ng in a practical shape the _forum domesticum_
of the Bishops, with just so much of coercive force added as seemed
necessary to meet the changed circumstances of modern times." I have
always loved this sentence. _Forum domesticum_ is distinctly good, and
so is "coercive force." The _forum domesticum_ has quite a comfortable
sound, and, as to the "coercive force" which lurks in the background,
Ritualists must not enquire too curiously. The Bishops were to have it
all their own way, and everyone was to be happy. Such was the Bill as
introduced; but in Committee it was made infinitely more oppressive.
Henceforward a single lay-judge, to be appointed by the two Archbishops,
was to hear and determine all cases relating to irregularities in Public
Worship.

When the Bill reached the House of Commons, it was powerfully opposed by
Gladstone; but the House was dead against him, and Sir William Harcourt,
who, six months before, had been his Solicitor-General, distinguished
himself by the truculence with which he assailed the Ritualists. On the
5th of August, Gladstone wrote to his wife: "An able but yet frantic
tirade from Harcourt, extremely bad in tone and taste, and chiefly aimed
at poor me.... I have really treated him with forbearance before, but I
was obliged to let out a little to-day."

Meanwhile, Disraeli, seeing his opportunity, had seized it with
characteristic skill. He adopted the Bill with great cordiality. He
rejected all the glozing euphemisms which had lulled the House of Lords.
He uttered no pribbles and prabbles about _forum domesticum_, and
paternal guidance, and the authoritative interpretation of ambiguous
formularies. "This," he said, "is a Bill to put down Ritualism." So the
naked truth, carefully veiled from view in episcopal aprons and
lawn-sleeves, was now displayed in all its native charm. Its success was
instant and complete. The Second Reading passed unanimously; and the
Archbishops' masterpiece became at once a law and a laughing-stock. The
instrument of tyranny broke in the clumsy hands which had forged it, and
its fragments to-day lie rusting in the lumber-room of archiepiscopal
failures.

But in the meantime the debates on the Bill had produced some political
effects which its authors certainly had not desired. Gladstone's
vehement attacks on the Bill, and his exhilarating triumph over the
recalcitrant Harcourt, showed the Liberal party that their chief, though
temporarily withdrawn from activ