Ch. 12: The Bill For Settling the Tithe of Hemp, Flax, &c

SOME REASONS AGAINST THE BILL FOR SETTLING THE TITHE OF HEMP, FLAX, &c.

BY A MODUS.

NOTE.

About the end of 1733 the Irish House of Commons had under consideration a bill for the encouragement of the growth of flax and the manufacture of linen. This bill contained a clause by which the tithe upon flax should be commuted by a modus or money composition. The clergy, to whom this tithe was an important source of revenue, and, naturally, not wishing to lose its advantage, took steps to petition Parliament to be heard by counsel against the bill. Swift signed the petition, which set forth the injury which would be done to their order if the clause in the bill, then before the House, were allowed to become law. In addition to this he committed and arranged his arguments to writing, and issued them in the following pamphlet. The activity against the bill proved so efficacious that the House of Commons dropped it. It may be remarked that Swift's interference was purely disinterested, since no part of the revenue of St. Patrick's, as Monck Mason points out, comes from the "district appropriated to the culture of flax;" nor did Swift, "or any of his predecessors or successors, ever receive one shilling upon account of that tithe."

This attempt on the part of the House of Commons to regulate the affairs of the clergy of Ireland seems to have been one of a series which divided laity and clergy into two strongly opposing parties. On the one side were the House of Commons and its supporters, on the other the general body of the Irish clergy, with, for a time, at any rate, Swift at the head. The tithe of pasturage, or, as it was called, the tithe of agistment, was being strongly resisted at the time, and many of the clergy were forced to sue in court before they could obtain it. The matter of this tithe had been already before an Irish court in 1707, and had been settled in favour of the suing clergyman, one Archdeacon Neal; and although the cause was removed to King's Bench in England, the previous judgment was confirmed. In spite of this decision, however, the tithe continued to be a subject of litigation, and the landed proprietors even formed themselves into associations for the purpose of resisting the clergy's claim. In 1734 the House of Commons aggravated matters by passing resolutions against the claims, many of which were then the subject of legal actions, and prevented decisions being come to while it had the matter under its consideration. From the pamphlets written at the time it may easily be seen that this interference on the part of the lower House was both unseemly and unjust. Its conduct so roused Swift that his indignation found expression in one of his bitterest and most terrible poetical satires--"The Legion Club"--a satire so bitter and so scathing that reading it now, after the lapse of more than a century and a half, one shudders at its invective--"a blasting