Untitled - Electric Scotland

4 i8 LIFE OF ARCHBISHOP TA1T [CH. xv.
a hearty and loving obedience in all things in which I am not
called upon to give up my own principles. . . . Your Lordship
will, I trust, pardon me for reminding you that there have always
been in the Church of England, as there now are, two distinct
views held by different parties within her pale, and I believe that
the great object of the compilers of the Liturgy was so to frame
it, that room might be given for the expression
of the views of
both. The Liturgy and Articles ought, I think, to be regarded
as a great compromise, in which the middle course between the
two contending parties was adopted, and so while both are at
liberty to hold their own opinions, so are they at liberty to carry
them out as they please, provided they keep within the letter of
the law, the one party not exceeding, the other not falling short
of, the terms agreed upon. This I believe to be the spirit of
the law which governs the Church, and I conceive it to be of
the last importance that this spirit should be maintained. It is,
as I believe, one great office of the constituted authorities of the
Church to maintain this principle inviolate, and I cannot think
that, in asserting my right of appeal to the laws of the Church, I
am in any way setting myself against these authorities. It is the
privilege of every suitor to appeal in all cases in which he believes
himself to have a fair ground to do so, and I am not aware that
in any appeal to the highest tribunal the appellant is ever con
sidered to show any disrespect to the judge from whose decision
he appeals. On the contrary, it is, so far as my observation
goes, always a matter of satisfaction to the Judge that any error
he may have committed may be redressed by the higher tribunal.
"Your Lordship says that the interpretation of the law given
in your Consistorial Court has no weight with me. My Lord, I
beg most respectfully to deny having written any such thing.
speak disrespectfully of your Consistory Court would be an
to express any want of confidence in the individual who
offence ;
exercises the office of the Judge is, I submit, quite another thing,
and is my undoubted . . .
right.
"
Of course, I do not mean to assert that the use of the lights
is in any way essential, or has in itself any virtue, but I do believe
that this is one of the outworks of the Church s citadel, and that
in contending for this, as for every other rite which the law of the
Church permits, I am only contending for those protections which
the piety and wisdom of our forefathers have thrown around
sacred things. The ceremonies which the Church of England
To