Entroduction

Τ

IT may be well to state clearly the

scope

and

design of this publication, and the reason

of the form into which it is thrown.

Its scope and design is to sketch the highest ideal of the work of a Cathedral-an ideal which is probably only partially and imperfectly realized even in the best administered of our present Cathedral Institutions.

I have thought that the tracing of this ideal was the best answer that I (being one of the persons directly appealed to) could give to the letter of May 20th, 1869, addressed by the English Primates to the deans of the Cathedral Churches of England and Wales. That letter succeeded a meeting of the deans at Lambeth, "called" expressly "to consider what

improvements could with advantage be made in the Cathedral system, and what is the best mode of effecting such improvements." We are asked in it to suggest to the Primates "any change which" we "may consider as of great importance for the" Cathedrals "over which we" (respectively) "preside," and also to "state whether any means at present exist in the regular system of" our "Cathedral government for effecting such changes as" we "think desirable." A question put by such authority, and taken in connexion with the state of feeling in the country and the Church on the subject of the Cathedrals, must not be answered in a superficial or perfunctory way. Simple and inoffensive as are the terms of the question, and certainly not calculated in themselves to awaken apprehension, yet we know that there is a grave issue behind them, even the safety and continued existence of the Institutions, which are made the subject of Archiepiscopal inquiry. The Primates of England are not likely to seek