The Sun.
London, England, 1845-10-08 00:00:00

MOrtrialr

LONDON, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 8, 1845.

The Charge delivered by the Lord Archbishop of
ARMAGH to his clergy at a visitation held by him on
the 2d instant, at the cathedral of his diocese, is too
remarkable a document to be passed over, like an
every-day discourse of this nature, replete with
egotism and bad taste. when delivered by the Bishop
of Loamoar—with petulance and Puseyism if. pro.
nouneed by the Bishop of EXETER. It must be al-
lowed that the Primate of Ireland is a very different
personage, and of a differently constituted intellect from
either of these his Right Reverend Brothers. In the
" Charge" before us his Grace maintains all that dignity
and self-possession which are identified with his public
deportment on every occasion. The " Charge" itself is, as a
whole, di,tinguished by a tone of argumentative fairness
and perfect equanimity, modified only by the earnest,
ness witta\vhielt it upholds the mission and the merits of
the Protestant Estabtished Church. Of course, it would
be to mach to expect from a Protestant Archbishop
aqy ex's as of candour or liberality in dealing with qucs
tie& of-Roinan Catholic encroachments, or the doctriue.4
maintained by the Roman Catholic Church. The latter
are universally indicated by the application of such hard
worda as " ignorarxe " and " superstition;" the former,
as r,:-oposing for their ultimate, and indeed; avowed ob.
icct, the total abolition of the %hole Protestant Este-
blia!unent. Unliapplly the Archbishop, it cannat be
deltic], 112 d the precedent for language and in-
sinuations far more intemperate already furnished to
his ;rinds by the unmeasured vituperation and illiberal
coastruntians so commonly indulged in. of late, by the
hies-ili:by and parozhial clergy of the Romish Church in
Ireland, and even by the Catholic laity of that
country, against the Church, the clergy, the
laity, and all the institutions of England. This
is one of the curses of every controversy in
which religious is mixed up with political excitement. '
For our own parts, we have long looked on, with equal
disgust for -the utter want of Christian charity developed
on bath sines, and little hope of seeing them ever imi-
tate the excellent txsmple of timely compromise.
afforded in that dramatic scene, where our satiric
dramatist naakes 'one gentleman—who has well lined his
own pecketsa-exclaim to enc ther, who has been success.
fully attempting, at his expense, to replenish his—es-
claim, "Brother, brother! we are both in the wrong." But
the .Archbishop of ARMAGH is a fair controversialist
with some small allowances for the prepossessions
natural to his cloth and station. His Grace's most
grievous offence, on the present occasion, is a sin of
omission rather than commission. He complains, and
with reason, of the extraordinary amount of misunder-
standing which still fireVSils in this country as well as
in Ireland on., the " enormous revenues" and " lavish ,

endowments" of the Irish Established Church. It has
often occurred to us as matter fur surprise, that after the
pains which Lord ALTHORP took in his speech of 1833,
on the " Irish Church Temporalities Act," to disabuse
the public mind as to its exaggerated notion on these
two matters, the old mistakes should be still so exten-
sively cherished.' The Archbishop, on the subject of
tithes, endeavours to prove that prior to the intervention•
of Parliament, in the reign of WILLIAM IV., that which
was called tithe was not the tenth, but barely the thirtieth
as collect: d, of the produce of the land ; and that since
its e9mmutation, by recent Acts NE. Parliament, into tt•
rent- cliarge, it is in reality but a fortieth part of that
produce is hich i3_filled to the Established Church. flis
Grace pursues these exaggerations through the various
items of ei,iscopal fines ; the patronage and income
of
cathedrals and chapters ; the condition of dignitaries
and prebends ; and the evils attrib.ited to the unions of
parishes. This latter evil, he said, must to a great
measure be attributed to other quarters. A vote of that
worthless body, the old Irish Parliament, in 1735, abo-
lishing," for the obvious and selfish purposes of those who
passed it, the tithe of agistment, rendered it necessary to
form such unions, in order to constitute single districts
large enough to require the services of a separate mi-
nister, and to provide him with an income. Many
parishes. were at present but the sites of former
religious 110 USCF. In the city of Cork, one
"parish" was represented by a distillery ; another
by a sugatqakinr, house. For these and other statistics,
curious enough in their way, we must refer the reader
to the " Charge" itself. The Archbishop is even-banded

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