the law gives authority and
exacts obedience. It is not in the power of the Crown
itself to inhibit me from the performance of my ordinary
duties in this parish by any such missive as that sent to
me by your lordship. If your lordship think right to stop
my mouth as a clergyman in your diocese, you must proceed
to do so in an ecclesiastical court in accordance with
the laws, and will succeed in your object, or fail, in
accordance with the evidences as to the ministerial
fitness or unfitness which may be produced respecting me
before the proper tribunal.

I will allow that much attention is due from a clergyman
to pastoral advice given to him by his bishop. On that
head I must first express to your lordship my full
understanding that your letter has not been intended to
convey advice, but an order;--an inhibition, as your
messenger, the Reverend Mr. Thumble, has expressed it.
There might be a case certainly in which I should submit
myself to counsel, though I should resist command. No
counsel, however, has been given,--except indeed that I
should receive your messenger in a proper spirit, which
I hope I have done. No other advice has been given me,
and therefore there is now no such case as that I have
imagined. But in this matter, my lord, I could not have
accepted advice from living man, no, not though the
hands of the apostles themselves had made him bishop
who tendered it to me, and had set him over me for my
guidance. I am in a terrible strait. Trouble, and sorrow,
and danger are upon me and mine. It may well be, as your
lordship says, that the bitter waters of the present
hour may pass over my head and destroy me. I thank
your lordship for telling me whither I am to look for
assistance. Truly I know not whether there is any to be
found for me on earth. But the deeper my troubles, the
greater my sorrow, the more pressing any danger, the
stronger is my need that I should carry myself in these
days with that outward respect of self which will teach
those around me to know that, let who will condemn me, I
have not condemned myself. Were I to abandon my pulpit,
unless forced to do so by legal means, I should in doing
so be putting a plea of guilty against myself upon the
record. This, my lord, I will not do.

I have the honour to be, my lord,
Your lordship's most obedient servant,