BISHOP ELECT OF WELLINGTON.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIII, Issue 965, 11 March 1911, Page 4

BISHOP ELECT OF WELLINGTON.

The Rev Thomas Henry Sprott, who was last Wednesday appointed to the Bishopric of Wellington, is a man of great qualifications. He was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, and has a brilliant career as a scholar. In 1877 he won the Hebrew Prize, and attained his b.a. degree in 1878. He carried off the Divinity Testimonium (Ist class) and Church Formularies Prize. He took his m.a. degree in 1882. He was ordained Deacon in 1879, and Priest in 1880, at York Minster. He has held four important livings, Holy Trinity, Kingston on Hull, St. John the Evangelist, Waterloo Road, St. Barnabas’, Auckland, and his present cure, St. Paul’s Pro-Cathedral, Wellington. He was Examining Chaplain to the Bishop of Auckland from 1888 to 1891, and has been the Examining Chaplain to the present Bishop of Wellington since 1895, He is a man with a giant intellect. With this he carries the two virtues of humility and sympathy, and has won the respect and love of his fellow clergy. Outside the Anglican Communion he has many admirers, including scholars of the Roman Catholic Church and Presbyterian Church, and his counsel has been sought from far and near. If Mr Sprott accepts the high position of the important see of Wellington, it will be pleasing to all sections of the community, for he has nearly every qualification of an efficient and true Father in God. It is hoped that the consecration will take place in Wellington ; such date will be determined by the primate. AN APPRECIATION. One of the oldest clergymen in the diocese of Wellington gives a very interesting appreciation of Mr Sprott as a man, a scholar, and a minister of the Church. Referring to his work of clergyman, the writer says: —“In the supreme tragedies of personal and domestic sorrow he is facile priuceps, going to the bottom of things—the only real consolation —with rapid comprehension and intuitive sympathy. “Intellectually, Mr Sprott is a head and shoulders taller than anyone else in the province. His intellect is not of a cold and hard nature, but is infused with pathetic feeling as of one to whom the great tragedy of life is always present in the background of his thoughts. . ■ • He is above shibboleths, because he has a much broader horizon and a deeper insight into things. “Mr Sprott is an organising mind' with a strong will, and would make definite plans for diocesan improvements, discerning and giving his mind to the crucial points. He is essentially a leader of men. He took the lead in the Synod almost from the first, without any immodesty or pushing. He would soon be a commanding and inspiring leader of the diocese, and, indeed, of the province ; and as far as politics enter into the duties of a Bishop in regard to Education, etc., he would command —indeed, he does now the respect and attention of those without. The Church at this present time wants daring in her leaders to get out of conventional ruts, to cease preaching to a generation that has already been entombed and to seize the opportunities of the moment before they are gone, the audacities of Newman and Ifiddon were proverbial in their day. Like Paul they turned the world of conventionalities upside down. Mr Sprott, too, has the daring of genius that, through its intuicive perception of times and occasions is nearly always successful ; with rapid insight to perceive the forces of the new and all that is precious old ; like the man in the parable that brought forth out of his treasures things new and old ; which might indeed be the motto of Mr Sprott’s book.”