"THE work of the Church in Australia, or, at least, in the settled districts of that continent, has outlived the heroic age. It was, however, the work of heroes to minister in that newly peopled country sixty years ago. Mr. Johnson, Mr. Marsden,--such men were indeed the salt which saved the whole colony from becoming irretrievably corrupt. Before Marsden's death, the Australian Church had received one who was destined to exercise a great influence upon it; this was WILLIAM GRANT BROUGHTON" (Under His Banner, ch. xxxi.). Yes, indeed; and his Life ought to have been written long ago in full detail. Yet a sketch, such as can be given within the limits of the following pages, may serve to exhibit the out lines of this remarkable man, and of his great work for the Church of God. Without further preface, let us take--
WILLIAM GRANT BROUGHTON was born in Bridge Street, Westminster, in the year 1788. When he was about six years old his family removed to Barnet, Herts (his mother's birth-place), where his boyish days were passed. In January, 1797, lie was placed in the King's School, Canterbury, being admitted to a King's scholarship in the same year, and he left the school in December, 1804. He had obtained an exhibition to Cambridge, but for want of means could not then take up residence; and, being offered a situation in the East India House through the good offices of the Marquess of Salisbury of Hatfield, Herts, (who held Mr. Broughton senior in high estimation), he gave up his own inclinations, and became a clerk in the Treasury department. The way, however, was made clear in the year 1813 for the accomplishment of his long-cherished desire to enter the sacred ministry of the Church; and so lie spent a few months at Canterbury under the tuition of his intimate friend the Rev. H. J. Hutchesson, Fellow of Clare Hall, and, in October, 1814, became a resident member of Pembroke Hall, Cambridge, taking his Degree of B.A. in January, i8i8, as sixth Wrangler in that year. The same year saw him deacon and priest, his title being the curacy of Hartley Wespall, Hants, of which, during his tenure of the curacy, the Rev. Dr. Keate (late Head Master of Eton) became rector. That year, too, he was married, in Canterbury Cathedral, to the daughter of the Rev. J. Francis, of that city.
During the four years in which Mr. Broughton [4/5] held his first curacy, he published some learned and elaborate works, which attracted the notice of Bishop Tomline of Winchester, who removed him to the curacy of Farnham, with the intention of bestowing upon him the first preferment that should fall vacant. Meanwhile, however, he had been brought under the notice of the Duke of Wellington at Strathfieldsaye, which was only one mile distant from Hartley Wespall, through the intervention of the Duke's chaplain. The first result was the offer by the Duke, entirely of his own motion, of the chaplaincy of the Tower; and the second, with far more widely reaching consequences, of the archdeaconry of New South Wales, then recently vacant by resignation. Mr. Broughton, after expressing to the Duke's chaplain his own desire to continue in the preferment he had already received, added that of course he would take the matter into his serious consideration, and would return his final answer shortly. He consulted his Diocesan, and, above all, he committed the case to his God in prayer and at the Holy Communion. Then and there it was (as he related the whole narrative in his last striking address to members of the S.P.G., in the year 1852) that he made his determination, God helping him, to undertake the office. Within a few days he was admitted to an interview with the Duke, who said the colonists and Australia "must have a Church," and, after some more characteristic remarks, desired him to give the whole subject a second serious consideration. Within a week his acceptance was given in, and "hence," he said, "my connection with the Colonial Church." The well-known sagacity of the Duke did not forsake [5/6] him on this occasion. In truth, patron and nominee were in many respects men cast in the same mould. Nor did he repent of the selection he had made; for an interesting anecdote was told at Canterbury by an eye-witness, that, at the King's School Feast, in 1834, the Duke of Wellington was one of the company, when, as they were assembling for dinner, one of them saw from the window Archdeacon Broughton in the street, and mentioned his name, and the Duke immediately said, "He is a superior man," and went out of the room to greet him.
Like other great men, such as Bishop Andrewes and Bishop Thomas Wilson, so was the subject of this present sketch ever mindful, with heartfelt gratitude, of "the persons and places to which God had made him a debtor." Thus of Barnet, speaking on his last public appearance there, in the same month in which he died: "It is now forty years since I was in Barnet; it is a place associated with my earliest recollections, and for which I still feel a deep interest. My own early knowledge was all acquired in your own Grammar School; and if this as mc to become a humble instrument in the Lord's vineyard, why should not any of our youth follow in the same course, which, by God's help, I have been enabled to follow; for men are required to go forth to preach the gospel, until the earth is full of the glory of God as the waters cover the sea." Of the King's School, Canterbury: "I remember as a very little boy often going to old Gilbert (tile father of my excellent friend at Grantham), who had been Bishop Home's attendant, who was with him when he died, to hear stories about him, the odour of [6/7] whose piety and goodness still hung around Canter bury Deanery; and when I was last there, old Mrs. Gilbert showed me the inkstand which he used in writing the Commentary. How very much, I often think, of our character and principles is made up of these odd out-of-the-way impressions, picked up one hardly knows when or how, and remembered one cannot tell wherefore. No boys in New South Wales have any such reminiscences or regards. It would be well for them if they had." And the practical result of thoughts like these was the establishment of a "King's School" at Paramatta at a very early date. Canterbury Cathedral lay still closer to the heart of Bishop Broughton, for, in the very year after his entrance on the Episcopate, he made a beginning of a Cathedral for his diocese, the Governor laying the foundation stone, and introduced into his plan a visible reminder of his earlier associations in the twin western towers of the building. And again, in the extreme joy he felt and constantly expressed on the rise and establishment of St. Augustine's Missionary College, it was one characteristic element that the site was one so familiar to him, on the rescue of which from its desecration he had himself in earlier days held conversations with a friend. For his College at Cambridge he ever retained the feelings of a grateful and attached member. On receiving the first volumes of the Anglo-Catholic Library (Andrewes), and of tile Parker Society (Ridley), he breaks out, Is it not a fine thing for my venerated old college, Pembroke Hall, that it should have produced the men, and such men--Ridley and Andrewes--who stand respectively at the head of these two series? [7/8] That is truly an academical triumph: and I heartily enjoy it." A trace of filial piety and gratitude to God comes out in the following extract from a letter to his aged mother (June, 1852): "I am going, to-day, to have a guest at dinner, whose name will perhaps surprise you. It is Lord Robert Cecil, second son of the present Marquess of Salisbury.
I could not help thinking how strange is the course of events which brings one of that family to my house; and I think that my having the honour of being able to receive and entertain him on terms of equality may lawfully gratify you, and make some little return for the exertions and sacrifices which you and my dear father made to give me education, and to prepare me for the situation in which I am." To that mother, then in her ninety-third year, he made it his first duty to go on his arrival in England, in the autumn of 1852; and his brother, who was present, remarks on the touching sight of the Metropolitan of Australasia throwing himself on his entrance at her feet, and imploring her blessing.
ARCHIDIACONATE AND EPISCOPATE.
The jurisdiction of Archdeacon Broughton extended over the whole of Australia and Van Dieman's land, and his Diocesan was the Bishop of Calcutta. Such was our ecclesiastical organization in the year 1829. [The spirit in which the Archdeacon accepted his appointment may be seen in an admirable letter he addressed to the Rev. H. H. Norris, printed in the "Memoir of Joshua Watson," vol. ii., p. 113.] The history of the penal settlement in Botany Bay, the almost incredible spiritual destitution, and "the [8/9] shameful inattention to things sacred with which the foundations of the colony were laid," can only be dealt with here, as they illustrate the task which lay before the new Archdeacon. On that account, and on other accounts too, it is best to use his own words of description of what he found and what he had to face, taken from his letter to the S.P.G., December, 1834, on his return to England, after five years' hard work in the colony, and from his Barnet address. "Since 1788 more than 100,000 convicts have been transported to this colony, to take up their abode amidst forests coeval with the Creation. Nor was it at first thought necessary by the Government to send any clergymen to take charge of this freight of wickedness, until, a few days before the fleet sailed, at the earnest entreaty of Mr. Wilberforce, one devoted man was allowed to accompany them. A few more zealous and spiritually minded men, as years went on, cast in their lot with this good man; and afterwards, till the year 1826, considerable expense was incurred by the Government for providing means of religious worship and instruction for these banished offenders. From that year the entire provision was thrown on the colony. And now (in 1829) 25,000 convicts survive in the country. In Sydney, where there are 2000 of them, divine worship can be held only in wretched rooms. There are but eight churches and twelve clergymen in New South Wales. Melbourne and South Australia are uninhabited. During the past eight years not a shilling has been contributed in England, though the average of convicts transported has been 2500 for the last three years. The question, in truth, which [9/10] the people of England have to consider is, Whether they are prepared to lay the foundation of a vast community of infidels; and whether they can, collectively or individually, answer to Almighty God for conniving at such an execution of the transportation laws as will infallibly lead us to this result." This trumpet-call brought to his aid the help of the S.P.G., the S.P.C.K., and private individuals, to the extent of £13,000, by means of which he at once doubled the number of his clergy. The home Government were not cordial in their support of his proposals, but he was not the man to abandon his post of duty by a voluntary act of resignation, "so long as there remained the most distant prospect of doing good, or even the shade of an obligation upon me to maintain it." Better counsels, however, prevailed, and arrangements were made for erecting the Arch deaconry, with its original income of £2000, into a Bishopric. Accordingly, on February 14, 1836, Archdeacon Broughton was consecrated Bishop of Australia in the Chapel of Lambeth Palace, the excellent Rev. G. J. Mountain being at the same time consecrated Bishop of Montreal.
One of his first acts, after his arrival in Australia, as Bishop, was to collate to the newly formed Arch deaconry of Van Dieman's Land an old College friend and contemporary, a Wrangler like himself, the Rev. W. Hutchins, a man whose name and labours are commemorated in an excellent Grammar School in Hobart.
The Church people in the colony made generous efforts answerable to the encouragement they had received from home, and a sum of more than £3000 [10/11] was raised at a public meeting. The High Sheriff of the colony, in a letter to the S.P.G., attributed it all to the Bishop's "prompt decision and firmness, his unwearied exertions, and the high estimation in which he was held."
Meanwhile, the Bishop's letters to his friends at home revealed his real feelings--almost overwhelmed with responsibility, and yet trusting to God's grace to discharge it aright. "I am set in the front of the battle, against the forces of the Roman Catholics, and having almost singly to sustain against them the cause of the Church of England. And yet they are only one-seventh or one-eighth of the population; and in Sydney there are 14,000 Protestants, with only one clergyman to minister to them. Whilst, on the other hand, the so-called Protestantism is tinged with sectarianism and indifference, and even professed Churchmen are deplorably ignorant of the ground on which the Church is founded."
In truth, the education battle was imminent; for the Governor was on the opposite side, and had a measure in hal1d appropriating a large grant of money to a scheme of education, from which all distinctive religious instruction was shut out. And he had contrived to exclude the Bishop for a time, on technical grounds, from his proper seat as a member of the Legislative Council. The Bill, however, was thrown out. A second struggle of the same kind was en countered later on, in 1839, but on that occasion also the Bishop's efforts were successful. As a member of the Legislative Council he lifted up his voice in a most able, eloquent speech, in which (according to his wont) he illustrated how deeply rooted were his [11/12] principles of true education. "It happened to me, sir" (addressing the Governor), "to be brought up in a school founded by Archbishop Cranmer, and afterwards in a College in which Bishop Ridley had been Master; and I may, therefore, be supposed to have directed more than ordinary attention to their opinions." And he concluded with an appeal to the Governor, made partly on the ground of their having been schoolfellow at Canterbury. His letter on the occasion describes in strong language his sense of the great injustice to the Church of the proposed measure. "However, we made a fair fight, and compelled the Governor to give way." The pleasant fact remains to be told, that the two "schoolfellows" retained their friendship to the last; and when the Governor retired, the Bishop in his private letters home wrote a beautiful and touching account of him. More touching still it is to record that they now sleep side by side, in the nave of the great Cathedral of Canterbury, till the morning of the resurrection.
Still later, in 1846, the conflict was renewed. In truth, with Bishop Broughton's strict principles of real Church education, inherited from his English experience, and proved to his inmost conscience to be the only sound ones, he could not fail to come into frequent collision with the opinions of three chief constituents of the colonial population, i.e. Romanists (chiefly of Irish descent), Liberals in belief, and Indifferentists. But he was always supported, even in defeat, by a body of faithful and zealous Churchmen.
Another chief and constantly pressing anxiety, was the supply of clergy for the colony. His letters are full of this topic, now being on the verge of [12/13] despair,--as when he writes, "My office will expire of itself, in consequence of having no clergy to govern,"--and then thanking God for the arrival of fresh helpers from England. He could always speak highly of the great body of his clergy, but he was very discriminating; he set the standard high, and declined to receive such as were not likely to come up to it. In one, other vise distinguished, Priest that was offered him, he discerned "a kind of susceptibility about trifles, which could never make the possessor of it equal to contend with any great crisis of affairs." Later on, when he had not only to seek a supply of clergy for his own diocese, but to discuss the sort of bishops that would be required for the government of other dioceses, whether in immediate or more remote prospect, he would say that each one, whatever his other qualifications, must be in himself" a substantive;" and again, that "he must be a man ready for everything and everybody that may require him, whilst he must require nothing, but just what he happens to find." Indeed, a collection of his recorded experiences on the head of the qualifications of colonial clergy would be very valuable. For the permanent benefit of his clergy and of the diocese generally, he formed a valuable library of standard books, obtained largely through the indefatigable exertions of the Rev. Edward Coleridge, of Eton College.
Subordinate to the supply of good men, the erection of suitable churches in which they should minister called for and received his careful attention. Here he was considerably helped by grants from the S.P.C.K. and the S.P.G., and his constant friends, Mr. Edward Coleridge (who raised wonderful [13/14] contributions for him year by year), Mr. Joshua Watson, Dr. Warneford, and Mr. Gilbert of Grantham.
The progress of the Cathedral, indeed, after 1837, was delayed for several years, and the consecration did not take place till after his death, though the Bishop's deep interest in it was helped on by gifts from England. But, indeed, there was not a church erected in any part of his vast charge in which he was not personally concerned. One striking instance, far too long to reprint here, and too full of graphic details to bear mere allusion, is given by Archdeacon Harrison (Memoir p. 26), taken from the Gospel Missionary of 1852.
The Letters Patent of the Bishop of Australia included Tasmania, which island he visited in 1838, as he did also New Zealand and Norfolk Island, shortly after, from pure zeal for the missionary cause, though external to his jurisdiction, and at that time, in fact, out of the Queen's Dominions. His longings for Episcopal coadjutors were gratified by the consecration of Bishop Selwyn for New Zealand, in 1841, and of Bishop Nixon for Tasmania, in 1842,--gratified, but not satisfied. In 1844 he urged upon the Archbishop of Canterbury the establishment of a See in South Australia, but received no encouragement. Lord Stanley was "immovable." To all which he replied, "We must have Bishops, whether we get money or not, either married or single." Meanwhile he was contemplating a noble act of self-denial. His Episcopal (!) abode had at first been a second-rate hotel, and afterwards a miserable and yet highly rented house; and the expenses of the administration of his diocese were far too heavy for the income, so [14/15] that he was "a poorer man than he had been thirteen years before;" but he was not content with surrendering an annual £500, one fourth of his income, to secure another bishopric; he offered another £500 for a second; and fain would he have surrendered a third £500 for payment of clergy, though he "worked harder than any curate in England." Living himself with his devoted wife in the most simple way, and loving his children, he could still say, "All I can hope to do is to leave them above want." He always said he had accepted the office of Archdeacon, and then that of Bishop, as a matter of duty, which Providence clearly laid upon him; but that now, having put his hand to the plough, he could not look back. In writing about his purposes of reducing his own income to one of his friends, he says, "Let no man think me a fool I have just been a journey of 1500 miles, occupying more than three months, and I ought to start again to-morrow. It cannot, must not go on." He rejoiced in the high qualities of the Bishops who were now his suffragans, but, whilst he gladly contracted his jurisdiction to the Bishopric of Sydney, he shrunk from the new position of Metropolitan, in the thought that, such as they, were now under himself. He always felt ready to retire, only that his one absorbing motive was to fulfil God's purpose in placing him where he was. Truly he was "lowly in his own eyes."
The sore lack of clergy, and the consequent evils to the colony, drove him to devise measures for remedying them by the establishment, first, of a good grammar school, and then, through the assistance of the S.P.C.K., of a Diocesan College in Sydney, over which he placed [15/16] his trusted friend the Rev. Canon Allwood, whilst he took much of the instruction upon himself. Mr. Moore, a colonist, made over to him by will a sum of £20,000, together with 6000 acres of land, to found a college, to build a house for the Bishop, and for other purposes. This was, though only prospectively, a cause of thankfulness to him. But his great joy and hope in this direction was in the foundation of St. Augustine's College, and in the supply from thence (which he often dwelt on) of a succession of well-trained, orthodox, and zealous clergy for the Colonial Church.
He had paid great attention to the Romish controversy, which, indeed, was forced upon him by the encouragement given in high places to Dr. Polding, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Sydney. And he pre pared and delivered a celebrated protest, in the most solemn way, in the church of St. James, Sydney, on the Festival of the Annunciation, 1843. No notice was taken of it by Dr. Folding, and the Bishop of Australia was rather disappointed it was not actively followed up by the heads of the Church at home, though it was approved by the Archbishop of Canter bury and Bishop Selwyn. It would seem that his experience in this matter led him to change his views about the Oath of Supremacy, and to advocate its abolition, as having been entirely and publicly violated in the colonies. And this, again, led him to convene his suffragans to a conference at Sydney, in October, 1850,--one ever memorable in the history of the Church, and resulting in the formation of the Australasian Board of Missions. He explained to the Bishops assembled on that occasion his desire [16/17] and plan, as he did afterwards, in 1852, to the whole of the clergy and representative laity of his diocese. The two distinct features of his plan were, first, to obtain, by royal licence, liberty to the Clergy in Synod, and the Laity in Convention, to deliberate and consult on matters touching the ordering of the affairs of the Church of England, it being understood, secondly, that the Bishop was a separate order, and that the distinction between Clergy and Laity was ob served. These propositions, after thorough discussion, were accepted by all concerned; and, in August, 1852, the Bishop of Sydney took his departure for England with the purpose of bringing them before the proper authorities.
He commenced his voyage by way of Panama and South America, in order to perform some service there to the Church. But the Bishop shall give his own story, as he gave it to his friend on his arrival at Southampton on November 19, 1852: "We have had a most calamitous passage from the West Indies; having lost our captain, purser, one of the engineers, and seven or eight men, chiefly by yellow fever. Thanks to that merciful Providence which has watched over me during so many years, and in the midst of so many dangers, I have escaped that scourge; although I was during a week or ten days lamentably unwell; reduced to such a state of debility that it was burdensome to me even to go up and downstairs from my cabin to the saloon; and my voice was entirely lost. The first time that I got out of bed to attend the funeral of a sailor, my power of utterance was so impaired that, being quite unable to make myself heard, I requested the captain, who [17/18] stood next to me, to read the lesson; and when t looked upon the poor fellow who lay at my feet ready to be plunged into the surge, I could not sup press the thought that not improbably I might be the next to occupy that place. Yet how mysterious and unsearchable are the appointments of the Almighty! Within four days I was standing again in the gang way to perform the same solemn office over the lifeless body of our much-respected captain, whose assistance I had so lately solicited to supply my own infirmity. We have just lost another of the crew, who will be buried this afternoon. There are a few other sick. The same evening, I landed, after having gone out to sea again to inter the bodies of two poor fellows who died on successive days. Each death detains the ship in quarantine ten days. At the close of my duties I took my leave of the survivors in a short address, suggested by the late events, and was thankful to observe it was attended to with earnest attention by all, some speaking to me afterwards in terms which evidently showed that a right impression had been made upon their minds. God grant it may be a lasting one." The self-sacrificing devotion of Bishop Broughton during the whole of this trying time, till all danger was over, won the admiration of every one, and was described in full, with high appreciation of its noble character, in the Times newspaper.
No wonder that the following week the Bishop was obliged to report of himself, that the attack of bronchitis, under which he had been suffering severely during the voyage, had revived, and assumed the form of asthma, and confined him to his bed. As soon, how ever, as he was comparatively convalescent, he paid his [18/19] long-looked-for visit to his aged mother in Warwickshire, and after that had private conferences with leading men in Church and State upon the important measures which had brought him to England. In the prospect of an appointment with the S.P.G., and of a speech to be made by himself on that occasion, he consulted a friend on the propriety of introducing a topic on which he felt warmly and gratefully. "There is one relation peculiar to myself, which might be introduced, with the effect of showing the great Duke in one point of view in which he has not yet appeared after all that has been said; that is, in connection, as Prime Minister, with the institution of the Colonial Church. In this he did not act merely ministerially; but took personal pains, and showed an interest in the matter, as a Church matter, for which the world has not given him credit, and to which, it may be, I am the only person living who could bear testimony. My relation of events in 1828 would also evince on his part a spirit of kindness and condescension (towards a curate, too,) which was very noble and pleasing. May I venture?" The speech is to be found in full in Colonial Church Chronicle, vol. vi., but it may here be mentioned that the day on which the Bishop arrived at Southampton was the very day of the funeral of the Duke of Wellington.
Besides attending the meeting aforesaid, the Bishop preached two or three times, visited his diocesan and former parishioners at Farnham, and delivered a speech at Barnet, mentioned on a preceding page, amidst the scenery of his early childhood. On his return to London, while staying at the house of his old and valued friend, Lady Gipps, the widow of the [19/20] former Governor of New South Wales, he was seized with an attack of bronchitis. His pocket-calendar was full of prospective engagements, which were all necessarily cancelled. The rest may be told in the words of Archdeacon Harrison: "For a fortnight he lingered in an uncertain state. On Saturday evening, February i he began suddenly to sink, and at a quarter-past one on Sunday morning he quietly breathed his last. During The whole of his illness, his mind seemed to dwell on religious subjects, and to occupy itself in prayer. He was constantly repeating psalms and prayers, and would lie for hours engaged in devotional exercises. His voice and articulation were scarcely changed at the last moment. His whole thoughts, while he was conscious, and even when his mind wandered in delirium, were upon the Church. His faith seemed to grow brighter as his strength failed; and he expired almost with the words of prophetic scripture on his lips, earnestly repeating thrice the slight variation from the text marking expressively his fervent zeal and holy faith, 'The earth is full of the glory--full of the glory---of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.'" [A doubt exists, and must always remain, whether the quotation was made with this striking variation, or in the exact terms of our English version. But this text had long been a favourite one with the dying Christian. It is not a little interesting, that in a sermon preached by him as Archdeacon, in November, 1829, two months only after his first arrival in the colony, are the words, "The earth shall be full of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." The promise was evidently a life-long support to him.] And then he peacefully fell asleep, in the sixty-fifth year of his age.
On becoming acquainted with the sad event, the Dean and Chapter of Canterbury expressed to the [20/21] family their earnest desire that the body of the great prelate might find his resting-place within the walls of their Cathedral, which had been so dear to him;--how much so may be gathered from his own words, in a letter dated May 9, 1851: "The view of that glorious Cathedral at the head of your letter occasions a variety of emotions. It connects itself with the remembrances of my earliest life, almost of infancy; with all the hopes and enjoyments of youth; with all that I have learned, and all that I have felt through life; with the memory of early friends--most of them now in the grave." Most fitting, then, was it that he should be laid there to sleep. And the burial service and ceremonial were most impressive and suitable to the occasion. Funeral sermons were preached, the day after in the Cathedral, by Arch deacon Harrison, and, in the Chapel of St. Augustine's College, by the Warden: both of these discourses were printed by request, and largely circulated in the colony. And without delay a memorial fund was started, and all its objects were carried into execution: first, an altar tomb with recumbent figure in alabaster (by Lough) in Canterbury Cathedral; second, a Broughton scholarship at St. Augustine's; third, a similar tomb and figure for Sydney Cathedral; fourth, prizes in Church History at the King's School. Public meetings were subsequently held in the colony itself, and addressed by its most distinguished men, full of the highest admiration for the wonderful qualities and work of the beloved prelate, adviser, and friend they had lost, the like to which they never expected to see again. The same testimony was borne by the pulpit and by the press in terms which bespoke the feelings of the whole community.
From the fore-mentioned notices, necessarily imperfect, of the life and acts of the first and only Bishop of Australia (so called), the reader will be able to form some idea of what manner of man he was. His letters to his chief friends in England, covering a period of eighteen years, from A.D. 1834 to AD. 1852, reveal the man more fully still. With but few like-minded persons in the colony, except such as Mr. Justice Burton and Canon Allwood, he found relief in unbosoming his whole heart to those he loved in England, who, in turn, it should be said, well repaid him by their unfailing sympathy and material support. The Bishop's letters are written in a plain, regular, manly hand; the style is nervous, lively, and perspicuous; the descriptions given in them of parties and opinions are very graphic; the estimate of characters is highly discriminating. His chronic conflict with the Romanists led him to study the whole question of the Papal Supremacy by the light of Christian antiquity, and he would deliver himself of a really learned dissertation upon it, in beautiful manuscript, and yet with evidently the pen of a ready writer. On a threatened cessation of grants in aid of additional clergy for the spiritual welfare of the convicts, from government sources, he addressed a letter, marked by Christian boldness, to Lord John Russell. It is the like bravery, foresight, fixedness of principle that mark all his references to the controversies in which he was engaged, or to the plans he was forming for the present and eternal welfare of the community. He felt the full force of [22/23] the responsibility laid upon him. "Episcopacy here rests upon my single person." "I am paving the way for others who are to come after; and their road, I hope, will be smoother." "I often consider what will be the effect of what we now undergo, two centuries hence." Having thoroughly thrown him self into the interests of his adopted country, he had alternate seasons of hope and gloom according as he regarded their condition. For himself he had no other rule of life than that of his Divine Master "I came not to do my own will, but the will of Him that sent me." Hence his indifference to personal comfort, and even to position, except in view of his office, and the influence of it; hence his readiness to surrender one portion of his professional income after another: "if so be I can place my children above want, it will be enough." When consulted about translation to an episcopate more lucrative and of greater supposed dignity than his own, he left himself passively in the hands of Providence, saying, "None of these things move me." His great year of domestic sorrow was 1849, when his dear wife was taken from him. Amongst other sources of comfort he especially mentions a sermon by (the then) Archdeacon Manning, on "the Sleep of the Departed," over the repeated reading of which he "shed floods of tears." But with all the tenderness and susceptibility of his nature, he was firm as a rock of granite where principle was at stake. "Men," he says, "are so taught to hate exclusiveness, that they are startled at truth, because it requires them to embrace one view in preference to others." The staunchness with which he retained and maintained the Anglican position in which [23/24] education and experience had fixed him, was characteristically marked in his correspondence on the course of events in the English Church from 1840 to 1845, of which he was a very close observer. With all charitable construction of motives, he never conceded any right to mere sentiment, or strained interpretations of authorized formularies. Besides his constant study of theology proper, he made a translation of the Book of Job with large annotations. His classical studies seem never to have lost their charms to him. Words, phrases, whole sentences, and whole lines, come to his aid opportunely throughout his correspondence. And to a sense of humour he was always alive. Besides the care of all the Churches in Australia which came upon him, he offered his services to the Archbishop of Canterbury to go to Hong-Kong, at a critical season, to "set in order the things that were wanting," as he did later on, to South America. He plainly had come to love pioneering work, through having it appointed to him. And in the pioneering work of the Church, as a Church, in Australasia, Bishop Broughton must ever stand a noble and pre eminent figure, if not quite alone. The motto which that heroic soul adopted (in a letter to a friend) when he was bracing himself up for one of the most courageous acts of his Episcopal life, may well be inscribed upon the whole of it:
"NEC TEMERE, NEC TIMIDE."