Transcribed from the 1843 Longman, Brown, Green and Longmans [first edition] by David Price. SUBSCRIPTION THE DISGRACE OF THE ENGLISH CHURCH. * * * * * ——— BY THE REV. C. N. WODEHOUSE, CANON OF NORWICH. ——— * * * * * London: LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, AND LONGMANS. NORWICH: CHARLES MUSKETT. MDCCCXLIII. SUBSCRIPTION THE DISGRACE OF THE ENGLISH CHURCH. IN human affairs, when attention is powerfully attracted to some question of absorbing interest, the effect frequently is as though one half only of the subject were visible to the eyes of the understanding. The mind fixes on some peculiar point. On that a partial light is exclusively cast; till in time it is discovered that others, consigned for a while to an unnatural obscurity, are in reality of greater moment. They have quietly grown in importance—like hardy trees unnoticed by the planter, as not requiring his care—till they are suddenly developed in their true character and vigour, to the astonishment of those who had overlooked them; and demand, if it be not too late, the deepest attention and the most active intelligence to control or direct them. While Charles I. and Archbishop Laud were absorbed in maturing their favoured plans for Church and State, opposite and deeply-rooted opinions, whose force they never paused to appreciate till it was useless, were ripening all around them; and their lives became a sacrifice to their blindness. While James II. was only intent upon enforcing the dictates of his own one-eyed bigotry, the Revolution was already accomplished in the hearts of his people; and William III., the instrument to realize their wish, was almost at the gates of London. While Mr. Canning was delighting the electors of Liverpool with his eloquent, and to them convincing, denunciations against the minutest change in the parliamentary representation of this nation; while he was admonishing them, with a wisdom then esteemed oracular, “_Spartam nactus es_, _hanc adorna_,” a few brief years were to give us almost a new Sparta; new electoral departments; new laws and forms of election; new qualifications, and thus new constituents; and, more than all, new influences upon electors and the representatives elected.