Page:Tithes, a paper read at the Diocesan Conference at Rochester, May 31, 1883.djvu/11

 with the tithe; and of this I am quite certain, that in bad times we shall go hat in hand to the clergy, and shall ask in vain as needy landlords for those kind and liberal deductions which under similar circumstances they have extended to the tenants. And here may I make a remark upon the practice which in the late bad times has prevailed very extensively of the clergy making remissions in respect of tithe. It has been pressed upon them very urgently by the tithe-payer, and has been conceded by them from motives of kindliness and generosity; but may I say how exceedingly mischievous a course I consider it, and how it tends to encourage the idea that the tithe is a tenant's charge, and stands in the same category as farm rent. If the tithe-owner is a wealthy man, and chooses to say to his parishioners, "The times are bad; you must be in difficulties owing to the losses in your business. I propose to make you a present out of my own pocket," to that I have nothing to object; but that the person on whom the collection of the tithe devolves should have instructions to remit 10, 15, or 20 per cent., as the case may be, from the tithe, is a practice utterly indefensible on principle—one that causes invidious distinctions to be drawn between those who do and those who do not adopt it (either from a conscientious objection or from inability to make the sacrifice) and is playing into the hands of those who are attacking the tithe merely with a view to further attacks upon property. I feel this very strongly, that so long as the law remains as it is the tithe-owner ought not, in fact has no right, to allow any abatement of the tithe. Of many evils this must necessarily result from it, either that the landlord in making a reduction of rent expects that the same will be made in the tithe, and makes a less reduction in consequence, in which case the remission of tithe is really made to the landlord, or else the landlord makes such a reduction as he intends to cover tithe as well as rent, in which case the tenant obtains a remission twice over.

II.—It is objected that the averages are taken over too long a period, viz., seven years, and that they should be reduced to three, or even two. The reason that this matter has acquired such prominence of late is that during the past disastrous years the tithe has been considerably above par. For instance, in 1880, after the ruinous