Part 1
Transcribed from the 1841 L. and G. Seeley edition by David Price, email [email protected]
[Picture: Pamphlet cover]
LETTER TO THE FRIENDS AND SUBSCRIBERS OF THE CHURCH PASTORAL-AID SOCIETY.
OCCASIONED BY A LETTER FROM THE REV. DR. MOLESWORTH TO THE LORD BISHOP OF CHESTER, CONTAINING ALLEGATIONS AGAINST THE SOCIETY.
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BY THE REV. CALEB WHITEFOORD A.M.
CHAPLAIN TO THE INFIRMARY OF ST. JAMES’S, WESTMINSTER, DOMESTIC CHAPLAIN TO HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF ROXBURGHE AND TO THE MOST HON. THE MARQUESS OF BUTE.
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Then I sent unto him, saying, There are no such things done as thou sayest, but thou feignest them out of thine own heart. For they all made us afraid, saying, Their hands shall be weakened from the work, that it be not done. Now, therefore, O God, strengthen my hands.
_NEHEMIAH_, VI. 8. 9.
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LONDON: L. AND G. SEELEY, 169 FLEET STREET; AND NISBET, BERNERS STREET.
1841.
_Price Sixpence_.
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SYNOPSIS OF THE SOCIETY.
OBJECT.—The salvation of souls, with a single eye to the glory of God, and in humble dependence on His blessing, by granting aid toward maintaining faithful and devoted men to assist the Incumbents of Parishes in their pastoral charge.
PRINCIPLES.—That, in a Christian land, a Church established should adequately provide for the spiritual instruction of all the people; and that it is part of the duty of a Christian Legislature to furnish the Church with means to this end: but that, if the Legislature should fail of this duty, then, rather than souls should perish, Christians must join together, to supply the deficiency, and make the Church as effective as it is in their power to do.
PLAN.—The Church Pastoral-Aid Society strictly regards the wants of the Church on the one hand, and the order of the Church on the other. It would make the Church efficient; it would carry the Gospel, by means of the Church, to every man’s door, but it never intrudes its aid: the Incumbent must apply for aid, or sanction the application; and until this is done, the Society cannot move. When aid is sought and granted, the Parochial Minister must say how it is to be employed—he must nominate the persons to be employed—he must engage them, as well as superintend and entirely control them. All that the Society does, is to provide for their remuneration; and, while so doing, to ask satisfactory proof of their qualifications.
OPERATIONS. RESULTS OF AID. Incumbents aided 275 Grants now in operation: Population under their 2,035,556 for Clergymen 230 charge Average population to each 7,375 Lay- 40 Assistants Average income of £163 Additional Churches and Incumbents Chapels: Without Parsonage-houses 138 Opened 67 The Society’s aid is to provide Proposed 59 for Clergymen 293 Addit. Licensed Places used as Chapels: Lay-Assistants 42 Opened 106 Total charge on the £26,198 Proposed 20 Society, when all are in operation, per annum Charge of those now in £20,908 Additional full Services operation established: Income of the Society for £16,176 On the 401 the year 1839–40 Lord’s-Day On Week-days 172 Additional 161 Cottage Lectures
LETTER _&c._ _&c._
THE Rev. Dr. Molesworth, a Clergyman favourably known for some time past by the publication of a periodical called the “Penny Sunday Reader,”—who is likewise (as I perceive by the Advertisement appended to his Pamphlet) Author of “Family Sermons for every Sunday in the Year,” and whose promotion from a small benefice in _Canterbury_ to one of the largest in the North of England was not long ago announced to the public,—has lately signalized his zeal in another way, by coming forward in the character of public prosecutor {3} against the “Church Pastoral-Aid Society:”—this he does in a printed Letter addressed to his own Diocesan, and our respected Vice Patron, the Bishop of Chester, containing serious charges affecting the whole character and management of the Society.
The indictment sets forth, that the Society, in spite of professed attachment to the Church, is in reality doing it the greatest injury, and chiefly by the exercise of a _veto_ upon the appointment of parties to be maintained upon its grants. Dr. Molesworth therefore calls upon the Society to put itself upon its defence,—to appear at his bar, and answer to his indictment, upon pain of _sentence of outlawry_ to be pronounced against it by all the orthodox. He further presses upon the subscribers and friends of the Society, as yet more friends of the Church, the necessity of transferring their subscriptions from the “Church Pastoral-Aid Society,” to the “Society for promoting the employment of Additional Curates, &c.”{4}
This direct attempt to injure the Society, as well in its funds as more vitally in its character, will make apology needless on my part for following Dr. Molesworth in his appeal to the Society at large; little as I may think his statements calculated to effect their design of weakening your attachment to _this tried instrument_ (under God) of _so great an amount of good_. And not suspecting that the Committee acting for the whole Society—a Society comprising in its members ten of the Episcopal order (including Dr. Molesworth’s own Diocesan), many Church Dignitaries, the Regius Professor of Divinity at Oxford, &c. &c.—is likely so to forget what is due to itself, as to descend into the arena of controversy at the challenge of an individual; I thought it open to any of the 1400 Clergy attached to the Society, against whom _the sentence of outlawry_ is to be passed, to accept Dr. Molesworth’s challenge upon somewhat more equal terms.
The Society will naturally enough remark, upon a _primâ-facie_ view of Dr. M.’s cry of alarm,—“We have all these learned and venerable Bishops amongst us, these esteemed and valued Dignitaries; they would have informed us, long ago, if we were justly chargeable with the evil Dr. Molesworth has imputed to us:”—but either these learned and venerable men must be far less careful for the interests of the Church than Dr. Molesworth, or else (_not having sufficient discernment_?) failed to discover, in the five years’ working of the Society, under all the advantages of their connection with it, those evils which a single observer at a distance, acting in the exercise of his private judgment, has found so clear. Happy for the Episcopal Bench, amidst all the mischief Dr. Molesworth has _conjured up_, not only in the Society, but in the Church, that there should be still left to them such a faithful adviser, such a controller, such a corrector of their inadvertencies and mistakes! We shall presently see what testimony is borne by these learned and venerable men to the character and services of the “Church Pastoral-Aid Society;” when it will be for Dr. Molesworth to decide, how far his statement can be made to tally with theirs; or otherwise, which of the two we shall prefer.
Whether the Society is right or wrong in the exercise of its _veto_ upon the nomination of parties to occupy its grants, is the main question at issue. A more satisfactory way of dealing with it, than by following Dr. Molesworth’s arrangement,—which (with the exception of what he has culled from the Newspapers in his Preface and Appendix) is the simple one, of first saying all that can be said in favour of the Additional Curates’ Fund, and next, all that can be _imagined_ against the Church Pastoral Aid Society,—will be, to place fully before you the simple and intelligible principles upon which, in the question at issue, the Church Pastoral-Aid Society acts. I speak as one well acquainted with the Society’s operations, but as having no other authority for what I say.
Dr. Molesworth affirms (p. 13) that this rule of the Society will not abide “the sifting of _honesty_ and common sense.” Let us see. We contend,
I. That unworthy men do intrude themselves into the sacred ministry of the Church.
II. That it is a principle not unknown to the Church, that those who provide the temporalities shall have a voice accorded to them in the selection of parties to benefit by their appropriation.
III. That to appoint such as unworthily intrude into the ministry of the Church to cure of souls, is to be “partaker of their evil deeds.” (2d Ep. John.)
In these particulars, it is presumed, will be comprehended a full discussion of the question at issue. By the first proposition, I intend to shew the expediency of the _veto_; by the second, its lawfulness; and by the third, its bounden obligation.
Previously, however, I would disclaim, for myself, and the cause with which I would identify myself, all pleading at Dr. Molesworth’s tribunal;—a conclusion to which I am forced by the perusal of his Letter.—I appeal not to him;—and why? I discover him to be an _incompetent_, because an _unfair_ and _presumptuous_ judge. These are strong charges; and only to be warranted if borne out by proofs derived from his own Letter.
To his revered Diocesan appeal would have been superfluous, who well knows how to appreciate the becoming sneer at “_spiritually-minded_,” “_evangelical_,” and every thing of that sort. Indeed, a less-disguised antipathy to real Religion, in my judgment, _these later days_ have seldom witnessed,—at least in print, and from one of the Clergy. My appeal is to those whom Dr. Molesworth would seek to pervert (vide App. p. 39), the friends and supporters of the Society: and I ask them, whether Dr. Molesworth has not prejudged already, from the temper and style of his pamphlet, the cause which he affects to put on trial? A few extracts will shew. He commences temperately enough; calling for, in page 7,
“An abandonment of the objectionable test, or at least a clear and explicit understanding upon the character and designs of the Society.” And adding, “The Society owes to itself as well as to the Church, an official vindication from the questionable (to say the least) _appearances_ against it.”
Such likewise was the tenor of his original Letter to the Manchester Courier (p. 4). But, as he warms upon his theme, he forgets this prudent part of his plan. Page 15, we find the _veto_ thus described:—
“It is an _insidious_ plan;—it is a plan _fit for a society_ with _shabby_, _party_, _and sectarian_ designs, but not for a society _with simply and singly Church views_. It places the Society above the Bishops and Archbishops,” &c.
Page 14, he had remarked—
“I will not affirm that the rule was designed to be the instrument of a _shabby and crooked_ policy; but I will affirm, that if it _had_ been so designed, it could not have been better _contrived_.”
The insinuation here conveyed is that amplified, as we have seen, in the very next page, by which we may judge at what rate Dr. Molesworth travels.—Page 20, he feels shy of saying that this rule _is_ the instrument of “a _dangerous_ and _double-faced_ policy;” whilst he does not hesitate to style (p. 23) those who have the working of the rule, “_despotic_, and _irresponsible_” (!) managers.—The Secretary of our Society (the Rev. E. B. Were) had wound up an unpleasant correspondence (for it is always unpleasant to tell a man he will not do) with a layman (Mr. Briarly Browne), whose friend, the Rev. Mr. Clark, had sought for him a grant from the Society, upon which Mr. Briarly Browne was to be ordained; brooding all the while, and hardly suppressing, considerable ill-will to the Society in their hearts. The endeavour on the part of our Secretary to expose this unhandsome proceeding is stigmatized as “a poor shuffling attempt” (p. 24). _Previously_, Dr. Molesworth had _admitted_ (p. 18) that this was done “_with some_, _but rather severe_, _justice_.” I pass by another charge, in the same page, of more serious and offensive character, which Dr. Molesworth greedily catches up from a Letter of Mr. Clark; intending to return to it by and by. But after all, nothing of this kind comes up to the appendix:—he has bade adieu to the Bishop, and has got a little out of sight;—and now hear him:—what was but _the lion passant guardant_ before, is become truly the lion _rampant_ now. “The Society” (he says, p. 36), “_in the plenitude of their super-papal authority_, _have __thought fit to declare_!!!”—and at the end of the next extract—“Is not this _monstrous_?” “Are these Church principles?” “Is such a tribunal of _intolerance_ and _sectarianism_!! to stand forth and collect money, and to be advocated in our pulpits as a Church Society?”
And now, friends and supporters of the Church Pastoral-Aid Society, are you willing to be tried by Dr. Molesworth, or are you convinced that he has made up his mind before you come into Court? If the Society, or the Committee it appoints as among its most responsible members, be deserving of such _rank abuse_ as this, where is the need of inquiry? Bad indeed must the Society be decided to be;—bad in its principles, bad in its management, bad in its officers; in short, all bad together. Why, then, does Dr. Molesworth dwell so tamely, at the outset, upon “_questionable appearances which require vindication_”? Wherefore does he affect to call for “_a clear and explicit understanding upon the character and designs of the Society_.” (P. 7, and Letter to the Manchester Courier.)
If the matter needs no inquiry, why does Dr. Molesworth make a show of demanding it? And if it does, why does he approach the question in such a predetermined spirit of hostility as to make _the proposal_, in his case, _a deception_; shewing that he at least has settled the question _before_ (as he admits) he has heard it.
There is no disguising it—Dr. Molesworth’s objection lies far deeper: this will be seen, as we enter further into the consideration of his attack. _The ostensible grounds_ of objection shift about. The employment of Lay agents is now _the minor matter_ (pp. 18 and 19). It was the major, onewhile; but the Society having suffered as much loss as the urging and mis-stating of that objection could inflict, and having happily survived the injuries, _the major point sinks_, _and becomes the minor_ (as you perceive), and _the minor is now the major_, and so on; for reproach will never be wanting against a Society founded, supported, and (under God) successfully worked by those whose religious sentiments Dr. Molesworth treats with undisguised aversion. Else why that strange loathing of the very word “_spiritually-minded_”; so that he has actually clipped it of a full syllable? It is a curious fact, that the Rev. Doctor has quoted this word (in allusion to the Letter of the Rev. Mr. Were, Secretary to the Society), but always writing it thus, “_spiritual-minded_,” no less than _eleven times in twenty pages_, and evidently in a tone of derision. Now, when a Doctor of Divinity takes up a Scriptural term only _to disparage it_, and others by it; and actually mistakes the orthography of the word, as though it were quite new to him, and foreign to his taste; it is high time we should quote him the passage at length wherein it occurs, and then leave it with him:—Rom. viii. 6: “To be carnally-minded is death, but to be spiritually-minded is life and peace.”
Dr. Molesworth can do justice to the Society in nothing; he cannot even allow it its real title: yet one would think, that the good he is forced to admit, to a certain extent, that the Society has done _in_ the Church, and _not out of_ the Church, might, in a lesser sense at least, and putting aside all courtesy to his clerical brethren in the Society, entitle it to be called _a_ “Church Pastoral-Aid Society.” Not so, for (p. 25) the Society is a “_Lay Society_”! What Dr. Molesworth does with the _ten Bishops_, so high a Churchman as he would be thought, I marvel: when _they_ are treated thus, his 1400 brethren of the Clergy will, of course, go for nothing! The title given us of “_Lay Society_,” however, is adopted from the Letter of Mr. Briarly Browne; a layman himself, be it observed, but who (_proh pudor_!) will not bestow the name of Churchman upon Bishop or Archbishop, Dignitary or Parish Priest, so long as they remain connected with this Society! Might it not have served his turn to have denounced the Society as a mixed Society of Lay and Clergy, an unauthorised Society, or any thing more offensive that he pleased, which would at least have spared the Church Dignitaries attached to the Society _the insult_ of being reckoned as _laymen_, _or nothing_; and by which this layman would not have set his clerical champion the bad example he was not slow to follow, of _casting contempt_ (as I cannot but consider it) upon the highest authorities of the Church.
Another, and the most unmeasured of all their charges against the Society, is likewise adopted by the Doctor from the Letter of Mr. Clark, that of “_raising money upon false pretences_!!!” This, in other terms, accuses the Society of _swindling_; and to this no defence will be conceded on my part. If the authors of the charge can believe it, I pity them: in my judgment, it refutes itself. Nevertheless, as an offence cognisable by our laws,—they will pardon me the suggestion,—it will afford them the very opportunity they appear to seek, of exposing, as well as annoying, the Committee of the Society in open court; _provided only the proofs are at hand_.
Little as I am disposed to bandy words, I might ask, if a Society, having fully, fairly, and publicly declared its principles, (and I believe there never was a Society which carried the practice to a greater extent,) and had thereby published upon what terms its money was subscribed and its grants made, so that there could be no mistake; and if others, knowing and hating its principles equally, had, notwithstanding, proposed themselves as parties to benefit by its funds whilst they eluded its principles; who would be raising money upon false pretences, in that case?
Here I cannot refrain from reporting an earlier specimen of the bad faith the Society has experienced at the hands of those whose dislike it may have merited by diligence in the Church Pastoral-Aid. The facts are known to the subscribers generally; but are again introduced here, to shew, that when the “_minor matter_,” as Lay-agency is _now_ called, was urged as the _major_, (before it had fallen so many degrees by Dr. Molesworth’s _disciplinometer_,) the Society was not a jot the less liable to misrepresentation and unkindness than now.
The following statement appeared in a work of a popular character, published in 1838 anonymously, and called “_A Voice from the Font_.”
“An Incumbent of a populous town in the West of England applied for two Lay-teachers, who were granted; but who, after establishing an acquaintance and intimacy with the parishioners, became Dissenting Ministers of the town, drawing to them those whom they had visited as the delegates of the Incumbent.”
This stood in the relation of a note, containing the proof, or substantial part of an excellent argument against Lay-assistance and the Church Pastoral-Aid Society. Alas! the whole was pure invention. But all men are liable to err, and to derive information from incorrect sources. The publisher was therefore apprised, and the Editor of the Church-of-England Quarterly Review, _which had copied the objectionable passage_, written to. The Author of the book, understood to be a Clergyman, was appealed to: there could be no doubt of the mistake (to call it by the mildest name); and the publishers, Messrs. Longman & Co., consequently received authority to paste over the note in all future and unsold copies.
Now the Society thought that more was due to it: the libel had gone through the length and breadth of the land. So void of truth was the statement, that, in point of fact, no Incumbent in the West of England ever had two Lay-assistants _paid_ by the Society:—(to nominate them, I beg to acquaint the “_Poor Parson_” p. 5, is always left to the Incumbent himself); and _not a single instance_ has occurred, since the formation of the Society, of any Lay-agent, supported by its means, becoming a Dissenting Teacher. Yet all attempt to obtain further redress was hopeless: no sorrow was expressed by the party who had circulated _the false report_; no proper feeling shewn for having wounded a much-called-for Christian Charity;—no apology,—no reparation,—_no answer_, in short, was given to the Society’s appeal! I know not what effect the relation of such injustice may have on other minds: it made me the zealous friend of the “Church Pastoral-Aid Society:” previously content with being its well-wisher, I had taken no part in its proceedings: since then, I am thankful to say, I have.
Hitherto, my object has been, to expose the _animus_ of these attacks: though painful, it was necessary to do so, lest any one should conceive that Dr. Molesworth, and those who think with him, are men who may be easily satisfied; or that by giving up one point, however vital, we should silence opposition. Does _the spirit_ displayed in their attacks afford us any fair grounds for hoping this? Was not Lay-agency first attacked, as _the veto_ is now? Does not the reproach of “_Lay Society_” announce that the whole Society must be re-constituted, from the top-stone to the bottom? In short, these gentlemen _will be satisfied_ when we have given up every thing, and have nothing more left to give up. Bear in mind, that they have already established a Society (a Church Society they call theirs), for the same objects, upon their own model;—I do not say, in opposition to, but a year or more after the Pastoral-Aid Society. One would think, if Dr. Molesworth could do justice to the Society in any thing, it would be _as parent_ of _a child_ so hopeful, so highly-prized, and so justly-commended by himself, as the Society for the employment of Additional Curates &c. Standing in this relation to each other, it is painful to learn from Dr. Molesworth the probability of their becoming “_bitter rivals_” (p. 27). On the part of _the parent_, I am sure, no such _unnatural_ sentiment prevails; and I trust it would continue to be so, were the respective positions changed, and the daughter _flourished_ as much, or more, than the mother.
Far more congenial to my feelings than the topics which have engaged us hitherto, will be the discussion upon certain definite principles, as was proposed, of the use of the _veto_. My first proposition was a question of fact scarcely requiring proof; yet indeed the whole argument depends upon it: for could it be proved that no evil men exist in the Church as ministers, then the Society’s rule would doubtless be unnecessary, offensive, and chargeable with party motives. But I assert,
I. That unworthy men do intrude themselves into the sacred ministry of the Church.