en by no sane man to be a literal fact in temporal matters, it is
violating the analogy of the Constitution, and dealing with the most
important subjects in a mere spirit of narrow perverseness, to insist
that it can have none but a literal meaning in ecclesiastical matters;
and that the Church _did_ mean, though the State _did not_ to accept a
despotic prerogative, unbounded by custom, convention, or law, and
unchecked by acknowledged and active powers in herself. Yet such is the
assumption, made in bitterness and vexation of spirit by some of those
who have lately so hastily given up her cause; made with singular
assurance by others, who, Liberals in all their political doctrines,
have, for want of better arguments, invoked prerogative against the
Church.

What the securities and checks were that the Church, not less than the
nation, contemplated and possessed, are not expressed in the theory
itself of the royal prerogative; and, as in the ease of the nation, we
might presume beforehand, that they would be found in practice rather
than on paper. They were, however, real ones. "With the same theoretical
laxity and practical security," as in the case of Parliaments and
temporal judges, "was provision made for the conduct of Church
affairs." Making allowance for the never absent disturbances arising
out of political trouble and of personal character, the Church had very
important means of making her own power felt in the administration of
her laws, as well as in the making of them.

The real question, I apprehend, is this:--When the Church assented
to those great concessions which were embodied in our permanent
law at the Reformation, had she _adequate securities_ that the
powers so conveyed would be exercised, upon the whole, with a due
regard to the integrity of her faith, and of her office, which was
and has ever been a part of that faith? I do not ask whether these
securities were all on parchment or not--whether they were written
or unwritten--whether they were in statute, or in common law, or
in fixed usage, or in the spirit of the Constitution and in the
habits of the people--I ask the one vital question, whether,
whatever they were in form, they were in substance sufficient?

_The securities_ which the Church had were these: First, that the
assembling of the Convocation was obviously necessary for the
purposes of taxation; secondly and mainly, that the ver