found our reasoning, not on the utility of an establishment, but on its possible abuse, we shall at length have no establishment either religious or civil. If the alliance between church and state is to be considered as nothing more than an alliance of religious abuse with political abuse, the inference will be no less subversive of our civil than of our ecclesiastical establishment. These remarks we have thought it necessary to make, because Paley's sentiments have been lately so represented as if an alliance between church and state must lead to the corruption of both, or as if the principles maintained in his Moral Philosophy were inconsistent with an established or national religion.

But even were it true, that in reference to the state, all religious parties in this country were on an equal footing, one consequence at least would follow, namely, that the party constituting the Church of England had the same right to associate among themselves for the promotion of their own cause as any other party. If the old dissenters in this country, namely, the Baptists, the Presbyterians, and the Independents, may associate without reproach for the furtherance of their own systems; if the modern seceders, called Methodists, may do the same; if the same privilege is not denied even to the Catholics; surely the members of our own church may likewise associate among themselves, for the purpose of self-defence, without being exposed to the reproach of their neighbours. The circumstance that this church is in fact the established church, cannot place them in a worse condition than those who are not of the establishment. But the circumstance that they are still the stronger party may excite the jealousy and apprehension of the weaker parties. Now jealousy will always subsist between similar societies, whether civil or religious; but the dissenters have surely nothing to apprehend for their own safety from the establishment of the National Society. All intentions of interfering with their religious concerns were expressly disavowed, both in the prospectus and in the address to the public. It was formally declared, that 'whatever religious tenets men of other persuasions may think proper to combine with the mechanism of the new system, whether tenets peculiar to themselves or tenets of a more general nature, they are free to use the new system so combined without reproach or interruption from the members of the establishment.' claim, therefore, no more than we are ready to grant; nor can it be considered as an offence that a society established to promote what Dr. Paley himself calls the National Religion should be entitled the National Society.

We

Having shewn that the appellation is justified by that very authority to which the adversaries of the society appeal, we must now endeavour to guard against an error, to which a misapplication of it

6

might lead, in respect to the object of the society. The avowed object of the society, the very condition on which subscriptions have been solicited and received is, Education in the Principles of the Established Church.' In the address prefixed to the primary resolutions, the friends of the establishment throughout the kingdom are earnestly requested to associate and co-operate for the purpose of promoting the education of the poor in the doctrine and discipline of the established church.' This society therefore, like the society for promoting Christian Knowledge, is altogether an association of members of the establishment; consequently the funds of the society are wholly derived from the contributions of those members who have subscribed for the specific object above stated. Hence it follows, that in estimating the claims upon those funds, we must never lose sight, either of the persons who have contributed, or of the purpose for which they have contributed. We must not consider the funds of the society as being national in that sense, which applies to a national treasury, consisting of contributions from men of every description in the state. When a fund is raised from the contributions of one party, for the avowed purpose of educating the poor in the principles of that party, it is evident, that they who refuse to conform to those principles, can have no claim on such a fund. This reasoning applies equally to every society; it applies equally to the churchman and to the dissenter. The term exclusion, which has been invidiously applied to this society, belongs not to this society alone. For every society, whether civil or religious, which requires from its members any kind of qualification to entitle them to admission, (and this is the case in most societies,) necessarily excludes every candidate in whom the qualification is wanting. Now the qualification required by the National Society, and which it must require from the very nature of its constitution is, that the children for whose education it provides, should be brought up in the doctrine and discipline of the established church. Here then is an association of churchmen, providing, in the first instance, for the education of children belonging to parents who are likewise churchmen, but whose children, for want of such provision, might either have no education at all, or an education different from that of the established church. The society was founded, not in the spirit of proselytism, but of self-preservation. Its primary object was to retain in the establishment the children of churchmen, by an education in the principles of the established church. Its adversaries indeed contend, that if the established religion is really more excellent than any other, it cannot need the bias of early instruction to secure adherents; and hence conclude, that they who are solicitous to communicate this early bias, imply at least a doubt on their parts, whether the established

religion

religion really is so excellent as they pretend. But would it not be more reasonable to conclude, that solicitude for the promotion of an object shewed rather a conviction, than a doubt, of its excellence? When a father educates a son in habits of industry and honesty, no man concludes that he doubts the real excellence of those qualities. In like manner, if we think that education in the church is necessary for the purpose of preserving our children in the religion of their fathers, it is not because we doubt the excellence of that religion; it is not because we think it has nothing to recommend it beside an early prepossession, but because the very best of principles, if not instilled at an early age, are seldom or never instilled at all. Considering our own doctrines as conformable with scripture, and our discipline as consistent with it, we promote an education which is suitable to such doctrine and discipline, well knowing that the education which we give to our children must determine the religion which they will profess as men. Christianity itself, when taken in its broadest sense, would not be secure without a Christian education; for if the children of English parents. were sent to Turkey for religious instruction, they would become not Christians but Mahometans. The insinuation, therefore, in respect to the Church of England, that a solicitude for education in its principles is an argument against its worth, not only applies to every other religious party, but to Christianity in its widest extent. And as our adversaries themselves would certainly not carry the insinuation so far, they must admit the injustice of its application to the Christianity which is established in this country. They must admit that the zeal of the National Society, in promoting an education adapted to this religion, is no argument against the excellence of the religion itself, but is simply founded on the maxim, that as we sow, so shall we reap.

The specific object of the society being education in the principles of the established church, the children of churchmen, who would otherwise remain uneducated, or be educated in other principles, are of course the immediate objects of its attention. But they are not the only objects of its attention, provided the parents of children, who ask for admission, consent to those conditions, on which alone admission can consistently be granted. Every one who confers a voluntary boon, has a right to annex to it what conditions he pleases: if there is no injustice in withholding a favour altogether, there can be no injustice in withholding it, if the applicant refuses what the donor requires as a qualification for the grant. Now the subscribers to the National Society might have withholden their subscriptions without injustice to any one; cousequently they had a right to prescribe such conditions as they pleased to the gratuitous education which they intended to provide. But

the

the grand condition on which the whole institution hinges, is education in the doctrine and discipline of the established church. It was for this particular kind of education for which the subscriptions were solicited and paid. Consequently no parent who refuses to let his children be educated for the church, has a right to complain, if his children are not received by this society. In fact, the conductors of it being trustees of a common fund, cannot, without a breach of trust, employ what is confided to their care, for any other purpose than that for which it was so confided. Since then, the funds of the National Society were raised for the express purpose of promoting education in the principles of the established church, the guardians of those funds would be amenable for a misapplication of them, if they employed them in promoting education, which was not founded upon that basis. The conductors of the institution therefore being bound to employ the funds which were entrusted to them, on the furtherance of a prescribed object, it is the institution itself, and not the conductors of it, which must be subject to censure, if the furtherance of that object is matter of reproach. But we have already seen, that the qualification for admission required by the society is such as it had a perfect right to demand.

Let us now consider, whether this qualification, or condition required by the society, operates so extensively, or carries exclusion so far, as to be a bar to the admission of any other children than the children of churchmen. The most numerous class of seceders in this country are the methodists; indeed they probably exceed in number all other classes of seceders put together. But the methodists in general, whether followers of Wesley or of Whitefield, profess an attachment to the doctrine, and even to the discipline of the established church. They are seceders in having their own places of worship, not under the establishment, nor subject to episcopal jurisdiction; but they have no objection to attend the service of the church, and in fact consider themselves as the true churchmen. No methodist therefore can properly object to the condition required by the National Society; consequently the children of all the Methodists throughout the kingdom are admissible into schools which are in union with this society.

But though the condition required can present no obstacle to the methodists, it may to the old dissenters. On the other hand, however, we must observe, that they who are chiefly excluded by it are the least subject to inconvenience from such exclusion. Among the Quakers, whom the condition particularly affects, there are few, if any, objects of gratuitous education: and if there were, it is not probable that any relaxation of principle would induce the Quakers to send their children to a place which had the appearance

of

of a Church-of-England school. Among the Socinians too, there are few or no objects of gratuitous education, for Socinianism has not yet spread itself among the lower orders. The Baptists have their poor, but they have also their rich, as appears from the ample subscriptions to the Baptist Missionary fund. The two other denominations of what are called orthodox dissenters, namely, the Presbyterians and the Independents, are dissenters rather in discipline than in doctrine. The use of the Church Catechism would not be a bar to the admission of their children into a Church-of-England school. But to that part of the condition which requires the attendance of the children at church, there are probably some parents (though certainly much fewer than is supposed) who would object. Here then the condition, if strictly enforced, might exclude children, who would otherwise have no education at all. And though exclusion, even in such cases, would not be inconsistent with strict justice, it might militate against the dictates of humanity. As this is a point of great importance to the National Society, it deserves minute examination.

In the first place, we must observe, that no general rule can be founded on a few extreme cases; and though an exception is said to prove a rule, it can never constitute a rule. Now the rule which the society cannot abandon, without abandoning the very object for which it was formed, is, that the children received into its schools, should be educated in the doctrine and discipline of the established church. This is the very charter of its foundation; and if this charter be altered, a society, which was formed for the preservation of the church may be converted into an instrument of its destruction; nor would either the name of the agent, or the quality of its promoters prevent the consequences which must ensue. It is the thing, and not the name, with which we are concerned. As the question at present is not whether the children of the poor shall be educated or not, so on the other hand the question is not by whom, but in what principles they shall be educated, The question is not, whether the children patronized by the National Society shall be taught to read, to write, and to cypher, in a school regulated by this or by that individual, but whether the school shall be so regulated as to bring up the children to the established religion. If it is not so regulated, it is regulated on principles which are at variance with the fundamental law of the National Society. And this fundamental law cannot consistently be altered. The conductors of the society cannot subject themselves to the charge of having raised money on false pretences. They cannot expose themselves to the danger of being called upon to restore what was paid for one purpose but applied to another. And it is not very probable, that the two Universities for instanee, who