that the Mexican Church and Père Hyacinthe in Paris ought to accept every usage and every rubric of our "incomparable prayer-book." We find some disposed to withhold aid from the "old Catholics," because they prefer, in many respects, their national rites to ours. Human nature does not change.

12. A CONFERENCE.

Augustine obtained a conference with some of the British bishops, and it was held under a tree which remained till comparatively recent times, and was known as "Augustine's oak." What a meeting! What but Christianity could have afforded any common ground for such a conference! There were the aborigines of the soil, and here the robber Saxons; there the ancient Church of Caradoc and Pudens, of Claudia and of St. Paul's own missionaries, and here was a new-comer, who called himself Bishop of the English, and seemed to them in league with their old enemies against them. In answer to prayer, Augustine was thought to have wrought a miracle, which excited their fraternal respect; but they answered, with dignity, that "they could not depart from their ancient customs without the consent of their own churches."

13. AND ANOTHER.

At a second conference, Augustine's bearing and conduct were offensive to these very primitive people. Yet he proposed no terms of union other than

such as we should approve. They were to adopt, 66 not as our custom, but as that of the Universal Church," certain compliances with the local Roman and Apostolic Church, (1) in the administering of baptism, and (2) in the keeping of Easter. Further, (3) they were to act jointly with him in preaching to the English nation the word of God. They refused consent, chiefly because of his overbearing manner. And here he seems to have forgotten what was due to himself and them, for he threatened them with the divine displeasure. When, some ten years later, King Ethelfrid with a great army fell upon them and massacred them in great numbers, the Saxons looked upon this terrible event in one way and the Britons in a very different one.

An ancient Welsh document relates that the answer of the British clergy was made on one occasion in the following words, by Dinoth, an abbot :

"The British churches owe the deference of brotherly kindness and charity to the Church of God, to the Roman Papa, and to all Christians. But other obedience they do not know to be due to him whom you call the Papa. As for ourselves, we are under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Caerleon upon Uske, who, under God, is our spiritual overseer and guide."

Ethelfrid's vengeance fell upon Chester in the North, the ancient name of which resembles that of Caerleon in South Wales. This may have led some to imagine that the massacre was inspired by Augustine's threat, of which he probably had

never heard; but it shows how intense was the Saxon prejudice of Bede himself against the Britons, when this holy man can see nothing in the event but a just judgment from the Lord. We must acknowledge with grief, that a like uncharitable comment might be made upon the failure of missions and bishoprics which Augustine founded. There were terrible relapses; some of the bishops retired to France; the old idolatry returned in divers places. The Anglican Church had shrunk to the dimensions of the single county of Kent, when once again it revived, and for a time spread over the northeastern counties, under good King Edwin. But again there came a relapse. In Lincolnshire, where a great work seemed begun, the churches went to decay, and so continued for years. It became manifest that Augustine's work must all be done over again.

14. IONA AND ITS MISSIONS.

But for thirty years (A. D. 633-664) a more primitive and a more successful work had been carried on among the Northern English, by Scots and Picts, the old enemy, now Christianized by the zeal of Columba and his missions that went forth from Iona. King Oswald restored the cathedral at York. Aidan, a saintly bishop, fixed his missionary see at another Iona, Lindisfarne, on the coast of Northumbria, which was long known as the Holy Isle. This bishopric was afterwards enlarged, and settled as the see of Durham. Finan, who succeeded to Aidan, recovered very much peo

ple to Christ. A bishop was set over Lichfield, and another was restored to London. Nobody can read the beautiful tributes which Bede pays to the Northern bishops, with whom he differed on so many points, without the conviction that to Iona and to Lindisfarne, and to the meek and loving spirit of their missionaries, the ultimate conversion of all England is chiefly due. At one time only one bishop of the Latin rite was left in the island. And so it came about that this rite was observed only in Kent and a small part of the South, while the converted North adhered to the Gallican rites, or others of very primitive use, brought into the Pictish churches from Ireland. To heal the differences occasioned by such diversity, a synod was summoned (A. D. 664) at Whitby, in Yorkshire.

15. COUNSELS OF UNITY.

And very interesting and truly Christian in spirit were the discussions. Bede attributes the Easter rules of the Northern Britons to the causes I have already instanced, and excuses their non-conformity in this respect, acknowledging their true faith and piety in the spirit of their observance of rules they had received from primitive times. Though the immediate results were not unanimously adopted, this synod unified the churches in a good degree; and soon after (A. D. 667), such a desire for the settlement of affairs was reached that the Northerns came to an agreement with their Kentish brethren, and elected Wighart Archbishop of

Canterbury, desiring him to go to Rome and receive consecration there. This measure was very wisely conceived. The English Church exercised its own rights of election; but the failure of Gregory's mission having become a scandal, it was fitting that "the Pope of the city of Rome," as Bede and Alcuin call him, should be informed of the better state of things now existing, of the growing unity of the Church in Britain, and of their desire to be in unity with the Apostolic See. Unhappily, as we might think, Wighart died at Rome in a pestilence before he could receive consecration; and, very pardonably perhaps, Vitalian, the patriarch of the city, resolved to find a proper person to be the English metropolitan, and send him out as his missionary. This was an unfortunate precedent, interfering as it did with the elective franchise of the English Church, and tending to impair its autonomy. But God overruled all for good.

16. THE MISSION OF THEODORE.

He chose Theodore, a native of St. Paul's own city, Tarsus, and consecrated him Bishop on the feast of the Annunciation, A. D. 668. It was, perhaps, a concession to the North British churches to send them an Eastern bishop, who could best persuade them to adopt the Nicene rules of Easter. But, as a restraint upon him, and to keep up the Latin side of the controversies, Vitalian gave him a sort of archdeacon in Adrian who accompanied him. It was in A. D. 669 that he arrived in England, to reconstruct and to "set in order the