The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D. — Volume 03 Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church — Volume 1

To remove opinions fundamental in religion is impossible, and the attempt wicked, whether those opinions be true or false; unless your avowed design be to abolish that religion...

But there is another reason for the rise of land, more gradual, constant and certain; which will have its effects in countries that are very far from flourishing in any of the a...

I think I may assert, without the least partiality, that it is a treatise wholly devoid of wit or learning, under the most violent and weak endeavours and pretences to both. Tha...

Fifthly, the Bishop applies himself to his own party in both Houses of Parliament, whom he exhorts to "guard their religion and liberty against all danger at what distance soeve...

Another argument against the legislative power in the clergy of England, is, p. viii. that Tacitus telleth us; that in great affairs, the Germans consulted the whole body of the...

Page 95. "And that only _they_ had a right to give it." Another part of his scheme, that the people have a right to give the sacrament. See more of it, pp. 135 and 137.

There is not a landlord in the whole kingdom, residing some part of the year at his country-seat, who is not, in his own conscience, fully convinced, that the tithes of his mini...

Men of eminent parts and abilities, as well as virtues, do sometimes rise in the court, sometimes in the law, and sometimes even in the Church. Such were the Lord Bacon, the Ear...

[Footnote 1: Lucius Cary, second Viscount Falkland (1610-1643), who was killed at the battle of Newbury in the great Civil War, was a generous patron of learning and of the lite...

The other bill, which passed in two days after the former, is said to concern the division of parishes into as many parcels as the bishop shall think fit, only leaving £300 a-ye...

To enter upon particulars: A Church of England man hath a true veneration for the scheme established among us of ecclesiastic government; and though he will not determine whethe...

The mention of quotations puts me in mind of commonplace books, which have been long in use by industrious young divines, and I hear do still continue so. I know they are very b...

Swift took an entirely different attitude towards Collins from that assumed by the professional controversialists. He refused to take him seriously, and no doubt he felt that ri...

My Lord begins his Introduction with an account of the reasons why he was guilty of so many mistakes in the first volume of his "History of the Reformation:" His excuses are jus...

Our priests differ about the eternity of hell torments. The famous Dr Henry More,[13] and the most pious and rational of all priests, Dr Tillotson,[14] (both freethinkers,) beli...

To conclude: A Church of England man may with prudence and a good conscience approve the professed principles of one party more than the other, according as he thinks they best...

_Ibid_. "Great advantage which both Church and state have got by the kindness already shewn to dissenters." Let them then be thankful for that. We humour children for their good...

Scott notes that the "tone of _aigreur_," which is more distinctly felt in the second of these tracts, intimates a "deep dissatisfaction with late ecclesiastical preferments, wh...

The other popish expedient for augmenting church-revenues, is "engaging the clergy to renew no leases."[31] Several of the most eminent clergymen have assured me, that nothing h...

The many corruptions at present in every branch of business are almost inconceivable. I have heard it computed by skilful persons, that of six millions raised every year for the...

The grave and wise Cato the censor will for ever live in that noble freethinking saying--"I wonder," said he, "how one of our priests can forbear laughing when he sees another!"...

To gratify this great reformer, who enlarges the episcopal rent-roll almost one half; let me suppose that all the Church lands in the kingdom were thrown up to the laity; would...

He doth not think the Church of England so narrowly calculated, that it cannot fall in with any regular species of government; nor does he think any one regular species of gover...

In the last place, I think nothing can be more plain, than that by this expedient, we shall run into the evil we chiefly pretend to avoid; and that the abolishment of the Christ...

It is further objected against the Gospel System, that it obliges men to the belief of things too difficult for free-thinkers, and such who have shaken off the prejudices that u...

The inquiry into the religious thought of the eighteenth century forms one of the most interesting subjects for speculation in the history of the intellectual development of wes...

But, if the like methods were pursued as far as possible, with regard to those who are in the great employments of state, it is hard to conceive how general a reformation they m...

[Footnote 2: Peter Heylin, D.D. (1600-1662) was born at Burford, Oxfordshire. Educated at Magdalen College, Oxford, and became in succession, chaplain to Charles I., rector of H...