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be in effect to give up our discipline, and to suffer the flock over C H A P. which the Holy Ghost hath made us overseers, to be scattered and corrupted, to be uncharitable, unjust, lewd, or anything, without control.

"But God forbid that we should suffer this as long as we live. What Mr. Archdeacon can say to excuse so enormous an irregularity, is what I am now ready to hear before you, my brethren, that you may be able to testify the equity of our proceedings. For if I have the testimony of my own conscience, and my clergy's approbation, and that of my superiors in spirituals, I shall not be deterred from my duty by all the reproaches and libels that the devil or man can invent."

The official summons being recited, and the serving of it proved, the record proceeds:

"Our Right Rev. Diocesan having upon the trial of Mr. Archdeacon Horrobin asked him whether he had administered the Holy Sacrament to Madam Horne, and whether he then knew that she was under the Church's censure, he owned that he had admitted her to the Sacrament, but did not acknowledge he knew her to be under the said censure. Upon which the Lord Bishop referring that matter to his own oath, and he refusing to swear, the depositions of Mr. Jo. Quaile, Vicar of Kirk Christ Rushen, Mr. Henry Allen, Vicar of Lezaire, Mr. Jo. Woods, jun., Curate of Kirk Michael, and J. Woods, sen., Vicar of Kirk Malew and Episcopal Registrar, were taken, who declare that they were present in Castle Rushen, with the Lord Bishop and Vicars-General, on or about the 10th of February last, where the said Mr. Archdeacon was also present, when Madam Horne gave into the Temporal Court a paper, which was then read publicly, concerning her being censured by the Ecclesiastical Court, and desiring redress; and Mr. Quaile, with Mr. Woods, sen. and jun., depose that the said Mr. Archdeacon was in the same place the day before, when a scandalous libel concerning the Ecclesiastical Court was read; the last article whereof contains these words, viz. that the said Court have taken upon them to summons and censure persons not within the jurisdiction of their Court, contrary to the known laws of this isle, for instance, the case of Madam Horne," &c.

Mr. Woods, sen., deposed to something further, which I give at length, as being much to the point:

"On Friday, Dec. 22, 1721, immediately after Morning Prayer in Castletown Chapel, I desired Mr. Archdeacon Horrobin to walk into my house, and when we were come into the parlour, I gave

CHAP. him the annexed individual copy of record in which Madam Horne XVI. is censured, and told him I had the Court's directions to shew it

him. He looked it over very carefully, and then asked me, why it was shewn him. To which I answered, I could not tell him the Court's reasons for it. I then, of my own accord, said, it would be well if Madam Horne knew it, and desired him to acquaint her with it, which he utterly refused to do. However, on Saturday night I went to his house, and enquiring whether he had informed Madam Horne of it, he answered, he neither had, nor would tell her: For,' said he, to what end?' I replied, the solemn festival being at hand, it was both our duties to endeavour a reconciliation betwixt neighbours, lest perhaps Madam Horne might come to the altar where he was to officiate; and as he had brought her into trouble, he should endeavour to bring her out. To which he answered, 'She would easily forgive him that trouble.' At length I desired him only to acquaint Madam Horne that I had something of importance to communicate to her, if she would be pleased to appoint the time and place; but that too he obstinately refused to comply with, and so we parted.

"Some time in January or February last, Mr. Archdeacon came into my parlour, where the book lay on the table, and then likewise he saw the original order, and my certificate on the back of it, that I had shewed him a copy of it, December 22, before. And at another time, when Madam Horne said to me, If she had known of the censure before Sir James Poole had spoken publicly of it, she would have done something in it; I assured her, 'I had let Mr. Archdeacon see the copy before I gave it to Sir James, and importuned him (the said Archdeacon) to acquaint her with it, and went to his house next day for that end, but he utterly refused to do her that friendly office, or to inform her I had something of moment to impart to her.' Upon which she went and charged him with it, (as I presume,) for he came on horseback to my door, and there could not deny, but owned before Madam Horne and some others, that I had requested him as abovesaid; but added, 'Did not I then tell you I would not be concerned in it?' And 'Was I to be your sumner or servant?'

"This was the substance of our discourse.

"J. WOODS, sen., Reg. Episc."

"After which depositions were taken, Mr. Archdeacon urged that he had not denied his knowledge of the censure above-mentioned, only declined to own it, but that he did not esteem any censure he saw to be such as to exclude her from the Holy Sacrament, but what he did was unwittingly, and not in contempt of any

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person, or authority, which the Court are surprised to hear, con- CHAP. sidering the annexed declaration of Mr. Jo. Woods, sen., which he has also deposed, and is desired to annex to this upon record. "Memorandum, the deponents have sworn to and signed the above depositions so far as is, in their several narratives, expressed."

The Archdeacon's principal plea being thus utterly overthrown, he seems to have alleged nothing further but a complaint of a verbal error in the report of his sermon, and a hint that he might perhaps be entitled, as the Governor's Chaplain, to freedom from all spiritual censures:

"May 17, 1722.

"Whereas the Archdeacon, upon his trial this day, objected that the word 'jangling,' mentioned in some of the depositions and the following censure, was not in his sermon; it is to be observed that the Archdeacon himself, at the last annual convocation, (June 1, 1721,) owned, as the Court very well remember, that he could not say, but he might have added or omitted some words in the delivery of his sermon, which were not written down; as he said was natural for preachers to do.

"The Archdeacon having, in his defence, frequently hinted, though not insisted on, an exemption from the episcopal jurisdiction, the Lord Bishop required him to produce any law for such exemption, and the same should be considered; which the said Archdeacon not doing, his Lordship proceeded to judgment in manner following:

"Suspension of Archdeacon Horrobin.

"Having duly weighed the annexed proceedings, occasioned by a complaint of Mr. Archdeacon Horrobin against Mr. Thomas Harley, for charging him with preaching false doctrine, and having compared the several depositions with the sermons to which they refer, it appears to us, and so we adjudge, that the said Archdeacon, either from a fond imitation of some late heterodox writers, or from a desire of novelty, has delivered several things from the pulpit not agreeable to truth and sound doctrine; and by an obstinate defence of them, after he was seriously admonished to forbear giving offence, he has done what in him lay to involve in endless disputes a Church which, at his coming hither, he found in perfect peace and unity. And this he has done,

"First; By endeavouring to fix an unjust and groundless reproach upon his brethren of the clergy, as if they had carried the

CHAP. doctrine of absolution so high as to persuade weak minds that they assume to themselves a power of pardoning sins.

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"Secondly; By asserting, in direct contradiction to the first exhortation to the Communion Service, that the absolution of a priest, whether Papist or Protestant, is at the best a false foundation of comfort. Which expression being made use of (without any regard had to the fifty-third canon) in opposition to a sermon concerning the power of the keys, preached but two Sundays before in the same pulpit, did manifestly tend to render the excellent discipline of this Church contemptible; to encourage offenders to despise her censures, as if public satisfaction, and absolution thereupon, were not necessary parts of repentance, where public wrong or offence has been given.

"Thirdly; By limiting the words of Christ, Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them',' to the Apostles only, and affirming, that men uninspired, weak and fallible men, must no more appropriate this to themselves, than the power of working miracles; and this in contempt of that very office, and the very words by which he received the order of priesthood; as if the Church usurped a power which she neither understood, nor had any right to.

"Fourthly; And in consequence of the foregoing assertion, by affirming that God's ministers have only authority to declare the terms of salvation, and to tell people that if they come up to those terms, God will pardon them; and that this in truth is all they can do; a position for which the followers of Socinus stand justly condemned by all orthodox Churches.

"Fifthly; By perplexing his hearers with his uncertain conjectures of God's uncovenanted mercy; making it a question not yet determined, whether the heathens, and such as have never embraced the Christian religion, shall not receive the like benefit with Christians of pardon and salvation by Christ; laying too great stress of men's salvation upon their living up to the light of nature; and affirming that it is nowhere said in sacred Scripture, nor can be inferred from thence, that no man can be saved unless he believe in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and have the Gospel preached to him.

Lastly; By speaking of the controversies in the primitive Church after a very loose and suspicious manner. For, not content with calling the disputes about the time of keeping Easter, and the fast preceding it, (which fast is strictly and almost universally observed here,) a trifling controversy, he immediately

J John xx. 23.

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added, ‘ the wrangling, jangling disputes about the Divinity of our CHAP. Saviour, the two natures in Christ,-the doctrine of the sacred Trinity, heretical baptism, &c., are niceties in religion, which consists not in the knowledge of such things;' expressing himself so as if he designed (for so the evidences understood him) that his hearers should look upon them all of the same importance; namely, all trifling.

“All which and many more novel assertions of the said Archdeacon having, during the course of this controversy, been frequently represented to him as very shocking and offensive to Christian ears, we were in hopes our patience and forbearance hitherto might have had so good an effect upon him, as to have made him sensible of his errors, and induced him to have given satisfaction to the Church, and thereby prevent a public censure.

"But instead of this, he has not only presumed to repel one of the evidences in this controversy from the Holy Sacrament, without any previous admonition, and for which he has been already declared irregular, but also, forgetting his ordination vows, and oath of canonical obedience, has since done his utmost to supersede our judicial acts, and to wrest the episcopal authority out of our hands, by admitting unto the Lord's Table Mrs. Horne, whom he knew to be under the censures of the Church, and this deliberately, and in contempt of the rubric before the Communion, the canons, and the laws and statutes of this Church and nation.

"It being therefore high time, and our express duty, to remove the offence given to the flock of Christ, by laying him under ecclesiastical censures, we do accordingly pronounce him, the said Mr. Robert Horrobin, Archdeacon, suspended ab officio et beneficio, until he give such satisfaction to the Church as the nature of his crimes before-mentioned requires.-Dated May 17, 1722.

"THO. SODOR AND MAN."

"N.B. After the Lord Bishop had pronounced the above sentence, he desired the clergy now assembled in Convocation to declare their minds freely, if they observed any harshness or illegality either in the foregoing proceedings, or censure; to which they severally answered, They did not; and added, That the said censure was so mild, as they could hardly expect the like, were they themselves in the same circumstances. Only the Vicar of Kirk Marown apologized for the Archdeacon, imputing his last crime to his ignorance or inadvertency, and hoping he might be pardoned for the same."

It appears by a private memorandum of the Bishop's, that Mr. Bridson, the only one who separated himself in any de