In London, more than in any part of
England, the Diocesan system is valuable. A London parish is not
like a country one, a self-dependent, corporate body, made up of
residents of every rank, capable of providing for the physical and
spiritual wants of its own stationary population. In London,
population fluctuates rapidly, sometimes rolling away from one
quarter, always developing itself in fresh quarters; in London all
ranks do not dwell side by side within sight and sound of each
other: but the rich and the poor, the employed and the unemployed,
dwell apart, work apart, and are but too often out of sight, out of
mind. These, and many other reasons, make it impossible for the
mere parochial system to bring out the zeal and the liberality of
London Churchmen. If they are to realize their unity and their
strength, they must do so not as members of a Parish, but of a
Diocese; their Bishop must be to them the sign that they are one
body; their good works must be organized more and more under him,
and round him. This is no new theory of mine; it is a historic law.
The Priest for the village, the Bishop for the city, has been the
natural and necessary organization of the Church in every age; and
it was in strict accordance with this historic law, that the London
Diocesan Board of Education was founded in 1846, not to override the
parochial system, but to do for it what it cannot, in a great city,
do for itself; to establish elementary schools (and now I am happy
to say, evening schools also) in parishes which were too poor to
furnish them for themselves.
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