Such is the
power of the _esprit de corps_ to palliate and recommend as colorable
the very weakest logic to a man of acknowledged learning and talent!--In
conclusion I must again disclaim any want of veneration and entire
affection for the Established Church: the very prejudices and injustice,
with which I tax the English clergy, have a generous origin: but it is
right to point the attention of historical students to their strength and
the effect which they have had. They have been indulged to excess; they
have disfigured the grandest page in English history; they have hid the
true descent and tradition of our constitutional history; and, by
impressing upon the literature of the country a false conception of the
patriotic party in and out of Parliament, they have stood in the way of a
great work,--a work which, according to my ideal of it, would be the most
useful that could just now be dedicated to the English public--viz. _a
philosophic record of the revolutions of English History_. The English
Constitution, as proclaimed and ratified in 1688-9, is in its kind, the
noblest work of the human mind working in conjunction with Time, and what
in such a case we may allowably call Providence. Of this _chef d'oeuvre_
of human wisdom it were desirable that we should have a proportionable
history: for such a history the great positive qualification would be a
philosophic mind: the great negative qualification would be this [which to
the established clergy may now be recommended as a fit subject for their
magnanimity]; viz.
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