2-888-024 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Gorham Controversy - Great Meeting of Clergy and Laity, in St. Martin's Hall, Long-Acre, [London], 1850. Clergymen met to discuss the case of '...George Cornelius Gorham, a clergyman holding heretical doctrines, [who] is to be forced into a vicarage with cure of souls...surely no ordinary peril could have assembled here from places far apart so many hundreds, not of turbulent agitators, but of retiring and peaceful men - no peril less than that which now impends - the peril of their faith. That faith has been assailed, impugned, insulted...'. Gorham's view of baptism was considered to be heretical by many members of the Church of England, making him, in their view, unsuitable for the post of vicar. The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council disagreed, causing great controversy about whether a secular court should decide on the doctrine of the Church of England. From "Illustrated London News", 1850.