Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 4.djvu/399

Rh made of ecclesiastical revenues, as if they were all upon the same foot, were alienated with equal justice, and the clergy had no more reason to complain of the one than the other; whereas the four branches mentioned by him are of very different consideration. If I might venture to guess the opinion of the clergy upon this matter, I believe they could wish that some small part of the abbey lands had been applied to the augmentation of poor bishopricks; and a very few acres to serve for glebes in those parishes where there are none; after which, I think they would not repine that the laity should possess the rest. If the estates of some bishops and cathedrals were exorbitant before the reformation, I believe the present clergy's wishes reach no farther, than that some reasonable temper had been used, instead of paring them to the quick. But as to the tithes, without examining whether they be of divine institution, I conceive there is hardly one of that sacred order in England, and very few even among the laity who love the church, who will not allow the misapplying of those revenues to secular persons, to have been at first a most flagrant act of injustice and oppression; although, at the same time, God forbid they should be restored any other way than by gradual purchase, by the consent of those who are now the lawful possessors, or by the piety and generosity of such worthy spirits as this nation sometimes produces. The bishop knows very well, that the application of tithes to the maintenance of monasteries, was a scandalous usurpation, even in popish times: that the monks usually sent out some of their fraternity to supply the cures; and that when the monasteries were granted away by Henry VIII, the parishes were Rh