* * * * *
SONG OF THE CHURCH.
No. 1.
LEAVE ME ALONE.
A PASTORAL BALLAD.
"We are ever standing on the defensive. All that we say to them is,
'_leave us alone_.' The Established Church is part and parcel of
the constitution of this country. You are bound to conform to this
constitution. We ask of you nothing more:--_let us alone_."
--Letter in _The Times_, Nov. 1838.
1838.
Come, list to my pastoral tones,
In clover my shepherds I keep;
My stalls are well furnisht with drones,
Whose preaching invites one to sleep.
At my _spirit_ let infidels scoff,
So they leave but the _substance_ my own;
For in sooth I'm extremely well off
If the world will but let me alone.
Dissenters are grumblers, we know;--
Tho' excellent men in their way,
They never like things to be _so_,
Let things be however they may.
But dissenting's a trick I detest;
And besides 'tis an axiom well known,
The creed that's best paid is the best,
If the _un_paid would let it alone.
To me, I own, very surprising
Your Newmans and Puseys all seem,
Who start first with rationalizing,
Then jump to the other extreme.
Far better, 'twixt nonsense and sense,
A nice _half_-way concern, like our own,
Where piety's mixt up with pence,
And the latter are _ne'er_ left alone.
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