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    nature for those who disUked them . The fact was , that the case submitted to their lordships wag really & question of theology ; and he believed no inquiry of the nature of the present was ever yet instituted in their Lordships' House . The truth of religious doctrines could not be

    a fit subject for discussion in either House of Parliament . If any inquiry on this petition were gone into , he apprehended that their Lordships could not alter , far less prohibit , the questions alluded to . The 43 th canon made examination on

    the Church Liturgy and Thirty-nine Articles the duty of the bishop ; and that mode of examination which he had adopted was that which was best calculated for his diocese . The same questions had been used ever since he . was a

    bishop , and had not been objected to ; but if he were wrong , could their Lordships interfere for the purpose of correcting or removing the questions ? If the 48 th canon were to be altered , that surely could be done only by the same authority that made it . Be the allegations of

    the petition what they might , still the subject was not within the jurisdiction of their Lordships . But he did not say this from fear to meet the allegations ; he would shew that they were gross misrepresentations . He would , therefore , describe the examination . The questions referred to in the petition were arranged

    under distinct heads or chapters , and every chapter contained references to the Liturgy of the Church and the . Thirtynine Articles . The object of the inquiries was to know whether the religious opinions of the applicant accorded with the doctrines of the Established Church .

    The petitioner could not pretend that he did not know this , because he had received an explanation , stating the object of the examination ; and that explanation he had printed in his statement of the correspondence . The petitioner and the applicant must therefore have known that the standard alluded to in the

    correspondence meant only the standard of the doctrines of the Church ; and yet it was ventured to be asserted in the petition that he ( the Bishop ) had set up U new and arbitrary standard . If these allegations contained a particle of truth , it would be the duty , not of their Lordships , but of the convocation to

    inter-* ere . Far from his having forsaken the standard of the Established Church , it had been his endeavour to preserve it ; a » d had his endeavours for that object not been successful , their Lordships would never have heard of the present complamt . Nothing coulfl be more ahura than to suppose that the putting seilea ° f questions w * s requiring sub-

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    ftcription to a test or standard . If in subscribing the answers , it appeared that a new standard was subscribed , it was the standard of the person who answered , not of the examiner . But the signature was only req \ nred to authenticate the

    answers , and not as a subscription to any new standard of faith . It wags not sufficient to give a thing a name , and then declaim against it ; the question first to be determined was , whether the name was properly applied . He was at

    a loss to understand how a string of questions could be called a standard of faith . That name might belong to the answers ; but without a perversion of terms it could not be applied to the questions . If his own declaration of

    attachment to the doctrines of the Church , supported by the references under the heads of chapters to the Liturgy and the Thirty-nine Articles were not credited , he would appeal to all hia publications . On receiving answers to the questions , if he found any deviation from

    the doctrines of the Church , he never rejected without remonstrance , and sometimes he had succeeded in correcting deviations . Only those who refused to answer at all were rejected in the first instance . His conduct had always been

    open ; nothing was therefore so easy as bringing proof , if there were any wellfounded complaint against him , and in such a case the absence of proof shewed the impossibility of producing any . The noble Lord had endeavoured to extract

    from his letter to the petitioner an admission of setting up a new standard of faith . But had his standard been different from that of the Established Church , he surely would not have been raised to

    the bench on which he sat . His publications were before the public ; his opinions were well known ; and when he spoke of hi 3 standard , he meant no new standard , but the old standard of Church doctrine . The mode of examination

    which he had thought fit to adopt was particularly necessary at the present time . If great care were not taken , the Church of England would fall into that anomalous state which was exhibited by another church in a part of Switzerland , the clergy of which subscribed to a Calvinistic test , and preached Sociuian doctrines . *

    * This statement produced the following letter in the Times newspaper of June 20 : — " Sir , " Amongst other statements in the speech of the Bishop of Peterborough , in the debate of Thursday last , is one which may serve to shew how far the correctness of that Bight Reverend Prelate is

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    Intelligence e + ^ Parltam entary . Peterborough Questions . 435

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), July 2, 1821, page 435, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2502/page/55/