completed, perhaps before, a new series of divisions will commence, and our dioceses will become really small. It is not probable that any man living will see the conclusion of the first process or the commencement of the second. But small dioceses will ultimately be discovered to be a necessity of the Church. We want free churches-vigorous and permanent missions, both in the cities and in the country. These cannot be had without vigorous diocesan efforts. People must learn to bear the burdens of others as well as their own-to support clergymen who do not minister to them and their families. The Bishops and clergy must teach them these things. They must be accustomed to diocesan action, instead of parochial or society action. But the conditio sine qua non of all this is mutual confidence among Bishops, clergy, and laity. This mutual confidence implies intimacy, and intimacy implies small dio

ceses.

The affections can only be effectually cultivated in a small society, and by frequent intercourse. The family is the divinely appointed school for the affections. It is a small society, and the communication between its members frequent. It has been frequently observed that men, not remarkably good men, are capable of forming strong attachments within limited circles. Every regiment in the British army has a strong esprit de corps, and a strong attachment exists among the officers. They meet every day at mess. The connection of an American officer with his regiment, which is scattered all over the country, is little more than nominal. The members of the bar are not, as a class, better men than physicians-not so good as the clergy; but they agree better. It is because they are more together, and have more mutual intercourse than either.

At present the intercourse between the Bishop and his clergy is very slight; that between him and his laity nominal. The visitation of a parish occupies a day, or perhaps a single occasion of public worship. The Bishop dines, probably in haste, or, at most, spends the evening and night with the clergyman, or, if that be not found convenient, with one of the vestry. All parties are occupied with the business of the day. If the Bishop be a man of commanding talents or eminently Christian deportment, he may have made a favourable impression on a very few

persons. But the great bulk of the people know nothing of him, but that he is a great preacher. Then come the conventions, three days roll by, crowded with the business of the meeting and with the private business of the members, the few leisure moments occupied in the giving or receiving a hurried hospitality, which gives men but a very slender opportunity of learning anything about each other. In three days they separate for a year. The Bishop knows little of the clergy, the clergy little of the Bishop,-both less of the laity, except some few individuals whom circumstances have rendered prominent.

Hence comes distrust, and from distrust the spirit of party, and the yet worse spirit of clique, which are so rife among us. The remedy is small dioceses. A Bishop who was able to visit every parish in his diocese once or twice a year, and to spend a day or two among the people, would be a very different per son from one who is seen as a passenger for a few hours once in two or three years. This would be a great change in the policy of the Church, and therefore it must be made slowly; still it must be made. In many things the American Church must become less Anglican, less European, and more primitive.

H. D. E.

NOTE. There has been some discussion as to the construction of the Fifth Article of the Constitution of the General Convention. This induced the writer of the above article to express his views, on the question, in the Baltimore Monitor, of which he is the editor. The subject is so closely connected with the subject of the above paper, that he has been induced to append the article from the Monitor as a note.

The Fifth Article of the Constitution of the General Convention.-A very curious question has arisen, as to the true meaning of a clause which was inserted into the fifth article of the Constitution at the General Convention of 1856. The discussion has been generally carried on by clergymen, who, after the manner of men of their profession when dealing with questions of interpretation, have perplexed the matter by referring to the opinions and recollections of distinguished men, who have been concerned in the concoction of the clause. According to the true principles of interpretation, all these are beside the matter. The legal principle is, that every document must be construed, according to a common phrase, within its four corners. What it means agreeably to the literal and grammatical sense of its language and nothing else, is its true meaning. In order that we may be intelligible to our readers, we subjoin the clause, about which the difficulty has arisen, premising that all the difficulty is in the first sentence, and in the three first members of that sentence. The clause is as follows:

No such new Diocese shall be formed which shall contain less than fifteen self-supporting parishes, or less than fifteen presbyters who have been for at least one year canonically resident within the bounds of such new Diocese, regularly settled in a parish

or congregation, and qualified to vote for a Bishop. Nor shall such new Diocese be formed if thereby any existing Diocese shall be so reduced as to contain less than thirty self-supporting parishes, or less than twenty presbyters who have been residing threa and settled and qualified as above mentioned, provided that no city shall form more than one Diocese.

It will be observed, that the first member of the sentence contains a general prohibition, which is qualified by the other two. The question is, whether the qualifications be cumulative, so as to require, in order to make them operative, the union of those contained in both the second and third members of the sentence, or alternative, so as to operate, if either of the conditions be cocaplied with. Are the second and third members of the sentence cumulative, so that they must unite in producing the qualification, or alternative, so that either of them will produce it? It cannot be denied, that the sentence is an awkward one, and presents some difficulty. Yet, notwithstanding the use of the disjunctive particle "or," we have never been able to understand the sentence alternatively; although we should be very glad so to do. We must confess, however, that we have not found it easy to assign reasons for the view which we have taken. It seems to us, notwithstanding, to be the natural, and therefore the true, view. The other is a mere grammatical refinement.

We do not even believe, that it is a sound refinement; for it seems to us, that in this case, the use of the copulative, or of the disjunctive, particle, is a matter of perfect indifference. The precept, so to speak, is a negative one, and prohibits every thing of which it speaks. It prohibits the formation of a diocese, which shall not have certain qualifications. It therefore prohibits the formation of any diocese, which does not possess all those qualifications which it enumerates; and this equally, whether it enumerate them conjunctively or disjunctively.

Were it an affirmative precept, the case would be different. Did it read thus, any diocese may be formed, which shall contain not less than fifteen self-supporting parishes, or not less than fifteen presbyters, it would clearly be alternative; and were the word "and" substituted for the word “or," it would be as clearly cumulative. But there is a difference between a general enabling clause and an exception out of a prohibition. Because the prohibition is always definite, and so constitutes a precise obstruction which must be over

come.

Looking at the sentence grammatically, we see that the two first members are complete, and that the third has no verb. Were the second stricken out, the first and third could not be read together so as to make sense. This difficulty must be gotten over, by considering the verb in the second member of the sentence to be, what grammarians call, understood in the third. That is, it is supposed to be repeated, and its meaning carried into the new position. It is, in fact, the same thing as if it were again introduced in the second place. The sentence in question means, then, the same as if read thus: No diocese shall be formed which shall contain less than fifteen self-supporting parishes, or shall contain less than fifteen presbyters. Had it been thus written, no one could have doubted that the clauses were cumulative, and that both fifteen parishes and fifteen presbyters were necessary to the formation of a diocese.

If it had been the design to make the qualifications alternative, all ambiguity would have been easily removed, by writing: No diocese shall be formed, which shall not contain either fifteen parishes, or fifteen presbyters. But that is not the language; and we confess that there is a difficulty. But how the words are to be so interpreted as to be made alternative, we do not see. If the verb "contain" is understood, they are not so. If it be not understood, the third member of the sentence means nothing.

OUR DEBT TO LAFAYETTE.

OUR SUBJECT, in itself, is so far from being a novel one, that the very name of it must seem to imply old facts, old thoughts, so old, indeed, as to be generally let alone. We might put in a plea that, old as they are, they do not deserve to be regarded as superannuated; that the generous enterprise, the romantic devotion with which they are intermingled and inspired, are enough to keep them young; that the recollection of benefits, whether national or individual, is one of those things which we cannot put aside as uninteresting, without confessing ourselves ungrateful; in short, there is no want of reasons for recurring to the incidents and the sentiments which the subject at once suggests.

But there is a stronger motive than any as yet mentioned for recalling the familiar story. It is not, familiar as it seems, more than superficially known. The details are in a thousand volumes; but their relations amongst themselves, or those which they sustain to the history of our nation, are not generally regarded as they might and as they should be. We may not be able to repair the deficiency; but the experiment is worth trying.

What was France at the time of the Declaration of Independence, that she should sympathize, much more ally herself with the infant nation? There was her monarchy, a system of government to which every principle of republicanism was abhorrent. There were her dominant classes, the clergy and the nobility, without a shadow of favour for movements so mischievous and so impious, they would say, as those then separating the colony from the mother country, the subjects from the rulers. The people of France might have entered into the cause of the United States but for one obstacle-that there was no people, worthy to be called such, in all the wide realms of the French name. Men there were, and women, and children, a race of inferior circumstance and inferior character; indeed, so inferior as to render the great mass of Frenchmen helpless. degraded, ruined. What was the American Revolution to them? They had never heard of it. If they had, they

would have possessed no influence in its behalf, they would have had no effect in inducing the Government to come to its aid. Indeed, it may be doubted if any class or any power in France would have thought of countenancing the rebellious colonies of England but for two circumstances.

One was the ancient animosity between France and England. Let us give it its full weight, for it was of the gravest importance. It prompted all France,-government, clergy, nobility, and those of the people who thought about the matter, to do what was possible toward depriving England of a dominion that constituted, as Lafayette said, "more than half, and that the better half, of the British territory." Give this feeling its full force: how full a force it had, is universally known.

But the other circumstance remains. All the animosity of France against Great Britain might, we do not say would, but might, not have persuaded her to commit herself to the support of the struggling colonies. Two State papers, of the early part of 1776, the one from the Count de Vergennes, and the other from Turgot, show the Government to have had no spark of sympathy for the Americans; this minister regards their exhaustion, that one their subjection, as an issue to be looked and wished for, and both unite in considering the whole contest as a civil war of eminent service to France, especially if it were let alone, and allowed to rock the British dominions to their centre. We repeat it, there is no sign that France would have committed herself, but for the example set and the enthusiasm inspired by an individual. Lafayette, as a member of the great French nobility, had an influence which no one in any other rank could have exerted. In the first place, whatever he did, was sure to be known. Moving in such a sphere, every act, whether the star of good or of bad omen, the light that filled the zenith or that merely flashed in the horizon, was witnessed of men, of the high and of the low. In the next place, a cause espoused by such a man was respected if for nothing more than the fact that he had espoused it. When, in addition, it was a cause which he could not support without grave risks and serious sacrifices, the lightest hearted could not but stay to ask about it, and what was at first mere curiosity, became interest,