ed the Committee of the
Church Missionary Society. He was able to assure these cautious men as
to the inoffensive character of his proposals. "The Committee now
understood," writes their historian, Dr. Eugene Stock, "that no
separation from the Church of England was intended; that the Queen's
supremacy was recognised; that questions of doctrine and ritual would be
excluded from the purview of the synods; and that the interests of the
Maori Christians would be cared for." They accordingly withdrew their
former instructions, and now signified their approval of the
missionaries joining with the bishop in the proposed organisation of the
Church.

This concession formed the answer of the Committee to Selwyn's proposal
to found the missionary bishoprics mentioned in the last chapter, and it
removed one of the most formidable obstacles in the way of a
constitution. Another obstacle, hardly less formidable, disappeared of
itself during the year after the bishop's return. This was the
difficulty of obtaining State sanction for the proposed authority. Many
attempts had been made by Mr. Gladstone and others to procure such
sanction from the Imperial Parliament; but in 1856 the English legal
authorities discovered, what seems so obvious now, that no State
authorisation would be needed if the system could be based simply on
voluntary compact. If any colonial Church wished to make rules for its
own government, it was quite at liberty to do so, provided that these
rules were held to apply only to such persons as were willing to be
bound by them. Thus then it happened that, as the moral and personal
obstacles were removed by patience and Christian wisdom, the legal ones
fell of themselves, and now there remained no hindrance to the calling
of a conference for the final settlement of the matter.

[Illustration: SOME CANTERBURY CHURCHES.
St. Lukes, Christchurch.
Holy Trinity, Lyttelton.
St. Mary's, Timaru.
St. Peter's, Riccarton.
St. John's, Hororata.
St. Stephens, Ashburton.
Christchurch Cathedral.
St. Paul's, Glenmark.
Holy Trinity, Avonside.]

The conference met on May 14, 1857, in the little stone chapel of St.
Stephen, near the residence of Sir William Martin, at Auckland. The
occasion was felt to be one of extreme importance. Never before had the
different elements of which the Church was composed been brought face to
face together. Christchurch sent its new bishop and the Rev. J. Wilson.
Archdeacon Abrah