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    that , to the will unites the power of defying thy useless array of well paid officials . I will not insist on the firm conviction I have that thou desecratest thy , spiritual by the assumption of legislative functions , that thou raakest thy spiritual influence contribute to thy civil aggrandisement , and thy political subserviency tributary to thy worldly affluence *

    I merely express my wonder that thou canst have allowed ages to elapse without such improvements in thy forms of worship as might adapt them to improved states of mind , improved usages of society , and convert them from a dead letter into a living reality . These things I know and deplore , but I pass them by to ask , how far in the great bearings of thy influence thou hast contributed to the intellectual and spiritual good of my children ?

    Small defects I could tolerate . The vice of thy connexion with the civil power I could endure yet for a season ; but I have a right to expect that in return for all the good things I have poured into thy lap , thou shouldest have instructed the mind and informed the heart of the great bulk of the people * What hast thou done ? Let us first attend to intellectual education . P ast thou been its promoter and friend in proportion to thy

    distinguished station and multitudinous opportunities ? Experience answers unhesitatingly and loudly , No . The young of the labouring classes thou art now instructing in considerable numbers , but not—the fact is knownnot in consequence of thy own good will ; rather because compelled by the irresistible impulse of public opinion , and in the sordid fear lest , in allowing others to have the education of the youthful poor , thou shouldest undermine thy foundations and fall prematurely . The marks of compulsion in this work are visible to every eye . What plan for the education of the many didst thou originate ? Bell was but the antagonist of Lancaster , and set forward mainly with the design of preventing the catholic plans of Lancaster from diffusing that catholic spirit before which a Church that is eminently sectarian could not stand . What would have been the actual state of popular education if left to . thee ? Which of thy prelates led the way in the education of the youthful poor ? The work , if any , is eminently Christian . There stand thy professed models , Jesus Christ and his apostles , themselves poor , teaching the poor , and the poor hearing them gladly .

    The work is eminently Protestant . Thou hast reproached the Catholics with having the key of knowledge , yet entering not themselves , and hindering those who desired to enter . If the right and exercise of individual judgment , and the sufficiency of the Scriptures , are the bases of thy seces sion from the papacy , surely it is thy duty to take care that all are able to read the Bible and judge for themselves . Yet , how much soever the work is in unison with the great principles of Christianity and Protestantism , thou hast not been found the leader of the blind , thou wert not the first to unseal the pages of the Bible to the many . True it is , that when first thoudidst separate from the Church of Rome , thou didst encourage the reading of the Scriptures ; but no sooner was thy power established by this means ,

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    The Question between the Nation and the Church . 827

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1831, page 827, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2604/page/31/