PREFACE. IN presenting to the public another volume of THE CHURCH MAGAZINE, our first duty is to thank our contributors and readers. for the support and encouragement which they have afforded us; and while rendering them our grateful acknowledgments, we respectfully solicit a continuance of their assistance in our endeavours to promote the stability, extension, and welfare of our ancient and Apostolic Church. The great principles which we have hitherto laboured to defend and propagate, through the medium of this Magazine, are those upon which alone the one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church of Christ has ever been, or can ever be, successfully defended against the attacks of her enemies. And in such proportion as the members of the English Branch of the Catholic Church believe and act upon those principles will be her stability and prosperity; simply because those great principles are of God, and His blessing accompanies them. To those who cordially embrace them, Church principles afford rest, satisfaction, and comfort not to be obtained anywhere beyond the precincts of the Holy Church. How important then is it, when men's minds are tossed to and fro by the various and contrary winds of doctrine, and they are anxiously desiring rest and peace, to direct and lead them to the Church of God, wherein alone they will find that satisfaction, quietness, and rest which their souls desire! It is not to be denied that the conflicting and confounding sectarianism of the age is driving some men into popery, and others into indifferentism and infidelity; and causing a larger number to enquire-Who will show us any good? It consequently becomes. more imperatively than ever the duty of Churchmen to press with persevering energy and zeal, upon the understandings and feelings of all men, the vastly superior claims of the Church; and to strive to convince them that, within her sacred fold, there are, what are nowhere else to be found, stores of good amply sufficient to supply all their spiritual wants. To assist in this work of faith and labour of love, THE CHURCH MAGAZINE will always be found a ready, and, we trust, not an ineflicient auxiliary. We have the happiness to know that it has already been highly beneficial to the Church in a number of instances; and we doubt not that it would become much more extensively so if more widely circulated. Churchmen would do well to copy, in this respect, the example of their enemies, who are constantly pushing publications advocating and defending their principles and practices into every town, village, and family, wherever they have a possible opportunity of doing so. For general circulation, THE CHURCH MAGAZINE is well adapted by its cheapness and attractiveness. The quantity and variety of matter to be found in its pages, together with the Portraits, render it one of the cheapest publications in existence. And we confidently hope, that with the additional strength brought into it, and the improvements now in contemplation, it will in future be found still more worthy of public patronage and support. MEMOIR OF THE LATE RIGHT HONOURABLE AND MOST REV. POWER LE POER TRENCH, D.D. LORD ARCHBISHOP OF TUAM, IRELAND. THOUGH repeatedly requested to do so, we have never before given the Portrait of any deceased Clergyman; but the high character, and great excellences of the last Archbishop of Tuam, and the richly-deserved estimation in which he was universally held, were such, that we readily yield to the many solicitations which we have received from several of our brethren in Ireland, by departing, on this occasion, from our usual course. This venerable Prelate, whose praise is in all the Churches, whose record is on high, and whose name will be had in everlasting remembrance, was the second son of William Power Keating Trench, afterwards Earl of Clancarty. His mother was Anne, daughter of the Right Hon. Charles Gardiner, and sister of Luke Viscount Mountjoy. He was educated at Harrow, and graduated in the University of Dublin. Shortly after this he was admitted to the order of Deacon, and then to that of Priest. The first preferment to which he was appointed was the small benefice of Creagh, in the diocese of Clonfert. Within the parish were situated Garbally, the family residence, and the town of Ballinasloe, built on his father's property: these circumstances made the appointment particularly desirable; it gratified his parents, who loved and respected him; and carried with it an influence which, judiciously exercised, tended to promote order and regularity amongst a numerous tenantry. He married Anne, daughter of Walter Taylor of Castle Taylor, in the county of Galway, by whom he had six daughters and two sons: his love for her who shared his happiness was unabated to the last hour of his life, and even then her name was hanging on his lips. His affection for his children was evident in his anxiety to anticipate their wishes; it was so regulated that none could know he had a favourite; and yet on the first day of his last illness, he said to the friend who will ever deplore his loss, "I have long endeavoured not to love one child more than the others; I have not succeeded; but I have been enabled to hide this from all the world." He was called to the Episcopal Bench during the administration of the Earl of Hardwicke; his Consecration as Bishop of Waterford took place on the 21st of November, 1802, in the Cathedral of Tuam, where he was afterwards to discharge the duties of the Archiepiscopal office with efficiency and zeal. In the year 1810, he was translated to the Bishopric of Elphin, and here it pleased the Heavenly Husbandman abundantly to water the seed sown in his heart, and gradually to fit him for the eminence to which he was afterwards raised, as the supporter and defender of societies and individuals devoted to the support of the Church, and the maintenance of true religion. How he stood in the estimation of the VOL. III. B |