The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1839-12-31 00:00:00

repeal the Gas-light Act; but when he thought of setting up
a little Parliament in his own perverse brain, and acting upon
itsalecision, of course the result was, that his resistance met
with expense and punishment. We cannot really discern the
difference between the conduct of the church_ rate refusers,
and that of the supposed gas-light defaulter ; unless it be that
in a matter of religions concernment it is justifiable to have
recourse to means, which in the ordinary affairs of civil life,
arc reckoned disreputable and absurd: We should, however,
of ourselves have been inclined to consider, that if submission
to the law were a duty in common affairs, it were ten times
so much a duty in those of a religious character. There is
one remarkable saying of our blesstsd. Saviour constantly in
the mouths of Dissenters when resisting the " ungodly"
union of civil and ecclesiastical power;---" my kingdom
not of this world ;"—and they will tell us that these divine
words condemn the assumption of secular power by the
Church. • Butwhat saysTthe context? "'My kingdom is not
of this world—,else ,woald‘ nry,
.dpes..this passage more pointecllyesttidre; elispliaticrillY Con-
demn, than a system of resistancb tolkeehlar power under the
pretended plea of Christ's religion • •
To apply the argumentunz ad hominent to our conscientious
opposers of church rates. They are to a man, we believe,
supporters of the ministerial plan' of education. There are
portions of that plan which we, as ConserVative Churchmen,
oppose most strenuously, because we disapprove most forcibly.
Yet that odious scheme is to be supported by grants of money,
a large proportion of which is taken out of our own pockets
for that very purpose. Now should see-be justified in resist-
ing the payment of the public taxes on the ground of our
strong repugnance to the purpose to which so large an amount
of them is to be applied ? We apprehend that such a resolu-
tion on oar part would be visited not only with the condign
punishment of the law, but also with the loud exclamations
of the " Liberal " dissenters against our " disloyal Tory ma-
lignity." And we should deserve their scornful taunts, be-
cause we should be acting just as foolishly, and just as wick-
edly, as their own " martyrs " are now acting under their
especial patronage and approbation!
We would beg to ask our fierce voluntaries one question.
—" In what respect is your conduct better than that of the
chartists You object to a particular form of government
in Church ; the chartists are, opposed to a particular consti-
tution in state. You make it a point of conscience to refuse
the _payment of tuxes' to the Church e the chartists do
i-the very same with regard to the state. You demand
san•ceelesiastical republic.; the chartists insist upon a eitil
democracy. Finally and chiefly, you set • the law at all-
ance in resisting ,the . claims of the Churcb ; and what
more hew the Cnartists ever done against the State? You
have not fought, we admit ; yOu have not assembled your-
selves in riotous crowds to set fire to St. Paul's or Westmin-
ster Abbey. But von have attempted the destruction of the
Churchin a more dangerous because more practicable man-
ner; yon hare not been content with submitting to the law,
as late, and in the Meantime striving constitutionally to effect
s its alteration : but you have gone about to defy the law, and
to cOmmend and assist those who do the seine. An intenti-
onally mischievous, but really weak person among you of the
, name of Thorogood, in some small town in the south, has
gone to prison rather than -pay a legal rate of five shillings
and sixpence; and the whole body—or rather all the bodies—
of you throughout the kingdom have been applauding this
man's conduct, and subscribing to give him money, in order
to make his martyrdom answer. You hope that by such ex-
amples as these,the power of the Church will be set at nought,
. and that she will be intimidated and brow-beaten out of her
claims upon the community. You are thus trying the same
experiment that was tried by the Birmingham demonstration
in the time of the Reform Bill, and then succeeded ; and which
has again recently been tried for the "Charter," by the "sacred
month," and the affair at Newport, and has in this case been a
signal failure. You can applaud pious Christians who will
pay no Church taxes : but when a society of poor working
men declare that for a month they will pay no State taxes
and do no manual work, nothing can exceed your indigna-
tion at their wickedness and audacity. Yet the " sacred
month" was only designed as a " passive resistance," to
bring the upper and middle classes to Chartist terms ; as
the going to prison of John Thorogood, is intended to
humble and reduce the Church of England. By the way,
talking of Chartists, did you ever happen to hear of one
'Joseph Rayner Stephens, formerly a Wesleyan preacher,
'but discarded from that respectable body for—being an
active local Secretary of Your pet dissenting " Ecclesiastical
Knowledge Society ?" The said Joseph Rayner was at that
time yourssworn friend; you prized his unyielding spirit;
reviled his " cruel persecutors." How is it that he has
since become the object of your bitterest vituperation and
contempt ? Why simply because he has had the manliness
and consistency to attempt to carry out against the State,
the same principles in which you and he once cordially united
against the Church ! The comparison between yourselves
and the wretched and despised Chartists is one that you will
not admire. No doubt you often feel thankful that you are
not as other men are, and especially not as those poor
publicans. But we must speak as we think nevertheless :
our opinion has not been given without argument ; if is
questioned, let it by argument be impugned.
But in the meantime we.must take leave to carry the pa-
rallel yet a little further. The Chartists and yourselves are
both seeking after impossibilities—even though you might be
successful in your primary design of upsetting " the powers
that be." This country will never submit to a democracy
either in Church or State. By the blessing of Divine Pro-
vidence it has now attained the greatest height of liberality
and toleration in both, that can co-exist with the supremacy
of an efficient government. Suppose you succeed in over-
', throwing the Church—suppose the Chartists succeed in over-
throwing the State ;—what would be the results ? They would
be exacth similar in both cases : the mild and tolerant Go-
vernment: would be destroyed amidst the fierce joy of the Re-
publican and the insulting triumph of the scoffer ; and in its
room, armed with tenfold power, would soon be seated the
strongest and most unprincipled of the factions which had
united for its overthrow. A despotism, perhaps a cruel and
certainly a stern one, would as surely succeed as night fol-
lows day. You will admit the truth of this in the case of the
Chartists, without the slightest hesitation : it) matters of civil
government you are not so devoid of penetration as to doubt
for a moment that anarchy must be followed by absolute
power. But how long would your own golden equality last?
Which of your present allies would step forward to take
the station of your future tyrant ? Can you doubt for a mo-
ment ? Is there not now, professedly in strictest league and
amity with yourselves, a spiritual sect, once the lord paramount
of all Christendom, and now possessed of every means of ags
grandisement and determined to stretch' thnse means to the
Utmost ? The Church of England removed, what could any of
yon—all of you in concert—do against the Church of Rome ?
—with her mighty foreign 'influenceewith her commanding
talents, and her determination for empire ? And (the truth can
not be denied. nor needluse lissChniehmen hesitate to confess
t
epee for the. conflict withedissent by the accession of those
quondam Churchnten who would love to embrace the strong-
est side, and, thatmurnerous class who would take refuge in
it; as a church, however corrnet;.yet better than none; just
as in-ease of the overthrow of a moderate and equitable go-
vernment, multitudes of well-tneaningsand honest minded
individuals arefain to take up with the succeeding despotism.
Oh ! well may the Roman Catholics join hand in hand and
(feigning) heart:with you in your church rate war I Well
may- o.'Connell preach up the beauties 'of the "voluntary sys-
tem," to beguile the minds of those who are so intent upon
their own petty Schemes that they cannot perceive his drift,
nor discern the knowing sneer with which he utters those
cant expressions, and converts the zeal of ultra-dissenters to
the furtherance of the unchanged and unchareeable Church
of Rome!
It will be seen, that in the above remarks we have confined
ourselves entirely to the refutation of the reasons on which
dissenters themselves rest their anti-church rate pretensions.
Were it not foreign to our present purpose, we should be
ready to argue the question on the far higher grounds of
strict justice and public advantage, both of which it would
not be very difficult to show are involved in the successful
enforcement of the church's rights. We shall be ready to go
into this subject so soon as the positions we have above laid
down have met with anything like an argumentative dispute
on the part of our dissenting cotemporaries. We have no
sanguine expectation of anything of the kind; not that we
value our own poor ability at so high a rate, but because the
side of the argument which we feel it our duty to take, is so
unquestionably the strongest and the best. If we have
spoken severely to those who, with the plea of religion on
their lips, " resist the powers that be," our answer is, that
we have warrant from scripture for condemning their conduct
in terms much more sharp and decisive than any we have
employed.
The immediate occasion which has called from us the
above remarks, is a bitter and rather ludicrous quarrel which
is just now raging between two of the sections, which have
united in encouraging Thorogood (the man to whom we have
before alluded) in his resistance to the law. It appears that
the poor fellow was induced to go to prison by the persuasion
of the leading members of one of the London agitating So-
cieties, under the expectation of something handsome being
done for him' in the way of subscription, in addition to the
temptation of his humble name being crowned with dissent-
ing glory. After he had lain in gaol for some time, as might
naturally be expected, his affairs began to get somewhat dis-
ordered. Still, thought he, the subscription will surely come
by and by, and a good thing will be made of it after all. At
'length, beginning to grow rather apprehensive of his interests
being neglected by his officious patrons, he makes and appli-
cation to them, stating the melancholy plight to which
he has been reduced by following their counsels. But
what sort of a reply does he get ? Why they go about to
console him somewhat after the following style : " Bravo !
John Thorogood, every thing proceeds in as favourable a
manner as can be desired ; your affairs, you say, are al-
ready brought to the verge of ruin ; your health and spirits,
too, are beginning to give way under the pressure of impri-
sonment • nothing could possibly be better for exciting sym-
pathy with your sufferings, unless, perhaps,' you could ma-
nage to give up the ghost altogether! Only think what a
' tine stroke that would be! Why, your name would be im-
mortalised. and the-Church would receive in your death one
of its hardest and deadliest blows !" But Thorozood, as
one might anticipate, was far from being satisfied with the
prospect of future glory held out to him, in the place of pre-
sent comfort, health, and life ; what he wanted was the ready
cash, which had been so liberally promised to him; as to
dying for his principles, to be sure it was a fine thing to talk
. about, hut a very melancholy one to encounter in reality. He
accordingly turned away with disgust from his evangelical
comforters, and addressed himself to the more miscellaneous
portion of the Church's enemies ; since Which timethe ape-
*lotion has seemed more likely to suceeed-. The money has
ediently begun to pour in pretty copiously, end there-is good
reason to. expect, that a handsome thing will be realised after
all. But. in the mean time some of his friends have .ciaiti-
menceda most ,furious attack on the Cool and ,calculating
gentry who first- broUght the poorr-len-ow into his present
plight, and then refused to exert themselves in his behalf..
The Anythingeirian Advertiser and. the Nothingtonian Sun
have distinguished themselves on the one side of the contro-
versy, and the evangelical- Patriot hits been equally bitter on
the other. Of course, Strange criminationa and recrimina-
tions have come out of this schism among schismatics, and
curious have been the disclosures•laid open on each side, as to
the secret workings of dissenting agitation. Brother Conder,
of the Patriot, abuses brother Childs, late " martyr" of
Bungay, and wishes he would at once "jump Jim Crow,"and
leave the dissenting troops. Brother Childs retorts by calling
brother Conder " a needy adventurer" and " a rancorous
buffoon ;" and he closes'a long letter to the Sun with a note
respecting one of -the most conspicuous of the dissenting
societies, which is too rich not to be copied entire. " For
nearly a year the Church Rate Abolition Society has made
no sign. The last public event in its history was a con-
troversy respecting alleged malversation of its funds, Mr.
Besley pledging himself to prove, at tine next meeting, the
grave charges he advanced, and the committee pledging'
themselves to call such meeting iu May last. No public
meeting was called in May, nor at any other time. The
charge, therefore, returns; and if there really be any present
members of such a society, they are invited to say what be-
came of its funds:"
Well-a-day ! cannot these people- be content with trying
to rob the church, but they must also rob one another?
Cannot they be content with robbing one another, but they
must go and expose their dirty tricks to the world ? Verily,
verily, this one little controversy is calculated to do more to
the separation of any thing like religion—any thing like com-
mon decency—from the company of dissenting " martyrs,"
than a thousand arguments. But there are some Who tire
very hard to be convinced.

CLAY CROSS TUNNEL.—This tunnel is now in a forward
a state as any part of the line. The whole of the brick work
was completed some time since, and the permanent rails are
being laid; but the laying of the last brick was deterred until
Wednesday, owing to the illness of the engineer, on which
day a silver trowel was presented to him, and the brick
was laid in the presence of the gentlemen of the North Mid-
land Railway. After the ceremony the party partook of a
sumptuous repast At Mr. Price's, the contractor.—Derbyshire
Chronicle.