Page:Remarks on Some Late Decisions Respecting the Colonial Church.djvu/12

 the Church of England, but a part of the Church of England itself; and all the ministers, priests, and deacons, there officiating, and all the persons composing the several flocks, are members and brethren of the Church of England in the strict sense of the term."

Upon these decisions I defy anybody to say for certain whether there is, or is not, a Bishop and a diocese of Natal. And this uncertainty affects in an equal degree nine at least of our Colonial Bishoprics, and throws doubt, according to a careful estimate, on twenty-five. It affects, not merely the position of the Bishops themselves, but a multitude of transactions, which have proceeded on the assumption that they had a diocesan character; and it may possibly raise a question whether persons ordained by them are, or ever could be, capable of receiving preferment, or even ministering in England.

What do we mean when we speak of a " voluntary" religious society established by law? We do not mean by it a society to which a man may belong or refuse to belong at his pleasure: if we did, the Established Church in England would be a voluntary society, for even in England no subject of the realm is under any legal obligation to belong to the Established Church. Nonconformity is recognised by the law as a fact, and is not prohibited. Nor do we mean the absence of endowments, or of political power, or of external dignities, or of internal discipline, or of doctrinal standards, or of formularies; for of these things some are plainly unimportant, and others are possessed in a greater