Clerical Incomes in England.

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 188, 22 January 1887, Page 2

Clerical Incomes in England.

I It would probably be easy to draw frotx tho records of probate during the last 5( years an imposing list which might bo en titled "Clerical Savings." But scarcelj the most ignorant or hostile reader woulc believe that these savings had been made out of professional incomes. The clergj are still, in a great degree, drawn from the wealthy class, and though probably few persons in actual possession of large in comes take orders, many clergymen in the natural course of events succeed to such incomes. Fortunes, too, may sometimes be made by schoolmasters, whose occupation u still, for the most part, an appanage of the clergy. It is even conceivable that a bachelor Dean who should neglect the social duties of his position, and shut hie purse against the appeals for subscriptions, might lay by something considerable out oi his income. But it is scarcely possible that any parish clergyman without means of his own, not being a positive miser, should save anything beyond the barest provision for his family. The great prizes of former days exist no longer — the Rectory of Doddington, for instance which used to bring in more than £4,000 per annum, the presentee to which had to give a bond for £100,000 that he would not accept a bishopric, and so put the next presention into the hands of the Crown. People still talk of " good livings," and apply the term to a benefice of £1,000 or £800 per annum. Even if these sums represented net income, the livings could only be culled "good" in virtue of a contrast with others that are unquestionably not good. They would not be considered prizes in any other occupation followed by the upper classes— in either of the branches of the law, in medicine, in commerce, or even the civil service of the Crown. In the army and the navy, it is true, the pay is still worse than in the Church. But the income is not all that can be desired ; on tho contrary, it is subject to drawbacks and deductions which few laymen appreciate. It is seldom re memberedthata hundred years ago there was scarcely a curate, in the ordinary acceptation of the term— i.e., the assistant of a resident rector or vicar — to be found in England, Such curates as there were had the charge of parishes held by pluralist incumbents. Of curates proper there are now but few ; of assistant curates, a class created to meet the demand for a more efficient performance of parish duties, there must be at least 5,000. If we reckon that these receive, on an average, a stipend of £125 per annum, we have a burden of £625,000 on the general income of the benefices throughout the country, a burden voluntarily undertaken, as no incumbent, unless he has more than one church to serve, is legally i'Ound to furnieh himself with an assistant. A compulsory burden, the weight of which is not generally appreciated, is to be found in the rates. The average householder who groans, and not without cause, under these imposts, pays, after all, only upon the rent of his house ; the clergymen pays upon his whole income, sa far, at leaßt, as that income is derived from his profession. Add to this that his puree is supposed to be open to every call of the needy, that he belongs, by right of his profession, to the small class of those who give, and that he is the ultimate resort when there is a deficiency in the churchwardens' account for the expenses of worship, or in the balance sheet of the schools, and it is easily seen that the " good living " is, in fact, something that, from a commercial point of view, is little to be desired. As to poor livings, it is well known that they are less profitable than curacies, and would scarcely be accepted but for the fact that for men above a certain atre curacies are practically unattainable When, therefore, we read in Mr Mulhall's admirable Dictionary of Statistics" that "in England and Wales, 11,754 clergymen collect £4,054,000," we perceive that womething remains to be said. Deduct £625,000 for the expenses of professional assistance, and £450,000 for rates (reckoned at 8s in the pound on a ratable value of £3 000,000), and we arrive at a total of £2,979,000, or an average receipt of a little over £250, to which, however, should generally be added the value of a house, and sometimes a sum for the rent of glebe. Glebe, indeed, is now a most undesirable possession, and the unfortunate incumbents who derive their income wholly from this source are frequently in a most deplorable | situation. Unableto lettheland, without the capital or the skill to cultivate it themselves, and knowing that to leave it uncultivated j will make them liable for ruinous dilapida- | tions, they find themselves in a kind of financial "little case," the distresses of which it would not be easy to exaggerate. We can imagine, then, the dismay, and, unless they have attained Jto a rare saintlineBB of temper, the wrath with which men who are already in seriouß difficulties — aud tho relief societies could tell piteous tales of clerical poverty even among the beneficed— find themselves assailed by an antitithe agitation. About 50 years ago, as many of our readers will probably be aware, tithes were commuted for a rent charge, which was to vary according to the price of wheat, barley and oats. On the whole, the calculation has been justified by events. The general average value for 50 years of £100 has been £102 lie 9d, the highest point reached being £112 15s 6d, in 1875, and ' the lowest, £89 15s Bd, in 1855. For the present year it stands at £90 10s 3d, But as the prices of seven years are taken into account, the variation is gradual, and may aeem, at least to the tithepayer, too slow ; when, for instance, he Bees' that his payment is increased by high prices obtained years before by a predecessor. It must be remembered, also, that in the 50 years which have gone by since the Tithe Commutation Act was passed circumstances have entirely changed. The price of corn dependa not on the prosperity of Engl6h harvests, but on the seasons iv India and America (the importations from the Continent becoming yearly less and less important). In 1881, e.g., the yield of wheat in the United Kingdom was 79,000,000 bushels, while the importations mounted up to 135,000,000, double the amount of 20 years before, and far more than double the figures of 1837. Sooner or later, from this, as from other points of view, we shall have to face the fact that English agriculture is ceasing to concern itself with the production of corn. The Government is very liberal just now in promising royal commissions, and it might very well add to the number of its engagements an inquiry into the subject of tithe commutation. Meanwhile, it is not easy to know where our sympathies should be bestowed in the

conflict which has already broken out in Wales, and which is not very far below the surface in many parts of England. The farmers are refusing the payment of what is styled a legal charge, one, too, which by an elaborate arrangement, has been liable to vary with the means for raising it. The sliding -scale changing with the change of prices, which is so loudly demanded as an equitable adjustment of rent, proves to be quite unacceptable when it is applied to tithe rent charge. And their resietance is ultimately hopeless, because whatever abatement may be made from tithe will naturally be added to rent. On the other hand, they are probably resisting under the pressure of necessity, though their action is doubtless accentuated by religious, and even political hostility. But the clergy assailed with these demands for reductions are probably ill able to grant them. The incumbent of one of the most disturbed parishes, for instance, has a nominal income of £700, reduced by the fall of value and by ratee, we may conjecture to something like £550, not to speak of income tax, house tax, and professional; claims. The tithe-payers demand a reduction which would still further diminish iti by more than £150— a claim which may not be anything more than their necessities, require, but which the incumbent may well be unable to accede to. How few who read this article could give up more than a quarter of their income without creating for themselves very serious embarrassments. And, unfortunately, there seems to be no way out of the difficulty. Where the debtor cannot pay, and the creditor 1 cannot afford to excuse the debt, the situation is apparently hopeless. In any future adjustment, if the tithe rent-charge were to be reduced, the clergyman might be relieved by having to pay rates only on the value of his house, a considerable advantage to him, which would impose a small and equally distributed burden on the other ratepayers, The legal fiction—for so we may call it— that what a man receives for his professional services is real property, is at the bottom of much of the present trouble.— From the " Spectator," October 30th,