weddings “workhouse marriages.” A remedy is instantly found, at the risk of establishing a Gretna Green in every Dissenting place of worship. In a word, the Legislature seems to say to Dissent “Ask and have.” Very different is the tone both of Parliament and of the Executive, towards the Church. The prayer of the Convocation for permission to reform its constitution is, notwithstanding the plighted faith of the Crown, peremptorily refused. The Royal Letters on behalf of the Church Societies are stopped; the bill drawn up by the bishops to enfranchise the Colonial Church is rejected. It is perhaps hardly worth while to speak of various shabby acts with regard to money votes, such as the withdrawal of the grants to the Bishop of New Zealand and to the Scottish Church; but the animus which dictated them is only too obvious. After all, however, the saddest evidence that the public feeling has undergone a great change is to be found in the Education Bill of Sir John Pakington. Every one knows how fast the Church was becoming, in fact, what she is in theory, the instructress of the people; and till lately no Churchman could have been found to suggest any material alteration in a system which was bringing forth such gratifying fruits. Suddenly, however, Sir John is seized with a panic. The task appears in his eyes to be utterly hopeless, and he brings in a bill which would have destroyed the distinctive character of Church schools, and would have deprived Churchmen of all share (save that of paying school taxes) in the education of every district in which they could not command an absolute majority! That the Church is inefficient, every one now seems to take for granted—the only matter in dispute is, what has been the cause? Of course the fault is always laid at the door of the Clergy; but it is amusing to observe the perplexity which appears to be felt as to the manner in which the indictment against them should be framed. Sometimes the charge is that they cannot preach—just as if orators were a whit more plentiful at the bar or in the senate, on the stage or in the Dissenting pulpit. Sometimes we are told that the Clergy are not abler men because they are not better paid. We have actually lived to see it stated by the _Times_, that the Clergy of the Church of England—the men who a few short years ago were reported to be rolling in wealth—are worse rewarded in this life than persons belonging to any other profession whatever! The object of the present essay is to strike at the very first step in the _sorites_—to show that the Church, since the great revival, so far from having proved a failure, has proved herself more than equal to the situation; and finally to point out how grievously both the public and the Legislature have been deceived by the data which have been published for their guidance.