l synod. Some
forms of special prayer were appended to these canons.

In 1869 the Irish Church Act (32 and 33 Vict. c. 42) "disestablished"
the Irish Church, sect. 19 repealed any act of parliament, law or custom
whereby the bishops, clergy or laity of the said church were prohibited
from holding synods or electing representatives thereto for the purpose
of making rules for the well-being and ordering of the said church, and
enacted that no such law, &c., should hinder the said bishops, clergy
and laity, by such representatives, lay and clerical, and so elected as
they shall appoint, from meeting in general synod or convention and in
such general synod or convention forming constitutions and providing for
future representation of the members of the church in diocesan synods,
general convention or otherwise. The Church of Ireland, so set free,
created for herself new legislative authorities, unknown to the old
canon law, viz. mixed synods of clergy and laity, and a system of
representation by election, unknown to primitive or medieval times.
Similar changes had, however, been introduced during the preceding
century in some parts of the Anglican communion outside the British
Isles (see _infra_). Sect. 20 of the same statute kept alive the old
ecclesiastical law of Ireland by way of assumed contract (cf.
ECCLESIASTICAL JURISDICTION).

Under the provisions of this statute, the "archbishops and bishops of
the ancient Apostolic and Catholic Church of Ireland" (so they describe
themselves), together with representatives of the clergy and laity,
assembled in 1870, in "General Convention," to "provide for the
regulation" of that church. This Convention declared that a General
Synod of the archbishops and bishops, with representatives of the clergy
and laity, should have chief legislative power in the Irish Church, with
such administrative power as might be necessary and consistent with the
church's episcopal constitution. This General Synod was to consist of
two Houses--the House of Bishops and the House of Lay and Clerical
Representatives. No question was to be carried unless there were in its
favour a majority of the clerical and lay representatives, voting either
conjointly or by orders, and also a majority of the bishops, should they
desire to vote. This General Synod was given full power to alter or
amend canons, or to repeal them, or to enact new ones. For any
alteration or amendment of "articles, doctrines, rites or rubr