islands until 1818, when Dr. Fisher, Bishop of Salisbury,1 went to Guernsey on behalf of the Bishop of Winchester, who was unable to cross the Channel on account of his age and infirmities. He consecrated the churches of St. James, Peter Port, and Porteval. At the same time he confirmed a vast number of natives, old as well as young.' To any period before that time the description given by the Rev. Philip Falle at the close of the seventeenth century is applicable. The passage is curious and important:

'None of our Bishops,' he wrote, 'since the Reformation have visited us. To supply therefore in some measure the defect and want of confirmation, great care is had of the public catechizing of children. Private instruction goes before, and some competency of age is required; and then, their answering to the interrogatories put to them at church, in the presence and hearing of the whole assembly, is understood and taken for a ratification of their Baptismal Vow, and an owning to the obligation of Christianity, to the discharge of their sponsors. Nor can any more be done here, as we are circumstanced, to qualify catechumens for the Holy Communion, to which they are after this admitted' (p. 220).

From occasional visits by the Bishop of the diocese the islands have advanced a further stage in the course of ninety years to becoming part of the charge of a Suffragan Bishop, who stays a week, chiefly for the purpose of holding confirmations. But it must be obvious to anyone who makes a genuine endeavour to understand the question of the Church or the government of the islands that the primary need is that they should have separate episcopal government. The fact is recognized and approved by men with widely differing views in other respects. It is really not a matter of very great importance whether the present diocesan authorities recognize the position or not. The Dean of Guernsey has allowed some of his rights to be usurped by the Bishop of Winchester, but if one examines the Canons carefully, unmoved by the fear of disobliging, or by hopes of personal

1

1 For a short time, early in the sixteenth century, the islands were in the diocese of Salisbury,

favour, it would be evident that the Bishop of Winchester has very little ecclesiastical power in Jersey, and that he is very little more than a judge in appeal.'' The Dean possesses the full authority of an Ordinary with his own court and the necessary power to assert his jurisdiction, although there has been a tendency from time to time for the civil power to usurp the authority of the ecclesiastical court. It may be noted that the Act of institution of the Dean of Guernsey refers to the Cathedral or Parish Church of St. Peter Port.' So far then as English Churchmen are concerned there is little cause for their interposition in this matter of insular ecclesiastical politics. Upon plans for a separate bishopric or bishoprics being definitely formulated they might be allowed an expression of satisfaction, which could take the form of a monetary contribution, that the detachment of these islands should render somewhat less hopeless than is otherwise the case, the attempt of one man to have the episcopal oversight of the huge diocese of Winchester.

The consideration of the matter in the two islands is met at the outset by an important difficulty as to whether they should be formed into one diocese or constitute two separate dioceses. For civil purposes the two islands are entirely separate, and there are wide divergences in the government. It is a sound principle, which has been frequently endorsed by the English Convocations, that the division of dioceses should follow the lines of the civil divisions. A strong case needs to be presented if the principle is not to be applied in the present instance. The advocates of one diocese claim that the Church would break down the jealousy between the two islands. But they are accustomed almost as much to independence in ecclesiastical as in civil affairs. The Canons of 1603, for example, were adopted in Jersey, but not accepted in Guernsey. The obvious corollary of the argument that they should be formed into one diocese is that they should also become one for civil purposes, and that is a reductio ad absurdum. Guernsey and its appendant islands would form

'Durell's notes to Falle's History, p. 439. Appeals were not infrequent at the time he wrote. There were six from Guernsey between the years 1673 and 1686.

one diocese with a population of forty-three thousand, and Jersey another having about fifty-two thousand each therefore would be about the same size, as regards population, as the Isle of Man. The Dean would become a Bishop, and there need be no fear that the islanders would not send him to England for consecration.' Among other advantages which the islanders would derive would be that they would have a Bishop who could speak to them in their own dialect, as the Jersey patois is by no means like the Guernsey, and neither is easily understood even by an accomplished French linguist.

The establishment of a right system of Church government would, so far as human knowledge can foresee, give a real impetus to the work of the Church. The islanders are quite kindly disposed towards the clergy, who in some cases belong to old insular families. Their houses are maintained by the rates, but the stipends are small. The islands are outside the scope of Queen Anne's Bounty, and the means are not forthcoming to make good the absence of its benefactions. The position of the Rectors of the old parishes in the States is very similar to that of the Bishops in the House of Lords. A proposal to diminish their number aroused the opposition of those not concerned with the rights of the Rectors so much as with the making of an important change in the constitution, which is regarded with as much jealous veneration as in other countries or even more. The separation of ecclesiastical from civil affairs in parish government has followed upon the same step in England. The constitution in the islands of a complete system of Church government as part of zealous endeavour to make the Church an essential part of the life of the people would strengthen the position against the inroads of Roman Catholicism.

The conclusion, then, may be briefly stated that the circumstances of the Church afford much material to interest

'Fellowships were founded at Oxford in order that clergy might be educated there for the islands, and King Charles I scholarships are still competed for at Pembroke and Jesus Colleges by candidates from Victoria College, Jersey, and Elizabeth College, Guernsey, who have been born in the islands.

the English Churchman; and, if he seeks a holiday which is more than merely the annual conventional search for amusement, he may hope to find it in the Channel Islands.

ART. IX. THE RESURRECTION-BODY: A STUDY IN THE HISTORY OF DOCTRINE.

1. La Théologie de Tertullien. Par ADHEMAR D'ALÈS. (Paris: G. Beauchesne et Cie. 1905.)

2. Dogmengeschichte. Von Dr. J. SCHWANE. (Münster. 1869.)

3. Des Origenes Lehre von der Auferstehung des Fleisches. Von C. RAMERS. (Trier. 1851.)

4. The Doctrine of the Resurrection of the Body as taught in Holy Scripture. 'Bampton Lectures,' 1850. By the Very Rev. E. M. GOULBURN, Dean of Norwich. (London. 1850.)

5. The Gospel of the Resurrection: Thoughts on its Relation to Reason and History. By BROOKE FOSS WESTCOTT, D.D., sometime Bishop of Durham. (London: Macmillan. 1867.)

6. The Resurrection of Our Lord. By W. MILLIGAN, D.D. (London: Macmillan and Co. 1881.).

7. The Historic Faith. By B. F. WESTCOTT, D.D., sometime Bishop of Durham. (London: Macmillan and Co. 1882.)

8. The Resurrection of the Dead. By W. MILLIGAN, D.D. (London: Macmillan and Co., Ltd. 1894.)

9. The Risen Master. By H. LATHAM, M.A., late Master of Trinity Hall, Cambridge. (Cambridge: Deighton, Bell and Co. London: George Bell and Sons.

1900.) 10. Problems and Principles. By R. C. MOBERLY, D.D., late Canon of Christ Church. (London: John Murray. 1904.)

II. The Body of Christ. By the Right Rev. CHARLES GORE, D.D., Bishop of Birmingham. New Edition. (London: John Murray. 1908.)

And many other Works.

RECENT discussions upon our Lord's Resurrection have brought into peculiar prominence the question What is the nature of the Resurrection-Body? The subject might seem too speculative to be practical, and wisely relegated to the realm of things insoluble. But it is evident that belief in our Lord's Resurrection, and in our own, may be hindered or promoted by the form in which the doctrine is presented, and by presuppositions as to what it precisely is in which Resurrection consists. And since the doctrine not only exists in Scripture, but has passed through a long historic development, full of interest and importancea development, moreover, which explains our present situation (since we have inherited it)-we may profitably study the course of Christian thought upon this theme. Such a study may throw some light upon existing perplexities.

I.

Two opposing theories as to the nature of the ResurrectionBody divided early Christian thought between them. The first was profoundly materialistic. It affirmed the retention in the Resurrection not only of the existing particles and form of the human frame but also of the present physical organs, although frankly confessing an inability to explain their usefulness under changed conditions. The strongest early advocate of the gross materiality of the Resurrectionstate is the African Tertullian. He defines body in the following terms :

'Since perverse interpretations are given of what is meant by body," I understand by the human body nothing else than all that fabric of the flesh, whatever be the materials from which it is constructed and modified, which is seen and touched, and even slain by men, just as the "body" of a wall is nothing else than the mortar and the stones and the bricks. If anyone introduces into our discussion some subtle body, let him demon. strate that such a body is the one that can be slain, and I will grant that such is the body of which the Scripture speaks.'

Here we find the matter-of-fact unphilosophic concep

1 De Resurrectione Carnis, xxxv.