ADDRESSES AT ALDERLEY.

I.

A COUNTRY RECTOR'S ADDRESS

TO

HIS PARISHIONERS,

AT THE CLOSE OF THE

TWENTY-FIFTH YEAR OF HIS RESIDENCE AMONGST THEM,

WITH REFERENCE TO

THE DISTURBED STATE OF THE TIMES.

It was the Bishop's practice, while Rector of Alderley, to circulate Addresses amongst his parishioners, as has been described in the Memoir. The following is given as a specimen, as having been, with some few alterations, published for general use under its present title, with a view to the attacks on property and machinery which were common in 1830 and 1831.

TIME slips away so fast and silently with all of us; one day is so like another; new things become old; everything, like the grass of the field, grows so gradually; that we live on, and hardly perceive how we ourselves, and all around us, change from day to day. The dial marks the hour, the Sunday marks the week, change of season marks the fading year; but for these signs, we should scarcely trace our progress in the journey of life; careless, indifferent, and thoughtless as to the why and wherefore of our earthly pilgrimage. Some restingplace, then, whereon we may pause, and look back upon the past, cannot but be useful and important. From thence we may see, plainly enough, the changes of departed days; and, in comparing what is with what has been, we may be led to many thoughts, to many reflections, for which we may be the better in the hours we have yet to live.

Twenty-five years have passed since, as Minister of this Parish, I first came to reside amongst you. A quarter of a century—a large portion of even the longest and many and great are the changes which have taken place in it.

life;

In the state of the times

Europe was then involved in war.

Nations stood in

arms, in defence of their rights and liberties, against an ambitious conqueror who would deprive them of both. But while on foreign lands dreadful scenes of bloodshed and strife took place, rumours of invasion alone reached us. Throughout the United Kingdom Englishmen joined hand and heart in self-defence, and the danger passed away. Wellington fought at Waterloo, and gained a victory never to be forgotten. Bonaparte became our prisoner; and, after a war of many years, the world was at rest; our heaviest taxes were reduced, our anxieties were over, our soldiers returned to their homes, and their arms were laid aside.

But with returning peace came not all its blessings; for war, though a fruitful source of misery to multitudes, is yet a welcome season to others. A change from war to peace is, and ever must be, a change in the balance of loss and gain to numberless classes of the community. Extensive and constant orders for the clothing of troops, demand for arms of every sort, supplies of all kinds of provisions for immense fleets and crowded garrisons, excited a spirit of activity and industry in every department of our manufactures, and almost every article of consumption and produce. Workmen were wanting to complete the orders of the manufacturing districts, and, in many parts of the country, labourers could scarcely be found for the tillage of the land. The consequences naturally were, that wages were high, money plentiful, work abundant, and, of course, all things rose in price. But now came as natural a change, and those