The Catholic World, Vol. 25, April 1877 to September 1877Various
Religion
The Catholic World, Vol. 25, April 1877 to September 1877
Various
Catholic Church -- Periodicals
On one occasion, the 14th of January, in particular,
the scenes both within and without were disgraceful. “Inside,” we are
told, “there was a good deal of fighting and scuffling, especially at
the lower end,” while outside the crowd, besides breaking down the
fences, shouting “No popery,” yelling, and in various ways demonstrating
their inclination to break the laws as well as the parson did, had they
not been kept in some abeyance by a strong body of three hundred police,
joined in singing loudly the national anthem, vociferating with especial
emphasis and vigor the line “Confound their knavish tricks”—improved by
some to “popish tricks” in honor of the occasion. Some time after the
service was over, so as to give the mob time to thin, the sight of Mr.
Tooth issuing from the church under the protection of “twenty stout
policemen of the F Division” had in it something almost ludicrous to
those who reflected that all this commotion arose from the fact of his
having spurned the “secular arm.”
When, on the 20th of January, the Rev. R. Chambers, who has been
appointed curate in charge of the parish of Hatcham by the Bishop of
Rochester, went, accompanied by the bishop’s apparitor, and, producing
his license, requested Mr. Tooth to hand over to him through the
church-wardens the possession of the church, the vicar replied that he
refused to take any notice of the document or the application. He was
therefore committed for contempt of court, and is now lodged in
Horsemonger Lane jail.
It is not necessary to give more than two portions of the very temperate
explanations with which Lord Penzance has accompanied his
judgment—namely, those portions which are aimed at the delusions
supposed to be most important in the controversy. These delusions are,
in brief, 1st, that the new Public Worship Act was an innovation upon
Anglican custom, and an invasion of its rights; 2d, that obedience
should be rendered to an ecclesiastical and not to a lay superior. The
answers of Lord Penzance to these assumptions are, substantially, as
follows:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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