Part 8

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 promote the good of Church and State; but he will never be swayed by passion or interest, to advance an opinion merely because it is that of the party he most approves; which one single principle he looks upon as the root of all our civil animosities. To enter into a party as into an order of friars with so resigned an obedience to superiors, is very unsuitable both with the civil and religious liberties we so zealously assert. Thus the understandings of a whole senate are often enslaved by three or four leaders on each side; who instead of intending the public weal, have their hearts wholly set upon ways and means how to get or to keep employments. But to speak more at large, how has this spirit of faction mingled itself with the mass of the people, changed their nature and manners, and the very genius of the nation; broke all the laws of charity, neighbourhood, alliance and hospitality; destroyed all ties of friendship, and divided families against themselves! And no wonder it should be so, when in order to find out the character of a person, instead of inquiring whether he be a man of virtue, honour, piety, wit, good sense, or learning; the modern question is only, whether he be a Whig or a Tory, under which terms all good and ill qualities are included.

Now, because it is a point of difficulty to choose an exact middle between two ill extremes, it may be worth enquiring in the present case, which of these, a wise and good man would rather seem to avoid: Taking therefore their own good and ill characters with due abatements and allowances for partiality and passion; I should think that in order to preserve the constitution entire in Church and State, whoever has a true value for both, would be sure to avoid the extremes of Whig for the sake of the former, and the extremes of Tory on account of the latter.

I have now said all that I could think convenient upon so nice a subject, and find I have the ambition common with other reasoners, to wish at least that both parties may think me in the right, which would be of some use to those who have any virtue left, but are blindly drawn into the extravagancies of either, upon false representations, to serve the ambition or malice of designing men, without any prospect of their own. But if that is not to be hoped for, my next wish should be, that both might think me in the wrong; which I would understand as an ample justification of myself, and a sure ground to believe, that I have proceeded at least with impartiality, and perhaps with truth.

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REMARKS

UPON A

BOOK,

INTITULED,

"THE RIGHTS OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH, &c."

WRITTEN IN THE YEAR 1708, BUT LEFT UNFINISHED.

NOTE.

Dr. Matthew Tindal, of whom a short account has already been given (see note, p. 9), issued his "Rights of the Christian Church" in 1706. In 1707 it had already gone through three editions. The full title of the work is: "The Rights of the Christian Church asserted, against the Romish and all other Priests, who claim an independent Power over it: with a Preface concerning the Government of the Church of England, as by law established." Ostensibly the book was an attack on the Roman Catholic Church, but the attack was so cleverly veiled that it included in its criticisms the Church of England also; and must take its place among the works of the deistical writers of the time who aimed at subverting the foundations of the relationships between the Church and the State. According to Dr. Hicks, who wrote several works in reply to Tindal's book, Tindal told a gentleman, who found him at work on it, that "he was writing a book which would make the clergy mad." If so, he did not fall short of his intention; for not only the clergy, but even learned laymen became "mad." In addition to Dr. Hicks of Oxford, the Church of England found champions in Dr. William Wotton, Samuel Hill, Conyers-Place, Mr. Oldisworth, and Swift. Swift delayed the preparation of the materials for his reply, or else he found other matters to occupy his time--the Sacheverel business came on soon after, and the Tindal controversy lost interest in this more immediate and more important affair. So that Swift's criticism remained unfinished, and was only published when his editors came to search among his papers. In 1710 Tindal's work was ordered, by a vote of the House of Commons, to be publicly burned by the hangman. The grand jury of Middlesex were presented that the author, printer, and publisher of "The Rights of the Christian Church" to be dangerous and disaffected persons, and promoters of sedition and profaneness; and this charge was grounded on the following extracts. I take these from Scott's note, and I find that the page references are to the second edition of Tindal's work issued in 1706.

"The church is a private society, and no more power belonging to it than to other private companies and clubs, and, consequently, all the right anyone has to be an ecclesiastical officer, and the power he is entrusted with, depends on the consent of the parties concerned, and is no greater than they can bestow." Preface, p. xxx.

"The Scriptures nowhere make the receiving the Lord's Supper from the hands of a priest necessary." p. 104.

"The remembrance of Christ's sufferings a mere grace-cup delivered to be handed about." p. 105.

"Among Christians, one no more than another can be reckoned a priest from Scripture"--"And the clerk has as good a title to the priesthood as the parson ... Every one, as well as the minister, rightly consecrateth the elements to himself ... Anything farther than this, may rather be called Conjuration than Consecration." p. 108.

"The absurdities of bishops being by divine appointment, governors of the Christian Church, and no others are capable of being of that number, who derive not their right by an uninterrupted succession of bishops in the Catholic Church." p. 313.

"The supreme powers had no way to escape the heavier oppressions, and more insupportable usurpations of their own clergy, than by submitting to the Pope's milder yoke and gentler authority." p. 255.

"One grand cause of mistake is, not considering when God acts as governor of the universe, and when as prince of a particular nation. The Jews, when they came out of the land of bondage, were under no settled government, till God was pleased to offer himself to be their king, to which all the people expressly consented ... God's laws bound no nation, except those that agreed to the Horeb contract." p. 151.

"Not only an independent power of excommunication, but of ordination in the clergy, is inconsistent with the magistrate's right to protect the commonwealth." p. 87.

"Priests, no better than spiritual make-baits, baraters, boute-feux, and incendiaries, and who make churches serve to worse purposes than bear gardens." p. 118.

"It is a grand mistake to suppose the magistrate's power extends to indifferent things ... Men have liberty as they please, and a right ... to form what clubs, companies, or meetings, they think fit, either for business or pleasure, which the magistrate ... cannot hinder, without manifest injustice." p. 15.

"God ... interposed not among the Jews, until they had chosen him for their king." p. 312.

For a full account of Tindal and his work, see the "Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Matthew Tindal, with a History of the Controversies wherein he was engaged," published in 1733. The text of the present reprint of Swift's "Remarks" is based on that given in "Works," vol. vii. of the 4to edition of 1764. It has also been collated with the 8vo edition of same date (vol. xiii.) and with that of 1762 (vol. xiii.).

[T. S.]

REMARKS UPON A BOOK INTITULED "THE RIGHTS OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH, &c."

Before I enter upon a particular examination of this treatise, it will be convenient to do two things:

_First_, To give some account of the author, together with the motives, that might probably engage him in such a work. And,

_Secondly_, to discover the nature and tendency in general, of the work itself.

The first of these, although it hath been objected against, seems highly reasonable, especially in books that instil pernicious principles. For, although a book is not intrinsically much better or worse, according to the stature or complexion of the author, yet, when it happens to make a noise, we are apt, and curious, as in other noises, to look about from whence it cometh. But however, there is something more in the matter.

If a theological subject be well handled by a layman, it is better received than if it came from a divine; and that for reasons obvious enough, which, although of little weight in themselves, will ever have a great deal with mankind.

But, when books are written with ill intentions, to advance dangerous opinions, or destroy foundations; it may be then of real use to know from what quarter they come, and go a good way towards their confutation. For instance, if any man should write a book against the lawfulness of punishing felony with death; and, upon enquiry, the author should be found in Newgate under condemnation for robbing a house; his arguments would not very unjustly lose much of their force, from the circumstances he lay under. So, when Milton writ his book of divorces, it was presently rejected as an occasional treatise; because every body knew, he had a shrew for his wife. Neither can there be any reason imagined, why he might not, after he was blind, have writ another upon the danger and inconvenience of eyes. But, it is a piece of logic which will hardly pass on the world; that because one man hath a sore nose, therefore all the town should put plasters upon theirs. So, if this treatise about the rights of the church should prove to be the work of a man steady in his principles, of exact morals, and profound learning, a true lover of his country, and a hater of Christianity, as what he really believes to be a cheat upon mankind, whom he would undeceive purely for their good; it might be apt to check unwary men, even of good dispositions towards religion. But if it be found the production of a man soured with age and misfortunes, together with the consciousness of past miscarriages; of one, who, in hopes of preferment, was reconciled to the Popish religion;[1] of one wholly prostitute in life and principles, and only an enemy to religion, because it condemns them: In this case, and this last I find is the universal opinion, he is like to have few proselytes, beside those, who, from a sense of their vicious lives, require to be perpetually supplied by such amusements as this; which serve to flatter their wishes, and debase their understandings.

[Footnote 1: Dr. Matthew Tindal became a convert to the Romish religion during the reign of James II. What share interest had in his conversion may be easily imagined; but it is uncertain whether it was the disappointment of his expectations, or conviction, that, in 1687, induced him to reconcile himself to the Church of England, and become a decided favourer of those doctrines which produced the Revolution. He often sat as a judge in the Court of Delegates, but did not practise much as an advocate in Doctor's Commons. His chief means of support was a pension from government of £200. Tindal died in 1733, three years after publication of his grand deistical work, "Christianity as Old as the Creation." His effects, amounting to £2,000 and upwards, were appropriated by the noted Eustace Budgell, to the prejudice of the heir at law, under a will attended with circumstances of great suspicion. [T. S.]]

I know there are some who would fain have it, that this discourse was written by a club of freethinkers, among whom the supposed author only came in for a share. But, sure, we cannot judge so meanly of any party, without affronting the dignity of mankind. If this be so, and if here be the product of all their quotas and contributions, we must needs allow, that freethinking is a most confined and limited talent. It is true indeed, the whole discourse seemeth to be a motley, inconsistent composition, made up of various shreds of equal fineness, although of different colours. It is a bundle of incoherent maxims and assertions, that frequently destroy one another. But still there is the same flatness of thought and style; the same weak advances towards wit and raillery; the same petulancy and pertness of spirit; the same train of superficial reading; the same thread of threadbare quotations: the same affectation of forming general rules upon false and scanty premises. And, lastly, the same rapid venom sprinkled over the whole; which, like the dying impotent bite of a trodden benumbed snake, may be nauseous and offensive, but cannot be very dangerous.

And, indeed, I am so far from thinking this libel to be born of several fathers, that it hath been the wonder of several others, as well as myself; how it was possible for any man, who appeareth to have gone the common circle of academical education;[2] who hath taken so universal a liberty, and hath so entirely laid aside all regards, not only of Christianity, but common truth and justice; one who is dead to all sense of shame, and seemeth to be past the getting or losing a reputation, should, with so many advantages, and upon so unlimited a subject, come out with so poor, so jejune a production. Should we pity or be amazed at so perverse a talent, which, instead of qualifying an author to give a new turn to old matter, disposeth him quite contrary to talk in an old beaten trivial manner upon topics wholly new. To make so many sallies into pedantry without a call, upon a subject the most alien, and in the very moments he is declaiming against it, and in an age too, where it is so violently exploded, especially among those readers he proposeth to entertain.

[Footnote 2: See note, p. 9, where it will be seen that Tindal was an Oxford man. [T.S.]]

I know it will be said, that this is only to talk in the common style of an answerer; but I have not so little policy. If there were any hope of reputation or merit from such victory, I should be apt like others to cry up the courage and conduct of an enemy. Whereas to detect the weakness, the malice, the sophistry, the falsehood, the ignorance of such a writer, requireth little more than to rank his perfections in such an order, and place them in such a light, that the commonest reader may form a judgment of them.

It may still be a wonder how so heavy a book, written upon a subject in appearance so little instructive or diverting, should survive to three editions, and consequently find a better reception than is usual with such bulky spiritless volumes; and this, in an age that pretendeth so soon to be nauseated with what is tedious and dull. To which I can only return, that, as burning a book by the common hangman, is a known expedient to make it sell; so, to write a book that deserveth such treatment, is another: And a third, perhaps as effectual as either, is to ply an insipid, worthless tract with grave and learned answers, as Dr. Hickes, Dr. Potter,[3] and Mr. Wotton have done. Design and performances, however commendable, have glanced a reputation upon the piece; which oweth its life to the strength of those hands and weapons, that were raised to destroy it; like flinging a mountain upon a worm, which, instead of being bruised, by the advantage of its littleness, lodgeth under it unhurt.

[Footnote 3: George Hickes, D.D. (1642-1715), born at Newsham, Yorks, and educated at Oxford. He visited Scotland with his patron, the Duke of Lauderdale, in 1677, and was presented by the St. Andrews University with the degree of LL.D. Became Dean of Worcester in 1683, but lost that office at the Revolution, for not taking the oaths. The nonjuring prelates, in 1693, consecrated him Bishop of Thetford. Dr. Hickes was a profound scholar, and well versed in northern literature. Among his works may be named, "Institutiones Grammaticae Anglo-Saxonicae et Maeso-Gothicae," "Antiquae Literaturae Septentrionalis Thesaurus."

John Potter, D.D. (1674-1747), born at Wakefield, and educated at Oxford. In 1707 he published a "Discourse on Church Government," and eight years later became Bishop of Oxford. On the death of Wake, in 1737, he was appointed to the Archbishopric of Canterbury. [T.S.]]

But neither is this all. For the subject, as unpromising as it seemeth at first view, is no less than that of Lucretius, to free men's minds from the bondage of religion; and this not by little hints and by piecemeal, after the manner of those little atheistical tracts that steal into the world, but in a thorough wholesale manner; by making religion, church, Christianity, with all their concomitants, a perfect contrivance of the civil power. It is an imputation often charged on this sort of men, that, by their invectives against religion, they can possibly propose no other end than that of fortifying themselves and others against the reproaches of a vicious life; it being necessary for men of libertine practices to embrace libertine principles, or else they cannot act in consistence with any reason, or preserve any peace of mind. Whether such authors have this design, (whereof I think they have never gone about to acquit themselves) thus much is certain; that no other use is made of such writings: Neither did I ever hear this author's book justified by any person, either Whig or Tory, except such who are of that profligate character. And, I believe, whoever examineth it, will be of the same opinion; although indeed such wretches are so numerous, that it seemeth rather surprising, why the book hath had no more editions, than why it should have so many.

Having thus endeavoured to satisfy the curious with some account of this author's character, let us examine what might probably be the motives to engage him in such a work. I shall say nothing of the principal, which is a sum of money; because that is not a mark to distinguish him from any other trader with the press. I will say nothing of revenge and malice, from resentment of the indignities and contempt he hath undergone for his crime of apostasy. To this passion he has thought fit to sacrifice order, propriety, discretion, and common sense, as may be seen in every page of his book: But, I am deceived, if there were not a third motive as powerful as the other two; and that is, vanity. About the latter end of King James's reign he had almost finished a learned discourse in defence of the Church of Rome, and to justify his conversion: All which, upon the Revolution, was quite out of season. Having thus prostituted his reputation, and at once ruined his hopes, he had no course left, but to shew his spite against religion in general; the false pretensions to which, had proved so destructive to his credit and fortune: And, at the same time, loth to employ the speculations of so many years to no purpose; by an easy turn, the same arguments he had made use of to advance Popery, were full as properly levelled by him against Christianity itself; like the image, which, while it was new and handsome, was worshipped for a saint, and when it came to be old and broken, was still good enough to make a tolerable devil. And, therefore every reader will observe, that the arguments for Popery are much the strongest of any in his book, as I shall further remark when I find them in my way.

There is one circumstance in his title-page, which I take to be not amiss, where he calleth his book, "Part the First." This is a project to fright away answerers, and make the poor advocates for religion believe, he still keepeth further vengeance in _petto_. It must be allowed, he hath not wholly lost time, while he was of the Romish communion. This very trick he learned from his old father, the Pope; whose custom it is to lift up his hand, and threaten to fulminate, when he never meant to shoot his bolts; because the princes of Christendom had learned the secret to avoid or despise them. Dr. Hickes knew this very well, and therefore, in his answer to this "Book of Rights," where a second part is threatened, like a rash person he desperately crieth, "Let it come." But I, who have not too much phlegm to provoke angry wits of his standard, must tell the author, that the doctor plays the wag, as if he were sure, it were all grimace. For my part, I declare, if he writeth a second part, I will not write another answer; or, if I do, it shall be published, before the other part cometh out.[4]

[Footnote 4: Tindal did, however, attempt to maintain his ground against his numerous opponents, in "A Defence of the Rights of the Christian Church, against a late Visitation Sermon, 8vo. 1707;" and also in "A Second Defence of the Rights of the Christian Church considered, in two late Indictments against a Bookseller and His Servant, for selling one of the said Books, 1707." [T. S.]]

There may have been another motive, although it be hardly credible, both for publishing this work, and threatening a second part: It is not soon conceived how far the sense of a man's vanity will transport him. This man must have somewhere heard, that dangerous enemies have been often bribed to silence with money or preferment: And, therefore, to shew how formidable he is, he hath published his first essay; and, in hopes of hire to be quiet, hath frighted us with his design of another. What must the clergy do in these unhappy circumstances? If they should bestow this man bread enough to stop his mouth, it will but open those of a hundred more, who are every whit as well qualified to rail as he. And truly, when I compare the former enemies to Christianity, such as Socinus,[5] Hobbes, and Spinosa,[6] with such of their successors, as Toland, Asgil, Coward, Gildon,[7] this author of the "Rights," and some others; the church appeareth to me like the sick old lion in the fable, who, after having his person outraged by the bull, the elephant, the horse, and the bear, took nothing so much to heart, as to find himself at last insulted by the spurn of an ass.

[Footnote 5: Laelius Socinus (1525-1562), born at Siena. He studied at Bologna, and in 1546 became a member of a secret freethinking society in Venice. The society, however, was broken up, and Socinus left Italy for Switzerland and Poland. He died at Zurich. His papers were published by his nephew, Faustus Socinus, who founded a sect on the tenets they taught.]

[Footnote 6: Benedict or Baruch Spinoza (1632-1677), born at Amsterdam, of a Portuguese Jewish family. He was excommunicated by his people for atheism. He retired to the Hague and took to making lenses, and the study of philosophy. His "Ethics" and "Tractatus Theologico-Politicus" constitute a system of philosophy which has had no little influence on modern thought. See Pollock's "Spinoza."]

[Footnote 7: Charles Gildon (1665-1723-4) was educated at Douay. He printed a book called "The Deist's Manual." For accounts of Coward, Toland, and Asgil, see note, p. 9.] I will now add a few words to give the reader some general notion of the nature and tendency of the work itself.