"But would you," it is asked, "exclude a Dissenter from Communion, however good and holy he may be, merely because he has not been Confirmed?" He certainly would have very little respect for me if I did not. If, for instance, he belonged to the Methodist Society, he would assuredly not admit me to be a "Communicant" in that Society. "No person," says his rule, "shall be suffered on any pretence to partake of the Lord's Supper _unless he be a member of the Society_, or receive a note of admission from the Superintendent, which note must be renewed quarterly." And, again: "That the Table of the Lord should be open to all comers, is surely a great discredit, and a serious peril to any Church".[5] And yet the Church, the Divine Society, established by Jesus Christ Himself, is blamed, and called narrow and {100} bigoted, if she asserts her own rule, and refuses to admit "all comers" to the Altar. To give way on such a point would be to forfeit, and rightly to forfeit, the respect of any law-abiding people, and would be--in many cases, is--"a great discredit, and a serious peril" to the Church. We have few enough rules as it is, and if those that we have are meaningless, we may well be held up to derision. The Prayer Book makes no provision whatever for those who are not Confirmed, and who, if able to receive Confirmation, are neither "ready nor desirous to be Confirmed". (III) WHOM IT IS FOR. Confirmation is for the Baptized, and none other. The Prayer-Book Title to the service is plain. It calls Confirmation the "laying on of Hands upon _those that are baptized_," and, it adds, "are come to years of discretion". First, then, Confirmation is for the Baptized, and never for the unbaptized. Secondly, it is (as now administered[6]) for {101} "those who have come to years of discretion," i.e. for those who are fit for it. As we pray in the Ember Collect that the Bishop may select "fit persons for the Sacred Ministry" of the special Priesthood, and may "lay hands suddenly on no man," so it is with Confirmation or the "laying on of hands" for the Royal Priesthood. The Bishop must be assured by the Priest who presents them (and who acts as his examining Chaplain), that they are "fit persons" to be confirmed.