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OUR NEW DEPARTURE.

OUR WELSH COLUMN.

. PROFESSOR REES ON THE LAND…

TREFCARN OWEN.

THE LIBERAL THREE HUN! RED.

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THE LIBERAL THREE HUN! RED. To the Editor of the "County Guardian," Sir,—The speeches of my fellow deacona fit the meeting of the Three Hundred in Bethda. Schoolroom last week sent me to our minister to ask him if to wish to injure and to rob waa a phrase of the New Theology and a new doc- trine of the Free Churches. He asked me what I meant. "Tell me," said I, "what exactly is meant by calling the Church of England & State Church?" "They don't understand what- they mean," said he. And he took down from his library shelf, Freeman, J. R. Green, and. Duschne. and one or two other histories. This is what he read: "The Church of England wa'. not founded by the State; it is not a political creation; it does not derive its e-ssential laws, from the State. It was not established by Act of Parliament. It was in existence in Wales* and in England before there ever was a Par- liament. Its organisation was in full worki order before the Heptarchy was united unden one King." That is a true statement of facts as given by the best historians. "But," said I, "why is the King called the Head of the Churchy" In 1534 an Act was passed by which the King was recognised "p. the only supreme Head on earth next and immediately under God." It does not mean that the King claimed any spiritual office of any power over the Church of England. By the 39 Articles the Church of England' claims to have a spiritual mission and author- ity, neither derived from nor commencable to the State. She acknowledges in the head of the State that power only over ecclesiastical persons and causes which she believes to be within the rightful province of all Christian Governments.—Note this :—We Nonconformist ministers and our chapels are as much subject to the supremacy of the King as the clergy and-, their churches. The King is Head of the State over all persons and in all causes within the realm; and in no other sense is the King the Head of the Church of England. That means that Nonconformist chapels and minis- ters are as much under State authority and control as churches and clergy. The Book of Common Prayer was not drawn up by the State but by the Church. The 39' Articles were not drawn up by the State but by the Church, just as the formularies of faith of the Calvinistic Methodist have been drawn up by the founders of Methodism. The "Cyffes Fydd" is as binding upon Methodists as the- 39 Articles are binding upon Churchmen, and there is nothing in the constitution of the Established Church to compel it when the law of the realm differs from the divine law to accept the former as its rule, any more than there is in the constitution of the Calvinistic body. If a Nonconformist minister disobeyed, the rules of his particular denomination and it was necessary to deprive or suspend him-it could only be enforced by the Civil Courts. So- that the Nonconformist ministers like the clergy are under the rule of the State. "Is it," I asked, 'love for the Church that makes the delegates of the Three Hundred so wishful for Disestablishment?" "Nonsense! You don't harm, and injure, and misrepresent those you love," said our minister. The real cause of opposition to the Church of England is political. I am ashamed to say that Nonconformist ministers and deacons are daily becoming more political: they prostitute re- ligion for political ends. Hardly a Free Church meeting is held but what political subjects are discussed. The majority of delegates on the Liberal Three Hundred are deacons and minis- ters. They wish to cripple the Church for un- worthy mottoes. We Nonconformists know that our Sunday Schools are empty of young men, and once the Sunday School was the pride of the Welshman. We find the greatest difficulty in getting young men to pray at our week night prayer meetings. Prayer meetings, in fact, have ceased to exist in scores of our chapels. Our chapels are in debt. Our ministers are badly paid. Ag- nosticism is increasing. Hundreds of our young men in Haverfordwest and Milford never enter a place of worship. And yet we squabble and fight, and under the cloak of religion wish to injure the work of a Church to which we owe our parish churches, our churchyards, our Cathedrals, and our Schools. Disestablishment in Ireland has been a bitter failure. It has strengthened Romanism in Ireland and has created the bitterest antagonism between class and class, and sect and sect. DEACON JOHN.

. PEMBROKESHIRE HUNT BALL.

AFTER A SHARE OUT.

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PEMBROKE AND HAVERFORDWEST…