the descriptions of the life of a good country clergyman, from the time of Chaucer to the days of Goldsmith, represent it as the happiest, most useful, and most respectable, that can be imagined. Such delineations, joined to the sense, which all good and wise people must have of the importance and dignity of the clerical profession, would naturally dispose parents to educate their children for the church: and it was obviously the original intention of our constitution, that not only a decent competence should be secured to all deserving clergymen, but that men of superior learning, talents, and conduct, should, without any assistance, or recommendation, but what their own merit afford, rise to the highest dignities of the church. The regulations and endowments of our universities, and the gifts of many generous individuals, provided a fund, which put it into the power of any man to pursue his studies at college, and to make his way in the church, without any expense to his family, and without requiring the assistance of patronage, or the advantages of a private fortune. But, though our universities, and their endowments, continue the same, yet such has been the change in the value of money, and in the real and imaginary necessities, which alterations in manners have produced, that it is now scarcely possible for any man to go through college without some aid from private fortune.-Even after the expenses of education are defrayed, and when a young man is ordained, his salary, as a curate, is so small, that he can hardly support the becoming rank and appearance of a gentleman, and at the same time preserve his independence. He has not, like men in other professions, various means of improving and advancing his fortune by his own exertions or merit. He may, indeed, become a schoolmaster,

and the press is open to him. Some young men of great talents have, by their mode of preaching, and by their publications, whilst they were yet curates, brought themselves into public notice, and have in consequence obtained preferment. Some have become tutors in the families of noblemen, and, after a course of years, have been justly remunerated for their services by benefices in the church. Some, unconnected with the great, have been distinguished by royal discernment and justice, and, without any species of solicitation, have most unexpectedly been appointed to bishoprics. But they were men of very extraordinary merit; and these are not cases of probable recurrence. It is obvious, that, in all these instances, a considerable length of time was necessary to obtain distinction by exemplary conduct, or by literary superiority. In the mean while, curates must live; if they marry, they cannot support a family decently; to enjoy the comforts of life, must often be utterly impracticable.

Some curates in the remote parts of England, and especially in Wales, have such small salaries, and such hard duty to perform, that it seems scarcely possible for them and their families literally to exist. Nor is their poverty, as amongst mendicant and ascetic orders of former times, a circumstance to be avowed and gloried in; but to be concealed as something criminal: something, the acknowledgment of which must lead to a loss of worldly respect, and to an actual degradation of rank; the attempts at concealment must produce what is worse than degradation of rank, degradation of character. All the petty subterfuges, breaches of promise, and mean evasions of a debtor, must be practised, and all the

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servile habits of dependence must be contracted. This is the extreme line of human misery; in comparison with these evils, the privations and humiliations to which a poor man is exposed, who owns his poverty, appear easy to be endured.

"Do you know," said a country curate, "I am so inti"mate with my Lord ****'s butler, that I can say any thing to " him "."

This state of degradation is very different from the rector of Houghton's felicity, or from any of the descriptions of Chaucer, Pope, or Goldsmith: therefore poetry must not make us forget realities. How far it may be consistent with the policy of the legislature, and how far it may be for the interests of the church, to meliorate the present condition of curates, and of the lower orders of clergy, it is not the object of this essay to discuss. It was necessary, however, to advert to facts, which ought to be full in the view of all parents, who have thoughts of educating their sons for the church. Prudence should prevent them from choosing the clerical profession for a son, unless they are fully able not only to defray the very considerable expenses of his education at a university, but to add to his income, perhaps for many years, what may be sufficient to render him at least independent whilst he continues to be a curate. Some exceptions may be made, where extraor

* We hardly dare mention, even in a note, a fact in which there appears such a mixture of the ludicrous with the pitiable. We know from undoubted authority, that the cast wig of a beneficed clergyman, who resided some time in Wales, was most gratefully accepted by a poor curate, whose wild caxon could no longer cover his head with any decorum.

dinary indications of talents and application, joined to a decided preference for the clerical profession, are seen in a young man of inferior rank or fortune: where this is the case, his parents will do wisely to let him follow his own wishes; for probably he will have fortitude and exertion to endure or overcome all difficulties: he may raise himself and his family from indigence and obscurity to affluence and honourable stations; and it is within the verge of possibility, though not of probability, that this may be accomplished without the aid of parliamentary connexions.

The share, which parliamentary interest is known to have in disposing of ecclesiastical preferments, is, according to the manner in which it is obtained, either beneficial or injurious to the church, and to national morality. That which is exerted by rich commoners or noble families, to obtain livings for men of learning and virtue, who have been tutors to their children, is highly advantageous; it secures good education to our young nobility, and it encourages men of learning and talents, in the middle or lower classes of life, to instruct themselves, and to become fit for such employments, and worthy of such rewards. Parliamentary interest, influencing the distribution of clerical honours and emoluments, is also beneficial, as it tempts parents of good families and fortunes to educate younger sons for the church; they give, as it were, a family pledge for the good conduct of their children, who at the same time may, by their manners and rank, raise the whole profession in the esteem and respect of the publick. Church benefices may thus be considered as a fund, for the provision of the younger sons of our gentry and nobles; and

in this point of view it cannot surely be a matter of complaint to any of the higher and middle classes in the community, that the clergy enjoy a large portion of the riches of the state. If this wealth, if these benefices are bestowed as rewards to merit, it is well employed for the nation, and none have any cause to be dissatisfied; and if we look at the present bench of bishops, and at the highest dignitaries of the church, it must be acknowledged, that, with few exceptions, the publick has just reason to approve of the manner, in which clerical honours have been dispensed: and though parliamentary influence may have had considerable share in the selection, yet still, where the persons rewarded are of eminent merit, upon the whole, candidates for church preferments have no just cause to be dissatisfied.

But parliamentary interest is not always employed in this manner; it is sometimes exerted to obtain livings for the mean hanger-on of one lord, or the drinking, or the profligate companion of another. Wherever this species of influence is permitted, it is extremely injurious, both to the immediate and the remote interests of the church; injurious, by introducing into it men, whose morals disgrace religion, and whose example lowers its members in the esteem both of the pious and the unbeliever; injurious, by lessening the confidence, which prudent parents and meritorious young clergymen ought to feel, that they shall meet with temporal rewards proportioned to the labour and expense of their education, and their talents, and moral conduct. Those who educate sons to be dependent on such patronage, and to employ any of the mean arts of servility and flattery, by which some have risen in the