THE CLEWER CASE. T HE Bishop of Oxford has helped to
fill the columns of the Times during the dull days of the Easter Resess. He has written a letter himself ; he has been the occasion of several letters from other people ; and he has enabled the Times itself to pose in its favourite attitude of " Our Soverign Lord in all causes and over all persons within these his dominions supreme." Considering the excessive freedom of language which lay Judges now use to one another, it seems hypercritical to object to the Bishop of Oxford's letter to the Archdeacon of Berkshire. Whether the frequent interruptions to which it has become the fashion to subject Counsel really help to the clear presentation of a case is, to say the least, doubtful. At all events, if such interruptions are to be the rule for the future, it would be well to suspend the application of it until due notice has been given. A sustained argument is one thing, a general conversation between three or four Judges and an advocate is another, and the same qualities will not necessarily lead to success in the two lines. It would be convenient to solicitors to have a little time to con- sider whether the men they have hitherto employed are likely to show themselves proficients in the skirmishing tactics to which a counsel has of late been compelled to resort. Apparently, the gift which is now most wanted in a Court of Law is that of turning the tables on a Judge by a smart, yet respectful, repartee, and it is possible that this change may give the younger members of the Bar quite a new opening. If to " shut up" a Judge is held to be better than convincing him, it may hereafter be found that a counsel's value is greatest on the day after he is called, and steadily declines as age and experience bring some degree of modesty in their train. The only ground of quarrel that the Times has with the Bishop of Oxford is, that he is not prepared to recognise the advantages of this new state of things. The Bishop thinks that it is almost impossible to present a connected argument under a constant shower of interruptions, and so far we are surprised that any one should be found to differ from him. The question really in issue is whether, under certain circumstances, a disconnected argument may not be preferable to a connected one. That a counsel should not be disturbed by being suddenly called on to meet a difficulty which he had intended to answer an hour later seems impossible, though it may, of course, be contended that in a trial the important thing is to get difficulties met in the order in which they present themselves to the Judge, rather than in that in which they have been considered by the advocate. Perhaps it was the unreasonableness of denying to the Bishop of Oxford the liberty of giving his opinion on this point that unconsciously led the Times to put into the Bishop's mouth a complaint of personal ill- treatment which he never made. He said nothing about the constant shower of interruptions from the Bench to which " one speaker, at least," was subjected. He only stated his objection to the practice of interruption generally. Upon this point, no doubt, the Bishop speaks as a layman, but it is sometimes useful to know what a layman thinks even about experts.
Another aspect of the Clewer case which has been debated with much warmth during the last ten days is the propriety of the appeal put out by the Archdeacons of the diocese for subscriptions to meet the Bishop's costs. A correspondent who signs himself " X." is particularly excited by this appar- ently common-place occurrence. He asks the Times to give it publicity as an "extraordinary fact." He ventures to submit that the conduct of the Archdeacons is " nothing less than astonish- ing." We are tempted to envy this gentleman the extraordinary and invaluable gift he has of being surprised. Life must indeed be full of interest for him. Sunrise and sunset must startle him, the succession of the seasons must yearly come upon him as something novel and unexpected. The reason he alleges for maintaining his normal attitude of wonder in pre- sence of the Archdeacons' appeal is that Archdeacons are sup- posed to be, like Bishops, officers not of a party, but of the Church at large. How, then, can they have answered it to their consciences to circulate in their official capacity " a document which no amount of caution in its wording can, under the cir- cumstances, deprive of a distinctly party character ?" It is creditable to " X.'s " fairness that he should have enclosed the Archdeacons' appeal in his letter to the Times, so that his readers can at once ascertain what he means by " a distinctly party character." It must reside in one or all of three passages, —either in the expression of sympathy with the Bishop "in vindicating the true relations between a Bishop and the clergy of his diocese," or in the thanks given to him for maintaining what he considers the duty of a Bishop towards those set under him, or in the statement that the diocese is indebted to him for endeavouring to maintain the paternal relation of a Bishop towards his clergy. What party character is there in feeling this sympathy, or in conveying these thanks, or in ex- pressing this gratitude ? The point selected for com- mendation is not, as " X." apparently thinks, the Bishop's un- willingness to allow the prosecution of Mr. Carter ; it is his unwillingness to allow the determination whether such a prosecution shall be instituted to be taken away from the Bishop of the diocese. Whether it is a good thing that this discretion should be vested in the Bishop is a matter upon which much may be said ; but there is no reason why the two sides in the argument should coincide with any recognised party divisions in the Church of England. According to " X.'s " view, High Churchmen will be on the Bishop's side, and Low Churchmen against him, because the clergyman whom the Bishop wishes to shield from prosecution wears vestments and lights candles. But, supposing he had worn a black gown and sung a hymn before morning sermon, both of which are undoubtedly illegal acts, does" X." mean to say that High Churchmen must then have been against the Bishop for refusing his consent to a prosecution, while Low Churchmen would have been ranged on his side ? It is fair, however, to say that "X." is not quite alone in his confusion. One " T. S. P." writes to the Times to call atten- tion to a letter from Charles Kingsley to a rural dean, who had sent round a circular from the Archdeacon, asking the opinion of the clergy on " Essays and Reviews." " T. S. P." sup- poses that this act was an exact parallel to the act of the Archdeacons of the diocese of Oxford. But to make the like- ness good, he should have been able to show that the present circular asks the clergy to say that Mr. Carter ought not to be prosecuted. That might fairly have been regarded as a party manifesto, and being such, would obviously have been an improper document to be put forward by officials of the diocese. But to say that the bishop of the diocese ought to have a discretion whether Mr. Carter shall be prose- cuted, is to make a statement which may be accepted by Low Churchmen, or be dissented from by High Churchmen. Indeed, inasmuch as the majority of the Bishops sympathise, on the whole, with the Low-Church rather than with the High- Church Party, one would rather expect to find High Church- men disposed to limit Episcopal discretion, and Low Church- men disposed to enlarge it. Yet, on the amazing theory of " X." and " T. S. P.," every High Churchman must want to enlarge Episcopal discretion, and every Low Churchman to limit it, because for once it happens to have been exercised in favour of a Ritualist.
For ourselves, we frankly confess that we should like to see ecclesiastical prosecutions multiplied. The idiotcy of the Public Worship Regulation Act, and of all similar attempts to obtain an impossible uniformity, would then be seen more clearly. If every deflection from the Rubric were made the subject of a trial, there would be as many prosecutions as there are churches,—say, 20,000, and the country would come at last to see that the object of Ritual legislation is not to set up a service which will be impartially disliked by every member of the Church of England, but to deprive individual incumbents of the uncontrolled right, which at present they virtually enjoy, of giving their congregations precisely the service they like themselves. If it is decided that a prosecution may be instituted by every fanatic who takes the fancy into his head, the chaos we desire, as the prelude to something better, will have been brought decidedly nearer.
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