Z83 
 JS-t 73s 
 
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SUBSTANCE 
 
 or THE 
 
 SPEECH 
 
 OF THE 
 
 RIGHT HONOURABLE 
 
 SIR WILJ.I4M SCOTT, 
 s;c, 8(c. 
 
SUBSTANCE 
 
 OF THE 
 
 SPEECH 
 
 OF THE 
 
 RIGHT HONOURABLE 
 
 SIR IFIJLLI^M SC.OTT, 
 
 DELIVERED IN THE 
 
 HOUSE OF COMMONS, 
 
 WEDNESDAY, APRIL 7 , 1802 , 
 
 UPON A MOTION FOR LEAVE TO BRING IN A BILL, 
 
 RELATlVe TO THE 
 
 NON-RESIDENCE OF THE CLERGY, 
 
 AND OTHER 
 
 AFFAIRS OF THE CHURCH. 
 
 LONDON; 
 
 PUBLISHED BY COBBETT AND MORGAN, PALL lylALL, 
 AND WHITE, FLEET STREET. 
 
 Mav, 1802 .' 
 
Printed by Cox, Son, and Baylis, 
 Great Queen Street. 
 

 SUBSTANCE 
 
 OF THE 
 
 SPEECH 
 
 OF THE 
 
 RIGHT HON^le sir WILLIAM SCOTT, 
 
 arc. arc. 8{c' 
 
 THE HOUSE IN A COMMITTEE, 
 Mr. Alexander in the Chair. 
 
 SIR, 
 
 In pursuance of my notice, I have to move 
 for leave to bring in a bill for amending the 
 Statute of Henry the Eighth respecting the 
 Clergy; and before I enter upon the subject 
 N itself, I must trouble you with a very few 
 words in excuse of the person who has been 
 rash enough to undertake it. — Sir, it is by no 
 obtrusion of myself that this office has de- 
 scended into my hands; no man could be more 
 (^sensible of its difficulties, or less disposed to a 
 
 B personal 
 

 personal encounter with them. But I have 
 yielded to the judgments and inclinations of 
 other minds, aided by a sense of public duty 
 in my own ; the House, therefore, will have 
 the satisfaction of knowing, that what I have to 
 offer to its consideration, is not the eager ex- 
 j^ression of any favourite, preconceived opi- 
 nions; whatever other demerit may belong to 
 it, it will come, I am sure, without the confi- 
 dence, and, I trust, without the prejudice of 
 system upon the subject. 
 
 The business is to review some of the provi- 
 sions of the Statute of King Henry the Eighth. — 
 The prosecutions recently brought in great 
 numbers, and in different parts of the kingdom 
 upon that statute, have imposed, what I may 
 venture to call an admitted necessity upon the 
 Legislature of reconsidering it. I say admitted, 
 because the Legislature, under a sense of that 
 necessity, forcibly impressed upon it last year 
 by two most worthy members, representatives 
 of western counties, has already agreed to sus- 
 pend its operation. I meddle not with the mo- 
 tives, nor with the characters connected with 
 those prosecutions ; if any thing exceptionable 
 belongs to either of them, I fear that the 
 reproach must be shared by the Legislature 
 
 which 
 
5 
 
 which has addressed such motives and invited 
 such characters. It is the less necessary for 
 me to advert to them, because if no such pro- 
 secutions had existed, the statute would never- 
 theless be, in my opinion, a very fit subject of 
 modern consideration. It is a statute upon 
 important subjects immediately connected with 
 the religion and morals of the country — but 
 a statute made three hundred years ago, in a 
 state of religion and manners very different 
 from the present. It is a statute which en- 
 forces its operation by money-penalties — but 
 those penalties prescribed under a very different 
 valuation of money from that which obtains at 
 present. On these considerations alone it might 
 be deemed not unfit to revise this statute, even 
 supposing it to be possessed of all the charac- 
 ters of original wisdom and justice, that are to 
 be looked for in an act of the Legislature, 
 framed with an attention to the exigencies of 
 the times that gave it birth. It is admitted by 
 Lord Coke, one hundred and fifty years ago, 
 that It then required alterations and addi- 
 tions, although excellent for its time.,’'— 
 Lord Hobart has likewise described it as a. 
 
 most wise and po.litic statute.” May I be 
 permitted to say, with all the profound re- 
 
 B ^ verence 
 
4 * 
 
 verence which I owe and feel to the opinions 
 of very eminent persons (men of oracular weight 
 upon questions of the existing law of their 
 country, but, I may say without offence, not 
 quite of such unappealable authority, upon 
 questions of legislative policy) that I cannot help 
 entertaining a doubt whether these panegyrics, 
 oil the original wisdom and equity of this sta- 
 tute, have not been somewhat liberally con- 
 ferred ? 
 
 It is impossible not to advert a little to the 
 limes in which it was produced, and the mo- 
 tives which, in part at least, operated in pro- 
 ducing it. The times were times of great fer- 
 vour and irritation — the corruptions of the 
 Church ■ collected during the grossness of the 
 darker* ages, and which that Church, by neg- 
 lecting the favourable opportunity of reforming, 
 has entailed upon itself the unhappy necessity 
 of perpetuating and defending, had provoked 
 great popular resentments ; but, as was natural 
 to be expected, resentments not always justly 
 directed to their objects, nor very exactly pro- 
 portioned in their measure. They overflowed 
 upon the whole body of the clergy, deserving 
 and undeserving (for unquestionably there were 
 many of the first description), and upon all 
 
 clerical 
 
5 
 
 clerical claims, just and unjust, for it is equally 
 unquestionable that there are both. In short, the 
 times were exactly those which are the least 
 fitted in any country for a happy exercise of 
 deliberative wisdom, lying in that precise junc- 
 ture, when ancient opinions and maxims have 
 become the objects of contempt and aversion, 
 and the new and improved system had not 
 yet settled itself, in a firm and sober and cor- 
 rect possession of men’s minds. The history 
 of those times abounds with instances of the 
 general animosity, that then prevailed against 
 the clergy. It is a familiar anecdote in every 
 body’s mouth, of the observation made by the 
 then Bishop of London in a letter respecting 
 an idle and malicious charge of murder brought 
 against his Chancellor, that a London jury was 
 at that time so prejudiced against the clergy, 
 that where a clergyman was concerned, they 
 were ready to find Abel guilty of the murder of 
 Cain, A more singular demonstration of the 
 general prevalence of that sort of inveteracy, is 
 recorded by one of the most exact inquirers 
 into our national history, (particularly the ec- 
 clesiastical parts of it) Mr. H. AVharton, in his 
 Remarks on Strype’s Memorials of the Reforma- 
 tion. Crimes of incontinence f he says, were 
 
 ihen^ 
 
& 
 
 then, as now, cognoscible only in the ecclesiastical 
 courts ; but rapes were then, as now, triable at the 
 common law\ and of this the laity took suck 
 malicious advantage in times immediately before 
 the reformation, that they were wont to pretend 
 all acts, and even indications of incontinence in 
 ecclesiastics to be so many rapes, and to indict 
 them as such ; insomuch, that scarce any assizes 
 passed at that time wherein several clergymen 
 were not indicted of rapes, and a jury of laymen 
 impannelled to try them, who would be sure not 
 to incur the guilt of shewing too much favour in 
 their verdicts,'* There is reason enough to 
 suppose, that Parliament was sufficiently tinc- 
 tured with the popular prejudice of the times. 
 It had its particular resentments against that 
 great minister and churchman Cardinal Wolsey : 
 a man of great talents! qui nihil humile out 
 sensit aut dixit ! but, who had likewise that 
 pride and confidence of great talents, which, in 
 a state of coarse manners, is with difficulty kept 
 free from betraying itself in an oppressive inso- 
 lence of language and demeanor. ‘‘ They hated 
 him, because he hated Parliaments," says Lord 
 Coke in the passage I have alluded to, and 
 had been the mean that no Parliament was holden 
 in the realm but one, for the space of fourteen 
 
 years;" 
 
7 
 
 years and it could not well be forgotten. 
 Sir, that in that one Parliament, the very one 
 which immediately preceded the Parliament 
 which made this statute, he had come into this 
 room in all the pomp of the most ostentatious 
 prelacy, and seating himself by your chair, had 
 demanded ‘‘ to know the reasons of those members 
 who opposed the King's Highness' subsidy y in 
 order that he might confer with them thereon," 
 It is not out of our historical recollection, how 
 severely an intrusion of the like kind cost the 
 Sovereign of this country in the following cen- 
 tury* As to the King, he had other passions, 
 besides resentment, to animate him in these 
 measures ; he had two years before began the 
 business of his divorce ; it proceeded much too 
 tardily for the impatience of such a lover ; he 
 had quarrelled with Wolsey on account of the 
 delay, and was determined to menace the Pope 
 into a compliance. The Kingf says Bishop 
 Burnet, set the bills forward,^ and they were 
 agreed to and had the royal assent. The King 
 intended by this to let the Pope see what he could 
 do if he went on to offend him, and how willingly 
 his Parliament would concur with him if he zvent 
 071 to extremities," 
 
 Under this ferment of passions was this 
 
 statute 
 
8 
 
 statute conceived ; and if it did come into the 
 world with the characters of wisdom and pro- 
 priety appearing in its constitution, it would add 
 one more instance to the number, which the 
 experience of mankind has eertainly furnished, 
 of good effeets produced by questionable and 
 mixed causes. I have ventured to doubt the 
 existence of such characters. The very policy 
 of throwing matters of this nature into the ge- 
 neral tribunals of the country is, in my appre- 
 hension, subject to very reasonable doubt. I 
 shall speak with the less reserve upon this po- 
 licy, because, finding it here established, it is not 
 my intention to attempt to remove it, guarded, 
 as I purpose it should be, by the correctives 
 which I propose to apply to it. .1 cannot help 
 remarking, that It was a violent innovation on 
 the practice of the Church, not only of the 
 Church then existing, but upon the general 
 practice of the Christian Church, which has con- 
 sidered matters of this nature as administrable 
 in a course of ecclesiastical discipline only. 
 Take, for instance, the matter of residence. The 
 power of enforcing, or dispensing with resi- 
 dence, belonged de jure cominuni to the Bishop. 
 Super residentia faciendd potest ordinarius gratiavi 
 dispensative ad tempus facere, prout causa ratio-' 
 
 nabilis 
 
9 
 
 kahilis id exposed , Such was the rule of the 
 Christian Church. The oath of vicars, taken at 
 institution, which has existed in this kingdom for 
 six hundred years, down to the present hour, is, 
 that they will reside, unless dispensed with by their 
 ordinary. In the Refoi^matio Legume a code drawn 
 up for the use of the Reformed Church of Eng- 
 land, by some of the most considerable persons 
 of the age, both laymen and churchmen, the 
 rule is, that absence is excused if the party* is 
 annis gravis, morhorum incur sione extenuatus, vel 
 oh quameunque justam aliain causam episcopo ap- 
 probandam. And in fact, the power of dispen- 
 sing with residence continued to be formally 
 exercised by Cranmer, and other eminent pre- 
 lates of the Reformed Church, down to a very 
 late period, notwithstanding the apparent pro- 
 hibition of this statute, as appears from the' 
 records of the office of Faculties and from Epis- 
 copal Registers. I take such to be the prac- 
 tice of the Lutheran and Calvinlstic Churehes. 
 In that most respectable branch of the Calvinistic 
 Church, the Church of Scotland, I understand it 
 to be a matter of consistorial discipline; nor 
 does this practice found itself merely upon high 
 and exclusive notions of the immunities of the 
 Church ; it is no more than what the policy of 
 the law has found it convenient to apply to the 
 
 C regulation 
 
10 
 
 regulation of the conduct of men in other pro- 
 fessions, the peculiar duties of which are en- 
 forced not in the ordinary course of judicial 
 proceeding, but in forums of their own, and in a 
 course of official administration, confided to the 
 vigilance and integrity of the respective supe- 
 riors; nor is it to be alleged (as one sometimes^ 
 hears,) that the interest, which the laity has 
 in the good conduct of the clergy, makes this' 
 absolutely necessary, because, in the first place, 
 no one will deny that they have a pretty con- 
 siderable interest in the good conduct of other 
 professions ; in that, for instance, of their naval 
 and military defenders : and in the next place, 
 because their interest, give it what comparative 
 magnitude you please, seemed to be sufficiently 
 secured by the power which the laity then pos- 
 sessed, and still possess, of applying to the con- 
 sistorial tribunals,, and there enforcing a specific 
 performance of canonical duties, in all cases 
 where it was fit it should be enforced. 
 
 I do not, however, object merely on the 
 ground of this policy being a novelty, and a. 
 novelty without a necessity, (though this alone 
 is no contemptible objection in acts of legisla- 
 tion,) but, because it is a novelty that is un- 
 avoidably productive of practical injustice and 
 
 in con- 
 
11 
 
 inconvenience. When I use these words, let 
 no man be perverse enough to impute to me, 
 that I am hazarding irreverent expressions 
 against the great tribunals of my country ; no 
 man venerates more, cither the wise constitu- 
 tion, or the honourable administration of them. 
 They have both of them, at all times, and at no 
 times more than the present, been amongst the 
 best securities, and the proudest ornaments of 
 our Country. But I may be permitted to ex- 
 press a doubt, whether in consequence of the 
 very fact of their being so admirably adapted 
 to the administration of general justice, they 
 may not be less conveniently framed, for 
 wielding the peculiar discipline of a peculiar 
 profession. 
 
 Take, in illustration again, this matter of 
 residence. The statute enacts that, whoever is 
 imlfully absent from his benefice, (and which 
 the courts of law have interpreted to be the 
 parsonage house of that benefice) for one month is 
 Liable to a penalty. The courts have of course 
 followed the strict construction, which as courts 
 of law they were bound to do, and they have 
 accordingly determined, (as far as can be in- 
 ferred from the adjudged cases) that a wilful 
 absence, is that absence which is not produced 
 
 C 2 by 
 
12 
 
 by some physical necessity ; for I cannot find 
 in any adjudged case, that any cause of ab-s 
 sence has been allowed, besides these three : 1st. 
 Imprisonment of the body elsewhere. 2dly, In- 
 firmity of body; and 3dly, Want of habitation, 
 or of an ubi in the parish ; a plea which, 1 must 
 observe, has been in effect disallowed, or at least 
 contracted in some late determinations, in which 
 it has not been admitted as a valid defence, un-r 
 less it has been at the same time shewn, that the 
 Clerk has approxlnivated his habitation to the pa-, 
 rish, cy pres^ or as near as he could in some 
 contiguous parish. These pleas likewise, (all 
 of which are merely physical,) must be proved 
 in an absolute degree* As to imprisonment of 
 the body, that is not a matter which much ad- 
 mits of plus and minus, but the matter of infir- 
 mity of body must be proved to a degree, not 
 merely of discomfort, but of something ap-. 
 preaching to actual peril. Yf ith respect to ha- 
 bitation, I have only to mention the late case of 
 the Rector of Bow Church; that clergyman was 
 shewn to be one of the most exemplary of his* 
 time; it appeared that he not only performed, 
 in an assiduous and edifying manner, the public 
 duties of his churcli, but in a manner equally 
 assiduous and edifying, the more painful, but 
 
 not 
 
13 
 
 MOt less Important offices, of private and constant 
 ministration to the spiritual wants of iiis parish- 
 ioners. It was admitted on the part of the pro- 
 secution, that on these very accounts he was se- 
 lected for the purpose of shewing, that no merit 
 could excuse the legal guilt of non-residence; 
 for true it was, that he was legally a non-resi- 
 dent, living not in the parish of Bow Church, 
 but in the no distant parish of Saint Andrew’s, 
 Holborn ; and under these circumstances, that 
 the proper parsonage house was of such con- 
 fined dimensions, that the only ground floor 
 room was converted into a shop. Any enlarge- 
 ment of the house was hopeless, not only from 
 the obstructions of the Statute of Mortmain, but 
 from the excessive value of ground, in that 
 highly commercial part of this capital. Under 
 this representation the jury were instructed, and 
 properly instructed by the learned and noble 
 judge, to consider whether this habitation, in- 
 commodious and uncomfortable as it might be, 
 was not yet one in which a clergyman, submit- 
 ting to a painful necessity, might contrive to 
 live, and the jury found for the full penalties 
 against the defendant. I mention this case to 
 shew the degree in which even these legal pleas 
 must be substantiated. As to pleas of neces-sity, 
 ^ merely 
 
merely moral, I cannot find the admission of any 
 such, in the cases which the practice of three hun- 
 dred years has furnished. I cannot deny that an 
 attendance elsewhere, upon the last months of a 
 declining wife, or parent, or child, or upon any 
 other of the charities of life, is certainly a xvilfuL 
 absence, for it must be admitted, that it is pro- 
 duced by a mere determination of the xvill; 
 though the will may be influenced in the par- 
 ticular case, by causes as powerful, and as laud- 
 able, as any that can act upon human volition. 
 In the Consistorial Courts acting under the epis- 
 copal discretion, or a discretion of the like 
 nature, such pleas can have a reasonable atten- 
 tion paid to them. A Court of Law acting upon 
 the express letter of a statute, assumes no such 
 discretion itself; and it is expressly forbidden, 
 by the same statute, to invoke or admit the inter- 
 position of episcopal discretion. As far as a 
 court of law contemplates such a subject under 
 such an authority, it has been, and, I presume, 
 must be, upon the footing of a something, very 
 little short of a hard and dry physical necessity. 
 
 So much as to the general policy — Are the 
 specific provisions more clearly marked with 
 wisdom ? The provision made for carrying all 
 its other provisions into effect, is by means of 
 
 the 
 
15 
 
 the common informer. Of that personage I shall 
 take care to speak with all due caution, because 
 I perceive, that although he is a very abhorred 
 man, when he is blowing up a conspiracy against 
 the State — not very gracious when he is enforc- 
 ing a tax — yet that he is received with some 
 degree of kind acceptation, when he betakes 
 himself to the employment of privateering upon 
 the Church : all, therefore, that I shall venture 
 to say of him, is, that it appears to be but a 
 clumsy sort of policy at best, to make tlie ava- 
 rice of mankind the grand instrument of religi- 
 ous and moral reformation. But, supposing it 
 ever so decent a thing to dethrone the Bishop, 
 and to put the common informer in his place, 
 look at the penalties wdth which he is armed ! 
 —perfectly ruinous to the majority of the clergy 
 at the time, and in that respect directly con- 
 trary to every principle of our happy constitu- 
 tion — ten pounds for a month's absence ! By 
 the Valor Beneficiornmy made five years after 
 the passing this statute, a very large proportion 
 of the cures in this kingdom, were under ten 
 pounds a year in value; so that the great body 
 of the clergy were put into this state, that if 
 they slept out of their parsonage-house, for one 
 
16 
 
 day above a month, they were deprived of alt 
 subsistence for above twelve months following. 
 
 What was the grand object to be secured 
 to the publick, by this unnatural change of the 
 ecclesiastical constitution, bearing so hard upon 
 the convenience of individuals ? Is it a canoni- 
 cal residence ? By no means. What is a ca- 
 nonical residence ? not merely residentia paw- 
 chialis, but personalis minisiraiio likewise — « 
 residere in parochid, et deservire in ecclesid. 
 Such is the general language of the canon 
 law, and mere bodily presence in a parish is no 
 sufficient defence, in the ecclesiastical suit, for 
 non-residence, if it is shewn that the Clerk has 
 not likewise performed the duties which ought 
 to accompany it. But this statute takes the bo- 
 dily presence, Independent of the personal mi- 
 nistration — the corpus sine pectore — upon the 
 presumption, which, the experience of the world 
 proves, will often fail, that the man who is com- 
 pelled to be upon the spot, will perform every 
 thing for which he is compelled to be upon 
 that spot. If a man does but sleep in his par-' 
 sonage bed, he may sleep tliere from month's 
 end to month's end ; he may live in the most 
 slovenly disregard, or in the most insolent de- 
 fiance 
 
17 
 
 fiance of every obligation of duty; and yet, 
 as far as this statute reaches him, he may go 
 utterly unwhipt of publick justice. The re- 
 sidence, wdiich this statute secures to the pub- 
 lick, may be a parish nuisance, and a parish 
 scandal, and nothing better. 
 
 In pointing out such passages in this statute, 
 as appear to me to mark it rather as a statute of 
 vengeance than reformation, as uniting in itself 
 the extremes of violence and inefficiency, I 
 cannot help adding, that if such provisions are 
 really, what they have been sometimes called, 
 the first firiiitsoi the Reformation, they are fruits 
 collected in a state of great acerbity — harsh> 
 and crude, and unmellowed — much fitter to 
 ferment than to compose the passions of man- 
 kind. Let me ask those who shelter this statute 
 under the apology, that time may perhaps have 
 rendered some of its provisions unseasonable, 
 for what times such provisions as these could 
 possibly be fit ? tlLat no clergyman, bencficed or 
 iinbenefiiced, should take a house, except in a city, 
 market town, or borough, under a penalty of ten 
 pounds a month ? That no poor vicar could take a 
 lease ofi' the parsonage, to help out his own scanty en- 
 dowment, under a penalty of ten times the value of 
 the profits of such lease? That no clergyman can 
 
 D hold 
 
18 
 
 hold a lease of laiid, though not occupied by him- 
 self, and though descended to him from his fa- 
 mily, under a peyialty of ten times its annual va- 
 lue? That no clergy mayi possessed of a patrimo- 
 nial freehold estate, in a grazing country, could 
 buy and sell a cow, without a forfeiture of treble the 
 value of that cow? In my apprehension nothing 
 could have concealed the vices and infirmities 
 of this statute, but its having been consigned by 
 almost general consent to almost general ineffi- 
 ciency ever since its birth, till within the last 
 two years, v/hen it has been made the commer- 
 cial bank of two or three trading attornies. Be- 
 fore that time it had rarely been heard of, but 
 occasionally as a postscript to a dispute about 
 tythes, or to some personal squabble between 
 the parishioner and his parson, generally discoun- 
 'tenanced in the particular instance by the excel- 
 lent personswho have presided in the Courts, who 
 have repeatedly lamented their own inability to 
 admit pleas, highly proper to be attended to, 
 and that tliey were bound to consider the most 
 conscientious, clergyman, who after tv/enty years 
 most sedulous performance of all his duties, ab- 
 sented himself for one month from his parish 
 (or even from his parsonage-house, though do- 
 ing the duties of his cure), and with the permis- 
 
 sion 
 
19 
 
 sion of his superiors, as a culprit — and as a cul- 
 prit who was not to be exonerated, on any other 
 plea than that which would exonerate a man 
 from charges of the most atrocious kind — the 
 plea, of having acted under something little short 
 of an irresistible necessity. 
 
 But whatever may be the original character 
 of this statute (on which I have ventured to ex- 
 press an opinion, contrary to opinions which I 
 cannot but respect, when I look at those who 
 have entertained them) ; it is not to be denied, 
 that the change of time and manners has im- 
 ported into it a degree of incongruity and in- 
 justice, which no man can be found to defend. 
 
 In the first place, the money-penalties have 
 acquired an additional injustice, by acquiring 
 an additional inequality. Many of the livings 
 of this kingdom, that were meanly endowed 
 with land or tythes, continue in their original 
 poverty; others, better provided with those spe- 
 cies of property, have risen into opulence : on 
 the poor livings the statute operates with its ori- 
 ginal severity, aggravated by the consideration, 
 that it touches the richer benefices, compara- 
 tively, with a feather. Its utmost effect upon a 
 living of c£ 1,200 per annum (of which there are 
 
 D 2 several 
 
several in this kingdom), is compounded for by 
 the payment of an income tax. 
 
 In the next place, the general alteration, 
 which has taken place in the general system of 
 life and manners, must be adverted to. The 
 native clergy (as far as the statute applied at all 
 to them) were single men, living in the habits of 
 a secluded life. They generally fixed near the 
 places of their nativity. I observe in most an- 
 cient catalogues of the English clergy, both se- 
 cular and regular, that their names are usually 
 taken from some neighbouring village or bo- 
 rough, to that where you find them settled. 
 From the spot where they settled they had few 
 possible calls ; there was little communication 
 between different parts of the country or with the 
 capital; correspondence was rare, and carried 
 on either by special messengers, or by the acci- 
 dent of pilgrims passing that way. The gentry 
 themselves, excepting those wim attended Par- 
 liament, ventured little beyond the sod of their 
 own village, unless to the county court : The 
 business of the county was transacted in the 
 county. All this has undergone a great altera- 
 tion ; the different classes of men are no longer 
 glebce adscriplitii ; communication is opened ; 
 
 much 
 
21 
 
 much of the business of the kingdom is trans- 
 acted in this town. The clergy are most ge- 
 nerally beneficed in parts of the island remote 
 from the places of their birth and education* 
 and they have calls of family affection and duty 
 to the relations they have quitted. Being in- 
 vited by the Reformation to marry, they form 
 new family connections which again produce 
 calls of a similar nature; and, I presume, no 
 reasonable man would wish that they should be 
 deaf to such calls, and should turn their backs 
 on the happy Intercourses of family kindness. 
 It is one of the best effects of the Reformation, 
 that by introducing them to the charities of 
 domestic life, it has taught them a practical 
 knowledge of the duties, which belong to those 
 charities. They have family property in other 
 parts of the county; they are called to the ca- 
 pital for the transaction of family concerns; 
 they are called to attend to the declining health 
 of a wife or a child, by a temporary change of 
 air and situation. I am no advocate for dissipa- 
 tion, when I observe, they have families of 
 young persons who are not without their claims 
 to reasonable indulgences for the purposes of 
 licalth, of education, of improvement, and, I 
 
 venture 
 
22 
 
 venture' to add without fear, even of innocent 
 curiosity and relaxation. 
 
 In the next place, the change, not only of 
 the manners, but of that which is every day as- 
 suming a greater importance in the country, its 
 agriculture, makes a change of the provisions 
 of the statute relative to farming quite indis- , 
 pensable. It is impossible for me to state this 
 eftect half so well in any words of my own, as 
 in those which compose a letter, written to me 
 by two most respectable clergymen of the west 
 of England, and which, with the permission of 
 the House, I beg leave to read as a part of what 
 I have to offer. 
 
 Whilst wc were thus indulging in what 
 we conceived to be innocent pursuits, we 
 find ourselves amenable to that part of the Sta- 
 ‘‘ tute of Henry VIIL which interdicts us from 
 buying and selling, and an avowed informer, 
 who has come into the country with an ex- 
 press intention of prosecuting the clergy on 
 the other parts of the Act, has just began to 
 enforce this tremendous clause. 
 
 What constitutes the peculiar hardship 
 of the modern clergy is, that the restraint in 
 question did not materially, if at all, affect 
 
 their 
 
 4 
 
23 
 
 their predecessors at the time the Act was 
 made, but has, for the most part, been occa- 
 sioned by the alteration, that has taken place 
 in the general state of society, and our ha- 
 bits of life. 
 
 The facility with which all our wants are 
 at present supplied, was in the sixteenth ceh- 
 tury wholly unknown. Our ancestors, who 
 resided in the country, derived from their 
 estates the most ample maintenance for them- 
 selves and dependants. The provisions, 
 which were laid up against winter in the 
 great mansions, fill with astonishment the 
 mind of a modern house-keeper. In con- 
 ** formity to this general practice, the resident 
 country clergyman had, comparatively speak- 
 ing, few demands for money, the glebe and 
 tithes supplying all his necessaries ; his wheat 
 provided bread, and the barley, under his own 
 eye, was converted into malt — most of the old 
 rectorial houses having, even now, a build- 
 ing formerly appropriated to that purpose’; 
 the wool was spun under his own roof, and 
 wrought into cloth in the neighbouring 
 towns ; the cattle, fattened during the suni- 
 mer (there was no winter feeding), were 
 slaughtered and laid up for the remainder of 
 ' ' the 
 
** the year; and, as his family must have been 
 large, the day labourer and occasional arti- 
 ficer being fed from his table, it is reasonable 
 to suppose, that he had little to spare beyond 
 his own consumption — add to this, that he was 
 then a solitary being, deprived by superstition 
 of those' endearing connexions, which impel 
 mankind to look beyond themselves, to the 
 ** welfare of those, who are of far more im- 
 portance to them. 
 
 His situation is now totally changed — 
 Commerce, and the influx of wealth have 
 entirely overthrown his domestic arrange- 
 ments ; money is the medium through which 
 all his wants are to be supplied ; he therefore 
 sells his wheat to pay his workmen : Barley, 
 ** the laws of his country restrain him from 
 making into malt, he sends it to a market, and 
 with the money received in return purchases 
 beer — the wool is disposed of to a distant 
 manufacturer, and with its value, himself and 
 family are cloathed : The fat cattle are sold 
 instead of being salted, and the profit en- 
 sures a weekly supply of fresh meat, 'till the 
 return of summer. 
 
 The expenses also attendant on a mar- 
 ** riage-state (to say nothing of the various and 
 
 heavy 
 
25 
 
 heavy taxes) occasion repeated demands on 
 him for money, which were wholly un- 
 known to the clergy at the time of Henry 
 the Eighth* 
 
 A revolution equally great has taken 
 place even in our system of agriculture — ■ 
 Formerly a part of every farm was appro- 
 priatcd to tillage, another to pasture, and a 
 ‘‘ due proportion of calves and lambs were 
 "" annually reared; but by experience it is 
 found, that some districts are litter for each 
 separate purpose, so that a glebe may be 
 wholly given up to corn, or pasture, accord- 
 ing to its soil, to the great advantage of the 
 proprietor and the public. In one instance, 
 different sorts of grain will be sent to mai*'- 
 ket, in the other, the return must be in fat 
 cattle. By occupying his lands in this man- 
 ner, the modern clergyman doth not violate 
 the spirit of the Act ; though he bii^s to sell 
 agahi, yet it is a buying and a selling incl- 
 dental to the farming of his glebe ; he is not 
 carrying on a traffic, which is evidently tire 
 offence prohibited, but only In conformity 
 with the improved mode of husbandry, cul- 
 tivating his ground to the best advantage. 
 Enforce the statute literally, and at once he 
 E is 
 
IS deprived of his principal support ; it will 
 be impossible for him to farm his glebe^ 
 which he must immediately let, to the incah 
 culable loss of himself and the community; 
 as instead of being (which whilst in the hands 
 of the clergy it will generally be found to be) 
 in a progressive state of improvement, it will 
 gradually become worse, no tenant ehusing 
 to risk his money in manuring premises, the 
 possession of which cannot be assured to him 
 for a single day. 
 
 The foregoing observations apply for 
 the most part to our own case, but it would 
 be selfish in the extreme were we not to re- 
 mark, that there are many of our brethren 
 of opulence and great respectability, who, 
 actuated by the most politic motives, have, 
 by occupying their own estates as well as 
 their glebes, held up a superior mode of hus- 
 bandry to their neighbourhood, and done 
 essential service to the country. 
 
 To take them also out of the hands of 
 informers, would be conceived to be an act 
 well worthy your serious consideration. Any 
 undue restraint on their exertions must prove 
 a manifest injury to the community at large, 
 and agriculture in its present state may be 
 
 consW 
 
27 
 
 considered so far from an Illiberal pursuit, 
 that it is hard to say how any clergyman can 
 employ his hours of relaxation, (and such 
 hours must occur in every profession) with 
 more innocence to himself, and benefit to the 
 public, than in the moderated study and 
 practice of its various branches/' 
 
 I have my doubts, from what passed within 
 these walls last year, whether the House will 
 quite go along with the sentiments expressed in 
 the last paragraph. I confess that my own sen- 
 timents are considerably mollified, since the last 
 year, in favour of farming ; I see that in this 
 country the parish priest is, by the very consti- 
 tution of his office, in some degree, an agricul- 
 turist ; he is, ex officloy in part a farmer. He Is 
 to take care, undoubtedly, that the ecclesiastic 
 shall not merge in the farmer, but shall con- 
 tinue the presiding and predominating charac- 
 ter ; but the moderated and subordinate prac- 
 tice of farming, supplies many means of cheap 
 subsistence for the clergyman and his family; 
 many means of easy kindness and hospitality to 
 his. poorer parishioners ; many opportunities of 
 distinguishing the industrious and well-disposed 
 by the favour of employment ; and many mo- 
 tives of pleasing attachment to the place, which 
 
 E 2 furnishes 
 
^8 
 
 furnishes the healthy and amusing oceupatloii 
 of his vacant hours. Personal debasement must 
 be guarded against; but when I recollect that it 
 has been the opinion of all antiquity that 
 agriculturd libero homine nihil dignius, and that 
 the practice of modern times reconciles it with 
 the dignity, and even the majesty of the most 
 exalted stations, I am not prepared to admit 
 that personal debasement is a necessary conse- 
 quence ; and in the example of the illustrious 
 Hooker tending his sheep on Barham Downs, I 
 think I see, that even some of its humble occu- 
 pations may be performed without degradation. 
 
 But what above all creates a necessity for 
 new moulding this statute is, the extreme de- 
 pauperated state of many of the churches and 
 , parochial clergy of this kingdom. The statute 
 makes one uniform demand of universal resi- 
 dence, under one uniform penalty; and universal 
 residence cannot be had, without universal com- 
 petency. If all the benefices in the kingdom 
 were equal and competent, an equal obligation, 
 enforced by an equal penalty, might be applied 
 to them all universally. But the fact is, that 
 the inequality is great, and has greatly increased 
 since the passing of this Act ; since it is certain, 
 that if many benefices have increased in value, 
 
 many 
 
29 
 
 many have been comparatively depauperated by 
 the Reformation. 
 
 The appropriation of the Chureh revenues 
 to the religious houses, was in ancient times a 
 subject of loud and energetic complaint from 
 Parliament. This blouse represented, That 
 the religious men mischievously under divers 
 colours appropriated benefices, and grievously 
 threw down the houses of the same to the 
 ground, and cruelly did take av/ay, and de- 
 stroy divine service, hospitality, and other 
 marks of charity ; and the clergy from pro- 
 motion did bar, in offence to God, confusion 
 of their own souls, grievous desolation of their 
 country, final destruction of the clergy, great 
 impoverishment of the kingdom, and irrevo- 
 cable ruin of the Church of England.'' But 
 the clergy, though pillaged of their glebe and 
 tythes by the monks, had their resources. In 
 market-towns they had a variety of small devo- 
 tional offices to perform for individuals, for 
 which they were paid. In the country they 
 farmed from the monks the glebe and tythes 
 which they formerly possessed ; but their grand 
 resource Vv^as in the authority of tlie bishops, 
 who had a power, and occasionally exercised it, 
 to compel the monks to raise their stipends, as 
 
 the 
 
30 
 
 the times required. Temporary vicars, who 
 answer to modern curates, had been raised suc- 
 cessively up to ten marks, consider at d temporum 
 ^jualitate, which Spelman computes to be equal 
 to sixty pounds a year, and the perpetual vicar 
 was raised to twelve marks, equal to seventy 
 pounds a year. They were single men, of small 
 wants, and generally smaller learning ; he who 
 had Latin enough to read the office to those 
 who could not read English, had no call for an 
 expensive library. This statute, followed by 
 the Reformation, struck a severe blow^ at their 
 means of subsistence. In the country it put 
 an end to their farming the glebe and tythes, 
 a grievance bitterly complained of, by the Con- 
 vocation of the same year with this statute, 
 which represented that the statute had non-nihil 
 iniquitatis in it, by robbing the miseros vicarios, 
 the miserable vicars, of this advantage. The 
 Reformation swept away in towns all the traffic 
 of private superstitious offices; but the great 
 blow was struck by the Statute of Alienations, 
 or rather by the construction wdiich has since 
 grown upon it, and which has now exonerated 
 the impropriated parsonages, from any powder of 
 the bishops to provide for the better mainte- 
 nance of the officiating minister ; for though 
 
 tlie 
 
 7 
 
51 
 
 the statute expressly reserved all rights, and 
 transferred these Church revenues to the Crown, 
 and consequently to its grantees, in the same 
 state and condition as they now be, as held by 
 the religious houses,'' yet it is settled law, in later 
 times, that these impropriations, being lay fees, 
 are no longer subject to the authority of the 
 bishop. 
 
 It is now, Sir, too late to undo what was done 
 at the* Reformation in this matter. The property 
 has for three hundred years passed into circula- 
 tion — is become family inheritance — ^possessed 
 by as good a title, and as safe a conscience, as 
 other family inheritance; but, wlien I observe, 
 that it is to be lamented that a better provision 
 was not, at that time, made out of these revenues, 
 for the support of the national religion, I say 
 no more than what is supported by high autho- 
 rity, particularly by that of a person who was a 
 great favourite and ornament of this House, and 
 no partial friend to ecclesiastical claims — Mr. 
 Selden ; and by that of another person of stil! 
 more elevated character, the ornament of his 
 age and country ! whose voice^ when not per- 
 verted by passions or Interests of his own, was 
 the voice of reason and philosophy itself! — the 
 
 great 
 
great Lord Bacon. The former expresses hmi'^ 
 self thus, "" I doubt not, but that every good 
 man wishes that at our dissolution, their land 
 and tythes, and churches, had been bestowed 
 rathei' for the advancement of the Church, to 
 a better maintenance of a labouring, deserving 
 ministry, relief of the poor, and other such 
 good uses, (as have in them a character of the 
 good wishes of those who first dedicated them 
 to God) than conferred, with such a prodigal 
 dispensation, on those who stood ready to 
 devour what was sanctified.’' — The latter 
 thus — It were to be wished, that impropriations 
 were returned to the Church, as the most na- 
 tural and proper endowments. In mine own 
 opinion and sense, I must confess, (I speak it 
 with all reverence) all the F arliaments sinde 
 the 21th and of Henry VUI. which gave 
 away the impropriatmis, seem to me to stand, in a 
 sort, obnoxious to God in conscience to do some- 
 what for the Church, and to bring the pati^ony 
 thereof back to a due competency^ — May I 
 presume with all humility to impress these me- 
 morable words upon the recollection of the 
 House ! Till that is done, which Lord Bacon says, 
 ought in the conscience of Parliament to be donef 
 
 ail 
 
33 
 
 tall legislative provisions I fear^ can be mere 
 temporary palliatives and no better. 
 
 The truth is, that King Henry VII L put the 
 matter of the Church establishment into such a 
 state, that without some forcible interposition of 
 Parliament, it is become remediless in all time 
 coming. The poverty-struck condition of the 
 clergy, at that period, is recorded in a hundred 
 striking instances, by Strype, by Kennet, by 
 Wharton, and other collectors. The venerable 
 Latimer, in a sermon preached before King Ed- 
 ward, says, ‘‘We of the clergy had too much, but 
 ‘‘ that is taken away, and now we have too little; 
 “ for my own part I have sufficient, God is my 
 “ judge, I crave nothing of ahy man, but I 
 “ know them that have too little; there lieth a 
 ‘‘ great matter by these appropriations, great 
 “reformation is to be had in them; I know 
 “ where there is a great market town with di- 
 “ vers hamlets and inhabitants, where do rise 
 “ yearly of their labour to the Value of jC50, 
 “ and the vicar that serveth hath but 12 or 
 “ marks, being so great a cure ; so that of his 
 “ pension he is not able to buy books, nor give 
 “ his neighbour drink, all the great gain goeth 
 “another way — A redress God grant!'' The 
 same collectors record similar complaints made 
 
 F 
 
 m 
 
34 ^ 
 
 in a popular publication of that day, called ^^the 
 Supplication of the Beggars.’' — Yoiu* pretence 
 to put down the abbeys, was to put away 
 what was amiss : It was amiss, that a great 
 part of their land was spent on a few super- 
 ** stitious monks, who gave not o£'4'0 alms, when 
 they should have given <£^00 : It W 2 is amiss, 
 ** that monks should have benefices, and preach 
 once a year to them that paid their tithes of 
 the parsonage : It was amiss, that scarcely 
 ** among twenty, they set one sufficient vicar 
 to preach. But see now how that was amiss, 
 ** is amended, — marry as the devil amended his 
 ** dame’s leg ; when he should have set it 
 ** right, he broke it in pieces. The monks gave 
 ** little alms, and set unable men in their bene- 
 *'fices; but now where *£20 was given to the 
 poor, in more than a hundred places, not one 
 ** meal’s meat is given ; thafs a fair amendment. 
 Where they had always one or other vicar to 
 preach, now no vicar at all, but the farmer is vi- 
 car and parson altogether, and only a cast away 
 monk or fryer, which can hardly say ma- 
 tins, is hired for twenty or thirty shillings, 
 ** and meat and drink, yea, in some places, for 
 meat and drink only. I know, and twenty thou- 
 
 sand 
 
35 
 
 " sand more men know, more than five thousand 
 benefices thus well and gospelly served/' 
 
 The fact of the reduced condition of the 
 clergy, is admitted by the Legislature itself, not 
 only by the acts of shortly afterwards passing the 
 Statutes of Union of Benefices, and of Dilapi- 
 dation, (which for the first time found their way 
 into our municipal code, from a necessity 
 then first emerging in any pressing degree,) 
 but it is expressly recorded in the preamble of 
 these statutes, lamenting the decay of parson- 
 age houses, and the insufficiency of single 
 benefices for the maintenance of a minister/' 
 The condition of the superior clergy was 
 comparatively little better. Cranmer, in a letter 
 to his friend Sir Wm. Cecil, who had just taken 
 to himself a handsome estate from the newly 
 erected see of Peterborough, and immediately 
 thereon had reproached the Bish0ps with covet- 
 ousness, (as was customary, if th'e Bishops shew- 
 ed the least repugnance to the 6-peration of being 
 stripped of their property) replies, ‘‘ Asforycur 
 admonition, I take it most thankfully ; for the 
 saying of St. Paul, that they who would grow 
 rich fall into temptado . — I Lar, it is not half so 
 much, as stark b.ggari/. And if I knew any 
 ‘‘ Bishop that wer.e covetous, I would surely 
 
 F % admonish 
 
56 * 
 
 admonish him, but I know none but all very 
 beggars, except it be one, and yet I dare 
 well say, he is not over rich !” The general 
 ' condition of churchmen at that time, affords 
 a solution natural enough of that otherwise ex- 
 traordinary fact, of their general and hasty 
 relapse into the ancient superstition. 
 
 Succeeding times have provided nothing 
 like a sufficient remedy. On a complaint made 
 to King Charles I. by Parliament against non-, 
 residents, he answered them, He recom- 
 mended to this House to make due provision, 
 that every parish should allow a competent 
 ** maintenance for an able minister;-* and it was 
 upon that occasion well observed in the House, 
 that scandalous livings made scandalous mh 
 nisters.** From that time nothing was done, till 
 the splendid benefaction of the first fruits and 
 tenths made by Queen Anne ; on which oc-, 
 casion. Her Majesty observed, that she had 
 taken into her princely cpnsideration the 
 mean and insufficient maintenance belonging 
 to the clergy in divers parts of this kingdom ;*^ 
 and the Parliament in the preamble to the Act, 
 recites, that a sufficient settled provision for 
 the clergy, in many parts of this kingdom, 
 hath never yet been made.** 
 
 This 
 
37 
 
 This fund has now been in operation for 
 near a century, under the administration of a 
 Board composed of persons of high station, both 
 in Church and State. The number of livings 
 returned, certified to this Board and to the Ex- 
 chequer, were not exceeding 
 
 Per annum. 
 
 <£10 
 
 
 
 Livings. 
 
 t071 
 
 20 - - 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 1467 
 
 30 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 1126 
 
 40 - - 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 1049 
 
 50 - - 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 844 
 
 Livings under £50 per 
 
 annum 
 
 5597 
 
 Since the first returns, many hundred cures 
 have been returned as of small value, some 
 not more than twenty or forty shillings — so that 
 there being about eleven thousand seven hun- 
 dred and odd livings in the kingdom, about one 
 moiety of the whole were under fifty pounds a- 
 year, and upon an average less than twenty- 
 three pounds a-year. Private benefactions and 
 accidental improvements have aided the opera- 
 tion of this charity ; the two lowest classes have 
 all received an actual augmentation from it ; and 
 a third class is now receiving the same benefit. 
 But by a paper from the Secretary of that Board, 
 which I hold in my hand, it appears, that if 
 we compute the number of livirigs iinder 
 f* £b0 per annum to be as above about six 
 
 thousand. 
 
38 
 
 thousand, a moiety of which were actually 
 under jCso per annum; and if we reckon 
 that they have been since improved by the go- 
 vernors, and by other means upon an ave- 
 rage two thirds, which is a very liberal allow- 
 ancQ indeed, it follows that there are now 
 six thousand livings in England and AYales, 
 that do not exceed upon an average <£*85 
 per annum, and that a very great proportion 
 of them are, at this time, not jCSO per annum, 
 and so progressively from <£30 to c£40 and 
 fronic^^O tOc£50/’ In a document with which 
 I am . favoured, by Mr. Archdeacon Plymley 
 of Salop, I am informed, that of one hundred 
 and sixty-eight churches in that Archdea- 
 conry, (which, as he justly observes, com- 
 prebends a part of five different counties, and 
 has within it specimens of almost every na^ 
 ‘‘ tural and artificial situation) one hundred 
 and nine only have any parsonage house. 
 Independent of this deficiency of fifty-nine 
 parsonage houses, many of those in existence 
 are totally unfit for the residence of any cler- 
 gyman’s family; forty-seven churches have no 
 glebe land. Where there is a house or land 
 to build one upon, the want of a sufficient resi- 
 dence would be an excuse, if the livings could 
 
 afford 
 
39 
 
 afford money to repair or to build : But 
 twenty-seven churches, exclusive of those that 
 are subordinate churches, and which for the 
 most part have no independent income, have 
 from X2; 5s, a year, only, to £50 a year: 
 No living would remain so low as £2: 5s, a 
 year, if the patrons would accept of augmen- 
 tation from Queen Ann’s bounty ; but this is 
 declined for fear of putting them under the 
 Bishop’s jurisdiction. Of the livings, twenty- 
 ‘‘ seven are under £50, — thirty-three above 
 <£50, but under o£’l00, — twenty-three above 
 c£l00, but under <£l50, — twenty-four above 
 £l50 but under £200 per annum : There 
 are but nineteen livings of the whole hun- 
 dred and sixty-eight, that are above c£200 
 ** per annum ; and this in a country, in which 
 the ecclesiastical state is conceived to be much 
 more respectable, than in the average state of 
 the kingdom.” 
 
 In adverting to this subject, I just ven- 
 ture to remark, that in a publication of an ‘Ho- 
 nourable Baronet, upon the revenues of the 
 kingdom, (whom I do not see in his place,) 
 it is stated, that the revenue of this charity 
 of Queen Anne’s bounty, at first amounted 
 to about of 14000 per annum; and on the 
 1st of January, 1735, the governors of that 
 
 charity 
 
40 
 
 charity, possessed, besides from savings and 
 private benefactions, the sum of 15 2,5 00 
 
 ** of Old South Sea annuities, and .£4857 of 
 cash in the hands of their treasurer ; the state 
 of that fund has of late years been carefully 
 concealed, but it probably yields at present 
 from of 40 to 50,000 per annum.” The Ho- 
 nourable Baronet will, 1 am sure, thank me for 
 using the present opportunity of correcting such 
 a misapprehension. It is perfectly true, that 
 such a sum existed in the funds in the year 
 1735 ; but it is equally true, that this was a sum 
 fully appropriated to a great number of livings, 
 to which it was paying a money interest ’till 
 proper purchases of land could be found ; and 
 wherever there is a surplus of such interest, k 
 is made principal, and is applied in a similar 
 manner. Its present income is, with very slight 
 accidental variations, the same as its original in- 
 come, between .£14000 and <£15000 per an- 
 num. It would be difficult, indeed, to con- 
 ceive any reason for an idle unproductive ac- 
 cumulation of the money of this charity, to the 
 prejudice of its present numerous objects ; 
 though, if any such practice could exist, I cer- 
 tainly should not be much surprised, at the 
 careful concealment of it. 
 
 To the mischiefs arising from the extrenie 
 poverty of many parochial heneficcs, I have 
 
 heard 
 
41 
 
 heard it suggested in this House as a cure, that 
 there should be an equalization. Equality is in 
 these days the grand panacea for all disorders. 
 Unfortunately, besides twenty other objections, 
 arising from the general interests of the civil and 
 religious policy of the country, there are two 
 objections that seem to dispose of it completely: 
 one is, that it could not be effected without a 
 most enormous plunder of the laity; and the 
 other, that if done, it would not answer the 
 purpose for which it is intended. In the first 
 place, advowsons, though originally perhaps 
 mere trusts, are now become lay fees. They are 
 bought and sold, and are lay property, just as 
 mueh as any other tenements or hereditaments. 
 And they are not merely lay property In lata, 
 but a very large proportion of them is so in 
 fact\. for of the eleven thousand six hundred 
 and odd livings in this kingdom, two thousand 
 five hundred may be in ecclesiastical patronage, 
 the rest, (exclusive of those which belong to the 
 Crown, amounting to near eleven hundred,) ei- 
 ther belong to various lay corporations (for 
 even colleges are such,) or to lay individuals, 
 who alone possess near six thousand of the 
 whole number. Now, Sir, in this state of 
 things, I desire to ask, upon what ground 
 I can be called upon to give up half the 
 
 (r living 
 
42 
 
 living, the advowson of which I have pur- 
 chased, upon a price relative to its value, in 
 order that that moiety may be transferred to 
 improve another living, belonging to another 
 patron, who has paid nothing for that moiety, 
 and who has no other title to it, but that he 
 happens to possess the advowson of a smaller 
 living ? I see no ground, except such an one as 
 would justify the Legislature in taking away half 
 of any other estate I had purchased, in order 
 to give it to my neighbour, because he happened 
 to have less. Let gentlemen consider the 
 effect of such speculations ! In the next place, 
 suppose, that this was accomplished, in a way 
 consistent with the rights of property, what 
 would follow ? Equalize all the clergy, and you 
 in effect degrade them all, for it is the grossest of 
 all mistakes, that the parochial Church of Eng- 
 land is amply endowed It is demonstrated 
 * by a very exact inquirer upon these subjects, 
 Mr. Cove, that if even all the preferments, of 
 every species, belonging to the Church of Eng- 
 land, were moulded into one common mass; 
 and thence distributed — if the venerable fabrick 
 of the hierarchy was dissolved, (a matter not to 
 be effected without a convulsion and laceration 
 of the civil state of the country, of which no 
 man can foretell the consequences) and its 
 
 funds 
 
45 
 
 funds parcelled out amongst the parochial 
 clergy, the maximum of an English benefice 
 would be not more than <£\61 a year — an in- 
 come by no means adequate in the present state 
 of the vforld, to the demands which society 
 makes upon that profession in point of educa- 
 tion, of attainments, of manners, of general ap- 
 pearance in life. As the revenues at present are 
 distributed, the clergy, as a profession, find an 
 easy and independent access to every gradation 
 of society, and maintain a fair equality, as they 
 ought to do, with the other liberal professions; 
 and the elevation of the highest ranks give some- 
 thing of a dignity to the lo^vest : alter the mode 
 of distribution, and you run the risk of producing 
 a body of clergy, resembling only the lower or- 
 ders of soeiety, in their conversation, in their 
 manners, and their habits ; and it is v/ell, if they 
 are not infected by a popular fondness, for some 
 or other species of a gross, a factious, and a fa- 
 natical religion. 
 
 An invidious parallel is sometimes stated, 
 between the sister Churches of England and 
 Scotland, upon this matter, and particularly 
 upon the opinion of Dr. Adam Smith, to the 
 disadvantage of the former. With all respect 
 to the talents of a very acute and accomplished 
 person, I am disposed^ to stop a little short of an 
 G 2 unlimited 
 
44 
 
 Unlimited subscription to his opinions, on many 
 subjects, and particularly upon the subject of the 
 English Church, and the English Universities; 
 both of which I have had means of knowing, in 
 consequence of causes from which I can claim 
 no merit, in a mode of personal observation and 
 experience, which that eminent person never 
 possessed. Sir, when I consider the extraor- 
 dinary men which tlie Church of Scotland has 
 produced, [quales vb'os Caledonia emiserit, if I 
 may use the words of Tacitus respecting their 
 ancestors) I cannot help adverting to the cir- 
 cumstance, that their harvest of literature has 
 been principally produced within the last thirty 
 or forty years ; within which time, I understand, 
 a more liberal provision has, by the authority of 
 the Courts of Justice, been made for their clergy. 
 Sir, I presume that I state a fact that is generally 
 admitted, that from the Revolution downwards 
 till that time, the clergy of Scotland had not 
 taken a distinguished share in the literary occu- 
 pations of Europe, even in those of a theological 
 nature. They have amply paid up their arrears, 
 and their country has, in part at least, paid up its 
 arrears to them, of a due and honourable main- 
 tenance. The improvements of their incomes 
 have been very considerable in late times. 
 I know not whether Bishop Burnet, M^ho cer- 
 tainly 
 
45 
 
 talnly Iiad the means of knowing, is correct 
 in saying, that in Charles the Second's time, 
 all benefices in Scotland were raised to jCBO 
 sterling; but I have been given to understand, 
 that the Church of Scotland, particuiaily taking 
 into consideration the cheapness of education 
 and cheapness of living, may be deemed a 
 better endowed church than the parochial 
 Church of England: Which distribution of the 
 Church revenues is preferable, is a question (if 
 it can possibly be made a question in the actual 
 state of things) which must be examined not 
 simply by a view of the distributions themselves, 
 but with reference to many important circum- 
 stances, connected with the civil policy of the 
 two parts of the island ? This I may venture to 
 say, as a general position, in spite of the bright 
 exception of the Church of Scotland, that the 
 general effect of an equality and mediocrity of 
 provision, is to produce an equality and medio- 
 crity of talent ; and I think I do not misrepre- 
 sent in saying, that it has had some such effect 
 upon the foreign Protestant churches, when 
 I refer what they have produced, to any com- 
 parison with the splendour of the literary 
 fame of the Church of England. One thing 
 I am sorry to learn from the statistical accounts 
 «f the worthy Baronet, that the number of 
 ” youths 
 
'46 
 
 youths eclucatlng for the Church, in many part!? 
 of Scotland, is considerably falling off. It ra- 
 ther looks as if the profession, notwitlistanding 
 the kinder treatment it has lately received, has 
 not yet obtained its fair share in the growing 
 prosperity of that country. 
 
 Sir, I have to apologize for digressing to 
 these topics; in returning, I must observe, that, 
 in the state of the Church I have described uni- 
 versal residence is out of the question. How 
 can the public demand, under pains and pe- 
 nalties, that there shall be a resident incumbent 
 in ' each' parish, when so large a proportion of 
 the benefices in the kingdom, do not pay more 
 than what most of us in this House pay to our 
 upper servants ? There are, I suppose, three 
 thousand livings not exceeding fifty pounds a 
 year, and many belowTt. When I look at the 
 real situation of the clergy, at the distresses and 
 difficulties of a very large proportion of them, 
 men must be made of sterner stuff than I hap- 
 pen to be composed of, who can say, that this 
 matter is to be put upon the footing of a rigid, 
 universal, unbending obligation, to be applied 
 with a mathematical apathy to all cases, with- 
 out the least consideration of men’s families or 
 their fortunes ! Let us remember, that we are 
 providing, not physical laws for the government 
 
 of 
 
47 
 
 of matter, but moral regulations for the conduct 
 of a great number of men, placed in an infinite 
 variety of situations, the effects of which must 
 be taken into the account, and with a candid 
 and Immane consideration. 
 
 Gentlemen say, and I am sure with the 
 very best intentions, Give us clear general 
 rules; we desire to have nothing to do with 
 any man’s discretion.” My answer is,. Giv^e 
 me a subject that admits of clear general 
 rules; this is not one of them.” If the benefices 
 of the kingdom were all equal, and the men 
 who held them were all single men, it would 
 be easy to take the compasses out of one’s 
 pocket, and to mete out exactly the extent of 
 indulgence, that might universally be granted to 
 men, simply and uniformly situated ; but you 
 cannot apply a straight rule to a surface infinitely 
 uneven and irregular. Here are above eleven 
 thousand persons in conditions of great dis- 
 parity, of different habits of life, of no small 
 difference of education and attainments, of 
 church incomes that bear no proportion to 
 each other, and of family circumstances that 
 are equally disproportionate. What is to be 
 done ? The rule, that would be no more than a 
 just rule, applied to the opulent rector, would 
 be a rule of severe oppression upon the poor 
 
 man. 
 
48 
 
 man, with his benefice of thirty pounds a-year, 
 who is driven to eke out his family subsistence 
 by a more beneficial employment of himself 
 elsewhere. Will you consti'uct your rule upon 
 the scale of the value of benefices ? To say no- 
 thing of the different value of money, in different 
 parts of the island, the different state of men's 
 families will still create a monstrous inequality; 
 for no man will deny, that a single man, and a 
 married man with ten children, living each 
 upon the same income of seventy pounds a 
 year, are in a state of great inequality. All that 
 can be done in such a subject is, to call in a dis- 
 cretion, to operate on this infinite variety of cir- 
 cumstances. God forbid, that I should mean an 
 interested jobbing partiality; I mean a prudent 
 and humane discretion, that is to distribute it- 
 self honestly and honourably, between the just 
 rights of the publick service on the one side, and 
 the necessity of private convenience on the other, 
 as far as the infirmity of human judgment will 
 allow. Another consideration calls with a loud 
 voice for the existence and exercise of a discre- 
 tion — I mean the consideration, that must be 
 had of that meritorious body of men, the cu- 
 rates. Establish a rigid rule of residence to be 
 carried into a hasty effect, under the letter of a 
 
 • statute. 
 
49 
 
 statute, and you turn these persons adrift, from 
 situations where they have spent their lives in- 
 nocently and usefully, to seek their bread 
 where, on a supposition of universal residence, 
 it is not to be found — perhaps at an advanced 
 time of life, and with families dependent upon 
 them. These persons mmt be tenderly consi- 
 dered; if there is a curate who has long de- 
 meaned himself with propriety in a station, it 
 would, in my opinion, be not more than a just 
 exercise of discretion, to bear with the absence 
 of the Incumbent, till that curate is removed, 
 in some way consistent with the attention due to 
 his interests; otherwise the reformation of in- 
 cumbents will be the persecution of curates* 
 A discretion therefore must be called in, at 
 least till the charity and piety of Parliament has 
 put the lower parts of the Church establish- 
 ment on a more favourable footing: and the 
 only question can be, Where shall that discre- 
 tion be placed? And of question, I say, that 
 it must be determined by the result of this ques- 
 tion, Where can It be most constitutionally 
 placed? that is, with reference to the general 
 frame- of the Church establishment, to the prin- 
 ciples on which It is founded, and to the na- 
 il ture. 
 
50 
 
 ture and character of the authorities that exist 
 in it ? 
 
 Upon all the different grounds 1 have stated, 
 a necessity exists of revising the statute. What 
 I have to oft'er, I desire to propose as merely a 
 provisional or interim bill ; for I can never re- 
 peat too frequently, that till the situation of the 
 lower clergy is improved with respect to their ' 
 incomes, their parsonage houses, and other cir- 
 cumstances, which I trust will soon become the 
 subjects of parliamentary attention, nothing ra- 
 dical, nothing permanent, can be projected. 
 But, so far as the present bill is concerned, I 
 beg leave to state the principles, on which, I con- 
 ceive with all deference, the Legislature ought 
 to proceed to the consideration of such a sub- 
 ject. In the first place, not to recede from an- 
 cient foundations, not to attempt reformations, 
 particularly in the present disordered state of the 
 Church finances, upon high, a priori, notions of 
 a theoretical perfection, but to use and apply 
 the existing means in the constitution, in order 
 to obtain such a quantity of good effect, as is 
 really attainable; to keep to that, which, consi- 
 dering the familiarity of ancient usage, the at- 
 tachment of habit, and the uniformity of gene- 
 ral 
 
51 
 
 ral system, promises to be practically the most 
 commodious — to give confidence, and to allow 
 discretion where the constitution has vested dis- 
 cretion, has required confidence — and to guard, 
 by reasonable caution, against the perils of a 
 blind confidence and an abused discretion. Se- 
 condly, Not to look to a petty harrassing system 
 of regulations, that Is to be dogging, and hunt- 
 ing men, in every hour of their lives, and at 
 every turn of their steps, for no sufficient pur- 
 pose of respectable utility, but to a substantial 
 bond fide enforcement of substantial bond fide 
 duties, that the public may not be told that there 
 is nobody responsible — and, in truth, as the mat- 
 ter stands at present, there are but few, compa- 
 ratively, who are responsible. I have no wish 
 to deny, tliat there are many oftensive cases of 
 non-residence; though the majority of cases, I 
 am persuaded, are such, as a man of even strict 
 religious principles, tempered with a little hu- 
 man feeling (possibly not much the worse for 
 that temperature), would find to contain circum- 
 stances of more extenuation than he had sup- 
 posed. But, e ven iiithe offensive cases, it is difficult 
 to say, who is responsible beyond the individuals 
 themselves — certainly not the governors of the 
 Church in hardiy any case — for I must, in jus- 
 
 H 2 tice, 
 
tlcc, let out to the House a secret, a little dan*^ 
 gcrous perhaps to be communicated at large, 
 that in truth there is hardly one act of discipline, 
 which a Bishop can execute upon his clergy, (if 
 it is at all resisted,) but at the expense, and the 
 vexation, and hazard of a law suit. Take this 
 tnatter of residence — A Blsliop admonishes his 
 clerk to reside, and the clerk turns a ddaf ear \ 
 what is to be done? The Bishop has only this 
 election, whether he shall .employ the compul- 
 sion of the ecclesiastical prpccss, or the common 
 law compulsion of this statute; for a suit of one 
 kind or other he must have, For a Bishop to 
 be dragging his clergy, in the character of 
 common informer, into every assize town of his 
 diocese, subject to all the publick freedom of 
 discussion (necessary, I admit, in that mode of 
 inquiry), and to all the levity of remark (allow- 
 able, I likewise admit, in the advocate who has 
 to carry his present point with his jury), is no 
 verv seemly sight; I cannot help thinking, that 
 3nore harm is done to the modest dignity of re- 
 ligion, by such exhibitions, than balances the 
 advantage of the success of the particular pro- 
 secution. On the other hand, if the Bishop re- 
 pairs to the Ecclesiastical Court, I cepainly can- 
 not venture to describe a penal suit travelling 
 
 thi'oiigh. 
 
through the Consistory, the Arches, and finally 
 the Delegates^ as any luxury to the man who 
 has to pursue it; certainly very far from it, 
 looking at the expense and the vexation that 
 may travelalong with it. No man can expect a 
 Bishop to venture upon the use of such remedies, 
 but in very enormous cases indeed. The con- 
 stitution, in theory, supposes the governors of 
 the Church to have all necessary powers ; but 
 they are powers which can hardly be deemed 
 to exist to any practicable effect. Give the go-^ 
 vernors of the Church, not new and unknown 
 powers, but prompt and commodious means of 
 applying those they have, an awful response 
 bllity will immediately arise ; they will feel, 
 that the expectation of the publick is upon 
 them ; that the publick requires that the powers 
 so given shall be used, and used for the purposes 
 for which given. If they are not used^ or not 
 so used, it may give rise to a suspicion (which God 
 avert), that the episcopal government of the 
 Church, high and sacred as its origin may be, is, 
 in the present state of manners, less favourably 
 adapted to the cafe of its interests and duties, 
 tlian the civil constitution of the country had 
 hitherto supposed. 
 
 In the third place, that this enforcement 
 
 of 
 
54 ^ 
 
 of duties should be framed with as little vex- 
 ation to its objects, as is consistent with its effi- 
 cacy; without any unnecessary harshness or 
 restraint, still less with disrespect and degrada- 
 tions; with all decent attention to the situation 
 of the order in the State, and to the personal 
 convenience of individuals. Their profession 
 is in all countries of most important use to so- 
 ciety, and its general utility depends upon, its 
 general estimation. In this country it is an 
 eminent order of the State : It has always stood 
 by the State with 'firmness, and in no times 
 more meritoriously than in the present. The 
 individuals are, in a large proportion ^of them, 
 men of learned, and many of them of elegant 
 education. Literature, both useful and orna- 
 mental, has been in no country so largely in- 
 debted to its clergy. Many of them are taken 
 from among the best and most respected families 
 of our country ; and it is on all accounts, reli- 
 gious, moral, ani political, anxiously to be 
 wished, that the families of our gentry should 
 continue to supply a large proportion of our 
 clergy. Such ’men are not the subjects of an 
 extreme and overstrained legislation. Some- 
 thing must be trusted to their own sense of duty; 
 something allowed to their personal conveni- 
 ence. 
 
55 
 
 erice. They are to be governed, it is true, but 
 lenikis hnperiis, by an 'authority efficacious in 
 its results, but mild in its forms and just in its 
 indulgences. May I add, that whilst we have 
 seen, in other countries, Christianity suffering 
 in the persons of the oppressed clergy, it im- 
 poses a peculiar obligation upon us, to treat 
 our own with kindness and respect, and to be- 
 ware of degrading religion, by an apparent de- 
 gradation of its ministers. If there has been 
 an undue laxity in this matter, let the Legislature 
 signify firmly, that they should generally repair 
 to their benefices ; but not as men stigmatised 
 and relegated — carrying their resentments to 
 their solitudes — and from whom, after unkind 
 treatment, a chearful and ardent performance 
 of duty can hardly be expected. Surely, Sir, 
 it is upon such subjects, more than any others, 
 that one ounce of sweet spontaneous duty, is 
 worth whole pounds of compelled performance. 
 
 Whether these principles, on which I have 
 endeavoured to construct this bill, are just, or 
 the provisions well adapted to carry them into 
 effect, is for the House to judge. I shall state 
 briefly its general provisions, both on the part 
 of the public, and on the part of the clergy, re- 
 ferring for fiirther and more minute detail to 
 
 the 
 
56 
 
 the bill Itself, which I shall move for leave tO 
 have printed, for the use of the Members during 
 the recess. ^ 
 
 On the part of the public, I propose to 
 guard against what the House appeared to con- 
 sider as the abuses of clergymen’s farming, and 
 to enforce the duty of residence, in a double man- 
 ner more eftectually, by enabling the Bishops to 
 exert the authority, which the constitution 
 has given them, and by giving the common 
 prosecutor, where he is permitted to act, an 
 increased reward of his diligence. On the 
 part of the clergy, there is offered : 1st, An 
 entire amnesty for past neglect, where no pro- 
 secution had been commenced ; and, 2dly, 
 Where there had been, An exemption from fur- 
 ther prosecution, on paymentof costs already in- 
 curred. 3dly, On the matter of farming, a li- 
 berty given in the cases, where they were injuri- 
 ously prohibited by the ancient statute. 4thly, 
 On the matter of residence, to give a fair and 
 reasonable allowance of time, to the clergyman 
 for the occasions of private life, free from the 
 doggingsof any Informer, though still subject to 
 the superintendance of his proper superior — to 
 allow an ipso facto exemption from all penalties, 
 for clergymen bearing certain offices, during 
 
 the 
 
57 
 
 the times required for the duties of those office^i 
 — to restore the power to Bishops to grant li- 
 cences for absence, in certain enumerated and 
 expressed cases, which licences shall protect 
 from the common prosecutor — and in other 
 cases, which cannot be specitically foreseen, or 
 provided for, to allow the concurrence and con- 
 sent of the metropolitan to have that effect. 
 
 Sir, these are the outlines of the proposed 
 bill. I have only to add, that leaving felt the 
 difficulties of the subject in undertaking this 
 matter, I have not felt my sense of Its diffi- ' 
 culties diminished, by having contended with 
 them. The subject has deep foundations in 
 legal and ecclesiastical antiquity ; it has wide 
 and diffusive bearings in the present system of 
 life and manners, and certainly a very serious in- 
 fluence upon the good order of society, as well 
 as the comfort of individuals. I could have 
 v/ishcd> that it had fallen into other hands, par- 
 ticularly those to which is confided the care of 
 the great establishments of the Empire ; for un- 
 questionably in a country which, with a most 
 fortunate wisdom, makes its religion an essential 
 part of its civil polity, the establishments of re- 
 ligion are amongst the greatest. Far be from 
 me the vanity of supposing that any bill which 
 1 can construct on a subject ’so loaded with 
 I practical 
 
58 
 
 practical difficulties, can find a ready accept- 
 ance amongst the various opinions which pre- 
 vail upon it. For I must honestly confess, that 
 since it has been devolved upon me, I have 
 rarely conversed with any gentleman, who did 
 not favour me with an opinion, that was not 
 directly the reverse of the last opinion, I had 
 been favoured with upon the subject. All I have 
 to say is, that if with the improvements the bill 
 shall receive from the wisdom of the House, it 
 should finally succeed, I shall be glad to have 
 been the instrument of introducing it to its no- 
 tice. If it should fail, I shall write satisfecl 
 upon my own mind and conscience, under the 
 conviction, that I have with fair intentions pur- 
 sued a most desirable object, and only failed 
 under difificulties, to which humble talents are 
 very unequal. 
 
 Sir, I move, that leave be given to bring 
 in a bill — and leave being given — ^ that the 
 Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Attorney 
 and Solicitor General, the Members for the two 
 Universities of England, Mr. Dickinson, Mr, 
 Gregor, Dr. Duigenan, and Dr. Laurence, do 
 prepare and bring in the same. 
 
 THE END. 
 
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