While leaving to men like the
Metropolitan of Cape Town and Archdeacon Denison the noisy part of
the onslaught, Wilberforce was among those who were most zealous in
devising more effective measures.
But time, and even short time, has redressed the balance between
the two prelates. Colenso is seen more and more of all men as a
righteous leader in a noble effort to cut the Church loose from
fatal entanglements with an outworn system of interpretation;
Wilberforce, as the remembrance of his eloquence and of his
personal charm dies away, and as the revelations of his indiscreet
biographers lay bare his modes of procedure, is seen to have left,
on the whole, the most disappointing record made by any Anglican
prelate during the nineteenth century.
But there was a far brighter page in the history of the Church of
England; for the second of the three who linked their names with
that of Colenso in the struggle was Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, Dean of
Westminster. His action during this whole persecution was an honour
not only to the Anglican Church but to humanity.
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