Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 10.djvu/273

Rh Irishmen, but vicarages, tidewaiters places, &c. therefore no reason to make them worse.

The modus upon the flax in England affects only lands reclaimed since the year 1690, and is at the rate of five shillings the English acre, which is equivalent to eight shillings and eightpence Irish, and that to be paid before the farmer removes it from the field. Flax is a manufacture of little consequence in England, but is the staple in Ireland; and if it increases (as it probably will) must in many places jostle out corn, because it is more gainful.

The clergy of the established church have no interest, like those of the church of Rome, distinct from the true interest of their country; and therefore ought to suffer under no distinct impositions or taxes of any kind.

The bill for settling the modus of flax in England, was brought in the first year of the reign of king George I, when the clergy lay very unjustly under the imputation of some disaffection; and to encourage the bringing in of some fens in Lincolnshire, which were not to be continued under flax; but it left all lands, where flax had been sown before that time, under the same condition of tithing, in which they were before the passing of that bill: whereas this bill takes away what the clergy are actually possessed of.

That the woollen manufacture is the staple of England, as the linen is that of Ireland; yet no attempt was ever made in England, to reduce the tithe of wool, for the encouragement of that manufacture. This manufacture has already been remarkably favoured by the clergy, who have hitherto been generally content with less than half, some with sixpence a garden, and some have taken nothing. Employ-