Page:Essay on the First Principles of Government 2nd Ed.djvu/292

 all together about their ears. A number of spirited and conscientious men, openly refusing to enter into the church, or throwing up the livings which they hold upon those iniquitous and enslaving terms (and such men there have been in this country) would rouse the attention of the temporal heads of the spiritual part of our constitution. They would see the necessity of an immediate and compleat reformation; and then the alarm of churchmen, with their paultry expedients and compromises, would come too late. The temper of these times would not bear another St. Bartholomew.

If only one or two persons, of known probity and good sense, did now and then, act this heroic part, it would serve to keep up an attention to the subject. If every man who doth not in his conscience believe the articles he has subscribed, would magnanimously throw up the emoluments he enjoys in consequence of his subscription, it can hardly be doubted, but that a reformation of, at least,