'Tis thus our race hath to true manhood grown:
To make the general good the common care,
Breaks through the sacred law of Laissez Faire!
Laissez Faire in the family circle was another matter. The authority of the father in domestic affairs is represented as still unquestioned even by the mother as late as 1879. But, just as you can always find proverbs which are mutually contradictory the one of the other, so the pages of Punch constantly provide simultaneous illustrations of opposing tendencies. In the very same year in which the doctrine of patriarchal rule is shown to be still firmly established, Punch exhibits a highly modern aspect of the relations between the two generations. Squire Quiverfull's son, who pays 60s. a hundred for his cigars, rebukes his father for paying 3d. each for his: "If I had as many children to provide for as you, I wouldn't smoke at all."
[4] Chapman: Homeric Hymns.
[RELIGION AND THE CHURCHES]
In the previous volume it was shown how Punch ranged himself on the side of the determined Protestantism of the mass of the English people against the growth of Ritualistic opinions and practices in the Church of England.
The tone of Punch's remonstrances was not always judicious or considerate, and it would be easy to overrate their influence. Still, they were not unrepresentative, and undoubtedly played a part in the movement which led to the introduction in the spring of 1874 of the Archbishops' Bill for the Regulation of Public Worship. As it was originally drafted, the directory power as to worship was given to the Bishop, assisted by a board of Assessors, clerical and lay, with an appeal to the Archbishop with a Board of Assessors whose decision should be final. The provisions of the Bill were criticized by Lord Salisbury, the Bishop of Peterborough, and Lord Shaftesbury, but of the amendments proposed those of Lord Shaftesbury carried the day, viz. that an Ecclesiastical Judge should preside in the Courts of Canterbury and York, to be appointed by the two Archbishops with the approval of the Crown, and that before this Judge, and not before the Bishop, such case of complaint, if not dismissed by the Bishop as frivolous, was to go for trial; one appeal should lie from this Judge to the Privy Council. These amendments gave the final character to the Act.