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There can be no question that the state of property in France is much
more favourable to mortality than that of this country. The wants
of life are supplied by the moderate income as well as by the large
income; but the Englishman is constantly stimulated to obtain more
more than is necessary for the supply of his own wants, to obtain
what may enable him to make such an appearance in the world
as is is made by fashionable people. In short, the Taxes and Church
property of this country, by enabling the Aristocracy to leave enormous
incoms to one child, have in some measure established notions which
ensure the perpetual pauperisation of the mass of the people. The
public expenditure must continue to be fixed according to a scale rendered
necessary by the incomes with which the highest class of functionaries
associate.
The chamber of Deputies proceeded, in the sitting of the 16th, to discuss
the Ecclesiastical Budget. No disposition was evinced to reduce
the allowance to the Parish Clergy; but an Amendment having been proposed
to reduce the allowance for Exhibitions to the Seminaries from 1,100,000
france to 800,000 frances, M Guizot a (Protestant) opposed the Amendment,
in a speech which created considerable sensation:—
Even under Charles X" he said "the Clergy could not revive and
take a place in our institutions as a political power. The power that
they had they owed to their influence with that Prince personally, it has
disappeared with the prince. Hence I am entitled to say, that as a political
power the Clergy have perished, been dethroned with Charles X
. We are very wrong, in my opinion, when we now speak of the
Clergy in a general and absolute manner as a body, entirely animated
with one and the same spirit — a counter revolutionary
spirit, which they will always preserve, from the Bishop down to the
lowest Curé. Gentlemen, this is not the case, and every day they there will
be less of this. It is already easy to perceive that very different opinions,
are manifested among the Clergy [divers murmurs] I see yet
a title of the old opinioni opinion, the country-revolutionary opinion,
which persists in dreaming a state of things which no longer
exists, and in desiring its returns [yes, yes] I see besides this opinion
another small opinion which is taking root, a small opinion which
I shall call the revolutionary opinion of the Clergy, which endeavours
to ally the old Ultra Montane ideas with universal suffrage,
and which flatters itself with finding in this whimsical marriage
of old Ecclesiastical ideas with modern theories a certain influence,
which it could not use if it obtained it; besides this small school,
besides this small sect animated with the new spirit, I believe
in general the Clergy tranquil, pacific; they may have their regrets,
their affections; but they remain, and will remain strangers to the
intrigues and the passions of the others, and confine themselves
purely and simply to their religious functions: We must hold
with these different parties of the Clergy a conduct extremely
different; we must not speak in the same manner of their different
opinions, nor treat them in the same manner.
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