HC Deb 21 December 1819 vol 41 cc1392-3
Mr. Canning

begged to remind an hon. gentleman opposite of a statement which he had made on a former evening respecting a clergyman who had preached a sermon at an Orange procession, calculated rather to inflame than to allay the passions of his hearers. He was not at that time acquainted with the circumstances which the hon. gentleman stated, nor did he know the name of the clergyman; but he had since received a letter from him, denying many of the circumstances mentioned, and declaring that the sermon which he had been requested to preach on that occasion, and which he had consented to preach as any other clergyman would have done in ordinary civility, was by no means of the tendency which had been represented. He mentioned the text from which he preached, and he (Mr. Canning) thought it a sort of guarantee against doctrines such as had been imputed to him: it was, "By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." He had made inquiries respecting the reverend gentleman himself, and had found that he was highly respectable in character.

Mr. Bennet

expressed himself obliged to the right hon. gentleman for the opportunity afforded him of removing any erroneous impression which he might have been the means of occasioning. In the report which had been given of his speech on the night to which the right hon. gentleman alluded, he had seen many things which he did not state. He had been made to say, that the procession went to church bearing effigies, with the insignia of a pope and a bishop; that on their arrival at the church, they stripped the effigies of their robes, and threw them into the fire; and that then a clergyman preached a sermon which was nothing less than sedition. Now, he stood in the judgment of the House, whether he had said this. As to his having charged the clergyman with preaching sedition, all he had said on that subject was—"I conceive a sermon preached under such circumstances, to be sedition against man, and blasphemy against God." He was quite ready to admit that this clergyman, or any other who acted as he had done, thought he was doing right, but still he must disapprove of his conduct.