that of Ireland, yet no attempt was ever made in England to reduce the
tithe of wool, for the encouragement of that manufacture.
This manufacture hath already been remarkably favoured by the Clergy,
who have hitherto been generally content with less than half--some with
sixpence a garden--and some have taken nothing.
Employments they say have been taxed, the reasons for which taxation
will not hold with regard to property, at least till employments become
inheritances.
The Commons always have had so tender a regard to property; that they
never would suffer any law to pass, whereby any particular persons might
be aggrieved without their own consent.
***** ***** ***** *****
AN ESSAY
ON THE
FATES OF CLERGYMEN.
NOTE.
This essay was first printed in Nos. v. and vii. of "The Intelligencer"
(Dublin, 1728). In that periodical it bore the title: "A Description of
what the World calls Discretion;" and had the following lines from Ben
Jonson as a text:
"Described it's thus: Defined would you it have?
Then the World's honest Man's an errant knave."
The text here printed is based on the original issue, and collated with
the "Miscellanies," vol. iii. of 1732, and the "Miscellanies," vol. ii.,
1747.
[T.S.]
AN ESSAY ON THE FATES OF
CLERGYMEN.
There is no talent so useful towards rising in the world, or which puts
men more out of the reach of fortune, than that quality generally
possessed by the dullest sort of people, and is in common speech called
discretion; a species of lower prudence, by the assistance of which,
people of the meanest intellectuals, without any other qualification,
pass through the world in great tranquillity, and with universal good
treatment, neither giving nor taking offence. Courts are seldom
unprovided of persons under this character, on whom, if they happen to
be of great quality, most employments, even the greatest, naturally
fall, when competitors will not agree; and in such promotions, nobody
rejoices or grieves. The truth of this I could prove by several
instances within my own memory; for I say nothing of present times.
And, indeed, as regularity and forms are of great use in carrying on the
business of the world, so it is very convenient, that persons endued
with this kind of discretion, should have that share which is proper to
their talents, in the conduct of affairs, but by no means meddle in
matters which require genius, learning, strong comprehension, quickness
of conception, magnanimity, generosity, sagacity, or any other superior
gift of human minds. Because this sort of discretion is usually attended
with a strong desire of money, and few scruples about the way of
obtaining it; with servile flattery and submission; with a want of all
public spirit or principle; with a perpetual wrong judgment, when the
owners come into power and high place, how to dispose of favour and
preferment; having no measures for merit and virtue in others, but those
very steps by which themselves ascended; nor the least intention of
doing good or hurt to the public, farther than either one or t'other is
likely to be subservient to their own security or interest. Thus, being
void of all friendship and enmity, they never complain or find fault
with the times, and indeed never have reason to do so.
Men of eminent parts and abilities, as well as virtues, do sometimes
rise in the court, sometimes in the law, and sometimes even in the
Church. Such were the Lord Bacon, the Earl of Strafford, Archbishop
Laud, in the reign of King Charles I., and others in our own times, whom
I shall not name; but these, and many more, under different princes, and
in different kingdoms, were disgraced or banished, or suffered death,
merely in envy to their virtues and superior genius, which emboldened
them in great exigencies and distresses of state, (wanting a reasonable
infusion of this aldermanly discretion,) to attempt the service of their
prince and country, out of the common forms.
This evil fortune, which generally attends extraordinary men in the
management of great affairs, has been imputed to divers causes that need
not be here set down, when so obvious a one occurs, if what a certain
writer observes be true, that when a great genius appears in the world,
the dunces are all in confederacy against him. And if this be his fate
when he employs his talents[1] wholly in his closet, without interfering
with any man's ambition or avarice, what must he expect, when he
ventures out to seek for preferment in a court, but universal opposition
when he is mounting the ladder, and every hand ready to turn him off
when he is at the top? And in this point, fortune generally acts
directly contrary to nature; for in nature we find, that bodies full of
life and spirits mount easily, and are hard to fall, whereas heavy
bodies are hard to rise, and come down with greater velocity, in
proportion to their weight; but we find fortune every day acting just
the reverse of this.
[Footnote 1: "And thus although he employs his talents." This is the
reading of "The Intelligencer." [T.S.]]
This talent of discretion, as I have described it in its several
adjuncts and circumstances, is nowhere so serviceable as to the clergy,
to whose preferment nothing is so fatal as the character of wit,
politeness in reading or manners, or that kind of behaviour which we
contract by having too much conversation with persons of high station
and eminency: these qualifications being reckoned, by the vulgar of all
ranks, to be marks of levity, which is the last crime the world will
pardon in a clergyman; to this I may add a free manner of speaking in
mixed company, and too frequent an appearance in places of much resort,
which are equally noxious to spiritual promotion.
I have known, indeed, a few exceptions to some parts of these
observations.[2] I have seen some of the dullest men alive aiming at
wit, and others, with as little pretensions, affecting politeness in
manners and discourse: But never being able to persuade the world of
their guilt, they grew into considerable stations, upon the firm
assurance which all people had of their discretion, because they were of
a size too low to deceive the world to their own disadvantage. But this,
I confess, is a trial too dangerous often to engage in.
[Footnote 2: This word is "regulations" in "The Intelligencer." [T.S.]]
There is a known story of a clergyman, who was recommended for a
preferment by some great men at court, to an archbishop.[3] His grace
said, "he had heard that the clergyman used to play at whist and
swobbers;[4] that as to playing now and then a sober game at whist for
pastime, it might be pardoned, but he could not digest those wicked
swobbers;" and it was with some pains that my Lord Somers could
undeceive him. I ask, by what talents we may suppose that great prelate
ascended so high, or what sort of qualifications he would expect in
those whom he took into his patronage, or would probably recommend to
court for the government of distant churches?
[Footnote 3: Archbishop Tenison, who, by all contemporary accounts, was
a very dull man. There was a bitter sarcasm upon him usually ascribed to
Swift, "That he was as hot and heavy as a tailor's goose." [S.]
In "The Intelligencer" the word "archbishop" is replaced by the letters
A.B.C.T. [T.S.]]
[Footnote 4: "Swobbers" were four privileged cards used, at one time,
for betting purposes, in the game of whist. [T.S.]]
Two clergymen, in my memory, stood candidates for a small free school in
Yorkshire, where a gentleman of quality and interest in the country, who
happened to have a better understanding than his neighbours, procured
the place for him who was the better scholar, and more gentlemanly
person, of the two, very much to the regret of all the parish: The
other, being disappointed, came up to London, where he became the
greatest pattern of this lower discretion that I have known, and
possessed it with as heavy intellectuals; which, together with the
coldness of his temper, and gravity of his deportment, carried him safe
through many difficulties, and he lived and died in a great station;
while his competitor is too obscure for fame to tell us what became of
him.
This species of discretion, which I so much celebrate, and do most
heartily recommend, hath one advantage not yet mentioned, that it will
carry a man safe through all the malice and variety of parties, so far,
that whatever faction happens to be uppermost, his claim is usually
allowed for a share of what is going. And the thing seems to me highly
reasonable: For in all great changes, the prevailing side is usually so
tempestuous, that it wants the ballast of those whom the world calls
moderate men, and I call men of discretion; whom people in power may,
with little ceremony, load as heavy as they please, drive them through
the hardest and deepest roads without danger of foundering, or breaking
their backs, and will be sure to find them neither rusty nor vicious.
I[5] will here give the reader a short history of two clergymen in
England, the characters of each, and the progress of their fortunes in
the world; by which the force of worldly discretion, and the bad
consequences from the want of that virtue, will strongly appear.
[Footnote 5: In "The Intelligencer," No. v., this paragraph reads as
follows: "In some following Paper I will give the reader a short history
of two Clergymen in England, the characters of each, and the progress of
their fortunes in the world. By which the force of worldly discretion,
and the bad consequences from the want of that virtue, will strongly
appear." In No. vii. the subject is continued as in the next paragraph.
[T.S.]]
Corusodes, an Oxford student, and a farmer's son, was never absent from
prayers or lecture, nor once out of his college, after Tom had tolled.
He spent every day ten hours in his closet, in reading his courses,
dozing, clipping papers, or darning his stockings; which last he
performed to admiration. He could be soberly drunk at the expense of
others, with college ale, and at those seasons was always most devout.
He wore the same gown five years without draggling or tearing. He never
once looked into a playbook or a poem. He read Virgil and Ramus in the
same cadence, but with a very different taste. He never understood a
jest, or had the least conception of wit.
For one saying he stands in renown to this day. Being with some other
students over a pot of ale, one of the company said so many pleasant
things, that the rest were much diverted, only Corusodes was silent and
unmoved. When they parted, he called this merry companion aside, and
said, "Sir, I perceive by your often speaking, and your friends
laughing, that you spoke many jests; and you could not but observe my
silence: But sir, this is my humour, I never make a jest myself, nor
ever laugh at another man's."
Corusodes, thus endowed, got into holy orders; having, by the most
extreme parsimony, saved thirty-four pounds out of a very beggarly
fellowship, he went up to London, where his sister was waitingwoman to a
lady, and so good a solicitor, that by her means he was admitted to read
prayers in the family twice a-day, at fourteen[1] shillings a month. He
had now acquired a low, obsequious, awkward bow, and a talent of gross
flattery both in and out of season; he would shake the butler by the
hand; he taught the page his catechism, and was sometimes admitted to
dine at the steward's table. In short, he got the good word of the whole
family, and was recommended by my lady for chaplain to some other noble
houses, by which his revenue (besides vales) amounted to about thirty
pounds a-year: His sister procured him a scarf from my lord, who had a
small design of gallantry upon her; and by his lordship's solicitation
he got a lectureship in town of sixty pounds a-year; where he preached
constantly in person, in a grave manner, with an audible voice, a style
ecclesiastic, and the matter (such as it was) well suited to the
intellectuals of his hearers. Some time after, a country living fell in
my lord's disposal; and his lordship, who had now some encouragement
given him of success in his amour, bestowed the living on Corusodes, who
still kept his lectureship and residence in town; where he was a
constant attendant at all meetings relating to charity, without ever
contributing further than his frequent pious exhortations. If any woman
of better fashion in the parish happened to be absent from church, they
were sure of a visit from him in a day or two, to chide and to dine with
them.
[Footnote 6: Scott has "ten shillings." [T.S.]]
He had a select number of poor constantly attending at the street door
of his lodgings, for whom he was a common solicitor to his former
patroness, dropping in his own halfcrown among the collection, and
taking it out when he disposed of the money. At a person of quality's
house, he would never sit down till he was thrice bid, and then upon the
corner of the most distant chair. His whole demeanour was formal and
starch, which adhered so close, that he could never shake it off in his
highest promotion.
His lord was now in high employment at court, and attended by him with
the most abject assiduity; and his sister being gone off with child to a
private lodging, my lord continued his graces to Corusodes, got him to
be a chaplain in ordinary, and in due time a parish in town, and a
dignity in the Church.
He paid his curates punctually, at the lowest salary, and partly out of
the communion money; but gave them good advice in abundance. He married
a citizen's widow, who taught him to put out small sums at ten per
cent., and brought him acquainted with jobbers in Change-alley. By her
dexterity he sold the clerkship of his parish, when it became vacant.
He kept a miserable house, but the blame was laid wholly upon madam; for
the good doctor was always at his books, or visiting the sick, or doing
other offices of charity and piety in his parish.
He treated all his inferiors of the clergy with a most sanctified pride;
was rigorously and universally censorious upon all his brethren of the
gown, on their first appearance in the world, or while they continued
meanly preferred; but gave large allowance to the laity of high rank, or
great riches, using neither eyes nor ears for their faults: He was never
sensible of the least corruption in courts, parliaments, or ministries,
but made the most favourable constructions of all public proceedings;
and power, in whatever hands, or whatever party, was always secure of
his most charitable opinion. He had many wholesome maxims ready to
excuse all miscarriages of state: Men are but men; _Erunt vitia donec
homines_; and, _Quod supra nos, nil ad nos_; with several others of
equal weight.
It would lengthen my paper beyond measure to trace out the whole system
of his conduct; his dreadful apprehensions of Popery; his great
moderation toward dissenters of all denominations; with hearty wishes,
that, by yielding somewhat on both sides, there might be a general union
among Protestants; his short, inoffensive sermons in his turns at court,
and the matter exactly suited to the present juncture of prevailing
opinions; the arts he used to obtain a mitre, by writing against
Episcopacy; and the proofs he gave of his loyalty, by palliating or
defending the murder of a martyred prince.
Endowed with all these accomplishments, we leave him in the full career
of success, mounting fast toward the top of the Ladder Ecclesiastical,
which he hath a fair probability to reach; without the merit of one
single virtue, moderately stocked with the least valuable parts of
erudition, utterly devoid of all taste, judgment, or genius; and, in his
grandeur, naturally choosing to haul up others after him, whose
accomplishments most resemble his own, except his beloved sons, nephews,
or other kindred, be in competition; or, lastly, except his inclinations
be diverted by those who have power to mortify, or further advance him.
Eugenio set out from the same university, and about the same time with
Corusodes; he had the reputation of an arch lad at school, and was
unfortunately possessed with a talent for poetry; on which account he
received many chiding letters from his father, and grave advice from his
tutor. He did not neglect his college learning, but his chief study was
the authors of antiquity, with a perfect knowledge in the Greek and
Roman tongues. He could never procure himself to be chosen fellow: For
it was objected against him, that he had written verses, and
particularly some wherein he glanced at a certain reverend doctor famous
for dulness: That he been seen bowing to ladies, as he met them in the
streets; and it was proved, that once he had been found dancing in a
private family, with half a dozen of both sexes.
He was the younger son to a gentleman of good birth, but small estate;
and his father dying, he was driven to London to seek his fortune: He
got into orders, and became reader in a parish church at twenty pounds
a-year; was carried by an Oxford friend to Will's coffee-house,
frequented in those days by men of wit, where in some time he had the
bad luck to be distinguished. His scanty salary compelled him to run
deep in debt for a new gown and cassock, and now and then forced him to
write some paper of wit or humour, or preach a sermon for ten shillings,
to supply his necessities. He was a thousand times recommended by his
poetical friends to great persons, as a young man of excellent parts who
deserved encouragement, and received a thousand promises; but his
modesty, and a generous spirit, which disdained the slavery of continual
application and attendance, always disappointed him, making room for
vigilant dunces, who were sure to be never out of sight.
He had an excellent faculty in preaching, if he were not sometimes a
little too refined, and apt to trust too much to his own way of thinking
and reasoning.
When, upon the vacancy of a preferment, he was hardly drawn to attend
upon some promising lord, he received the usual answer, "That he came
too late, for it had been given to another the very day before." And he
had only this comfort left, that everybody said, "It was a thousand
pities something could not be done for poor Mr. Eugenio."
The remainder of his story will be dispatched in a few words: Wearied
with weak hopes, and weaker pursuits, he accepted a curacy in
Derbyshire, of thirty pounds a-year, and when he was five-and-forty, had
the great felicity to be preferred by a friend of his father's to a
vicarage worth annually sixty pounds, in the most desert parts of
Lincolnshire; where, his spirit quite sunk with those reflections that
solitude and disappointments bring, he married a farmer's widow, and is
still alive, utterly undistinguished and forgotten; only some of the
neighbours have accidentally heard, that he had been a notable man in
his youth.
***** ***** ***** *****
CONCERNING THAT
UNIVERSAL HATRED,
WHICH PREVAILS
AGAINST THE CLERGY.
May 24, 1736.
I have been long considering and conjecturing, what could be the causes
of that great disgust, of late, against the clergy of both kingdoms,
beyond what was ever known till that monster and tyrant, Henry VIII. who
took away from them, against law, reason, and justice, at least
two-thirds of their legal possessions; and whose successors (except
Queen Mary) went on with their rapine, till the accession of King James
I. That detestable tyrant Henry VIII. although he abolished the Pope's
power in England, as universal bishop, yet what he did in that article,
however just it were in itself, was the mere effect of his irregular
appetite, to divorce himself from a wife he was weary of, for a younger
and more beautiful woman, whom he afterwards beheaded. But, at the same
time, he was an entire defender of all the Popish doctrines, even those
which were the most absurd. And, while he put people to death for
denying him to be head of the Church, he burned every offender against
the doctrines of the Roman faith; and cut off the head of Sir Thomas
More, a person of the greatest virtue this kingdom ever produced, for
not directly owning him to be head of the Church. Among all the princes
who ever reigned in the world there was never so infernal a beast as
Henry VIII. in every vice of the most odious kind, without any one
appearance of virtue: But cruelty, lust, rapine, and atheism, were his
peculiar talents. He rejected the power of the Pope for no other reason,
than to give his full swing to commit sacrilege, in which no tyrant,
since Christianity became national, did ever equal him by many degrees.
The abbeys, endowed with lands by the mistaken notions of well-disposed
men, were indeed too numerous, and hurtful to the kingdom; and,
therefore, the legislature might, after the Reformation, have justly
applied them to some pious or public uses.
In a very few centuries after Christianity became national in most parts
of Europe, although the church of Rome had already introduced many
corruptions in religion; yet the piety of early Christians, as well as
new converts, was so great, and particularly of princes, as well as
noblemen and other wealthy persons, that they built many religious
houses, for those who were inclined to live in a recluse or solitary
manner, endowing those monasteries with land. It is true, we read of
monks some ages before, who dwelt in caves and cells, in desert places.
But, when public edifices were erected and endowed, they began gradually
to degenerate into idleness, ignorance, avarice, ambition, and luxury,
after the usual fate of all human institutions. The Popes, who had
already aggrandized themselves, laid hold of the opportunity to subject
all religious houses with their priors and abbots, to their peculiar
authority; whereby these religious orders became of an interest directly
different from the rest of mankind, and wholly at the Pope's devotion. I
need say no more on this article, so generally known and so frequently
treated, or of the frequent endeavours of some other princes, as well as
our own, to check the growth, and wealth, and power of the regulars.
In later times, this mistaken piety, of erecting and endowing abbeys,
began to decrease. And therefore, when some new-invented sect of monks
and friars began to start up, not being able to procure grants of land,
they got leave from the Pope to appropriate the tithes and glebes of
certain parishes, as contiguous or near as they could find, obliging
themselves to send out some of their body to take care of the people's
souls: And, if some of those parishes were at too great a distance from
the abbey, the monks appointed to attend them were paid, for the cure,
either a small stipend of a determined sum, or sometimes a third part,
or what are now called the vicarial tithes.
As to the church-lands, it hath been the opinion of many writers, that,
in England, they amounted to a third part of the whole kingdom. And
therefore, if that wicked prince above-mentioned, when he had cast off
the Pope's power, had introduced some reformation in religion, he could
not have been blamed for taking away the abbey-lands by authority of
parliament. But, when he continued the most cruel persecutor of all
those who differed in the least article of the Popish religion, which
was then the national and established faith, his seizing on those lands,
and applying them to profane uses, was absolute sacrilege, in the
strongest sense of the word; having been bequeathed by princes and pious
men to sacred uses.