teaching of your own Church; which (3) Will never be admitted by Protestants generally, because satisfied that it is wholly false; and which (4) Because of the obstacle it presents to Christian Unity, will largely place upon you the awful responsibility of continuing the spirit of schism in the Church Universal. On the other hand, if you will defend the Episcopate upon the reasonable ground: that (1) No matter what view may be taken of its origin, it unquestionably possesses DIVINE AUTHORITY; that (2) It is that form of Government which is HISTORIC and was PREVALENT down to the Reformation; that (3) It continues still to be the PREVAILING form of Government in the Christian world; that (4) This antiquity and universality naturally demand a consideration and respect, to which no other form of government can lay claim; that (5) Experience has proved it to be the most expedient for insuring stability, order, unity, and continuity in the Church; that (6) The further fact that it is even at this day the form under which the MAJORITY of Christian people are living, makes it the only form of government that it can reasonably be expected the Christian World can agree upon. If you will defend it upon these grounds asking Protestant Churches to adopt it, not because it is a sine qua non, and their own forms without validity, but because it is the only form that has PREVAILED, that is really Historic, that has, speaking generally, been characteristic of the Church Universal throughout its entire History, and because it is for many other reasons the BEST and the most EXPEDIENT,

and the only one that, from a practical standpoint, can be agreed upon, you will disarm prejudice, will win commendation, and whether successful or not will at least remove any charge of narrowness and exclusiveness from us, and place the responsibility of further schism elsewhere. On the other hand, to advocate a change of Name, and the adoption of the title "The American Catholic Church," on the ground that the latter is "comprehensive”—and will "make for unity," etc., is simply ridiculous. Think of it! The title which unchurches more than one hundred millions of our fellow Christians, lauded as "comprehensive," exploited as an eirenicon! Nor could the immense loss sustained upon this side be compensated by any gain upon the other. For such action would be as useless in its overtures to Rome, as it would be insulting to our Protestant brethren. For be it remembered by all who are beguiled by such visions, that reunion with Rome can never be attained by any mere abandonment of our Protestant title, but only by complete submission to all her pretensions-in short, only by unconditional surrender. He who does not know this, simply does not know Rome. Right here, we venture to make a prediction, which we sincerely hope may not be true, but which we cannot persuade ourselves to believe is false. Brethren of the Anglican Communion, it may be that before these words are printed the principles for which the martyrs of England laid down their lives, those beacon-fires of the Reformation which old Hugh Latimer asserted even with his dying breath should

never be extinguished,—those PROTESTANT ideals and doctrines then stamped upon the Church of England, and ever since OFFICIAL in this Communion -Ay! Those Protestant Principles now falsely denounced as uncatholic, illiberal, obsolete, will be abundantly vindicated to a shocked and startled world. We say no more. He who hath the eyes to see, will see and comprehend. We speak here only our convictions. We make no pretension to prophetic vision. It may be that we are mistaken. If so, we believe we are mistaken only as to the time, not as to the fact. Be this as it may, the realization or non-realization of such an event in no wise affects the argument set forth in these pages. Under any circumstances, the truth of these principles remains unchanged, and the importance of their enunciation continues imperative. In a word, then, Brethren of the Protestant Episcopal Church, we have reached the parting of the ways. The principles of the Reformation and the principles of the "Catholic" party are admitted upon all sides to be mutually exclusive. The former are OFFICIAL in this Church, the latter are not; though their adherents are seeking earnestly to substitute them for the former, to have them recognized as official. We cannot longer defer the issue. You are compelled, this day, to choose between the two. There is no straddling a contradiction. You must choose between Protestantism and pseudo-catholicism; between the creed of the English Reformers and the creed of John Henry Newman; between the ideal which led the former out of Rome,

and the ideal which led the latter into Rome; between the doctrines which have been official and authoritative in this Church from the beginning, and those which were officially and authoritatively condemned by your Church at the time of the Oxford Movement; between a view of the Episcopate which is reasonable, defensible, and liberal, and one which is unreasonable, indefensible, and intolerant; between one which is comprehensive enough to recognize all Christian Bodies (the Roman included) as valid branches of the Catholic Church, and the other which is narrow enough to "unchurch" all that have not the Historic Episcopate; between an existing title which, because it is protestant only against all illiberal, intolerant, and exclusive theories respecting the limits of the Church Universal, is, for that reason, protestant only that it may be liberal, broad, and truly catholic in its conception of the Church, and a proposed title which, on the other hand, would be "Catholic" only that it might narrow the confines of the Church Universal, and exclude one fourth the Christian World from membership therein. In short, you have to choose between denominational pride and Church Unity, between bearing the arrogant title of an exclusive ecclesiastical set (The American Catholic Church) and becoming the peacemakers for universal Christendom.

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