their defence, not in any servile spirit indeed, or with any intention of bolstering up the wrong-doer-(that be far from any man calling himself a minister of God!)-but in a spirit favourably disposed towards them as an order, willing rather to screen than expose them-rather to explain than to aggravate their mistakes -rather to soothe than to excite their impugners; in a spirit that would tarry till it found opportunity to speak a word to them in season on the subject of complaint when it was reasonable, so that the remedy might drop gracefully, as if unsolicited, from their own hands, on the head of the sufferer, and all heartburnings be removed? Would these be the men to sow the seeds of feudal allegiance in the hearts of the rising generation on an estate; whilst all their own sympathies of blood, of connexion, of society, of livelihood would be wholly popular? They would be no such persons-rather would they stand in natural opposition to the landlord; who would find upon his domain in the character of a clergyman, no longer a friend, but a little tribune of the people jealous of the rights of man; and however he may think that his elevation of rank would set him above all concern as to what so mean a person might do or say respecting him, he would soon discover himself to be surrounded by more petty embarrassments and mortifications than he had reckoned upon, though he might be for a while at a loss to divine the cause. It would be with him as with the natural body, when the insensible perspiration happens to be impeded a sense not of pain but of annoyance would be experienced; he would be surprised that, for some reason or other, things did not go so smoothly on his property as they had been used to do that there were more misunderstandings between him and his dependants than of old-more dark looks and ambiguous sentences that their carriage towards him was less fair and cordial than it once was; and then perhaps there might come across him the thought, that the Church Establishment, at whose incipient. downfal he had shouted for joy on the benches of St. Stephen's, as boys do at the first crash of a noble tree which is about to break their own heads in its descent, had more good in it than he had believed, and that the old rector or vicar had his use.

What if he did see but a little way before him? What if he was prejudiced and bigoted, an enemy to things new, as thinking old things better? What if he was unversed in the genuine principles of political economy? What if he did hold, for instance, cheap gin to be an evil, under a mistaken idea that it was better to have smuggling on the coasts, than to saturate the whole country with poison; that it was of less consequence to protect the extremities than the vitals? What if he did consider beer-houses to be bad-because he saw them breaking the hearts of the wives and mothers of his own insignificant parish-when more enlightened economists knew that

they

they increased the consumption of malt? What if he did look upon Sunday newspapers with an unfriendly eye, fountains as they were of knowledge; and pretend that the Word of God was a more improving study on a Sabbath evening for a cottager or mechanic by his own fire-side, than high-seasoned police reports and seditious speeches at a public-house? What if he did contribute with all his might to make that day what is called a day of gloom-in other words, of religious observance and domestic quiet

when real philanthropists were for making it a day of cheerfulness; that is, for devoting it, as our intelligent French neighbours do, to waltzing and quadrilles, or as the Swiss do, to practising with the rifle? He should have been forgiven this wrong-he should have been indulged in these humours-for the sake of the substantial benefits he conferred upon society nevertheless. Allowance should have been made for habits which necessarily produced in him narrow views. He had no opportunity of mixing in the saloons of the metropolis-he repaired to no watering-places-he sailed in no yachts he was steward of no races-he frequented no operas and ballets-he lounged in no club-rooms; in short, he was not in the way of hiving wisdom or keeping pace with the intelligence of the times; but dwelt amongst his people, strewing where he gathered, looking therefore at objects too near; and applied himself to his books as though they were not old almanacks.

Next it may occur to him, (we are still pursuing the retrospective soliloquies of the repentant landlord,) that he should have taken time to sift that grand argument of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, by which the seizure of church property was justified, before he had given it his vociferous assent-that he should have guarded himself against the fascination of that noble lord's eloquence, and not have pronounced an opinion upon so great and difficult a subject whilst he was under the wand of the enchanter -that he should not have allowed the merits of the orator to blind him to the merits of the question. The state,' said Lord Althorp, was justified in appropriating to itself any increase in value which might accrue to the property of the church, when that increase was created by an act of the state!! Therefore the state would be justified in seizing the increase in value of a house, when that increase was created by a license to sell ale and spirits, which the state had granted it; the state would be justified in seizing upon any increase in value of a district of waste land, when that increase followed upon an act of inclosure which the state had passed; the state would have an incontestable claim (hear it, Mr. Attwood!) to any increased value accruing to property in the funds from a legislative action on the currency; indeed, the state would be justified in making free with any man's private property, of any kind, to any extent, seeing that its entire

value

value to the individual was derived from his secure possession-a security which he owed altogether to the state!!! Truly might Mr. O'Connell return his thanks to ministers for stirring a priuciple upon this occasion that reached further than appeared at first sight. It is worth more to a Chancellor of the Exchequer, under any fiscal embarrassment, than ever was Jew's eye of old. Then the livings were to be taxed for the payment of churchrates. Here he will accuse himself (we are still thinking of the penitent land-owner) for having approved this part of the measure before he had satisfied himself of the justice of it. The clergyman, he will by this time have recollected, paid his full share of taxes to the state, like another man; where then, he will now say to himself, was the fairness of saddling him with a second, a heavy, and an exclusive impost? If it was expected of him to provide for the repairs of the church, why was it not expected of the judges to provide for the repairs of the courts of law? A clergyman might perhaps be disposed to sacrifice a portion of his income for the benefit of a small living and a poor brother, but he would naturally feel some indignation at being called upon singly and alone to give up ten pounds out of a living of two hundred, merely to relieve the parish (many of its inhabitants being probably much more opulent than himself) from a payment which they took upon themselves to consider disagreeable. Lastly, he will remember, that the moment when the measure of spoliation was announced, ought to have struck him as pregnant with suspicion :-That whilst property and life, by the very confession of ministers a few days later, were utterly without defence in Ireland; murder and rapine stalking unpunished through the land; peaceable men crying aloud to them for instant help; that this moment was the precise time chosen for reforming the church, to be sure; as if the church, and not the conspiracy, claimed the earliest attention of the legislature; as if the Protestants were to be first put down, and then the assassins-How could such an order of proceedings be explained but in one way; namely, that the government were prepared to fling the church to the fierce dog that scared them, in the hope that, whilst he was engaged in despatching the prey, they should be able to clap a chain about his neck. Vain hope! he would feed on what they threw to him, and rise up with hunger unabated, but with strength refreshed, to burst their bonds,

And bark and bully for another meal.'

But alas! these reflections are now too late. He gave his voice in an evil hour for the plunder of the property of the church, not knowing where it might stop; and though he would now restore it if he could, it is as water spilt on the ground, that cannot be gathered up.

Let

Let not the great land-owners deceive themselves; they may be Whigs, and they may have found that the church opposed them, though we believe that by far the majority of the clergy, and those the most influential, took no active part in the late elections, and it is well known that the dissenters, as a body, gave them their support. Had they been radicals, these latter would have served them still better; but let them be assured of this, that sooner or later, their cause and that of the establishment must be the same; that in breaking that establishment up, they may gain a short-lived, a very short-lived, triumph; and that when they awake from their paroxysm they will discover the staff of their strength to be gone; that whilst they remember they are Whigs, they forget, what circumstances will soon restore to their memory, that they are lords and squires too. Would that the class to whom we have been offering these remarks were as much alive to the support they derive from the establishment as are those who wish them worst! Imperfections it may have; what earthly thing is without them?-It is not, however, its imperfections but its virtues that now mark it out for the spoiler, whatever he may pretend. It maintains order; this is its offence, not to be forgiven and it must fall-delenda est Carthago. Let the friends of order only learn their lesson from its foes; conclude, that what is worth an assault so furious, is worth a defence as obstinateand the church is safe.

We cannot close this paper without expressing a hope that our observations will not be misconstrued. We should not come forward to recommend the Established Church to the care and protection of influential persons amongst us, merely on the score of its services to rank and property, if that were all. Its claims are of a far higher nature than this. It has succeeded in spreading abroad much genuine, but unobtrusive piety. It has stimulated the discharge of those numberless duties of imperfect obligation, which, though beyond the reach of the law, are to the social system as the very breath of its nostrils. It has upheld both against false philosophy and wild fanaticism, for these many ages, the faith as it was delivered unto the saints. It has combined sound learning with pastoral activity. It has gathered what was good from Papist and from Puritan, and cast away what was bad in both. It has secured for religion an effectual hearing in the palace as well as in the peasant's hut. It has been a fountain of alms to the people-of light to the colonies. And it has furnished a multitude of saints, after whose blessed example we may safely live and die. But still it is true, that whilst it has directly ministered to these high and holy purposes, it has promoted other ends, subordinate indeed,-yet considerable.

ART. XI.-1. Reports on the Navigation of the Euphrates. Submitted to Government by Captain Chesney, of the Royal Artillery. London. 1833.

2. An Account of Steam- Vessels, and of Proceedings connected with Steam-Navigation in British India. Compiled by G. A. Prinsep. Calcutta.

1830.

3. Eastern and Egyptian Scenery, Ruins, &c., illustrative of a Journey from India to Europe; with Remarks on the Advantages and Practicability of Steam-Navigation from England to India. By Captain C. F. Head.

AL

LTHOUGH the steam-engine be now perhaps as perfect as it ever can be, the management and application of steam to mechanical purposes are still capable of very great improvement. The whole machinery of a steam-vessel, for instance, is as yet rude, cumbersome, and expensive, liable to constant derangement and frequent accidents, both within the ship and without-that is to say, in the engines and boilers, and in the paddle-wheels. Nor is there much hope that, while steam is employed as the moving power, any very considerable improvement in these respects will be effected-any important diminution of space, or of coals, or of expenses for wear and tear.

The late Sir Humphry Davy, and, since his time, Mr. Faraday, and still more recently Mr. Brunel, made several experiments with the view of applying carbonic acid gas as a mechanical agent, in place of steam, by the alternate condensation of the gaseous into the liquid state, and vice versâ. Mr. Brunel contrived a very beautiful apparatus, so constructed as to prevent the danger which was always dreaded from experiments with this gas; but after a laborious investigation of some years, the sanguine hopes he had entertained of success ended in disappointment. The transmutation was easily effected, but he had the mortification to discover that this gas assumed an intermediate form between the liquid and the gaseous state, in which all its energy seemed to be neutralized. Had it succeeded, the application of its power would have been one of the most important discoveries of the age. In propelling steam-vessels, it would have been invaluable, by effecting a saving of more than two-thirds of the space at present occupied in the vessel, two-thirds of the expense of the steam-engine, and nearly the whole of the fuel.*

We

* The Americans, in their river-navigation, have far surpassed us, at least in speed, having, by their own statements, gone sixteen to eighteen miles an hour fairly through the water, and certainly not less than thirteen on the Hudson; but their machinery is infinitely inferior to ours, and the loss of life, resulting from its imperfect workmanship and the employment of the high-pressure engines, has been enormous. But the Americans are not satisfied with superiority in point of speed, to which they are