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Disconnecting Church and State: Richard Whately’s Ideas in the 1830s

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 June 2017

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Extract

Addressing the clergy of his diocese in 1831, Bishop John Kaye of Lincoln spoke frankly. “We cannot be surprised at being told,” he said, “as we often are, that the days [of the established church] are already numbered, and that it is destined to sink…before the irresistible force of public opinion.” A similar warning appeared a few years earlier when, in his provocative little book Church Reform, Edward Berens urged the Church to acknowledge public opinion before it lost the public altogether.

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Research Article
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Copyright © North American Conference on British Studies 2003

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References

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12 There are three major biographies of Richard Whately. The first to appear was John Fitzpatrick’s Memoir of Richard Whately, 2 vols. (London, 1864). Whately’s daughter Elizabeth Jane published The Life and Correspondence of Richard Whately, 2 vols. (London, 1866). The most recent is from Akenson, D. H., A Protestant in Purgatory: Archbishop Whately of Dublin (Hamden, Conn. [n. s. 2] 1981).Google Scholar The Dictionary of National Biography, 20:1334-40 provides the most succinct account of Whately’s career and identifies him as “an independent liberal,” enthusiastic teacher, pioneer of social science, reformer of tertiary education, and seminary training, an anti-evangelical and advocate of civil rights for Dissenters and Jews. The largest single collection of Whately’s papers is now held by the Library of Oriel College, Oxford.

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16 Mather, High Church Prophet, p. 205.

17 Both editions of Moral Philosophy and the View of Christian Evidences were published in London in 1859. Another edition, Christian Evidences, intended chiefly for the Young, was published in London in 1864.

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24 Article 4 of the Act of Union provided: “the four Lords Spiritual of Ireland by rotation of sessions…shall be the number to sit and vote on the part of Ireland in the House of Lords.” Article 8 was more precise: the Primate of Ireland was to sit in the first session, Dublin in the second, Cashel in the third, and Tuam in the fourth. See Akenson, D. H., The Church of Ireland: Ecclesiastical Reform and Revolution, 1800-1885 (New Haven, Conn., 1971), pp. 7273.Google Scholar

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29 Ibid. According to Turberville (House of Lords, pp. 297-98), the bill might have passed, had all the bishops either abstained or voted for it.

30 Chadwick, Victorian Church, 1:25-29; and Best, Temporal Pillars, pp. 245, 272-73.

31 The Times, 12 October 1831.

32 Smith, House of Lords, p. 86.

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36 Weston, C. C., English Constitutional Theory and the House of Lords, 1556-1832 (London, 1965), p. 167ffGoogle Scholar.

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43 William Warburton, Bishop of Gloucester in the eighteenth century, defended the alliance of Church and State as a form of social contract. He thought that the Church, left to itself, had no security against external violence and therefore sought the protection of the State. Warburton, The Alliance between Church and State (3rd ed.; London, 1748), pp. 88ff. See also Cragg, G. R., Reason and Authority in the Eighteenth Century (Cambridge, 1964)Google Scholar, ch. 7. Bishop Horsley’s praise for Warburton’s argument can be found in Evans, A. W., Warburton and the Warburtonians (Oxford, 1932), pp. 4647.Google Scholar

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48 Whately, E. J., Life and Correspondence, 116871Google Scholar; and Best, Temporal Pillars, p. 286, n.l.

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56 Whately, Richard, Errors of Romanism, traced to their Origin in Human Nature (London, 1830), pp. 282–84.Google Scholar

57 Thompson, Kenneth A., Bureaucracy and Church Reform (Oxford, 1970), pp. 18, 9899;Google Scholar in a similar vein, Solloway, R. A. has pointed out frelates and People: Ecclesiastical Thought in England, 1783-1852 [London, 1969], p. 228)Google Scholar that Whately, unlike the Whig aristocrats, had little fear of Chartism and socialism; he was more worried about “churchmen like Phillpotts.”

58 London Review, 1, 1 (1829): 78-79.

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60 See Chadwick, Victorian Church, 1310-11. The idea of Convocation attracted much support, although few persons really knew its history of administrative anomalies. Some clergy petitioned Queen Victoria on her accession, asking for her help to revive Convocation; others worried that it might become too democratic a body and generate factionalism and even “schisms.” See Brown, R., Church and State, p. 97.Google Scholar

61 W, R.., Letters on the Church, p. 141Google Scholar, Biber, George (Bishop Blomfield and his Times [London, 1857])Google Scholar, was one of many Victorian writers to praise Blomfield’s talents and energy for administration.

62 W, R.., Thoughts on Church Government: being the Substance of a Charge, delivered at the Visitation of the Diocese and Province (London, 1844), appendix.Google Scholar

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64 R.W. to Grey, 19 September 1832. GPDUL.

65 Chadwick,, Victorian Church, 1:62.

66 Best, Temporal Pillars, p. 278.

67 Mill, J. S., “Aristocracy,” in London Review (1836), 2283306Google Scholar; and “Of What Use is the House of Lords?” in Westminster Review (1836): 24:47-79. Annual Register (1836), 78:208; Hansard, 3rd ser., vol. 33 (1836), 311-22.

68 Turberville, House of Lords, pp. 317-18; Journals of the House of Commons, 92:59; Hansard, 3rd ser., vol. 36 (1836), 609-33.

69 Henley’s, Plan of Church Reform, 6th ed., “With a Letter to the King” (London, 1832)Google Scholar, saw eight quick editions after it first appeared.

70 Turberville, , House of Lords, p. 307.Google Scholar

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78 Chadwick, Victorian Church, 1:312.

79 Ibid.

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