Archbishops Bishops Office Correspondence: Bishop Charles Perry - Private Letter Book December 5 1849 - January 5th 1854
DESCRIPTION
SeriesArchbishops Bishops Office CorrespondenceDate range1849-1854Description
Letter Book 1
Private Letter Book Number 1. Contains correspondence to clergy including Reverends Blomfield , Budd , Brickwood , Barker , Collins, Cheyne , Gurney , Grylls , Gregory , Merry , Newham , Russell , Thompson (asking for leave) , Trollope , Archdeacon of Geelong and others.
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BOX numberLetter Book 1FormatBook
Subject
Number of Pages186
ADMIN
Accession2013-2NotesCharles Perry (17 February 1807 – 2 December 1891) was the first Anglican Bishop of Melbourne, Australia. Bishop of Melbourne 1847 – 1876.
Pages 185 and 186 attached to back of book.
Includes
From Charles Perry
- To Charles Sladen Esquire – I was sorry to learn incidentally from a person, who happened to be at Christ Church on Sunday week, that it was by no means full at the morning service, As the day was favourable, the circumstances as struck me as remarkable, and at a time when you are making so large an addition to the building, it seems particularly to require explanation. I shall feel much obliged to you & your Co Trustees, if you will have the goodness, as quasi churchwardens, to state to me frankly, whether the comparative emptiness of the church in the morning referred to, was altogether unusual, and attributable to accidental circumstances, or whether the attendance is irregular, and if so, to what cause this is to be imputed. I should be glad also, if you would report to me, whether in your opinion, the present arrangement in respect to our church at Geelong, is altogether satisfactory, & is working well; and would likewise communicate to me any particulars respecting the services of the Church, the management of the schools, & the influence of the ministry upon the people, which you may feel it desirable for me as the chief Pastor under Christ, of this portion of his flock, to be acquainted with. It is my intention, if God permit, to spend next week at Geelong; & I would request that any statement which you may have to make, may be communicated to me, as early in the week, as may be convenient to you. With the grateful acknowledgement of the zeal & energy of yourself & fellow labourers. Melbourne December 5 1849. Page 1.
- To The Reverend T. Cusack Russell ( Francis Thomas Cusack ) – (14 Jun 1850 exhibited letters of orders and took oaths Melbourne 1850 minister at The Wannon Victoria diocese Melbourne 1850-1876 minister Castleton and Hamilton district – Cable Clergy Index ) – I am sorry that my delay in communicating to you my final reply to your application for employment in my diocese. Has kept you so long in a state of painful suspense, but I could not come to any decision until I received an answer from the Bishop of Sydney, to whom I wrote by the same post by which I wrote to you upon the subject. It would obviously be most unbecoming for me to receive a clergyman, without the consent of his former Diocesan, and I therefore wrote to ask the Bp. of S. if he would give you a simple “hicat migeare?", according to the phrase of our English Universities, in which case I was willing to take the responsibility of employing you without any testimonial to your character and conduct. My reason for offering to do this was, that as I told His Lordship, & as I told you in my last, I believed you, whatever may have been your fault, to be a faithful and diligent minister of the Gospel. I am disposed to think that the Bp. would have complied with my request but ? at that time, your notice of an appeal to the Archbishop of Canterbury was served upon him, as he complains in his letter to me, by a common attorney. I think he says; and he states that after such an indignity put upon him he cannot have anything more to do with you, but must leave you to take your own course. I have not his letter before me, & cannot be certain that I use his words, but I believe that I express the sense of them. You will I am sure agree with me that under these circumstances, I am compelled, very much to my regret, for I still maintain my confidence in your ? integrity and honesty of purpose, to refuse your application, for it does not at all become me, either by word or act to call in question the propriety of the Bp. of Sydney’s conduct toward you. If I could have done so, I would willingly have given you a trial in my own Diocese, but as I feel that I cannot now do so, I must content myself with expressing my earnest prayer & hope that the Lord will graciously sanctify your past present trials to your own growth in grace, & to the ultimate benefit of His Church. What effect they will produce upon you, depends, under God’s blessings on? yourself. If you regard them, not as inflicted by men, but as appointed for you by God; & if you bear them with meekness & patience humbling yourself under His mighty Hand, he will exalt you in due time; He will make them work together for your good, & give you cause to praise Him for them in the end. But the present is the most important crisis of your life; & I cannot but feel that you are placed in a position of no little difficulty & danger. If your faith & patience fail you & and you follow the devices and desires of your own head, instead of waiting the Lord’s good pleasure, you will, as so many faithful & earnest ministers of our Church did in he last generation, greatly mar your own future usefulness & happiness; and perhaps perpetuate a ruinous schism. You probably are inclined to feel that you have been called to the ministry, & are not at liberty to forbear exercising that ministry. But you must remember that you were called according to the order of a particular Church, & solemnly engaged to submit to the authority of him who was placed over you in that Church. That authority may have been, according to your judgement harshly & even unjustly exercised, but still it ought to be regarded by you as the expression of God’s will concerning you; – & by exercising your ministry in violation of it, you would I conceive, be guilty of as great an irregularity, as if you had never been ordained. It would have been quite a different thing if you were convinced that our Church was itself unsound & unscriptural; and should on that account separate yourself altogether from her. It is I am aware, a difficult thing for a man whose heart is full & who longs to be preaching the … of Christ, to remain silent, but we are to remember that as it is an honour put upon us by God, to be entrusted with the Gospel so if He in his providence signifies His withdrawal of that trust, we are bound simply to submit. It is a simple mistake into which we are very apt to fall to think that he stands in need of our services; whereas he will accomplish His own purposes with us, or without us, just as he sees best. The simple question for each of us to consider, is what is, the will of the Lord concerning me? Again, we should remember that God continually lays His servants aside for a time, it may be by sickness, or it may be by some other providential dispensation; and that at any moment when He sees fit. He puts them as it were again into commission & sends them forth to their appointed work. Thus although Paul was distinctly informed of the Lord’s purpose that he should bear witness to Him at Rome, yet he was kept for 2 years afterwards a prisoner at Caesarea. And afterwards when he reached Rome, he was still a prisoner, & would preach only to those who came to see him. Thus we see that God’s ways are not our ways; we are always in a hurry to do what we feel right to be done; but God has an appointed time for everything; & He often tries the faith & patience of His people, by the delays which he forces upon them. Our duty & our wisdom is to acquiesce cheerfully in these delays, & not to attempt to precipitate matters; knowing that if we simply wait His time & pleasure, the Lord will, it may be suddenly, and quite unexpectedly, in due season, make the way plain before us. Then shall we be able to walk in it with confidence & comfort. My earnest advice, I may say my entreaty to you therefore is, that you will not suffer yourself to be into any kind of irregularity, but endeavour by prayer & readings of the S.S. to cast yourself with a calm & quiet mind upon the Lord, assured that He will make all things work together unto you for good. You might also as much as possible, to keep yourself from all that tends to disturb & irritate your feelings & on this account I should recommend you to quit Sydney & either to return home, where I do not doubt you would soon be able to obtain clerical employment, or if you still long to be engaged in the Colonies, to take up your abode in some place where you can live quietly for a time, until you see what the Lord will do with you. I am thankful to see that you are relieved from any fear of pecuniary want at present. I have no doubt that you will be able by a school, or in some other way, to obtain a maintenance for your family. I do not give any opinion as to which of these courses you should take, but I strongly advise that you should adapt without delay, the one or the other of them. I would only add that you have peculiar need at the present time both to cultivate a meek & lowly spirit, & also to set a watch upon your lips. That the Lord may direct, strengthen, & comfort you, is the sincere prayer.. December 20 1849. Pages 2 – 5.
- To The Reverend J. Y. Wilson ( James Yelverton ) – In remitting to you the usual quarterly upon the S.P.G. I am compelled to say, that I cannot undertake any longer to guarantee to you its continued payment. It is part of an annual sum granted by the Society for providing clergyman for the squatting districts beyond the settled boundaries; & although when I was at Portland last year, I was prepared, as I the stated, to apply for their permission to continue to appropriate it towards your salary as the Minister of that township & neighbourhood, the circumstances which shortly after occurred, induced me to defer doing so; and now the experiences of the past year makes me feel, that I should not be justified in making such a request to them. It is my purpose however, if God permits, to visit Portland in the latter end of this, or the beginning of next month; and I shall then be ready to receive any representation which may be made to me, either by myself or others, upon the subject.. January 1 1850. Page 6.
- To The Reverend A. C. Thomson ( Adam Compton ) – I can have no hesitation in granting you leave of absence for 3 months to date from the 1st inst. agreeably with your request. For even if your state of health had not require rest, & change of scene, I should have felt that you had, by your continued labours without any intermission during the whole period in which you have been Chaplain of St James’ Church, justly become entitled to some recreation. I earnestly trust that the Lord may bless your temporary sojourn in Van Diemen's Land, to the restoration of your strength; & that both yourself and Mrs Thomson may return with recruited health and spirits to your duties. The only difficulty in such a case as yours is as to the mode of providing for the performance of your duties in your absence. You are aware, that in England a clergyman always makes arrangements for the services of his Church & the pastoral care of his parish, while he is away. If you had gone away some time ago, when I proposed that you should do so, I might myself with the other clergy in Melbourne have occupied your post without much difficult, but I am also going away & Mr Merry is about to proceed to Geelong; my intention being not to replace him, at least for the present. I am therefore obliged to retain Mr Chase here, expressly to supply your place, as well as to enlist the services of Mr Strong, who has been for some time past, in respect to yourself, your gratuitous assistant. These two gentlemen are, as you are aware paid entirely out of my E. Ch. F. which not only cannot bear any additional demands upon it, but which I must relieve from some of those at present existing. I mention these particulars, because I wish you .. to understand the position in which I am placed. My desire is to do that which is right before God, both in respect to the Church in this Diocese generally, & to you yourself in particular, The subject has occupied much of my thought during the last few days, & I will now state the result which I hope will be satisfactory for you. In consideration of your long service & present state of health, I think that shall be justified in allowing you to draw your full government stipend during the period of your leave of absence but the surplice fees must be received by the officiating minister, and accounted for to me, in part payment of their stipends. I must also request you to resign your office of chaplain of the Goal, the duties of which it is not possible for you to perform in connection with those of St James’ Church & Parish. Yet it is right likewise to state to you distinctly, that here after, i.e. after your leave expires, the ministerial duties of St. James’ Church & Parish must be provided for without any charge against my English Fund; & that I shall consider myself bound to see that they are efficiently performed. It is manifestly wrong that any portion of the above mentioned Fund, should be appropriated towards the maintenance of a clergyman for the only Church & Parish within the Diocese (excepting indeed Christ Ch Geelong) which have a sufficient stipend for them. I am sorry to occupy your mind at this time with any subject which may harass & disturb it: but I should not be acting justly towards you & towards myself if I did not at once tell you my views. The oversight of Emigrants, & perhaps also the pastoral care of the soldiers are extraparochial; & for these maybe properly called to make an independent provision, but for no more. With respect to your duties as surrogate: it has for sometime past been my intention to give Mr Newham a surrogate license; & the circumstance of your temporary absence, and it shows the necessity, so also furnishes the natural occasion for executing my purpose. When you return, I will, if it should appear desirable, define the limits of his authority by each of you respectively. I have now I believe noticed the various particulars which required my attention, previously to you setting off on your excursion: but I cannot conclude without expressing the great grief & anxiety which the knowledge of your primary circumstances has afforded me; & my fear that you do not sufficiently regard the inconsideration & carelessness of expenditure which have been the causes of those circumstances, as a very grievous sin against the Lord. I know, for I am acquainted with some of the particulars of your life in India, - that this has been one of your most besetting time during the whole of your ministerial course; & I fear that it has already greatly injured, & is now very injurious to your ministerial usefulness. I am very reluctant just at this time when you are suffering under the heavy hand of the Lord, to say anything to aggravate your pain; but I am bound in faithfulness and in love, to urge upon you the duty of deep humiliation & confession of sin before the Lord, with the distinct & solemn resolution, in dependence upon the divine assistance, of never again, by any fault of your own incurring debts which you are unable to pay out of your ordinary income. Pecuniary difficulties necessarily destroy a man’s independence’ & too frequently injure his character for strict integrity and ingeniousness, & of my own feeling as to the effect upon the efficiency of a clergyman is so strong, that I am resolved to mark in the very strongest manner, even to the revocation of his license in an extreme case, any sense of the evil. I do not write this as at all anticipating any such necessity with respect to you, but only to make you fully acquainted with my sentiments; and to supply an additional motive, if any be needed, for you to practise the most rigid economy, in order that you may be really a free and independent man. You might I am perfectly sure live with comfort & respectability upon little more than half your income for the last years. If you use the season of rest, which you will now with God’s blessing, enjoy, in serious? on this, and other particulars of your ministerial life, you will have cause to be thankful for the present trying dispensation & will return not only strengthened in body, but also better prepared in the spirit of your mind for any service within the Lord may be pleased to employ you hereafter. You & your dear wife & child have our most sincere good wishes; & will I trust be often remembered by us in our prayers.. January 12 1850. Pages 7 – 11.
- To The Reverend D. Newham ( Daniel ) – I have been lately reflecting much upon the state of my episcopal accounts; & I am convinced of the necessity of making every possible reduction of expenditure in order to avoid insolvency. Among other particulars, that of your stipend has come under my consideration. I have undertaken to pay out of my fund, the yearly sum of 100 pounds, to meet 100 pounds raised by your Parishioners during the first 2 years of your incumbency of St Peters. This period will expire on the _ day of _ next, after which I feel that I cannot renew it, even if the Trustees were willing upon my doing so, to proceed with the enlargement of the Church. My guarantee to yourself was, that you should receive 200 pounds per annum, for 5 years, & in respect to my English Fund, I must do no more hereafter than supply any deficiency which your income may fall short of that amount. It is however my wish that you should receive that sum or 150 pounds, which with a house will be equivalent thereto, exclusive of all fees… ; this must depend on the Trustees, & the people generally. You will believe that will be most painful to me, if your income should receive any diminution, & that necessity alone occasions me to withdraw my help. I shall be glad if you will think over the subject & be ready to tell me your views in respect to the best mode of communicating with the Trustees.. I may mention that it is my intention to give you a Surrogate’s license immediately, & would wish you to meet me at Mr Moore’s office on Wednesday next at 2 o’clock punctually for that purpose. I may also state that it is my intention hereafter to require that the staff of clergy necessary for the services & pastoral charge of St James’ District, should be maintained from local sources; & that if there be an extra clergyman, his office will be that of chaplain of the Goal, Hospital Barracks & Emigrants, & assistant at suburban stations. I think that I am justified in providing at present an assistant for St Peters’ division, & I shall continue to do so if possible, until there is some certain income for the Chaplain of the Church. I shall be happy to hear any remarks which may occur to you respecting my views.. January 12 1850. Pages 11 – 12.
- To The Reverend W. Trollope ( William ) – I should thankfully avail myself of your offer to conduct the services upon the Lords day at the Russell Street School room., if I conscientiously thought that I should thereby promote the glory of God, and the edification of His Church in this Province. But you will remember that my reason for declining to employ you in the ministry upon your first arrival was not the difficulty of obtaining for you a stipend, but the circumstance of you not being accredited by my commissaries in England. During your residence here I have endeavoured to form a judgement for myself as to your character & sentiments, and general qualifications for usefulness in this Diocese, and I am obliged frankly to state to you, that I have been confirmed in my original determination. I do not wish to arrogate to myself any right to advise or admonish you, except as a Xtain brother; nor; inasmuch as you are, as you reminded me in your former letter, older than I am, should I have volunteered to do so in that character: but your application compels me to express my opinion concerning you. Do not therefore be offended with me for saying, that the whole tenure of your writing since you have been in Melbourne, both those of which you are the avowed author, and those which they do not have your name, have been evidently proceeded from your pen, - so far as they have come under my notice has convinced me, that we are not of one heart, & of one mind in the Lord, & therefore could not profitably labour together in His service. I write this in no unkindly spirit – I feel for your difficulties; and my desire & prayer for you is, that the Lord will sanctify them unto you, & in his own time deliver you out of them:- but in the fulfilment of my office, I must act according to the dictates of my conscience in the sight of God &, great as is the coil? Of the present insufficiency of Church accommodation, I believe this to be far less than would result from the employment of clergymen, in whom I could not place implicit confidence. I am truly sorry that I am thus constrained to give you pain, and can sincerely subscribe myself.. March 26 1850. Pages 13 – 14.
- To The Reverend W. Trollope – I am sorry, that you have thought fit to address me in the language of your note of the afternoon; and I think that hereafter you well yourself be ashamed of having done so. – I shall only now say, that I have most carefully abstained from any kind of interference, direct or indirect, which your projects, lest I should do you any injury; & that I shall continue to pursue the same course. The Lord judge whether you, or I, have manifested an unchristian spirit in this correspondence. March 26 1850. Page 15.
- To The Reverend E. Collins ( Ebenezer ) – I am sorry to learn from a letter of the Archdeacon which I have just received, that you either do not understand or do not choose to acquiesce in the Ecclesiastical relation in which you stand towards him. You will recollect that when I received your license as Chaplain of Christ Church, I expressed to you in writing my fear that you were not qualified for so arduous & responsible a post as you then occupied; & the obligation which I should feel myself to be under of removing you if you were not efficient, knowing however your unwillingness to accept of any other situation, & believing you to be a faithful servant of the blessed Lord, I was very desirous to make some arrangement whereby there might be an effective pastoral superintendence exercised over the people of Geelong & you might still retain your situation. Both these objects I hoped might be affected by the appointment of an Archdeacon, who as my representative would be your ecclesiastical superior, & preside over the Church there. From what I have seen of you I was led to think there was a want of energy & strength of mind, arising probably from the enfeebled state of your bodily health. But I entertained a confident expectation that no feeling of false pride or jealousy of control would prevent you for acting cordially, & cheerfully under another. Herein I regret to say I have been disappointed for it is quite clear that you are not willing to work under the Archdeacon; and I am afraid that this unwillingness has very greatly increased the difficulty of his position. At the same time the communication which have been made to me from several quarters, have fully confirmed me in the conviction, that your ministrations both public & private, are very inefficient, & that you are wholly unfitted for an independent pastoral charge. It would therefore, I must frankly say, relieve me from a burden of painful responsibility, if you would determine as you once talked of doing to return home; and in this case I should myself pay the passage money for yourself & family. If however you prefer to remain, I must require that you place yourself bona fide under the direction & control of the Archdeacon, to whom I have, & do hereby distinctly inform you that I have, committed, so far as is in my power to do so, the spiritual charge of Geelong & its neighbourhood. Whether this is my last effort to make a satisfactory arrangement respecting you, succeed, rests, under the pleading of God chiefly on yourself. I am sure that in no other way can you become a really efficient minister of Christ in this Colony; & therefore earnestly hope that you will consent to give the experiment a fair trial. I have lately learnt that before my arrival, the Bishop of Sydney had written to the S.P.G about removing you to some less responsible post near Sydney, on the ground of your energies having been impaired by your residence at Sierra Leone & the West Indies. With respect to your stipend, it is my intention now that Geelong is so much enlarged, to give a surrogate license to the Archdeacon, & to make a fresh arrangement respecting the surplice fees. It gives me pain to write in a manner which must give pain to you, but I do so under a strong sense of my own responsibility before God, praying that he will direct us both, & overrule all things for His own glory, & our real well being. It is therefore with a feeling of sincere interest in yourself & Mrs Collins & family, that I subscribe myself.. January 25 1850. Page 15 – 18.
- To The Reverend E. Collins – I found your note of March 12th upon my return home at the end of the week before last; but I have been too much occupied since to reply to it. Indeed I have been rather expecting to hear from you again: for you surely cannot intend such a note to be your only reply to my communication. You simply thank me for the copy of the Archdeacon’s letter, & express your regret that he should have felt it necessary to trouble me with such a communication. I cannot accept this as an answer to my letter, as a man of God appointed to watch for the souls of many hundreds of his fellow creatures, & sensible of his responsibility herein, would make. I wish to know, what ground of hope I may have, that, if you continue at Geelong, you will give yourself heartily to the work of the Lord under the Archdeacon. I own that my confidence in your own personal Christian character, has been very much shaken by your seeming indifference concerning the progress of real spiritual religion among your people; & concerning the account which you must one day for every one of them. I do not know, how a man, who has really experience the power of the gospel in his own heart, can show so little feeling as you do respecting the eternal well being of those who have been committed to his charge. I am aware that I am writing strongly; but I cannot refrain from doing so. My earnest desire & prayer to God, is, that the work of the ministry may be effectually carried on, I care not whether by yourself or others, at Geelong; and, God helping me, I will use all the authority which he has given me, for this object. If you are really an humble, earnest, servant of the Lord, you will sympathise with me in my feelings, & will be anxious to prove to me, by all means in your power, that you are labouring with a singleness of purpose, & with self denying diligence, in dependence upon the Grace of God, to fulfil his ministry which you have received. Hoping therefore to receive in the course of next week a more satisfactory reply.. April 4 1850. Pages 18 – 19.
- To The Reverend E. Collins – I am happy to accept your assurance that you will, by the help of God’s grace, give your self heartily to the work of the Lord in the post which he has assigned to you; and that you will act therein under the Archdeacon. May He who is in the fountain of all grace, wisdom, and strength, enable you to fulfil your ministry so that you may hereafter give an account of it with joy and not with grief.. I can only say that if your sermons are as carefully worded as your notes, your people will have no reason to complain of a loose phraseology. Mrs Perry and Miss Cooper write in kind regards to Mrs Collins.. April 1850. Page 20.
- To Mr Edward Wilson – I have been unable to answer your note of the 24th .. before today. It is very gratifying to me, that you so entirely approve of the course, which I have hitherto presented? In the fulfilment of the duties of my office, I trust that my desire is always to do that which is right in the sight of God, & to be an instrument in His hand for extending the kingdom of his dear son. Herein I do not doubt, that, as one of the editors of a paper (Argus) which exercises a considerable influence upon people, you may very greatly promote the objects which I have in view; & I thankfully accept the expression of your wish to do so. I am happy also to believe, that there are many particulars, & those of the chief importance, in which our opinions agree. I think however that you may really cooperate with the most efficiently by our acting quite independently of each other. You may perhaps remember, that, upon my first arrival, I publicly stated my determination not to connect myself in any way with parties, but to regard every man in his individual character, without any reference of his political opinions. On this account I can never communicate to you as Editor of the Argus on any other terms than those to which I communicate with the Editors of other newspapers.. publicly with the strictest impartiality. Of course, I must hold my own private sentiments with respect to the principles respect to the principles advocated by the different papers, & I may have occasion to animadvert upon those principles, when they directly affect the spiritual, & moral, well being of the community: but in such cases I should wish to say no more than is absolutely necessary. I trust, that what I have written may commend itself to your judgement:- the interruption which I have experienced in writing this short note, may have caused me to express myself badly; but you will, I think, understand my general meaning. Whatever you can properly ask of me as one unconnected, & desirous to remain unconnected with any party, I shall always most gladly communicate; but more than this I cannot do. It may not be improper for me here to say, that the great complaint, which I have heard formerly alleged against the Argus, was, that it was so often guilty of personal abuse; & that I believe abstinence from this weapon tends greatly to raise the paper in public estimation.. April 30 1850. Pages 21 – 22.
- To S. G. Henty Esquire – I was beginning to wonder how matters were going on at Portland, when yours of the 24th ult. Came to hand. The qualified assent of Mr Wilson to my proposal respecting him has not so much surprised, as disappointed me; & I regret to say, that I cannot view it as you do, as doing away with any claim upon me at the expiration of the year & affording the opportunity for the appointment of another clergyman in his place. On the contrary, it appears to me calculated to defeat the great object, which I have had in view in the proposed arrangement viz to prevent Mr Wilson from getting again involved in debt; and to enable me, if he should do so, to remove him without giving himself, or his friends any pretext for complaint. I have no confidence in his owner power to keep himself out of debt; & a temporary restraint upon him, such as he engages to submit to, would be, in my opinion of no benefit whatsoever. I cannot therefore accept of such a qualified assent he has given to my proposal; and will undertake to make up the deficiency in his assets only upon condition of his erasing the words “for one year ending the 31st day of March 1851”; & substituting in their stead, “as long as the Bishop of Melbourne shall think fit to enforce them. I wish it also to be distinctly understood by himself and others, that the revocation of his license, if I should be compelled to revoke it, would be equivalent to a dismissal from all employment in the Diocese. I am very sorry my dear sir to trouble you so much upon this painful subject; but we must both be willing to do what is most painful to our feelings, when the Lord requires it from us. Will you be so kind as to pay Mr Bates 2.10.0 pounds for me, being the amount allowed by me for the superintendence of the Sunday School during the last Quarter, I think that at the close of the present year I ought to leave it to yourselves to bear this expense. We shall be most glad to see you in Melbourne, both in account of the pleasure which a visit from you will us & because it will assure us of the safety & progressive convalescence of your dear wife. Mrs Perry desires to send the assurance of her affectionate love to Mrs Henty & her little family; & I do beg that you will also convey to her & our other friends my Xtain regards.. May 3 1850. Pages 23 – 24.
- To Mr Edward Wilson – In reply.. I beg to assure you, that I did not at all intend to impute to you any improper motive in the suggestion contained in your previous note, nor did I suppose, that you wished me in any degree to compromise my independence in thought & action. I understand you, & I gav
Pages 185 and 186 attached to back of book.
Includes
From Charles Perry
- To Charles Sladen Esquire – I was sorry to learn incidentally from a person, who happened to be at Christ Church on Sunday week, that it was by no means full at the morning service, As the day was favourable, the circumstances as struck me as remarkable, and at a time when you are making so large an addition to the building, it seems particularly to require explanation. I shall feel much obliged to you & your Co Trustees, if you will have the goodness, as quasi churchwardens, to state to me frankly, whether the comparative emptiness of the church in the morning referred to, was altogether unusual, and attributable to accidental circumstances, or whether the attendance is irregular, and if so, to what cause this is to be imputed. I should be glad also, if you would report to me, whether in your opinion, the present arrangement in respect to our church at Geelong, is altogether satisfactory, & is working well; and would likewise communicate to me any particulars respecting the services of the Church, the management of the schools, & the influence of the ministry upon the people, which you may feel it desirable for me as the chief Pastor under Christ, of this portion of his flock, to be acquainted with. It is my intention, if God permit, to spend next week at Geelong; & I would request that any statement which you may have to make, may be communicated to me, as early in the week, as may be convenient to you. With the grateful acknowledgement of the zeal & energy of yourself & fellow labourers. Melbourne December 5 1849. Page 1.
- To The Reverend T. Cusack Russell ( Francis Thomas Cusack ) – (14 Jun 1850 exhibited letters of orders and took oaths Melbourne 1850 minister at The Wannon Victoria diocese Melbourne 1850-1876 minister Castleton and Hamilton district – Cable Clergy Index ) – I am sorry that my delay in communicating to you my final reply to your application for employment in my diocese. Has kept you so long in a state of painful suspense, but I could not come to any decision until I received an answer from the Bishop of Sydney, to whom I wrote by the same post by which I wrote to you upon the subject. It would obviously be most unbecoming for me to receive a clergyman, without the consent of his former Diocesan, and I therefore wrote to ask the Bp. of S. if he would give you a simple “hicat migeare?", according to the phrase of our English Universities, in which case I was willing to take the responsibility of employing you without any testimonial to your character and conduct. My reason for offering to do this was, that as I told His Lordship, & as I told you in my last, I believed you, whatever may have been your fault, to be a faithful and diligent minister of the Gospel. I am disposed to think that the Bp. would have complied with my request but ? at that time, your notice of an appeal to the Archbishop of Canterbury was served upon him, as he complains in his letter to me, by a common attorney. I think he says; and he states that after such an indignity put upon him he cannot have anything more to do with you, but must leave you to take your own course. I have not his letter before me, & cannot be certain that I use his words, but I believe that I express the sense of them. You will I am sure agree with me that under these circumstances, I am compelled, very much to my regret, for I still maintain my confidence in your ? integrity and honesty of purpose, to refuse your application, for it does not at all become me, either by word or act to call in question the propriety of the Bp. of Sydney’s conduct toward you. If I could have done so, I would willingly have given you a trial in my own Diocese, but as I feel that I cannot now do so, I must content myself with expressing my earnest prayer & hope that the Lord will graciously sanctify your past present trials to your own growth in grace, & to the ultimate benefit of His Church. What effect they will produce upon you, depends, under God’s blessings on? yourself. If you regard them, not as inflicted by men, but as appointed for you by God; & if you bear them with meekness & patience humbling yourself under His mighty Hand, he will exalt you in due time; He will make them work together for your good, & give you cause to praise Him for them in the end. But the present is the most important crisis of your life; & I cannot but feel that you are placed in a position of no little difficulty & danger. If your faith & patience fail you & and you follow the devices and desires of your own head, instead of waiting the Lord’s good pleasure, you will, as so many faithful & earnest ministers of our Church did in he last generation, greatly mar your own future usefulness & happiness; and perhaps perpetuate a ruinous schism. You probably are inclined to feel that you have been called to the ministry, & are not at liberty to forbear exercising that ministry. But you must remember that you were called according to the order of a particular Church, & solemnly engaged to submit to the authority of him who was placed over you in that Church. That authority may have been, according to your judgement harshly & even unjustly exercised, but still it ought to be regarded by you as the expression of God’s will concerning you; – & by exercising your ministry in violation of it, you would I conceive, be guilty of as great an irregularity, as if you had never been ordained. It would have been quite a different thing if you were convinced that our Church was itself unsound & unscriptural; and should on that account separate yourself altogether from her. It is I am aware, a difficult thing for a man whose heart is full & who longs to be preaching the … of Christ, to remain silent, but we are to remember that as it is an honour put upon us by God, to be entrusted with the Gospel so if He in his providence signifies His withdrawal of that trust, we are bound simply to submit. It is a simple mistake into which we are very apt to fall to think that he stands in need of our services; whereas he will accomplish His own purposes with us, or without us, just as he sees best. The simple question for each of us to consider, is what is, the will of the Lord concerning me? Again, we should remember that God continually lays His servants aside for a time, it may be by sickness, or it may be by some other providential dispensation; and that at any moment when He sees fit. He puts them as it were again into commission & sends them forth to their appointed work. Thus although Paul was distinctly informed of the Lord’s purpose that he should bear witness to Him at Rome, yet he was kept for 2 years afterwards a prisoner at Caesarea. And afterwards when he reached Rome, he was still a prisoner, & would preach only to those who came to see him. Thus we see that God’s ways are not our ways; we are always in a hurry to do what we feel right to be done; but God has an appointed time for everything; & He often tries the faith & patience of His people, by the delays which he forces upon them. Our duty & our wisdom is to acquiesce cheerfully in these delays, & not to attempt to precipitate matters; knowing that if we simply wait His time & pleasure, the Lord will, it may be suddenly, and quite unexpectedly, in due season, make the way plain before us. Then shall we be able to walk in it with confidence & comfort. My earnest advice, I may say my entreaty to you therefore is, that you will not suffer yourself to be into any kind of irregularity, but endeavour by prayer & readings of the S.S. to cast yourself with a calm & quiet mind upon the Lord, assured that He will make all things work together unto you for good. You might also as much as possible, to keep yourself from all that tends to disturb & irritate your feelings & on this account I should recommend you to quit Sydney & either to return home, where I do not doubt you would soon be able to obtain clerical employment, or if you still long to be engaged in the Colonies, to take up your abode in some place where you can live quietly for a time, until you see what the Lord will do with you. I am thankful to see that you are relieved from any fear of pecuniary want at present. I have no doubt that you will be able by a school, or in some other way, to obtain a maintenance for your family. I do not give any opinion as to which of these courses you should take, but I strongly advise that you should adapt without delay, the one or the other of them. I would only add that you have peculiar need at the present time both to cultivate a meek & lowly spirit, & also to set a watch upon your lips. That the Lord may direct, strengthen, & comfort you, is the sincere prayer.. December 20 1849. Pages 2 – 5.
- To The Reverend J. Y. Wilson ( James Yelverton ) – In remitting to you the usual quarterly upon the S.P.G. I am compelled to say, that I cannot undertake any longer to guarantee to you its continued payment. It is part of an annual sum granted by the Society for providing clergyman for the squatting districts beyond the settled boundaries; & although when I was at Portland last year, I was prepared, as I the stated, to apply for their permission to continue to appropriate it towards your salary as the Minister of that township & neighbourhood, the circumstances which shortly after occurred, induced me to defer doing so; and now the experiences of the past year makes me feel, that I should not be justified in making such a request to them. It is my purpose however, if God permits, to visit Portland in the latter end of this, or the beginning of next month; and I shall then be ready to receive any representation which may be made to me, either by myself or others, upon the subject.. January 1 1850. Page 6.
- To The Reverend A. C. Thomson ( Adam Compton ) – I can have no hesitation in granting you leave of absence for 3 months to date from the 1st inst. agreeably with your request. For even if your state of health had not require rest, & change of scene, I should have felt that you had, by your continued labours without any intermission during the whole period in which you have been Chaplain of St James’ Church, justly become entitled to some recreation. I earnestly trust that the Lord may bless your temporary sojourn in Van Diemen's Land, to the restoration of your strength; & that both yourself and Mrs Thomson may return with recruited health and spirits to your duties. The only difficulty in such a case as yours is as to the mode of providing for the performance of your duties in your absence. You are aware, that in England a clergyman always makes arrangements for the services of his Church & the pastoral care of his parish, while he is away. If you had gone away some time ago, when I proposed that you should do so, I might myself with the other clergy in Melbourne have occupied your post without much difficult, but I am also going away & Mr Merry is about to proceed to Geelong; my intention being not to replace him, at least for the present. I am therefore obliged to retain Mr Chase here, expressly to supply your place, as well as to enlist the services of Mr Strong, who has been for some time past, in respect to yourself, your gratuitous assistant. These two gentlemen are, as you are aware paid entirely out of my E. Ch. F. which not only cannot bear any additional demands upon it, but which I must relieve from some of those at present existing. I mention these particulars, because I wish you .. to understand the position in which I am placed. My desire is to do that which is right before God, both in respect to the Church in this Diocese generally, & to you yourself in particular, The subject has occupied much of my thought during the last few days, & I will now state the result which I hope will be satisfactory for you. In consideration of your long service & present state of health, I think that shall be justified in allowing you to draw your full government stipend during the period of your leave of absence but the surplice fees must be received by the officiating minister, and accounted for to me, in part payment of their stipends. I must also request you to resign your office of chaplain of the Goal, the duties of which it is not possible for you to perform in connection with those of St James’ Church & Parish. Yet it is right likewise to state to you distinctly, that here after, i.e. after your leave expires, the ministerial duties of St. James’ Church & Parish must be provided for without any charge against my English Fund; & that I shall consider myself bound to see that they are efficiently performed. It is manifestly wrong that any portion of the above mentioned Fund, should be appropriated towards the maintenance of a clergyman for the only Church & Parish within the Diocese (excepting indeed Christ Ch Geelong) which have a sufficient stipend for them. I am sorry to occupy your mind at this time with any subject which may harass & disturb it: but I should not be acting justly towards you & towards myself if I did not at once tell you my views. The oversight of Emigrants, & perhaps also the pastoral care of the soldiers are extraparochial; & for these maybe properly called to make an independent provision, but for no more. With respect to your duties as surrogate: it has for sometime past been my intention to give Mr Newham a surrogate license; & the circumstance of your temporary absence, and it shows the necessity, so also furnishes the natural occasion for executing my purpose. When you return, I will, if it should appear desirable, define the limits of his authority by each of you respectively. I have now I believe noticed the various particulars which required my attention, previously to you setting off on your excursion: but I cannot conclude without expressing the great grief & anxiety which the knowledge of your primary circumstances has afforded me; & my fear that you do not sufficiently regard the inconsideration & carelessness of expenditure which have been the causes of those circumstances, as a very grievous sin against the Lord. I know, for I am acquainted with some of the particulars of your life in India, - that this has been one of your most besetting time during the whole of your ministerial course; & I fear that it has already greatly injured, & is now very injurious to your ministerial usefulness. I am very reluctant just at this time when you are suffering under the heavy hand of the Lord, to say anything to aggravate your pain; but I am bound in faithfulness and in love, to urge upon you the duty of deep humiliation & confession of sin before the Lord, with the distinct & solemn resolution, in dependence upon the divine assistance, of never again, by any fault of your own incurring debts which you are unable to pay out of your ordinary income. Pecuniary difficulties necessarily destroy a man’s independence’ & too frequently injure his character for strict integrity and ingeniousness, & of my own feeling as to the effect upon the efficiency of a clergyman is so strong, that I am resolved to mark in the very strongest manner, even to the revocation of his license in an extreme case, any sense of the evil. I do not write this as at all anticipating any such necessity with respect to you, but only to make you fully acquainted with my sentiments; and to supply an additional motive, if any be needed, for you to practise the most rigid economy, in order that you may be really a free and independent man. You might I am perfectly sure live with comfort & respectability upon little more than half your income for the last years. If you use the season of rest, which you will now with God’s blessing, enjoy, in serious? on this, and other particulars of your ministerial life, you will have cause to be thankful for the present trying dispensation & will return not only strengthened in body, but also better prepared in the spirit of your mind for any service within the Lord may be pleased to employ you hereafter. You & your dear wife & child have our most sincere good wishes; & will I trust be often remembered by us in our prayers.. January 12 1850. Pages 7 – 11.
- To The Reverend D. Newham ( Daniel ) – I have been lately reflecting much upon the state of my episcopal accounts; & I am convinced of the necessity of making every possible reduction of expenditure in order to avoid insolvency. Among other particulars, that of your stipend has come under my consideration. I have undertaken to pay out of my fund, the yearly sum of 100 pounds, to meet 100 pounds raised by your Parishioners during the first 2 years of your incumbency of St Peters. This period will expire on the _ day of _ next, after which I feel that I cannot renew it, even if the Trustees were willing upon my doing so, to proceed with the enlargement of the Church. My guarantee to yourself was, that you should receive 200 pounds per annum, for 5 years, & in respect to my English Fund, I must do no more hereafter than supply any deficiency which your income may fall short of that amount. It is however my wish that you should receive that sum or 150 pounds, which with a house will be equivalent thereto, exclusive of all fees… ; this must depend on the Trustees, & the people generally. You will believe that will be most painful to me, if your income should receive any diminution, & that necessity alone occasions me to withdraw my help. I shall be glad if you will think over the subject & be ready to tell me your views in respect to the best mode of communicating with the Trustees.. I may mention that it is my intention to give you a Surrogate’s license immediately, & would wish you to meet me at Mr Moore’s office on Wednesday next at 2 o’clock punctually for that purpose. I may also state that it is my intention hereafter to require that the staff of clergy necessary for the services & pastoral charge of St James’ District, should be maintained from local sources; & that if there be an extra clergyman, his office will be that of chaplain of the Goal, Hospital Barracks & Emigrants, & assistant at suburban stations. I think that I am justified in providing at present an assistant for St Peters’ division, & I shall continue to do so if possible, until there is some certain income for the Chaplain of the Church. I shall be happy to hear any remarks which may occur to you respecting my views.. January 12 1850. Pages 11 – 12.
- To The Reverend W. Trollope ( William ) – I should thankfully avail myself of your offer to conduct the services upon the Lords day at the Russell Street School room., if I conscientiously thought that I should thereby promote the glory of God, and the edification of His Church in this Province. But you will remember that my reason for declining to employ you in the ministry upon your first arrival was not the difficulty of obtaining for you a stipend, but the circumstance of you not being accredited by my commissaries in England. During your residence here I have endeavoured to form a judgement for myself as to your character & sentiments, and general qualifications for usefulness in this Diocese, and I am obliged frankly to state to you, that I have been confirmed in my original determination. I do not wish to arrogate to myself any right to advise or admonish you, except as a Xtain brother; nor; inasmuch as you are, as you reminded me in your former letter, older than I am, should I have volunteered to do so in that character: but your application compels me to express my opinion concerning you. Do not therefore be offended with me for saying, that the whole tenure of your writing since you have been in Melbourne, both those of which you are the avowed author, and those which they do not have your name, have been evidently proceeded from your pen, - so far as they have come under my notice has convinced me, that we are not of one heart, & of one mind in the Lord, & therefore could not profitably labour together in His service. I write this in no unkindly spirit – I feel for your difficulties; and my desire & prayer for you is, that the Lord will sanctify them unto you, & in his own time deliver you out of them:- but in the fulfilment of my office, I must act according to the dictates of my conscience in the sight of God &, great as is the coil? Of the present insufficiency of Church accommodation, I believe this to be far less than would result from the employment of clergymen, in whom I could not place implicit confidence. I am truly sorry that I am thus constrained to give you pain, and can sincerely subscribe myself.. March 26 1850. Pages 13 – 14.
- To The Reverend W. Trollope – I am sorry, that you have thought fit to address me in the language of your note of the afternoon; and I think that hereafter you well yourself be ashamed of having done so. – I shall only now say, that I have most carefully abstained from any kind of interference, direct or indirect, which your projects, lest I should do you any injury; & that I shall continue to pursue the same course. The Lord judge whether you, or I, have manifested an unchristian spirit in this correspondence. March 26 1850. Page 15.
- To The Reverend E. Collins ( Ebenezer ) – I am sorry to learn from a letter of the Archdeacon which I have just received, that you either do not understand or do not choose to acquiesce in the Ecclesiastical relation in which you stand towards him. You will recollect that when I received your license as Chaplain of Christ Church, I expressed to you in writing my fear that you were not qualified for so arduous & responsible a post as you then occupied; & the obligation which I should feel myself to be under of removing you if you were not efficient, knowing however your unwillingness to accept of any other situation, & believing you to be a faithful servant of the blessed Lord, I was very desirous to make some arrangement whereby there might be an effective pastoral superintendence exercised over the people of Geelong & you might still retain your situation. Both these objects I hoped might be affected by the appointment of an Archdeacon, who as my representative would be your ecclesiastical superior, & preside over the Church there. From what I have seen of you I was led to think there was a want of energy & strength of mind, arising probably from the enfeebled state of your bodily health. But I entertained a confident expectation that no feeling of false pride or jealousy of control would prevent you for acting cordially, & cheerfully under another. Herein I regret to say I have been disappointed for it is quite clear that you are not willing to work under the Archdeacon; and I am afraid that this unwillingness has very greatly increased the difficulty of his position. At the same time the communication which have been made to me from several quarters, have fully confirmed me in the conviction, that your ministrations both public & private, are very inefficient, & that you are wholly unfitted for an independent pastoral charge. It would therefore, I must frankly say, relieve me from a burden of painful responsibility, if you would determine as you once talked of doing to return home; and in this case I should myself pay the passage money for yourself & family. If however you prefer to remain, I must require that you place yourself bona fide under the direction & control of the Archdeacon, to whom I have, & do hereby distinctly inform you that I have, committed, so far as is in my power to do so, the spiritual charge of Geelong & its neighbourhood. Whether this is my last effort to make a satisfactory arrangement respecting you, succeed, rests, under the pleading of God chiefly on yourself. I am sure that in no other way can you become a really efficient minister of Christ in this Colony; & therefore earnestly hope that you will consent to give the experiment a fair trial. I have lately learnt that before my arrival, the Bishop of Sydney had written to the S.P.G about removing you to some less responsible post near Sydney, on the ground of your energies having been impaired by your residence at Sierra Leone & the West Indies. With respect to your stipend, it is my intention now that Geelong is so much enlarged, to give a surrogate license to the Archdeacon, & to make a fresh arrangement respecting the surplice fees. It gives me pain to write in a manner which must give pain to you, but I do so under a strong sense of my own responsibility before God, praying that he will direct us both, & overrule all things for His own glory, & our real well being. It is therefore with a feeling of sincere interest in yourself & Mrs Collins & family, that I subscribe myself.. January 25 1850. Page 15 – 18.
- To The Reverend E. Collins – I found your note of March 12th upon my return home at the end of the week before last; but I have been too much occupied since to reply to it. Indeed I have been rather expecting to hear from you again: for you surely cannot intend such a note to be your only reply to my communication. You simply thank me for the copy of the Archdeacon’s letter, & express your regret that he should have felt it necessary to trouble me with such a communication. I cannot accept this as an answer to my letter, as a man of God appointed to watch for the souls of many hundreds of his fellow creatures, & sensible of his responsibility herein, would make. I wish to know, what ground of hope I may have, that, if you continue at Geelong, you will give yourself heartily to the work of the Lord under the Archdeacon. I own that my confidence in your own personal Christian character, has been very much shaken by your seeming indifference concerning the progress of real spiritual religion among your people; & concerning the account which you must one day for every one of them. I do not know, how a man, who has really experience the power of the gospel in his own heart, can show so little feeling as you do respecting the eternal well being of those who have been committed to his charge. I am aware that I am writing strongly; but I cannot refrain from doing so. My earnest desire & prayer to God, is, that the work of the ministry may be effectually carried on, I care not whether by yourself or others, at Geelong; and, God helping me, I will use all the authority which he has given me, for this object. If you are really an humble, earnest, servant of the Lord, you will sympathise with me in my feelings, & will be anxious to prove to me, by all means in your power, that you are labouring with a singleness of purpose, & with self denying diligence, in dependence upon the Grace of God, to fulfil his ministry which you have received. Hoping therefore to receive in the course of next week a more satisfactory reply.. April 4 1850. Pages 18 – 19.
- To The Reverend E. Collins – I am happy to accept your assurance that you will, by the help of God’s grace, give your self heartily to the work of the Lord in the post which he has assigned to you; and that you will act therein under the Archdeacon. May He who is in the fountain of all grace, wisdom, and strength, enable you to fulfil your ministry so that you may hereafter give an account of it with joy and not with grief.. I can only say that if your sermons are as carefully worded as your notes, your people will have no reason to complain of a loose phraseology. Mrs Perry and Miss Cooper write in kind regards to Mrs Collins.. April 1850. Page 20.
- To Mr Edward Wilson – I have been unable to answer your note of the 24th .. before today. It is very gratifying to me, that you so entirely approve of the course, which I have hitherto presented? In the fulfilment of the duties of my office, I trust that my desire is always to do that which is right in the sight of God, & to be an instrument in His hand for extending the kingdom of his dear son. Herein I do not doubt, that, as one of the editors of a paper (Argus) which exercises a considerable influence upon people, you may very greatly promote the objects which I have in view; & I thankfully accept the expression of your wish to do so. I am happy also to believe, that there are many particulars, & those of the chief importance, in which our opinions agree. I think however that you may really cooperate with the most efficiently by our acting quite independently of each other. You may perhaps remember, that, upon my first arrival, I publicly stated my determination not to connect myself in any way with parties, but to regard every man in his individual character, without any reference of his political opinions. On this account I can never communicate to you as Editor of the Argus on any other terms than those to which I communicate with the Editors of other newspapers.. publicly with the strictest impartiality. Of course, I must hold my own private sentiments with respect to the principles respect to the principles advocated by the different papers, & I may have occasion to animadvert upon those principles, when they directly affect the spiritual, & moral, well being of the community: but in such cases I should wish to say no more than is absolutely necessary. I trust, that what I have written may commend itself to your judgement:- the interruption which I have experienced in writing this short note, may have caused me to express myself badly; but you will, I think, understand my general meaning. Whatever you can properly ask of me as one unconnected, & desirous to remain unconnected with any party, I shall always most gladly communicate; but more than this I cannot do. It may not be improper for me here to say, that the great complaint, which I have heard formerly alleged against the Argus, was, that it was so often guilty of personal abuse; & that I believe abstinence from this weapon tends greatly to raise the paper in public estimation.. April 30 1850. Pages 21 – 22.
- To S. G. Henty Esquire – I was beginning to wonder how matters were going on at Portland, when yours of the 24th ult. Came to hand. The qualified assent of Mr Wilson to my proposal respecting him has not so much surprised, as disappointed me; & I regret to say, that I cannot view it as you do, as doing away with any claim upon me at the expiration of the year & affording the opportunity for the appointment of another clergyman in his place. On the contrary, it appears to me calculated to defeat the great object, which I have had in view in the proposed arrangement viz to prevent Mr Wilson from getting again involved in debt; and to enable me, if he should do so, to remove him without giving himself, or his friends any pretext for complaint. I have no confidence in his owner power to keep himself out of debt; & a temporary restraint upon him, such as he engages to submit to, would be, in my opinion of no benefit whatsoever. I cannot therefore accept of such a qualified assent he has given to my proposal; and will undertake to make up the deficiency in his assets only upon condition of his erasing the words “for one year ending the 31st day of March 1851”; & substituting in their stead, “as long as the Bishop of Melbourne shall think fit to enforce them. I wish it also to be distinctly understood by himself and others, that the revocation of his license, if I should be compelled to revoke it, would be equivalent to a dismissal from all employment in the Diocese. I am very sorry my dear sir to trouble you so much upon this painful subject; but we must both be willing to do what is most painful to our feelings, when the Lord requires it from us. Will you be so kind as to pay Mr Bates 2.10.0 pounds for me, being the amount allowed by me for the superintendence of the Sunday School during the last Quarter, I think that at the close of the present year I ought to leave it to yourselves to bear this expense. We shall be most glad to see you in Melbourne, both in account of the pleasure which a visit from you will us & because it will assure us of the safety & progressive convalescence of your dear wife. Mrs Perry desires to send the assurance of her affectionate love to Mrs Henty & her little family; & I do beg that you will also convey to her & our other friends my Xtain regards.. May 3 1850. Pages 23 – 24.
- To Mr Edward Wilson – In reply.. I beg to assure you, that I did not at all intend to impute to you any improper motive in the suggestion contained in your previous note, nor did I suppose, that you wished me in any degree to compromise my independence in thought & action. I understand you, & I gav
Archbishops Bishops Office Correspondence: Bishop Charles Perry - Private Letter Book December 5 1849 - January 5th 1854. Anglican Diocese of Melbourne, accessed 05/11/2026, https://archivesandlibrary.melbourneanglican.org.au/nodes/view/10292