The Sun.
London, England, 1852-12-10 00:00:00

Our readers have, been amply supplied w

lists, longer than they could have patience to read,
of the elsewhere unheard of nepotism of the Ec-
clesiastical Courts. Such perfect " family Cabi-
nets" are they, that one involuntarily suspects
that sympathy prevented the Whigs from trying
their reforming hand upon them. We have no
intention now of quoting from the return relating
to Ecclesiastical Courts, which, though moved for
by Sir BENJAMIN HALL, in August, 1851, has
but just made its appearance, to tell of infants
of three and five years of age, and females ! ap-
pointed as Registrars of Courts—of a pair of
VERNON HARCOURTS, differenced by a G. or an E.
prefixed to the well-sounding patronymics, the one
Registrar in two Courts by the time he was six-
and-twenty, his office a perfect sinecure of nearly
2,000/. a year ; the other, since the same age,
having enjoyed 1,4001. a year, for five half-days
per annum in his Court—the two having already
bagged, of good English money, not less
than 96,3861. for doing nothing, or next
to nothing. We leave these Ecclesiastical
flowers for our readers to cull in abundance from
the extracts which will appear from time to time
in the public papers. There is another question,
a more important one, that is—why are laymen
to be plagued with Ecclesiastical Courts at all ?
We should, indeed, be thankful to see them
banished entirely from these realms. We have
no wish to hand over " offending clerks" to their
tender mercies, unless the said clerks desire it.
Were we in the position of a clerical delinquent,
we fancy we would much rather appear before one
of her MAJESTY'S Civil Judges, and an honest
Jury, than before the FUSTS or VERNON HAR-
COURTS, or the deputies of female infants three
years of age, who grace our various Courts
Christian. We should prefer, we mean, if we
thought our defence complete or tolerable, to
place it before those whose constant practice qua-
lifies them to act the part of a Judge, and those
whose unsophisticated habits dispose them to
decide a case upon its merits. If, however,
as we anticipate, Archbishops and Bishops,
especially, and perhaps the " inferior clergy" also,
wish to settle their own matters between them-
selves, why let them do so. We would not
for the sake of emancipating the cloth from
a cherished slavery, risk the opposition of
the Bishops in the Lords, and the noise and
petitions of the clergy throughout the country.
We of the profane laity only ask that we at least
may not be forced, nolens volens, into these sacred
Courts. Courts Christian we know they are called,
but most of our grade, when we have had the mis-
fortune to be dragged or pushed into them, have
been mulcted with what we have thought a most
un-Christian burden of fees, and an equally in-
tolerable loss of our time. Indeed the reflection

has occurred to us, that these Courts Christian
obeyed the Christian precept of " Redeeming the
time," on the principle that so much of ours as was
spent in attendance within their holy precints, was
time redeemed from the profane use we should other-
wise have made of it in our worldly callings. One
case long ago set a going in them, the Braintree
Church-rate case, bids fair to rival the longest de-
lays for which the ante-Sugden of Court of Chancery
used to be notorious. Now as this is the hour
of Law Reform, and as our Conservative Law Re-
formers have actually undertaken the reformation
of these very Courts, we do put in our humble
petition that they would leave nothing for their
successors to do ; nothing, we mean, on behalf of
us laymen. It is complained, and with too much
truth, that their Budget was pervaded by no
master-principle ; it was freely owned, on the
contrary, that their Reforms of Irish Law Proce-
dure, though they might have gone further,
were not open to this charge. That even the
more complicated Reforms of Mr. NAPIER had
their leading principle. Let, in like manner, a
well-defined, sound, and popular principle be
adopted in reforming the Ecclesiastical Courts,
and our Cabinet will deserve and will enjoy
the thanks of the present generation, and of all
generations to come.

There are but two sets of Courts in England
now, in which the class interested in a conviction
are made judges of Englishmen : these are the
Church Courts and the Gale-law Courts. In the
latter, the clerical game-preserving Magistrate or
Squire deals out his practically irreversible sen-
tences against the criminals whom his own amuse-
ments have made such, and in support of his own
selfish and feudal privileges. In the former, the
man who enjoys Church fees, or Church emolu-
ments of various kinds, is made the judge of our
offences against Church demands upon us—it may
be of Church rapacity. We protest against such
one-sided, interested judges. Perhaps many of us
are Dissenters from the Church : we can expect
no mercy from our theological adversaries trying
us on questions of Church tribute, and disliking
us as a practical denial of their right to such
tribute at all. What we want, then, is, that no
case of ours which affects our time, our property,
or our liberty, should come under the cognisance
of these Courts. It is a good proposal to take tes-
tamentary matters out of their hands; but that is
by no means enough. Every matter in which
property is concerned, Church Rates, Easter
offerings, Mortuary fees, Surplice fees ;.everything
when a shilling could be demanded or refused,

may come as easily under the jurisdiction of our
Civil Courts, from the County Courts upwards,