THE BISHOP OF DURHAM ON THE WELSH SUSPENSORY BILL, D R.
WESTCOTT'S letter to the Archdeacons of his diocese on the Welsh Suspensory Bill, strikes the true note when he speaks of it as a good deal more than what Mr. Asquith called it,—namely, the first step towards the Disestablishment and Disendowment of the Church in Wales. The Bishop of Durham thinks it is really the first step towards the Disestablishment and Disendowment of the Church of England and Wales. The four dioceses which extend over Wales and Monmouthshire not only pass the borders of Wales, but they are not really distinguish- able at all in principle from any dioceses where the repre- sentatives returned to the House of Commons happen to be nearly unanimous for Disestablishment and Disendowment. If careful inquiry had shown that the Established Church in Wales and Monmouthshire, instead of serving the cause of religion and morality, had, in consequence of exceptional conditions and circumstances, proved injurious to that cause, and bad set the people against religion and the Christian morality which is inseparable from religion, then there would be some kind of excuse for saying that, in the interests of the same cause which makes an alliance between the Church and the State desirable in the remainder of the Kingdom, a dissolution of that alliance is desirable in the four dioceses referred to. We are no bigots for an Establishment ; and wherever it can be shown that an Establishment and an Endowment of the Church fails to answer any of the purposes for which it has generally proved useful,—and still more where it has a totally opposite effect, and alienates the people from the religion which they would otherwise embrace,—there we think it ought to be terminated. But this is not only not the case in Wales and Monmouthshire, but something like the very reverse of the case. The Church is certainly growing in favour there, and has never grown in favour so much as it has during the last half-century. Even Nonconformists like the Church so well that they attend gladly many of its religious services. The Burials Act by which it was proposed to give Non- conformists the right to conduct the burial-service in the graveyards of the Church, is, we believe, very little used. Nonconformists like to be married in Church. The Church, instead of being regarded as a religious foe by the people, is regarded with great friendliness and equanimity by them, except so far as they are engaged in political agitation against it. Supposing it were possible to take a secret ballot amongst the indifferentists,—those who identify themselves neither with Church nor chapel,— as to the religious body which they would prefer to apply to in case of a moral or spiritual emergency in the family, we believe there is no doubt at all that they would vote for the Anglican Church rather than for any Dissenting body. The tithe agitation has prejudiced many of the farmers against the Church, and no doubt the Noncon- formist ministers indulge a kind of jealousy of it which one admirer indulges towards a rival in the affections of the object of their common admiration. But when this has been said, all has been said which can be said against the Church in Wales. If there is to be a residuary trustee in charge of the religious interests of those of the people who profess no special creed of their own, it would be impossible to show that any better trustee could be found than the existing National Church in Wales. Nor can any argument be alleged in favour of its Disestablishment and Disendowment, which would not apply just as effectually to the case of any large district where Methodism, say, has proved a successful rival of the Church of England. If the Church be dis- established and disendowed in Wales and Monmouthshire, we shall very soon be invited to disestablish and disendow it in Cornwall, and perhaps in Devonshire, for the very same reasons. And soon again it would be shown that there are some of the counties in East Anglia, where a claim quite as good for Disestablishment and Disendow- ment could be set up. Mr. Asquith's Bill is a Bill for piecemeal Disestablish- ment and Disendowment wherever a, considerable majority of the local representatives can be got to combine in favour of that measure. The Government is for Local Option in religious matters as well as in licensing for the sale of alcoholic drink. What they really approve is patchwork legislation in all directions. The United Kingdom, they think, has been a good deal too much of a United King- dom for centuries back. They would. like the people to have patchwork institutions on all sorts of matters,— compulsory temperance in one county, unlimited public. houses in another,—an Established and Endowed Church in the Midlands, pure Voluntaryism in Wales and Mon- mouthshire, the same perhaps in Cornwall and Devonshire and the East of England,—free libraries in one town and county, free ignorance in another ; and we do not see why, if the same tendency spreads, we should not come at last to having, as the United States have, one law of divorce in Scotland, another in Ireland, another in Wales, and another perhaps in London. Let "the people of Eng- land" be no more heard of, but rather "the people of this or that county, of this or that town, of this group of counties or unions." We are to have as much variety, it would seem, in our religious and moral institu- tions as there are varieties of opinions and tastes. Only,— and we cannot well understand this condition,—this is to be for ever denied to local option, that any other religious body may claim and use the endowments which the Church of England has once had, if it is decided that she is to have them no more. There seems to us no principle visible in that arbitrary veto on the appropriation to any other religious body of the endowments taken from the Church of England. Why are the people to have the right to rate themselves, or to refuse to rate themselves, for free libraries, and not to have the power to endow or not to endow the various religious bodies from which they derive their religious teaching ? Is it only because it would lead to more serious quarrelling ? Perhaps it might, but certainly not to more serious quarrelling than the Veto Bill will lead to, if it should ever be passed into law. It seems to us that the growing taste for snippets of political and social life draws a, very arbitrary line at religious endowments. If one county may refuse all its inhabitants special facilities for a particular kind of diet, and another not, why may not one county refuse all its inhabitants special facilities for religious worship, and another not ? The fancy for obliging the people to choose between an endowed Church and Volun- taryism, seems to us arbitrary. It would be more reason- able to allow the people to choose between a single endowed Church, and many endowed Churches, and no endowed Church,—whichever they pleased. If we are to have coats of many colours in all other departments of life, why not in religion too ? We are far from wishing to see the sects scrambling for their share of the Church's endowments, but we cannot see at all why the will of a local majority is to have the right to disestablish a Church or a liquor law at its pleasure, and not to establish a Church or a liquor law, or a number of Churches and liquor laws, at its pleasure. We are asked to go so far in the way of variegated institutions, that there seems to us no conceivable reason why we should not be asked to go a, little further. Why should not the local majority of one county prohibit capital punishments, and the local majority of another county multiply capital punish- ments, if the local majority of four dioceses is to abolish the Church of many centuries without any reference to the local majority in other dioceses of the same Church ? If his- torical continuity is to count for nothing, why should not Ireland be accommodated with a Republic of her own as as well as a Parliament of her own, and Wales with a law of divorce of her own as well as a Disestablishment and Disendowment that she is to enjoy all to herself P "Please yourselves, and never mind history or geography," seems to be the favourite pass-word of the day.
Previous page
