Other Church Dignitaries belonged, as a matter of right, at the signing of Magna Charta; and from which they never can be excluded without violating the very first article of Magna Charta, the basis of English liberty.
4. In the law De excommunicato capiendo, by which the State engages, that on receiving due notice of the excommunication of any given person, he shall be arrested, and put in prison until he is absolved.
Such are the four principal heads of State Protection: on reading them over, it will occur to every one, that the first is nothing more than common justice, and no greater favour than every person in the country receives in being protected from thieves; that, as to the second, the most that one can infer from it is, that in the eye of the State the importance of the Church is to the importance of civil government as a thousand to a million, or as one to a thousand; that, to counterbalance the third, which admits some Bishops to the House of Lords, all clergymen whatever are excluded from the House of Commons; and that the fourth is a bad useless law, which cannot be done away with too soon.
II. Such is State Protection: now, on the other hand, let us consider the existing set off against it, which is demanded of us. This is State Interference, which encumbers us in ways too numerous to be catalogued, but is especially grievous in regard to the two following particulars:—1. Church Patronage. 2. Church Discipline.
1. With regard to the first of these, it is obvious that the efficiency of the Church must ever mainly depend on the character of the Bisbops and Clergy; and that any laws which facilitate the intrusion of unfit persons into such stations must be in the highest degree prejudicial. The appointment of our Bishops, and of those who are to undertake the cure of souls, is a trust on which so much depends, that it is difficult to be too cautious as to the hands in which it is placed, and as to the checks with which its due execution is guarded. The sole object which should be kept in view is the getting these offices well filled, and the fewer private interests which are allowed to inter-
