had a place assigned to him, just as in Peru, though
less perfectly. It was a system of organized labour, the possession of
land being a trust, not a property. But now commerce was beginning to
disturb the foundations on which all these arrangements had been
sustained, and to compel a new distribution of population; trading
companies were being established; men were unsettled by the rumours or
realities of immense fortunes rapidly gained in foreign adventure.
Maritime enterprise was thus not only dislocating society, but even
destroying its spirit, substituting self-interest for loyalty.
[Sidenote: It is imputed to the clergy.] A nation so illiterate that
many of its peers in Parliament could neither read nor write, was hardly
able to trace the troubles befalling it to their proper source; with one
voice it imputed them to the bad example and shortcomings of the clergy.
Long before Henry VIII., England was ready for the suppression of the
monasteries. She regarded them as the very hot-beds of her evils. There
were incessant complaints against the clergy for their scandalous lusts,
for personal impurities such as in modern times we do not allude to, for
their holding livings in plurality, for their extortion of exorbitant
profits, and neglect in the discharge of their duty. [Sidenote: Causes
of irritation of the laity against the clergy.] In public opinion, to so
great an extent had these immoralities gone that it was openly asserted
that there were one hundred thousand women in England made dissolute by
the clergy. It was well known that brothels were kept in London for
their use. It was affirmed that the confessional was shamefully abused,
and, through it, advantage taken of females; that the vilest crime in an
ecclesiastic might be commuted for money, six shillings and eightpence
being sufficient in the case of mortal sin. Besides these general causes
of complaint, there were some which, though of a minor, were not of a
less irritating kind; such for instance, as the mortuary, soul-shot, or
corpse present, a claim for the last dress worn by persons brought to a
priest for burial, or some exaggerated commutation thereof.

[Sidenote: Accusation against the clergy by the House of Commons.] That
such was the demoralized condition of the English Church, and such its
iniquitous relations to the people, we have the most unimpeachable
evidence, under circumstances of an imposing and solemn character. The
House of Commons brou