notice of the following motion, to be brought before the next meeting.”. "Read it.". "The motion is, 'That any member of this society ceasing to be licensed as an incumbent or a curate in this diocese shall, ipso facto, cease to be a member.' Pray, may I inquire whose motion that is?" said Faithful, who knew that it was levelled against him. "Mr. Oxonford is not obliged to say," answered the chairman, who evidently saw through the whole thing; "he merely gives such a notice." "But I think, Mr. Chairman, if any notice of motion is given at this meeting, we have a right to know from whom it emanates. Mr. Oxonford says that he has been requested to place this notice of motion before the society. Whose motion, then, is it? I may fairly ask. If the real author is ashamed to propose it in person, surely his name, or some name, ought to be given." 66 Name, name," cried Mr. Wishwell, Mr. Fairlight, and some others. Mr. Roodstock here whispered to Mr. Oxonford; and the chairman, seeing their perplexity, suggested that Mr. Oxonford had better give the notice in his own name, as if it were his own motion. "Well, then," said Mr. Oxonford, "I give notice of it as my motion." "This is so important a motion," remarked the chairman, "so directly affecting your established rules, that I think due notice of it ought to be given to all the absent members, that every one of them may have an opportunity of attending, and giving his opinion upon it, at the next meeting." It was accordingly proposed that a written notice should be sent to every member, preparatory to a general muster at the next meeting; which being agreed to, the assembly dispersed. CHAP. XVII. THE PARISH DISTURBED. "Now Ceremony leads her bigots forth,, With hollow form, and gesture, and grimace." COWPER. FAITHFUL retired from the curacy of Cherrydale into a state of private independence in the same parish, when the new rector came into residence. Long, however, before this took place, the minds of the people had been disquieted by the report which had reached them of the strange popish pranks which the new incumbent, or his curate, had been playing in his late parish. "Have you heard, sir," said one of the old parish officers one day to Faithful, "what strange things they tell of our new rector and his curate?" "It is true, Roger, I have heard some strange things; but we must not believe all that we hear." "No, sir, certainly not," replied Roger. "But I suppose," he added, "if you have heard the same things that I have, there must be some truth in them." "Well, what things have you heard? said Faithful, just to learn whether he had heard the same things as himself. "Why, I have heard, sir, that he, or his curate, set up a cross at the foot of the bed of a sick man, and told him to look at that to do him good. They say also that he had a cross set up in one of his rooms upon a table, with a lot of pots of flowers around it, and made his servants bow down before that whenever they came in to prayers. I am told, too, that he forced people to come to him to confess their sins, and that when the persons who came to him were females, he put a towel over his face, and one over the woman's, while he heard her confession." 66 No, no, Roger," said Faithful, "I cannot believe the last. The other things may be true; but I am sure the last must be an exaggeration." 66 Well, then, you think the other is true." "I do not wish to think any thing about it," Faithful replied. "I should not like to believe any thing of the kind, unless I was well certified of it. From whom did you hear what you relate?" "I heard it, sir, from Mr. Trueman, who told me he heard it from a gentleman he met at Cmarket, who came from our new rector's parish, and complaint, he said, had been made of it to the Bishop." "Well, Roger, we cannot always depend upon what we hear. If we wait we shall see in time whether these things are so." Similar stories to the above were continually coming into the parish, and exciting the alarm of the people, so that Faithful was exceedingly glad when the time came for him to retire from the cure. Before, however, he finally gave up the charge of the parish, he faithfully-pointed out to the people, as he felt bound by his ordinatiou vows to do, what were the errors of the day, and so.cmnly warned them to be on their guard—to stand fast in the faith let no man deceive them. But, in order to avoid - to coming into any direct collision with the new rector, he preached his farewell sermon, by a lawful anachronism, a month before he ceased to officiate; after which he carefully abstained from all statements of a controversial character. He had cleared his own conscience, and he left the result with God. When the new rector came to take possession, Faithful (for he always wished to be personally friendly with him) accompanied him to the church, and performed the office of admitting him into his new living. After what he had heard respecting him, he was prepared to notice anything peculiar in his conduct. The first thing he observed was, that when he came to the entrance of the church, he made a stand, put up his hat before his eyes, and, as it appeared to Faithful, who was standing just behind him, made a cross on his breast. When admitted, the new Incumbent locked himself into the church for an unusually long time; but what he was about all the while Faithful knew not, as, being outside, he was not able to witness. After the ceremony of admission was over, they returned together to Faithful's house, where he entertained him; but not a word did the new rector drop about his principles or proposed mode of proceeding. He seemed thoroughly to have learned the doctrine of reserve. And as he was reserved, Faithful was reserved too, and waited for time to develop what were the rector's real tendencies. When he entered upon his duties in the parish, he proceeded, at first, very cautiously (as might be expected after the check he had lately received), making no marked innovations, and preaching only such general truths as would be admitted by all. His sermons, indeed, were distinguished in general by their negative rather than their positive character. A single distinct enunciation of the doctrine of justification by faith, or of the necessity of the Holy Spirit's influence to change the heart, or of any change at all except that which was wrought by baptism, never occurred in his discourses. He dealt almost exclusively in vague generalities; so that, as a pious old man in the parish once happily described his sermons, they began about nothing-they were all about nothing—and they ended in nothing. Not a word ever dropped against Popery; nor would he ever speak of the "Church of England," or of our "Protestant Church," but always in a general way of "Christ's Church." These generalities awakened, of course, no alarm. His endeavour seemed to be, by a most winning gentleness of manner, which was indeed natural to him, to insinuate himself into the hearts of his people, and to gain their affection and confidence. His first two sermons, however, which probably were old sermons taken up in haste, were exceptions to this general description, by containing some rather mysterious statements, which startled the people by their singularity. He spoke much in one of them about the real presence of Christ, and seemed to signify that Christ was or might be really present in any part of the church, in the very stones, and especially in the elements of the Lord's Supper. He argued also, that as Christ was forty days with his apostles after his resurrection, "speaking to them of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God," there must have been many things delivered to them, which have not been committed to writing, but which we are to receive from tradition. But what struck the attention of the people most, was his affirming in one of these sermons, that the places in the Psalms where fire and hail, snow and vapours, beasts and flying fowl are called upon to "praise God," are not to be regarded as mere poetical figures, but that we were to believe that these |