of disloyalty to mankind, are fond of saying that ballot is harmless; that it will neither do the good nor the evil that is expected from it; and that the people may fairly be indulged in such an innocent piece of legislation. Never was such folly and madness as this; ballot will be the cause of interminable hatred and jealousy among the different orders of mankind; it will familiarize the English people to a long tenour of deceit; it will not answer its purpose of protecting the independent voter, and the people, exasperated and disappointed by the failure, will indemnify themselves by insisting upon unlimited suffrage. And then it is talked of as an experiment, as if men were talking of acids and alkalies, and the galvanic pile; as if Lord John could get on the hustings and say, 'Gentlemen, you see this ballot does not answer; do me the favour to give it up, and to allow yourselves to be replaced in the same situation as the ballot found you.' Such, no doubt, is the history of nations and the march of human affairs; and, in this way, the error of a sudden and foolish largess of power to the people might, no doubt, be easily retrieved. The most unpleasant of all bodily feelings is a cold sweat; nothing brings it on so surely as perilous nonsense in politics. Llose all warmth from the bodily frame when I hear the ballot talked of as an experiment.

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sal suffrage, as there is no act of folly or madness which it may not in the beginning produce. There would be the greatest risk that the monarchy, as at present constituted, the funded debt, the established church, titles, and hereditary peerage, would give way before it. Many really honest men may wish for these changes; I know, or at least believe, that wheat and barley would grow if there was no Archbishop of Can. terbury, and domestic fowls would breed if our Viscount Melbourne was again called Mr. Lamb; but they have stronger nerves than I have who would venture to bring these changes about. So few nations have been free, it is so difficult to guard freedom from kings, and mobs, and patriotic gentlemen; and we are in such a very tolerable state of happiness in England, that I think such changes would be very rash; and I have an utter mistrust in the sagacity and penetration of political reasoners who pretend to foresee all the consequences to which they would give birth. When I speak of the tolerable state of happiness in which we live in England, I do not speak merely of nobles, squires, and canons of St. Pauls, but of drivers of coaches, clerks in offices, carpenters, blacksmiths, butchers, and bakers, and most men who do not marry upon nothing, and become burdened with large fami lies before they arrive at years of maturity. The I cannot at all understand what is meant by this in-earth is not sufficiently fertile for this: dolent opinion. Votes are coerced now; if votes are free, will the elected be the same? if not, will the difference of the elected be unimportant? Will not the ballot stimulate the upper orders to fresh exertions? and are their increased jealousy and interference of no importance? If ballot, after all, is found to hold out a real protection to the voter, is universal lying of no importance? I can understand what is meant by calling ballot a great good, or a great evil; but, in the mighty contention for power which is raging in this country, to call it indifferent appears to me extremely foolish in all those in whom it is not extremely dis

honest.

If the ballot did succeed in enabling the lower order of voters to conquer their betters, so much the worse. In a town consisting of 700 voters, the 300 most opulent and powerful (and therefore probably the best instructed) would make a much better choice than the remaining 400; and the ballot would, in that case, do more harm than good. In nineteen cases out of twenty, the most numerous party would be in the wrong. If this is the case, why give the franchize to all? why not confine it to the first division? because even with all

the abuses which occur, and in spite of them, the great mass of the people are much more satisfied with having a vote occasionally controlled than with having none. Many agree with their superiors, and therefore feel no control. Many are persuaded by their superiors, and not controlled. Some are indifferent which way they exercise the power, though they would not like to be utterly deprived of it. Some guzzle away their vote, some sell it, some brave their superiors, a few are threatened and controlled. The election, in different ways, is affected by the superior influence of the upper orders; and the great mass (occasionally and just fy complaining) are, beyond all doubt, better pleased than if they had no votes at all. The lower orders always have it in their power to rebel against their superiors; and occasionally they will do so, and have done So, and occasionally and justly carried elections against gold, and birth, and education. But it is madness to make laws of society which attempt to shake off the great laws of nature. As long as men love bread, and mutton, and broadcloth, wealth, in a long series of years, must have enormous effects upon human affairs, and the strong box will beat the ballot box. Mr. Grote has both, but he miscalculates their respective powers. Mr. Grote knows the relative values of gold and silver; but by what moral rate of exchange is he able to tell us the relative values of liberty and It is hardly necessary to say any thing about univer

truth?

* The 400 or 500 voting against the 200, are right about as often as juries are right in differing from judges; and that is very seldom,

Difficilem victum fundit durissima tellus.

After all, the great art in politics and war is to choose a good position for making a stand. The Duke of Wellington examined and fortified the lines of Torres Vedras a year before he had any occasion to make use of them, and he had previously marked out Waterloo as the probable scene of some future exploit.The people seem to be hurrying on through all the well-known steps to anarchy; they must be stopped at some pass or another; the first is the best and most easily defended. The people have a right to ballot or to any thing else which will make them happy; and they have a right to nothing which will make them unhappy. They are the best judges of their immedi ate gratifications, and the worst judges of what would best conduce to their interests for a series of years.Most earnestly and conscientiously wishing their good, I say,

NO BALLOT.

FIRST LETTER TO ARCH DEACON SINGLETON,
ON THE ECCLESIASTICAL COMMISSION.

MY DEAR SIR,—

As you do me the honour to ask my opinion respecting the constitution and proceedings of the ecclesiastical commission, and of their conduct to the dignitaries of the church, I shall write to you without any reserve upon this subject.

constitution of the commission. As the reform was The first thing which excited my surprise, was the to comprehend every branch of churchmen, bishops, dignitaries, and parochial clergymen, I cannot but think it would have been much more advisable to have added to the commission some members of the two lower orders of the church-they would have supplied that partial knowledge which appears in so many of the proceedings of the commissioners to have been wanting-they would have attended to those interests (not episcopal) which appear to have been so complete. ly overlooked-and they would have screened the com. mission from those charges of injustice and partiality which are now so generally brought against it. There can be no charm in the name of bishop-the man who was a curate yesterday is a bishop to-day. There are many prebendaries, many rectors, and many vicars, who would have come to the reform of the church with as much integrity, wisdom, and vigour as any bishop on the bench; and I believe, with a much stron ger recollection that all the orders of the church were not to be sacrificed to the highest; and that to make their work respectable, and lasting, it should in all (even in its minutest provisions), be founded upon justice.

268

AL the interests of the church in the commutation of tithes are entrusted to one parochial clergyman;* and I have no doubt, from what I hear of him, that they will be well protected. Why could not one or two such men have been added to the commission, and a general impression been created, that government in this momentous change had a parental feeling for all orders of men whose interests might be affected by it? A ministry may laugh at this, and think if they cultivate bishops, that they may treat the other orders of the church with contempt and neglect; but I say, that to create a general impression of justice, if it be not what common honesty requires from any ministry, is what common sense points out to them. It is strength and duration-it is the only power which is worth having-in the struggle of parties it gives victory, and is remembered, and goes down to other times.

A mixture of different orders of clergy in the commission would at least have secured a decent attention to the representations of all; for of seven communications made to the commission by cathedrals, and involving very serious representations respecting high interests, six were totally disregarded, and the receipt of the papers not even acknowledged."

I cannot help thinking that the commissioners have done a great deal too much. Reform of the church was absolutely necessary-it cannot be avoided, and ought not to be postponed; but I would have found out what really gave offence, have applied a remedy, removed the nuisance, and done no more. I would not have operated so largely on an old, and (I fear) a decaying building. I would not, in days of such strong political excitement, and amidst such a disposition to universal change, have done one thing more than was absolutely necessary to remove the odium against the establishment, the only sensible reason for issuing any commission at all; and the means which I took to effect this, should have agreed as much as possible with institutions already established. For instance, the public were disgusted with the spectacle of rich prebendaries enjoying large incomes, and doing little or nothing for them. The real remedy for this would have been to have combined wealth and labour; and as each of the present prebendaries fell off, to have annexed the stall to some large and populous parish. A prebendary of Canterbury or of St. Paul's, in his present state, may make the church unpopular; but place him as rector of a parish, with 8000 or 9000 people, and in a benefice of little or no value, he works for his wealth, and the odium is removed. In like manner the prebends, which are not the property of the residentiaries, might have been annexed to the smallest livings of the neighbourhood where the prebendal estate was situated. The interval which has elapsed since the first furious demand for reform, would have enabled the commissioners to adopt a scheme of much greater moderation than might perhaps have been possible at the first outbreak of popular indignation against the church; and this sort of distribution would have given much more general satisfaction than the plan adopted by commissioners; for though money, in the estimation of philosophers, has no ear mark, it has a very deep one in the opinion of the multitude. The riches of the church of Durham were most hated in the neighbourhood of Durham; and there such changes as I have pointed out would have been most gladly received, and would have conciliated the greatest favour to the church. The people of Kent cannot see why their Kentish estates, given to the cathedral of Canterbury, are to augment livings in Cornwall. The citizens of London see some of their ministers starving in the city, and the profits of the extinguished prebends sent into Northumberland. These feelings may be very unphilosophical, but they are the feelings of the mass; and to the feelings of the mass the reforms of the church ought to be directed. In this way the evil would have been corrected where it was most seen and noticed. All patronage would have been left as it was. One order of the church would not have plundered the other. Nor

*The Rev. Mr. Jones is the commissioner appointed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, to watch over the interests

of the church

would all the cathedrals in England have been subject-
ed to the unconciliating empire, and awearied energy
of one man.
Instead of this quiet and cautious mode of proceed-
ing, all is change, fusion and confusion. New bishops,
new dioceses, confiscated prebends-clergymen chang-
ing bishops, and bishops clergymen-mitres in Man-
chester, Gloucester turned into Bristol. Such a scene
of revolution and commutation as has not been seen
since the days of Ireton and Cromwell! and the sin-
gularity is, that all this has been effected by men se-
lected from their age, their dignity, and their known
principles, and from whom the considerate part of the
community expected all the the caution and calminess
which these high requisites seemed to promise, and
ought to have secured.

The plea of making a fund is utterly untenable-the
great object was not to make a fund; and there is the
mistake into which the commission have fallen: the
object was not to add 107. or 20l. per annum to a thous
and small livings, and to diminish inequalities in a
ratio so trifling that the public will hardly notice it;
a very proper thing to do if higher interests were not
sacrificed to it, but the great object was to remove the
causes of hatred from the church, by lessening such
incomes as those of Canterbury, Durham, and London,
exorbitantly and absurdly great-by making idleness
work-and by these means to lessen the envy of lay.
It imposssible to make a fund which will
men.
raise the smaller livings of the church into any thing
like a decent support for those who possess them
The whole income of the church, episcopal, prebendal,
and parochial, divided among the clergy, would not
give to each clergyman an income equal to that which
is enjoyed by the upper domestic of a great nobleman.
The method in which the church has been paid, and
must continue to be paid, is by unequal divisions. All
the enormous changes which the commission is making
will produce a very trifling difference in the inequality,
while it will accustom more and more those enemies
of the church, who are studying under their right rev.
masters, to the boldest revolutions in ecclesiastical af-
fairs. Óat of 10,478 benefices, there are 297 of about
407. per annum value, 1,629 at about 751., and 1,602 at
about 1251.; to raise all these benefices to 2001. per
annum, would require an annual sum of 371,2931.; and
upon 2,878 of those benefices there are no houses; and
upon 1,728 no houses fit for residence. What differ
ence in the apparent inequality of the church would
this sum of 371,2931. produce, if it could be raised? or
in what degree would it lessen the odium which that
inequality creates? The case is utterly hopeless; and
yet with all their confiscations the commissioners are
so far from being able to raise the annual sum of
371,000l., that the utmost they expect to gain is 130,-
0001. per annum.

It seems a paradoxical statement, but the fact is, that the respectability of the church, as well as of the A bar of one hundred lawyers bar, is almost entirely preserved by the unequal division of their revenues. travel the northern circuit, enlightening provincial ig. norance, curing local partialities, diffusing knowledge, and dispensing justice in their route: it is quite certain that all they gain is not equal to all that they spend; if the profits were equally divided, there would not be six and eight-pence for each person, and there would be no bar at all. At present, the success of the leader animates them all-each man hopes to be a Scarlett or a Brougham-aud takes out his ticket in a lottery by which the mass must infallibly lose, trusting (as mankind are so apt to do) to his good fortune, and believ ing that the prize is reserved for him, disappointment and defeat for others. So it is with the clergy; the whole income of the church, if equally divided, would be about 2501. for each minister. Who would go into the church and spend 1,2007. or 1,500l. upon his educa tion, if such were the highest remuneration he could At present, men are tempted into the ever look to? church by the prizes of the church, aud bring into that church a great deal of capital, which enables them to live in decency, supporting themselves, not with the money of the public, but with their own money, which, but for this temptation, would have been carried into

some retail trade. The offices of the church would | dience to an act of Parliament, but the very act of then fall down to men little less coarse and ignorant Parliament, which takes away, is recommended, than agricultural labourers-the clergyman of the par- drawn up, and signed by the person who has sworn ish would soon be seen in the squire's kitchen; and all he will never take away; and this little apparent inthis would take place in a country where poverty is consistency is not confined to the Archbishop of Canterbury, but is shared equally by all the bishop comIn fact, nothing can be more unjust and idle than the missioners, who have all, (unless I am grievously reasoning of many laymen upon church matters. You mistaken), taken similar oaths for the preservation of choose to have an establishment-God forbid you their respective chapters. It would be more easy to should choose otherwise! and you wish to have men see our way out of this little embarrassment, if some of decent manners, and good education, as the minis- of the embarrassed had not, unfortunately, in the par. ters of that establishment; all this is very right: but liamentary debates on the Catholic question, laid the are you willing to pay them as such men ought to be greatest stress upon the king's oath, applauded the paid? Are you willing to pay to each clergyman, con- sanctity of the monarch to the skies, rejected all fining himself to one spot, and giving up all his time to comments, called for the oath in its plain meaning, the care of one parish, a salary of 500l. per annum? and attributed the safety of the English church to the To do this would require three millions to be added to solemn vow made by the king at the altar to the the present revenues of the church; and such an ex- Archbishops of Canterbury and York, and the other penditure is impossible! What then remains, if you bishops. I should be very sorry if this were not will have a clergy and will not pay them equitably and placed on a clear footing, as fools will be imputing separately, than to pay them unequally and by lotte- to our church the pia et religiosa Calliditas, which ry? and yet this very inequality, which secures to you is so commonly brought against the Catholics.

There is an awkward passage in the memorial of the church of Canterbury, which deserves some consideration from him to whom it is directed. The Archbishop of Canterbury, at his consecration, takes a so- commission have received such a bonus. lemn oath that he will maintain the rights and liber- I must express my surprise that nothing in this ties of the church of Canterbury; as chairman, how-commission of bishops, either in the bill which has ever, of the new commissiou, he seizes the patronage passed, or in the report which preceded it, is said of of that church, takes two-thirds of its revenues, and abolishes two-thirds of its members. That there is an answer to this I am willing to believe, but I cannot at present find out what it is; and this attack upon the revenues and members of Canterbury, is not obe

the duties of bishops. A bishop is now forced by law | who, in enumerating the advantages of their stations, to be in his diocese or to attend his duty in Parliament have always spoken of the opportunities of providing -he may be entirely absent from both; nor are there for their families as the greatest and most important. wanting instances within these six years where such It is, I admit, the duty of every man, and of every has been the case. It would have been very easy body, to present the best man that can be found to to have placed the repairs of episcopal palaces any living of which he is the patron; but if this duty (as the concurrent leases of bishops are placed) has been neglected, it has been neglected by bishops under the superintendence of deans and chapters; quite as much as by chapters; and no man can open but though the bishops' bill was accompanied by the Clerical Guide' and read two pages of it, withanother bill, containing the strictest enactments for out seeing that the bench of bishops are the last perthe residence of the clergy, and some very arbitra- sons from whom any remedy of this evil is to be exry and unjust rules for the repair of their houses, it pected. did not appear upon the face of the law that the bish- The legislature has not always taken the same view ops had any such duties to perform; and yet I remem- of the trust-worthiness of bishops and chapters as is ber the case of a bishop, dead not six years ago, who taken by the commission. Bishops' leases for years was scarcely ever seen in the House of Lords, or in are for twenty-one years, renewable every seven. his diocese; and I remember well also the indigna. When seven years are expired, if the present tenant tion with which the inhabitants of the great cathe- will not renew, the bishop may grant a concurrent dral town spoke of the conduct of another bishop lease. How does his lordship act on such occasions? (now also deceased) who not only never entered his He generally asks two years' income for the renewal, palace, but turned his horses into the garden. When when chapters, not having the privilege of granting I mention these instances, I am not setting myself such concurring leases, ask only a year and a half; up as the satirist of bishops. I think, upon the whole, and if the bishop's price is not given, he puts a son, or they do their duty in a very exemplary manner, but a daughter, or a trustee, into the estate, and the they are not, as the late bills would have us to sup- price of the lease deferred is money saved for his pose, impeccable. The church commissioners should family. But unfair and exorbitant terms may be ask not have suffered their reports and recommendations ed by his lordship, and the tenant may be unfairly to paint the other branches of the church as such slip- dispossessed-therefore, the legislature enacts that all pery transgredient mortals, and to leave the world to those concurrent leases must be countersigned by the imagine that bishops may be safely trusted to their dean and chapter of the diocese, making them the own goodness without enactment or control. safeguards against episcopal rapacity; and, as I hear This squabble about patronage is said to be dis- from others, not making them so in vain. These sorts graceful. Those who mean to be idle, and insolent, of laws do not exactly correspond with the relative because they are at peace, may look out of the win- views taken of both parties by the ecclesiastical com dow and say,This is a disgraceful squabble between mission. This view of chapters is of course overlookbishops and chapters;' but those who mean to be ed by a commission of bishops, just as all mention of just, should ask, "Who begins? the real disgrace of the bridles would be omitted in meeting of horses; but squabble is in the attack, and not in the defence. If in this view, chapters might be made eminently useany man puts his hand into my pocket to take my ful. In what profession, too, are there no gradations? property, am I disgraced if I prevent him? Church Why is the Church of England to be nothing but a colmen are ready enough to be submissive to their supe-lection of beggars and bishops-the Right Reverend riors; but were they to submit to a spoliation so Dives in the palace, and Lazarus in orders at the gate, gross, accompanied with ignominy and degradation, doctored by dogs, and comforted with crumbs ? and to bear all this in submissive silence ;-to be ac- But to take away the patronage of existing prebencused of nepotism by nepotists, who were praising daries is objectionable for another class of reasons. themselves indirectly by the accusation, and benefit. If it is right to take away the patronage of my catheing themselves directly by the confiscation founded dral and to give it to the bishop, it is at least unjust on it-the real disgrace would have been to have to do so with my share of it during my life. Society submitted to this: and men are to be honoured, not have a right to improve, or to do what they think an disgraced, who come forth contrary to their usual improvement, but then they have no right to do so habits, to oppose those masters whom, in common | suddenly, and hastily to my prejudice! After securing seasons, they would willingly obey; but who, in this to me certain possessions by one hundred statutes matter, have tarnished their dignity, and forgotten passed in six hundred years after having clothed me what they owe to themselves and to us. in fine garments, and conferred upon me pompous

It is a very singular thing that the law always sus-names, they have no right to turn round upon me all pects judges, and never suspects bishops. If there is of a sudden and to say, You are not a dean nor a any way in which the partialities of the judge may in- canon-residentiary, but a vagabond and an outcast, jure laymen, the subject is fenced round with all sorts and a morbid excrecsence upon society. This would of jealousies, and enactments, and prohibitions-all not be a reform, but the grossest tyranny and oppres partialities are guarded against, and all propensities sion. If a man cannot live under the canopy of ancient watched. Where bishops are concerned, acts of Par- law, where he is safe, how can he see his way, or lay liament are drawn up for beings who can never possi- out his plan of life? bly be polluted by pride, prejudice, passion, or interest. Not otherwise would be the case with judges, if they, like the heads of the church, legislated for themselves.

• Dubitant homines serere atque impendere curas.'

76

You tolerated, for a century, the wicked traffic in slaves, legislated for that species of property, enThen comes the question of patronage; can any couraged it by premiums, defended it in your courts of thing be more flagrantly unjust, than that the patro-justice-West Indians bought and sold, trusting (as nage of cathedrals should be taken away and conferred Englishmen always ought to trust) in parliaments. upon the bishops? I do not want to go into a long Women went to the altar-promised that they should and tiresome history of episcopal nepotism, but it is be supported by that property, and children were born notorious to all, that bishops confer their patronage upon their sons, and sons-in-law, and all their relations; and it is really quite monstrous in the face of the world, who see this every day, and every hour, to turn round upon deans and chapters and to say to them: 'We are credibly informed, that there are instances in your chapters where preferment has not been given to the most learned men you can find, but to the sons and brothers of some of the prebendaries. These things must not be-we must take these benefices into our own keeeping;' and this is the language of men swarming themselves with sons and daughters, and

to it, and young men were educated with it, but God touched the hearts of the English people, and they would have no slaves. The scales fell from their eyes, and they saw the monstrous wickedness of the traffic; but then they said, and said magnificently, to the West Indians, 'We mean to become wiser and better, but not at your expense; the loss shall be ours, and we will not involve you in ruin, because we are ashamed of our former cruelties, and have learnt a better lesson of humanity and wisdom.' And this is the way in which improving nations ought to act, and this is the distinction between reform and revolution.

Justice is not changed by the magnitude or minuteBess of the subject. The old cathedrals have enjoyed their patronage for seven hundred years, and the new I have noticed with great pleasure the behaviour of your ones since the time of Henry VIII.; which latter pe- lordship's second son, and am most happy to have it in my riod even gives a much longer possession than ninety-power to offer to him the living of * He will find it nine out of a hundred of the legislators, who are called of considerable value; and there is, I understand, a very upon to plunder us, can boast for their own estates. good house upon it, &c. &c. And these rights, thus sanctioned, and hallowed by time, are tor from their present possessors without the least warning, or preparation, in the midst of all that fever of change which has seized upon the people, and which frightens men to the core of their hearts; and this spoliation is made, not by low men rushing| into the plunder of the church and state, but by men of admirable and unimpeached character in all the relations of life-not by rash men of new politics, but by the ancient conservators of ancient law-by the archbishops and bishops of the land, high official men, invented and created, and put in palaces to curb the lawless changes, and the mutations, and the madness of mankind; and to crown the whole, the ludicrous is added to the unjust, and what they take from the other branches of the church they confer upon themselves.