Page:The Church of England, its catholicity and continuity.djvu/215

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Growth of Church Life
199

work which had attracted much attention. I refer to the work on the Pentateuch, written by Colenzo, Bishop of Cape Town. In this book Colenzo denied the Mosaic origin of the Pentateuch, and many statements in it showed that he could not accept the doctrines of the Church. He said that the clergy could no longer use the Baptismal Service as it stands in the Prayer Book, because he considered that it had historical inaccuracies. The teaching of this book was considered by the first meeting of the Bishops, and they entirely disapproved of it, and, as Mr. Hore says, [1]"They implicitly condemned two of its most prominent errors," viz., the denial of the inspiration of Holy Scripture and of the Godhead of Jesus Christ.

An encyclical letter was then sent out by the Bishops to the world, giving an account of their deliberations. In the year 1868 another Pan-Anglican Council was held, under the Presidency of Archbishop Tait, and more than one hundred Bishops were present, and these Councils have been held periodicaliy ever since.

With the increase of Church life in England there was need of more Bishops to cope with it. It was felt that every Bishop should have personal knowledge of the whole of his diocese. Many of the old dioceses were far too large to allow of this possibility. New dioceses were therefore formed. In 1876, St. Albans was made a separate See again, and in the same year the diocese of Truro was founded. In 1878 an additional Bishop's Act was passed; and, as a result of this, the See of Liverpool was formed in 1880. Newcastle was cut off from Durham in 1882. The

  1. Hore, p.392.