And here it may not be amiss to say one word upon the principle of a Memorial to such a body as the Royal Commission. I believe there are some who think it improper to memorialize the Commissioners, as if it were like petitioning a judge to convict or acquit a prisoner placed upon his trial before him. Of course, if the cases were parallel, it would be most improper and indecent. But a moment’s reflection will shew the difference. The Commission is not a court of justice at all. It has no judicial functions at all. There is no more objection to memorializing it than there is to petitioning Parliament. It is a body of men appointed to collect evidence, and afterwards to give an opinion as to what is expedient. It is then in the very nature of things, of high moment and importance that these Commissioners should know and understand what large masses of earnest Churchmen are thinking and feeling, whilst they are finding their way to their recommendations. It is a duty upon us to let them know what these feelings are, and what consequences are likely to result to the Church, when we see their tendency, nay, _more than tendency_, to lead an assault upon the Prayer Book. It is not only not improper, but it is a part of high and holy duty, which we owe to ourselves, to our Book of Common Prayer, to our faith, to the Church of England, to Christendom at large—nay, to God, our Maker, Redeemer, and Sanctifier, to say openly and plainly, solemnly and earnestly, “We will have no tampering with our faith; we will have no altering our Prayer Book; we will have no legislation in this matter of Ritual;” and this all the more; all the more deeply felt, the more strongly urged, _became_ we see that this is a wholly one-sided movement. We hear of no restraint or restriction, no new Canons or new enactments, when men fall short of the requirements of the Church and the Church’s law; when churches are closed from Sunday to Sunday; when Christ’s people are starved and stinted of their spiritual food and sustenance by few and far-distant communions; when Services and Lessons are altered, and Services garbled and curtailed at the will of this or that priest. Nay, we hear of no “simple and positive enactments,” even when men within the Church’s pale deny the inspiration of the Holy Scriptures; impute absolute ignorance to Christ our Lord, the ever-blessed Son of God; as, that He did not know as much about the authorship of the Pentateuch, or the date of certain of the Psalms, or other facts concerning the Holy Scriptures, as modern doctors could tell Him; none, when we hear denied the possibility of miracles; none, when we find explained away and rejected the duration without end of Hell; none, when it is maintained that we ought not to pray to the Son of God. I say that upon these subjects we hear of no Royal commissions, no Bishop’s charges recommending new enactments; no impending legislation to place such teaching under the disability of “_abeyance_” even “until further order be taken;” but here, where the law of the Church as to ceremonies and vestments (things no doubt important, because no doubt representing doctrine and connected with it, but certainly not more important than those other subjects to which I have alluded), but here, where these ceremonies and vestments, are the objects of ignorant clamour and brutal violence, the Prayer Book is to be altered, and new law is to be made, actually to put a penalty on those who have been guilty only of the crime of obeying it as it is.