and void, unless the previous approbation of his Majefty be obtained; but in cafe the parties fhall have attained the age of twenty-five years, and give notice to the Privy Council of their intention of marriage, fuch marriage fhall be held good in law, unless the Parliament fhall within the space of twelve months declare its difapprobation of the fame.

This bill excited great diffatisfaction, and it did not pafs without confiderable difficulty. Two very animated protefts against it, figned by eighteen Peers, difplay, with great precifion and energy, the reafons employed in oppofition to the bill.

"The

defcendants of GEORGE II." it is affirmed, " may in time comprehend a very numerous description of people; and it would be an intolerable grievance, that the marriages of fo many fubjects, difperfed amongst the various ranks of civil life, fhould be fubject to the restraints of this act. It feems indecent to the royal family, to fuppofe that they arrive later at the age of difcretion than others, and abfurd to allow them to be capable of governing a kingdom at an age when they are not to be trusted in the choice of a wife. It feems," fay their Lordfhips, "to be a mere act of power, having neither the force nor obligation of law, and contrary to the inherent rights of human nature, to difable a man from contracting marriage, perhaps for life; and it is pregnant with civil difcord and confufion, as

having a natural tendency at fome future period to produce a difputed title to the Crown-and all this for ends wholly difproportionate to fuch extraordinary efforts, as the main purposes of the bill might have been answered without creating that perpetuity of reftraint which they think themfelves in confcience bound to oppofe."

In the courfe of the feffion, a petition was prefented to the Houfe of Commons of an interefting nature, and, from the fingular importance of its object, demanding peculiar attention. This was a petition figned by fome hundreds of the Clergy of the Established Church, humbly praying to be relieved from the obligation of fubfcribing the Thirtynine Articles of Faith as impofed by law. "Your petitioners," say they, "apprchend themselves to have certain rights and privileges which they hold of GOD alone-of this kind is the exercife of their own reafon and judgment. They conceive they are. alfo warranted, by thofe original principles of reformation from popery on which the Church of England is conftituted, to judge, in fearching the fcriptures, each man for himself, what may or may not be proved thereby. They find themselves, however, in a great measure precluded the enjoyment. of this invaluable privilege, by the laws relative to subscription, whereby your petitioners are required to acknowledge certain articles and confeffions of faith and doctrine; drawn up by fallible men, to be

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all and every one of them agreeable to the said fcriptures. Your petitioners therefore pray that they may be relieved from fuch an impofition upon their judgment, and be reftored to their undoubted right, as Proteftants, of interpreting fcripture for themselves, without being bound by any human explanations thereof-Holy Scripture alone being acknowledged certain and sufficient for falvation.” And they elsewhere ftyle the impofition of fubfcription" an encroachment on their rights both as men and members of a Proteftant establishment."

By this mode of ftating their complaint, a great advantage in argument was unadvisedly given to the numerous and powerful adverfaries of this petition, the most able and intelligent of whom urged, with irresistible force, that all Governments had a right to form fuch general plan or fyftem of ecclefiaftical polity or national inftruction as should approve itself moft conducive to the general goodthat it was neceffary that those who were appointed to be the inftructors of the people should be bound by fome certain principles, from which, so long as they acted in that capacity, they were not at l berty to deviate-that fome public symbol must be therefore established as the ftandard of their conformity and union. To toleration in its greatest and moft liberal extent thefe objectors declared themselves the firm friends and advocates; but they faid, that the petitioners fuffered no injuftice, as

they were under no neceffity of accepting benefices contrary to their confcience; and if fcruples arofe afterwards, they had it always in their power to relinquish their preferments-that in fact every man was now, conformably to the prayer of the petition, at liberty to interpret the fcriptures for his own private ufe; but that his being authorised to do fo for others was a matter of a very different nature. The State had doubtlefs a right to judge of the qualifications of thofe who were invested by the governing power of the community with the character, and who received the emoluments annexed to the office, of public teachers of religion. It was alfo fuggefted, that this was a matter of deep and dangerous import; and that, as civil diffenfions had lately run high, it would be moft impolitic to inflame ftill farther the public mind, by agitating at this crifis any topic of theological dif putation."

Another and very different clafs of opponents of the Old Tory and High-Church ftamp, who, conceiving the CHURCH to be in DANGER from this attack, "trembled for the ARK of Gop," feemed to reprefent it as little less than blafphemy to propose any innovation refpecting the Thirty-nine Articles. They faid, "that a compliance with this petition would give a mortal wound to the Church of England that the Church and State were fo intimately united, that one could not perish without

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the other that this petition was levelled against the Articles of the Church, and that the next would be for annulling the Liturgy. They called to the recollection of the Houfe the deftruction of Church and State in the laft century, which they charged upon the Sectaries, and infinuated that the petitioners were very fimilar to them in fentiment and complexion; they averred, that there was ftrong ground to fufpect, from the licentiousness of fome recent publications, that feveral amongst them denied the doctrine of the Trinity, and the Divinity of our Saviour. They affirmed, that the Parliament could not grant relief to the petitioners, for it had no power to vacate oaths-that the King could not give his affent to this petition, being himfelf bound by oath to preferve the Established Churchand that a compliance with it would be a breach of the Treaty of Union, which enacted, that the Church Governments both of England and Scotland should for ever continue as they then were."

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The petition itself was fupported with great ability by Sir William Meredith, who prefented it; and by various other members of the highest merit, talents, and reputation. Thefe gentlemen maintained, that to grant the relief folicited by the petitioners, far from being detrimental or dangerous to the Church, would redound equally to its honor and its fafety-that the Articles of the Church were well known to have been compiled at a period

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