him low; then he will be both safe and useful;-the result is a National Church, and a Constitutional Army.

I. In the first place we tie both parson and soldier up, by forbidding each to form one large organization. We prohibit an organized religion and an organized force. Instead of one corporation in religion, we only allow of a multitude of small ones, as chapters and rectories, while we ignore the Establishment as a whole, deny it any legal status, and recognize the Dissenting bodies. For Universities we substitute Colleges with rival interests, that the intellect may not be too strong for us, as is the case with some other countries; we freely multiply local schools, for they have no political significance. And in like manner we are willing to perfect the discipline and appointment of regiments, but we instinctively recoil from the idea of an army. We toast, indeed, "The Army," but as an abstraction, as we used to drink to "The Church," before the present substitution of "The Clergy of all Denominations,” which has much more of reality in it. Moreover, while we have a real reason for sending our troops all over the world, shifting them about, using them for garrison duty, and for the defence of dependencies, we are thereby able also to hide and divide them from one another. Nor is this all; if any organization requires a directing mind at the head of it, it is an army; but, faithful to our Constitutional instincts, we have committed its command, ex abundanti cautela, to as many, I believe, as five independent boards, whose concurrence is necessary for a practical result. Nay, as late occurrences have shown, we have thought it a less evil that our troops should be starved in the Crimea for for want of the proper officer to land the stores, and that clothing and fuel shall oscillate to and fro between Balaklava and Malta, than that there should be the chance for the smallest opening into our political system of a power

formidable to nationalism.

and soldier.

Thus we tie up both parson

2. Next, in all great systems and agencies of any kind, there are certain accessories, absolutely necessary for their efficiency, yet hardly included in their essential idea. Such, to take a very small matter, is the use of the bag in making a pudding. Material edifices are no part of religion, but you cannot have religious services without them; nor can you move field-pieces without horses, nor get together horses without markets and transports. The greater part of these supplemental articles the English Constitution denies to its religious establishment altogether, and to its army, when not on active service. Fabrics of worship, it encourages; but it gives no countenance to such ecclesiastical belongings as the ritual and ceremonial of religion, synods, religious orders, sisters of charity, and the like necessary instruments of Christian faith, which zealous Churchmen in times of spiritual danger, decay, or promise, make vain endeavours to restore. And such in military matters are the commissariat, transport, and medical departments, which are jealously suppressed in time of peace, and hastily and grudgingly restored on the commencement of hostilities. The Constitutional spirit allows to the troops arms and ammunition, as it allows to the clergy ordination and two sacraments, neither being really dangerous, while the supplements which I have spoken of are withheld. Then it cuts their claws.

3. And lastly, it keeps them low. Though lawyers are educated for the law, and physicians for medicine, it is felt among us to be dangerous to the Constitution to have real education either in the clerical or military profession. Neither theology nor the science of war is compatible with a military régime. Military and naval science is, in the ordinary Englishman's notion, the bayonet and the broad

side. Religious knowledge comes by nature; and so far is true, that Anglican divines thump away, in exhortation or in controversy, with a manliness, good sense, and good will as thoroughly John Bullish as the stubbornness of the Guards at Inkermann. Not that they are forbidden to cultivate theology in private as a personal accomplishment, but that they must not bring too much of it into the pulpit, for then they become extreme men, Calvinists or Papists, as it may be. A general good education, a public school, a knowledge of the classics, makes a parson; and he is chosen for a benefice or a dignity, not on any abstract ground of merit, but by the great officers of the State, by members of the aristocracy, and by country gentlemen, or by their nominees, men who by their position are a sufficient guarantee that the nation will continually flow into the Establishment, and give it its own colour. And so of the army; it is not so many days ago that a gentleman in office assured the House of Commons (if he was correctly reported) that the best officers were those who had a University education; and I doubt not it is far better for the troops to be disciplined and commanded by good scholars than by incapables and dunces. But in each department professional education is eschewed, and it is thought enough that the functionary be a gentleman. A clergyman is the "resident gentleman" in his parish; and no soldier must rise from the ranks, because he is not "company for gentlemen."

Let no man call this satire, for it is most seriously said; nor have I intentionally coloured one sentence in the parallel which I have been drawing out; nor do I speak as grumbling at things as they are ;-I merely want to look facts in the face. I have been exposing what I consider the weak side in our Constitution, not exactly because I want it altered, but because people should not consider it

the strong side. I think it a necessary weakness. I do not see how it can be satisfactorily set right without dangerous innovations. ("Discussions and Arguments," P. 356.)

IRISH DISCONTENT.

(I.)

[AN English visitor to Ireland] if he happens to be a Catholic, has in consequence a trial to sustain of his own of which the continental tourist has no experience from Austrian police, or Russian douane, or Turkish quarantine. He has turned his eyes to a country bound to him by the ties of a common faith; and, when he lands at Cork or Kingstown, he breathes more freely from the thought that he has left a Protestant people behind him, and is among his co-religionists. He has but this one imagination before his mind, that he is in the midst of those who will not despise him for his faith's sake, who name the same sacred names, and utter the same prayers, and use the same devotions, as he does himself; whose churches are the houses of his God, and whose numerous clergy are the physicians of the soul. He penetrates into the heart of the country; and he recognizes an innocence in the young face, and a piety and patience in the aged voice, which strikingly and sadly contrast with the habits of his own rural population. Scattered over these masses of peasantry, and peasants themselves, he hears of a number of lay persons who have dedicated themselves to a religious celibate, and

who, by their superior knowledge as well as sanctity, are the natural and ready guides of their humble brethren. He finds the population as munificent as it is pious, and doing greater works for God out of their poverty, than the rich and noble elsewhere accomplish in their abundance. He finds them characterized by a love of kindred so tender and faithful as to lead them, on their compulsory expatriation, to send back from their first earnings in another hemisphere incredible sums, with the purpose of bringing over to it those dear ones whom they have left in the old country. And he finds himself received with that warmth of hospitality which ever has been Ireland's boast; and, as far as he is personally concerned, his blood is forgotten in his baptism. How shall he not, under such circumstances, exult in his new friends, and feel words deficient to express both his deep reverence for their virtues, and his strong sympathy in their heavy trials?

But, alas, feelings which are so just and natural in themselves, which are so congruous in the breast of Frenchman or Italian, are impertinent in him. He does not at first recollect, as he ought to recollect, that he comes among the Irish people as a representative of persons, and actions, and catastrophes, which it is not pleasant to any one to think about; that he is responsible for the deeds of his forefathers, and of his contemporary Parliaments and Executive; that he is one of a strong, unscrupulous, tyrannous race, standing upon the soil of the injured. He does not bear in mind that it is as easy to forget injuring, as it is difficult to forget being injured. He does not admit, even in his imagination, the judgment and the sentence which the passed history of Erin sternly pronounces upon him. He has to be recalled to himself, and to be taught by what he hears around him, that an Englishman has no right to open his heart, and indulge his honest affection