Punch: Punch (56.1869)

CAUTION TO LADIES.

Don't try to Catch a Gentleman’s Horse for him, unless quite Sore you can Stop it !

[Gentleman in distance sees every chance of finishing the run on foot, and is grateful in proportion.

PUNCH’S ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.

Monday, March 1. The Great Magician began to utter the Words
of Power that, when all are said, shall set the Protestant Ariel free,
and bid her fare far better than ever. That night, the Penian Caltban

“ had cramps,

Side stitches that did pen his breath up ; urchins
Did for that vast of night that they might work
All exercise on him. That most lying slave,

Whom stripes might move, not kindness,”

felt that soon his occupation would be gone, or else-

But to the Words.

New Year’s Day, 1871, will see the Irish and the English Churches
severed.

But the work of Disestablishment and Disendowment is to begin on
the passing of the Bill, the Second Beading whereof stands for the
18th of this month.

Then is the present Ecclesiastical Commission for Ireland to be
wound up, and a new one formed. Eor the purposes now before us,
the Church is to be under two Governments, one, the State’s, to last
ten vears, one her Own, to last as long as the Church pleases.

The first is a Commission, appointed by the State.

The second is a ©obcrning ISobg, elected by the Church.

No new Vested Interests are to be created after the passing the Act,
but for the temporary government of the Church, spiritual appoint-
ments may be made.

The Queen loses her prerogative of appointing Bishops; but, on the
prayer of the Church, may nominate them for spiritual purposes.

The Irish Bishops at once depart from the House of Lords.

Svnodical action is to be restored to the Irish Church, and it is invited !
to elect a body which shall fairly represent bishops, priests, and laymen |
ol the Anglican communion, and if the Government shall consider that
such body is properly representative, the Queen will recognise it, and it
will govern the Irish Eree Episcopal Church of the future. This is the
Governing Body that has been mentioned. i

To this body, which it will be convenient to call the G. B. (let us
hope the initials will also mean Great Blessing), will be set over so
much of the property of the Church as she is to retain. Careful calcu-
lations have been gone into as to the value of that property, and of the
rightful claims upon it, and it will be seen that provision is made for
the clergy of various ranks.

Incumbents are to have their net income (less curates’ salaries) so
long as they discharge their duty. • Or, if they please, the annuity
representing their interest may be commuted, and handed to the G. B.,
subject to the trust of paying the income while duty is done.

Curates are divided into two sorts, the Permanent and the Transitory.
The former are to have the same provision as Incumbents; the latter
are to be dealt with as are Civil Servants.

No, aged ladies of both sexes, Mr. Gladstone does not plunder the
Private Endowments, nor does he hand over the Protestant churches
to the Papists. On the contrary, every private endowment since King
Charles the Second’s Restoration (before which Mr. Gladstone
holds that the Irish Church was Calvinistic, and different from our own)
is to be religiously preserved to the G. B. These are valued at half a
million. And as for the churches, they are to be handed to the G. B.
conditionally on its keeping them in order for divine service, or under-
taking to pull them down, and build others where there are more
Protestants. And,

Twelve churches, which are national memorials, or objects of art, are
to be maintained by the Commission. Ruined churches, or such as are
refused by the G. B., are to be transferred to the Board of Works, to be
taken down, and the materials and the land sold.

Nor are the Protestant Church Burial Grounds to be given up to
Popish ghouls, but are to pass with the churches, all rights reserved.
All other burial-grounds go to the Guardians of the Poor.

We disincline to trouble you about Glebe Houses and the Glebe,
lest, like Addison,—

“ In the sultry glebe you faint.”

But take it from us that the proposed arrangements are very just to
the Church.

Would you like to know the value of the Public Endowments ol