vice to legal gentlemen. In
it, among other things, we are enlightened as to the '_Rights of the
Clergy_.' We subjoin a few items: 'An archbishop is a sort of inspector of
all the bishops in his province; but he does not call them out as an
inspector would so many policemen, to examine their mitres, and see that
their lawn sleeves are properly starched, before going on duty in their
respective dioceses. An archbishop may call out the bishops, just as a
militia colonel may call out the militia.' 'A bishop (_episcopes_) is
literally an overseer, instead of which it is notorious that some of them
are overlookers of their duties, and blind to the state of their diocese,
though they call it their see.' 'The duties incumbent on a parson are,
first to act as the incumbent, by living in the place where he has his
living. Formerly, a clergyman had what is called the benefit of clergy in
cases of felony; a privilege which, if a layman had asked for, he would
have been told that the authorities would 'see him hanged first.' 'A
curate is the lowest grade in the church, for he is a sort of journeyman
parson, and several of them meet at a house of call in St. Paul's
Church-Yard, ready to job a pulpit by the day, and being in fact
'clergyman taken in to bait' by the landlord of the house alluded to.'
Concerning '_Subordinate Magistrates_,' as officers of the customs,
overseers of the poor, etc., we glean the following information:
'Tide-waiters are overseers of the customs duties, therefore it is their
duty to overlook the customs. Custom is unwritten law, and a practice may
be termed a custom when it can be proved to have lasted for a hundred
years. Now, can any man doubt that the custom of defrauding the customs
has endured more than a hundred years? Then the practice has become a law,
and for observing this law, which, it seems, is one of our time-revered
institutions, and a profitable proof of the wisdom of our ancestors,
landing-waiters and tradesmen are to be prosecuted and punished. Monstrous
injustice!' 'Overseers of the Poor are functionaries who sometimes
literally over-see or over-look the cases of distress requiring
assistance. The poor law of ELIZABETH has been superseded by a much poorer
law of WILLIAM the Fourth, the one great principle of which is, to afford
the luxury of divorce to persons in needy circumstances. It also
discountenances relief to the able-bodied, a point which is effected by
disabling, as far as possibl