334. 
any fraud or evil praétice, had fuftained 
by fuch fire, the lofs and damage therein 
mentioned.”’ It is not my objeét, here, 
to enqure, how far it becomes public fo- 
cieties, not connected with the govern- 
ment, to inflitute the whole body of refi- 
dent clergy, and the churchwardens. of 
every parizh, permanent and fixed Judges 
of the honefty and chara@ter of every indi- 
vidual; or, whether it be politically wife - 
to increafe the power. and influence of a 
public body, which has, in no form, ever 
fuffered from a negleét of its profeffional 
interefts. J would rather fuggeft to 
every infurer the neceffity of confidering 
how he is’perfcnally connected with the 
minifter and churchwardens of his parifh, 
left the perfonal enmity or caprice of any 
one of them fhould deprive him of his 
legal remedy againft the office infuring 
his property. Vhis point was determined 
in the King’s Bench, in the fummer of 
Jaft year.—See Worfley v. Wood, &c. in 
error, 6 Ferm, Rep. 710.—On the trial of 
that cafe, one of the queftions, which, 
from the flate of the pleadings, it was re- 
quifite the jury fhould determine, was : 
whether the refufal of the minifier and 
churchwardens to fign fuch certificate, 
<¢ was wrongful, unjuft, and without 
reafonable or probable caufe?” A’nd 
they determined for the infured, who had 
a verdié, and the Common Pleas con- 
firmed the judgment. But in the King’s 
Bench, on Writ of Error, it was deter- 
mined, that this certificate of the minif- 
ter and churchwardens was {& effential to 
the plaintiff's right of action, that though 
the jury had exprefsly found that this was 
wrongfully witbheld, its lofs could by 
no means be fupplied, and was an infu- 
parable cbftacle to the plainufi s recovery, 
And the judgment of the Common Pleas 
was reverfed. The ultimate decifion 
was, I believe, conformable with juftice; 
but the court difclaimed being influenced 
by the circumftancrs pecuitar to the cafe, 
but maintained that the infured, having 
affented to the propofals, was bound to 
comply with its conditions; that the 
clergymen and churchwardens had a 
power of granting or refufing the certifi- . 
cate, which was perfeétly arbitrary, and 
which no court of juftice had authority 
to enquire. into or influence; and that 
their refufal, uniefs caufed by the parties 
infuring, however palpably unjuft, at 
once abfelved,the office.. 
In the political and veligious diffenfions 
-of the laft ten years, the clergy have cer- 
tainly pot been the leaft aétive; and allow- 
ing them the utmoft integrity in their pri- 
Caution to Infurers againft Fire, 
[ Nov. e 
vate concerns, it muft be acknowledged 
that whenever the rights of the church, 
or fubmiflion to the temporal authority, 
has been in the loweft degree queftioned, 
their profefiional zeal has a ditrle in= 
fringed the’ laws of good neighbourhood 
and civility ; and that orthodoxy and loy- 
alty have janétioned grofs violations of the 
laws of juftice. 
Surely, therefore, itis an affair of pru- 
dence in every perfon who frequents the. 
meeting in preference to the church, - 
who is pot a member of fome loyal corps, 
or does not otherwife unequivocally evince 
his hatred of French republicans and 
French principles; who ever raifed a 
{cruple againft the payment of his tythes 
in kind, or was remifs in difcharging the 
ecclefiaftical dues ; to apply to the infu- 
rance office to be releafed from fuch con- 
dition. And if all the offces fhould per. 
fitt in retaining itamong their regulations, 
T doubt not, it would preduce fome rival 
inftlitution, free from an ebligation fo ob- 
noxious to a large body of the nation, and 
which, in fact, fubficutes in the place of 
a legal demand, an clemofynary appeal to 
the. generofity and compaiiion of the in- 
furers. , 
STN BORON, 
—= 
For the Monthly. Magazine. 
CHRONOLOGICAL REMARKs.ON THE 
Book or Ezra. 
‘HE fix firt. chapters of Ezra are a 
ftrangé, incongruous, chafmy com- 
pilation, partly drawn up in Hebrew, 
and partly (from. i. 7 to vi. 18) ia 
Aramic: they confift fometimes of nar- 
rative, very disjointed, and fometimes 
of lifts of names and diplomatic docu- 
ments. aaa wi 
In the firft chapter, the proclamation 
afcribed to Cyrus (i. 2,3, 4) is evidently 
a fictitious paper, and the compofition 
of a Jew. A Perfian fcribe muft have 
cifcerned, and have avoided, the ludi- 
crous anticlimax in the opening, 
“« The Lord-of heaven hath given me 
all the kingdoms of the earth: Ard he 
hath charged me to build him an houfe 
at Jerufalem.’’—-Neither cou!d: an offi- 
cial fecretzry have attributed, falfely, to 
the emperor, a feétarian religion ; and, 
after mentioning the God-of Hrael, have 
added: ** He is the God.” 
From this impropricty, we ought, how- 
ever, by no means to infer, that our hif- 
torlan is a romancer; but merely, that 
he was not poffeffed of the real ftate- 
paper ;. for, on other occafions (v. 4) he 
-appears to tranfcribe an original account. 
oe kt. 
