Observe here, before we proceed further, that this power of manipulation, over and above being open to the objection which the Bishop notices of multiplying diversities of practice, is in fact nothing else than setting the bishop above the law as it exists, and is, therefore, as we said all these remedies would be found to be, a repeal of the rubric which is the present law. But at any rate, here again, the Bishop rejects the proposed mode of action, though, he says, we should “pause” upon it.
“On this remedy it is necessary to pause. Every clear-headed man among us must see, in the first place, that it is giving to bishops a power which they have never even attempted to exercise, except in the unsettled times which immediately followed the Reformation; secondly, that our dioceses would exhibit varieties of usage dependent on the general views and convictions of the bishop for the time being, and liable to be altered when a successor came into his place; thirdly, that men of advanced opinions would make every effort to get into the diocese of that bishop who might be supposed, rightly or wrongly, most to favour them—and, when there, would exercise a combined pressure which would be very difficult to resist; fourthly, and lastly, that, after all, this is but an ingenious expedient to postpone that settlement of the question which common sense and common foresight now perceive to be inevitable.”
Without endorsing the concluding remark of the Bishop’s comment, we may say that with great justice he condemns the remedy, though not expressly upon the ground which I have mentioned as the strongest—viz., its setting the bishop above the law, and so altering the Prayer Book. He adds, however, something more as to a modification of the plan of giving more power to the bishops.
“We may, then, I think, fairly dismiss this proposed remedy as even less hopeful than the first. But there is a sort of phase and form of it, a kind of intermediate course, which deserves more consideration. The proposed measure would be of this kind—to give the bishop not only power to restrain, but to require him to stop, all Ritualistic innovations, more especially in regard of vestments, whenever he might be appealed to by a certain number of trustworthy parishioners. The effect of this, of course, would be to leave things alone where no complaint was preferred, the justifying grounds being the uncertainty of the law on the one side, and the deliberate preference shown by the parishioners for the mode of conducting public worship then prevailing. No doubt this, in some degree, helps us over the plain difficulty we must expect to meet with in those cases where Ritualistic practices have prevailed for some time unopposed. We must not disguise from ourselves that it will be extremely difficult to bring back to simpler forms of worship a minister and a congregation that have not only been accustomed to, but deliberately prefer, much more ornate forms; the putting off of these vestments will, in some cases, involve much more difficulty and trouble than their original introduction. It is human nature to cling tenaciously to what is distinctive, and this deposition of the distinctive will be complicated by the assumed close connection between the vestment and the doctrine. All these great and real difficulties we have before us, and we may feel at first inclined to favour that which seems to reduce their dimensions, but I do venture to think here again that the dangers likely to arise from thus practically leaving the matter unsettled, and still more from the local discords that would be sure to arise during the constant attempts that would be made to bring the prohibitory bishop in some way or other on the scene, and the sad divisions that would follow if the attempt succeeded—all these things, I fear, must lead us to decide against a remedy, which, while saving us from some immediate difficulties, would bequeath to us and to our children a heritage of future difficulties and dangers far exceeding both in number and degree the difficulties and dangers of the present.”