The Orford Conservatives have been pouring out their griefs in
the ear of a friend. In an address to the Archbishop of Canter- bury which appeared in Tuesday's Times, they declare that if the Oxford Tests' Abolition Bill passes it will completely destroy "the existing connection of the Universities and Colleges with the Church." This alarming result will follow, they infer, from allowing any one to become a member of Convocation who has • not signed his assent to the doctrines of the Church of England, —which is very like saying that if any deviation from those doe- trines is allowed at all, it will include in no time the majority of Convocation. If that be really so, it is high time to admit a body which has grown so powerful as to outnumber the Church in the University. But in this solemn appeal on behalf of "the • Christian parents of our English youth" we recognize a sad dis- trust of Church principles. Put the Church on an equal footing with other faiths, and the Church will go to the wall, say these timid worthies. We do not agree with them ; but if we did, we should urge the gross injustice of keeping the University thus artificially in the hands of a mere minority, still more strongly. Dr. Scott, Master of Balliol, and Mr. Edwin Palmer, tutor of Balliol, whose names we find among the signatures to this piteous appeal, are surely new converts to this enormous and, we hope we may say, fanatical distrust of the power of their own faith. There is unconscious pathos in this appeal to worthy, helpless Dr. Longley. No doubt what they really want is a little soothing sympathy, and the Archbishop can give them that as tenderly as any woman.
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