My object in these last cursory remarks has not been, I really need not say, to convey information in detail on the difficult and intricate points to which I have referred[54]. It has been simply this, to shew how very real, and substantial, and fully equipped, and independent, was the Church existing in all parts of these islands, save only the parts of Britain occupied by the pagan Jutes and Saxons and Angles, at the time when Augustine came; came with his monks from Rome, his interpreters from Gaul. I do not say that there were no pagans left then in parts of Scotland and of Ireland and perhaps of Wales, but the knowledge of the Lord covered the earth, save where the English were. The impression left on my mind by a study of the face of our islands in the year 594, thirteen hundred years ago, is that of the pause, the hush, which precedes the launch of a great ship. The ship is the Church of England. In the providence of God, all was prepared; Christian forces all around were ready to play their part; unconsciously ready, but ready; passively ready, needing to be called into play. There were obstacles enough, but obstacles removable; obstacles that would be removed. The English had been the first to act. They desired to move. They had called across the narrow sea to the Gauls to come over and help them. But there was no voice, nor any that answered. Once in motion, its own momentum would soon carry the ship beyond the need of the aids that helped it move. Who should touch the spring, and give the initiation of motion? Far away, in Rome, there was a man with eagle eye, who saw that the moment had come. In wretched health, tried continually by severe physical pain, his own surroundings enough to break down the spirit of any but the strongest of men; with all his sore trials, he was never weary of well doing. He was called upon to rule the Church of Rome at one of the very darkest of its many times of trial. Pestilence was rife; it had carried off his predecessor. Italy was overrun by enemies. The celibate life had for long found so many adherents, that defenders of the country were few; children were not born to fill the gaps of pestilence and war. Husbandry was abandoned. The distress was so great, so universal, that the conviction was held in the highest quarters that those were the fearful sights and great signs heralding the end of the world.