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CONWELL

oi legislating for themselves. That idea of Convo- ciiiun as the clerical parliament had important con- v.|iionccs; the right to tax church property was

~i ssfiilly maintained; but the clergy could ileither

Irrt nor be elected to the House of Commons, and lo iliis day a person in Holy orders is ineligible for Parliament. At the same time the legislation of invocation was binding on the clergy only and not iijHiu the laity.


 * 1 The H<'jormation Period. — Convocation lost its

m'l.'prndence and most of its powers by the Act of

i Henry VHI, though a lajTiian, asserted his

to preside, a right never subsequently exercised.

Post-Reformation Period. — The Act of Sub-

'U of Henry VIII was stringently interpreted

!• judges at a committee before the Lords in

(inent (in 8 Jac, 1) as forbidding, even after

iiiing royal assent, any canon (a) against the

■ r. i liiative of the king; (b) against common law; (c)

I'^iinst any statute law; or (d) against any custom

I :'ii' realm. The loss of legislative independence

! the way for the loss of taxing powers, which

iiually renounced in 1665, the right of voting at

imentary elections being obtained in return.

lii. power of Convocation of dealing with cases of

h 1' -y has been exerci.sed bvit rarely, and then to no

iiii'ise. It continued to be convoked at the be-

.'iiiiuiig of each Parliament, but its sittings were in-

' 1 ipted from 1640 to 1660, to be resumed after the

ir-t I ■ration. In 1689, in view of the opposition of

hi clergy to the Toleration Act of William and

iliiy, no summons was issued to Convocation. The

'iianions, however, protested against the innova-

i'li:. and their petition had its effect; at the same

iiii' Archbishop Tillotson, and to some extent his

1' i^^or Tcnison, met the difficulties of the situa-

•y refusing to allow any deliberations. Convo-

1 was summoned, met, and was prorogued.

^ were formed, and claims were made, insist-

I on the independence of the Lower House on

■idogy of the House of Commons. Atterbury

u' malcontents; Wake, afterwards ArchbLshop

'! I aiiterbury, Kennet, Hoadley, and Gib.son led the

I'f. lice. The question was really a political one.

I r\ i-^rn dominated the Lower House; Liberalism,

in politics and theology, pervaded the Upper

Permission to deliberate led to trouble in

and prorogation followed. The Bangorian

iversy arising out of Hoadly's sermon led to

r results in 1717. The opposition of the

r House was worn out by repeated proroga-

i:nmediately following the opening session, and

he exception of the discussions allowed in 1741

1 742, Convocation ceased to be a deliberative

lutil 1S.54.

Moilrrn Times. — -The old organization had sur-


 * and many earnest Anglicans of the early nine-

I century, anxious to revive the sj-nodal life of

\riglican Church, .sought and obtained the re-

M'ln of the customary immediate prorogation.

,V brief session was authorized in 18.54. (The ex-


 * \mple was followed by York in 1859.) The action

'f (^"'invocation as a deliberative body began in 1861,

at its own request, the Crown licen.sed it to

I the twenty-ninth of the canons of 1603 on

ibject of sponsors, and although no result fol-

'•■ new canons were passed in 1865, 1887, and

in 1802,

Apart from such general authorizations the Crown also possesses the right to submit definite business to the consideration of Convocation. This is done by "Special Letters of Business", a method used in 1872, and again in 1907, in submitting the reports of the ritual commissioners to its consideration.

The House of Laymen, which first met in con- nexion with the Convocation of Canterbury in 1886 (York, 1892), is an assembly unknown to law. As at present constituted the two Convocations of Can- terbury and York are summoned by the archbishops on the instruction of the king when Parliament is summoned. Each possesses an Upper and a Lower House; the L^pper House, presided over by the arch- bishops, consists of the diocesan bishops; the Lower House is compo.sed of deans, archdeacons, a proctor for each chapter, and proctors for the beneficed clergy, two from each diocese in the province of Canterbury, two from each archdeaconry in the province of York. The Lower House elects a pro- locutor who, on being presented to the archbishop and approved by him, presides over the delibera- tions of the Lower House, and communicates the re- sults to the Upper House. The stately ceremonial of Catholic days has been preserved for the opening session of Convocation, together with the use of the Latin tongue.

Gibson, tiynodns .inglicana (1702). ed. Cardwell (London, 1854); Wake. The Authority of Chrialian Princes over their Ecclesiastical Si/noHs (T.ondon, 1697); Kennet, Ecclesiastical Synods {LoTii\"n 170l ]■ }h^\iM^v:\,A Historyof EnglishCounciU andConvocahnn .n, 1s.-,;<V Joyce, England's Sacred Synods (LontU'u. 1^ : i '. vii II islory of England, pass\m\ SrvBBa. The Coii-^tii ■ "i England {London. 1H78);

Idem, Select (Vi.i./.- . i Imh. l.SflS); Makoweh. The

Constitutional 11 u-^lm ; < ^^ '■! thr Church of England,

tr. from German (I. mi, l i h i im..ke. The Ecclesias-

tical Law of the Chur J. ■ I undon, 1895);Gee

and Hardy, Docum< n I, I ,jlixh Church History

(London, 1896); He.nm..,. C',.. .\- ... i.... ( hi.rch (London, 1908).

Edward Myers.

Conwell, Henry, second Bi.shop of Philadelphia, U. S. A., b. at Moneymore, County Dern,-, Ireland, in 1745; d. at Philadelphia, 22 April, 1842. After the death of Bishop Egan, in 1814, the Bishopric of Philadelphia was offered successively to the Rev. Ambrose Marechal and to the Very Rev. Louis de Barth, the administrator, but both these clergymen, deterred by the contumacious attitude of the trustees of St. Mary's church, retunied the Bulls; whereupon the Holy See appointed (2(i Nov., 1819) Henry Con- well, parLsh prie.st of Dungannon and Vicar-(ieneral of Armagh, Ireland, who imjirudently accepted a task too heavy for his seventy four years. He hail made his studies in the Irish ("ollege at Paris, where his family had founded a burse. He was universally be- loved by his jieople and the clergy, and an ineffectual attempt was made to retain him in Ireland. He was con.sccrated in London by Hi.«hop Poynter, 24 Aug., 1820, and arrived in Philadeljihia, 2 Dee., bringing with him a young priest named Keenan, subsequently for many years pastor at Lancaster. The seeds of future troubles had been so«n during the vacancy, when the administrator, without demanding creden- tials, stationed at St. Marj-'s the brilliant but dema- gogic and unpriestly Rev. William Hogan, wlio had so ingratiated himself with the board of trustees that when, on 12 Dee., the bi.shop revoked his faculties, a schism ensued which histed for many years. For de- tails of the quarrel, the reader is referred to J. (!il- mary Shea's "History of the Catholic Church in the T^nited States" (see below). Bishop Conwell con- ducted the controversy with dignity, but in the course of it, through desire of peace, committed two errors of judgment. Tlie first was the recalling to the diocese and appointing as vicar-general of William Vincent Harold, a Dominican whom his predecessor had dis-