Untitled - Electric Scotland

4o6 LIFE OF ARCHBISHOP TAIT [CH. xv.
in that session. Ample time was thus given for its con
sideration, and on the House assembling in the following
February (1867), the Bishops, after two days of debate,
agreed unanimously upon a long resolution, which was
moved by Bishop Wilberforce, and seconded by Bishop
Tait. After setting forth in careful terms the dangers
attaching to an undue Ritualism, the Bishops resolution
ended with the following words :
"
Our judgment is that
no alterations from long-sanctioned and usual ritual ought
to be made in our churches, until the sanction of the
of the diocese has* been obtained thereto." 1
Bishop
In this judgment the Lower House was formally
invited to concur, and again there was an ample debate.
In the end the Lower House resolved, with only three
dissentients,
"
That this House, having regard to the Ritual observances
treated of in the Report presented to the House on the 26th
June 1866, do concur in the judgment of the Upper House, that
no alteration from the long-sanctioned and usual ritual ought to
be made in our churches until the sanction of the Bishop of the
diocese has been obtained thereto."
It has seemed worth while to record these facts with
care, as the first occasion on which the revived Provincial
Synod of Canterbury came to a deliberate resolution upon
the Ritual questions which were agitating the Church.
Some two hundred and forty-five closely-printed pages of
the Chronicle of Convocation are occupied with these par
ticular debates, and the ultimate unanimity, after so much
discussion, is almost, if not quite, without a parallel. But
the judgment, important as it was, could have no coercive
force without State aid, and the scene was now shifted
from the Jerusalem Chamber to the House of Lords.
1 Chronicle of Convocation, Feb. 13, 1867, p. 711.
* Ibid, Feb. 15, 1867, p. 843.