Untitled - Electric Scotland

1866-68] PREPARATIONS FOR CONFERENCE 377
ing with the Royal Mandate at the election of the Bishop of
Niagara, as explained in Parliament at the beginning
of last
session. Also I took the opportunity of showing how an appeal
to the Crown could not be avoided, even by Churches not
established, as shown in the recent decision of Lord Westbury
in the Privy Council with reference to a minister of the Dutch
Reformed Church at the Cape, deposed by their Synod or
Presbytery for denying the personality of the Evil Spirit
"
I reached 5 Park Place in good time. A large assembly of
Bishops, many of whom I had never seen before, and some of
whom were so much changed since I last saw them that I could
scarcely recognise the new faces. Of the latter were New
Zealand, Perth in Australia even Nova Scotia. The others
were chiefly Americans from the United States. There were
present, besides those named Montreal, Capetown, Grahams-
town, Orange-River, Huron, Quebec, Ontario, Coadjutor of
Newfoundland, Bishop Smith, Bishop Trower, and a large body
of Americans, including old Vermont, the presiding Bishop, a
jolly old man with white beard and wideawake hat;
Potter of
New York, like a very respectable English clergyman ; Iowa
and Louisiana.
"
At this preliminary meeting there cropped up, as might be
expected, all the difficulties of Natal and Church-and-State. I
thought it well to let it be distinctly understood that I thought
the Romeward tendency more dangerous for our clergy than the
tendency towards freethought, and stated that if the Natal
question were introduced, the Bishop of St. David s and others
would find themselves in a great difficulty, having agreed to
attend on the distinct understanding that the subject would not
be entered on. I pointed out to the Bishop of Capetown that it
would be much better for him privately to take counsel with the
English Bishops at home, especially those who differed from him
in opinion, and with some of his Colonial brethren, than to bring
the subject before a mixed body of English, American, and
Scottish Bishops, many of whom could not enter into the diffi
culties arising from English law and the connection of the
Church with the State. The Archbishop of Canterbury entirely
concurred with me, but Capetown intimated that he would
certainly bring the matter forward.
"We came to Fulham on Friday the 2oth, to be ready to
entertain, and from the 23d to 27th inclusive kept almost open