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fering, where the priest shall refuse these and other rites and sacraments, to or in favour of persons who have exempted themselves from Church Rates.
The Parliamentary standard of Church-membership which this bill would enact is not really any approach to Canonical discipline. It seems to me that any endeavour to revive discipline by act of Parliament is Erastian in its nature and can never be attended with any real benefit to the Church of England. Many orthodox Churchmen hold that the bulk of baptized Dissenters are, unknown to themselves, de facto members of the Church of England, and are, consequently, not to be regarded as excommunicate majori excommunicatione. To such persons this new standard of Church-membership, to be established by Act of Parliament, must appear extremely revolting.
I am as ready as any one to confess the need in which the Church of England stands of revived discipline. It is perhaps a hardship that her clergy should ever be compelled to bestow the marriage blessing of the Church upon persons who openly deny her faith. But how does this compulsory power exist, excepting through the tribunals of the Church herself? The laxity of Church discipline is, in these respects, owing to the continuance of those Ecclesiastical Courts whose whole procedure is based upon the false presumption that all Englishmen are members of the Church of England.
If instead of claiming from Parliament fresh
