Page:Shirley (1849 Volume 1).djvu/87

 monarch, an unprincipled debauchee the real ruler; where such an insult to common sense as hereditary legislators was tolerated—where such a humbug as a bench of bishops—such an arrogant abuse as a pampered, persecuting established Church was endured and venerated—where a standing army was maintained, and a host of lazy parsons and their pauper families were kept on the fat of the land?”

Mr. Helstone, rising up and putting on his shovel-hat, observed in reply, “That in the course of his life he had met with two or three instances where sentiments of this sort had been very bravely maintained so long as health, strength, and worldly prosperity had been the allies of him who professed them; but there came a time,” he said, “to all men, ‘when the keepers of the house should tremble; when they should be afraid of that which is high, and fear should be in the way;’ and that time was the test of the advocate of anarchy and rebellion, the enemy of religion and order. Ere now,” he affirmed, he had been called upon to read “those prayers our Church has provided for the sick, by the miserable dying-bed of one of her most rancorous foes; he had seen such a one stricken with remorse, solicitous to discover a place for repentance, and unable to find any, though he sought it carefully with tears. He must forewarn Mr. Yorke, that blasphemy against God and the king was a deadly sin, and that there was such a thing as ‘judgment to come.’&thinsp;”