The Sun.
London, England, 1835-04-02 00:00:00

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of the community, and there we -fe • abuses to which it was 7
liable ; its revenues were not excessive, and he wished them -1" '
to remain untouched in that country. \ He_ would not at
the present moment enter into the subject„which the
Hon. Member for Oldham had spoken of, namblY the subject '
of endowment ; but he would say, that in some instances he
thought an extension of endowments might be useful. In
Montrose, and also in Edinburgh, they had no funds
From the State for the support of the Establishment.
there the stipends of the Clergy were paid by assessments on
the inhabitants, whether they were Presbyterians, Roman
Catholics, Episcopalians, or Dissenters; that was ;a great
grievance, and the only grievance which the Church
of Scotland could have imputed—(Hear, hear,)--..
to it. In the two places to which he hadreferred, he thought
it was deserving of consideration, whether the deficiency
mght not to be supplied by the State.—( Hear.) With rus..
pest to Ireland, if it was entirely res integrce' he should have
'iesitated long before he had thought it right to
have a Protestant Church in that country, consider-
ing that the remarkably great body of the people of that
country were of a different religion ; but as there was an esta-
blishment there, he would let it remain. In his opinion it ought
to be so improved as fully to meet the wants of all parties.
Its endowments were excessive, and for the sake of religion
and civil order they ought to be reduced, and the funds ap-
plied to more beneficial purposes.—( Hear, hear.) Many
contradictory statements of the revenues of the Irish
Church had been made, but he paid little at-
tention to them, whether they came from one side of
the House or the other; he looked at the bad effect. The
Church Establishment in Ireland was as great as it was in
the times of Popery, when it was a Popish Church; and the
whole mass of the population of that Church. The law of
tithes there was the same as in England, and the
establishment of Ireland was on a scale amply sufficient for
he whole mass of the population, if they were of the Protes-
tant religion. What was the amount of the Protestant popu-
ation of Ireland ? It was acknowledged that it was not more
than a tenth of the whole, and therefore the statements from
the Right Hon. Secretary for Ireland, the Noble Member for
Lancashire, and other Members onl the opposite side were
of no avail. It was said, indeed, that the revenue of any cler-
gyman in Ireland did not exceed 4001. or 5001., but he did
not confine himself to the revenue of the parochial
clergy—he looked at the gross amount which the Irish
Church received from the State, which was allowed to be not
less than one million—and for what? For not more than one-
tenth part of the whole population ! The provision for that
community was ten times as great as it was in England or
Scotland ; and therefore he was justified in saying that it was
excessive.—( Hear, hear.) What were the melancholy
consequences of this state of things to pure religion and civil
society ? They were told that churches were multiplied, but
he was sorry to say that congregations had decreased. What
benefit then was the increase of churches ?—( Hear, hear.)
It was only a grievance to one party, and an insult
to those who were compelled to maintain; them—( Hear.)
The Right Hon. Member for the University of Oxford had
boasted of the increased number of Churches in Ireland within
the last 20 years, but he had not denied that a proportionate
decrease had taken place in the Protestant congregations.
With respect to the increase of Churches, he would state one
fact—about a year and a half ago, he ( Sir J. Campbell) had
visited Ireland, that beautiful but ill-fated country, and instances
were pointed out in which churches had been erected where there
was no Protestant congregation, but merely for the sake of
giving a job to the builder and carpenter ;_ and so great a job
was it, that it had been proved on the most satisfaotory
evidence that the Church had fallen two or three
times, and that addditional rates had been imposed
upon the parish, for the purpose of rebuilding the Church.
When he found that such was the effect of the system upon
religion, he must look to its effect upon civil society. Could
there be any doubt that the enforcement of the payment of
tithes was the cause of much of the insubordination and
outrage which had so long characterised the ' country 2
( Cries of " Hear, hear.") They were compelled to pay
tithes to a Church for which they had no occasion, and when
they combined to resist the payment of those tithes, and thereby
disobey the law, they had been accused of insubordination and
disloyalty, and it had been the fruitful source of many of the
crimes and enormities that had disgraced that country. This was
what might have reasonably been expected from the attempt
to force upon that people a religion that the people
did not believe in—( Hear)—and it only increased the hatred
and disgust with which they regarded an establishment
of that sort. Various allusions had been made to his ( Sir
J. Campbell's) native country, and it was impossible with re-
gard to these portions of the history of Scotland, that
these allusions could be too frequent. The Noble Lord
the Member for Lancashire had stated, and stated truly, that
in the beginning of the seventeenth century there was very little
animosity between the Episcopalians and the Presbyterians ; but
an attempt had been made by the Stuarts to thrust prelacy
upon the people of Scotland. What was the consequence ?
Why that Prelacy became odious to the people of that
country. Need he remind the House of the language of
the Marquis of Argyle in the last moments of that
great and lamented man. He had not been exempted from the
common prejudices which tyranny had given rise to : in his
last moments, he stated that he hated Popery, prelacy, and all
superstitions whatsoever. Need he remind the House of
the assassination of Archbishop Sharpe. Such was
the state of things at that period that the assassi-
nation of Archbishop Sharpe was approved of by
the great majority of the people of Scotland.—(Hear.)
That ought to absolve the Irish from some of the deeds of vio-
lence which now unfortunately marked that country. Nothing
could exceed in atrocity the murder of Archbishop Sharpe,
and yet that murder was justified in Scotland. Such had been
the effect of attempting to force prelacy on the people of Scot-
land. Things went on from bad to worse, and were at the end of
the 17th century, even worse than they had been a century
before. He need not also remind the House of Bothwell
Brig and other similar scenes.—( Hear, hear.) The effect of
the change of system had operated decidedly as a ..Sarm,
and now Episcopalians and Presbyterians lived together in
complete harmony, and they even subscribed towards erect-
ing each other's places of worship.—( Hear, hear, hear.)
Ought not this to act as an example, and should they not
endeavour to assimilate the religious state of Ireland to that of
Scotland? It ought to be so altered as to be proper and suffi-
cient for those of the Episcopalian faith in Ireland. But the
number of bishops in that country was still excessive, as were
also their incomes, in comparison with those now proposed to
be given to the English prelates. From that source there would
be a large surplus left for the general benefit of the commu-
nity. They had been told that such property was in-
alienable, however small might be the number of persons who
profess that religion, and that it never could be diverted for any
purpose, or from any cause whatever. But there was no warrant
for this in any law—neither statute law, nor the law of the land.
Such a doctrine had been advocated in times of Paganism, but
what abominations bad it not occasioned ? It had afterwards been
resorted to by Catholics (and here he assured Hon. Gentlemen of
that persuasion that he intended nothing offensive to them)
Catholics had laid down and encouraged that doctrine. At
the time of the Reformation, however, this doctrine had entirely
been put an end to, and such property as the House well
knew was freely applied to other purposes.—( Hear, hear.)
Could it be expected that the doctrines of the Pagan religion
—that the docrines of Popery, which were exploded in the
sixteenth century, should be revived in the nineteenth—and
should form the basis of Legislative enactment? He held
that they could not ; and this opinion he had formed
after great deliberation. He thought that the property
of the Church should not be touched while it could
be employed beneficially for the Church itself. But still
be held that it was the property of the State originally, and as
the State conferred it, so could the State take it away when
the public safety demanded its interference.—( Hear, hear.)
He knew no distinction between a Clergyman and any
other functionary of the State. He believed that those who
ministered at the altar should live by the altar. So said the
Scriptures. The Judges, the Ministers of State, and those
who fought the battles of the country, were alike upon one
footing ; there was no distinction between the one and the
other; they were all supported by the State, and when the
amount of their income or their numbers exceeded what
was required, the State which regulated them in the
'first instance had a right to reduce them when it was deemed
necessary to do so. He apprehended that what he stated would
be supported by the history of tithes. All who know the history
of tithes must be aware that they were first imposed in the
nature of a property tax. The Christian religion was long
-established before tithes were known —at a time when
there was hardly any personal property.-4 Hear.) Rents were
then paid in kind. There was little money in use, and the
tithes were originally made in the shape of a property tax,
which amounted to the value of a tenth part of the produce
of the soil. There was a fourfold division—one part
to the Bishop--oae to the incumbent—one for the fabric of
the Church, and the fourth for the poor.—( Cheers.) So that
tithes originally were conferred on the clergy by the State,
and were not voluntarily undertaken by the people. Whether
the Church was endowed by landed possessions or by
pecuniary means was immaterial, if by pecuniary funds
they could be cut down, and if by landed possessions
they could be taken away. Within a few years the
salary of the Chief Justice ,of England had been dimi-
nished from ten to eight thousand pounds. The Chancellor
of Ireland had also his salary reduced from ten to eight thou-
sand a-year, and he would like to know why the Clergy could
not be dealt with as any other public functionaries of the land.
If half the property of the country has belonged to the Church,
and there was a crying evil that it corrupted the clergy, and
caused the laity to be dissatisfied with the Church, could it be
said that under such circumstances Parliament could not inter-
fere ? Before the Reformation in the Church of Scotland it
was calculated that one-third of the whole property of the
country belonged to the Church. The Legislature of Scot-
land dealt wisely : they allotted a sufficient portion
and the rest they applied
tiblrthesupotherport
s.of Hthee wmoiunldistsearys,the same example might be
made in every Christian state.—( Hear, hear.) At present
England, Scotland, and Ireland, was one great united empire,
:Ind he hoped would remain so for many ages to come ; but
would it be said the predominant religion of the land was to
be the religion of the majority who formed the Legislature of
the United Kingdom ? He knew it was contrary to what the
enefit of the country required. What was there in the articles
of Union that prohibited the proper and adequate reduction
of the establishment to the wants of the] e3ple7 He apprehended
that all the articles of the treaty of Union were to be inter-
preted, enforced and modified, according to what the public
good might require, and of this they had a most distinguished
instance during the time the Right Hon. Baronet was at the
head of the Home Department. By the Articles of the Union
of Scotland it was provided that-there should be a Court of
Admiralty. By the sanction of the Right Honourable
_Ba-
ronet not only were measures in contemplation to reforn