especially command recognition. First, the genuinely spontaneous universality of his nature: it embraced effectively the widest range of subjects, and the widest range of vigorous expression, from verse and drama to technical learning and keen criticism. Secondly, the unfailing thoroughness and sincerity of his action in all things and on all subjects he took in hand. No trace of subterfuge exists in anything done by Lessing. He never sought to screen his mind behind a mask. Time will enable people to distinguish what we have in our minds from what we have said,' is the self-convicting confession dropped from D'Alembert, when writing to Voltaire from under the full blaze and favour of Paris freethinking salons, in apology for the deliberately ambiguous language studiedly adopted in the 'Encyclopédie,' with the view of smuggling into circulation views it was deemed expedient not to broach in full. Such double meanings the poor and unprotected Lessing scorned; his nature never bent to underground devices; it never practised duplicity; and it is because his labour on all occasions was so honest and so earnest, so free from affectation and from artifices of any kind, that his writings have proved abidingly pregnant, and his creations bear a stamp, the freshness of which time cannot easily efface.

ART. II.-1. Reports of the Executive Committee of the Society for the Liberation of Religion from State Patronage and Control, for 1875, 1876, 1877, and 1878.

2. The Church Defence Institution. An Association of Clergy and Laity for defensive and general purposes. Reports for 1874, 1875, 1876, and 1877.

The

3. Dissent in its relation to the Church of England. Bampton Lectures for 1871. By George Herbert Curteis, M.A. London, 1872.

4. The Congregational Year Book. 1878.

5. The Baptist Hand Book. 1878.

6. Charges delivered to the Clergy of the Diocese of Llandaff. By Alfred Ollivant, D.D., Bishop of Llandaff. 1869-1875. 7. A Charge delivered to the Clergy at his Primary Visitation. By William Basil Jones, D.D., Lord Bishop of St. David's.

1877.

8. St. David's Diocesan Calendar and Directory. 1877. 9. Reports of the Proceedings of the Representative Body laid before the General Synod of the Church of Ireland, 1876 and 1878.

10. Church

10. Church Property and the Liberation Society. By Rev. W. L. Bevan, Prebendary of St. David's and Vicar of Hay.

11. Notes on Mr. Miall's 'Title-Deeds of the Church of England.' By Rev. W. L. Bevan.

12. The Established Church in Wales. Reprinted from the 'British Quarterly Review' for January 1871.

13. Practical Suggestions relative to the Disestablishment and Disendowment of the Church of England. Prepared by a Special Committee of the Society for the Liberation of Religion, &c. 1877.

14. Practical Modes of Disestablishment and Disendowment. By Frederic Harrison, M.A.

1878.

15. Church and State. By Frederic Harrison, in the Fortnightly Review' for 1877.

16. The 'Nineteenth Century' for May and June 1877.

IF

F we are to believe the opponents of the Established Church of England, her days have long since been numbered. Immediately upon the passing of the Reform Bill of 1832, politicians began to count the utmost continuance of her existence, which even such warm-hearted supporters as Wilberforce deemed not to be worth many years' purchase. Subsequent changes, which lowered the borough franchise and admitted a vast addition to the electoral burgess-roll, were accompanied by lugubrious vaticinations and exultant prophecies of the Church's doom. The disestablishment of the Irish Church awakened hopes and fears which had only so much more ground in reason, as injudicious friends and crafty foes tried to make out that the causes of the two Establishments were identical, and that the fall of the one inevitably involved that of the other. More recently a certain impulse has been given, and eagerly seized upon by 'Liberationists,' in the contemptuous assurance of the Liberal leader of the House of Commons that, without having deeply studied the question, he did not object to disestablish the Church of Scotland, if by so doing he could further the interests of his party. Once more the advanced section of the Radicals, the only political body identified with the assault upon the Church, assure themselves and the world that the extension of the county franchise will necessarily result in the election of a majority hostile to the Establishment, and will ensure the triumph of the latest form of Chartism, embodied in Free Church, Free Land, Free Education, and Free Labour. The failure of the past is to be atoned for by more complete organization; and the main body of Liberationists, reinforced on either wing by a contingent of philosophical Vol. 147.-No. 293. Positivists,

E

Positivists, and by the Agricultural Labourers' Union, is to march onward to victory under the control of the Birmingham Liberal Association. Such is the programme now put forth, with all the confidence of tone with which the experience of half a century has made us sufficiently familiar. Never was a party, in hunting phrase, more given to holloaing before they are out of the wood. The whole question, if we are to believe Liberationist tracts and orators, is settled. As a matter of argument it is threshed out, and waits only the declaration of the terms which the victorious enemies of the Church will graciously accord to her. Even these, as we shall see presently, are not withheld. It may be politic to assume so bold an air. Brag is a good dog, but Holdfast is a better. It is in any case desirable to understand the present position and actual strength of Aggressive Nonconformity, the alliances which it courts, and the objects at which it aims. We may learn something of its competency to deal satisfactorily with a question of the first importance, which involves the most profound problem of political ethics-namely, the true place, the proper functions, the just relations, and the exact limits, of the spiritual and secular powers, with their almost innumerable lines of intersection and complication-from the spirit with which we find it entering upon so delicate a task. We may cast some light upon the probable consequences to the Church itself of disestablishment and disendowment, from the present condition of the principal voluntary denominations in England; and we may gauge the almost certain results to the country at large, from the avowed aims of Liberationists and the example of other lands. Two startling paradoxes, to which we can only advert, meet us at the outset. First, that those who would repudiate all so-called national endowment for religion should have recently become converts to the necessity of a gigantic national endowment for education. Secondly, that in the day when ultramontanism invades every province of free thought and every function of the State, men with any pretension to statesmanship should advance the proposition, that the religion of a people should be looked upon with indifference by its rulers.

In sober truth the array of forces hostile to the Church is formidable enough. Romanist, Presbyterian, Nonconformist, Secularist, all are welcome allies in this campaign, and of late a further accession of strength has been gained from the adhesion of some Ritualistic leaders. The Radical press throughout the country-only too often, in the case of local newspapers, first in the field or in sole possession, and therefore largely supported by Conservatives and Churchmen; the periodical literature of

the

6

the party, from the leaflets of the Liberation Society, through all the ranges of its magazines, Baptist, Independent, and miscellaneous, up to the pages of the Fortnightly,' 'Nineteenth Century,' and 'British Quarterly' Reviews, and down to those of the Sword and Trowel'; the London weekly organs of hostile denominations, such as the Nonconformist,' English Independent,' Freeman,' 'Baptist,' and 'Christian World,' as well as those of advanced democratic allies, like the English Labourers' Chronicle';-all these, added to the living voice of a vast army of Dissenting ministers throughout the country, form a powerful Propaganda, whose movements are marshalled and directed by the Liberation Society and its various agents. Life is kept up by local conferences, by visits from travelling and organizing secretaries, and by frequent and stimulating communications from head-quarters in London. Meetings are held in every direction, at which the forty paid agents of the Liberation Society deliver themselves of their version of the origin of Church property, of the injustice of an Establishment, and of the superior advantages of voluntaryism. Large placards posted up in our populous towns inform the poorest passer-by of the exact income of each bishop on the bench, or give fanciful estimates of the annual value of Church property, with a pointed suggestion that it would be desirable plunder. Pamphlets, tracts, leaflets, with catchpenny titles, are circulated by millions. The Liberation Society's Report for 1878 gives the following account, not without a characteristic sneer, of this branch of its labours:

'In no previous year of the Society's history-not even during that of the Irish Church agitation-has there been so large an issue of its publications. . . . The committee have continued their efforts to instruct and interest the agricultural labourers in the question of disestablishment, in anticipation of their being invested with the franchise at no distant day. Notwithstanding their experience of the advantages of "the educated gentleman in every parish," the labourers have willingly, and even eagerly, received the publications of the Society, and have also volunteered their services as distributors. . . The total number of publications sent out from the office since the date of the last report has been 2,323,000. Such an extensive distribution of its literature has necessarily involved a considerable expenditure; but it is believed that the expenditure has been wisely incurred, and that a still farther extension of the Society's operations in this direction will presently become necessary.'-Report, pp. 8, 9. 'During the four years ending April, 1878, it held about 3500 meetings, and distributed between seven and eight millions of publications.'-Report, p. 23.

Inquiry into the financial position of the Society enables us

to ascertain how the large expenditure thus occasioned is met. With a courage we could only wish had been bestowed on some worthier object, the Liberationist party had no sooner experienced their crushing electoral defeat in 1874, than they held counsel how they might best retrieve their lost position. It was determined to raise a special fund of 100,0007., to be expended during the next five years in the furtherance of their object, and more than 53,000l. were forthwith promised. So large an amount would at first sight indicate a widespread and earnest determination on the part of aggressive Nonconformists to dislodge the Church from her position without further delay. We do not for one moment question the large numbers or the energy of our opponents. We do not under-estimate the mischief which an annual distribution of two millions and a half of Liberationist publications may occasion. But a close scrutiny of the subscription list and balance-sheets of the Liberation Society reveals some facts of no little significance. Of the special fund, which is being rapidly spent, and which forms two-thirds of the Society's annual income, about 20,000l., or nearly one half, was raised in the town of Bradford and its immediate neighbourhood, three firms alone contributing to it 15,000l.; Manchester sent 62002, London 64007., Birmingham 5457., Leeds 2407.: from this it is evident that the mainspring of the whole movement arose from a handful of Bradford manufacturers and wool-combers. Nor is there wanting an equally significant indication that the agitation thus elaborately organized has little spontaneous life. There has been a genuine sale of the Liberation Society's publications for the four years ending May 1878 to the amount of 2847. 14s. 1d., and this magnificent result has been attained by the expenditure of more than 60,0007.

It would, however, be delusive to regard the circulation of its anti-Church literature as the only result of the Society's energies. Without entering minutely into its constitution, it is enough to say that its Council of six hundred is so composed as to bring every district in England into communication with head-quarters; that annual meetings and triennial conferences serve to keep the flame alive and the members alert; that a vigilant Parliamentary Committee watches the progress and dissects the details of every measure supposed to have any bearing upon Dissenting interests, and affords a centre from which all the machinery of petitions and public meetings is rapidly set in motion: in short that the party enjoys all the advantages of perfect organization and of astute strategy, the result of long years of experience and pains.

Before proceeding to consider the maxims and proposals of

the