Chamber. Your Majesty's House of Laity sees things differently: I am
bound, therefore, to submit to your Majesty certain important proposals
for the relief of the impasse at which we have now arrived. As no doubt,
sir, you are aware, we have the Judges, the Juridical half of the
Chamber, for the most part with us, since for the last few years their
appointment has been entirely in our hands. But the Bishops, with the
exception of one or two, are obdurate and immovable. We select the most
liberal Churchmen we can find: but it is no use; each new Bishop,
adopted by Dean and Chapter, becomes when once seated in the Upper
Chamber, merely a reflection of those who have gone before him: the
Juridical minority is swamped, the Spiritual element remains supreme,
and we have no chance of obtaining a majority."

"It is only because you will try to do things too fast!" said the King;
but the Prime Minister continued--

"And now, sir, our one opportunity has come. The Bill for dividing the
dioceses and doubling the number of the Bishoprics has just passed into
law. I flatter myself that when the Prelates assented to that Bill they
did not realize how its powers might be directed. It is the proposal of
your Majesty's advisers to nominate to those Bishoprics only Free
Churchmen, men whose political views coincide with our own."

"Free Churchmen!" cried the King, startled; "but they are outside the
Establishment altogether."

"Merely on a point of Church discipline," answered the Prime Minister.
"They are ministers properly ordained. When they seceded over the
'Church Government Act' they carried their full Canonical Orders with
them: only as they had no Bishops they have become a diminishing body.