NEPOTISM, FAMILY, AND MERIT - THE CHURCH-OF-ENGLAND IN THE 18TH-CENTURY

The debate on nepotism in the eighteenth century has developed more fu lly in the last five than in the preceding fifty years. Within the eme rgent professions nepotism was difficult to distinguish from the hered itary nature of recruitment into the Church, the law, and the army. Th e debate on nepotism in the Church has produced contrasting views, one regarding nepotism as a feature of the corruption and abuse that dogg ed the Church after 1714, the other suggesting that nepotism not only served a specific function, as it did among the laity, but was accorde d moral legitimacy by contemporaries. The article suggests that nepoti sm took its place within the structure of patronage which included the recommendation of deserving clergy to the purveyors of patronage and the nomination of men of talent from the universities to the household s of bishops.