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should become necessary , would doubtless refuse to let them loose from their present state of abeyance . No one can contemplate the enforcement of these laws without parliamentary sanction , and-if Parliament thought the Dissenters entitled to fair play with the church , what good can the Churchman Contemplate from the mere existence on the Statute Book of such enactments ? On the other hand , can he not see that distrust and half confidence are the most likely sources of division and discord , of antipathy and danger to the
Church ? Can he expect a healthful state of society while his occupation lasts of persuading one half of the community to keep the other half with halters round their necks , and of coaxing this latter half into being quiet under the operation , because it would , he admits , be " harsh , and almost tyrannous , " to hang them . It might be of use to somebody to crush the Dissenters altogether , but it is worse than useless merely to bully and threaten them . It mi g ht be pleasant to the church to be able to persecute , but how can it be politic to shew a wish to do so when the power is gone ?
* Great objection is taken to the Dissenters for not asking the repeal as a concession , but demanding it as a right . We do not admit any weakness in the position of denying to any civil authority the right of intermeddling with mere religious opinions , but exceedingly little is said in the " Statement" on this question of right , in the way in which the Pamphleteer would represent ; though , to be sure , it talks of " those important political rights from which they are shut out . " A great deal of space is wasted in arguing the
question of natural ri ght to offices , &c . &c , about which the writer might have saved his paper . There are important offices , honours , rights , ( or whatever he may choose to call them , ) to which Dissenters would , in common course , be eligible , and of which they would have their share , but for their exclusion , in Whole or in part , on account of their religious profession . For this exclusion from rights , which no one would otherwise aeny , they assert that do sufficient justification is shewn ; and some of them , and of their defenders ,
assert , that the case is one in which none can be shewn . But unless the Churchman refutes the first assertion , it is quite unnecessary to discuss with him whether the point is to be argued on the ground of natural right or immutable policy ; whether , if it be politic or advisable , it be morally or religiously justifiable to make a man ' s creed the test of his qualification to be an exciseman or a chancellor .
The author is not very fortunate in his historical assertions . He protests strongl y ( but with a knowledge of the subject obviously imperfect , and certainly not going further than what he finds in the " Statement" itself ) against the assertion that the operation which the Test and Corporation Acts have acquired was accidental , and that perpetual exclusion of the persons who became , or now are , Protestant Dissenters , was not the deliberate purpose of the Legislature .
" Was there not a continual struggle between the Parliament and Charles , who wished to pass an act of generaftoleration , in order that , under the cloak of indulgence to the Dissenters , he might bring the Papists into power } Did qot the Parliament force the King , by their remonstrance , to rescind his illegal declaration of general indulgence ? And , in short , is it not as evident as fects can make it , that the Lords and Commons were decidedly hostile to the Dissenters , and that the favour shewed them by the King was not for their own aake , but on account of the Papists ? " —Pp . 30 , 31 .
Now , it is quite clear that Charles wished for a general toleration or indulgence for the sake of the Catholics , and that the Parliament , including the Dissenters , opposed it ; but the fact ^ e tail ^ d in Sergeant Hey wood ' s
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J 80 Review . —Defence of the Corporation and Test Act * .
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), March 2, 1828, page 180, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2558/page/36/
