The admission of the Roman catholic body to equal privileges, was defended as a measure of policy. The national clergy appealed to a legal recognition; but, until a recent period, the catholic worship had by statesmen been both tolerated and abjured. The penal institutions required catholic instructors, to teach a proportion of prisoners, amounting to one-third of the whole. The appointment of the Rev. Dr. Ullathorne as vicar-general, led to increasing concessions of money and patronage. The zeal and intelligence of that clergyman was conspicuous in the management of the prisoner class. On their arrival, they were submitted to a course of moral and religious training, and from his testimony it appears, that the effect was long visible, and led to a marked decrease of crime.[221] The patronage of the crown was more freely granted to the Roman catholics than the presbyterians, until the general policy of the state was revised. When other non-national communions were passed over, the number of the catholics, and their subordination to a governing body, were the reasons assigned for their special countenance.
The protestant bishop, Dr. Broughton, was preceded by the arrival of Dr. Polding, the prelate of the Roman church. An incident occurred, which occasioned great delight to his adherents: he landed at Hobart Town, and the governor sent down his carriage to the beach to conduct him to the government-house. At a meeting of the catholic body, resolutions, to which Messrs. Rowe and Hackett were the speakers, voted a present of plate, to express their gratitude for Arthur's zeal in their cause, and his courtesy to their bishop.
Beside the leading denominations, who obtained the pay of the state, the wesleyans possessed the great pre-requisite, a governing body. By a singular oversight, they permitted the bounty of the treasury to descend to them in an annual donation, instead of a stipend regulated by the general law. Their co-religionists in New South Wales now enjoy an endowment, of which nothing can deprive them, but the joint consent of the crown and the people.
The preliminaries being settled, a bill was introduced by Franklin, and passed into law (November, 1837). It authorised the governor to grant £300 to any congregation, to provide a parsonage, and £700 for the erection of a church, or a sum not greater than the amount subscribed by the people. It directed the issue of a salary of £200 to any minister of the three churches, whose congregation should be equal to eighty adults, or in towns to two hundred. The discussion of this bill created considerable controversy: the ministers of the church of England were especially opposed to its latitudinarian aspect, and Archdeacon Hutchins represented that the principle was wholly untenable on Christian grounds, but cast the responsibility of a permanent establishment of the papal faith on the members of the Scotch communion. Their protest against the bill, and a renunciation of their claims would, he affirmed, at once fix the establishment principle. Had the proportionate numbers of the two churches been reversed, he believed that, rather than endow the Romish priesthood, the Anglican communion would abandon all further competition for the favours of the state. To this the minister of St. Andrew's retorted, that the responsibility lay wholly with the state; and that, if sincere, the English clergy might, by withdrawing their own, remove the pretensions of all.
The archdeacon, and his clergy[222] of the English church, united in a petition, presented by the chief justice, against the provisions of the act. They complained that its principles were a compromise of truth, since they not only assumed that the religious "sentiments of the Roman catholics are equally entitled with those of the protestant to the support of government, but that every variety of religious sentiments, which is to be met with amongst the various denominations of Christians, is entitled to support, without any reference whatever to the conformity of those sentiments to the word of God."
The law was scarcely in action, when one of its clauses was found to operate against its professed design. A church and a house were required before a minister could be salaried; but the settlement of a clergyman was in fact a necessary preliminary to the erection of a church. An amendment gave the governor a power to issue a salary on a requisition, on condition of a small local subscription (1838). But this relaxation proved mischievous in another direction: the salary was paid, but the church was not erected. This required a third law, and it was therefore enacted, that if a religious edifice were not in progress within six months from the issue of a stipend, payment should be discontinued (1840).
The colony, on the passing of the church act, was an open field. The first clerical candidate, because he was such, engrossed a large proportion of the available signatures. The people, generally anxious for some form of worship, both as a moral agency and from its tendency to raise the respectability of a township, gave their names freely as bonâ fide members of either protestant church. The inevitable result was, an eager competition by the more zealous members of the rival communions. The meaning of bonâ fide membership of this or that church, was brought into considerable debate. The Anglican clergy insisted on the census; the Scotch on the right of every man to make himself a member for the purposes of the act, whatever his hereditary or mental creed. These different views led to serious discord: the analysis of names appended to various applications imputed all the errors, informalities, and even corruption supposed to attach to popular elections. Those who had never thought much on religion, gave with facility and then retracted their adhesion: they virtually changed not only their minister but their creed. The opposite parties represented each other in terms full of reproach and bitterness; imputations of sectarianism, intrusion, kidnapping, were the common forms of recrimination. It would be useless to relate examples now before the writer, in colours painted by the passions of the conflict. It is the nature of religious controversy to throw on the surface all the malignant feelings that cloud the reputation of gentler spirits, in whom the real virtues of a communion dwell; but the lesson is worth remembrance—that of all forms of clerical institution, none realise less the idea of loving-kindness than that based on universal suffrage.
The social effects of this competition were lamentable: neighbours were divided, who had often worshipped at the same altar; religious emulation sprung up in every locality: an attempt to possess the ground, led to the marching and counter-marching of hostile forces. The advent of an eminent clergyman on a township was reported to the head-quarters of his antagonists. In one place the moderator had appeared, in another the archdeacon: it was thus the more zealous partisans of either exasperated their antipathies. Again, the church act did not tie the laity to either their ministers or their creeds: thus a dissatisfied people might easily raise the preliminaries for a second or a third clergyman, and leave their late pastors to their salaries and their solitude.
Demands on the treasury for the erection of churches and support of the clergy perplexed the executive. The ordinary revenue showed symptoms of declension, and the council passed a bill which declared that new imposts were impracticable, and vested a discretionary power in the government to refuse assistance to any new undertaking (1841). Thus the principle of the church act was subverted, and the grant of money for purposes of religion confided solely to the impartiality of the administration.
The voluntary efforts of the different sects largely supplemented the legal provision. Churches of respectable architectural pretensions were rapidly multiplied. The wesleyans, independents, and baptists raised buildings for worship in the more important townships. Many private persons expended large sums for these purposes.