"With regard to alterations in the laws which govern our ecclesiastical establishment, I have had no recent opportunity of giving that grave consideration to a subject of the deepest interest, which could alone justify me in making any public declaration of opinion. It is a subject which must undergo the fullest deliberation, and into that deliberation the Government will enter with the sincerest desire to remove every abuse that can impair the efficiency of the Establishment, extend the sphere of its usefulness, and to strengthen and confirm its just claims upon the respect and affections of the people."
This is just what I wanted you to say. It is honest, if you will but act up to it. This is the sort of Church Reform that I propose. Here we have from you, as the Chief Minister, a promise that your Administration will enter into the fullest deliberation, with the sincerest desire to remove every abuse that can impair the efficiency of the Church Establishment, extend the sphere of its usefulness, and strengthen and confirm its just claims upon the respect and affections of the people. Had I been called to your situation, I could not have promised more; but I should have acted up to that promise, and I hope you will so act. In the performance of that promise, everlasting fame will be yours. So act—and greater than the name of Lycurgus or Solon—greater than that of Cicero, Constantine, or Napoleon—greater than the name of any past man will be that of Robert Peel. If the Duke of Wellington join you in this sentiment, and goes manly and honestly forward to its accomplishment, his, too, will be an imperishable name. This would wreathe him an evergreen chaplet, that would survive the memory of all his physical victories! This is the great moral victory to be obtained before any society can settle down into peace, welfare, and happiness:—the best use that can be made of the Church. It is a subject of the deepest interest; it requires grave consideration; I pray that it may have that consideration. I pray that I may be heard by a Commission, in grave consideration of that subject of the deepest interest, before any legislative change be entered upon. I put myself forward in this letter. Many will be the schemes proposed to your consideration: let mine be one, and then select and improve the best.
The first consideration is—What is now the Church? What are its defects? What the cause of that dissent, which has made a revision necessary?
The second consideration will be—What ought the Church to be, so as to leave no ground and reason of dissent? To some minds, the fickleness and fallibility of human nature will appear as an insurmountable obstacle to the construction of such a Church. I see farther and will propose in order.
I flatter myself that I am writing this letter with very proper feelings toward all institutions and all persons. I suspend, pro tem., all quarrels that I have with all men, to assist you in this common good, in which you deserve and will have, in the ratio of their goodness, the assistance of all good men. If I can sink the past in oblivion for common good, who should say he cannot? To the altar and shrine of that Reformed Church, which you contemplate, I have sacrificed property much—all I had, and years of liberty many. I am still worshipping, still so sacrificing, both property and personal liberty, and will so continue to the end. I say it not boastfully; but in comparative claim to attention, and in encouragement and example of union to assist you in the performance of your present promise.
Let me be permitted to say, too, that the Church is a subject which I have studied in its origin, its history, its first principle, all its dissent or variation from that first principle, down to its present standing. I have so studied it, that I cannot now find author or preacher who can present me any thing new as to its general merits, past or present. This is the chief ground on which I solicit your and the public attention to my view of this subject of Church Reform. I presume to know what the Church is, and what it ought to be.
It may be taken as a point to be yielded by all parties, that the desire with regard to the Law Established Church is, the removal of all ground of dissent, so as not to leave it a mere sectarian Church, which any mere abatement of existing dissenting objections will do. No Dissenter can complain, if the ground of his dissent be removed from the Church. And if there be no ground of future dissent left, there can be no future complaint, no new dissension arising. Without the absence of the possibility of dissent, there can be no just holding and application of a public and common property for the business of the Church. With that absence, the property is justly held and applied. Any law that recognizes and tolerates the Dissenter, recognizes and tolerates the justness of his dissent, and calls for the primary justice of removing the ground of dissent. No man can reasonably say, let us not be of one Church; but every man can reasonably say, let the Church be purified of its errors; and while any man can show an error, it is his duty to call for the purification, and the duty of authorities to attend to his call and to purify. A permanent Church then must be an improving, self-purifying Church, and continue a true picture of the best state of the human mind, meeting every well-founded and majority-decided call upon its utility.
Any idea of keeping up a Law Established Church with public property, surrounded by Dissenting Churches, without a public property, can enter the head of no man who understands the subject. There can be no peace or final settlement under such an arrangement. The effect to be accomplished is, not to break up the Church Property; but to break up the Dissenters from the Church. This will startle the present state of mind and feeling. I propose no abridgement of equal liberty. Is not this the grand desideratum? Can it be accomplished?—I think it can, and so proceed to unfold the two-fold consideration.
First.—What is now the Church? What are its defects? What the cause of that dissent which has made a revision necessary?
This, in reality, is but one question, with a three-fold expression.