office in this ministry, and authority over each of the clergy, though he determined on nothing of importance without previously consulting the clergy. Such was, in general, the system throughout the Church for more than a thousand years, when another system was gradually introduced. The presbyters of the cathedral church were intitled canons, and began to live together in a monastery attached to the cathedral, under certain collegiate rules. They were supported out of the common fund of the Church, which also supported deacons, and other inferior ministers. In after-ages, certain lands and possessions of the Church were appropriated to particular canonries, which then became benefices, though they still retained a share of the common property of the Church. Gradually, also, they were divested of the cure of souls, by the foundation of parish churches in the cathedral cities, and the appropriation of certain funds to their endowment. So that, at length, the cathedral presbyters were, as such, certainly sinecurists, though they retained various privileges, and were still nominally the bishop's council.

Such was, in general, the position of cathedral chapters at the era of the Reformation; and the system had worked so badly, that Archbishop Cranmer endeavoured to dissuade King Henry VIII. from founding chapters on the old model for the cathedrals of newly-founded sees, and of those sees of the older foundation in which monks had previously been installed. His objections were founded on the slothfulness and self-indulgent habits into which canons or prebendaries had fallen; and we can well understand this, in remembering that they were without cure of souls, and yet possessed ample pecuniary resources.

King Henry VIII. was the founder of no less than fourteen of the chapters now existing, eight of which were in place of the monastic bodies which had formerly been possessed of cathedrals. The remaining six were for sees newly founded by King Henry VIII. And it may here be remarked of this sovereign, that, amidst all his evil deeds, he certainly did more for the Church of England than any sovereign who has ever sat on the throne of England. None of his predecessors for 300 years founded a see. He alone founded six episcopal sees, and fourteen chapters. The recent erection of the see of Manchester, so reluctantly and grudgingly conceded, merely raises the number of sees to what Henry VIII. left it, while the suffragan sees, of which he erected twenty-six, have been allowed to fall into abeyance. With all our indignation at Henry's crimes, we have never yet been able to equal his good actions in this respect. The people, entrusted to the care of the bishops, have multiplied fourfold since the time of King Henry, but our episcopate has been diminished since his time.

It is very true that the funds which King Henry employed in the erection of sees and chapters had belonged to monasteries which he suppressed. This suppression may have been very wrong in some respects-we are not saying whether it was so or not; but we apprehend that in the present day, when monasteries are suppressed, their funds are wholly absorbed by the State. We have never heard of any Roman Catholic sovereign or ruler in modern times applying any part of the wealth he has gained from suppressing or robbing monasteries, to the erection of new episcopal sees and chapters.

Cranmer the vilified and reviled Cranmer-monster as he was of hypocrisy and wickedness, if we are to believe certain controversialists, was, without doubt, the adviser of Henry in these most laudable foundations; and we must say, with some regret, that had the intentions of Henry VIII. and Cranmer been fully carried out by the bishops and the chapters themselves, the cause of religion would have derived a far greater amount of benefit from cathedral institutions than it actually has.

We are not about to dispute or deny the fact that important benefits, in many ways, have resulted from the cathedral establishments. The solemnity of divine services in these splendid and antique edifices, and the continual offering of praise and prayer each day of the year, are in themselves benefits of no ordinary description; and, without doubt, there have been occasional instances in which learned and pious men have been sustained by the cathedral endowments. This is all very true; but still, if the intention of the founder of so large a number of the English cathedrals had been carried out, the results would have been far more satisfactory. There was a highly ecclesiastical character about these institutions as designed by Henry VIII. and Archbishop Cranmer. Each cathedral body formed a college; each member of which had his allowances, his food, his dwelling, his clothing, from the common fund. There was a common hall, where all partook of their meals together. The society consisted not merely of a dean and presbyter, canons or prebendaries, but also of a deacon and a subdeacon, a schoolmaster, with scholars boarded and taught free of expense; choristers with their teacher; a number of servants, and a body of almsmen, who were supported by the Church. A regular fund was set apart, not only for repairing the church, but also for building bridges and mending causeways, and other charitable works. Poor scholars were to be supported at the universities. In short, the whole foundation was not only connected with the due maintenance of divine worship, but it was conceived on a scale of liberality which was largely to benefit the poor and destitute, and to promote the cause of

Christian education. We must here quote from Mr. Whiston's pamphlet.

"The means and instruments for carrying out these purposes were, in the main, ecclesiastical or collegiate; and a general idea of the scope and nature of the cathedral establishments, as originally planned and settled by Henry VIII., may be formed from the first chapter of the old statutes of Canterbury, which is almost identical with the corresponding chapter of the statutes of all the other cathedrals of the new foundation. It is as follows:

"On the entire number of those who have their sustentation (qui sustentantur) in the cathedral and metropolitical Church of Canterbury:

"First of all we ordain and direct that there be for ever in our aforesaid church, one dean, twelve canons, six preachers, twelve minor canons, one deacon, one subdeacon, twelve lay-clerks, one master of the choristers, ten choristers, two teachers of the boys in grammar, one of whom is to be the head master, the other, second master, fifty boys to be instructed in grammar, twelve poor men to be maintained at the costs and charges of the said church, two vergers, two subsacrists (i. e. sextons), four servants in the church to ring the bells, and arrange all the rest, two porters, who shall also be barber-tonsors, one caterer, one butler, and one under-butler, one cook, and one under-cook, who, indeed, in the number prescribed, are to serve in our church every one of them in his own order, according to our statutes and ordinances.'

"In the Durham statutes, the corresponding chapter is as follows: "On the total number of those who have their sustentation (qui sustentantur) in the cathedral church of Durham :

"We direct and ordain that there be for ever in the said church, one dean, twelve prebendaries, twelve minor canons, one deacon, one subdeacon, ten clerks, (who may be either priests or laymen,) one master of the choristers, ten choristers, two teachers of the boys in grammar, eighteen boys to be instructed in grammar, eight poor men to be maintained at the costs of the said church, two subsacrists, two vergers, two porters, one of whom shall also be barber-tonsor, one butler, one underbutler, one cook, and one under-cook.'

"The monastic or collegiate characters of the bodies thus constituted, is indicated by the names and offices of the inferior ministers above specified, who were intended to form a part of the establishment of the common hall, in which most of the subordinate members, including the boys to be instructed in grammar, were to take their meals. There was also another point in which the cathedrals were meant to resemble and supply the place of the old religious houses, i. e. in the maintenance of a certain number of students at the universities. Thus in the 'general injunctions to be given (A.D. 1535) in the king's highness' behalf to all monasteries, it was ordained that the abbot or president of every religious house should keep and fynde 'in some university one or two of his brothers, according to the ability and possessions of his

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house which brethren, after they were learned in good and holy letters, when they returned home, might instruct and teach their brethren, and diligently preach the Word of God.' So again it is recorded, that in the years 1536 and 1547, Henry VIII. commanded that 'every parson, vicar, clerk, or beneficed man, being able to dispend, in benefice or promotion in the Church, 100l. or more, should for every of the said 100l. yearly, give a competent exhibition to maintain one scholar, or more, in the grammar schools, or in the universities of Oxford and Cambridge.'

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Accordingly, one result of the suppression of the old monasteries was, that many of the younger monks and friars dependent upon them for support, were obliged to leave the universities, the population of which was considerably thinned in consequence. For this, however, some compensation was made, by imposing upon the new cathedrals the obligation of maintaining at the universities, out of their corporate funds, a certain number of students proportionate to their several possessions, and the number of the foundation scholars in their respective grammar schools. Indeed, the preamble of the act 31 Henry VIII. c. 9, for founding the new cathedrals, preserved in Henry's own handwriting, recites that they were established To the intent that children might be brought up in learnyng, and clerks noryshed in the universities.' Thus, by his regulation, the church or college of Canterbury was required to maintain (alere, i. e. to provide alimony for) twenty-four poor students, twelve at Oxford and twelve at Cambridge, the allowance originally granted for this purpose being estates of the value of 2001. clere by the yere.' So Chester, Ely, Peterborough, and Rochester, were required to maintain each four students in the universities, and Worcester twelve, and Westminster twenty."

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In the foundation of new chapters by Henry VIII. there are certain offices mentioned, which it would have been most desirable to have retained, and for the apparent abeyance of which, in the present day, in various cathedrals, we are unable satisfactorily to account. We allude to the Deacons. It seems that every chapter founded by Henry VIII. was to have a "deacon and subdeacon," who are called, in some statutes, a "gospeller and epistler," the duty of the deacon and subdeacon being to read the Gospel and Epistle.

In the passage just quoted we find amongst the officers as planned and settled by Henry VIII. in the Statutes of the Cathedral and Metropolitical Church of Canterbury, "one deacon, one subdeacon." In the cathedral church of Durham, "one deacon, one subdeacon." Mr. Whiston states that the chapter of the statutes in which these appointments are directed, is almost identically the same in the statutes of all the cathedrals founded by Henry VIII. We find (p. 10) in a scheme for the formation of the college of Canterbury, that the "gospeller" and "epysteller" (or

deacon and subdeacon) were to have salaries of 10%. In the original plan for the foundation of the college of Ely (p. 12), we find the names of "Sir John Spirarde, gospeller there, 87. ;" and " Sir Thomas Maunde, pistoller there, 87." So again, in the cathedral of Rochester (p. 17), there were a "deacon and subdeacon, each 67. 11s. 10d." In a table prefixed to this pamphlet, and drawn up from a manuscript of the sixteenth century, in Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, compared with the cathedral statutes, whereever it was possible, the "deacon and subdeacon " regularly appear in the list of officers of the cathedrals of Canterbury, Rochester, Gloucester, Bristol, Carlisle, Chester, Durham, and Ely, with salaries of different amounts. The list does not mention any such officers at Peterborough, Worcester, or Winchester; and of the remaining cathedrals of the new foundation we have no account in this respect. With reference to the cathedrals of the older foundation, we have no means of judging as to what their regulations were as to the employment of a deacon and subdeacon ;" but we cannot suppose that their rule varied from that adopted in the new cathedrals. Without doubt they all had their deacons and subdeacons also.

Now, with regard to the office of subdeacon, it could not of course be expected that any such office should remain in cathedral and collegiate churches, the order having been discontinued at the Reformation; but we should certainly have supposed that the office of deacon, being one of the holy orders recognized by the Church of England, would have continued in cathedrals, when Henry VIII., the founder of the majority of those collegiate bodies, expressly mentions them in his statutes given to his cathedrals. But we have looked in vain through the lists of cathedral and collegiate officers in the clergy list to find any such office as that of deacon. Throughout the whole list of cathedral functionaries comprised in the Clergy List, we can only find a single instance in which the offices of gospeller and epistler appointed by King Henry VIII. are still retained. This honourable exception is to be found at Norwich. Every where else, as far as we can see, the offices of gospeller and epistler, or deacon and subdeacon, have wholly disappeared. We have some notion of having heard of "gospeller and epistler" in some other cathedral; but of "deacon " we have never heard as existing in any English cathedral within our own times.

It appears from the following passage in Mr. Whiston's pamphlet (p. 46), that at the commencement of Queen Elizabeth's reign a power was given to withdraw the salaries paid to the deacon and subdeacon, in favour of the divinity lecturer :

"Her royal father, Henry VIII., reserved to himself and his suc