could not sit in the commons, though they could sit in the Addington, the minister, moved the previous question, which lords under the name of spiritual peers. This anomaly, no was carried, and then Tooke was allowed to retain his seat. doubt, arose from the feeling that a clergyman should devote But two days afterwards Addington brought in a bill to himself solely to the spiritual care of his parish, though it prevent such accidents in future, and his bill, after much might seem to ordinary minds that it was equally clear discussion, passed, not only excluding clergymen of the that bishops should confine themselves as exclusively to the church of England, but those of the church of Scotland, and spiritual concern of their dioceses. Yet a Mr. Rushworth, such continues to be the law on this subject. In 1809 an a clergyman, had, in 1784, been returned for Newport in act was passed against bribery in elections for parliament, the Isle of Wight, and had been allowed to retain his seat. inflicting a penalty of five hundred pounds on any one This seemed to render the present observance of old enact- giving or even promising a bribe, and on the person receiv ments on the subject uncertain, and John Horne Tooke, the ing it. A penalty of one thousand pounds was also attached

celebrated author of the "Diversions of Purley," and one of the most successful antagonists of Junius, was returned for the rotten borough of Old Sarum; in fact, he was a government nominee. Horne Tooke was undoubtedly in orders. He had been ordained priest in 1760, and had officiated as such at New Brentford for thirteen years. He had, however, resigned his living, and devoted himself to politics, and might probably have sate safely enough had he not offended Earl Temple by supporting a motion for military force in Ireland. Lord Temple, on the 10th of March, moved for calling witnesses to the bar of the house to prove the ordination of Tooke. There was a long debate, but

progress of both legal and constitutional reform during this reign was small; but the public mind had made a decided advance in knowledge, and was beginning to demand and to enforce great legal, political, and moral changes.

agricultural produce, owing to the war, and afterwards to the corn-laws, rendered the landlords very eager for the inclosure of waste lands. A General Inclosure Act was therefore passed in 1801, which has formed the groundwork of numerous particular acts which have since been intro- Still, vast reforms were demanded in every branch of our duced, and under the operation of which an enormous legal system. Since the end of this reign many and great extent of inclosure has taken place. In 1794 the amount changes have taken place; but it was not until a very of waste lands in England was calculated at fourteen million recent date that our laws or our courts of law could afford of acres. Of these, two million eight hundred and thirty-substantial and impartial justice to the great body of the seven thousand four hundred and seventy-six acres had been people. The court of chancery, in particular, still reinclosed before the passing of the General Inclosure Act in mained a fearful place of delay, expense, and therefore of 1801. Of late years, however, much has been done to injustice. But during this reign, and especially under lord mitigate this evil. Eldon, the number of cases which remained for long years undecided, and the ruin and misery into which thousands of families were thrown by it, present a state of things that it is difficult to conceive occurring in the most barbarons of countries, much less in one calling itself Christian. Lard Brougham has said, in his "Historical Sketches of Statesmen," that lord Eldon's fault was not slowness in coming to a conclusion on a subject, but in willingness to pronounce judgment upon it. On the contrary, Eldon himself tells us that he had been doubting on some subjects before him for twenty years. Wherever lies the truth, nothing is clearer than that lord Eldon had a mind perfectly callous to the sufferings of those whom his dilatory conduct doomed to constant suspense, anxiety, and poverty. His intellect was clear and keen, but his mind was narrow, despotic, and unfeeling. Perhaps no man, living in the ease and comfort which his post of lord chancellor gave him, inflicted such an amount of misery on his fellow-men with the same criminal apathy.

Amongst the mitigations of the penal laws towards the end of this reign may be mentioned that regarding the execution of persons for high treason, by which the disgusting practice of disembowelling such persons whilst still alive ceased; and the punishment was reduced to hanging, beheading, and quartering, with a power given to his majesty of further abating the punishment by remitting the hanging and the quartering. The number of cases for which a person should be set in the pillory was greatly reduced by an act of 1816. But the act which casts the greatest honour on this reign was that by which, in 1807, the slave trade was abolished. The efforts of Sir Samuel Romilly to reduce the extreme severity of the criminal laws constituted a new era in legislation. In 1808 Sir Samuel cbtained an act by which stealing from the person was reduced from a capital offence to one incurring only imprisonment or transportation. In 1811 he procured a change of the law in regard to stealing from bleachinggrounds, which had previously been a capital offence; and, in 1812, the same as regarded soldiers or sailors wandering about the realm without a pass, which also till then had been a capital offence. But he failed in other humane attempts-amongst them, to repeal the laws which made stealing in a shop to the value of five shillings, and from a private dwelling-house, or from a vessel in a navigable river, to the amount of forty shillings, capital. Still, Sir Samuel introduced a new and more Christian principle into the spirit of penal laws, which has operated most extensively since his time. In fact, some think that our legislators have, in some respects, run into the opposite extreme of lenity, by introducing amongst us the colonial system of tickets-of-leave, and letting loose hardened convicts, to the great encouragement of criminals, and injury to the public. Amongst the most distinguished judges of this reign were lords Hardwicke, Camden, Mansfield, Eldon, Stowell, Ellenborough, and Sir William Grant. Most of these great lawyers, however, were of a most conservative character, and effectually resisted much reform in the political and criminal laws of their time. Lord Camden was a noble exception. At the same period Jeremy Bentham was labouring to demonstrate the true principles of legislation, in works which have already effected great changes, and are destined to effect more. We do not further allude to the stringent political enactments towards the end of this reign, occasioned by the general distress after the French war, and the consequent riots and movements for reform, because they were merely temporary specifics. On the whole, the

On the former state of the court of chancery, and its constant injustice, these remarks were made :—“Is it not a strange hardship, in a country called free and civilised, that a man entitled to five hundred pounds a year cannot obtain the interference of the court of chancery, which is requisite to enable him to get possession of his property, without paying half of it to the said court and its ministers for the use of its machinery? And is it not a strange hardship that the executors or administrators of a person deceased cannot pay five hundred pounds, being the residue of such person's estate, over to his representatives without first passing through the court of chancery, in which proces half of it will stick by the way, unless they choose to rau the risk of having to pay it twice over, in case it shouli afterwards turn out that the deceased had left unsatisfi.i debts to that amount? The whole magic of the process of the court of chancery results in the master inserting an advertisement in the Gazette in his name to the creditors, if any, to come with their claims within a specified time. Could not the creditors be conjured up by an advertisement from the executors and administrators, which would cost a few shillings, as well as by one from a master in chancery, which may cost a few hundred pounds? Or, if a master interference be deemed. on the whole, eligible, might it wa be had for a reasonable consideration?"

Further on we find: "Such-notwithstanding sor recent attempts at reform, and notwithstanding the hig character of the English equity judges-is the cumbrous a inefficient nature of that machinery, that the working f

To 1820.1

PROPOSAL TO ABOLISH SUBSCRIPTION TO THE ARTICLES.

is attended with a degree of expense that renders it totally unavailable, unless the amount of property in question is very considerable, and with a degree of delay that, whatever be the amount of property, is unavoidably productive of the greatest inconvenience, vexation, and anxiety to the parties interested."

RELIGION AND THE CHURCH.

585

or Westminster, to the universities, but it was no reason why people should be compelled to sign propositions which were repugnant to their conscience or their common sense, or be excluded from all chance of becoming useful members of the church. But, with such subscription, a political church could not exist; and people must soon content themselves simply with being Christians, and at liberty to believe what the Bible, and not a certain institution, teaches. The fact was, that the church knew too well that it would soon cease to be the state church if freedom of opinion was admitted into it, and therefore its advocates threw out the question. Sir William Meredith, notwithstanding, again introduced the subject in February of the following year, only to be defeated by a majority of one hundred and fiftynine against sixty-seven; and a third attempt, the year after, was met by such an overwhelming number of ayes that he declined to divide the house. In all these debates, Burke, who now was grown excessively conservative, supported subscription with all his power.

The great struggles going on through the reign of George III. were not so much for the advancement of religion, as to obtain release from the impositions and restrictions on both liberty of conscience, and political liberty, by the Church of England, and its ally, the state. With the exception of the reign of queen Anne, no reign since the revolution has taken so high a tone of toryism as that of George III. We have had to detail the evidences of that fact; and it is equally true that, with toryism in the state, toryism—or what is called high churchism-prevailed coin cidently in the Establishment. True, the indemnity acts, the suppression of the convocation, the spread of dissent, The discussion of the question, though it was so sumand especially of methodism, had in some degree clipped the marily dismissed as it regarded the church, did not prevent talons of the hierarchy, but these very things made it more a certain number of the dissenters from coming forward to tenacious of its still existing powers. At the very opening endeavour to relieve themselves of the yoke of these articles. of the reign, the church was alarmed by a proposal by one In the Toleration Act, passed after the revolution, it had of its own members to abolish subscriptions to the Thirty- been stated that this toleration was conceded to those only Nine Articles. This question had been a matter of contro- who were willing to subscribe these articles, with the exversy from the time of bishop Burnet's "Exposition" of ception of the first clause of the 20th, which asserts that the these articles; but in 1766 a very able work appeared, church has power to decree rites and ceremonies, and entitled The Confessional; or, a Full and Frec Inquiry into to settle controversies of faith; the 34th, which relates the Right, Utility, Edification, and Success of Establishing to the traditions of the church; the 35th, relating to the Systematic Confessions of Faith and Doctrine in Protestant homilies; and the 36th, relating to the consecration of Churches." This was traced to the hand of archdeacon bishops and ministers. With these exceptions, the articles Blackburne, of Richmond, in Yorkshire. This produced had been little objected to by the dissenters till the presbymuch excitement and discussion amongst the clergy of the terians of England had, for the most part, embraced uniEstablishment, as well as amongst dissenters, who were tarianism. It was chiefly from this class that the movement entirely shut out of one of the national universities by these against these articles now took its rise; but not altogether, subscriptions, and their education at the other hampered for the subscription to the articles included in the Toleration and impeded. An association was formed amongst the Act, having for some time been little insisted on, some disestablished clergy, favourable to Blackburne's views, and in senters, who had not subscribed them, were menaced with 1771, at its request, he drew up " Proposals for Application trouble on that account by officious clergymen. Amongst to Parliament, for Relief in the Matter of Subscription." these Dr. Doddridge was mentioned as one who had been so The association, from its place of meeting called the disturbed. It was now thought fit to press the question on Feathers Tavern Association," determined to address parliament, and in April, 1772, Sir Henry Hoghton moved parliament on the subject, and drew up a petition, which was for leave to bring in a bill for that object, under the title of presented to the house of commons, in February, 1772, by A Bill for the further Relief of Dissenters. Sir Roger Sir William Meredith. It was signed by two hundred Newdigate, destined for so many years to be the champion clergymen, and fifty other individuals, chiefly lawyers and of church toryism, led the way in opposition, as one of the physicians. A keen debate ensued, but the motion for taking members of the University of Oxford; and he was supthe subject into consideration was negatived by two ported by two or three men of the same stamp. In this hundred and seventeen against seventy-one. The arguments case, however, Burke voted for the bill as only reasonable, of those opposed to the motion were very much of the same and it passed by a majority of seventy against nine. But kind as those used by Dr. Johnson upon it: that it was in the lords the bishops came forward in full strength nonsense objecting to subscriptions, on the ground that against it, and Barrington, bishop of Llandaff, pointed it students at the universities did not understand what they out as a Socinian movement, and quoted, with telling effect, were subscribing; that if the students were asked in what some of the most objectionable passages from the writings of the English church differed from the presbyterian, the Dr. Priestley. There were cries of "Monstrous! horrible! catholic, Greek, or any other church, they would not under-shocking!" and, amongst the utterers of these, the loudest stand it. This wretched sophistry of the bigoted old was lord Chatham. The bishop of London said that, so far from the dissenters generally advocating this measure, he had been waited on by some of their ministers to inform

doctor might be a very good exemplification of the excessive Ignorance in which youths were sent up from Harrow, Eton,