ion, coupled with due explanation of the nature of
righteousness and iniquity, directed mainly to those who have the power
of both in their own hands, being makers of law, and holders of
property, would, without any further debate, bring about a very singular
change in the position and respectability of English clergymen.

265. How far they may at present be considered as merely the Squire's
left hand, bound to know nothing of what he is doing with his right, it
is for their own consciences to determine.

For instance, a friend wrote to me the other day, "Will you not come
here? You will see a noble duke destroying a village as old as the
Conquest, and driving out dozens of families whose names are in Domesday
Book, because, owing to the neglect of his ancestors and rackrenting for
a hundred years, the place has fallen out of repair, and the people are
poor, and may become paupers. A local paper ventured to tell the truth.
The duke's agent called on the editor, and threatened him with
destruction if he did not hold his tongue." The noble duke, doubtless,
has proper Protestant horror of auricular confession. But suppose,
instead of the local editor, the local parson had ventured to tell the
truth from his pulpit, and even to intimate to his Grace that he might
no longer receive the Body and Blood of the Lord at the altar of that
parish! The parson would scarcely--in these days--have been therefore
made bonfire of, and had a pretty martyr's memorial by Mr. Scott's
pupils; but he would have lighted a goodly light, nevertheless, in this
England of ours, whose pettifogging piety has now neither the courage to
deny a duke's grace in its church, nor to declare Christ's in its
Parliament.

266. Lastly. Several of your contributors, I observe, have rashly dipped
their feet in the brim of the water of that raging question of Usury;
and I cannot but express my extreme regret that you should yourself have
yielded to the temptation of expressing opinions which you have had no
leisure either to sound or to test. My assertion, however, that the
rich lived mainly by robbing the poor, referred not to Usury, but to
Rent; and the facts respecting both these methods of extortion are
perfectly and indubitably ascertainable by any person who himself wishes
to ascertain them, and is able to take the necessary time and pains. I
see no sign, throughout the whole of these letters, of any wish
whatever, on the part of one of their writers, to a