146 O/i Tithes. May 



which Sir Jo^n Sinclair brought in during Kis prefidency, 

 which had been long and loudly called for, were ignorantly op- 

 pofed ? "What could be expefted, when you fee our prints of 

 the prefent day teeming with language fach as the following ? 

 * There is not a common in the l<ingdom/ faid a London paper 

 en tlie laft day of the year which is but newly gone, ' which has 

 not produced food for cattle, more or lefs, in proportion to the 

 iiature of its foil ; not one on which cattle have not confumed 

 every particle of food fo produced. Many commons have been 

 highly uVeful in rearing ftock, many of them afford excellent paf* 

 turc •, cottagers ftill find an afylum upon them ; and it is only 

 there we can now expe£l to fee any remnant of the once bold 

 independent peafintry of England. If the prefent land-owners 

 and farmers of England were at a lofs to find out fome m-Cthod 

 more efFcclual than another, to raife the price of provifions high- 

 er than they now are, they could not hit upon a better plan, than 

 that of taking into their immediate occupation and difpofal all 

 the wafte and common lands of the kingdom. They could then 

 produce as little as they pleafed, and fix their own price on every 

 thing. ' If fuch is the language yet held with regard to walte 

 lands, what oppofition, Vvdiat itrange inconfiftcncies, may not thofe 

 who urge the abolition of tithes expe£l to meet .? Indeed, the in- 

 genuity with which your correfpondent, and all his afTociates, 

 fhift from obje£tion to objeftion, remind me of the ftory of 

 "VVill-o'-the-AVifp mending his cloke. * If it will not be thi^ 

 way, ' faid the fpirit of the water, fhifting his cloke, and fitting 

 it firil here, and then there, * it w:ill be that way, and if it will 

 not be that way, it v/ill be this way. ' Were all this gentle- 

 man's doubts' and fears held out to cur late Premier, much 

 as feveral people pretend to ridicule him for trying to divert 

 his fpleen by farming, he would defpife them all j and, in- 

 ilead of flirinkiag from the difcuffion, he would there alio, if 

 properly fupported by thofe whofe interefl: it was to ftand for- 

 ward to his aid, (hew himfelf the ' pilot who could brave the 

 jlorm. ' Fear not, then, ye land-owners, to lay a finger on 

 tithes ! Tremble not led, while ye overturn the tottering fa- 

 bric, yc fliould at the fame time undermine the well-built pillar 

 of the State. They haye no connexion with each other ; or, if 

 they have, tithes are a part of the building, which is fo ruinous, 

 lb dangerous to the reft of the edifice, as to require that it 

 {hould be pulled down and built anew. Since the days of 

 Henry VIII. the Church has undergone feveral ufcful alterations 

 md repairs *, yet Hill it is a Church, and ilill our free Govern- 

 ment is not overthrown. Nor fiiall it be, by the meafure which 

 we now propofe. Unhurt, it vriil be yet more flrong j and it 



will 



