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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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grounds and reasons of their opposition to all Church Establishments , and without this knowledge there can be no zeal but of a spurious and improper kind . That steady and consistent zeal which never loses sight of its object , and which alone is to be depended on , exists only in the minds of such as understand their principles .
The following document will shew the light in which the exclusion laws were considered nearly a century and half ago by some of the members of the House of Lords .
" Die Jovis , 21 ° Martii , 1688 . " The House having been in consideration of the bill for abrogating the oaths of allegiance and supremacy , and establishing others in their place , " A clause for repealing so much of the Test Act as concerns the receiving the sacrament was read . " And the question being put , whether to agree to the said clause ; " It was resolved in the negative .
" Leave was given by the House to such Lords as will , to enter their dissents , and accordingly these Lords following , do enter their dissents , for the reasons following : * ' 1 st . Because a hearty union amongst Protestants is a greater security to the church and state than any test that can be invented .
" 2 dly . Because this obligation to receive the sacrameut is a test on Protestants rather than on the Papists . " 3 dly . Because so long as it is continued , there cannot be that hearty and thorough union amongst Protestants as has always been wished , and is at this time indispensably necessary .
" 4 thly . Because a greater caution ought not to be required from such as are admitted into offices , than from the members of the two houses of Parliament , who are not obliged to receive the sacrament t « enable them to sit in either house . " North and Gkey , Grey , Chesterfield , Vaughan , J . Lovelace , Staivtford , Delamer , P . Wharton . "
" Die Sabbati , 23 ° Mar tit , 1688 . " Hodie 3 a vice lecta est billa , An act for the abrogating of the oaths of supremacy allegiance , and appointing other oaths . " A rider ( in parchment ) providing , that no officer shall incur the penalties of the Test Act , in case he shall receive the sacrament in any Protestant congre-
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gation within a year before or after his admission , was offered and read . " And the question being put , whether this rider shall be made part of the bill ; " It was resolved in the negative . " Leave was given to such Lords as will , to enter their dissents , and these Lords do enter their dissents in the reasons following :
" 1 st . Because it gives great part of the Protestant freemen of England reason to complain of inequality and hard usage , when they are excluded from public employments by a law , and also because it deprives the king and kingdom of divers men fit and capable to serve the public in several stations , and that for a mere scruple of conscience , which can by no means render them suspected , much less disaffected to the government .
" 2 dly . Because His Majesty , as the common and indulgent father of his people , having expressed an earnest desire ot liberty for tender consciences to his Protestant subjects ; and my lords the bishops having , divers of them , on several occasions professed an inclination , and owned the reasonableness of such a Christian temper ; we apprehend *
it will raise suspicions m men ' s minds of something different from the case of religion or the public , or -a design to heal our breaches , when they find , that by confining secular employments to ecclesiastical conformity , those are shut out from civil affairs , whose doctrine
and worship may be tolerated by authority of Parliament , there being a bill before us , by order of the House , to that purpose ; especially when , without this exclusive rigour , the Church is se - cured in all her privileges and preferments , nobody being hereby let into them who is not strictly conformable .
" 3 dly . Because to set marks of distinction and humiliation on any sort of men who have not rendered themselves justly suspected to the government , as it is at all times to be avoided by the makers of just and equitable laws , so may it be particularly of ill effect to the reformed interest at home and abroad , in this present conjuncture , which stands in need of the united hands and hearts
of all Protestants , against the open attempts and secret endeavours of a restless party , and a potent neighbour , who is more zealous than Home itself to plant popery in these kingdoms , and labours , with the utmost force , to settle his tyranny upon the ruins of the Reformation all through Europe . " 4 thly . Because it turns the alge of
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134 Occasional Corresvondence
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 2, 1828, page 134, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2557/page/62/
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