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Untitled Article
one common "bond of union , will exhort the people to join together and pull together for free government , for cheap government , for rationaJ government—not for a party but the nation , not for a sect hut for Christianity , not exclusively for the rich , but equally for the poor—and Britain would then be what she has often boasted she was —The envy of surrounding nations , and the admiration of the world . On one point the independent is at fault . After proposing to abolish the established church immediately , he is asked
* And what would you do with the property and clergy of this church ? * Leave the clergy at once to be supported by their flocks , and gather the property into one general fund , to be placed at the disposal of the nation . * This would be penny-wise and pound-foolish as to the ' nation , and harsh and unjust towards individuals .
What is called church property ,, is in fact a public trust of property , assigned in perpetuity for a particular purpose , the spiritual and moral culture of the people . The community would be little benefited by its being seized and thrown into that great quagmire , the National Debt . Still less is there occasion to make a present of the tithes to the landlords . The best thing would be for the property to remain intact ; commuting the tithes for land , or land ' s worth in money ; and for the nation to reap the benefit of its original appropriation , that appropriation being interpreted in accordance with the knowledge which mankind have gained since the endowments were founded . The donors thought tliat the essence of moral and spiritual culture was in the rites and ordinances of
the Romish church . It was long ago discovered that they were mistaken ; and that the funds which they left were properly applied to the purer and ampler instruction of the episcopal church , very well ; the people are ripe for , and need a more pure and ample instruction still . The church of England is in the same predicament now as the church of Rome was , three centuries ago . Then , the old mass book and the mysteries would not do any longer . They were found insufficient . And the services and sermons of the clergy are found insufficient now , and they will not do any
longer . We want something more and better for the money ; and the nation has a right to the most and the best which that money will procure . Not only religious worship of so comprehensive a form , that few would dissent from it ; or so varied , that almost all might join in that which they preferred ; but education also , a thorough education for the entire population ; the apparatus of scientific experiments ; lectures on all topics which can be illustrated by lecturing ; institutes and libraries ; in short , the complete mental culture of the people might be provided for out of what is called church property , and would be the enlightened direction of that property towards the end which the founders contemplated in their blind and superstitious way . This would
Untitled Article
782 An Independent in Church and State *
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Nov. 2, 1833, page 782, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2626/page/50/
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