The Sun.
London, England, 1847-12-24 00:00:00

S 17

'N

FRENCH VIEWS OF THINGS Il
ENGLAND.
(From the Jur; al dr-s i Wbats of Sunday.)
English fanatici,in has plenty- to do just pow ; it
besieged on all sides simultaneously, and placed be
tvveezi several fires. Yesterday it v‘ as the Marquis of
Lansdowne who made a bold attack on the absurd 4..4ci
"interdict " under which England still lays the Court
of Rome; to-day- it is Lord John Russell who brings
in a Bill for opening the doors of Parliament to the
Jews.

(4,

_~•~

The party of English " exclusiveness " are
defending themselves with an energy befitting a des-
perate cause. They have already represented Pope
Pius IX. casting batches of human victims to the
Minotaur of the Inquisition ; at present they are
menacing England with the fate of Sodom and Go-
morrah if she renounces what these ignorant
fanatics are pleased to call her " Christian " charac-
ter. Hitherto the causes of the cholera were not
very exactly ascertained. But, lo! a " new light" has
dawned, and the leading organ of the party has dis-
covered that the Asiatic cholera descended in a dirEct
line from the Roman Catholic Belief Bill of 1829 !
It ‘N as when the Papists were liberated from their
secular quarantine, and admitted to free pratiguein
the British Imperial Parliament, that Divine justice
let loose the scourge of that dreadful pestilence upon
guilty England to punish her for her impious tolera-
tion! And if Parliament take thc Jews into its
bosom, you may rest assured, old women and gos-
sips of Great Britain, that the cholera will enter
through the same door—so beware !

Let not our intelligent readers opine that we are
dreaming—we merely quote the words of the
Standard. " Those who have eyes to see" (remarks
this delectable disciple of orthodoxy) " cannot have
forgotten the scourge which invaded us almost imme-
diately after the great apostacy of 1829, and which
now threatens to submerge in an abyss of ruin an
empire which was so powerful, so rich, and so pros-
perous 25 years ago."
In sober seriousness, when we see the way in which
these questions are sometimes treated in England, we
are astonished at the very little progress which the
most elementary principles of liberty and equality
have made in that country. Nothing is more amusing
than the dismay with which the English Tory or
obstructive party ask—" But we hare already ad-
mitted the Papists; you wish us now to admit the
Jews; why then should we not be asked to admit
the Mahomedans and the Hindoos ? We have pos-
sessiona in China—we have Ceylon—we have the
Cape of Good Hope ; shall we, then, have in our
Parliament disciples of Confucius, followers of Buddha,
and worshippers of the Great Serpent ? ' To these
irrational and childish queries it might easily be an-
swered, " Why not ?" but the primary error of these
questions is that they are incorrectly laid down. The
question is not to know if such or such an individual
professes such or such a religion, but simply this,
whether he is a citizen of the country, and fulfils tha
duties appertaining to that character ? It matters
not, so far, whether he worships God or bows down
to Baal—that is an affair of conscience.

England has herself long since renounced the
maintenance of the absolute principle of religion in
her legislative enactments. Her constitution ceased
to he Protestant the day on which, she restored to the
Dissenters, of whom the Papists formed a section,
their share in the making of laws.
Mr. Macaulay, the ex-Member for Edinburgh, and
a member of the Cabinet, acutely remarks, in one of
his admirable articles, that " a Government essentially
Protestant, essentially Christian, is nonsense; it is
just as absurd as if one were to talk of an essentially
Protestant cook, or an essentially Christian method
of riding on horseback. The differences between
Christianity and Judaism are of some moment when
a bishop or a rabbi is to be appointed ; but they have
no more to do with the capacity of an individual to
make a magistrate or a legislator than with his ca-
pacity to make a cobbler. Religion has just as much
to do with the mending of shoes as with the budget
of the Chancellor of the Exchequer !" This is rather
a bold sally, we admit, especially for England. But
Mr. Macaulay is duly rewarded for his learning, for
his philosophical opinions have cost him his seat in
Parliament.

At all events, if the Church of England were to
die or to fall away, it would certainly not be of in-
anition, as may be seen from a recent debate in the
(louse of Commons. An Act of 1836 thus fixed, as
it appears, the revenues of the principal English
bishoprics ; viz., Canterbury, 15,0004 ; York,
10,000/. ; London, 10,000/.; Durham, 8,000/. ; Win-
chester, 7,000/. ; Ely, 5,5001. ; St. Asaph, 5,200/. ;
Worcester, 5,0004 ; and Bath, 5,000/. The excess
of the revenue of each see was to serve to complete
the revenue of the rest, which were to be of a maxi•
mum of 5,000/., or a minimum of 4,0001. We say
revenues," because in England there are ecclesi-
astical " properties" and no clerical " salaries."
The figures above quoted will doubtless appear
sufficient, especially if we compare them with the
25,000 f. (1,0001.) of our own archbishops, and the
15,000 f. (6000 of our own biihops ; but it must not
be imagined that they represent the whole revenue of
the English prelates. The Act of 1836 was only to
take effect as the episcopal sees became vacant ; the
existing bishops remained in plenary possession of all
their revenues. But a preliminary inquiry showed
that the Archbishop of Canterbury enjoyed an annual
revenue of 32,000/. ; the Archbishop of York, 14,5501;
the Bishop of London, 14,552/. But even this is not
rill ; and the Bishop of London—how short soever the
remaining period of his 'mortal career—will soon be
one of the richest private individuals in the world.
We find that in London alone, an entire district
abutting on Hyde-park is built on ground which is
the property of his Reverence. This is a new district
—one of the finest in the capital ; and the probable
revenue is estimated at 100,000/

These figures were cited the other day by Mr.
Horsman, M.P., in the House of Commons. The
Hon. Member complained that the Ecclesiastical
Commissioners had deviated from the Act of Parlia-
ment. For example, when the see of Durham had
become vacant the revenue of the new bishop ought
to have been fixed at 8,0001. This bishopric yielded,
it appears, an income of 19,0001. The bishop was
offered the alternative of taking 8,0001., and leaving
the property of the diocese to the management of the
Commission, or to manage it himself and to pay the
Commissioners 8,0001. The cunning bishop preferred
the latter, and has pocketed a vast sum by the ar-
rangement.

Hence, it will be seen that the situation of the
English clergy is not so very bad! We know not
how real religion flourishes in England, but the Esta-
blished Church is in very good case indeed.