When the nature and provisions of the proposed measure were made known to the public, an alarm was excited among all those whom it was likely to affect. The Nonconformists generally regarded it as intended, not so much to add to the respectability of the dissenting ministers, as to contract the limits of toleration, and subject the licensing of preachers to the control of the magistracy. When therefore, on the 21st of May, the bill was to be read a second time, such a deluge of petitions was poured in against it, that the mover was left totally unsupported. The Archbishop of Canterbury said with truth, that the Dissenters were the best judges of their own concerns; and as it appeared from the great number of petitions against it, that they were hostile to the bill, he thought it unwise to press the measure against their manifest wishes. Under these circumstances the bill was, we need not say, thrown out.
This would appear to be the subject which produced George Cruikshank's graphic satire of the _Interior View of the House of God_, in the first volume of "The Scourge." The pulpit is occupied by two fanatics, one of whom rants, while the other snuffs the candles; the devil, in the gallery above, ridicules the proceedings by rasping, _à la_ fiddle, the bars of a gridiron with a poker; among the numerous congregation present we notice some attentive and interested listeners, whilst others evidently attend from mere motives of curiosity. Above the composition appears the quotation, "Believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world." The satire, _The Examination of a Young Surgeon_, which appears in the same volume, is aimed at the medical profession. One of the examiners is deaf, another has the gout, a third is asleep, while two others (unmistakable Scotchmen) discuss the merits of their respective snuff-mulls. The deaf man calls upon the frightened candidate to "describe the organs of hearing." The table is garnished with "The Cow Pox Chronicle," and a skull and bones, while the walls are decorated with pictures depicting a fight between death and a pugilist, the Hottentot Venus, a group of various nations worshipping the golden calf, and the lady without arms or legs. The hand of the clock points to the hour of eleven. Judging by the pile of money-bags lying at the foot of the president's chair, and the two members of the court who are busily engaged in counting coin, George would seem to insinuate that the fellows of the college of his time were a decidedly mercenary set.