FURTHER EXPOSURE OF THE BISHOP'S JOB.
IN defending the Bishop's Bill, Lord JOHN RUSSELL invidiously contrasted the refusal of the Deans and Chapters to relinquish their patronage, with the more patriotic and liberal conduct of the Bishops, whom he represented as voluntarily making great sacri- fices for the advantage of the Church.
" With respect to patronage enjoyed by the Bishops," he said, "I must re- mind the House of what has been a good deal overlooked,—namely, that they have given up some most valuable patronage that was in their gift, and relin- quished their right to nominate to certain Prebends and preferments, for the purpose of placing at the disposal of Government, funds which might be ap- plied in providing for the efficiency of the Church."
And Lord JOHN added, that the Deans and Chapters, who in- terposed a vested right to patronage in the way of a measure of Church Reform, preferred the accomplishment of their own ob- jects to the good of the Church. Now, we all along suspected that the Bishops bad not made a bad bargain for themselves in this matter of patronage. We questioned their title to the character of disinterestedness be- stowed on them by the Home Secretary. Not supposing Deans and Prebends to be the most single-minded of' mortals, we always considered them full as ready to make sacrifices for the good of the Church, as those sage, reflecting men, the Bishops. And such turns out to be the case. The Bishops, having the upper hand, excluded representatives of the Deans and Chapters from the Commission ; and then set to work in the best manner to secure to themselves the reputation of abandoning patronage, while for every sacrifice on the one hand, they took care to in- demnify themselves by fresh acquisitions on the other. Even- tually, we think, these holy tricksters will find that they have played a losing game, and overreached themselves. If any thing could reconcile us to the passing of the Bishop's Bill, it would be the "spoliation" to which it subjects its cunning and canting authors.
A letter from Mr. SYDNEY SMITH to Lord JOHN RUSSELL seems to put this case of patronage in its true light. The clear- headed Canon Residentiary says- " :There are a few observations upon the conduct of the Deans and Chapters limning about the world, upon which I must make some commentaries. Our conduct is invidiously contrasted with that of the Bishops, who are represented as having made great sacrifices for the good of the Church, while we are making none at all, and are looking only to our own advantage. But this is assuming the whole point in dispute. We deny that the sacrifice exacted from us is of the smallest utility to the Church ; we maintain that the patronage of Deans and Chapters has been as fairly and as honestly given away as that of Bishops ; and that to take it away from one and to give it to the other, is to make a needless change, and to fix an undeserved Stigma, and to confer no benefit whatever upon the public."
We apprehend that there is little indeed to choose between the modes of distributing patronage by Deans and Bishops; the ob- ject of both being to provide for their relatives and connexions.
"The Bishops give up the patronage of Prebends, which are hereafter to he destroyed, the income of which is wanted to make a fund for the endowment of smaller livings ; but the preferment you tahe from our patronage is not to be sold, it is always to endure ; the only question is, who is to give it away ? if we submit to the meditated injustice, we are utterly unable to see what benefit would be conferred on the Church."
If there had been any sacrifice intended on the part of the Bishops, they would not have laid hold of a quid pro quo at the expense of the Deans and Chapters—the only parties who were to lose without being indemnified for their losses.
" But I whh this sacrifice on the part of the Bishops were a little more explained. Was it voluntary, or was it involuntary ? If it was a sacrifice, it was voluntary ; their consent was asked, and they did not refuse. Before patronage is taken away, then, it seems consent of the patron is necessary, and if necessary in one ecclesiastical patron, it is so in all. Whence comes it, then, may I ask, that the consent of Deans and Chapters was not only not asked, but of five or six communications from different Chapters, why were none replied to, and the receipt of only one communication acknowledged?"
The Deans and Chapters are subalterns in the Church, and the Bishops conceived that they had a vested right to trample upon them : this overrode all the objection which the sufferers might have to the process.
"But, perhaps, the consent of the Dean and Chapters was not required. 'Where, then, is the merit and the sacrifice, if the Bishops had no power of re- fusing ? But they have not complained—and why ?—because MORE has been given to them of other persons' patronage than they hare lost of their own : so that the alternative nth's, either you have thought it but just to ask leave of the Bishops before you took away their patronage, and have not extended the same justice to us, or the patriotic conduct of Bishops is this, that they have given up what they could not keep, and do not complain, because they gain more by the wrong done to us than they lose by the wrong done to them- . selves ; and our selfishness consists in not quietly submitting to an injury, which involves a censure, and dots not advance, in the minutest step, the pro- gress of Church Reform."
Unless this statement as to the balance of the patronage ac- count is false,—and we believe it to be perfectly true,—the con- duct of the Bishops has been most despicable as well as greedy. Had they contented themselves with merely grasping an indem- nity for the loss of patronage which they thirst not retain, their conduct would have been only consistently extortionate ; but, by endeavouring to delude the public into the notion that they had suffered a loss while they had actually profited by the transaction, they have laid themselves open to the charge of hypocrisy and fraud. Far be it from our thoughts to suspect Lord JOHN RUS- SELL of being an accomplice in the cheat. We doubt not that advantage was taken of his ignorance of the real nature of the measures he proposed and defended. But we know that his favourable picture of the relinquishment of patronage made by the Bishops, had considerable effect in diminishing the majority against the bill. All who voted under that influence were duped. Yet, if we rightly understand the provisions of the Established Church and the Deans and Chapters Bills, the Bishops have not secured the spoil they had marked out for themselves. They have made the sacrifice, but have not laid hold of the expected re- ward; and we may safely say, that even a Tory Government will not dare to carry the Deans and Chapters Bill, when its object and effect are clearly understood by the public. That there will be no prolonged delusion on the subject, we may believe, now that Mr. SYDNEY SMITH has taken up his pen for our enlightenment, and condescends to fight Bishops and Ministers in the news- papers.
Previous page
