THE DUNEDIN BISHOPRIC.

Evening Star, Issue 3359, 25 November 1873, Page 2

THE DUNEDIN BISHOPRIC.

Wo have received a copy of the following letter published by the Eight Kev, Dr Jcnner, in reply to the Primato of New Zealand To the Right Rev. the Lodl Bishop of Christchurch, Primate of New Zealand. Preston Vicarage, Sandwich, 2nd July, 1873. My Lord,—l have received from you a printed letter on the Dunedin Bishopric controversy, on which I beg to offer a few remarks. You protest against the action of the Home Episcopate, who have, with some emphasis, expressecl their opinion on the question at issue ; and against the testimony borne by the various diocesan ami other almanacks, including that of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. I do not wonder at your mortification. It is indeed certain that the treatment I have met with at the hands of the New Zealand Church is universally condemned at Horae. Nor does any one, that I know of, doubt the validity of my claim to be what the almanacks, as well as the Bishops, designate me. The Archbishops and Bishops of the Church of England, assembled at Lambeth on the sth February. 1872, decided to recognise Dr Nevill as Second Bishop of Dunedin, thereby clearly, as you point out, recognising me as the First. Whether in this they are consistent—whether Dr Nevill can in any sense be regarded as Bishop of Dunedin is, I think, open to question. Consecrated before I had resigned the See, in avowed disregard of my rights. I conceive that his exactly the case to which St. Cyprian’s dictum would apply: “ Quisqui* post unurn, qui nolns esse debeat,' foetus est, non jam second us tile, sed n ullus ed' (Ep. ad Anton). But as my object is not so much to attack Dr Nevill’s position as to vindicate my own, I shall not enter upon this branch of the subject. You object to the action of the English Bishops, because (yon say) one Ecclesiastical Province has no light to interfere in the concerns of another. This is no doubt true. But surely there is no interference here, still less assumption of authority, as you also seem to imply. All that the English Bishops had to decide was, how they were to treat a prelate who came to them claiming to be the lawful possessor of a See in a Provincial Church, at whose instance they bad already consecrated a Bishop for that same Sec; of which See the Bishop so consecrated still claimed to be the first occupant. What assumption of “ authority,” what “ interference” is there here?_ But, you contend, the opinion of the Bishops was formed on insufficient information - a statement to me, I confess, quite incomprehensible. You cannot surely forget who was present among those Bishops -even your predecessor in the New Zealand Primacy ; one who of all men had the most to do with this case ; one who is more familiar than any with the constitution and statutes of the New Zealand Church ; one, lastly, who is utterly incapable of suppressing or distorting facts. Certainly the suggestion of insufficient information does appear rather ridiculous. You profess, yourself, to supply the information desiderated; but yon do very little more than repeat the old and oft-nfuted arguments. There is, perhaps, one new feature in your letter—viz., the reference to a former letter of yours addressed to me, in which you say that you did not see how my consecration had'been brought about, inasmuch as no formal resignation of that part of your diocese . . . had been sent in. But it is important to observe that the extract from your letter of November 5, 1866. gives by no means a fair account of what you said. In the original, which now lies before me. I read as follows the difference of complexion is obvious when the omitted portions— those within [ ] are added : " My Dear Brother, —The last mail brought us the intelligence of your proposed consecration on Aug 24, an event which I trust has been realised, though it is not yet clear to us how it has been brought about. [A Patent is of course out of the question, ami the nullity of the one granted to mo, uud_ which with my brother Bishops I offered resign, has hieu proved from the fact of your consecration,] inasmuch as no formal resignation of that part of my diocese which lies within the Provinces of Otago and Southland has been sent iu by me [in accordance with the requirements of the Patent. The authorities at Homo have evidently acted upon the assumption -and I am thankful that they havo done so—that the Patents convey no territorial jurisdiction.] I hope that for the future the settlement of this and other matters will be left to the Church iu the Colony.” Then, having thus expressed your belief that Letters Patent are null, and convey no territorial jurisdiction (which amounts to a conation that you had none, fov BQ other authority

had even pretended to confer it on yon), you proceed in the clearest manner to recognise ray status. Your next words are [“ Some few weeks before the arrival of the mail, I had issued directions for the general election of a new Rural Deanery Board, in what I hope I ma/’ now call yonr diocese. Of course I shall now recall them ; but I would recommend you at once to request the Rev. Mr Edwards, the Rural Dean, to take steps for the election of your Synod.”]

Now if all this does not mean that yon consented to my consecration on the distinct understanding that I was to have for my diocese the two Provinces of Otago and Southland, and that you encouraged me to act in every respect as if I was, at the date of your letter, Bishop of that diocese, all I can say is that I am igno rant of the meaning of the language. _ And if yon plead that at that date you were ignorant of the circumstances under which my consecration had been brought about, I quote the following passage from a letter written by you six months after that event —a period when the whole of the circumstances were known to you : “I have consulted with .... and have come to the conclusion that no steps should be taken in convening your Synod until your arrival, and that the necessary steps be taken by yourself in person. The General Synod will meet in 18G8, and be held at Dunedin, if you shall have arrived—otherwise, at Auckland. Pei haps the formal settlement of your territorial jurisdiction will have to remain in abeyance until then, but practically it will be determined by your presence among ns.” (I may here observe that the fact of the General Synod of 1805 having resolved that the Synod of 1808 should he held at Dunedin, if there should by that time be a Bishop there, affords the strongest proof that the General Synod contemplated the erection of the See of Dunedin, without any further action of theirs). My Lord, I challenge yon to prove that, in all onr correspondence, you ever gave me the least, intimation that, there might bo a difficulty about the division of the diocese. It is manifest that the contrary is the truth, namely, that you allowed and encouraged me to be consecrated under the full impression, conveyed in every letter of yours, that you had virtually resigned a definite portion of yonr diocese to me. This, I solemnly assert you led ine'to believe, and I trusted to your good faith. With what result ?

I protest against your appealing to the resolutions of the Rural Deanery Board of 22nd February, 18(10, as if they were of any force. It cannot surely be necessary to remind you that you yourself, as Bishop of the Diocese, vetoed these resolutions, thus not only rendering them of none effect, but preventing them (and they were actually the only formal expression of dissatisfaction at my appointment) from reaching me in time to arrest consecration. Never, until some months after that irrevocable step had been taken, wa» I made aware that any dissatisfaction existed. Had I been allowed to receive these resolutions, yon mav be sure I should not have presented myself for consecration, and thus I should have escaped tire tremendous injury, which, to 1 the eternal disgrace, of the New Zealand Church, has been inflicted upon me. You maintain that thoProvinccs of Otago and Southland could not have been separated from Canterbury, and made a new diocese without the formal act of the General Synod. I havcalready shown.parenthetically, that the General Synod contemplated the establishment of the Diocese of Dunedin without any further Synodical action, between 1805 and 1868. But your perpetual appeals to your own territorial jurisdiction, invaded, as you contend, by my consecration to the See of Dunedin, render it necessary to inquire hy whom the limits of ('hristchnrch Diocese were defined ; in ether words, how did the three Provinces become your Diocese at all ? You only mention your Letters Patent (p. 9 of your letter), but you know perfectly well that it lias been decided by the Privy Council that Letters Patent have no power to convey territorial jurisdiction. And if.you fall back, as in consistency you arc bound to do, on the General Synod, yon are confronted hy the fact that the General Synod has never assigned you any particular area as a Diocese. So I ask, in utter amazement, why it should he so absolutely essential that the General Synod should do for me what it has never done for you, or,, indeed, for any other New Zealand Bishop? If I was not made Bishop of the Diocese of Dunedin by my consecration, neither weie you made Bishop of the Diocese of Christchurch tv yours. This is not my line of argument, remeinher. but merely an application of yours. I freely admit that, by general consent, though not hy any Synodical act, you became Bishop of the three Provinces ; but then I say that bv general consent of Bishops (including'yourself), clergv, and laity, I became Bishop of two of them. In proof of your consent, I need only refer to your own conduct and your own letters to myself and others; which also show how universally I was accepted (in your judgment) by the clergy and laity of Otago and Southland. I beg you to remember that, from November 1896 down to June 1868, you. in common with everybody else, invariably addressed me as Bishop of Dunedin. You sat with me in the Lambeth Conference of 1867. and, with me, signed its acts. You gave me no intimation of any dissent on your part from my assumed position, which if unauthorised, must have been schismatical. You wrote to Mr Oldham in 1867, referring to Resolutions passed by the Rural Deanery Board in February of that year, in the«e terms . “ It is impossible to read these resolutions without accepting the conclusion that the Rural Deanery Board, representing as it did the Church in the Provinces of Otago and Southland, acquiesced, to say the least, in the appointment of Dr -Tenner.”

It is unnecessary to say more. This one letter is sufficient; and it is not evacuated of its force by your recent discovery that the resolutions referred to were based on a misconception, inasmuch as I was not consecrated “ Bishop of the See of Dunedin.” but only “a Bishop in the Colony of New Zealand.” Vor herein you misquote the language of the resolution. I have lying before me the official copy sent to me, in the handwriting of the Secretary, Mr (Banger, an I I find the word “for” where you write “of” — “ for the See,” not “of the See.” And if I was not consecrated for the See of Dunedin, I ask, what was the intention of those who consecrated me, or who procured my consecration ? But I have said enough. The whole subject is too painful and humiliating to be dwelt upon longer than is absolutely necessary. Had it not been for the appearance of your pamphlet, I should not again have broken silence, that is, until the next Lambeth ( '(inference, when it will, doubtless, be necessary to re-open the whole question. But I cannot conclude without once more, and for the last time, reiterating my oftdelivered challenge to refer the whole dispute between us to a fair arbitration. This would settle the question for ever ; in no other way that I can see can it be settled. I protest that I cannot understand what reason, save a conviction of the weakness of your case, there can be fqr refusing this offer. Bishop Nevil! has told me that he, for one, “declines the proposed arbitration, lest he should compromise the whole ecclesiastical province of New Zealand, and imply a doubtfulness ,ou their part of their position, which they are not willing to allow. But after the ]>ronbuncement of the English Bishops -to which I assure you they adhere, in spite of your letters - you cannot intrench yourselves behind any infallible certainty. And now that the Bishop of Nelson is in England, the difficulty of getting the views of the New Zealand (ffiurch fairly represented will bo removed. For my part, I am willing to give you almost any advantage you like to demand, whether in the choice of arbitrators or in the basis of the arbitration. I pledge myself not to revoke my resignation, even if the award should be in my favor. And if it ' , o€s against me, I will freely retract and apologise for all that I have hitherto maintained in tins controversy. My Lord, I claim an answer to this my challenge, and I pray that Hod will guide you, and the Church over which you preside, to a right judgment thereon. —I remain, &.c., H. L. Jknnkii D.D., First Bishop of Dunedin. PS I have omitted to notice one argument of yours. At p. If you endeavor to explain the action of the Metropolitan Bishop (Sclwyn) in procuring the selection and consecration of all the other New Zealand Bishops, as well as of myself, by the suggestion that tins was done, in their case, before the Church Constitution jwd come into operation, a l’ 6

facts? Wellington and Nelson were provided with Bishops in 1859. The Church Constitution, by virtue and by means of which the General Synod was called into operation, was passed in 1857. The truth is that the notion of territorial jurisdiction being given by the (Tenoral Synod was an afterthought, and was never acted upon in the case of any See in New Zealand, except Dunedin, in 1808, and in that instance only as a means of supplanting me. To this day, neither Auckland, Waiapu, Wellington, Nelson, or Christchurch, have had their geographical limits defined by the General Synod ; though it was asserted by Bishop Solwyn. in his opening address to the General Synod of 1808, that since it had been “ decided by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council (20th March, 1805) that the Crown has no power to assign to a Bishop any Diocese in a Colony which is possessed of an independent Legislature, it would become the duty of the General Synod to define, from time to time, the boundaries of Dioceses.”