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great reluctance, in order to return to England, there to folicit fome matters in favour of the commerce of Penfilvania. But he never fawit again, he dying in Rufcomb in Berkshire, anno 1718.

I AM not able to guess what fate Quakerifm may have in America, but I perceive it dwindles away daily in England. In all countries where liberty of confcience is allow'd, the establish'd religion will at last fwallow up all the all the reft. Quakers are difqualified from being members of parliament; nor can they enjoy any poft or preferment, because an oath must always be taken on thefe occafions, and they never fwear. They are therefore reduc'd to the neceffity of fubfifting upon traffick. Their children, whom the induftry of their parents has enrich'd, are defirous of enjoying honours, of wearing buttons and ruffles; and quite afham'd of being call'd Quakers, they become converts to the church of England, merely to be in the fashion.

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LETTER V.

ON THE

CHURCH

E

O F

ENGLAND.

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ANGLAND is properly the country of fectarists. Multæ funt manfiones in domo patris mei, (in my father's house are many manfions.) An Englishman, as one to whom liberty is natural, may go to heaven his

own way.

NEVERTHELESs, tho' every one is permitted to ferve God in whatever mode or fashion he thinks proper, yet their true religion, that in which a man makes his fortune, is thefect of Epilcoparians or Churchmen, call'd the Church of England, or fimply the Church, by way of eminence. No perfon can possess an employment, either in England or Ireland, unless he be rank'd among the faithful, that is, profeffes himself a member of the Church of England. This reason (which carries mathe

matical

matical evidence with it) has converted fuch numbers of diffenters of all perfuafions, that not a twentieth part of the nation is out of the pale of the establish'd Church. The English clergy have retain'd a great number of the Romish ceremonies, and especially that of receiving, with a moft fcrupulous attention, their tithes. They alfo have the pious ambition to aim at fuperiority.

MOREOVER, they infpire very religioufly their flock with a holy zeal against Diffenters of all denominations. This zeal was pretty violent under the Tories, in the four Jaft years of queen Anne; but was pro1ductive of no greater mifchief than the breaking the windows of fome meetinghouses, and the demolishing of a few of them. For religious rage ceas'd in England with the civil wars; and was no more under queen Anne, than the hollow noise of a fea whose billows still heav'd, tho' fo long after the ftorm, when the Whigs and Tories laid waste their native country, in the fame manner as the Guelphs and Gibelines formerly did theirs. 'Twas abfolutely neceffary for both parties to call in religion on this occafion; the Tories declar'd for epifcopacy, and the Whigs, as fome imagin'd, were for abolishing it; however, after these had got the upper hand, they contented themselves with only abridging its power.

AT the time when the earl of Oxford and the lord Bolingbroke us❜d to drink healths to the Tories, the Church of England confider'd thofe noblemen as the defenders of

its holy privileges. The lower house of Convocation (a kind of houfe of Commons) compos'd wholly of the clergy, was in fome credit at that time; at leaft the mem-. bers of it had the liberty to meet, to difpute on ecclefiaftical matters, to sentence impious books from time to time to the flames, that is, books written against themfelves. The miniftry, which is now compos'd of Whigs, does not so much as allow thofe gentlemen to affemble, fo that they are at this time reduc'd (in the obfcurity of their respective parishes) to the melancholy occupation of praying for the profperity of the government, whofe tranquillity they would willingly difturb. With regard to the bifhops, who are twenty-fix in all, they ftill have feats in the houfe of lords in fpite of the Whigs, because the ancient abuse of confidering them as Barons fubfifts to this day. There is a claufe however in the oath which the government requires from thefe gentlemen, that puts their chriftian. patience to a very great trial, viz. that they fhall be of the Church of England as by law establish'd. There are few bishops,. deans, or other dignitaries, but imagine they are fo jure divino; 'tis confequently

great

great mortification to them to be oblig'd to confefs, that they owe their dignity to a pitiful law enacted by a fet of profane laymen. A learned monk (father Courcyer) writ a book lately to prove the validity and fucceffion of English ordinations. This Book was forbid in France; but do you believe that the English miniftry were pleas'd with it? Far from it. Thofe damn'd Whigs. don't value a straw, whether the epifcopal fucceffion among them hath been interrupted or not, or whether bishop Parker was confecrated (as 'tis pretended) in a tavern, or a church; for thefe Whigs are much better pleas'd that the bishops fhould derive their authority from the parliament, than from the apoftles. The lord Bobferv'd, that this notion of divine right would only make fo many tyrants in lawnfleeves, but that the laws made fo many citizens.

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WITH regard to the morals-of the Englif clergy, they are more regular than thofe of France, and for this reafon : All the clergy (a very few excepted) are educated in the universities of Oxford or Cambridge, far from the depravity and corruption which reign in the capital. They are not call'd to dignities till very late, in an age when men are fenfible of no other paffion but avarice, that is, when their ambition craves a fupply. EmployC 4

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