'I have my own impression of the men whom I meet, and of
the way in which they obtrude their contempt for religious
opinions in general, but I can say nothing more definite
than that I allude to people who are _already upon
foundations_.
'40. Marquis of Salisbury: They come in in spite of the
existing tests?
'Yes.
'41. Do you think that that is probably due either to some
subsequent change of opinion on their part, or to a
peculiar elasticity of mind?
'It is due to the loss of common honesty and morality, I
think.'
'1001. Earl of Morley: I think you mentioned the fact of
several fellows having retired who had formerly taken the
tests. Would you like to mention any instances of that?
'Dr. Lightfoot: I am not in a position to say exactly the
motives which led them to resign their fellowships; but
there have been two or three instances quite lately where
persons have resigned fellowships, and I believe they have
done so on account of religious scruples.
'1302. Do those facts have rather a bad effect upon the
undergraduates, do you think?
'I think they have. That is my reason for desiring a
change. They create a prejudice against religion.'
Lord E. Fitzmaurice, in the debate on clerical fellowships, is reported
to have said:--
'The clerical fellows might be classed as those who wore
white ties and those who went without. The first class
steadily opposed all progress in the universities, and the
last merely took orders to obtain the fellowship. These
latter, in fact, threw away the outward visible sign of
that inward and spiritual grace which they were conscious
they did not possess.'
Lord Fitzmaurice has so lately left the University of Cambridge that his
recollection of it must be very vivid. The sentences quoted have just
that quality of candid but rather indiscriminate truth, flavoured with
somewhat flippant and irreverent satire; which would have brought down
the house at the Union Debating Society. Indeed we can hardly refrain
from thinking these words were originally prepared for the benefit of
the audience there assembled.
The ingenuity of the great enemy of souls would be taxed in vain to hit
upon a device by which the ministry of Christ and the truth of God could
be more thoroughly brought into contempt in the judgment of susceptible
youth, which is ever keen to detect selfish shams, and ever loyal to
self-sacrificing nobility. The system of clerical fellowships is such a
scheme--
'As from the body of contraction plucks
The very soul; and sweet religion makes
A rhapsody of words.'
If this hoar iniquity of clerical tests be for a few years longer
maintained by a mistaken section of Churchmen, it will be our duty as
Nonconformists, during that time, by making a vigorous protest through
every channel by which public opinion is influenced, to show that if
these tests be _safeguards_ they are safeguards not of Catholic
Christianity, but of sectarian ascendancy; to keep the fair garments of
religion unspotted by a worldly and turbid policy; to cause that the
contempt which cannot but be felt should light not upon the royal
priesthood of Christ, but on the priesthood of the Establishment; and to
demonstrate that, if truth be violated, she is violated by no criminal
consent of ours.