1830.] Lord Monntcashel and the Church. 617 



Those subscriptions were perfectly matters of good-will, and propor- 

 tioned to the means of the individual. They were of course of various 

 values, but, as according to the Levitical Law, a tenth was set apart for 

 the priesthood, the early Christians adopted the proportion, and the 

 tenth of their gains, the tithe, was given. This fund originally placed 

 in the hands of the Apostles or leaders of the congregations, was subse- 

 quently deposited with their successors the bishops, and thus they became 

 the regulators of the distribution. A part was allotted to the priests who 

 served the various congregations or travelled through the country, a 

 part for the maintenance of the church buildings, and the residue for the 

 support of the humbler portion of the disciples, in case of infirmity, 

 accident, or age : but the parts were generally unequal, and the whole 

 was regulated by the necessity of the case, and the zeal and wisdom of 

 the head of the diocese or congregations. 



This arrangement seems to have ceased at a very early period in Eng- 

 land, and to have naturally given way to the regular endowment of the 

 clergy. The contributions which continued for some time to be made 

 in the churches, being thenceforward appropriated solely to the poor. But 

 in England the legal and regular provision for the poor, introduced by 

 the 43d of Elizabeth, at length superseded this collection; and it ceased, 

 as contributions for the clergy had ceased, and for the same reason. 



The last argument that we shall notice, and it is an argument that 

 naturally exhausts the controversy, is the actual wealth of the church. 

 We are told that, allowing the clergy to have a full right to a maintenance, 

 they can have no right to wallow in the present enormity of church opu- 

 lence. The whole statement is an assumption, and the argument upon it 

 must therefore be a fallacy. The total amount of the public endowments 

 of the establishment is 1,628,095/. Those form the obnoxious part in the 

 opinion of our haranguers. The livings in private patronage, which are 

 equivalent to personal estates, and which the English landholders, who 

 harangue in the loudest tone against the church, grasp with all the eager- 

 ness of private property livings with which they endow their sons and 

 their connexions, or which they sell, amount to nearly twice the value, viz. 

 2,084,043/. The whole revenue is 3,872,133/., which divided among 

 11,342 benefices, (the number in England and Wales,) leaves only 300/. 

 a year as the average of an English living. 



But trivial as this sum is for the support of a man who must keep up 

 a decent rank in society, who in most instances has a family, and whose 

 education has on an average cost about 800/., a large deduction must still 

 be made for his actual church expenses. He must keep his parsonage 

 house in repair ; in general he must pay down a considerable sum for 

 previous buildings ; and there are few instances in which the advantage 

 of having a house is not counterbalanced by the necessary expenses. It 

 is computed, that, taking the whole as a mere matter of pecuniary calcu- 

 lation, a clergyman, before he can expect a living, lays down, in principal 

 and interest, about 1100/., which about middle life would purchase an 

 annuity of 90/. a year, thus leaving him but 210/. as a recompense for 

 his clerical labour, his literature, the devotion of his life to solitude in 

 nine instances out of ten, and all to gain an income about the average 

 gains of a country tailor, or grocer in a tolerable run of trade. 



The advowsons are the true scandal of the church : but those are not the 

 property of the establishment ; but of the country gentlemen, of the whigs 

 and patriots, the great reforming aristocrats, and general patriotic and fox- 

 hunting portion of the legislature. We see those livings advertised in 



M. M. New Series. VOL. IX. No. 54. 4 K 



