( 90 )
[90] of ecclesiastics, and in all stages from infancy to manhood[1].' Far from agreeing with you, Sir, that these regulations render the clergy a more useful and respectable body, experience convinces me that the very contrary is the fact. In schools and colleges they may, in some degree, support their dignity within the monastic walls; but, in paying due respect to the parents of the young nobility under their tutorage, they do not forget, obsequiously, to respect their noble patrons The little respect paid, in great houses, to tutors and chaplains proves, Sir, the fallacy of your reasoning. If would be almost invidious to remark, that they sometimes are only modern substitutes for the jesters of Gothic memory, and serve as whetstones for the blunt wit of the noble peer who patronizes them; and what respect a boy can imbibe for a butt, at which the shaft of ridicule is daily glanced, I leave
- ↑ Page 148.
those
