and to render the clergy beggars, in order that they might depend on them

a The whole question of church property is one of vast importance to the country, and is unfortunately so frequently misunderstood, that it may prove useful to say something of the principles on which provision ought to be made for the clergy. The payment, if rightly arranged, will redound to the benefit of the whole body politic. Humanly speaking, labourers cannot be procured without hire, and their quality will correspond with the payment, which is provided for them. Now men are paid either by consideration or by actual advantages, (i. e. in a civilized country by money ;) and the consideration will itself depend on the esteem in which the profession is held, as well as indirectly on the rank and fortune which are independently possessed by those individuals who compose it. Thus, for instance, the profession of arms is honourable, and therefore the pay which is allotted to officers always has been, and should be inadequate to support the rank which they hold in society; and yet we find men of family and fortune crowding into the pro fession for the sake of the honour to be acquired in it. Com pare this service with the collection of customs or excise, and will be found that the same pay in money will provide a ve different species of person for the employment.

The duty of an established clergy is to promote the spirit benefit of their brethren, and the reason why the state pe them at all, is, that the spiritual and moral advancement country directly influences the prosperity of a state. Fo may safely be asserted, that nothing but vice really injure kingdom, and that states fall not from luxury, but from the v which accompany luxury. In England, for instance, an ind dual may enjoy luxuries and conveniences unknown to pec of the same station in other countries of modern Europe, or the ancients; yet the commonwealth is the richer for our cc forts, and we are still, comparatively speaking, far from bein vicious nation. The object, therefore, which the politician sho have in view, in providing for an established clergy, is to as such a remuneration to them as would procure a body of

§. 431. The events which took place between the settlement of the church and the death of Parker

whose rank in life would not be likely to render them irreligious, and whose attainments were such as to enable them to promote the civilization of society in general. There can be no doubt that much temporal wealth is not suited to promote Christianity, and that without temporal wealth, such an education cannot be procured in a civilized country, as will render the generality of teachers adequate to direct their flocks. The English politician has not the difficulty of adjusting this balance, for by the great mercy of God we possess an establishment in which the clergy are by their station mixed with every rank in society, and on the whole adequately paid. In a scale which it has taken so many centuries to form, and in which so much has depended on circumstances apparently accidental, there must exist some pieces of preferment which seem to be paid too largely, and we know that there are many more, in which the workman is inadequately remunerated. In a constitution such as ours, the true friends of the establishment will always have the eye fixed on what can most easily be remedied, and not on what a theorist might originally have desired; such laws, therefore, as tend to support ecclesiastical discipline among the clergy themselves, and to make us perform our duties more adequately, must be deemed beneficial, and every step should be promoted which will provide for the poorer clergy, for curates in cases of non-residence, and for the incumbents in livings where the tithes are impropriated, which are perhaps at present the worst paid of any species of preferment; but he must be a very bold, and ought to be a very cautious legislator, who would venture to attack the oldest tenures in this or any other country. That the legislature has a right to interfere with property belonging to either bodies corporate or individuals, be they laymen or ecclesiastics, cannot be denied; but the right is the same in one case as in the other, and in both the necessity which calls for such a step should be clearly proved. It is always much more safe to tax the property of some for the support of others, than to touch the property itself. If the tenths on the larger preferments were increased, the sums thus thrown into the hands

are not in themselves very important or interesting; and since we have already taken a general view of the leading features which distinguished the ecclesiastical proceedings, a brief account of the various occurrences must suffice. When the chief points were settled, as to belief and discipline, it remained only to allow matters to take their own course, and to observe how the laws and ordinances answered the purposes for which they were intended. Activity and exertion were necessary among the clergy, in carrying on their ministerial duties; but the great object was to establish throughout the country the habit of observing what the legislature had enacted. Jewel *, in speaking of the state of the country in the beginning of the reign, says, that the people were very ignorant and superstitious, but very much inclined to religion; a state in which much labour was required, but in which the exertions of the ministry were not likely to prove unsuccessful. Few, however, seem to have trod this unpretending path of spiritual and quiet toil: the one party were eager to

of the governors of queen Anne's bounty would gradually provide for the increase of smaller livings: nor should it be forgotten, that probably one half of the English bishoprics do not amount in income to the salaries of the judges, who upon a fair estimate of the nature of their offices, and the rank they rightly hold in society, are very inadequately rewarded. And that even these incomes of the bishops are made up in many cases of impropriations, where the maintenance, which in foro conscientia is due to him who performs the spiritual duties of the parish, are taken from him and given to another.

* Burnet, iii. 207. fol. 495, 8vo.