that power should be given to the commissioners to carry gradually such alterations in this respect into effect, as to them may seem meet. _July 81,1834_. * * * * * _Tests no Security to Religion_. The noble duke, amongst other matters, has adverted to the union between church and state, with respect to which he has made some observations which are undoubtedly worthy of consideration, but to which I do not intend, on this occasion, to offer any answer. I will, however, just observe, that I apprehend what is generally meant by dissevering the union of the church and state is, that there should be no established religion. To that proposition, I trust it is superfluous for me to say that I am a most decided opponent. It is, however, a subject which I cannot now pretend to discuss. It is my opinion, that to leave religion to rest upon the voluntary efforts of the people, is a notion which we are not at present in a situation competent to entertain. It is so very great a change, and so totally different from all that we know and observe, that we are absolutely precluded, from want of experience, from entering upon the consideration of the question. It is not a just criterion, by which to form a judgment, to refer to the experience of other nations--such as the existence of Christianity in Rome before it became the established religion of the empire, or the existence of religion in a country so distant and so unlike our own, in all its circumstances, as the United states of North America. That, my lords, is the opinion I entertain, and therefore I will no longer occupy your lordships by any further discussion on this subject. I belong to the church of England, and am a friend of that church, from feeling and from conviction. I do not say that I have examined all her doctrines, or that I am master of all the grounds upon which her rites and ceremonies stand--I do not say that I am able to discuss with my noble friend those one thousand questions, which Bishop Law said arose out of the thirty-nine articles, but I believe her doctrines to be scriptural, and I know her principles to be tolerant. But, my lords, I beg leave to say, that I adopt those doctrines upon another ground, which perhaps may expose me, with some in the present day, to censure. My lords, I espouse those doctrines because they are the mode of faith delivered down to me by my forefathers; and because they are the mode of faith which I find established in my country. I am not prepared to remove the basis upon which is founded (though it may be apart from) the structure of the religion of my country. I do not think that such is the wish of the majority of the dissenters; but, at all events, it seems to me a course calculated to lead only to a state of general scepticism and universal suspension of religion among the people. But while I say this for myself--while I claim to found my attachment to my religion upon