s, who hath left memorials of his
bounty in many parts of his province. I might add, the Bishop of
Raphoe,[8] and several others: Not forgetting the late Dean of Down, Dr.
Pratt, who bestowed one thousand pounds upon the university: Which
foundation, (that I may observe by the way) if the bill proposed should
pass, would be in the same circumstances with the bishops, nor ever able
again to advance the stipends of the fellows and students, as lately
they found it necessary to do; the determinate sum appointed by the
statute for commons, being not half sufficient, by the fall of money, to
afford necessary sustenance. But the passing of such a bill must put an
end to all ecclesiastical beneficence for the time to come; and whether
this will be supplied by those who are to reap the benefit, better than
it hath been done by the grantees of impropriate tithes, who received
them upon the old church conditions of keeping hospitality; it will be
easy to conjecture.

[Footnote 5: Dr. Marsh.]

[Footnote 6: Dr. Lindsay.]

[Footnote 7: Dr. King.]

[Footnote 8: Dr. Forster.]

To allege, that passing such a bill would be a good encouragement to
improve bishops' lands, is a great error. Is it not the general method
of landlords, to wait the expiration of a lease, and then cant[9] their
lands to the highest bidder? And what should hinder the same course to
be taken in church leases, when the limitation is removed of paying half
the real value to the bishop? In riding through the country, how few
improvements do we see upon the estates of laymen, farther than about
their own domains? To say the truth, it is a great misfortune as well to
the public as to the bishops themselves, that their lands are generally
let to lords and great squires, who, in reason, were never designed to
be tenants; and therefore may naturally murmur at the payment of rent,
as a subserviency they were not born to. If the tenants to the Church
were honest farmers, they would pay their fines and rents with
cheerfulness, improve their lands, and thank God they were to give but a
moderate half value for what they held. I have heard a man of a thousand
pounds a year, talk with great contempt of bishops' leases, as being on
a worse foot than the rest of his estate; and he had certainly reason:
My answer was, that such leases were originally intended only for the
benefit of industrious husbandmen, who would think it a great blessing
to be so provided for, instead of