parliament," I should say, that I can see no necessity whatever, either for their obedience to the act or their otherwise resignation of the benefice, under any possible circumstances that can be devised. To obey the act contrary to the bishop's injunction, or to resign their benefices contrary to his will, would be equally an act of insubordination to his authority-would be, in fact, virtually dissent and schism. Let the bishops understand fully what they may expect from us, and what we expect from them. We are bound not to do as we may severally please, but collectively and individually to obey our ordinary, and to submit ourselves to his godly judgments. He may direct as he pleases concerning an act of parliament which interferes with his spiritual functions, but until he does direct me to observe and obey it, I should not consider that an act passed in 1834 would absolve me from an oath taken in 1824-and therefore, the act as worth nothing; and the authority from which it sprang as an authority not allowed, but usurped; and the power which backed it, even the boasted omnipotence of the imperial parliament, as a thing scarcely worthy of defiance, because not entitled to the slightest degree of respect when its deeds and objects were professedly or designedly evil.

There is one subject which I have not yet seen noticed in your Magazine, and yet it is one deserving, I think, of anxious consideration in our present condition,-it is the comparative value, in their bearing on a Christian church, of various forms of government,-under which form a scriptural church is most likely to prosper, or would possess the greatest advantages, or meet with fewer evils, and under which we ourselves would be most likely to obtain peace within ourselves, protection from violence without, and security against aggression and spoliation.

I am, Sir, respectfully yours,

E. D. R.

CONDUCT OF THE LAITY & CLERGY AT THE PRESENT CRISIS.*

SIR,-Persons who, like myself, lead a retired life, may be excused for indulging in speculations upon the probable conduct of the great and prominent actors on the arena of this restless world. At all events, I plead guilty to the practice. In none of these excursions, however, of conjecture and "weak-hinged fancy," have I been more disappointed,

The Editor will be glad to have the means of communicating with Tarpa. He will, on consideration, see, that however reluctantly such powerful sentences as some of his have been cut out, the Editor had no choice. Party politics cannot be admitted. It is not that every man whose opinion is worth thinking about must not have his own decided principles on politics. But in a publication which endeavours to bring churchmen together, on church grounds, it is necessary for each writer to be contented to lay aside party politics. In a season like this, where great principles are daily involved in public measures, general politics are a part of religion and morals. The same observation applies to the preceding letter.-ED. 4 P

VOL. IV. Dec. 1833.

than in my anticipations and preconceptions of the spirit and temper with which many of the higher laity, and the clergy themselves, would receive the present infidel attack upon the church.

With respect to the former, they seem influenced by “craven scruples," either of timidity, indifference to religion,* or self-interest. to such a degree, as virtually to admit, that now the storm runs high, and the vessel reels, gunwale to, it may be best to throw the latter overboard; and, no doubt, they flatter themselves, that by this magnanimous sacrifice of others, they shall save themselves, or get rid of what they secretly hate, or that they shall come in for a share of the effects of the drowned. Or, perhaps, they expect, as in the case of the prophet of old, that having so done, "the sea will cease from her raging. Heus vatum ignaræ mentes!' Can they really delude themselves so far as to imagine that the deep-seated and oldest foundations of church property can be dug into and torn up, without making their own totter to its ruin'? The wicked casuistry which would make that property, or any part of it, the property of the State, is not merely a two-edged sword, which will cut the hands of him who wields it, but is the very fiction, and 'dòç e σT,' upon which the scramblers and unwashed commonwealth-men are all waiting to make both parties throw somewhat more than the superfluous to them. Then shall these cunning engineers, now blinded by faction, envy, and cupidity, be hoist,' as they were in the Great Rebellion, 'by their own petar !+-To what else must tend the pretended, the professed principle of this sacrilegious pillage, but to their own spoliation in turn? Is it not a sure bridge, which they themselves let fall for the besiegers? The precedent is secured-how easy, how irresistible its further extension, and wider adoption! Has not the principle of expediency always this elasticity? The cloak for injustice was ever of most accommodating stuff; and the necessitous pupils of the utilitarian' philosophy will lose no time in making an opportunity of putting it on.

But let us dwell a little longer upon this subject. Have these enemies to the established church ever reflected upon the certain consequences to themselves of the degradation of the clergy? Confined, indeed, as is the field of their vision, they admit, no doubt, that religion is a clever invention, a very nice state policy, for keeping men and things together, for softening a little the savageness and

The infidel habits and opinions of so many of our gentry and nobility may be fairly considered as resulting from a want of religious principles. The causes of this defect, and of the deistical spirit which prevails in the country, are among the most important subjects which can now engage the attention of the clergy. In the hope of promoting such inquiries, I have ventured to transmit, for your excellent publication, my own humble views of the sources of the infidel spirit of the times.

devildom of man's heart, for preventing the forcible emancipation of factory children, for allowing heartless trade to pile the means of future luxury in safety, and for maintaining so much honesty among tenants, as to leave few, or no defaulters on the rent day. How then will they go on without this safeguard, this specific against FACTION? But have they ever looked a little further than this? have they endeavoured,by artificial means, to correct their natural nearsightedness, and considered, not only deliberately, but dispassionately-I mean, not only like men who have a great stake, or, at least, a life-interest, in the present state of things and institutions around them, but also without the black bile, the vengeful bitterness and jaundice of party spirit-what is the tenure of their own estates, in minds resolutely bent upon rapine, but waiting the pretext to begin, when the established church has been publicly robbed of hers.

Even admitting that they have no desire or means of estimating her doctrines, and her ritual, her primitive purity, her scriptural simplicity, her apostolic hierarchy, and that zeal of fervent piety and charity directed by knowledge, which is the exclusive growth of genuine Christianity, and which can "very gladly spend, and be spent," for the spiritual good of the poor, and 'them that are out of the way,' as well in our dense and starving manufacturing towns, as in the pestilential fens, or the remote and pelting villages, of hills and heaths, and wolds, uncheered and unenlightened by resident nobles or squires, and unintersected by high-roads, railways, or canals; admitting, I say, that such attributes of our inestimable church have never entered their thoughts, by reading, reflection, or education, I would ask them, if they comprehend (not the real political value, but) the real political bearings of such a church? Are they, for instance, aware of the political effects of the RESIDENCE FOR LIFE of a gentleman, a scholar, an able and a judicious Christian pastor in such places, where the wealthy cannot be tempted to settle, and whither, for the most part, he carries with him something more than the pittance generally afforded by the benefice on which his lot for life has been cast, while both are expended on the spot, and a large portion ever joyfully dispensed for the encouragement of honest industry, or for the comfort and cravings of afflicted indigence? Have they ever forecast in mind, what would be the melancholy results to society, if the clergy, in such districts more especially, indignant at the base and vulgar outcry raised against them, by envious landlords, purse-proud parvenus, and infidel revolutionists, threw up, in disgust, the King's commission to keep the peace;-a commission forced upon them by circumstances, from which they would but too gladly be relieved, and which, in this present reign of lies and terror, nothing but the disinterested love of country, and a deep sense of public usefulness, could induce them to retain, at their own cost and inconvenience, and under such a burden of radical malice and detraction. Lastly, has it ever entered their thoughts, what would be the state of things in this country, if the clergy of the established church-so vilified and calumniated, as a body, by the very highest in the land, whose existence without them (I speak boldly) is not worth a twelvemonth's purchase, so insulted, plun

dered, threatened, maligned, by the King's Ministers, and so large a portion of (what I suppose must be called) the Legislature' of the country, so baited and bullied by a ferocious and unmuzzled press, so impiously and jesuitically defrauded of their share in the great national guarantee of the coronation oath, so bretrayed by friends, so delivered over to enemies, so unheeded, so undervalued and abandoned by those who should defend her in the great assemblage of the nation, and, by all these means combined, so crippled in influence, character, resources, and usefulness-should, after so much patience and forbearance, but without relinquishing one iota of their rights or property (I put the case hypothetically), simultaneously retire from their flocks, desist from their ill appreciated spiritual functions, cease their thankless labours, and leave our destructive meddlers and novices in legislation (who have, in their short but fatal career, touched every thing, even the most sacred and settled, and left nothing unblighted and unwithered that they have touched) to devise, (after they have disposed of the 134 motions, set out for the first course of the next session,) with their wonted felicity, some 'liberal' and 'popular' substitute for the English church, and her decried and disabled clergy?-But I have done; the subject is too painful, too mortifying, to continue: and, at the same time, leaves me, I fear, under the self-reproach of the poor Egyptian melodist, whose strains were so lost upon the Syrian King:-TOUT EσTLY, τὸ εἰς ὄνε ὦτα ᾄδειν.

I come now, therefore, to the clergy themselves. I had thought, in my reveries upon the probable conduct of such persons, at such a crisis, that the many bright and disciplined intellects of our glorious priesthood-many of them, it is true, retired from the world, in the nooks and corners of the country, diffusing light and charity and refinement where nothing else could spread them-would now, if ever, now, in the hour of need and danger, boldly and effectually shew themselves. I had dreamed, that, like "the son of that Ephrathite of Bethlehem Judah," they would come forth from feeding the flocks of their father, and take the field, in the power of the Most High, against the enemies of our Israel. I had fancied to myself a host of these advanc ing, unawed by the crafty taunts of the adversary, who would most eagerly, if possible, and upon any plea or stratagem, deter them from the maintenance of true religion, the defence of their own order, its just rights and privileges and property, and the exposure of infidelity to public execration; but principally by the cry of "Politics!" (which, in good truth, 'par excellence,' they are),-I had fancied them spurning all such insidious contumely, and advancing into the front of the battle, and encouraging the good and wise by those cheering accents, "Let no man's heart fail because of him; thy servant will go and fight with the Philistine." I had thought, that the veterans of our churchthe successors of Hooker, and Barrow, and Bull, and Stillingfleet, of Waterland and Butler, of Warburton, and Horsley, and a thousand more, whose pages, in other days, when such works were read, would have been a panoply against myriads of such pigmy mockers as now assail us-would, in the present fearful struggle, wear their armour, and wield their sword. I did hope that heroes, whose merits had placed

them in the van, would not permit the young and rash to take their posts, and disgrace the cause. I did not suppose it possible that they would stand timidly or supinely by, and allow for an instant,

Yet such, I grieve to say it, has been too much the case. The conceited, the disappointed, the injudicious, and the flippant, have deluged the press with their reforms, and strictures and amendments, while they seem to have agreed in nothing, but in attempting to make out a case for the interference of the worst enemies of the church; meantime, the powers of mind and erudition which we have among us have been paraÎyzed by a kind of fascination, or have remained unaccountably passive. Hence it is, upon this old legal maxim, that they are not supposed to exist:-De non apparentibus," &c. &c. But did these persons flatter themselves that it was not in bitter earnest, that the higher ranks of the clergy were told to "set their houses in order?"-Did they find, in high offices, more than one who, when the agrarian principle of confiscating the property of the church, to the uses of the community, was publicly discussed, came prominently forward, like an upright English Christian 'maker of laws,' in support of the rights of property, which are the first, and should be the

Republicanism is the daughter of Pride and Conceit; she chafes under every species of control, disdains antiquity and authority, and winces under the acknowledgement of a superior. No wonder, then, that the words 'monarchy,' 'aristocracy,' 'hierarchy,' 'ascendancy,' should blister its very lips to utter. All that breaks and rises above the low level of mediocrity it would fain cut down to its own puny standard; and if the clergy will consent to bow down their heads to mobs and unions, and radicals, to enable it to divide, that it may destroy the connexion, upon which our ancestors built up the greatness of this country, between a State,' which they are mangling to its death, and a church,' which they detest for its eminence, and excel. lence, and influence, then shall there be doled out to them such an eleemosynary grant from the Republic,' as may put them upon the beggarly rations of spiritual mercenaries, amongst whom, the leading minds, and ample fortunes, and nobility classes of society may ever after scorn to enlist themselves. If the clergy will renounce their property, or yield it to the tender mercies of the commonwealth, if they will only be good and kind, and christianly enough to sink down to poverty, and ignorance, and insignificance, to become 'gospel fishermen,' as the cunning conventiclers and fifth-monarchy-men of our day recommend them to become, pour l'amour de Dieu,' then they shall be 'hail-fellow-well-met' with Jews, Turks, Heretics, Atheists, and Anarchists; and, if they are not consigned to a new clerical St. Luke's, shall live like vermin, and die in a ditch. So true is it, "chi pecora si fà, lupo la mangia," "he that makes himself a sheep, the wolf devours him." If once men shrink from the open and strenuous support of a church, in whose welfare, rights, and property are involved the highest public interests of this country, if by their treachery, their conversation, their writings, their lives, they disgrace or forsake, or do not zealously, and to the utmost of their ability, defend, illustrate, adorn, and recommend her, then are they traitors to the cause of truth and peace, and order and law, and learning, and the gospel of Christ, whose soldiers they sacramentally were, whose standard bearers they have sacramentally become. Now then, more especially, let me exhort them, in the apostle's words to the Philippians, now, when the axe of the feller is in his hand, and when already some of the noble branches have been lopped,-"to stand fast in one spirit, with one mind, striving together for the faith of the gospel, and in nothing terrified by their adversaries.