372 The Church put in the True Light. [APRIL, 



ture into the remotest similitude to that of the apostles. Nothing, in 

 short, can be plainer than that a radical reform of the church is neces- 

 sary, if it be true, that its design is to benefit the community by the 

 advancement of religion. 



But let us throw that idea boldly overboard, and state the design of 

 the establishment to be simply the temporal comfort and good estate of 

 the clergy, and see how intelligible and harmonious the whole system 

 at once becomes ! Before the true theory, as by the touch of some 

 wizard's wand, every difficulty vanishes ; the crooked becomes straight ; 

 deformity is turned into loveliness ; what seemed anomalous proves to 

 be in the most exquisite proportion ; ecclesiastical practice with eccle- 

 siastical principle makes sweet music ; all is regular, consistent, natural : 

 the splendour of the church is no more her shame : with one hand upon 

 her coffers replenished with gold, and pointing with the other to her 

 vast domains, she turns to any who assail her, and exclaims 



" You vulgar cynic ! how can I be wrong ?" 



How glorious, upon the golden hypothesis, is the right reverend 

 bench ; how comely the deans, each in himself a corporation ; how 

 seemly the archdeacons, prebendaries, and canons ; and oh ! how goodly 

 a thing it is to traverse, even with the mind's eye, the florid files of the 

 rectors, and see in every round and rosy form the profit of that godli- 

 ness which maketh fat ! Where now is the abomination of non-resi- 

 dence and the crying sin of plurality ? where the scandal of fox-hunt- 

 ing? what has become of the unseemliness of holding the commission 

 of the peace, or the extortion of taking the poor man's tenth sheaf, or 

 tenth goose ? Even the starveling curate, in this view of the establish- 

 ment, is justly to be numbered amongst its beauties : he makes the 

 fatness of the rector more fat by contrast. 



The money theory makes every thing square. The connection of 

 church and state is no longer a criminal conversation ; the bishop yearns 

 to the boroughmoriger, and says unto corruption, " Thou art my 

 brother," nor can malignity itself charge him with departure from prin- 

 ciple ; the deanery is no longer ill-bestowed on the adulator and para- 

 site ; the priest no longer intrudes, when he meddles in politics ; the 

 pulpit is no longer polluted when it rings with the cry of the Orange- 

 man or the Tory ; the character of a good parson is no longer fabulous,* 

 like the Chimera or Centaur, for to be a good parson nothing more is 

 needful than a pious affection for the good things of the passing world. 

 Pelf, on this hypothesis, is religion ; the love of pelf is piety ; avarice 

 is devotion ; rapacity zeal ; extortion enthusiasm ; he is the best divine 

 who has the largest maw; he the most faithful shepherd who shears his 

 flock nearest to the skin. As to preaching, the essence of all sermons 

 (that are of any use) is contained in the following laconic address of an 

 Italian monk we have somewhere read of: Vos me quceritis^fratres caris- 

 simi ! quomodo ilur in Paradisum. Hoc dicunt vobis campance monasterii 

 nostri dando, dando, dando. 



But it will be said, if this view be correct, the God of the establish- 

 ment cannot be the God of the scriptures. Why, not exactly ; but still 

 a god often made mention of (never of course very honourably) in that 



_ . , . 



* See Drvden's Fables. 



