land) of the right of nominating the ministers of the Reformed Church, subject, as at present, to the approval of the bishop. For the public to purchase their interests, according to the present value of tithes and church-fees, would be nothing less than at act of NATIONAL SIMONY; it would be converting a spiritual function into a temporal possession, and the state committing the very crime in wholesale which had been condemned and punished when perpetrated in a less degree by individuals.

Nothing has yet been said of the provision for the Established Clergy, to be substituted in lieu of tithes and church estates,-whether they ought to be paid stipends by Government, or out of the poor-rates, the county-rate, or some other rate levied expressly for the purpose, or whether they ought to be supported bythe voluntary contributions of their hearers. The discussion of these matters will be time enough, when the people, or their representatives, have determined upon the secularization of church property. The proceedings of the Church-building Commissioners offer an example which some may think it wise to follow. They have shown not only how episcopalian churches may be built by subscription, but how the minister's stipend may be paid out of pewrents, and other voluntary contributions, without the aid of the compulsory and odious provision of tithes. It may be thought a similar plan might be extended to all the churches of the establishment; but, for our parts we are in favour of a national religion-a Liturgy - and an endowed clergy; provided the endowment is moderate-fairly apportioned among the working clergy-and does not exceed about a million and a half per annum. A public worship protected by the state has formed, with few exceptions, a part of every well-ordered community. The French tried to do without it; the experiment was productive of enormous crimes, and after floundering for a time in the waves of anarchy, they were compelled again to resort to the aid of spiritual faith. Religion contains now little to give offence to the most liberal mind; it is not, as formerly, like the demon of some German storyrecluse, bloody, and unrelenting; its worst features-bigotry and intolerance-have been removed by the progress of science and philosophy, and what remains may be considered a good with scarcely any admixture of evil.

Whether, however, we have an endowed clergy or not, no fear need be entertained about the interests of religion suffering. The fear at present is all the other way, lest a people evidently verging into the gloom of puritanism, may not afterwards recoil into the opposite extreme of licentiousness and unbelief. This has been termed an age of cant, and every thing tends to show its ascendancy. Nothing but cant can live in literature, the drama, trade, or politics. Let any one deny the popular faith, and the doors of the legislature are closed upon him; he is a " doomed man," whose future life is "bound in storms and shallows," and he is shunned as if he had caught the plague from some infectious lazaretto. This is the state of opinion among the lower and middle orders; among the higher, there is less scrupulosity; and a lord

or a gentleman of £10,000 a year may admire Voltaire, Diderot, or Spinoza, without being ejected out of the pale of social communion.

While men's fortunes depend on their faith, we may be sure there will be enough of it, or at least, the profession. Like the French satirist, every one thinks it necessary he should live, and of course will adopt the means essential to the end in view. It is possible, however, the artificial encouragement of devotion may produce it in excess, beyond the wants of the state, and thus generate the extreme to which we have adverted at the Restoration of Charles II. There is always some danger in meddling with spiritual opinions as with temporal interests; and many may think the wisest course to be adopted towards religion would be to follow the policy recently become popular in respect of trade-leaving it free; neither attempting to depress one sect by the drawback of civil disabilities, nor to encourage another by the bounty of protection. It is certainly a fact that religion will generally abound in proportion to the wants and demands of society; where there is much ignorance and mental debility, there will, as there ought, be much faith; on the other hand, where there is a strong and enlightened reason, the motives for good conduct will be sufficiently apparent, without being aided by the hopes and fears of superstition.

However, as before hinted, we are not the partizans of a free-trade in religion, and think a worship patronized by the state is best, provided it be cheap. Our reason for this preference may be somewhat peculiar, and not shared in by our readers. We prefer an established worship, not less as a means of maintaining a rational piety, than as a counterpoise to fanaticism. Without religion at all, men are seldom better than beasts; but if their rulers have no control over the popular faith, the people will be at the mercy of every pretender, whose warm imagination or an over-weening conceit may have filled with the delusion of a divine commission. With an endowed corps of ecclesiastics the state possesses a medium through which religion may be kept in countenance among the higher classes, (adopting the slang of aristocracy,) and its temperature among the lower be regulated. Of course we mean a race of clergymen differently qualified from the present. These, good easy souls! have little influence or authority; they have ministered away their flocks, and remain themselves objects of derision or cupidity, not veneration.

With the near and long-standing example of the Presbyterian establishment, North of the Tweed, it is surprising the task of ecclesiastical reform has made no progress either in England or Ireland. In the Kirk of Scotland, it has been already remarked, there are no bishops, nor dignitaries, nor tithes. The incomes of the national clergy are paid by the Court of Session out of a fund formed from the ancient tithes of the country. Some of the benefices being considered of too small value, they were, in 1810, augmented by an annual grant, from Parliament, of £10,000, which made the poorest livings worth £150 a-year, and the income of some of the ministers are considerably more, amounting to £300 or £350. Exclusive of house and glebe, the average income of

the clergy is £245, which to 948 pastors, makes the whole annual expenditure on the Kirk only £234,900. This cannot be considered extravagant to a ministry with upwards of a million and a half of hearers; and upon the whole there are many things to admire in the Scotch Establishment. The Scots do not pay a quarter of a million for lawn-sleeves; nor half a million for cathedral and collegiate sinecurists. There are no curates; the parochial clergy reside upon their benefices; exhorting, catechising, instructing, and performing all those duties to their parishioners, for which they receive their incomes. The Scotch Church, though it cannot now be termed poor, yet its wealth is not so exorbitant as to corrupt its ministry. The wealth of the English Church is the source of all its vices-sinecurism, pride, luxury, and inefficiency.

The Dissenters afford an example of the efficient support of religion without any compulsory provision. In England and Wales there are upwards of 9,000 ministers supported by Dissenters. This is certainly not done at a less expense than £120 each, or rather more than a million per annum. Again, America is another proof of what can be done by voluntary contributions. There are not less than 11,000 ministers of all denominations in the United States, the great majority of whom derive their subsistence from the free-will offerings of the people, independent of legislative provision. The option left to the people has not operated to the decay of virtue or religion; on the contrary, religion flourishes among them to an extraordinary extent-it pervades all ranks and conditions of men-it is associated with all their pursuits-not, indeed, as a second head of the social body, dividing the intellect and strength of its frame, but as a pursuit distinct from political combinations, altogether a personal concern, and, therefore, purposely discarded by the constitution. Notwithstanding this absence of state-worship the United States have become a mighty empire, which, in spite of the solemn pedantries of Capt. Basil Hall, may be advantageously compared with any other in the world, whether measured by the standard of morals, personal prowess, commercial enterprize, or national wealth and power.

We have now done, and having finished our exposition of the Church of England, can truly say we have "nothing extenuated, nor set down aught in malice." Our statements we know cannot be impugned; but it is possible our opinions may be misunderstood. It may be thought we are Jacobins, Liberals, or worse. Of this we take no note, knowing we are as good subjects as true Christians. We have no dislike to the Church, but we object to it as we do to the borough system, because it does not reward merit, and oppresses the honest and industrious. Our humble endeavour has been to expose the corruptions of the establishment. If the duties of the Church be of importance to Government, or to the interests of religion and morality, it is a strong reason for reforming, not protecting its abuses. It must be clear to the most common observers it cannot long continue in its present state. Without adverting to the number of dissenters--to defects in discipline,—the

Liturgy-ill-proportioned revenue- -or the conduct of the clergy themselves, the mere fact of a body of men, not exceeding eight thousand in number, and of no great social importance-claiming in the most vexatious manner a tenth of the natural and artificial produce of a soil, raised for the support of FOURTEEN MILLIONS, is so staringly outrageous, as to throw all argument out of court, and leave the Church a barefaced and unparalleled oppression, without precedent or palliative. Further reasoning on such a subject is out of place, and the only question is-Who will rise to abate the colossal nuisance? Will Government timely interfere and afford the Church a chance of prolonged duration, under a less obnoxious form, or will it supinely wait and behold it swept off in a whirlwind, leaving "not a wreck behind," by a simultaneous rush of the TIERS ETAT?

If the Church is to be saved it must be saved by a wisdom very different from that which directs the councils of the heads of the Establishment. They are obviously as insensible to the position in which they stand as the child unborn. Only think of the nature of the bills introduced by them last year for the reform of the Church. The character of one that for a composition for tithe-has been already noticed. Of the remaining two, one is for augmenting the incomes of vicarages; the other for shortening the time of prescription in cases of moduses and exemptions from tithes. In the last is a proviso which prevents it from interfering with any suit which may be commenced within three years. Ah, my Lords Bishops, the crisis will be past long before. Do not, we beseech you, lay the flattering unction to your souls that there will be litigation about moduses, prescription terms, and nullum tempus maxims three years hence. Your days are assuredly numbered; your lease is expired. The fatal vote given on the Reform-Bill has sealed your doom, and no depth of repentance can again establish you in the estimation of the people. Solemn pledges will be demanded from a reformed parliament that tithe shall be abolished, and that haughty prelates shall cease to haunt the chambers of legislation. A terrible storm is impending over the Church, and nothing can avert its destructive ravages save a timely abandonment of all that has long excited popular indignation-its enormous wealth-its avarice, pride, and self-seekingits insolent and oppressive power.

LIST

OF

BISHOPS, DIGNITARIES, AND PLURALISTS

OF THE

CHURCH OF ENGLAND.

EXPLANATIONS.

THE name of the Pluralist comes first. After the name comes the first living of the Pluralist in italic, and an initial letter denoting its title-namely, r. for rectory, v. for vicarage, c. for chapelry, p. c. for perpetual curacy, d. for donative, d. r. for district rectory, and d. c. for district chapelry. The name of the Patron is put after the living or livings, supposing more than one living, of which the same person is patron. Abp. is put for archbishop, bp. for bishop, archd. for archdeacon, dn. for dean, ch. for chapter. When a living is in the gift of the University of Oxford, Oxon is put; when of the University of Cambridge, Camb. When a nobleman, as the duke of Newcastle, or the marquis of Exeter, is patron, the of in the title is omitted both for brevity and propriety. The "of" expresses territorial jurisdiction, but as peers do not possess such authority at the present day, the term by which it is implied may be properly dropped.

In the language of churchmen a living or benefice, which are synonymous, is a rectory or vicarage only; but many chapelries are equally entitled to fall under this denomination, and have been so considered. There are free chapels perpetually maintained, and provided with a minister, without charge to the rector or parish. In some places chapels of ease are endowed with lands and tithes; they have by custom a right to a distinct minister, to baptize, to administer sacraments and burial: such parochial chapelries differ only in name from parish churches. Parish is a vague term. In the north, parishes comprise thirty or forty square miles, which is seven or eight times the area of parishes in the south. Under 13th Charles II. certain townships and villages are allowed to maintain their own poor; hence these townships became so many distinct parishes. There are 200 extra-parochial places, many of which are as large as parishes; these are exempt from poor-rate, because there is no overseer on whom the magistrate can serve an order;-from militia, because no constable to make a return; from repairing highways, because no surveyor. The 37 Hen. VIII. c. 31, (also 4 and 5 Will. & Mary,) allows the union of churches, when not more than one mile apart, and under value of £6. Under these acts churches have been united: the city of London reckons 108 parishes, forming no more than 78 benefices; in Norwich, 70 parishes have been compressed into 37 benefices. Contrary to the rule of ecclesiastics, we have considered all parishes held cum, or with another, distinct benefices; the only reason for an opposite course is, that they form only one presentation, though such presentation is often held by two patrons, who present alternately; and many of such consolidated parishes (Upham cum Durley, for instance,) have two churches, and two sets of overseers and churchwardens.

The district rectories and district chapelries, established in such parishes as have been divided into ecclesiastical districts by the Royal Commissioners for