a promiscuous nature, they are building up a system of discipline, with even too much zeal; the Convention of one of the Carolinas having made a canon, excluding from Church membership those who might attend races and other places of public amusement,- a regulation, as we well know, that would not be submitted to in any country of Europe. I understand that the General Convention has disallowed this rule, and of course acted wisely in doing so. It is far more gratifying to reflect on the provision which the constitution of our sister Church supplies for remedying the injudicious acts of its members, than to dwell on the blunder of the Diocesan Convention; and we may well envy the Churchmen of Carolina that zeal and that union between Clergy and laity which could devise and enact even so mistaken a development of energy as this. There is often far more life in irregular action than in torpid sluggishness.

But if the difficulties of tranquil times are likely to be so great as to need such very extensive changes, what must be the danger if troubles arise? And we have no right to be secure, and take it for granted that they will not come. Independently of the movement in the minds of religious men, which has perplexed the English Church during the last seventeen years and is continually forcing us to look to the bottom of new questions, and which will doubtless run its course in the Colonies as well as here, there is the great question of independence, which may at any time come up, and by cutting off the Clergy from their resources in England, place them in very great difficulties, or more likely deprive the Colonies of their services. Whether the difficulties be doctrinal or political, they call equally for such measures as may unite the Clergy to their Bishop, to each other, and to their flocks, so that they may not be rent asunder by dissensions and jealousies, as deep as those between different religions, and as strong as patriotism; and that their community may go through its troubles, united and sound, not split by schism like the Kirk of Scotland, nor plunged into difficulties such as those of the American Church in the war of Independence, from which a long period has been required to raise it. Both with a view to present strength and future dangers, it is equally desirable that the Colonial Clergy should give up all notion of being an Established Church. It is not easy to say in what the advantages of the Established Church here consist. What some men might think advantages, others would take as signs of degradation. Probably the prominent idea in the Colonies of an Establishment is, a Church endowed by the state. Now, if one watches at all the temper of the Colonial parliaments, the first thing that strikes one is, a general distrust and dislike of the Church, an unwillingness to grant her privileges, and a readiness to withdraw them. There is little use in inquiring at whose door the blame rests, unless we can remove the evil. For the future the Colonies will be governed, whether as dependencies of the British empire, or as independent, in all substantial respects according to their own will as expressed by their representatives. It is clear, therefore, that dependence on the mother country is no more than dependence on a

party here, who lack the ability to help their friends in the Colonies, and if they had the power, would frequently be tempted to sacrifice Colonial interests for the sake of home politics. Such dependence, also, of the Church on the mother country is generally sure to provoke the hostility of other bodies of Christians. And to all colonists

who look on their new country with anything like love, it will bear also an antinational aspect. While the Church, then, cannot resign her claim over all baptized persons within her pale, and cannot, therefore, give any pledge that she will not seek proselytes, she must beware of seeking or accepting any powers or rights of an exclusive character, that may seem calculated to help her in her work. If her judicatures are acknowledged by the law to be courts, so also ought those of dissenting bodies. If she requires the power of summoning witnesses to her tribunal under legal penalties, this power ought also to be conceded to all Christian bodies that desire it. The affection of her members has always been found a better thing for the Church than civil rights or property, which are not worth the jealousy they excite. The Church has never flourished since, as it did in those days when the poor and needy were her riches, and her ministers were martyred. But without saying more about such days as those— days for which we, alas! are unworthy,—the Church had better now put aside her secular preeminence, and ask merely for common justicefor such temporal sanction to her laws as is given, or may be given to those of other bodies of Christians, and for protection to her property, alike with other individuals and communions. And if these be denied her, she must go on her way patient and sorrowful, united, nevertheless, and strengthened by the discouragement. The Church must be in the main a voluntary Church, dependent on her own members, and not on extraneous power; and the Clergy must give up the dreams of rectories and an establishment, with its dignity, its glebes, and its reserves, and set themselves to win the hearts of their people.

But here, Sir, I must conclude, and reserve to a future opportunity what more I have to say on this subject, and particularly some remarks on the relation of the ecclesiastical law in England to that in the Colonies, and the aggravated inconveniences which our present mode of legislating for the Church inflicts on the Colonial Bishops and other Clergy. I remain, sir, your obedient Servant, F. H. D.

GENERAL CONVENTION AT CINCINNATI.

College Green, Hartford, Nov. 9, 1850.

MY DEAR SIR,-It gives me great pleasure to comply with your desire by furnishing you with some account of our General Convention, which has just adjourned at Cincinnati, after a brief session of less than a fortnight. It has been a very satisfactory council, and has demonstrated the growth of sound and Catholic principles, beyond our most sanguine anticipations. Indeed, it was feared by many that the Convention of 1850 would breed some scandal to the Church.

The experiment of a meeting west of the Alleghanies was tried for the sake of giving encouragement and strength to the vast field of Domestic Missions, to which Cincinnati is central: but it was feared that it might afford some advantages to parties disposed to agitate the Church, and that, what with the embarrassments arising from the New York case, and with the recent vexed questions with regard to Romanizing, and the like, there would be little to gratify the lovers of truth or peace, and quite as little to encourage our British brethren in their desire to see their own Synod once more permitted to legislate for their Church. However, there was much practical trust in the great Head of the Church; and I am sure there were never so many prayers, private and public, offered in behalf of any of our conventions heretofore. In many places such prayers were offered, in churches, twice a day, where such a practice was before unknown ; and richly have those prayers been heard and answered, so that it would be faithless not to recognise their effectual and prevailing utility. To all appearance our greatest difficulties have been quietly removed, and something gained in the way of positive and aggressive action.

The opening services, though conducted with great simplicity, seem to have produced a strong impression upon the western people, among whom no such sight had ever been seen before. Twenty-nine Bishops, in their robes, headed by the venerable Bishop of Illinois, now in his 76th year, and representing all parts of a country which stretches from New Brunswick to Mexico, were an apostolic company which might be expected to inspire any spectator with awe and reverence. In addition to these, there were assembled clerical delegates from twenty-nine dioceses, and lay delegates from all but three of them. One Presbyter was present from California, though not as a member of the Convention; and one of the Bishops was Bishop Southgate, lately returned from Turkey. The clerical and lay delegates constitute one House, which sits with open doors: but the House of Bishops hold strictly private sessions.

It must be confessed that our Convention, however novel its constitution, has worked admirably well. The lay element proves itself, more and more, an element of strength, of influence, and of safety. The position of Laymen in our councils has tended to produce a class of well-read, sound, and practical lay churchmen, who are always found on the side of conservatism, order, and law. Hence, when ignorant and fanatical laymen obtain a seat in Convention, they soon find their level, and are kept in check by members of their own order; while the practical and popular views of purely practical matters which the laity sometimes suggest, in connexion with sound doctrinal principles, have often been found of great benefit, and have been readily accepted by the clergy, in very embarrassing junctures. And here I would remark, in passing, that a treatise on the Canon Law of the American Church, which has just been published, and which is the work of Judge Hoffman, of New York, affords a happy testimony to the research and interest which have been inspired in many of our

laymen, by a sense of their responsible position, as liable, at any time, to be called upon to sit in council for the holy interest of the Church of GOD. It is a book which must attract the attention of the legal profession generally, and command their respect for a Church in which law is enshrined as a part of religion.

The case of the suspended Bishop of New York has been finally settled. The House of Bishops have refused, by an overwhelming vote, to terminate the suspension: but, to relieve the diocese, a canon has been passed, allowing it to elect a provisional Bishop, and another canon permitting a suspended Bishop to resign his jurisdiction, as if he were still exercising it, his suspension to the contrary notwithstanding. This special legislation is not in itself to be praised; but the case is peculiar, and requires extraordinary remedies. The New York delegates recorded their dissent, in order to have no direct respon-sibility for the measures designed for the relief of their constituents, and to leave them free in accepting what others should bestow: but "the Standing Committee" of the diocese has already called a Special Convention to act under the canon, and if no further impediments are found to lie in the way, the election of the Provisional Bishop will very probably be consummated ere this comes to your hand. The suspended Bishop of Pennsylvania was also left by the Bishops under his sentence, although a petition for his partial restoration had been sent up from the Convention of his former diocese: but it is due to the Right Reverend House to say that weighty reasons prevented the exercise of mercy in this case, and that in the case of the Bishop of New York, their action is very generally sanctioned by the judgment of the Church. Still, no one can but feel a deep sympathy with the fallen prelates who once exercised so great an influence in our Ecclesiastical affairs, but who now, long before the waning of their faculties, find themselves as it were buried alive, and almost hopelessly relegated to obscurity and sorrow. Far be it from any one to add to their afflictions by a single reproach, to diminish aught from their former well-deserved reputation, or to say that their history is anything more irreconcilable with original rectitude and pious zeal, than that of too many other men who have furnished melancholy proof of human infirmity and the tempter's power, but whose failings are not unforgiven here, nor supposed too grievous for the mercy of GOD hereafter.

The most exciting business of the Convention was that which arose from a complaint from certain parties in Maryland against their Bishop, for asserting the right to celebrate and administer the HOLY EUCHARIST, at his visitation of a parish church, against the wish of the rector. So extraordinary a complaint was the occasion of a very full expression of sound views as to the sacerdotal and apostolic powers of a Bishop, and resulted in the enactment of a declaratory canon, by which a Bishop will be relieved hereafter from all possibility of hindrance in the praiseworthy performance of so solemn and edifying a part of his sacred duties to his flock. It is but justice to those who supported the complaint to say that, with one or two absurd excep

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tions, they pressed their opinions with courtesy, and submitted with good grace to their signal defeat. Indeed, they professed the warmest attachment to the Prayer Book, just as it is, throughout, and a not less hearty acquiescence in the law of the Church, when once settled and defined.

You will regret to hear, what I blush to record, that our Mission to Constantinople is at an end. Bishop Southgate has resigned, and will go to California, as our first Bishop on the Pacific coast. But I count it a great pity that his oriental attainments should be lost to the Missionary work, and that the Eastern Church should be abandoned to the assaults of Romish and Dissenting emissaries, without any substantial sympathy from Catholics of a pure faith, and a primitive worship. Either in founding this Mission there was a rash and faulty inconsiderateness, or its destruction is a sin for which somebody is to blame. It may be hard to say where the blame should be charged, but for one, I feel that the work undertaken was like that to which Paul and Barnabas were separated by the HOLY GHOST, and which, through many trials, they were enabled to perform.

Great efforts have been made to induce some competent Presbyter to undertake the apostolic work in Africa, as our Missionary Bishop of Liberia, or Cape Palmas; but those to whom the eyes of the Church have naturally turned have been unable or unwilling to encounter the climate, or to leave their present posts. I am happy to say that the present Convention have determined to defer no longer to give the African Mission a Bishop, and have designated the oldest resident Missionary for that office. The Rev. John Payne is therefore the Bishop-Designate, and will probably soon arrive in this country to receive consecration. As the government are about to establish a line of steamers between America and Liberia, and as the emigration of our coloured population will soon begin to be extensive, there is great probability that the new Bishop will find his Mission increasing every day in importance, and if it please GOD, in prosperity and success.

I rejoice to add that the House of Bishops, with only one dissenting voice, have appointed a Committee, consisting of five of their number, with the Bishop of Connecticut as chairman, to devise a plan, "by which, consistently with the principles of our reformed faith, the services of intelligent and pious persons, of both sexes, may be secured in the education of the young, the relief of the sick and destitute, the care of orphans and friendless immigrants, and the reformation of the vicious." An important step has also been taken towards the division of our immense dioceses, and for the increase of our Bishops, in some degree proportionate to the growth and the necessities of our vast country. In these latter movements I see the beginnings of a noble aggression, in the Missionary spirit which has too little characterised our councils heretofore. Remember in your prayers the Catholic and Apostolic Church in America, that her light may no longer be hid under a bushel by the unbelief and timidity of those who are commanded to let their light shine before men. A. C. C.