Page:Distinguished Churchmen.djvu/287

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CHAPTER XI

THE REV. MONTAGUE FOWLER, M.A.

Rector of All Hallows’, London Wall.

THE CHURCH IN HER RELATION TO THE CHURCHES IN THE EAST.

“Rise, happy morn; rise, holy morn,
   Draw forth the cheerful day from night;
    O Father! touch the East, and light
The light that shone when Hope was born.”
Tennyson, In Memoriam.

Lamentable Condition of Affairs in the East—“Christian Egypt”—St Mark's Martyrdom—The Mohammedan Conquest: the Scourge of a False Religion—The Coptic Church has the Sympathy of English Archbishops, notably Howley, Benson and Temple—Fund for the Egyptian Bishopric—Sir John Fowler's Work in Egypt—How He helped the Government and the Expedition after General Gordon's Death—Sir John's Third Son at Harrow and Cambridge—With Archbishop Benson—Mr and Mrs Fowler in the Literary World—Features of the Work at All Hallows’—Investigations in Egypt—Proposal for Egyptian Bishopric; the Difficulties between the Promoters and the Government—Lord Cromer's Attitude—Brighter Prospects—The Down-trodden Nestorian or East Syrian Church—Recollections of Archbishop Benson and Archbishop Thomson.

To readers of Old Testament history there has been vouchsafed, at any rate, some knowledge of Egypt. But it is at best very limited and very

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