§ Mr. G. W. Woodrose to move for leave to bring in a bill to exempt scientific and literary institutions from the payment of parochial and municipal rates and taxes, for such parts of their buildings as are used exclusively for scientific and literary purposes. He believed this exemption would have the most salutary effects upon the population, by encouraging the dissemination of scientific, moral, and religious instruction in all places where institutions literary or scientific, were already or might hereafter be established. It would, in effect, be equivalen to a vote by that House of so much public money, without being felt by any one. As this was an object in which all who wished to disseminate sound knowledge throughout the nation must feel a deep interest, he anticipated that there would be no indisposition to assist institutions so meritorious, and which, nevertheless, he regretted he was compelled to say were in too many instances, so deficient in means as to require all possible aid from the well wishers of science.
§ Mr. Wyseseconded the motion. This bill was free from objections which had been made to bills of a similar kind. There were many buildings of a similar kind, and of a public nature, which were exempted from taxation in the manner proposed by this bill, and he saw no reason why the exemption should not be applied 921 with respect to the buildings contemplated by the present bill.
§ Leave given.
§ Bill brought in and read a first time.
§ The House adjourned at a quarter past Twelve o'clock.