most luxuriant crops that can be imagined of every description. My wheats, my barleys, my clovers, my turnips, my mangels, have all sprang out of the earth thick and threefold, as if it could never tire of bearing; and as Providence has been pleased to bless me with such abundant increase, I feel it my duty to share, in some measure, this blessing with others. Do, pray then, Sir, permit me to add fifteen per cent. to your very lowly composition.Nay, no hesitation-I must not be denied.-Remember, my good Sir, this is no every day offer." I repeat, where are we to find the landlord or the farmer that ever addressed the parson in this manner? No with him, a bargain's a bargain, and, were his crops fifty-fold, he would not add fifty pence to his agreement. Is it, then, any thing short of the meanest and most bare-faced injustice to foist such a scandalous, trumpery proviso upon the church and her clergy as this? A healing measure?-O, shame! where is thy blush!

Abatement of tithe upon the mere principle of compassion, is not, it is said, to be permitted to operate against us. I shall be glad, my Reverend Brethren, to find it so, for the honour of human nature; for I cannot conceive a deeper blot upon her, than to let a man's virtues uniformly contribute to his disadvantage. Yet, what, I ask, are the aforesaid abatements which this law seems to insist upon but acts of compassion? abatements which we were not called upon to make, on any principle of equity, and which, now that we see how the thing is turning against us, we should have done well never to have made at all. The farmers, however, have always, on these occasions, a sort of persevering, pitiful, bothering way with them, which, I am sorry to say, tells in the long-run; and by these special pleadings, it comes to pass that they generally so bring matters to bear as to receive no damage, like the cat that

falls on her feet, throw her out of the casement in what manner you will. These annual exercises of patience the Act may, however, be found to put a stop to, unless, like tinkers, they mend a hole and make a hole, and thus leave the farmers an opportunity of creeping out of the sum total of the rentcharge, as they occasionally did out of that of their voluntary agreements.

CLAUSE XXXVIII.

Power to alter Averages on Appeal.-Power to increase or diminish Average by one-fifth.—Certain cases may be reserved for Special Adjudication, at discretion of Commissioners.

This clause at first sight seems to make, my Brethren, for us, but whig management may yet turn it against us. A note from Mr. White here informs us, that "the provisions of clauses XXXVIII. and XXXIX. for making alterations in the amount of the average value, are discretionary with the commissioners," so that, even this addition of one-fifth to our very lowest compositions will rest upon their good will towards us. If they please, they may give us these cheese-parings of equity for all the gone by years of tenderness and generosity on our part; or if they please, we may continue to eat our "bread

of carefulness" without them.

This power to increase or diminish our tithe compositions by one-fifth, may, under the guidance of such authorities, as often be used against us as for us; and even where they must feel compelled, by the urgency of the case, to suffer it to operate in our favour, they may so stint the measure of relief, that the very beggar at our doors would scorn such mouldy scraps as they consent to throw to us.

Put the case that a clergyman, in making his compositions, happens, by great good luck, to have some knowledge of the value of his tithes, and strikes

his bargain accordingly. Will he be any sharer in this whig bounty of one fifth? No, not in a penny of it. Nay, it is well if he be not deemed to have made so high an agreement, that this one fifth, (or a certain portion of it, at least,) must, in justice, be taken from his composition-in justice-that is—in whig justice, which generally carries with it the idea of as much wrong and robbery as they dare to foist into their definition of the word. We shall presently see how this one fifth works, and whether it deal most in addition or subtraction.

Notwithstanding the threats of a "compulsory award," the clergy, if they were of my mind, would reject "voluntary agreements;" would sacrifice half their incomes before they consented to put their hands to such ruinous proceedings. We shall presently have required of us the full" tale of bricks," with a go ye and get straw for yourselves." We shall be enjoined the complete performance of our duties, with the defalcation of half our revenues.

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As all is at the will of the commissioners, subject to the approval of whig ministers, probably the least unruly among the clergy may fare the best. The bending reed, we know, stood the storm that rooted up the knotted oak. Now, my Reverend Brethren, now is our time for making our markets. Accipe qua ratione queas ditescere. Whoever among you is wise enough to see that church-rates ought to be abolished,- Whoever can advocate the general measures of government, and especially those appertaining to "justice to Ireland,"-Whoever can speak a good word for the great healing measure, the "Tithe Commutation Act for England and Wales,"-Whoever can adopt the convenient principle, that, let a proposition be never so vile, pending its discussion, yet the moment it passes into a law, (no matter by what manoeuvering means) it becomes scandalous for any shepherd of Christ's fold to utter a syllable

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against it,-Whoever, among the clergy, can tutor his mind to that complaisant frame of thought as to hold a radical-popish whig ministry, the best administration for the support of the Protestant Church of England and Ireland,-Whoever can bring up his heart to perform these sweet-toned suits and services, may make sure of his reward; may sit by his fireside, in the family elbow chair over night, and find himself translated to the episcopal bench by the morning.

Such diamonds of this water among the clergy may now realize the dreams of Elysian prospects; of climes, where the earth needs no tillage, and the land flows on for ever with milk and honey. Let them look into the evening clouds, and there will they perceive the shadows of their future greatness; there will they behold palaces, prebendal stalls, archdeaconries, deaneries, mitres, and cardinal's caps, all, under the thimble-rig system, hustled together, and drawn forth like tickets in the whig lottery. O never let them "regard their stuff," their commutation pittances, while such delicious bowers of repose await them, while "the good of all the land of Egypt" is about to be theirs. A treatise in favour of "Den's Theology," or a diatribe of ecclesiastical reform, or a sermon on education without religion,* or a defence of the creed of Pope

* A liberal sermon, highly approved by the mayor and corporation, was, some time since, delivered at Norwich Cathedral, headed "Party Spirit in Religion and Politics considered on Christian Principles." As an aid to conservatism in its hour of need, it will, I fear, do us no good. Our divines, if they wish us to respect their devotional exercises, must avoid the crazy school of Fowel Buxton, Esq.; a school which men easily slide into, when they are once properly initiated into the saintly spirit of the day, and taught to believe that the orthodox clergy of the old school, are, in both faith and

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Pius IV. against the cruel aspersions of Protestanism, would now be worth a Peruvian mine. With a whig ministry and a whig bench of bishops, what "hewers of wood" or drawers of water" need be out of hope? They want neither Blomfields, nor Marshes, neither Wranglers nor Medallists. All they stand in need of are men that will kick against the church though cradled in her bosom, and give their votes for her downfall while they are gaping after her preferments. Such are the clergy of our hierarchy to be selected now; such the peculiar qualifications to insure election!-Carpe Diem.

CLAUSE XL.

How the Tithe of Hops, Fruit, and Garden Produce is to be valued.

Here some of the vicarial tithe come into play. They are probably considered by these friends to the "working clergy" as more trouble than profit; as a sort of picking the bones of a starved to death horse. Formerly the tithe of orchards, gardens, &c. did yield a very comfortable increase to poor vicarages, but of late years, being a good deal in possession of cottagers, only a small sum has been set upon them, and even that small sum is frequently mitigated or forgiven.

It is to be hoped, however, now that, under whig guidance, Astræa is returning to our earth and the golden age once more gathering round us, that these, and other articles of a like nature, will not be to us velut ægri somnia, but will be restored to their original healthy value, and, if put in the parish rent

works, doctrine and practice, centuries behind the evangelical clergy of the new, those only rational supporters, if not, at the present moment, the only accredited ministers of the Established Church of England!!-Can pious vanity go further