§ Mr. S. Crawford, in resuming the adjourned debate, said he felt deep regret at being compelled to separate himself on the present occasion from many hon. Gentlemen for whom he entertained the highest respect, and had been obliged to differ more especially in opinion from many Members for Ireland. He also felt regret at being compelled to oppose the measure of Her Majesty's Government, which he was sure they brought forward with the kindest dispositions towards Ireland. But as one of those who were in favour of the voluntary principle, he fell compelled to vote against it. There were two charges brought against those persons who, like himself, supported the voluntary principle. They were charged, first, with concurring in the former grant to Maynooth; and in the next place, they were charged with voting for a chimerical project, which they had no chance of carrying out. With regard to the first, he believed it would be admitted without dispute that a new question now arose, for a permanent endowment by Bill was a very different thing from an annual grant by vote. It might be in some degree inconsistent with the voluntary principle that he had not opposed the grant to Maynooth; but he confessed, out of respect to his Roman Catholic brethren, he felt reluctant to vote against the grant to Maynooth, and to upset that which had been established by the Irish Parliament. Nor did he think that the second charge was mere valid. He was of opinion that if this grant were passed to the College of Maynooth, the principle would not stop there. He trusted that the course he was now taking would not be imputed to any unfriendly feeling on his part towards his Roman Catholic countrymen. It had been said that the opposition in England to the measure had arisen from what was commonly called the "No Popery" cry; but those who made the charge should consider what cause the people had for their opposition. They had ample cause in the inconsistency of the great leader of the Irish people with respect to the voluntary principle. With respect to that principle, his course had been one completely marked by inconsistencies. Some thought that this grant would not lead to further concessions, because that the Roman Catholic clergy would not accept 940 any endowment from the State. He thought differently; and he did not see why, if they accepted the present, they should refuse any future and more extended endowment. There was no man more hostile than he was to the principle of an Established Church; but he would not take the revenues from one Established Church to establish another. It had been said by, he believed, the hon. Member for Dundalk, that a great portion of what had been taken from the Catholic Church to enrich the Establishment, had consisted of the gifts of individuals. When that could be proved, he would restore the property to its owners; but any grants which had been made by the State he would not transfer from one Church to another. It was not consistent with the former declarations of the Catholics to be parties, as they were at present, to the extortion for a support for their Church from the English people; for if there was unanimity on any question in this country, it was upon that before the House, to which opposition was universal out of doors. He objected to all grants to the clergy of every denomination, as inimical to the progress of civil and religious liberty. That was proved in the case of the Presbyterian clergy of Ulster, who, though they had been among the foremost in the rebellion of 1798, no sooner had an increase of their grant, which was given to them by Lord Castlereagh, than they became the friends of every Government. The grant to Maynooth in 1795 was given on the recall of Lord Fitzwilliam from Ireland, and in lieu of the political advantages that had been promised to the people of that country, and of which his assumption of the Vice-royalty was the earnest; and it had the effect intended by its donors for a time. He wished the grant now proposed to be given to Maynooth might not be given in the character of "hush money" for the compromise of political rights; but he was afraid that there would be little extension of political rights to the people of Ireland when once it passed the House. He was opposed, besides, to any grant for the exclusive education of clergymen. The measure was spoken of as a panacea for Ireland; but as there was not a single petition from the people of Ireland in its favour, he could not see how it could deserve that designation. If he thought that it would benefit the people of Ireland, as those Gentlemen stated, he 941 would in the abstract yield his own opinion; but, not believing it to be the case, he could not give up his attachment to the voluntary principle. The people of Ireand were now claiming from the people of England the violation of religious feeling—which they had no right to claim. At the same time, he thought there was no proper fund to pay the Roman Catholic priests but the Established Church; and he therefore admitted that, in so far as that Church was concerned, the measure was eminently Conservative. In his opinion, however, no man should be compelled to pay for the church of another; and he never would give a vote to enable such a system to be carried out in this country. The Catholic people of Ireland might relieve themselves by refusing to accept a compulsory grant from the people of England, and by insisting on the Church of Ireland being abolished. They could not benefit Ireland by any policy that did not conciliate a moral power in England in its support; and if they carried this grant contrary to the feeling of the people of England, they would materially damage the welfare of Ireland, by creating towards it an hostility in the minds of the people of this country.
Lord C. HamiltonI trust the House will excuse me if I do not follow the hon. Member who has just sat down into his arguments on the voluntary principle; but I must be permitted to remark upon his observations respecting the Dissenters in England. Does he mean to say, that there is any analogy between the position of any body of Dissenters in this country, and the Roman Catholics of Ireland? I confess, when I hear such a comparison, it does appear to me to furnish the only valid argument, if any can be valid, for the Repeal of the Union; for it does show such a lamentable ignorance of the peculiar position of the Irish Roman Catholics, and of the peculiarities of that country, as almost to justify the assumption that those who use it are unfit to legislate for Ireland. The situation of the Roman Catholics of Ireland is not only totally unlike, and distinct from, that of any body of Dissenters in England, but is without precedent or example in any part of the universe. But if it could be shown that there was any body of Dissenters in England placed in similar circumstances, that would not meet the case. Why do you attempt to refer the Roman Catholics of Ireland to the Dissenters of 942 England? Why cannot you refer them to the Dissenters of Ireland? The Roman Catholics of England, at least, see themselves treated in the same manner and with the same consideration as the Dissenters; but the Roman Catholics of Ireland, if they look to their own countrymen, they behold within their own island the Dissenters enjoying a State provision. They see the Dissenters, with a population of no more than 600,000 souls, in the enjoyment of 35,000l. a year; whilst the grant of 26,000l. proposed to be given to 7,000,000 of people, is opposed on the ground of the English Dissenters being unpaid. Why is this anomalous and mortifying distinction to be maintained? Is it because they are Irish? Or is it because they amount to seven-eighths of the population? I trust, this comparison with the English Dissenters will have no weight with the House. It has been urged that this measure should not be granted, because it was not demanded by the people of Ireland. Now, Sir, on this subject I entertain a very different opinion. If this measure had been brought forward as a concession to clamour—had it been extorted by intimidation from an unwilling Government, then I, for one, would have opposed it strenuously. A demand made by violent and multitudinous meetings would furnish a reason for refusing to grant it; but were the people of that country to be deprived of the advantages spontaneously offered them by Her Majesty's Ministers, because they had not demanded it with violence and clamour? If it had been offered as "hush money, or as a bribe to the watch dogs," as has been suggested on the other side of the House, I should have viewed it in a very different light; but no such view was apparent on the face of it, and I am convinced such were not the intentions of its proposers. Much stress has been laid on the word "restitution" used by the noble Lord the Member for Liverpool; now, I never wish to cavil at expressions used in a debate: possibly the noble Lord did not intend to convey the meaning that has been attached to it; but whether he did or no, I must disclaim any such views or doctrines as that word may be supposed to imply. I never will consent to apply the principle of restitution to the Church established in Ireland, until the nearest representative of the deposed house of Stuart, has been sought out in foreign countries, and placed upon the Throne of these realms. The opponents of this measure 943 seem to me to have trusted more to their powers of prophecy than to their powers of argument; but as regards their prophetic accuracy, I conceive they have rather put themselves out of court, by the surprise they have expressed at the introduction of this measure. If they cannot see the shadows which coming events cast before them, though aided by the statements of the Government, they certainly are not entitled to much credit for their views into futurity. I must, however, confess that this measure has placed me in an embarrassing position; I see myself, with regret, opposed to many with whom I have long acted, and with whose principles I fully concur. But this is not so much a question of principle, but rather of the application of a principle; and in this way, I at once find myself reunited with those from whom I apparently differ; for we all feel an equal determination to uphold the Established Church, and we also concur in condemning the present College of Maynooth. I must also add, that in supporting this measure, I am aware that I am not representing the unanimous feelings of my constituents; but whilst great excitement is apparent in England on this subject, there is no corresponding excitement in Ireland. And I am quite prepared to prove that the majority of the petitions presented against the measure have been from Dissenters, and not from the Established Church. The Established Church has expressed little or no alarm on the matter; but that is not because she is either tired or spirit-broken, as some Gentlemen would have us to believe, but because she feels no alarm. That the Church is not tired of petitioning, or broken in spirit, is fully shown by her conduct on the Education question, and will doubtless be equally demonstrated whenever there arises an equal necessity. The Roman Catholic priests have been taunted with lending their chapels to political agitation. It is certainly true that they have done so; and, strongly as I censure that conduct, I must be permitted to express my regret that the clergy in this country should have allowed their pulpits to resound with denunciations of this measure, and converted their vestry-rooms into places for signing petitions. I also regret that a cry has been raised of the "Church in danger." Being most firmly attached to the tenets of that Church, and deeply convinced of the purity of its doctrines, I do not think that it incurs any danger from a more liberal course of conduct towards 944 those who differ from it; and I deprecate the idea that the safety of the Church depends upon illiberality towards those who are opposed to it. As a Protestant—by some considered a bigoted Protestant, (and I would rather deserve that title than merit the description of being a lukewarm one,) I must protest against the imputation that the Protestant Church cannot contend with its opponents if they are educated, or that its safety depends entirely upon the adventitious circumstances that ally it to the State in this country. I know, that when Protestants were few in number and lowly in life, not all the power of leagued potentates, or the embattled hosts of all the Sovereigns in Europe, were able to put it down—nor could the fierce flames of persecution destroy the zeal of its followers. It was based on truth, and the storms of persecution have not been able to beat it down; and am I now to be told, after it has been established by law, and allied to the State for three centuries, that it is so slightly rooted in the feelings and affections of the people, or has lost so much of its original virtue, that a better education given to its opponents must necessarily emperil its safety, and shake its foundations? I do not believe it to be of so artificial or frail a nature; on the contrary, I believe that the increase of light and knowledge which is produced by enlarged and liberal education, instead of strengthening the hands of its opponents, will diminish the number of those who reject its doctrines, from hereditary prejudices, without any examination. On this point I must remark that it appears to me that the opponents to the measure have, in the course of their speeches, rather dwelt generally against the Roman Catholic religion, than confined themselves to the effect to be expected from the proposed increase of grant. All the speeches that have been quoted, and the extracts from class books that have been read, do not in my opinion exactly bear upon the present question. I cordially concur in the condemnation expressed of those passages, and also most strongly disapprove of practices and doctrines of the Roman Church; but we are not now discussing whether we shall tolerate Roman Catholics in our country — they are here—they have existed, and will exist; the real question is, how shall we treat them? Now, do those who argue danger from this act of liberality, deduce their reasonings from the success that has attended the opposite course? Has illiberality succeeded in putting them down, or 945 in strengthening the Established Church? There have been years of persecution, proscription, and penal laws, yet there has been no general conversion of the people of Ireland to the Church. I believe that these acts of oppression on the part of the Legislature have seriously interfered with the utility of the Church. I conceive it to be a natural effect in the human mind to adhere more blindly to a doctrine when it involves persecution and insult. Every act intended to prevent the outward manifestation of affection for a creed, drives it deeper into the heart; and in exact proportion as you endeavour by legislation to degrade its priests, to insult its rites, and shackle its civil independence, you wrap it closer round the hearts of its followers. I conceive nothing can be less suited to proselytism than persecution; for you thereby fence around a creed, originally adopted on religious grounds, with a barrier of prejudice and hatred—you widen the gulf that separates you, by calling in all the worldly feelings that a sense of injustice, neglect, and persecution are sure to engender, so that an hereditary faith is adopted with the accompaniment of an hereditary animosity, and the Protestant name is looked upon by millions merely as a title whereby worldly advantages are to be enjoyed at their expense. Has persecution succeeded in making congregations desert or betray their pastors? or have penal Statutes rendered the priests less faithful to their flocks? We all know the old fable—the storm and the whirlwind could not deprive the traveller of his cloak; he wrapped it the closer around him, as the storm raged fiercer, but the gentle rays of the sun caused him to lay it aside. We have tried the storm and whirlwind of persecution—we have failed in inducing the Roman Catholics to unite with us; let us now try whether the genial rays of Christian kindness will not induce them to lay aside their prejudices, and join us in all national undertakings with cordiality and good will. I recognise the missionary character of the Church, and I know that the first object in missionary enterprises is to gain the hearts of the people. The legislation that has embittered the minds of the people against the Protestant name has greatly impeded the efficiency of the Church; for minds that would have been open to the force of truth, and amenable to the influence of conviction, have been steeled against its doctrines by a sense of neglect, oppression, and insult. But, although I deeply regret the 946 course this country has pursued in times past towards Ireland, yet I do not think anything can justify the proceedings of the Roman Catholic clergy. I consider their political conduct open to the severest reprobation; but I think, whilst expressing this censure, that their anomalous and difficult position should be considered, and that the faults of the Legislature should be remembered, as I do not think it is conceivable that any body of men so situated should take a different course. We have acknowledged the obligation to educate the priesthood, only to insult it by our practice; we have admitted the principle, only to show our contempt for it. We have offered an education of such a nature, as only to produce feelings of dislike and resentment. Can any one imagine that a student, rejoicing in obtaining, as the reward for his labours, a free studentship in the seminary endowed by the richest country in the world, can feel anything but disgust and anger when he beholds the desolate looking spot and deserted barrack that Maynooth is described to be? How must its appearance damp his glowing hopes, and turn to bitterness his feelings towards those who dole out so niggardly a pittance for so important an object! I conceive the impressions received at that College are well calculated to stamp a mind with permanent discontent; penury and stinted means meet the eye in every direction: this cannot produce gratitude. Is it then surprising, if in after years a priest should instil into the minds of his hearers an abhorrence of those to whom he attributed studied insult and neglect? I view the present College as a root of mischief and source of permanent evil to the country; and if I am now to decide upon its merits by the way in which it has hitherto fulfilled the intentions of its founders, I should at once vote for its total destruction—I would abolish it altogether; but by the Amendment proposed you would perpetuate it in all its imperfections, which are confessed by all parties. I have previously voted against it, considering it to be unfit for the duty it was intended to fulfil, and would do so again rather than continue it in its present mischievous form; but I rejoice in the alternative now offered of improving it. I think all the arguments used against the existing College tend to prove the duty of improvement; I think the premises laid down irresistibly lead to the conclusion that you should endeavour to amend it. I do not think 5l. 947 per annum for each student will over educate them, as feared by the Member for Northamptonshire. Nor do I anticipate, with the eloquent Member for Canterbury, that they will resemble the Abbés of ancient France. We all know how his historic fancies have embellished the past; in this case I conceive his prophetic fancy has with equal elegance shadowed forth a danger not likely to be established by the historic annals of future times. But we are told that we are acting contrary to the laws of God: now this is an argument to which I would reply with great deference. I have searched in the holy volume that contains revealed wisdom, and I can find nothing in it that would justify the opinion that it may be lawful to give enough to furnish a bad education, but sinful to give enough to offend a liberal and sound education. I cannot deduce any such principle from that sacred volume; much less can I trace in the tenor of Protestant principles, that the morality and lawfulness of a grant depend upon the ciphers which represent its amount. I cannot see how this or any other argument adduced tends to prove that this increase of grant involves any new principle, or leads to the great danger so loudly proclaimed. This College was founded by a King supposed not to be vacillating in his opinions or lax on religious subjects; his Minister was not a rash expediency-serving man, without settled principles, or careless about religion; the Parliament that originally endowed the institution was exclusively Protestant. Therefore if these men saw no danger, I do not think we need anticipate any, unless it is supposed that the Church is less secure on its base, or pure in its principles, than at that time. I believe it to represent the truth, and to exhibit the purest form of worship; and therefore I cannot think a trifling circumstance can endanger its existence. If this was an isolated scheme, I should have less confidence of success; but this is not so—a tone of conciliation has been adopted. Whilst firmness and prosecution responded to monster meetings, the present tranquil state of Ireland is greeted with such measures as this, conceived in a spirit of conciliation? Who can shut his eyes to the improved state of Ireland? Two years ago the whole country was convulsed with Repeal; now it has subsided into a whisper—we only hear of it through the quarrels of its promoters, or the description of the fancy dress they have adopted. Look at the spirit of the Roman Catholic 948 clergy—is the effect of the Bequests Bill to be overlooked? That Bill has acted as a touchstone between political and religious churchmen. I rejoice to say, in spite of contumely, insult and agitation, those who have undertaken to carry out the provisions of that Bill, have carried the day, and the agitators are defeated. Then followed the letter from a high authority abroad, enjoining abstinence from political strife. Look at the Kilkenuy festival, and see the effect of that letter—not one single Prelate attended. Is the Government to neglect such signs as these? No public men ever had such an opportunity. I rejoice they endeavour to profit by it. I do not intend to say, that I expect an instant change in the Irish priesthood. Such changes must be gradual; if a higher class do not enter the College, at least a better class will leave it. But I also anticipate great benefits from the spontaneous manner in which it has been offered, without condition or bargain, not to gain support or mitigate hostility, but from a sense of justice, and a desire to exhibit good will and liberality. The manner in which it has been received in this House and in Ireland leads me to augur well of the ultimate results. The Irish are a generous and grateful people; when they see that from every side of the House Gentlemen have expressed their readiness to endanger their seats, emperil their popularity, and alienate the affections of those they respect, rather than not support a measure for the benefit of Ireland, I am convinced it will produce a good and lasting effect. These interests thus freely sacrificed at the national shrine as a peace-offering, will arouse feelings of gratitude that will produce the happiest results. There is only one thing which I should venture to suggest in the carrying out of the proposed measure; I would avoid the name and locality of Maynooth. We all know that in building, patchwork is very much to be avoided. From the nature of the present buildings, their retention can be of no value; but it may seriously interfere with the designs of the architect and the convenience of the new buildings; but that is not my reason for advocating a new site. The locality of Maynooth is tainted with the suspicion, dislike, and prejudice of millions. The very name is a by-word—a battle cry—a rallying point for all religious bigotry and political animosity. As the institution is to undergo the process of regeneration, let it anew go through the rite of baptism; 949 let the ill-omened name be obliterated, and with it all the prejudices it has created be forgotten. Let this new institution arise under happier auspices, and let us invoke the good will and favourable aspirations of all parties, to a seat of learning founded in a spirit of conciliation and liberality. Let the new name be the harbinger of a new era in Irish legislation. Above all I would implore those who view this measure as rash and dangerous, if it does receive the sanction of Parliament, to suspend their judgment, and let it bring forth fruits of its own. Let them not hand down to it the dislike they felt to its predecessor, or seek to justify their prophecies, by marshalling hostility against the new institution.
§ Mr. Muntzobserved that they saw many strange things, and heard many things as strange. But nothing that he had ever seen that was strange, or heard that was strange, was so strange as the change which had taken place in the speeches and dispositions of noble Lords and hon. Gentlemen since they had changed from this side of the House to that. Their memories were clearly affected. They did not seem to recollect that, at the time when he first had the honour of a seat in that House, their great battle field was Catholic concession. On what was the vote of confidence passed? Was it not the great source of argument to those who voted against the Government on that occasion, that they could have no confidence in a Government which yielded anything to the Roman Catholics? Had not such arguments frequently descended to personal dispute, and did they not once end in a duel? He would yield to no man in that House, he would yield to no man in England, he would yield to no man in Europe, in a spirit of the utmost toleration to all classes of religionists, in the wish that all should have the fullest, freest, and fairest exercise for their own religious views. But that was one of the very reasons why he was opposed to this paltry, pitiful measure of expediency now brought before the House—a measure which the Government should be ashamed to offer, and which the Irish should be ashamed to receive. If they wanted general education, let them ask for a grant as ample and extensive as they thought was required, and he would give them, in such a course, his hearty and unhesitating support. But let them not tell him that that was education which their paltry, miserable measure 950 proposed—the education of whom? The education of a few Roman Catholic priests! And pray whom else would these priests educate? Could any Gentleman from Ireland, or elsewhere, inform him that it was the principle of the priests to communicate to the people the general education which they themselves received? Did they communicate any thing except the holy Scriptures, and only of them such part as suited their own religious views, and squared with their own peculiar principles? Did they ever teach the people to think; did they even allow the people to think at all for themselves? He would say that any man, that every man, should be admitted to the free and unimpeded exercise of his own religion. But there was one broad principle to which he had always adhered—which was, that he would neither pay for another man's religion, nor would he assist in obtaining money from one set of men for the purpose of maintaining the religious views of another. He had been told that for so acting he was bigoted. Bigoted! What, he bigoted! What an idea! He had, he was sorry to say, suffered too much in both person and pocket to fear the charge of being bigoted. He had been prosecuted, not to say persecuted, within the last seven years for his attachment to civil and religious liberty; and if he had not had the means of defending himself, he would have been cast into gaol, and have gone to ruin, although he was as free from the charge brought against him as the Speaker in the Chair. Was he now to be called a bigot? He felt conscious that the charge did not apply to him in the least degree; he was as free from bigotry as was any man in that House. No debate that had ever before taken place in that House, had shown him such extraordinary reasoning as had the present discussion. They had had every species of reasoning under the sun brought forward. And why? Simply because there was no principle in the measure. What had the hon. Member for Pontefract (Mr. Monckton Milnes) done and said? He came forward the other evening to justify the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government. But after proceeding a little, he felt confident that his task was a hopeless one, and that it was impossible to justify those who were unjustifiable. What did he then say? Could they have believed it? Why, he turned round and said that expediency was better than principle! If he really advocated such a line of conduct as this, he 951 must be in the most satisfactory condition of any Member in that House; because, certainly, in that House expediency was the rule—principle the exception. The hon. Gentleman to whom he referred was a very good-natured, a clever, and well-intentioned man. But he had a vast deal of credulity if he believed this was a final and satisfactory measure. Were they to be told that such was to be the case, in the face of that honest and extraordinary speech made by Mr. O'Connell in Conciliation-hall? What did he say? He (Mr. O'Connell) did not approve of the principle of this Bill. He took the grant as a restitution in part, and thanked Repeal and Conciliation-hall for the restoration of that part, and pledged himself to agitate for all, and to agitate until he secured all. They were told that the Catholics were to be satisfied with this measure. Let them recollect the Catholic Emancipation Bill. What was it to give? It was to give that to the Catholics which it was said would satisfy them. Did it satisfy them? They would soon find that, like the measure of Emancipation, the present Bill which they were called upon to sanction would be alike unproductive of anything that would pacify those for whose benefit it was intended. They would only, by this measure, disturb the whole country, at the same time that they gave satisfaction to no party. There was another axtraordinary reason given for the support of the measure. What said the noble Lord the Member for Nottinghamshire (the Earl of Lincoln)? He said that inasmuch as Her Majesty's Government had thought fit to hold the cup of bliss to the Roman Catholics, the House would not be justified in dashing it from their lips. Were they to be told so by any Minister of the Crown—were they to be told that they had no right to judge of the merits or demerits of that which was brought before them? If such were to be the case, the sooner they went back to their homes, and their comfortable firesides, and their businesses the better, for their occupation there was gone. The Minister had at once better govern as a despot, and the people had at once better know that he was a despot. He had often said in that House that he had no sort of care whether the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Government administered the government of the country, or the noble Lord (Lord John Russell). Some time since he would not have given the toss up of a sixpence which of them it was. 952 But he was bound to confess, and he did so with sorrow, that his opinions on this point now were entirely changed. This measure was now brought forward by the right hon. Gentleman after climbing to power on principles asserted—repeated—and determined upon—totally opposed to the principle of the measure; and they then saw the right hon. Baronet, without any sufficient reason, turning round on the principles which put him in power, and disposing of his friends, and forgetting those who had firmly supported him before. In this altered position of the right hon. Baronet, the noble Lord stood out in bold relief to him. An hon. and gallant Member (Colonel Sibthorp) said last night, that the right hon. Gentleman had deceived him. He (Mr. Muntz) might say the same. He would say further, that if the right hon. Gentleman deceived him once, he might again deceive him. It mattered not whether it was a Minister of the Crown, or a person holding the very lowest position in society, the principle held good, that he who deceived once would deceive twice if it were in his power, and suited his interest; and feeling that this was a base deception, that there was no necessity for the measure, and that it was not called for by the Irish, he considered it a gross insult to that House and to the nation; and, like the hon. and gallant Gentleman to whom he had alluded, he (Mr. Muntz) could never place the same confidence in that man (Sir R. Peel) again. But then they had been told that this measure would produce peace, and comfort, and happiness, and tranquillity, and what not. A noble Lord, a Colleague of the right hon. Gentleman, but now in the other House, had once said of the right hon. Gentleman, that "he was the best hand in that House at dressing up a case." The noble Lord was quite right. The right hon. Gentleman was not only the best hand at dressing up a case, but he was the best and ablest hand at baiting a trap. There was no man in that House equal to him. Whenever the right hon. Gentleman was conscious that there was any project of his that would not be aided by his own supporters, he then baited a trap for his opponents—and he caught them wholesale. There was the Income Tax, for instance—he laid a trap for the free traders. What did he do? He gave them a reduction in the duties on cotton, sugar, glass; he gave them one thing, and then they gave him three times as much as they received from him, 953 after which they said that he had conferred on the country one of the greatest blessings it had ever received. Then there were the Irish Catholics; they were in a discontented state. The right hon. Baronet said, "We must conciliate them." What then did he do? He came down here and proposed to give them a grant; but he would not dare to propose that it should be directly a grant. Oh, no! It was to be for education. Scores of Gentlemen spoke to him about this. They were opposed to the principle. They disliked the thing. They despised the men from whom it came; but then there was the cause of education; it was the bait for the trap. The right hon. Gentleman set the trap, and caught whole crowds of them directly. The right hon. Gentleman knew perfectly well the fable of the lion and the three bulls. He divided that he might conquer. He attacked each interest singly; he beat each, separated from the others, and then he took and ate them all up one after the other. Sir, said the hon. Member, if the Irish people want priests, and well-educated priests, why don't they educate their own priests, and why not pay for their education? It is not a fair answer to us, or any reason or excuse for this measure, to say that so much money is taken out of their country—that their absentees spend as much as 6,000,000l. a year out of Ireland. Sir, if Irish Gentleman can afford to do this—if they do not choose to attend to what is their interest, and the interest of their poor countrymen—to what is theirs, and theirs alone; this country is not to see to it for them. What, Sir, is the real position of Ireland? Look back but a year or two. The Income Tax was introduced. We did not put an Income Tax upon Ireland. Instead of that there was a little stamp duty, and a spirit duty. The spirit duty has been withdrawn, and the stamp duty produces no more than 90,000l. a year. We have renewed the Income Tax. We did not put it on Ireland. We have taken all the burden on ourselves; and all the benefit of the Tariff Ireland has as well as ourselves. Now, we are told to assist Ireland, because Ireland is in need of assistance. But why is Ireland in need? Because she chooses to be in need. When Ireland subscribes 10,000l. a year for Repeal, and 10,000l. for foreign missions, and when she can find ample funds for agitation, cannot she also find money to pay for her priests? I deny that Ireland has any claims upon us—indeed, I am not 954 aware that she does make any claim—but if she did, then I say she has ample means, if she wants to educate priests, for the sake of educating the poor. Another consideration, Sir. If you begin this, where will you stop? It has been very well remarked, that if you pay these priests, you must pay for others; and if you will pay the ministers of the Roman Catholic, how can you refuse to pay the priests of all other sects both in England and Ireland, down to the meanest Jumper? They will have a right, if the others have it. Why, there will be no end to the thing; and this must show you the impropriety and the danger of deviating from a principle. I never knew any one to do it who did not get into the dirt. I never yet knew a man in public or in private who once deviated from principle, who did not repent of it, and who was not found to fail in the object he had in view. I have had addressed to me a hundred complaints and remarks against this measure, and not one—not a single one, in its favour. And how is the feeling of the people on this subject met? It was said, when we were discussing the Income Tax, that the people did not complain about it, or the Table would be covered with petitions against it. Now, however, the Table is covered with petitions, and what is said? That they are "got up without principle;" want of principle in the petitions is now set against want of principle in the measure. What is the fact? The real truth is, that the people of this country have a great feeling, a strong feeling against this measure, and they are quite right in having it. It is my opinion that there is a great disposition in this country to return to the Catholic religion. I see that plainly enough; and that the Catholics are going to great expenses, extending themselves everywhere, and making proselytes wherever they can. I wish for toleration for them and for all others; but I do not wish to pay for advancing other religions, when I think my own the best. I am unaffectedly in favour of the free exercise of every religion; tint then I am not to be told that I am to pay for the religion of another out of the Consolidated Fund. I do not understand being called upon to pay for another man's religion. Oh! but then there is the bait of "education;" that is the bait—there is the trap, and in that persons are caught. If there were to be a direct grant, it would be refused; but a grant for education will be acceded to. I have now, Sir, to conclude my remarks. [Sir Robert Peel 955 here entered the House.] I am very sorry the right hon. Gentleman did not return before, and whilst I was remarking upon his political conduct; but I now say, in all cases, whether in public or in private, I am and ever have been the friend and supporter of principle and steadiness. I think the present Government has not adhered to principle; I am bound therefore to oppose it—to assist in changing it for another; and if those who follow it are not consistent, change them also, and so on, until at length we get those that will satisfy the country that they do adhere to principle.
§ Mr. Neville, protracted as this debate had been, was anxious not to let it come to a close without craving the indulgence of the House for a few moments. He could not shut his eyes to the petitions which were nightly poured upon that Table from nearly every constituency in the kingdom; but as they were an argument one way, so was the absence of petitions from the only two solely Protestant, solely Church of England, and solely educated constituencies—viz., the two Universities, an argument in the opposite direction. Whenever the Church was in danger, Oxford and Cambridge were foremost to petition; and he could not but think, that had it been so now, they would not have remained in the back ground; and he thought he was speaking the opinions of a majority of the right hon. Chancellor of the Exchequer's constituents, when he said that the conduct of the right hon. Gentleman had not lost him the confidence of those by whom he was so deservedly honoured and esteemed. He had visited Maynooth, and in bearing testimony to the courtesy he received at the hands of the authorities, he conld not but acknowledge the truth of every description he had heard of it, except that of the right hon. Member for Perth (Mr. F. Maule) and his friend Mr. Grant. He viewed with feelings of pity those dilapidated walls, that scanty library, and the care and pride with which the few works of value contained in it were regarded; but those feelings were changed into remorse and shame, when he heard that he was a Member of a Legislature which so miserably endowed a Government educational institution, that they were forced to send away the pupils a portion of the year solely from being unable to provide them with the necessaries of life. Everything about it was meagre. One, and 956 only one work of art he remembered to have seen, viz., a marble bust of George III., beneath which were these words:—
Georgio Tertio,Patri Patriæ,Fundatori suo,Collegium Manutianum.Upon this inscription he would not comment; but hon. Members, he thought, would not expect to find such an one in a "nursery of sedition." Taunts had been thrown out from the other side, that this measure was not entertained by the Government when in Opposition. He would not retaliate, or find fault with those who, when in power, might have brought forward a measure of which they highly approved. The noble Lord knew he could not carry it; he knew that such torrents of petitions as were now poured into the House, backed by the opposition of those Conservatives who were now tacitly opposed to it, if not by the scruples of those whom confidence in the right hon. Baronet—which the noble Lord did not possess—had overcome, would have prevented this Bill reaching a second reading. Besides, there would have been the opposing vote and speech of one Member of the Government—the right hon. Member for Perth (Mr. F. Maule). He hailed this as a measure of justice as well as of policy; and would never believe that the principles of the Christian religion, or of the Protestant faith, were opposed to the education of the Christian instructors of so vast a portion of our fellow-subjects.
§ Mr. Bellewwas disposed to give full credit for consistency to the hon. Member for Rochdale; but he could not concede the practical advantage of his views. He confessed that the language just delivered by the hon. Member for Birmingham (Mr. Muntz), and by his Colleague (Mr. Spooner) last night, almost justified Mr. O'Connell in the way he had spoken of his country; and he was sure that their constituency was one of the last which could be expected to sanction such expressions. One of those Gentlemen had told the Roman Catholics that their religion was an awful delusion. The other said, they were not entitled to receive this money from the public purse, and taunted them with their poverty. Now, not to put the question on higher ground, why should they be such fools as not to take that which, so far as it went, was a modification of the poverty under which the 957 Roman Catholic Church in Ireland laboured? But it was said, that there was no control established over the system of education pursued at Maynooth. He thought that the right hon. Baronet had never shown greater prudence and wisdom than in giving this boon in the way he had done. Suppose restrictions had been added. The education, arrange it as they might, would still be a Roman Catholic education; and no advantages arising from control could make up for the want of the hearty good will with which the Roman Catholics of Ireland met the Government on this occasion. It was said, that in other countries this control was given over the Roman Catholic Church. But in other countries the relation of the Roman Catholic Church to the State was different. In other countries the Roman Catholic Church was endowed, and diplomatic relations were established between Rome and the State. Then, it was said, the Dissenters in this country ought to have support granted them in the same way. He believed that in some cases they had not expressed the desire to have anything from the public purse; and, at any rate, the case was not the same, for there was no parallel between the situation of the Dissenters here, and the Roman Catholics in Ireland; and though he did not want to argue on the ground of "restitution," still it was impossible to say that the Dissenters of this country were similarly placed in that respect to the Roman Catholics of Ireland; for it was not to be denied that at one time the Roman Catholics there had possession of the funds of the present Establishment. As to the question of the endowment of the Roman Catholic priests, he believed there existed the strongest feelings in Ireland against endowment. Last year, in consequence of something he had said on the Bequests Bill, he had been assailed by his constituents for having spoken, as it was inferred, in favour of endowment. It had been said, that this was a step to something more; and that, not just at present, but in 1850, perhaps, the right hon. Baronet, or some other Member, would come down and ask for part of the property of the Church of Ireland for some such purpose as this. Now, he thought it very hard that the Protestant Church should be eternally thrust forward to bar the people of Ireland from receiving anything they asked for. It had been so 958 on the Catholic question, on the Reform Bill, and the Municipal Corporations Bill. This debate had given rise to much language in and out of doors which was calculated to be disagreeable to the feelings of the Roman Catholics. The Rev. Mr. Scott, at a meeting at Northampton, had said—
What do the Roman Catholics want? They want one little tiling, and that we will give them—swords and firearms.That was from a clergyman of the Church of England. At a meeting of merchants of the city of London, Mr. Labouchere spoke of his firm belief that the system taught at Maynooth was directly contrary to the revealed will of the Creator. The Presbytery of Belfast deprecated the establishment of Maynooth as being subversive of the principles of the gospel, and as an act of national guilt, against which it was their duty to protest. In the House, the hon. Member for Elgin (Mr. Cumming Bruce) had quoted a statement of the Duke of Ormonde, that he had been twenty years dealing with the Roman Catholic bishops, and never knew one of them speak the truth or hold to a promise. The hon. Member for Kent (Mr. Plumptre) said he would not say the religion of Roman Catholics was the religion of Antichrist, but it was contiguous to it. How was the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Line (Mr. Colquhoun) best known to the House? He had been remarkable for many years for speeches of a very strong character in opposition to the Roman Catholics; and he had objected that the education at Maynooth was not of a mixed nature, and that the priests were sprung from the people. He must express his gratitude to those English Members who, notwithstanding the pressure upon them, had supported this measure. There was, he was glad to say, amongst the highest in rank, intelligence, and fortune in this country, those who would not be carried away by a mere popular feeling of the moment, but who would do that which would render the two countries more united. His only regret was, that it had not been brought forward sooner; but in conclusion he would say, that although he did not regard it as a panacea for all the wants of Ireland, yet he did regard it as the foundation of a series of measures, and of a new line of policy towards that country. The right hon. Baronet at the head of the Government, 959 more than any other man in this country, had the means of pacifying and tranquillizing Ireland, and permanently uniting her to England; and, as he regarded this measure as an advance in that direction, and as the harbinger of better days for Ireland, he should give to it his most earnest support.
Captain Edward Taylorsaid: I can assure hon. Members who have a much better right to be heard than I have, that I shall be very brief; for though I might have desired to have addressed myself more at length to the House, had I been so fortunate as to catch the Speaker's eye on a former evening, I cannot flatter myself that I can now suggest any very new idea, the subject has become so thoroughly exhausted; nor should I venture to make the few observations I wish to offer, were it not that I am very anxious to repel the very unjust attack made in the course of this debate by the hon. Member for Durham upon the Protestant magistrates and the Protestant landlords of Ireland. It would be well for that hon. Gentleman to ascertain the truth of his premises before he repeats so unfounded an attack. I know not whether he has ever been in Ireland; but if so, he has not profited by his visit. He has dealt in generalities, so I must confine myself to the same limits; but I would entreat the House not to place credence in the statement they have heard—a statement which I am obliged to describe as equally remarkable for betraying a virulent feeling towards the class to which I am happy to say I belong, and an unfortunate ignorance of the subject he ventured to undertake. There is another point to which I wish to advert. It has been frequently repeated in the course of this debate, by those whose speeches must be listened to with consideration and respect, that the Dissenters alone object to the proposed measure, and that the Protestants of the Established Church are utterly indifferent on the subject. Is it possible that the petitions which have daily crowded the Table of this House, emanate from a single section of the community? and, to look out of doors, is the great and influential county of Kent peopled by Dissenters alone? I have returned from Ireland since the noble Lord the Member for Tyrone, and I am principally anxious to assure the House that the reverse of his 960 assertion is the fact. I do not mean in the least to dispute the just antipathy which the Dissenters feel to the proposed Bill; but I believe the feeling to be fully participated in by the Protestants of the Established Church. Almost all those with whom I conversed, expressed the strongest apprehensions of the calamitous results which would follow the measure becoming law; their conviction being that it could be only preliminary to the Roman Catholic religion superseding the Church as now established. It has been said that there have been fewer petitions and a less loud outcry against the Bill from Ireland, than the other parts of the kingdom; but if it be so, the reason is obvious. There has been scarcely time—a delay has been asked for, and refused. There also, the Protestants, deserted by their friends, and betrayed by those leaders whom they mainly assisted to place in power, know not to whom to look for advice and assistance: they are in the attitude of beaten, dispirited, and disheartened men; but they are not the less sensitive to this fresh attack upon their privileges and their religion. It is not many years since the right hon. Baronet at the head of Her Majesty's Government gave us some excellent advice—"that the battle of the Constitution was to be fought at the registries." I have ever since acted upon that advice; and last week I thought it right to attend while the registry was proceeding in the county which I have the honour to represent. A short time since my line of conduct was a simple one, and my task easy. I requested gentlemen to register that they might support Conservative principles—I experienced little hesitation and few objections. Matters are now quite changed—I find apathy and refusal, and am met in nine cases out of ten with the inquiry, "What do you mean by Conservatism? Is it the principle that directs the measures of the present Government? If so, we think the appellation a misnomer; we totally disapprove of the system they pursue, and we had rather not register. I am sorry to be obliged to add that I believe the present Ministers (soi-disant Conservatives) are daily becoming as unpopular with the Protestant party as were the late Ministers, with this ruinous misfortune superadded, that being infinitely more powerful, they originate measures which their predecessors would never have ventured to intro- 961 duce. I leave it to those who last night heard the speech of the right hon. Baronet the Secretary for the Home Department, to circulate their impression, whether the friendly feelings he expressed towards Protestantism are calculated much to reassure those whe represent that ill-used body in Ireland. Again, with reference to the actual measure before the House, is it called for? I chanced to travel in company with two priests of the Church of Rome since the first reading of the Bill, and they observed, "We wonder that Sir Robert Peel should risk his popularity with his own party on our account—we do not want what he offers, we will take it, but we never asked for it." The same sentiments, I believe, to be very general throughout the priesthood, and has since been repeated in more significant language by the great leader of Repeal in Ireland. It is too late for me to enter in detail into the merits of this question; besides, I am quite sensible of my incapacity to do so. However, as I have in previous years generally avoided taking part in any vote in respect to Maynooth, I hope I shall not be deemed bigoted in opposing the increase now proposed. There is, I conceive, every difference between an annual grant and a permanent endowment; and, conscientiously thinking the latter to be fraught with most mischievous consequences, I have no option but to vote as I should do, for the Amendment of the hon. Member for Newcastle; and, though I cannot conceal from myself that the proposition, once formally introduced into this House (unless some fortunate and unforeseen circumstance should occur), its eventual success will be only a question of time; yet, if I can, by defeating it now, delay for even a single year a measure which I in my heart believe will be ruinous not only to Ireland, but also to England, I trust I shall be doing my duty.
§ Sir F. Trenchsaid, that he had presented ten petitions against the measure, and received an intimation from many of his constituents that, unless he opposed the measure, they could not continue to give him their support; but, notwithstanding that representation, he should give the measure his anxious and cordial support. He entertained a confident opinion that reflection upon this subject would produce an alteration in the views of those Gentle- 962 men; but, at all events, if he lost their votes, he knew he should retain their esteem by following the dictates of his own conscience. There were seven or eight millions of Roman Catholics in Ireland who were very poor—very ignorant—very bigoted, and brought up in feelings of hostility to "Saxon tyranny." The Government could not convert—and could not transport them. All they could do was to conciliate them. These people were under the spiritual and temporal influence of their clergy, and the only method of touching their feelings was through the instrumentality of that superintending clergy. They ought then to improve the character of their pastors, if they hoped to influence the people themselves. He had heard with great pleasure the speeches of the noble Lord the Member for Arundel, and of all the other Roman Catholics of that House. It had been said that "gratitude" was a word unknown to the Irish language; but from his knowledge of that nation he believed that they would receive this concession with the most grateful feelings. Two speeches had been delivered during the course of this debate, which he had heard with great regret. He alluded to the speech of the hon. Member for Shrewsbury, and that of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Edinburgh. The speech of the one had been described by a better critic than himself as "malice concealed under the garb of wit;" and the speech of the latter Gentleman had contained charges equally extraordinary and incorrect. The right hon. Gentlemen had charged the right hon. Baronet with inconsistency. In his opinion, a conscientious change of opinion was entitled to praise rather than to censure; and if any change had taken place in the sentiments of the right hon. Baronet, there was not a man in the country who would attribute it to any other than the most conscientious motives. The right hon. Baronet had sacrificed the enjoyments of an immense fortune, and of domestic comfort, to the service of his country; and this country had never had a statesman which had conferred upon its people more substantial and permanent advantages. The presence of the right hon. Baronet prevented him from saying that which justice would have demanded from him if the right hon. Baronet had been absent; but he had so high an opinion of his judgment, and of 963 his sincerity and he saw so bright a prospect of good in the present measure, that he gave to it his most hearty and strenuous support.
§ Mr. Cobdenspoke as follows: Sir, I am sure I shall be borne out in the assertion, by all who have listened to the various speeches addressed to the House in the course of this debate, that I never remember an occasion when more irrelevant matter to the real subject of discussion was interposed, than on the present. It seems to be an impression almost generally entertained, that the question we are discussing, is the propriety of endowing the Roman Catholic priesthood of Ireland. I do not know that it would be necessary thus to notice the character and nature of our debates, did I not believe that the effect might be to produce much misapprehension in the public mind. And looking at the petitions which have been presented against the Bill, I find that at least three-fourths of them, in their prayer or argument, proceed on the supposition that we are about to pass a measure to endow the Roman Catholic priests of Ireland. Now, Sir, since the hon. Member for Birmingham (Mr. Muntz) spoke, who stated he had fallen into a trap, and knowing that he, with his extraordinary sagacity, generally stands alone in his far-seeing knowledge, I thought it my duty to go and look at the Bill that the right hon. Baronet has brought in, in order to see what we are really going to do; and upon examining it I find the preamble states it to be a Bill to amend two Acts passed in the Irish Parliament, for the better education of persons professing the Roman Catholic religion in Ireland. I have also looked over the Bill clause by clause, to see if any thing had been smuggled into it that could by possibility lead to the endowment of the Irish Roman Catholic clergy, and I have been unable to find anything of the sort. Now, if any hon. Gentlemen are in the secret, and are consequently better informed upon the point than I am, from what I have read, and what I have heard from those in authority, of course they have the advantage over me; but from all I can see, and all I have heard, I know nothing that should lead me to suppose that the object of the Bill is other than its title and preamble indicate. Of course it is competent for hon. Gentlemen to put any interpretation they please upon 964 the measure; and if they suppose that the House is about to pass a measure, a consequence of which will be an endowment of the Irish Roman Catholic priesthood, they are without doubt right in opposing it. But so far as I understand it, I consider that in voting for this measure I vote simply and purely for an extended educational grant. That alone is the object I contemplate in the vote I am about to give; and I will further say, that if the right hon. Baronet who is at the head of the Government himself were to favour such a proposition, and, following the example of the noble Lord the Member for London, express a desire or consent to the endowment of the Roman Catholic clergy in Ireland, though both the right hon. Baronet and the noble Lord should combine together, and parties be united in this House to effect that object—I say no party, no combination of party, would be able to carry in this country, in our day at least, a measure for the endowment of the Roman Catholic clergy of Ireland out of the Consolidated Fund; and if any single doubt upon that point existed before, the excitement that has been created through the country, consequent upon the misapprehension as to what we are about to do, must convince the House that I am right. I look upon it, therefore, as purely an educational grant—as a vote of 26,000l. a year instead of 9,000l. a year granted by Parliament for the education of the Irish priesthood in the College of Maynooth. That, and that alone, is the question before the House. And when I think that this great country has been stirred from its centre—when I witness the excitement that has been occasioned upon this simple question of 17,000l., more or less, involving no point of principle—I say involving no principle—[Sir R. Inglis: "Hear."]—I cannot conceal my astonishment. The hon. Member for Oxford, cheers—ironically, I presume—the assertion that there is no point of principle in the question at issue. Now I ask him—I will assume, for the sake of argument, that he will have a majority against the Bill, and that the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Government falls by the measure, and becomes a martyr to the cause of Ireland. I will assume that Her Majesty sends for the hon. Baronet (Sir R. Inglis) to form another Government, and coming into power with a majority as large as he could 965 claim—what, I would ask, would be one of the first measures of the hon. Baronet's Government? Why a vote of 9,000l. for the College of Maynooth. [Colonel Sibthorp: "No."] If I am right in this, what, I ask, is this Bill, but a mere question of 17,000l.? And what a spectacle must we present to the eyes of Europe when they witness this uncalled-for excitement. Why, they will say such pettifogging paltry persecution as that was never heard of in any country, and is not to be found in the annals of religious hatred in any part of the world. What is the position you take? You contend, not that there shall be no Maynooth—not that there shall be no education to the Roman Catholic priesthood by Parliamentary grant—you allow Maynooth to remain as it is—you say there is to be education, but it shall be a defective education. You do not contend that there shall be no college; no, you say the College shall remain, but it shall be like a barracks, and not a college—that is what you contend for. It is altogether beside the question to discuss the merits of the education given at Maynooth, for no one proposes to put an end to the College. You may say, that this Bill goes to endow it permanently, whereas now it is dependent upon an annual grant. But what is a grant continued for fifty years but a permanent grant? The Statute of Limitations at common law would render it permanent, and you make it no more permanent by endowing it as proposed by this Bill than if you leave the money to be annually voted. Then, again, it is said this is a grant for a college in which the instruction given is confined principally to theology; and I have heard it said, both by hon. Gentlemen on the other side and some of my hon. Friends with whom I am associated, that if this were for a mixed education they would not object to the vote; that their great objection is that the education is purely theological. It assorts with the practice of the Church of Rome to educate their students intended for divinity apart from those who are to follow secular callings; but suppose we had a college in which it could be so arranged that the clergy should be educated on one side, and the laity on the other, I presume my hon. Friends would vote for that. Really this is a poor pitiful distinction. The right hon. Baronet at the head of the Government intends, as I understand, to bring forward measures for establishing 966 other colleges in Ireland, for the purposes of giving to Roman Catholics secular instruction; and, for myself, I can say, that if I shall find that it is proposed to establish those institutions on sound principles, and under proper regulations, I shall gladly vote for their endowment. But I cannot see the objection to giving a body of men, who are destined to be the instructors of many millions of people, a good and proper education in any building or manner in which it can be most effectually given. You have a system of national education in Ireland, and you vote 70,000l., 90,000l., or 100,000l. a year to instruct in the elementary branches of education the children of both Catholics and Protestants. You provide for the education of Catholics who are destined to be farmers, shoemakers, and tailors, and yet you refuse to give a sufficient education to those who are destined to be the spiritual leaders of the people, and who are to go into their cabins and instruct them in their religion. One advantage in this increased provision for Maynooth is, that you may give a more liberal and comprehensive education to the students. I have inquired and found that in practical science, in those branches of education not connected with theology, the instruction is very defective, and that there are not the means for giving to the students a more liberal education. In other colleges in which divinity is taught, I find chemical and philosophical apparatus, and every means provided for giving the students a liberal and complete education; and if you allow it—if you give them the means—you will find the same course will be taken at Maynooth; the students will be taught chemistry, natural philosophy, and other branches of science, and you will no longer have to complain that the system of education is confined to theology. There is no ground, therefore, for opposing this Bill, in the objection that the Roman Catholic clergy taught at Maynooth are educated only in theology. Another objection has been put forward: it has been said this grant is for the education of one particular religious sect. I must remind hon. Gentlemen that we have voted sums of money for the purpose of education, and shall do so again this year no doubt. For one religious sect we voted 35,000l. last year for education; and by the Report of the Privy Council, we find 967 the money went to the support of the national schools of England; and at these national schools, the clergyman is at the door, and none are admitted who do not learn the Church catechism. Now a portion of that money is paid by the Irish people, for it comes out of the Consolidated Fund, to which they, in common with us, contribute. We also pass annually a vote of money to the Universities, none of the benefit of which can go to that portion of the Roman Catholic people who are intended for the clergy. You may say that is unsound in principle, that it is wrong; but it is too much to tell the Irish people we have adopted a wrong principle by which we take money out of their pockets, and will not apply it when it touches our own pockets. There is no justice in that. I will not go into the religious arguments, or enter upon the questions of theological controversy which have been started in the course of this debate. In my opinion this is not the place to discuss such matters. I believe if all our discussions had been more logical and less theological, we should have made more progress in the business of legislation. At all events this is the last place—I wish not to say anything offensive to any hon. Member, but this is the last body of men that ought to set themselves up as a synod to settle matters of theology. I therefore do not treat this as a religious question at all. I say, if you give instruction to Roman Catholics at all, it is wise and politic that you should give it to the Roman Catholic priests, who are to instruct the people, as well as those who are to fill an inferior position in society. I have, like many other hon. Members, received communications from the borough I represent, and also from many other parts of the country, for I am looked upon as a sort of general Representative on a certain subject, and, therefore, I cannot perhaps complain of people writing to me and addressing their views to me on others—I have no right to do so, for it is probable that many hon. Gentlemen have received communications on another question, for which they might hold me responsible; but I have received communications in which I am called upon to oppose this proposed increase in the grant to Maynooth, which is looked upon as an important question; and, though pitiful and paltry in amount, I am disposed to look upon it as an important question; for I am told by Irish Members on both 968 sides of the House, that the measure, if passed, will be most acceptable and pleasing to the Irish people. I am happy at any time to give a vote which may be acceptable to the people of Ireland, if I can do so without violating any conscientious principles I entertain. It is not often I have the opportunity of doing so; but while I say this, I am far from overrating the importance of this measure—it can only be considered valuable so far as it tends to place on a more harmonious footing the people of the two countries, and as paving the way by placing them in a calmer mood with each other, for other and more important ameliorations, I cannot understand how 17,000l. a year can be of any great importance to Ireland in a material sense; and I do not mean to say, that had it depended upon me, I should have brought forward this measure as a remedy for the evils of Ireland. I might have my own peculiar views of what I considered would be more advantageous to that country; but we all know the main evils of Ireland are more moral than physical, and if this measure should have the effect of conciliating and promoting harmony in the Irish mind—if it should render the Irish people more tranquil, and disposed to look to England with a feeling of brotherhood, instead of taking the position they have—that retrogade position of attempted isolation, when all the rest of the world were becoming cosmopolite and amalgamating—if anything I can do can tend so to conciliate, I need hardly say how happy I shall be to do it. The first act of my public life was to publish my views and opinions of the evils under which Ireland laboured, and that subject is one that, amidst all the public questions in which I have been engaged, I have always had deeply and painfully at heart. I know I am taunted by some of my friends with giving a bad vote on this occasion. I shall give a conscientious vote, and if in doing so I am to make personal sacrifices, and lose the good opinion of those with whom I have long acted and have a deep respect for, I shall regret it; but, next to the satisfaction of having acted conscientiously, will be that I shall feel in voting for that which I believe will tend to heal the festering wounds of Irish society.
§ Mr. Ferrandsaid: Sir, I consider that this House is not the place in which the present question should be decided. I 969 think we ought at the present moment to appeal to the country to decide whether the House is justified in pursuing a course of policy opposed to those principles on which a great majority of the Members of this House were returned to Parliament. I rise, Sir, on this occasion, to support those principles which I have ever held most sacred and most dear—to support the principles professed for many years by the present Ministry, when they were attempting to undermine the position of their opponents. I have not forgotten how an expression which fell from the Whigs during the time they held office was seized upon by the Conservative party, and used on every possible occasion to arouse the Protestant feeling of England. I have not forgotten the time when Lord Melbourne said that the measures he proposed with regard to Ireland would inflict a "heavy blow and great discouragement" on the Protestant Church. I have not forgotten how that expression was re-echoed by every Conservative association; how every man opposed to the Whig Ministry seized upon it as a convincing argument why they should no longer be trusted with power. I stand here to-night to support the principles I professed upon the hustings at the last general election. I stand here the Protestant Representative of a Protestant constituency—one not about to betray the trust they reposed in me, but to convince them that no inducement upon earth shall lead me, for one instant, for party purposes, to forget or abandon those principles which placed the present Ministry in power. I have heard it said by hon. Gentlemen who have addressed the House during this debate from behind the Ministerial Bench, that no pledges were given at the last general election which should prevent Her Majesty's Ministers from proposing this Bill to this House and to the country. Why, is there a Member of this House who has forgotten the cry raised at the last general election that the Church was in danger? Since I heard the declaration of the hon. Gentlemen to whom I have alluded, who have determined, in defiance of the opinions of their constituents, to support the Ministerial proposition, I have referred to many of the public journals; and I am prepared to state that if ever there was a party solemnly pledged, before God and in the face of the country, to stand by the Pro- 970 testant principles we professed at the last general election, and with which a majority of the electors of England identified themselves and drove the Whigs from power, it is the present Government and the hon. Gentlemen who sit behind them. With the permission of the House, I will judge this party out of their own mouths—(I don't mean the Protestant party, but that small party now called Conservative)—and then I will appeal to the people of England, whether with one unanimous voice they will not call upon their Sovereign to dissolve this Parliament, and enable them to have their sentiments properly represented within these walls. At the last general election this was the language almost universally used by the hon. Gentlemen on this side:—
As a friend to the Established Church, he felt bound to oppose the Ministry, not from any factious motive, but from a belief that they would consent to measures tending to destroy that Church. He had opposed their Education Bill, the direct tendency of which would be to place the whole of the power of ruling the country in the hands of the Roman Catholics, to the utter exclusion of the Protestant population.That was the language used at an election at Guildford by a Gentleman who is now a Peer of the realm (Lord Abinger), and who was returned to represent these principles in this House. I might quote language equally strong which was used at that time by many hon. Gentlemen who now identify themselves with the Government; but to save the time of the House I will come at once to the Treasury Bench. And oh! when I have finished with you (addressing the Ministers), what a position you will hold in this House, before your opponents, and before the country, after the exposure! At a county election a Cabinet Minister (Lord Lincoln) used this language:—Our efforts have availed to prevent mischief, if we have not had the power to effect good. We have resisted, and successfully resisted, the wild and visionary schemes of Radical politicians. We have saved the Church from the attacks of its open enemies, and its still more dangerous and insidious foes.I ask Her Majesty's Ministers who, in the opinion of the people of England, these "insidious foes" now are? Why, it is acknowledged in this House—it is the universal cry throughout the land—that Her Majesty's Ministers themselves are the "insidious foes" of the Protestant 971 Church. I will now call the attention of the House to the language of another hon. Gentleman who sits—not at ease—upon the Treasury Bench. That hon. Member said,—They could not forget, that when the Tithe Bill was brought forward ostensibly for the purpose of establishing harmony and peace in Ireland, but which, as was truly observed by Lord Lyndhurst, contained in the Appropriation Clause the assertion of an abstract principle intended at a future period to be used by the Whigs for the destruction of the Irish Church, and which it was admitted by the Prime Minister of a Sovereign of the House of Brunswick, would deal a heavy blow and a great discouragement to Protestantism in Ireland—they could not forget that Dr. Lefroy, in his opposition to that meature, had proved himself the faithful, honest, and zealous sentinel of the Irish Church. He had likewise voted in favour of Sir Robert Peel's Motion, of want of confidence in a Ministry of whom he would say, in the language of Lord Stanley, that the cup of their iniquity was full.That was the language of the Attorney General for Ireland at the election of a Member for the Dublin University. I now ask that right hon. Gentleman whether he intends to prove himself, on this occasion, a "faithful, honest, and zealous sentinel of the Irish Church?"—or whether he, like the present Government, is prepared to sacrifice his Protestant principles for the sake of retaining office? But other pledges were given at the last general election. There is a Member of Her Majesty's Government who, on the day of his nomination, made a declaration which was posted on the walls of every borough and every county town in England, and which among the Conservative party is known as the "Tamworth manifesto." I wish to call the attention of the House to the manner in which the First Lord of the Treasury (Sir R. Peel) pledged himself, in the face of his fellow-countrymen, to principles diametrically opposed to those of the right hon. Gentleman whom he deprived of office; and in doing so I wish to record my opinion that the Whigs were, in office, high-minded, honourable, and upright men compared with the present Ministry. At the nomination for Tamworth, when the right hon. Baronet appealed to his constituents for their support, and gave his reasons for considering himself better fitted for office than his political opponents, he used the language I shall now quote. The right hon. Baronet 972 was referring to the French Revolution of 1830; and I may tell him that soon after 1829 we had a revolution in this country which, it is my firm conviction, was produced by his Catholic Emancipation Act. The right hon. Gentleman said,—Those events in France made a deep impression throughout the whole of Europe, convulsed the public mind—in some countries led to revolution, and there were some which escaped from the influence of those great events. This great country was not exempt from that influence; there arose here a desire for change in the ancient institutions of the country; and the consequence was a fundamental change in the Commons' House of Parliament. I then foresaw," (the right hon. Baronet proceeds,) "that that change was accompanied with a restless desire for further change. I then foresaw, I say, the importance of laying the foundations of a great Conservative party.Where is this great Conservative party now? Your conduct (addressing the hon. Gentlemen on the Treasury Bench) has scattered it to the winds. You have no party—no constitutional party. The constitutional party which sits on this side of the House is, to a man, opposed to you. The right hon. Baronet proceeded,—I then foresaw the importance of laying the foundations of a great Conservative party, attached"—And let us see what the right hon. Gentleman's attachment is—to the ancient fundamental institutions of the country, not disposed to resist such changes as the altered circumstances of society might require; but a party determined to maintain on their ancient foundations the institutions in Church and State.I will prove whether they have done so by and by. This language was placarded in Yorkshire; I quoted it myself upon the hustings; I heard it quoted by many hon. Members who were returned to this House by Protestant constituencies of the north of England. The right hon. Baronet, after using the language I have read, was himself elected by the constituency of Tamworth; and to show their deep regard for the right hon. Gentleman, on account of his expressed desire to maintain the institutions of the country, they determined to entertain him at a grand banquet. On the 28th of July, about a month after his election, the banquet took place; and the right hon. Baronet on that occasion used this language:—I do hope the Conservative party of this 973 country will continue to secure for themselves, by all fair and legitimate means, and by no other whatever"—I do not call it "fair and legitimate means" to call in the aid of hon. Gentlemen opposite—the possession of that power and influence in the State which their wealth, their intelligence, their respectability, their character, fully entitle them to exercise. Their good will and their confidence can be the only safe foundation for political opinion.Has the right hon. Baronet the good will and confidence of the great Conservative party now? And where is public opinion? United against the right hon. Baronet. If he thinks it is not united against him, I call upon him as an Englishman, if he has one spark of political honesty and consistency in his breast, to dissolve this House and to appeal to the country. He adopted that course in 1829, and he found out what public opinion was upon that occasion. Here sits below me the Representative of public opinion; but such is the state of that opinion, so disgusted are the public with the conduct of the Government, that if the right hon. Baronet were now to appeal to his constituents at Tamworth, I do not hesitate to say that, though that place may almost be called a pocket borough, those constituents would not return him to this House. I say this, because I form my opinion on good grounds of various kinds; but if I were to limit myself merely to the means of forming an opinion which the presentation of petitions to this House supply, I should say, that never was public opinion more unequivocally expressed; for we have thousands of petitions on the one side, and only three or four on the other. As regards the matter of petitions, what an extraordinary scene was that which we witnessed this evening, when the hon. and learned Member for Bath presented a petition in favour of the Bill! He brought it up; and scarcely was it laid upon the Table, when the Chancellor of the Exchequer rose and seized upon the document with avidity, and carried it to the Treasury Bench in triumph, where he and his Colleagues spent no small time in devouring its contents; as if they thought that it furnished conclusive evidence that they possessed the approbation of their fellow-countrymen, and that their power could only enjoy a safe foundation in public opinion. I have been, as hon. Members must per- 974 ceive, exerting myself for some time past to lay before the House the opinions of Her Majesty's Government on this subject; and now I will presently read to them other statements illustrative of those doctrines, on the profession of which the present Ministers of the Crown obtained possession of the Cabinet. They will, however, after all, find that I shall road to them but a few of the pledges uttered by the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Government a short time before he met that Parliament in which he found himself at the head of a majority of ninety. With the aid of that majority he filched power from the noble Lord opposite. When he thus obtained office, the noble Lord the Member for London asked the right hon. Baronet how he intended to carry on the government of the country. What was the answer of the right hon. Baronet? "I intend," said he, "to walk in the direct paths and in the light of the British Constitution." Now, I want to know from the House and the country, is the right hon. Baronet walking "in the light of the British Constitution?" Is he, in proposing this Bill—is he walking in the "direct paths of the British Constitution?" I have no intention of uttering one offensive word to any Gentleman at this side of the House or at that, least of all should I deliberately interfere with the religious feelings of hon. Gentlemen who profess the Roman Catholic religion. They have as much right to their own opinions as I have to mine. I admire the manner in which they have adhered to their opinions. They glory in their religion as I do in mine. There is nothing for which men are more to be admired than for adherence to the doctrines which they profess; but I want to know how the First Lord of the Treasury has adhered to the pledges which he has given. I should like to ask him, is he now adhering to the pledges which he gave at the last general election? Is he walking, as he said he should do, in "the direct paths of the British Constitution, and in the light of the British Constitution?" I say that he is not; I say, that he is not only walking in the darkest paths of that Constitution, but that he is outraging its principles, and that that he is doing in utter disregard of the pledges which he gave to his constituents and to the public at the last general election. But I feel that I need not confine myself to the pledges of 1841; I have many other pledges which 975 the right hon. Baronet has given to the world. I may now take those of 1829, when he brought in the "great healing measure which was to settle the Roman Catholic claims." On the 5th of March, 1829, the First Lord of the Treasury addressed the House of Commons in these words:—I rise, Sir, in the spirit of peace, to propose the adjustment of the Roman Catholic question. This question, at least the measures I have to propose for its adjustment, are measures of State policy, and of State policy exclusively; they are not calculated to shock any religious scruples. They will imply no sanction, they will disclaim all encouragement of any religious doctrines from which our own Established Church revolts. These measures will restore the equality of civil rights, but they will give no favour or encouragement to any form of religious worship, excepting that which is incorporated by fundamental laws with the constitution of the State, and which claims the respect, veneration, and affection of a Protestant people.Are you adhering to those solemn pledges? Does the measure now before the House imply no sanction of religious doctrines opposed to those of the Protestant Church — no doctrines from which we as Protestants revolt, and which are not only incompatible with, but contrary to the fundamental laws of the realm? Do they not outrage our feelings instead of establishing claims to our respect? But he has gone further; he has broken through other pledges, and done that which in effect violates the Oath of Supremacy. He pledged himself to retain the Oath of Supremacy, and how has he kept that pledge? I will read to you his words;—The Oath of Supremacy, that oath which denies to any Foreign State, prelate, or potentate, any jurisdiction temporal or spiritual within this realm, I propose to retain. A practice has occasionally of late prevailed in Ireland, which is calculated to afford a great, and I may add just, offence to Protestants. I allude to the practice of claiming and assuming on the part of the Roman Catholic prelates the names and titles of dignities belonging to the Church of England. I propose that the episcopal titles and names made use of in the Church of England shall not be assumed by bishops of the Roman Catholic Church. This will be prevented in future.He also required, and in 1829 insisted, that communities bound by monastic vows shall not be extended in this country in future. Those were the pledges 976 which the right hon. Baronet gave when he brought forward the Emancipation Act. Has he stood by those pledges? No; on the contrary, he has violated every pledge that he ever gave to the House and the country. He not only told the House all that I have read to them, but he told them also that if the Emancipation Act did not produce peace in Ireland, he should be the first man to come down to that House and vote for its repeal. But instead of there being any thing like peace in Ireland, agitation followed upon the passing of that measure—that "healing and final measure." Since the right hon. Baronet became Minister, he has risen in his place in this House not for the purpose of proposing a repeal of the Emancipation Act, but to violate the Act of Settlement and contravene the Oath of Supremacy. Some time ago there was a petition presented to this House from the Protestant Conservative Association of Dublin, complaining of the changes with respect to the Established Church which were then in progress; and I called the attention of the Prime Minister of England to the statements set forth in that petition; but what occurred? He carried the Roman Catholic Bequests Act in direct violation of the Act of Settlement, and in contravention of the Oath of Supremacy. I repeat this, because I feel convinced that the assertion is sound. I have the opinion here, and I will produce it if the charges be reiterated. I have not forgotten that during the first week of last Session both the Home Secretary and Lord Stanley taunted the Roman Catholics with forgetting the sanctity of the oaths which they had taken. I tell you there are tens of thousands and millions even of Protestants who think that you are violating your oaths of office. It ill becomes you, then, to taunt the Roman Catholics with having forgotten the sanctity of an oath. Once more, I say, that I called attention to the Charitable Bequests Act—a measure that was introduced by the Home Secretary. Now I will read to the House a short extract from the Parliamentary proceedings of that period. The conversation to which I refer took place on the 29th of July, 1844, and was as follows:—Sir J. Graham moved the second reading of the Charitable Donations (Ireland) Bill. Proposed, that five Roman Catholic Members should be on the Board. Mr. M. O'Ferrall 977 said, very great pains had been taken to exclude the word 'bishop' as referring to the dignitaries of the Catholic Church. Lord Eliot followed, but avoided alluding to this subject. Sir R. Peel called them Roman Catholic prelates and priests, and said, that as the Roman Catholics objected to the word 'minister' being used, they had substituted the word 'priest.' On the 1st of August, in Committee, Sir J. Graham said, some comments had been made the other night as to the omission in this Bill of the titles of 'archbishop' and 'bishop,' with reference to the Roman Catholic clergy. He had demurred, and he still demurred, to the right of the 'archbishops' and 'bishops' of the Church of Rome claiming titles as affixed to certain localities and districts in Ireland: but, hoping to conciliate the feelings of those who were deeply interested in this measure, and having no other desire than, as far as was consistent with sound principles, to tender that which might be acceptable to their Roman Catholic fellow subjects, the Government were anxious to make such tender in the form and in the terms which might be most satisfactory.Now, the House can hardly fail to remember that all this was done in defiance of a clause in the Act of Parliament, which affixed a penalty of 100l. to the use of such titles as archbishops, bishops, or deans; yet, in total disregard of that Act, there were introduced almost at the end of the Session, when the attendance in Parliament was very thin, two clauses, in the language of which were adopted these same prohibited terms of bishop, of archbishop, &c. These are the clauses to which I refer:—And be it enacted, that it shall not be lawful for any such 'archbishop,' 'bishop' or person in holy orders of the Church of Rome to alien, &c.: provided always that it shall and may be lawful for the said 'archbishop,' 'bishop,' or other person in holy orders of the Church of Rome to execute such leases as are hereinafter mentioned.This, I affirm, was a direct violation of the Act of Settlement, and in contravention of the Oath of Supremacy. [Laughter.] Hon. Gentlemen may laugh, but the fact is so. Such a proceeding is distinctly prohibited by the Act of Settlement; and the Prime Minister has sworn that Roman Catholic prelates have not, and ought not to have, any authority in this realm. If he can refute this doctrine, he ought to do so. I implore him to do so, for there is an immense quantity of Protestants who think that he cannot. Being, as I am, anxious for the welfare and the peace of the community, I shall rejoice if he can refute 978 them, and prove that the Bequests Act is not a violation of the Act of Parliament, and in contravention of the Oath of Supremacy. The present measure is not only in direct opposition to those principles, but it is at the same time a measure identified with the doctrines of that party which the right hon. Baronet has driven from office. I ask the House, and I ask the country, and, above all, I ask the Tory party, what benefits they have gained by bringing you into power? I ask myself, why did I work for you like a slave during ten years in order to drive the Liberal party from office? I tell you you have betrayed me. I was your tool—I am not now ashamed to acknowledge the fact, but I did not know it at the time, or I should have acted a different part. But the First Lord of the Treasury was not the only Member of the Government who stood pledged against the measure. At the last general election, when Lord Stanley addressed his constituents from the hustings at Lancaster, he used these words:—If, in the present instance, there were any contest for the representation of this country, of which we have heard so much, but seen so little—if any Gentleman had come forward to support the views of Her Majesty's Government, to defend their present policy, to vindicate their consistency, to support their firm adhesion to principle.[Derisive Cheers.] Ay, you were fine cocks of the dunghill then. The noble Lord went on to say—Their steady resistance to dangerous encroachment, I should have been fully prepared to enter into that discussion, with a full conviction that I should have shown you all, and demonstrated, if not to the satisfaction, at least to the conviction of the parties coming forward with this case into court, that Her Majesty's Government, of late years, far from maintaining a steady adhesion to principle, have conceded one day that which they described as mischievous the day before, and gradually alienated those of their moderate Conservative and Liberal supporters, who formed the most respectable portion of their party, and one by one dropped off from their side, until they found themselves at last compelled, from sheer weakness and inability to carry out their own views, to throw themselves into the arms and adopt the principles of men with whom they most essentially differed, and whose course they themselves believed to be dangerous.That was the character which he gave to you, and by such means you obtained a 979 majority; but where is your majority now? A majority of this side of the House is against you; and you are supported by some on this side who ought, if they were consistent, to go and sit behind the noble Lord the Member for London. I thank the House for having listened to me so long, but the subject is one on which I feel deeply. I cannot conclude without warning you that the people will not soon forget the pledges given at the last election. They will not soon forget that you have violated the principles which have placed the Royal Family on the Throne. ["Oh, oh!"] I will read you the opinion of Lord Eldon on this point. He was a better lawyer than the hon. Member for Bath. I assert that which I believe to be true. I say that this measure tramples in the dust the principles which placed the Royal Family on the Throne. Who can doubt that Ministers are unpopular when we find them resorting to every expedient, and dragging in the name of the Sovereign to their assistance? I could speak more strongly than I dare allow myself, but I will judge the Ministers out of their own mouths. But I will expose the inconsistency of the men who sit on the Treasury Bench. I will expose their contemptible apostacy to the people of England. At the last general election the noble Lord the Member for Lancashire (Lord F. Egerton) said:—There is another point which I have before mentioned, but which I now refer to, because I consider it a duty we owe to the Constitution, and more especially to the Crown. I allude to the expression of Sir J. C. Hobhouse, 'that the Government had the favour of the Crown, and that this favour was the best support a Ministry could have.' I should be sorry to take advantage of a casual expression, or an individual remark, if it were loosely worded, but this was an expression used in debate, which had been commented upon by Lord Stanley, and which had never been denied, apologized for, or explained. I will not say, as Cromwell said to Harry Vane, 'The Lord defend me from Sir Harry Vane,' for Sir J. C. Hobhouse can do me no harm—his opinions are not infectious; but I may and do say, 'The Lord defend the Queen from advisers such as those who can pronounce such observations in Parliament, and who may be suspected of whispering into the ears of the Sovereign theories far more dangerous to the monarchy.In conclusion, as a sincere Protestant—and I speak my feelings most sincerely 980 —I solemnly believe that if Her Majesty's present Government can induce Her Majesty to attach Her signature to that Catholic Maynooth Bill, she signs away Her title to the British Crown.
§ Mr. SheilIt is unfortunate that the Minister cannot do the least benefit to Ireland without doing a mischief to himself. A great deal of excitement has arisen in reference to the endowment of the College of Maynooth. It is, however, gratifying to find that from any very active interposition the Church of England (which I begin to consider as a safeguard of religious liberty) has prudentially abstained. From its serene elevation it looks down in cold neutrality on the great sectarian affray. The resistance to this Bill is chiefly made by the Dissenters; by the men whom we did our utmost in assisting to obtain the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts; and those Wesleyans who, whenever an act of severity, an abridgment of Irish liberty, has been propounded, have been the backers of domination; but when a measure of plain justice is brought forward, rise up against us in a mass of fanatical insurgency, pile petitions on the Table of this House of Commons in which "idolatry" recurs in almost every line, and in a great anti-Catholic and anti-Irish demonstration, to feelings the most unchristian, because they are the most uncharitable, contumaciously give way. I am not, however, very much surprised at the conduct of the Wesleyan Methodists; but I am, I own, more than surprised at the course which the Free Church of Scotland (in whose favour every Catholic in this House uniformly voted), has thought it creditable and consistent to pursue. There are many incidents to that Church which I much admire; for, although I think that it is to be lamented that the secession was founded upon a point of Auchterarder litigation, rather than upon a question of Genevese theology; and I regret that the rock of poverty, on which it has been said that the Scotch Church was built, has been riven asunder; yet, when I see so many teachers of the gospel making sacrifices for conscience' sake; when I see them, with those who are dearer than they are to themselves, suffering great privations; when I see husbands and fathers preferring the freedom of their altars to the happiness of their homes, I am struck with that fine spectacle, and cannot, I 981 own, but think, that if men capable of so much heroic disinterestedness have been led astray, it is not to "light from heaven" that their aberrations are to be ascribed. But, having said thus much in their honest commendation, I cannot refrain from expressing my sorrow, for their own sake that they should have "intruded" into an Irish question with which they have, in truth, no sort of concern. They did not recede on the voluntary principle; the voluntary principle does not constitute one of their dogmas; they do not call for the abrogation of the Regium Donum; they do not even expostulate against the abuses of the Irish Church Establishment. They survey a great pontifical sinecure without indignation; but when the Minister proposes to carry out the principle of an equitable agreement—which is not the less binding because it is implied—when he tries to make the better instruction of the priest a means of moral amelioration for the people—when he bestows upon the Catholic Church that which, compared with the superfluities of the Establishment, is a donation small indeed — the bile of Calvinism overflows, the Legislature is inundated with its effusion, and the men who are loudest in the assertion of perfect freedom of conscience for themselves, assume the tone and aspect of infallibility, and against the religion of the great majority of the Christian world, in a spirit the most wanton and unprovoked, they direct their exceedingly unchristian denunciation. Sir, I have already stated, upon a former occasion, what I considered to be the chief advantages which might be expected to result from the adoption of this measure: I stated that the people of Ireland would look upon this measure as an earnest of good will—an overt act of benevolent intention. I stated that it would be eminently useful that, in the mind of the young Irishman, who was serving his noviciate to the Irish Church, you should deposit a seed of union—the growth could be afterwards most beneficially developed—and that I was convinced that all classes of the community would be materially served by placing in every parish in Ireland an educated gentleman, who should be the means of disseminating good principles and good feelings through the persuasiveness of his precept, and the still more eloquent inculcation of his example. I 982 shall not travel over the ground which I have already traversed; and instead of pointing out the advantages which may be expected to accrue from the adoption of this measure, I shall show you the evils which will ensue from its rejection. That rejection will, indeed, be hailed by the Dissenters on both sides of the Tweed. Ashton-under-Lyne will be illuminated. My right hon. Friend the Member for Perth, when he shall return to his spiritual dominions in the north, in what exulting psalmody will his Calvinistic Holiness be greeted with loud hosannahs wherever he appears! But what will be the effect of rejecting this measure in the country which by courtesy you call "the sister"—what will be the effect in Ireland? That is a question, the answer to which deserves to be well considered by those who do not confine their solicitudes to the retention of their seats in the next Parliamentary contest, but think it worth while to reflect upon the means by which, in the next national emergency, the Union between the two islands is to be preserved. What, then, will be the effect of the rejection of this measure in that country, in which there are 7,000,000 of Roman Catholics, the depositories of great political power, by whom two thirds of the Representatives of Ireland are returned to this House—who preponderate in almost every corporation in Ireland—who in wealth, in property, landed, funded, and mercantile—who in intelligence, in public spirit, in self-respect, in knowledge of their rights, and determination to maintain them—who in all the attributes that constitute a State, have within the last fifteen years made a progress so surprising—what will be the effect of the rejection of this measure in that country, in which there already exists a discontent so deep, so dark, so just, in which a demand for the restoration of the national legislature is by a powerful nation so peremptorily made—to which your great antagonists, the speculators in the ruin of England, are constantly turning their eyes, and whose hazardous position must needs afford matter for the serious meditation of the Earl of Aberdeen? No man of ordinary perspicacity can fail to see that the rejection of this measure must give a great impulse to the Repeal agitation. It will, in my mind, more than justify it. It is not that the people of Ireland set any great value upon the grant 983 of 26,000l.; it is not that the people of Ireland attach any very great importance to the measure per se, and seen apart from other considerations; but that the rejection of this measure will afford a proof, beyond all controversy, that Ireland is not to be governed in conformity with the feelings of the great majority of the Irish people, nor even in conformity with the views of the first statesmen of both parties in this country, but in obedience to the worst passions of the most fanatical portion of the English people. When the Union between Great Britain and Ireland was about to be carried, it was foretold by the ablest men in the Irish Parliament — that Parliament which was so prolific in the production of men of genius—that the share of Ireland in her own legislation would be nominal; that the Irish Representatives would be swamped by English majorities; and that to the great English aristocracy the government of Ireland would be transferred. The government of the English aristocracy it is hard, but possible, to bear. The dignity of the despot diminishes the debasement of the slave; but if, after having been deprived by the most profligate instrumentality of the right of self-government—that right, to the exercise of which it is not in human nature that eight millions of Irishmen should not aspire—we are to be transferred from the dominion of the great English aristocracy to that of the three denominations—if we, a people, brave, energetic, adventurous, and determined—if over us the three denominations are to be exalted in an inglorious masterdom—if the policy by which the affairs of Ireland are to be carried on is to be regulated, not by the statesmen, and the patricians, and the proprietors, and the thinkers of England, but by the Baptists, and the Moravians, and the Independents, and the Wesleyans—I frankly and fearlessly tell you, that there is in that new vassalage an infamy so utter, that we will not bear it; and if a Minister shall be found to succeed the right hon. Baronet so lost to all sense of his own honour, and who shall fall so low, who shall descend so deep, as to seek for an oracle in the Tabernacle, and convert the Cabinet into an appurtenance of the conventicle—there will be, you may be assured, found men in Ireland who shall tell their countrymen, in thoughts of fire and in words of flame, that at every hazard—and no matter what may befall— 984 the restoration of the Parliament of Ireland, which you will have forfeited all capacity to govern, must be extorted from you; that in such a cause there is nothing—no matter how precious—which ought not to be set upon a cast—that life is not to be kept at the expense of ignominy—and that the degradation to which we should be reduced would be so measureless, that it were better a thousand times to perish than endure it. I have spoken, I am conscious, with a more than ordinary fervour. I have permitted my pulse to beat less temperately than befits this deliberative assembly; but you will make allowance for me—you will forgive me, when you consider how much more just a cause for indignation an Irishman must find in the means which have been employed in order to arrest the progress of this measure, than an Englishman is justified in finding in the reasons which have been suggested for its approval. When such language is employed as has been uttered by the antagonists of this measure—when such provocatives have been applied to the religious feelings of the people—when into passions the most inflamatory, fanaticism has thrust a torch—when the vocabulary of theological opprobrium has been exhausted by the men who have the temerity to revile, and the audacity to threaten us, can you wonder that the blood should boil in the veins of men who have become too like yourselves, who have become too closely assimilated to you, who have become too much identified with Englishmen in the characteristics by which Englishmen are distinguished, tamely to brook the indignity which Englishmen will forget their natures when they shall learn to suffer? Sir, I repeat that the rejection of this measure will greatly invigorate the agitation for that sunderance of the Union to which you are all opposed. You are all, I have no doubt, opposed to the Repeal of the Union. When the Prime Minister declared that the Repeal of the Union should be resisted, even at the hazard of civil war, that announcement was received with acclamation. Is not a grant to Maynooth, followed by a series of analogous measures, better than a civil war? I ask that question of the noble Lord the Member for Dorsetshire, who did me the honour to refer to some opinions of mine touching the equality with Protestants, in regard to which I have the presumption to aspire. 985 The noble Lord is distinguished by his humanity—by a benevolence to which I have always borne my humble testimony—but does it not occur to him that one month of civil war in Ireland would be productive of more misery and of more vice than all the factories in Lancashire would generate in a hundred years? The noble Lord and his associates recoil from the terrible contingencies of which I have but for an instant traced the shadow, and yet they are prescribing to the Government that fatal policy which will lead us to the gulf, from which with their holiest deprecation, religion and humanity lift up their voices to warn us away. Let it not be imagined that I am sufficiently preposterous to believe that the rejection of this measure would be followed by an Irish insurrection. I am adverting to the consequence of continuing to govern a Catholic country upon the Protestant policy on which the rejection of this measure would be founded. Let the Catholics of Ireland be taught by you to despair of justice—let them be firmly persuaded that there is no chance of fair dealing at your hands—and discontent growing into disaffection, will at last reach to such a height, that the entire nation will join in one deep anathema against the Union of which you shall have availed yourselves for the purposes of our debasement; and whenever England shall be involved in one of those emergencies to which all nations have been exposed, and from which there is no reason to believe that your exemption will be everlasting, you will have cause to lament your adherence to that policy by which we are told by divine authority that wise men are saddened—that you will lament it when your repentance will be valueless, and when the tears of remorse will be unavailing, and the sighs of contrition will be heaved in vain. There is not a man in this assembly who deprecates with more sincerity than I do, the realization of those fearful contingencies to which I have adverted; and it is in order that they may be averted (a purpose far more important than the propagation of Protestantism) that I so strenuously enjoin, through honourable means, the complete and thorough conciliation of the Catholic clergy. There are three thousand of them: they constitute a great intellectual incorporation of active, energetic, and courageous men; power centres in their episcopacy, and 986 circulates at the same time through their minute parochial subdivision. Their influence can scarcely be exaggerated: for good or for evil they are omnipotent: they have been your stern antagonists, you can convert them into your firmest and fastest friends. It was by the Catholic priesthood that, in 1826, the powerful Beresfords, so long the Representatives of Protestant ascendancy, were overthrown—it was by the Catholic priesthood that, in 1828, the great victory at the Clare election was achieved—it was by the Catholic priesthood that throughout the great tithe struggles in 1833, the Catholic people were inspirited and sustained. It is from the Catholic priesthood that the power by which the vast Repeal machinery is set at work is derived. By whom was the meeting, which would have been attended by half a million of men, summoned in the old field of Irish victory at Clontarf? Neither the name of Daniel O'Connell nor the name of Smith O'Brien, nor the name of no one layman was attached to the requisition: it was signed—I know what you will say—it was signed by five-and-twenty priests. You will cry out, "Down with Maynooth!" Suppose it down—suppose that consummation to have taken place—suppose that Maynooth were laid prostrate—suppose that not one stone were left standing upon another — suppose that the plough were driven through its foundations, and suppose that a great Catholic ecclesiastical seminary, of which the voluntary principle should be the architect, were raised in its place; what think you would you have gained? Would the doctrines of passive obedience to England be taught in this Catholic Free Church academy? Would the British connexion be strengthened by this national institution, which you seem so anxious that we should proceed to erect? That question needs no answer. I have told you that the Irish Catholic priest had been your antagonist, and I also told you that he could be made your firmest and fastest friend. I have painted the Irish priest in his agitating capacity: I can present him to you in the enactment of a far different part. If there be any man by whom the belief is entertained that an Irish Catholic priest is beyond the reach of conciliation—that the sacerdotal Celt is irreclaimable, and that justice is a pearl which ought not to be cast away upon him—I entreat the men by whom a notion so erroneous is enter- 987 tained, to look to the conduct of the Irish Catholic clergy in Upper Canada during the revolt, by which that province was exposed to so much peril. On one point all the Governors of Upper Canada were unanimous. They all concurred in stating that the Irish Catholic priests were not only true to England, but that they exhibited the most enthusiastic and the most efficacious fidelity in her cause. The entire of the Irish Catholic population in Upper Canada, with the Irish priests at their head, took part with the British authorities, and from your just dealing in their regard you derived advantage of the most signal kind. You have followed up that judicious policy, by awarding to the Catholic worship in Upper Canada a share of the clergy reserves, which were originally appropriated by Act of Parliament to the propagation of Protestantism. Can you doubt that if you go to war with the United States, you will derive the greatest possible advantage from that most salutary measure? But surely the increased grant to Maynooth is as nothing when compared with the alienation of part of the clergy reserves from Protestant to Catholic purposes. The conciliation of the Irish Catholic priest in his own country is as easy as in that to which he emigrates; and you can convert the Catholic Church into a fortress of your strength, secure from treason from within, and impregnable from assault from without, and from which you will derive more real security than if you were to plant a hundred cannon on every promontory on your coast. Sir, I have considered this subject solely with a view to the practical consequences, in reference to which it ought to be regarded, and I have not adverted to any abstract questions connected with endowment or restitution. My object is the pacification of my country—I have no other. I believe that the right hon. Gentleman has that object in view, and I commend him for it. I own that I wish that he had brought this measure forward at an earlier period of his administration; but it is far better to give a temporary triumph to agitation, by beginning to do right, than to give a permanent incentive to agitation, by continuing to do wrong. Some severe animadversions were pronounced upon the conduct of the right hon. Gentleman when in Opposition; but when he is doing the great community to which I belong an important service, I do not think the occa- 988 sion an appropriate one for indulging in any criminatory retrospect. I think it far better to invite the right hon. Gentleman to persevere in the policy of pacification in which he has taken an important step. I consider this measure to be an initiative link in a series of measures by which the two countries can be honourably attached to each other. I am of opinion that the Irish Catholic millions require to be placed on a perfect level with their fellow citizens. I augur that equality from the speech of the Secretary for the Home Department, who announced that Ireland was no longer to be governed on the principles of ascendancy, in an auspicious tone, for which he deserves no ordinary praise. Repentance, says a casuist is so noble, that it is worth while to have grievously wronged, in order that the glories of contrition should be earned. The right hon. Gentleman may be assured that when he proceeds to Ireland with Her Majesty, his past offences will be forgotten. The right hon. Gentleman told us with some significance that this measure was proposed with the full consent of the Queen. The particular opinions of the Queen on any specific measure it may not be legitimate to refer to; but I think, that in speaking of the general policy by which. Ireland ought to be governed, it is not inappropriate to say, that with the virtues of my Sovereign, I associate my hopes for the happiness of my country. When I remember that on Her accession to the Throne she charged Lord John Russell to convey to Lord Normanby (towards whom you ought to have acted a different part)—She charged Lord John Russell, I say, to convey to the man to whom Ireland owes a debt of lasting gratitude, Her entire approbation of the principles on which the government of Ireland had been carried on; when I recollect that it was stated by Lord De Grey, that the Queen had sent for him before he proceeded to Ireland, and expressed a peculiar and most tender concern for the welfare of Her Irish people—when I bear in mind that the First Lord of the Treasury emphatically referred to the feelings of the Queen towards Ireland, and intimated a hope that, in the construction of a fabric sacred to Concord the first stone should be laid by her—I feel convinced that there is no object nearer her heart than the felicity of Ireland. She will soon arrive amongst us, with a countenance beaming 989 with joy, not unmixed with the expression of feelings of which smiles are not the best interpreters. I care not if she goes encompassed by the gorgeousness of a brilliant court, for Justice and Mercy will be in her retinue, and Hope, in all its beauty, will wait upon her. If her father's brother was received by us with enthusiasm, because he was the first Sovereign by whom in a spirit of amity the shore of Ireland was trod, with what blessings will she be hailed—the good wife, the good mother, the pure, the undissembling, the honest, the sincere—with the brightest diadem in all the world glittering on her unblemished forehead, and the love of her people enthroned in her heart. Not for the purpose of escaping from the lassitude of royalty, or flying from the monotonous pomp of the palace—she goes for the nobler purpose of looking at her people—her chivalrous, her devoted Irish people—for the purpose of seeing with her own eyes, of judging with her own judgment, and with her own heart of feeling what it is that ought to be done for the Irish people. Engaged in that noble study, let her tarry long amongst us; and when the period of her sojourn shall have expired—when she shall be compelled to return to this, the central seat of Empire, and to bid us farewell, it is not surely mere imagination on my part to think that, still thrilling with acclamations, such as she never heard before, she will stand high on the deck of that ship that will bear her too fast away from us; and as she looks back towards Ireland, with eyes not unsuffused with emotion, she will pray that before she shall have attained the meridian of that reign whose morning has been so bright, it may be granted to her, by the Disposer of all human events, to endow that beautiful country with perpetual peace, and that it may be her blessed lot, surrounded with men who shall participate in her magnanimous feelings, to make reparation to Ireland for all that Ireland has suffered—for all the tears that Ireland has shed—for all the agony of grief through which Ireland has passed—for all the wrongs which it was the fault of your forefathers, and which it was more than your misfortune, to have inflicted upon her.
§ Mr. Lawwas aware that topics at first calculated to arrest the attention of Parliament, had lost, by the long continuance of this debate, much of their interest with the 990 House; and in addressing himself to the subject under consideration, he was not unmindful that the House had been engaged nearly six nights in discussing the principle of this measure; nor could he disguise from himself, that whatever the importance of the question arguments from that side of the House were likely to meet with little favour from those who had hitherto given so imperfect an answer to the arguments that had been already offered, and the objections so strongly urged against the Bill. He desired to deprecate in the strongest terms the introduction of Her Majesty's name into this debate. It was most unconstitutional; the minds of hon. Members—all of whom were animated alike with sentiments of the profoundest loyalty of affection to Her Majesty—ought not to be swayed nor influenced by the mention of the august name of Her Majesty, nor by the intimation of the Minister of the Crown and the responsible advisers of the Crown, that on their representation of the case they had succeeded in inducing Her Majesty to acquiesce in the views and measures of Her Ministers, for which they alone were responsible to the Crown, to Parliament, and the country. He objected to this Bill—if on no other ground, emphatically upon this—that it converted an annual grant, subject to the review and control of Parliament, into a permanent endowment by the State. The great principle involved in the present measure was, the permanent endowment by the State for the purposes of education of the Roman Catholic priesthood in Ireland? The consideration of the details would involve the important question—the public fund out of which this money should be raised. The character of the debate had been hitherto equal to its importance, to the momentous issues involved in the decision—temperate and decorous as became the wisdom and gravity of Parliament—except, indeed, during a short and painful interval in the course of the present evening. [The hon. and learned Member, referring to some notes which he held in his hand, was here assailed with Cries of "Read, read, read!"] If it is not the pleasure of that Gentleman (said the hon. and learned Member), who ingeminates so frequently and in so elevated a tone the word "Read" as an interruption to the observations I offer to the House, to stand on his feet and deliver his own more sagacious sentiments to the House, I desire that in the ordinary decency and courtesy due from 991 one Gentleman to another, I may be permitted to proceed in the discharge of a bounden duty to the constituency I have the honour to represent. [Interruption repeated.] I am unconscious in what way I have deserved this treatment. There was nothing in the manner in which I endeavoured to express my sentiments when this measure was discussed on the first reading, disrespectful to the Members of the Government, offensive to the feelings of anyone, or calculated to produce in any well-regulated mind the slightest excitement or anger. He now gave to the right hon. Baronet the open intimation of his opinion, that when on a future stage of the Bill the question mooted by the hon. Member for Sheffield (Mr. Ward) shall be discussed in the House, he anticipated that by a majority which would produce the extinction of the measure, it would be determined that from the taxes of England, the Consolidated Fund, the sources should not be drawn. [Cries of] "Read, read."] I really do not understand why I should be put down by the senseless clamour which some hon. Gentlemen think proper to employ for the purpose of preventing me from delivering the sentiments which it was my intention to have expressed in a very narrow compass. Had it not been for the interruptions inflicted on me I should have been now about to conclude the observations it was my object to submit with becoming respect to the consideration of the House. There were three propositions involved in this question: first, the endowment of the Roman Catholic clergy; second, the protracted existence of the Protestant Establishment in Ireland; and third, the faith of Parliament pledged for its existence at the period of the Union. First, with respect to the great consideration of the endowment of the Roman Catholic clergy, the noble Lord the Member for London, in terms the most distinct, gave his unqualified assent to that proposition, and deduced it as a natural inference from the introduction of this measure by Her Majesty's Ministers. They had also had an intimation—what appeared indeed to amount to an admission—to the same effect from the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Government and other Ministers of the Crown, and only a solitary disclaimer from his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. His right hon. Friend, indeed, told the House, and he might be permitted to remind them of it, for there were not then forty Members present, that there 992 was nothing involved in the Bill beyond what was expressly contained in it. At last his right hon. Friend said that, if the endowment of the Roman Catholic clergy should at any time be proposed, he, for one, would never consent that that endowment should be made by the confiscation of the property of the Protestant Church in Ireland. This was the sole matter that had appeared to controvert almost the universal opinion that this was one of a series of measures, and that it was the necessary and not remote consequence that they must entertain the question of the endowment of the Roman Catholic clergy. It might be supposed that some language had fallen from the right hon. Baronet the Secretary for the Home Department, at least, suggesting that this measure was not immediately intended. He had anxiously attended to the right hon. Baronet's statement, and all he could discover was that the Government was not at present prepared to submit that ulterior measure, nor were our Roman Catholic fellow-subjects prepared to ask it. The latter consideration (pursued the hon. and learned Gentleman) appears to me the only obstacle to the endowment of the Roman Catholic clergy.
§ Mr. HuttI rise to order. I wish to know if it be not contrary to the Standing Orders of the House for any Member of it to read his speech.
§ Mr. LawBy what right the hon. Gentleman presumes to say, at that distance from the spot on which I stand, that I am reading my speech — and having made the assertion, to call upon you, Sir, to require me to desist, I cannot imagine. It is worthy of the cause of which he is the advocate. The only difference in the statement which I shall be enabled to lay before you, in consequence of these repeated and injurious interruptions, unusual, contrary to the practice of Parliament and of Gentlemen—
§ Captain Bernal Osbornerose to order. The hon. and learned Member said, contrary to the practice of Gentlemen. He wished to know if that was in order.
§ The Speakerwas understood to say, that the hon. and learned Member for the University of Cambridge (Mr. Law) was in order under the circumstances.
§ Mr. LawI thank you, Sir, for your most obliging and most just interpretation of my words and my intentions—an interpretation in which, I firmly believe the hon. Gentleman who afforded the interruption, at the time he rose, fully con- 993 curred. [Captain Bernal Osborne: "No."] If I am to be the only person in this House who is not at liberty to refer to the heads of his argument, to enable him to pursue in order the statement which he wishes to lay before the House—if the object is to prevent me from proceeding, I have no doubt it will be successful to this extent—that when I shall retake my place, I shall have omitted most of those points on which I rest the importance of this measure, and shall have occupied unintentionally an enormous portion of your time, without having given expression to my sentiments. Up to this time the debate has been conducted in a manner suitable to the occasion, and with the utmost decency and decorum. I trust that my situation will not be an exception on this important subject; that I shall be patiently and fairly heard in advocating the rights of those I represent, and who, I may say without offence, are not inferior in situation and circumstances, in learning, and all that adorns human nature, to the hon. Gentlemen who have offered me interruption. I was insisting that the statement of the Chancellor of the Exchequer was the only obstacle to the conclusion that the principle of this measure was the endowment of the Roman Catholic Church, and that it would put in peril the existence of the Established Church. If I can make no other appeal, I claim the indulgence of hon. Gentlemen, in order to make myself intelligible, and to do my duty to those who have sent me here. In the profession to which I have for so many years belonged, I have been in the habit of making notes, and not of trusting entirely to my memory for the arrangement of points of argument; and if you rigidly insist upon my exclusion from a privilege accorded to every other Member by the indulgence of the House, I will not contest the matter, but I will yield to you, if that is your pleasure, and sit down. The hon. and learned Gentleman continued: The apparent coyness of those who would have to make the request to Government to provide for the endowment of the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland, presented the only obstacle to the success of that measure. But when he referred to the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Dungarvon, delivered on the announcement of the measure by the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Government, he was reminded that the coyness was of a nature that might be 994 prevailed upon to yield; that it was of the character of shyness which a little time would remove; and there was a delicate hint from the right hon. Member that it might be expedient that a comfortable snug parsonage house, and a convenient glebe, should be presented to every Member of the Roman Catholic priesthood to whom the cure of souls was committed. Nor had he found that that gentle suggestion, made very naturally, and in the best spirit, by the right hon. Gentleman, met with anything like discouragement from Her Majesty's Ministers. On the contrary, it seemed to him, that if the right hon. Gentleman had pressed his point, he would have had more than a tacit admission that there was a disposition to grant it. The speech of the right hon. Member for Dungarvon was in the best and most conciliating spirit towards Her Majesty's Ministers. It was on no sudden thought that he had exchanged forgiveness with the right hon. Baronet the Secretary for the Home Department: from his temperate language and conciliatory tone, it would almost seem that he was prepared to swear an eternal friendship with Her Majesty's Government. The right hon. Gentleman had undoubtedly the authority of Burke for saying that the peculiar duties consigned to those who were to fill the office of Roman Catholic priests, appeared to furnish a ground for that seclusion which in all other denominations of religious sects was regarded as not enjoined, and scarcely in accordance with the spirit of those Scriptures which were the foundation of the instruction they would hereafter communicate to their flocks. The second proposition involved in this question regarded the Establishment in Ireland. His right hon. Friend—if he would excuse him for presuming to call him so—the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Government, when he introduced the great measure for the removal of the civil restrictions and disabilities of their Roman Catholic fellow-subjects, drew, if he was not mistaken, a very broad line of distinction between the removal of civil disabilities and the advancement to ecclesiastical power of those on whom the civil disabilities were imposed. They were now engaged in the discussion of a second, and by far more important, Catholic question; and when the alarm raised throughout Great Britain was considered, it was not surprising that the Table should groan with petitions, which appeared to 995 be utterly disregarded, but which emanated from those who were, perhaps, better acquainted with the bearings of the question than those who were legislating upon it. This was, as he had said, a second Catholic question; and of the inconveniences that attended the discussion of the first, one was the want of distinction between questions merely affecting civil and social life, and the greater question affecting the national Protestant Establishment in Church and State. It was fitting that the people of England should be heard on a matter so vitally affecting them, before the first step was taken in subverting those institutions in Church and State. Members of that House should pause ere they committed the capital—he had almost said the irretrievable—error of plunging this country into an agitation that might occupy as many years as the old question regarding civil disabilities had done before, and be attended with deeper and more lasting feelings of alienation and distrust. He warned them that they were entering upon a course the end of which it was difficult to predict, and which would plunge them into evils which it was impossible to overstate. It was now no longer a question whether the right hon. and learned Member for Dungarvon should occupy a distinguished place in the Legislature, and concur with his Protestant fellow-subjects in all those important legislative measures which were to advance the prosperity of their common country; but it was a question whether the foundations of the British Constitution should be shaken to their centre and subverted. It was no longer a question whether, for political expediency or imaginary danger, they were to admit to or exclude from full participation in civil rights, those who were separated from them by a different form of religious belief. The question before the House and the country was simply this—whether the title by which the Crown of England had been hitherto held should be abrogated, and whether the Act of Settlement should be a dead letter—whether the 5th Article of the Union, which was considered the fundamental Article, should be infringed. The Act of Settlement made it impossible for any one professing the Roman Calic religion to occupy the Throne of these realms. Whether they who established that exclusive condition were warranted in so doing by the position in which they were placed—whether circumstances had 996 intermediately or newly arisen to shake the principles of that settlement—whether we were so much wiser than our ancestors that we not only wished to review the Revolution but the Reformation—whether they were now, by a State grant to the College of Maynooth, to send gentlemen educated in the Roman Catholic religion to make a market for sedition; to stimulate to acts of sedition the vast population of Ireland; and to recognise this College as part of the civil system and government of the country—he did not know. This was nothing but a preliminary question whether they were to concede an endowment to the Roman Catholic Church. Out of what revenue the expense was to be met, had yet to be discussed. Were these imaginary difficulties? Was there not on the Voles a notice of Motion involving not the endowment alone, but an endowment out of the property of the United Church of England and Ireland. Before he proceeded further—["Oh, oh."] He knew that hon. Members were not willing that their constituents, who had given them their powers on other conditions, should know, through those organs which promulged to the public the sentiments delivered in that House, the speeches made by those Members who were ready, in the hour of danger, to vindicate the rights of the Church of which, they were members, and carry into practice the principles they had professed at the hustings. He should, therefore, make no apology for insisting upon those important topics which were so vital to the question under consideration. He only regretted that the tone in which he was compelled to speak should appear unfriendly. He had no wish to give offence to any Gentleman. On the contrary he declared, with a sincerity which no one had a right to dispute, that he respected the opinions of every man who differed from him on religious grounds; and he begged to say, in distinct terms, that since a victory had been achieved for Gentlemen of the Roman Catholic religion, he rejoiced that they were in full enjoyment of every civil right and privilege which the subjects of this realm could enjoy. They were indebted to the right hon. Gentleman for all those privileges, and it was well that the discussion upon those topics had now passed away. He now addressed himself to the question regarding the establishment of the Roman Catholic Church, as a co-ordinate establishment. In trespassing on their time, 997 as he was conscious he was, he must again throw himself upon the indulgence of the House, and of those who were the sole cause of the late hour at which he continued to address them. At the commencement of this discussion, and upon the question of the reception of this Bill at the hands of the Government, he had stated that he gave his full acknowledgment of the pure and exalted intentions of those who had been induced to submit to Parliament a measure fraught with such great difficulty and danger. They had really to consider whether they were prepared permanently to endow the Roman Catholic clergy, and whether they would do so out of the taxes of this country, or the property of the Established Church in Ireland. It was miserable special pleading in the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Edinburgh, to ascribe the opposition to the measure to objections against the amount of the grant proposed. Such a motive had been distinctly repudiated; and his (Mr. Macaulay's) declaration that the only question involved was one of figures, was irreconcileable with that part of his speech in which he had vituperated the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Government, and accused him (Sir R. Peel) of introducing a measure not based on his former principles, and opposed to the principles on which he had acted when in Opposition, and of professing one set of principles for the purpose of removing the Whigs, and of adopting others in office, as the rule and guide of the measures of Administration. In the speech delivered on the previous evening by the right hon. Baronet the Home Secretary, he (Sir James Graham) appeared to derogate from the originality of the right hon. Premier, and to attribute too much importance to himself and his noble Friend (Lord Stanley), as the originators of the Government measure. He (Sir James Graham) had also alluded to his right hon. and learned Friend the Member for the University of Dublin, in terms not calculated to heal a breach between members of a party, but rather to widen and perpetuate the differences that unhappily existed between friends who had for years acted together—or appeared to do so—in reciprocal confidence and mutual harmony. His right hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Shaw) had held no unimportant position when the party now in power sat on the opposite side of the House. He was not then taunted with the expression "Protestant Ascendancy in its old sense, is at an end;" nor were apologies 998 then tendered to Ireland by the right hon. Baronet for the indiscreet expression "that concession had reached its utmost limits." Mr. Law (proceeded amidst a scene of noisy interruption that rendered him nearly inaudible) to state his opinion that when this measure was carried, any overture from the Roman Catholics must be met by the Minister of the day not with mere tacit acquiescence, but with active fervour and co-operation. The principle being conceded, the power to resist effectually will have passed out of the hands of the Government. But they were assured by his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, that they need be under no apprehension for the revenues of the Established Church in Ireland, for that he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) would never be a party to their confiscation for Roman Catholic purposes. Now, knowing the character of his right hon. Friend, he freely admitted that he (Mr. Goulburn) had not the remotest intention to support any measure for confiscating the revenues of the Irish Protestant Church; but he was compelled to fear that his right hon. Friend's faculty of resistance would be found extremely limited, and that when the question arose "from what source shall the Irish Roman Catholic clergy be paid and endowed," neither the influence of his right hon. Friend, nay, nor the united strength of the Government, would be found sufficient to withhold the further concession demanded, and based on the voluntary surrender of the principles of the Protestant Constitution in Church and State. If the Roman Catholic religion was proposed to be established in Ireland, the voice of his right hon. Friend would be silenced, and his remonstrances be urged too late, and in vain. He was inclined to think so—because at an early period of his (Mr. Law's) parliamentary life, when he (Mr. Law) was induced to support a measure to enable a gentleman of the Jewish persuasion to become Sheriff of London, his right hon. Friend had dissented from that measure in terms that would have led him (Mr. Law) to expect the most strenuous opposition from his right hon. Friend, whenever a further step should be attempted to be taken in the same direction. The Jewish Disabilities Removal Bill now lies upon your Table, the measure of the Government of which my right hon. Friend is at this time a prominent and efficient member and ornament. He (Mr. Law) was resolved to support the proposition of 999 the hon. Member for Newcastle, that this Bill be read this day six months. Let it repose, in the meantime, upon that Table, merged under the petitions of the people, entwined in the folds and the embraces of its twin brother the Jews' Bill, to be revived and resuscitated under the fostering care of its real parents and natural guardians—the Whigs. They alone with consistency can engraft these measures upon our Christian Protestant Constitution. Be theirs the merit, if merit there be, and the rewards of success. Be theirs and theirs alone the peril of discomfiture, and the ignominy of defeat.
§ Mr. Thomas DuncombeAssuming that it was the wish as well as the determination of the House, that this debate should be brought to a close this evening, he could assure the House that he would not occupy one-tenth of the time which had been occupied by the learned Recorder. Considering the tone and temper of this debate, considering that there had been no offence given to the religious opinions of any man, be they what they might, he could not help expressing his regret at the speech of his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Dungarvon (Mr. Sheil). He could not help thinking that he had done a great act of injustice to the Protestant Dissenters of England. If any one had proposed that the Government and the people of Ireland should be handed over to the three denominations of Protestant Dissenters, instead of to the aristocracy of England, which it appeared his hon. and learned Friend greatly preferred, then there might have been some cause for the expressions which he had used against them. But no such proposition was ever dreamed of, and the hon. and learned Gentleman had, therefore, done the three denominations a great injustice. He (Mr. Duncombe) wished he could attract the attention of his hon. and learned Friend to the petition which he this evening presented from a deputation nominated by the three religious bodies of Dissenters residing within twelve miles of this metropolis. They represented every Dissenter belonging to their different bodies, and what was their language? It was this:—
That they objected to the revenues of the State being appropriated to any ecclesiastical purpose whatever. They stood upon the broad ground of no endowment; and they stated that it was only from their attachment 1000 to what they considered right, that they presented their petition to the House, and from no ill feeling whatever, either to the tenets, or in respect to any portion of the conduct of their Roman Catholic fellow-subjects of Ireland, with whom they said they sympathised, and long had sympathised, for the sufferings, cruelties and wrongs to which they had for so many years been subjected.His right hon. and learned Friend, therefore, had done these three denominations of Dissenters great injustice, in describing them as being a set of fanatical insurgents. The Dissenters had been perfectly consistent upon this question. Let the House recollect what was their course in 1834, when Lord Althorp and Lord Grey brought in a Bill to pay the church rates out of the Consolidated Fund. Did not the Dissenters take the same ground on that occasion which they were assuming now? The Whig Government of that day considered it prudent to withdraw the Bill; for the Dissenters would never tolerate the principle of taxing the people for the support of a Church to which they did not belong. Again, was not their conduct perfectly consistent in regard to the educational clauses in the Factories Bill? Was their conduct then directed against the Roman Catholics? No; their opposition was to the attempt that was at that time being made by the Crown to hand over the education of a great portion of the young of both sexes to the exclusive control of the Established Church. They objected conscientiously to the children in factories being altogether subjected to the educational control of the ministers of the Church of England. They were, therefore, perfectly consistent when they came forth in opposition to the measure now before the House. He hoped that that opposition would continue, and that it would be successful. Before closing his observations, he wished to put a question to Her Majesty's Ministers upon this part of the subject. It should not be an impertinent one, such as had been put by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Northamptonshire; he was not going to ask whether, if the noble Lord the Member for London (Lord John Russell) had brought in this Bill, Her Majesty's Ministers would have opposed it. He believed that if the noble Lord had introduced such a measure, all those who now supported the right hon. Baronet (Sir R. Peel) would have exhibited the noble 1001 Lord and the Pope in effigy in every parish in the kingdom. But he was not going to ask that question, and that for the best of all reasons, as the learned Recorder would tell them, "that no man was bound to criminate himself." But the question he would ask the right hon. Baronet was this:—Were these innumerable petitions which had been presented against the measure to be treated as so much waste paper? Were not they (the House of Commons) a representative assembly? Could any former instance be pointed out where petitions had been presented to the House so numerously, so respectably, and so honestly signed? What answer, he would ask, had they to give to these petitioners? Would it be any answer for hon. Gentlemen to get up, and having abused Her Majesty's Ministers for their inconsistency—for their duplicity, if you please—then vote for the Bill? Did they suppose it would be any answer to these petitioners to tell them that certain persons would be inconsistent if, after having formerly supported a small grant to the College of Maynooth, they should now oppose its extension? That was no answer; if by this measure it was proposed not only to enlarge the grant but to make it perpetual, and give to it the character of an endowment of that College. Not only would it be an endowment, but it had been most distinctly pointed out—and he hoped the right hon. Gentleman (Sir Robert Peel) would be explicit upon this point—by the noble Lord the Member for the city of London (Lord John Russell), that he considered this measure only valuable because it was the precursor of some future measures for making a provision for the Roman Catholic clergy of Ireland. A similar remark fell from the right hon. Gentleman the late President of the Board of Trade, which had not been contradicted by any Minister who had hitherto spoken. To be sure the right hon. Baronet the Secretary of State for the Home Department had said, that he had been told that the Roman Catholic clergy would not accept any provision from the State, and therefore the right hon. Gentleman was not prepared to propose it. But the right hon. Gentleman did not tell the House that if the Roman Catholic priests were prepared to accept it, he was not prepare to propose it. For his part, he (Mr. T. Duncombe) was surprised that the Roman Catholics of Ireland should 1002 accept of this beggarly miserable grant. He always understood that they disdained to become the liveried lacqueys of the State; but it now, alas! appeared that they were ready to prostrate themselves before this golden image that the Government were setting up. [A cry of "No."] An hon. Member said "no;" he (Mr. T. Duncombe) hoped the Irish people would also say "no." And this suggested the reflection, that if the Irish people were so grateful for this boon—if they were so overflowing with gratitude—how was it that they did not come forward and declare it to the world? He wanted to learn that from the Irish people; not from newspaper report, but from their own lips. Let them come face to face before the Commons of England, and tell the House and the country that this is so great a boon to them that all Ireland would be grateful for it, and that the cry of "repeal" would be hushed for ever. He wished to know whether it were intended to tell the people of England that if they rejected this Bill, they would in effect be rejecting Her Majesty's present Ministers? Did any one suppose that that would be an answer to the people of England? However much hon. Gentlemen opposite might flatter themselves, they would find that the carrying of this measure would not carry with it the voice of the people of England in support of the present Administration. But he must again revert to the question—what was to be done with the petitions of the people? Were they to be treated as waste paper? He did not think that either the House or the Government could afford to play such pranks with the people of England. They were not sufficiently respected by the people to be able to do that. Never was a Parliament so intensely hated and detested by the people of this country as was the present Parliament; and if they persevered against the sense of the people in so great a matter, they would rue the day. He knew that they did not and would not believe it—no more than the hon. Gentlemen opposite would believe that the people would not break their hearts if they (the Government) were to go out of office. But the day would come, they might depend upon it, when they would compelled to believe it; but not, perhaps, until they found these rotten walls rattling about their ears. He was told that this measure would conciliate the people of Ireland. 1003 He did not believe it. They would only despise the Government for their truckling policy, and laugh at the House for sanctioning it. Where would the Government be this day six months? Had they any fixed plan of policy? Would they come forward and say that they had some great, and comprehensive plan, and that Ireland should no longer be governed on the principle of exclusion? He was glad to hear the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Home Department say that Ireland was henceforth to be governed upon the principle of equity; but he was anxious to know what that principle of equity was to be. Before this Bill passed, Her Majesty's Government ought to lay upon the Table a full statement of the measures they intended to adopt towards Ireland. All their measures ought to be before the House together, whether as regarded education, the poor-law, or registration, in order that the Mouse might judge whether Her Majesty's Ministers were so much in earnest as they professed to be to govern Ireland as an integral portion of the Empire. The right hon. Baronet (Sir Robert Peel) had said that he had consulted the great ecclesiastical authorities in Ireland upon this subject. Had the right. hon. Gentleman consulted the great ecclesiastical authorities in England upon it? He wished to know whether the spiritual Lords were upon this question to play the same part as was played in 1832? If he should see Charles James of London and Henry of Exeter absent themselves on this occasion, he should exceedingly rejoice, because it would be the means of relieving them altogether from their parliamentary duties without any difficulty, and also without injury to the State, or prejudice to the religion of the country. Whatever agreeable reminiscences the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Sheil) might have of the College of Maynooth, he very much feared, be the issue of this Bill what it might, that the only reminiscences which would be left to the right hon. Baronet (Sir Robert Peel) would be found in the recollection of the bitter reproaches of those friends whose confidence he had lost, and in the reproach of that insulting and humiliating support of those political opponents whose office he had usurped. He promised not to occupy the time of the House, and he would keep his word; but notwithstanding all those taunts, and those charges of in- 1004 tolerance and of bigotry, and of a desire to perpetuate injustice, that had been levelled against those who were opposed to this Bill, he, knowing them to be most true and unfounded, should resist the measure as long as it remained on the Table of the House.
Lord J. Russellsaid: Sir, if it is the general wish of the House that this debate should conclude to-night, I am, as my hon. Friend who has just sat down has said, ready to address the House out of a feeling of respect to the petitions of the people, which have been so numerously presented to it. I could have been well contented otherwise to have given a silent vote in favour of the second reading of this measure; but after the numerous petitions that have been laid upon the Table—after the many letters I have received from my constituents, and other parties, expressing their objections to this measure, I own I should not feel entirely satisfied if I did not express to the House the reasons which induce me to differ from their opinions. Sir, I concur so far with the opinions of those who are opposed to this measure, that I do think the question is one of the highest importance; and in that respect, perhaps, I do not agree so entirely with such of Her Majesty's Ministers as have spoken on the Motion for the second reading, because, as far as appeared to me, the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer seemed to consider the proposal as merely an addition of 17,000l. to the former grant to Maynooth. Again, the right hon. Secretary for the Home Department appears to consider that the question of the endowment of the College of Maynooth was settled by the Act of 1795. I cannot agree with the opinion of either of these right hon. Gentlemen. If the question is merely one of an addition of 17,000l. to the grant, I think it might have been placed among the Miscellaneous Estimates in the ordinary manner, like the repairs of a barrack at Portsmouth, or any other place. It might have been shown that the building was insufficient; that there was not enough room for the students; or that a greater amount was required for the subsistence of the scholars—a case might thus have been made out for an increase of the vote from 9,000l. to 26,000l. Upon that question, however much those who had always been opposed to any grant to Maynooth might have contended against it, seeing how small that opposition had been for some years past, 1005 the only doubt would have been, whether this additional sum of money were sufficient or not, and whether the principle that induced us to vote a sum for the maintenance of Maynooth required us to spend this 17,000l., in addition to what we had already contributed? Neither can I agree with the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for the Home Department, that this whole question as to its principle was decided in 1795; for, were I to agree with that opinion, I should in the same manner concede that the Charitable Bequests Act of last year contained—which I do not think it did—the whole question of the endowment by the State of the Roman Catholic Church. The Act of 1795, as I understand it, allowed the Roman Catholics to found their own College, and to give their own lands and money for that purpose. Then, from year to year, we have voted a sum in aid of the funds thus contributed. I consider that a totally different measure—one differing in degree, differing in extent, and differing in character from the proposition now before the House; and although, Sir, I am far from saying that if you agree to this measure you must proceed farther, and endow the Roman Catholic clergy of Ireland, I think it is impossible to controvert the position laid down by the right hon. Member for Newark (Mr. Gladstone), who said, as far as the religious question is concerned, that will be decided by the carrying of this measure. But, Sir, there remain other questions to be considered: there is the question, whether the public taxation of this country should be burdened by a payment to the Roman Catholic clergy — the question, whether anything shall be taken from the Protestant Church, and whether it would afford any surplus for the purpose; and, thirdly, whether any taxation can be laid upon Ireland exclusively for such an object? All these are questions of great difficulty, which have to be decided; and besides these, there is still the previous question of the consent to this course of the Catholic clergy themselves. You will, therefore, by no means decide the question of endowment by carrying such a measure as the Bill which is to-night before the House. But, with regard to the endowment of the Catholic clergy, I consider, that in some respects such a measure would be open to less objection than the proposal before the House; because the clergy of the Roman Catholic communion have to perform many duties which, resemble those 1006 performed by the clergy of the Established Church of this country, and by the clergy of the Presbyterian Church of Scotland—duties of charity, of instructing the people, and informing them of the Word of God, and duties about which there can be no dispute—duties of consolation and kindness, which all these clergymen perform in a similar useful and Christian manner. But with regard to this College, the whole question is one of the theology to be taught in it; or, if not the whole question, the theology is the principal part of the matter. It is in this respect that, in point of principle, the stronger question is the endowment of the College; and, therefore, I come prepared to treat it thoroughly impressed with its importance—as much so as any of those who have opposed it—as much so as any of those among the Representatives of Ireland, who, my hon. Friend (Mr. Duncombe) states, have exaggerated that importance. But in discussing this question, I think the acceptance of it by the Irish Catholic clergy and people—which I believe is an undoubted fact—is an important element for our consideration. The first and the last thing we have to consider in connexion with this question is, the condition of the people and of the Government of Ireland. You have in that country 7,000,000 of people; and the statistical results of your inquiries show that they are in a condition which it is frightful to read of and shocking to contemplate. Your statistics show that millions of that people are in a state bordering on starvation—that many live in cabins of a single room, without a window, and many in cabins of two rooms; but all these details show that a very large proportion of the people are in a state of the deepest poverty. You have, too, this fact distinctly brought before you — that those who live in this state of poverty especially belong to the Roman Catholic religion; and their clergy have to depend not only on the contributions of farmers, or persons in somewhat comfortable circumstances, but on the miserable earnings of the poorest of these destitute people. You have, at the same time, in that country an Established Church very richly endowed—so richly endowed that the whole sum now proposed as the grant to Maynooth, taking the old grant and the new together, hardly exceeds the revenues of three Prelates of that Establishment. Is not this a case in which any measure calculated to conciliate the affections of that people, and which 1007 can be adopted without any violence to the Constitution as it exists, is worthy of your consideration, and one which you ought to hesitate long ere you rejected it? The opinion of the people of Ireland, as far as I can collect it, is, that they are ready to receive this grant with gratitude. It will be a means of conciliating their affections; it does not trench upon the revenue of the Established Church; and no doubt the majority of this House would pronounce against such a means of providing for the expenses of any Catholic establishment. We know that the grant does not offend the religious feelings of any of the Catholic clergy, and in this respect it does not present such a difficulty as the endowment of that clergy. The hon. Member for Finsbury — who, strange to say, is tonight the ally of the hon. Baronet the Member for the University of Oxford on this question — says, the Dissenters are ready to agree in their case that there shall be no endowment and no State Church, and that the voluntary principle ought to prevail in the Anglican as well as the Roman Catholic Establishment. This appears highly liberal, and seems to do a justice to the people of Ireland; but, in fact, it is not concession of which any use can be made. Let us look what must be the feelings of the people of Ireland, if we bandy about one subject after another on this question, without ever coming to some practical conclusion? Suppose my hon. Friend were to say, "Let us abolish the Establishment in England and Ireland, and let religion rely for support on the voluntary principle." It seems a great and high sounding principle that every man shall pay only to support the religion he professes, and that no man shall have his conscience burdened by having to pay ministers of a religion from which he dissents; but everybody knows that the great majority of this House would negative such a proposition; and suppose that a dissolution took place to-morrow or any other time, still there would be a great majority to oppose any demand for the abolition of the State Church. The Government come forward and say, "Let us make an endowment of a small portion belonging to the Roman Catholic religion;" if we were to pay with my hon. Friend, "No, let the voluntary principle prevail, let us have no State endowment, let every man provide his religion for himself;" and suppose the State endowment to be rejected with Scorn and contempt by the House—what in 1008 the mean time is the state of the people of Ireland? If one party refuse to consent to any inroad on the revenues of the Establishment, and another party absolutely refuse any endowment at all, what will be the condition of the people? Why, they will remain quite uncared for by the Legislature of this country; they will see that the Legislature provides abundantly for the religion of a minority, and that both England and Scotland oppose their wishes. Whether the plan proposed be in the shape of an endowment, or the voluntary principle be adopted, that which is for the benefit of Ireland would be rejected. The Irish would then look on this country as they did of old; they would not consider the different parties, and their views and combinations; they would take the whole together, and would say, every proposition for the benefit of Ireland is rejected by the House of Commons and the Representatives of Great Britain. If that be the case, then I say the proposed remedy, that sounds so well, of the abolition of all State endowments, and the establishment of the voluntary principle, is quite illusory; it would be nothing but a delusion and a fraud upon the people of Ireland to say, we cannot give this endowment, and profess that we are quite ready to abolish all State Churches. Sir, I cannot agree with what was said by the right hon. and learned Member for Dungarvon (Mr. Sheil) of the Protestant Dissenters of this country. I think they are men to whom, with respect to all questions of civil and religious liberty, this country is deeply indebted. When it is a question of equality in point of civil privileges, they are as forward as any men in wishing their Roman Catholic fellow-subjects to be placed on that equality. They have taken up this question of a State endowment on the strongest religious grounds favourable to Protestantism, and hostile to Roman Catholicism; but I believe, when the question is further considered, they will see that the result of the rejection of a Bill like this will be that an inequality and an injustice will be committed towards Ireland, and will see that some such measure as this is necessary as a partial remedy for some of the grievances of that country. For my own part I cannot see without alarm—I cannot see without pain, the declarations made in the petitions laid upon the Table of this House with respect to the religious part of this question. I cannot read the petitions which I see printed 1009 here before me, coming both from Protestants of the Established Church, and from Protestant Dissenters of this country, without deeply regretting that so strong a feeling—I should for myself say so strong and unjust a prejudice—should exist with respect to the Roman Catholic religion. I say so, because I remember, that at the time of what is called the Roman Catholic Relief Bill, the same statements were made. I remember the same charges against the Roman Catholic Church for its idolatry, for its antiscriptural professions, and of the members being followers of Antichrist; and many other phrases which I only repeat because they are so often contained in the petitions which have been presented to this House. The whole question of the Catholic Relief Bill came before the House of Lords; and on looking at the speeches of the Prelates of the Established Church, both for and against the Bill, I find nothing to justify these phrases. The Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishop of London, and the Archbishop of York, placed their opposition entirely upon political grounds, and upon the encroachments of the Catholic Church. I find other bishops discussing the doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church; but all who discussed them, admitting that the Roman Catholic Church is a part of the Christian Church; and the Bishop of Llandaff asked, if we did not acknowledge the Roman Catholic Church to be part of the Christian Church, whence was the authority derived by the ministers of the Church of England? When such are the opinions of the Prelates of our Church, I consider myself wholly free from the necessity of holding opinions which it would give me great pain if I were compelled to entertain. But I regret to say; that there is still great intolerance upon this subject. There is a feeling which has come down to us from the Reformation, which I do fear exists both on the one side and on the other side. When I read the charges made against Maynooth, and when it is said that intolerance to a certain degree exists in the Roman Catholic Church, and that this should be the cause of withholding from it our aid, I must say that I greatly regret that this spirit, which existed in so fierce a degree at the period of the Reformation, should not by this time have been softened, if not effaced. I fear, Sir, that the religious warfare that then took place has left remains of a more durable character than any civil war which this country has 1010 ever remembered. We all recollect the beautiful passage in Virgil, in which he supposes that in future time the husbandman will dig up the remains of the arms of those who fell in the civil wars of Rome, and that he will find the spears covered with rust and the empty helmets worn in some forgotten battle; but it appears that the arms of the parties who contended at the time of the Reformation, will never be allowed to rust—that there are parties constantly coming forward who will keep the spears bright, and the helmets still burnished; and that whenever any question shall arise which excites the religious differences, whenever that same chord is touched, the unrusted spears, and the well-burnished helmets, and the tattered banners, are again brought forth, and are displayed with all the fierceness which distinguished the religious animosities of the sixteenth century. It is time, as I conceive, that this spirit should give place to a more kindly and a more conciliatory spirit. It is grievous to think that what the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newark is often pleased to suppose, cannot be, and that there cannot be one church contented and at peace. But, Sir, I have seen the attempt made; I have lived in Spain where this was attempted; I saw the dreadful evils that ensued; and it is impossible and extravagant to expect that in a country, divided as this is, there should be anything like an unity of the Church: but this at least we can each do; whilst each adheres conscientiously to his own faith, whilst we stand firmly by our own religion, we can each give full credit to others, whether we are Catholic or Protestant, whether we belong to the Church of England or the Church of Scotland, for equal conscientiousness; and we may all discuss the great subject of the general welfare, without joining in those unfortunate animosities which still prevail among the people. In saying this, I cannot consent to yield to the petitions of the people on this subject. I think if we say, with these petitioners, that we cannot support a religion which we consider to be unscriptural—in the first place our efforts must go beyond this Bill, and next that they must go far beyond Ireland, and we must extend to the Colonies a rigid and unbending rule, which will, in a few years, shake the Empire to its foundations. But suppose I admit that, for the sake of the maintenance of the Protestant religion, such an act is necessary—suppose at this moment 1011 that we will take all the consequences—suppose that we are ready to do all this, have we any pretence for saying that we legislate for the people of Ireland? Are we not bound to say to the people of that country, "We engaged at the time of the Union to govern Ireland in a spirit of equality with England; we engaged to consider Irishmen as we consider Englishmen; to allow the same rights and privileges to the Irish as we claim for ourselves, and to consider the questions with regard to Ireland as we would consider them with regard to ourselves?" If that be the case it will be totally inconsistent with our saying that "our own religion is so exclusively true that we cannot bear anything like an equality, or anything like a favour being shown to the people of Ireland?" If we say that such are our strict religious principles, that we defy these demands for justice, then will come more fiercely than ever those demands for the Repeal of the Union which all will deplore. Either we must say that "we will carry out the compact in the spirit which was declared at the time, and that we will fulfil the compact not only to the letter, but with all that kindness and all that affectionate regard, and all that conciliation which Ireland should have from England;" or we must say that "our religious opinions will not allow us to act with equity and justice towards Ireland," and then we must renounce the connexion and the compact, and we must give them back their Legislature to enable them to decide for themselves as they think best. I own that I consider this a dilemma from which you cannot escape. If you insist upon your strict religious principles, we must dissolve the Union; but, on the other hand, if you will maintain the Union, you must convince the Roman Catholic people of Ireland that you will treat them as you treat the Protestant people of England. Then, I do say that this Bill involves a more important question than the mere consideration of a few thousands of pounds, or of carrying into effect an Act which was passed some fifty years ago. I allow that in this Bill a principle is introduced, and that we may be called upon to carry that principle further; but I think that to this Bill we are bound to agree if we would preserve the Union in the spirit in which it was enacted. And mind this, that we, the Members on this side of the House, who do not belong to the Government, having nothing to do with the introduction of this Bill, whether 1012 the proposal is made at the proper time, or in the best way, does not now concern us. What I believe to be the question is this: the Bill is before us, and upon the second reading, shall we vote for its adoption or its rejection? On that question I cannot conceal from myself that the rejection of this Bill would produce the same feeling in Ireland, which would be the result of the rejection of a much larger measure of justice and conciliation. It would be argued in Ireland, that if upon a question such as this, you have so shown your religious animosity, if the people of England will not allow such a contribution as 26,000l., all further appeal to your justice is at an end. When, therefore, this great question is before the House, when a question of such great magnitude is presented for our decision, I am not afraid to say, that the opinion—if it be the opinion—of the majority of the people of England or of my constituents, will not deter me from giving my vote in favour of this measure. If we mean to decide as the Parliament for the general welfare of this country, we must not act upon every impulse we receive at the time from our constituents; and I hesitate not to say that on this question we must act as those on this side of the House have always acted, having ever in view the great cause of truth, of freedom, and of justice. The Protestant Dissenters are in general arrayed against this Bill. There was a time when the Protestant Dissenters were petitioners to this House to be relieved from burdens on their own consciences, and complaining of the privation of civil liberty which worked a great injustice towards them. We, then in Opposition, urged that injustice upon the House, and we obtained the concession of the repeal of the Act which afflicted them. Again the Roman Catholics of Ireland were afflicted with civil disabilities; and the right hon. Gentleman opposite acknowledged, when he passed the Emancipation Act, that it was owing to our continued support that those claims were carried. Such was the avowal which the right hon. Gentleman made at the end of the discussion on the Bill he introduced for the removal of the Roman Catholic disabilities. Now, it was not that we wished to favour the Protestant Dissenters, that we sought to deliver them from their disabilities. It was not to favour the Roman Catholics, that we relieved them from their grievances. No, I trust, that we so acted upon that occasion, as we have upon all occasions acted, from a conviction that the 1013 cause of the Protestant Dissenters and of the Roman Catholics was the cause of justice; and that their claims could not without continuing gross injustice be refused. If we had not acted then without reference on the particular expression of opinion at the time, the Protestant Dissenters would not have been thus relieved. If the Roman Catholics now find that we have not the power to help them the whole of their gratitude will be turned towards the Government which has proposed this measure. [Mr. Redington: "No."] My hon. Friend says "No;" but, with the exception of the hon. Member for Dundalk, such is the feeling, as I collect it, of the Representives of the Irish people. But be this as it may, I do not guide my course merely with a view to the obtaining the favour or support of any particular class of men, and I, therefore, do not repine at the course which any particular class of men may take. The principle on which I guide my public conduct is, to act in the way which I myself deem to be the best adapted for the true interests of the country — taking my chance as to the favour or disfavour which I may receive at the hands of the public:—
Nor love thy life, nor hate; but what thou liv'stLive well, how long or short permit to Heaven.This sentiment is as applicable to political as to natural life; and for myself, I would rather retire into private life—I would rather leave the business of this House to others who may possess the people's confidence—than attempt to injure this country by giving a vote against a measure which I think the welfare of my country demands. Sir, then my belief is, that this measure, as proposed, is likely to be received gratefully in Ireland. You may say that their gratitude will be misplaced—that it is a paltry favour. I am not to judge of that. But I am to judge of the effect — the real effect—which this measure will produce. I will not take it as if it were the last of a series, and were the crowning act of a long course of justice to the people of Ireland. No, Sir; I shall maintain, as I have hitherto maintained, that with regard to the civil and political privileges of the people of that country, you have yet much to do; that those measures to which the right hon. Baronet the Home Secretary alluded last night, fall considerably short of that which the people of Ireland have a right to require of you, to put them on an equality with the people of England. I think 1014 with respect to their ecclesiastical state, that that great anomaly of a large endowed Church for a small minority of the people is an evil which, without entering into the ways in which it might be remedied, Parliament must consider. I will not conceal that opinion. I will not deny that after his measure is passed, I shall, either in support of some proposition from others, or making my own proposition, endeavour to obtain for the people of Ireland that justice which I think was long and cruelly denied to them. If the House will permit me for a few minutes longer, I would beg you to consider how much the power of this country has been injured, how much its Administrations have been disturbed and rent asunder, by these Irish questions. I will not go back to any very remote period, but—going back to the period of the Union—Mr. Pitt was then in the height of his power—opposition, in fact, had almost ceased and disappeared. But in a short time an Irish question broke up his Government. He intended a complete union between the two countries. He intended, as far as we can see from his subsequent speeches, that that union should be attended by a complete relief from political and civil disabilities, and that it should be accompanied by a provision for the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland. That strong Ministry of Mr. Pitt was succeeded by the weak Administration of Lord Sidmouth. Mr. Pitt returned to office, but not with his former power. Lord Grenville, Lord Spencer, and others, who agreed with him on the Catholic question, did not agree in his coming back to office without the Catholic question being proposed to Parliament. The Administration of Mr. Pitt was weakened, and it ended with his death. The Administration which succeeded was strong for a time: it had many men of the highest talents in it. In 1809 it was broken up—broken up on the Catholic question—the question especially affecting Ireland. You had then an Administration based on the principle of refusing all concession. It did not last many years before Lord Castlereagh declared it was necessary that he, differing from many of his Colleagues, should be the advocate of the Roman Catholic claims. That, I always thought, was a legitimate arrangement during the time of war, when the country was opposed to the greatest peril from a foreign foe; when it was difficult to make a compact Ministry either to support or to oppose the Roman Catholic claims. That 1015 state of things lasted from 1812 to 1829, weakening every Ministry that was formed, and carried on during that period, when we beheld the spectacle of Secretaries of State, being leading persons, opposed to each other on a question the most vital of our whole domestic policy. In 1828, you had a Ministry of which the leading members were opposed to the Catholic claims; in 1829, they conceded them; but in 1830, in consequence, as I think, of the dissensions that had arisen in the Government on the question, the Ministry was broken up. Lord Grey came in. The Reform Bill was carried. The Ministry which carried it had an immense majority in the House of Commons. Everything seemed easy to so strong a Government; but in 1834 that Ministry was wrecked and divided by Irish questions. Four members, of the Cabinet seceded. Not long after, Earl Grey himself retired from office, and the Ministry before long ceased to exist. Another Ministry was then formed, which was dissolved by a vote of this House on a question affecting Ireland. A new Ministry came in in 1835, having a small majority at first, owing very much to the divisions which had taken place in 1834; but during the whole of the existence of that Ministry, their power was weakened and crippled by dissensions as to the state of Ireland, and a difference of opinion as to the measures they brought in. I have, Sir, on other occasions, and I shall probably on future occasions, refer to the party questions involved in those debates; but what I want to point out now is, that from the period of the Union down to this year, 1845, there has been scarcely a year in which the Government has not been weakened by the state of Ireland, and has not been liable to disruption in consequence of difference as to the condition of the Roman Catholics. Without referring, then, to war, or to any other dangerous contingency, do you not see that if you can conduce by any measure to the tranquillization of Ireland—if you can hit upon any course of policy in which parties generally may agree, or by which you may at length come to some concord, on this question of Ireland—you will be adding immensely to the strength of this country? The petitioners who have laden the Table of the House on the subject, have surely not retraced for themselves the short review which I have just taken of the subject. If they have not indeed considered the immediate reference which this question has to the power and strength 1016 of this country, I would earnestly entreat them, and those who think with them, most deeply and seriously to turn their attention to that most grave and deeply important point. And for myself, let me, differing from them—with the utmost respect for the conscientious sense of religion which animates them—let me, using my own conscientious and independent judgment, vote in favour of a Bill which I regard as calculated in some degree to heal the still bleeding wounds of Ireland, which I regard as tending to place that country in the position which she ought to occupy, as the most, improving and not the least happy portion of Her Majesty's dominions.
§ Sir R. H. Inglissaid, that he had listened with the greatest attention to the speech of the noble Lord the Member for London; and of all the important considerations which the noble Lord, his noble Friend, had urged on the House, none appeared to him more important than that with which he had just concluded, because his noble Friend had indicated pretty clearly the course which, whether in Opposition or in Administration, he should feel it consistent with his duty to take. In no ambiguous terms had his noble Friend adverted to the condition of the Established Church in Ireland as influencing the prosperity of that country, or rather as causing the absence of prosperity; and his noble Friend had told them, that without reference to the articles of the Union, to the obligations which bind us to continue, and which bind our Queen to continue, the perpetual support of that Church, he would take into consideration some mode—he did not say of preserving existing interests, which was the popular phrase when spoliation was intended—but some mode by which that Church might be made more acceptable to the Roman Catholic people of Ireland. The noble Lord adverted to the language which was contained in the petitions that were addressed to this House against the Bill; and he spoke of the language of those petitions in a tone of censure, and in a manner altogether which he (Sir Robert Inglis) had not expected to hear from a great friend of civil and religious liberty. He defied his noble Friend to produce from all those petitions a single phrase which was not to be found in the liturgy, the articles, or the homilies of the Church; and which had not been adopted and maintained on oath by at least two hundred of the living Members 1017 of that House. During the course of this debate, which had now continued for six long nights, he had attentively listened to the speeches which had been delivered on the important question before them; and he was rejoiced to perceive that so little had been said which was calculated to give offence at either side of the House. Hon. Members at his side of the House, who were opposed to the policy of the Government on this subject, were not in the habit, and he defied any Member of the Roman Catholic Church in that House to state the contrary—they were not in the habit of addressing themselves to the hon. Members sitting opposite to them, and who differed from them in religious or political opinions, in language different from that which they would use in their own houses: and he could safely say that there was not a single instance in which hon. Members on his side of the House had used language which was inconsistent with a due respect for any of the hon. Gentlemen opposite. However he might feel that it would be inconsistent with his duty and his conscience to regard the religious opinions of some hon. Gentlemen opposite as any other than erroneous—to use the mildest phrase—he hoped that he had always used language towards them which was perfectly compatible with respect for themselves individually. When he considered this, he felt that it was rather hard that the petitioners to this House should not be permitted to use, unblamed, the language of the homilies and liturgy with respect to a question involving the truth or error of religious opinions. He could not agree in any blame which was directed against such language; but if he heard any language used in support of the opinions which he held that was inconsistent with those formularies, then, and not till then, could he acquiesce in such blame or censure. In the course of the debate several questions had been asked with respect to the threefold division of the subject which had first been introduced by his right hon. Friend at the head of Her Majesty's Government when he brought forward the question, namely the continuance of the grant, its discontinuance, or its increase. The hon. Member for Stockport, with a poetry which he (Sir R. Inglis) was not led to expect from him, had assumed an imaginary position for the individual who was now addressing the House, and had asked a question—which was cheered by his right hon. Friend at 1018 the head of the Government—whether if he (Sir Robert Inglis) were in that office, "would he dare to refuse the grant of the lesser sum?" The hon. Member asked if the opposition to this Bill succeeded now, would he (Sir R. Inglis) not be ready in the course of a few months to come down and advocate at least the renewing of the grant of 9,000l.? To that he could answer the hon. Member for Stockport, that not merely the two hon. Members for the University of Dublin, who had, in the present debate, specifically repudiated any grant to Maynooth; but, also every other individual at his side of the House, who, on former occasions, voted against the smaller grant to Maynooth, would be found to-night voting with him (Sir R. Inglis) in the minority, if minority it should be, against the Government; and, having voted on principle, would always vote in the same way. He utterly repudiated the notion that the question before the House was a question of pounds, shillings, and pence. It had been so put by a noble Friend of his who sat opposite, (Lord Leveson) and who asked, what would a distinguished foreigner think of the British Parliament disputing about such a sum; and a Secretary of State had said that this was a question of a few pounds more or less for the pacification of Ireland. It was not a question of mere pecuniary amount; and he believed that every one of those with whom he expected to have the honour of dividing to-night, rejected, as distinctly and emphatically as he did, the idea that it should be looked on as a money question. Whilst he repudiated the feeling of a pecuniary question, he felt it, however, to be his duty to add, that an increase in the sum of money might be capable of rendering an engine which had been useless atone time, dangerous and effective for evil at another; but he would repeat that his objection was not to the large amount or to the 9,000l., but to the principle of the Bill. He had been asked frequently in the course of the debate what he meant by his religious scruples as affecting this principle. Those who with him were opposed to this measure of the Government, had been asked, were they not grossly, scandalously, and more than ludicrously inconsistent? They had been asked, were they not in the habit of granting sums of money to those whose faith they did not recognise as true? and it was demanded of them how they could consistently refuse to vote for the present Motion, when they had in other respects 1019 supported a faith which they did not acquiesce in? It was said—"How can you presume to dictate to your fellow subjects, and to tell them that their religion is erroneous?" On this last point he must repeat what he had often asserted in this House, that to each man's conscience on every question must the appeal be made; and that, so far as his own vote is concerned, if that, conscience be enlightened, as every Christian man's ought to be enlightened, by prayer for the grace of God's Holy Spirit, he was not at liberty to compromise his own convictions, because his neighbour may have been led to a conclusion totally different. On the contrary, he, and every one who thought with him, were bound not merely to hold, but to promote and diffuse, whatever they believed to be true, and to discourage whatever they believed to be false; leaving, of course, an equal freedom to all who thought otherwise. So much for the general principle: but it is said, "You have already acted, and are daily acting, in contradiction to that principle." Those who opposed the present measure had been told that such opposition was inconsistent with the Colonial system of government which this country adopted; and he (Sir R. Inglis) had been appealed to by the hon. Member for Montrose in consequence of his father's connexion with India, and asked how he could defend the system adopted there, and in the Colonies, consistently with his opposition to this measure for promoting the religion of Ireland. He must take this opportunity of thanking the hon. Member, particularly, for the manner in which he had mentioned that relative so justly dear to him, his father: but he could assure the hon. Member who had so alluded to him, that he was entirely mistaken in relation to the British Empire in India; and he (Sir Robert Inglis) did not believe that the British Parliament was responsible for the good or evil which was connected with the matters the hon. Member called the attention of the House to when adverting to British India. With respect to the endowment of the Roman Catholic Church in Canada and Malta, it should be remembered that this was not the gratuitous act of the Government and Parliament, but it was done by virtue of the Treaties by which those possessions were ceded to us. Some hon. Members who supported the Bill had made allusion to an observation of his on a former night, and said that he had no right to consider in the measure before the House 1020 anything but the contents of the Bill, without reference to any presumed intended measures: that they should not regard the almost inevitable consequences of the measure on the endowment of the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland; but merely view it as a Bill for the legal establishment and perpetual endowment of the College of Maynooth. But this he conceived to be a very unwise and unstatesmanlike view of the question, and contrary to intimations which had been given of the views of many of the supporters of the Bill. First of all, he would call the attention of the House to an observation of his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Home Department. After admitting that the measure was one which could no longer be delayed—an expression not very likely to secure a favourable reception of it by those for whose benefit it was intended — the right hon. Gentleman said, "I do not say that this measure will insure pacification in Ireland, but it is the commencement of a happier state of things." His right hon. Friend the Member for Newark (Mr. Gladstone) said they could not stop there: they could no longer resist, on religious grounds at least, any further measures, after having acceded to this. His hon. Friend the Member for Pontefract (Mr. M. Milnes) had said, "that the Bill was good in itself; and good also, for what it promised." On the other side of the House, the hon. Member for the city of Cork said, he welcomed the grant as an earnest of greater things. That hon. Member, therefore, did not value it in a money point of view, but because it was the renewal of Peter pence—a new tribute paid to the Church of Rome. As such he would not say it was tendered, but as such it would be received. The hon. Member for the county of Cork said the sum ought to have been 70,000l. His right hon. Friend the Secretary for Ireland censured his right hon. Friend the Member for Newark for his observation respecting further proceedings, and said that he was not the exponent of the minds of the Government, as he had just left them: but he (Sir Robert Inglis) thought on this account he was the fairest man to tell what were the intentions of the Government. [Mr. Gladstone: "No, no."] Did he not understand his right hon. Friend to have said that if they acknowledged the principle of that measure, they could not resist, on religious grounds, any further measure in the same direction? Again, the right hon. Secretary at War had 1021 alluded to the question whether the measure now at issue were to be the precursor of a measure for the endowment of the Roman Catholic clergy; but he did not touch that question: he only noticed it, and flew from it as he would from a snake in the grass. The noble Lord too at the head of the Woods and Forests said, that this was the first step; then he premised that there must be a second step. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, however, studiously avoided saying anything on the point. Now, the inference which he drew from all these incidental admissions and omissions was, that, sooner or later—it might be in the year 1845, or in the year 1846, or they might take four years to consider the matter—but that, sooner or later, Her Majesty's Government would be prepared to introduce a Bill following, in the judgment of some of them, almost necessarily and logically, and following, in the apprehensions of the people of England most distinctly, the proposition of the Bill now proposed, namely, a Bill to endow the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland. It was not only by the speeches of the habitual supporters of Her Majesty's Government that that inference was sustained. One of the acutest men in that House, who was formerly Secretary at War—the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Coventry (Mr. Ellice), said, that Parliament had now fairly embarked in a new course. What was that new course, if it were not the endowment of the Roman Catholic Church? It was a complete change of policy, to substitute for the old annual grant, proposed and resisted in every Session, a permanent endowment of three times the amount, resting on the same security as the Civil List of the country. He felt sure that a noble Friend of his would regret a phrase which he honestly believed his noble Friend had hazarded without consideration. He referred to the noble Member for Liverpool (Lord Sandon). He believed the phrase was not intended deliberately; but it had been used as the foundation of considerable agitation in the sister kingdom. Mr. O'Connell had declared that it was no infringement of the voluntary principle (which he had always advocated) to receive by way of "restitution" the means of educating the Roman Catholic clergy, especially when tendered in so conciliatory and satisfactory a way as this measure had been. In a recently reported speech of that hon. and learned Gentleman he found the following passage:—
Circumstanced, however, as this country 1022 now is, with its ecclesiastical revenues, originally granted for Roman Catholic purposes, now vested in the Protestant Church Establishment, it is no infringement of the voluntary principle to receive, by way of restitution, the means of educating the Catholic clergy.But the House might be assured that "restitution," if it began in Ireland, would not end in Ireland. There were those in that House, and in the other House, in whose minds that phrase "restitution," as applied to abbey lands and church lands, would not awaken the most agreeable recollections, or present the most pleasing anticipations; and if it were just that the property of the Established Church in the parishes of Ireland should pass into the hands of the Church of Rome, he defied anybody to tell him why the same principle should not be applied in this country; and if they were to endow the Church of Rome in Ireland with the spoils of the Establishment, at least they ought to be prepared with some answer to those who twenty years hence would call on them to make provision for the Church of Rome in this country out of the some source. Nor was this view of the question lost sight of by persons who reasoned and reflected upon the necessary consequences of events. The opinion of an intelligent foreigner is often like that of posterity. The Journal des Debats, in a recent article, said:—The measure which the Prime Minister of England has introduced is nothing more nor less than a revolution of the policy pursued in England since the Reformation. It is the greatest concession made by Protestantism, without excepting the Emancipation Act of 1829.In that view the great body of the petitioners to that House concurred. The writer went on to say,—It is the first step in a new course—a regular and general maintenance of the Roman Catholic clergy by the State. The Protestants are not deceived by this grant. They even consider, and with certain reason, that it would have been more rational in the Government to pay stipends to the existing priests than to take the pains to create and educate more, and thus establish a Roman Propaganda.Without comparing the talents displayed in the newspapers of the two countries, it must not be forgotten that the writers of the leading journals in France were themselves leading men in their two Chambers; a fact which rendered their opinions more important and influential. 1023 He (Sir R. Inglis) concurred in the idea that it would eventually induce the endowment of the Roman Catholic Church. He wished respectfully to ask his right hon. Friend that he would be pleased to state whether this measure were to be an end or beginning — whether it were to be a grant for the education of 500 priests, or whether it were to be an endowment of the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland; and he hoped his right hon. Friend would answer him—not with reference to any Bill which might be now prepared by the Crown lawyers, for he did not think the matter was gone so far as that yet; but that he would state, in order that the country might not be taken by surprise, whether it were in his contemplation at any future time, or, in other words, whether it were consistent with his principles—he would put it in that way—to entertain such a proposition as this, that the Roman Catholic Church ought to be endowed by the State. His right hon. Friend the Secretary for the Home Department, in replying to some taunts levelled against him with respect to the Appropriation Clause, and denying that any such measure was in contemplation, made use of a remarkable expression; for he said, "The propriety—I will not use a stronger phrase — of taking the funds from the Established Church, I will not concede." Was that a phrase which was to be expected from the most determined opponent of the Appropriation Clause? He (Sir R. Inglis) would be ashamed to view this question with reference to mere party politics; and he believed there never was an occasion on which the public mind in England arose more rapidly, more spontaneously, more firmly, and more unextinguishably than it had done upon this question. So far as he was concerned in the matter, he might be allowed to state that, individually, he had been no party to raising the public cry which existed against this measure; but he would, at the same time, beg solemnly to remind the Government that they had alienated the affections of the people from them, and that such public confidence as they had thrown away was not easily to be recovered. The support of a political ally they might recover to-morrow as they had lost it yesterday; but it was not so with the support of the entire country. Having once lost the countenance of the public, they had lost the great element of political strength by which they had been placed in their present posi- 1024 tion, and they would find it difficult indeed to recover it. For himself, he had but to say that he had compromised nothing. He hoped he should be able to maintain the course which he had hitherto pursued; but if, without any compromise on his part, any hon. Members opposite who on other subjects might happen to disagree with him, should in the present instance go out with him, and those who had acted with him, in the lobby, he would certainly most gratefully accept their aid in support of a principle which they all held dearer than any other consideration. The hon. and gallant Member opposite (Sir Charles Napier) had appealed first to his fears, and then to his justice. That gallant Commodore never knew fear in his own profession, in which he had nobly maintained its glorious character, and the triumph of his country, and, he might be permitted to add, the honours of his own distinguished race: and he ought to understand the possibility of moral courage also in civil life. He denied, for his own part, that there was any injustice in a refusal to give gratuitous encouragement to a system which those who withheld their aid thought to be evil in principle. In lower questions, he (Sir Robert Inglis) would undoubtedly look to consequences. In questions of a tariff on corn, or sugar, for instance, he would calculate nicely, and look closely to consequences. But this was a great religious question: and for his part, he would never forget the privileges that were connected with the two words "Christian Protestant." He would not hold back, if he believed that he was acting according to the will of God. In the clear discharge of duty he would fearlessly trust the consequences to His wise and holy Providence. It did not depend on the wisdom or skill of man to maintain or augment the material greatness of this country; it belonged to Him to give the increase, and he believed that even in civil matters, they would most insure success, if, in religious matters, they desired humbly, but firmly, to seek His will and guidance.
§ Sir R. PeelSir, I am not about to review the course of this debate. It has been protracted to a period unusually long, but I think it has not been protracted unnaturally or unreasonably, considering the importance of the subject, and the excitement of the public feeling with respect to it. Sir, the course of that debate has exhibited many honourable examples of men, determined at any hazard to express their 1025 conscientious feelings upon this question. Many upon this side of the House, who approve generally of the policy and of the conduct of Her Majesty's Government, yet, conscientiously differing from them upon the proposal which they have made on the present occasion, have proved their determination to permit no political or party consideration to interfere with the honest expression of their opinion, whatever may be the consequence of their so doing. Sir, I assure those hon. Members that, however deeply I regret the difference that has arisen between us, I honour them for the course they have pursued. Again, on the other side of the House, we have the same honourable exhibitions; and I must say that my observations are intended to apply equally to hon. Members on both sides. There have been also examples equally honourable on the other side of the House as well as on this, of men prepared to encounter any risk—to brave any disapprobation on the part of their constituents—to relinquish, perhaps for ever, their political station—because they believed this measure to be politic and just, and they have resolved to act on their own sense of public duty, rather than on the feelings which they know to be entertained by their constituents. I say the debate has been honourable both to the opponents and to the supporters of this measure. Sir, I abstain from any minute reference to the line of argument that has been adduced in this debate. Whatever feelings may have been occasionally excited in my mind in the course of it, they are overpowered by, and are merged in, one feeling of deep and earnest hope that you will not become parties to the rejection of this measure. You may think, and perhaps not unjustly, that it would have been better if this measure should have proceeded from the constant and strenuous friends of the Roman Catholics. You may think it right that those who have proposed such a measure should forfeit your patronage. Act upon that principle—inflict that penalty—withdraw from us your confidence—punish the men; but do not disregard the consequences of rejecting this measure as it has been introduced. You tell us—my hon. and respected Friend who spoke last, the Representative of the University of Oxford has told us—that we have forfeited the confidence, not only of a great party in this House, but of a still more powerful party in the country. He says we have destroyed that element of power which 1026 constitutes the ability to carry on the public business. I have been told in the course of the night that if I were to appeal even to my own constituents, limited as is their number, and strong as is supposed to be the personal confidence which they repose in me, and that which I have in them, that I should forfeit my seat in Parliament. Well, be it so. Suppose that to be a correct representation of the real state of affairs—do you believe that we would have incurred the hazards, do you think that we should have run the risk, of forfeiting the confidence of the great party by whom we have been supported; that we would have run the risk of losing the confidence of the great body of the people out of doors; that we would have endangered our own existence as a Government, and our seats as Members of Parliament? Do you think that we, who have watched the course of affairs in Ireland; we who have had all the anxieties that accompany the administration of its affairs; do you believe that anything but a sense of public duty would have induced us to incur all these risks which you tell us we have incurred? Sir, I feel bound to answer the questions put to me as the author of this measure, and, as the organ of the Government, to explain—I am afraid I should say, after the length to which I troubled the House on a former evening — to recapitulate the motives of the Government in bringing forward this measure—the object intended by it—the ulterior objects which we contemplate—and the effects upon the state of Ireland, and its relations to this country, which we do think the adoption of this measure may produce. Sir, our motives for introducing this measure are these. In 1843, there was a formidable excitement in Ireland; there were immense meetings held there, menacing the public tranquillity. We did determine to resist the object which these meetings and which that demonstration of physical force had in view, and we were urged by some to demand extraordinary powers, and were taunted by others with inaction. We then thought it unwise hastily and precipitately to interfere. We thought it our duty to have ranged on our side, as we asked for no extraordinary powers—to have ranged on our side, when we did interfere, the force of public opinion. We resisted all the encouragements to precipitate, undue, and hasty action. But when we at length thought the case was clearly established; when we thought that the 1027 public peace was endangered; when we thought that the object of these demonstrations was clear and developed, we then did, relying on the justice of our cause, resort to the law of the land, and the result of that resort was the condemnation, in a Court of Law, of the parties concerned in these demonstrations. A temporary calm ensued. There was a universal feeling at that time that you ought not merely to rely on applications of force, but that then was the time—the law and its authority having been vindicated—it being impossible that our conduct could then be imputed to intimidation—there was a feeling, I say, then prevalent, that it was the duty of the Government to take into consideration the condition of Ireland. We were invited to do that by those opposed to us. The noble Lord opposite (Lord John Russell), who, I must say, has in this mutter acted on the principle on which I expected he would act, having invited us to take that course, and having informed us that there were measures which, consistently with our avowed principles, we might adopt, which he thought would have a beneficial effect — led us, as the organ of a great party, to infer that if we did adopt them, party considerations should oppose no impediment to an honourable and generous support. We, therefore, determined to take into consideration the social condition of Ireland, in so far as related immediately to the relations of landlord and tenant. We did not yet feel ourselves in a condition to legislate. Local circumstances of the country prevented us. We prevailed on five honourable men—truly representing the state of parties in Ireland—to undertake the local and personal inquiry, which might remove much misconception, and lay the foundation of legislative measures for the improvement of the social condition of Ireland. Towards the close of the last Session of Parliament we proposed a measure calculated, as we thought, to remedy a great grievance. We thought the law relating to charitable bequests in that country, a law justly liable to complaint on the part of the Roman Catholics. It placed the charge of such bequests under the superintendence of a body exclusively Protestant. We determined to alter the constitution of that body which had the charge of charitable bequests; we went further, we expressly enabled the proprietors in Ireland to provide a permanent endowment, by voluntary contribution, for the building of Roman Catholic cha- 1028 pels, and the support of Roman Catholic ministers and churches. That Bill passed with the almost universal concurrence of this House. On the second reading there was, I think, a division, and a majority of about 72 to 5; and the five Members who voted against it were Members of the Roman Catholic persuasion in Ireland; or if there were one or two professing the Protestant faith, they were Members acting immediately in unison with the Roman Catholics in Ireland. The objection to the Bill did not come, therefore, from the English Members of the House, or from those who were, and still are, interested in the maintenance of the Protestant cause. At that time, whether it was that you had a more lively recollection of the state of Ireland in 1843 I know not; but you did almost unanimously approve of the measure brought in by the Government, which expressly permitted, sanctioned, and encouraged the endowment of Roman Catholic bishops and ministers by the advance of money for the building of Roman Catholic chapels. Well, if you then did that, is the religious objection now to be deemed insuperable? You appointed five Roman Catholic Commissioners; ten were appointed in all, and five of them were necessarily to be Roman Catholics, with a Roman Catholic Secretary. The expense of that Commission was defrayed out of the public funds; and we did that in order that we might invite and encourage the voluntary endowment of Roman Catholic churches. We were pressed to bind the discretion of the Crown in respect to the appointment of some of these Commissioners. We undertook, on the part of the Government, to carry out the Bill in the spirit in which it had been adopted. We proposed as these Commissioners prelates of the Roman Catholic Church. They felt it their duty to accept the appointment. They acted from public and disinterested motives. They believed that you were honest in your intentions, in doing an act of justice in a kind manner; and the first result of that act was to break up, in some degree, that formidable combination of laity, clergy, and physical strength, which had heretofore existed. Sir, these prelates had great difficulties to encounter, in undertaking to co-operate with us in the execution of that measure. There was a formidable agitation directed against them but, confiding in the purity of their motives, and in the belief of the honourable intentions of the Government, they resisted 1029 the force of that agitation, and we had the satisfaction of seeing prelates of the Established Church, and prelates of the Roman Catholic religion, acting in friendly concert for the promotion of a common object. Let me say, that was no small object to attain, by the execution of the first Act; that Act having received the almost unanimous approbation of both Houses of Parliament. There was no violation of public principle—no sacrifice of the interests of the Protestant religion, to which, I trust, I as firmly adhere, the doctrines of which I hold in as high estimation, as any of my hon. Friends around me; but the result of that measure of justice, offered in the spirit of kindness, was that which I have described. Was not this reason sufficient to induce us to proceed as we have begun? I do not say that it should be looked upon as an encouragement to make any concession inconsistent with religious principle, or inconsistent with any constitutional principle. I say no more than that it was a marked encouragement to proceed in the course of conciliation consistent with the principles of the Constitution. We had then to consider what course we should take with respect to Maynooth. It was forced upon us. Neither you nor we can escape the consideration—what will you do with the College of Maynooth? You have supported it for fifty years. My hon. Friend says (and he escapes from a great difficulty in the argument by the avowal) that he is prepared to withdraw the grant. Sir, I am not. When opposed to Her Majesty's Government, I came down here expressly to support them in the maintenance of that College; and I do not, indeed, believe that there can be ten men found in this House who would have thought it justice, after passing the Act of last Session, having acted in cordial concert with Roman Catholic prelates who consented to be Commissioners in the execution of that Act—I say I do not believe there are ten men in this House who would believe it possible for us to come down this year and state "a conscientious scruple prevents us from continuing the grant to Maynooth." Why, what would have been the feeling of the whole of the Roman Catholic community? We continued the grant, as I said before, for fifty years. But it is not merely the vote which you have passed—you have also passed three Acts of Parliament for cementing your connexion with that institution. You have appointed trustees—you have subjected their by-laws to the revi- 1030 sion of the Lord Lieutenant and his approval—you have made the nomination of the President dependent on his approbation. That is the relation in which you stand to Maynooth. You have for fifty years, therefore, been professing to act, as far as you could consistently with our own principles and feelings, in a spirit of kindness to the Roman Catholic community. Can you conceive it possible that I, for example, who in 1840 thought it impossible to withhold the grant, should have this year advised the House of Commons to separate itself from all connexion with it? Surely, there can be but few who would take that course. Well, then, should we continue it? Some hon. Gentlemen have doubted the accuracy of the statements which have been made with regard to the state of the College of Maynooth. One hon. Gentleman has read some account which he had received of the comfortable condition of the students, the appearance of the building, and the general state of the College. Sir, the account which I gave of Maynooth will, I believe, be confirmed by all who know it; that it is an institution, professing to be supported by the Government and by Parliament, which is in a condition utterly unworthy of the patronage of the State. I hold in my hand what I believe to be a much more correct account than that to which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Perth has referred. It was quoted by a noble Lord who, perhaps, is better acquainted with the state of Ireland than any other noble Lord in the House of Peers—I mean Lord Monteagle—it was quoted, I say, by that noble Lord from a book written in the year 1842. The writer says,—
An accurate description of Maynooth would be of necessity so disagreeable, that it is best to pass it over in a few words. There is such a look of lazy squalor about it, that no Englishman who has not seen it can suspect. Lecture-rooms and dining-hall, kitchen and students' rooms, are all the same. Why should the place be so shamefully ruinous?Such was the place in which the Roman Catholics were educated, you assigning to them only 9,000l. a year. Some of the objections which I have heard to Maynooth only confirm my opinion of the policy of increasing this grant. The hon. Member for Dublin says that the Maynooth priests have taken a part in the agitation. Why, can you be surprised at it? Why, by the amount which you have granted, so far from having afforded them the means of 1031 liberal and enlightened education, you have compelled them to make their education exclusively theological, and you have compelled them to make that theology exclusively polemical. That has been the consequence of the votes which you have given. You have your three professors of theology; you have these professors living upon some 120l. a year, endowed by you, and teaching the doctrines of the Roman Catholic religion. Is it any practical compensation for your sacrifice of principle, that you have endowed them in so niggardly and so parsimonious a manner? I will refer you to a statement that was made before the Committee in 1826, although I believe things have somewhat improved since, by one of the professors — the professor of the Greek and Latin languages—a gentleman of the greatest distinction, who had taken almost every prize as a Dunboyne student. He was afterwards, as I have said, professor of Greek and Latin, and he was asked,—Do you receive anything from the annual vote?"—"I do." "What is your stipend?"—"It is 80l. a year Irish, from which thirty guineas are deducted on account of groceries and other necessaries.Do you then mean to continue that state of things, and do we violate any principle in improving it? I will not, I cannot, be a party to this. I will not send out fifty theologians to be parish priests in Ireland educated in this wretched way, and amongst such scenes as I have described. What we propose is to increase the comforts, to elevate the condition of the professors, and to enable them to remain longer at the College. They are men now of great acquirements—they are men, I believe, of highly respectable talents — they devote themselves to this toil at their miserable salaries, from the pure zeal which they entertain for the interests of religion and the cause of education. I beg to ask, do we do any thing inconsistent with the Protestant religion, or injurious to the Protestant faith, if we raise their character, or at least their position in society, and give them the means of supporting themselves with decency and in comfort? Now, mark what the bearing of this will be on your Endowment Act. You have encouraged voluntary endowments on the part of the great landed proprietors in Ireland, and I do hope that the landed proprietors of Ireland will avail themselves of the facilities which have been afforded them under that Act. I cannot conceive 1032 a better mode of endowment, one more pregnant with advantage to the public interest, or more calculated to assuage the evils to which difference of religious faith gives rise, than by establishing a connexion between the Protestant proprietors of Ireland and the Roman Catholic clergy. But if you make the Roman Catholic priest merely a skilful polemic devoted to his religion—this advantage is not so likely to accrue, as if you give him the means of acquiring scientific and scholastic knowledge. If you make him a good chemist, in short, a proficient in modern science, then, probably, the landed proprietor will feel an inducement to avail himself of his power, and by voluntary contribution to make an endowment for him. The increase of this vote to Maynooth, therefore, has a material bearing upon, and greatly facilitates the operation of, the Charitable Bequests Act. We are told that this institution of Maynooth is of a monastic and ascetic character. Whose fault is that? Not that of the Roman Catholics. In 1795, at the institution of the College, Mr. Grattan presented a petition from the Roman Catholic body against that clause in the Act which prohibited the education of Protestants at Maynooth. The trustees of Maynooth were desirous of establishing a lay college. They did not wish it to be of an exclusive character. They, however, were interfered with and prevented; and Mr. Abbott informed the secretary that the creation of a lay college would be contrary to the intentions of the Act; and, in consequence of the intervention of the British Government, it was prevented. Therefore, the Roman Catholics themselves are not responsible for the peculiar character of the education. At the same time, my belief is that any attempt now to make it a condition that the education to be given them should be that of a mixed or secular character, would be totally fruitless. It would alter the character of your liberality, and prevent its acceptance. It was Mr. Burke who inculcated on the British Government the necessity of providing spiritual education for those who had to discharge the functions of Roman Catholic priests. Well, Sir, we determined then that it was desirable to increase this grant; and, in determining to increase it, to make the offer in a manner which should be thoroughly acceptable to the Roman Catholic people. We considered well the question; we did not act lightly in this matter. We considered the question—shall we before we 1033 propose this increase institute an inquiry into the course of instruction at Maynooth? We referred to the inquiry which was made in the year 1826, and I own that we came to the conclusion that no benefit would result from a new Commission of Inquiry sent to examine Maynooth. Was that inquiry to be conducted in a friendly or a hostile spirit? No Commission which you could appoint would be satisfactory, unless it contained the names of men hostile to the course of education there. We foresaw, therefore, that the consequences of the appointment of such a Commission would only be to generate a hostile theological controversy; and after mature consideration, we came to the conclusion that it was better to adopt Maynooth as we found it. We did not expect any new light to be thrown on the state of Maynooth beyond that which the Commission of 1826 affords; and we determined to trust for the beneficial effect of our interference to the liberality and confidence of Parliament. We propose that the Vote should be a permanent one, instead of an annual one. We do not think that by making the Vote for Maynooth permanent, you interfere with any existing principle, and we do think that to remove it from annual controversy in the House of Commons, will conduce to peace, and relieve us from painful debates. We have incorporated the trustees, because we have thought that in so acting we do that which is conformable to the spirit of the original Act which was passed on this subject. When you appointed trustees, you so appointed them to enable them to acquire land; but, in refusing to incorporate them, you disable them from possessing land without being put to great and constant expense in the law courts. In incorporating them, you relieve them from litigation; but the principle was admitted when the trustees were appointed, that they might be prepared to acquire land; and we propose to incorporate them, and give them the power of holding land, without the necessity of constant litigation. That is the whole of our proposal. I see in that proposal, though the vote be not annual, but that the measure is to be permanent—I see, I say, no violation of principle which does not apply to a continuance of this Vote for another fifty years in the way in which it has been formerly granted. In each case, the money will be distinctly applied, under the authority of Parliament, in the inculcation of the tenets of the Roman Catholic belief. It 1034 is said, that the Roman Catholic people of Ireland are indifferent to this proposition. We are asked what impression do we anticipate to make on the professors of Maynooth by it? We are told that they will reject it as an unnecessary boon; and that they will laugh at us for our liberality. In this respect you do injustice to their feelings. The generosity with which you have acted has excited gratitude in them. When they heard of the proposition, they wrote immediately a letter, of which I will read a part to the House. I think there are seventeen professors at Maynooth; and the letter addressed to me is signed by sixteen out of the seventeen, the other one being incapacitated by illness. In that letter they thus express themselves:—The undersigned beg leave most respectfully to express our deep sense of gratitude for the very liberal provision which you, as the head of the Government, have proposed for the education of the Roman Catholic clergy, and still more for the kind and gracious manner in which you have recommended the measure to the friendly consideration of the House.If you ask me whether I prefer that the education of the Catholic clergy should be entrusted to men influenced by such grateful feelings, rather than to men whom you have starved by the paltry and shameful pittance you have hitherto given them, I do not hesitate to say, if I am to entrust the education of men who have to inculcate peace and good order—if I have to provide for what I believe to be the general interests—nay, what I believe to be the interests of the Protestant religion—then I would rather commit the instruction of the young men who are to be the spiritual guides of the people in another faith, who are to be their instructors through life, to persons grateful for your liberality, than to men who view with indignation the paltry pittance you assign to them, under a pretence of making a provision for their education. I do not pretend to say that they will be satisfied with institutions as they exist at present. I do not pretend to say that this will produce permanent satisfaction — I do not say that it will induce these men to compromise a single principle. I cannot go so far as that. I do not guarantee the Vote for Maynooth as a final and complete measure. I cannot say that; but I can give you a proof that they are not indifferent to your liberality; and that, under the generous impulse of their feelings, they declare that this is 1035 an honourable and liberal proceeding. This is all I profess—these are the motives on which we acted when we made this proposal. My hon. Friend asks me two questions. He asks me this. He calls upon me to state whether or not this is part of a preconcerted system, the whole of which we have not developed; and whether the proposal with respect to Maynooth is not brought forward designedly for the purpose of facilitating the endowment of the Roman Catholic clergy. I answer my hon. Friend that this proposal is brought forward singly and exclusively on its own abstract merits. It is a proposal by itself, and not a part of a preconcerted system; it is not brought forward with the design of facilitating the endowment of the Roman Catholic clergy. We have had no communication on this subject with any authority in Ireland or elsewhere. We have not had that subject in our contemplation. You may suppose—as I have seen rumours of it elsewhere—that though we have had no communication with the Roman Catholic authorities in Ireland, yet that we have had some secret negotiations with Rome. I state explicitly that the report is altogether without foundation. I have a strong impression that we should do no good in Ireland by any secret, unavowed negotiations at Rome, to which the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland is not a party. By such a negotiation, fettering the independence of the Church — I mean the Roman Catholic Church—or establishing any connexion between the State and that Church, as it exists in Ireland, of which members of the Church were not cognizant, and to which they were not parties, I do not think any such arrangement could be satisfactory to them, or beneficial to the country. I have said that this measure forms no part of a general system; that it is not brought forward designedly for the purpose of forming the foundation of a future proposal for an endowment. I say, also, as to endowment, that I think there are very great objections to it. I do not believe that it would be acceptable to the Roman Catholic laity; nor have the Roman Catholic clergy exhibited any inclination in its favour. Perhaps the declaration recently made by the hon. Member for Kildare with respect to endowment may be in your recollection. He distinctly declared that the clergy and laity were opposed to the endowment of the Roman Catholic Church, and it is impossible not to see, from the many demonstrations of 1036 feeling in this country, that here also there would be great difficulties with respect to such a measure. I have stated precisely the truth with respect to endowments. But my hon. Friend proceeds to ask, "Will you make a declaration that it would not be consistent with your principles that at any future time there should be an endowment of Roman Catholic ministers?" I must say I think my hon. Friend has no right to require such a declaration. I have stated to you most explicitly the truth, but I will make no such declaration. This I will not do; and I beg you to draw no unfair inference from it—I will not hamper or embarrass any future Government by a declaration upon that which is now a difficulty that I know to be altogether insuperable. I see great difficulties in the way of such a measure; but I do not think any one has a right to call upon me now to give a public opinion that those difficulties, can never, at any future time, be overcome. I think it would not be right in me, for the purpose of purchasing a relaxation in the opposition to the measures which I now propose, to place on record a declaration which may fetter the action of those who may hereafter be responsible for the government of the country. My hon. Friend asks me whether I do not consider there is some principle of religious objection opposed to endowment. In refusing to state the objection as one at all times insuperable, I cannot say there is a decided religious objection to it. I think that this measure has no bearing on the religious question, and, so far as religion is concerned, does not affect the question of endowment. I believe that the Endowment Act of last Session, by which you constituted a Board for facilitating the endowment of Roman Catholic bishops and ministers, and for building Roman Catholic chapels, had a much more material bearing upon the religious principle than the present Bill for a permanent grant to Maynooth. I am bound to say, with all respect for my hon. Friend, that I cannot concur in his doctrine, that it is an offence in the eyes of God to support the tenets of the Roman Catholic Church, and that that same religious principle which compels me to dissent from, excludes me also from contributing to the support, under all circumstances, and in all times, of any body of men who adopt the tenets of the Church of Home. I do not see how my hon. Friend can get over the difficulty with regard to our Colonies. He says, of Malta that 1037 having taken that Colony, and having a capitulation, you are bound by the terms of that capitulation to support the Roman Catholic religion there. But why did you take Malta? Because it was a convenient position in the Mediterranean; and being so convenient for your purposes, you are now ready to go to war rather than abandon it. But if, as my hon. Friend says, there is some high religious principle which prohibits you from connecting yourselves in any way with the Roman Catholic religion, why did you go to war and incur great loss of life in conquering Canada? and why did you accept Malta with this condition? You do not overcome the difficulty by saying that this is a colony, and we are bound by the terms of the capitulation. If the religious principle be good for anything, it should have prevented you from accepting the Colony, and entering into that capitulation. Then as to the other point, I think, too, the doctrine of my hon. Friend is dangerous with reference to the interests of the Established Church. The principle of that doctrine is, that it is a violation of conscience to contribute to the support of a religion from the faith of which we dissent. I can understand saying to the Dissenters, "The Established Religion is a great national institution—all Christians are interested in its maintenance; we ask you to contribute to its support—in doing so you violate no conscientious scruple, and it will aid the cause of religion generally by keeping up such an Establishment as the Church of England." But, if I say to the Dissenter, "There is no tax I can impose upon you for the maintenance of the Established Church, which does not violate your conscientious scruples," then I make him who might have been willing to contribute to its support, if he thought that in doing so there was no violation of religious principle, object to a pecuniary impost for such a purpose, because by my own confession I accompany the levy of the tax with an avowed expressed injury to his religious feelings. My hon. Friend says,—"The Established Church is supported by tithes; tithes are a charge upon property; the Dissenter, therefore, who acquires or inherits property takes it with its incumbrances; and contributions to the church being one of those incumbrances, it is no violation of conscience on his part to discharge a legal obligation." The hon. Gentleman says the same of church-rates; but what does my hon. Friend say of 1038 church extension? Tithes may be a legal incumbrance upon property; church rates may partake of the same character; but, supposing this House, for the interests of religion, were to think it advisable this year and next year to do what they have done in former years—make a grant for the construction of religious edifices in connexion with the Church of England, would it not be better that we should be enabled to say to the Dissenter, "We call upon you to contribute to this object, meaning to impose no violation upon your conscience," than that we should say, "We make you contribute to the support of a Church from whose doctrines you dissent, and we tell you it is a violation of your religious scruples if you consent." It is no answer to say to them, "I am a Member of the Established Church, and you are Dissenters." We must admit that, in respect of conscientious scruples, there is no difference between us. If it violates my conscience to contribute towards the support of the Protestant Dissenters in Ulster, it equally violates the conscience of those Protestant Dissenters to contribute to the support of the Established Church. I will take it on another ground. I would say to the Dissenters that there are great public interests involved in the maintenance of the Established Church; I say the maintenance of that Church is important to all religious sects; I call upon them to contribute to this, as I call upon the Quaker to contribute to the support of the army, and I intend to impose no obligation onerous to any man's conscience. But I do shrink from telling the Dissenter, "I not only subject you to the tax, but I tell you that by paying it you violate your conscience." On that ground, I cannot agree to the doctrine that this measure is prejudicial to the best interests of the Established Church. So far as to the objects of the Government. With regard to the Established Church in Ireland, the opinions I have declared I still adhere to; but I do think, looking at the condition of Ireland, looking at the importance of the question, and taking into account the position of the people, and all its past evils, I do believe this measure, proposed by us for the permanent endowment of Maynooth, is a measure just to the Roman Catholics, while it violates no principle of ours. We hope for the acquiescence of the House in this Vote as proposed by the Government; the willing adoption of 1039 which, we feel confident, will produce a kindly feeling in Ireland. It has produced that effect; it has been received with a grateful feeling, and with a spirit corresponding to that in which it was proposed. I hardly expected it would have produced such an effect as has already attended it. I do not believe the gratitude which is expressed by the Irish people for this measure is connected with any feeling or wish for future encroachments on the interests of the Established Church. I believe that it is the natural effect of a kind and generous policy, producing grateful and kind feelings. I might have been tempted, at an earlier period in the debate, to refer to the speech of the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Macaulay); but the taunts and imputations in which he indulged against the Government I will forbear from noticing. I will rather follow the example of the noble Lord, and abstain altogether from any thing like recrimination. I think, however, if I were so inclined, I could prove, from the admissions of the right hon. Gentleman himself, in that part of his speech which was addressed to his constituents, as to there being no violation of principle in this measure, as to its being a mere question between 9,000l. and 27,000l. a year, and as to his not conceiving it possible that any mind could be so obtuse as not to see that there could be no difference in principle, between 9,000l. and 27,000l. a year, that he is the last man who should throw an imputation on the Government for departing from past principles. With me every feeling as to the imputation of inconsistency, every feeling with regard to the suspicions thrown upon the sincerity of the Government, every other feeling is subordinate to one—my desire that you should not reject this measure. I do not regret the course I have taken. I know not what the consequences may be in respect to the more kindly relations between Ireland and this country. It has produced in the minds of a generous people a kindly and a grateful feeling. As I said before, punish us; visit us with censure; let the two parties combine against us on the ground that the policy we are adopting ought to be carried out by its original promoters; take what other course you please; but let not your indignation fall on the measure—let it be confined to those who proposed it. I don't rest the measure on any question of mere compact. I say an honourable engagement does exist, which makes it im- 1040 possible for you to withdraw the support from Maynooth without wounding the feelings of the Roman Catholics of Ireland. It is not the amount of the grant; but, after granting it for fifty years, it could not be withdrawn without exciting suspicion as to your motives. But I say again, I do not defend the measure on the ground of compact; I defend it because I believe it to be a wise and a just measure, and far better than the continuance of the present system. I say that without the least hesitation; and I call on you to recollect that you are responsible for the peace of Ireland. I say, you must break up, in some way or other, that formidable confederacy which exists in that country against the British Government and the British connexion. I do not believe you can break it up by force. You can do much, consistently with the principles you avow, as to the maintenance of the Union and the Protestant Church. You can do much to break it up by acting in a spirit of kindness, forbearance, and generosity. And I believe it is essential you should break it up, in order that you may carry on the work of good government in Ireland, and in that you may strengthen the connection between the two countries and maintain, unimpaired, the power and dignity of the United Kingdom. When I proposed this measure on Thursday week, I did so, having given notice of it during the last Session of Parliament, and without reference to events that have since taken place. But on the day after I gave notice of this measure, and introduced it to the consideration of the House, our attention was called to a matter of great importance, and the noble Lord (the Member for the city of London) did feel it to be his duty partially to raise the veil which conceals the distant future. On the far horizon of the West there rises a cloud—a cloud small indeed, but threatening future storms. It became my duty on the part of Government on that occasion, temperately, but distinctly to state, that while we are most anxious for an adjustment of the impending differences—while we will leave nothing undone to effect an amicable settlement—yet I did feel it to be part of my duty—of the duty of the First Minister of the Crown—to state that, if our rights be invaded, we were determined and prepared to maintain them. I own, Sir, that when I was called upon to make that declaration, I did recollect with satisfaction and consolation that the day before I had sent a message 1041 of peace to Ireland. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Canterbury who spoke last night, thought it not impossible that the time would come when this country would be compelled to summons all her energies for action. Sir, I heard that speech of the right hon. Gentleman with great satisfaction, from the ability and eloquence which it displayed. I heard also the speech, differing as I do from many of its positions of the noble Lord (Lord John Manners) who also on the same evening addressed the House, with great satisfaction—I differing from him with respect to his views upon the Revolution, and also with respect to that illustrious person whom he called a Dutch Stadtholder. It was still impossible for me to listen to his speech, as well as to that of the hon. Gentleman, without very great satisfaction at the bright views they indicate of great future eminence. I remember having foretold to the hon. Gentleman—I know not whether he recollects it—when, through the embarrassments of youth, others thought that he had failed—I remember I tried to console him; and I told him my conviction was, that he was destined for future eminence. Sir, in his speech last night, that hon. Gentleman said that he thought it probable that, in case it should be necessary to summon the energies of this country in defence of her honour and her interests, that to my hand would the high task be confided. Now may God avert so great an evil as war! May God forbid that this time of general peace should be so awfully disturbed! But if it is to be so, if war is to come, I doubt much, considering what is now before me, whether the vindication of our honour and our interests will not be confided to other hands. But to whomsoever they be committed, I shall take my place beside them, encouraging them by every support which I can give in a just and honourable cause. And if that calamity should befall us, it is my earnest hope that when it shall occur, it may find the people of this Empire united in loyalty to the Throne, and in determination to support the common interests. It is my earnest prayer, that every pulse throughout this mighty frame shall beat in harmonious action—that Ireland shall stand ranked with us; and then, Sir, confiding in a good cause—confiding in the valour and perseverance, and fortitude of every part of this great Empire—I shall await the result with perfect composure, being assured that the energies of an 1042 united people will ensure a glorious triumph to a just cause.
§ The House divided on the Question that the word now stand part of the Question:—Ayes 323; Noes 176: Majority 147.
| List of the AYES. | |
| Acland, Sir T. D. | Childers, J. W. |
| Acland, T. D. | Cholmondeley, hon. H. |
| A'Court, Capt. | Clay, Sir W. |
| Adare, Visct. | Clayton, R. R. |
| Adderley, C. B. | Clerk, rt. hon. Sir G. |
| Aglionby, H. A. | Clifton, J. T. |
| Ainsworth, P. | Clive, Visct. |
| Aldam, W. | Clive, hon. R. H. |
| Anson, hon. Col. | Cobden, R. |
| Archbold, R. | Cockburn, rt. hn Sir. G. |
| Armstrong, Sir A. | Colborne, hn. W. N. R. |
| Arundel and Surrey, Earl of | Colebrooke, Sir T. E. |
| Collett, J. | |
| Bagot, hon. W. | Collins, W. |
| Baillie, Col. | Coote, Sir C. H. |
| Baird, W. | Corry, rt. hon. H. |
| Barclay, D. | Courtenay, Lord |
| Baring, rt. hon. F. T. | Cowper, hon. W. F. |
| Baring, T. | Craig, W. G. |
| Baring, rt. hon. W. B. | Cripps, W. |
| Barnard, E. G. | Currie, R. |
| Barneby, J. | Dalmeny, Lord |
| Barrington, Visct. | Dalrymple, Capt. |
| Bell, M. | Damer, hon. Col. |
| Bell, J. | Dawson, hon. T. V. |
| Bellew, R. M. | Denison, W. J. |
| Bentinck, Lord G. | Denison, J. E. |
| Berkeley, hon. C. | Dennistoun, J. |
| Blackburne, J. I. | D'Eyncourt, rt. hn. C. T. |
| Blake, M. J. | Dickinson, F. H. |
| Bodkin, W. H. | Divett, E. |
| Boldero, H. G. | Dodd, G. |
| Botfield, B. | Douglas, Sir C. E. |
| Bowes, J. | Douro, Marquess of |
| Bowles, Adm. | Dowdeswell, W. |
| Bowring, Dr. | Drummond, H. H. |
| Bramston, T. W. | Duncan, Visct. |
| Broadwood, H. | Duncannon, Visct. |
| Brotherton, J. | Duncombe, hon. A. |
| Browne, hon. W. | Dundas, D. |
| Brownrigg, J. S. | East, J. B. |
| Bruce, Lord E. | Easthope, Sir J. |
| Bulkeley, Sir R. B. W. | Eastnor, Visct. |
| Buller, C. | Ebrington, Visct. |
| Buller, E. | Egerton, Lord F. |
| Butler, P. S. | Ellice, rt. hon. E. |
| Byng, G. | Elphinstone, H. |
| Byng, rt. hn. G. S. | Emlyn, Visct. |
| Campbell, Sir H. | Escott, B. |
| Cardwell, E. | Esmonde, Sir T. |
| Carew, hn. R. S. | Estcourt, T. G. B. |
| Carew, W. H. P. | Ferguson, Col. |
| Carnegie, hon. Capt. | Ferguson, Sir R. A. |
| Castlereagh, Visct. | Fitzmaurice, hon. W. |
| Cavendish, hon. C. C. | Fitzroy, hon. H. |
| Cavendish, hn. G. H. | Fitzwilliam, hon. G. W. |
| Chapman, B. | Fleetwood, Sir P. H. |
| Charteris, hon. F. | Flower, Sir J. |
| Chelsea, Visct. | Follett, Sir W. W. |
| Forster, M. | Liddell, hon. H. T. |
| Fox, C. R. | Lincoln, Earl of |
| Fremantle, rt. hn. Sir T. | Lindsay, H. H. |
| French, F. | Listowel, Earl of |
| Gaskell, J. Milnes | Loch, J. |
| Gibson, T. M. | Lyall, G. |
| Gladstone, rt. hn. W. E. | Macaulay, rt. hn. T. B. |
| Gladstone, Capt. | Mackenzie, W. F. |
| Godson, R. | Mackinnon, W. A. |
| Gordon, hon. Capt. | Macnamara, Major |
| Gore, M. | McGeachy, F. A. |
| Gore, hon. R. | McNeill, D. |
| Goulburn, rt. hon. H. | Mahon, Visct. |
| Graham, rt. hn. Sir J. | Mangles, R. D. |
| Granby, Marquess of | Manners, Lord C. S. |
| Granger, T. C. | Manners, Lord J. |
| Greene, T. | March, Earl of |
| Grey, rt. hon. Sir G. | Marshall, W. |
| Guest, Sir J. | Martin, J. |
| Hale, R. B. | Martin, C. W. |
| Halford, Sir H. | Martin, T. B. |
| Hamilton, W. J. | Matheson, J. |
| Hamilton, Lord C. | Mildmay, H. St. J. |
| Harcourt, G. G. | Milnes, R. M. |
| Hatton, Capt. V. | Mitcalfe, H. |
| Hawes, B. | Mitchell, T. A. |
| Hayter, W. G. | Murphy, F. S. |
| Heathcote, Sir W. | Murray, A. |
| Heneage, G. H. W. | Napier, Sir. C. |
| Heneage, E. | Neville, R. |
| Herbert, rt. hon. S. | Nicholl, rt. hon. J. |
| Heron, Sir R. | Norreys, Lord |
| Hervey, Lord A. | O'Conor Don |
| Hinde, J. H. | O'Ferrall, R. M. |
| Hobhouse, rt. hn. Sir J. | Ord, W. |
| Hogg, J. W. | Ossulston, Lord |
| Hollond, R. | Oswald, A. |
| Holmes, hn. W. A'C. | Oswald, J. |
| Hope, hon. C. | Owen, Sir J. |
| Hope, G. W. | Paget, Col. |
| Horsman, E. | Paget, Lord W. |
| Howard, hn. C. W. G. | Paget, Lord A. |
| Howard, hon. J. K. | Pakington, J. S. |
| Howard, hn. E. G. G. | Palmerston, Visct. |
| Howard, P. H. | Parker, J. |
| Howard, hon. H. | Patten, J. W. |
| Howard, Sir R. | Peel, rt. hon. Sir R. |
| Howick, Visct. | Peel, J. |
| Hume, J. | Pendarves, E. W. W. |
| Hutt, W. | Pennant, hon. Col. |
| Ingestre, Visct. | Philips, G. R. |
| Irving, J. | Phillpotts, J. |
| James, Sir W. C. | Pigot, rt. hon. D. |
| Jermyn, Earl | Pigot, Sir R. |
| Jocelyn, Visct. | Ponsonby, hon. C. F. A. |
| Johnstone, Sir J. | Praed, W. T. |
| Kelly, F. R. | Pusey, P. |
| Knight, H. G. | Rawdon, Col. |
| Labouchere, rt. hn. H. | Redington, T. N. |
| Lambton, H. | Reid, Sir J. R. |
| Langston, J. H. | Repton, G. W. J. |
| Lascelles, hon. W. S. | Rice, E. R. |
| Leader, J. T. | Roebuck, J. A. |
| Legh, G. C. | Ross, D. R. |
| Lemon, Sir C. | Round, J. |
| Lennox, Lord A. | Rous, hon. Capt. |
| Leveson, Lord | Rumbold, C. E. |
| Russell, Lord J. | Traill, G. |
| Russell, Lord E. | Trelawny, J. S. |
| Russell, C. | Trench, Sir F. W. |
| Russell, J. D. W. | Trevor, hon. G. R. |
| Rutherfurd, A. | Tuite, H. M. |
| Sandon, Visct. | Vane, Lord H. |
| Scott, R. | Vernon, G. H. |
| Scrope, G. P. | Villiers, hon. C. |
| Seymour, Sir H. B. | Villiers, Visct. |
| Sheil, rt. hon. R. L. | Vivian, J. H. |
| Shelburne, Earl of | Walker, R. |
| Sheppard, T. | Wall, C. B. |
| Sheridan, R. B. | Walsh, Sir J. B. |
| Smith, B. | Warburton, H. |
| Smith, J. A. | Ward, H. G. |
| Smith, rt. hon. T. B. C. | Watson, W. H. |
| Smythe, hon. G. | Wawn, J. T. |
| Somers, J. P. | Wellesley, Lord C. |
| Somerset, Lord G. | White, S. |
| Somerville, Sir W. M. | Whitmore, T. C. |
| Somes, J. | Wilde, Sir T. |
| Sotheron, T. H. S. | Williams, W. |
| Standish, C. | Wilshere, W. |
| Stansfield, W. R. C. | Winnington, Sir T. E. |
| Stanton, W. H. | Wodehouse, E. |
| Staunton, Sir G. T. | Wood, Col. T. |
| Stewart, J. | Worsley, Lord |
| Stewart, W. V. | Wortley, hon. J. S. |
| Stock, Serjt. | Wortley, hon. J. S. |
| Strutt, E. | Wrightson, W. B. |
| Sutton, hon. H. M. | Wynn, rt. hon. C. W. W. |
| Tancred, H. W. | Wynn, Sir W. W. |
| Tennent, J. E. | Wyse, T. |
| Thesiger, Sir F. | Yorke, H. R. |
| Thornely, T. | |
| Tollemache, hon. F. J. | TELLERS. |
| Tomline, G. | Young, J. |
| Towneley, J. | Baring, H. |
| List of the NOES. | |
| Ackers, J. | Bruges, W. H. L. |
| Acton, Col. | Buck, L. W. |
| Antrobus, E. | Buckley, E. |
| Arbuthnott, hon. H. | Buller, Sir J. Y. |
| Arkwright, G. | Burrell, Sir C. M. |
| Astell, W. | Burroughes, H. N. |
| Bagge, W. | Campbell, J. H. |
| Bailey, J. jun. | Chapman, A. |
| Bankes, G. | Chetwode, Sir J. |
| Baskerville, T. B. M. | Christie, W. D. |
| Bateson, T. | Christopher, R. A. |
| Beckett, W. | Codrington, Sir W. |
| Beresford, Major | Cole, hon. H. A. |
| Bernard, Visct. | Colvile, C. R. |
| Blackstone, W. S. | Compton, H. C. |
| Blewitt, R. J. | Conolly, Col. |
| Bouverie, hon. E. P. | Copeland, Ald. |
| Boyd, J. | Crawford, W. S. |
| Bradshaw, J. | Curteis, H. B. |
| Bright, J. | Darby, G. |
| Brisco, M. | Dawnay, hon. W. H. |
| Broadley, H. | Deedes, W. |
| Brocklehurst, J. | Denison, E. B. |
| Brooke, Sir A. B. | Dick, Q. |
| Bruce, C. L. C. | Disraeli, B. |
| Bruen, Col. | Douglas, Sir H. |
| Douglas, J. D. S. | Lowther, Sir J. H. |
| Dugdale, W. S. | Lowther, hon. Col. |
| Duke, Sir J. | Mackenzie, T. |
| Duncan, G. | Maclean, D. |
| Duncombe, T. | McTaggart, Sir J. |
| Duncombe, hon. O. | Mainwaring, T. |
| Du Pre, C. G. | Marton, G. |
| Eaton, H. J. | Masterman, J. |
| Egerton, W. T. | Maule, rt. hon. F. |
| Egerton, Sir P. | Maunsell, T. P. |
| Entwisle, W. | Maxwell, hon. J. P. |
| Ewart, W. | Morris, D. |
| Farnham, E. B. | Mundy, E. M. |
| Feilden, W. | Muntz, G. F. |
| Fielden, J. | Neeld, J. |
| Fellowes, E. | Neeld, J. |
| Ferrand, W. B. | Newdegate, C. N. |
| Filmer, Sir E. | Newry, Visct. |
| Fitzroy, Lord C. | Northland, Visct. |
| Ffolliott, J. | O'Brien, A. S. |
| Forbes, W. | Packe, C. W. |
| Forman, T. S. | Palmer, R. |
| Fox, S. L. | Pattison, J. |
| Fuller, A. E. | Plumptre, J. P. |
| Gisborne, T. | Polhill, F. |
| Gore, W. O. | Pollington, Visct. |
| Gore, W. R. O. | Powell, Col. |
| Goring, C. | Pringle, A. |
| Greenall, P. | Protheroe, E. |
| Gregory, W. H. | Rendlesham, Lord |
| Grimsditch, T. | Richards, R. |
| Grogan, E. | Rolleston, Col. |
| Hallyburton, Lord J. | Round, C. G. |
| Hamilton, J. H. | Rushbrooke, Col. |
| Hamilton, G. A. | Ryder, hon. G. D. |
| Hampden, R. | Sanderson, R. |
| Hanmer, Sir J. | Shaw, rt. hon. F. |
| Hardy, J. | Sibthorp, Col. |
| Harris, hon. Capt. | Smith, A. |
| Hastie, A. | Smyth, Sir H. |
| Hayes, Sir E. | Smollett, A. |
| Heathcoat, J. | Spooner, R. |
| Henley, J. W. | Stanley, E. |
| Hepburn, Sir T. B. | Stewart, P. M. |
| Hindley, C. | Stuart, H. |
| Hodgson, F. | Talbot, C. R. M. |
| Hornby, J. | Taylor, E. |
| Hughes, W. B. | Taylor, J. A. |
| Humphery, Ald. | Tollemache, J. |
| Hussey, A. | Tower, C. |
| Hussey, T. | Troubridge, Sir E. T. |
| Inglis, Sir R. H. | Turner, E. |
| Jervis, J. | Turnor, C. |
| Johnstone, H. | Tyrell, Sir J. T. |
| Jolliffe, Sir W. G. H. | Verner, Col. |
| Jones, Capt. | Vyvyan, Sir R. R. |
| Kemble, H. | Waddington, H. S. |
| Knight, F. W. | Wakley, T. |
| Knightley, Sir C. | Welby, G. E. |
| Law, hon. C. E. | Wyndham, Col. C. |
| Lawson, A. | |
| Lefroy, A. | TELLERS. |
| Leslie, C. P. | Ashley, Lord |
| Long, W. | Colquhoun, J. |
§ Bill read a second time.
§ Sir R. Peelafterwards moved,— 1046
That this House will, upon Monday next, resolve itself into a Committee, to consider of making provision out of the Consolidated Fund for the maintenance of the College of Maynooth.
§ Sir R. Inglisobjected to fixing the day so early.
§ The Chancellor of the Exchequerdefended the course of proceeding moved, as being usual in money bills.
§ Mr. Plumptrewanted to know distinctly what would be the order of proceeding.
§ Sir R. Peelexplained that the Committee on the Consolidated Fund Act would be taken on Monday, and that the Committee of the House upon the Bill itself would follow on Friday.
§ Lord John Russellobserved that the hon. Member for East Kent had not been present at the discussion in the earlier part of the evening. The Committee on the Bill was postponed to Friday next. The question of the grant being a charge on the Consolidated Fund must be moved in the previous Committee, and that Committee, as he understood from the right hon. Baronet, was to be taken on Monday. Upon that day the hon. Member for Sheffield (Mr. Ward) would bring forward his Motion.
§ Mr. T. Duncombesaid he should certainly bring on his Resolutions respecting the Railway Department of the Board of Trade, of which he had given notice, before this, on Monday night.
§ Mr. SpeakerWill you divide on it?
§ Mr. T. DuncombeYes.
§ The House divided on the Resolution moved by Sir R. Peel:—Ayes 61; Noes 25: Majority 36.
| List of the AYES. | |
| Acland, Sir T. D. | Cripps, W. |
| A'Court, Capt. | Darby, G. |
| Adderley, C. B. | Dickinson, F. H. |
| Aldam, W. | Eastnor, Visct. |
| Archbold, R. | Escott, B. |
| Baring, rt. hon. F. T. | Fitzmaurice, hon. W. |
| Barrington, Visct. | Fremantle, rt. h. Sir T. |
| Boldero, H. G. | Gaskell, J. M. |
| Brotherton, J. | Gibson, T. M. |
| Bruce, Lord E. | Goulburn rt. hon. H. |
| Bruges, W. H. | Graham, rt. hn. Sir J. |
| Cardwell, E. | Greene, T. |
| Childers, J. W. | Hamilton, W. J. |
| Clayton, R. R. | Hawes, B. |
| Clerk, rt. hn. Sir G. | Heneage, G. H. W. |
| Collett, J. | Herbert, rt. hon. S. |
| Corry, rt. hn. H. | Hinde, J. H. |
| Craig, W. G. | Hope, G. W. |
| Jermyn, Earl | Sheridan, R. B. |
| Labouchere, rt. hn. H. | Smith, rt. hn. T. B. C. |
| Lincoln, Earl of | Strutt, E. |
| Macnamara, Major | Sutton, hon. H. M. |
| Marshall, W. | Warburton, H. |
| Martin, J. | Ward, H. G. |
| Martin, C. W. | Wawn, J. T. |
| Murray, A. | Wellesley, Lord C. |
| Nicholl, rt. hon. J. | Whitmore, T. C. |
| Parker, J. | Worsley, Lord |
| Peel, rt. hon. Sir R. | Wortley, hon. J. S. |
| Pigot, rt. hon. D. | TELLERS. |
| Redington, T. N. | Young, J. |
| Russell, Lord J. | Lennox, Lord A. |
| List of the NOES. | |
| Bagge, W. | Maule, right hon. F. |
| Buller, Sir J. Y. | Morris, D. |
| Clive, Visct. | Muntz, G. F. |
| Colvile, C. R. | O'Brien, A. S. |
| Curteis, H. B. | Pack, C. W. |
| Duncan, G. | Plumptre, J. P. |
| Duncombe, hon. | Shaw, rt. hon. F. |
| Ferrand, W. B. | Sibthorp, Col. |
| Forbes, W. | Spooner, R. |
| Hamilton, G. A. | Taylor, J. A. |
| Hastie, A. | Waddington, H. S. |
| Henley, J. W. | TELLERS. |
| Hindley, C. | Duncombe, T. |
| Maclean, D. | Inglis, Sir R. H. |
§ House adjourned at half-past three o'clock.