Dr. Ver Mehr, who arrived in San Francisco
in September, 1849, and in 1850 founded Grace Parish; and Rev. John
Morgan, who organised Christ Church Parish in 1853; and Rev. Dr.
Christopher B. Wyatt, who succeeded Mines in Trinity Church. There is
another also whose name is interwoven in the history of the Church's
mission in California. It is that of Right Rev. William Ingraham Kip,
D.D., LL.D., who was consecrated first Bishop of California, October
28, 1853. Few, if any, of his day, were better fitted in scholarship,
zeal, and other gifts and qualifications for his work than he, who is
the famous author of "The Double Witness of the Church," a book which
has largely moulded the faith and practice of the churchmen of this
generation. Bishop Kip's immortal work and Mines's incomparable volume
deserve to be ranked together, and though they differ widely in their
manner of presenting the Old Faith, yet are they one in purpose. Is it
not a little singular, or is it not rather a happy coincidence, that
the two foremost pioneers of the Church's work in California should
thus be the authors of works which are fit to take rank with the
Apologiai of the early Christian writers or the "Apologia pro Ecclesia
Anglicana" of Bishop Jewell?
Mines went to his rest in 1852, just in the prime of life, while Kip
was spared to the Church until 1893, witnessing its great increase and
reaping the abundant harvest from that early sowing.
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