pated such a case in her legislation, nor had occasion to fear it. The only penalty for so doing exists in nature the inconveniences attendant upon such a withdrawal, and the sense of having departed from the most perfect unity of the Church in our country. An example of such withdrawal is not, we may add, on record, and, from the nature of things, will probably never occur.

There are at this date (July, A. D. 1878), in this Church, forty-eight Dioceses, and ten missionary jurisdictions or districts; and there are forty-eight Diocesan Bishops, three assistant Bishops, ten domestic missionary Bishops, three foreign missionary Bishops, and two Bishops resigned.

III. It is hardly necessary to add that, within the limits of the Dioceses, the Church is distributed into the smaller subdivisions of parishes or congregations or societies.

These parishes are all at perfect liberty to manage their own concerns in any way which they may choose, except in those cases where, for their unity and mutual convenience, they conform to the general laws which they themselves have made, and which they may at any time alter, by their delegates in the Diocesan Conventions, and by their deputies in the General Convention. They may elect and settle their own ministers, appropriate their own moneys as they please, hold property independently, etc., etc.

And here it is to be candidly conceded that this absolute independence of the parishes is not always exercised wisely by them, and is liable to very great abuse and drawbacks. Especially in the providing of clerical services, it works badly both for the clergy and the parishes. The large number of unemployed clergymen

and of vacant parishes shows the bad working of too great an independence of parishes in all those religious communions where such independence is the rule. It would certainly be better for both clergy and parishes, if, as in the Methodist system, the parishes and bishops should in some way be required to work together. See further in Section XIII.

Each parish, at an annual parish meeting (holden generally on Easter Monday, which occurs in March or April), elects, for the year, two wardens (the one called the senior and the other the junior warden), whose business it is to advise and assist the pastor. These officers correspond to the deacons of Congregational and Presbyterian Churches. At the same meeting, and for the same term, it elects also a vestry, of an indefinite number, whose business it is to superintend, with the wardens, the secular concerns of the parish, and to attend to all such matters as the parish leaves in their hands after its annual meeting. These officers save the necessity of frequent parish meetings, and are analogous to the trustees or business committees of other denominations.

We will remind the reader, before we pass to another topic, that the territorial divisions of the Protestant Episcopal Church are similar to those of all extensive denominations. Parishes are alike in all. The limits of Synods and Presbyteries, Consociations, Associations, Conferences, etc., are all correspondent to Dioceses. So, too, the General Conference, the General Association, the General Assembly, etc., do each correspond to the General Convention, and take in the extent of the United States and Territories.

The arrangement of its territorial divisions furnishes, therefore, no objection to the Protestant Episcopal Church; while, to say the least, the simplicity and extent of these exhibit convenient instrumentalities for the formation of a united and universal Church.

SECTION IV.

LAWS.

All written-made by the whole Church-laws of the General Convention -laws of the Dioceses-the election of wardens and vestry, and the use of the clerical dress, common customs--liberty in everything not defined by law-clear laws advantageous for unity.

THE laws of the Protestant Episcopal Church are all a lex scripta, written laws, statutes.

They are all made by the whole Church-Bishops, Clergy, and Laity. In the next section this will be further elucidated.

They are as follows:

1. The Constitution and Canons of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States, adopted in the General Convention; also the Resolves of the General Convention. These are obligatory upon the whole Church, in all the dioceses. They are liable to revis ion, change, or repeal, every three years, at each session of the General Convention.

The various orders and rubrics in "The Book of Common Prayer and Administration of the Sacraments and other Rites and Ceremonies of the Church," etc., relate to sundry occasions of public worship, and are also

laws of the General Convention, and liable, like its other laws, to change or repeal every three years.

*

2. The Constitutions and Canons and Resolves of the different Dioceses represented in their Annual Conventions. These are obligatory only in the Dioceses which adopt them. These are liable to repeal or change every year, at each session of the Diocesan Convention.

In the above two classes are all the laws and the only laws of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States with penalties. We have customs; but there is no such thing as a lex non scripta, an unwritten law, a law of custom, or of arbitrary individual enactment, in this Church, for the violation of which a man may be tried or punished.

There are, however, two customs, very common in the Church, which it is proper to allude to. The one is the election of wardens and vestrymen, by the parishes, at their annual meetings. This was a custom adopted from the parish customs of England, and is, we believe, universally practised. It is not, however, enjoined by General Canon, but is assumed as in force in Title I., Canon 14, Section 6, and elsewhere. The legal (corporate) existence of most parishes is, likewise, in almost every instance, through these officers. Most of the Diocesan Conventions have seen fit to provide for their election by special ecclesiastical legislation. The other cus

*This Constitution is in nine articles.

The canons are on various subjects, and are but partially referred to in this treatise. All the previously existing canons were revised and rearranged into a new code, in the General Convention of 1832. This collection is called THE DIGEST; and the canons are arranged under four titles, according to their subjects.

tom is the use of the clerical dress-the bands, surplice, stole, cassock, and gown. This dress is enjoined by ecclesiastical law, only for the particular time and occasion of ordination, as in the Rubrics in the Ordinal. Yet it is assumed by one of our canons as a custom generally followed. See Title I., Canon 9, Section 3 [3]. It is a very general custom, although not, like the former, universal.

In every matter not defined by written law, there is liberty; and no person, clergyman or layman, is liable to ecclesiastical trial for any departure from a mere usage or custom. There are usages and customs so manifestly useful and convenient, that almost all persons conform to them in society as in the Church; and the violator of such usages punishes himself, in losing the respect, just so far, of those who see nothing to be admired in mere eccentricity.

If clear and definite laws, under which every person may accurately know his rights and privileges, as a member of the Church, and be able to defend and to continue them, be praiseworthy as well as important and useful in a Church; and if such be especially necessary in any system proposed to the favorable regards of all Christian people, then may the Protestant Episcopal Church claim the attention, and ask for the kind consideration, of the Christians of the United States, as a Church fitted to heal their differences, and secure them in "the unity of the spirit and in the bond of peace."