THE DIOCESE OF LONDON. T HE changes rendered necessary by the
death of Arch- bishop Benson have been made with praiseworthy speed. The accumulation of business in the dioceses in which the vacancies have occurred will go on, we suppose, for some while longer. The Bishop of London is not yet Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishop of Peter- borough is not yet Bishop of London. But there are a variety of things that can be submitted to each of them before they have the legal right to deal with them. Considering the suddenness of the late Archbishop's death, and the amount of other work in the Prime Minister's hands, the dioceses concerned may well feel satisfied at the way in which their convenience has been consulted.
Bishop Creighton had been so generally regarded as Archbishop Benson's successor that his appointment to the bishopric of London came as a surprise to no one. The man who has just missed the first place is the natural occupant of the second. Nor can there be a question as to his fitness for the post. The greater comprehends the less. The qualities which would have seemed just what was wanted at Lambeth cannot be out of place at Fulham. It does not follow, however, that they will be equally in place. Though the two offices demand the same gifts, they do not demand them in the same proportion. The man who would make the best Commander-in-Chief may also make the best commander of an army corps, but it is not inevitable that he should do so. In the case of an Archbishop of Canterbury there is a call for ecclesiastical statesmanship in the highest sense of the term. There is need also of the arts of organising and administration. He has a diocese—we hope he always will have a diocese —and it is part of his business to govern it well. But it is not his sole nor even his most important business, and here comes in the difference between him and one of his suffragans. If at the end of his episcopate a Bishop of London can say with truth, 'I leave my diocese in the best condition to which it has been possible to bring it,' he has said all that can be asked or expected of him. But if an Archbishop of Canterbury were to say the same thing he would not have said all that could be asked or expected of him. He has the charge, not merely of the diocese of Canterbury, not merely of the Province of Canterbury, but of the Anglican Church throughout the Empire. No doubt his legal powers in respect of this latter function are exceedingly small. A headstrong Colonial Bishop can always set him at defiance, and if there be a penalty for so doing, it is one which has not yet been ascertained. But actual and legal powers are not always co-extensive, and the statesmanship of an Archbishop of Canterbury is nowhere more conspicuous than in giving the former a meaning far in excess of the latter. He has vast opportunities of making his influence voluntarily felt and his authority voluntarily recognised, and his success or failure as an Archbishop will be determined by the use he makes of these opportunities. Consequently the two cases are not alike. The qualities which are of most importance in the higher of the two offices are not those that will be of most importance in the lower.
And yet there is sufficient resemblance between them to sustain a presumption that Bishop Creighton's tenure of his new See will be a conspicuous success. For though a Bishop of London is in all respects but one in the same position as any other diocesan Bishop, he is as regards that one in quite a different position. The distinction is not ecclesiastical but civil. It rests not on any special rights accorded to him by law or recognised by his ecclesi- astical superiors, but on the accidental circumstances of the city which makes up the larger part of his diocese. It is emphatically a city set on a hill. It is a platform on which episcopal successes or episcopal failures will of necessity seem larger than elsewhere. This pre-eminence is the result in part of the size of London and its position as the capital. But it is still more the result of the acci- dent which has brought together a larger collection of extremes than can be found elsewhere. We call this an accident because we know of no reason why the description should not equally have applied to other great cities; why the most diverse forms, whether in doctrine, in ritual, or in social effort, should not have existed side by side in Manchester or Sheffield as in London. But, as a matter of fact they do not so exist. There is a greater uniformity in all these respects in Northern towns than there is in London. It is this feature that marks off the diocese of London from all others, and gives occasion for the exercise of corresponding wisdom on the part of its Bishop. The Guardian says oracularly that if a Bishop of London is to deal adequately with the "reconciliation of liberty and law," he must have "the courage to act and, what is sometimes a rarer virtue, the courage to abstain from action." Putting this dark saying into plainer language, it comes, we imagine, to this, that Bishop Creighton will have to make his choice between following in the footsteps of Bishop Temple and marking out a path for himself. Bishop Temple's rule was to live and let live. He bore with the largest diversities in the churches under his rule provided only that good work was being done in them. He had no liking for services widely divergent from the type with which Englishmen have been so long familiar, and probably thought incense and limelight equally out of place in the worship of God. The result of this large tolerance has been to make London a kind of arts and crafts ex- hibition for ecclesiastical purposes. Every kind of ex- pedient that has been suggested to attract or to benefit the worshipper may here be seen in full work. If this was Bishop Temple's ideal it has been completely attained. Nor while the Church of England is what she is, is it easy to suggest any better ideal. It is open, no doubt, to many objections. It is lawless, it is anarchical, it leaves congre- gations at the mercy of their clergy. But it has kept the ship together, and it has kept her off the rocks.
At the same time we can conceive a Bishop of London working on quite different lines with an equally satisfactory result. The policy of simple toleration knows no distinctions. It puts all divergencies from the normal on a level. They may be little or great. They may have much reason in their favour or none at all. They may be an extension of admitted principles or an introduction of wholly new prin- ciples. They may testify to a deep-seated desire on the part of a large number of persons, or be mere exhibitions of individual eccentricity. The policy of simple toleration takes no note of these characteristics. They all lead to divergence from the old-fashioned standards; consequently they are all condemned in theory while permitted in practice. We can conceive, we say, a policy which should inquire separately into all the facts which simple toleration lumps together. It would take each case on its merits. It would inquire into all the circumstances,—the motives of the clergy, O€ feelings of the congregations, the degree and nature of the justification set up for each particular practice. It would, in short, essay that most difficult of tasks,—the distinguishing between legitimate and illegiti- mate developments. Probably there are many of the clergy—even of those who are most "advanced" in their several ways—who would be willing to modify their ritual or their want of ritual, if they were asked to do so by a Bishop who showed ability to understand their point of view and willingness to take it into account. Few men are so unreasonable as to hold all that they do of equal importance. For the most part they will admit, if they are wisely approached, that while there are some points to which they cling as essential, there are others which they can give up without feeling that they have abandonedtheir convictions or trifled with their consciences. It is obvious, however, that a policy of this kind requires qualities of a rarer order than are needed for simple toleration. To distinguish between things apparently alike ; to show how this, though it is not expressly per- mitted, follows naturally from things which are permitted, while this other has no relation with what is permitted, but introduces a new order of ideas ; to make it plain that prohibition and permission have their origin neither in indifference nor despair nor self-will, but that they are dictated by a definite principle which can be explained to those whom it concerns,—is not only a difficult task in itself, but one that exposes him who takes it in hand to the constant danger of being misunderstood and misre- presented. It may, if successful, be far better than simple toleration ; it must, if it fails, be far worse. This, how- ever, is virtually the choice that lies before a Bishop of London. We have seen the diocese excellently adminis- tered on one of these lines. Are we now about to see it equally well administered on the other ? Bishop Creighton's episcopate will give the answer to this question.
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