our bishops might occasionally allow a carefully-chosen Romish priest of liberal views to speak at a cottage lecture.

This, at any rate, we may take as certain, that if Cardinal Manning would go to Lambeth Palace or London House, one of our bishops or clergy would favour him with "brotherly admonitions." Hitherto, however, the Romish Bishops have been those, of all others, who have most sedulously abstained from having anything to do with the Society for the Promotion of the Union of Christendom, which we take to be the modern exponent of that "Unity," so earnestly sought by Augustine.

When, after a long disputation, they did not comply with the entreaties, exhortations, or rebukes of Augustine and his companions, but preferred their own traditions before all the churches in the world, which in Christ agree among themselves, the holy father Augustine put an end to this troublesome and tedious contention, saying, "Let us beg of God, who causes those who are of one mind to live in His Father's house, that He will vouchsafe, by His heavenly tokens, to declare to us which tradition is to be followed, and by what means we are to find our way to His heavenly kingdom. Let some infirm person be brought, and let the faith and practice of those,

I

by whose prayers he shall be healed, be looked upon as acceptable to God, and be adopted by all."

" 27

27 A blind man was then produced, and both the British and the Italian clergy tried their hands upon him, the former without effect; but when Augustine had knelt and prayed, the blind man received his sight. The Britons, I am sorry to say, "confessed that it was the true way of righteousness that Augustine taught;" but they very properly refused to "depart from their ancient customs without the consent and leave of the people," and they asked that there might be a second synod in which they should be represented in greater numbers.

Here we have the first grand protest

against Augustine by the British clergy! After " After "a long disputation," "entreaties," "exhortations," and "rebukes," they were of the same opinion still. This was truly English, and we "They preferred

feel proud of them.

their own traditions before all the churches in the world." Capital! That is precisely what we do now. After repudiating Augustine and the whole Welsh Church, we have got to the real thing at last. There is a wholesome tone about this preference for their own opinions to those of the whole world, and we may fairly claim to have preserved this precious legacy down to the present moment in our glorious Church of England. What does it matter to us whether other churches "agree among themselves"? All the miracles in the world would

not alter our opinions in the minutest degree. If the other churches are united in opinions at variance with ours, so much the worse for them.

There came (as is asserted) seven bishops of the Britons, and many most learned men, particularly from their most noble monastery, which, in the English tongue, is called Bancornaburg, over which the Abbot Dinooth is said to have presided at the time. They that were to go to the aforesaid council repaired first to a certain holy and discreet man, who was wont to lead an eremitical life among them, advising with