Church establishments, their advantages, social & religious : a lecture addressed to the Stourbridge Church of England Young Men's Association

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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. 2Srot 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) somer
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 udid 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.