MUNICIPAL CORPORATIONS.

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called Guardians of the Poor, were constituted a Board. These are elected by the ratepayers annually in each parish of the Union. In order to obviate the recurrence of the old abuses, to insure uniformity of administration, and to carry out the new test in its integrity, it was considered desirable to have a permanent establishment, called the Poor-Law Board, of which the President is usually a member of the Privy Council, and must possess a seat in the House of Commons.

The experience of a quarter of a century has modified the rigorous theory of the Amendment Act, and now a plan of administering relief in two modes—inside the workhouse and at the residence of the pauper (called out-door relief), is permitted.

It may be added, that the legislature has provided remedies for a parish or union which may consider itself aggrieved, and for a ratepayer in the same position. This is by the legal process called "an appeal," whereby if an union be called upon to maintain a pauper not belonging to it, or a parishioner is required to pay out of proportion to his neighbours, or for improper charges, the interference of the Court of Quarter Sessions is invoked. Against improper charges an additional remedy is provided by the appointment of an officer called a "Poor-Law Auditor," whose duty it is to check every account in connexion with the poor-rate and its expenditure, and who has power to disallow any item not justified by law.

I now come to the Municipal Corporations. In the year 1833, a royal commission was appointed to inquire into their state, and it being reported that they had degenerated into great inefficiency and corruption, an Act of Parliament was passed, by which most of the then existing Corporations were dissolved, and replaced by a municipal body consisting of mayor, aldermen, and burgesses. This law is known as the Municipal Corporations Act.”

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All persons of full age, who have occupied for three years a house or shop within the limits of the borough to be incorporated, and those who have regularly resided within seven miles of its limits, and have during that time been rated to the relief of the poor of some parish in the borough, are entitled to be placed on the list of burgesses. The borough is divided into wards, or districts, and by the burgesses in every ward the Common Councillors are elected. The number of councillors is fixed by the Act for each borough, and one-third of them go out of office every year. The councillors elect

Aldermen, whose number is one-third of their own.

Thus is formed the Town Council, which elects the Mayor, whose business it is to preside over it. He holds office for only one year, but may be re-elected. Half the aldermen go out of office every third year, but may be re-elected. The towncouncil lay the borough rates.

In many populous towns not incorporated, commissioners and boards, such as Boards of Health, Improvement Commissioners, &c. &c., are elected by the ratepayers, under the authority of Parliament, to conduct useful works, and to manage the local business.

LETTER X.

THE CHURCH.

History of the Church of England-Authority of the Pope-The Reformation-Puritans-Roman Catholics-Jews, Disabilities ofConstitution and Discipline of the Church-Bishops-Dean and Chapter-Priest-Deacon-Tithes-Ordinations-Church Accom

modation-Convocation.

In order to give you a right understanding of the relations of the ecclesiastical system and the Constitution of this country, it will be necessary briefly to sketch the history of the Church in England.

It is an undoubted fact that Christianity was very early introduced into this country whilst it was in the hands of the Romans, and tradition points to the numerous old churches dedicated to St. Paul, as a confirmation of the assertion that he was the apostle of Britain. However this may be, certain it is that in the third century numerous Christian congregations existed here, and the older chroniclers declare with a fond pride that Britain produced the first Christian emperor (Constantine the Great), the first Christian king (Lucius), and the first Christian monastery, that of Bangor in Wales. The Saxons, being idolatrous and exterminators, persecuted the native believers, and drove them into the Welsh mountains. There they were found when Pope Gregory the Great sent hither the monk Augustine and his companions, on the occasion of the conversion of Ethelbert, King of Kent. Before this time the British Church was governed by its own bishops, but Augustine (by coercion as well as persuasion) induced the scattered bodies of the faithful to acknowledge his authority as primate, whilst he himself admitted the superiority of the Roman pontiff. Augustine, upon being consecrated Archbishop of Canterbury, received a present of a pall from the pope, and each of his successors applied for and obtained a like mark of distinction for many years after from succeed

occupants of the papal chair, until it was asserted that an Archbishop of Canterbury could not enter upon his functions unless and until it was granted. This "pall" is an ecclesiastical vestment somewhat resembling in shape the hood now worn by clergymen to indicate the university degree of the wearer, and a symbol of it is still retained in the emblazonment of the arms of the province of Canterbury. Under the Norman kings, and the early Plantagenets, the claim to present this pall, and the rights which it was supposed to confer, were stoutly resisted. But what Henry II. refused to Thomas a'Beckett was conceded by his son John, who, as you know, humiliated himself so far as to hold his very crown as a

fief under the pope. Notwithstanding the famous statute of præmunire, passed in the reign of Richard II., which is still unrepealed, and which I shall have occasion to mention again, the general results of various compromises made between different monarchs and popes amounted to this :-That, whilst in matters of faith and (to some extent) of discipline also, the Church of England gave obedience to Rome, in matters connected with the choice of bishops and the enjoyment of temporalities the royal supremacy was admitted.

The first stage of the Reformation in the reign of Henry VIII. was not made in reference to doctrine. The right of appeal from the English courts to the pope was that against which the king's policy was directed in the beginning, and the operation of the statute 25th Henry VIII. chapter 20, was to establish the jurisdiction of the Crown, and the king's tribunals, in entire independence of any foreign potentate. The words of what is called the bidding prayer (still used in cathedrals and other churches before sermon) indicate clearly the intention of the Constitution upon this point. It runs as follows::"Ye shall pray for all Christian kings, &c., and especially for our Sovereign Lady Queen Victoria, defender of the Faith, over all persons, and in all causes ecclesiastical and civil, within these her dominions supreme." It is in this sense that the sovereign is called "the supreme head of the Church."

The policy of Elizabeth and of the Stuarts was to establish the Church of which they were members as the sole and exclusive form of religion. Hence non-attendance at a man's parish church, and non-conformity to its ordinances, were made by Convocation-of which I shall treat hereafter-the subject of spiritual censure, and by Parliament, of civil penalties, even of death. The theory of the Church down to

ACT OF TOLERATION.

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so late a period as the reign of George IV., according to the Constitution, was that of an ecclesiastical corporation coextensive with the State, every English subject being also an English churchman, and the Church a body absolutely national. Two great religious sections maintained a constant and, eventually, successful struggle against this theory,—I mean the Puritans and the Roman Catholics. The former party resorted to arms, and their victory in the contest against Archbishop Laud and his sovereign displaced for twelve years both the Church and her royal head. On the restoration of Charles II. the former doctrine was revived; and it was not until the accession of William III. that the Act of Toleration, permitting Protestants to meet to celebrate divine service after other forms than the Liturgy-and in other places than the temples-of the Church of England was passed. More than a century and a half elapsed before persons who did not conform to the religion established by law were allowed to enter Parliament, and to take office in municipal corporations. Every man elected to either was obliged to partake of the holy Sacrament, according to the rites and doctrine of the Church of England, as a test. It was not until the year 1828 that the statutes imposing this test were repealed. Thus terminated the contest with the first religious section I named. The result was that there was no longer a Constitution exclusively Church of England, but one necessarily Protestant. The following year saw the final success of the Roman Catholic body. Like the Protestant Dissenters, they had obtained various instalments of toleration. The objection to admit them to full rights of citizenship was based rather upon political than theological grounds, and they endured for many years the most vexatious disabilities intended to prevent their gaining wealth and influence, before it was discovered that being a papist did not prevent a man from also being an honest and a loyal subject. The Roman Catholic Relief Act, passed in the year 1829, placed Roman Catholics upon the same footing with their Protestant fellowcountrymen, and there were no offices from which Roman Catholics were to be excluded, except those of Regent, of Lord Chancellor of England or Ireland, and of Viceroy of Ireland. Until 1858 British subjects professing the Jewish religion were excluded from senatorial rights and honours, not by any direct enactment of the legislature, but because the wording of the oath of supremacy, which had to be taken by