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Untitled Article
His Royal Highness then appeared , and was received with those spontaneous and cordial acclamations which rank alone could not extort , but which were given as proofs of sincere gratitude and of unfeigned approbation for the liberality which his attendance displayed .
Mr . John Wilksj the other secretary , then began to analyze the proceedings of the Committee , and to invite an approval of their past conduct and future support . He commenced his detail by the statement of several cases , which bad continued to occur , of the refusal of clergymen of the Established Church to read the burial
service over the corpses of those who had dissented from that church . The illiberality as well as the illegal nature of that conduct wa « ex posed . Ye t a t W h i t ford , i n Fl i n fshire , and at Cannock , in the county of Stafford , such refusals had occurred .. The acknowledgments by the clergymen of
their error prevented their punishment . In Dorsetshire , another clergyman , with as impotent but more cautious malevolence , refused to admit the body into the church , although in the church-yard he did not Tenture to refuse that homage to the virtues and piety of the deceased , which the
service of the church indiscriminately presents . He censured , as a relic of superstition , the partiality of Dissenters to church-yards as places of interment , and recommended that they should provide burial-grounds for themselves , where the bodies of those
who had associated in Christian fellowship on earth might rest in peace , until those bodies should be raised incorruptible at the resurrection of th $ just . Yet even these establishments might occasionally need the aid of the society , as at Birmingham a demand of fees had been made hv the rector
of that parish , for the burial of the Rev . Jehoiada Brewer , in a ground which was appendant to the chapel recently erected by his cong-regation in that town . The assessment of places of religious worship to rates for the relief of the poor , constituted the next topic of his address .
To the novelty , inexpedience , and injustice of these demands , he had frequently been required to advert . The liability of such edifices to assessment , if they produced a profit to any occupier after all necessary expenses were discharged , he would not deny . But the vexation and disgrace
attendant on these proceedings particularly excited his antipathy and disgust . The failure of the attempt to procure an act to exempt such places from assessment , he attributed to too much reliance ou
governwent , and too little dependauoe on themselves . But as parliamentary Belief could uot be immediately expected , Dissente r * must $ jade * vmir lo rejxel the attempts by all the prudent mean * which th * faw ctould suppl y * Ib cases of assessment he advis-
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ed an immediate demand of a copy of the rate , investigation of the state of parochial property , and an appeal to the next sessions after the making of the rate The efforts of the committee at jtiorthop in Flintshire , at in Kent > at Pail ton
in Warwickshire , had been attended with complete success . At York ^ they had succeeded in postponing" an assessment ; at Worcester a chapel was assessed , but the rate was never demanded 5 and the ' prominent case of Surrey Chapel demonstrated the benefits which firm persevera ' nee would
produce . There the liberal party 10 the parish had prevailed $ and the final omission of the chapel in the assessment , and the remission of all rates which had previously been made , had freed the parish from much useless expense , and restored their parochial peace . There even a-sewer rate had . been reduced to 401 . from 450 / . which had
been originally required . On the case-of Pailton ^ he expatiated with peculiar feeling , and much apparent delight . There the attempt seemed to have been peculiarly harsh . The clergyman , being the magistrate , had originated the measure . The
people * were Baptists , and were pious and poor . Their minister had never received more than 10 s . for travelling expenses and three sermons on a Sabbath day ; and to raise even those small sums , persons whose families were large , and whose incomes did not exceed 70 / . had contributed
anntially 61 . and 11 . to promote , what they conceived to he , the cause of religion , of human happiness , and God . Yet their meeting house was assessed ; and two clergymen , being magistrates- signed the
warrant of distress during the pendency of an appeal . Providentially the distress was illegal . The levy was made ' in the cottage of a mother , and on the coat of a son , who had never been assessed . An action was
brought \ and at the Warwick sessions the officers gladly abandoned the assessment , returned the coat , and paid to the society 15 / . for the costs they had incurred . To Qther cases then depending at Yorky at Petworth , and at Wimhourney he also referred ; and cherished a hope , that he might report with equal satisfaction a
similar result ; although a purer joy , on such a subject , than he had felt amidst the tearful thanks and pious prayers of the poor cottagers of Pailton , he never could expect to partake . The tight of exemption from turnpike TOLLS on Sundays , he also considered as a matter of great importance , partly on account of the ? pecuniary burden th ^ i i'
collection would impose on m&ny country congregations , and yet more on account of the point of honour , which had f > fo « ed Ditstmttr * in that rmtnect on a )» it equality with ttit » e » b * r * of tb « established clui ng On that » ubj « ot tht applications to the
Untitled Article
s 456 Intelligence . —Protestant Society for the Protection of Religious Liberty .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), July 2, 1818, page 456, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2478/page/48/
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