CANTERBURY ASSOCIATION. From the (London) "Australian and New Zealand Gazette," April 5th.

New Zealander, Volume 7, Issue 565, 13 September 1851, Page 3

CANTERBURY ASSOCIATION. From the (London) "Australian and New Zealand Gazette," A pril sth.

We have recently been favoured with some information relative to this scheme, which has confirmed our previous suspicions of its real intentions, viz., to found an endowed Church in New Ze-iland, winch shall form a nucleus for more extended priestly doinmnlion. The plan is a bold one, but it will not succeed: the same movement which tendered nugatory the machinations of Cardinal Wiseman, has dealt a heavy blow and discouragement to this piopngandist effort also. Means aie not so abundant now as when, a few months ago, men, especially of the higher classes, were in full gallop Roinewjrd ; and ihe result in the case of this Association has been to compel them to turn shipbrokers to other settlements in order to keep up anything hke a show of colonization, Shipbrobjng is always the last

phato of a colomzi!i<; company, and therefore tvp vcoic not sony to hail its apperua ice ns the climax of a plan, the object of which was to tiansplant the bittci religious animosities of the old woild to couutnes which are as yet happily freed fiom them. We Jcgi'ot, on many accounts, this attempted Puseyite dc-coat on one of our most pioim&mg colonies. Weie it successful, no surei step could have been taken to prevent that emigution which should set in to the colony, but which has been thus checked. Emigration fiom England to the ojder settlements of Now Zealand is nothing to what it ought to be. and what it would have become had not this Puseyite s) stem of colonization taken place. IS fen at home regard the mock-Popish movement twlhsoirething veiy b'-e loathing ; ami they v ill not emigrato to a colony in which they will have to encounter the same spiritual annoyance as that fiom winch they have fled. Bishops and dignitaries, with Papist hoartb and Protestant pockets, aio the cancer on the othenvise fair fncfeofthe Cluuch of England ; and emigrants arc not sufficiently m lovo with the spiutual malady to follow it elsewhere. God forbid that colonial churches should bo inoculated with the same loatbsomu disease ! If there are men yet left who will pull down then- own church, let theai not nuke shipwreck of infant colonial churches. But tlio colonists nuiht look to this, if they would not have an effectual stop put to emigiation from the mothoi country, with the exception, perhaps, of an occasional cargo of bigots and devotees. Now Zealand, fiom having no land fund of its own, makes but littlo progiess in companion with those colouies winch can afford to impoit labour at their own expense. Theclas9of colonists which the Canteibury Absociation has taken out aie of no use to a colony like New Zealand, where laboui is the one thine- needed. Small capitalists will only add to the scarcity of efficient labouiers. It becomes matter of sonous consultation, theiefore, for the colonnts, whethei, in favour of such a class ab that introduced by the Canterbuiy Association, the kind of emigration wlucli the colotiy really wants should be scaied away. Absentee landowneis also, under the regulations of the New Zealand Company, bavo the same inteiest in discountenancing the spread of the I'useyite heiesy in the colony ns have the colonists themselves ; for as men will not follow that heresy, it is opeiatmg as a bar to their interests, since it is only by rapid emigiation that absentee lands m New Zealand possess the remotest chance of being worth anything ] dining the lifetime of their owneis. Whatever, therefore tends to check rapid emigiation is inimical to their interests. With all its lofty pretensions and much-sounding phraseology, thoCanterbuiy Association has not, according to its own accounts, sent more than 1/200 persons to the colony, Us foimulablo ecclesiastical ataft included. Of these 1,200 peisons, faome 400 or 600 were passengers to other settlements, so that in point of numbers the Canteibury eflort is contemptible, in companson with the noiso winch has for years been made about it. The enterprising little Otago settlement already numbers its 1,200 oona fide colonists, and that without noise or sound of ti limpets of any kind. What kind of men must they be s\ hose ears aie tickled with the " vox et praterea mini" of the Canto bury Association? One instance will suffice to show the impotence of such lofty pretensions on the part of the Association. Last autumn the Association sent off its preliminary body, including numbeis of emigrants for the other settlements, in five or six ships, which were kept iv the river whilst all soits of meetings, addresses, and puch like clap-trap devices were being enacted for the benefit of such as most leadily swallow such baits. The Puseyito creed was publicly announced by a nondescript ecclesiastic, yclept a "bishop-design.ite," to be "belief in the Prayerbook and the pi test." Since that time, advertisements, much m the style of the eminent George Robins, have been assiduously cuculated, announcing that the ''warn body " will proceed to the colony in June next. The " main body" should of course require twenty ships, if the preliminary body occupied half-a-dozen, but alas ! the "main body" is in such a state of atiophy, that a single barque will suffice for its accommodation. To be consistent, the Association should next advertise that its chairman will pioceed to the colony in two ships, and. this would render the "peri bathos" complete. From this specimen, the coloniits, who are at present in a ktate of bewilderment at the vastness of the Cauteibury scheme, may judge of the probable result. When leal Popeiy received its tl heavy blow and discouragement," we hoped that the common sense of the Canteibury Association would have led them to abandon the mock aiticle. In this hope, we cndeavouied to suppoit them, as wo would any other project which bore the promise of benefit to the colony. But, like their ' Papist prototype, they have again thrown off the mask ] too eaily. and it behoves all concerned to look upon the unmasked countenance as it presents itself. Fiom what we have learned from indubitable sources, no Christian cLarity can attribute to the Association any other design than that of establishing in the colony the heresy which Englishmen are driving" from amongst them. Their feeble efforts at real colonization, as compared with their pretensions, are of themselves a proof of this, weic other proof wanting 1 . The furtherance of a superstitious creed, educed from the barbarism of feudal ages lather than from the universal benevolence of Christianity, is their primary object; colonization is but the pretence. Whether the colonists, and those at home interested in the colony, will quietly acquiesce in seeing a land liteially '' flowing with milk and honey"converted into a wilderness of " dust and ashes," timo alone can develops ; we have, however, no intention of remaining silent spectatois of the event. We would call the attention of New Zealand colonists to the declaration of the Rev. Mr. Bennett, when takingleave of the congiegation which he had so long delighted by imposing histnomc displays. "Itisof no use concealing," said the reverend gentleman, " that there is a national antipathy to Puseyism." This amounts to the full adraisbion that the whole thing is unnational. Let the colonists bear this in mind, and they are safe. They pnde themselves on their nationality, as much as upon j their freedom fiom the nightmares, spiritual and ter- j poral, which render the mother country uneasy. Let them jealously guard against the introduction of such anti-nationalities, if they wish to preserve their English character. If they do not, they will certainly have an I endowed monkery amongst them. No effort will be { spared here to get the Canterbury settlement made into j a sepai ate province, whilst as yet there are none but the j propagandists themselves for legislators; their first act ! will be to vote the lands of the colony for the end«w- \ ment of their Puseyite 1 church, and the plague-spot will I become established beyond remedy. This, and not colonization, is the aim of the Association ; — for the ] promotion of the latter purpose, they neither possess the power nor tfie means* I