^ PRINCETON, N. J. BX 5157 .G55 Gladstone, W. E. 1809-1898 The state in Its relations with the church OA 1^ THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS WITH THE CHURCH. 111 !]':[,:: AUt 1882 ^ * I ^^ li u vi I c L J' S T A'T'»iH^^'^ IN ITS RELATIONS WITH THE CHURCH. W. E.'^LADSTONE, Esq., STUDENT OF CHRISTCHURCH, AND M. P. FOR NEWARK. jlioiTfj 01 traXaiti 'ioxovir'i fi.oi to.; ti^'i hat hvo'ias, xa! tus Vi^i ruv h "aSou liaX^^tis ovK tiKV KBti US 'iru^iv Its TK ?rXs5^>) Ta^stiTayxyiTv ^oXv §£ fiuXXov o'l vuv iixri Kcct iXoyu! lx/3aXX£iv a'vra.— Polyb. B. VI. 54. THIRD i^DITI^^rr^^QJ^QQlQj^l^ J LONDON: JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, AND HATCHARD AND SON, PICCADILLY. MDCCCXZXIX. LONDON: riinled by W. Clowes auil Sons. Slamford Street. AUf 1882 INSCRIBED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD; TRIED, AND NOT FOUND WANTING. THROUGH THE VICISSITUDES OF A THOUSAND YEARS ; IN THE UELIEF THAT SHE IS PROVIDENTIALLY DESIGNED TO BE A FOUNTAIN OF BLESSINGS, SPIRITUAL, SOCIAL, AND INTELLECTUAL, TO THIS AND TO OTHER COUNTRIES, TO THE PRESENT AND FUTURE TIMESi AND IN THE HOPE THAT THE TEMPER OF THESE PAGES MAY DE FOUND NOT ALIEN FROM HER OWN. London, iiugust, 1838. b I Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2015 https://archive.org/details/stateinitsrelatiOOglad CONTENTS. CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTORY EXPLANATIONS AND STATEMENT OF SEVERAL PUBLISHED THEORIES. Pur. Page 1 — 7. Introductory Explanations 1 — 5 8. Of prevalent Theories ...... 6 9. 10. Theory of Hooker 7 11, 12. Comment 9, 10 1.3, 14. OfWarburton 11, 12 15—17. Comment 13 18, 19. Of Paley 14, 15 20. Comment 16 21, 22. Of Coleridge 17 23. Comment 18 24, 25. Of Chalmers 19, 20 26. Comment ........ 20 27. Of Hobbes and of Bellarmine and others . . 21 28 — 30. Explanations 22, 23 CHAPTER II. THE THEORY OF THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. Par. Page 1 . The phrase " Church and State " .... 24 2. The argument from utility generally ... 25 3. The general doctrine ...... 26 4—18. Argument for the obligation hereby incumbent on governors as men ...... 27 — 37 viii CONTENTS. Par. Page 1 9 — 21. Argument for the obligation incumbent on the nation, as a person, to profess a religion . . . 37 — 39 22. And to propagate it ..... . 40 23 — 27. For the voluntary principle is insufficient . . 40 — 43 28—31. And the state may have the means of giving pecu- niary aid ....... 43 — 45 32 — 41. And has other extrinsic means .... 46 — 52 42—47. And has intrinsic competency .... 53 — 57 48—53. And adequate inducements ..... 57 — 61 54 — 62. Especially when we arrive at the Church . . 61 — 66 63 — 66. Which should be established singly by her members 67 — 69 67. The result of Establishment arises in natural order . 70 68 — 71. Danger and evil otherwise accruing . . . 71 — 73 72 — 77. Duty limited to the use of due means . . . 73 — 76 78. The argument summed up 77 79—86. Applied 78—83 CHAPTER III. THE INFLUENCE OF THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE CHURCH AND THE STATE UPON THE TONE OF PERSONAL RELIGION IN THE CHURCH. Par. Page 1. Objection, that personal religion is deteriorated by the connection ....... 84 2 — 4. Favoured by present circumstances . . .85, 86 5—1 0. It would imply an actual incompatibility of two duties 87 — 89 11 — 14. Argument upon the allegation of superior activity in dissenting bodies 90, 91 15 — 21. Argument upon selection, the method of dissent ; and upon universal solicitation, the method of esta- blishments 92—95 22—29. Argument upon the partial religion of large numbers in establishments 96 — 100 30-33. Establishment tends, on the whole, to enlist secondary motives in favour of religion . . . . 101, 102 34. Does not exclude the voluntary principle . . 103 35. Nor imply excessive wealth 103 36—41. Curtain beneficial effects of nationality on the tone of CONTENTS. ix Par. Page 42— 44. And of endowment, which is akin to establishment . 108, 109 45. Case of Rome 110 46 — 48. General argument applied to England . . . 111 — 113 49. Recapitulation . 114 CHAPTER IV. SKETCH OF THE ECCLESIASTICAL SUPREMACY OF THE SOVEREIGN IN ENGLAND. Par. P.ige 1 — 2. Objection, that the Church is enslaved by the supre- macy ; and notions respecting it . . . 115, 116 3, 4. Necessary law of adjustment for the powers of distinct bodies having connection together . . . UG, 117 5, 9. The authority in its general character negative, and does not destroy the independence of the Church 118 — 120 10 — 12. The power, the right, the law .... 121, 122 13. Appointment of Bishops 123 14. Attempt to classify 123 15. Want of precision in our theories .... 124 16. Case of the Scottish Establishment . . . 125 CHAPTER V. THE REFORMATION, AS CONNECTED WITH THE USE AND ABUSE OF PRI- VATE JUDGMENT. Par. Page 1. Sketch ofthe subjects of V. and VI. . . . 126 2. We must go far back ...... 127 3. The use and abuse of private judgment stated . . 128 4 — 24. How treated before the Reformation . . . 128—143 25 — 31. Views of Luther, to be distinguished from the conse- quences of the events connected with the foreign Reformation 144—150 32 — 37. Prevailing abuse 151 — 155 38 — 40, Case of the English Reformation .... 155, 156 41 — 57. Anglican doctrine of private judgment stated and defended 157—167 X CONTENTS. 58 — 60. The free diffusion of the Scriptures does not contra- dict it 168—170 61 — 67. The foregoing view historically illustrated . . 171—175 CHAPTER VI. THE USE AND ABUSE OF PRIVATE JUDGMENT AS CONNECTED WITH THE PRINCIPLE OF UNION BETWEEN THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. Far. Page 1 — 13. Of toleration, and how it is related to liberty of con- science and to private judgment . . . 176—183 1 4—18. Subject indicated, and forms of European state policy with respect to private opinion in religion classified 183 — 187 19 — 26. Nationality a leading feature of the English Reform- ation 188—194 27, 28. A vicious influence subsequently developed . . 194, 195 29—48. An historical sketch of the policy of the state respect- ing religious differences down to the Revolution of 1688 196-209 49—60. A similar outline from the Revolution of 1688 to the present day . . .... 209—217 61 — 72. Steps by which a state may progressively advance from the toleration of different religions, or forms of religion, to a recognition of their perfect equal- ity, by the indiscriminate admission of their pro- fessors to office, and by affording to them a com- mon support . . .... 217 — 226 73, 74. Nor is it likely to rest there 227, 228 75, 76. Our own position 229, 230 77. A retrospect of the argument . . . . 231 78 — 83. A parallel and co-operating political influence . . 231—234 CHAPTER VII. THE PRESENT CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE PRACTICE Par. 1. The subject is not re* m/eo-ra .... 2. Certain distinctions to be taken .... CONTENTS. xi Par. Pag.- 3. Hypothetical standard of comparison . . . 237 4. Signs of the nationality of the Church in England . '238 5. How far it is constitutionally distinguished from that of Scotland 240 6 — 13. Case of the Scottish establishment argued . . 241 — 245 14, 15. Illustrative facts . 246 16 — 21. Illustrative facts in England. Navy — Army — Pri- sons — Workhouses— Schools— Vote for Protestant Dissenters 247—251 22—28. Illustrative facts in Ireland. College of Maynooth — Regium Donum — National System of Education — Chaplains in Gaols, in Workhouses . . . 251 — 255 29, 30. Case of the Colonies 256, 257 31 — 40. Illustrative facts in the North American Colonies . 258 — 263 41 — 53. Illustrative facts in the West Indian Colonies . . 264—267 54 — 56. Illustrative facts in the Mediterranean Colonies . 267, 268 57— 64. Illustrative facts in the Austrahan Colonies . . 268 — 274 65-67. Illustrative facts in the East Indies . . . 274—276 68 — 70. Concluding remarks 276 — 273 CHAPTER VIII. THE ULTERIOR TENDENCIES OF THE MOVEMENT TOW .^iRDS THE DISSOLU- TION OF THE CONNECTION. Pav. Page 1— 3. General sketch 279—281 4, 5. Result on the science and art of government, as a de- clension from its nature ..... 281, 282 6, 7. Form of the development 283, 284 8 — 16. It naturally terminates in social atheism . . . 285 — 292 17— 23. Universality of primeval religion, its subsequent re- striction, and reintroduction of universality with Christianity 293—298 24 — 26. Abandonment of this universality appears consequent on the abandonment of nationality of religion . 298—30! 27 — 33. Which also seems to prepare for the consummation of the human apostacy, and the destruction of social morality 301-307 xii CONTENTS. 34. And disappoints the prophecies . . . . 308 35, 30. Civil results on character 309 37 — 49. Signs of the times bearing on our own particular case 311 — 319 50—52. Existence of the Church, independent of the connec- tion ; it is the State which demands our solici- tude 320, 321 53, 54. Conclusion .... ... 322, 323 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS WITH THE CHURCH. CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY EXPLANATIONS AND STATEMENT OF SEVERAL PUBLISHED THEORIES. 1—7. Introductory Explanations. 8. Of prevalent Theories. 9, 10. Theory of Hooker. 11, 12. Comment. 13, 14. Of Warbiirton. 15 —17. Comment. 18, 19. Of Paley. 20. Comment. 21, 22. Of Cole- ridge. 23. Comment. 24, 25. Of Chalmers. 26. Comment. 27. Of Hobbes and of Bellarmine and others. 28 — 30. Explanations. 1. Probably there never was a time in the history of OHr country, when the connection between the Church and the State was threatened from quarters so manifold and various as at present. The infidel, with sagacious instinct, following out all that tends to the general di- minution of religious influences ; the Romanist, who, in order to erect his own structure of faith and discipline, aims first at the demolition of every other, and who seems, in general, to deem us so involved in fatal error, that we must pass through the zero of national infi- delity in order to arrive at truth ; tlie professor of political economy, who considers this connection as a visionary theory, only and mischievously known by its tendency, when obtruded into practice, to interfere B 2 THE STATE IN ITS DELATIONS [CHAP. I. with what he deems the suhstantial interests of man- kind ; * the democrat, who naturally desires to strip government of all its highest duties, and leave to it the performance of no more than mechanical func- tions : of all these it was perhaps, on the whole, to be expected that they should unite upon any seemingly favourable occasion to press for their common object ; and they have so united. 2. But others of a different stamp are beginning to view the connection of church and state Avith an eye of aversion or indifference : men attached to the state, but more affectionately and intimately cleaving to the church — unwilling to regard the two as in any sense having opposite interests, but wearied, pei'haps exas- perated, at the injustice done of late years, or rather during recent generations, by the temporal to the spi- ritual body — injustice, inasmuch as the state has too frequently perverted and abused the institutions of the church by unwoilhy patronage, has crippled or sup- pressed her lawful powers, and has, lastly, Avhen those same misdeeds have raised a strong sentiment of dis- favour against its ally, evinced an inclination to make a separate peace, and surrender her to the will of her adversaries. Such being the case, we can hardly Avon- der, though Ave may lament it, that some attached mem- bers of the church are groAving cool in their appro- bation of the connection, under the influence of a nascent and unconscious resentment ; and, Avhile they * See, for example, the preface to the " Principles of Political Eco- nomy," by Mr. Poulett Scrope, M.P. CHAP. I.] WITH THE CHURCH. 3 seem at least to waver upon the question, there are others who, although they are themselves unshaken in their attachment to the principle, yet defend it upon grounds untenable for their purpose, and better fitted to be occupied as positions against them. 3. If, therefore, we believe that the connection of church and state, rescued on the one hand from Papal, and on the other from Erastian, tyranny of either power over its ally, be conformable to tlie will of God, essen- tial to the permanent Avell-being of a community, im- plied and necessitated by every right idea of civil government, and calculated to extend and establish the vital influences of Christianity, and therewith to in- crease and purify the mass of individual happiness ; then, as holders of that belief, are we all the most im- peratively summoned to its defence in this the most critical period of its history. 4. The point of view from which it is now proposed to contemplate and discuss the question, is that which men occupy as members of a state ; and the aim is to show, that the highest duty and highest interest of a body politic alike tend to place it in close relations of co-operation with the church of Christ. It is from this position that I propose to regard it ; first, because the combatant in defensive warfare naturally resorts Itt) to xa.[xvov, to the quarter which is threatened and in dan- ger ; because the church is not likely to be the moving- party in measures for the dissolution of this connection, while the state has, it is too certain, given signs, though perhaps unconsciously, of that inclination ; and therefore it is the mind of the state, not of the church, which E 2 4 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. I. requires to be more fully exercised upon this subject, in order to the better knowledge and fulfilment of its duty. 5. But besides the fact that we are more ignorant of our duty as citizens than as churchmen, in respect of the connection, Ave shall find another reason for instituting the investigation in the former capacity rather than the latter. The union is to the church a matter of second- ary importance. Her foundations are on the holy hills. Her charter is legibly divine. She, if she should be excluded from the precinct of government, may still fulfil all her functions, and carry them out to perfection. Her condition would be anything rather than pitiable, should she once more occupy the position which she held before the reign of Constantine. But the state, in rejecting her, would actively violate its most solemn duty, and would, if the theory of the connection be sound, entail upon itself a curse. ^Y'^e know of no effectual preservative principle except religion ; nor of any per- manent, secure, and authenticated religion but in the church. The state, then, if she allows false opinions to overrun and bewilder her, and, under their influence, separates from the church, will be guilty of an obstinate refusal of truth and light, which is the heaviest sin of man. It is of more importance, therefore, for our inte- rests as a nation, that we should sift this matter to the bottom, than for our interests as a church. Besides all which, it may be shown that the principles, upon which alone the connection can be disavoAved, tend intrinsically and directly to disorganization, inasmuch as they place government itself upon a false foundation. CHAP. I.] WITH THE CHURCH. 5 6. These are the main reasons for handling the ques- tion in that sense which most applies to indiviiliuil Christians, anxious to be informed how they may best discharge their duties in respect of this connection, as members of the state : while, at the same time, we shall find ourselves led by the proposed process to ex- actly the same conclusion, as if, setting out from an opposite quarter, we were called upon to assist in directing the operations of the church, with reference to the best means of extending its utility. There is a substantial conformity between our several duties, though not always an apparent one. The only question is, respecting the order of the processes by which they are demonstrated. 7. Our inquiry, however, is into the grounds and rea- sons of the alliance, not into its terms. The precise arrangements, by which the respective rights of the contracting parties are to be preserved, are matter of very great importance, but they are entirely distinct from the preliminary question, whether they ought to be contracting parties at all. There are indeed, points of contact between the two subjects, but they are inci- dental, and it is enough to indicate that which is the specific object of these pages, and which constitutes an object of adequate magnitude when taken alone, while the other, it is true, is alike important and neglected. Milton* wrote to Sir Harry Vane the younger, ' besides, to know Both spiritual power and civil, what each means, What severs each, thou hast learnt, which few have done * Sonnet xvii. 6 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. I. but the praise which was rarely due in his days, ought, I fear, to be still more rarely given in our own, 8. It does not appear that our literature is well sup- plied with works which would meet the necessity above described, and furnish men with sound principles (axiomata summa) upon the fundamental conditions of the union between the church and the state. Bishop Warl)urton has written upon it with much acuteness and ability, but in the dry and technical manner of a man who lived in times when there was no strong pressure in one direction requiring to be warmly and feelingly met from another. Mr. Coleridge has dealt admirably with the subject in his ' Idea of Church and State ;' but he does not carry out his conceptions into detail, nor apply them to practice sufficiently to meet the wants of general readers. Dr. Chalmers has handled some points connected with this inquiry in a manner the most felicitous, but, in other parts of his re- cently published lectures, he has laid down principles, we fear, not less seriously detrimental to our cause. The work of Dr. Paley on Moral and Political Philo- sophy is a store-house of anything rather than sound principles. Hooker looked at the question under in- fluences derived from the general controversy with the Puritans, and rather with reference to the terms than to the grounds of the connection. None of these writers regarded the subject in the aspect most imperatively required by present circumstances : namely, that which shows that governments are, by " dutiful necessity," cognizant of religious truth and falsehood, and bound to the maintenance and propagation of the former. CHAP. I.] WITH THE CHURCH. 7 We proceed, however, to give summaries of the re- spective theories of the above-mentioned writers. 9. If the 6th, 7th, and 8th books of the ' Ecclesiasti- cal Polity' are to be taken as representing the opinions of Hooker, at least they cannot be said to do so with the accuracy, nor consequently with the authority, which belongs to the earlier and larger portion of the work. In the 8th book, however, he teaches,* that the same persons compose the church and the commonwealth of England, universally; that the same subjectf is therefore intended under the respective names of church and commonwealth ; and it is thus variously named only in respect of accidents, or properties and actions,! ^vhich are different. His opponents contended for a personal separation, which precluded the same man from bearing sway in both ; he for a natural one, which did not forbid such an union of authorities,§ " The church and the commonwealth are in this case, therefore, personally one society, which society" is " termed a commonwealth, as it liveth under whatsoever form of secular law and regiment — a church, as it hath the spiritual law of Jesus Christ." Banishment, how- ever, casts out of the church ; but exconnnunication does not cast out of the commonwealth. 10. In this society, considered as a church, the king is " the highest uncommanded commander."|| He holds his entire office under the law, and by the willing consent and subjection of the people, though still by divine right, even while at man's discretion.^ His * Ecclesiastical Polity, book viii. c. i. 2. t lb. c. i. 5. X lb. c. i. 'J lb. c. i. 2, || lb. c. ii. 1. % lb. c. ii. 6. 8 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. I. chief ecclesiastical powers are, the title of headship ; the right of calling and dissolving the greater assem- blies ; that of assent to all church orders, which are to have the force of law ; the advancement of prelates ; the highest judicial authority; and in general an ex- emption from the ordinary church censures to which others are liable, at least from excommunication : but the question of this last he declines to determine* The conveyance of poAver is not to each sovereign in succession, but to one originally, from whom the rest inherit ; and the body cannot help itself, but with consent of the head, while there is one. The king's judicial power is subject to church law ; and it is the head of all, simply because not confined to a district, but legally reaching to all.f Regal power| is not natm-ally limited to the good of men's bodies. Kings have " authority § over the church, if not col- lectively, yet divisively understood ; that is, over each particular person in that church where they are kings." He does not contend for the particular || title of head to be applied to the sovereign, if that be offensive. The subject in which this power is to reside*[ need not be one personally. The commonwealth, Avhen the people are Christians, being ipso facto the church, the clergy alone aught not to have the po^ver of making laws** " Quod 07nnes tangit, ah omnihiis tractari et approbari debet."" And historically the fact is,'|"t that canons of the clergy in their synods have generally taken no effect as laws without the approbation of * Ecclesiastical Polity, book viii. c. ix. 2. t lb. c. viii. 1 . j lb. c. iii. 2. j, lb. c. iv. 6- II lb. c. iv. 8. f lb. c. iv. 7. ** lb. c. vi. 7, 8. ft lb. c. vi. 9. CHAP. I.] WITH THE CHURCH. 9 f^overnors ; not even those of the council of Trent in Romish kingdoms. Until that approbation, they are but tlie opinions of wise men on the subject-matter. Tlie parliament, by 1 and 2 Phil, and Mar. c. 8. ratihed by enactment the cardinal-legate's dispensation, to give it the force of law. The king's power of assent is a power derived to him from the whole body of the realm.* Secular courts here regulate secular causes, spiritual courts spiritual causes. 1 1 . We have now extracted matter enough to show the general doctrine of the Eighth Book of the Ecclesiastical Polity on the relations between church and state. And thus much at least is clear : there can be no doubt that it teaches, or rather involves, as a basis and precondition of all its particular arguments, the great doctrine that the state is a person, having a conscience, cognizant of matter of religion, and bound by all constitutional and natural means to advance it. It is impossible not to recognise throughout the book a texture of thouglat such as pre-eminently distinguished the great man whose name it bears. And yet, on the other hand, it contains some statements which lead us to rejoice that he is not responsible for it as it stands^ and that it does not carry with it the weight of his plenary authority ; the authority of that noble and sanctified intellect, to ^\■hich Pope Clement VIII., according to Walton, paid so just and eloquent a tribute. f " There is no learning that this man hatli not searched into, nothing too hard for his understanding. This man indeed deserves the name of an author : his books will get reverence by age, * Ecclesiastical Polity, book viii. c. vi. 11, t Walton-s Lives, p. 228. 10 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP I. for there is in them such seeds of eternity, that, if the rest be like this (the first), they shall last till the last fire shall consume all learning." The perfect copies of the three last books were unhappily lost after his death : the rough draughts were given to Dr. Spencer, his friend, and made up by him according to the best of his ability ; and he writes of them in veiy strong terms, that there were left " nothing but the old, imperfect, mangled draughts, dismembered into pieces : no favour, no grace, not the shadow of themselves remaining in them."* And again, " the learned will find in them some shadows and resemblances of their father's face." 12. Although the book speaks of the natural sepa- ration of the two societies, and so lays a ground for clear reasoning upon their mutual relations, yet in other places it seems to lose sight of the distinction between a society and the mere total of the individuals who may belong to it; and to assume that the people of England composed one society which bore two different names, rather than two societies accidentally co-extensive as to the persons they comprised. And even this Ave know was not in strictness true. There were, even under Eliza- beth, known members of the state who were not members of the church. Some confusion appears to arise from the want of a clearer line. For example, it is said that the canons even of general councils are only the prelimi- nary opinions of wise men upon the subject-matter until they have received the royal assent. Now we may grant that they want the assent of the state in order to take effect as a part of the law of the land ; but who * Walton's Lives, App. to Hooker, p. 25. CHAP. I.] WITH THE CHURCH. 11 will doubt that they have a validity in foro eonsciefitice, affecting the members of the church, independently of any civil approbation whatever ? Another most import- ant question is raised respecting the derivation of power from the body at large. This theory fell in Avith Hooker's purpose, because he was thus enabled to limit the ecclesiastical headship, and show it to be secondary to the body, though superior to individuals. We need not here examine into its soundness, as it is not within our scope. It is enough to say, that it bears out the theory of union between church and state, so long as the body which he contemplates is composed mainly of members of the church, and its conscience, represent- ing the result of the general belief of the people, yields homage to her doctrines. The religious duty of kings was " the weightiest part of their sovereignty,"* even while heathens. Do they then lose it, he asks, by em- bracing Christianity ? 13. Bishop Warburton, in the ' Alliance of Church and State,' !" taught that civil society, being defective in the control of motives and in the sanction of reward, J had in all ages called in the aid of religion to supply the want. The state contemplates for its end the body and its interests ; has for its means, coercion ; for its ge- neral subject-matter, utility. The church is a religious * Book viii. c. vi. 13. t See Postscript to the Fourth Edition (' Works,' vol. vii. p. 320), where a partial summary is given. ;j: There is a much nobler and purer statement of the inadequacy of the state, taken alone, to fulfil its purposes, in No. IX. of ' Letters to a Member of the Society of Friends,' pp. 50-52 : ascribed to the Rev. F. Maurice, chaplain of Guy's Hospital. 12 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. I. society, of distinct origin ; having for its end the sal- vation of souls; for its subject-matter, truth; for its instrument, persuasion ; regulating motives as well as acts ; and promising eternal reward. Though sepa- rate, these societies would not interfere, because they have different provinces ; but, the state having needs as above stated, and the church wanting protection against violence, they had each reasons sufficient for a voluntary and free convention. 14. Accordingly, the societies united ; not indeed under any formal engagement with all the stipulated conditions, but like sovereign and people in the original contract. That is, the theory of the alliance accurately represents the true klea according to which they ought to unite. And this idea was actually realised by the then existing state of things in England ; where an established church and a free toleration were made perfectly to agree by the medium of a test-la tv, ^vith- out which, either dissenters will obtain political power and destroy the church ; or, in the other extreme, the church will persecute dissenters. And the conditions of the union are, that the church receives a free mainte- nance for the clergy ; a share, for her security, in the legislative body ; and a coactive power to be used in her spiritual courts for a purpose ^vhich is also a state purpose, — namely, the correction of certain forms of vice. In return for which, she surrenders to the state her original independency, and subjects all her laws and movements to the necessity of the state's previous approval. If there be more than one such religious society or church, the state is to contract the CHAP. 1.] WITH THE CHURCH. 13 largest; to which will naturally belong the greatest share of political influence. 15. The greatest mora/ defect in this theory is that indicated by the concluding sentence. The state is to contract with the largest religious society. The adop- tion of a national church is then with it matter of cal- culation, and not of conscience. The state in this view has no conscience. It is not contemplated in the bishop's work as a moral person, having responsibility before God, nor as an aggregation of individuals, each having personal responsibilities, and bound in all things according to their capability to serve God, His church, His truth : therefore under obligation to regard that service as in itself an end of positive value, independ- ently of the resulting benefits to the state. 16. The propositions of this work generally are to be received with qualification. It is a very low theory of government which teaches, that it has only the care of the body and bodily goods ; and might seem besides to imply, that all physicians are more peculiarly statesmen. There was far more truth in the su ^tJi/* of Aristotle ; under which we may consider that the state, bound to promote the general good of man, finds the cluu-ch ready made to its hand, as the appointed instrument for advancing that department of human well-being which is spiritual, and contracts with it accordingly. 17. And there does appear to be something reasonable in the objection of Bolingbroke to the representation of the alliance in the light of a fact, on the ground that it is a fiction. But, says Warburton, it is no more a fiction * Arist. Pol. iii. 5. 14 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. I. than the celebrated original compact. Nor is it : but both are fictitious : and Bolingbroke also censures the teachers of the original compact for having represented men as if they had at some time anterior to civil society been independent, when it is notoriously untrue ; and this untruth is made the basis of other and greater untruths concerning tlie derivation of power from the people, and the consequent denial of a divine authority in government. In fact, Warburton appears to have adopted the views of Locke, and to have copied his representation of the alliance from the original com- pact, not himself objecting to the use that has been made* of that arbitrary mode of stating the case, but, on the contrary, considering any derivation of political from patriarchal rule as an absurdity. 18. Dr. Paleyf has supplied us with a view of reli- gious establishments, distinguished by his own great and highly characteristic merits, but likewise tainted by the original vice of his false ethical principles, and by the total absence of any substantive conception of the visible church. According to this author, the rights, offices, order, family, and succession of the priesthood, were parts of the Jewish religion, as well as the means of transmitting it. But no form of outward institution enters into the composition of Christianity. The au- thority, therefore, of a church establishment, is founded upon its utility :" and the end is " the preservation and connnunication of religious knowledge." Regard to political ends has only served to deteriorate the church * Postscript to the Fourth Edition, t Moral and Political Philosophy, book vi. chap. x. CHAP. I.] WITH THE CHURCH. 15 wherever it has been allowed. Three things, accord- ingly, are requisite : — 1. A clergy, or order of men set apart for religion. 2. A legal provision for their maintenance. 3. The restriction of that provision to the ministers of a particular sect. 19. He contends for the necessity of a clergy " to perpetuate the evidences of Revelation, and to interpret the obscurity of those ancient writings in which the religion is contained ;" and to conduct public Avorship with decency. From these peculiar occupations he deduces the necessity of a separate maintenance. Vo- luntary contribution would yield but an insufficient supply, and would lower the tone of instruction. As to the third condition, the form of religion ought to be such as to comprehend all existing differences of opi- nion ; but if the prevailing opinions be " not only so various, but so contradictory," as to render their junc- tion impossible, then, where patronage is allowed, and one set of people appoint the teachers whom another set are to hear, there must be a test — the simplest pos- sible — to secure some unity of proceeding. Such test, therefore, " may be considered merely as a restriction upon the exercise of private patronage." Again, if the parishioners chose their ministers without a test, into- lerable discords would arise. The recognition of all sects appears scarcely compatible Avith that which is the " first requisite in a national establishment — the division of the country into parishes of a commodious extent." One sect, therefore, should be preferred. But tests ensnare consciences, often come to " contradict the 16 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIOXS [cHAP. actual opinions of the church, whose doctrines they profess to contain," and proscribe tenets long after they have ceased to be dangerous. Any form of Christianity is better than none, as all tend to good. This justifies the magistrate's interference ; wliich therefore carries no violation of religious liberty while he is only " providing means of public instruction." But where his faith differs from that of the majority, he should establish the latter, as the chances of truth are equal. Toleration promotes truth; but exclusion may perhaps be de- fended where disaffection happens to be connected with certain religious distinctions. Generally there is no reason why these should prevent men from discharg- ing civil functions together, more than differences of opinion on questions of " natural philosophy, history, or ethics." 20. The views here given of the office of the clergy, of the visible church, of creeds, of the method of weigh- ing different forms of Christianity, and of the irrelevancy of religious distinctions to the discharge of civil duties, are full of the seeds of evil. The truths which the author seems to have perceived with clearness Avere, the national benefits of a recognition of religion ; the futility of the allegation that the civil magistrate is not competent to its advancement, or not justified in " pro- viding means" for that end ; the compatibility of an establishment for religion with religious liberty ; the need of a provision for preserving as well as diffusing the truth ; and the tendency of the voluntary method of support to deteriorate the quality of pastoral instruc- tion. CHAP. I.] WITH THE CHURCH. 17 21. The ai-gunient of Mr. Coleridge " on the Consti- tution of the Church and State according to the Idea of each" is alike beautiful and profound. He shows, from an analysis of the parts of the body politic, that, in order to its well-being, there must necessarily enter into its composition an estate, whose office it shall be to supply those governing and harmonising qualities of character, Avithout which the remaining elements cannot advan- tageously cohere.* His first estate is that of the land- owners, or possessors of fixed property, barons and franklins — providing for the permanency of the nation. His second, that of the merchants, manufacturers, arti- sans, " the distributive class," whose especial office it is to secure the progressiveness of the nation, and per- sonal freedom, its condition. In the king, again, " the cohesion by interdependence and the unity of the coun- try were established." But these, viewed alone, are as it were but the material means for attaining their seve- ral ends. 22. There must be a soul, underlying and animating them all, a cultivation of the inward man, Avhich is the root, the corrective, and the safeguard of eivUisuthm. The nourishment of this paramount ingredient of na- tional life constitutes the function of a third great estate : living on reserved property for more free devo- tion to its duties, and divided into two classes ; a smaller nundjer dwelling at the fountain-heads of knowledge, guarding the treasures already acquired, opening new shafts and mines, and dispensing !" their acquisitions to * Church and State, p. 4'2. t Che di su prendono, e di sotto fanno. — Dante, ParaJiso, II. 123. C 18 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. I. their l)retliren ; the second division of this estate, a far larger number distril)uted throughout the country, supplying for every spot a resident guide and teacher ; and thus connecting each part of time and each part of the nation with the rest respectively. Such is the na- tural " clerisy " of a state. Upon such a theory, drawn according to human principles, supervenes Avhat JNIr. Coleridge has felicitously termed the (in reference to this theory) "happy accident" of the Christian church,* " the sustaining, correcting, befriending opposite of the world, the compensating counterforce to the inherent and inevitable defects of the state as a state ;" not primarily to any particular state, inasmuch as the whole world is her inheritance, but yet with applicability, by subdivision into branches, to each particular state. 23. It may be well to observe, with reference to the analysis of the two first estates, that its classification is true on a large scale, not in minute detail : it is the de- lineation of a painter, not of an anatomist ; and yet the painter has regard to anatomy, but he generalises its results. The landed estate is not entirely permanent ; it is also productive and progressive ; but, on the whole, the habits of mind and action which belong to it are in- disposed to change. It hangs more evidently on superior power, and has less of self-dependence. The trading class appears more an agent, and less subservient : thus it has more of the spirit of egotism, and is consequently more inclined to judge, and to alter what has been judged already; while, on the other hand, there are influences which check this tendency, as the necessity * Church and State, p. 133. CHAP. I.] WITH THE CHURCH. 19 of order and tranquillity to tlie prosperity of trade, and to the regular action of tlie labour-market ; and the disposition of those Avho have acquired property to pass into the class of landholders. But these explanations in no way detract from the substantial truth of Mr. Coleridge's definition ; and I do not venture any further to incumber the masterly sketch which he has drawn. 24. The profuse and brilliant eloquence of Dr. Chal- mers, and the warm heart from which its colouring is principally derived, have necessarily contributed to render the scientific development of his views less ac- curately discernible than it would have been had he written more apathetically. His lectures on church establishments teach that Christianity is the sure found- ation of order and prosperity ; that the efforts of indi- viduals, without aid from government, are insufficient to bring it within reach of the whole population ; that the territorial division of the land into manageable districts, with a general cure of souls over all persons within them, is the most efficient method of giving to Christianity an universal influence : that such division cannot well be carried into effect but by a church of one given deno- mination. Again, with respect to the religious tenets within which a government may choose its national establishment, he contends that the church should be wholly independent in respect of its theology * — that there should be " maintenance from the one quarter, and an unfettered theology from the other :" — but he subsequently, in effect, qualifies this doctrine.f * Lecture ii. p. 37. t Lecture iv. p. 115. c 2 20 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. I. 25. He teaches that the government should deter- mine what shall l)e its establishment, if possible, simply by the answer to the question, " What is truth ?" but if not, then with a modified view to the benefit of the population at large. He considers a state incompetent to enter upon the details of theological discussion, but abundantly qualified to decide upon certain broad and leading principles. Upon the former consideration lie holds them justified in selecting, or in adhering to the selection of, any one of the Christian denominations, which, being Protestant, are also evangelical ; as, for example, IMethodist, Independent, Baptist : he does not, however, su])ply any precise test for determining to what extent the ejuthet "evangelical" may be ap- plicable. But, upon the latter consideration, he teaches that the state is com])etent, nay, that any man,* " with the ordinary schooling of a gentleman," and " by the reading of a few weeks," may qualify himself to de- cide upon the broad question which separates Protest- antism from Popery, namely, whether the Scriptures be or be not the only rule of faith and practice in religion. 26. It did not enter into the purpose of Dr. Chalmers to exhibit the whole subject, but even in these propo- sitions lie has, it may be apprehended, put forward much questional^le matter. He appears by no means to succeed in showing, upon his own principles, that his territorial establishment must be of one denomi- nation : he would probably find it impossible, upon stricter investigation, so to define Evangelical Protest- * Lecture iv. p. 11 'J. CHAP. I.] WITH THE CHimCH. 21 autism as to make it an universal criterion for the guidance of governments : it might further l)e argued, that he has surrendered the condition without which all others fail, in omitting from his calculation the divine constitution of the visible church ; and that Avhile he does not so much as inquire whether on the one side it would be difficult or easy to reject the unevangelical Protestants, he has on the other, very greatly under- rated the difficulty of the questions at issue between the church of Rome and her opponents. But no more : it is painful even to indicate points of difference from a man so distinguished, so excellent, so liberal — and one, too, who has studied and explained the machinery of a religious establishment Avith such admirable effect. 27. The reader will probably agree that it is unne- cessary, with a view to the practical purposes before us, to enter upon any detailed investigation of two other theories of the connection between Church and State, which embody the respective extremes of opi- nion adopted on the one hand by Hobbes, and on the other by Bellarmine and ultramontane Romanists. They are theories of derivation, rather than of connec- tion, properly so called. According to the first, the Church and her religion are mere creatures of the state. According to the second, the temporal power is wholly dependent and subordinate. These views are not avoAved amongst ourselves. A third extreme opi- nion of a different kind, namely, that the magistrate has no concern Avith religion, is that against which the general argument of the succeeding chapter is directed. 22 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. I. 28. It remains to observe, before proceeding to the formal investigation of our subject, that, when we speak of the Church of England as having actually entered into connection with the State, we use a phrase which lias more of historical truth, undoubtedly, than belongs to the celebrated original compact with which Bishop Warburton compares it. But the alliance probably was made by Ethelbert rather under an impression of personal conscience, than in any deliberate view of what we may term scientific results, or upon any formal specification of terms. In speaking, therefore, of its having been made on such and such conditions, we use the language of convenience, not of historical precision ; and tlie meaning merely is, that we are stating the terms which justify the connection in respect of their fulfilling the duties and the purposes of both the bodies concerned. 29. It is not easy to find any single word which accurately describes the relation subsisting between the two societies, in respect of the degree of its intimacy. Alliance means too little : it puts too much out of view the Christian conscience of the state, and seems to sup- pose too great an original distance between the parties ; whereas, in their personal composition, they very greatly mix ; and when Warburton says the state will ally with the largest connnunion, because that will have most influence in the legislature, this should mean that the majority of persons composing the legislature Avill have Buch a conscience as will approve and establish that communion. The word incorporation would evidently CHAP. I.] WITH THE CHURCH. 23 be as much too strong. Even union, though it is on many accounts convenient, may convey too much if it be understood as making two into one. Connection is too indeterminate, but is, perhaps, on the whole, for some reasons, the most convenient, as most free from the risk of misapprehension ; wliile, by the term " relations," our language enables us to express in the most compre- hensive form whatever functions or qualities of the two societies admit of mental association. 30. Lastly, the argument which follows is not speci- fically addressed to infidels ; hardly, indeed, to persons in a state of systematic separation I'rom our national church ; nor, on the other hand, to those who have deliberately considered all its conditions, and their own obligations as its members ; but to those Avho form the mass of the educated community, and whose minds have imbibed a general belief of the lawfulness and duty of public support of religion, yet 'without any clear and reasoned conclusions either upon the grounds or the limits of that duty. I presume, therefore, on but a very small portion of favourable predispositions in the mind of the reader, while I shall hope to show him, that a sin- cere believer in no more than the general principle of Theism will, upon looking attentively at the nature and the necessities of the state_, and its capabilities in respect of religion, be led on, by regular and progressive in- ferences, to the full adoption of the princijde Avhich de- mands the continued union of the church with the con- stitution of the country. 24 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. II. CHAPTER II. THE THEORY OF THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 1. The phrase " Church and State." '2. The argument from utility ge- nerally. 3. The general doctrine. 4—18. Argument for the ob- ligation hereby incumbent on Governors as men. 19—21. Argument for the obligation incumbent on the Nation as a person, to profess a religion. 22. And to propagate it. 23 — 27. For the voluntary prin- ciple is insufficient. 28 — 31. And the State may have the means of giving pecuniary aid. 32—41. And has other extrinsic means. 42 — 47. And has intrinsic competency. 48 — 53. And adequate in- ducements. 54 — 62. Especially when we arrive at the Church. G3. — 66. Which should be established singly by her Mtembers. 67. The result of Establishment arises in natural order. 68 — 71. Danger and evil otherwise accruing. 72—77. Duty limited to the use of due means. 78. The argument summed up. 79 — 86. Applied. 1. The phrase of " Church and State," so familiar to our mouths, has been adopted in the present day as a watch- word by a great political combination, ■\^'hich is un- justly dealt with when it is called a party, because it comprehends men of many parties, united not from un- faithfulness to their peculiar principles, but from fall- ing back in the movement of events upon those which they hold in common. Doubtless many of those who use the motto have well considered its meaning, and yet that is not a matter of narrow compass, obvious to the eye upon a superficial view, but a deep fundamental truth of human society, nay, more, of human natm-e. CHAP. II.] WITH THE CHtmCH. 25 prolific of results alike affecting individual character and public institutions, so that it may be within the bounds of truth to believe that, however sincere in al- most all cases, however intelligent in many, those may be who are now contending throughout all ranks for the maintenance of the union bet^-een church and state, yet the phrase is, to most among them, no more than the index of an hereditary or personal attachment, most valuable in itself, but greatly needing, and capable of effectually receiving, the (as it were) extrinsic suj)port of distinct intellectual conviction. 2. It is not a repetition of the arguments of Bishop Warburton that is here intended, or a mere exhibition, in any form, of the uses of this connection. Protection received on the one hand, and obedience inculcated on the otlier,are facts in themselves which I, at least, am not about to deny, and they undoubtedly manifest an interchange of benefits, such as should tend to support the credit of the alliance itself But in our period the uses are questioned and denied, and it is necessary that we fall back upon the examination of its rights. No theory upon a subject essentially ethical, which has reference to results alone, will be found sufficient in the day of trouble. It may be that the same proposition is applicable to theories founded upon causes alone. The fact is, that the all-wise God has given us evidence enough to support our convictions, but not too much; a strength according to our need, but not beyond it. Had questions of the deepest interest been so palpably and undeniably plain as to need no extrinsic support, lijiith 36 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. II. could not have been tried ; while, had those extrinsic props been wanting, it could not have survived the trial. We cannot then afford to dispense with any class of confirmatory arguments and evidence tending to uphold our practical principles ; but we must travel both backwards into the region of causes, and forwards into the region of results, in order to do them and our own consciences full justice in the time of need. 3. Under this complex view, then, let us proceed to declare, as follows, the general doctrine Avhich is em- bodied, as respects our own case, in the phrase " Church and State." That in national societies of men generally the governing body should, in its capacity as such, pro- fess and maintain a religion according to its conscience, both as being composed of individuals who have indivi- dual responsibilities to discharge and individual pur- puses to fulfil, and as being itself, collectively, the seat of a national personality, with national responsibilities to discharge, and national purposes to fulfil : that it must have the extrinsic, and, in proportion as it is a good government, Avill have the intrinsic, qualifications for professing and maintaining such religion : that re- ligion offers sufficient inducements to such a policy : that as, in respect of its extension, it should, for the benefit of the state, be the greatest possible, and we are therefore bound to show, in considering the above-men- tioned national purposes, that the direct aid of the state promotes that extension ; so, in respect of its quality, it should be the purest possible, that is to say, should be the Catholic Church of Christ : that such adoption by CHAP. II.] WITH THE CHURCH. 27 the state follows in the way of natural order upon the general prevalence of a religion in the community : that the means should be appropriate, and such as are au- thorised by the rules both of the religion and of the constitution. 4. Let us now proceed to explain and support the parts of the foregoing statement. First, that there should be a profession and maintenance of religion by the govern- ing body. By its profession is meant the observance of its ordinances, on the part of those who compose that body, throughout their acts done in that particular ca- pacity ; by its maintenance, the upholding of its insti- tutions through the instrumentality of influence and pecuniary support, in proportion as they may be at its disposal, with the ultimate view of offering that religion to every individual within the nation. 5. But it is generally, and not universally, that we are to plead for the literal fulfilment of this duty. All com- munities do not exhibit a natural growth, and the rela- tions of governor and governed may exist under some partial convention, which precludes the immediate and full development of all the functions which belong to them as a general rule. For example — in Saxony the royal family is Roman Catholic, the nation Lutheran : in British India, a small number of persons, advanced to a higher grade of civilization, exercise the powers of government over an immensely greater number of less cultivated persons, not by coercion, but under free sti- pulation with the governed. Now the rights of a go- vernment, in circumstances thus peculiar, obviously 28 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. II. dej^end neither upon the unrestricted theory of paternal principles, nor upon any primordial or fictitious contract of indefinite powers, but upon an express and known treaty, matter of positive agreement, not of natural or- dinance. It would be an absurd exaggeration to main- tain it as the part of such a government as that of the British in India to bring home to the door of every subject at once the ministrations of a new and totally unknown religion : yet even here the general obliga- tion to advance the well-being of the governed sul)sists in all its force; there must, therefore, be the desire and the endeavour to propose and propagate Chris- tianity to an extent only limited by the degree in which the people are found willing to receive it ; and the denial of this obligation is an error far more pernicious than even the attempt to precipitate its fulfilment. 6. Why, then, we now come to ask, should the go- verning body in a state profess a religion ? First, be- cause it is composed of individual men ; and they, being appointed to act in a definite moral capacity, must sanc- tify their acts done in that capacity by the offices of religion ; inasmuch as the acts cannot otherwise be acceptable to God, or anything but sinful and punish- able in themselves. And whenever we turn our face away from God in our conduct, we are living atheisti- cally. It is the deliberate avowal of the principle of turning away from him, of living " w ithout God in the world," which constitutes atheism in its ordinary, though not its strict, signification. This Avas the atheism of Lucretius, and his is pre-eminently an atheistic sect : — CHAP. 11.] WITH THE CHURCH. 29 " Omnis enim per se Diviim natura necesse est Immortali sovo summa cum pace fruatur, Semota ab nostris rebus, sejunctaque loiigc."* lie does not forbid men to pay acts of worship, l)ut he says, " Avoid referring the facts of the worhl to divine government," or else (in his too beautiful language), " Nec (lelubra Deuin placido r,um pectore adibis ; Nec, de corpore qusc sancto simulacra feruntur, In mantes hominum divinae nuntia formoe, Suscipere haec animi tranquilla pace valebis." !' It is, therefore, the recognition of actual relations between God and man that saves us from atheism, and not an abstract acknowledgment of His existence. 7. It is most important to stop for a moment and re- flect that, while on Christian principles we are com- manded to discharge our social duties " as unto the Lord" and not to man, so, even in the view of rational- ism, we must ever bear in mind that, whatever be the functions, whatever the external circumstances, of each particular person, he has a nature and a law within him, which protest against being absorbed and lost in the external energies required l)y those functions ; which claim to rule over him and to direct the paramount conditions of his life ; and by the supersession of which he surrenders his human birthright and patrimony, the inward and central freedom of his being, and becomes but as a captive, chained, though it may be to a tri- umphal car. 8. There is a striking and almost an indignant re- monstrance on this subject contained in an oration whicli Lucr. I. 57. t Lucr. VI. 74. 30 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. II- was recently delivered by Mr. Emerson, an American, at an American Cambridge.* He says, " There is one man present to all particular men only partially or through one faculty." "The individual, to possess him- self, must sometimes return from his own labour to em- brace all the other labourers." " The planter, who is man sent out into the field to gather food, is seldom cheered by any idea of the true dignity of his ministry. He sees his bushel and his cart, and nothing beyond, and sinks into the farmer, instead of man on the farm." And so it is with us, that he who holds oflBces of public trust runs a thousand hazards of sinking into a party- man, instead of man employing party for its uses — into a politician, instead of man in politics — into an administrator, instead of man in administration. Upon the observance of a distinction substantially analogous to this depend alike the freedom and dignity of our being, and that highest result of its highest dignity and freedom, its implicit submission to God ; for thus only do we keep in view the reflective nature of man and the judicial powers with which his con- science is intrusted. 9. In fulfilment, then, of his obligations as an indivi- dual, the statesman must be a worshipping man. But his acts are public ; the powers and instruments with which he works are public : acting under and by the authority of the law, he moves at his word ten thousand subject arms ; and, because such energies are thus * Oration delivered before the Phi Beta Kappa Society. Boston. James Munro and Co. 1838. CHAP. II.] WITH THE CHURCH. 31 essentially public and wholly out of the range of mere individual agency, they must be sanctified not only by the private personal prayers and piety of those who fill public situations, but also by public acts of the men composing the public body. They must offer prayer and praise in their public and collective character, in that character wherein they constitute the organ of the nation, and wield its collected force. Wherever there is a reasoning agency there is a moral duty and a responsibility involved in it : the governors are reasoning agents for the nation, in their conjoint acts as such. And therefore there must be attached to this agency, as that without which none of our responsibilities can be met, a religion. And this religion must be that of the conscience of the governor, or none. He cannot, that is, cannot rightly, believe one and profess another. It is ^vith profession alone that we are at present con- cerned. For these reasons, then, the public profession of religion ranks among the personal obligations of governors as individuals. 10. Let it not be thought a doctrine belonging to Christianity alone, and far less one savouring of fanati- cism, that the acts of men in their governing capacity have need of being sanctified by Divine worship. Hear on this the language of Plato : — " It will be for you, then, as it appears, Timseus, to proceed, when you have, according to law, invoked the gods." Ti- mseus : " Nay, Socrates, all minds in any degree well regulated call upon the Deity at the outset of every undertaking, be it small or great : but for us, who are 32 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. II. about to institute some inquiry into the nature of tlie universe, how it was generated or whether it be eternal (jTspl rou TravTog, -fi ye yovsv fj xa) ayevks £ 62. The inducements, of which the enumeration has now closed, are all matters intrinsic to the church ; and CHAP. II.] WITH THE CHURCH. 67 up to this point we have endeavoured to show, that ra- tional men, entertaining tlie average belief of men as such in a Creator, and serious in it, and being called to exercise the functions of government, ought to apply to the acts of government the offices of religion, for the discharge of their own personal responsibilities before God, paramount to all social relations ; and that in inquiring, not already under Christian prepossessions, what is the best religion for the profession of the state, they will, even without taking into view the scope of particular doctrines, arrive naturally at the adoption of the Christian church. 63. If, however, the claim of the church be preferable for state purposes, it does not seem at once to follow that it should be exclusive, as against sects of Chris- tianity professing to concur in its fundamental doctrines. Perhaps, in order to determine this question, we must alter our point of view ; and having heretofore looked at the question in the position of one who, owning an obligation to religion, simply finds his answer to the question, " what religion ?" by considering how the broad conditions necessary to its efficacy for state purposes may hcst be fulfilled, let us now suppose with Hooker that the persons composing the nation are all members of the church, that the governors are accordingly mem- bers of the church : in such case they will not be per- plexed by being left to determine this great question upon calculations of expediency, or by the results of an analytical inquiry into the composition of different reli- gions, claimants for state patronage, in order to decide F 2 68 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. II. whether there be in them more of truth than of false- hood, more of virtuous than of vicious tendency. They are called to no surrender of truth, to no bewildei'ing of the conscience. God has given them a vineyard wherein to hibour ; and they need not go beyond its bounds, for it will afford employment more than enough to all the energies they can set in arraj'. 64. The church, therefore, is the society with wiiich, and with A\ hicli alone, they can consistently form such an alliance as has been here described, an alliance, more or less, of incorporation. And as they know that she will best support the state, so their affectionate regard to her as having the stewardship of grace, and to Him who is her Head and their Redeemer, will supply them with an accumulated strength of persua- sion and of motive to be diligent in promoting a co- operation so natural, so needful, and so valuable. If, in short, we take up the subject as members of the church, we find her not merely a form, a vessel, an appendage, but a iiart of Christianity, revealed as one, the doctrine of unity in one society revealed as a portion of the living covenant ; and this of course precludes us, not indeed from discharging obligations incumbent on us as of good faith under any existing laws, but from entering into schemes even for the pro- motion of God's word in any manner coming short of that which lie has sanctioned and ordained, so long as the means of fulfilling his entire command are graciously vouchsafed to us. While the doctrine of " one body" is authoritatively declared by Scripture, CHAP. II.] WITH THE CHURCH. 69 to recognise the Christian religion in separate bodies might be to countenance the sin, which lies somewhere, though it may be hidden, or may be divided among many offending parties, in every such putting asunder of what God has united. 65. Indeed, more general considerations would lead us towards the same result, though they might scarcely reach it. Some kind of unity is desirable, nay needful. Now unity of opinion can never l)e absolutely ensured, and is a question of degree : it would be impossible for a government permanently to contract with any set of opinions as such, because it could not be competent to detect deviations in their subtle and nascent forms, and it might only become aware of their existence when they were too strong to be corrected and repressed. And the name of Christianity affords no security what- ever for the substantial unity or convergency of the doctrines taught. There is, for example, a far Avider space between Catholic Christianity and Unitarianism (regarded in the abstract), than between Unitarianism and the religion of the works of Plato. We might, then, argue for the church on princijdes of reason, as offering, in her one communion, the best guarantee of that unity which is so important to the state. 66. Further, if there be between any set of distinct religious communions not merely a nominal but a sub- stantial difference, then the idea of union Avith more than one is fatally at variance with the idea of per- sonality and responsibility in the government as the organ of the national life. It is sad when two persons 70 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. 11. take discordant views of religious truth. But it is still more sad, when one person contentedly acquiesces in each of these discordant views ; because, though he might not know which is truth, he must know that truth is one. Arguing, therefore, from the principle of the personality of the state, Ave arrive at a conclusion that, in order fully to satisfy it, the alliance must be with one religion and no more. 67. To practical men, not the weakest argument upon this subject will be, that the imion of the church and the state appears to have grown up in the order of social nature, and l)y no means as the result of any conspiracy of ecclesiastical anil)ition with civil despotism. When Dante wrote the " Ahi Costantin," * it was of the supposed donation of temporal sovereignty to the bishop of Rome that he meant to record his disappro- bation. But the union of the church and the state must have been found a powerful instrument of extend- ing the influences of religion, if we may trust the com- bined evidence of friends and foes. Of friends, for did not the principle receive too long continued, universal, and pure a sanction from the church and her holiest and wisest members, to allow those who walk with her reasonably to doubt of its general pro])riety ? Of foes, for Julian the Apostate, in his organised efforts to supplant the gospel, adopted the very machinery of tlie church, and brought the -whole powers of the state to 1)ear, by a regular heathen establishment, upon the attainment of his object. * Inferno, xix. 115. CHAP. II.] WITH THE CHURCH. 71 68. As has been observed by Dr. Sumner, the pre- sent l)ishop of Chester, the natural course of religion, as it drew more and more individuals within its pale, was to produce more and more endowments. And the principle of voluntary endowments, independent of tithe, had gone so far at the time of the Reformation, that we understand in England one-third, in Scotland no less than a moiety of the land, Avas owned by the church. Now is it compatible with the safety of a state that such a society should exist, forming practi- cally an imperium in imperio, and wielding such tem- poral resources, without being in fixed relations of civil subordination to itself? If the state claims the right to perpetuate the law of mortmain, and prevent the dedication of property to divine uses, it must be on the principle that those uses are already fully supplied : for if they were not, then the general interests of pro- perty A-t'ould afford no justification for a law so essen- tially restricting its free disposal. And if the state, then, has authority to check even private benevolence when the supply to the church is redundant, surely it has a corresponding obligation to increase that supply when it is deficient. G9. The two societies, both (though differently) or- dained of God, and having harmonious purposes, have spontaneously allied themselves in all the old Christian countries. But the danger to the state, it may l)e argued, from the separate and independent juxtaposition of the church, is not to be apprehended when the church is itself divided, and many denominations of religionists 72 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. II. are combined in one civil community. It may be true tliat the legitimate form of Christian polity will not, in earthly rivalry with other religious societies, always obtain the preponderance. But how wretched an alternative is here offered to us as an equivalent for imnumity from the ambition of the church ! We must, in this case, \vhere there is no j)redominant religion, have government divested of its religious conscience ; set to administer equity and justice without the aid of those ordinances which are the only permanent guaran- tee of morals among men ; appointed to concentrate the mind and civilisation of the whole nation in a most powerful agency, but doomed to leave that agency un- sanctified ! 70. It may seem a light thing to us, who live in habitual coldness and worldliness, to speak of leaving such an agency unsanctified. Too much of our life is in the like condition. But let us not erect our human frailties and backslidings from our law into a new and false law. If the light that is in us be darkness, how great is that darkness ! If Ave deliberately avow the principle of acting without God, how much more shall we act without Him than when we had not yet ado])ted it, and how shall we render adAaucement towards a practice more consistent with our present professions hopeless and impossible ! Thus, then, does the sin of religious divisions bring its own punishment : not only its OAvn punishment, but a civil retribution also, inca- pacitating government for its highest functions, and gnaAving as a aa orm at the root of that fair tree. CHAP. II.] WITH THE CHURCH. 73 71. There may be a state of things — in the United States of America, perhaps in some British colonies, there does actually exist a state of things — in which reli- gious connnunions are so equally divided, or so variously subdivided, that the government is itself similarly che- quered in its religious complexion, and thus internally incapacitated by disunion from acting in matters of religion ; or, again, there may be a state in which the members of government may Ije of one faith or persua- sion, the mass of the subjects of another, and hence there may be an external incapacity to act in matters of religion. We do not here trace out all the conse- quences, but it has been shown that this involves dere- liction of the functions and responsibilities of govern- ment ; and it is enough, therefore, for the present, to have marked each of these combinations of circum- stances as a social defect and calamity. 72. As has here been intimated, we repudiate the sup- position that the governor is to over-ride the constitution of a country for the sake of promoting religion ; or that he is to use force against a private person for the like purpose. As regards the first, the argument we have held is simply, that, because means naturally accrue to governments in general of promoting religion, they are bound to use those means for that end ; just as the individual man finds in the fact of his possessing capa- cities, or property, or opportunities, for doing God service, the obligation to perform that service. But a government can only with justice be said, or thought to have, what the fixed laws or customs of each parti- 74 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. II. cular country assign to it. In violating the constitution, therefore, to promote religion, — for example, in an illegal exaction of funds for that object, — it would give to God what l)elongs not to itself, but to another ; and it would no more be rendering to him a right or accept- able service, than if the private man committed robbery and dedicated the proceeds to sacred uses. 73. As respects the second objection, namely, that the use of force in religion naturally and logically follows from its adoption by a government as such, it may be observed, in answer, first, that the arguments which have been urged respecting the incompetency of a government to exercise constant and minute supervision over religious opinion, and consequently to enter into relations of co-operation Avith those professing particular religious opinions u])on the ground of those opinions, seem also to point out that a government exceeds its province when it comes to adapt a scale of punishments to variations in religious opinion, according to their re- spective degrees of deviation from the established creed. To decline affording countenance to sects is a single and simple rule. To punish their professors according to their several errors (even were there no other objec- tion) is one for which the state must assume functions wholly ecclesiastical, and for which it is not intrin- sically qualified. 74. Again, it may be said, that if the government be more competent to choose than the individual, and lie consequently both entitled and bound to offer to the in- dividual the result of that choice, the same argument CHAP. II.] WITH THE CHURCH. 75 must go to the extent of proving that the government is also bound to force its religion upon the subject, as carrying with it a greater likelihood of truth, and thus a probable advantage to the recipient. The answer is, that it requires much more than such a probability to warrant any human agency in breaking doAvn the na- tural freedom which God has given to man. To solicit and persuade one another are privileges which belong to us all ; and the Aviser and better man is bound to advise the less Avise and good : but he is not only not bound, he is not alloAved, speaking generally, to coerce him. It is untrue, then, that the same considerations which bind a government to submit a religion to the free choice of the people would therefore justify their enforcing its adoption. 75. There is an analogy apparently favouring the ob- jection we are now combating, in the fact, that public laws, for the most part, are not of an optional nature, and that, instead of appealing to the reason of an indi- vidual, they enforce his compliance. Now this is the case with some classes of laws which are coercive ; but others are purely permissive. Laws and institutions, having it for their object to bring before the people some mental or moral benefit, establishing, for exam- ])le, institutes, in order to the promotion of literature, art, or science, rarely attempt to force upon the subject the advantages they are designed to convey, partly be- cause it may be supposed there will be found no want of readiness to accept and use the benefits tiuis offered ; but also in part because there is an obvious incongruity 76 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. II. felt between the notion of force on the one hand, and of advantage to the higher faculties on the other. 76. And here, in truth, we come to one of the strongest reasons against religious compulsion. In proportion as we ascend from the lower to the more elevated desires and capacities of man, we leave the region of coercion, and enter that of freedom and choice. Our animal life deals with us as with slaves. Our intellectual wants are chiefly felt when a higher stage of refinement has been reached ; and yet they are discern- ilde in an atmosphere where the subtle forms of spiritual beings, which are the objects of our spiritual faculties, Avould be wholly lost. These are not forced upon our attention : witness the thousands who care not for them. And indeed there is a radical incompatibility in the nature of things, -which ought to exempt the domain of religion from the intrusion of force. The service which God requiresjs the service of the will. The conversion of the will to God is the fundamental change which Christianity aims at producing. The will, by its very essence, by its very definition, cannot be coerced, for if rendered subject to the action of force, the human being no longer has a will. 77. In one })oint of view, however, this argument may not be sufficient to preclude religious persecution. For it may still be held, and not wholly without truth, that although coercion cannot produce conviction by its owi immediate agency, it may set men about searching into the truth, and so bring them towards conviction, and put them in the way to arrive at it. Here, indeed, CHAP. II. J WITH THE CHURCH. 77 the question would incidentally arise, wliethei* in ge- neral, and, particularly, whether in the temper of the present day, any such degree and kind of coercion could be used, as should not be more than counterbalanced by the reaction it would excite ? But this does not touch the merits : and it is more fairly pleaded that coercion may be available in repressing error, than that it can actively assist the reception of the truth. It may, un- doubtedly, one would on general grounds apprehend, check the dispersion of error, and thereby prevent minds from being tainted, which might, if it moved freely, come under its influence. The conclusive reason tlierefore against persecution is this : it is not prescribed to man as an instrument for his use, and it is one which, not being so prescribed, it would be sinful to employ ; as it would, for example, be sinful to take away animal life had we not the Divine ])ermission to that effect. For mere error men are not allowed to punish ; and no theory of a church establishment leads by any fair con- sequence to an opposite conclusion. 78. It has now, perhaps, been sufficiently argued that both as a combination of moral individujil persons, and as the active organ of the national personality ; both as liaving a conscience, and for the sake of national bene- fits ; both for })Ositive reasons to procure advantage, and for negative reasons, to avoid detriment, the governing body or state, in order fully to discharge its duties, must seek, must profess, nmst support, must propagate a re- ligion ; must profess it personally and collectively ; must propagate it freely and persuasively, indirectly and by the 78 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. II. use of instruments ; of the instruments made ready to its liand by that divine ordinance, which has separated for ever a chiss of men to minister in tlie Christian sanctuary. 79. Now these views require to be strictly sifted. They cannot rest in mere speculation, but if affirmed as true, will be fofund full of points of contact with daily life, so far at least as regards that large and increasing portion of the community, who are called under the British con- stitution to exercise some degree of direct influence upon public affairs. Therefore, before finally resting in the principle, let us ask ourselves whether we have counted the cost ? It is very clear that these later times have been parents to an opinion, that government ought to exercise no choice in matters of faith, but leave every man without advice, or aid, or influence, from that source, to choose for himself. And many hold this opinion under an idea that the overthrow of national establishments, as such, will be beneficial to pure and \indefiled religion. They hold and contend thus, quite undisturbed in their convictions by the ominous and yet undeniable fact, that they share them with all the ene- mies of law both human and divine. They know not the acuteness of Satanic instinct. May they become alive to it while there is yet time ! But we have to calculate upon encountering not merely the political difficulties which these strangely mingling classes of men will create, but likewise the more bitter and more painful reproach that we are injuring the cause of Him, whom, in maintaining the union between church and state, we profess to serve. CHAP, II.] WITH THE CHURCH. 79 80. Nor need our opponents go far for a case in ex- emplification of their propositions. Upon us of this day has fallen (and we shrink not from it, but Avelcome it as a high and glorious though an arduous duty) the de- fence of the Reformed Catholic Church in Ireland, as the religious establishment of the country. The Protestant legislature of the empire maintain in the possession of the church property of Ireland the ministers of a creed professed by one-ninth of its population, regarded with partial favour by scarcely another ninth, and disowned by the remaining seven. And not only does this ano- maly meet us full in view, l>ut we have also to consider and digest the fact, that the maintenance of this church for near three centuries in Ireland has been contempo- raneous with a system of partial and abusive govern- ment, varying in degree of culpability, but rarely until of later years, when we have been forced to look at the subject and to feel it, to be exempted, in common fair- ness, from the reproach of gross inattention (to say the least) to the interests of a noble but neglected people. 81 . But however formidable, at first sight, these admis- sions, which I have no desire to narrow or qualify, may appear, they in no way shake the foregoing arguments. They do not change the nature of truth, and her capa- bility and destiny to benefit mankind. They do not re- lieve government of its responsibility, if they show that that responsibility was once unfelt and unsatisfied. They place the legislature of this country in the condi- tion, as it were, of one called to do penance for past offences ; but duty remains unaltered and imperative, 80 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. II. and abates nothing of her demands on our services. It is undoubtedly competent, in a constitutional view, to the government of this country to continue the present disposition of church-property in Ireland. It appears not too much to assume that our imperial legislature has been qualified to take, and has taken in point of fact, a sounder view of religious truth than tlie ma- jority of the people of Ireland, in their destitute and uninstructed state. We believe, accordingly, that that which we place before them is, whether they know it or not, calculated to be beneficial to them ; and that if they know it not now, they will know it Avhen it is presented to them fairly. Shall we, then, purchase their applause at the expense of their substantial, nay, their spiritual interests ? 82. It does indeed so happen, that there are also powerful motives on the other side concurring with that which has been here represented as paramount. In the first instance, we are not called upon to establish a creed, but only to maintain an existing legal settlement, where our constitutional right is undoubted. In the second, political considerations tend strongly to recommend that maintenance. A common form of faith binds the Irish Protestants to ourselves, while they, upon the other hand, are fast linked to Ireland ; and thus they supply the most natural bond of connection between tlie coun- tries. But if England, by overthrowing their church, should weaken their moral position, they ^vould be no longer able, perhaps no longer willing, to counteract the desires of the majority, tending, under the direction of CHAP. II.] WITH THE CHURCH. 81 their leaders (however, by a wise policy, revocable from that fatal course), to what is termed national independ- ence. Pride and fear on the one hand are, therefore, bearing up against more immediate apprehension and difficulty on tlie other. And with some men these may be the fundamental considerations ; but it may be doubted whether such men will not flinch in some stage of the contest, should its aspect at any moment become unfavourable. 83. What if the truth be this ; that among many acts of oppression, many of folly, others again of benevolence and justice, partial or not followed out to their conse- quences, we have done one, especially among these last, which was in itself thoroughly wise and good, had it been viewed as introductory, and not as final ? Who can doubt, that in the position occupied by Elizabeth and her government, it was right on their part to carry into Ireland the restoration of the Christian faith (just as they had carried it through England) with the addi- tional advantage of the almost unanimous acquiescence or concurrence of the bishops, and for this purpose to employ the appointed means of religious ministration to the people ? But Avhen the initiatory means had been thus adopted, the whole residue of the labour was relinquished. Those wise and salutary measures which brought the people of England from rebelling in favour of the Roman Catholic church and her superstitions, to their present mood of ste.ady attachment to a purified belief, Avere not extended to Ireland. The names of Bedell and of Boulter are bright upon the desolat*? 82 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. II. retrospect ; but the attempt has not been made until Avithin a period comparatively recent, (tiiank God it has commenced,) to ascertain what results will follow from the general proclamation of scriptural religion throughout Ireland. 84. Upon us, therefore, has devolved the duty of sup- plying, under more critical circumstances, the want of all those measures which might have been taken at an earlier period, and we have still the power of truth to befriend us, greater than any that can oppose. Is this faith of our national church deeply rooted alike in our convictions and in our affections ? If so, is it one merely separated by some slight shade from the Roman church, not simply such as she is in theory, but such as she is in the aggravations of her practice, and of her practice, above all, in Ireland ? If the diflference be broad and clear, if it be represented everywhere in character and conduct among that people, do we shrink from asserting on their behalf the truth which they have a right to know, n.'iy a desire to know, but which, by the inter- position of an unnatural and an illegitimate authoritj^ they are prevented from knowing? 85. Public men feel the duty of securing to the subject the advantages of intellectual cultivation. It has been proposed in this country to render such education com- pulsory, as is actually done in some others. The ex- pediency of such a measure has been doubted, but those who claim to represent the spirit of the age have hardly fjuestioned the right. Is then the benefit of spiritual truth more ambiguous or less extensive than that of in- CHAP. II.] WITH THE CHURCH. 83 tellectual culture, and can those who are hokl enough to propose enforcing the reception of the one, be timid enough to slirink from avowing and approving the offer of the other ? We have not yet arrived at the general assertion of such monstrous propositions. And it is a question of spiritual trutli in Ireland, arrayed against a church which has hidden the light that is in her amidst the darkness of her fixlse traditions, and \vliich adds to the evils of false doctrine those of schism. Yet we speak of a general principle, not merely of the striking and obvious case which has been cited for the sake of illustration. 86. Because, therefore, the government stands with us in a paternal relation to the people, and is bound in all things to consider not merely their existing tastes, but the capabilities and ways of their improvement ; because it has both an intrinsic competency and external means to amend and assist their choice ; because to be in ac- cordance ^^'ith God's word and will it must have a reli- gion, and because in accordance with its conscience that religion must be the truth as held by it under the most solemn and accumulated responsibilities ; because this is the only sanctifying and preserving principle of society, as well as to the individual that particular benefit, without which all others are worse than valueless ; we must disregard the din of political contention, and the pressure of worldly and momentary motives, and in behalf of our regard to man, as well as of our allegiance to God, maintain among ourselves, where happily it still exists, the union between the church and the state. 84 TEIE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. III. CHAFfER III. THE INFLUENCE OF THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE CHURCH AND THE STATE UPON THE TONE OF PERSONAL RELIGION IN THE CHURCH. 1, Objection, that personal religion is deteriorated by the connection. 2 — 4. Favoured by present circumstances. 5 — 10. It would imply an actual incompatibility of two duties. 11 — 14. Argument upon the alle- gation of superior activity in Dissenting bodies. 15 — 21. Argument upon selection, the method of dissent ; and upon universal solicitation, the method of establishments. 22 — 29. Argument upon the partial religion of large numbers in establishments. 30—33. Establishment tends on the whole to enlist secondary motives in favour of religion 34. Does not exclude the voluntary principle. 35. Nor imply exces- sive wealth. 36—41. Certain beneficial effects of nationality on the tone of religion. 42 — 44. And of endowment, which is akin to establishment. 45. Case of Rome. 46 — 48. General argument ap- plied to England. 49. Recapitulation. 1. There is an objection to the principle of the national establishment of religion not dependent upon any pecu- liarity in the terms under which the church and the state may in a given case be united, but which con- fronts the entire argument, and, if founded in fact, un- doubtedly overthrows it. It is this, that union with the state is proved by our own case to be detrimental to the inward life and health of the church, and lowers the tone of religion in her individual members. If this be false, it is not difficult for the church to bear the scoffs cnAr. III.] WITH THE CHURCH. 85 which are aimed at her in respect of her legal establisli- ment, and patiently to work out a destiny akin to that of her Divine Founder and Living Head, glorification through suffering. But if it be true, then however apparently complete be the fortifications of external argument, however reasonable or even resistless tlie antecedent grounds of the connection may appear, the foe is within the Avails, and at the rear of the defenders. Nothing can stand against the proof (if proof could be given) that a diminished amount or deteriorated quality of personal religion is the result of that alliance, which we have affirmed to be not less grounded in the nature and truth of things than affirmed by the general suft'rage of mankind. 2. There arise, however, from the circumstances of the day, some influences which tend to pi-e possess certain classes of minds in a manner favourable to the objection now before us. Every man will admit, that the loss of the temporal endowments of the church, and of the national homage which is still awarded to her, is, at least, within the bounds of obvious possibility. And such a prospect, even if regarded as remote, still has set many affectionate minds at work to store up topics of comfort as preparatives for acquiescing in sucli a dis- pensation should it be God's will to send it. Looking back to history, as well as inward upon the heart and mental constitution of man, they are glad to recognise in the case of churches as well as individuals, the re- corded and experienced benefits of affliction, and to find with what literal and palpable truth it is, that " all 86 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. III. things work together for good, to them that love God." They conceive that the result of the present trials has already been, and that the consequence of protracted and extended trials will be in a still more eminent degree, to produce intelligence, fortitude_, and devoted- ness in the children of the church. As the temporal advantages which have belonged to her are more and more questioned or curtailed, higher motives will in many minds gradually supersede those Avhich are more sordid. Those who have only known her surface and exterior, will take refuge from the altered and incle- ment atmosphere in the inner recesses of her bright and glorious tabernacle. And entering by degrees into the depth, the unity, and the spirituality of her character and scheme, her disciples will be more and more united in heart and soul to their forefathers in the ohurch of God, and will rejoice in the identity of their hope, love, and life, with those which anim.ited and nursed the primitive and apostolical saints. 3. It is, however, a common, though we think an unwarranted corollary from these pious and reasonable anticipations, that the overthrow of the church as an establishment will in natural course advance its inte- rests as a church ; and therefore, that it exists as an establishment for the benefit of the nation, but pur- chases that benefit at the expense of a certain portion, perhaps a large one, of its own purity and strength. 4. There can scarcely be any who, upon reflection at least, will not feel shocked and startled at this sup- position. The well-being of the church is surely an CHAP. III.] WITH THE CHURCH. 87 object too sacred for coiiiproniise or exchange. The value of spiritual truth utterly transcends every other so-called advantage, and none of them are in any way commensurable with it. No political gain can justify our incurring religious detriment. So it seems as if either we must be bound to surrender the national, establishment in virtue and by direct consequence of our love of its inner principles and system, or that a fallacy somewhere lurks in the idea, that the interests of the nation as such have demanded and obtained a sacrifice, however partial, of the interests of the church as such. 5. Of all trials which wound and lacerate the suscep- tible heart, perhaps none is so afflictive as a case which appears to be one of contradictory duties. There is in reality, indeed, no such thing. There is not, there can- not be, reciprocal opposition among the commands of God. All duty has one source in the Eternal IMind, and one di- rection, for tlie purposes ufiuvo, uuiiccivcu m tnu-v One duty is never sacrificed to another : but that which in one combination of circumstances would be duty, in another combination of circumstances is not duty ; the minor obligation is intercepted as it were, in embryo, while yet unformed, and in this sense only is super- seded by the major one. But the law which makes it a duty to obey a parent or ruler in all but sin, and the law which makes it a duty to disobey him in sin, are not conflicting laws, nay, they are not even parallel and concurrent laws, but are identical; and the conduct 88 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. III. adopted under each is ultimately referrible to one and the same ground-work. 6. This is one of the eternal truths Avhich belong to a pure theism, but which readily escape tiie superficial glances of the human mind. It sinks into retirement and desuetude, and when it is, as it were, exhumed, it comes like a stranger among men, and is questioned as a novelty. But in truth, if we had several duties, we should have several gods : for every proper and original law of action would be the index of a several deity, 7. For every such case, then, as that before us, there must be a real solution ; yet the difficulty of finding it may be extreme. But such cases, at all events, will not be held to arise out of the immediate ordinances of God. Social order and government is so evidently and directly by divine appointment on the one hand ; and the good of the Christian church so manifestly the most .„-4,i. „r Ox.nVa diopeijsaiions, ujion the other, that an opposition between these two, each so strongly claiming the highest and most irrefragable authority, upon the bare mention distracts and con- founds the heart. 8. It does indeed often happen that, when an autho- rity given by the Almighty is perverted by its earthly steward, one subjected to it may be much perplexed in the endeavour to fix that point in the progress of abuse, at which the subsidiary right becomes ablohitely annulled, and duty commands him to resort to the ori- CHAP. III.] WITH THE CHUECH. 89 ginal and compreliensive law of God, which cannot be contravened. Thus, supposing a parent enjoins that which is sinful ; since his authority is undoubtedly such as to render obligatory what is in itself indifferent, we may find it a serious matter to determine when that binding power loses its validity from being ])]aced in opposition to the general and less determinate, though more authoritative will of the Creator. 9. But in a case where human agency does not inter- vene at all ; Avhere we have recognised the principle of a church establishment, not indeed as matter of directly and definitely imposed command, but of in- vestigation into fundamental laws, and of conviction therefrom resulting, that its principles were intimately interwoven and its interests uniformly parallel with those of the body politic ; in such a case we may surely hope, that any incompatibility or discrepance which it is attempted to show or to assume, must be a seniblancc only, anU lKct;^^^^. ^^f ivunvi.^t,!^.. ,,ix..i ever, either in theory or in practice. The essential oneness of the divine will; the manifest convergency of the divine dispensations ; the stamp of concord on all practices or institutions whose origin is from hea- ven, impress so strong and deej) a general persuasion, as ought to fortify us beforehand in the particular case, against any supposition that the interests of the church are at variance with those of the establishment. 10. It would not, however, be wise or Avarrantable to rest in such a persuasion alone. For two classes it may indeed suffice : those, namely, who cannot or need 90 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. III. not inquire further, and those who liave inquired tho- roughly, and have summed up their thoughts upon the special instance in a full and deliberate ratification of the general principle. But there is much scepticism which cannot and ought not to be thus laid asleep ; many minds habituated to half perceptions of truth, and to practical error as their ordinary result ; many aroused to honest and unsatisfied inquiry, which may already have glanced at the obvious conclusion, " if the nation should hereafter show a disposition to cast off the church, let it do so at its peril, we will acquiesce, as the church will be the better for it." 11. To supply the verl)al defects, and to unfold the ambiguities of such reasoning as this, is exceedingly im- portant, inasmuch as the defenders of the union between church and state cannot, until it has been refuted, gird up their loins for the conflict with a clear persuasion of the rightfulness of their object, or without a dim ii._4. It ;„ o^l^- „„juot aa regards others, but suicidal as regards thejnselves, their attachments, and desires. 12. The foundation of the sentiment which is wont to embody itself in the foregoing argument has probably been, an impression conmionly entertained among the advocates of principles hostile to a legal recognition of religion or of the church, that a greater degree of reli- gious activity is found to exist within the compass of the unestablished bodies of this country, relatively to their numbers, than partiality itself can allege to per- vade the great masses of the established church. CHAP. III.] WITH THE CHURCH. 91 13., If the allegation liave reference only to an ac- tivity, and that activity one conversant with religion, we cannot doubt that it is true in point of fact, while we totally deprecate, and are prepared to repel, the infe- rences which have been hastily or inimically drawn from such an admission. In the first place, let us observe, that the term activity applies much more to outward than to inward vitality ; and that its applica- tion is more readily allowed to that which produces palpable and sudden change than to causes of simple and regular progression ; while yet the power that feeds a tree is more truly generative, and in -the end fruitful of greater results, than that which tears it down. 14. It may appear invidious, but it is necessary to mark the distinction between the system calculated to produce most activity at a given time, and that which will most eftectually perpetuate its own existence un- impaired in essential points. For there is a common notion or assumption, that these two characteristics are coincident. We need not go far to exemplify the reverse. It may be fairly allowed, that there was, under the later Stuarts, more religious energy in the congregations of the expelled ministers than in the generality of those of the established church of Eng- land, Many of the former we know were endowed by the zeal of their members, as well as adorned by their piety. What is at this moment the comparative state of the two ? The establishment has arisen from her torpor, she is awake and has put on strength ; and 92 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. Ill, in all age already venerable, she manifests the vigour of the earliest youth ; " In eta matura Parimente mature avea il consiglio E vercli ancoi- le forze." * But those seceding bodies have forgotten the faith for which once they were forward to contend, and almost without an exception have lapsed into Socinian- ism. Doubtless Ave have here to consider the catholi- city as well as the legal nationality of the church : but the illustration may properly serve to impress upon us the necessity of distinguishing permanent from transi- tory energies. 1 5. Dissenting bodies naturally act upon the principle of selecting individuals from the mass of the nation, by applying to them the stimulants of religious menaces and inducements, and associating them into congre- gations. The care of the dissenting minister is for a congregation, not a locality ; he deals Avitli persons, each of whom is supposed to have more or less a special reason influencing severally his mind and actions, by which alone, and not in consequence of any appointment independent of himself, lie has become a member of the flock to which he belongs. 16. How Avidely different is the case of an establish- ment. Her ministers are not to act upon this principle of preference, but to offer, and so f;iras they are permitted, to administer the ordinances of religion to every livintr soul. Not that their attentions are to be divided into * Gerusalemme Liberata, vii. 61. CHAP. III.] WITH THE CHURCH. 93 shares of a strict equality, but none are to be excluded : while they cherish the best with peculiar fondness, their regards are ever to be directed towards the reclamation of the absolutely profligate, and the retention of the worldly-minded within some at least of the restraints of religion. It is one of the peculiar offices of the esta- blishment, and often forms, to the minds of superficial observers, the gravamen of the charges against her, that she sustains in an outward, and partial, and accom- modating religion, a large number of persons who are not animated by its living and life-giving principles. Now this is termed lending encouragement to hypocrisy and lulling into delusive slumbers the souls of a perishing people. 17. Bring them to an inward religion if possible by love ; if not thus, then by the hope of happiness ; if not thus, then by the fear of perdition : if again there be no inward attraction of the soul to God, and they have no principles higher than those of nature, keep them even in the human religion rather than none at all : let them attend Christian ordinances from habit, from deference to society or to superiors, from fear of infamy, con- stantly if they will, or if not, yet frequently, or if not, yet sometimes : the smallest degree of religious ob- servance is better than none at all, however inefficacious for practical purposes be the life within it ; because while there is life there is hope. This is the principle and language of a pure establishment, which deems all spiritual life so precious that it would gather and save its very atoms, like the dust of gold, so long as that 94 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. III. little which is done is done by the l ight means and in the right direction. And such should its practice be. 18. But upon comparing the condition of a country blessed with a church establishment, and not solely dependent for religious ordinances upon the results of voluntary exertions, with that of another bearing the Christian name, but without any such institution, we find the difference to be that, while in both cases there are large numbers professing and cherishing individual religion, in the first a larger proportion of the people observe Christian ordinances, and there are infinite shades of character filling up the wide space between the children of God and of Satan, without any broad line of discernible demarcation : in the second, to a given amount of religious profession there is a greater amount of religious activity, and there is a more fearful mass of persons wholly cut off from the public profession of the Gospel and the appointed way of immortality. 19. Now when we change the subjects of our com- parison, and take the case of our own country alone, we find, I apprehend, that a similar relation obtains between the establishment and the sectarian bodies. The former does not cast off the dross of the comnmnity, or rather that which appears dross but contains much pure ore. She attempts and professes to secure a feeble, partial, and an outwai-d observance of religion, in default of, and she hopes in preparation for, that which is vigorous, complete, and operative with a transforming power upon the inward nature of man. She is content to be encumbered in her course with the inert and lifeless CHAP. III.] WITH THE CHURCH. 95 weight of large numbers of ])ersons who are strangers to conscientious and individual religion, and although she is ever busied in searching among the mass for the capable recipients of a vital principle, and dealing to each man according to his strength, and seeking to extract from each man whatever of religious love and service he is qualified to render, yet such a heavy and unprofitable residue she must always bear upon her, inasmuch as while the good are draughted off one by one into the enjoyment of her loftier discipline, new crowds of the indolent and the worldly-minded are continually entering within her pale, there, she trusts, lo be educated into Christian maturity. 20. She must be contented, however irksome the oflice, to provide for those whom the dissenting minister can- not attract to his congregation because they do not care enough for religion to contribute to its expenses, as well as those who are precluded by the real pressure of poverty, or by the rarity of population in a particular district, from joining any such voluntary assemblage, and again, for another large and important class who resort to rehgious observances primarily on the score of deference to public practice and opinion, which practice and opinion is generated and maintained chiefly by the in- fluences of an establishment. 21. But granting, as a consequence, that the average religious principle of the members of our venerated establishment is lower than that of dissenting bodies : it remains obvious in the first place, by general admis- sion, that this circumstance belongs essentially to its 96 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [ciIAP. III. comlition and oflice as an establishment : in the second, as we think, and shall strive to show, it does not imply any compromise between spiritual and political inter- ests, a thing if taken strictly we believe in its own nature impossible, and whose existence, at least in this particular instance, we shall now attempt to disprove. 22. What, then, can be meant by those interests of a church, which it is said, or felt, or feared, we compound for the sake of state expediency? The interests of a church are not the mere attachments of its members to its peculiarities, so far as they are inessential to its ex- istence as a church : if they were, we might yield our point, and admit that the effect of an establishment such as our own, is to induce a Catholic spirit and a liberal discrimination between matters necessary and matters indifferent. Discouraging in all things the capricious exercise of individual will, and setting little value upon the authority of mere opinion, its practices have been severely proved, and have acquired their claim to observ- ance in the lapse of generations, so that the full force of our individual self-will and ])ride is much less brought to bear in exciting our attachment to an established church, than where innovation is easy and perpetual, and each man stands to defend what has been, in a greater degree, produced or subjected to modification by his own personal agency and judgment. 23. The true interests of a church are best to be ascer- tained by considering its nature. It is an organised body, governed by the laws and ministers of Christ, having the charge of the Word, and the exclusive admi- CHAP. III.] WITH THE CHURCH. 97 nistration of the Sacraments, and dispensing both for the promotion of a spiritual life. Her end then is " the greatest holiness of the greatest number." Her inani- mate machinery has no capabilitj' of pleasure and pain ; has no interests in any intelligible sense. Her living members have all one and the same interest : the aggre- gate of that interest constitutes the interest of the church, and it is the production, not of the greatest pos- sible excitement connected with religion, nor of the greatest possible enjoyment connected with religion, nor of the greatest possible appearance of religion ; nay, not even the greatest possible (j^uantity of actual religion at any time or place ; but the greatest possible permanent and substantial amount of religion within that sphere over which its means of operation extend. By religion, wc would be understood to mean, conformity to the will of God. 24. Now we, who hold the principle of national esta- blishment, believe, that although a higher average of active rehgious motive may be found in limited and sectarian bodies, yet this is simply because the establish- ment is set and appointed to embrace, along with her more spirited and intelligent children in Christ, those who are too timid to make a religious profession ; those who hesitate between this world and the next ; those who give a limited and insufficient scope to the action of Christian principle ; those who attend Christian ordi- nances only in compliance with human opinion, or those who see nothing in Christianity but a system of outward forms, in an establishment nothing but a me- H 98 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. Ill thod of preserving social order, and of repressing reli- gious extravagance. 25. And it may doubtless be said, that the very con- stitution of an establishment, as thus represented, in- dicates an unsound state of things ; that the observance of Christain ordinances ought not to be exacted by the force of human opinion, but rendered by the spontaneous and joyful action of the heart ; that these false and im- perfect services of so many differing classes cannot be satisfactory to God. And unsound, indeed, is the con- dition of human society ; but the question is, Would it not be more unsound were the restraining influences of an estaldishment withdrawn? 26. Certainly her faithful members must be content to stand side by side with many who care little for reli- gion ; but tlie promises of Christ may secure them from the danger of contagion ; and they may also acquire from their position a livelier remembrance of that lesson, that we may not say one to another, Stand by, for I am holier than thou. I say, the promises of Christ : for the establishment does but fulfil His prophetic declarations, in not attempting any universal separation of the tares from the wheat ; of the good fish from the bad : con- tent with the laws of her mixed condition upon earth, emulous of the example of her Lord, who ate with pub- licans and sinners, and generous as her heavenly Father, who sends rain and light upon the just and the unjust, rendering benefit, but not therefore receiving pollution. 27. It is undoubtedly well for the state, that the hopes and fears of a future life should be used in aid of those Chap, hi.] WITH THE CHURCH. 99 which have reference to teinjioral prosperity and punish- ments ; that religion should check the ignorant and the irreligious; that men should worship they know not what, rather than not worship at all : but is it ill for the church ? Her principle is, to gather up the very crumbs of devotional offerings ; to feed the babes with milk ; not to break the bruised reed, nor to quench the smoking flax, until the Redeemer shall come in his glory, to send forth judgment unto victory. A small o])edience is bet- tei' than none. To think of God seldom, is better than not to think of Him at all. To love Him faintly is better than to be in utter and unvarying indifference or aversion towards the Giver of all good. Better — not as though our acts were strictly and truly good ; but be- cause these states of life and feeling indicate a mental condition less hopelessly inaccessi])le to the influences of the Spirit of grace, than those of total alienation from the means of grace. Better for the pupil, if the face be set invariably forwards ; for the instructress, if she be always leading and beckoning him in the same direction. Tiie church lives in the use of means ; and trusts in God for the production of results. 28. Did we, indeed, believe, with the foes of the esta- blishment of the church, that the natural effect of this operation was to keej) these dark worshippers in their darkness, we must join their ranks, and emulate tlieir zeal for the work of demolition. But while we see that the established church brings crowds of persons to the outer courts and the loAver steps of the temple, we believe further, that she is well calculated to use every H 2 100 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CIIAP. III. effort for their advancement to those which are inner and higher; and that but for her beneficent agency, they would remain utterly remote from the sights and sounds of worship, from the impressions and associations to which now, by the laws of bare humanity, they are sub- ject, and wliich, though not universal, not infallible, nor intrinsically efficacious, may yet be blessed, and often are blessed, and are the natural means and channels of blessing. 29. Is the Church, then, wounded or injured by this charitable operation of the EstahViahment? We do believe that her members may l)e less doatingly enamoured of her distinctive marks, as distinctive marks, than would be the case were she severed from the state ; and we admit that their liberality may receive a tinge so far latitudinarian, that they may confound her essential with her unessential peculiarities ; or again, they may regard her human trappings more than the unearthly linea- ments which these are intended to adorn. But Ave do not believe that, except it be from adventitious causes, in no way inseparable from the connexion, she has a smaller number of members under the influence of active religion, than, on the other supposition, she would possess. We do not believe that tlieir Christianity is of an inferior quality because they belong to an esta- blishment ; but, on the contrary, that it is, on the whole, more calm, more catholic, less alloyed by the contagion of spiritual pride and selfishness ; more comprehensive in its views of the manifold functions and capacities of human nature. We do not believe that they suffer de- CHAP. III.] WITH THE CHURCH. 101 triment from juxtaposition with the less heavenly-minded members of the establishment; because, though it is written of gratuitous and unordained communion with the kingdom of Satan, that a man cannot touch pitch without being defiled, yet recognising the manifest pro- hibition of our Lord to aim at an entire local separa- tion (as it were) of the hypocrites fi-om the saints in this life, we do not anticipate for the former any evil from that contact which may occur in the discharge of duty ; and there is in view the animating prospect of thus arousing many a dormant spirit unto holiness, and rescuing many a tender lamb of the Redeemer from the fangs of the roaring lion. 30, It is true that there may be a certain class of per- sons, Avho are alienated from' religion simply because it is established ; and who, startled at the apparent paradox of an authority jointly divine and pohtical, may be repelled from the very examination of the Gospel by that prima facie incongruity. And though it be true that that paradox is capable of easy explanation, that the divine and the national characters of the church eslablishment are capable of real, and generally of easy discrimination, yet this risk, so far as it extends, must be admitted to be in the nature of a sound and fair objection. 31. But the question before us is one of spiritual ex- pediency ; and we must inquire, whether there be not more who will be attracted towards religion by the instrumentality of an establishment as such, than those Avho Avill be driven from it. Look to the thousands 102 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. III. with whom Avorship is matter of sheer usage^ and unconnected with any active exercise of the mind upon Divine truth. Thus the beneficial action is upon masses. But those whom the paraphernalia of a national church, or the bugbear of a law church, frighten from the sanctuary, are units here and there, thinly interspersed through the community. A peculiar tone of character, a singular mixture of intellect and caprice, of philosophical rashness and timidity, can alone account for the rejection of a religion by no means necessarily associated with the state, because it happens in a particular case to be so allied ; and, as this temperament is rare and idiosyncratic in the ex- treme, so it is entitled to proportionably less weight in our calculations. Not, therefore, to no weight at all ; but this remote danger is not to preclude a course attended with such large and immediate benefit to the spiritual interests of masses of mankind. 32. In the long run, and upon a large scale, as I have already had occasion to argue more at length, the preju- dice of mankind is in favour of establishments^ political as well as religious. The destructive spirit has charac- teristic particular and critical periods ; but, upon a comprehensive average, a tendency to acquiescence in existing institutions is the rule, and a tendency to disturb them the exception. 33. We are prepared, then, to assert it generally of a national church, that it brings human and secondary motives to bear upon mankind in favour of religion, with a power greater than that Avhich would belong to CHAP. III.] WITH THE CHURCH. 103 it, cceteris paribus, when unestablished, because ordi- narily it would not occupy the same station in public estimation. The fashion which might, in a wealthy and luxurious country, choose to reject attendance at clmrch, is enlisted in its favour. A narrow and feeble provision, no doubt ; but we must not despise the day of small things. 34. Tliere is no intelligible argument fur the position, that the number of actively pious persons would be increased were the national church destroyed. The question at issue is not fairly represented, where it is said that it is between the voluntary principle and that of an establishment. In truth, it is between the volun- tary principle alone, on the one hand, and that princi- ple in association with the co-ordinate principle of an establishment, on the other. There is ample scope for the voluntary principle when the state has done as much as it is ever likely to do. There is as yet a great void, filled neither by the state, nor by the voluntary principle. But the state, as a directing and superior power, has means of eliciting, and of systematising, exertion, which no individual or association can command. 35. Since, however, we live in an age of religious par- simony, Avhen the voluntary principle affords to ministers of religion little more than a bare maintenance, men forming their judgment from the time may allege, that the wealth of establishments chokes them with worldly ministers. The answer to this is, that such wealth does not accrue to them as establishments. Let us take, for 104 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. III. example, the history of our own island. If we admit that the tithe was given hy legislative enactment, still the tithe did not constitute the bulk of the wealth of the church. Its enormous aggrandisement was by gifts of lands, which were notoriously and indisputably voluntary. It is, perhaps, not too much to inquire, if any case can be pointed out of a very wealthy church Avhich has derived its opulence from the gift of the state ? Upon the other hand, that disposition of the national endowments of religion in Scotland, Avhich is so commonly quoted as a model of economy, and which certainly is entitled to the praise of working great results from small means, is not owing to private economy, but to a law of king Charles the P'irst. 36. And if we are warranted in assuming that the na- tionality of a church does not diminish the number of its actively devoted members, or its quantity of vhal re- tigion ; so neither has it been often alleged that its endency is to deteriorate what we may term the quality of that piety. As its besetting sin is torpor, so its most natural virtues are calmness and stability ; and that fixedness of institutions, which the addition of nation- ality tends to give to any religious system, is certainly calculated to impart both a finer and a firmer tone to spiritual character. The abhorrence of mere individual will, as such, which properly belongs to the catholic church, and which renders her odious or unattractive to turbulent spirits^ has a l)eautiful effect upon the chastened mind, and presents man before God in the attitude which befits him, not as a creator, or an in- CHAP. III.] WITH THE CHURCH. 105 ventor, or even a reproducer, of a system, upon ^vllicll he shall read Self everywhere or anywhere inscribed, but as a recipient of pure bounty and compassion. The idea of inheritance, with all its at once ennobling and subduing effects, is perfectly realised in that body alone, where we are the heirs, not merely of antiquity, but of inspiration, and the long line of Christian gene- rations brightens, instead of fading, as it recedes. 37. Now it is necessary to be very cautious in com- paring any results of a political institution with those which flow immediately out of God's appointment. The mere adoption and establishment of a religious body by the state does not supply the Avant of any conditions which are required to constitute the church. Establish- ment and dissent present to us one contrast ; catholicity and sectarianism another. But still, so far as there can be an adumbration of what is palpably divine in systems of church polity constructed, in some at least of their parts, according to human conjecture, we do find that religion, not authenticated by apostolical descent, does certainly appear under less disadvantage when honestly united with the state, than when presented in the form of mere private association. 38. The Scottish establishment has deprived herself of the episcopal succession, and therein, Ave cannot but believe, of her strongest argument as an establishment against the competing claims of any other religious body ; but, if Ave compare her in respect of evangelical doctrine, or of the general spirit of her members, or of the capacity she has CA'inced of transmitting definite religious cha- 106 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. III. racter from generatiou to generation, with other Pro- testant bodies not having the succession, whether in Ger- many, or Switzerland, or America, or France (the cases of Denmark and Holland would be less in point), she appears, by the side of each and all, in a liglit highly favourable. And what better reason can be assigned for this remarkable fact, than that, in her case, the idea of a national clerisy, or estate of religion, has certainly been wrought out, upon the whole, with, greater fidelity than in any of the others which have been named, and the instruction, both of old and young, has been systematic- ally provided for, and solemnly committed to her charge ? 39. Habituated to the false or secondary conceptions Avhich arise out of our inveterate political sectarianism, Ave are very apt to look upon the state in an irreverent or careless temper, and to forget that next to the church it exhibits the grandest of all combinations of human beings. It is a venerable idea, in which the supremacy of laAV as opposed to mere will is asserted, . by Ai hich the sociality and interdependence of our nature are pro- claimed, and the best acts and thoughts are arrested and perpetuated in institutions, and a collective wisdom is made available for individuals, and the individual is humbled and disciplined by being kept in qualified subordination to the mass. The adoption of a moral principle, or scheme, or institution, by the state, is among the most solemn and the most pregnant of human acts : and although it cannot place what it adopts upon a ground higher than its own, any more than Avater can rise above its level, yet that ground is one of CHAP, in.] WITH THE CHURCH. 107 an order having more of natural justice, more of expe- rimentally demonstrated permanence, more of divine authentication, than any other, except the church, which it feebly though perceptibly imitates ; and certainly much more than that private will, which, sooner or later, learns to wanton in the whole spirit and practice of dissent, reversing every fundamental law of the mii- verse, and asserting the isolation, and deifying the arbi- trary caprice of man. 40. The individual adopted into such a national estate of religion is then in a situation of advantage with regard to his inward discipline, as compared with that which he Avould occupy in a system theologically similar but unestablished. Law is the highest of human autho- rities : thus he is taught to obey and to revere, the essential and first conditions of our well-being. The proportion of the single person to the mass is smaller as the aggregation is more extensive : therefore, and in the same ratio, the spirit of self is more repressed in the nation than it Avould be in some voluntary association carved out from the larger body. 41. Again: not only is the numerical importance (so to speak) of the individual less in proportion as the society is large, but his temptations to self-sutliciency and pride are likewise liable to be curtailed in proportion as the society is permanent. The more permanent the society, the greater becomes the authority attached to it; the minds of men are predisposed to submission, and the no- tions of domineering will are in a conmiensurate degree repressed. Now the state as such is less permanent in 108 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. III. its nature than the church, but more so than any sclieme of individual device: and thus again nationality, perpe- tuating as well as conspicuously exhibiting the body of a public religion, gives the aid of all the venerable associa- tions which it commands, and affords another emphatic contradiction to the exorbitant pretensions of self-\vill. 42. While, then, the noblest form of religion, and the authenticated form of Christianity, is presented in the catholic church, whether it does or does not occupy the vantage-ground of legal establishment, it j'et appears that the instrument next in point of efficacy for the pro- pagation and perpetuation of religion, is that nationality which, among the uncertain conditions of our human state, embodies what has least of uncertainty. But there is another very specific cause which remains to be noticed as tending to preserve the purity of established religion. Establishment and endowment are distinct ; but what is generally and extensively endowed will, for the most part, come sooner or later to be established ; and Avhat is established is by the ^•ery force of the term likewise endowed. And, further, endowment does but ill harmonise with the very nature of dissent, because it introduces something of independence into the religious institution itself, and liberates it at least in part from the dominion of those successive wills which are too apt to revel in its absolute control. 43. Now endowment, which is thus in its own nature aldn to establishment, and alien to dissent, having a tendency to give to the minister of religion some degree of exemption from the arbitrary influence of his congre- CHAP. III.] WITH THE CHUnCH. 109 gation, has also a commensurate tendency to preserve the purity of doctrine. Plato deemed it scandalous and at variance with the laws of virtue, to teach for a fee. Saint Paul claimed that those who ministered in the Gospel should live by their ministry:* but the vital powers given to the Church enable her to admit many popular influences, which, if she dealt with mere ab- stractions of philosophy, and not with a living covenant of gi'ace, she would be obliged jealously to exclude. And yet who does not see that the Apostle himself, in writing to his converts, that he had laboured for his own support, because he would not be chargeable unto any of them,t affords an express recognition of that truth for which we here contend, namely, that when the Christian flock are placed habitually in the position of paymasters, notions of pride and self-sufficiency will infallibly associate themselves with that function, and men will claim the right to determine upon the doctrine, for whose inculcation they are continually reminded that they supply the pecuniary means ? 44. It seems hardly too much to assume, that, upon the whole, religious truth, of whatever amount, is safer in the hands of teachers than in those of the taught ; in those of men who devote their minds specifically to the sul)ject, and accept it in lieu of any worldly profession, than in those of the crowd, who have other objects upon which to bestow their chief energies, and who, for the most part, bestow upon this such a residue only of their * 1 Cor. is. 1-1. t 1 Thcss. ii. 9; 2 Tlicss. iii. 8. 110 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. III. attention, as fails to be absorbed by the material wants and interests of life. Not that in the hands of either it is absolutely secure ; nor that it can anywhere be pure, except under the safeguards which God has appointed. But such elements or fractional parts of truth as are em- bodied in any system of religion, will, upon the whole, be better preserved by those most devoted to that system, than by the mass of its nominal adherents. Doubtless the watchmen require to be watched, and a compound action, of the teachers and the people recipro- cally, affords a better guarantee than that of each taken singly would supply : still it remains true, that the voluntary method tends to give a preponderating influ- ence, in determining the doctrine which shall be taught, to the less qualified class ; and the method of endow- ment, and therefore of establishment, which is so much akin to it, verges in the opposite direction. 45. The whole Roman history may be appealed to in proof of the augmented influence which nationality gives to the forms of religion, considered independently of their substantive truth or falsehood. The doctrine of unity of establishment will not apply, in a case where there was no exterior body constructed 1)y Divine com- mand for the conservation and exhibition of truth. But in the midst of the strangest anomalies, we find from indisputable and indeed universal testimony, these facts : firstly, that in Rome, more than in any other ancient polity, the will and the energies of the individual were subordinated throughout all ranks to the state. The oligarchical privileges held by the patricians sufliciently CHAP. III.] WITH THE CHURCH. Ill account for their patriotism ; but the conduct of the Roman people, their moderation, disinterestedness, and self-devotion, cannot be similarly explained. Never, probably, was human nature, on a large scale, without the aid of revelation, carried so much out of itself, as by that prevading principle of patriotic honour, which filled the ranks of the Roman armies for centuries to- gether with men who had little of their own to defend, and little to sacrifice but life, which to them was mucli, and which they spent freely in the field of battle. Now combine with this the second equally unquestionable fact that in Rome, as we learn from the unsuspected autho- rity of Polybius,* the stamp of public religion was im- pressed not only upon all the institutions of the state, but upon all the actions of life ; and as we find the in- fluence of things unseen (in however corrupted forms), simultaneously at a maximum in the individual and in tlie state, Ave cannot but infer a natural Iwmony, and a reciprocal causation, between these two parallel mani- festations, and by how much the more it may be shown that the religion was impure, and that the influence ex- ercised was not that of truth, by so much the argument for nationality is corroborated, because the results pro- duced must in the same proportion be set down to its credit. 46. Thus much upon the broad and general question. When we regard more specifically the case of England, where the church claims catholicity, and realises ac- cordingly the hereditary principle even more perfectly * VI. 54. 112 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. III. than the state, it may seem incongruous to ascribe to her legal incorporation those beautiful characteristics in her offices of religion which belong more properly to her divinely-written charter. And the more so, because the particular conditions of our nationality have never yet been carefully and permanently adjusted. We speak not of the difficult questions which arise in mixed matter between the church and the state, but there can surely be no doubt in the mind of any man who has reflected with care and candour on the question, that the powers most naturally and absolutely inherent in the ecclesiastical body are heavily and unduly fettered by acts or through omissions of the state. The discipline of this church appears to require more than executive diligence and wisdom can supply : an efficient reorganisation, and a development of principles which in the long continuance of lax and vicious practice have almost escaped from our view. Legal recognition, however, neither, according to its idea, ought to be, nor in practice always has been, adverse to efficiency and vigour in the internal government of the church : who, then, will deny, that these great objects are yet attain- able, and that we may live to see great accessions of strength derived from actual experience to the argu- ment of these pages, that the nationality of religion is favourable alike to its quality and its general extension ? 47. Those who dwell most fondly upon the spiritual ])rerogatives of the church considered, as she is, catholic, A\'ill, nevertheless, do well to remember, that the pro- mise of perpetuation, which is absolute to the body at CHAP, nr.] WITH THE CHURCH. 113 large, is, to the members in particular, conditional and contingent. It is, therefore, not too much to say, that the nationality may materially contribute to the per- manency, and thus to tbe authority of this branch of the church. Supposing her unjustly robbed of her secular patrimony, it might be that danger would accrue to her from pecuniary dependence ; the necessity of eleemosynary support might preclude her from occupy- ing a position of sufficient dignity and authority towards her own members. Except possibly in such a case as that of Romanism, which too often proves itself to be founded on the dogma of sheer spiritual slavery, we scarcely believe that it would, at least in these times, be possible to exclude undue influence sustained by the power of the purse ; the church might then, whether by a slower or more rapid, a direct or indirect process, be starved into heterodoxy. 48. It has thus been attempted to take a view of the question of connection between church and state, which, though very incomplete, inasmuch as it looks to con- sequences alone, and further, only to a part of the consequences belonging to that union, is nevertheless full of interest, because it touches vital considerations, which are decisive, if determined against us, of the whole matter at issue. For if religion be injured by the national establishment of the church, it must forth- with and at whatever hazard be disestablished. But if not, Ave need be little moved by the taunts of those who reproach us with a " law church." It is a law church : we rejoice in the fact : but how ? Just as by the sove- 114 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. III. reign's proclamation against vice, the morals of the nation are crown morals. The law in one case, the crown in the other, adopts and attests the truths of God, and does them homage. 49. For we have found the supposition, that religion is secularised hy contact with the state, to l)e fallacious. We have found, that the most devoted piety enjoys in the church a climate not less genial than elsewhere ; we might, perhaps say, more so : that in respect of liberal views of smaller peculiarities, and of discouragement to individual egotism, a national church has, as such, especial advantages for elevating and purifying personal religion: that she as a great and appropriate work, particularly in exercising a partial dominion over the indifferent and even the ungodly, bringing to bear upon them, in favour of the gospel, and their own happiness, a great force of human and secondary motives ; and that, from the com- parative independence of her jjosition, she is also pecu- liarly adapted for the permanent conservation of divine truth. If these things be so, we must get rid of that superficial impression, unfavourable to the nationality of the church, which arises upon the first view of the veiy mixed character of her component parts, and must re- member that, in containing together the good and the bad, she is fulfilling, for the time of her dispensation, the clear intentions of that Lord whose coming she awaits with joy. CHAP. IV.] WITH THE CHURCH, 115 CHAPTER IV. SKETCH OF THE ECCLESIASTICAL SUPREMACY OF THE SOVEREIGN IN ENGLAND. 1,2. Objection, that the church is enslaved by the supremacy; and . notions respecting it. 3, 4. Necessary law of adjustment for the powers of distinct bodies having connection together. 5 — 9. The authority in its general character negative, and docs not destroy the independence of the church. 10 — 12. The power, the right, the law. 13. Appointment of bishops. 14. Attempt to classify. 15. Want of precision in our theories. 16. Case of the Scottish establishment. 1 . Although it would be deviating widely from the pur- pose of these pages to discuss systematically, or in detail, the terms of compact between the church and the state, it may be allowable to say a few words, by way of meet- ing another objection sometimes taken in limine, that the regal headship in the Anglican church is essentially such as to render her the slave of the state, and to de- prive her of all pretensions to a distinct character as a spiritual institution ; and this is the more necessary, be- cause Bishop Warl)urton * speaks, in large terms, of the church as surrendering its supremacy, and becoming dependent on the civil power, as a natural consequence of the alliance. A question might be raised upon the very term of headship, but this we set aside; nor need we dwell on the facts, that the title of head was given * Alliance, book ii. chap. 3. I 2 116 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. IV. before the foreign or papal jurisdiction was renounced, and that a different appellation was adopted under queen Elizabeth ; or inquire whether the powers of the sove- reign in this country have been essentially altered by the Reformation ; or whether they are greater than those now exercised by many princes in communion with the Roman church.* It is only attempted here to show, that the general idea of the ecclesiastical supremacy of the sovereign does not involve what is unlawful or unreasonable. 2. Some, it may be feared, conceive of this supremacy as absolute, and deem the head of the state to be the fountain of all authority to bear office in the church, as he is in the state ; not distinguishing those powers and .attributes which appertain to the bishops and clergy in their distinct capacities as church ministers and state officers respectively. Others again, like Mr. Leslie, in his able argument on " the regale and the pontificate," conceive that the supremacy of the monarch is purely civil, and such as he might hold with the same pro- priety not being a Christian ; a theory nearer, perhaps, than the preceding one to the truth, which, nevertheless, appears to occupy an intermediate position between the two. 3. When two independent bodies enter into reciprocal relations, which are neither such as to fuse into one their * See for example the curious workof Count dal Pozzo on the Austrian EcclesiasticalLavv, i)p.2'2, -23,55, 81, 101. (Murray, 1827.) And I must direct the particular attention of the reader, upon this important point, to Mr. Palmer's work on the Church, Part I., Ch. X., Objection Xlll. CHAP. IV.] WITH THE CHURCH. 117 distinct personalities, nor are, on the other hand, capable of being determined prospectively by written stipulations, with no other additional provision or reservation than the alternative of a total rupture, it Ijeconies a matter of equal delicacy and importance to constitute a power, which may be found generally competent to regulate their joint action according to circumstances as they shall arise, Avithout either being absolutely tied to the limited sphere which a written contract could define ; or, on the other hand, hazarding a resort to the extreme measure of dissolving the alliance. That power must be one, and must be paramount. But although paramount, and although mainly deriving its character from one of the two bodies, it does not destroy the independence of the other, because there always remains the remedy of put- ting an end to the connexion, and the usefulness of the power is founded on the assumption that they will be generally in such a degree of harmony, that though there must be one fountain of authority for administrative ])urposes arising out of the connection, yet it will pretty much express and represent the tendencies of both. 4. Now those powers which belong to the church as a religious society may, of course, be competently admi- nistered by her spiritual governors, and the analogous proposition holds good with regard to the state ; but when the alliance has been formed, the church has become an estate of the realm; having certain relations with the other estates, closely united and interwoven with them, and entailing a necessity, for the well-being of the whole, of some uniformity of operation between them. Noav it is for the government of these relations from time to time 118 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. IV, that an authority is required neither purely ecclesiastical nor purely civil, inasmuch as the relations themselves are of a compound character. To take an example: if a bishop reject a candidate for a living upon ecclesiastical grounds, he cannot lawfully be corrected by the state ; but if he do it upon arbitrary grounds, or grounds not eccle- siastical, he may ; because the accession to the living is not to a spiritual function alone, but to certain civil emoluments along Avith it. Since then civil and eccle- siastical consequences are thus mixed up, and both flow from acts properly ecclesiastical, there arises a necessity for this mixed authority, which, having as much sym- pathy as possible with both bodies, and representing both, shall be more akin to this kind of jurisdiction than either of them, taken singly, would afford ; accordingly the head of the state, under the condition that he shall be also a member of the church, is invested Avith it. He exercises an appellate jurisdiction ; he judges not the cause, but the judgment ; assuming the grounds which are supplied by ecclesiastical law^, and inquiring Avhether its principles have been fairly applied to the particular subject matter. 5. But the authority of the sovereign in regard to church laws is chiefly negative. Tlie general principle should be, that neither body may do what substantially affects its relations Avith the other except by consent of that other. It is indeed true that such a principle is not at this moment in free operation among ourselves. We have not, hoAvever, here to shoAV Avhat is the agency of the church, nor Avhat is the agency of the state in re- spect to her, but Avhat is the legitimate recognised CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 119 function of the sovereign as lier head, and that it does not impair the essential conditions of her constitution. 6. Now this function in respect to church hiws is ne- gative. The sovereign claims under our constitution a veto on church canons, and his permission is required for the meeting of convocation, but he does not claim the right of making by his sole authority the laws of the church. Indeed a question may, w e believe, be raised whether it is or is not competent to the church of England to meet in synod even without the royal authority, especially when we consider that this right undoubtedly exists in Ireland. The whole of this sub- ject is most important, and requires to be fully consi- dered. It is enough here to observe that if anything has been done of late years in the way either of anomaly or of usurpation, it has been done by the collective legislature in its capacity of political omnipotence, making use of the occasion while the church organs are in abeyance, but it does not bind or commit the church, which is not a consenting party, and which is only bound to show that in the regal headship, as acknow- ledged by her, which claims a negative upon all church acts and upon all sentences in mixed matter, there is nothing unscriptural or unecclesiastical. 7. For, in point of fact, it is the indispensable condi- tion of any such alliance, that the church should consent to enter into joint action with the state. To this action there is required the concurrence of two wills ; and the concurrence of the Avill of the state was thought to be most naturally expressed through the sovereign's eccle- siastical supremacy. But the church is still independ- 120 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. IV. ent, because it retains its right to separate ; it is inde- pendent without exercising the right of separate action ; independent as two watches are independent, while indicating the same hour, and going at the same rate ; or as two men are independent, who become compa- nions on a journey, reserving their right lo pai*t when the roads which they have to follow shall diverge. 8. It is impossible, in point of fact, that any other basis could be adopted than one which gives the state nveto on changes in the church. The cliurch allies herself with the state in consideration of advantages accorded to her> which are accorded in respect of her peculiar constitu- tion as a church, and which would cease to be due if she violated that constitution ; therefore the state must have the means of observing all her movements, judging what change is violation, and interposing the veto, which means simply, " If you do so, you must no longer enjoy civil advantages." But the converse argument does not hold as arising from the alliance, that the church should have a veto on projected alterations in the state, because that which she renders to the state, the teaching of obedience, and the promotion of piety and virtue, she owes to it simply as the appointed government of the country, Avliatever changes its constitution may undergo. 9. The alliance, then, is one durante bene placito of both the contracting parties. And if the conscience of the church of England should, by its constituted rulers, require any law, or any meeting to make laws, as essential to its well-being, and such law, or the license of such meeting, should be permanently refused, it would then be her duty to resign her civil privileges CHAP. IV.] WITH THE CHURCH. 121 and act in her free spiritual capacity ; a contingency as improbable, Ave trust, as it AA Ould be deplorable, but one which, opening this extreme remedy, testifies to the real, though dormant and reserved, independence of the church. It must be added, that, although an extreme, it is not a visionary or an impracticable resort, Avhich is here supposed, l)ut one which has been actually re- alised in our history. Twice partially, (in citing the fact it is quite unnecessary to determine the merits,) in the cases, namely, of Mary, (when, according to Bishoi> Burnet, three thousand clergy Avere ex])elled,) and of the nonjuring bishops : once generally, Avhen eight thousand Avere ejected under the Long Parliament and CroniAvell. 10. It is very necessary, however, to the clear under- standing of this subject, that we should continually bear in mind a distinction of the power, the right, and the law, as severally affecting it. As respects the jmioer, the civil legislature is, by the first condition of all natu- rally constituted polities, taken to be omnipotent ; but as, if it enacted that individuals should sacrifice to idols, they Avould probal)ly disobey, so the church Avould be able to refuse compliance if an infraction of her divinely established constitution should be attempted. 11. As respects the rigid, Ave may or may not think that the church is hardly used, and requires a more free and effective organisation ; but before determining that by not insisting specifically on its being conceded to her, she has forfeited her spiritual character, Ave should in- quire, first, Avhether anything essential to her constitu- tion has lieen or is to be violated ; and, secondly, Avhether 122 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. IV. she has surrendered the right to pass into her state of separate freedom. For example, it is a part of our ecclesiastical law, that if any archhishop or bishop shall refuse, after due notice given, to confirm and consecrate a bishop elect, within a limited time, they and their abettors shall incur a preemunire.* But the proctor of the dean and chapter must certify tlie election, in order to the confirmation, and in this point among others, " that the person elected is sufficiently qualified by age, know- ledge, learning, orders, sobriety, condition, fidelity to the king, and piety."t Of course the governors of the church would be bound to incur the civil penalty, rather than confirm or consecrate, should a person ecclesiasti- cally incompetent be presented to them. And the ques- tions which alone we are here required to consider are, not whether the law be consistent in theory with eccle- siastical freedom, but whether in practice that freedom has been essentially invaded; and if not, then also Avhether, in the event of its being so invaded, there be not a remedy provided for a contingency so deplorable. 12. As respects the actual law of the case regarding the royal headship, we may gather its general principle sufficiently from the doctrine of Blackstone,|. who sums up tlie duties of the monarch to his people thus : " To govern according to la\v ; to execute judgment in mercy; and to maintain the established religion." And from the coronation oath; in which the j)romise is, "to maintain the laws of God, the true profession of the gospel, and tlie Protestant reformed religion established by the law :" and to ''preserve unto the bishops and * Burn, I, 210. t Bum, I, 20G. % Book I. cliap. 6. CHAP IV.] WITH THE CHURCH. 123 clergy of this realm, and to the churches committed to their charge, all such rights and privileges as by law do or shall appertain unto them, or any of them :" terms which imply a power somewhere to change the eccle- siastical laws, but which describe the royal duty as generally a duty to maintain, to preserve, not to modify or innovate. 13. As respects the appointment of bishops, it is unne- cessary to enter into any detailed consideration of this prerogative. It is analogous to ordinary lay patronage in the lower order of the priesthood. It was long and indisputably in the hands of sovereigns, at a period many centuries before the reformation. But the crown does not make a bishop ; it can merely propose him to be made ; and the amount of concession made by the church is, consent to a law that no bishop shall be made during the alliance, except such as shall have been de- signated for that function by the sovereign. Even where the canonical election of the bishop is not interposed, still it is the consecration, not the appointment, from which, and which alone, he derives his episcopal character. 14. The duty, then, of the sovereign towards the church, in virtue of the ecclesiastical supremacy, seems to con- sist mainly of the executive duty of defending it under the existing laws ; the judicial duty of determining all questions which arise, in mixed subject matter, out of the relations between the church and state; and the negative duty of permitting the church to enter, from time to time, upon the consideration of matters of her own internal government, to be subsequently proposed to the great council of the nation, that its members may 124 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. IV. have the opportunity of judging how they affect the com- pact, and that the church may know, by their assent, that it continues unimpaired : and if, in reference to the anomalies of modern legislation, this shall appear to be theory, let a fair consideration of our whole history declare whether it does not express the ancient practice and the general spirit of the constitution better than pre- cedents drawn from periods of indifference or oppression, or both.* 15. At the same time we would observe, that the go- vernment of England has ever been distinguished in civil nuitters less by accuracy of adhesion to any dogmatic and determinate theory, than by the skilful use of na- tural influences, and a general healthiness of tone and harmony of operation, resulting from a bappy and pro- vidential fusion of elements, rather than from delibe- rately entertained intention. If this has been the case in civil matters ; if our constitution, as viewed by the crude speculatist, consist of a mass of anomalies, threat- ening perpetual contradiction and collision ; if it has Avrought rather by provision for the avoidance of such issues, than for their subsequent remedy; so also it has been with the church, whose relations with the state had for very many years proceeded rather upon a mutu- ally friendly understanding, than upon precise defini- tions of rights ; and therefore we cannot expect to exhibit a theory which will bear throughout a critical analysis in this more than in any other department of our national government. * Mr. Palmer (on tlic Church, Part V. ch. G) gives an enumeration of the powers betunging to the ecclesiastical .supri.'niacy. CHAP. IV.] WITH THE CHURCH. 125 16. The Scottish establishment, we may remark by the way, claiming that divine authority which we deduce through the apostolical commission, has l)een extremely jealous of admitting the term or the idea of regal head- shij>. In the " Second Book of Discipline " it is stated that " it is a title falsely usurped by antichrist, to call himself the head of the church." Of the three divisions of duty belonging to the ecclesiastical supremacy, which we have above described, the first, that of maintaining the church, is allowed, though not perhaps with con- sistency. The second is likely to be speedily brought to issue, under peculiar and interesting circumstances, in the probable sequel of what is termed the Auchterarder case ; but the General Assembly of the Kirk, in its vote of the 23rd May, 1838, recognised " the exclusive juris- diction of the civil courts, in regard to the civil rights and emoluments secured by la^v to the church." The third is placed in a peculiar position. Both the state and the church claim in Scotland the right to summon the General Assembly, and to authorise its proceeding to business. The king's commissioner declares, before the dissolution of any General Assembly, when and where the next shall be holden. The Moderator re- peats it, but as of the Assembly's authority. The law of 1567, however, authorises the Assembly to appoint, in case neither the king nor his conunissioner be pre- sent. 128 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V- CHAPTER V. THE REFORMATION, AS CONNECTED WITH THE USE AND ABUSE OF PRIVATE JUDGMENT. Sequere viam Catholicso disciplinae, qnse ab ipso Christo per Apostolos ad nos usque manavit, et abhinc ad posteios manatura est. S. Aug. de Utililate Credendi, c. viii. 1. Sketch of the subjects of V. and VI. 2. We must go far back. 3. The use and abuse of private judgment stated. 4 — 24. How treated before the reformation. 25 — 31. Views of Luther, to be distinguished from the consequences of the events connected with the foreign reformation. 32—37. Prevailing abuse. 38—40. Case of the EngUsh reformation. 41 — 57. Anglican doctrine of private judgment stated and defended. 58—60. The free diffusion of the Scriptures does not contradict it. 61 — 67. The foregoing view historically illusti-ated. 1. The influences which at the present time are either actually operating or, so far as appears, about to operate, in an unfavourable manner, upon the principle of union between the constituted religious and political societies of this country, are connected with the doctrine of private judgment, as the doctrine of private judg- ment, again, is connected with the events of the re- formation. In order, therefore, to the elucidation of our subject, we must state how privatejudgment, which is an ecclesiastical pnnciple, stands related to the re- CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH, 127 formation generally, as a reaction from previous abuse of an opposite kind ; and to the English church in par- ticular ; respecting which we are desirous to show, that it was not chargeable, as has sometimes been urged against us, with any inconsistency, in reforming itself against the judgment of the existing Roman communion, and yet claiming to maintain an authority quite distinct from private opinion, and an union with the state. And besides this retrospective relation of private judgment to the reformation, we must examine* its bearings pro- spectively on the other hand, npon the coiinection of church and state: first, under the form of the political doctrine of toleration: secondly, as independent of that doctrine and beyond it. 2. To comprehend fully the strength of the doctrine of private judgment, we must measure the whole space which lies between its state before the reformation, when its infant struggles here and there were hardly percepti- ble upon the face of human society, and its position at this moment, when it threatens to disorganise kingdoms, to throw back the church into its condition before the time of Constantine, and to desecrate and degrade the whole function of political government. At first resisted and overborne by a gigantic power unscrupulously and tyrannously used, it gathered strength and elasticity in silence, and waited the season, not of release alone, but of revenge. In the time of Luther it threw oif the yoke by a mighty effort. It spoke for a while in gentle phrase, and did not at once claim to be emancipated from truth as well as error, from God as well as man : * Vide Chap. VI. 128 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V. but it has now fearfully developed its individualising tendencies, and they operate with an intensity and con- tinuity which we must explain by reference to the Jength of that course of centuries through which it was lield in sullen thraldom. 3. But the so-called "right of private judgment" has two very opposite senses, in one of which it is a right, in the other a monstrous abuse. It is a right, on the part, whether of nations or of individuals, as against human coercion, and it is also, of course, a duty, of learning and apprehending the truth. It is a monstrous abuse, when it is understood to imply that the conscience of the individual is acquitted, so soon as he has assented to some doctrinal system chosen at his pleasure, as coming from Scripture and constituting religion : when it is supposed to absolve him from the duty of being of one body and one spirit with the catholic church of Christ. In the first sense we believe it will appear that reli- gious liberty was the legitimate principle of the English reformation as regarded the nation, and its result as regarded individuals. In the second and abusive sense, that it sprang from the abusive proceedings in some other countries, less of the reformers than their succes- sors, and less of their successors than their opponents, which broke the chain of the ministry in the church, and thus destroyed the doctrine of its visibility and con- tinuity, and its consequent competency to bear a Avitness for the sense of the sacred word, superior in moral cre- dibility to the unsupported deductions of individuals. 4. In the centuries preceding the reformation, it may be almost said, there was no formal theory on the subject CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 129 of private judgment, nor for some time after it; yet there lias always been a certain relation between the individualitij of man and his position and functions as a member of the church, in which rehition the subject of private judgment is essentially involved. To this then let us apply our attention. 5. If we contemplate the operation of the Roman Catholic system upon its members, whether in the pre- sent or in an earlier day, but, as might be expected, more especially in those times when her su'ay was almost un- bounded and her fears not yet awakened, we shall perhaps find that the aim of her distinctive doctrines and practices cannot in few Avords be described with more fairness, than if we say that it was to limit the free agency of the mass of her individual members, and almost to l)ar all active exercise of their mental faculties upon religion. These terms, indeed, at least the idea of absorption, as aj)plied to the liberty of the human mind in a large mass of men, must be understood in a qualified sense : because it is scarcely possible that such a process should take strict and full effect except under peculiar circum- stances of rare occurrence, from its utter contrariety to the first laws of our being. But, so far as human nature would admit, in a matter involving not only the highest interests, but of right also the most powerful and durable emotions that belong to it, the tendency and the aim of Romish institutions was to nullify the principle of free agency in man as respected his direct relations towards God. 6. If we regard separately each of her peculiar insti- ll 130 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V. tutions we shall find not one which is not capable of reference to this general and pervading idea. Let us then (for the sake of convenient division) endeavour to ascertain by what means and with what effect she strove to supersede individual action in the several depart- ments of the rule of faith, the regulation of discipline, and the private practice of life. Now the rule of faith, however its subject-matter might, according to Roman doctrine, be variously developed, was avowedly and in- variably immutable ; matter of discipline, on the con- trary, was, by common confession, subject to change ; matter of practice, must often fall under the cognisance of the individual alone, and yet in all alike, though under conditions so different, the Romish religion came nearer than might antecedently have been supposed possible, to the accomplishment of the wonderful purpose of imposing entire silence and inaction upon the facul- ties^^of the private person, otherwise than as simple recipients of the dicta of the church. 7. In one sense, indeed, there is a power of judgment left to every living creature by the first necessities of its constitution. The animal employed in draught must interpret the voice of its driver, and must to this extent enjoy an actual though not a licensed freedom ; that is, there is a penalty accruing upon misapprehension, but there is no power brought to bear upon the faculties which will certainly enable them to avoid it. Under all circumstances, therefore, it was for the individual Romanist to supi)ly the last link in the chain which attached his practical conscience to the sovereign autho- CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 131 rity of tlie church. It was not in the nature of will to be forced, or of moral conviction to be stamped upon the mind by a power purely extrinsic, and without con- sent from within, as on inert matter. But thus much the chm'ch did ; she enabled, she encouraged, nay she commanded, and doubtless had it been other than an impossibility, she would have compelled each person to set aside his own free agency, except as regarded that last and formal transmission of her injunctions in which the mental faculties were no more than passive ; and where the command was not obeyed, a tem])oral inflic- tion followed, 8. First as to the rule of faith. Not only Avas she in- fallible, for this singly Avould not have been enough. It is evidently possible that there might be on earth a man or an incorporation possessed of certain truth, and yet not having the means of irresistibly communicating it ; that is, of conveying it home with demonstrative evi- dence of its infallibility accompanying it. And thus we, who believe in the perpetuity of a church holding vitally to its head, may also believe that this institution, preserved by a Divine power in its spiritual life, has not necessarily a reflected consciousness co-extensive Avith that life, and has not therefore the means of defining exactly and infallil)ly the amount of fundamental and certain truth, quoad which we believe her to be free from error. But it was not thus with the theory of Romanism. Not only was the church infallible, but she possessed, commensurate with the infallibility itself, a power of declaring it to her members with conclusive k2 132 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. V. evidence. She was unerring, not only in vital matter of doctrine, hut in all matter of doctrine — perceptibly and legibly infallible ; so that the private man, born or brought within her communion, had no work of inquiry reserved for his own mind ; he Avas not to try or prove any particular allegation : in short, there was no mental act upon matters of faith, but simply a reception ; unless, indeed, that definite and palpable one of general submission to whatever the church sliould enjoin. 9. Thus the agency of the man as regarded the inves- tigation and reception of his faith, the range for an operation of his will, the possibility of exercising a choice, were reduced avowedly to a single opportunity ; and, while upon that issue of obedience to the church he might undoul>tedly in theory be said to discharge the function of assent as a free agent, we must not omit to observe the particular manner in which the alterna- tives were nuide to present themselves to him. Upon the one hand he was promised absolute assurance from the mouth of the church, against Avhich he would have nothing to set, upon looking to the resources of his own mind, except the abstract love of truth, or self-will (as the case might be) veiling itself under that sacred form, and these damped and cowed by the want of all facilities for inquiry as well as by the sense of mental deficiency. Upon the other alternative, that of dissent, was sus- pended not merely the loss of the j)romised security, but a more affirmatively deterring spectacle in the shape of the severest penal inflictions, '^^^len the hopes and fears of these rewards and punishments respectively XIHAP. v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 133 co-operated with natural indolence and the reluctance of tlie carnal heart to entertain the conscientious and laborious consideration of spiritual things, can we AA-onder tiiat the ordinary result was a voluntary and tacit surrender of free mental action in matters of re- ligion : of that free mental action which is indeed our highest privilege, but which also entails our heaviest responsibility ? There was in the common opinion of those times a culpable deadness to the privilege, with a sei-ious and a pious sense of tlie responsibility, as there is with us on the other hand a conceit in the privilege which absorbs all sense of the burden. 10. A question might be raised how far the idle acqui- escence, with which most men would, under such cir- cumstances, be content, was entitled to be called belief. We perceive, among ourselves, how little of private judgment is really brought into practical exercise ; at least, how little of the mental investigation upon Avhich alone any result worthy of being termed a judgment can be founded. The labour of performance is declined, while the right to undergo that labour is jealously and extravagantly asserted — asserted, under the notion of its being a valualde possession tending to self-respect, and in utter forgetfulness of the accompanying toil. But when that toil was actually, and on principle, dis- couraged, when the command of the apostle to Chris- tians in general, " prove all things," was reversed, would not religious truth be, as it were, swallowed, without being tasted, received in sound, without refer- ence to the sense ; in quantity, without reference to 134 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. V. quality ? For there was no recognition of any intrin- sic difference in sense or in quality ; and, therefore, to the mass of men, who always seek the shortest way of bringing their religious concerns to what seems in their eyes a settlement, the operation would become purely mechanical ; and a service sadly degraded indeed, when considered as the offering of a spiritual creature, redeemed l)y Christ, to his Father in heaven. Not, indeed, that doubts and misgivings, or even ques- tionings in any form, are the essential antecedents of a sound and worthy faith ; not that intellectual investigation is the only way to that great acquisition : but that, as the religion of the Redeemer is destined to occupy the whole man, so it ought to be actively grasped by the imderstanding, as well as implicitly received into the affections and the will. 11. To those minds which felt a vital interest in the matter, which fixedly contemplated what they received as being truth, for the truth's sake, there might indeed, providentially be a spiritual benefit arising out of the very act of their submission contrary to their individual bias. The sacrifice of their prepossessions, or of their impressions, even of their reasonable impressions, hos- tile to the fictions of the church of Rome, might, in God's appointment, be made a fruitful part of their earthly discipline ; but this is good wrought by Divine Wisdom out of evil, tending in no way to the justifica- tion of that evil ; and it is, besides, obviously applicable only to a small class of persons, forming, as compared with mankind in general, the exception, and not the CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 135 rule. With the mass, as has l)een said before, when the exercise of the mental powers in the " proof" of the doctrines of religion was not only not inculcated as a duty, but denounced or treated as an offence, that which was termed belief could be little more than a mechanical reception. 12. Next as regarded matter of discipline. In this department, as immutability was not professed, it might be hastily conjectured that more scope was given to the free judgment of individuals ; but it was not so. It did not follow, because the church might change in matter of discipline, that she could err in it. The very perfection of her agency, the very proof of her infal- libility, might lie in the successive adaptation of her discipline to the changing circumstances of successive periods. But in truth, as discipline is for the most part secondary in its nature, yet necessary wherever men are combined for collective purposes, since there must be unity of rule in order to render co-operation possible and effective, and as in general neither the negative nor the affirmative upon a matter of discipline involve (an- tecedently to the sentence of competent authority) reli- gious principle or duty, we may be of opinion that private judgment has naturally little place in this de- partment, and that there is little to surrender, because thei'e is little to exact. Yet here the church of Rome advanced the most extravagant pretensions, and enforced the most exorbitant demands. It was a law of disci- pline that took the cup from the laity ; an act of rob- bery, iu which we see the wantonness of spiritual des- 136 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. V. potism in its extreniest stage, exercising oppressive poAver, as it would appear, simply for its own sake, 13. But how were the particular doctrines of the Romish church calculated to influence private tempers and conduct in a manner relevant to our present inquiry? For at first sight it would seem that, granting the duty of absolute acquiescence in discipline for the uniformity and harmony of the body of the church ; granting the propriety of mere recipiency in doctrine, in deference to her high spiritual privilege of dispensing from God His truth in certainty and perfection : yet still, in that largest portion of the religious life of the individual which is naturally and necessarily private, and in the general ap- plication of the system of rules delivered into his hands to his daily practice, there must be left abundant room for the exercise of faith, diligence, discrimination, and all the active qualities of the mind ; and, therefore, an ample field provided for the free development of charac- ter. For here, a glance inwards will surely remind us, that a great portion of moral facts, and those the most material, because they are the class connected with the formation and elucidation of motives, are known in the first instance to the individual alone. Perhaps we may go further and say, there is much in the varied workings of the mind of each, which must be known to him of all men exclusively. Many of its tints and colours, many of its initial and intercepted movements, many of its combinations of feeling and motive defying verbal exposition, yet not altogether inaccessible to reflective analysis : much, in short, of what most essentially con- CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 137 stitutes our life in tlie sight of God, c;in never be otherwise than very iinperfeetly explained through the medium of outward signs, and must therefore remain for the most part betAveen Him and ourselves. 14. Yet it is liere that the peculiar genius of Roman- ism is most wonderful and conspicuous. Everyu'here it seems to interpose itself between the man and his God, a dimly transparent medium, allowing only a measured and limited quantity of His light to pierce through the curtain which it spreads. And now let us review in series those distinctive tenets Avhich it professed, and see whether they do not tend towards this object as their common point of union ; namely, the draAving out from the mind of the individual those processes which concern his salvation, and making him extrinsically dependent on something above himself, yet below God, by removing the control of them from his own command. We Avould, however, state, once for all, we must be content to look at Romanism in the form which it naturally takes among masses of men, and not merely in the logical definitions of its theology. 15. First, then: to this would tend the crowd of mediators, wrongfully interposed between man and the one IMediator. The view of Christ as a mediator does not tend to suppj-ess the activity of inward religion, be- cause our final salvation depends upon union with Him, union with Him upon assimilation to Him, assimilation to Him upon the reality and effect of our daily discipline on earth. But mediators who are men or angels only, and with whom we have no special relations, do but come in as substitutes, falsely proclaimed to do for us 138 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP, V. what we are bound to do for ourselves, when their in- tercession comes to be contemplated, which practically it too often does, as our proper channel of access to our Lord. This is widely different from contemplating them as examples, which does really and legitimately tend to quicken our spiritual discipline. And the mediation of which we speak means much more than intercession such as man may practise : only partially avowed, perhaps, in the theory of the Romish church, but even now too generally legible in her practice. 16. Towards the same end would operate the doctrine of purgatory : adjourning till after death that work of purification through suffering, which, along with the work of probation through love, enjoyment, hope, fear, and other affections and emotions, God has appointed to be done before death. " QusD quis apud superos, furto lajtatus inani, Distulit in seram commissa piacula mortem." * A reflective man may indeed feel so deeply his own actual sinfulness, that he may long for a more ex- tended period than earth affords, as seeming abso- lutely necessary for its eradication. But such is not the connnon view ; and the idea of purgatory in fact removes from practical contemplation much of the real purpose of our earthly being, and leads in the same proportion to carelessness about the inward discipline of religion, so large a portion of whose office it has transplanted into a distant region. 17. In the doctrine of relics, again, we trace a similar * Virgil, iEn. vi. 568. CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 139 tendency. In them the Romish church lodges a vu-tue, the practical effect of which is, we do not say to ex- tinguish, hut to limit, free mental action in religion, because it substitutes that which is external for that which is inward ; — not in theory — for, doubtless, faith ought to be exercised upon the relic ; but in practice, because it is too manifest, that the multiplication of these instrumental media in religion gives a facility to the corrupt inclination of man, enabling him to ima- gine that a mere outward act on his part, joined to the intrinsic virtue on theirs, is sufficient. Doubtless, there are Christian ordinances of intrinsic virtue, and most necessary are they to repress the opposite danger from an unbalanced and unawed mental action on the part of man ; but the commanded acts of pure worship supply a constant exhortation to men to pray with all their hearts, and all the strength of their best faculties, and these exercises, it is the effect of Romanism, as it operates on the mass, to impair by the crowd of fictitious helps which it professes systematically to afford, 18. Now let us look to pilgrimages : to the preference of a saint or image at one place over the same saint under his or her image at another ; to the public advei-tise- ment of accounts of purgatorial remission for specified external acts ; to the very prayers Avhich we find in their churches, headed with the promise that such and such religious advantages shall be given to all who devoutly recite them ; to the (I think) ten spiritual, with some other number of temporal, benefits which may be found posted in some churches at Rome, as '140 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. V. resulting from the use of holy water. Do not one and all of these suggest these observations : that they tend to the substitution of outAvard and formal, for inward and spiritual, acts ; and that this so immediate juxta- position of acts and their rewards is going out of the line and the analogy of God's dispensations, and is ren- dering our discipline less moral and more mechanical, shortening the arm and the reach of faith, and substi- tuting for it those immediate expectations Avliich belong to sense, and in which even the inferior animals largely participate ? 19. But the grand exemplification of the influence of Romanism upon individual agency in religion is to be perceived in a condjined view of the doctrines of super- erogatory Avorks — indulgences — auricular confession — penance — and absolution. The In-anches are to bear fruit unto the vine : but the first of these doctrines sup- plies us with an excuse for fruitlessness, if the love of other men to Christ has already so far exceeded mea- sure, that it is ready to supply our short-comings — what a temptation to creatures, whose besetting danger is not excess of zeal ! Then of indulgences : they are, it is said, remissions of temporal penalties due to sin. Now, we know of no temporal penalty which is not also cor- rective, and emjdoyed for discipline : indulgences are, then, a remission or abrogation of our discipline, of the lessons by which we are to be educated for heaven ; and thus they are just taking so much from the range of our spiritual life on earth. 20. And how do the remaining doctrines, as they are blended in thp church of Rome, bear upon that pri- CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 141 niary and most essential exercise of all, tliat continual pardon which the soul requires, in order to render any- acceptable service ? , The tide of sin flows back upon us the moment it has been repelled : and to be deli- vered from its flood — to be washed from day to day — to have our justification renewed and restored in the perpetual cleansing of the blood of our Lord — this is the very pre-condition of all acceptable and Christian service. Here the Roman arts have infused a poison. St. Augustine calls the Lord's prayer quotidiuna pur- gatio nostra, showing how he regarded this striving and supplication for pardon as a work incessantly re- quired, and depending on the exercise of the soul in confession and prayer before God. But what routine are men permitted, in the Roman discipline, to substi- tute ? I do not say that she teaches so, but that so the mass of human nature will be found to use it. They will make confession at distant intervals to a priest, dis- cliarge the acts of penance which he enjoins, and receive his absolution ; and a sacramental character has been given to these acts ; acts, none of theni blameworlhy, but the reverse : acts, however, taken out of their place by the Roman doctrine. They are taken to be sacra- mental : but our daily prayers are not sacramental, nor taken to be so. Does it not follow, that our attention and desire will be concentrated on the former ? that the . mass of men, ever anxious to discharge religious duties at a mininunn of trouble, will be detached in no small degree from the unseen and wholly inward and continual: acts of prayer, not always bringing any palpable reward, I and will substitute for them the confession, \\'liicli recurs; 142 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. V. Lilt at rare intervals, and the penance and absolution, which deepen spiritual torpor, by an assurance of pardon from without ? 21. It is to be feared that the profoundest and most solemn exercises of the soul thus became matter of arithmetical calculation ; were merely weighed against the external penance which would commute them, and ceased to be regarded in the awful character of sin : that the spiritual relations of men towards God were viewed as a debtor and creditor account, on which men might run up a score, in the intention of paying it off by penance. Not that this was the deliberate view of the Roman church ; but we cannot look even to her formal doctrines on the subject, without seeing that she grievously tampered with singleness and sincerity of motive, and left room for reservations where they ought, of all things, to be avoided. It is of the effect of such doctrines on the mass of men that we speak ; and we cannot but see in it the substitution of sensual, formal, mechanical relations between God and man, for those inward works of confession and prayer, self-inspection and self-government, which are appointed to be our habitual exercise, and the means of ensuring an earnest- ness and activity of the faculties of the mind in the matter of religion, and to which external confession appears in the main to be properly subsidiary. 22. It has not here been attempted to enumerate the whole of the Romish peculiarities, but such only as have a specific bearing on the subject of these pages. For example, nothing has been said of the distinction of mortal and venial sin, as taught by Romanists ; nor of CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 143 the doctrines of probability and reservation, which have however a real connection with the foregoing argument ; nox*, for a different reason, of the sale of indulgences, which would add inunensely to its force. This last was the extravagance, ahnost the caricature of iniquity. It did not limit, but destroyed, where it jirevailed, the spi- rituality, that is, the whole subjective reality, of religion. But we believe the general argument is sufficiently made out, without resort to this abuse, from the acknoAvledged system of Romanism itself, as tending to deaden that inward action which is the life and soul of religion. 23. There were two classes who cannot be included in the scope of these observations. One, that of the intellec- tual men, who found a sharpening discipline for all their mental powers, in liarmonising the intricacies and the subtleties of the highly-artificial dogmatism, which pre- vailed so extensively in the Roman church. The other, that of the holy men, to whom confession would, in- deed, be the most intense and solemn exercise ; whose tender consciences would not be satisfied until they had exhausted every effort to rid themselves of the burden of their most secret sins. The holy men of Romanism have been great lights of Christianity. Penance with them would be a kind of thank-offering ; a beseeching God, as it were, to accept their humble and feel)le efforts at self-discipline ; absolution, a comfort which they would receive trembling; and pain and sliame would co-operate witli love to keep them stedfast in their allegiance. 24. But it is for the very reason that confession is a work so arduous and severe, nay, so impossible to be fully 144 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. V. discharged through words — for there must always re- main the prayer to God to look at tlie whole heart with an eye far more searching than our own, and to detect and cure all its iniquity — it is for this very reason that it is also a work which ought not to be made to depend upon a mere verbal exposition l^efore one w'lio cannot see the heart, and which, when it is made so dependent, will degenerate with the mass into a cold, formal, per- functory act, endured as it was before the Refoirmation, but now, we believe, to a great extent, discontinued in Eoman Catholic countries by the upper classes and the male sex in general. When exhibited as the imperative and almost the exclusive means of access to pardon, it obviously harmonised with a system in wdiich the most solemn concerns of the soul w'ere taken away from itself, and placed in the hands of the priest, and the scope of individual agency in religion was proportionably reduced. 25. Such was the state of the Avorld, in reference to liberty and activity of individual judgment, at the period when Luther and Zwinglius blew the first blasts of the trumpet. ^Ve come now to consider the views of the Reformers regard to this subject ; and together with their intentions, the natural, yet very different and unforeseen results of the transactions in which they bore a part, considered in the aggregate. But it will be ne- cessary to examine the case, as it respects our own coun- try, more in detail ; and to trace there both the intent of the Reformation, in the actual subsisting doctrine of the Anglican church upon the subject, and the spirit and ten- dency of the acts by which that reformation was achieved. 26. At tlje period of the Relbrmation, the object con- CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 145 teiTiplated by its authors was not, primarily, the esta- blishment of any abstract principle, but the removal of positive and palpable abuse. The practice of private judgment preceded its theory ; and it is difficult indeed to say when, in its specific sense, it commenced ; when the general protest of the Reformation began to differ in principle from the demands of Saint Bernard, and others, for tiie removal of abuses in the church. It was as the work advanced, and the number of detected cor- ruptions was increased, and the efforts for their main- tenance came into collision with those for their removal, that the men directly engaged, and their successors in the contest, found themselves compelled to fall back upon a general principle applicable to all the changes they proposed, and coextensive with the objections they had to meet on the part of the papists ; who, instead of being satisfied to join issue Avith them upon their argu- ments, rather denied their right to argue, and drove them first to the practical exercise of that right, then to a scrutiny into its nature, and, last of all, to its avowed maintenance as a principle *. 27. Thus Ave find, first, on the part of Luther, a free appeal to the pope from his ministers ; the act of an unsuspicious mind, following the truth according to its light, confiding in its power, and in the disposition of others to acknowledge that power, and ratify it in the • The high authority of Mr. Hallam appears to corroborate this view. "Literature of Europe," ch. iv., GO, 61. For a detail of facts evincing the intentions of the continental reformers, see " Palmer on the Church," part I., ch. xii. L 146 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V. face of men by their assent. Next comes an appeal from the pope to a general council, a proceeding not heretical nor contumacious, but conformable with the views authoritatively declared at the council of Con- stance. We perceive here a reference to what was held to be the fair exponent of the general mind of the church ; and we are still within limits compatible Avith devoted Romanism. Perhaps Luther did not doubt the infallibility of a general council at the time, in which case he went the whole length of the Cisalpine school. At least he recognised the propriety of suljniitting to it his own individual judgment; and this is quite enough to shoAV how far he was removed from the licentious opinions, which men in modern times have not only adopted for themselves, but have also ascribed to the Reformers. 28. And the course which Luther did pursue was that which we iriight naturally have expected would he taken. When the sale of indulgences suggested itself to his view as a monstrous abuse, and when he failed in his first and immediate resort to the executive eccle- siastical authorities for its redress, the Divine Word would next occur as the readiest and niost proper standard of appeal, the most certain and most fixed. To elicit the authentic expression of the mind of the church in its most solemn form, conveyable, according to the views then prevalent in Germany, through an oecumenical council alone, — avhs an aim too remote, and requiring by far too great an apparatus of means, in order to its attainment, for the satisfaction of a mind CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 147 earnestly contemplating a practical purpose, and tliat purpose the removal of a mischief not only most exten- sively spread, but of daily and hourly recurrence. In such a case even the pope was distant enough. Nor was the case like one where the voice of Scripture might have appeared to render an uncertain sound : no proposition could seem, at first sight, of easier deduc- tion, than that no warrant was afforded by it for the sale of indulgences ; and therefore, under these circum- stances, Luther appears hardly chargeable with incon- sistency in appealing immediately to Scripture against the doctrine of venal justification, and at the same time referring his views to the ultimate arbitrament of the organs of the church. Why should he doubt the mean- ing of Scripture, on a Roman Catholic principle, more than that of any decree of a council, until some positive reason for such doubt were supplied, by a condemna- tion of his view from authority ? 29. In short, if we inquire generally into the acts and intentions of the foreign reformers, we shall find that they neither meant to separate, nor actually did separate themselves, from the communion of the church. They were excommunicated by the pope, and the sentence Avas accepted and enforced by their bishops. But they were passive in the matter : they ai)pealed to church authority for a period (at least in the case of the Lu- therans) of forty or fifty years*: they continued gene- rally to maintain the doctrine of one body : they conti- nually referred to the mind of the fathers and of the primitive church: they had no idea of the system of * Palmer on the Chuich, part IV., ch. i. (Vol. II. p. 101.) L 2 148 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V. " denominations." Even in Scotland, where the Re- formation was late and exasperated, and where alone there seems to have been anything like a wilful rejec- tion of the apostolical succession, they broke indeed the link of connection with the previous church ; but they were not logically inconsistent, however wrong in matter of fact ; for they denied the Romish communion to be a church, and they maintained their own to be the one body, and would not allow of any other ; holding the doctrine of unity while they surrendered that of perpetual visibility. At first, indeed, they recognised the An- glican church ; but then they were holding apparent though limited and questionable communion with it. Generally speaking, it appears sufficiently evident, that the first generation of reformers were not voluntary separatists ; Ave cannot say so much perhaps, without qualification, of the second and the third. The state of separation gave rise to new and fictitious theories intended to hide its own defects, but really calculated to aggravate and peri)etuate them. Far be it, however, from us to sit in judgment on the men who, by the tyranny of Rome, were thrown into circumstances so cruel. 30. But of the circumstances we are bound to judge. They were destructive in some of their most important results : destructive in ultimately bliShting even the doctrinal systems which it was the great aim of the re- formers to rectify; but more specifically and rapidly destructive in their bearing on the unity of the faith, and on the authority of the church, appointed to be a bulwark of true doctrine. The overthrow of that authority left truths which were dear to Luther, ]\Ie- CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 149 lancthon, and Calvin, open to ntter devastation tlirough private licence, as we learn from the tlieology now so prevalent in Germany and in Geneva. The great mis- fortune Avas, that the continental reformation did not carry with it the bishops of the church, whence it failed to preserve the succession of the ministry. Thus the idea of authority was destroyed, and there remained in its stead mere opinion. True opinion in great mea- sure it was, but it was stripped of a great part of tlie strength of truth, its divine attestation by a personal descent from the apostles and from Christ. When men set up new institutions with new governments, they did acts which were certain to be referred to the tribunal of common opinion, because it was only opinion that could be pleaded in their favour. Not then from asserting private judgment ; not from denying authority at the outset ; but from losing the succession of the ministry, they became unable to point any longer to an organ really authoritative, as having the witness of tradition and the known commission of Christ. Tlie doctrine was deprived of its legitimate and hereditary defenders, the bishops and clergy ; it remained naked and exposed, and became, for the most part, a shadow and an unpro- fitable name. The evil grew with the lapse of time. The consequences of the loss were felt in the decaying piety and increasing pride of Protestantism, the gradual corruption of the true doctrines of the church and church government, the growth of private licence, and, subsequently, in grievous deflections from the funda- mental truths of the gospel. Who were the persons responsible for these results is not here the question ; 150 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V. my object simply is, to trace out in cause and effect the mysterious dispensations of God*. 31. Altliough, therefore, upon a general view we must admit that an abuse of religious freedom Avas the spontaneous, not the immediate, growth of the circum- stances attending the continental reformation, yet, on the other hand, we must allow that the first reformers themselves were contemplating objects strictly practical and legitimate. Of necessity they, by implication, assumed to themselves, in a greater or less degree, the liberty of private judgment, but they did not assume it as such, nor for its own sake, nor was it a private judg- ment irreconcilable with the authority committed to the church. This assumption lay between them and their grand object, the re-assertion and re-establishment of the truth, which they saw groaning and oppressed beneath fictions and superstitions, whereof they wished to rid it, never doubting of the right, and trusting in a power better than their own. And, in fact, they simply discharged a primary function of human nature, in restoring to it the free agency of which it had so long been deprived. It was not mere liberty that they sought or worshipped, but that which liberty was need- ful to procure, namely, truth. But as the existing mischiefs and abuses were great, so the power and the effort needed to destroy them were great also. Accord- ing to the common but the melancholy law of our fallen nature, the pride of that effort and of its success (speaking not of individuals but of bodies) contami- • See the Rev. C. Smith on National Religion, Letter VI. (Riving- ton, 1833.) CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 151 nated those who made it ; power corrupted its posses- sors, and there began to be a delight experienced in its exercise, and a love of it for the sake of that delight, and an increased admiration of self as holding the keys of that delight, and an indulgence in the exercise of that power irrespective of its uses, its objects, its re- sponsibilities. Hence, whereas it was first employed simply as a means to an end, in process of time men, dallying with the instrument, forgot the pur- pose for which it was designed. Reception of the truth, freely if it might be, but if not, then by compul- sion, was the maxim of the Romish church. Freedom of assent,' as a necessary condition of the right reception of the truth, was not the motto, but the latent and gra- dually developed law, and the legitimate fruit, of the Reformation. Freedom of assent, without reference to the substantive and objective nature of truth, has been its besetting sin. 32. And why has private judgment been the fruitful parent of nonconformity, and thereby of permanent aberration and laxity ? Because, as the Romanists on the one hand had identified it with error, so on the other, men living under generalised protestantism have been too apt to identify it with truth ; or, at least, to go the length of supposing that what is judged by the individual to be true is truth to him, and sufficient for the purposes of the gospel. Men Avere provoked by the long-continued oppression of their liberty not only to struggle the more vigorously for its re-establishment, but, in the length and tenacity of that struggle, to vie^v with too partial an estimate the immediate object for 152 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CIIAP. V. Avliicli they were contending, and to regard it as an end rather than as a means. Their first movement was not for the assertion of liherty essentially or primarily, but for the recovery of truth ; it was met on the Roman Catholic side, rather by the denial of freedom than by the refutation of falsehood ; the natural consequence has been an undue share of attention to the assertion of freedom, and a comparative laxity with regard to the claims of truth. And now, instead of fixing the mind steadily on the concurrence of these two conditions, truth and freedom, on both as essential, but the latter as subservient, we seem to have absorbed the concep- tion of the paramount in that of the secondary object, studious only to respect liberty, but resting with in- fatuated indifference in that state of division, which tes- tifies against us that the Christians of this day are not fulfilling all the mind of the Redeemer respecting his church. 33. And thus we may sometimes read* in the popular productions of the day, that it is vain to look for uni- formity in religious opinion, except Avhen the human mind is in a state of stagnation, and that our divisions are our homage to the truth. O melancholy and miserable avowal ! Then error is the condition of our mental activity, and we can only hold truth by holding it not as truth, by holding it mechanically and not rationally, by compulsion and not by option ! "Who shall choose between such wretched alternatives ? And yet to lose our right is better than to abuse it. And we do abuse it, because we rest content with a state • Miss Martineau on America ; Chapter on Religion. CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 153 of facts where schism is manifestly chargeable upon some one, Avitliout making it the subject of supplication and of effort, tiiat the church may again be one body, as it was when St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians. We do abuse it, because we acquiesce in differences of doctrine upon points ever taught by the church, and- deal with them as matters of unconcern. But no truth clearly revealed is matter of unconcern. The main demonstration of our unhealthy condition is in this, that while we know that unity must be a condition of truth, we are so little moved by the manifest want of unity, and by] the conclusion which that Avant of unity establishes. 34. For let it not be said, in the face of common sense, that the obscurity of the things themselves is the real cause of our differences. I indeed readily admit, that were every one called upon to exercise his private judgment to the extent of an intellectual analysis of every proposition in our creeds, there would be so extreme a disparity between such a tasli and the competency of men, sucli as on the average they have been, to perform it, that many differences must be the result. But this is not the case. It requires little of intellectual power to read and understand, that the church was ordained to be one body and one spirit. It is quite as clear that our present " denominations" witness of us unequivocally tliat we are not one body. Here was a precept plain as an axiom of Euclid ; and for men to differ on it was not less absurd, than it would be if varieties of opinion were maintained in reference to those axioms, and vindicated by a reference to the supposed peculiarities of individual minds. 154 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V. 35. At what point have we now arrived, or, at least, to what goal do we approach ? Freedom of assent, sim- ply, is the one thing needful, according to the spirit of modern theories : according to what is now their spirit, and what may soon be their letter. Yes ; for in free- dom of assent the human pride is fed and gratified, whatever the matter to which assent is given ; nay, the inflated understanding has often more delight in assent- ing to what is false than to what is true, because the voice of truth is iiuperative and calls only for submis- sion, but the web of sophistry is our own work ; we are not mere recipients, but almost creators of its fictions ; and we more proudly adhere to the creature of our own mind than to a truth extrinsic to us, and independent of us, neither owning nor owing to us any obligation. 36. And thus we forget that there is a substantive, changeless truth of God revealed, for which we ought ever to be striving, and of which unity is the essential condition, as well as freedom. Unity is the essential condition of that truth in itself. Free assent is the essential condition of its satisfactory reception, of its reasonable indwelling in us. The Roman Catholic church suppressed, in her tyranny, the latter of these great laws. The spirit of infidelity, assuming the name and the colours of Protestantism, has equally set aside the former. And now, instead of mourning over our divi- sions, and labouring and praying them away, we treat them as matters of no moment ; we deal with truth as if it had no prototype, but were a mere image, deriving its origin from each individual mind, and having no higher existence beyond it : we rest in our own defective CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 155 approximations, or capricious caricatures, as if they were indeed that whicli God had revealed. 37. Now of these two dangers, it may be true that that embodied in the practice of the Roman Catholic church had made more progress towards its consumma- tion than the other has as yet achieved. But is it not equally true, that the consummation of that other ^vill be far more terrible ? For better is it to divest man of his attributes, and to prostrate him even as a machine before the throne of his God, however the service ren- dered to that God be thereby lowered and curtailed, than to educate and expand these attributes for the purpose of turning tliem, in their maturity and their strength, against Him who gave them, and who can take them away, or can render them as fruitful of tor- ment, in their abuse, as they would have been, while used in His service, of permanent delight. In the first supposition we perceive a diminished benefit ; but, in the second, there is a creation of positive evil, entirely sup- planting and expelling the gracious gift of Christianity. 38. In England, to which we must now direct our regard, the case was widely different from that of the Continent. Her reformation did not destroy, but suc- cessfully maintained, the unity and succession of the church in her apostolical ministry. We have, there- fore, still among us the ordained, hereditary witnesses of the truth, conveying it to us through an unbroken series, from our Lord Jesus Christ and his apostles. This is to us the ordinary voice of authority ; of authority equally reasonable and equally true, whether we will hear or whether we will forbear ; of authority which 156 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V. does not supersede either the exercise of private judg- ment, or the sense of the church at large, or the supre- macy of Scripture ; but assists the first, locally applies the second, and publicly witnesses to the last. 39. The efforts of the church to reform herself must not be assumed to imply the abrogation of the supreme power in her, the channel of vitality, through which it is derived to all the members. Men may be tempted to argue, that as a political society, abrogating its government and instituting a new one, does not cease to be the same society, however wrongful the act may have been, so the church did not undergo any rupture of her visible continuity, because a new government was instituted, and the fountain-head of the old one stopped. Suppose we admit the truth of the fact adduced in illustration, the vital difference, and the failure of the analogy, is here — that while any aggre- gation of men may become a political society, they cannot become a Christian church of their own will. The being of the church depends upon gifts ; those gifts cannot be had without the sacraments and the teaching of the church, and they have been committed, by One whose acts we cannot annul^ to the custody of the Christian ministry. 40. As respects the first part of the inquiry into the Anglican doctrine of private judgment, we shall find it easy to show that our church never taught that men were free to frame any religion from Scripture which they pleased, or to form a diversity of communions. But were the acts of her reformation such as to destroy the effect of her doctrine of catholic consent ? The acts of her CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 157 reformation established the claim of the nation to be free from external control of any living power in mat- ter of religion, but not from catholic consent. It is a mere fiction to say that the English reformation was grounded on the doctrine of private judgment. It as- serted merely this, tliat the nation was ecclesiastically independent, and this, not of catholic consent, but of foreign authority. Subsequently, indeed, her Reforma- tion wrought out the result of freeing the individual also from the control of the nation by its physical power as a nation ; but it never ceased to recognise the princi- ple of religious authority binding on the conscience, which remains enshrined in her Twentieth Article, and in the canon of 1571. The opinions of some of the in- dividuals instrumental in our reformation were, per- haps, nearly the same as those originally professed by continental Protestants ; but in England they took more of permanent effect, because the organisation of the church, through God's peculiar mercy, was still preserved to us. Let us now turn, first to the doctrinal, and sub- sequently to the historical, elucidation of our subject. 41. Even in the heat of the reformation, and its poli- tical accompaniments, indeed at the very time when the po])e had issued his deposing bull, and the Romanists of England had just seceded from the church, the church of England most authoritatively declared, by the canon of 1571, its adhesion to the principle of catholic consent, as establishing the right interpretation of Scripture in all cases where this consent is une(iuivocally declared. She there, in further development of her Article, enun- ciates the principle that Scripture contains all things 158 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V. necessary for salvation ; but in determining the further question, what are the things which it contains ? she re- quires that we should look to the sense of primitive an- tiquity, as affording, wherever it has been declared, the most legitimate and probable method of ascertaining the doctrine of the Bible. These are its memorable words : — " Imprimis videbunt cuncionatores, ne quid unquam doceant pro condone, quod a papulo religiose teneri et credi velint, nisi quod consentaneum sit doctrince V ete- ris aut Novi Testamenti, quodque e.cilldipsd doctrina Catholici jmtres et veteres Episcopi colleger int*." Canon xix. A. d. 1571. Doubtless to very many readers this canon will appear as a startling novelty ; yet did it express the indubitable, the uniform doctrine, of our great Reformers ; and even those among them who were partially affected by the strong sympathetic ten- dencies t of the period to recede from Roman doctrine without sufficient grounds (1 may mention the venerable names of Archbishop Cranmer and Bishop Jewel), re- mained firm and undoubting whether in the closet, from the pulpit, or at the stake, in the doctrine of catholic consent. 42. There is an irreconcilable hostility between this * See for proof in detail, Palmer on the Church, Part II. oh. vi. See also Faber's postscript to the preface in " The Primitive Doctrine of Justification," pp. xxxiv. — .\li. This o]nnion will be unsuspected, and ■will deservedly carry great weight. Reference has been made elsewhere to the dispassionate and philosophical testimony of Mr. Hallani, " Lite- rature of Modern Europe," vol. I. ch. iv. pp. 60, 61. In No. 78 of the publication entitled " Tracts for the Times," will be found a collection of Anglican teslinionies on the subject. t In the first and second editions, the word " influences" was introduced through an error on my part, and besides confounding the grammar of the sentence altered the sense which it was intended to convey. CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 159 view of the rule of faith and the riiodern idea of private judgment, according to wliich it is a kind of impiety to suffer the intervention of any middle authority between the sacred Scripture and a man's own mind. A man is to ask himself the question, Does this appear so to me ? but where the matter has appeared differently to the universal church, is he not also to ask himself the fur- ther question, Is it more probable that I or that they should be right ? And yet, what should we think of one who had never quitted his native place, and who should interpret the customs of a foreign or ancient nation according to his own antecedent notions of propriety and probability, rather than by the direct testimony of travellers and eye-witnesses, or of antiquarians and students ? It will be said that there is a divine illuminating grace given to the individual believer; so there was and is to the church, and this great truth, if it alters the relative authority at all, alters it in favour of the church, and against the private person. 43. Without holding an infallibility in the church, ex- cept as to fundamental truths ; and aware of no test by which fundamental truths can be infallibly ascertained ; Ave find that the law of probable evidence is as binding on a rational agent as that which we term demonstrative; not to mention that there must, in the case of human beings, always, even on the Roman theory, be one link in which the infallibility lails to be transmitted, namely, the last, by which the truth has its access to the mind of the individual, through his own perceptions. This law of probable evidence then we are called upon to examine, to 160 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. V, appreciate, and to follow ; and we may think the dictate of reason will be, that we should prefer adopting the quod semper, quod uhiquc, quod ah omnibus, to our own conclusions from the sacred text, where they are at issue with the catholic interpretation. 44. Upon which, however, it is necessary to make these observations : — We do not in such a principle disparage divine grace, and the efficacy of prayer. In truth, our prayers are best approved and answered by our being directed to adopt the likeliest means of ascer- taining the Christian verity ; and, if the witness of the universal church le the most probable criterion of truth, then in adopting it we shall have the greatest reason to recognise a divine answer to our supplications. The early church prayed more and more fervently than we do. In addition it had the character and competency of a witness to matters of fact. The doctrines it heard from its founders were matters of fact, contradistin- guished from matters of opinion, in that sense in Avhich alone such a distinction ever can be fairly taken. Even granting that the private Christian prays with the whole heart, and maintaining that such prayer will generally bring an easy concurrence in catholic faith, yet, in the cases where the single and the general mind are at issue, we have on each side the fact of prayer, but with the church in its function of a w itness, and its oppor- tunities as such, and further, the accumulated strength of a concurrence among many witnesses. And again, this is a question wholly independent of that other, ^Vhat is the voice of the church ? Vs'e do CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 161 not say — nor does tlie Romanist say — that iipon all points that voice has been clearly and luiequivocally uttered ; but we say that, where there has been such utterance, there we are in reason and duty bound, in- wardly bound, to hearken and follow. That there are such cases there is no doubt. The creeds are examples. There are other intermediate cases where it is presum- able, but not clear, what was the testimony of the church. In all such instances, of course, the argu- ment suffers in its cogency ; but it retains a force vary- ing according to the probability that the consenting suffrage of Christian antiquity is given this way or that. 46. Do we then reduce private judgment to a mere name or shadow ? By no means. First, we have Scrip- ture paramount over all. Next, we have the witness of the church, never superseding Scripture, but only assist- ing in the interpretation of it. Thirdly, we have the judgment of private persons, which is by each according to his means to be actively exercised upon Christian truth. Now is this incompatible with unity ? Is it blow- ing hot and cold in succession, to teach the unity of objective truth in Christianity, and the office of private judgment? Then is the apostle open to this reproach, who said, "prove all things" — exercise your private judgment — but who also said, " hold fast that Avhich is good" — rest in the one authentic, real, and not merely apparent, conclusion. 47. Let us look at the case of mathematical inquiry. I give a free assent to the propositions of Euclid ; and yet there is no room for doubt upon them^ and it would M 162 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V. be an oflfence against the laws of reason* to come to any conclusion but one. Yet that conclusion may be per- fectly free. Freedom is opposed to force, not to cer- tainty, nor to unity. Otherwise there were no freedom in the universe except where there is ignorance and doubt, and with the increase of our knowledge our liberty would be diminished. Now why is it that no man hesitates to accede to the propositions of Euclid, while many hesitate to adopt the doctrines of the gos- pel ? Not because the latter are less certain ; but be- cause ^ve view the one with an incorrupt and the other with a corrupted faculty. While the freedom of the investigation depends upon the absence of external force, its right issue depends upon underanged ma- chinery within ; and it is the most miserable of all our human delusions, that we actually require discrepancy of opinion — require and demand error, falsehood, blind- ness, and plume ourselves upon such discrepancy as attesting a freedom, which is only valuable when used for unity in the truth. If, however, on the other hand, the obscurity of religious truth be pleaded as an excuse for differences, it is clear that this plea does but aggra- vate the fault of those who follow their own worse-in- formed judgment as preferable to the better-informed and cumulative judgment of others. 48. But even if we set aside these considerations, at * In the 13th century, when men's intellects were indulged in every kind of speculation, there were hei-esies in g;ranimar and logic as well as in theology. Archbishop Peckham, for example, had to restrain the doctrine, at O.xford, that " Ego cmxit " was as good Latin as " Ego cur?'o." Wood. Annals, k. d. 1284. CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 163 least no man will deny thus much, that the human under- standing is actively exercised upon mathematical truths ; they are then referred to private judgment ; private judgment is called upon to perceive and appreciate every step in the process, and to make the whole its own. And, further, Ave should say, that he who learns them by rote, he who accepts them in the mass, he who does not ascertain the continuity and connection of the parts, has done them and himself but imperfect justice. But the more accurately and carefully he scrutinises each, the more justice he does to them and himself, and the less is it probable that he should enter- tain a doubt upon any of them. Thus the activity of private judgment, and the unity and strength of convic- tion in mathematics, vary dii*ectly as each other. 49. The purpose for which we have adduced the exact sciences as an illustration is, not to assume that the same degree of certainty is attainable by each of us upon each of the points of religion as in those sciences ; but that the association we have most of us formed, under tlie influence of vicious habit, of these two ideas, activity of inquiry, and variety of conclusion, is a fallacious one. It is owing to our infirmity and vice, wherever such an effect flows from such a cause. Saint Paul did not allow that it was meant to be so in theology, or he surely would not have desired Christians to prove all things,* if the obscurity of the subject-matter were such that many of them must in consequence fail of holding fast that which was good. Better to receive the truth * 1 Thess. V. 21 ; compare ] John iv. 1. M 2 164 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V. without reasoning at all, than by false reasoning to lose it : but best of all, to receive, and, by reasoning, to ap- prove and appropriate it. 50. The Christian man, then, although he receives the truth on trust as to its details, and is most blessed in the continuance of a simple and a childlike spirit, and the voluntary abasement of his own self-will through life, yet is to exercise his private judgment in a degree proportioned to the general capacity and development of his understanding; not merely in order to determine whether there is sufficient evidence of a revelation from God, but also in order to be the more fully assured what are the matters contained in that revelation. He is assisted in his inquiries by the doctrine on which the church of England acts, like the early fathers, that of the sufficiency of Scripture for salvation ; so that he is not liable to have matter of faith imposed upon him from any other source. Tradition is not a co-ordinate authority. But it is a witness to the facts of the case, and he, acting in the character of a judge upon his own religious belief, is bound to hear that witness, and to judge, according to the balance of j)robabilities, whether it is not more likely to convey in a disputed point the mind of God, than his own single impressions, Avhich (by hypothesis) are either altogether new, or, where formerly promulgated, have been authoritatively or practically disavowed. That upon every point, small and great, he must surrender, it is not necessary for the general purpose to contend ; but where he finds antiquity and universality combined with fundament- CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 165 ality, tlie conclusion is inevitable, and, in proportion as he finds the evidence of each of those three conditions, is it plainly legitimate. 51. But perhaps those who love unity may ridicule the ■whole notion of encouraging a general spirit of inquiry into the ground of the doctrines of religion, and at the same time teaching the duty of unity, of arriving at one conclusion, and that one the ancient catholic a-eed, with any anticipation that that duty will be observed. And they may point to the state of this country and ask how much unity exists among us. It is a sore question. Our unity is very little. The abusive and irreverent exercise of private judgment, the forgetfulness of the supremacy and oneness of truth among us, is grievous. We have almost ceased not only to contemplate unity as an object, hnt to remember it as a duty. The mind of God then is unfulfilled in respect of this great duty. May our case soon be otherwise ! 52. But is it not so with all His dispensations ? Is not their ])loom wasted upon the thankless winds, and their seed upon the barren ground ? Was not Christ incar- nate for us all ; and did He not declare that the many Avould. still walk in the broad paths of destruction ? Why then should we murmur, or why be amazed, that, Avhile His universal redemption takes not full effect in the purpose of saving souls, so that part of His will which enjoins unity should remain a law precious in- deed but despised ? None of the other moral duties of man — for the cognisance of truth is a moral duty — are ade(|uately fulfilled ; and yet no one would 166 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. V. think of meeting tliis evil by substituting for a genuine code of ethics, \vhich is necessarily indeterminate, a set of mechanical regulations. 53. We are to remember that He has commanded unity, but not unity alone. He has commanded trutli, and proof of the truth : the vigorous application of the intellect to the dogmas, the blessed dogmas, of theology, and their firm, tenacious eml)race upon the ground of laborious experience and intimate personal conviction. Now we may fairly ask our brethren in the Roman church, whether they think the duty of " proving all things" is adequately taught or practised in their church ? Whether a mechanical and superficial unity has not been substituted for that unity Avhich has the guarantee of conviction, deep and solid ? Whether in fear of the abuse they have not greatly limited the use of the human faculties ? AVhether the free agency of man is suitably considered and provided for in their method of administering tlie word of God to the people ? Whether, in the fear of its irreverent and controversial handling, they do not deprive the mass of believers of much of that sincere milk which they would receive in innocence and simplicity without wandering into the thorny ways of pride and of discussion ? 54. We adopt, then, in connection these great princi- ples ; the unity of the church, and of the faith whereof the church is a part ; and the free subjection of that fiiith to private scrutiny. It is true that their junction looks like paradox. But it is the paradox of Saint Paul. And though we may not seek paradox for ourselves, we CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 167 may not refuse revealed truth when to our imperfect view it seems to bear that aspect. 55. It will, however, be objected : of what use is it thus to simplify the operations of private judgment by directing the minds of men to the duty of remaining at all events in one communion ; when there are now many claimants for the title of the church more or less ex- clusive, so that, in order to decide in which of the bodies he finds the nearest representation of the true church, a man must go into the details of all the particular questions contested between them ? No doubt there is a great difficulty here ; but who ever heard of a state of neglected duty and of obstinacy in sin, which was to be escaped without difficulty ? Perhaps the very un- easiness which the contemplation of that difficulty creates is the first step towards a remedy. 56. But however that may be, it is irrelevant to the present purpose, which is to show that there is a pre- cept, plain, broad, and unequivocal, such as none could mistake, which if men had preserved, thus applying obedience to what was manifest, and waiting in faith for the elucidation of what Avas obscure, they would have remained in the way of God's commandments, and in the train of His blessing and illumination. So that private judgment alone was not that upon which our differences are chargeable, but its neglectful and irreverent use ; nay, in many cases, its disuse, and the following of mere caprice and passion under the shelter of its name. 57. Our first step then is to inquire whether the mind of God declared in his word manifestly be that the 168 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V. church should be one l)ody. It is a subsequent exami- nation, whether the present state of disruption be chargeable on one, or on all, or in what proportions on different communions ; and how we should set about any remedy. That first step we allege Avill establish a broad truth, which truth will be a natural basis for further operations. In the mean time let us recollect, that the difficulty did not commence with Protestantism. It began, at least, with the Greek se])aration. The divisions of the church, before the Reformation, though fewer, and leaving more points undisputed, wei-e as un- question;ible as they now are, and had accordingly the same connection with the apostolic doctrine of " one body, one spirit." 58. It may, however, be thought that a contradiction to these views of the spirit of the English Reformation is practically found in the circumstance that the Scrip- tures were freely given to the people l)y our reformers ; for it may be urged, that easy access to them would na- turally beget diversity of opinions, and that these again must raise schisms in the church. Now as to the free circulation of the Holy Bible, there is no doubt (God be thanked) of the fact, that it was the first religious move- ment of our Reformation in England to place the Scrip- tures in a position of accessibility to the mass of the com- munity. And further, at a time when the pressure of Pu- ritanism had begun to be felt, and stringent measures to be taken for repressing a tendency to excess in religious change, we still find no jealousy existing on this head. In the Articles of JMetropolitical Visitation, dated 1567, CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHUI?CH. 169 one of the points to l)e inquired into is, wlietlier any of the ministers (of the cathedral and collegiate churches) " do, either privily or openly, teach any un- wliolesome, erroneous, seditious doctrine ; or discourage any man from the reading of the Holy Scriptures soherly for his edifying." * But lest any should draw hence an unwarranted inference, I quote a subsequent passage, which denounces those who maintain, " that it is not lawful for any particular church or province to alter the rites and ceremonies publicly used to better edification ;" or " that any man may or ought, hy hh private authority, to do the .same." 59. Thus we perceive that there is nowhere any idea involved of alteration in the faith itself ; and that, there- fore, neither the church nor individuals are viewed as having any power to do more than receive and transmit the one imnnital>le truth with their best fidelity ; while, in matters of discipline, a power of alteration is asserted for the church, to which the natural functions of an organised body must belong, but expressly denied to the individual members of that body. And yet, simultane- ously herewith, there was a provision intended to secure for the people the use of the Scriptures. To some this may appear a gross inconsistency. In my view it is far otherwise ; and the conduct of our then ecclesiastical rulers in this very matter was the brightest page in the history of the Reformation. They were not responsible for the abuse of a gift which God had bestowed on man, and * Strype's Life of Parker, Appendix, No. LIU. 170 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V. which they thought themselves bound, according to theix- power, to secure to him. They contemplated the Scrip- tures as food appointed for the universal people of God, and the critical examination of them as the accident, and not the essence, of their relation to us. They saw the truth in its simplicity, and legislated on the suppo- sition that others would see it also, and prize it and hold it for itself, and anxiously separate from it anything of private whim or notion, and endeavour to ascertain their own soundness in the faith hy assuring themselves that their creed was conformable to that of the catholic church of Christ. 60. At least it may be said, their supposed doctrine of catholic consent has failed to preserve unity, — witness our actual state in religion. It is too true, that the principle has not exercised an universal sway, and may even be unknown to many, who deem themselves at- tached and intelligent members of the Anglican chm*ch ; but it is by no means clear that this Avas cliargeable upon our Reformation. It seems more fairly attribut- able to these circumstances : the remembered excesses of Romanism through its long dominion, which engen- dered a jealousy of everything bearing its resemblance ; the l^anishments and contact with Geneva under queen IMary ; the papal bulls, which engendered recusancy under queen Elizabeth ; the association of Pm-itanism in the seventeenth century with the movement in favour of popular freedom ; the poUtical influences of the Revolution of 1688 ; and, generally, the grand twofold division of Europe, which forbade the existence of a CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 171 purely intermediate class, and the prevalent sympathy of the general idea and interests of Protestantism. 61. As respects the hist or// of our Reformation, it was the establishment, as we have said, of a national exemp- tion from external restraint in matters of religion. The' question between the nation, either through its church or its state, and the individual, was of subsequent growth : and providentially, no doubt, it was so ordei'ed. Doubtless there was a deep design of God in that arbitrary and capricious temper of Henry VIII., which tended to tyranny in religious matters over the conscience of the subject. It was requisite in order to educate us. JMen had been so long accustomed to look upwards to a visible authority, superseding, in great measure, the exercise of their own faculties, and destroying the idea of their responsibility for everything but obedience to its commands, that they had lost, as it were, the capacity of private judgment while the right was in abeyance : like children, placed for the first time on their feet, they could not walk at once, and required a guiding hand. Strange and monstrous as it may appear, in reference to individuals more advanced in their mental education than the mass, it was a natural, perhaps a necessary, accompaniment of the then state of the public mind, — perhaps an essential condition of satis- factory change, — that, after the transmarine authority of the pope had been abjured, there shoukl still have remained Avithin view a power claiming little less than an equal degree of sanctity or of absolutism. And thus, in gradual relaxation, we see that a very high doctrine of regal headship prevailed in the reigns of Edward VI., 172 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V. Elizabeth, and James I. ; not, indeed, as estimated by the terms of the Articles of Religion, but as understood from the current sentiments and practice of the times. 62. The first assertion, then, of religious liberty was for the nation, as against what lay beyond the nation, and not for the private individual as against all but himself. And the doctrine grew imperceptibly by unconscious and progressive deflections from the rule of arbitrary power. But, however it be true that the doctrine of private judgment was not matured in a single day or by a single effort, it remains strictly and demonstrably true, that it was born at the dawn of the Reformation, and grew with its growth. Its primary origin is to be traced to the assertion of a national liberty ; which esta- blished the idea of a nation as a free agent in the accept- ance of its religion, as an individual in the family of nations^ responsible only to the great Head of that family. 63. In order to illustrate these views, let us look to some facts in the first stages of the Reformation among ourselves. The Act 24 Henry VIII. c. 12, which released the Church of England from papal supremacy, commences by setting forth the integrity of the realm of England, as proved from ancient documents, in its several and proper parts, " compact of all sorts and degrees of people, divided in terms, and by names of Spiritualty and Temporalty ;" and it proceeds : " the body Spiritual whereof having power, when any cause of the law divine happened to come in question, or of spiritual learning, then it was declared, interpreted, and showed, by that part of the said body politic, called the Spi- CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 173 ritualty, now being usually called the English Church, which always hath been reputed and found of that sort, that both for knowledge, integrity, and sufficiency of number, it hath always been thought, and is also at this hour, sujfficient and meet of itself, without the intermeddling of any ejoterior person or persons, to declare and determine all such doubts, and to administer all such offices and duties, as to their rooms spiritual doth appertain." 64. We have here a clear view of the notion under which separation took j)lace. The nation of England said : We are an organised and integral whole, both in secular and spiritual matters, capable of self-govern- ment and self-direction. But in thus establishing the independence and integrality of the nation as a collec- tive body, there is no trace of any regard whatever to the private judgment of the individuals composing that nation in a separate and personal capacity. Extrinsic control was repudiated in terms bearing evident refer- ence to the pope, but the question was not even mooted, whether internal differences should be tolerated. It was assumed, that the unity of the nation would i)rovi(le means for its own maintenance, with reference to si)iritual matters, as it had always done with reference to temporal matters, and sometimes, nor upon unimportant occasions, even in subjects relating to ecclesiastical arrangements. 65. Nor let it be thought that the Romish party were behind those inclined to Protestantism in their recogni- tion of a paramount spiritual authority within the bounds of the nation itself, when unable to enforce the papal claims. In the Act for the Six Articles, dated 174 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. V. 1543, it is enacted, that the simple declaration of the king shall be absolute upon matters of religion ; and the penalties due to heresy are denounced against all who shall impugn it. Now this most tyrannical Act, this most absolute assertion of a regal infallibility in matters of religion, was carried under the influence of Gardiner and the Romanists, and in the teeth of the most deter- mined opposition on the part of archbishop Cranmer. 66. It is due to truth that observation should be atten- tively fixed upon the fact, that in England the question of private judgment was more remote from the imme- diate subject-matter of the Reformation than abroad. With us the question lay simply between the nation and the pope of Rome, and its first form as a religious question had reference purely to his supremacy. Thus the individual was not at all brought into the fore- ground, nor impelled to any distinct line in doctrinal matters. But in the cases of Luther and Zuinglius respectively, the first quarrel was upon matter of doc- trine : as regards the former, and still more as regards the latter, this quarrel had continued for some space of time before the papal supremacy came to issue with the rel)ellious movement. And then it came to issue not primarily with a nation claiming freedom, but with the religious opinions of individuals. True, they were supported by the communities in which they respect- ively lived ; but in England the question was first national, and then became doctrinal and personal : in Germany and Switzerland it was first doctrinal and private, and then became national, or rather, indeed, political. The idea of religious division must obviously CHAP, v.] WITH THE CHURCH. 175 have been much earlier suggested to individuals in the latter cases than in the former. 67. All the further stages of the growth of private judgment in England belong to the history of toleration. Authority here Avas not abolished, but it was fixed in the national organs, both civil and religious, the former acting on behalf of the latter. The state still attempted to maintain for the church the unlawful principle of external physical control, though with immediate and progressive advances towards the renunciation of that false doctrine. It has long been repudiated ; and there now remains for the maintenance and recovery of unity, in the interpretation of the sacred Scriptures, only that spiritual sanction of religious truth, which is termed catholic consent. It has been shown, we trust, that the English Reformation is responsible for the abolition of constraint from without in matter of religion, but is not responsible for the neglect of the inward o])ligation to hold, instead of ever-shifting opinion, that body of truth which we have inherited from our Lord and his apostles. I have deemed it strictly relevant thus to state and vindicate the Anglican doctrine in respect to private judgment, in order to distinguish it from that abusive and more recent theory with which the Refoi-mers are unjustly charged, and which now unfolds from day to day its disorganising tendencies in immediate relation to our subject : and, having done so, I proceed to consider the specific manner in which the growth of private judgment in its two successive senses has affected, does affect, and may hereai'ter yet further affect, he connection between the church and the state. 176 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VI. CHAPTER VI. THE USE AND ABtTSE OF PRIVATE JUDGMENT AS CONNECTED WITH THE PRINCIPLE OF UNION BETWEEN THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 1 — 13. Of toleration, and how it is related to liberty of conscience and to private judgment. 14 — 18. Subject indicated, and forms of European state policy with respect to private opinion in religion classified. 19 — 26. Nationality a leading feature of the English Reformation. 2", 28. A vicious influence subsequently developed. 29—48. An historical sketch of the policy of the state respecting religious diiferences down to the Revolution of 1G88. 49 — 60. A similar outline from the Revolu- tion of 1G88 to the present day. Gl— 72. Steps by which a state may progressively advance from the toleration of different religions, or forms of religion, to a recognition of their perfect equality, by the indiscrimi- nate admission of their professors to office, and by atfording to them a common support. 73, 74. Nor is it likely to rest there. 75, 76. Our own position. 77. A retrospect of the argument. 78 — 83. A parallel and co-operating political influence. 1. We have fully considered* the reasons which appear to give religion a place among the ends and the condi- tions of good government ; and it requires no lengthened argument to demonstrate, that if it is properly to be in- cluded among them at all, then its inclusion in a right manner must be of transcendent importance. 2. Previously to the Reformation, this theory was car- ried out simply and easily into practice. There was a ge- neral recognition of the law of external unity in religion, * Chap. II. CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 177 and of civil penalties as amongst the appropriate sanc- tions of that law. Upon this maxim (destitute as it ap- pears to us of support from Scripture) the whole powers of the government became at once applicable to the pre- vention of schism ; it Avas regarded like an infraction of the public peace ; and the secular magistrate afforded to the church his forcible but heterogeneous guarantees for a security too dearly purchased by a sacrifice of truth and duty, in the supersession of our functions as rational beings with reference to the trying and proving of religious doctrine. 3. But so long as this principle was maintained in its vigour, thie general preservation of the external unity remained a natural result ; and so long as the external unity was very generally preserved, no serious impedi- ment could arise to prevent governors from recognising their obvious duty, and no less obvious interest in the maintenance and advancement of religion, embodied as it was, so as to render it yet more apt for their purpose, in the conspicuous and permanent institutions of the Christian church. 4. But at the Reformation we enter upon an era alto- gether new, in respect of the present sul)ject. Here we find springing up by slow degrees two new princi])les : the first, that of liberty of conscience, or, as it has other- wise been called, the right of private judgment; the second, that of toleration, which has also been desig- nated by the phrase, " liberty of conscience," for it has rarely been attempted to treat of the matter now before us v/ith much precision of thought or language. Each N 178 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VI. of tliein has, we Ijelieve, a distinct province, a legiti- mate meaning, in which they indicate what is both right and expedient; and a hazard of attendant or con- sequent excess, which we now see in no small degree attaining its realization, and which ultimately involves results the most destructive both to our individual and our social welfare. 5. Each ofthem has a distinct province. The question of private judgment respects our religious position ex- clusively, while that of toleration has its subject matter in the region of civil politics. The question of private judgment depends, as has been shown, upon the right or duty of the individual (they are correlative) to try or prove, according to his capacity, the religious doc- trines presented to him, and to pronounce upon them for himself. The question of toleration regards the right or duty of the state to assume the function of a judge in matter of religion, and to coerce or incommode individuals on account of the variations in opinion inci- dent to the exercise of this right of private judgment. The former must evidently be decided by a reference to the principles upon which we are constituted in the church of Christ. The latter inquires whether the state has any, and what concern in the answer to be given to the former question. But the principle of toleration is evidently and naturally consequent upon that of private judgment. For where private judgment is established, the individual chooses for himself; but where toleration is denied, the state, pro tanto, extin- guishes his free agency and supersedes his choice. CHAP. VI.] AVITH THE CHURCH. 179 6. Each of them has a legitimate sense. The doctrine of private judgment is a noble principle, while it is understood to assert our obligation individually, and according to our individual opportunities and capacities, to exercise our minds upon the topics of divine reve- lation, and strive to assure and realise to ourselves the inestimable blessing of the truth in each and all its parts. It then constitutes in fact, as we have seen, a simple exhibition of the apostolic precept, addressed to the believers of Thessalonica in the mass ;* " prove all things, hold fast that which is good." Those few but pregnant words both fully state and effectually guard the doctrine. 7. The principle of toleration is likewise in itself of pure and untainted origin. It rests, I apprehend, upon some such ground as this. We, as fallible creatures, have no right, from any bare speculations of our own, to administer pains and penalties to our fellow crea- tures, whether on social or on religious grounds. We have the right to enforce the laws of the land by such pains and penalties, because it is expressly given by Him who has declared that the civil rulers are to bear the sword for the punishment of evil doers, and for the encouragement of them that do well. And so in things spiritual, had it pleased God to give to the church or the state this i)Ower, to be permanently exercised over tlieir members, or mankind at large, we should have the right to use it ; but it does not appear to have been so 1 Thess. V. 21. 180 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VI. received, and, consequently, it should not be exercised. The Church appears to have afforded a very general attestation to this truth as regards herself, by dele- gating to the civil power, in most cases at least, the office of performing the most sanguinary decrees of punishment for offences ecclesiastical. Now the prin- ciple of toleration simply affirms for the state what the church has in practice generally affirmed for herself — an exemption from that painful office, by disclaiming the right to punish in loss of goods, liberty, or life, for error or heresy in religion. 8. It is not, therefore, because we believe civil rights to be more important than religious doctrines, that we would use a power for the defence of the one which Ave decline to employ for the propagation of the other ; although too often some such vicious inference is drawn by persons reasoning ill or not at all, from such a con- duct on the part of the state. But it is because God has seen fit to authorise that employment of force in the one case, and not in the other ; for it was with regard to chastisement inflicted by the sword, for an in- sult offered to himself, that the Redeemer declared his kingdom not to be of this world, meaning apparently, in an especial manner, that it should be otherwise than after this world's fashion, in I'espect to the sanctions by •which its laws should be maintained. 9. Further, each of the phrases now before us had an abusive sense, and an attendant hazard. Private judg- ment as has been shown, becomes a gross delusion, when in pruviiig or pretending [o prove all things, CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 181 we forget the end of that preparatory duty, namely, to hold fast that Avhich is good. Good ; but how ? good in itself, or good for us ? good in itself, and therefore good for us ; if not for us as we are, yet for us as we ought to be, and as, if we receive the truth into our bosoms, we shall be. We are miserably deluded when we forget that the office of private judgment is not, after all, an exclusively or even mainly intellectual office, and that it essentially depends for its right dis- charge less upon the understanding than the conscience. 10. And the theory of toleration too, however pure in itself, has been associated with a series of consequences not less abusive nor less pernicious. AVhen, from the duty of forbearance on the part of governments with regard to the repression of religious error through civil penalties, men have gone on to infer that the state should refrain from the use of due and appropriate, as well as of undue because unauthorised means for that purpose ; and when thus unlawfully arguing from a particular forbearance to general inaction, they further connect with inaction indifference, and with indifference incapacity on the part of government to aid the advance- ment of religion by public means: then indeed the doctrine of toleration becomes not in itself a falsehood, but yet involved with a series of falsehoods so subtle as to be, without great care and pains, inextricably inter- woven with them in the common apprehensions of men. This confusion, however, is likely, within no long period, to terminate ; for some among the modern advo- cates of latitudinarian principles have, both in and out 182 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VI. of Parliament, Legun of late years to treat with con- tempt the notion and the phrase of toleration as ^vholly inadequate to carry out their real schemes, while it is no longer needed to conceal them. 1 1 . We most observe, however, yet more specifically, that two very different classes of subjects have been treated, the one erroneously, and the other correctly, as belonging to the question of toleration. The principle of toleration is this, in its proper form, that civil penalty or prohibition be not employed to punish or to preclude a man's acting on his OAvn religious opinions. In the largest extent which can properly be assigned to it, it requires that no privilege or benefit which he is capable of receiving rightly and beneficially be withheld on ac- count of religious opinions from the party professing them. All matters falling within these sets of condi- tions belong to the first class of sul)jects, and to the pure question of toleration. 12. But if penalties be inflicted upon the holders of certain religious opinions on account of the safety of the state, and because those religious opinions are be- lieved hostile to it, here there may be an error in judg- ment, or there may be in humanity, with a thousand other faults, but there is no intentional infringement of the principle of toleration. Much less is it contra- vened when pi'ivilege or office is withheld, because it is believed that there are in the creed of the excluded person faults of omission and commission, which of themselves disqualify him from rightly exercising the privilege or filling the office. All cases of these CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 183 latter descriptions (and our history furnishes them in abundance) are inaccurately treated as l)elonging to the question of toleration. 13. They may, however, intermix with the former classes ; punishment may be inflicted, or exclusion en- forced, from a complex regard to the proscribed creed, partly as a deviation from truth, and partly as a cause of incapacity in the person, and danger to the state. In Avhatever degree the former element may have prevailed, tlie question becomes one of toleration. Where the latter considerations were predominant, we fall back upon the questions, how far civil government is in its best and proper state a religious function, requiring religious motives and observances, and proposing reli- gious ends ; and how far the epithet religious, in order to be practical in its meaning, must l)e attached to some particular mode or modes of belief or of communion ? If we find that government is essentially religious, then we are not guilty of intolerance in shutting out from it those who deny to it that character, either expressly, or by as- signing to the term a vague and impalpalde signification ; while undoubtedly we are open to that charge, if the ques- tion on the nature of government be otherwise decided. 14. The subject of private judgment, as an ecclesi- astical principle, has already been sufficiently examined ; it remains to regard its operations as they alfect the Church, not directly by influencing the religious cha- racter of its members, but indirectly by their bearing on the particular question of connection between the Church and the State : to observe how they lead us. 184 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VI. tlirougli truth, by successive stages into latitudinarian- ism and infidelity, connecting all along even tlieir worst results with the name and pretence of protestantism. It has heen ah-eady shown how the first effect of the Reformation ^vas to establish the national spiritualty in independence, by calling home a duty, which had been delegated to a foreign see, and grossly perverted by it. We must now consider the co-ordinate influences of that period in their ulterior operations, and their gra- dual modification of the union between the church and the state, first by progressively evolving the principles and practice of toleration, and then through the abusive inferences which men have unwarrantably drawn, and which tend to dissociate the principles of government and of religion. "We shall see in succession a long series of changes, each very subtly and invisibly, yet most really, connected, but involving a transition from positive good towards equally positive evil ; and all bearing the marks of the most comprehensive forecast and design, of inti- mate relation to the development of the most weighty results upon human character and destiny. Let us trust that the ominous phenomena have been projected before their time by a merciful W^isdom, in order to arouse us ere we reach that period when the govern- ment shall have been made as well as deemed equally incapable in the matter of religion, with the most inca- pable of its component parts ; when political science shall have become deliberately false to its first prin- ciples ; when the state shall be first theologically, then morally ; first collectively, then in its component parts, CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. -185 without a conscience. Now is the time when men should halt in their forward march, and consider where they stand, and whither their road will lead them. 15. And we shall derive much instruction from further finding how the later among the above-mentioned pro- cesses are blended with a progressive relaxation in the theory of civil government ; and how each advance made in the one facilitates a corresponding step in the other ; thus affording the most solenm and judicial at- testation to the reality and permanency of those religious principles of government for which we are contending, and showing us how vainly we strive, by devices of our own, against the fixed laws and tendencies of nature, and of the God of nature, vindicating himself in our dis- a])pointment when we have overlooked His immutable commands. 16. We may embody, in the following forms, the principles of conduct which modern governments have, under different circumstances, adopted, or Avliich have been proposed for their adoption, with regard to the support of religion and to the treatment of varieties in its profession. * (1.) The first and most comprehensive position is, that uniformity in the Christian religion is absolutely essential to citizenship. (2.) The next, that uniformity on all points of the Cliristian religion is desirable for citizenship, and essential to offices of political trust and privilege ; and that, even for citizenship, unanimity in fundamentals cannot be dispensed with. * See a statement of tliis kind in Mi-. Hallam's Constitutional His- tory, vol. i. ch. iii. p. 180, 4to. 186 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VI. (3.) Contemporaneous with this modification is the growth of a third opinion, whicli views heresy less as an antecedent disqualification, poisoning, as it were, the characters of men, than as a prohable cause of overt acts directly injurious to the state, through fear of which overt acts, means are used to exact disclaimers and ab- jurations, and the heretical worship generally is discou- raged and repressed. (4.) A fourth form is, that separatism should be stifled by prevention of its assemblies, rather than fol- ]o^ved by absolute penalties. (5.) A fifth stage of government policy is this : that every citizen should hold those principles of Avhat is (perversely) termed natural religion, which have an immediate bearing on the safety of civil society ; and that he is a legitimate object of banishment or other penalty if he do not. This theory however has not been tested experimentally. (6.) That Christianity under some form is essential to office, but that all religious creeds which are prima facie serious and sincere, or even unbelief, if appearing under the same aspect, are to be tolerated, is a sixth and later form, under which we now live in England. (7.) That all forms of religion, or of professed Chris- tianity, should receive active and pecuniary support from the State. (8). That all should alike be refused it. 17. Together with most of these has coexisted, among us, the active assistance of the state to a national form of religion ; and, though with partial exceptions, its gene- rally exclusive assistance. At this stage, the sole reli- CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 187 gious limitation on the possession of power is the name of Christianity : and experience shows that this barrier is not one likely to be the most tenaciously defended, nor adequate to secure any sort of religious homo- geneity in those whom it permits to enter ; while at the same time in theory it is one of the most plausible. All sects being now recognised as legally competent to serve the state, it begins to be a common inquiry why the state is to render its reciprocal service to one form of religion only? They protest against national exac- tions for the church of a portion of the nation ; they confound the inherited church with the invented sects ; they claim the indiscriminate aid of the government ; they destroy its conscience and personality ; they reduce it to a mechanical representative of popular inclinations, first, in reference to religion, but with the view, secondly and not remotely, of universalising the principle of sovereignty from below, and of cutting off entirely that homage to Religion, which, by repudiating her unity, has already been so enfeebled and disgraced. 18. In a more summary view there are four great divi- sions in the history of the subject. The first, in which heresy and schism were visited with civil penalty salute ayiimcR, for the cure of the individual. This, we may almost say, terminated with the Reformation, and depended very much, though not wholly, on the idea of the infallibility of the church. The second, in which they were similarly visited, but chiefly in the view of preventing the infection of the society within whose limits they had appeared. This rather depended on the 188 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VI. right of self-preservation belonging to society. It ter- minated practiciilly -with the Revolution of 1688, or even earlier, as regarded Protestant Non-Conformists ; but remained as an opinion in tlie works of various writers. The third, in which disqualifications of a civil kind are imposed instead of penalties. The idea in these is dif- ferent, and merely aims at keeping all power to injure the established institutions out of hands which are as- sumed to be inimical to it. This period reaches, we may say, to 1829. The fourth is that in which all forms of religion claim from government a precisely equal regard, as respects either civil privileges or posi- tive assistance. 19. To speak of the influence of Protestantism as such \ipon the principle of vinion between the church and the state, to some may appear visionary or unintelligiljle — under many circumstances it may have been latent ; but upon examination we shall find it to have been both direct and very substantial. Its character has indeed, at different stages, been very different : at first it would seem to have operated in England very favourably to this principle ; and we may find that more strict re- gard has been paid to it, in some instances at least, by Protestant than by Romish governments. But at the point where Protestantism becomes vicious, where it receives the first tinge of latitudinarianism, and begins to join hands with infidelity, by superseding the belief of an innnutable objective truth in religion necessary for salvation, at that very spot it likewise assumes an aspect of hostility to the union of church and state. CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 189 20. The English reformation did not aim at or neces- sitate any breach in the unity of the church ; in the unity, that is to say, of the visible church, or what is in modern days disparagingly, and without any advantage on the score of accuracy, called uniformity. But, since it did not find that a visible headshij) was comprised in the teaching of the Apostles, or attested by the ancient church as having come from them, it rejected that headship as being full of obstinately-defended abuse. We may be of opinion that in some conceivable forms it might not liaV'e been deemed objectionable ; as we find that Melancthon did not find in the mere exist- ence of the papacy an insuperable obstacle to recon- ciliation. And as the ecclesiastical law of some modern nations (Austria, for example) appears to afford suffi- cient proof that, did no other obstacle exist, a bishop of Rome might occupy a harmless, or even possibly beneficial primacy in the universal church, without op- pressing and nullifying the general jurisdiction of bishops, or absorbing their authority into itself.'"^ 21. The fault, however, and the weakness of the An- ghcan reformation appears not to have lain in its rejec- tion of the visible headship extrinsic to the nation. It Avas rather faulty in allowing the transfer of too consi- derable a proportion of the prerogatives which Rome had enjoyed, to the sovereign. The doctrine has been ascribed to Cranmer, that the king bore both swords, and could create a bishop as well as a civil functionary ; * See the translation of the Austrian Ecclesiastical Laws into English by the Count dal Pozzo. Murray. 190 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VI. but, although that eminent benefactor to his church and country appears at one time to have fallen into a confusion of this kind, yet it is certain, from works which at a later period he himself composed, that he clearly distinguished the spiritual from the civil cha- racter. At the time of the accession of Edward the Sixth, " it was his judgment," says Strype, " that the exercise of all episcopal jurisdiction depended upon the prince.*" It does not however follow that even then he conceived, that ordination derived its virtue from the law ; but yet, from \^diomsoever it emanated, there was embodied in the practice of our ecclesiastical polity too much of dependence on the throne, while its theory was eminently reasonable. Elsewhere we have considered, whether this may not have been, so to speak, a condition necessary in order to effecting with safety the great transition which Avas to be made ; whether, if the idea of visible headship had been wholly discarded, or refined at once into its more subtle form, we might not have lost along with it, as was the case in other Protestant countries, the visible continuity of the church and the apostolical succession. 22. That the question of the English reformation Avas eminently and specially national ; that it Avas raised as betAveen this island of the free on the one hand, and an " Italian priest" on the other, is a remarkable truth Avhich derives equally remarkable illustrations from our history. The main subject of contention betAveen the *. Stiype's Cranmer, p. 141. See Palmer on the Church (Part II. ch. 8), for a general vindication of Cranmer's conduct. CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 191 state and tlie Romanists, or recusants, as they were called, was not their adhesion to this or that popish doctrine, but their acknowledgment of an unnational and anti-national head. To meet this case, the oath of supremacy was framed. Paradoxical as it may seem, tlie British rulers appear either to have thought, or to have acted as if they thought, that they were not requiring of Romanists anything which should do vio- lence to their conscience in religion when they attempted to enforce this oath. 23. Now let us observe both the fact, and the natu- ral inferences. The British Government required of its subjects the renunciation, not of Romish doctrines, but of the ecclesiastical supremacy of the Pope. We must suppose the abjuration of this particular tenet to have been thus exclusively required, because it was sup- posed to indicate either a political or a religious alien- ation on the part of those by whom it might l^e enter- tained. If the former supposition be accurate, then it was not the existing church as a religious institution, but the secular ambition of the papal see, again.st which security was sought by renouncing its jurisdiction ; and we perceive the more clearly how far the idea of our reformers was from anything like alteration of essence, or the overthrow of an old church, and the erection of a new one. But if, on the other hand, the foreign headship was assailed as a religious error, connected with other religious evils and corruptions, then the rulers of the nation could only make its renunciation a test of competency for citizenship, because they strongly 192 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VI. believed in tlie bearing of our religions creed upon our social conduct, and in the union of a religious with a political character in government. For why should a spiritual allegiance to the Pope be inconsistent with a patriotic allegiance to the Crown ? Only upon the supposition of a natural and indivisible connection be- tween the two supremacies ; in which case it was con- sistent and logically consequent to make the ecclesias- tical unity an essential condition of that which is civil. Thus then we find the first movements of Protestantism in our own country to have been towards the fuller development and the stricter application of the prin- ciple of a religious conscience in Government, not to- wards its relaxation. 24. But contemplating the English reformation on either side ; looking either to the entire rejection of a foreign headship, and the jealous care with which this rejection was enforced in the oath of supremacy ; or look- ing, on the other hand, to that partial colouring of Eras- tianism, that disposition to wear the harness of the state, and to fall into a complete unity of action with it, which we must all discern in the history of our church at those times, we perceive that there is a point in which these different sentiments coincide, and that point is the strict and absolute nationality of the church — a doctrine not inconsistent with its catholicity. The latter con- sisted in its unity of doctrine and sacraments, and (as I conceive is included) of its ministry, with the universal church, not of the moment, but of all time ; the former had reference to its natural and divinely appointed CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 193 boundaries, within which a common administrative power and a common agency should prevail. 25. And thus we may interpret into languge the acts of the English reformation : " We find the nation like the family, an institution manifestly divine ; we find in it a personality of its own, a collective power, a collective responsibility. In its oneness of organisation and of sympathy pervading its whole framework, ^ve recognise, us it were, the religious integral fitted for independent, though not discordant action ; independent, for we do not find that God has appointed any arbiter over nations, as in nations he has appointed an arbiter over indi- viduals. W^e go therefore as far as He has gone ; Ave stop at the point where He has stopped ; we take the nation as, humanly speaking, free and irresponsible in re- ligion, therefore we reject the doctrine which makes our church dependent on a foreign head for the exercise of her essential functions. But, on the other hand, within the limits of each nation we recognise a regular combi- nation of rulers and ruled, as in a family, and to this col- lective being, as such, Ave conceive that a religion must attach ; on its head naturally devolves the chief care of that religion, and thus the sacred trust of the sovereign poA\er becomes much more definite, and much more illustrious from the retrenching all those prerogatives Avhich the papal see exercised over u§, and which had their seat abroad. At the same time, while we assert such an independence as is here described, the church as being Anglican does not renounce the communion of the Catholic body, but, sympathising wirh all other o 194 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VI. nations and their churches, freely acknowledges the laws which are hinding in common upon all." 26. Thus, then, both because the religion Avas recog- nised as properly belonging to the nation, did it espe- cially become the care of the head of that nation, who previously was, though with some distinctions and ex- ceptions, one of many members, all extrinsically ruled ; and also because the crown stood as heir-general to the pope in most of the ])rerogatives which he had so abu- sively exercised, did the sovereign become, in an ample sense of the term, at the outset of our Reformation, the visible head of the church of England. At the com- mencement of the reign of Elizabeth, there was a wise and well-timed abatement in the royal style, but a great substantial power remained ; and it is but just to say, that, during four reigns, those of Edward VI., of Eliza- beth, of James I., and of Charles I., the duties of that office were discharged, if not with an unvarying purity or Avisdom, yet, at least, as it appears to me, under a general conviction that the active care of the Church was among the most momentous duties of the sovereign, as well as in dignity the first ; and with a disposition to regard her welfare as second to no secular object. Head- ship ascribed to the sovereign went to render the duty of interposition Avith the religion of the people, on the part of the government, naore determinate, and to con- centrate as Avell as to exhibit the obligation. 27. And had not Protestantism, in other shapes, made further advances; had men been content Avith vindicating the truth, by the joint appeal to Scripture for authority. CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 195 and to antiquity for attestation ; and had they been able to join with this vindication the sound doctrine of tole- ration ; this lively and intimate relationship between the sovereign and the church of the nation might have remained efiectual for all the purposes of good, and shorn of those tendencies to excess which were be- queathed to it as remnants of the antecedent slavery of the national church under a Roman head. But that wliich began well, by restoring man to the condition of a free agent in spiritual things, and thus bringing him up to the level of his responsibilities as a spiritual crea- ture, ran put into excess when it dAvelt so much on pri- vate liberty, that, without asserting propositions directly false, it nevertheless engendered a temperament most favourable to falsehood, by fixing men's attention on the possession rather than the end of freedom. 28. Now we may doubt concerning such evils as were mixed with the greatly preponderating blessings of our Keforniation, Avhether they are chargeable on those who promoted, or on those who opposed, after having ])ro- voked it ; or in what ])roportions the responsibility ought to be divided between each ; but we cannot deny that, upon the removal of the tyranny then prevalent, there came to us, along with the good thus elTectod, an element of mischief, opening the way to multiplied divi- sions of opinion in religion, not by the estabhshment of the Scriptures as the sole foundation, but because men abused their freedom, and overlooked the reasonable and religious helps which they ought to have employed in studying the sacred word. We are not now to in- o 2 196 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VI. vestigate the manner of this influence, but to talce the fact which is undoubted, to trace it through history, and to follow it out into its results upon the union between church and state. 29. In this country, we are to observe, the period of reformation was not the period of schism. We had, indeed, denied the recognition of papal authority to be a condition of Christian unity, under Henry VIII. But are Ave, or the maintainers of the opposite affirmative, chargeable witli the resulting division ? At least, it is historically clear, that England rejected not the com- munion but the jurisdiction of Rome, and in doing so that she maintained the national unity unbroken. There were defections of individuals, but there was no organisation of a rival church in England until the twelfth year of Elizabeth, when the Pope, Pius V., had published his deposing bull : then began the state of schism in this country. The professing church was no longer one body, but divided itself into those who held with the nation, and those who held with the Pope. But the latter were not cast out ; they went at the call of the Roman see. As for the internal schism in the Protestant body, it was hardly percepti- ble till the reign of Charles the. First and the great reljellion. 30. From the twelfth year, therefore, of Queen Eliza- beth, we nmst consider the fractional state of the Chris- tian church in England, the parallel existence of ditFerent forms, not only of opinion, but of religious institution, as an unquestionable fact. Our rulers went to war with this CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 197 fact; by tlie suppression of the rival worship, by the inflic- tion of tine and imprisonment, and the imposition of the ofith of supremacy. But they were using weapons un- suited to their character and position, and not upon the clear and broad, though false, principle of the Romish proceedings against heresy. They did not so go to war with schism, as did the papal power with the reforma- tion of Italy or Spain. We do not find that they ever adopted the unlimited maxim of persecution for reli- o;ious opinion. It is the mere cant of controversy, or dogmatism of ignorance, to say that Protestants and Romanists persecuted alike, as each got the upper hand. It would, on the other hand, be grossly illiberal to deny that Romanists could better palliate persecutions on their principles, than we on ours. 31. In proof, however, of the fact, that i\\e principle of persecution was soon shaken, and then progressively relaxed, I appeal to the very case which has often been quoted on the opposite side, the case of Joan Boucher, \\\\o was burnt as an anabaptist, by the authority of Edward the Sixth, and at the instance of Archbishop Cranmer. Even in the proceedings on the case of this mdiappy woman, I assert that we may discover that a distinct approximation had already, though, perhaps, un- wittingly, been made towards the right of private judg- ment. For the ground on \vhich she was put to death was, that, disbelieving the advent of the Redeemer in the flesh, or the doctrine of the Incarnation, she had thereby apos- tatised from the fundamentals of the Christian faith. 32. Of course it is not meant to adduce such a cir- 198 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VI- cumstance as a vindication of the conduct of Archbishop Cranmer ; but it is very worthy of remark, that, thus early in the history of Protestantism, penal infliction for the sake of religious opinions, affecting life, should have been limited, at least by implication, to cases wliere a denial of fundamental truth is involved, and not maintained to be applicable upon the simple ground of disobedience to the declaration of the church as a posi- tive law, Avhatever the magnitude or minuteness of the subject. Thus the range of persecution was at once very greatly narrowed, a stage prej)aratory to its ulti- mate disavowal and discontinuance. And we find here that disposition to make unity more a matter of moral and less of positive obligation (to use the terms in the sense of Bishop Butler), to refer more to the substance of the truth itself, and relatively less to the voice of the church as its visible organ, removing all that is inter- mediate between the objects of faith and man as its recipient ; which has all along been so characteristic of Protestantism, and which in its later stages has j)assed into gross excess. 33. The same remarks will apply to two more persons who were committed to the flames under Queen Eliza- beth, and also to the cases of two Unitarians, * one of whom likewise declared himself to be the Holy Spirit, and who were burned under James I. in 1612. A third was condemned to a similar fate ; but the king confined him for life instead of executing the original sentence. These instances must be set side by side with ; * Lingard, VI., 15G (4to), chap. III. CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 199 the practice under Romanism in order to institute a cor- rect comparison. Now, a recent historian, Dr. Russell, records that a Scotchman, named Straiton, was burned in 1534, for denying the right of ecclesiastics to tithes.* The law, indeed, was mitigated more tardily than the practice under it and the general opinion. It was only by a statute of the twenty-ninth year of Charles the Second, that the writ de hceretico comburendo was abolished. 34. Taking, then, the establishment of national liberty in religion as the hrst step towards the establishment of our personal freedom of conscience ; and the restriction of capital punishment to cases of dereliction from the faith in points universally held by the church to be es- sential, as the second, we soon find indications of fur- ther progress. \\''hen, under the persecution of Mary, a l)ortion of our reformers had imbibed on the Continent those peculiar views of discipline Avhich distinctively characterised the Swiss reformation ; and when this temper, exaggerated as it was by national tenacity (for the opinions of Martyr and Bucer, representing the continental reformers, had been in favour of conformity), manifested itself in a determined resistance to the habits appointed for the clergy under Elizabeth ; provision was made, as is well known, for the enforcement of the ob- noxious regulations, and after much vacillation they were adhered to and established. Now it is quite true that civil penalties followed upon the disobedience of the ministers to ecclesiastical regulations. The secular * History of the Churcli in Scotland, Vol. I., p. 141. 200 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VI. arm was still invoked, and its aid was afforded to church authority. But while the imposition itself remained arbitrary, as it had been in the days of Romanism, and the right to coerce was asserted and even exercised, yet it underwent an essential change by shifting its ground. It was noAv no longer, by an authority inniiediately and necessarily divine, that matters of discipline or other- wise were adjusted in the church, but by royal com- mand, Avith ecclesiastical assent for the sake of order and expediency, Avith a view to present circumstances. 35. In the "ordinances" or " advertisements "of the year 1564* (though even these were deemed too strin- gent for enforcement in the then temper of the Queen's council), we find the following passage : — " Not yet prescribinge the rules as lawes equivalent with the eternall worde of God, and as of necessitie to bynde the consciences of her subjects in the nature of the said laAves, considered in themselves ; or as that tlieye slioulde adde enye efficacieof more holynes to the mynystration of praier and sacraments, but as constitu- tions meere ecclesiastical, without anye vaine supersti- tion, as positive lawes in discipline, concernynge decency, distinction, and order for the tyme." Thus, while the right to enforce was still asserted, it was not only deprived of the aid of superstition, and divested of its sacred character, but it lost first its moral authority, then excited continually increasing resistance, and at last was surrendered as an impracticable notion. 36. Our third step is, therefore, the descent from a * Strype's Paiker Appendix. CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 201 religious to a civil sanction in respect of ecclesiastical regulations ; not that there was here necessarily involved on the part of the church any dereliction of her appro- priate authority. It was competent to her to enact laws of church discipline, as a church ; but, as a national establishment, she required the edict of the sovereign to give them force. The difference, however, was obvious in the face of the country, and it was a descent from higher to lowev ground ; a descent less conspicuous at the time when it took place, from the severe and arbi- trary tone of civil government during the reigns of the Tudors, than it afterwards became. But the authority of such rules having been once ascribed to a poAver mainly political, of course became sid)iect to deteriora- tion as the idea entertained of that power became lower and more familiar. 37. Butthe reign of Elizabeth furnishes us witha fourth and a more remarkable kind of testimony to the intimate connection between Protestantism and toleration or the liberty of private judgment, which two latter, in reason and equity, imply one another. The great Lord Burleigh himself Avrote atreatise, in 1583, expressly for the purpose of disclaiming the character of .religious persecution, for the severities, nay cruelties, exercised against the Roman recusants.* He declared that the punishments inflicted on them for their religion were inflicted not for its doc- trinal character, but for its social results ; the religion l)eing taken simply as the index of the disposition, from * Mr. Hallam's Constitutional History, Chap. III. (Vol. I., p. IfiO, 4to), and Chap. IV. (Vol. I., p. 244, note, 4to.) 202 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VI. which those social results were produced. Walsingham wrote a letter in 1580 to a similar effect. And even were it granted (which it is not) , that the allegation was untrue, the circumstance would in no degree be weakened as a pregnant evidence of the temper of the age. The doctrine of religious toleration in high places, in the mouth of a dominant party, was a sight alike novel and remarkable, and whether sincere or assumed, it indicates that there existed somewhere an opinion in favour of freedom of conscience, which has no parallel in preceding times. If it was the view of Lord Burleigh and the court in the exercise of its power, how new the circumstance of an association be- t\veen such a position and such a sentiment ! If it was the public feeling forced upon the government (a far less probable supposition) , how different from that same feeling either in a previous generation, or in countries then beneath the sway of the rival church ! The fair (juestion suggested by the case is this : Avould any minister have held the same doctrine in former times, or under a Roman Catholic government at that time ? And if not, how are we to account for the difference ? 38. We find, in addition, an authentic evidence, in the very Act of the 5tli Elizabeth, chap. 1, sect. 17, of the principle on which the oath of supremacy was taken. The passage runs thus : — " Provided always, that foras- much as the queen's majesty is otherwise sufficiently assured of the faith and loyalty of the temporal lords of her high court of parliament," therefore the oath of supremacy shall not be required of them, nor shall they CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 203 be subject to penalties for refusing it. Tlius their religion was left free, their allegiance being deemed secure. It is right to add, that the inferences from Mr. Butler's historical details of the persecution in his "Lives,"* when carefully weighed, support both the allegations of Lord Burleigh and of Walsinghani, and the tenor of the above-cited passage. 39. The history of L-eland, where the state of things before the rebellions is very much misunderstood, affords us a peculiarly instructive contemporary testimony, telling precisely to the same effect. Deputy IMountjoy Avrites to the council of Elizabeth, in the end of her reign, in conformity with the tenor of the directions he had received from them : — " Not that I think too great preciseness can be used in the reforming of ourselves, the abuses of our own clergy, church livings, or discipline ; nor that the truth of the gospel can with too great vehemency or industry be set for\vard, in all ])laces, and by all ordinary means most proper unto itself, that was first set forth and spread in meekness ; nor that I think any corporal prosecution or punishment can be too severe for such as shall be found seditious instruments of foreign or inward prac- tices, nor that I think it fit that any principal magis- trates should be chosen Avithout taking the oath of obedience, nor tolerated in absenting themselves from public divine service ; but that we may be advised how we do punish in their bodies or goods any such only for religion, as do profess to be faithful subjects to her * Vol, I. See also Southey's Book of the Church, chap. XV, 204 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VI. majesty ; and against wliom the contrary cannot be proved."* Accordingly is Avas the complaint of the Irish re- cusants in the rebellion of 1641, that the penal laws had lately begun to be put into execution against them from puritanical influence, having before been in a dormant state. 40. It is curious, and should he observed in passing, that the peculiar theory of church and state, Avhich, as given in the eighth book of Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity, seems to have grown out of the circumstances of the English reformation, had a natural tendency, taken alone, to support the doctrine of persecution. The view of church and state as being merely one society, though under different aspects, seemed to preclude the idea of any essential distinction of the powers which might be legitimately employed for the maintenance of order and authority in each ; more especially as schism is an overt act, if not necessarily, yet ordinarily and naturally. Now it is singular to observe that Hooker's theory, which admits the use of the civil sword, appears to have been actually put in practice under the Stuarts, and all ecclesiastical irregularities Avithin the church made the subjects of temporal penalty by the court of high commission. Thus the general tendency of the Reformation, and the particular circumstances of that change in England, were in opposite directions. The former, as might be expected, finally prevailed. And it is remarkable, that the Presb3 terian body retained the * Lelaud, ii. 383, note. CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 205 doctrine of })ersecution longer und more distinctly than their Episcopalian neighbours, although the authors of the Scottish reformation had so prominently taught the distinctness of the Church and her powers. 41. It is likewise material, in order to a right appre- hension of the ecclesiastical policy under James I. and Charles I., to distinguish the punishments which were inflicted by the Star Chamber from those of the High Connnission Court ; inasmuch as while the latter was ecclesiastical, the former was a civil tribunal, in which prelates appeared as privy councillors, or in virtue of other offices of state which they happened to fill. The High Connnission Court, it is but just to state, while acting upon the tyrannical principles which lay involved in the theory of the eighth book of the Ecclesiastical Polity, was firm and impartial in the repression of vice, exacting public penance alike from high and low.* The point, however, here to be chiefly observed is, that the object of this court was to punish ecclesiastical offences. At present, when the legitimate correctional powers of the church have become dormant, it is difficult for us to appreciate, in a moral sense, the character of such a tribunal, and the real difficulty of drawing the line be- tween that which is within the discipline of the Church over her members, and that which is beyond its pro-- vince. But, however sevei-e the tone of the day, it is clear that persecution, properly so called, was not the principle, but the abuse of the High Commission Court. 42. The capital punishments of Romish priests con- tinued in the reign of James I. From 1607 to 1618, * Lingaid, VI., page 324, (-Ito), ch. V. 206 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VI. sixteen were put to death as traitors for the exercise of their functions. During the great rebellion they sufiered under the parliament to the amount on an average of three anually :* the increased excitement and the pre- dominance of puritanism operating more against them, than the lapse of time, and the general progress of an opinion unfavourable to capital persecution had acted in their favour. 43. Thus far we have seen the principle of private judgment in individuals emerging into life, and differ- ence or separation from the established institutions of religion scarcely under any terms or circumstances permitted. We have now to consider the gradual relaxation of those terms, the progress from a partial to a complete toleration. Under Charles I. a greater connivance was allowed to the English recusants, but they were not recognised. Those of Ireland, however, succeeded in obtaining a recognition from the JMarquis of Ormond,t who, in his treaty of 1646 with the Romish insurgents, allowed the oath of allegiance to be substituted for the oath of suj)remacy. The stipulation Avas, that they might take this oath, giving security, at the same time, for their political allegiance, without renouncing the foreign jurisdiction in spirituals. This was a great step. Religious uni- formity was no longer to be a -condition of citizenship for ordinary purposes. 44. In the English house of peers, indeed, indulgence had from the first proceeded much further, and Roman * Lingard, VI., pagesl54 and 500, (4to), chapters III. and VII. t Leland, Book V., chapters VII. CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 207 Catholic lords enjoyed their seats until the act of the 30th of Charles II. But this appears to have been rather an exception, permitted from its necessarily narrow range of practical application, than the distinct allowance of a principle. And so it maybe observed of the JNIarquis of Ormond's treaty, that the concession was made under the extreme necessities of war, and did not represent what in the opinions of any Protestant party of the time it would have been, per se, wise or desirable to grant. 45. Again, the Independent General Ireton, in his reply to the plea of Browne, one of the Irish insurgents, laid down the folloAving position : " That touching the point of religion there was a wide difference also be- tween us ; we only contending to preserve our natural right therein, without imposing our opinions upon other men ; whereas they would not be contented, imless they might have power to compel all others to submit to their imposition on pain of death."* Practically indeed ^^•e find this profession illustrated in a singular manner by the ejection of 8000 of the clergy of England ; but the fact still remains, that the theory had arisen, and was gradually to work itself out. 46. The reign of Charles II. was not distinguished by the relaxation of the principle of connection between the church and the state. The dread of Romanism at that period defended it on one side, and the recollection of the years 1648 — 1660, on the other. Accordingly, the corporation act was passed in 1061, to replace * Leland's Ireland, Vol. III., imge 3 90, note. 208 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VI. churchmen in the possession of municipal offices, by imposing the sacramental test ; and the Protestant sepa- ration, wliich now assumed a definite form, did not obtain legal toleration, though the king coquetted Avith it, and at two periods issued declarations of indulgence, (1662 and 1672) which in deference to his parliament he withdrew. These were disliked, it would appear, by the commons, partly on account of the assumption of prerogative involved in them ; partly because their intention was suspected to be that of relieving not the Protestant but the Popish nonconformists. In 1673, the test act was passed. It imposed three restrictions ; the oaths of supremacy and allegiance, the test of having received the communion in the church, and the abjuration of transubstantiation. Thus it shut the door of all public office against both Romanists and Dissenters, Avhile the former were its special objects, and the Roman Catholic peers were deprived of their hereditary privilege of legislation by the act of 1678. 47. During the very short period of eleven years, from this time to the toleration act in 1689, the church of England had exclusive possession of the precincts of parliament. But the crown was Roman Catholic, really through the whole time up to 1688, and avow- edly from the accession of James II. At no time, therefore, in strictness of speech, was the Avhole legis- lature in bond fide communion with the church : yet as Charles was a professed churchman, we may, perhaps, set down the last years of his reign as affording a naked exemplification of the principle, too short-lived, how- CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 209 ever, and complicated with too many extraneous cir- cumstances, in particular with a denial of toleration, to allow any fair deductions to be drawn. 48. We find, however, a curious fact in the Irish history of reign of Charles II. It was then that the Earl of Granard procured for the puritans of Ireland a pension of 500/ annually from government.* Was this the first grant to the professors of a faith not established, excepting such as had reference thereby to what are termed vested interests, like the allowances to the ejected ministers in England ? If so, it is very important as the commencement of an actual aid afforded by the government to a form of religion differing from its own ; and is to be distinguished, in this point of view, from the concession of Charles I., who agreed to an ex- periment of Presbyterian government in the church for the period of three years. 49. The suspension of the penal laws by James II., having been illegal, it established no principle and re- quires here no comment. In 1689 the Toleration Act was passed. It exempted all who should subscribe the declaration of 1678 (that, namely, against transub- stantiation) from penalties for holding open religious assemblies ; and the indulgence likewise embraced their teachers, on condition of the signing their declaration, taking tlie oaths, and subscribing the articles of religion except part of the 20th, the 34th, 35th, and 36th. But the reign of William III. was otherwise, and more un- * Leland, Vol. Ill, p. 490. P 210 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VI. favourably distinguished. Influenced apparently by political motives alone, he set the example of allying the crown of Great Britain, by the formal compact of that Act of Parliament which re-established Presbyterian government in Scotland, with two churches. It is true that in the early part of James I.'s reign it stood nearly in the same perdicament, but the anomaly was then felt and removed. In 1690 it was re-established. 50. This reign also supplies us with another instance of assistance given by government to a religion differing from that established ; but we should remember that acts so minute as these were probably little more than eleemosynary in their original character. King William, in the summer of 1690, having landed in Ireland, allowed 1200/. per annum to the dissent- ing ministers in the northern province, Avho, says Leland,* " had shared deeply in the distresses of war." This pension was afterwards inserted in the civil list, and made payable from the exchequer. 51. The Act of Union with Scotland (IMay, 1707) further complicated the question with reference to the connection of church and state. By it the nation was involved in the religious anomaly wliich had formerly belonged to the sovereign alone, and the church of Scot- land was incorporated with the constitution of the two united kingdoms upon the same footing, in the most essential respects, with the church of England. Doubt- less it was under the belief, however questionable its * III., p. 559. CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 211 foundation, that the differences between the two churches were unimportant, and that unity was not substantially- violated by the change. Subsequently to the rebellion of 1745, the episcopalians of Scotland were subjected to a legal suppression of their worship with fine and imprisonment, and their ministers to the penalty of transportation, for exercising beyond the border the very religion which the government protected by tests on this side of it. It was upon political grounds that this conduct was adopted ; conduct which may serve to show how delicate is the subject-matter of the question with which we are dealing, and liow necessary is a clear comprehension of the principles which should govern the relations betAveen the church and the state. 52. It is not a part of the object of the present pages to furnish a distinct and detailed history of the laws affecting religious nonconformity. The general descrip- tion of the system of the eighteenth century may be com- prised under these few heads : — 1. Joint establishment of the Episcopal and Presbyterian forms. 2. Pro- scription of the Roman Catholic religion generally, on political grounds, and of the Episcopalian religion on the same grounds in Scotland alone. 3. Relaxation as respected the Ronian Catholics, and entire relief as regarded the Episcopalians, during the latter part of the century, when danger from the house of Stuart had ceased to be apprehended. 4. Protection of the Esta- blished Church of England in office, and the Legislature, by the sacramental test, with an indulgence to Dissenters, p2 212 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VI. intended to admit them without recognising them as such. 53. The history of the Roman Catholic question should, however, be marked by its chief eras. In 1778 the Roman Catholics of Ireland were empowered bylaw to hold landed property. In 1791 many professional and other disabilities were removed. In 1793 the elective franchise was given them. And, to pass into the next century, in 1829 the bar to their entrance into the legislature was removed, by their exemption from taking the usual oaths and declaration, and the construction of one to meet their case, by which they engage as fol- lows : — " I do hereby disclaim, disavow, and solemnly abjure any intention to subvert the present church establishment as settled by law within this realm ; and I do solemnly swear that I never will exercise any privi- lege to which I am or may l)ecome entitled, to disturb or weaken the Protestant religion or Protestant government in the United Kingdom," The terms of this oath appear to imply, that if Roman Catholics legislate in matters affecting the church for good or for evil, they must do it in the ho7id fde intention that it shall be for good ; and the great difficulty which it seems to raise is this, that the state exacts from them an obligation, binding them to follow a course as good legislators, which I apprehend, as good Roman Catholics, they are forbidden to take. At the period of this change, the great bulk of the Roman Catholic freeholders were disfranchised. Again they Avere much increased, and tiie fiicility of access to Par- liament greatly enlarged, by the Reform Act in 1832. CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 213 54. Of the resistance to the Roman Catholic claims it may be said that it intended rather than exhibited a noble and true principle, the pure union of church and state. But the principle was already become a dream of other days. The presence of dissent was already legalised in every form but that of Romanism ; and no ground is less tenable than that which defines compe- tency for political office by that mere negation which the term Protestantism is frequently used to designate, and accepts it as a guarantee for something like eft'ective Christianity ; a credulity the more strange when exhi- bited, as is sometimes the case, in company with the cruel and false opinion that, as Protestantism and Chris- tianity are inseparable, so Romanism and Christianity are incompatible. 55. In the year 1828 all Protestant nonconformists obtained a legal recognition of their fitness for Parliament and civil office, by the removal of the sacramental test. The remaining restriction is, that in its place they are required to declare upon the faith of a Chrintian. The definition of Christianity it is left to each individual to determine for himself. Is has been already many times attempted to abolish this declaration ; and in the year 1834 a bill reached the House of Lords, which would have left all public offices, with the sole exception, under the crown, of the chancellorship, alike open to men of all religions, or of none. 56. It only remains to notice the gradual expiration of the doctrine of persecution, or civil punishment for religious opinions. The opinions which alone it is now 214 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP, VI. ever attempted to bring under the notice of the law are not religious, or rather they are not opinions, but mere appeals in contempt of the understanding to the grossest parts of human nature. Perhaps the last case of actual punishment was the separation of Mv. Slielley's chil- dren from their father by Lord Eldon as chancellor, and that was incidental, the object being, not the punishment of atheism, but the due education of the children. We find the opinion of the lawfulness of civil penalties on account of religion, under, perhaps, its last forms, in Mr. Locke, and in Bishop Warburton. Mr. Locke teaches, in his work on Toleration, that the man who does not believe in a future life cannot be regarded as a competent citizen, because the state has no security for his good conduct. Bishop ^\''arburton* teaches, that the Quaker, the Anabaptist, the Papist, and the Atheist are all iu diflferent degrees the proper object of re- straining or penal law ; but the Quaker's measure is merely this : that, as he believes war unlawful, he should not be allowed, on the continent, to reside in a frontier town. 57. To prevent misunderstanding it may be well to notice a distinct class of civil penalties, to which members of the church are amenable for certain infractions of its laws.f The general principle of these enactments is, I apprehend, capable of being understood (whatever its historical origin), upon a principle quit distinct from * Alliance of Church and State, B. III. Works, Vol. VII., p. 255. t Enumerated by Mr. Palmer, " On the Church," Part V., Chap. VIII. CHAP. VI. J WITH THE CHURCH. 216 that of persecution. The question belonging to this place is not one of degree, whether tlie particuhir punishments which, for example^ a clergyman may suffer for rejecting the use of the Common Prayer be too great or too small, but whether they involve the prin- ciple of persecution. It is submitted that they do not. Tiie church, having temporal endowments, may require, in order to guard her internal discipline, the aid of tem- poral power, that, Avhere the temptations to intrusion and disorder are increased, the means of repressing them may be increased likewise. But whether she might or might not do well to rely more on her intrinsic powers, it is clear that the state may fairly urge the necessity of guarding these endowments as a reason for the enactment of temporal penalties, to follow upon the infringement of the conditions upon which they are held. Such infringement is a violation of the condi- tions of the compact with the state, and therefore an offence against the state, quite apart from the considera- tion, that it is also an offence against the apostolic pre- cept of order as interpreted and applied in the existing arrangements. 58. As respects, however, the law of the greater excom- munication, which is, ex vi termini, applicable only to those who are already out of the church, it still enacts (under 53 Geo. III. cap. 127), that a person* excom- municated for an offence of spiritual cognisance may be Burn, II., 243 ; and Blackstone, III., 101. 216 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CIIAP. VI. imprisoned for any term not exceeding six months. The temporal judges may see, whether the spiritual court had ])roper cognisance of the cause, and whether the excommunication be according to law, and, if it be not, may direct the absolution of the party. It should be observed, that the jurisdiction of the ecclesiastical courts is mainly conversant with the mixed matters which are connected with wills, and with a particular class of crimes.* In the Act 29 Car. II., cap. 9, sect. 2, the penalty for excommunication, of course with its civil consequences, is, however, reserved in case of proved heresy. The proceeding is undoubtedly antiquated ; and it is doubtful whether a law, Avhich for so long a series of years has not been brought into operation, should or should not be considered as expressing the mind of the legislature. 59. But how singular is tlie perverseness of human nature — apparently the only rule to which it clings amidst every variety of fluctuation. There is no period of our history which exhibits a full and consistent de- velopment of a satisfactory system of principles. AA'hen our legislature was bound to take all its members from the church, Ave were intolerant. "\\'^hen toleration was established, we relaxed the principle of the unity of the national religion. By the time each successive truth was established, new falsehoods had sprung up to re- place those which were exploded. Thus it is that, in * Namely, the crimes appertaining to the title of " Matrimony, bas- tardy, adultery, and the rest." — Burn, II. 31. CHAP. VI.] M ITH THE CHURCH. 217 the mixed combinations of worldly affairs, even the most needful, and, on the -whole, beneficial changes, bear Avithin them the seeds of disorganisation. 60. Taking our stand then at the point where the civil right of private judgment may be considered as having received full and absolute recognition by the legal esta- l)lishnient of entire toleration, Ave find that it there begins to operate in a manner AA liich, if its acts be translated into AA'ords, AA'ould be somewhat as follows : — " In vain it is pretended to give me, a private individual, the liberty of forming my OAvn opinion, if secular advantages are to be attached to the profession of other and different opinions, in Avhich mine is not to participate : since every such advantage Avill manifestly act as in the nature of a comparative discouragement on the one side, and in- ducement on the other, creating, therefore, a bias in the minds of men, and impairing the freedom of their judgment." To Avhich, in certain cases, may be added the yet more palpable charge that money is taken from the individual to support the doctrines Avhich he denies. I is no\A' not proposed to refute these fallacious allega- tions, but, havhig shoAvn their connection Avith private judgment, to trace their influence on the relations of the state Avith the church. 61. The discharge of civil office is in its first aspect a duty, but it also partakes of the nature of a reward. Its emoluments in part, but more than these its poAA'ers and distinctions, render it to th(y majority of men, in their several stations, an object ardently desired. So long as theological opinion Avas in profession one and 218 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VI. the same, no objection could be made against one indi- vidual as a canditate for civil office, nor any preference awarded to another, on the ground of religious belief as such. But when different sentiments in religion were permitted to exist without legal animadversion, the case was materially changed. The individual who found that his creed was the obstacle to his enjoyment of office, and who was irritated by exclusion, argued with plausibility, that matters of belief ought not to exclude him from duties Avhose obvious bearing was upon sub- jects of a distinct nature. And these considerations would gain force progressively, as the simple principles- of early society became complicated in its advance, by the immense multiplication of human enjoyments, and of human wants, and the consequently augmented pro- portion which temporal interests bore in the science and practice of government to the higher portions of its subject-matter. 62. But public offices were the organs of the national life. In them the personality of the nation had its province and means of action. And the supreme go- vernment had received, from the order of things esta- blished at the Reformation, the especial charge of impregnating the whole of that national life Avith the spirit and energy of the national religion. Hence the struggle in this country, incited by contemporaneous causes from opposing quarters, between the established church for the retention of civil office, and the Dis- senters and Romanists on the other hand for a share in its possession. CHAP. VI.] WITH THE CHURCH. 219 It may, indeed, have been mere human selfishness which prompted the attack on the one hand, and sus- tained the resistance on the other. But, sometimes predominating over this degrading motive, and ever parallel with it, there was a movement and a counter- movement of a distinct nature. The movement was that towards a dissolution of the union between church and state : the counter-movement, or resistance, was that of instinctive aversion to the first stages of such a proceeding. Not that all those of the movement con- templated, or were bound in reason to contemplate, its termination : not that there are not between its two ex- tremities rational and tenable positions : not that we venture to pronounce an opinion upon the merits ; but that, clearly, admission to civil office without religious distinction shortened the road over which men had to travel towards that consunnnation which is now coming into view. 63. Although the first plea of the Romanist and the Dissenter may be considered as no more than this, that their differences from us in religious belief did not absolutely disqualify them from the discharge of public functions ostensibly secular ; yet, when once they were opened, nothing remained to refute the idea of an abso- lutely equal competency in them to fulfil the general purposes of government with that of persons belonging to the church. If the oath taken by Roman Catholic members be an exception to the state of facts assumed by this observation, yet let us remark how much sore- ness has been evinced under the pressure of that oath ; 220 THE STATE IX ITS RELATIOXS [cHAP. VL haw modi regret at its original enartment ; how mach desire for its repeal. And it is difficult and inridioas forAtosajtoB^orfora class A to say to a class B, our fifnesB is wip qi ui to yours, wben the legal recog- nition is die same. Thus we hare, first, a state of circamstanees facilitating reiigioos differences; then, because men will not willingly resign objects of desire, we have the effort to s^niate all consideration of such diffierences finim that of the reqniates to ci?il office. And next, here is first inanoated, and finally affirmed, the prinei]Je, that di&ienccs in rdigions opinion have no bearing npon the disdiai^ of political and social duties, but tiiat they may be iidfilkd equally well by men of all creeds. 64. There is, bowerer, a very important au x iliary canae which accelerates the arriTal cf a state at the terrific fnadfie which has been just enunciated. We shall readi it by considering what is contained under tibe tenn (sU creeds. Now, when toleration was first con- ceded, and when the possession of civil office under the form en to Dissenters in this country, undn^ annual acts indemnity, it was as- sumed that the subjects <^ this indulgence agreed with as in the fimdamental parts (rf* our religimi, and i habitual celebra- tion on board ship. Isolation at sea has prevented any allowance to the men of leave to attend their own mi- nister or sect, and any permission of absence would probably have been found incompatible with discipline. To determine accurately the merits of the present prac- tice would require considerable discussion and detail ; our present object is to note facts. 17. In the British army the practice is, it appears, somew hat more varied. Under the general orders of the service, Roman Catholic soldiers are every\A'here exempted from attending the service of the church. In Ireland their officers resort to chapel with them, in order to prevent their being tampered ^vith l)y political harangues ; but the precaution hardly meets the sup- posed necessity, as the sermons are often in Irish. There is no similar exemption for dissenters ; probably because no rule of their religious communities in general forbids their attendance at the worship of the establish- ment. At each military home station divine service is performed by local clergymen of the established churches 248 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VII. ill England and Scotland respectively. Episcopalians and Roman Catholics are entitled, in Scotland, to repair to their respective churches. The troops stationed in the forts in Scotland are allowed the services of a Pres- byterian clergyman at the public expense. Thus it would appear that the principle of the army is, a full toleration of the Roman Catholics, a recognition of the established church of Scotland in Scotland, of the church of England elsewhere. 18. To continue our review of public institutions: Ave are not aware that in any prisons or workhouses of this country persons have been, uj) to the present year (1838), entertained as officers belonging to the esta- blishments in any spiritual capacity, except clergynieu of the church of England. The ministers of other per- suasions are admitted to attend those who desire their aid, with more or less freedom, according to the nature of the institution and its management. At JNlilbank Penitentiary, for instance, which is a prison, and a cor- rectional one, Roman Catholic priests are allowed to attend Roman Catholic prisoners in the cases when a desire to that effect is expressed, but the same liberty is not given to Protestant dissenters. The Roman Catholic prisoners, how ever, in a large majority of cases, will- ingly and even gladly receive the instructions of the chaplain, attending the worship of the church, and even partake of the holy communion iiccording to the liturgy. During the late session of Parliament, a clause Avas introduced, in the House of Commons, into a bill for the management of prisons, authorising the CHAP. VII.] WITH THE CHIRCH. 249 appoinlnient to gaols, uiuler cerlaiii ciicumstances, of niinisters not belonging to the church ; but as the bill ^^•as lost at an early stage in the U])per House, there was no opportunity of ascertaining the full amount of specific objection entertained to this particular enactment. 19. The aid of the state is given in England to schools of two kinds, those in connection with the Incorporated National Society, and those under the British and Foreign School Society. The former follow Bell, the latter Lancaster. The former give a definitive church education, teaching the catechism, using prayer, and require attendance at the public worship of the church ; the latter adopt the Bible as their basis of religious in- struction, ostensibly renouncing exposition of a contro- versial, or what we should rather call a doctrinal kiud ; this line, however, is far from being accurately observed in practice. An Unitarian witness made complaints to that effect before a Parliamentary Committee in 1834.* Upon the subject of the church, however, it is under- stood that they teach nothing affecting the differences that exist in this country, which may be termed nothing absolutely. They do not recognise distinctions of reli- gious connnunion ; nor, we believe, a form of prayer. There are schools in connexion with them, taught on Unitarian principles. The principle of this grant for schools is greatly short of a fidl church principle, and yet does not positively contravene it ; first, because it absolutely disclaims all sectarian teaching ; secondly, * See evidence of the Rev. Samuel Wood, in the Repoit of the Select Committee of the House of Commons, on Education, in 183-1. — Questions 2123-7. 250 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VII. because schools are not so entirely appropriated to reli- gion as to require the whole system of the church in the same degree with those institutions- which have no other end, and are the paramount means for the attainment of that end. It is supposed that half the children in the British and Foreign Society's schools may be members of the church of England ; they are instructed in a part only of what they should believe and know. It remains, however, indisputably true, that the only full scheme of teaching in religion recognised under the Parliamentary grant, is that of the National Society, whicli is likewise that of the church. 20. The next item which we have to notice is one Avhich appears to be more decidedly a deviation from the church principle— a small vote taken in the estimates for the benefit of Protestant dissenting ministers, and of poor French refugee clergy. The latter part of tliis grant (which amounts for 1838 to £3,195) is so evi- dently charitable that it hardly raises a question. As regards the former, it is put in charge of trustees belong- ing to the several bodies entitled the Three Denomi- nations, one of which is now really, though not profess- edly. Unitarian. It still retains the Presbyterian name. Recently there was a movement out of Parliament among some of the dissenters in favour of the discon- tinuance of this vote ; the trustees immediately pro- tested, and gave their reasons. From these it appeared that the vote operated rather by way of charity to the individuals than effective support to congregations. This plea, however, might be considered as terminating CHAP. VII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 251 with the Hves of the present hoklers ; but, in point of fact, it appears that the money given was originally a part of the private bounty of the crown, which Parlia- ment inherits in virtue of the civil-list compact, and \vhich therefore may stand rather in the light of a debt than of a spontaneous gift, with reference to those from Avhom at the present time it immediately proceeds. A small portion of the House of Commons divided against the grant this year, as an infringement of the voluntary principle ; a very large majority passed it. 21. "W^e have now mentioned the public acts and prac- tices immediately bearing upon the question of church and state within the borders of England. Negatively, indeed, much more might be said. While such masses of our population lie in darkness, and without access to the ordinances of the church, it might well be argued that the government is sadly neglectful of its duty in not making the effort to supply that deficiency. Yet this neglect, however unfortunate or blameworthy, is distinct in its nature from positive acts done in contra- vention of church principles ; and is also more easily reparable. 22. We now turn to the realm of Ireland, which is less easily disposed of, as presenting more serious anomalies. The points for consideration under this head are — the College of ]\fayno()th ; the Regium Donum ; the Na- tional System of Education, together Avith a brief re- ference to tlie Kildare Place Society ; the employment of chaplains in gaols ; and the proposed arrangement in the new Poor Law scheme. 252 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAl*. VII. 23. The support of the College of Maynooth was ori- ginally undertaken ])y the Protestant parliament of Ire- land, in the anticipation, Avhich lias since proved miserably fallacious, that a more loyal class of priests would be produced by a home education than by a foreign one, and that a gradual mitigation in the fea- tures of Irish Romanism would be produced Avhen her ministers were no longer familiarised with its condition in continental countries where it remains the religion of the state. Instead of which it has been found that the llicility of education at home has opened the j)riest- hood to a lower and less cultivated class, and one more liable to the influence of secondary motives. It can hardly be denied that this is a AA ell-merited disappoint- ment. If the state gives anything of pecuniary support, it should, in consistency, give everything. Unless it is bound iu conscience to maintain the national church as God's appointed vehicle of religious truth, it should adopt as its rule the numbers and the needs of the several classes of religionists ; and in either aspect the claim of the Roman Catholics is infinitely the strongest. In amount this grant is niggardly and unworthy. In principle it is wholly vicious ; and it will be a thorn in the side of the State of these countries so long as it is continued. When foreigners express their astonishment at finding that Ave support in Ireland the church of a small minority, we may tell them that we support it, on the high ground of conscientious necessity, for its truth ; but how should we blush at the same time to sup- port an institution, whose avowed and legitimate pur- CHAP. VII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 253 pose it is constantly to diinoiince that truth as false- hood ! If indeed our faith be pledged to the college, by all means let us acquit ourselves of the obligation ; but it is monstrous that we should be the voluntary feeders of an establishment which exhibits at once our jealous parsimony, our lax principles, and our erroneous calculations. 24. The Regium Donum is a gift annually voted in parliament for the partial support of Presbyterian minis- ters in Ireland ; and a portion of the participators are re- presented as holding Arian and Socinian doctrines. Tiiis being the case it will in all probability be extensively con- fessed, that the grant, were it at our free discretion, is unjustifiable ; while, in another point of view, having been originally given to those who believed in the Holy Trinity, it serves to illustrate the difficulty in which governments entangle themselves, when they covenant with ar])itrary systems of opinion, and not with the church alone. The opinion passes away, but the gift remains. The fault was in affixing a condition whose fulfilment it did not sufficiently lie within the state's jurisdiction to enforce. But its name imports that this grant is one which was established by the sovereign, and is inherited ])y us under compact like that to the Protestant dissenting ministers of England. 25. We come next to the grants for the Kildare Place Society, and for the National System of Education in Ireland. The former was exactly analogous in principle to the grants now made to the British and Foreign School Society, the difference in detail being, 254 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VII. that tlie Kildare Place Society did not make the Bible the exclusive vehicle of religious instruction. They concurred, however, in the main point of precluding instruction in peculiar doctrines. As respects the latter, we are here concerned not with its practice, but its principles. Its original object was to encourage rather than to afford a joint education to children of all denominations in Ireland in moral and literary instruc- tion. The former was to comprise as much of Scrip- ture reading in the form of extracts as could be agreed on by a board composed from the several religious denominations. The funds voted Avere intended to build school-houses, supply requisites, and afford gratuities to deserving masters. The several classes were permitted to have the use of the school-houses for separate reli- gious instruction. A certain portion of the week was to be set apart for that ol)ject. The Bible, or any catechisms, subject to the approbation of the members of the board professing each form respectively, might then be intro- duced. The idea does not appear to have been that the state should supply the people with a Roman Catholic education, so far as it can be collected from Lord Stanley's letter to the Duke of Leinster in 1831. There have been, hoAvever, practical departures from that letter, whicli was as it were the charter of the system, of a very important kind, over and above cases of glaring and punishable abuse. The plan now pur- sued is, to pay salaries instead of gratuities to the teachers ; and the amount of fees and local subscriptions is, I apprehend, very small. The state, therefore, CHAP. VII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 255 is likely to become the paymaster for the whole in- struction, and consequently responsible for the whole. The board have likewise authorised the introduction of the separate instruction during school hours — another very important deviation, intended probably to conciliate opponents, but not apparently at all removing the liability to serious objections in point of principle. 26. When the Irish Poor Law Bill of 1837 was under discussion, a division took place in the House of Com- mons against the clause which authorised the appoint- ment of chaplains to the Avorkhouses, either of the Esta- blished or of the Roman Catholic church, or belonging to some body of Dissenters. In the Act of the present year there is a clause, authorising the Commissioners to appoint in any workhouse one chaplain of the church, one of the Roman Catholic church, and one l^eing a Protestant Dissenter. 27. Ey the Act 50 Geo. III., cap. 103, sect. 47, and again by the Act 7 Geo. IV., cap. 74, sect. 68, each and every grand jury may appoint, and are required to ap- point, a chaplain of the established church of England and Ireland to the several gaols ; and, if they are re- quired by the court, to appoint also a Protestant dis- senting chaplain ; and likewise, if similarly required by the court, to appoint a Roman Catholic chaplain. This provision has been productive of serious difficulties in practice, whicli in one case have been brought under the notice of the public. 28. It is fair, however, to observe, that, whatever ob- jection may fairly lie against either of the two last-cited 256 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VII. Acts ill respect of the provisions to which allusion has been made, yet the cases of paupers confined in work- houses, and still more of prisoners inmmred in gaols, are not to be confounded with those of persons free to act for themselves. They have no pecuniary resources to assist in supporting a clergyman. They have no power of locomotion to resort to one. It is indeed possible to reply, that the latter objection may be met l)y giving access to a minister : the former would establish a similar claim on behalf of all the destitute throughout the king- dom. Still there remains behind a notion, that persons confined are not free agents — that they are not therefore competent to exercise an impartial judgment in mat- ters of religion — and that it might be unfair, and in the nature of seduction rather than conversion, to take ad- vantage of their dependent position for the purpose of bringing them over to the church. There is more of show than substance in such a charge. If no temporal favoui s follow the reception of the ordinances of the church, I see nothing to render it impure; but the fore- going remarks may show that if, in a spirit of indul- gence, these enactments be made for workhouses and prisons, they do not establish a precedent from which general endowment can fairly be deduced. 29. Wc have now concluded our review of the practice of government throughout the United Kingdom, in re- gard to the duty of yielding its exclusive support to the church. And, chequered as is the picture it presents, we must next contemplate one of a colouring yet more unsatisfactory to the eye which dwells with dqsire on CHAP. VII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 257 tlie picture of religious unity, and on the authority and fixedness of public institutions, as among the linman instruments of promoting it. We are to consider liow, throughout the various colonial dependencies of the British Crown, their respective governments, and the corresponding departments at home, are now regu- lating their conduct with respect to the support and propagation of religion. We shall have to review the cases of the Canadas, of the diocese of Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward's Island in particular ; of the West Indies, in respect both to church and to school establishments, and comprising within themselves many varieties ; of the Australian colonies, where vicious prin- ciples have recently assumed the form of a system, and obtained the sanction of law : and, lastly, of the East Indies under the Act of 1833. 30. We may, however, remark, that although the colo- nies are more spotted than the United Kingdom with the recognition of religious disunion in the ecclesiastical policy of the state ; yet, on the other hand, we have not the same degree of responsibility to them which we have towards the people at home, because they are not placed in the same closeness of natural union and depend- ence. The relations in which we stand to the colonies are very various. The power of the state t(\^retain them in ])olitical connection with this country is much less, nay, the right is much more indeterminate, than those Avliich it possesses over all persons residing within the natural limits of these realms. Those who repair to them often do it under such circumstances, and such a sense s 258 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VII. of civil equality, and with such inadequate instruction respecting the church, that they do not brook the idea of what they wrongly deem a preference given to par- ticular opinions for political purposes. In all Avhich is now to be set down, there is no blame intended, generally speaking, to what has been merely permitted ; but only where there has been a sacrifice of our own national conscience, by a participation in the doing of what it condemned. 31. Taking, first, the North American division of the British colonies, we find that in the colony of Upper Canada there are endowed rectories of the church of England, Avhich were constituted by instruments under the great seal, to the number of fifty-six, during the administration of Sir John Colborne.* Glebes, aver- aging about four hundred acres of wild lands, were annexed to each. There are twenty-five clergymen of the Presbyterian body in connection with the church of Scotland, receiving allowances generally of 57/. each from government, under authority of Lord Aberdeen's despatch, 22nd February, 1835. There are twelve ministers of the united synod of Upper Canada, re- ceiving government allowances of about 63/. each, under authority of Lord Rij)on's despatch of 22nd Nov., 1832. There are thirty Roman Catholic ministers receiving 50/. each annually ; and 100/. is paid to their bishop as a pension. The "N^^esleyan IMethodists receive 700/. annually. * Vide Pailiameutaiy Paper, No. 391, of 1836 ; and the History of the Church in Upper Canada, by the Rev, W. Bettridge, Rector of AVood- stock in that Colony, London, 1838. CHAP. VII,] WITH THE CHURCH. 259 32. The proceeds of the clergy reserves, for Upper Canada, appear to have been, in 1836, as follows : Rents of leased clergy reserves . . £2141 Interest on sales of ditto . . . .2163 Dividends on proceeds of sales, vested in England 655 Total £4959 The church expenditure, on account of these funds, was 5830/. ; besides which we find a charge on the casual and territorial revenues of 2765/. This charge is to be diminished by deaths, and by any increase in the funds of the reserves. We find, at the same time, the charges for other bodies standing thus : For the Presbyterian clei'gy of the Scotch church £1541 For the united synod .... 699 For the Roman Catholic Church, including 100/. paid as a pension to the bishop . . 1 600 For the Wesleyans 700 33. In Upper Canada there is a feeling, among the democratic party, in favour of devoting the clergy re- serves to purposes of education. A Bill, professedly for that purpose, was rejected, in 1835, by the coun- cil. In 1836, however, it was proposed in the As- sembly to divide them among the churches of Eng- land, Scotland, Rome, the Wesleyans, and the Baptists. A strong opposition to this project was made on behalf of the church, and likewise from a sentiment, Avhich appeared to obtain considerable prevalence, that the s 2 260 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VII. reserves should be made applicable to all Protestant religious communities, ljut that the church of Rome should not be allowed to participate in them. The scheme failed. In 1837 a suggestion of Lord Ripon's, that the reserves should be re-vested in the crown, was taken uj), but was lost in the Assembly by a single vote. It had been proposed in 1832 and 1833, but without taking effect. The legislative council has declared a conviction that the question cannot arrive at a settlement in the province. 34. In the colony of Lower Canada, the Bishop of Montreal and cerUiin rectors, in number about six or seven, are paid by annual vote of Parliament. From the same source a Roman Catholic bishop receives 1000/. annually. It is understood that the whole of these votes are to terminate with the lives of the existing holders. At the cession of the province the rights of the Roman Catholic church generally were confirmed, and it re- mains in possession of large and valuable landed pro- perty, and also of the tithe, subject to an exception where the occupier is a Protestant, in which case he is exempt. 35. By the Constitutional Act of 1791, in conformity with the tenor of ancient instructions to governors to make provision everywhere for the worship of the cliurcli, one seventh part of all wild lands were directed to be set apart, under the title of clergy reserves, as settlements should extend. As they were found to remain uncul- tivated, and thus to impede the general progress of the districts in which they were ])laced, a power has been CHAP. VII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 261 taken by Act 7 and 8 Geo. IV., cliaj). G2, of selling tlioin, and holding the proceeds for the benefit, according to the terms of the Act of 1791, of a Protestant clergy. This provision extends to both the Canadas. There has been much controversy upon the question, Avhether this phrase includes the clergy of the church of Scot- land. In conformity with an opinion given by the law officers of the crown at home in the year 1819, it has of late been held that they are so included : and a sum of ;;00/., the intere.*-t of moneys arising out of the sale of clergy reserves in Lower Canada, has been applied to the support of Presbyterian ministers. 36. In Lower Canada a very large sum is charged for 1836, under the head of education, no less than 31,000/. There are no payments from colonial funds to any reli- gious communion. The sales of reserves have produced 31,085/. (stock 3 per cents.), a portion of the interest of which is applied to the church of Scotland. Aljout 400/. a-year still remains unappropriated, having been realised only within the last few months. The crown is precluded from assenting to any act which alters the disposition of the reserves, until copies of it shall have lain on the tables of both Houses of Parliament for forty days ; and any address from either House during that interval is to render such assent unlawful. The whole subject has been referred by the colonial department to the local legislatures, with the understanding that they are to have the initiative in any measures for altering the present legal dispositions. 37. In the colony of Newfoundland the clergymen of 262 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VII, the church have no payments from the colony itself. The archdeacon is paid 300/. from the parliamentary estimate. The Roman Catholic bishop has 751. from the same source. A grant of eight acres of land has lately been made for the erection of a Roman Catholic cathe- dral. It is stated, by parties connected with the co- lony, that the contributions of the Roman Catholics of Newfoundland to the support of their bishop and clergy amount in value to not less than 6000/. or 7000/. annually. 38. There is no ecclesiastical charge upon the colony of Prince Edward's Island, as appears by the returns of the year 1837. The missionaries of the church are paid by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel. There is a vote of 100/. per annum from the British Parliament for a Presljyterian minister. There were in this colony certain church-lands, in the proportion of 130 acres to each toAvnship of 20,000. Instructions were sent from the Colonial Department during the secretaryship of JMr. Spring Rice, to the effect that a plan should be proposed for selling the lands. The Assembly and Council passed a bill not only directing the sale of the lands, but appropriating the proceeds to the purposes of general education. This bill was assented to at home in the year 1836. On a remon- strance from the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, the Society was informed that the Royal assent had been given under an erroneous impression, that the Colonial Act was in conformity with the instructions of the Colonial Department. CHAP. Vir.] WITH THE CHURCH. 263 39. In the colony of New Brunswick the clergy of the church of England are paid by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel ; and those of the Scottish church mainly by their congregations. The Assembly gave in 1836 nearly 10,000/. for education; but there is no vote of any kind for religious purposes, except a payment of 50/. per annum on the recently granted civil list^ for a Presbyterian minister. There are lands in this colony set apart for purposes of religion, amounting to upwards of 50,000 acres; they are entirely unproductive, and no act, I believe, has been passed to permit them to be sold. The archdeacon receives 300/. a-year, a grant which is included in the parliamentary estimate. 40. In the colony of Nova Scotia the public expendi- ture, taken for the year 1836^ exhibits a charge of 7600/. under the head of the Ecclesiastical Department. Of this sum 6830/. consisted of salaries to the bishop and clergy, of which 6150/. was granted on the parlia- mentary estimate. One vote of 75/. is for a Presby- terian minister. The colony itself is at no public charge whatever. Before the year 1831, the Society for the Propa- gation of the Gospel received, by annual vote of Par- liament, 16,000/. for the support of the church in North America. In that year it was determined by the Colonial Department that the vote should be w'lili- draAvn at the rate of 25 per cent, annually ; the effect of which would have been its total extinction in 1835. Lord Stanley, however, while Colonial Secretary, made 264 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VII. an arrangement for continuing the vote at the rate of 4000/. annually, subject only to gradual diminution as the missionaries in receipt of it might die or resign. For 1838 it amounts to 3500/., which is ajjplied, through the Society, entirely to the colony of Nova Scotia. 41. As respects the West Indian colonies, two bishops, and a certain number of clergy, are provided for them by an Act of the Imperial Parliament passed in the year 1825; and tliey are divided into two dioceses, \mder the sees of Jamaica and Barbadoes. No funds are voted by the Imperial Parliament in support of any other religious denomination for the ^Vest Indies. A A'ote, however, was taken in the year 1835, for the promotion of " moral and religious education on liberal and comprehensive principles," in compliance with the terms of the fifth parliamentary resolution for the abo- lition of slavery. The amount was at first 20,000/., and it was distributed indifferently to the societies con- nected with the church of England, to those acting for different bodies of Protestant separatists, to the Presbyterians, and to the trustees of the INIico charity, who proceed upon the i)lan of the British and Foreign School Society in England. They have very large funds at their disposal, which have accumulated under a bequest more than a century old, given originally for the purpose of redeeming negro slaves. In the principle of this distribution the church has been placed on a level with all other religious bodies having organs with which the government could negociate. Its de- tails have been such as consideral)ly to limit her agency. CHAP. VII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 265 The Society for the Propagation of the Gospel offered in 1835 to expend 10,000/. on schools, to meet as much from the government fund. The dissenting societies only tendered one-third of the total expense to be in- curred ; yet the government took the worse terms, and thus produced l)y the 10,000/. a total outlay of 15,000/., instead of 20,000/., which it would have been, had the proposal of the Propagation Society been accepted. 42. In the colony of Jamaica, the charge of the eccle- siastical estidjlishnient, according to the returns of 1 836, defrayed by the colony itself, is 14,220/., currency, or be- tween 8000/. and 9000/. sterling ; 240/. currency was voted for a Scotch church, and 601/. for the Presby- terian institution. In the year 1837 a disposition was declared to extend considerably the pecuniary aid given to that church, and a Colonial act has passed, appointing commissioners who are authorised to prepare subdi- visions of parishes, and to propose them to the Assembly as sul)jects for ecclesiastical endowment in connection with the church of England. It is not yet clear what amount of substantive results is likely to be realised. 43. In the island of Mauritius there is a joint endow- ment of the English and the Roman churches. The for- mer appears to be supported to the extent of 1081/. (in 1836), and the latter receives 2520/. The ministers of the one class are termed " Civil Chaplains ;"' those of the other " Roman Catholic Clergy." 44. In the colony of British Guiana, district of Deme- rara, there is a public colonial provision for religion, amounting in the year 1836 to 2208/. There is a 266 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VII. division into parishes, some of which have ministers of tlie church of England, Avhile some are connected Avith the Scotch church. There is also a payment to a Dutch minister in George Town. In the district of Berbice there is a parish-church, with several chapels. No notice appears to be taken of any religious com- munity other than the church. 45. In the colony of Trinidad, there was expended (in the year 1835) 860/. on account of the church of Eng- land, and 2487/. on account of the church of Rome. 46. In the colony of St. Lucia, there are one English and three Roman Catholic churches. The rector receives 300/. per annum. Two of the Roman Catholic clergymen receive together 1 1,000 francs. 47. In the colony of Grenada, there is certain land belonging to the Roman Catholic church, and there was an endowment, remaining from the period Avhen the French had possession of the colony, for a Roman Catho- lic priest, which, in consequence of an internal schism, has recently, I believe, been withdrawn. 48. In the colony of Antigua, there is a charge of 2555/. for the year 1886. It does not appear that any part of this sum is given to any communion other than the church. 49. In the colony of Barbadoes, there appears, for-the year 1836, a charge for the established clergy (as they are denominated) of 3666/., besides one of 533/. for the central school establishment, and payments to the cliaplains of the council and house of assembly, and of the gaol, respectively. CHAP. VII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 267 50. Ill the colony of the Bermiidas, the ecclesiastical expenditure for 1837 amounted to 1783/. Three hun- dred i)ounds is drawn from home for the archdeacon, of Avhich 200/. is from the funds of the state. The colony expended in the year above cited 1533/. on five clergy- men of the church, including the archdeacon. There is an allowance under the head of " miscellaneous civil services," to one Presbyterian minister. 51. In the colony of St. Christopher's, there are nine parishes, of which the rectors are variously paid ; but I find no trace of any payment except to the church. 52. In the Bahamas, the charge for 1836 is 1915/. There is no account of any payment but to the church. The same appears to be the case with Honduras, St. Vincent, Montserrat, and Tobago. 53. In Dominica, there are some payments to the Ro- man Catholic clergy, but it does not appear whether they are from a colonial fund. There is a rector of the English church, who receives 260/. from that source. The returns at present in this country are, as respects the AVest Indian colonies, for the most part extremely defective ; but the facts, so far as they are cited above, are derived from the most authentic sources to which access can be had. 54. Our establishments in the Mediterranean require but a very brief notice. At Gibraltar, the chaplain receives 300/. from government, the vicar apostolic of the Roman church has 100/. The total charge is — church of England 465/., church of Rome 196/ These amounts are for 1837. 268 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VII. 55. In tlie island of Malta, the ancient Roman Catholic estal)lifehnient remains. An allowance of 54/. is made by the government to a Roman Catholic garrison chap- lain. In Valletta there is a clergyman of the church, Avith 380/. per annum. The name of Malta likewise suggests the (piestion connected with the tributes of respect paid by the government to Roman Catholic festivals in the shape of military salutes ; they appear to involve a principle the same in substance as that of direct pecuniary aid. 56. The Ionian islands are inhabited by a population of 200,000 natives and 12,000 strangers. The Greek church is considered the establishment of the islands. It has 2242 churches and chapels, and 898 priests (1837). Their salaries amount to 9926/. There are thirteen Latin churches^ with salaries of 1010/. There are three English churches. The public charge of the islands for the ecclesiastical establishments amounts to 2479/. ; of this the Roman and English churches partake. It may be right to mention that there have been at different times certain marks of comminiion between the Oriental churches and that of our own country.* 57. The still infant settlement of Western Australia is fed by a parliamentary vote, in which is comprised a provision for a colonial chaplain. In South Aus- tralia, which is governed under a Commission, con- stituted by Act in 1835, the voluntary system is alone * Palmer on the Chiiicli, P. J, ch. ix, sect. 1. CHAP. VII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 269 contemplated. No part of tlie public resources is, or is to be, applied to religious purposes. This Act, it is right to observe, passed under the review, and received either the approval or the allowance, of several successive colonial secretaries. In the late project for colonising New Zealand, embodied during the session of 1838 in a bill, but now stifled or suspended in consequence of its rejection on the second reading, the principle of in- discriminate . establishment was adopted, but with a special provision for the appointment of a bishop of the church of England. It is instructive to observe, amidst thickening gloom, the last flashes of a light once as abundant and generally recognised, as it is now stinted and despised. 58. Great numbers of Roman Catholic convicts were sent from the United Kingdom to the penal colonies of Australia. They had been furnished in Ireland with gaol chaplains at the expense of their counties ; and it seemed a natural consequence, that a similar provision should be made for theni after their trans- j)ortation. It M'as made accordingly. But then this popuhition was so mixed up with the free portion of the colonial communities, and so many individuals were daily passing from the one to the other, that the line of principle, Avhich, as some may be inclined to think, separates the two kinds of support, was overlooked, and, several years ago, a claim began to be urged upon the Colonial Department for the endowment of Roman Catholic chaplains in proportion to the Roman Catholic population. It was recognised in principle as an en- 270 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VII. dowment. Arrangements were made while ]\Ir. Spring Rice was Secretary of State for sending out four additional chaplains, and three catechists, of the Roman church. Lord Aberdeen found these arrangements matured, but not executed ; they had his approbation, and took effect. 59. Measures of a more systematic description quickly followed.* The governor of New South Wales pro- posed to his council a scheme, which is embodied in an Act passed 29th July, 1836, "to promote the build- ing of churches and chapels, and to provide for the ministers of religion, in New South Wales." It pro- vides that, where a sum of at least 300/. has been raised by private contribution, and applied towards the building of a church or chapel, and where necessary a dwelling, a sum may be issued from the colonial funds not exceeding the amount of such private contril)ution, nor exceeding the sum of 1000/. A larger sum may, however, be applied by the governor, with the advice and consent of the legislative council. 60. Likewise where 100 adults subscribe a declaration of their desire to attend any proposed church or chape], the governor may allow the minister 100/. a-year. If 200 shall subscribe, then 150/. a-year. If 500 shall subscribe the declaration, then 200/. a-year may be allowed. And there is a power of issuing 100/. a-year when less than 100 subscribe, given to the governor, subject to the consent of the executive council. Where * A full account of them is contained in the Parliamentary Papers, No. 112 of Session 1837, and No. 75 of Session 1838. CHAP. VII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 271 there is no church or chapel the governor may issue any sum not exceeding 100/. a-year, to meet an equal amount of private contributions. Tlie governor and executive council may withdraw the stipend, if they think that the minister's duties have been culpably or wilfully neglected. This Act draws no distinction whatever between any religious societies, except by the use of the terms, " Churches or Chapels," which pro- bably would be understood to imply, that the body seeking the aid of the state must suljmit to the name, at least, of Christianity. Regulations Avere published in New South Wales, dated 4th October, 1836, setting forth the English, Scottish, and Romish churches, as the special objects of these provisions, but adding that applications from any other denomination of Christians will be taken into consideration, according to the special circumstances of each case. 61. The enactments of this measure appear to have been popular in New South Wales, so far as any evi- dence contained in the parliamentary papers will enable us to form a conclusion. A considerable number of clergymen have been settled, under its provisions, in connection with the church, the Presbyterian, and the Roman Catholic bodies. The ministers and elders of the Presbytery of New South Wales* " approach " Lord Glenelg, the Colonial Secretary (writing on the 27th July, 1837), " with unmingled feelings of grati- tude and joy,'' to request that he will transmit their Paper, No. 75, 1838, p. 14. 272 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CIIAP. VII. thanks to the throne; and they trust that supremacy arising from a monopoly of state indulgences and ap- pointments, expended on one church to the prejudice and depression of other churches, will no longer exist under these judicious and impartial regulations." And Dr. Lang, a Presbyterian minister, in his wovk on New South Wales, has warmly eulogised the above- mentioned measure.* Thus is the state establishment of the Roman Catholic church actively supported by a body which, in its origin, contended that it had lost the essence of a church, and, in consequence, broke off the channel through which the apostolical commis- sion had been conveyed : and thus are the principles of the Reformation contravened by its professed admirers. 62. There has been considerable dissension in New South AV^ales respecting a school system ; but as the question was, whether the government should establish, according to Sir Richard Bourke's wishes, that of the Dublin Board, or should afford indiscriminate aid to all communions, and since the latter was the ground taken by the Protestants of the colony, it is needless to pursue the details. There is no semblance, in any part of these arrangements, of a true and sound con- ception of the conscientious functions of government in matters of religion. For similar reasons, we need not detail the proceedings in Van Dicmen's Land ; they have been closely analogous in their general tendency to those of New South Wales, and the same principle * Dr. Lang on Ti-ansportation and Colonization, p 241, note. CHAP. VII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 273 of indisci-iniinate recognition and assistance lias been established ; the governor not being, however, in this instance the prime mover, but a willing instrument. And the accounts from Van Diemen's Land present a remarkable testimony, which is extracted in the fol- lowing passage from a dispatch of Colonel Arthur's,* dated 26th January, 1836 :— "The Roman Catholics have hitherto been a very inconsiderable body in this community, possessing one very rude chapel in Hobart Town, and a school in connection with it. The arrival of Dr. Folding, how- ever, has excited a degree of energy which has given them a more influential appearance, and has had the effect of recalling some persons who had been in the hahit of attending the established church.''' Dr. Folding, it should be observed, was the Roman Catholic bishop sent out to New South Wales by the government. 63. Upon the other hand, there is some evidence which appears to show that it is want of information and reflection, rather than indifference, which we have to lament in the case before us. An address presented to the bishop of Australia in 'June, 1836, from many of the most influential persons of New South Wales, speaks as follows : — f " We look upon the erection of these colonies into an episcopal see, and the appointment of yourself to be the first bishop, as (an) additional proof of His Majesty's paternal watchfulness over the Avelfare of the remotest portions of his dominions, and of his determination to * Paper 112, Session 1837, p. 70. t Ibid. p. 58. T 274 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VII. uphold here those sacred principles to which England owes, under Providence, the pure and elevated tone of her morality, her civil freedom, the domestic peace she has so long- enjoyed, and her pre-eminence among the nations of the earth." Again, it is satisfiictory to iind the ministers and members of the Wesleyan Methodist body in New South Wales addressing the bishop of Australia, on his return to the colony in 1836, and declaring that,* " firmly and conscientiously attached, as a body, to the united church of England and Ireland, as by law esta- blished, we cannot ljut rejoice in every measure which promises to extend the usefulness and to increase the prosperity of that venerable hierarchy." 64. The whole tone of these addresses does the highest honour to those who have framed and subscribed them. It is likewise due to that distinguished person. Sir George Arthur, that in tracing the melancholy progress of false principles, following naturally upon the neglect and abuse of sound ones, we should observe, he does not appear to have believed that he was placing other religious communions on a footing with the church of England.'!' We have no fears for the church of Eng- land in her competition with the denominational bodies around her. It is for the State, for the political society of these colonies, that reasonable apprehensions may be entertained, when they are seen to assume radically false principles as their foundation. 65, Under the Act for the renewal of the East India *Paper 112, 183;, p. j9. t Ibid. p. fi'J. CHAP. VII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 275 Company's Charter in 1833, there is specificlegislation with regard to the church, and a provision is introduced allowing of the endowment or support of any body of Christians from tlie funds of the government. In a Parliamentary paper of August, 1836,* we have an account of the practice in the East Indies under this clause. It hence appears, that in the three presidencies a system of threefold endowment has been established : its objects ai-e, the church, the church of Scotland, and the church of Rome. The expense incurred is as follows : — Bengal (sicca rupees) . Madras Bombay Si ncapore,Prince of Wales' 1 Island, and Malacca I Church. Presbyterians. Roman Catholics. 457,116 22,414 4,800 200,562 21,944 5,922 155,005 21,685 4,080 22,932 1,895 811,615 65,043 16,697 At 2s. the sicca rupee . . £84,161 10s. ^6,504 65. £l,669 H.s 60. This is certainly a melancholy picture. We find an ample allowance of the false principle on the part of the Indian executive ; but an amount of funds dispensed to the established churches, as compared with those given to the church of Rome, are greatly out of proportion, it is conjectured, to the relative numbers attached to the several communions. And such an arrangement really gives plausibility to the charge often and unjustly made, that money and not principle is the object of solicitude * Sess. 183G, No. 53G. T 2 276 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VII. Avith the friends of the connection between the church and the state. 67. Tliere is another branch of the religious conduct of the British government in India, which involves matter of the highest importance — namely, its alleged ])articipation in the idolatrous rites of the Hindoo wor- ship, by the coerced attendance of its servants at their celebration, as Avell as a pecuniary concern in the ma- nagement. The facts of this case are not yet fully in the possession of the public, but it seems to bear a melan- choly and awful aspect.* It does not, however, enter into the scope of these remarks to deal fully with the merits, because if the allegations should be wholly substantiated, although a most heavy charge would lie against us, it would involve us rather in the sin of having acted against the light of our own principles than in that of having adopted others ; for the only principles by which, as such, the maintenance of idolatry can be vindicated, are more monstrous than as yet, it may be hoped, we could bear to contemplate. It is highly gratifying to add, that, if a judgment may be formed from the recent declarations of the President of the Board of Control t and of the Prime INIinister, in Parliament, a speedy and effectual termination is to be put to these ill-omened practices. 68. In summing up it may be observed, that there are * See " The Connection of the East India Company's Governraent with the Superstitions. &c. of India." Hatchards. 1 838. + Speechof Sir John Hobhouse, July 2G, 1838, and of Lord Melbourne, July 24, 1838. CHAP, VII.] WITH THE CHURCH. •277 some material distinctions to be taken with respect to the different relations of our colonies to the mother country. Some of them are the adopted children of the empire, which have been received into it when already adult, with their own fixed institutions, or at least Avith a prevalent religion different from that established at home. Such are, for example. Lower Canada, Trinidad, Mauritius, Malta, the Ionian Isles, To refrain from rooting up Avhat we found enjoying an actual existence in law, is very different from encouraging or assisting that Avhicli is newly proposed. The secular rights of the Roman Catholic church in Lower Canada were a part of the original contract, in this case a real one. And this admission does not involve any answer to the inquiry, Avhether such a contract ought to have been framed. The distinction in principle will not apply, where we have given state assistance to the Roman Catholic church upon a res integra. 69. Upon the whole, the universal characteristic of these extremely varied cases, is msitffi.ciency in the assistance afforded to religion by the state. No one of our colonies, properly so called, appears to have an adequate provision. The next feature is gross anomaly of principle in the distribution of that assistance ; from which reproach only a portion of the West Indian colonies, especially the old English islands, appear to be exempted. In the West India colonies generally, the church is most favoured. Next to her, the Presbyterians. The only other participants are the Roman Catholics. If we except the case of South Australia alone, the diocese of Nova Scotia presents the least amount of 278 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VII. assistance from a colonial legislature. The Australian colonies have most broadly avowed the principle of indis- criminate establishment : but we should rememljer, that they have not yet obtained a popular government. 70. Again, however, let it be specified, we have stated no opinion as to the manner in which, under the difficult and peculiar circumstances of our colonies, the functions of government in respect to a state religion ought to be discharged, or the principles laid down in the foregoing inquiry saved. J3ut thus much it is right to say : there ought not to be that positive contravention of such prin- ciples, that active participation in evil, which in some at least of these cases there unfortunately has been. It is one thing to mark wisely the limits of our real power, to disavow all compulsion, to aid that which we hold to be true, and for the rest, where we can do no more, under protest to permit ; but it is another thing to confound the boundary lines of truth and falsehood, to concur in, to promote, to originate measures which may fall in Avitli the inclinations of the day, but which being in- trinsically vicious, though they may yield a harvest of present popularity, are also the seed of certain evil for the future. If the democratic characteristics and tendencies of these colonies, taken together with the religious differences of the inhabitants, prevent their enjoying the benefit of the nationality of the church, these circum- stances may be resistless, but let us at least see and describe them as they are, and instead of hugging ourselves with a false theory, contrived to flatter our self-love, let us honestly recognise in the causes an evil, in the result a misfortune. CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 279 CHAPTER Vni. THE ULTERIOR TENDENCIES OF THE MOVEMENT TOWARDS THE DISSOLUTION OF THE CONNECTION. 1 — 3. General sketch. 4, 5. Result on the science and art of govern- ment, as a declension from its nature. 6, 7. Form of the development. 8 — 16. It naturally terminates in social atheism. 17 — 23. Univer- sality of primeval religion, its subsequent restriction, and rcintroduc- tion of universality with Christianity. 21 — 26. Abandonment of this universality appears consequent on the abandonment of nationality of religion. 27—33. Which also seems to prepare for the consummation of the human apostacy, and the destruction of social morality. 34. And disappoints the prophecies. 35,36. Civil results on character. 37 — 49. Signs of the times bearing on our own particular case. 50 — 52. Existence of the church, independent of the connection. It is the state which demands our solicitude. 53, 54. Conclusion. 1. We have now only to institute an examination into some of the consequences likely to arise out of the general abandonment of the principle of union between the church and the state. The question is too large to admit of any thing more than a very partial in({uiry. And "what in the laxity of common language we are apt to term the consequences of such a change, might be more accurately described as the next follow- ing results of that temper and those tendencies hy which it was itself produced. Their features are ob- vious and broadly marked ; their bearing upon the 280 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VIII. formation of human cliai-acter in its fundamental prin- ciples, and in its entire figure and development, is indis- putable ; so that it ought to be possible to grasp as much as is necessary for an intelligible delineation, however large a portion of the subject may remain un- traversed. Nor do we depend upon speculation alone. These tendencies have already had in part the oppor- tunity of becoming practical ; and from the child we may find some means of calculating the future disposi- tions of the full-grown man. 2. I know not A\ hether it be presumptuous to say at the outset what we might more fully unfold in approach- ing towards the conclusion of the present chapter ; that the changes which have appeared, and which are daily unfolding themselves, in connection Avith the movement towards the overthrow of national church establish- ments, seem as if they were gradually supplying what yet remained void in those fore-ordered dispensations of the Deity towards man, which are traced throughout the history of this way^A ard world. It is one thing to speculate through antecedent presumptions, or inter- pretations of those j)arts of the divine truth Avhich are purposely wrapped in enigma, upon the times and features of the future destiny of our race.* And no- thing can be farther from the province or intention of these pages. But it is quite another thing to study the signs of the times, by the endeavour to analyse and exhibit those great moral causes, most influential upon * Compare Mark xiii. 32 ; and Matt. xvi. 2, 3. CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 281 human charactei' and happiness, -which everywhere force themselves upon our view, Avhich pervade the masses of society, and which appear to he conducting towards its issue, by however circuitous a path, the ancient conflict between good and evil in the world. 3. "We shall in(juire, then, whether the relinquishment by governments of the care and propagation of religion prepares the way for that final gathering-in of the har- vest of the Redeemer, aa IucIi immediately attends upon the separation of the good from the \^ icked. "\^'^llether it implies, as it were, a retrogression of the Divine mer- cies, and consists in surrendering large masses of man- kind to that Avhich they term their freedom, but which is indeed their misery. "Whether or not it practically involves the abandonment of the glorious enterprise to Avhich the Christian church Avas commissioned to ad- dress herself, namely, the universal proclamation of the gospel. Whether by leaving a jiartial religion to be replaced by total irreligion, you do not remove from in- dividual selfishness the great bar to its absolute and final development. Whether by taking out of public institutions their sanctifying principle, you do not give them over to become the depositories and manifestations in a collective and, as it were, authoritative and ultimate form of that selfishness and self-worship, wherein con- sists our apostacy from God, and in the completion of which is accordingly contained the consummation of that apostacy. 4. It is a less awful but still a very momentous con- sideration, whether, simultaneously with these terrible 282 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VIII. results, you do not degrade the character of govern- ment to that of a machine, leaving as the function of those who are engaged in it, simply to ascertain and to obey a popular will, like the index of a clock worked by a pendulum. From the master-science it would in such case, we may fear, be degraded to the lowest of all arts ; the lowest, not in an earthly but in a Chris- tian sense. It might still, during its permitted time, Avield masses of human power, which in our eyes appear great, and be the instrument of large results ; but this abandonment of its highest duty is so essen- tially evil, that it must impart a taint of corruption to all its acts, and to the minds of those who are its in- struments, and by desecrating their life, inflict a real degradation, far different from any Avhich can ever attach to the humblest of duties, if performed^ relatively to its best capabilities, for the glory of God. 5. It is a strange and appalling state of things, when the creatures of God fall away from the law and pur- pose of their several natures, even although that into which they degenerate do not to the fleshly eye appear to present any revolting features, Eacli of them, how- ever apparently insignificant, has its own blessing in its own ordained constitution, and in the sphere deter- mined for its action : whatsoever fulfils its functions is honourable before God and man. But so, on the other hand, does each, however lofty and imposing, lose that blessing and honour, when it forgets its instru- mentahty, and passes out of the place which has been given to it in the Divine economy into another which CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 283 is sell-chosen. We should be shocked if we saw a man, even a man of" indifferent appearance, and less than ordinary abilities, changed into the most beautiful, the most intelligent, the most faithful of animals ; because he would have fallen from the rank in which his IMaker placed him, from the work he gave him to do, from the capabilities of his constitution, from a higher to a lower essence. Now it is a case which ought similarly to shock us, when human beings, made and elected to be in the body of the Redeemer, par- takers of the Divine nature, and to do all whatsoever they do in Him and for Him ; when such beings, re- nouncing Him who is their permanent spiritual life, avail themselves of lower gifts which they hold, but Avhich are not less His, to construct a new system of reciprocal relations among themselves, for their own presumed convenience and benefit, in which he has no part nor lot. As there is beauty even in God's lowest natural gifts, so there may be much in such a system that is fascinating and attractive : but viewed in relation to the true, the spiritual law of our nature, nothing can be more monstrous and loathsome than a change which should thus embody, in fixed institutions, and perpetuate so far as in us lies, our innate impiety, poisoning the very wells of water from which successive generations are to dra^v. 6. There is, however, a line of argument sometimes ])ursued in relation to this question, which I am about to notice, in order more distinctly to mark that I do not adopt it. Men have pointed to the horrible excesses 281 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VIII, of the French Revolution, and have anticipated that atrocities similar in kind, though, perhaps, less in de- gree, must follow the overthrow, should it ever take place, of our national religion. There are many reasons which may disincline us, however, from anticipating such a result. Firstly, the extraordinary concurrence of political causes, and, above all, the immense abuses of the former system, which combined to embitter the popular mind of France before that revolution, is such as Ave are not led, however formidable some of our symptoms, to expect. Next, the Romish church in that country had much less, Ave believe, of the heart and life of religion to temper and to check the exaspe- rations of the time, than England Avould noAV supply. But further ; the spirits of anarchy have had a warning rather than an encouragement in the French Revolu- tion. Its singularly chequered course has, Ave may con- jecture, taught them that in order to Avork effectually they must be contented to AAork more sloAA'ly. They triumphed aAvhile, it is true, in bloodshed the most profuse, but the revelation of Satan Avas too naked and too hideous for the heart of man, as that heart then Avas, to behold, Avithout shuddering, and a violent re- action, and an earnest determination to use every effort for quelling the monster, and banishing liim again from the face of earth to the darkness of his home, 7. We may, therefore, more probably anticipate that the next attempt to constitute society Avitliout a God, and to erase his name from the Avorld AA'hich His might and His beneficence have made, AA ill be n)ore crafty and CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH, 285 considerate, requiring time for its development, and a preparation consisting, not merely, like that in France, of suffering applied to exacerbate the heart, but em- bracing a thorough education of the understanding and expansion of its powers, and a circuitous, perhaps, but real application of tliem to the suppression of the best human sympathies, and the exhaustion of all the noble fountains of thought, emotion, and, above all, affection within us. Whenever upon this or any other basis a complete structure of hardened selfishness shall have been erected, to be the universal tyj)e of human charac- ter, it may be, that the day will have arrived for a tem- pest of Avoe and awful desolating crime, more fierce and more lasting than that under which but one gene- ration groaned ; yet all this devilish machinery may wear a very smooth appearance, drawing upon the " de- ceivableness of unrighteousness" for all its resources of illusion, and soothing us with the belief that we are but ridding the earth of bigotry and persecution, esta- blishing human freedom, and therein rendering to God the most acceptable service, while we are in fact immo- lating tlie faith and the truth, and with them all our own hopes and destinies of good. 8. But some may honestly think, that there is nothing irreligious in dissolving the union between church and state, and taking from the government all power to ex- ])ress a preference in a matter of a religion. They may rather attach to such a change a contrary idea, and hail it as ridding the church of much impure and tyran- nical handling, which it has in former times received 286 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. YIII. from the secular power. Certainly governments will no longer be able to abuse their religion when they have none ; to come short of their obligations to it, when they are precluded from owning any. It is bohlly argued by some that the amount of individual religion wWi be greater, should the connection be dis- solved. This we deny. But even were it so, still it would not be enough. It is clear, that God has rela- tions and reckonings with men in their national capa- city. How are those relations to be conducted by a government which has not a religion ? The law is not the act nor the voice of an individual, nor of a number of individuals as such ; but it is a public instrument, proceeding from a public power, and that power the greatest upon earth ; and yet, under the proposed system, that power will be without religion. 9. But really, when we contemplate in seriousness this argument from the abuse of religion by governments for its abandonment, it appears itself to l^e the greatest abuse of reason that men can imagine. For what is the whole history of religion in the mind of an indi- vidual ? Does the individual man Avelcome religion iiom the first, provide for it in his breast a pure and holy home, use his powers to draw out all its benign influences over his whole character and conduct ! No, it is a series of gross abuses ; a series of conflicts between the natural and spiritual man ; a series of violences done by us to our convictions, and to the Holy Spirit of God, as often as we sin ; and thus so fiir of profanations ofl'ered to that ^ivine in-dwelling presence, ^^•hereby CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 287 alone spiritual life is maintained in an alien atmosphere. But is the man therefore to desist from his work, or is he not rather to persevere until the purifying have overcome the deleterious influences, and his nature is impregnated throughout with the spirit of truth and love ? Why, then, so it is with states, and they, like indi- viduals, are to repent of their sins, and to strive earnestly for amendment, and for the increase of the knowledge and fear of God, until it pervade the whole hody of the nation, and bless it for ever. 10. Will it however be said that the republic of Ame- rica has not relinquished religious ordinances together Avith the principle of an establishment, and that prayers are regularly offered in her Congress by ministers be- longing to her various denominations ? It may be so. The day may however come when a vast portion of the American population will own no Christian name or ordinance whatever ; they will return their representa- tives; they may be a majority, or a large and untract- able minority. Talk not of the power of truth ; it does not subdue those who wilfully and habitually reject it. It did not do so in the days of that primitive revelation which fell gradually into the most hideous corruptions. I know not why it should do so again in days of keener and more calculated and systematised self-love. These antichristians may claim not to be insulted by religious ordinances in which they cannot participate. But judge matters as they are, is that an acceptable service to God which proceeds upon the most oi)posite views of his nature ? Is that government guiltless which one 288 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VIII. day approaches him through Jesus, the IMediator of the new covenant, and another day in its own righteousness, and without the blood of sprinkling, which one day worships the Saviour as God, and the next in prayer by overlooking, if no more, denies his deity ? 11, Of two creeds thus differing we may lay down these propositions — first, that one must be false : se- condly, that the one which is false must be blasphemous ; and yet this unhappy scheme deals with both alike, re- cognises both alike. The man, or the body of men adhering to either, may find consolation in the belief that the creed of its choice is the truth ; but in adopting both, in placing both on the same level, the individual or the government is self-condenmed ; condemned of the fatal crime of wilfully confounding truth and error in the highest subject-matter, while its own best hope and function is but to establish truth, and discounte- nance error, in concerns of far less momentous import. The fact therefore remains that this service is not an in- telligible, nor a reasonable, nor an acceptable service. It is contrary to the express denunciations of the Scrip- ture against heresy ; it is an impious mixture of all religions upon that ground which alone they occupy in common, namely, the possession of a certain amount of human assent, and by recognising religion only in virtue of that suffrage, they afhrm the baneful proposi- tion, that religion has no groundwork, or at least may be dealt with (which is in substance the same thing) as if it had no groundwork extrinsic to the human mind, thus depriving it of all relation to a God, and rendering CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 289 it a curse rather than a blessing, because leaving it to clothe the creations of human caprice and pride with a sacred and authoritative name. I hold, therefore, that when the connection of religion with the state has been destroyed, government becomes essentially godless. 12. But it may be thought chimerical to anticipate that the time ever can arrive when so simple, so reasonable a service as the acknowledgment of God in the public worship of the state, can be offensive to any large num- ber of men. Would that it were so ! But if these men have fallen out of Christianity and the recognition of it in their private capacity, will they retain it in their public one ? If they can find a foundation other than the ac- knowledgment of His name for all the relations of their social and domestic position through life, why should they need it in the brief discharge of those political functions which we are told ought to be separated from all consideration of religious differences ? If it was found impossible to continue the faith of the church in the state, the adoption of the apparently broader basis of Christianity has supplied no means of more deter- mined resistance. If, to proceed one step further, all ministers of religion may come and pray ; if theism be the only test, will this endure? Say, all you who believe in revelation, is then theism the one thing need- ful, and revelation subsidiary, or can theism be perma- nently recognised when the testimony and the sanction of revelation are separated therefrom ? Doubtless it would be unreasonal)le, most unreasonable, to contend against the acknowledgment of God, but let those who u 290 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VIII. are willing to surrender every other test, show from the experience of history, or from the dictates of reason, that this one can on their principles endure. 13. Mr. Locke* contended that the acknowledgment of a future state was so necessary for civil order, that it should be required as a condition of citizenship. Let us then suppose that this dogma, and this alone, is established as the formulary of state religion, does this present in argument an unassailable position ? It can- not be shown from revelation that the sanctions of social order depend on the recognition of this truth. The Apostles in commanding obedience to authorities, do not make it contingent on the belief of rulers in a future state ; they do therefore recognise a possible form of human society, independently of any such belief. And who can doubt it ? The principle of the day is, that a reasoning regard to self interest affords the best gua- rantee of good conduct; and this principle is at the bottom of Mr. Locke's rule ; it is human, and not divine motive on which he rests. 14. Now if a regard to self interest, in the less enlightened and educated state of man, required the view of a future state to make the balance in favour of virtuous conduct clear, it does not follow that in a more advanced and cultivated state that doctrine will be equally required to produce the amount of order and restraint necessary for social purposes ; for on the principles of Christianity, godliness hath " the * Letters on Toleration. CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 291 promise of the life that now is/'* and on the principles of infidelity, virtue, upon the whole, promotes the worldly happiness of the individual. On neither theory, therefore, is the obligation to virtue (though that obligation be essentially diflferent in the one from what it is in the other) dependent upon the doctrine of a future state. Thus the denier of that doctrine may argue ; and he may point out that the force of opinion is with virtue ; that enjoyment depends upon property, property upon order, order upon virtue, on that above specified amount of virtue which is required for the peace of society ; consequently that the recognition of a God, or of a future state, is not needed for morality, since man has (according to some great educationists of the present day) a natural foundation of morality in his own physical constitution. 15. Now the question is not, whether these arguments are sound, but wliether they are consequent. Not, whether they ought to prevail, but whether they would prevail. Not, whether they would prevail here and now; but whether they would prevail in times Avhen, and upon men with whose approbation, the principle of a church and the principle of Christianity had been suiTendered, the notion of a national regard to God abandoned as visionary, and the entire independence of our competency t© perform social duties upon our reli- gious belief established, subject to the single reservation, that, for the purposes of social order, not on religious * 1 Tim. iv. 8. U 2 292 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VIII. grounds, a belief in a future state must still be required as a test for office. The question is, whether men who had separated every other dogma from tlie holding of civil office by inclination, would, or in consistency could, continue to attach to its tenure that remaining one : whether natural religion (as it is falsely called) would retain a stronger hold over its followers than re- vealed religion had done, or if not, then whether the principles of civil society would dictate an adherence to what would by that time have come in its turn to be designated " the last remnant of intolerance ?" Surely they would not. The doctrine of a future state is an abstract philosophical doctrine, ivhen it stands alone. In Christianity it is joined with others, on Avhich its efficiency depends. By Paganism it was dressed in imaginary terrors. But as denuded of the substantial support of revealed truth on the one hand, and of the aid of superstitious credulity on the other, reduced to a pure abstraction, it might indeed hold a place in the confession of faith of some rationalising philosopher, but it would be totally incapable of exercising national influences or forming the groundwork of a constitution. 16. Those who hold an opposite opinion should be re- minded that revealed religion derives its strength from its entireness ; from the fact that it not merely presents to us a body of abstract truths, but carries with it the executory powers necessary to procure their acceptance, the vital influences without which we cannot receive, digest, and assimilate those truths. But when we reject the belief iu those powers, when Ave bring down the CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 293 Christian Church from " Avhat is transcendental in her pretensions," when we analyse and dissect the hody which God has given, and when, impiously dividing it into parts to be rejected or retained at pleasure, we further ridiculously suppose, that each of those parts is to retain the vitality which belonged only to the aggregate, we are the victims of a wretched delusion, and the portion of truth, which we have torn from -the quivering trunk, will but as a severed limb putrefy Avithin our grasp. And indeed men seem to forget that this experiment of the influence of mere truth, without covenanted powers, on fallen man, is not a new one, but has been already once at least wrought out to its results. In the effort to describe them, I must be led to assume something of the language and the tone of a writer on religion, but I ask to be excused for that apparent presumption, be- cause it is a matter of necessity, not of option ; when influences belonging to religion issue into consequences belonging to politics, and these again produce percepti- ble effects upon the interests of religion, a writer on either must inevitably, more or less, and for a time, draw his materials as well as his principles from both. 17. When the law of our nature was inverted at the fall, and harmony with the will of the Creator became thenceforward the exception and not the rule among men, divine truth was planted as it were in a little spot upon the surface of the earth, to germinate for a while sheltered from the adverse contact of mankind in general, who systematically followed out the disobe- dience of their first progenitor, and by natural conse- 294 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VIII. quence corrupted, defaced, and almost extirpated the whole of that religious truth, which, in proportion to the degree in which it was allowed to remain among them, could not fail to disturb their conscience by testi- fying to a degeneracy which it was unable to correct. The melancholy history of those who, though originally possessors, like the subsequently favoured people, of the revealed knowledge of God, became afterwards the Pagan nations of the world, has this among its uses, that it shows us how inadequate is the sin^ple power of truth to produce pei'manently beneficial results on our corrupted nature, without the covenanted influences of divine grace. 18. The hideous anomaly, Avhich sin had introduced, was now therefore in full exhibition, and the universal creation might behold a world intrinsically alike won- derful and lovely, and set under a being who had received the highest of all honours in being made after the image of the Maker himself, in a state of Avar with the will of that Maker, and bearing in consequence as it were his provisional curse in a system of mixed dispensations intended to summon and prompt men to repentance. But while a spiritual intercourse between the Almighty and the mass of his human creatures had nearly* ceased, he had not Avithdrawn even that intercourse from the entire race. 19. He made himself known by personal manifesta- tions, by the voice of prophets, by a written law, by a * Not altogether. See Bishop Horsley's Treatise on the Extra- judaical Church. CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 295 perniiuieiit priesthood, by fixed institutions of sacrifice and worship ; but it was to a people small and inconsi- derable when compared with the mighty nations of the earth ; to a people planted in a country of seclusion ; and fenced about with laws and customs of an unsocial and absolutely repulsive character Avhen viewed with re- ference to the rest of the world. Within this narrow spot alone were the oracles of God generally known as such, and kept in faithful custody : while even here, as they themselves assure us, they were at one time in imminent danger, according to all human appearances, of being lost. The Avide Avorld lay in darkness and iu death, as though the Sun of heaven had risen only for the narrow valley of Jerusalem, and the hills that gii t her round about intercepted his rays lest they should go forth for the healing of the nations. 20. Thus for a very long period was divine truth rather kept from mankind than offered to them. It was shut like a tender plant in a liothouse to be reared to a certain maturity before it could endure exposure to the unkindly elements. Alas ! those unkindly elements Avere simply the dispositions of the being, for whose healing the leaves of that precious plant had sprouted, and its flowers had spread their blossoms. How many, and Avhat purposes of good may have been accomplished by this (so to speak) imprisonment of revelation, we cannot know; but this Ave do too surely know, that with every jealous care and regulation to separate the JcAvs from the mass of men; and to quicken their spirit of obedience by establishing an immediate and 296 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VIII. palpable connection between obedience and reward, as Avell as between their respective contraries — still the prevalent tendency among them was not that of truth by its expansive force to burst out from its narrow limits and illuminate the world ; but was that of inward and essential sinfulness to invite from without the con- tagion of error, and to attract and imbibe it by vicious sympathy in despite of every bulwark that the care of the Almighty had devised for its exclusion, until the terrible inflictions of the Captivity had repressed the tendency to idol Avorship, and given scope at the same time for opposite errors. But as the case of the world before the Mosaic law, and independent of it, shows the inability of men to retain pure truth in an abstract form, so the general unfaithfulness of the Jews under that law testifies to the impossibility of bringing the human race to God through considerations of reward and punishment in this life, or what is now termed a well-calculating self-interest ; because that particular engine was brought to bear under the law of ]\Ioses with a far greater force, than in all human probability it can ever again acquire. 21. A brighter day, however, dawned, when the ful- ness of time had arrived, and the whole world had been politically and socially re- cast, apparently in order to allow of a free, uninterrupted, and universal propagation of the liberated truth. God sent forth his Son, made of a woman ; and that which hitherto had but been chanted in the Temple, or echoed in the mountains of Judah, that which had been enveloped in types and CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 297 figures, symbolised in the visible institutes of sacrifice and purification ; that which had been known in the letter to a small and single people, and which in the spirit had l)een the precious food of a yet smaller and obscurer flock, was to be told upon the housetops, to be proclaimed, as with a trumpet, through all lands, be- ginning from Jerusalem, even unto the ends of the earth ; was to summon to its obedience every nation, every class, every character ; to purge, to chasten, to restore the whole of the fallen race of man. 22. Such was the scheme of glory that appeared to be announced in tlie preaching of that gospel under which where sin had abounded, grace was much more to abound : and where, by the disobedience of one, (the) many had been made sinners, so and much more by the obedience of one, were (the) many to be made righ- teous. The whole earth was to break out into songs of triumph and rejoicing, and was to be filled to overflow- ing with the universal knowledge of the Almighty in a more tlum golden age of light, and love, and joy, Luceintellettual, pieno d' amove, Amor di vero ben, pien di letizia ; Letizia, clie trascende ogni dolzore.* The universality of this dispensation was its glory. Its message of mercy was to every child of Adam. Rob it of that characteristic, and you rob it of its crown, and St. Paul of his triumphant assertion. It becomes, with reference to the extent of its application, but as * Dante, Paradiso, c. xxx., v. 40. Conf. St. Augustine, De Civ. Dei, viii. 6. 298 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VIII, another form of Judaism, What matters it, in respect of universality, whether you take the whole of one nation, or an individual here and there from every nation ? There is a limit, a limit of principle, in either case aUke, and upon such a supposition, one fixed by the will of the Author of the dispensation, not merely by the stubborn intractability of its recipients. 23. But in the case of the Christian scheme, the limit is imposed, as Scripture informs us, only by the obstinate aversion of the human will from God, ^vhich induces it rather to choose misery and destruction, by blinding it in such manner, that it is incapable of soljer choice, and yet that it also remains persuaded of its power of sight. The difference, therefore, is this : now the mercies of the covenant are made ready for every one, are oflfered to and enjoined upon every one ; " Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature." Then the vast majority of mankind were left under the darkened natural law, and a covenanted salvation was not placed within their reach. Let us then keep steadily in vie^v this universality, or universal applicability of the Christian dispensation, as opposed to the limited applicability of the Jewish. 24. I proceed to sum up a few of the principal propo- sitions which most pointedly illustrate the position, that tlie nationality of religion is conducive to the realisation of this intended universality, and, consequently, that the renunciation of the first is unfavourable to the attainment of the second. We may remark, then, that by the nearly universal consent of civilised nations, the care of religion CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 299 has ever been a principal or the jjrincipal function of the Supreme Power (as we find even in Sparta, where the regal prerogatives were most Hmited, they yet retained Tu Trpog Tobs ^sovg). That the connection of the state with the church under Constantine, appears to have been formed, not as the result of ecclesiastical or civil ambition, but after the order (so to speak) of nature and following the course of events. That the territorial division of a country is apparently the best method of providing for the universal extension, whether of civil or religious institutes. That the permanent adminis- tration of the ordinances of the church requires perma- nent pecuniary supplies. That large masses of the people have ever been in a condition of inabihty to pro- vide such supplies for ministers of religion. That in the present condition of the old countries of the world, the population pressing on the means of subsistence, and the supply of labour exceeding the demand, such inability is likely both long and extensively to continue. That the ties of affection which bind different classes of the community, are not strengthened, but the reverse, by the great increase of trade and manufacture throughout civilised nations, and the gathering of men into masses, by means of large towns : that, consequently, we must not expect (to say the least) that the rich will be much more forward than they were long ago to supply the religious wants of the poor. That besides the unable, we have another large class of persons, unwilling to pro- vide for themselves a power of admonition and control in the shape of rehgious institutions. That the mere 300 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VIII, private support of religion tends to promote diflferences in its form, and that it is a duty to check those dif- ferences by reasonable means, and to promote unity. That, with a greater plenty of general subsistence and property than has been known elsewhere in modern times, the case of the United States of America shows that the voluntary zeal of individuals Avill make no adequate provision for tlie wants of an entire nation. 25. Many of these propositions are undisputed, and the rest are such as no friend to the union of church and state, under the most naked form, will question. And we must observe, that the tendency of every one of them is towards the same mournful demonstration, — that when nations in their collective capacity have abandoned the promotion of religion, the natural effect of that abandonment will be, that while it has been dif- ficult heretofore to place the sacred ordinances within the reach of every man throughout human societies, it will thereafter be found absolutely impossible. In the early poverty of the European kingdoms it was done. It is not done in the far wealthier youth of that vast re- public^ wliere what is termed the voluntary principle bears undisputed sway. What, then, do Ave see as the first mark of this threatened, but, thank God, not yet inevitable change, but a retrogradation from the great purpose of Divine love, to give a universal reality to the free tenders of the Gospel : a retrogradation which shall remove great masses of men by one broad stage further from the hope ol everlasting salvation ; Avhich shall re- transform the garden and the vineyard into the forest CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 301 and the desert, and shall again seem to raise a wall of partition^ upon even the Christianised portion of the earth, more lasting than that which was broken down in the Redeemer, between the mixed visible church on the one hand, and the crowd of utter aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and the hope of everlasting life, on the other ? 26. That the effect of this blow to the Catholic church from without would not l)e the suppression of her internal life, we absolutely know from the Divine word. That when thus again thrown into a state of independ- ence upon the principalities of this world, slie might in such manner have recourse to her own inward elas- ticity as again to put forth her powers of conversion more effectively than ever, and to re-occupy her position in the councils of earthly sovereigns, both chastened and strengthened by trial : all this may or may not be ; but when our human vision seems to discern results from any given act which are destructive, it becomes an imperative duty to use every means for averting those results, quite independently of the inquiry, how it might please God to overrule the sin of man for his glory, as he has already overruled the transgression of our first father, Adam. 27. But, besides the abandonment of that path in which it appeared competent to the Church to conduct systematically her aggressions against the entire masses of men in nations, we may perceive in this change an apparent preparation for the consummation of the human apostasy. What was the essence of that apostasy ? It 302 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VIII. was disobedience. It was the rejection of the old stand- ard of action, and the substitution of a new one. The old and appointed one Avas the Divine will, in wliose observance would have been maintained the unity and harmony of God's creation. The new and forl)idden one was simply the will of man. Not merely the positively and palpably evil results into which that will unfolds itself, but the pi-inciple itself was forbidden, as an insufficient, an unnatural, a false law of action. Lord Bacon says,* " Man made a total defection from God, presuming to imagine, that the commandments and prohibitions of God were not the rules of good and evil, but that good and evil had their own principles and beginnings, and lusted after the knowledge of those imagined beginnings ; to the end, to depend no more upon God's will revealed, but upon himself, and his own light, as a god." 28. And similarly St. Augustine t has shown, that disobedience was the great featui-e of Adam's sin, not an intrinsic essential evil in the act had it not been forbidden. The question was thus brought simply and nakedly to issue, whether God or man should be supreme in giving law to the free will of the latter. Now this disobedience was simply the divesting human agency of its proper and natural reference to the Creator. How fearfully does this definition coincide with the separation of religion from government ! An agency, — a personal and responsible agency, — an agency * In his " Confession of Faith." ■]• De peccatoium meritis et remissione, B, II. c. 21. CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 303 in power, influence, and stability, the highest of all on earth — an agency capable of lending efficient aid to religion — this it is which it is proposed, in the phrase- ology of modern liberalism, to divest of all regard to religious differences, that is to say, to the differences between the Catholic faith and heresies ; between reve- lation and deism ; between the affirmation and the denial of the sovereignty of God ; and whose si)here of action, in order to the attainment of this end, must necessarily exclude all functions which assert or imply the superiority of truth in religion to error, or the rele- vancy of any man's religious creed to his performance of civil duties and his principles of moral conduct. To call this social atheism is no passionate exaggeration, but an inference from our premises, in logical order, not less inevitable than melancholy. 29. Thus would mankind, if they should fall into the snare that is laid for them, setup a vast, unconsecrated, atheistic power at the head of all their social interests, as an example for all individuals to follow, a model to teach them, an authoritative declaration to assist the evil voice within in teaching them that they may with- draw their own individual lives from allegiance to God, and base their methods of social conduct upon a code in which His name is not to be found. In combating the obstinate irreligion of the world, it is something that the authentic permanent convictions of men are declared, beyond dispute, to be with us, by the legalised existence and support of the fixed institutions of re- ligion : but the conclusion, towards which we are now 304 THE STATE IN ITS BELATIONS [CHAP. VIII. led and driven, threatened and cajoled, will reverse the Avliole of this beneficial influence, and will throw it into the opposite direction, to co-operate with the scoffer, the profligate, the unbelieving, the indifferent, when it shall be told, amidst the exultations of some and the tears of others, that there was a time Avhen the power of thrones and the paternal functions of govern- ment bore witness to the faith of Christ, and that the witness is now Avithdrawn, and thus the truth em- phatically denied. 30. But further. This divorce of religion from government will proceed upon the principle that men of all religions, or none, are alike to be considered competent for the duties of citizenship. If, however, a man is competent for public, is he not also competent for private duties ? If without religion we can learn and discharge our duties to our country and our laws and authorities, can we not also without religion learn our duties to our parents, brethren, families, friends, where we are aided, by natural instincts, and where the return, in the shape of enjoyment, is more certain, immediate, and abundant, as well as the corresponding penalty of failure to perform them ? In this view the argument, which is good to prove that religious differ- ences have no bearing upon the discharge of political duties, is equally good to prove, that they have no bearing on private life, and, consequently, asserts the possibility and propriety of a social system founded on atheism, in its real and substantial sense of the denial of a providential government of the world. Is not this CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 305 ussertioii, conveyed through the most authentic organs which are at human command, an issue awful to con- template ? Let him who is tempted to acquiesce in tlie doctrine which thus disconnects belief and conduct, remember the precept of St. Paul, " Speak every man truth with his neighbour, for we are members one of another." He could scarcely think that relative duties were independent of religious creed, who thus expressly grounded tliem on the high Christian doctrine of union in tlie bodi/ of the Redeemer. 31. Let us beware, in this part of the subject, of being seduced from the truth, by observing in the midst of society certain persons, it may be, who do not believe the catholic faith, or who disavow the name of Christianity, perhaps even any of the forms of Theism, and yet whose discharge of public and domestic duties is equal or superior to that of the average of persons who are members of the church. Nothing can be more false than a supposition tliat their present conduct is a measure of the natural effects of their creed. To estimate those effects aright, and to compare them with the moral working of the church, we must take the mass of the professors iu each. But, further, we must consider whether these be educated persons, aware of the value of good opinion and of the enjoyments of society, and of the consequent necessity of keeping on good terms with society by conforming to many of its approved practices. And yet again, we must consider how all individuals are naturally affected by an exten- sive system into the midst of which they are cast, which X 306 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP, VIII. surrounds them like an atmospliere, and from wliich they cannot help inhaling and assimilating some, at least, of its properties. And we must not infer tliat, because society can bear a few of any class or character in its composition, it could therefore bear to be com- posed of such throughout. The law can dispense Avith the oaths of Quakers and other small communities while they are small ; but would the general adminis- tration of justice remain secure, if the whole nation were to pass into Quakerism ? But the character of the system, in each case respectively, is to be tried by considering Avhat results it must produce if it were dominant and universal. From certain truths, stolen out of Christianity, has been compiled a structure, under the name of natural religion, which nature did not discover, but which, now that they have been established for her, she can sometimes receive and appreciate. So it was that the heathen writers of the Roman empire reached a higher tone of morals than their predecessors, from the insensible but real diffusion of the balmy influences of Christianity. And just so it is that there are now some individuals whose cha- racters are beneficially modified by the Gospel, but who yield it not their acknowledgments, and cite its benefits against itself, denying the channel through which they came. 32. But some may be inclined to say, public opinion will not endure these excesses and extremes. Doubt- less in its present state it Avould not do so. Public opinion is generally above common practice, but seldom CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH, 307 very greatly above it, and in the long run sure to be sympathetically affected by it, and deteriorated by its deterioration. The prevailing opinion of the nation now exercises a beneficial influence. The individual is affected by it. The sectarian body is affected by it, and is thus unconsciously but powerfully modified by tlie very institution from which it has departed, and ^vlnch conmiands, in a great degree, the formation of public opinion. But let no man conceive that, amid the general fluxion of human affairs, public opinion is stable and unmoved. It is a cause ; but it is also an effect, America, I believe, is influenced by the pul)lic opinion of Europe ; but when the religious institutions of Europe are assimilated to those of America, the waters will have found their level, and the current must cease. Where religious ministrations are crippled and contracted, individual character will suffer in a proportionate degree, and the materials for forming a sound public opinion will no longer exist, but will be replaced by others, representing a different set of principles and sympathies. 33. In the separation, then, of religion from govern- ment, we see a change Avhich seems to indicate the pro- gressive ripening of those harvests which are in prepara- tion, the one for the love, and the other for the vengeance, of the Lord. Firstly, because it asserts practical atheism, that is a human agency knowingly, deliberately, and permanently divested of regard to God. Secondly, be- cause it asserts that atheism in the most authentic form, namely, by casting out its antagonist, religion, from X 2 308 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VIII. what are most permanent and most authoritative among men, their public politics. Thirdly, because the asser- tion is made not by individuals alone but by masses, invested with political power, and, under the most wretched infatuation, claiming it as a right of freedom thus to banish themselves from the divine protection and regard. 34. Surely it must touch the heart, when, after having looked upon these awful prospects, which appear palpa])ly to lie at least before some nations of the world, we turn to the blessed Scriptures and observe the strong yearnings of affection wherewith the world's great King ^vrought for our deliverance, and the exultation with which His prophets and His saints foretold a friendship l)etween earthly thrones and His spiritual body, and a consecration of earthly powers to His glory, which has appeared already, so far as to identify the description, but of which it seems as though the obstinacy of huinan madness would yet struggle to intercept the glorious fulfilment^ — " He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth. The kings of Tarshish and of the isles shall bring presents : the kings of Sheba and Seba shall offer gifts. Yea all kings shall fall down before Him : all nations shall serve Him. His name shall endure for ever : His name shall be continued as long as the sun ; and men shall be blessed in Him ; all nations shall call Him blessed.*" " And kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and their queens thy nursing mothers : they * Ps. Ixxii. 8, 10, 11, 17. CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 309 shall bow down to thee with their face towards the earth, and lick up the dust of thy feet.*" " And the nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it : and the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honour into it.t" 35. Let lis also consider shortly what would be tlie civil consequences of the great change Ave have been dis - cussing. One of the effects of attaching religious sanc- tions to an office is, to render more glaring and offensive any irreligious conduct in it, but upon the whole also to render that conduct rarer. The removal of those sanc- tions Avill give a lower tone to governors, in common with society at large. Even the high and delicate feel- ing of honour which is now entertained by many men regardless of God, is, in its main and better parts, the growth of Christianity ; of Christianity, not as cherished here and there in the secrecy of individual breasts, but as recognised and established in public institutions. As her light recedes into sequestered places, the selfishness of men will become colder, and ruder, and harder, and the false refinement which, without religion, may for a while present a varnished surface, will soon crack and disappear. 36. But if such be the result upon the general tone of manners, how Avill it be found to operate in regulat- ing the most serious and trying circumstances of life ? Yet the part of the case which refers to individual character, is too palpable even to need a statement. What, then, will be the social consequences ? How * Is. xlix. 23. + Rev. xxi. 24. 310 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VIII, will occasions of discontent he borne ? How will visi- tations of God be undergone ? Tlie lower classes are the great object of solicitude Avitli the patrons of the system in question. How will their case be considered ? Will the streams of charity flow more largely in com- munities where the name of Christ shall not claim or receive honour from the mass, and where it shall be deemed a thing indifferent in common society whether a man profess himself a believer in revealed religion, or the contrary ? We must recollect this great fact, that we owe to Christianity alo7ie the institutions which aflford systematic relief to the sick, the wounded, the widow, the orphan, the lunatic, and which acknowledge and meet the claim of the poor to be suppoi-ted from the land. This has been shown with great force during the present year by an eminently learned minister of our church.* He seems induced to consider it a soli- tary exception to his general statement, that the infirm citizens of Athens were entitled to support. But the citizens of Athens were, in fact, an oligarchy ; and the healthy as well as the infirm were fed by the contribu- tions of subject isles and cities. Communities of men then had no bowels of compassion for their fellow-nien before Christianity pervaded them. And should so- ciety be thrown back into unbelief, do Ave flattei- our- selves that the old and holy influences would very long survive ? No, rather the latter state would be worse than the first ; the case would be that of truth rejected, as well as of falsehood received. * Spital Sermon by the Rev. Christopher Wordsworth — 1838. CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 311 37. Thus far we have spoken concerning general results, without attempting to determine the amount of probability that they may actually arrive. By attempt- ing to uncover the consequences — by laying bare, to the best of our power, the whole of our danger — we are using the means most likely, under God, to avert the catastrophe itself. In different parts of the Avorld the case very greatly varies. While we have our own pe- culiar dangers, there are other countries much farther advanced in the separation of religion from government. In America it may be less surprising, where the state rests on the dogma of equality, that no creed should be preferred. It is invidious to allude to results ; but neither the good neighbourhood of the United States to those whom they touch on the northern frontier ; nor the existence and extension of slavery ; nor the state of law and opinion respecting it ; nor the sentiment enter- tained in the north towards the black and coloured race ; nor the general tone of opinion on religious subjects in society ; nor the state and extent of religious institu- tions, under circumstances of great facility ; induce us to regret that England does not follow the ecclesiastical principles of the Avestern continent. It is, on the other hand, more astonishing that, under the political despotism of Prussia, the state should have entered into the most unequivocal alliance with different and hostile com- munions ; but it is yet further remarkable that in France, Avhere the almost incalculable majority are of one communion, and that communion Roman Catholic, the principle of national religion has been essentially sur- 312 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VIII. rendered, and the state joins hands with all creeds alike — a marked and memorable result of her first Revo- lution. 38. In England we have not proceeded so far. We seem still to have ground which is defensible, and which is worth defending ; Ave are cursed with religious di- visions ; we have grievously sinned in ecclesiastical abuses ; the church is greatly crippled by the state in respect of her government ; she is denied the means of ministering to the people where they most need it; yet with all this, and Avith political institutions in reality very much more popular than those of France, to say nothing of Prussia, our country seems to promise at least a more organised, tenacious, and determined re- sistance to the efforts against national religion, as well as to the general principles of democracy, than any other country which is prominent upon the great stage of the civilised world. We have, therefore, no cause to be ashamed of the Reformation of religion on account of any apparent connection in which it may seem to stand Avith spurious and counterfeit principles ; but, on the con- trary, Avith our Bibles in our hands, Ave, of all ranks, may yet render thanks for it to God, and still declare it the blessed Reformation. 39. The symptoms around us are at once ominous and cheering. On the one hand is increasingly per- ceptible a disposition to defend the institutions of the country in church and state, a disposition pervading all ranks, and combined Avith an earnest desire to purify the operation of a principle in itself so pure ; CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 313 and to investigate it in all its parts and bearings, that, knowing it more clearly, we may contemplate it more fixedly, defend it more promptly, love it more enthusiastically. Upon the other, a great develop- ment of the extremes of the opposite opinion ; and with this, which was to be expected, a lukewarmness, or a timidity, on the part of some in high office deeply pledged to our institutions, or even an adoption of notions involving the seminal principle of their entire overthrow and abandonment, and preparing us to fear that should the church become, in a secular view, less popular and strong, and should men be called upon to suffer for her sake, we may expect to see these notions carried out by those who dally with them, or by their successors, to their results. 40. We should hide nothing from ourselves, and we do no justice to the case if we fail to observe that there are a variety of civil influences at work, all operating upon religious unity, and operating in a manner un- fa\ ourable to the principle of authority, and therefore also in a manner unfavourable to unity, until the average character of man has been both greatly raised and essentially altered. The diminution of the range of in- tellectual inequality, by the elevation of the lower ranks of mind, and the reduction of the higher, na- turally and legitimately lessen the general force of autliority. Lord Bacon foresaw in the " Novum Or- ganum," that the tendency of his system was to equalise minds. He felt none of that result : he was 314 THE STATE IN ItS RELATIONS [cHAP. VIII. not one of its examples. Now the world is full of them. 41. The passing away of influence from definite sta- tion and privilege to the mere possession of property, and the increased facility of its acquisition, or at least its increased diffusion, have rendered it of late infinitely more difficult than formerly to attain the end of security to an established church by the exclusion of dissidents from civil office; because political influence attends very considerably upon property, and Avill therefore be felt in the legislature even when the holder of property is excluded. Thus it was argued in the case of the Roman Catholics, to the effect, that they had increasing numbers, intelligence, and w ealth : that these were the elements of power, and that political privilege was but one among its accidental attributes ; Avhy, therefore, it was urged, irritate without attaining the desired object of enfeebling ? 42. Again, the growth of the opinion that political pri- vilege is in itself valuable, and among the natural rights of man, of course renders it infinitely more invidious to withhold that ])rivilege, than when it was vieAved as matter of positive burden, or as attainable only or mainly by inheritance, or in a conscientious view, as a possession of which the responsibility greatly outweighs the enjoyment. JMen must have a possitive value for the church before they can be expected to forego on her account, without dissatisfaction, that for which they have a positive value ; and this we can hardly expect of CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 315 the general mass of dissenters in their state of informa- tion and of feeling. All these are among the purely civil causes, which, notwithstanding, have an ob- vious bearing upon the religious question now befoi-e us. 43. The moral movement, however, of the day, away from religion and towards infidelity, is not merely traceable in the increased growth of that fallacious opinion which excludes the subject of religion from the consideration and preference of governors in the exer- cise of their office ; there are also a set of correlative and parallel symptoms, which greatly fortify the con- clusions already drawn from that portion of political acts which directly bears upon the connection between the church and the state. Not contented with excluding religion from the province of government, the spirit of the age struggles with not less zeal to introduce, as its substitute, education ; that is to say, the cultivation of the intellect of the natural man instead of the heart and affections of the spiritual man — the abiding in the life of Adam, instead of passing into the life of Christ. 44. Not that in contending for religion as the proper moral engine of governors, it is meant to say that they are not to cultivate the intellect. On the contrary, under the shade of genuine and eflfective religion, the intellectual harvest will be largest and most secure. But what we would mark is, by Avhat subtle gradations popular opinion is deviating further and further from the truth in the highest of all matters which belong to 316 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VIII. political societies. Tlie old notion wns that religion Avas their salt, and in a prudential view their only effective guarantee, as well as a duty of imperative obligation flowing out of the personality of nations, and out of the individual composition of governments. But the modern notion is, first, that the governor is not com- petent to exercise a preference in religion for the nation or any part of it ; and, next, that a matter in which he is not competent to discriminate, manifestly cannot be in any way essential to the well-being of societies, or he who is concerned for them must according to his oppor- tunities be concerned for it. 45. After this, it is felt that these conclusions taken alone blot out the light of the world. Accordingly an intellectual illumination is proposed. In truth it is felt how intolerable would be the tyranny if there were a general predominance of the lower parts of man's nature : if we descended at once from the elevating doctrine which, in the Avords of Mr. Burke, consecrates the commonwealth and all that officiate in it, to the mere sensualism into Avhich political eco- nomy, were all its claims allowed, would issue. A substitute, therefore, in some form, for religious truth we must have ; and they who deprive us of the na- tional acknowledgment and worship of God, offer us at least a molten calf To prevent evil, Ave hear it said, cultivate and strengthen the higher faculties of man. Now Christianity is the one appointed means of doing this. To attempt doing it without Chris- CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 317 tianity, is repeating tlie sin of Adain, who sought a knowledge of things in grounds other than the will of God ; but with this aggravation, that it is done after the melancholy experience of six thousand years have shown, by the favourite utilitarian test of consequences, how ruinous was its nature. 46. They of old time thought that there was no in- justice in taxing men for the truth, because it was beyond doubt the most precious of all objects, and was, through divine mercy, in degree at least attainable. But now this is deemed arbitrary and insufferable ; yet there is an object so clear and so beneficial that men nmst be taxed for it whether they choose to avail them- selves of its benefits or not. That is the cultivation of the understanding. But why has not the subject a right to say, I deny the advantages which you say will result from that cultivation, if it be Avithout religion, and I contend, on the contrary, that it will be productive of detriment ? If he be an intelligent Christian, he will say so. And if in saying so he be overborne, the fact will only prove, that human opinion is approxhnating to that state in which man seeks his chief good, and attempts to found his permanent welfare both public and private, not in revelation, but in the principles of deism. 47. The advocates of this theory often deprecate, in words, a mere naked intellectualism. They talk nuicli of moral culture, and assume that it can be sufficiently and generally had without religion. Or, perhaps, they are shocked at the idea of surrendering religion, and they profess that religion consists in certain habits of 318 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VI II. mind, entirely apart from dogma ; that while they ex- clude dogma, which they stigmatise as the cause (at most and in any case it is but the sign and the instru- ment) of dissension, they would carefully include religion. But all these forms of profession come to the same thing. Once cast off allegiance to the revealed truth of God — once assume the function of dispensing Avith such portions of it as carnal wit here or there does not appreciate ; once reject the means which God in his mercy has provided by revelation — and the attempt to attain the end will inevitably fail. Do we flatter our- selves that, if Ave deem His methods impracticable, we shall succeed in our own ? All these modes of teaching will resolve themselves into the mere culture of the understanding. We do injustice by terming it intellec- tualism. The higher faculties will Avither beneath its influence Avherever it is introduced. 48. But the point upon Avhich Ave have to fix our attention is this. There is a strong disposition to over- throAV the principle of an established church ; and therein ultimately to deny that religion is the great sanction of civil society. There is a contemporaneous disposition among us, entertained almost exclusively by the A'ery same persons, to substitute an universal educa- tion or general culture at the expense of the state for the universal spiritual culture by the church. The former is to be the substitute for the latter. It is in- tended fundamentally to change the structure of society ; and the one thing needful for its Avell-being is to be this general culture. The mark of tyranny is upon it CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 319 even while the theory is young : it is to be compulsory. This, I suppose, is thought the only way in which the energies of the church can be effectually quelled. But what insanity is this labouring at a moral Babel which will not only confound but crush and grind into the very dust its framers ! It is a more fatal repetition of an old experiment, to the failure of Avhich there is not one of us who is not too able, if he be but willing, to bear mtness. 49. Perhaps, however, we are desired to find conso-" lation in the fact, that there is a greatly increased dif- fusion of knowledge among mankind. Of sanctified knowledge, that is of knowledge subordinated to tlie great purpose of serving God ? If so, it is well. All know- ledge will then harmonise with the general character, and, increasing its power, will increase its usefulness. But if there be no corresponding extension of the spi- ritual life, this increase of power will not only not be advantageous but will be detrimental, in the very pro- portion in which it would and ought to have been advantageous ; for it Avill destroy the equilibrium of the human being, and increase his wants, his desires, his self-opinion, without strengthening in a commensurate degree the sovereign principle which renews his nature. Without that sovereign principle, too, the presumption or su])position of knowledge will increase much more rapidly than knowledge itself, and the effect of such increase will be to leave men much less adapted to the discharge of their duties than they were before. Much might be said on the particular kind of this knoAvledge. 320 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [cHAP. VIII. It is that winch tends too much to fix the eyes on the earth instead of raising them to heaven to look for angels' bread. 50. Will it be said, " All this anxiety is very much disproportioned to the case, if you are sincere in your belief, that there is safety Avithin the church as an ark Avhicli shall float on the waters Avhenthe fountains of the great deep of human Desire are broken up ?" It is true that we have nothing to fear for her, who bears a charmed life that no weapon reaches. She pursues her tranquil way of confession, adoration, thanksgiving, in- tercession, and Divine communion, concentrated alike for the present and the future, upon one object of regard, her Lord in heaven. This of the church of Christ. And in the church of England we find all the essential features unimpaired, which declare her to be a fruit-bearing tree in the vineyard of God. The Scriptures faithfully guarded, liberally dispensed, universally possessed and read; the ancient bulwarks of the faith, the creeds, and the sound doctrine of catholic consent, maintained ; the apostolical succession transmitting, with demonstration of the Spirit, those vital gifts which effectuate and assure the covenant ; the pure worship ; the known and acknowledged fer- tility in that sacred learning which, when faithfully used, is to the truth what the Israelitish arms were to the ark ; and the everywhere reviving and extending zeal, courage, love : these are the signs which may well quiet apprehensions for the ultimate fate of the church of England in the breast of the most timid of her sons. CHAP. VIII.] WITH THE CHURCH. 321 51. But we need not be ashamed, with all this, to feel deeply and anxiously for our country. For that State, which, deriving its best energies from religion, has adorned the page of history, has extended its re- nown and its dominion in every quarter of the globe, has harmonised with a noble national character sup- porting and supported by it, has sheltered the thickset plants of genius and learning, and has in these last days rallied by gigantic efforts the energies of Chris- tendom against the powers and principles of national infidelity, bating no jot of heart or hope under re- peated failures, but every time renewing its deter- mination and redoubling its exertions, until the object was triumphantly attained. For this State we may feel, and we may tremble at the very thought of the degradation she would undergo, should she in an evil hour repudiate her ancient strength, the principle of a national religion. 52. I do not dream that the pupils of the op- posite school will gain their end, and succeed in giving a permanent and secure organisation to human so- ciety upon the shattered and ill-restored foundations which human selfishness can supply. Sooner might they pluck the sun off his throne in heaven, and the moon from her silver chariot. What man can do without God was fully tried in the histories of Greece and Italy, before the fulness of time was come. We have there seen a largeness and vigour of human nature such as does not appear likely to be surpassed. But it does not comfort us that those op- Y 322 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS [CHAP. VIII. posed to us will fail. They are our fellow-creatures ; they are our brethren ; they bear with us the sacred name of the Redeemer, and we are washed for the most part in the same laver of regeneration. Can we un- moved see them rushing to ruin, and dragging others with them less wilful but as blind ? Can we see the gorgeous buildings of such an earthly Jerusalem, and the doom impending, without tears ? Oh, that wliile there is yet time, casting away every frivolous and nar- row prepossession, grasping firmly and ardently at the principles of the truth of God, and striving to realise them in ourselves and in one another, we may at length know the things which belong to our peace ! 53. These arguments and convictions, intended to exhibit a sketch of a subject involving everywhere matter of the deepest concern, now brought daily more and more to bear upon our daily duties in life, are proposed by the writer to those who feel an interest in their theme, with a deep and painful sense of their unavoidable deficiencies, as his offering towards the elucidation and estabhshment of the Truth, whatever it may prove to be. He has folloAved what appeared to be her light to the point whither it appeared to lead him. For the last six years he has watched the subject in its practical as well as its speculative forms with the deepest earnestness, and has endeavoured to give his whole mind to the lessons with which they have abounded. He has seen some zealously, and some wisely, defending trutli, some discrediting it with ad- ventitious incumbrances, some resolute in oj)posing it, CHAP. Vin.] WITH THE CHURCH. 323 some seeking it with earnestness, some merely drifting with tlie tide of circumstance, some wavering between a multitude of opinions ; most, perhaps, acting blindfold, and speaking at random, in a matter beyond all others demanding the adoption of definite principles. 54. His desire is that the whole matter should be fret;ly and carefully discussed, in the certainty that whether he has erred or not in his own particular attempts to probe it, there can be no doubt that it is full of importance, that it is treated with lamentable neglect, and that the time is now arrived, when with a view, if to no higher end, yet to decency and dignity of conduct, an answer should if possible be had to the question, whether it be or be not the manifest ordinance of Almighty God that governments have active duties towards religion. Christian governments towards the Christian church ? As was said of old. If the Lord be God, serve Him, but if Baal, then serve him ; so it should now be said to the English })eople, If there be no conscience in states, and if unity in the body be no law of the church, let us abandon the ancient policy under which this land has consolidated her strength, and matured her happiness, and earned her fame ; but if the reverse of both these propositions be true, then in the sacred name of God " to the utmost and to the latest of our power " let us persist. If it be not too presumptuous for him to bid farewell, and to request indulgence in the words of Herder, the writer would say : " It is man that writes, and thou, too, reader, art man. He may have erred. 324 THE STATE IN ITS RELATIONS, ETC. [cHAP. VIII. probaWy he has erred : thou knowest, what he did not, and could not ; use of his what may serve thee, consider his intentions, be not content with censuring, rather improve and complete."* Or, Avith one of the world's greatest men : av oui/ r