The Bishops are really too weak. After referring to the
Lower House of Convocation on the subject of the Athauasian Creed, instead of taking their legitimate places in the Church and endeavouring to lead opinion, they were very naturally unable to -accept the opinion of the Lower House of Convocation when they got it, and for a time simply shelved the question. But on Thursday, again, the question was raised what they should do in the matter. They could not refer it back to the Lower House again, for the Lower House had spoken, and not spoken as they wished. They had all the materials for judging for themselves in their hands and all the debates of the Lower House before
them, but it was intolerable to them to take a line of their own, so the Bishop of Winchester,—resisted, however, by the‘Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol, and others,—proposed to appoint a large joint Committee of both Houses to consider the subject, a sugges- tion accepted by their Lordships after a little debate with general tokens of relief. Firstly, the Committee would sit in private, an inestimable advantage on which Dr. Wilberforce was not slow to remark ; and secondly, there would be a good number of the lower clergy to share their responsibilities. Probably the bishop is the only English official known to us who evidently prefers notoriety withold power to power whether with or without notoriety. The bishops leave all their stamina behind them when they break from the clerical chrysalis into the bishop.
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