funds are provided by the State for Church purposes, and where he is beyond the reach of the public opinion of England, exercises a very great and irresponsible authority.  If a zealous man, of extreme views on points of doctrine, the clergy of the diocese, looking to him alone for advancement in their profession, are apt to echo his sentiments; and the wide folding doors of our mother Church, which she flings open for the reception of so many, to use Milton’s words, ’brotherly dissimilitudes that are not vastly disproportioned,’ are contracted, to the exclusion, perchance, of some whom it were desirable to retain in our communion.  If, on the other hand, he be a man of but moderate piety, ability, and firmness, the importunity of friends at a distance, who may wish to provide for dependents or connections, and other considerations which need not be enumerated, may tempt him to lower the standard of ministerial qualification, of which he is, of course, the sole judge.  It requires a person of much Christian principle, and singular moderation, discretion, and tact, to administer powers of this nature well.  I have every hope that the bishop whom you have sent us will prove equal to the task.  For the sake of humanity and civilisation, as well as for the interests of the island, I fervently trust that I may not be disappointed in my expectations on this head.

The complex and thwarting currents of interest and opinion that may exist in a colony respecting the maintenance of a State Church are well illustrated in the following extracts:—­

Very soon after I arrived here, I felt satisfied that the conflicts of party in the colony would ere long assume a new character.  I perceived that the hostility to the proprietary interests, which was supposed to actuate certain classes of persons who had much influence with the peasantry, was on the decline.  Should a state of quiescence prove incompatible with the maintenance of their hold on their flocks, analogy led me to anticipate that the Established Church would, in all probability, become an object of attack.

Considering the facility with which the franchise may be acquired, it is not a little remarkable that the constituency should have hitherto increased so slowly.  This phenomenon has not escaped the notice of the opponents of the union of Church and State, and they have ascribed it to the true cause.  They are sensible that all uneducated population in easy circumstances, without practical grievances, are not likely to be intent on the acquisition of political privileges.  They have, therefore, undertaken to supply them with a grievance, in order to whet their appetite for the franchise, and also to provide them with guides who shall instruct them in the proper use of it.  But in attempting to carry this scheme into effect they have encountered an obstacle, which has, for the time, entirely frustrated their intentions.  The more educated and intelligent of the brown party