Note 33 — BISHOP FRASER
Reading edition
He was himself aware that this caused displeasure. In his latest Charge, delivered some months before his death, he said: “I am charged, amongst other grievous sins, with that of thinking not unkindly, and speaking not unfavourably, of Dissenters. I don’t profess to love dissent, but I have received innumerable kindnesses from Dissenters. Why should I abuse them? Why should I call them hard names? Remembering how Nonconformity was made—no doubt sometimes by self-will and pride and prejudice and ignorance, but far more often by the Church’s supineness, neglect, and intolerance in days long since gone by, of which we have not yet paid the full penalty—though, as I have said, I love not the thing, I cannot speak harshly of it.”
That a defence was needed may seem strange to those who do not know England.