WHAT OUGHT TO BE DONE FOR THE CHURCH? 549 



It is a most extraordinary fact, that with all the legislative precautions 

 adopted in her favour, and intended to secure to her exclusive privileges, 

 the Church of England at this day is more restricted and crippled in her 

 efforts to do good than any other denomination of Christians whatsoever. 

 Under the pretence, and perhaps with the intention, of protecting her, 

 she has absolutely been tied hand and foot, and put into prison ! where 

 nobody can get at her, except through bolts, and bars, and doors of iron ; 

 and from whence she cannot come forth to convey the gospel, unless by 

 asking leave of so many, and giving such large securities for the non- 

 commission of irregularities, that nearly all attempts of the kind are re- 

 linquished as hopeless. The church, to be made prosperous, needs nothing 

 so much as to be released from her present thraldom ; she would then dis- 

 play her strength and develope her sufficieney for all the purposes of human 

 salvation. 



But lest these should be thought to be merely figurative expressions, 

 we will be more explicit. The machinery of the established religion in 

 this country, and the safeguards as we suppose they must be called, 

 though they afford her no safety at all which are placed around her, 

 was the work of a former age, when other sects being either unknown, 

 or existing only in small numbers in connexion with civil disabilities, 

 which necessarily prevented them from being formidable competitors, 

 she could bear to be limited. There was, too, at that time, political 

 danger, which had to be provided against, and which occasioned the du- 

 ties of her functionaries to be rigidly defined, and put into force. But 

 what changes have taken place, within the last half-century, in the intel- 

 ligence of the great body of the people ! in their capability and habits of 

 thinking, and in the concessions made to the claims of liberty of con- 

 science by altering the laws affecting both catholics and dissenters ? 

 The church has now only one prerogative over other religious bodies, 

 and that is her connexion with the state, which gives her the right of 

 having her clergy provided for out of the revenues set apart for the main- 

 tenance of Christianity in Great Britain. But if dissent should continue 

 to gain upon the establishment, as it has recently done, it may be doubted 

 whether claims will not be set up by it, ere long, of sharing with her the 

 province which she has hitherto enjoyed alone. A conviction of this 

 nature has recently forced itself upon the minds of Churchmen, and has 

 stirred them up to devise what can be done for the Establishment. The 

 subject is indeed deserving of the greatest consideration. 



We have just observed, that the church has only one privilege left ta 

 her over the Dissenters ; but as a counterbalance to this, how great are 

 the number of disadvantages that she has to contend with, which dissent 

 has not ; and it is from them that she needs emancipating, and from 

 which she must be emancipated, in order to prosper. 



We do not think the people of this country generally disapprove of a 

 state religion, nor that they prefer the dissenting principle for its own 

 sake ; our opinion is that the church has in her the power either of in- 

 creasing tenfold the number of them who separate from her, or of re- 

 covering nearly all who have left her, and of extinguishing every rival 

 interest. All depends upon herself and upon her friends. She has piety, 

 and learning, and wealth, and public feeling on her side ; and, in the 

 name of every thing sacred, we ask, why may she not prosper ? 



