>}t -y.
 
 I B RAHY 
 OF THE 
 U N IVLRSITY 
 Of ILLINOIS
 
 CHURCH ESTABLISHMENTS : 
 THEIR ADVANTAGES, SOCIAL & RELIGIOUS. 
 
 A LECTURE 
 
 ADDKESSED TO 
 
 THE STOURBRIDGE CHURCH OE ENGLAND 
 YOUNG MEN'S ASSOCIATION, 
 
 HON. AND KEV, W. H. LTTTELTON, 
 
 RECTOR OF HAGLEY AND HONORARY CANON OF 
 WORCESTER. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY THE ASSOCIATION. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 BELL AND DALDT. 
 
 STOURBRIDGE: T. MELLARD. 
 
 1861,
 
 PKEFACE. 
 
 The principal political leaders of the dissenters have 
 nonestly declared, before the Committee of the House 
 of Lords, that the abolition of church-rates, for which 
 they are now chiefly agitating, would by no means 
 satisfy them ; that it is but a step in the changes 
 which they seek to introduce j an.d that their main 
 object is the entire separation of Church and State ; 
 the withdrawal of all State-support from religion. 
 
 Now we have not the slightest fear of their 
 attaining this object for an indefinite number of years, 
 if ever. Nor will any reasonable man complain of 
 their agitating for this purpose, if they sincerely be- 
 lieve it is for the public good. It is, in that case, 
 nothing more than their plain duty to do so; 
 and we rejoice in the fact, that in this country — 
 this almost solitary home of complete political and 
 personal freedom — as we are not afraid to put weapons 
 of war into the hands of all classes of men, so neither 
 are we afraid to allow full liberty to all men to attack 
 any, or every institution of which they disapprove, 
 even though it be one consecrated by the veneration 
 of ages, and forming an integral part of that ancient 
 constitution of this realm, to which more perhaps than 
 to anything else, under God, we owe our truly mar- 
 vellous national prosperity and greatness. We believe 
 that in an atmosphere of full freedom of discussion, 
 truth will in the end prevail. And an Institution
 
 IV. 
 
 which will not bear the fullest and freest discussion 
 is hardly worth the keeping. But the Church of 
 England will stand far more formidable attacks than 
 any which the Liberation Society, or all her adver- 
 saries united can make upon her. 
 
 Still, if men attack us, it is right that we should 
 defend ourselves, and be ready to give a reason for 
 our belief and conviction that the union of Church 
 and State, if ordered on sound principles, is in a high 
 degree beneficial to both. 
 
 I hope that in this lecture I have not violated 
 Christian charity. I entertain sincere respect for 
 many of our adversaries on this great question. I 
 honour the spirit in which some of their writings — as 
 for instance, Mr. Miall's Eight Letters to the Earl of 
 Shaftesbury — are written. Every one who, like Mr. 
 Miall in these letters — I hope all his writings are 
 in the same spirit — sets an example of courtesy in 
 argument, and of that chivalrous generosity which is 
 so much less common in paper war, than it is in our 
 time in literal war between civilised nations, deserves 
 the thanks of both parties. 
 
 But in every time of controversy we shall have 
 instances of war carried on in a very different spirit j 
 there will be demagogues whose object is to ride upon 
 the storm for their own merely personal or party 
 objects ; ministers of the gospel of Divine love, who, 
 professing a theology which declares that " God is 
 love," and that only "he that dwelleth in love, 
 dwelletk in God" set, in common life, deplorable 
 examples of 'that "odium theologicum" which has 
 been the scandal of religion in all ages ; who in their 
 churches or chapels make extreme confessions of their 
 own and their party's sinfulness, but out of them con- 
 fess nothing but other people's ; and who continually 
 urge us to prefer their own system or their own party 
 to that of their antagonists, on the ground of sins in 
 the latter which a moment's serious thought would 
 
 in*
 
 V. 
 
 shew them were equally, if not more common, on their 
 own side ; and in fact belong to human nature every- 
 where. Mr. Bright's charges against our Church 
 might be retorted with double force upon volun- 
 taryists, as any one may see who will read the evidence 
 drawn from dissenting publications in Dr. S. E. 
 Maitland's admirable little book on the " Voluntary 
 System." 
 
 As long as there is sin and error in the world, 
 there must be war ; only let all good men labour that 
 the spirit in which the war is carried on be Christian 
 and generous. When men in the violence of party- 
 spirit lose self-possession, they are apt, like the Jeru- 
 salem mob, to " throw so much dust into the air," that 
 they can no longer clearly distinguish friend from foe 
 — that which would, in the end, be beneficial to 
 themselves as well as others, from that which would 
 injure them. To attempt to reason with men in this 
 state of mind, is hardly wiser than to appeal to the 
 calm reason of a wild bull charging a red cloak ; for 
 it is far more blind animal passion than thoughtful 
 love of God and of man that guides and impels them. 
 
 The question here discussed is one in which all 
 good men of every kind are alike interested, since it 
 refers to the best and most effective way of estab- 
 lishing and maintaining the kingdom of our Lord in 
 the world. We do not plead for the disuse of the 
 voluntary system ; by no means ; but only against its 
 exclusive use. If we are asked which is the best 
 system for bringing the preaching of Christ's truth 
 and the ordinances of Divine grace within reach of all 
 the members of any nation ; of the poor as well as 
 the rich ; of those who despise, or are indifferent to 
 all religion, as well as of those who value it — for 
 Christianizing a whole nation — the Establishment sys- 
 tem or the voluntary system — we answer without the 
 least hesitation, that we should use both together with 
 all the energy we can.
 
 VI. 
 
 Those who maintain the sufficiency of the volun- 
 tary system by itself, are taking their stand upon un- 
 proved theories and gratuitous assumptions, against 
 the universal experience of mankind hitherto. 
 
 The following lecture was delivered last year at 
 Stourbridge, and again this year at Bridgnorth. I 
 have endeavoured to make it more worthy of publica- 
 tion — as the Stourbridge Association have wished to 
 publish it — by adding notes, and otherwise, I hope, 
 improving it. 
 
 There are some dissenters whom I should never 
 hope to convince. There are men who act upon the 
 principle of one who said, " When I have quite made 
 up my mind, I am ready to listen to argument, be- 
 cause then it can do no harm ; " or who, if facts are 
 mentioned which appear to tell against their side of 
 the argument, would answer with a renowned French- 
 man, " So much the worse for the facts ! " 
 
 Upon such men I have no hope of producing any 
 impression. But I cannot conceive how any rea- 
 sonable man, open to persuasion, can study the subject 
 carefully, without arriving at the conviction that an 
 Established Church, rightly ordered, is one of the 
 greatest blessings any nation can enjoy. 
 
 W. H. L. 
 
 Hagley Rectory, 
 
 April, 1861.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 Subject of this Lecture, p. 2. 
 
 Opinions of great Non- Conformists in former ages on Church. 
 Establishments, p. 3 and Note C. 
 
 A Church-Rate imposed by Independents, p. 4. 
 
 Opinions of the Reformers on Church Establishments, p. 4. 
 
 Argument from the Old Testament in favour of Church Estab- 
 lishments, pp. 5-7 and Note F. 
 
 How much does the argument from the Old Testament prove ? 
 p. 7. 
 
 Objections from the New Testament answered, p. 9. 
 
 Dissenters accept of State-aid, pp. 11-12 and Note H. 
 
 Church Rates, pp. 12-13 and Note F. 
 
 Imperfections of the Voluntary System, pp. 15-17. 
 
 Character of the Clergy of the Church of England, pp. 18-20. 
 
 Incomes of the Clergy, pp. 20-23 and Note E. 
 
 Three Questions to be asked of Reformers in Church and State, 
 pp. 24-25. 
 
 Religious advantages of the Union of Church and State, 
 pp. 25-35. 
 
 The Church as a Church of Christ not dependent upon the 
 State, pp. 26-27. 
 
 Note A. — Archbishop Whately on Party-Spirit. 
 
 Note B. — Books and Pamphlets upon the present controversy. 
 
 Note C. — Opinions of eminent Non- Conformists in former ages 
 on Church Establishments. 
 
 Note D. — Christianity never filled whole countries till sup- 
 ported by the State. Dr. Chalmers' final verdict 
 on Voluntaryism. 
 
 Note E. — The Revenues of the Church ; the Incomes of the 
 Clergy ; Edmund Burke's opinion thereon. Pa- 
 tronage in the Church, and among Dissenters. 
 
 Note F. — Compulsory Temple-Rates under the Old Testament. 
 
 Note G. — The Territorial System. A specimen of clap-trap 
 made to do duty as argument. 
 
 Note H. — The Church's right to her property. Opinions of 
 Dissenters on Endowments for religious purposes. 
 
 Note I.— William Cobbett on the Established Church.
 
 LECTURE. 
 
 Introduction. 
 
 There are few subjects of greater importance to us all 
 than that of Church Establishments. 
 
 All men who love their church and their country 
 should study it as far as they have means and oppor- 
 tunities; and do their utmost, by conversation and 
 otherwise, to form in the minds of all men an intel- 
 ligent and well-founded public opinion upon it. 
 
 It is no secret that there is in existence a very 
 active society, called the " Society for the Liberation of 
 Religion from State Patronage and Control," whose 
 avowed object it is to sever all connection between 
 Church and State ; and which sends out emissaries all 
 over the country to agitate in favour of this great 
 and fundamental change in the ancient constitution of 
 this country. 
 
 Now whatever be our opinion upon the desirability 
 or the reverse of such a change, no one will deny that 
 it would be a change of great importance. 
 
 Old England without any Established Church would 
 be very different from what it has been with one. 
 If the time should ever come, when tithes being 
 abolished, clergymen will have to go round their 
 parishes asking for subscriptions for the support of 
 themselves and their families ; and church-rates being 
 abolished, the willing members of congregations have 
 to pay the whole expenses of the repairs of their church 
 
 B
 
 and of the support of its services ; and all the other 
 members of the church eDJoy its use, free of expense, or 
 paying much less than their fair proportion : the state 
 of things so introduced will be very widely different — 
 whether better or worse is another question — but very 
 different from any we have yet as a nation expe- 
 rienced. 
 
 I believe that a thousand characteristics of our 
 quiet English life and our sober English religion, and 
 some of the most valuable features of our peculiar 
 national habits of mind and temper, are the direct 
 effects of the State establishment of a Christian Church, 
 and of nothing else ; though we are very apt to attri- 
 bute them to other causes, or even to the nature of 
 things. We are so accustomed to many of these advan- 
 tages, that we are in danger of thinking that they come 
 of themselves. If asked how they arose, many would 
 be ready to make Topsy's answer, M 'Spects they 
 growed." And they think they always would grow, 
 simply because the world is made as it is. 
 
 My own conviction on the other hand, and that of 
 many far wiser men, dissenters as well as churchmen, 
 is, that they never would grow, or at least never to 
 anything like their present extent, were it not for the 
 support by the State, as a State, of some Christian 
 Church. 
 
 Subject of this Lecture. 
 
 Now I intend in this lecture to confine myself 
 strictly to the question of Church Establishments in the 
 abstract. I shall not at all consider whether or no our 
 Church as it is, is the best that could be selected to be 
 established. That is an entirely different question. I 
 only wish to urge that some body of Christians ought 
 to be supported by the State. 
 
 Stating the case so, you will observe that it becomes 
 no longer a question between churchmen and dissenters. 
 For while on the one hand there are some members of our 
 Church — very ill-judging ones in my opinion-^-but still 
 bona fide and earnest members of our Church, who wish 
 to separate Church and State ; on the other hand some of 
 the greatest of the non-conformists of ancient and modern
 
 times are strongly in favour of their union. This is 
 an important fact to be urged upon candid dissenters. 
 
 Opinions of Great Non- Conformists on 
 Church Establishments. 
 
 Matthew Henry, the Independent, one of the best 
 Scripture commentators, writes as follows : — 
 
 "Let us give God praise for the national establish- 
 ment of our religion, with that of our peace and civil 
 liberty; that our Canaan is not a land flowing with 
 milk and honey, but (which is of much greater advan- 
 tage) that it is Immanuel's land; that the Christian 
 religion — that choice and noble vine, which was so 
 early planted in our land — is still growing and flourish- 
 ing in it, in despite of all the attempts of the powers of 
 darkness to root it out ; that it is refined from the errors 
 and corruptions the Church of Eome had, with the help 
 of ignorance and tyranny, introduced ; that the Eefor- 
 mation was in our land a national act; and that 
 Christianity, thus purified, is supported by good and 
 wholesome laws, and is twisted in with the very con- 
 stitution of our government" 
 
 Doddridge adds in the same strain — 
 
 "Ministers of all denominations claim our prayers, 
 and peculiarly those of established churches; Tvhen as 
 the temporal emoluments are generally greatest, there 
 is of course more to invite unworthy persons to offer 
 themselves to the ministry. Nor ought we to forget 
 those wise, learned, and pious men, whom our govern- 
 ment may from time to time think fit to raise to the 
 most exalted stations among the clergy, and to invest 
 with a dignity and authority, which, though no part of 
 their ministerial office, is capable of being improved to 
 great advantage. It is devoutly to be wished that they 
 may use their great influence and power to exclude 
 those that are unworthy from that important trust ; and 
 that they may preside over the doctrine and behaviour 
 of those committed to their care, in such a manner as 
 may render both most edifying to those who attend 
 their instruction. By these pious and zealous endea- 
 vours an establishment will flourish, and separate 
 interests decrease. But what folly and iniquity were it
 
 so much as secretly to wish that one limb might grow ly 
 the distemper of the body, or one coast be enriched by the 
 wreck of the public navy."W 
 
 Such was the spirit of these true men of God, among 
 the non-conformists of former days. They were men 
 capable of looking beyond narrow class-interests, and of 
 taking a large view of such questions as affect the whole 
 community. 
 
 Let all sober-minded dissenters consider whether 
 Owen, Flavel, Howe, Baxter/ 2 ) Henry, and Doddridge, 
 or the violent party men who compose the Liberation 
 Society, are the likeliest to guide them according to the 
 mind of Christ. 
 
 A Church-Rate imposed by Independents. 
 
 Here let me notice one remarkable fact with 
 reference to church-rates — that the only Act of Parlia- 
 ment ever passed that imposed church-rates on all 
 parishes (whether, that is, a majority voted for them or 
 not), was in the time of the Commonwealth, when the 
 Church of England was down, and the Presbyterians and 
 Independents held the rule, who then enforced church- 
 rates by Act of Parliament, without either the consent 
 of, or accountability to, the parishioners. @) 
 
 The notion of its being in itself unlawful or un- 
 scriptural for the State to support the Church was, I 
 believe, never started by any class of Christians till 
 the end of last century. All the different professions 
 of faith drawn up in Switzerland or England at the time 
 of the Reformation — twelve I believe in number — urge the 
 duty of the State to support religion. 
 
 Are then our modern Liberation Society sages better 
 authorities on the interpretation of Scripture than all 
 these ? Let fair-minded dissenters consider this. 
 
 For my own part, I am so earnest a believer in the 
 value of Church Establishments for the due maintenance 
 of religion, and for its diffusion over a whole country, that 
 if our Church were ever to be separated from the State, 
 
 (1) Sermon on Deut. xxiii., 9, quoted, together with the passage from 
 M. Henry, in Essays on the Church, p.p. 18, 19. 
 
 (2) See their opinions in Note II. 
 
 (3) Quoted from Mr. Toulmin Smith, a dissenter, in the Preface to an excel- 
 lent little tract on the Voluntary System, called "Overbury," by Dr. Molea- 
 worth, Vicar of Rochdale, Rivington/p. viii.
 
 I should then earnestly pray that some dissenting body, 
 holding the great essentials of the Christian faith, should 
 be united to it, while we were left to provide for our- 
 selves, as they are now. This however is not a very 
 practical remark. For no one I think whose eyes are 
 not very tight closed indeed to the present state of par- 
 ties or of public feeling, will imagine that there is the 
 slightest chance that if our Church were separated from 
 the State, any other body of Christians would be united 
 to it in its place. "Whatever may be imagined in 
 theory, the only alternative really open to us is, not 
 between the establishment of our own Church and 
 that of some other body of Christians, but between 
 the establishment of our Church or no establishment at 
 all : the present state of things, or the voluntary system. 
 Let all practical men then make up their minds 
 upon this alternative, and act energetically upon the 
 opinion they arrive at. 
 
 Lawfulness of Church Establishments. 
 
 I have then now to- prove, first, the lawfulness in 
 the abstract, and then the expediency and advantages, 
 social and religious, of Church Establishments. 
 
 First, is there anything in itself unlawful or con- 
 trary to the will of God as revealed in scripture, or as 
 demonstrated by sound reason, in Church Establish- 
 ments ? 
 
 Evidently if there is, there is an end of the question 
 for Christians. What is wrong can never in the end 
 be expedient. "We may not bow down to Satan in any- 
 thing, even if by so doing we could really give all 
 the kingdoms of the world and their glory to Christ. 
 
 Argument from the Old Testament. 
 
 Now one might have thought that every one would 
 allow that the union of Church and State was allowed, 
 and even commanded, under the Old Testament. For 
 that the Jewish Church was established would appear 
 to be an undeniable fact. But I lately heard this dis- 
 puted in a lecture delivered by a lawyer, a Mr. Callaway, 
 an eloquent member of the Liberation Society, at Kid- 
 derminster.
 
 Mr. Callawaifs version of the Law of Hoses; 
 Mr. Callaway's Voluntary System. 
 
 He said that though it was indeed true that it was 
 the law of God that every one should contribute to 
 the temple worship, yet no one was obliged to obey 
 that law ; that every one who obeyed it did so on the 
 voluntary system, i.e., by his own will, and not because 
 he was compelled. 
 
 This eertainly struck me as an original view. A 
 law of God, which every one might obey or not as they 
 pleased, seemed rather a singular thing. 
 
 But what was the fact ? 
 
 The contribution fixed by the law of God to be paid 
 for the temple and temple worship was half a shekel : 
 " This" it is said in the law of God, " they shall give, 
 every one that passeth among them that are numbered, 
 half a shekel after the shekel of the sanctuary — every 
 one shall give an offering unto the Lord. And thou 
 shalt take the atonement-money of the children of Lsrael, 
 and shalt appoint it for the service of the tabernacle of 
 the congregation, that it may be a memorial unto the 
 children of Lsrael before the Lord, to make an atonement 
 for your souls." M 
 
 "Yes," says Mr. Callaway," that was the law of God ; 
 but whether a Jew obeyed it or not was, a matter of 
 choice." Now a matter of choice it was, in the sense in 
 which all human actions are so ; but unfortunately if 
 he chose the wrong way, he was to be visited with — 
 what do you think ? Nothing short of the plague ! 
 
 Hear the words of the law : " And the Lord spake 
 unto Moses saying, ivhen thou takest the sum of the 
 children of Lsrael after their number, then shall they 
 give every man a ransom for his soul unto the Lord, 
 when thou number est them, that there be no plague among 
 them when thou numberest them."®) 
 
 Certainly a very peculiar and original " voluntary 
 system" with this feature in it, that if any one volun- 
 teered wrong he was visited with the plague ! I am 
 sorry to have to convict Mr. Callaway either of great 
 ignorance of the subject on which he professed to be a 
 
 (1) Exodus xxx., 13-16. (2) Ibid. ver. 12.
 
 teacher, or else of as gross unfairness as can well be 
 conceived. 
 
 " There are some lawyers in our time, who like their 
 predecessors of old, " take away the key of knowledge ; not 
 entering in themselves, and hindering them that were en- 
 tering in " (Luke xi., 52) — use the powers of argument 
 acquired in their professional life to misrepresent the 
 truth ; to introduce, instead of exposing, sophistries ; to 
 hinder men from seeing plain facts, which would tell 
 against their side of an argument ; and so neither ' enter 
 in ' themselves into the world of * knowledge,' nor allow 
 others to do so. I hope Mr. Callaway does not generally 
 do this, as he has in this case." 
 
 It remains then an undeniable fact, that the Jewish 
 Church was in the strictest sense of the term estab- 
 lished. 
 
 The fabric of the tabernacle first, and of the temple 
 afterwards, was kept in repair ; the expense of services 
 in them was defrayed ; the Levites who ministered were 
 supported, by a compulsory rate imposed by the Divine 
 will. 
 
 How much does the Argument from the Old 
 Testament prove ? 
 
 Such was the case under the Old Testament. How 
 much then does this prove ? 
 
 Now it is true that the Jewish law and Eevelation 
 neither was, nor ever professed to be, perfect or final. 
 Many things, we are expressly taught, were. " winked 
 at" under it "for the hardness of men's hearts," and 
 because men's natures were not as yet ripe for any- 
 thing better. 
 
 But allowing full force to such considerations, surely 
 no one who is in any sense a believer in the Divine 
 Inspiration and authority of the Old Testament, would 
 refuse to say as much as this : that none of the great 
 fundamental principles of the Jewish law could have 
 been in themselves immoral. Not necessarily all that 
 was allowed there is eternally good, nor yet perhaps 
 even every little detail of positive commands; some 
 such things may have had only a local and temporary 
 meaning and force ; but no Christian surely will say
 
 8 
 
 that any of the great characteristic features of that law 
 to which Christ Himself so continually appeals, could 
 have been in themselves immoral, or contrary to the 
 mind of God. 
 
 That wonderful Tabernacle built in the wilderness 
 of this world, the Mosaic Church, must have been made, 
 at least, in its great lines and distinctive features, after 
 a "pattern seen in the Mount ;" and all ages and gen- 
 erations cannot have wondered at it ever since, as a 
 marvel of superhuman wisdom — all Christians cannot 
 have believed it to have been of really Divine origin, 
 only for us to listen patiently, while we are told by the 
 great lights of the Anti- State Church Society, that all its 
 great features are " weak and beggarly elements," which 
 such wise men as they have a right to look down 
 upon. 
 
 Now whatever else may not have been fundamental 
 iu the Mosaic Law, certainly this was so : the existence, 
 all over the Holy Land, of an order of men, whose 
 proper work and occupation in life, it was, to keep up 
 the knowledge and worship of God among all the people ; 
 and who, for performing this national work, were paid 
 and supported, by Divine command, out of the na- 
 tional funds. 
 
 What was this but an Established Church ? 
 
 The members of the Anti-state Church Society are, 
 of course, bound in consistency to hold that this was a 
 great calamity to the Jewish nation : that the knowledge 
 and worship of God would have been kept up in a much 
 purer and better way, had no such institution, as this 
 National Church, existed ; but the Levites had been left, 
 for their support, and the temple and temple services 
 also, to the voluntary subscriptions of the faithful. In- 
 dividuals might indeed rightly, according to them, 
 "remember the Levite," as the law commanded ; but 
 the State, as a State, ought to have forgotten, and taken 
 no notice of them. 
 
 The wisdom of Moses, then, and the wisdom of the 
 Anti-state Chnrch Society are here directly at issue. 
 
 Which of them is the most truly inspired, I must 
 leave it to you to determine. 
 
 For myself, I think, with all my heart and soul,
 
 9 
 
 that it was one of those features in the Mosaic Institu- 
 tions which most manifestly bore the impress of the 
 Divine wisdom — of the wisdom of Him, who "needeth 
 not that any should testify of man; for He hioweih 
 what is in man" — knoweth what this fallen world is, 
 what are its needs, and what the best supplies for those 
 needs ; that there should have been provided in it, such 
 an institution* as this duly organized National Church, 
 for the maintenance of the public worship of Almighty 
 God, in the whole country, and in every part of it. 
 
 But it may be objected that all that I have hitherto 
 said is drawn from the Old Testament, therefore is not 
 binding upon Christians. 
 
 Now I am not sure that there is so much force as 
 many suppose in this objection. For the Old Testa- 
 ment is the only part of the Bible that much professes 
 to deal with such questions. The New Testament is 
 chiefly occupied with other subjects. Great principles 
 of politics are to be derived much more from the law of 
 Moses and the writings of the Prophets, rightly under- 
 stood, and interpreted in the spirit and not in the letter, 
 than from other parts of the Bible, which do not so 
 distinctly bear upon these subjects. 
 
 Milton, in "Paradise Regained," iv. 357, makes 
 our Lord speak of the Prophets — 
 
 "As men divinely taught, and better teaching 
 The solid rules of civil government 
 In their majestic unaffected style, 
 Than all the oratory of Greece and Rome. 
 In them is plainest-taught, and easiest-learnt, 
 "What makes a nation happy, and keeps it so, 
 What ruins kingdoms, and lays cities flat ; 
 These only, with our law, best form a king." 
 
 But still we have not the slightest objection to be 
 tried by the New Testament alone, if our antagonists 
 wish it. "We will give them the choice of weapons and 
 of ground ; and believe we shall beat them equally on 
 all grounds, and with all weapons, fairly used. 
 
 Objections from the New Testament answered. 
 
 Now the objections to Church Establishments drawn 
 from the New Testament, are so weak that it is diffi- 
 cult to get firm hold of them.
 
 10 
 
 They most commonly urge against us the many 
 texts in which Christians are exhorted to give freely : 
 and then ask whether giving in accordance to a law is 
 giving freely ? Where, they say, is the text in the New 
 Testament which speaks of any compulsory payment for 
 ministers or churches ? 
 
 Now the weakness of this argument is transparent. 
 Because one way of gaining a particular object is com- 
 manded, does it follow that all others are unlawful ? 
 
 Take a similar instance. For one precept urging 
 the voluntary support of the ministry, there are ten 
 urging voluntary contributions for the support of the 
 poor. Of course then, in all consistency, they ought to 
 maintain that all State-interference with this matter 
 also, all legal enactments for the maintenance of the 
 destitute, the aged, or the orphans, are unlawful for 
 Christians, " doing despite," as Dr. Wardlaw has said 
 in the other case, "to all the principles of Christ's 
 Kingdom." 
 
 Yet no dissenter, that I am aware of, has ever yet 
 said that poor-rates were unlawful or unchristian. W 
 
 Surely it is evident that the argument that anything 
 is unlawful simply because we never read of the apostles 
 doing it, is utterly futile. If they had ever received an 
 offer of this means, and refused it on principle, then in- 
 deed the proof would be a good one. But it is well known 
 that the early Christians were never offered any support 
 for the service of God from a Christian government, simply 
 because there was no such government. If they had been 
 offered anything of the kind, I think the whole analogy of 
 Scripture leads us to expect that they would have gladly 
 accepted it. 
 
 But then we are asked, " Does not our Lord distinctly 
 say, My kingdom is not of this world ? Did He not forbid 
 the use of all earthly weapons in defence of His king- 
 dom? Does He not in these words teach, as His 
 apostle afterwards does, that the weapons of our warfare 
 are not to be carnal, but spiritual ? " 
 
 Doubtless: but does any one understand this to 
 mean that Christ's ministers ought not to receive any 
 money for their support ? If so, what shall we say of 
 
 (1) " Essays on the Church," p. 36.
 
 11 
 
 dissenting ministers, who are supported by the free gifts 
 of private individuals ? Are not dissenting bodies just 
 as truly as our Church, in this sense, an organised 
 " kingdom of this world ? " Of course they are. They 
 have a regular system for the provision of funds for the 
 support of their ministers and chapels ; and in some cases 
 they have endowments secured by the State. 
 
 Dissenters accept of State-aid. 
 
 In some cases also they actually accept of State-aid : 
 they have done so in Scotland, in Ireland, and in England, 
 for their cemeteries and mortuary chapek. This is really 
 a very awkward fact for the Anti- State- Church Society. 
 As to rates raised from the whole population for the 
 support of our church, here are dissenters who con- 
 scientiously refuse to consent to them ; but as to rates 
 equally raised from the whole population — but in this 
 case for the support of their chapels — they equally con- 
 scientiously no doubt accept them. Really a most con- 
 venient conscience — so delightfully flexible ! 
 
 Evidently if they agitate to liberate the Church from 
 all her ancient endowments — very many of them, be it 
 observed, endowments from private sources, so they 
 ought to liberate all dissenting chapels from their 
 endowments, and from all State help to their schools or 
 cemeteries. 
 
 No individual or nation may force religion upon any 
 one ; but nations, as well as individuals, are perfectly 
 at liberty, according to all Bible or other principle, to 
 support ministers of religion. 
 
 The truth is, it is a marvel that any one should ever 
 have dreamed that our Lord's words to Pilate had any- 
 thing whatever to do with this subject. "What He 
 meant is manifest. He was denying the truth of the 
 common opinion held by the Jews at that time, that, 
 since He had declared Himself to be the Messiah, 
 He must therefore intend to set up an earthly king- 
 dom in opposition to that of Caesar. If He had so 
 intended, then His servants would have fought to set 
 it up. But what has this to do with the lawfulness or 
 otherwise of Pilate, for instance, or of the Eoman 
 Emperor, had he so pleased, giving for the support of
 
 12 
 
 ministers of the gospel ? The two things have evidently 
 nothing whatever to do with each other. 
 
 All the many cases in the Bible History of kings 
 and rulers giving money and help for building temples 
 and supporting churches, are examples of our practice. 
 
 Inconsistencies of the Liberation Society. 
 
 Let it here be observed that the " London Missionary 
 Society," to which large numbers of dissenters of, I be- 
 lieve, several denominations, including some members of 
 the Liberation Society, subscribe, urged upon the king of 
 the South Sea Islands " the propriety of publicly adopting 
 Christianity as the religion of his dominions ; " and in 
 another part of their report say that " it is deeply to be 
 lamented that Protestant Governments take so little care 
 to convey the knowledge of the true religion, wherever 
 they carry their arms, their commerce, or their arts, in 
 colonization." How very shocking Mr. Miall and his 
 friends must think this ! The fact is, the great bulk of 
 the dissenters do not at all agree with the principles of 
 this Liberation Society.* * 
 
 Should our Church again begin (as in ages of perse- 
 cution she no doubt did, though not more than others) 
 to take up arms against the dissenters, or to inflict civil 
 penalties upon them for being dissenters, or in any other 
 way to use physical force to compel them to profess 
 what she considers the true belief; then, indeed, she 
 would rightly come under the charge of contravening 
 these great words of our Lord ; but not so long as her 
 ministers only accept from the nation, as a nation, what 
 all dissenting ministers accept from their own commu- 
 nions, often also from old endowments secured by the 
 State, and sometimes even from the State itself, like 
 ourselves. 
 
 Church Corruptions no argument against paying Church- 
 rates, so long as they are the Laio of the Land. 
 
 Neither is it any solid objection to the payment of 
 church-rates, so long as they are the law of the land, 
 
 * See a very remarkable Lecture, delivered at Clifton, against the Liberation 
 Society, by the Rev. J. B. Clifford (Wertheim and Macintosh) , price two-pence.
 
 13 
 
 that the Church of England is, according to some, a 
 corrupt Church. 
 
 Will any one say that it is more corrupt than the 
 Jewish Church, when our Lord said that the temple 
 was made a "den of thieves ; " and when the chief priests 
 and rulers were those who crucified the Son of God ? Yet 
 to this Church our Lord paid tribute. On this Matthew 
 Henry, the Independent, observes: — "Church duties 
 legally imposed are to be paid, notwithstanding church-cor- 
 ruptions. We must take heed of using our liberty as a cloak 
 of covetousness or maliciousness. If Christ pay tribute, do 
 we pretend an exemption ? "W 
 
 I know of no other argument worth mentioning 
 which has ever been supposed to prove that it is in it- 
 self unlawful for a State to support a Church. It seems 
 to me that the argument from Scripture is all on our 
 side : and as to establishing any valid objection to it on 
 the ground of morality, or what is called " the eternal 
 fitness of things," it has not, that I know of, been ever 
 attempted; it would be manifestly impossible to do 
 so. 
 
 Expediency of Church Establishments. 
 
 I come then now to the next great question, the 
 expediency of the union of Church and State. It may 
 be lawful, but is it expedient — good for the church, and 
 good for the nation ? 
 
 To answer this satisfactorily, you must endeavour to 
 understand clearly the practical differences between the 
 two systems, the voluntary system and the establish- 
 ment system. 
 
 The Territorial and Congregational Systems. 
 
 !Now Dr. Chalmers, in his admirable lectures on 
 Church Establishments, has shewn that one great drffer- 
 ence between the two is, that the latter is what he calls 
 a territorial, the former a congregational system. Under 
 an Establishment the ministers of some Christian Church 
 have assigned to them, as their proper charge, all the in- 
 habitants of a particular geographical district ; and every 
 
 (1) Matthew Henry's Commentary, on Christ paying tribute. 
 C
 
 14 
 
 part of the country is so assigned by the national 
 government to some minister of Christ. Under the 
 other, or voluntary system, on the other hand, each 
 minister is the minister, not of a district, but of a con- 
 gregation, with which he has become connected by his 
 own voluntarily undertaken efforts, or by the appoint- 
 ment of some body of men, whose authority is not 
 recognised, as in the case of an Establishment, by the 
 whole community, but only by a certain section of it. 
 Observe, therefore, that under this latter system, there 
 may be any number of ministers, in any district, each 
 with his own congregation ; but there may at the same 
 time be in that district a number of families, who have 
 not connected themselves with any of these congre- 
 gations, and to whom therefore none of the ministers 
 have any mission, whose authority is acknowledged 
 by them. This system Dr. Chalmers calls the congrega- 
 tional system. To the existence of the territorial scheme, 
 some national authority — some authority acknowledged 
 by the whole nation, is essential. 
 
 What then are the advantages to the nation of the 
 territorial scheme ? 
 
 Consider the clergy first as what Coleridge has called 
 the clerisy, i.e. y a body of national officers entrusted with 
 the care of the temporal welfare of all members of the 
 nation ; and agents for the civilisation of the nation ; 
 not necessarily even ministers of Christ, though it is far 
 better they should be that also. 
 
 Social usefulness of a National "Clerisy." 
 Now the value is great of this fact alone : that if a 
 clergyman does his proper duty, he knows all the in- 
 habitants and they know him ; and that he is officially 
 bound to let himself be known to every human being in 
 that district as his friend— not only willing, but in duty 
 bound, to do him all offices of Christian benevolence within 
 his power. What a security this gives that that large pro- 
 portion of mankind, and specially of English mankind, 
 whose natural reserve and modesty would always prevent 
 their obtruding their personal troubles, difficulties, or 
 sufferings upon others — just the most deserving people- 
 shall be sought out ; that they shall have any of their
 
 15 
 
 difficulties, which call for the sympathy and assistance 
 of neighbours able to give it, made known to those 
 neighbours ; and that in a manner that shall not wound 
 the feelings of the poor, but shall be felt by them to 
 be proper and inoffensive. 
 
 And with respect not to the receivers, but to the 
 givers of assistance — what an advantage it is to them, 
 one for which it would be hard to find any sufficient sub- 
 stitute, that there should be resident in their parish an 
 educated and intelligent gentleman, whose office obliges 
 him (at the same time giving him the requisite leisure 
 and opportunity) to acquaint himself with the real 
 condition and character of the poor and the suffering, 
 thereby bringing to their notice all cases of real distress. 
 If on the other hand the national clergyman happens to 
 be the only gentleman, the only man of education or 
 of means, resident in the parish, it is an advantage, 
 which I think no man of discernment will fail to value 
 very highly, that at least he should be known to all the 
 poor and the suffering as their friend; that in this 
 way the upper and more educated classes should be 
 represented to them in the person of one who, must 
 almost of necessity be a man at least of professed 
 benevolence, public spirit, and general kindness. In 
 many such ways it is hardly possible to exaggerate 
 the value of a national clergy with territorial charges, 
 in binding together all classes of society in mutual 
 acquaintance and good will; in acting as links be- 
 tween class and class ; in representing in every place 
 the national benevolence. Great is the value to the 
 nation of the parochial system. God grant we may 
 never find it out by losing it. 
 
 Imperfections of the Voluntary or Congregational 
 System. 
 
 Now observe how much of all this would be lost 
 under the voluntary system. Under such a system the 
 clergyman would not be obliged to visit all the inhabi- 
 tants, and therefore in nine cases out of ten certainly 
 would not do so. When he had gathered together 
 what he considered a sufficient congregation, he would 
 contentedly leave the rest of the population, unless
 
 16 
 
 under some special circumstances, to themselves. If, 
 as in so large a body of men would be certain to be 
 the case with some, one of his chief motives for minis- 
 terial effort was the making of a livelihood, the rich 
 would draw more of his attention than the poor. He 
 might indeed be led in order to quiet his conscience to 
 visit a certain number of the poor ; but a thousand mo- 
 tives — such as the indolence natural to us all, and which 
 so eagerly lays hold of all excuses within reach to 
 silence the call to work, and which grows upon most 
 men with advancing years ; — or the natural modesty and 
 shyness which influences some of the best men most, 
 and which would prevent their venturing upon visits 
 which they could not be sure would be well received ; 
 — or again, the notion that a life's work would be more 
 effective, if concentrated .upon a small, than if diffused 
 over a large field — these and other motives would pre- 
 vent all but a very few of the clergy from taking 
 persevering care of all the inhabitants of any dis- 
 trict. Besides, it is seldom good for a man to be left to 
 choose his work for himself. Our salvation, I think, 
 generally consists in not having our own will in such 
 matters. 
 
 Again, that peculiar sense of order and fitness which 
 is so valuable a feature of the English character (how 
 much of it is the direct effect of an Established Church 
 I beg you to consider), would make many families re- 
 ceive the visits of a self-appointed minister much less 
 willingly than that of a nationally-authorised clergyman 
 of the district. Poor and suffering persons, whose self- 
 respect disinclines them to accept of help to which they 
 do not feel they have any proper claim, would rather 
 not encourage visits from such a minister ; particularly 
 if they knew that he depended for his living upon the 
 voluntary subscriptions of his congregation, to which 
 they had not the power to contribute. Whereas from 
 the national clergyman such persons have no objection 
 to receive visits, because they know they have a right 
 to his services, and that he is paid by the nation for 
 what he does. Do away with an Established Church, 
 and you will either demoralise the English poor in these 
 high matters, by accustoming them to depend upon
 
 17 
 
 charity for spiritual attendance and instruction ; or else 
 you will drive them to do without it altogether. The 
 advantage to them of having a ministry provided 
 to which they know they have a right, as mem- 
 bers of the nation, is very great. Vicious and ill- 
 disposed persons again, who, under the present 
 system, may often, from fear of a person of recog- 
 nised official position, be induced to receive the visits 
 of the clergyman, and in the end to profit by them, 
 would without the least scruple shut their doors in the 
 face of any minister on the voluntary system. 
 
 Following out this line of thought, I think it will 
 be evident that without such official persons living in 
 our parishes, many would starve who are now suffi- 
 ciently relieved ; many poor men would become secretly 
 embittered against the upper classes, who now learn to 
 look upon them as their sympathising friends and 
 brethren ; many rich men and women would lead sel- 
 fish and idle lives, who now, by the information supplied 
 them by their clergyman, and the claims he makes upon 
 their sympathy and assistance for the poor and suffering, 
 are induced to devote themselves to works of active 
 charity. 
 
 I have no such low view of the value of friend- 
 ship in alleviating the sorrows, and mitigating the 
 sufferings of this suffering and sorrowing world ; and 
 no such notion of the commonness of friendship on 
 earth, as to value at less than an almost incalculably 
 high price, the existence of a body of official friends of 
 all men, who shall also be ordained ministers of Christ, 
 the great Lover of Souls, the Friend of the poor and 
 the suffering, as well as, and more than, of the rich and 
 powerful. 
 
 Usefulness of Country Parsons. 
 
 Take away " the parson of the parish " from our 
 out-of-the-way rural districts, you take away the 
 only friend to whom multitudes of the modest poor are 
 in the habit of looking for advice and assistance. 
 Look down from a hill-top (to borrow Cobbett's illus- 
 tration) upon the remote valleys of rural England, 
 dotted with their solitary cottages — though still in our
 
 18 
 
 time, thank God, dotted also with the moss-grown 
 towers of our old parish churches ( — how long these 
 will last under the voluntary system, or without church- 
 rates, let our radicals consider), look down, I say, on 
 such valleys, which make up so large a part of the map 
 of Old England; and reflect whether there is the 
 slightest chance of educated gentlemen settling down 
 to the life's- work of educating and spiritualising their 
 inhabitants in more than a very small minority of 
 cases, on any system but that of an Establishment. 
 All the civilising agency of a resident clergy (I am not 
 referring here to higher considerations, such as must, 
 however, commend themselves so powerfully to every 
 Christian heart) would soon be withdrawn from the 
 larger number of these, and they would sink into bar- 
 barism and heathenism. What the uncared-for resi- 
 duum of poor, unattached to any self-made congregation, 
 will be in our parishes, on the voluntary system, that 
 will all these out-of-the-way places be in the general 
 map of the country — they will pass unnoticed, or un- 
 provided for. 
 
 Consider also the value of this fact — that the Ser- 
 vices of our Church are celebrated in all these remote 
 districts — that birth, youth, marriage, death, are accom- 
 panied with the noble commentary of our baptismal, 
 confirmation, marriage, and burial services. Every 
 church tower and spire means this, among so many 
 other things. 
 
 Objections from the faults of the Clergy. 
 
 Here however, I can fancy I hear some well-known 
 objections raised, as follows : — " Disinterested friends of 
 all the people indeed ! men of high name and influence, 
 whose presence in any place is a moral and social bless- 
 ing ! All this is very fine talking ; but look at Mr. A., 
 and Mr. B., and Mr. C, — this parish, and that parish, 
 how will your theory fit them ?" 
 
 But let me ask these objectors how is it that 
 according to this uncompromising principle of theirs, 
 they do not abolish the Ministry altogether ? Look at 
 Mr. A., and Mr. B , and Mr. C, among dissenting 
 ministers, multiplied many times over !
 
 19 
 
 It is unworthy of men of sense and honesty to 
 raise such objections. They evidently must, of necessity- 
 apply to everything human. All that they come to is 
 simply this — that clergymen are men and not angels. 
 Angels would certainly be very much better ; but then 
 unfortunately they are very difficult to get at. 
 
 Systems to be judged by their practical results. 
 
 But if we are told that we must judge of systems 
 by their fruits, we shall be very glad to accept the 
 challenge ; only let it be, as Dr. Magee has well urged, 
 by their real fruits, as ascertained by experience, not by 
 a priori notions of what men think their fruit ought to 
 be. Let the characters and lives of any number of clergy 
 of the Church of England fairly selected, be compared 
 with those of the same number of dissenting ministers, 
 and let the result determine which system — that of an 
 Establishment, or that of Voluntaryism, is likeliest 
 to form a body of high-minded, independent, public 
 spirited men, acting fearlessly on Christian prin- 
 ciples, and I have not slightest fear what would be the 
 verdict of an impartial jury. 
 
 Means used in the Church of England for securing 
 good Clergymen. 
 
 Now as to securing good men to fulfil the duties of 
 this, or any office, there are, as far as I can see, only 
 two classes of means which it is possible to use, besides 
 proper education; namely, first, to do all you can to 
 guard against improper, and to secure good, appoint- 
 ments ; and secondly, so to arrange the circumstances 
 connected with the office, as to furnish as many motives 
 as possible to induce the holders of it to fulfil its duties. 
 
 Now for the great national work committed to the 
 clergy — the work, I here mean, of attending to the moral, 
 social, and temporal welfare of all members of the 
 nation — we select first, ministers of Christ, men, that is, 
 upon whom all the mightiest influences of true re- 
 ligion are brought to bear. And what better means 
 can be suggested for preventing improper persons ob- 
 taining ordination, than are already in use in the Church 
 of England? The names of all candidates for ordination
 
 20 
 
 • 
 
 are published in Church, in the places where they live, 
 for several successive Sundays. The laity are called upon 
 to come forward and object, if they know anything against 
 them. During the week preceding the ordination, 
 prayers are used in all rightly ordered Churches, that it 
 may please God to guide the Bishops in their appointment 
 of Ministers. The Bishops, Archdeacons, or examining 
 Chaplains are called upon to investigate their character 
 and to examine them. And as if this was not enough, 
 the Bishop at the time of the ordination, again solemnly 
 calls upon the assembled Church to testify if they know 
 anything against any of the Candidates. Further, when 
 any Minister has been so ordained, before he can receive 
 any appointment he must obtain testimonials to his fitness 
 from three beneficed Clergymen. If any rabid dissenter 
 object that the Bishops and Archdeacons may be worldly, 
 the laity indifferent, the three beneficed Clergymen in- 
 terested and designing men ; the answer is, that such 
 possibilities are inevitable in a fallen world. No con- 
 trivance of man can prevent some tares growing among 
 all wheat. The true conclusion from these premises is, 
 not that the ministry should be abolished, but that 
 better means should be taken, if any such can be devised, 
 to fill it worthily. 
 
 As to the circumstances in which a Clergyman is 
 placed when in charge of a parish, it is difficult to 
 imagine any more fitted to furnish strong motives of 
 all kinds to public spirit, benevolence, and a life of 
 general and impartial beneficence. If you object that 
 even these means often fail; you are only saying, I 
 repeat, that Earth is not Heaven, men not angels. 
 
 Incomes of the Clergy. 
 
 One more point must be briefly alluded to before 
 leaving this part of the subject. Consider a national 
 clergy, as holders of national wealth. If all the money 
 that now goes to the national clergy were to be with- 
 held from them, and otherwise bestowed, would the 
 community at large be a gainer or a loser? 
 
 Now on all such questions, you should guard against 
 the gross, though common delusion of supposing that 
 the stopping of such national payments of any kind
 
 21 
 
 would enrich the whole community. Of course the only 
 gainers are those persons by whom the taxes that 
 produce the money are paid. In the case of tithes, 
 those would be the landlords. 
 
 If a Bill were passed to-morrow simply stopping the 
 payment of tithes, what would be the effect? Not 
 that all classes would be the richer, but only that one 
 very pitiable class, so truly deserving all our compas- 
 sion — the landlords. All the money that used to go to 
 the clergyman of the parish, would then go to the 
 squire. All land would become worth so much more — 
 would fetch so much more in the market ; and the ulti- 
 mate gainers, would of course be the landlords, not the 
 tenants. Which then is the most likely to spend a large 
 per-centage of his money for the general good of the 
 parish, and especially of the poor — a national clergyman 
 or a squire ? Supposing they are both on a par in 
 respect of natural good disposition, upon which of the 
 two are the most powerful motives brought to bear, 
 to overcome his natural selfishness or covetousness ? 
 Evidently the inducements are far stronger for a 
 clergyman to be liberal to the poor, and to subscribe for 
 public objects, than for a squire to do so. 2S r ot to 
 speak of his professed character as a minister of Christ, 
 public opinion expects liberality from him with a force 
 which it requires unusual moral courage to resist. 
 Accordingly it is, I believe, a fact, which the most un- 
 questionable statistics might be brought to prove, that 
 a very far larger per-centage of the income of the clergy 
 is spent upon objects of national benefit — such for instance 
 as the support of national schools, the relief of the desti- 
 tute, the maintenance of the Houses of God, and the 
 wcrship of God, than of that of any other class. 
 
 This does not shew that they are in themselves 
 better men ; it may be only the natural effect of their 
 position. But, if so, this shews the importance of the 
 position. It shews the great value of an order of things 
 which places so large a number of men — holders of a 
 considerable amount of property — in positions which so 
 powerfully incline them to use it in these ways. If 
 the great reservoir of public money is to be poured out, 
 let us pour it upon such recipients as reason and ex-
 
 22 
 
 perience would lead us to expect will be the most likely 
 to diffuse its benefits widely. 
 
 Now Lord Palmerston, and those who think with 
 him that all men are born good, may perhaps expect 
 that if the tithes were given back to the landlords, they 
 would of their own free will, give as much for public 
 objects; — as for instance, for the maintenance of 
 religion and education in all classes, as the clergy 
 now do. It may be true that this would be the case 
 with some. But anything more contrary to all expe- 
 rience, than such an expectation with respect to most 
 men can scarcely be conceived. 
 
 Why not apply the Income of the Church to other 
 public objects? 
 
 But if on the other hand you say, "No, do not 
 stop the payment of tithes, but apply them to other 
 national objects" — of course that opens another enormous 
 subject. All I can say on it now is, let us well and 
 wisely make up our minds what these objects are to be, 
 before we proceed to make the change. My own be- 
 lief is, that the difficulties of the question would in 
 practice be found so great — the claimants for the money 
 so many, that men would give up the business in 
 despair ; the end would be, that they would cut the 
 knot, by simply ceasing to collect the tithes — in other 
 words presenting them to the landlords. 
 
 But if you ask, why not divide the present income of 
 the national clergy among the ministers of " all denomi- 
 nations ? " I answer, for this reason among others, 
 because it would be proved quite impossible to work 
 such a scheme. Where are we to stop ? Are we to 
 subsidize the Mormons ? or the Secularists ? Or if the 
 minister of a congregation of Methodists received pay, 
 and a schism arose among them — a New Connexion was 
 formed — is the minister of this body to receive his 
 share ? If not, why not ? And then a " Secession from 
 the New Connexion," and soon another from that — the 
 " Old Secession" and the " New Secession ?" It needs 
 but a moment's thought to see that such a scheme could 
 not be worked. Those who wish to see the difficulties 
 of it well stated by wise and statesmanlike men,
 
 23 
 
 may refer to Dr. Chalmers' lectures, or to Gladstone's 
 Church and State. For my part I had infinitely rather 
 see the Wesleyan Methodists, for instance, made the 
 National Church, and receiving all its funds, while we 
 of our Church received nothing from the State, than any 
 scheme adopted for the distribution of Church property 
 among all sects ; simply because I am persuaded that 
 some one National Church, supported by the State, is 
 the only possible provision for all men, poor as well as 
 rich, irreligious as well as religious. 
 
 However I do not pretend to go fully into that part 
 of the subject ; but, to take the lowest ground, I say 
 that at present the holders of this property are most 
 useful national officers, and that till it can be shown 
 that some other application of the money would be 
 as generally useful, it is best to leave things as they are. 
 
 It may be well to remind some that the temporalities 
 of the Church are open to be obtained by all classes. 
 A body of national clergy is a distinctly democratic 
 institution ; opening a road for men of all classes, even 
 to the highest positions in the State. The late Arch- 
 bishop of Canterbury was, I believe, the son of a shop- 
 keeper ; and the late Archbishop of York the son of a 
 tailor. Many of our bishops are sons of tradesmen. 
 These are facts in which we may well rejoice. Such 
 democracy is a noble feature of our Church. 
 
 If the clergy are bad, by all means displace 
 them and appoint others that are better ; but do not 
 for that reason destroy the institution. That would 
 be no wiser (to borrow an illustration from Dr. Chal- 
 mers) than the act of a man, who, having an admi- 
 rable system of pipes laid down in his house to bring 
 water into all his rooms, and finding, at some particular 
 time, the water conveyed by these pipes to be bad, 
 should proceed therefore to destroy the pipes ! Of course 
 what he ought to do is to keep the pipes, and let good 
 water, instead of bad, be poured through them. Just so, 
 if the clergy who are appointed to convey means of grace, 
 and spiritual, moral, and intellectual instruction and 
 exhortation to every room in this great House of England, 
 are ill-fitted for their high office, do not therefore des- 
 troy the institution, but apply it better.
 
 24 
 
 Three Questions to be asked of Political and 
 Ecclesiastical Reformers. 
 
 And with respect to all political changes, there are 
 three questions which every wise man will always put 
 to the man who proposes them, namely — 
 
 1 . "What he proposes to set up in the place of what 
 is destroyed ? 
 
 For if we destroy any existing institution, which, 
 with whatever defects, yet works tolerably well in the 
 world as it is, and set up another in its place which is 
 quite free from those defects, this will be very poor 
 comfort, if it has others which are a good deal worse. 
 
 A child, we are told, was so struck with the beauty 
 of the mountains on the horizon that he set off to gather 
 some of the blue grass. Unfortunately when he got 
 there, he found the grass much like what he was used 
 to at home ; and the country in other respects much less 
 satisfactory to live in. He came back a sadder and a 
 wiser child. Do not be too ready to run after blue 
 grass ; remember that things are very different in reality 
 and when seen near at hand, from what they may seem 
 at a distance, or as described by men of violent passions 
 and lively imaginations. 
 
 2. Whether it is his honest and determined purpose 
 to do his best to set up this other institution in the 
 place of the old ? or whether like the fox in the fable, 
 he is only holding out this bait to us to make us leave 
 hold of what we now have, and will be quite content 
 when we have done so, to let us do without the sub- 
 stitute also. 
 
 That fox I am credibly informed is not yet dead, or 
 at least he has had many avatars, many incarnations 
 since the days of JEsop, and will, unless I am much 
 mistaken, have many more. A wise man will be on the 
 look out for him under many disguises, especially under 
 that of a popular orator addressing a mixed audience. 
 
 3. Whether even if the proposed institution really 
 would be on the whole better than what we now have, and 
 our reformer does honestly intend to set it up in the 
 place of the old, it will be possible for him in the pre- 
 sent state of things to do so ? 
 
 For if, while we are living in an old house, which
 
 25 
 
 with many defects, perhaps, and faults, such as unfor- 
 tunately belong to all human things, yet gives us real 
 shelter from the storms and inclemencies of the world, 
 an enthusiastic person pulls it down, with the benevo- 
 lent purpose of building us a better one in its place, but 
 unfortunately only succeeds in giving us a magnificent 
 " castle in the air," which cannot, by any contrivance, 
 be brought down to terra firma, the result will not be al- 
 together satisfactory ! Or if a man proposes, because of 
 the faults in the stone and the timber, to pull down this 
 old house and rebuild it with other stones and timber, 
 which would be a good deal better, only unfortunately 
 such stone and timber is not to be had in the world as 
 it is ; but only, say, in the fixed stars, or in an ideal 
 world ; or if it does exist on earth, yet we cannot get 
 at it, because between us and it there is a country occu- 
 pied by unconquerable enemies ; then I think we had 
 better not consent to let our old house be pulled down, 
 till some practicable railroad has been laid down to 
 these grand fixed star quarries, and this splendid 
 dream-land. 
 
 What we have to ask always is, not only what do 
 men intend to give us, but what is there any security 
 that in the present state of things they will be able to 
 give us ? 
 
 Our old Church has done us good service in her 
 time. Let us not consent to " break down all the 
 carved work thereof with axes and hammers," till we 
 see something better than a pretty picture of something 
 equally good to be set up in her place. If we wilfully 
 cast away great blessings we once had, it is not God's 
 way to give them back easily. 
 
 We may "find no place of repentance though we 
 seek it carefully with tears." It is not Adam only who, 
 having wilfully cast away a state of privilege he once 
 had, and wishing to recover it, has found a "flaming 
 sword turning every way " keeping the way back. 
 
 Religious advantages of the Union of Church and State. 
 
 II. I have next to consider the great subject of the 
 directly religious advantages of the union of Church 
 and State.
 
 26 
 
 All I have been hitherto saying, would have been 
 almost equally true if these national officers settled in 
 every parish had not been Christian ministers at all, 
 but merely benevolent men, holding an office conferred 
 upon them by the nation, for the promotion of the tem- 
 poral and social welfare of every member of the nation 
 in that parish. This is one, and a very important view 
 of the subject ; but yet every Christian must reckon it 
 infinitely inferior in importance to that view which we 
 have now to consider — that, namely, which looks upon 
 these national officers as ministers of Christ, holding a 
 commission from Christ Himself, and empowered by 
 Him for the fulfilment of their high duties with res- 
 pect to the spiritual and eternal interests of mankind. 
 Of course I assume that you are men who believe that 
 there are such ministers on earth; that there is a 
 Church of Christ to which the Divine presence is 
 assured. Are there then any advantages which accrue 
 to this Church and to the State respectively from the 
 union of these two, such as they would not enjoy equally 
 were they separated ? And if there are such advantages, 
 what exactly are they? These are the questions we 
 have now to consider. 
 
 The Church, as a Church of Christ, not dependent 
 upon the State. 
 
 Now I do not for one instant believe or allow 
 that the existence of our Church as a Church, or 
 even as a powerful and influential Church in this 
 country, depends upon State-support, or upon any such 
 cause whatever. God forbid that we should be guilty 
 of such treason to all our highest faith, of such faint- 
 hearted distrust in Christ's own promises, or in the 
 reality of our Church as a branch of that to which 
 His presence is promised till the end of time. Most 
 heartily do I for my part, and do you, I trust, for yours, 
 subscribe to the noble saying of one whose words have 
 been rightly called " half-battles," I mean that great 
 Christian hero, Martin Luther, when speaking of the 
 grounds of safety of Christ's Church, he said " Who is 
 the Church's protector, that hath promised to be with
 
 27 
 
 her to the end, and the gates of hell shall not prevail 
 against her ? Kings, Diets, Parliaments, Lawyers ? 
 Marry no such cattle"* 
 
 Yes, Martin Luther was not one of those miserable 
 men, who believe that there is nothing really Divine on 
 earth ; nothing stronger than that the waves and storms 
 of an ever-changing world could shake or uproot it ; 
 nothing to the existence and permanence of which 
 the very "Word of God is pledged. He was, if ever 
 there was one, a religious man; a man who verily 
 believed that amid all that changes and perishes in 
 this visible world, there were some things which 
 could not perish, because they have their root in God 
 Himself. % 
 
 Remember the great words of the 46th Psalm, spoken 
 of God's ancient Church, and at least equally true of His 
 Church now, and for ever : — " God is in the midst of 
 her, therefore shall she not be removed : God shall help her 
 and that right early. The heathen make much ado, and 
 the kingdoms are moved, but God hath shewed Sis voice 
 and the earth shall melt away. The Lord of hosts is with 
 us, the God of Jacob is our refuge." 
 
 Doubtless, the true strength of our Church is within, 
 not without — in God, not in man. Therefore nothing 
 in earth or hell can destroy her. Let her be cast 
 into the sea, like Jonah she will come up again, 
 for she is the bearer of a Divine message to mankind ; 
 let her be crucified, dead, and buried, like her Lord, 
 and let her tomb be guarded by all the force that the 
 craft and cunning of the world may collect, she will 
 rise again in renewed glory, and with mightier power. 
 God will not suffer His Holy One — for in her Divine 
 character and commission the Church is holy — to see 
 corruption. 
 
 Therefore I, for one, do not for an instant dream 
 that if the buttresses of State-support were all pulled 
 down to-morrow, her ancient walls would fall, or for a 
 moment tremble. No, " Her foundations are upon the 
 
 * I have given these words as quoted by Coleridge as one of the mottoes to 
 his treatise " on Church and State." The first part of the quotation alone is a 
 literal translation of Luther's words— the last words are Coleridge's addition. 
 But they express admirably the very spirit of many of his sayings.
 
 28 
 
 holy hills ; the Lord loveth the gates of Sion more than 
 all the dwellings of Jacob ."* 
 
 If all State support were withdrawn from us, we 
 should still remain not only an influential, but far the 
 most influential of all Churches or organised bodies in 
 this land. 
 
 Advantages to the Church of Union with the State. 
 
 But what then is the advantage to the Church of 
 union with the State ? If it is not existence or per- 
 manence, what is it ? 
 
 Extension of Influence. 
 
 1 . I answer, first, extension of influence over the whole 
 land and every member of the nation. 
 
 The waters of life contained in the great reservoirs 
 of our Church would still be contained in them, and the 
 reservoirs would remain ; but many districts, many 
 human habitations, to which their life-giving waters 
 are now conveyed by the pipes and channels of State- aid, 
 would be deprived of them. This I have already en- 
 deavoured to shew. 
 
 The Church would lose some influence; and of 
 members of the State and nation, many would lose the 
 benefits the Church now confers upon them, and in a 
 large number of cases would get no substitute whatever 
 for them, but be left in a state of total spiritual des- 
 titution. 
 
 If any one object that, as it is, our Church does not 
 sufliciently provide for the instruction and edification of 
 all members of the nation ; if he draw attention for in- 
 stance to our great towns, and to the terrible amount of 
 spiritual destitution existing in them; I answer, 
 that this is an argument not for pulling down the 
 Church, but for helping her to extend her influence 
 more than at present she can; to provide, not fewer 
 Churches, ministers, and schools, but more of all these. 
 Let our opponents remember that these evils which they 
 are so ready to cast in our teeth, are many of them of 
 their own causing ; that, as Dr. Magee has admirably 
 urged, their conduct in this respect is like that of a man 
 
 * Psalm lxxxvii. 1.
 
 29 
 
 who should carefully tie our hands and then boast that 
 we cannot fight. They deliberately and carefully take 
 off the wheels of our chariots, and then taunt us 
 because they drive heavily. Such objections are 
 really not valid against the Establishment system, 
 but rather against the voluntary system. Why do not 
 dissenters provide for all these r How is it that their 
 much-vaunted voluntary system does not reach these 
 evils ? Do we hinder them ? Do we forbid the use of 
 the voluntary system to supplement the deficiencies of 
 State-aid ? Is it not notorious that we profess to be too 
 glad to make all possible use of both systems together, 
 and that if we are prevented doing as much as 
 we ought, a large part of the blame lies at the door of 
 our antagonists, who do all they can to hinder our ob- 
 taining the additional help we need for Church-building 
 and the like ? 
 
 State-aid then, I say, ought not to be withdrawn, 
 but to be very much increased, if we wish the means of 
 grace to reach all members of the nation. The volun- 
 tary system does not do this, and so long as mankind 
 are selfish and indifferent to the spiritual needs of their 
 neighbours, never will. 
 
 Let it be remembered that with respect to religious 
 instruction and means of grace, the demand will always 
 be in inverse proportion to the real need. A large 
 number of mankind are devoid, not only of all means 
 of grace, but of all sense of their value. They would 
 rather pay to get rid of religious ordinances than to 
 obtain them. " Should we expect thieves to teach 
 themselves honesty," asks Dr. Hume, " the ignorant to 
 promote useful learning, or the impure to struggle for 
 the promotion of chastity? Our missionary operations 
 abroad are carried on differently. The society at home 
 provides the means and appliances of public worship for 
 the Maori of New Zealand, the Zulu of Cafrreland, or 
 the Dyak of Borneo ; but for the heathen of our great 
 towns and cities at home no provision is made.'**"' 
 
 Independence of popularity. 
 2. But secondly, I come to the great advantage of 
 
 * " Condition of Liverpool, Religious and Social," p 32.
 
 30 
 
 a Church Establishment over the voluntary system ; that 
 it makes ministers of religion independent of their con- 
 gregations. 
 
 Nothing can, in many ways, be more mischievous 
 than that a minister's living should depend upon his 
 pleasing his hearers. His duty must often be to find 
 fault with them. That must be a vicious system, which 
 makes those, the very purpose of whose life is to be 
 to try to raise men above their natural state, dependent 
 upon pleasing them in their natural state. Instead 
 of Felix trembling before Paul, you have in such 
 a case, it has been truly said, Paul trembling before 
 Felix. 
 
 Some dissenters are, I must say, shamelessly unfair 
 and dishonest in their arguments upon this point. They 
 urge that the clergy of the Established Church are not 
 free or independent-minded, because they are dependent 
 upon the State ; and therefore they urge that they 
 should be reduced to the condition, in this respect, of dis- 
 senting ministers. Are then their own ministers alto- 
 gether independent-minded ? Which, let me ask, is the 
 worst or most oppressive control, that of the State, such as 
 it is, over us of the national clergy (and, in all sincerity, 
 I do not know what it is ; I have no notion of feeling 
 in the slightest degree dependent upon the State, with 
 respect to my doctrine or ministerial practices) — but, I 
 ask, which is the most oppressive control, that of the 
 State over us of the national clergy, or that of their own 
 congregations, or their own deacons, over the ministers of 
 dissenting chapels ? Surely the tyranny of a mob may 
 be a thousand times more oppressive than any other. 
 On the voluntary system all clergymen would be 
 dependent, if not literally upon the will of a mob, yet 
 upon the votes of a majority. The object of the Church 
 of God is to reform the world after the model of Chris- 
 tian doctrines and precepts; but the effect of the 
 voluntary system would be to reform Christian doctrines 
 and precepts by universal suffrage. What kind of reli- 
 gion would the world vote for ? Is it likely to be very 
 elevating? Are the most popular preachers just the 
 men to do the most substantial good? Would you 
 wish for a state of things, in which you would have
 
 31 
 
 Christ's ministers, as it has been said, "crying up each 
 their wares, and bidding against one another for popular 
 favour?" 
 
 Of course I know that very many men would still, 
 under any system, be found strong enough, and noble- 
 minded enough by the grace of God, to stand firm 
 against such temptations. I am glad to bear witness 
 to the noble and truly Christian lives of many a dis- 
 senting minister, in the face of all such temptations. 
 But I am speaking of the effect certain to be produced 
 upon average men, such as will always constitute a 
 large proportion of any class of mankind. I say that the 
 effect of the voluntary system upon the doctrinal and 
 practical teaching of such men would inevitably be very 
 lowering. And if you feel and acknowledge the vast 
 practical importance of conferring upon our judges such 
 an income as will raise them above the allurements of 
 bribes, then be sure it is at least equally important for 
 the sound education of any country to raise its moral 
 and religious teachers above the danger of corruption in 
 any form ; especially above that most powerful tempta- 
 tion to which a teacher is exposed, who knows that his 
 very livelihood, and that of his family, may be taken from 
 him if he displeases his hearers. God forbid that the 
 time should ever come when the moral and re- 
 ligious teachers of our country shall be subjected to such 
 a trial of their courage and constancy. 
 
 And I believe one great reason why clergymen are 
 oftenest, I honestly think, less bigoted, more fair- 
 minded, more tolerant, than dissenting ministers, is, 
 that they have not to fight for their position. Their 
 position is a settled and acknowledged one. They need 
 not to be continually asserting their rights ; and so have 
 more time to act upon them quietly. "Whereas many 
 men, and especially leaders of sects, are so occupied with 
 disputing in favour of their own peculiar views in 
 religion, that they have comparatively little time left to 
 give to those great fundamental truths in which almost 
 all Christians agree. And just as one great advantage 
 of the possession of wealth is, that it delivers a man 
 from the necessity of continually thinking about money ; 
 and a great advantage of having an established rank and
 
 32 
 
 position in society is, that it delivers a man from the 
 degrading and vulgarising temptation to be continually 
 pushing for precedence ; so is it an invaluable advan- 
 tage for religion that we have a set of men in the 
 country whose religious position is acknowledged and 
 established, and who are therefore at leisure, quietly 
 and uncontroversially, to meditate upon the great doc- 
 trines of religion, to live upon them, and teach others 
 to do the same. 
 
 Appeal to all Christians in favour of Church 
 Establishments. 
 
 Finally, we appeal also on higher grounds to all 
 Christians, to support a national profession of Chris- 
 tian belief. I say to all Christians ; for it is, as I have 
 said, almost only modern non-conformists who have 
 denounced, or not strongly advocated, some National 
 Establishment of religion. Some of the greatest names 
 in the annals of non-conformity — and how could I men- 
 tion greater than Owen, Howe, Flavel, Doddridge, 
 Matthew Henry — are on our side in this argument. 
 They would have preferred, no doubt, to have seen 
 the body to which they themselves belonged united to 
 the State ; but failing this, they were not only content, 
 but eager to see our Church united to it rather than 
 none. I appeal then to fair-minded Dissenters to 
 listen thoughtfully to our arguments ; and if the result 
 should be to bring them over to the opinions of these 
 their great forefathers in the faith, then if they have 
 largeness of mind and generosity of spirit to be able to 
 rise, as they did, above mere party or sectarian feeling, 
 let them have the courage to stand firm against their 
 own party- leaders. 
 
 Lay no rash hands upon that old and venerable tree, 
 which has struck such deep roots in the whole soil of 
 our country; which, through so many centuries, has 
 grown with her growth and strengthened with her 
 strength ; under whose mighty shelter so many of the 
 noblest of her sons have been nurtured ; lay no hands I 
 say upon this tree of God's planting, unless you see your 
 way not only to plant, but to make to grow in its place
 
 33 
 
 in this our modern world another tree which shall fur- 
 nish as effective a shelter for whatever is highest and 
 noblest on earth. 
 
 Is it nothing to a Christian to see that under the 
 present system all great acts of State are accom- 
 panied with solemn religious services ; that the Corona- 
 tion of our Sovereigns is celebrated in one of our great 
 National Churches ; that Royal Proclamations and great 
 acts of the State are prefaced with words of high 
 Christian faith; that the debates in Parliament are 
 still opened with prayer; that the Sovereign Ruler 
 of the Land is still, in one true sense, always "most 
 religious," however unworthy some of our Sovereigns 
 (though not, thank God, our present noble Queen) 
 may be of the title ; because it is only after a solemn 
 profession of religious faith, and a vow that he, or 
 she, will support the Protestant Faith, that they 
 are admitted to the supreme office; that, in short, 
 the State, as a State, is still professedly and openly 
 Christian ? Yet how could all this be under the volun- 
 tary system ? Will you commit the celebration of State 
 services to all sects in turn ? Would this be tolerable 
 to any of us? No, the only alternative to the 
 present system is that, under which the State pro- 
 fesses entire indifference to all forms of religious belief 
 and therefore dispenses with all religious services of every 
 kind. 
 
 I ask whether that will not be a miserable day, 
 if it ever comes, which God forefend, when all these 
 sacred ceremonies and sacraments of faith, to which 
 I have alluded, are swept away; and one only sub- 
 feet is forbidden, and shut out from State acts, 
 and State ceremonies, namely, that one subject, which 
 alone gives glory and true greatness to all the rest — 
 the subject of religion, and the worship of our God and 
 Saviour. 
 
 Depend upon it, if you value justice and truth in 
 high places ; if you value a high tone in public men and 
 public functionaries ; if you wish to make sure that men 
 as men shall be respected, that the true equality of man- 
 kind before God shall be maintained; if, further, you 
 wish that the great truths of religion shall be taught to
 
 34 
 
 all members of that lowest stratum of society in which 
 earthquakes originate, and that these shall all of them 
 be taught that reverence before the Eternal Power that 
 governs all things, which alone saves us from the terri- 
 ble evils and desolations of rebellion and revolutions — 
 by teaching men that it is not in the power of man to 
 new-make the world according to his own fancies, or to 
 get rid of evil and suffering by violence and self-will — 
 then the best way to gain all these great objects is to 
 maintain the solemn profession of the faith in the whole 
 land; and to make its maintenance everywhere to 
 depend not upon the fluctuating fancies of the people, 
 but upon the fundamental laws and constitution of the 
 realm. 
 
 One security only is there for the prosperity and 
 nobleness of nations, that is, true religion. The arm 
 that is stretched out without this, however strong it 
 may seem, shall in the end wither ; every arm that is 
 stretched out with it shall, however weak it may seem, 
 prove in the end mighty for good. Let Moses hold up 
 his arms in prayer on the mountain-top, and Amalek 
 shall be defeated; let him suffer them to fall, and 
 Amalek shall prevail. This is our firm belief. Of this 
 we believe the whole course of human history and expe- 
 rience, as well as the Bible itself, demonstrates the 
 truth. And for the keeping alive of religion in a whole 
 country, I maintain that infinitely the best means is the 
 union with the State of some one Christian Church. 
 
 And if in our noble Liturgy we pray that " peace 
 and happiness, truth and justice, religion and piety, 
 may be established among us for all generations," one 
 principal sense in which all wise lovers of their country 
 should use these words is, that it may please God to 
 preserve ever among us a national profession of religion, 
 a national Christian Church; for that is the truest 
 foundation of peace and happiness, truth and justice, 
 religion and piety, in the whole nation. Reform and 
 enlarge that which you have, if you will and if you can ; 
 but beware of forsaking her, lest God's blessing in more 
 ways than you dream, forsake you. 
 
 I cannot conclude better than in the noble words 
 of one of the greatest men whom God has of late
 
 35 
 
 years given to this country and to the world, whom 
 no one will suspect of being actuated by anything but 
 an impartial love of truth, and a high-minded patriotism, 
 I mean the poet Wordsworth. Hear how that great 
 man spoke of the Church as well as the State, of 
 Ed gland, and of their union : — 
 
 Hail to the Crown by Freedom shaped to gird 
 An English Sovereign's brow — and to the Throne 
 Whereon he sits ! whose deep foundations lie 
 In veneration, and the people's love ; 
 Whose steps are Equity, whose seat is Law. 
 — Hail to the State of England ! and conjoin 
 With this a salutation as devout, 
 Made to the spiritual fabric of her Church ; 
 Founded in truth ; by blood of martyrdom 
 Cemented ; by the hands of Wisdom reared 
 In beauty of holiness, with ordered pomp, 
 Decent and unreproved. The voice that greets 
 The majesty of both, shall pray for both ; 
 That mutually protected and sustained, 
 They may endure as long as Sea surrounds 
 This favoured land, or sunshine warms her soil. 
 
 END OF LECTURE.
 
 NOTES. 
 
 Note A. — On Parti/ -Spirit. 
 
 The following striking passages from Archbishop Whately's 
 Bampton Lectures, on Party-spirit, may be useful at a time of 
 controversy such as the present : — 
 
 "The great historian of Greece (Thucydides), who described 
 with such frightful vividness of colouring the political party-spirit 
 of his own times, and who pronounced, with the prophetic power 
 which results from wide experience, acute observation and sound 
 judgment, that the like would be ever liable to recur, though in 
 various forms and degrees, has proved but too true a prophet. 
 Much of his description may be applied with very slight, or with- 
 out any, alteration, to many subsequent periods, not excepting the 
 
 present No assurance," he says, " or pledges of either 
 
 party could gain credit with the other ; the most reasonable pro- 
 posals, coming from an opponent, were received, not with candour, 
 but with suspicion ; no artifice was reckoned dishonourable by 
 which a point could be carried ; all recommendation of moderate 
 measures was reckoned a mark, either of cowardice or of insin- 
 cerity ; he only was accounted a thoroughly safe man whose 
 violence was blind and boundless ; and those who endeavoured to 
 steer a middle course were spared by neither side." — Whately's 
 "Hampton Lectures," p. 57. 
 
 In another place the Archbishop says : — 
 
 " Of the baneful effects of party-spirit, the most obvious and the 
 most shocking, is the extinction of Christian charity — of that spirit 
 of meekness, forbearance, and benevolence, which are characteristic 
 of the gospel. If one should go through Paul's description of 
 charity, reversing every point in the detail, he would have no in- 
 correct description of party-spirit, as it has appeared in almost all 
 ages of the Church. Party-spirit is not ' long-suffering nor kind ; ' 
 party-spirit ' envieth, vaunteth itself, is puffed up,' making men 
 feci a pride in their own party and hostile jealousy towards all 
 others. 'Party-spirit seeketh her own' (narrowing men's views 
 to the welfare of their party, and inclining them to sacrifice the 
 interests of all others to it) ; ' party-spirit is easily provoked : 
 thinketh evil ' (being ever ready to attribute to an adversary the 
 E
 
 38 
 
 worst motives and designs"); 'rejoiceth in iniquity, and rejoiceth 
 not in the truth ; ' catching eagerly at every unfair advantage, and 
 leading to an indifference about gospel-truth, which was the object 
 originally professed." — Ibid. p. 65. 
 
 Note B. — Books and Pamphlets upon the present Controversy. 
 
 Abundant facts proving the insufficiency of the voluntary 
 system in providing means of grace for the United States of 
 America, will be found stated with admirable ability and clearness 
 by Dr. Magee, in his pamphlet on the " Voluntary System ; " 
 which it is not too much to call one of the most masterly and 
 satisfactory ever published on any subject. The same question is 
 also ably treated in ''Essays on the Church." The statistics 
 given by these two writers, proving the deplorable failure of 
 the voluntary system, may, I suppose, be trusted, since they 
 are all gathered from the writings of strong advocates of that 
 system. Its working among dissenters is also exhibited in 
 a vast number of facts compiled by Dr. S. R. Maitland (who 
 -was himself brought up a dissenter) entirely out of dissent- 
 ing publications, in his excellent, clever, and entertaining book, 
 called " The Voluntary System " — a good book for lending 
 libraries. 
 
 A striking picture of some of the evils of voluntaryism — of the 
 tyranny of the " deacons " over their ministers is given in a little 
 sixpenny publication of Dr. Molesworth, of Rochdale, called 
 " Overbury," published by Rivington. 
 
 The Free Kirk of Scotland, which is sometimes mentioned as 
 an instance of the success of the voluntary system, is nothing of 
 the kind. It is a richly endowed church ; and its members are 
 strong advocates for the union of Church and State, wherever it 
 may be purchased without the sacrifice of any great principle. 
 
 I need hardly mention that thoughts of the highest value on 
 this whole subject may bo found in Gladstone, On Church and 
 State, as well as in Dr. Chalmers' lectures. The publications of 
 the Manchester Church Defence Association, (Sowler and Son's, 
 Manchester,) are also useful. On the other side of the question, 
 Dr. Wardlaw's lectures and the publications of the Libera- 
 tion Society are, I believe, the principal authorities. 
 
 Note C. — Opinions of Non-Conformists in former ages in 
 favour of Church Establishments. 
 
 The notion that the State ought not to meddle with religion, 
 and that Church Establishments are injurious to religion, is of 
 modern origin. 
 
 Dr. Owen, one of the very greatest of the Puritan Divines, 
 preaching before the Long Parliament, says : 
 
 " If it comes to this, that you shall say you have nothing to 
 do with religion as rulers of the nation, God will quickly manifest 
 that He hath nothing to do with you as rulers of the nation. 
 Certainly it is incumbent on you to take care that the faith which 
 was once delivered to the Saints, in all the necessary concern-
 
 39 
 
 ments of it, may be protected, preserved, propagated, to and among 
 the people over which God hath set you." 
 
 John Howe, another great name, in his sermons on the yet 
 future, but expected prosperity of the Church, looks to see this 
 prosperity brought about, " First, by means of the kings and 
 potentates of the earth — and think how it will be if such Scriptures 
 come to have a fuller accomplishment than they have ever yet 
 had ; when in all parts of the Christian world king3 shall be 
 nursing-fathers, and queens nursing-mothers ; when the Church 
 shall suck the breasts of kings ; when the glory of the Gentiles 
 shall be by them brought into it. Think whether this will not do 
 much to the making of a happy state, as to the interest of religion 
 in the world," etc. 
 
 Flavel, in his exposition of the Assembly's Catechism, replies 
 to the question, " What is the duty of political fathers or magis- 
 trates, to their political children or subjects?" in the following 
 words : " It is to rule and govern the people over whom God hath 
 set them, with wisdom ; carefully providing for their souls in every 
 place of their dominion." " And they taught in Judah, and hadthe 
 booh of the law of the Lord with them, and went about through all 
 the cities of Judah, and taught the pieople." (2 Chron. xvii., 9.) 
 
 Richard Baxter, in his Christian Directory, when addressing 
 civil rulers, says : " Let none persuade you you are such terrestrial 
 animals, that you have nothing to do with the heavenly concern- 
 ments of your subjects. There is no such thing as a temporal 
 happiness to any people but what tendeth to the happiness of their 
 
 souls ; it must be thereby measured, and thence estimated 
 
 The very work and end of your office is, that under your govern- 
 ment the people may live quietly and peaceably, in all godliness 
 and honesty." 
 
 " So entirely opposed, then, were all these truly great men, in 
 whose well-earned reputation the dissenters of modern days delight 
 to clothe themselves, to that notion which has of late been pro- 
 mulgated, of the anti-christian nature of the alliance between 
 Church and State." 
 
 I have extracted these passages from an able and useful book — 
 though disfigured, as I think, by bitter attacks upon opinions held 
 by some of the most eminent men and most earnest Christians in 
 our Church — " Essays on the Church, by a Layman," published by 
 Seeley. 
 
 Note D. — Christianity never filled whole countries till supported 
 by the State. Dr. Chalmers' final verdict on Voluntaryism. 
 
 Dr. Chalmers has well stated this part of the argument in the 
 following striking passage, quoted in Essays on the Church : — "It 
 is a far mightier achievement than may appear at first view, com- 
 pletely to overtake the length and breadth of a land. All the 
 devices and traverse movements of the many thousand missionaries 
 who, during the first three centuries, lived and died in the cause, 
 failed in their accomplishment. I beg you to recollect that fact, 
 because it is one of chief importance in the argument for a reli-
 
 40 
 
 gious establishment — that, notwithstanding the high endowments, 
 the political endowments — notwithstanding the advantages of 
 highly-gifted men, though bordering on the ages of inspiration — 
 yet all the movements in the three first centuries did little more 
 than plant Christianity in the cities of the Roman empire. And 
 that is the reason why the term " heathen " is synonymous with 
 that of " pagan," which signifies " countryman ; " it was because 
 the great bulk of the countrymen (and those who lived in the 
 country) were still in this state of heathenism. These men did 
 much in the work of spreading the gospel externally, but they 
 left much undone in the work of spreading it internally. They 
 had Christianized the thousands who lived in cities ; but the 
 millions of pagans, or the peasantry, who were yet unconverted, 
 evince the country to have been everywhere a great moral fastness, 
 which, till opened up by an establishment, would remain im- 
 pregnable. 
 
 "Now this very opening was presented to the ministers of 
 Christ when the Eoman Emperor, whether by a movement of 
 faith, or of philanthropy, or patriotism, made territorial distribu- 
 tion of them over his kingdoms and provinces, and assigned a 
 territorial revenue for the labourers of this extensive vineyard ; 
 and so enabled each to set himself down in his little vicinity, the 
 families of which he could assemble to the exercise of Chris- 
 tian piety on the Sabbath, and among whom he could expatiate 
 through the week in all the offices of attention and Christian 
 kindness. 
 
 " Such an offer, whether Christianly or politically made on the 
 one side, could most Christianly be accepted and rejoiced in by the 
 other. It extended inconceivably the powers and the opportunities 
 of usefulness ; it brought the gospel of Jesus Christ into contact 
 with myriads more of imperishable spirits : and with as holy a 
 fervour as ever gladdened the breast of the devoted missionary, 
 when the means of an ampler service in the Redeemer's cause, 
 were put into his hands, might the Church in these days have 
 raised to heaven her orisons of purest gratitude, that kings had at 
 length become its nursing-fathers, and opened up to us the plen- 
 tiful harvest of all their populations." 
 
 If it be objected that Dr. Chalmers himself by joining the Free 
 Church gave up the support of the Establishment-principle, and 
 gave in his allegiance to the voluntary principle, I answer this is 
 a total misrepresentation of the case. 
 
 The advantages, as he considered them, of the union of Church 
 and State, great as they were, were not indeed to be purchased at 
 all costs — not, for instance, at that of the surrender of any great 
 principle. It might be necessary to separate the two ; but if so, 
 the necessity would be a deplorable one. That this was Chalmers' 
 final verdict upon the question will be seen from the following 
 words, written at the end of his life : — 
 
 " I can afford to say no more than that my hopes of an 
 extended Christianity from the efforts of voluntaryism alone, 
 have not been brightened by my experience since the disruption^
 
 41 
 
 This is no reason why we should seek an alliance with the State 
 by a compromise of the Church's spiritual independence ; and still 
 less with a government which, on the question of endowments, 
 disclaims all cognizance of the merits of that religion on which it 
 confers support, and makes no distinction between the true and 
 the false, between the scriptural and the unscriptural. Still, it 
 may be a heavy misfortune — it may prove a great moral calamity 
 — when a government does fall into what, speaking in the terms 
 of my own opinion, I hold to be the dereliction of a great and in- 
 cumbent duty. And ere I am satisfied that voluntaryism will 
 repair the mischief, I must first see the evidences of its success in 
 making head against the fearfully increased heathenism, and 
 increasing still, that accumulates at so fast a rate throughout the 
 great bulk and body of the common people. We had better not 
 say too much on the pretensions or the powers of voluntaryism, 
 till we have made some progress in reclaiming the wastes of irre- 
 ligion and profligacy which so overspread our land ; or till we see 
 whether the congregational selfishness which so predominates 
 everywhere can be prevailed on to make larger sacrifices for the 
 
 Christian good of our general population The Free Church 
 
 is at this moment lifting a far more influential testimony on the 
 side of ecclesiastical endowments than can possibly be given in any 
 other quarter of society." — Memoirs of Dr. Chalmers, Vol. iv., 
 488-90. 
 
 Note E. — On the Incomes of the Clergy. 
 
 A favourite topic with all enemies of the Established Church 
 is its wealth. Popular orators are continually drawing attention 
 to the riches of Bishops and dignataries; to the millions a year 
 belonging to the clergy as a body ; to the thousands out of these 
 millions that go to the Bishops ; and the miserable pittances 
 allotted to some working curates. 
 
 Now of course all such facts are admirable for drawing cheers 
 from a public meeting, mainly composed of those who are not 
 accustomed to take the trouble to look deeper than the surface of 
 things, or carefully to analyse large statements, or the particulars 
 of which they are made up. 
 
 But what are the facts ? 
 
 Mr. Callaway, in his lecture at Kidderminster, estimated the 
 whole income of the clergy at five millions a year. The number 
 of the clergy is I believe 17,320. The five millions divided 
 equally among these will give an average of £289. Will any one 
 say this is too much to give such men as the national clergy ought 
 to be ? It is, I am told on good authority, less than the average 
 income of ministers of the Church of Scotland. 
 
 I do not by any means deny that some reform is needed in 
 the Church as to the distribution of Church-revenues. The in- 
 comes of the Bishops have lately been very much reduced; greatly 
 to the benefit of the Church. And a better division of the incomes 
 of the rest of the clergy might, doubtless, be made, and some 
 great abuses remedied.
 
 42 
 
 But what would be the effect of dividing the money equally ? 
 In the first place, would the public benefit by it ? Is it not evident 
 that a clergyman with £289 a year would be obliged, if he was 
 married and had a family, and would be very much tempted even 
 if he were a single man, to spend the whole of that very moderate 
 income upon personal and private objects ? Whereas the effect of 
 giving larger incomes to Bishops and dignitaries is, that a large 
 per-centage of them is given away for public objects. Let the 
 subscriptions given in any year by Bishops and dignitaries to 
 public objects, to church-building, schools, and almsgiving, be 
 counted, they will be found an enormous sum. I know 
 of one Bishop who gave in a single year a quarter of his whole ' 
 income to churches, schools, and parsonages, besides what had 
 gone for other charitable objects. Now most of this would have 
 been lost to the public on the levelling system. Look down 
 subscription-lists for charitable purposes, you will find in most 
 cases that a large proportion comes from the clergy. The census 
 on education (on which, as Dr. Hume — to whom I am indebted 
 for many of my facts — has said, political dissenters maintain a 
 most eloquent silence) shews that the Established Church educates 
 four-fifths of the children of the poor. 
 
 As to the expediency of conferring wealth and high station 
 on Bishops, hear Edmund Burke : — u Whilst we provide first 
 for the poor, and with a parental solicitude, we have not relegated 
 religion (like something we were ashamed to shew) to obscure 
 municipalities or rustic villages. No ! we will have her to exalt 
 her mitred front in courts and parliaments. We will have her 
 mixed throughout the whole mass of life, and blended with all the 
 classes of society. The people of England will shew to all the 
 haughty potentates of the world, and to their talking sophisters, 
 that a free, a generous, an informed nation honours the high 
 magistrates of its Church ; that it will not suffer the insolence of 
 wealth and titles, or any other species of proud pretension, to look 
 down with scorn upon what they look up to with reverence ; nor 
 presume to trample on that acquired personal nobility which they 
 intend always to be, and which often is, the fruit, not the reward 
 (for what can be the reward ?) of learning, piety, and virtue. 
 They can see, without pain or grudging, an Archbishop precede a 
 Duke. They can see a Bishop of Durham, or a Bishop of Win- 
 chester, in possession often thousand pounds a year; and cannot 
 conceive why it is in worse hands than estates to the like amount 
 in the hands of this earl or that squire; although it may be true 
 that so many dogs and horses are not kept by the former, and fed 
 with the victuals which ought to nourish the children of the 
 people." " We shall believe those reformers then to be honest 
 enthusiasts, not, as now we think them, cheats and deceivers, when 
 we see them throwing their own goods into common, and submit- 
 ing their own persons to the austere discipline of the early 
 Church." — (From Burke's Reflections on the French Revolution.) 
 
 Which are we to account the wisest politicians, Edmund Burke. 
 Gladstone, Chalmers, or the leaders of the Liberation Society :
 
 Depend upon it, if we have pedestals of public honour and of 
 commanding influence in the country, we shall not, if we are wise, 
 overthrow any of them ; we shall only labour to get the right men 
 set upon them. If we can do that, the larger the number of such 
 pedestals we have, the better for us all. 
 
 That our present system of patronage is not the best possible, 
 — far indeed from it ; that we may even sometimes wish for a 
 Church-Garibaldi to deliver us from it, I should be one of the last 
 to deny. But this is not a reason for abolishing the union of 
 Church and State, but for ordeiing it better; — for giving the 
 Church greater power to speak her mind in Convocation, or other- 
 wise. But though our system of patronage is bad, it is incom- 
 parably better than that which prevails in many chapels under 
 the voluntary system. Dr. Maitland and Dr. Magee have brought 
 to our knowledge most grievous facts on this subject. Nothing is 
 easier than to find fault with systems of patronage while in " op- 
 position ; " nothing more difficult than to find a good one, free 
 from the enormous evils of canvassing, while on the " other side 
 of the House." 
 
 In a very remarkable pamphlet by the late Mr. Cawood, of Bewd- 
 ley, called " The Church of England and JDissenters," (Seeley's) 
 price Is. (well deserving of distribution by Church Defence Socie- 
 ties), a terrible exposure will be found of the evils of the voluntary 
 system, as it exists among dissenting communities, in extracts drawn 
 from a book entitled " Christian Felloicship, or the Church Member's 
 Guide," by the eminent Independent, the late Mr. Angell James. 
 The extracts are from the second edition of the book— some of the 
 later editions having, I understand, been judiciously expurgated, 
 on account of what was considered the dangerous candour of its dis- 
 closures as to the real state of many dissenting communities. In 
 this book Mr. Angell James states that, in the election of 
 ministers in dissenting chapels, sometimes " only trustees vote;" 
 (it is of course all done by vote, on the voluntary system) some r 
 times " only male subscribers ; " sometimes "female subscribers ; " 
 and sometimes " seat-holders generally, including Arians and 
 Socinians ! " He says that the choice of a new minister " always 
 brings on a crisis in the history of the (vacant) church." At this 
 " perilous crisis," " secret canvassing" " cabals, intrigues, and the 
 most disgusting exercise of the most disgusting tyranny" between 
 opposing " parties take place." Some ''deacons make kindness 
 and assistance a cloak for their own tyranny ; or a silken web to 
 wind round the fetters they are preparing for the slavery of their 
 pastor! " For " what is the deacon of some of our dissenting 
 communities ? the patron of the living, the Bible of the minister 
 {i.e. as guiding his doctrines), and the wolf of the jioch." 
 
 Much to the same effect might be quoted ; and after stating 
 some of the worst abuses he adds " lamentable state of things ! 
 would God it rarely occurred ! " Let it be remembered that these are 
 not my words, but those of a dissenting minister of the most un- 
 questionable trustworthiness and high character. Is this the 
 system of Church patronage that we are exhorted to substitute for 
 our own ?
 
 44 
 
 There are many and great evils in the government of our 
 Church, and in its systems of patronage ; but there are none at all 
 comparable to these. 
 
 Note F. — On compulsion to pay Bates under the Old Testament. 
 
 In answer to my statement that the payment of rates for the 
 maintenance of religious worship among the Jews was compul- 
 sory, inasmuch as it was enforced by a penalty of the plague on 
 disobedience, Mr. Callaway in a letter to the Bridgnorth Journal 
 replies : " that Mr. Lyttelton's argument was based upon a mis- 
 apprehension of what ' compulsory ' and ' voluntary ' meant. 
 That the compulsion voluntaries objected to was, of course, human 
 compulsion. That when God commanded the payments He 
 threatened to punish disobedience, and gave no permission to man 
 to enforce His claim. That is the true voluntaryism, and no 
 " peculiar kind," which holds that every man is to obey what he 
 thinks is God's law, and is responsible alone to the Almighty ; 
 and that no man or government has a right now to usurp God's 
 place, and use a compulsory power which God did not even give to 
 Moses. This is why 1 called the Jewish payments voluntary." 
 
 So that Mr. Callaway believes that though it was indeed the 
 law of God — disobedience to which was to be visited with a 
 national visitation of the plague — that every man should pay this 
 rate, yet if any Israelite deliberately refused to obey that law, the 
 Jewish authorities would have allowed him to do so with im- 
 punity so far as man was concerned, and would have left him to 
 God's judgment. 
 
 This is so paradoxical an opinion as hardly to need an answer. 
 The infliction of punishment was certainly not ordinarily left to 
 the Almighty.— See Deut. xvii., 8-13 ; Lev. xxiv., 13-16, and 
 many similar passages. In the former passage the reason assigned 
 for putting a man to death, is that he u did presumptuously, and 
 would not hearken unto the priest that stood to minister before the 
 Lord God, or unto the judge" nor act " according to the sentence 
 of the law which they taught" Such a man was not to be left to 
 God's judgment miraculously inflicted, but was to be executed by 
 the civil power. 
 
 The truth is, that though the Jewish laws were far more mer- 
 ciful than those prevalent in heathen countries, they had never- 
 theless a character of terrible sternness. 
 
 As to punishments inflicted by the civil magistrates, among us, 
 or in any country, for wilful disobedience to the law of the land, 
 it is evidently a great misuse of words to call such punishments 
 " persecutions," merely because some think the law a bad one. 
 So long as it is the law, it must be enforced. The magistrate is 
 bound to enforce it ; — whether by " seizing the man's clock," or 
 in some other way, must depend upon circumstances. To allow 
 any one to disobey a law because he thinks it an unjust one, is 
 simply to give up government altogether, and to let every man 
 do " that which is right in his own eyes." 
 
 One might have thought a lawyer would have understood
 
 45 
 
 such a first principle of politics ; and would not have branded 
 as " persecution " acts done by magistrates and official persons — 
 whether the acts consist of " seizing clocks," or of any similar 
 strong measures — in compelling " tribute to be paid to whom tri- 
 bute is due." Whether the receiver of the tribute be a Nero, as in 
 the days of St. Paul, or a King Alfred, and whether he spends it 
 well or ill, has nothing whatever to do with the question. It 
 may be a reason for changing the government ; it is no reason at 
 all for refusing to pay tribute to it while it is the government 
 — unless indeed in a case so bad as to make rebellion justifiable. 
 Neither is any man in the slightest degree responsible for the use 
 to which Government applies any tax. The Government alone is 
 responsible for that. 
 
 These are some of the most elementary of all truths of political 
 morality. 
 
 Note. G. — On the " Territorial" System. A specimen of Clap- 
 trap made to do duty as Argument. 
 
 The following comment made by Mr. Callaway upon the part 
 of my lecture referring to the " territorial system " is a good 
 specimen of the kind of argument popular orators think good 
 enough for public meetings : — "To carry out the Hon. and Rev. 
 gentleman's proposition, namely, the i territorial system,' " said 
 Mr. Callaway, at Bridgnorth, " the Church should commence a 
 crusade against the dissenters. They should banish the Presby- 
 terians, hang the Independents, drown the Baptists, give no 
 quarter to the Primitive Methodists, smite the Quakers — clear all 
 sects, root and branch out of the land (applause and laughter) ; 
 then the territorial principle could be carried out, but not 
 otherwise." 
 
 "When in controversy one of the combatants ceases to use 
 argument, and begins instead to throw any mud that may be 
 within his reach at a man of straw, whom he wishes his audience 
 to mistake for his antagonist, we may make excuse for him, but 
 it is only on the score of loss of temper, or of great frivolity of 
 mind. Such missiles recoil in the end with double force upon 
 the man who lowers himself and his cause by making use of them. 
 
 Did Mr. Callaway really think that a system which should 
 tolerate only one class of Christians, and exterminate all others 
 by physical force, was the same as one which merely assigns 
 pecuniary support to one, and withholds it from others ? Not in 
 the least ; he could not have thought so for a moment. But he 
 thought this style of argument good enough for a popular 
 audience. 
 
 It is not a satisfactory excuse for " casting about Jire-brands, 
 arrows, and death" or even irrelevant jokes on grave sub- 
 jects, to say " am not I in sport f" (Prov. xxvi., 18, 19.) The 
 folly and sin is to " be in sport," or to encourage others to be so, 
 on such matters. 
 
 It is to be hoped that the progress of sound education will 
 introduce more and more men into every public meeting who are
 
 46 
 
 not to be caught by such clap-trap (a " trap" with which to catch 
 the " claps " and cheers of the foolish or thoughtless) and will re- 
 ceive it, not with " applause and laughter," but with the indigna- 
 tion it deserves. On the particular case in question, let it be 
 remembered that the great advocate of the " territorial system" 
 in church-matters was— and unless Mr. Callaway was entirely 
 unacquainted with the literature of his subject he must have 
 known it — that cruel and narrow-minded persecutor Dr. Chalmers ! 
 Let all honest men combine to put down this style of contro- 
 versy on grave matters, whether used on their own side of the 
 dispute, or on that of their antagonists. Under a representative 
 government the habit of mind it fosters may have serious con- 
 sequences. 
 
 Note H. — The Church's right to her Property. Opinions of 
 .Dissenters on Endowments for religious purposes. 
 
 I have spoken of the property of the Church as if it were a gift 
 from the State, a kind of salary continually voted by the nation 
 to the officers of the National Church. But evidently this is not 
 a complete statement of the case. A large part of the property of 
 the Church comes from endowments by her zealous members in 
 past ages, and is no more the property of the nation, than the 
 land of any private individual or corporation. If this immemorial 
 endowment of the Church of England be taken away by an act of 
 the State, what security have we left for any other ancient endow- 
 ment, or indeed any property whatever ? 
 
 When the Dissenters' Chapels Bill, by which it was proposed 
 to alienate the endowments of many chapels, was before Parlia- 
 ment seventeen years ago, the " Committee of Protestant Dis- 
 senting Congregations in or near London" sent up a petition, in 
 which they affirm that " they have observed with anxiety and 
 alarm the introduction of the Bill by which they conceive the 
 rights of property are dangerously violated." In the petition from 
 the " Congregational Union of England and Wales," at that time 
 representing one thousand eight hundred congregations, " The 
 petitioners enter their decided protest against the passing of the 
 measure, deeming it a flagrant violation of long -established and 
 acknowledged rights, and forming a most dangerous precedent for 
 future interferences by the legislature with religious trust ; the 
 adoption of such a rule would give a legal sanction to the most 
 profane uses of places of public worship." Other equally strong 
 passages from these petitions may be found in Mr. Clifford's lecture 
 referred to at page 12. Is it then wrong to rob the dissenters and 
 right to rob the Church ? Or have the dissenters changed their 
 principles in the last seventeen years ? Are they ready now to 
 give up their endowments ? 
 
 Note I. — William Cobbett on the Established Church. 
 
 The following shrewd remarks of William Cobbett do not give 
 the highest view of an Established Church ; but they are well 
 worthy of consideration : —
 
 47 
 
 " Ought we to have any Establishment at all* In answering' 
 which for ourselves, it is our own opinion that this nation has been 
 much more religious and happy under the influence of the Protes- 
 tant Established Church, than it is ever likely to he in case that 
 Church were abolished. To make the question still more close, 
 let it be this : whether it be reasonable that any one should be called 
 upon to contribute towards the maintenance of a Church, the tenets of 
 which he dissents from ? This is making the question as home as 
 it can well be. And we do not hesitate to say, that there is to us 
 nothing so outrageously unreasonable in the idea. One thing is 
 certain, that if all are not to remain liable to pay for the Church, 
 it is no Established, or at least no National Church. Reasons are 
 not wanting to shew the benefits of a national religion, or a mode 
 of worship, or some religious establishment, the peculiarites of 
 which are under the especial patronage and peculiar favour of the 
 government. In judging of such a matter, we can only be guided 
 by experience ; and experience is not less wisdom here than in all 
 other things." 
 
 " It does not follow that because an Institution has been 
 abused it should be done away with, if the Institution itself be 
 necessary or beneficial. Even kings may require now and then 
 to be driven from their thrones ; but that does not prove the neces- 
 sity of doing away with the throne." 
 
 " If it be allowed (and we think it ought to be) that an Estab- 
 lishment is desirable for such a purpose, the dissenters cannot well 
 object to paying the clergy of a different persuasion. An Estab- 
 lishment cannot consist of all creeds, or the Quakers themselves 
 would have a right to form a part of it. As we have before said, 
 the Church is not national unless all be taxed towards its support ; 
 and for the sake alone of preserving decency for religion, it appears 
 to us to be no more unjust than it is impolitic towards the com- 
 munity in general, to require the aid of all in maintaining that in 
 which all are equally interested." 
 
 11 But then come the just and charitable principles of the 
 Christian religion ; and they say this to the owners of the land and 
 the houses; the land and the houses are yours, but not in such ab- 
 solute right as to exclude your working and poorer brethren from 
 all share. There shall be a Church in each parish, and a priest for 
 the teaching of religion; there shall be a churchyard for the burial 
 of the dead ; there shall be sermons, and prayers, and marriages, 
 and baptisms, and these shall form the possessions of the inhabitants, 
 the property of those who labour." 
 
 " Go upon a hill, if you can find one, in Suffolk or Norfolk ; and 
 you can find plenty in Hampshire, or Devonshire and Wiltshire ; 
 look to the Church steeples, one in almost every four square miles 
 at the most on an average — imagine a man of small learning at the 
 least, to be living in a genteel and commodious house, by the side 
 of every one of these steeples, almost always with a wife and family; 
 always with servants, natives of the parish, gardener, groom, at the 
 least, and all other servants. A large farm-yard, barns, stables, 
 thrashers, a carter or two, more or less of glebe and of farming.
 
 48 
 
 imagine this gentleman having an interest, an immediate and pressing 
 interest in the pi*oductiveness of every field in his parish — heing pro 
 hably the largest corn-seller in the parish, and the largest rate-payer 
 — more deeply interested than any other man can possibly be in the 
 happiness, harmony, morals, industry, and sobriety of the people 
 in his parish. Imagine his innumerable occasions of doing acts of 
 kindness ; his immense power in preventing the strong from oppress- 
 ing the weak, his salutary influence coming between the hard 
 farmer, if there be one in his parish, and the feeble or simple-minded 
 labourer. Imagine all this to exist close alongside of every one of 
 these steeples, and you will at once say to yourself, hurricanes and 
 earthquakes must destroy the island before that Church can be over- 
 thrown. And when you add to all this, that this gentleman, 
 besides the example of good manners, of mildness and of justice, 
 that his life and conversation are constantly keeping before the eye 
 of his parishioners — when you add to all this, that one day in every 
 week he has them assembled together to sit in silence, to receive 
 his advice, his admonitions, his interpretation of the will of God as 
 applicable to their conduct and their affairs ; and that too in an 
 edifice rendered sacred in their eyes, from their knowing that their 
 forefathers assembled there in ages past, and from its being sur- 
 rounded by the graves of their kindred— when this is added, and 
 whe'n it is recollected that the children pass through his hands at their 
 baptism, that it is he alone who celebrates the marriages, and per- 
 forms the last sad service over the graves of the dead ; when you 
 think of all this, it is too much to believe that such a Church can 
 fall. Yet fall it will," &c. 
 
 " This settles the matter as to the Church as it now stands ; and 
 then the next question is, ' Can it be restored to what it ought to be; ' 
 If it could be, that is the thing that ought to be done — because, though 
 people in great towns do not perceive it, it is a serious change to the 
 country, a serious change to the 465 parishes of Devonshire for in- 
 stance, to the 629 parishes of Lincoln, the 731 parishes of Norfolk, 
 the 41 1 parishes of Kent — a serious change to take away one little 
 gentleman out of every one of these parishes." — Cobbett's "Political 
 Register" as quoted in the notes to Chalmers' Lectures. 
 
 Since the days of Cobbett, the Church has laid much firmer hold 
 of the affections of the people. We have not the slightest fear 
 that as a Church, or as an Establishment, it will fall. The 
 favouring Providence of God will, we believe, continue to de- 
 fend this country from what, as the above passage shews, Cobbett 
 would have held to be the great national calamity of the separation 
 of Church and State. 
 
 THOMAS MELLA.BD, I'KINTER, STOUBBRIDGE.