fol. 66.  A printed letter from the clergy of Leeds and the West-Riding country, responding to a resolution passed by the committee of the West-Riding Dissenters at Wakefield, 30 December 1789, seeking support from the clergy in the repeal effort and “friends” of repeal [Wyvill had suggested this in his letter of 21 December 1789--see above, fol. 47].

The clergy who signed this notice were strongly against repeal of the Test Acts and did not wish to be thought in support of the Dissenters.  They did not see the Acts as a “perversion” or a “grievance” but rather a “salutary Provision for the Security of our established Constitution, in both its Civil and Religious Branches.” These clergy were concerned about the “apparent Eagerness of the whole Body [of Dissenters] to bring this Matter [of repeal] again under Discussion at the Eve of a General Election; before a Parliament, which hath already twice, after the fullest Hearing, solemnly decided against it.” They believed that the Dissenters already enjoyed a “complete Toleration,” but with their desire for repeal ongoing, these Clergy could only see it as an ultimate “Contest for Power in the State.” If the Dissenters should gain their object, these men were convinced it would be detrimental to the church and the constitution.  Among the signees was a Richard Fawcett. M. A.

Attached to this letter is a response from a meeting of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, an Anglican society in London, signed by George Gaskin, Secretary, in which the attempt to enlist or insinuate that the established clergy are supportive of and would somehow benefit by the repeal of the Test Acts is condemned.  They write that repeal “must give great uneasiness to all true friends of the established Church; And that the most distant probability of its success would be a cause for the greatest apprehensions and alarm; the Test being a wise and necessary provision of the laws, for the common security of the civil and Ecclesiastical Constitution, the interests of which, in this realm, are inseparably connected.” A repeal would increase the influence of the Dissenters to “a degree inconsistent with the security of either.”

Also included here is a newspaper clipping of the meeting of Dissenting Ministers for the County of Glamorgan, 31 December 1789, at Pyle, Walter Coffin, chairman; and some more letters to the editor of the Bury Post and from Suffolk freeholders.