But there were other gentlemen of equally pleasing notions present at that meeting, some of whom declared that, on the ground of the expenses of collecting alone, from thirty-five to forty per cent. must be struck off from the full value of tithes! However, it is needless to go into particulars. The one broad fact is enough. Here is a bill which will either leave the clergy where they were, or will reduce their income, in every case where they have got sixty per cent., or three-fifths of their real income; and will do nothing more for them in those cases where they have got less than this, than assign them this modicum of their real rights. And to such a bill there is found a large body of land-owners to object, and to proclaim it a dreadful injury to them. What is it which they will not esteem an injury? They talk of apportioning tithes to rent. But we are not come to the question of how the thing is to be done. We are only inquiring now how much they intend to demand from the spoil of the church for themselves. This is no slander on the Palace-yard meeting, at least. They say they will not agree to pay three-fifths-that is, robbing the church of two-fifths, and putting it into their own pockets, is not enough for them! Will they, at their next meeting, tell us how much they do expect to put there? Will they leave the clergy two-fifths? Mr. Preston, it may be feared, will not. He who loses fifty thousand pounds by paying three-fifths, must have very large estates indeed, if he does not lose a good many thousand pounds by paying two-fifths. Will they like to pay one-fifth? or anything at all? When it is got down to one-fifth, surely they can fairly argue at the lowest rate, 251. per cent. In some districts it is 50l. per cent. !! and, "on potatoes, &c., absorbs a still larger portion of the gross value" !!! Now let us try Mr. Preston's arithmetic : Rent of one acre of his land Seven rents or gross produce on the Norfolk scale...... ..£0 13 4 4 13 4 This is more than 3s. above Mr. Preston's present tithe-i. e., he is paying 2s. 6d. per acre, the produce being 41. 13s. 4d.; or he is paying about 1-38th of the produce, very little more than one-fourth of his real tithes! But does any one believe that Mr. Preston's land makes seven rents? try it on supposition it makes five rents, which is probably the outside : Let us That is, Mr. Preston is now paying less than 1s. per acre tithe on land producing 31. 6s. 8d., or little more than 1-7th of his real tithe! What will ever satisfy him? He tells us plainly that 401. per cent. is no bonus to him. So he expects a bonus! This is of itself a plain declaration of intention, which speaks for itself. Here, too, a person who has bought land, and has taken very good care to pay less for it on the very ground that the parson can take his tenths, now comes forward openly and says, that after this he has contrived to make the parson take so much less than these very tenths, for not one farthing of which did Mr. Preston ever pay, that making him a present of two-fifths of them is no boon at all! He never paid for a farthing of them, and yet it is clear that he has made three-fourths of them at the expense of the real owners! How can such people be satisfied? that such a trifle is not worth paying-that it would be quite an insult to the clergy to offer it, and they had therefore better take it all. But let us look a little farther-at actual documents. To shew what chance of justice the clergy can expect to have from any quarter, let us refer to the meeting of the Central Agricultural Association, on March 18th, where there were persons of all parties, and of the most respectable rank and condition in life, but where no one person, except Mr. Bickham Escott, said one word against the resolutions drawn up by Mr. Eagle, probably one of the most extreme politicians and vehement haters of the clergy to be found. The temper of these resolutions, and of those who passed them, may be at once seen by the eleventh resolution-" That very great encroachments have been made in modern times upon the rights of tithe-payers, by overturning moduses and exemptions from tithes which had been enjoyed for many generations"! Any person who knows the history of moduses and exemptions, knows (1) that a very large portion of them arose in fraud, and a large portion in oppression, practised on the clergy; and (2) that, from the advantages possessed by the land-owner over the clergyman, who rarely receives papers from his predecessors, and has therefore no means of proof, scarcely any moduses, except the most barefacedly fraudulent and false ones, have ever been set aside; and (3) that no modus was ever set aside, except by due process of law, unless it was so openly bad that the landowner gave it up; and (4) that, notwithstanding all this, the landowners got a bill preventing the clergy from suing for their rights, even in such cases, after a year from the date of the bill's coming into operation, and thereby confirming, beyond all question, a number of most unjust and fraudulent moduses. Yet, notwithstanding all this, this great meeting pronounces the common operation of justice in the Court of King's Bench, interfering on the side of equity against fraud, a violation of the rights of the tithepayers! When men go so far as to say that the verdict of a jury, deciding that one man took from another, by fraud, what belonged to him, and that the successors of the one are withholding the same, in injustice, from the successors of the other, is a violation of the rights of the unjust possessor, one knows what to expect from them. The first resolution suggests a fallacy about tithes, for the invention of which Mr. Eagle received great credit, though it has been propounded often enough before, but not persevered in, because it is too foolish. Mr. Eagle does not say now that tithes are a tax. That fallacy is given up! but he says that because a land occupier may let his whole farm lie waste, in which case there would be no tithe, therefore tithes are not a lien on the land, but a personal demand on the occupier. And then, in Resolution 4, he says that the exchanging this personal security, which is very bad, for so admirable a security as a rent-charge (the best and most eligible of all real securities) without a consideration, would be an unexampled violation of the rights of property. To be sure, one supposes that all these meetings and speeches are got up for the sake of London newspapers and readers who are all utterly ignorant of the question, and that it is calculated that the clamour so raised will settle things, or else men would really hardly be able (without either a blush or a laugh at their own hardihood) to get up and state such monstrous figments. At the present moment the tithe-owner has the right of entering on the land, and taking away the tenth part of the produce, and this right this agricultural meeting calls a personal security! No doubt, if there is no cultivation there is no tithe, and the parson demands none. The donors of tithes certainly did not say that the successors to their property should cultivate it. They left that to their own discretion. All they did say was-"We give the tenth part of the produce of all cultivated land, not in value only, but in kind, and the parson may always come and take it away." The answer to Mr. Eagle's wretched sophistry is-"We have not even a personal claim where the land occupier likes to leave his land waste, and we ask for nothing. We beg he will leave (it waste as long as he likes. When he begins to cultivate, he will be so good as to let us know, and we shall take the liberty of taking the tenth of the produce." Of course, no scheme and no law can deal with madmen or with-one hardly knows how to describe the malignant without a hard word. Of course, a debtor may always defraud a creditor finally, by saying, "I will take care you never arrest me, for I will cut my throat," or, "I will take care you never seize my goods, for I will burn them." No law can provide for such conduct. But it would be esteemed a strange answer to the man who was about to put in an execution, to say, "You have no lien on my goods, because I can burn them; you have, therefore only a personal claim on me"-that is," You shall be cheated to whatever extent I please, because if you ask for more than a third of your demand, I will burn all my goods before you can put your execution in." This, however, is Mr. Eagle's argument, applauded by noble lords, baronets, and esquires, conservatives and radicals, as equally sagacious and honest. After this, what chance of justice can the clergy have? Ir is a matter of very serious regret to be obliged to put off giving some very interesting documents, both MS. and printed, respecting Church Destitution at Manchester, and the munificent subscriptions made to relieve it. A few words on it are given in Events. There is another subject also to which attention must, at least, be called. Let every one read Dr. Dickinson's Defence of the Memorial on the Irish Tithe Bill, if they wish to know what that measure is to be. There is, indeed, very plain speaking and avowals of surrender of principles and property, which, whatever might have been expected, were too much to expect. SECOND REPORT OF THE CHURCH COMMISSION. As the report is reprinted in this Number, it is not necessary to give any account of its contents. With respect to its nature, the readers of this Magazine will be so kind as to refer to what was said on the first report, and to consider that as said again. The simple truth is, that the battle was won by the Reformers without and within the church long ago, and that the time for objection to change is over when change is come. They who resisted, as long as resistance was possible, will at least feel easy in their own minds; and as to the actual change, men, who are worthy of the name, may lament the past, but will firmly endure the present. Let it not, however, be supposed that all the past is a matter of regret, or all the present considered as evil; on the contrary, whatever prevents undue accumulations of preferment, (and such there were, which shewed, that although the instances might be few, and becoming fewer, the law was defective,) must be considered as a very great good. The regulation, which prevents certain dignities from being held before a person has been six years in orders, is another good. The additional powers to be placed in the bishops, for enforcing the building of glebe houses, where it is practicable, and securing residence, must be looked on as advantageous. The diminishing of pluralities within due limits, and with strict respect to the actual circumstances of the establishment, has always been held desirable. The proposal for a better education of the clergy, must be hailed as a signal good. And so of other things. But the necessity for change in the cathedrals, is one which must surely be contemplated with the sincerest regret. Of the non-residentiary stalls, with a few exceptions, the value was so small, that they could not well be looked on as matters of gain, while, as matters of pleasure and satisfaction to their possessors, as marks of respect for them, on part of their superiors, they were of high value; nor was their number great. The whole number of stalls, dignities, &c., to be done away with, is stated at 368. These minor stalls were the stars and orders for a profession consisting, at least, of 12 or 14,000 men. Had there been anything of a generous feeling in the country, one might have said, that as so many pluralities were to be done away, this was the very time for increasing such means of adding a very little to the income, and very much to the harmless gratification of worthy men, or even of increasing the number of more valuable stalls, taking care that accumulation of preferment should be obviated. Considering, too, that the secular canons are the oldest body of clergy in this country, (the body, indeed, through whom the Gospel was taught and spread, long before parish ministers or parishes were known,) their removal is, on that account, matter of deep regret. As the report mentions that rural deans are to receive some small payment, would it not be possible to preserve some of the minor stalls for that purpose, and thus to keep up something more of a representation of the secular canons? One other matter seems to demand especial notice. We have here not the episcopal commissioners only, but my Lord Melbourne, and my Lord John Russell, &c. &c., declaring to the country, that this great sweep of all the non-residentiary canons, most of the residentiaries, all the dignitaries, &c. &c., will produce so small a sum of money, that when applied to augmenting livings with a population of between 500 and 2000, up to 2007. only, those of between 2000 and 5000, up to 300/., and those of 5000 and upwards to 4007. per annum, it will not effect this poor increase, even on the livings in public patronage, which are little more than half of the whole of this class. If all this vast change in cathedrals is to be made, and will yet effect so little, will this reforming country, which forces all these changes, do nothing itself? Will it say, that such and such things are absolutely necessary, and when it finds that after all it can extort from the clergy, their property cannot do this necessary work, will it leave the work undone ? The effect of these changes will not, of course, be felt by the upper clergy, and by those who have got their preferments. The very young members of the profession they who have entered it, at least, for the last five or six years, have entered it with change staring them in the face. On the middle-aged clergy, who are now bearing the heat and burthen of the day, many of whom have given health and strength to the cause, and would have been thankful, not for gross accumulation of income, but for tranquillity, as well as competence, for their declining years, the changes will fall very hard. They cannot have their youth and health, and their power of gaining independence in another profession, restored. But they must endure, and look on this as one of the many trials which are to purify and elevate the spirit, and take it off more entirely from the world. They will not enjoy the dignities, or the ease, of those who have gone before them; but the opportunity of enduring hardness, and struggling on to the end, is, in fact, a more precious, though a more painful possession. On the principles of these changes it is vain to speak. From the time of the Conservative government's return to office, in 1834, it was obvious what must come. If they felt it necessary to make large changes, every other party was ready, nay, was pledged to it. To talk of the church resisting, or to blame it for not resisting, is therefore, humanly speaking, absurd and unreasonable. But where great changes are to be made, how can they be made on any hitherto recognised principles? The truth is, that in every part of our social body, all rights are disappearing, and fitness is made the tenure (though that is a bad word, for, if experience is worth anything, it will not hold). A weak body like the establishment must of necessity submit to that to which every other part of the social fabric is submitting. May the success be greater, and the duration of the new order of things, in England, be longer, than one can now foresee. THE "RECORD" AND THE SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE. THE "Record" makes exceeding complaints of the charge which was undoubtedly preferred in this Magazine against it, that it speaks in an unchristian tone, and does very much in stirring up and cherishing bad feelings among churchmen. The following passage, occurring this month, speaks for itself:-" The man who states the doctrines promulgated in all the publications of the Society to be according to Scripture and the articles of the church, we declare to be either deplorably ignorant, or false at his very heart. We deliberately make this statement! If we are uncharitable, or mistaken, or libellous, in thus |