Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 9.djvu/257

Rh with a wife and seven children gets a living of 55l. per annum, he must, after three years, build a house that shall cost 77l. 10s. and must support his family, during the time the bishop shall appoint for the building of it, with the remainder. But if the living be under 50l. a year, the minister shall be allowed 100l. out of the first-fruits.

But there is said to be one circumstance a little extraordinary; that if there be a single spot in the glebe more barren, more marshy, more exposed to the winds, more distant from the church, or skeleton of a church, or from any conveniency of building; the rector or vicar may be obliged, by the caprice or pique of the bishop, to build, under pain of sequestration (an office which ever falls into the most knavish hands) upon whatever point his lordship shall command; although the farmers have not paid one quarter of his dues.

I believe, under the present distresses of the kingdom (which inevitably without a miracle must increase for ever) there are not ten country clergymen in Ireland, reputed to possess a parish of 100l. per annum, who for some years past have actually received 60l. and that with the utmost difficulty and vexation. I am therefore at a loss what kind of valuators the bishops will make use of; and whether the starving vicar shall be forced to build his house with the money ne never received.

The other bill, which passed in two days after the former, is said to concern the division of parishes into as many parcels as the bishop shall think fit, only leaving 300l. a year to the mother church; which 300l. by another act passed some years ago, they can divide likewise, and crumble as low as their Rh