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in this slight sketch I have to notice is that which began in Oxford rather more than forty years ago. Cambridge had been the nurse, at least, if not the parent-had for nearly half a century been the acknowledged centre-of the Low Church Evangelical revival in the Church of England. Oxford was to be the parent of revived Anglican High Church zeal and devotion. It cannot, indeed, I suppose, be doubted that in a sense the Oxford revival was the result, humanly speaking, of the Evangelical movement during the half-century preceding. It was not merely in great part a reaction from that movement, it was in part a direct fruit of it; at least in this sense, that some of the leading souls in the Oxford movement were first quickened into spiritual life under Evangelical doctrines and in Evangelical homes. Dr. Newman, in his "Apologia," has told us the facts as to himself, and he has never disowned or spoken slightingly of his "conversion" whilst still under what are currently described as Evangelical influences. Similarly, we learn from Canon Liddon's sketch of the life of the late Bishop of Salisbury, Dr. Hamilton, that his conversion took place whilst he was under Evangelical Low Church influences. These instances occur to my memory as I am writing. It is likely that if I were to search I should find others of the same kind; but these two are enough to cite for my purpose. Dr. Newman was in its earlier stage the arch-leader of the High Church revival. Bishop Hamilton was, to the end of his life, one of its brightest and most reverend names. How the movement has advanced during the last forty years I have neither need nor wish to describe in this sketch.

But I wish to point out how these various movements or agencies of which I have been speaking have combined, in a very remarkable manner, to cover the whole ground of English society, and to bring Christianity to bear upon every field, every province, every class. The Methodism of Wesley took hold of colliers, miners, ironworkers, handloom weavers (both in the west and north), upland farmers, northern dalesmen, and some of the larger towns in England, especially where there were manufactures, or an independent shop-keeping middle class. Whitefield's labours stirred up a considerable number of Dissenting congregations, and in conjunction with the "Countess " he gained for his Evangelical doctrines a good lodgment in the leading watering-places of England. Alike at Bath, at the Hotwells at Tunbridge Wells, and at Spafields, Whitefield and her ladyship-one or both-left influential congregations behind them. The Low Church Evangelical movement in the Church of England developed

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largely in the same direction in which the Countess had broken ground; its strongholds were found chiefly in fashionable places of resort and in considerable towns, its adherents belonged chiefly to the middle class, especially the upper middle class. The numerous and powerful circle of which Wilberforce was the centre was of the same class. His most generous and influential supporters were found among the highest ranks of commercial life. Thus it resulted, that notwithstanding all that had been done by Methodism in its various forms, by the Low Church Evangelical movement, by the philanthropic efforts of which Wilberforce and "the Clapham sect were the centre, there were left wide spaces and important sections of England and English society almost untouched by the new life which had flamed so far and so wide through the land. Leaving out of account the west and south-west of England, there was little sign of earnest religious life in any purely agricultural region south-west of the Trent; there was quite as little in the eastern counties; nor was there any more sign of fervency or life in those districts of country north of the Trent where the politicoecclesiastical alliance of the Church and the hereditary landed interest was strictly maintained. In short, in the England of which Oxford may be said to have been pre-eminently the representative-alike in general culture and in political and ecclesiastical tendencies-there was no movement of religious revival and aggression, whatever amount there may have been of steadfast orthodoxy or of religious reverence.

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Now it is precisely these regions of England and the corresponding sections of English life which have at length been reached by means of the Oxford High Church movement. am far from meaning to intimate that within these limits only that movement has been confined; I know that it is far otherwise. Nevertheless the High Church revival was applied first of all to some of the rural parishes, and took hold first of some of the sections of society which I have attempted to describe, and it took hold of them with authority and directness. While elsewhere it encountered organized opposition, here, for the most part, it obtained entrance with comparative ease, and in these spheres of influence the High Church revival has made a powerful impression, whereas the other forms of religious life and organization had, for the most part, failed to strike any root of power.

But High Church zeal has besides applied itself to the reclaiming and converting of the lowest classes of our large towns with great earnestness, and not without success. works more by specific missions, by brotherhoods and sister

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hoods, than the Evangelical section of the Church; it makes less of doctrine and much more of ritual; it is great in services and in public demonstrations; it cultivates attractive music, and makes the Church the theatre of much symbolism and much decoration; its donations are most generous and its charities profuse.

Thus equipped the Anglican High Church has entered into the fellowship of revivals, and has completed the circle for England of religious awakening. The whole land is now full of religious movement-every county, every town, of whatever class, every section of society. Church and Dissent, High Church and Low Church, vie with each other in revival services and in homely mission work. In all this revived energy and activity there are not wanting features which even Christians, each from his own point of view, cannot but regard with doubt and even fear; but surely also there is much on all sides in which Christians of a catholic spirit cannot but rejoice. For myself, I would say with St. Paul," By all means Christ is preached, and therein I do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice." To many Christians-as to myself-the characteristic tenets of High Church Anglicanism seem to savour of serious. and even dangerous error, while extreme Ritualism is regarded by such Christians with a feeling not only of dislike, but of alarm. Yet surely no Evangelical Protestant of a catholic spirit, however strong in his Protestant and Evangelical convictions, can fail to recognize much good in a party which numbers among its leading men such preachers as Canon Liddon, and such working clergy as the newly-appointed Bishop of Lichfield. There is large common ground between such men and earnest Evangelicals. Whatever their High Anglicanism may mean, whatever it may imply from which an Evangelical Low Churchman or a Nonconformist is bound strongly to dissent, it is certain that Evangelical doctrine forms the main staple in the ordinary public ministrations of such High Churchmen as I have named. Therefore, even those who utterly dread all hierarchical claims, especially as touching confession, penance, and the sacraments, may, notwithstanding, thank God for such men, and for such revival work as that with which they are identified. So, on the other hand, I would fain hope that all large-hearted and truly cultivated High Churchmen cannot but rejoice in the labours and influence of such men as Dr. Vaughan and Dean Howson, however they may differ from them as to points of great importance. Nor would I allow myself to doubt that, although to many Churchmen Dissent as such may be an offence,-Nonconformity, even in the mildest form of Metho

dism, a grievous delinquency,-and the doctrine preached in some at least of the pulpits of Baptists, or Congregationalists, or Methodists, especially by the least instructed and refined among the preachers of these sects, may appear as perilous an extreme as the most highly developed and emblazoned ritualism appears to be to an old-fashioned Protestant Dissenter, yet, on the whole, earnest and thoughtful Churchmen cannot but thank God for the Christian work done by such men as Thomas Binney in the last generation, as Dr. Stoughton through a life still happily continued among us, as the powerful preacher of the Surrey Tabernacle, strong Dissenter though he may be, during the last five-and-twenty years. In our controversy with infidelity the Christian union of forces, virtually represented by our Victoria Institute, for ours is an omni-denominational, or else an undenominational, union, cannot afford to ignore our common Christian basis of faith, or the common Christian life which; ramifies through all our various organizations and developments, and which leavens. with Christian conviction and feeling the different classes of our English population.

In the presence of the common foe of us all-the terrible blight of agnostic unbelief which has withered so much fair promise in our Universities, which has so strongly infected our civil service all over the world, which makes so considerable a figure in our social circles, which seeks to inspire all our periodical literature, and has deeply tainted not a little of it-it seems as if there were just now a special need for cultivating in all Christian circles, and among all professors of faith in Christ, a liberal and loving spirit; for seeking, apart from mere forms, to realize "the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace and in righteousness of life."

My object, however, in this address is not, even incidentally, to read a homily on Christian charity, however brief, and however noble may be the theme, but to attempt a sketch of the progress which Christianity has made in this country since the time of George II. and his favourite minister Walpole; to note, as I said awhile ago, the agencies which Providence has employed during the last century to raise up the power of Christian faith and religion in the country; to mark the successive waves of force and influence which have carried Christian energy and life into all parts of the land and into all sections of society, and which serve, in a general way, to indicate, to register, the interval between the Christianity of to-day and that of the first half of the eighteenth century. It is for this reason that I have referred specifically to different sections of the Church of England in their several

influences and operations, and to the work respectively of the national Church, as such, and of the various great Dissenting bodies. All these may be said, with insignificant exceptions, to agree as Christians on the common basis of the Apostles' Creed; all recognize as their common foe that infidelity which it is one of the special objects of this Institute to resist and refute; in their combined operations they represent the total Christianity of our land as organized for aggression against sin and evil, and for defence of the Divine revelation of truth. and life in Christ Jesus.

And what a marvellous contrast does the Christianity of England as thus regarded present to the condition of this country at the period to which I have referred! What the moral and religious state of England was in the early part of the last century may be learnt from Mr. Leckie's "History of the Eighteenth Century" better even than from the reports of the Society for the Reformation of Manners, as published during the very period. We complain to-day of the wicked rudeness of our street boys in certain parts of London, insulting passengers, and especially women, as they move to and fro. But what are the worst excesses of our street scum to-day compared to the daring and customary outrages of the fashionable Mohocks of London, in the most frequented westend thoroughfares, during the first third of the last century? To have put down with a strong hand those gentlemen Mohocks was counted one of the high merits of England's greatest Minister of that age. Those were days in which famous highwaymen were favourites in fashionable society, kept their lodgings publicly in St. James'-street and Jermynstreet, were privileged to fight duels with military officers, and openly played bowls on the best-frequented greens and in the company of the most highly titled of the nobility. Intemperance the intemperance of the masses of the people-is often spoken of as one of the special curses and disgraces of our time; and curse indeed it is, beyond power of words to describe its shame and its horrors. Gin-drinking, in particular, is the peculiar disgrace and ruin of London and of our larger cities. Nevertheless, the gin-drinking of to-day is positively inconsiderable in proportion when compared with the gin-drinking of 1750. Even our lowest classes accordingly, the classes which we sometimes think have defied so obstinately and so hopelessly the ameliorating influences of our Christianity during the present century, have notwithstanding shared, more or less, in the general improvement. It cannot be doubted that the language, the morals, the manners to-day of the Seven Dials or Ratcliff-highway are

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