(Vol. vii., p. 528.)
"Charity thinketh no evil;" but we must feel both surprise and regret that
any one should, in 1853, consider it a doubtful question whether Bishop
Butler died in the communion of the Church of England. The bishop has now
been in his grave more than a hundred years; but Warburton says truly, "How
light a matter very often subjects the best-established characters to the
suspicions of posterity--how ready is a remote age to catch at a low
revived slander, which the times that brought it forth saw despised and
forgotten almost in its birth."
X. Y. Z. says he would be glad to have this charge (originally brought
forward in 1767) _sifted_. He will find that it has been sifted, and in the
most full and satisfactory manner, by persons of no less distinction than
Archbishop Secker and Bishop Halifax. The strong language employed by the
archbishop, when refuting what he terms {573} a "gross and scandalous
falsehood," and when asserting the bishops "abhorrence of popery," need not
here be quoted, as "N.& Q." is not the most proper channel for the
discussion of theological subjects; but it is alleged that every man of
sense and candour was convinced _at the time_ that the charge should be
retracted; and it must be a satisfaction to your correspondent to know,
that as Bishop Butler lived so he _died_, in full communion with that
Church, which he adorned equally by his matchless writings, sanctity of
manners, and spotless life.[4]