We inserted an article fr...
The Times, 1824-12-07T00:00:00

We inserted an article from a correspondent yestarday, on the subject of a protest tendered to a clergyman of the Church of England by a couple about to be married, against the ceremony according to which the clergyman was bound by his duty andloIemn obligation to perform the rite. The manider in which we have here stated the case swill show our opiinion upon it. If the clergyman had previously promised to accept the protest, he had inadvcrtently enter- ed into an inproper engagement, from the infraction of wlich, however,, the party with whom the engagement was made could recoive no damage; for what good could this, protest do them, unless the degradation of the parish priest were a good to those wvhlo were married by him ? WVhat have the clergy of the Established Church to do with protests of this nature ? Or where is the acceptance of them enjoined as a part of their duty ? It is not optional ,with them to use or to omit a part of any of the Church ceremonies. They pledge themselves, and are solemnly bound at their ordina- tion, " to comnply with the Liturgy of the Church of Eng- "land;- t'. ir handts, therefore, are tied; and it seems ex- cessively foolish to pester them with protests in an affair totally beyond their control. It would be quite as rational in the clergyman to give the couple a protest on accournt of Lheir faith, as for them to give him one on account of a rite contained in the Book of CommonPrayer. Indeed,itappears to us, that if a Dissenting couple must tender a protest on ac- count of their being married in the church, and according to its ritual, the minister of their own Dissenting congrega- tion is the propcr person to whom the protest should be tendered, and by whom it should be received ; for by such a process, he learns and is assured, that though this portion of his flock may seem to quit him on the most important occasion of their lives, it is only because the existing law of the land for ces them, and that he is not therefore to esteem them as renegades or deserters. The particular protest, however, in question (that signed W. WooDs and S. HoDGRs)possesses a degreeofabsurdity peculiar to itself; from which, perhaps, ingenuity might contrive to purify similar documents in future. The parties protesting first go to the church, and thenr and there they protest " against the use in their instance of the marriage " ceremony, as contained in the Book of Common Prayer." Now, suppose for a moment, that the clergyman had been inclined to violate his duty, and having got the couple into church, had professed his, readiness to save them the trouble of a protest, by marrying them according to any other form they might wish. Would they Jhave suffer- ed him ? WVould they have been content to place the validity of their marriage upon so rotten a founda. tion? Certainly not. They, therefore, pretest to the officiating Mlinister against his marrying them by the prescribed form, wlhilst at the same time they would not suffer him to marry them by any other. Does not this absurdity prove, that the clergyman is not the person to whom the protest should be presented? He does not force them to be married according to the ritual of the Church of England; they enter the sacred Temple voluntarily, and would force him, if he should attempt to diverge, to use that ri-ual. The protest thengoes on to say, or to complain, that " the parties are compelled to submit to the Clhurch ce- remony, as the only means of obtaining a legal mar- " riage." Anid is not the clergyman also compelled to submit to the use of that ceremony,? How preposterous, then, when all are subject to the same compulsion, for one to pro- test to another, of an obligation wlhichl is not of hlis impos- ing to whom the protest is offered; but by which, wvhether with or against his will, he is equally bound with the au- thor of the protest. HIaving said thus much on the ratio- naleofthe subject, we must add, that we cannot excuse the clergyman for any rudeness in hiis manuer of rejecting the foolish protest, or for any needless menace of legal con- strainit.