into the Books or Registers belonging to the said respective Cities, Corporations or Boroughs, or Cinque Ports and their Members, or other Port-Towns.

None to be a Magistrate unless he take the Oaths and receive the Sacrament. Farther Provisions relating hereto, 5 Geo. I. c. 6. §. 3. Carthew 306. 3 Lev. 116. 2 Ven. 247, 248.

"XII. Provided also, and be it enacted by the Authority aforesaid, That from and after the Expiration of the said Commissions, no Person or Persons shall for ever hereafter be placed, elected or chosen, in or to any the Offices or Places aforesaid, that shall not have within one Year next before such Election or Choice, taken the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, according to the Rites of the Church of England; (2) and that every such Person and Persons so placed, elected or chosen, shall likewise take the aforesaid three Oaths, and subscribe the said Declaration at the same Time when the Oath for the due Execution of the said Places and Offices respectively shall be administred; (3) and in Default hereof, every such Placing, Election and Choice is hereby enacted and declared to be void. XIII. Provided always, and be it enacted, That every Person who shall be placed in any Corporation by virtue of this Act, shall upon his Admission take the Oath or Oaths usually taken by the Members of such Corporation.

XIV. Provided also, and be it hereby enacted, That the Powers granted to the Commissioners by Virtue of this Act, shall continue and be in Force until the five and twentieth of March, one thousand six hundred sixty-three, and no longer.

XV. Provided, That if any Action, Bill, Plaint or Suit shall at any Time hereafter happen to be brought or commenced against any Person or Persons nominated a Commissioner aforesaid, for any Matter or Thing by them or any of them done by Virtue or in Pursuance of this Act, That

The usual
Oath.

How long

the Commissioners' power shall continue.

Commissioners sued may plead the General Issue, and

recover treble

Costs.

22 CORPORATION ACT AGAINST DISSENTERS.

then it shall be lawful to and for every such Person and Persons against whom such Action, Bill, Plaint or Suit shall be brought or commenced, to plead the General Issue, and to give this Act, or any other special Matter in Evidence; (2) and if the Verdict shall pass with the Defendant or Defendants in any such Action, or the Plaintiff or Plaintiffs become Nonsuit, or suffer any Discontinuance thereof, that in every such Case the Judge or Judges before whom the said Matter shall be tried, or be depending, shall by Force and Virtue of this Act allow unto the Defendant or Defendants his or their treble Costs, which he or they shall have sustained by reason of their wrongful Vexation in Defence of the said Action or Suit, for which the said Defendant or Defendants shall have like Remedy as in other Cases where Costs by the Laws of this Realm are given to the Defendants.

Reversions of Offices in London saved.

XVI. Provided always, and it is hereby declared, That this Act, or any Thing therein contained, shall not extend or be to the Prejudice of any Person or Persons whatsoever, that hath any Reversion or Reversions of any of the Offices or Places belonging to the City of London, by Force or Virtue of any Order, Grant, Designation or Nomination of the Lord Mayor and Court of Aldermen of the said City heretofore respectively made or granted to him or them before the Times of the late Wars, for or in respect of such Grant, Designation or Nomination only; any Thing in this Act to the contrary notwithstanding.

This-this is "the galling yoke we lay upon the consciences of Dissenters!"--an enactment positively unincumbered with any penalty whatever, much as we daily hear from Dissenters of pains and penalties!" The

Act merely says, that in the event of noncompliance the election to office shall be void. Who now will say that the grievance complained of is practical? Who will not perceive that it is purely theoretical and imaginary? The Act embraces two points-and two points only-the Sacrament and the Oath of Allegiance. Lord J. Russel, the noble agitator of the question of repeal, admits, incautiously indeed, but such admission is better than a volume of abstract reasoning, that "Hume" (to whom of course with Bishop Hoadly and Bishop Baxter, as Mr. Brougham facetiously terms him, all the partizans of this cause look up with the profoundest veneration, as a “pillar” of the school of latitudinarianism) thought the clause respecting the Sacrament of so little consequence, that he omitted it from his abstract of the Act, and as for the oath of allegiance, that his Lordship still wishes to be retained." It would be important, therefore, that we should be informed, if it be not too great a secret, what it is that is contended for. His Lordship strongly reminds us of the man in Horace,

Rixatur de lanâ caprinâ, et

Propugnat nugis armatus.

THECAL

NUS, 710

NA

LEI

We are told that an Act is oppressive, tyranni

cal, &c, and a disgrace to the Statute-book: and we have seen that that Act contains but two points-the one admitted to be nugatory, and the other it is designed still to keep in force! To contend, therefore, that such Act ought to be abrogated, appears to my limited comprehension the very apex of absurdity,

As for the " DECLARATION" now proposed in lieu of this Act, and which Lord John Russel and the Dissenting party so kindly "consented" to receive, it requires no great penetration to discover that it is a total abandonment of the question, while it offers a kind of sugarplum to the children of the Church to keep them from crying! The very proposal of the "Declaration" argues FEAR-" the worst motive in politics," as every one who has studied the Greek and Roman classics will readily call to mind; and it is also the most unsafe to disclose. The "Declaration" itself, and the singular and hasty manner in which it was propounded and seized at, can leave no doubt as to the political motive that dictated it. It is, per se, the most perfect nullity that ever was invented; nor can the theologian help smiling at the misnomer of calling the Presbyterians a " Church !"

Proceed we now to the TEST ACT. This Act was passed the 25th of Charles II., twelve years subsequently to the passing of the Cor

poration Act, to which it is artfully made to appear an inseparable adjunct. The following is a verbatim reprint:

"An Act for preventing Dangers which may happen from POPISH RECUSANTS.

Preamble.

All Persons that shall bear any Offices or Places of trust under

His Majesty, &c. must take the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy, and the following Oaths,

"FOR preventing Dangers which may happen from POPISH RECUSANTS, and quieting the Minds of His Majesty's good Subjects, be it enacted by the King's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and the Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the Authority of the same, That all and every Person or Persons, as well Peers, as Commoners, that shall bear any Office or Offices, Civil or Military, or shall receive any Pay, Salary, Fee, or Wages, by reason of any Patent or Grant from His Majesty, or shall have Command or Place of Trust from or under His Majesty, or from any of His Majesty's Predecessors, or by his or their Authority, or by Authority derived from him or them, within the Realm of England, Dominion of Wales, or Town of Berwick upon Tweed, or in His Majesty's Navy, or in the several Islands of Jersey and Guernsey, or shall be of the Houshold, or in the Service or Imployment of His Majesty, or of His Royal Highness the Duke of York, who shall inhabit, reside, or be within the City of London, or Westminster, or within Thirty Miles distant from the same, on the First Day of Easter Term, and that shall be in the Year of our Lord 1673, or at any Time during the said Term; all and every the said Person and Persons shall personally appear before the End of the said Term, or of Trinity Term

&c.

When and

where to appear and make Oath.