ROMAN CATHOLIC RELIEF BILL.

HC Deb 08 December 1847 vol 95 cc800-52

MR. ANSTEY

rose to move the Second Reading of a Bill for the further repeal of Acts of Parliament imposing pains and penalties upon Her Majesty's Roman Catholic subjects on account of their religious opinions. He would refer the House to the third recital in the preamble of this Bill, as containing a full and fair exposition of the measure, and of the motives which had induced him to bring it forward. The preamble recited that, nothwithstanding the provisions of the two recited Acts of Parliament of the 8th and 10th Victoria— Her Majesty's Roman Catholic subjects do still continue to be liable for or on account of their religious belief, practice, or profession, to sundry punishments, pains, penalties, and disabilities, ordained and enacted by certain Acts made and passed by the Parliament of England, the Parliament of Great Britain, and the Parliament of Great Britain and Ireland respectively, and to which punishments, pains, penalties, and disabilities none other of Her Majesty's subjects are liable; and that it is expedient that all such punishments, pains, and penalties as aforesaid shall be for ever repealed and taken away. And that it is likewise expedient that all such and so many of the aforesaid disabilities shall in like manner be repealed and taken away as do not in anywise relate to the holding of offices, collegiate or ecclesiastical, or whereunto collegiate or ecclesiastical preferment or patronage is incident, or to the presenting to ecclesiastical benefices, or as do not in any other manner tend to the better securing and strengthening the present Church Establishment and the present Civil Government, and the settlement of property within this realm. For his own part, he could only say that if any hon. Member could show him that any clause of this Bill would interfere with a single Act of Parliament which tended to the strengthening of the Church Establishment, or the present civil Government, or the settlement of property, he would at once be happy to strike it out. His object was merely to benefit Roman Catholics, so far as he could do so without harm or detriment to any other interest. Before he entered into the details of the measure, he wished to address himself to an objection which had been urged against it in the course of last night's debate. It was said by the learned Attorney General that the Ministers of the Crown and their law advisers had not had sufficient time afforded them to consider the details of the Bill and the Acts of Parliament which it proposed to repeal. He begged to say, that this very Bill had been under the immediate consideration, not only of the Legislature, but of the present and also of the last Administration, from 1842 down to the present time. In the summer of 1842 the Criminal Law Commissioners drew attention, in their report, to the laws relating to Roman Catholics, and suggested, in strong and forcible language, that something should be done to effect the repeal or simplification of the whole body of that penal code; but they added, that they forbore to offer any specific suggestions on the subject, because they considered that their commission did not authorise them. On the 13th of July in that year the hon. Member for Finsbury (Mr. T. Duncombe) asked the right hon. Baronet who then filled the office of Home Secretary (Sir J. Graham), whether it were the intention of the Government to bring forward a Bill to carry into effect the recommendations of the Criminal Law Commissioners; and the right hon. Baronet replied that the subject was one of much delicacy and difficulty, and that the Government were not then prepared to introduce such a measure. On the 3rd of May, 1844, Mr. Watson, who then represented Kinsale, repeated the same question; and the answer of the right hon. Baronet being more favourable than his former one, Lord Beaumont, on the 6th of May, laid on the table of the House of Lords a Bill embodying all the enactments contained in the measure which he held in his hand. That Bill was read a second time, and passed through Committee, without a division; but, in consequence of some representations from the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, and from some of the Lords Spiritual then absent from town, the Lord Chancellor, on the 30th of July, 1844, proposed to strike out all provisions about which there might be any contrariety of opinion in either House, and the Bill so amended passed into a law—7 and 8 Victoria, cap. 102—repealing about half the enactments originally proposed to be repealed. On the 20th of March, 1845, Mr. Watson brought in a Bill for the repeal of the remainder of those enactments; but it was thrown out on the 9th of July, owing to the Government having stated that they had determined to appoint a Commission to inquire into the operation of the laws affecting Roman Catholics, and the propriety of their repeal. That Commission, however, was defective in this respect, that the Commissioners, conceiving that they were only to inquire respecting ancient laws, concluded their labours with the 31st of George III., the last of these penal Acts, and did not consider the propriety of re-pealing the clauses in the Relief Act of 1829 against monks, Jesuits, and regulars. Mr. Watson, therefore, on the 5th of February, 1846, again brought in his Bill into this House. Two days before that, the then Lord Chancellor had introduced a Bill into the House of Lords founded on the report of the Commission, and proposing the repeal of various enactments. It had been his Lordship's intention to include all the penal Acts affecting Roman Catholics down to the 31st of George III.; but the Bill was somewhat inartificially drawn, and one or two enactments were omitted upon a surmise that they were no longer in force. But it should be observed, that although the specific penalties contained in those statutes had been repealed, yet, notwithstanding, the prohibition itself remained upon the Statute-book, and a good deal of doubt existed as to the state of the law. Of course he did not wish to state his opinions when they were adverse to so high an authority as that of Lord Lyndhurst; but he was bound to say that with respect to these portions of the enactments, amongst eminent lawyers considerable doubt had arisen. And he would submit that any such law upon which such a doubt had arisen, ought to be repealed, and that they would all concur in the propriety of the course now proposed. In order to clear up these doubts, therefore, Mr. Watson introduced his Bill, which was read a second time, by a majority of nearly three to one. It was afterwards, in consequence of an Amendment by the hon. Baronet the Member for Oxford, thrown out. On the 18th of August, 1846, the Lord Chancellor's Bill received the Royal Assent, and became the Act 9 and 10 Victoria, c. 59. On the 10th February, 1847, Mr. Watson again brought in his Bill, and he undertook—in consequence of the right hon. Baronet the Member for Tamworth stating that otherwise he should oppose the Bill—to add clauses for the registration of those Jesuits and male regulars whom it was proposed to relieve from the penalties of the Act of 1829. He added those clauses; but that right hon. Gentleman was absent on the 14th of April, the day for going into Committee; and, it not appearing whether he was or was not satisfied with the proposed clauses, the Bill was, after debate, thrown out. The principle, then, of the present Bill had been affirmed by the last Parliament; and the points of detail which caused the failure of the measure before, would be properly discussed in Committee. The Bill proposed to repeal enactments as to the expediency and justice of whose repeal there was no doubt; and if it repealed also others, which some hon. Members would retain, the time for determining the selection would be in Committee. The Religious Opinions Act of 1846 had placed the Jews upon the same footing with their Protestant fellow-subjects in all social respects, with the single exception of the disability which the Bill proposed to be brought in by the noble Lord (Lord J. Russell) would remove; the object of the present measure was, to place Her Majesty's Roman Catholic subjects upon the same footing, for all social purposes, with their Jewish fellow-subjects. The Bill proposed, first, to repeal, not the Act of Supremacy, 1 Elizabeth, c. 1, but one clause in it, of extreme severity and cruelty, and absurd to be retained after the Legislature had restored Roman Catholics to a legal status and capacity—a clause providing that if any one should affirm, maintain, or defend the authority, pre-eminence, power, or jurisdiction, spiritual or ecclesiastical, of any foreign prince or prelate, theretofore claimed, he should suffer certain penalties. The Religions Opinions Act repealed the specific penalties, but left the prohibition in force; so that here was still an offence punishable with fine and imprisonment, it being a misdemeanor by the common law to disobey an express statute. It was originally proposed to repeal this Act of Elizabeth by the Lord Chancellor's Bill; but out of deference to the scruples of the Bishop of Exeter, and to facilitate the passing of the Bill, the Lord Chancel- for reluctantly gave way. The next enactment which the present Bill would repeal was the 13th Elizabeth, c. 2— against bringing in and putting in execution bulls, writings, or instruments, and other superstitious things from the See of Rome. By that Act it was made an offence punishable with prœmunire in the first instance, and high treason if repeated, to bring in or publish or use any bull or rescript, of however harmless a character, of the See of Rome, or even to import into this realm, or use within it, any rosary or Agnus Dei. Those penalties were in effect repealed as to rosaries and agnuses by one of the Customs Acts, in 1824 or 1825, which substituted for punishment so severe the payment of an ad valorem duty on importation. But the statutory prohibition as to bulls and writings remained, with the liability to fine and imprisonment at common law. The total repeal of this enactment was proposed by the Lord Chancellor's Bill, but relinquished upon the objection of the Bishop of Exeter; and, instead of that, the punishments of prœmunire and death were taken away, and those of fine and imprisonment suffered to continue. The next enactment now proposed to be repealed was the Uniformity of Worship Act, 13 and 14 Charles II., c. 4—one of the enactments which the Lord Chancellor had supposed to be indirectly repealed; but other lawyers had expressed a different opinion. Under this Act, any person hearing or being present at any other form of worship than that contained in the Book of Common Prayer was liable to six months' imprisonment for the first offence, one year for the second, and imprisonment for life for the third. The present Bill would also repeal 25 Charles II., c. 2, which related to Popish recusants, and prevented them from filling any office under Government; and, in the opinion of some lawyers, Roman Catholics who had omitted certain oaths imposed by that Act, as well as those contained in the Relief Act, were not protected by the Indemnity Act. To remove similar doubts, also, the 30th Chas. II., which disabled Papists from sitting in Parliament, was proposed to be repealed. The statutes of the present reign repealed enactments imposing the oath of supremacy under the penalties usually attached to Popish recusancy; but by an oversight, as well of Mr. Watson as of the Criminal Law Commissioners, the 7th & 8th William III., c. 24, which re-enacted a former Act of the same reign, and imposed on practitioners of law refusing the oath of supremacy the penalties of a prœmunire, was not included in either of the repealing-statutes of the present reign. It was proposed to be now repealed. He might mention that every clause contained in the Religious Opinions Act which in any way referred to Roman Catholics had been taken textually and literally from Mr. Watson's Bill. There were also some restrictive clauses of Mr. Burke's Act (31st George III., c. 32) which were still in operation; and he proposed by the present Bill to repeal several of the provisions of that Act. He might explain to the House that one of the effects of the penal laws was to make all dispositions of property for the benefit of the Roman Catholics in their spiritual capacity absolutely illegal. To remedy this state of things as far as possible, an Act was passed in the reign of William IV., called the Roman Catholic Charities Act; but, according to a recent judgment of the present Lord Chancellor and one of the Vice-Chancellors, the reservations in Mr. Burke's Act had not been repealed by the statute of William IV.; so that all dispositions of property for Roman Catholic purposes, not expressly repealed by the Roman Catholic Charities Act, were still illegal and liable to confiscation. A case actually occurred under this law during the Administration of the right hon. Baronet the Member for Tamworth, where such property was confiscated. It had been given for the support of the Roman Catholic poor of Hexham in 1698, and regularly enjoyed down to 1825. Yet it was confiscated. But to the great credit of that right hon. Gentleman, he advised Her Majesty in 1842 that the property should be regranted for the purposes for which it was originally given. By the Act of 31st George III., the Roman Catholic ecclesiastics were subject to several other penal enactments, such as being deprived of the use of a steeple and bell, and of the right of performing funeral service in the churchyard. It was for the House to say whether it was fit that Roman Catholic ecclesiastics should still be liable to have their property confiscated, and to be subject to perpetual imprisonment and transportation for life, for offending against such enactments. The next penal enactment was contained in the 10th George IV., c. 7, commonly called the Roman Catholic Belief Act. He might mention, that he had carefully omitted to propose the repeal of any one clause as to which there might be any objection. He had not complied with the suggestions of many friends, of doing away with the disqualification of a Roman Catholic to fill the office of Lord High Chancellor of England or of Ireland. His reason for this was, that so far from considering it a penalty for a Roman Catholic to be disabled from administering ecclesiastical patronage in the Church of England, it was a wise ordinance standing between the conscience of any Roman Catholic and the performance of inconsistent duties. If he had proposed the repeal of that restriction, it would have been accompanied by a provision that the ecclesiastical patronage should be exercised by some other authority during the time that a Roman Catholic should hold such office. But this he would be unable to do without the previous consent of the Sovereign. The effect of the enactment making it illegal for Roman Catholics to perform the funeral rites openly was, that the ceremony was performed in the dead man's chamber, where a mock funeral took place, in order that the burial service of the Church of Rome might be read. This service being concluded, the body was carried to the grave without any prayer or formula, and there deposited as if it were the body of an unbaptised and unchristian man. He proposed to repeal that clause. He also proposed to repeal so much of the law as provided for the gradual suppression of the Jesuits, and of bodies bound by monastic and religious vows, resident within the United Kingdom. When he stated to the House that this law affected not only Jesuits—not only monks and friars, who participated, he believed, very largely in the odium and unpopularity which a long course of misrepresentation had laid them under—not only these, but also men as to whom there could be—among men of charity, humanity, and religion—no doubt at all, that it affected the Christian Brothers, those who were devoted, from youth to manhood, from manhood to old age, and from old age to death, to the constant and unceasing care of the spiritual and temporal concerns of the veriest poor—those who were serving God and were doing good to man—that every one of these saintly men was at this moment liable to transportation to Norfolk Island—that Gehenna of the southern seas—for their natural life, to be worked there as convicts, among the worst and most degraded of the human race; surely, when he mentioned this, he had made out a strong case for the adoption of the principle at least—for that was all to which he now sought to pledge the House—of his Bill, by which they would declare that it was at length necessary that this odious, unchristian, and degrading legislation should be for ever done away. He would appeal to hon. Members on both sides of the House, especially to those who knew the regulars both of England and of Ireland, whether it was fit that the Apostle of Temperance and his Franciscan order, and the Cistercian order of Mount Meilleraye in Ireland, and Mount St. Bernard in England, and the Christian Brethren of the two countries, should be any longer exposed to these cruel and degrading penalties—whether it were fit that those who loved and cherished those pious men should be any longer exposed to the reproach that such laws existed, and that no effort was made for their removal? His object was merely to move for the repeal of the laws to which he had referred: he proposed to substitute nothing in their place. Those who thought it necessary that there should be a registration of Jesuits or monks, as such, as well as in their capacity of Roman Catholic priests under the 31st of George III., might propose it. He would not. His duty was limited to proposing the repeal of the penal clauses in the Act of 1829, the absurdity and injustice of which were universally recognised. He did not know that any Member of that House, except the right hon. Baronet the Member for Tamworth, the author of those enactments, would attempt to defend them. They were founded on a supposed distinction between the secular and regular clergy of the Church of Rome—a distinction which it was reserved for the right hon. Baronet to invent—a distinction not made by the friends of religious liberty—a distinction not to be found in the Elizabethan or Caroline statutes, by which the Church of Rome and all her children had been put under the ban of outlawry and civil death. It was possible that the right hon. Baronet was still attached to the distinction he had invented, for the ignoble purpose, as it seemed to him (Mr. Anstey), of sowing discord between the Jesuits or monks upon the one hand, and the secular clergy of the Church of Rome upon the other. But, at least, no other Member of the House was of that mind. Whether hon. Members were friendly or unfriendly to the principle of the present measure, they were unanimous in condemning the degrading enactments of 1829, which had no prescription of time in their favour, and were impotent to effect their apparent purpose. He did not know what course the present Home Secretary was likely to take on this occasion. But he would invite his attention to the wise and noble language in which his predecessor, the right hon. Baronet the Member for Ripon, had expressed himself on the 24th June, 1846, with reference to Mr. Watson's Bill of last year. That right hon. Baronet, speaking with official knowledge, and upon official responsibility, as Secretary of State for the Home Department, thus expressed himself:— I now come to a matter of infinitely greater importance, relating to the regular orders in this country. And, Sir, I certainly do not participate in the expression of that jealousy which has been stated by others with reference to the regular orders. I should be the last man to cast any sweeping censure upon them; I will not ascribe to them any disloyal or treasonable intention, endangering the safety of the State; I entertain no such opinions of them; and even with respect to one of those orders in particular—I allude to the Jesuits—I cannot forget that literature and that the Christian religion are under immense obligations to that order. I believe that they are among the most learned and the best educated members of the Christian faith; but on the other hand, I am bound to state, with respect to that order, and to the regular orders generally, that the members of the Protestant religion have just cause of jealousy—not on account of the political opinions of those orders, but on religious grounds; because it must be admitted that the regular orders are the aggressive force, and that they supply the missionary body most active in the conversion of those who are heretics in their eyes. I therefore say, that the Protestant Establishment has just cause, upon religious grounds, to entertain a jealousy of the regular orders. Still, upholding as we do a spirit of just toleration, and having an immense body of Roman Catholics in this country, we cannot give its full and its proper effect to that tolerant spirit if we exclude the regular orders. The hon. Gentlemen opposite entertain conscientious feelings upon this subject, and I should be sorry to speak one word irreconcilable with my respect for those feelings. But I have reason to believe that in the great sacrament of the Roman Catholic Church—the Confession—the regular orders, so far as the laity are concerned, do administer that sacrament in a manner which is most consistent with the feelings and the sentiments of the laity. I, therefore, feel we are in this position with respect to the regular orders in this country—that we have 8,000,000 of Roman Catholics, and that we can hardly, by any sound argument, maintain any exclusion against them.^* In every word of those extracts, he (Mr. Anstey), as a Roman Catholic, most ^* Hansard, Vol. lxxxvii. (Third Series), p. 922. heartily concurred. He agreed that the enactments of 1829 against religious liberty should be repealed. He agreed that the conscientious scruples of those in communion with the Established Church ought to be respected. He would not be there that day to support the present measure if he were not persuaded that, whilst it gave security to the Roman Catholic conscience, it emperilled no interest—it violated no feeling which was dear to those of any other faith. It was not his wish to deprive the large and respectable class of his fellow-subjects in communion with the Church of England of any essential security. Far from that! If any such attempt were made—whether in the shape of an Appropriation Clause or in any other shape—he would be the first to oppose it. The restrictions contained in his Bill were as dear to him as the relief it would confer When persons argued that by the passing of this Bill the supremacy and title of the Church of England would be taken away, they forgot that we were living, not under Charles II., but Queen Victoria. It was ridiculous now to raise the question of the ascendancy of the Established Church of England and Ireland. That ascendancy had been taken away long before the passing of any Act for the relief of Roman Catholics. Lord Mansfield said, that from the moment the Act for the toleration of British Dissenters passed, in the reign of William and Mary, the worship of every sect of Protestant Dissenters in the realm, Unitarian excepted, became an established religion. In the same way it was a matter of notoriety that from the time the 19th George III. was passed, the Roman Catholic body was entitled, though they did not exercise their right, to claim the assistance of Her Majesty's Ministers, courts, and officers of justice, to retain them in that status with respect to maintenance and defence of the rights and privileges to which they were by law entitled. He appealed to any lawyer in the House to say if he were not correct, and to deny, if he could, that a writ of mandamus or an injunction would not issue on the application of a Roman Catholic prelate for the removal or deprivation from his parish of any priest who was contumacious, or would not preach in accordance with his ritual. It was idle, then, to talk of the ascendancy of the Church any longer. The law now protected all alike. Having thanked the House for the patience which they had extended towards him, the hon. and learned Member concluded by moving that the Bill be read a second time.

SIR R. H. INGLIS

said, that although he could not but acknowledge the business character of the speech they had just heard, he would not be tempted to follow the hon. and learned Gentleman through the lengthy details with which he had treated the House respecting the history of the Bill before them, and of its predecessors. He would not travel into the facts connected with the Bills of 1842, 1845, and 1846, but would confine himself to the Bill introduced in an early part of the present year by Mr. Watson (the late Member for Kinsale). True it was that the hon. and learned Gentleman who had just addressed them was better able than any one else could be to state the facts connected with those measures; for, in point of fact, they were his own manufacture. The blunderbuss bore his name everywhere but in the House, and it was to be considered as double-barrelled, for with the present Bill was to be taken the Roman Catholic Charities Bill, which had been already before them. The hon. and learned Gentleman opposite primed and loaded both barrels, and gave it to Mr. Watson to discharge; but unfortunately it missed fire, and they had but now heard the report in the speech of the hon. and learned Gentleman himself. The double object of these measures was—and he called on the House to say if he in the least exaggerated it—was neither more nor less than to increase aggressively the influence of the Church of Rome, and indirectly to diminish that of the Church of England, and of the Protestant Church in general. As to the operation of the other Bill, it was for lawyers to form an opinion; but he believed its effect would be practically to remove all the restrictions of the law of mortmain, in so far as they related to the Roman Catholic Church; and in saying so, he did no injustice to the hon. and learned Gentleman, for he had three or four times repeated the words which the Member for Kinsale (Mr. Watson) had used on a former occasion in his Bill. As far as the Roman Catholics were concerned, all their disabilities were removed; but as far as benefits were to be obtained, and advantages to be conferred by the passing of this Bill, they were to be extended to Roman Catholics, and to them only. Therefore those Liberal Members who supported it must be aware, that whatever evils were to be redressed or good conferred, would be restricted to Roman Catholics by this Act, and that their Protestant fellow-subjects would not receive any relief or benefit of any description. The law was general, and did not refer to Roman Catholics alone; and when the hon. Member proposed to relieve them only, he must know that the penalties for denying the Queen's supremacy, for instance, were applicable to the Church of England, as well as to the Church of Rome, though he would leave them in the former case, and remove them in the latter. The hon. Gentleman stated he would not remove those restrictions for conscience sake which prevented Roman Catholics from presenting to any benefice in the Established Church; but he was at the same time very willing to admit the right of Roman Catholics to hold the highest offices in the State, with all their privileges, and with these of course he included the disposal of Church patronage. On a former occasion, the right hon. Member for Dungarvon (Mr. Sheil) distinctly claimed for the Irish Roman Catholics the right to hold the office of Lord Chancellor without any such restriction as to patronage. Looking to the whole of these proceedings, and the spirit with which they were animated, he thought himself justified in saying that this Bill was one of a series of aggressive measures, by which the Church of Rome sought to elevate itself in this country, and proportionably to degrade and lower the Protestant Established Church. The House would very imperfectly discharge its duty with respect to the Bill if they did not consider it, not merely in its relation to the other branch of which he had spoken, but in reference to the conduct and views of the Church of Rome, wherever she had power in Europe or this country. It was not enough to look to the clauses of the Bill that had been placed on the table of the House, but to consider the animus in which the Church of Rome was conducting her operations in every part of the country. The hon. and learned Member, in describing the Bill, though generally correct in his statements, was not altogether justified in saying it was identical with the Bill brought in by Mr. Watson. That gentleman was induced by a consideration of expediency, and looking to the chance of the Bill passing by its being in so far adapted to the views of those who would otherwise oppose it, to promise that he would introduce a clause with respect to Roman Catholic processions in the streets. The hon. and learned Gentleman had not literally adopted that clause. Mr. Watson had also intro- duced two clauses, marked B and C, in the former Bill, which referred to the registration of the religious orders, and were considered essential securities by the hon. Members who gave him a qualified support, which they would have withheld altogether if those clauses had not been inserted. These were not in the present Bill. He contended that though totidem verbis et totidem literis, the Bill was the same in those clauses which remained, it could not be said to represent the Bill of Mr. Watson. The hon. and learned Gentleman said the principle of the Bill was admitted by the House on a former occasion; but he (Sir R. Inglis) in answer to that would just state what the House did in the matter in April last, and would only say he trusted the House would, by a majority as great as that by which they had then defeated the former Bill, now reject the present attempt of the hon. and learned Member for Youghal. His recollection was not very perfect as to the numbers of the division on the Motion for the second reading; but he recollected that it barely escaped being rejected, the majority for it being only three, and that finally it was rejected by a division in which the numbers were 158 and 119. He hoped they would not allow this Bill to go into Committee, for as far as the operation of it related to what were called "obsolete laws," and what had been termed by an hon. Friend of his not now in the House "the rubbish of the Statute-book," it was practically rendered useless by the Religious Opinions Act, 9 and 10 Vict. Could any member of the legal profession in the House furnish him with a single instance in which an indictment at common law had been laid for any one of those violations of the law to which the Bill referred, for the last 250 years? He would give them 50 years before that, and they would only discover one solitary instance of such a prosecution. The first Bill mentioned by the hon. and learned Gentleman had been repealed by 7 and 8 Victoria. He begged to repeat the question he had put on the first occasion when this subject was discussed, namely, how far the supremacy of the Queen in all matters of religion, and the essential condition on which she held her Crown as a member of the Protestant Church established, testified by her communion in the most solemn act of her religion, would or would not be affected by the provisions of the Bill now on the table of the House? It was very true the hon. and learned Member did not directly repeal the Bill of Rights; nor had any Gentleman, in or out of the House, ventured to whisper an intention of touching that great security for the Protestant character of this nation, so far as that character was maintained by the continued protestation of the Queen against the errors of the Church of Rome as the condition of her reigning over this nation; for that was the condition on which Her Majesty and the Members of Her illustrious House reigned, and he hoped long would reign, over this kingdom. He wished to ask Her Majesty's Attorney General how far he was correct in his view? If the hon. Member for Youghal did not repeal the Bill of Rights, he would repeal the 13th Charles II., by which a certain act required to be performed by the Bill of Rights was to be performed; and if he did so, would he leave anything for the Bill of Rights to work upon? He had asked this question in the early part of the present year, and no Member of Her Majesty's Government condescended to notice the inquiry. The hon. and learned Member for Kinsale was so far struck with the objection as to say that if it were right, if there was a foundation for it, they could alter it in Committee. But he (Sir R. Inglis) held that the House was to decide upon the Bill as it was laid on the table—to assent to it or reject it on the general view of its merits as they found it—and not to give their sanction upon the hope, however strongly expressed by those with whom the measure originated, that at a subsequent period they would remove or modify the objections. Let the House decide upon the Bill as they found it now. If the Bill at the present moment involved in any degree such a conclusion as this, that under its provisions the essentially Protestant character of this Church and nation, as maintained by the declaration of the Queen, the organ of the representation of England, was to be abandoned, he said, Consult public feelings, consult public principle, consult your own doubts, and do not give the sanction of your vote in favour of a measure which has even a tendency to such a consummation as this. This declaration was required by a certain Act to be taken; and if they repealed this, did they not weaken, if not entirely remove, the obligation of the Sovereign to take the oath? It was not for any Member sitting in that House to say that this declaration imputed opinions to members of a great Church, which it was very painful to him, as a member of that Church, to hear so stated. The members of the Church of Rome, our fellow-subjects, had for the last century and a half, and above all from the year 1829, been admitted to the privileges to which they had by succession been raised, under the stipulations of security specified. He was speaking in the hearing of some who took a leading part in favour of the Act of 1829, when he said there was every reason to believe that measure would never have been carried if such securities as the present Bill professed to remove had failed to be inserted. Whether it were true, as had been alleged, that the hon. and learned Member would be willing to get rid of all which might be called, comparatively at least, the obsolete statutes against which he directed his aim, or whether his great object was to repeal the clauses inserted in the Act of 1829, of this at least he was sure, that the House would do well to look before them when asked to give their sanction to cither of these propositions. The hon. and learned Member had stated, in respect to some of these latter clauses, the grievance now existing, of a Roman Catholic clergyman being confined to the performance of the religious ceremonies of burial in the house of the party dying a member of that communion. As all legislation was a compromise of evils, he would say that even if they were prepared to allow as a grievance the refusal to admit priests of the Church of Rome to celebrate in the grave-yards of our churches, for example, in a manner as public as that in which the clergy of the Established Church were permitted and bound to celebrate their services, he felt that this advantage would be dearly purchased by the violation of tranquillity and peace which would ensue. Recollect that if you granted this to Roman Catholics, you must grant it to every party; and the character of the Church of England, not as the dominant Church, for that had long ceased to be, but as the Established Church, would be seriously endangered, if you were to give in the places of worship restricted by law to members of the Church of England, a right to members of any other communion to perform their religious ceremonies. For this was the fact: it was now proposed that members of one religious communion should be admitted to celebrate the rites of their creed within ground belonging by law to members of another communion. He did not admit that the grievance was one which ought to be removed at such a risk. Then with respect to processions in the streets, he had heard an hon. Member, whose voice was always listened to in that House with the deep attention ensured by his influence over his fellow-countrymen—he referred to one now not only no longer a Member, but no longer living in this world—declare almost inaudibly, but certainly in a most solemn tone, that nothing should induce him to consent to any such possible desecration of the most holy objects of his faith as would probably attend a procession through the streets of any of our towns. The hon. and learned Member for Kinsale entirely agreed in this, for he stated that the object of the clause he had proposed was limited to funerals. Was the clause as it stood now in the Bill of the hon. and learned Member for Youghal so limited? He apprehended that it was not. Had the hon. and learned Member wished clearly to define the enactments of his Bill, it would have been easy, instead of saying that nothing in this Act contained should prevent such acts from being done, to have said specifically what it would be lawful for Roman Catholics to do. There were countries in which such processions were not lawful; he apprehended that no such procession could pass through the streets of Paris at this moment. It certainly was not the case a few years ago; but if it were otherwise now, the increase of the power of the Roman Catholic Church had not been very greatly to the advantage of the country. The hon. and learned Member had said that every member of a religious order was at this moment liable to be transported for life, and kept to hard labour in the Gehenna of Norfolk Island. He asked the hon. Member, on his professional reputation, to state whether there had been a single instance since 1829 in which any penalty was inflicted, or sought to be inflicted, on any clergyman of the Church of Rome, regular or secular, on account of his religion? The Parliament of England required that in the case of members of these orders certain registrations should take place, as in other cases registration was enjoined by Parliament. He had found it in vain to ask for a return of the members of religious orders thus registered; for members of the Church of Rome thus bound by their religious vows, and directly contemplated by the Act of 1829, had, he would not say found it convenient to evade the provisions of the Act, but had in point of fact evaded them, and no such registration had ever been entered into. That was stated to him by a former Secretary for Ireland, and it was within the experience of both sides of the House. It was not, however, merely in reference to these points of the Bill that he felt so strong an objection to this measure. It was because the Bill in itself was part of a general system, which he had already characterised as aggressive on the part of the Church of Rome, having a tendency to aggrandise itself, and depreciate and degrade the Protestant character of this country. On a former occasion he had asked the law officers of the Crown to be prepared to say whether they regarded it as lawful for the Pope, or any foreign authority, to divide England into new dioceses? A noble protest had been made against this in the southern hemisphere by his right rev. Friend the Bishop of Australia, in a speech and formal protest, both of which did honour to the firmness of his Christian principles. No notice had been taken, so far as he was informed, either of the protest, or of the violation of the independence of the Queen's authority which the cause of that protest involved. But were those usurpations on the part of the Pope solely confined to the Australian colonies of the Queen? They had heard that it was the intention of the Pope to create new dioceses even in England. He had heard a most distinguished individual say that the apostolical succession in England had ceased to exist, and was broken, though he admitted that it existed in Ireland. If so, the claim to create new dioceses in England was an act of daring schism on the part of the Pope of Rome, or any other ecclesiastical authority. It was not only a violation of the Queen's supremacy and authority in all matters ecclesiastical, but a violation of one of the first principles of Chritian unity. If that were so, he contended that Her Majesty's Ministers, instead of entering into negotiations with the See of Rome, and signing agreements, as it was now alleged their secret emissary had signed, with the Pope, ought at once to have removed from the dominions of the Crown any bishop whose see had been created without the Queen's consent, and in violation of Her supremacy. So far from that, he saw it recently announced that Her Majesty's colonial dependencies were to recognise, in the person of the Archbishop of Sydney, one invested with higher temporal rank than the Protestant Bishop of Australia, and to give him a title accorded to only two of the prelates of England. This was giving encouragement to those who had shown that they did not want much encouragement to raise their heads against the Protestant Established Church. He might refer also as part evidence of the animus of the present head of Rome to the answer recently given to the bishops in Ireland with respect to a particular Act—in which he certainly happened to think that the Pope was quite correct—the Act for establishing the Irish colleges. But his opinion that the Pope was right did not induce him to look with pleasure, or even with indifference, on the Pope's interference in the matter. It had been asked, would you refuse to receive the Pope's advice in such matters? He said no, but the rescripts of the Pope contained not advice, but commands, as was stated in the chief organ of the Roman Catholics in this city, the Tablet. He believed no person would deny that the Tablet had such an authority and circulation as at least entitled it to be held as the exponent of the mind and will of the Roman Catholics on this subject. The rescript did not say—do this, or you will be imprisoned; but—do this, or you will become schismatical and rebellious, and exposed to the highest vengeance of God. Those to whom it was addressed were subjects bound by the provisions of the canon law, of which the Pope was the ultimate judge and administrator. When the Pope's mind was made up, he issued not a mere expression of opinion, which might be accepted or flung aside—not a warning which might be followed or neglected—but the sentence of the highest judgment-seat, a command that must be obeyed, and that could be obeyed only by a purely voluntary obedience. Was this power consistent with the full and free obedience of all the Queen's subjects? If the late Dr. Chalmers, for example, had given his opinion that such a law made by Parliament was a bad one, no great harm could ensue from the expression of such an opinion; but that which issued from the mouth of the Pope was to be received as a command, and would be so received by perhaps not less than three thousand bishops, priests, and other clergy within Her Majesty's dominions. He was not asking any measure to prevent this; his only object was simply to give no more authority to those who exercised the authority which they had in a manner so little in obedience to the temporal laws of this kingdom. He had said that there were in this country, and even within a very short distance from the place in which the House was now sitting, proofs of an intention on the part of the Church of Rome not to neglect any opportunity of enlarging and extending its authority. It appeared from a printed copy of the rules which he had in his possession, that the "Westminster Association and Confraternity" was established for the regulation of the elections to seats in that House, and for the maintenance of a perpetual intercourse between the electors and the elected, without reference to party, and solely with a view to the advancement of their religious interest. The association was declared to be "under the protection of Our Blessed Lady, the help of Christians, and St. Thomas of Canterbury." who was better known to the reader of English history by the name of Thomas A'Beckett. He thought it but right to state, at the same time, that the association also asked for God's blessing upon the undertaking. If that had been done before 1828, would it not have been considered as one of many reasons that would have justified the Legislature of that day in resisting any further concession of political power to those who were so able and so willing to use the powers they possessed to complete the aggrandizement of the Church to which they belonged? He did not blame them for it—he did not say that those were things which others in similar circumstances would not have done; but he said that it was a good reason for not giving further power to the Roman Catholics. Another objection to which he had called the attention of the House in the early part of the present year was the interference of the Church of Rome with respect to the marriages of members of that Church with members of a different Church. Very great confusion had arisen in the Prussian provinces on the Rhine, and also in France, risking the peace and happiness of families, in consequence of the Church of Rome insisting that the children of these marriages should be educated in that faith. Another proof of the aggressive character of the Church of Rome, of which the Bill upon the table was only an exponent, was, that she had gradually restored to her breviary the saints' days of those two Popes who had been most specially distinguished as interfering in the internal concerns of other kingdoms in former years. A hundred years ago no breviary, perhaps, except that printed at Rome, contained any reference to the saints' days of Pope Pius V., or Gregory VII. The latter, it would be remembered, was the Pope who had excommunicated the Emperor Henry IV., whilst the former, who had since been canonized, had excommunicated Queen Elizabeth, and released her subjects from their allegiance. The saints' days of those Popes had been restored to the breviary. He had now stated his general objections to the measure. He had stated that the statutes it proposed to repeal were either obsolete or had been already repealed, and that no instance of suffering on the part of any Roman Catholic under them had been adduced by the hon. Member who introduced this Bill, or else that they were those statutes which by the Roman Catholic Relief Bill were regarded as something like a compensatory security to the Established Church for the relief given to the Catholics in 1829. If those statutes were obsolete, or had been specifically repealed, he contended that the House would do wisely, as a matter of prudence, not to go into any further discussion on the subject; whilst, if they were intended as a security to the Established Church—if they were meant by his right hon. Friend who moved the Catholic Emancipation Bill to be anything but illusory, as a security to the Church of England and the Protestant character of the people—he called upon that House, not as a measure of prudence, but of principle, to reject the Bill; and for that purpose he should move that it be read a second time that day six months.

MR. HENRY DRUMMOND

apprehended that it was the firm intention, not only of a considerable majority in that House, but of a vast predominating majority in the country, to give to the Roman Catholics, as well as to every denomination of Christians, the fullest and most ample toleration that words could give. He believed also, that it was the intention of a very large majority not to be seduced, under the word "toleration," to give supremacy, pre-eminence or distinction of any sort or kind either to that or any other denomination of Christians. If, then, he was right, as he believed he was, and in the faith of which he should continue until he was corrected by a decision of that House, it was upon that principle that he ventured to call their attention to the provisions of the Bill then before them, and to say whether those provisions did indeed give nothing more than ample toleration to those who they were agreed ought to enjoy it. He must confess that he did not agree with much that had fallen from the hon. Baronet who had just spoken. He could not think that the decision of the Church of Rome with respect to the colleges he had referred to was wrong. He did not think that the conduct of the Church of Rome with respect to mixed marriages was wrong. Let them consider what marriage was—that it was a contract between two parties to live together as man and wife; and certainly those who did feel the burden they had so taken upon themselves, would apply to some minister of God to give them his blessing on that new relation of life. But surely it rested with those who were ministers of God to define the condition upon which that blessing should be given, and he greatly rejoiced that there was a Church yet left upon the earth that had the faith to say, "Blessing is only with us." The necessary consequence of that Church believing herself to be the only Christian Church was the denunciation of all who differed from her, although it did sound strangely in loyal ears to hear our Queen denounced as a heretic. So far, indeed, from thinking the conduct of the Church of Rome, in respect to the cases of mixed marriages at Cologne, to which the hon. Baronet had referred, was wrong, he would recommend the hon. Baronet to read the dignified correspondence between the Pope and M. Bunsen on that subject, and not to trust to the garbled version of the German journals. But did this Bill relate to religious freedom only? The preamble of the Bill said— Whereas Her Majesty's Roman Catholic subjects do still continue to be liable, for or on account of their religious belief, practice, or profession, to sundry punishments, pains, penalties, and disabilities; —though he was not aware of any pains or penalties to which any man was subject touching his religious belief; and then the first clause enacted, that— So much of an Act passed in the 1st year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, intituled 'An Act to restore to the Crown the ancient jurisdiction over the estate ecclesiastical and spiritual, and abolishing all foreign powers repugnant to the same,' whereby it is enacted, 'That if any person or persons dwelling or inhabiting within this your realm, or in any other your Highness's realms or dominions, of what estate, dignity, or degree soever he or they be, after the end of thirty days next after the determination of this Session of this present Parliament, shall, by writing, printing, teaching, preaching, express words, deed or act, advisedly, maliciously, and directly affirm, hold, stand with, set forth, maintain or defend the authority, preheminence, power, or jurisdiction, spiritual or ecclesiastical, of any foreign prince, prelate, person, state, or potentate whatsoever, heretofore claimed, used, or usurped within this realm, or any dominion, or country being within or under the power, dominion or allegiance of your Highness, or shall advisedly, maliciously, and directly put in use or execute anything for the extolling, advancement, setting forth, maintenance or defence of any such pretended or usurped jurisdiction, power, preheminence, and authority, or any part thereof, that then every such person and persons so doing and offending, their abettors, aiders, procurers, and counsellors, being thereof legally convicted and attainted, according to the due order and course of the common laws of this realm, for his or their first offence shall forfeit and lose unto your Highness, your heirs and successors, all his and their goods and chattels, as well real as personal,' and so on, 'so far as the same related to or in any wise concerned Roman Catholics; —and various other statutes should be repealed. Unfortunately, the Pope was not simply the head of the Church, but he did claim to be the temporal head of this and all other countries; and he was recognised by the Roman Catholics here as having a right to interfere in the politics of this country. ["No!"] He thanked hon. Members for that denial. But he held in his hand an address, moved by Mr. John O 'Connell, and addressed to his Holiness Pope Pius IX., which contained these words:— Most Holy Father—We, the Catholics of Ireland, venture to approach the foot of your throne with sentiments of the deepest humility, the most profound veneration, and the most devoted gratitude and grateful affection towards your Holiness, recognising in you the true example of what the vicar of Christ should be upon earth, not only the faithful guardian and protector of his Church, but the guardian, protector, promoter, and illustrious champion of the rights, the liberties, and the legitimate and well-ordered privileges, political and social, of the universal family of man. It has been fitly reserved for you, most Holy Father, to vindicate—as nobly you are vindicating—the eternal cause of truth, in the great argument now debating among the nations of the earth. It is your high mission to strip oligarchic tyranny and democratic anarchy of their false pretences, and to establish in the face of day, and patent to the universe, the great fact, so redolent with happiness to man, and safe and peaceful progress to society, and with advantage to the sacred interests of morality and religion, that the increase of popular power, and the making of it an essential element in the governing of a country, is most entirely consistent with the maintenance of order and legitimate authority—nay, more, is accessory and eminently useful to that most desirable end. Would any hon. Member say "No" to that? The document continued— We claim, most Holy Father, we claim—under the guidings and teachings of one now gone from amongst us, to whose mortal remains you so generously vouchsafed to do honour—we, Catholic people of Ireland, do claim to have commenced that good and glorious work your Holiness is so splendidly carrying out. We have been labouring to show, and you have been appointed by Heaven to establish, that the advancement of popular liberty has no necessary connexion with lawless and bloody revolution, or with any violation whatever of the rights of property, or danger to the peace and welfare of society. And then, in reference to Ireland, it continued— Alas, alas! prayers are all poor Ireland has now to give. Impoverished, unjustly subjugated, trampled upon, famine-stricken, helpless, she cannot bear you the aid that willingly her sons would give you with their heart's best blood. She can only look forward to hope for, and endeavour still to struggle for that restoration of her natural and inalienable rights which shall enable her to resume her place among the nations, and to perform, well and boldly, her part in the glorious struggle now progressing under the illustrious guidance of your Holiness, for the social and political regeneration of mankind. But, what he called upon that House to consider, was nothing relating to the clergy of this or that establishment, but that the history of Europe had been one continued struggle of laymen against the usurped rights of priestcraft. The whole of their history, from the Constitutions of Clarendon down to the Reformation, had been one continued struggle to keep the priests in their proper places; and he called upon that House to consider what was the evidence given by a Roman Catholic relating to Ireland before a Committee of that House. The witness said— The Roman Catholic priests have aimed at supreme authority—all concessions only lead to further demands ad infinitum. He had heard in other countries that the priests were urged on; but in Ireland the priests were almost the sole agitators. There were several other extracts to the same effect. The witness, Mr. Wolfe Tone, said— You will find it easy enough to deal with the Roman Catholic laity, for their objects are those of simple constitutional Irishmen: but I confess I do not see my way with respect to the priesthood; and I would not trust them as long as anything was to be gained. [Mr. JOHN O'CONNELL: Mr. Wolfe Tone was not a Roman Catholic] He was obliged for the correction. He had been reading, in the first instance, the evidence of a Mr. Carroll, and had read on, thinking it was all the evidence of Mr. Wolfe Tone. They thought they had got a great deal when they passed the law, forbidding Jesuits to come into England; but they had always been in England, and would come in just as often as they pleased. The Jesuits might, in certain things, have gone beyond others; but many of their doctrines and principles were the doctrines and principles of the Catholic Church. Upon the doctrine of obedience, he held in his hand a proof of their constitution. Not only that, but they said that every man was bound to be as a carcass in the hands of his superior. They went on to say, that every one was obliged to receive the word of his superior, as if it were the word of our blessed Lord; and they took even this illustration, that a cookboy was to receive the word of the cook as if it were the word of the Saviour. They said first— Tous doivent s'efforcer d'observer le mieux possible I'obéissance, et d'y exceller, non seulement dans ce qui est obligatoire, mais encore dans tout le reste, et cela sur un simple signe de la volonté du supérieur, sans aucun ordre exprès. And then— Quand quelqu'un entrera pour le service de la cuisine ou pour aider le cuisinier, il devra obéir à celui-ci en toute humilité, dans toutes les choses qui ont rapport à son office. Car s'il ne lui prêtait pas une entière obéssance, il y a lieu de croire qu'il n'obéirait non plus à aucun des supérieurs, puisque la veritable obéissance ne considère pas la personne à qui elle se soumet, mais celle pour qui elle se soumet; et si c'est pour notre seul Créateur et Seigneur qu'elle se soumet, elle doit voir notre Seigneur dans chacun indifféremment. Il ne faut done point regarder si c'est le cuisinier ou le supérieur de la maison, si c'est celui-ci ou celui-là qui commande, puisqa'à penser sainement ce n'est à aucun d'eux qu'on obéit, mais à Dieu seul et pour Dieu seul, notre Créateur et Seigneur. C'est pourquoi il sera mieux quo le cuisinier ne prie point celui qui le sert de faire ceci ou cela, mais qu'il le lui commande avec modestie, ou dise, 'Faites ceci, faites cela.' S'il le priait, en effet, il ressemblerait plutôt à un homme qui parle à un homme; or qu'un cuisinier laique priât un prêtre de laver les marmites ou de faire toute autre chose semblable, c'est ce qui ne paraÎtrait ni convenable ni juste. Mais s'il commande, ou qu'il dise, 'Faites ceci, faites cela,' il donnera bien plus à entendre qu'il parle comme Christ à un homme, puisqu'il commande au nom même de Jésus Christ. Ainsi celui qui obéit doit considérer les paroles qui sortent de la bouche du cuisinier ou de l'un des supérieurs, comme si elles sortaient de la bouche même de Jesus Christ notre Seigneur, afin de se rendre capable de plaire à la Divine Majesté. That was their doctrine of obedience, and every layman who dared to discuss with a priest any point of religion was silenced by that doctrine. They were commanded to obey—they were not permitted to reason. [Mr. SHEIL: That applied to the lay brothers of the Jesuits.] It was the doctrine of obedience throughout the Church. There was no difference of doctrine for others. But, if the right hon. Gentleman would like it, there was another authority, the Theologia Dogmatica of Livourier. For his own part, he would act towards the Roman Catholics as he would towards the laymen of any other communion; but he said that, for the aggrandisement of the priests, they had ever been, from the time of Constantine, when they first assumed temporal power, to this day, in a greater or less degree, the lords over God's heritage. He therefore earnestly prayed that House to reject this Bill in its present frame.

The EARL of ARUNDEL AND SURREY

said, he had heard with great pleasure much of what had fallen from the hon. Member who had just spoken, in which he had asserted the rights of the Church; but he was not prepared to admit the fairness of the hon. Member's quotations with respect to obedience, and his further application of them to all members of the Roman Catholic Church. It was, he had almost said, ridiculous to compare the voluntary obedience entered into by the religious orders with the obedience exacted from the laity. And it must never be forgotten that the obedience even of the religious orders did not extend to the commission of the smallest venial sin: the whole earth must perish rather than the smallest venial sin be committed. The hon. Member had made the assertion that the Catholic laity admitted the temporal rights of the Pope. To support the statement he had read an extract from a resolution; but he (the Earl of Arundel and Surrey) had not heard the words in which this document was couched; and, indeed, he did not care for its purport. The Catholic laity did not acknowledge the temporal rights of the Pope, and this was sufficiently evidenced in the oath which was taken by the Roman Catholic Members of that House. The oath was, "I do declare that I do not believe that the Pope of Rome or any other foreign power, prince, or potentate, ought to have or has any temporal jurisdiction, control, or pre-eminence, directly or indirectly, within these realms." It was, therefore, unnecessary to say any more on that subject. Allusion had been made to the late rescript of the Pope in Ireland respecting the Roman Catholic colleges. The view taken with regard to that rescript was not exactly fair; it had been said that it was an interference with an Act of Parliament. The Act of Parliament founding the colleges in question was not compulsory. Supposing that Parliament had made laws directing that a certain number of churches should be built, and that the whole of the Roman Catholic population should be forced to attend divine service in those churches, the Pope, as a matter of course, would at once issue a rescript forbidding such attendance, and that rescript would most certainly he obeyed. In such a case, however, a just complaint might be made that the Pope had interfered with an Act of Parliament, that Act of Parliament being essentially of a compulsory character; but when their law left it optional with those for whom it was intended whether to accept or to reject it, it was absurd to say that the Pope's prohibition was an interference with the decrees of the Legislature. He could not venture to predict what course would for the future be pursued in the matter of those colleges; he did not know that any concession would be made, on one side or the other, which was likely to produce the results so anxiously looked for by the friends of the colleges; and he was not aware that any compromise was in contemplation or was probable. It was altogether a different question whether the establishment of the colleges would be beneficial or otherwise; but he would say, as a Catholic, rather than that the bishops and priests of his Church should yield in the conscientious exertion of their spiritual rights either to the diplomacy or to the menaces of the civil power, he would prefer that the Catholics of the world should be driven forth as the Jews were by the Roman soldiers of Titus—that the Pope should be driven from the Vatican to take refuge in the Catacombs—and that the ploughshare should be passed over the ground where now stood the altars of St. Peter. The hon. Member (Mr. Drummond) had said that ever since the recognition of Christianity, the history of religion had been one perpetual exertion of the laity in resistance to the usurpation of priestly power. But was the civil power to be predominant? Was there to be no line drawn? It did not follow, because these was separation and equality, that there was danger from priestcraft. No one would deny that the Church of God ought to be left independent in her own jurisdiction; and it was impossible a greater catastrophe could occur to a Christian than to see his church submitted to the control of the civil power. The bull "In cœnâ Domini" had been referred to; and he was the more anxious to allude to it as an explanation given in another place was not satisfactory. It was a bull published annually, and it had not been published since the time of Clement the XIVth—since 1774. It was originally published in this country in the 14th century. It was a bull against pirates, different descriptions of bad men, and heretics. The Church of England, by her canons of 1603, still in force, excommunicated all without her communion. What was good for one, was good for the other. It had been said that the Church was aggressive. Why, all churches were so. He would not give twopence for the church which was not so. If it believed that it was in the possession of the truth, why should it not make aggression on error? Why should it not evince an anxiety that others should embrace the true faith, as well as itself? He looked upon the aggressions of a church as a mark of its sincerity. Allusion had been made to the circumstance of this country having been divided into districts, by the Catholic Church, for ecclesiastical purposes: but he was at a loss to understand on what plea that fact could be interpreted into a cause of offence. Other bodies, for example the Wesleyans, had likewise apportioned the country into districts for ecclesiastical purposes, without reference to the civil power, and no one had dreamt of taking umbrage at the proceeding; and he did not see why that which was done with impunity by one class, should be alleged as an offence against another. With regard to the Bill, he would support it. He was of opinion that to prevent men from joining together to yield obedience to the evangelical councils of perfection was unwise, injudicious, and intolerant, and ought not to be permitted in any Christian country. If the laws which had been directed against the Jesuits and regular clergy were, as some hon. Members contended they were, wholly inoperative, why not sweep them away? What good purpose could be insured by retaining on the Statute-book laws which did not accomplish the object which was in the contemplation of those who enacted them? If, on the other hand, they were really effective, and did, in point of fact, exclude Jesuits and the regular Catholic clergy from this country, they were not only an indignity but an injury, and an injustice to the Catholic community, who had not anything like an adequate number of priests to supply their spiritual requirements. Their priests had been struck down in great numbers by fever—many of them had fallen victims to cholera when that dreadful scourge visited this country—and many more of them would no doubt fall if unhappily it were again to visit it. In one word, the Catholics wanted more priests—they ought to have them—and any measure which would prevent their obtaining them must be a burden and an injustice.

MR. H. WALPOLE

would not wander from the subject into any digression on the discipline of the Roman Catholic Church; and in the observations he should offer to the House he would attempt to conciliate rather than to exasperate. The Bill was the only question they had to entertain; and, if he had understood the proposition aright, there were but two principles to be discussed, the one of which it was useless to consider, and the other of which he believed to be objectionable. The first was, whether they should repeal the penalties and disabilities of certain antiquated statutes supposed to exist. It was useless to consider this principle, for if those antiquated statutes did operate, no one could be more willing than he would be to repeal each and all of them; and before he sat down he hoped to be able to convince the House that there was no necessity for going into Committee, so far as those statutes were concerned. With regard to the second principle now involved, whether they ought to repeal any of the provisions in the Act of 1829, he would stand on that point, and he would argue against the proposal on a ground which might be equally acceptable to Protestants and to Roman Catholics—that for the sake of religious peace it was but right and reasonable there should be an end of all further sectarian contest. This Bill proposed to deal with eight different statutes, and as to the first six of these, as he would show, not one of the penalties or disabilities therein contained now remained. The first was the 1st of Elizabeth, c. 1; that statute declared that if any person maintained the authority or jurisdiction of any foreign prince within these realms, he should be liable to certain penalties, the first of which was forfeiture of goods and chattels; the second, præmunire; and the third, punishment for high treason. The last two penalties had been repealed by the 7th and 8th of Victoria, c. 102; and the first, that of forfeiture, had been repealed by the Bill of the right hon. Baronet the Member for Tamworth, 9th and 10th of Victoria, c. 59. It was a misdemeanor at common law to violate a statute, if the statute continued operative; but when the penalties fixed in an enactment were repealed, every lawyer knew that everything depending upon that enactment became void. The supremacy of the Queen did not depend upon these clauses or upon another clause in the Act of Elizabeth, declaratory that no usurped authority should have jurisdiction within these realms; it depended upon common law, which was common sense, that the supreme power in the kingdom should be supreme, notwithstanding the interference of any prince from abroad. The 13th of Elizabeth, c. 2, prohibiting bulls from coming into this country, had been repealed by the 9th and 10th of Victoria, c. 59, so far as related to penalties for the introduction of such instruments into the kingdom; but, at the same time, no sanction or legality was given to bulls. They were called bulls of consolation or absolution, absolving any Roman Catholic subject who forsook "his due obedience to the Queen (in the words of the statute), and denied Her lawful authority;" and it was clear that no Roman Catholic could now wish such a bull to be admitted. The 13th and 14th of Charles II., c. 4, was repealed by the 9th and 10th of Victoria, c. 59, so far as related to the offence of wittingly and willingly being present at any other form of common prayer than our own, and, in point of fact, this offensive clause was not in the 13th and 14th of Charles II., but in the 5th and 6th of Edward VI., c. 5, which again had been repealed by the 7th and 8th Victoria, c. 59. The 25th of Charles II., c. 2, requiring all persons entering on office to take certain oaths not permitted by the Catholic religion—to accept of the sacrament—and forbidding the education of children by Roman Catholics—had been repealed by the Test and Corporation Act, 9th George IV. as regarded persons being admitted into office; by the 10th George IV. as to taking the sacrament; and by the 7th and 8th Victoria, c. 102, as to the education of Roman Catholic children. The next Act proposed now to be got rid of was the 30th of Charles II., c. 2, disabling Papists from sitting in either House of Parliament; but this had also been already repealed by the 10th George IV., c. 7, and the 9th and 10th Victoria, c. 59; and with respect to the last statute, the 7th and 8th William III., c. 24, requiring certain other oaths to be taken by Roman Catholic barristers, under particular circumstances, that had been superseded by the 34th George III., c. 32. Each of these statutes, therefore, was inoperative; and he thought it was misleading the House to ask it to consent to a Bill in which those several Acts were recited. He now came to that statute of George III., intended to be repealed, called the Roman Catholic Relief Act; and here he took his stand as an opponent of the Bill. There were, he conceived, three reasons why it was neither right nor reasonable to make at this period any material alteration in the Act of George III. They had, first, to inquire if it was expedient to allow the Roman Catholics to exercise the rights and ceremonies of their Church in public places; next, if they would permit any person holding a civil or judicial office to wear the insignia of that office in any places of worship excepting such as were in connexion with the Established Church; and, thirdly, whether it was wise to grant to the monastic orders of the Roman Catholic religion introduction and indulgence in this kingdom. He thought that the fact of religious ceremonies being exercised by the Roman Catholics in public places would occasion irritation to the general feeling of the community. Dissension would be thus assuredly promoted between the Roman Catholics and the Protestants, and it seemed to him that no one desired to see such proceedings. There was no principle of toleration involved; and why should they attempt to conciliate those with whom they differed, by giving offence to those with whom they agreed? With regard to the next point, he did not know why an official or dignitary should desire to wear the insignia of his office in any place of public worship: such a parade accorded little with the humility which, on such occasions, should be the characteristic of every man's demeanour; and, instead of extending this so-called privilege to those who had it not, he should rather be inclined to take it away from those who had it. If, however, the practice was to continue, and if the Established Church was to remain predominant, it would be hardly decorous for the authorities of that religion to wear the insignia of their authority anywhere but where the ritual of the Establishment was complied with. These were two reasons why he should object to the Bill; and he now proceeded to the third proposition. He was well aware that this was a part of the Bill which the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Anstey) and those whose religious opinions were identical, were exceedingly anxious to carry. He wished to be understood, however, as not opposing the Bill from any feelings of religious intolerance. He resisted, because toleration did not require that he should concede—because the fullest exercise of his religion was not prohibited to the Roman Catholic—and because he was convinced that the extra liberty demanded would not harmonise with the spirit and temper of a Protestant Government. When laws like the Roman Catholic Relief Bill had been passed, it was well to consider them as permanent and final. If they encouraged a contrary conviction, they afforded opportunities to the discontented and seditious to rake up all kinds of animosities, and to re-create causes for contention which would otherwise be consigned to oblivion. If such laws were not spoken of and looked upon as final, the Legislature would be constantly petitioned to go further than they had yet gone; there would be perpetual entreaties for modifications and amendments; and thus they would again rouse the dangerous spirit of religious rivalry under the mistaken colours of religious zeal, withholding satisfaction from the one party, and security from the other. They could not show that the Roman Catholic Relief Act was wrong in principle or unjust in operation, and he did not, therefore, see any necessity for repealing or altering it. Locke had defined toleration as the permission and enjoyment of every political, civil, and social right which did not prey upon the public peace, or interfere with the wellbeing of the State; but the same philosopher pointed out that toleration could not safely be given to any society which by its constitution delivered itself up to the control and direction of a foreign potentate. If, he said, such toleration be granted, we enlisted the people of the country as soldiers against the Government. And if that definition were just, he (Mr. Walpole) asked, was it not reasonable that an association of men such as the Order of Jesus should, as a matter of State security, be deprived of admission into this country, when they did, ipso facto, "deliver themselves up to the authority of a foreign Power?" This was a society of which the laws were peculiar to itself; it was a society under the superintendence of a general who must reside abroad; it was a society which devoted itself, as a matter of conscience, to the conversion of all those whom it differed from, and regarded and treated them as heretics and unbelievers; it was a society inveterately opposed to the Protestant religion; it was a society which was devoted to obtain the ascendancy of its own opin- ions above all others, and therefore could not rest satisfied until it had attained that object. Was it, then, reasonable that a society of this kind should be allowed to come into this country for the express purpose of combating our opinions and system as contrary to its own? And if such a society were so allowed to come in, could it possibly operate for the wellbeing of the people? Other countries, he reminded the House, regarded this matter in a very different light. How many countries had abolished or expelled this society from their precincts? France had done so, Spain had done so, Sicily had done so; and even the Pope himself had issued his bull against them in 1773; and in that bull the society were said to have applied and used maxims noxious to morals, and that unless it was suppressed, the Church of Christ never could recover true and lasting peace. Those were the words of that remarkable bull. He asked why that society was now to be introduced into this country, to bring along with it confusion and religious differences? If it were necessary to the Catholic religion, he would not enforce this opposition; but they were not necessary. If Roman Catholic States had thought it fit and found it expedient to abolish and expel this society, why, he asked, should we, a Protestant country, give admission to its members? Such were briefly the main objections he entertained to this measure; and the House would observe that those objections rested on two grounds: the first, that two-thirds of the Bill were useless; and the second, that the remaining third was decidedly objectionable. Further, he objected to this measure, because when a settlement of a great question had been made, it was impolitic to disturb it; and upon this point he might quote the authority of the noble Lord at the head of the Government for not proceeding with this measure; for when the noble Lord came into power in July, 1846, in answering a speech made by an hon. Member whom ill-health prevented from being at present in his place—the hon. Member for Fins-bury—the noble Lord, in one of those general propositions which he often so ably laid down, containing in a small compass a large constitutional maxim, said, that when a great measure was once settled, it was wise in that House, wise in the Legislature and Parliament, to abide by that settlement; "for," the noble Lord added, "the advantages to be gained by the alteration are not equivalent to the irritation consequent upon the revival of the subject." These were his (Mr. Walpole's) chief reasons for opposing this measure. He believed that the maintenance of the last great settlement of this question was necessary in this country for the preservation of peace. He conscientiously believed that unless that settlement was maintained intact, religious peace could not exist in these realms. He believed that if anything would enable us to live in harmony with one another, without the renewal of religious animosities and exacerbation, it was that settlement. He believed that that settlement would not only prevent those animosities, but also that aggression on the one side which was always sure to be met with retaliation on the other; and that it would give us a chance—perhaps the only chance—of maintaining that harmony and concord which ever ought to prevail among Christian men; he did not mean harmony in matters of faith or doctrine, because that he knew to be utterly impossible while man was man, with such various feelings, such diversity of habits, and such different degrees of knowledge and understanding; but he meant that better kind of unity which it was the common interest and duty of all to promote and uphold—the unity which arose out of mutual charity, mutual kindness, mutual goodwill. To maintain the principle, he thought that the best way was to act upon the maxim of the noble Lord, and to abide by the settlement of this question which took place in 1829, unless it could be shown that there was some intolerable evil which must be remedied. If that settlement were not maintained, they would imbue the Protestant minds of this country with the impression, and would induce the people to believe, that all the concessions that had been made were only used as arguments for still further advances; that they were aiming at more than they were willing to allow; that in asking for toleration, equality was meant; that in asking for equality, establishment was intended; and that in asking for establishment, nothing would really give satisfaction but ascendancy.

SIR G. GREY

I rise to occupy the time of the House but a very few moments while I state, as briefly as I can, in answer to the appeal of the hon. and learned Gentleman opposite, the reasons why I cannot join him in his opposition to the principles of this measure. In the first place, however, I must say, that this is not a Bill to which I attach any great weight and importance; for I do not believe that the laws which are sought to be repealed are laws which do in fact impose any practical grievance on our Roman Catholic fellow-subjects. I feel, however, bound at the same time to state, that the views which I expressed to the House at an earlier period of the present year, on the occasion of the discussion upon a similar Bill brought forward by my hon. and learned Friend then the Member for Kinsale, remain unaltered, namely, that it would be wise and expedient, acting in that spirit of mutual kindness and charity which I, equally with the hon. and learned Gentleman opposite, should rejoice to see animating the professors of all creeds, to remove from the Statute-book those Acts, practically and substantially repealed, as the hon. Member for Oxford stated, and which the hon. and learned Gentleman opposite believes to be for the most part literally repealed, but which, nevertheless, by remaining actually upon the Statute-book, the penalties only being remitted, do tend, as I think, to inspire and keep up these feelings of mutual repugnance and aversion which the hon. and learned Gentleman himself has, in language with which I most cordially concur, expressed his ardent desire to see abolished. I agree with the hon. and learned Gentleman that this Bill consists of two parts; the first being that which proposes the repeal of certain obsolete statutes; and the second, that which proposes to repeal certain portions of the Act of 1829. With respect to the first part, when the hon. and learned Gentleman observes that these ancient statutes were practically and sufficiently repealed by the Act of the late Government of which the right hon. Baronet the Member for Tamworth was the head, I must remind that hon. and learned Member, that this very year the right hon. Baronet, himself one of the authors of that Act which in the opinion of the hon. and learned Gentleman has removed all the grievances which press upon the Roman Catholics, gave his cordial concurrence and support to the second reading of the Bill proposed by Mr. Watson. I must also remind the hon. and learned Gentleman, that the object of the first part of this Bill, namely, the repeal of these old statutes, is in accordance with the recommendation of the Criminal Law Commission; and that a distinction was drawn in the House of Lords between the repeal of the Acts themselves, and the repeal only of the penalties inflicted by those Acts; and it was contended that while the Acts remained on the Statute-book, a breach of them would be a misdemeanor at common law. The hon. Gentleman opposite, the Member for Surrey (Mr. H. Drummond), has adverted to the words of this Bill, and said it was proposed to repeal the Act against maintaining the authority of a foreign potentate, and assumed that that authority was exclusively of a civil nature; but if the hon. Member will have the goodness to look at the Act proposed to be repealed, he will see that the words are directed against those who maintain or defend the authority or jurisdiction, "spiritual or ecclesiastical;" and the hon. and learned Gentleman himself has admitted that the Roman Catholics maintain the spiritual jurisdiction of the Pope. Thus what is considered the spiritual duty of the Roman Catholic, is prohibited by the Act proposed to be repealed; and although the distinct penalties under that statute are doubtless abrogated, yet the Act itself remains upon the Statute-book. As to there being no practical grievance, I think that although no such grievance may arise from these Acts, we are bound to defer to the feelings of our Roman Catholic fellow-subjects, and to remove what may be offensive to them, and which, it is admitted, has no practical or beneficial effect. With respect to the second part of the Bill, I must repeat what I have before said, that, although I may not be disposed to go the whole length of the doctrine of the hon. and learned Gentleman as to the finality of the Bill of 1829, yet I still think that at an early period—within a few years—of the settlement of a great question, it is not in general wise or expedient to attempt to disturb that settlement. Therefore I do not give my assent to that part of the Bill which proposes to repeal the provisions of the Act of 1829. At the same time we might, perhaps, consider certain parts of that Bill with a view to see if the securities which now exist, with reference to certain religious orders, might not be removed, and others substituted of a less vexatious nature; but I do not think that we ought to dispense with all securities, and I am not one of those who sympathise with persons who view with satisfaction the increase of those religious orders. With regard to religious processions, I entirely agree in what has fallen from the hon. and learned Gentleman, and object to the celebration of Catholic rites in any public place. That objection was made last year, and the hon. Gentleman who then had charge of the Bill undertook to meet the objection. The hon. Gentleman who has now brought forward the Bill, has introduced a clause for this purpose which does not go perhaps to the full extent which is required, but which is evidently intended to meet that objection. I do not agree in the opinion that on the second reading of the Bill, we are. to oppose it on account of verbal objections, or deal with a Bill on the second reading as if the third reading had been moved; that is a doctrine which I never remember to have heard stated so broadly as I have to-day by my hon. Friend the Member for the University of Oxford, and of which I cannot approve. I think the clause introduced an improvement. It may still require amendment; but we should not object to a Bill because there are clauses in it that require alteration, and which can he properly considered in Committee. I hope I have satisfied the hon. Gentleman now as to the course I shall take; and if he asks for the opinion of the House, I will vote for the second reading.

MR. PLUMPTRE

begged to contradict a statement which had been made in the course of the debate by a noble Lord opposite (the Earl of Arundel and Surrey). That noble Lord had said the bull In Cœna Domini had not been published in this country since 1774; but he would assert that it was published subsequent to the passing of the Relief Bill in the year 1829. He considered that those aggressions of the Church of Rome might have the effect of rousing the Protestant feeling of the country in a contrary direction; and he hoped they would have that effect. They were going on step by step since those concessions were first made, and concession had not been anything else but the parent of demand. The Bill at present before the House was part of that system. He firmly believed that the real aim of it was to give equality; and if equality were once attained, they would not be satisfied until they acquired ascendancy. He regretted that men who called themselves Protestants should countenance such a system; and believing it was one of aggression, and that the Roman Catholics had nothing to complain of as regarded the exercise of their religion, he should give his hearty opposition to this measure.

The EARL of ARUNDEL AND SURREY

explained. He had asserted strongly that the bull In Cœna Domini had not been published since the year 1774. That assertion was denied by the hon. Gentleman who last addressed the House; and he again denied the statement made by the hon. Gentleman. He had now only to say that he had merely stated what was his full conviction; but if he found on inquiry that he was mistaken, he would communicate the fact to the hon. Gentleman. He would say he believed the bull had never been directed against the Queen of this country. It was directed against heretics, but was not directed against the sovereign power.

MR. J. O'CONNELL

would have contentedly left the discussion on this stage of the Bill to the enlightened Protestant Members of that House, had not the allegiance of himself and his Roman Catholic fellow-subjects of these realms to Queen Victoria been denied. He rose then for the purpose of stating that he rejected all sort of temporal allegiance to the Pope or any other foreign potentate, as strongly as he rejected all spiritual allegiance to Queen Victoria. With regard to what hon. Members had said as to the vows of obedience to ecclesiastical superiors, which were taken by the members of religious orders in the Catholic Church, he wished the House to bear in mind that that vow of obedience did not extend to obedience in matters that the members might consider as involving a breach of the laws of virtue; they were not compelled to do anything which they might deem to be an infraction of the law of God. The vows which they took imposed upon them the responsibility of obeying all the orders of their superiors, however revolting they might be to human pride, as long as they were not infractions of God's laws. The hon. Member for East Surrey had spoken on the mixed marriages question. Now, the Catholic clergy did not want to assert that such marriages were invalid. They recognised them as valid; but they refused to give their spiritual sanction to the principles of such marriages. The Catholic clergy of Prussia had, in some instances, attended such marriages as civil ceremonies. They recognised the efficiency of them as civil contracts; but they certainly did refuse to extend to them their spiritual sanction, and for that they were persecuted. The hon. and learned Member for Midhurst (Mr. Walpole) began his speech by saying that it was useless to keep down the Jesuits in this country by statutes; that they would continue to increase in spite of the Acts of the Legislature to keep them down; and yet, towards the close of his speech, he argued for their exclusion. He perfectly agreed with the hon. and learned Member; and he was sure that the House and the country must by this time have found that the statutes against their increase were and must be inoperative and entirely defeated; and he was, therefore, surprised that the hon. and learned Member advocated the maintenance of such useless provisions, which were operative for no other purpose than that of giving insult and offence to the Roman Catholic subjects of Her Majesty. The hon. Gentleman had also spoken on the legal points of the question raised by the introduction of this Bill. Now, he did not mean to place his legal opinions against those of the hon. and learned Gentleman; all he would say at present was, that they had conflicting opinions of lawyers on the subject of the 13th of Elizabeth; and it would be but fair on the part of the House to allow this Bill to go into Committee. A clear conclusion might be come to on that point. He, as a Catholic, most fully agreed in what had been said by the hon. and learned Member on the subject of religious processions. He thought that nothing was more to be deprecated, even by Catholics themselves, than the bringing into the streets of that object which they held in adoration, or of those which they held in reverence, which might be dishonoured by and must necssarily give offence to their Protestant fellow-subjects. On those grounds he should be prepared to sanction the introduction of a most stringent provision in this Bill against such processions. He was very happy to hear an hon. Member opposite stigmatise the bull In Cæna Domini as a mere brutum fulmen, which ought to be got rid of. Well, now if that bull was a mere brutum, fulmen, was it not inconsistent to retain on the Statute-book penalties in relation to it, which served no other purpose than that of giving offence to a large portion of the subjects of these realms? With regard to the details of this Bill, he should not enter into a discussion of them at present: the Committee—which he hoped the House would allow it to pass into—would afford a more fitting opportunity for so doing. But he could not pass by what had been said by the hon. Member for the University of Oxford. That hon. Gentleman had chal- lenged the advocates of this Bill to produce a single case in which an indictment had been laid during the last 150 years against any party for a breach of those parts of the penal statutes which it was the purpose of the Bill to abolish. Why, he would ask that Gentleman whether the absence of any such indictment during go long a period, was not an additional reason why they ought to get rid of the inoperative portions of the penal laws against Catholics? With regard to the late decision of his Holiness the Pope, respecting education in Ireland, he was glad to hear the right hon. Baronet express his opinion that that was by no means an invasion, on the part of his Holiness, of the temporal authority of the Queen. The Catholics of Ireland had reverently looked forward to the Pope to give such a decision as should enable them to guard the education of their youth against any danger to their faith or morals, and to secure them against the teachings of infidel and unchristian professors. The Pope had every right to give his decision on such matters; and by that decision the Catholics of Ireland would most implicitly abide.

MR. NEWDEGATE

rose merely for the purpose of making one observation. There appeared to him to be a difference between the opinions of the hon. and learned Member for Midhurst, and the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Home Department, with reference to the efficiency of the various enactments proposed to be repealed by this Bill. Now, if his hon. Friend the Member for Midhurst was right in his opinion on the legal view of the question, he cordially agreed with him that it was most unwise for them to go into Committee upon this Bill for the purpose of effecting a repeal of obsolete provisions. But if the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Home Department was right in his opinion that those provisions were still operative in common law, he begged the House to consider what it was about to do. What were the provisions of the Act of Elizabeth, which this Bill proposed to repeal? They excluded the power of any foreign potentate. But if they sanctioned the passing of this Bill, they would, by so doing, declare that it should be lawful for any person or persons dwelling in this realm, or any other of Her Majesty's realms or dominions, to teach or preach, in words or acts, advisedly and maliciously, the maintenance of power, spiritual or ecclesiastical, by any foreign prince or potentate. They would, if they passed this Bill, directly sanction the introduction of such foreign power. He, therefore, must say, that it was with deep regret that he saw the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Home Department declare his belief that, as those enactments were operative under the common law, he was prepared, at all events, to take into consideration in Committee this attempt to remove them. This was really a very serious matter. It made him believe that the reports which he had heard were true, as to the Government having a secret agent at the Court of Rome—with which, by the constitution of this country, they were forbidden to have any communication. He begged the House to consider another point. It had been denied that the Pope exercised any ecclesiastical power beyond the limits of his own dominions. Now, he had referred once before to a most important document, the encyclical letter of the present Pope on his inauguration. And what did his Holiness himself say in that document? After claiming for himself all those powers which his predecessors had exercised—after claiming for himself an infallible authority—he said he trusted that all princes, remembering in their piety and religion, that the power which they possessed in the government of the world was given to them with the view that they might thereby promote the honour of the Church of Rome, which he declared to be the only Catholic Church; and that, so long as they did that, they should hold their kingdoms and powers in undisturbed possession; so that the Pope declared that the conditions on which they held their powers were the maintenance of the dignity and integrity of the Church of Rome. He had no wish to intrude upon the House; but, after the specific declaration of the right hon. Baronet, he must beg the House seriously to consider before they allowed the Bill to go into Committee, whether this Bill, if passed, would not sanction the introduction of a foreign Power. He wished for one moment to advert to the other provisions of this Bill. If the enactments which it proposed to repeal were operative under the common law, they were about to go into Committee for the purpose of repealing them, and thereby legally exempting all practitioners at the bar from taking those oaths which were now required to be taken, and which were considered essential to the safety of the State. They were about to sanction the legalization of the wearing of habits, by members of orders in the Roman Catholic Church, in public. He most willingly and most cordially concurred in the eloquent appeal which had been made by the hon. Member for Midhurst, that that House would not, for any such reason, for any such object as the right hon. Baronet opposite thought was contemplated by this Bill, disturb a long-settled question, the unsettlement of which might cause years of religious animosity.

MR. W. E. GLADSTONE

In some respects, Sir, it is my misfortune that I am unable to give the same vote on this measure as my hon. Colleague; and I should not think it respectful to him, nor should I think it respectful to the distinguished constituency which I have the honour to represent, if I gave my first vote upon a subject necessarily interesting to them—although I have no means of knowing their feelings upon it—without stating the grounds upon which I give that vote. I must say, that there are several arguments of a general nature which I cannot but think ought to be set aside in arriving at a decision on this subject. Frequent allusion has been made to the aggressive activity of the Church of Rome in this country. I am necessarily among those who deplore any consequences which that activity may have produced; but I cannot think it by any means either the obvious or just consequence of such regrets that we should be impelled to a precipitate conclusion upon a measure like the present. We must look at that measure upon its own merits; and we must look with jealousy at any argument which would lead and induce us to stop religious activity by a political enactment. In justice, as well as in common sense and prudence, we ought to look to the zeal, fidelity, energy, and activity of those of our own profession for the defence and dissemination of our principles, as the only means upon which we can expect a blessing, and as the only legitimate and proper means for arresting the activity of the Church of Rome, or of any other religious body. Then it is said that there is no practical grievance. Here again I consider that, although not devoid of weight, this argument cannot be deemed so conclusive as to influence us upon this question. Here is a large body of our fellow-subjects who feel a great interest in the matter now before us, who do not allege, at least with respect to a large portion of the Bill, any practical grievance, but who do allege wounded feelings; and it appears to me undeniable, that the fact of these statutes wounding the feelings of a portion of our fellow-subjects, in default of any positive object to be gained by them, tells all the other way, and affords a good reason for their repeal. But it has been said by an hon. Gentleman behind me, to the excellent temper and conspicuous ability of whose speech I must bear my willing testimony, that there is a danger of re-awakening religious clamour upon the subject by fresh legislation. I confess that, although there maybe such a danger, owing to a variety of circumstances, yet upon the whole I still feel that we must look to the justice of the provisions contained in the Bill. If those provisions are unjust, it is not necessary to resort to the fear of clamour in order to insure their rejection; but if they are just, we must trust, as we have often trusted, and seldom in vain, to the good sense and good feeling of our fellow-countrymen, and do what is just, in spite of the apprehension of clamour. Having disposed of these general considerations in a manner which seems to me conclusive, I shall now divide the few remarks I have to make upon the Bill into two parts: first, with reference to that part of the Bill which proposes to repeal the ancient statutes; and, second, with reference to that part which proposes to repeal a portion of the Act of 1829. With respect to the first part, which proposes to repeal the statutes or portions of the statutes antecedently to 1829, I confess I should have been glad to hear from the law officers of the Crown, or from the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Home Department, a more detailed statement of the present condition of the law exactly as it stands. I feel that there are a good many points touched by the first or earlier portion of the Bill, upon which I, for one—and I have attentively listened to this debate, as well as sought other sources of information—am greatly in the dark. With respect to that part which touches the Act of Supremacy, the 1st of Elizabeth, c. 1, I confess, until I hear the argument of the hon. Member for Midhurst answered, I cannot think the hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. Anstey), entitled to ask us to go into Committee upon it. The Bill quotes, verbatim et literatim, the clause of the Act of Supremacy which the hon. and learned Member seeks to repeal. Now, what is the structure of that clause? I need not read the clause; it will be suffi- cient to refer to its structure. It has been contended, on the one side, that the penalties of that clause have been repealed, but that the offence remains. The clause, as it stands, seems to me to read thus: "If any person shall maintain or defend the jurisdiction of the Pope or any other foreign Power in this country, and shall be thereof lawfully convicted and attainted according to the due order and course of the common laws of this realm, he shall suffer such and such penalties." If, however, the penalties be repealed, as has been stated, how does the matter then stand? Why, then there is a half sentence left on the Statute-book without any meaning whatever—that you have a law which says, "That if any person shall maintain the jurisdiction of the Pope in this country,"—and nothing more. If I am right in this construction of the clause, it does more than the hon. and learned Gentleman seeks to do, because if it be true that the penalties are removed, then that involves ipso facto the destruction of the whole clause, not only as respects the Roman Catholics, but as respects the members of the Church of England, and all other bodies whatsoever. I think, therefore, the hon. and learned Member will not be able to draw from this source any reason for our going into Committee on this part of his Bill. If it be true that the repeal of the penalties in this clause does not touch the offence at common law, as regards the question of the supremacy of Her Majesty, the hon. and learned Member had better leave the matter as he found it. With respect to the other Act of Elizabeth (13th of Elizabeth, c. 2), against the bringing in and putting in execution of "bulls, writings, or instruments, and other superstitious things from the See of Rome," the right hon. Baronet the Secretary for the Home Department has stated in general terms that the repeal of that Act was recommended by the Criminal Law Commissioners. I apprehend that in respect to this particular law the right hon. Baronet is in error. I believe that we did not have the authority of the Criminal Law Commissioners for going into Committee on this particular Act. I believe, also, that this law as it now stands simply prohibits the bringing in, not all bulls from the See of Rome, but only such as impeach due obedience to the Queen. If so, the law as it now stands, although not absolutely necessary for the safety of the country, is by no means an unreasonable law, and affords no sufficient ground for new legislation. But I think we all feel that the substantial question before us relates to the Act of 1829. The great and important question in the view of every Gentleman who has addressed the House is, whether are we prepared or not to touch any part of the settlement effected in 1829? For my own part, although sensible of the force of those considerations which make it exceedingly unwise, for the sake of a minute although clear benefit, to interfere with a recent comprehensive settlement of a question that has been long contested, yet, upon the whole—placing myself, or endeavouring to place myself, in the position of our Roman Catholic fellow-subjects—I do think that we cannot, with justice, and with due consideration to them, or with a full recognition of the principles upon which Parliament professes to act, adhere to the entire settlement of 1829. My hon. and learned Friend referred to the provisions of the Act of 1829, and to the compensatory securities laid down in that Act, with the qualifications that accompanied those terms; but surely the qualifications must be very light indeed, and a person must take a very sanguine and exaggerated view of the effect of those provisions, who can seriously propound them as securities to any vital, or even to any great, extent to the established institutions of the country. In my estimation, the hon. Gentleman who introduced this measure has shown good ground why we ought to go into Committee, in order that the fullest consideration may be given to the provisions of the Act of 1829; and in so expressing myself I believe I am only speaking the sentiments of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Ripon (Sir J. Graham), on a former occasion, when he was a Member of the Government to which I also belonged. The first proposition calling for notice is that which prohibits Roman Catholic ecclesiastics to exercise the rites and ceremonies of their religion, or to wear the habit of their order, except within some place of worship for the exercise of the Catholic religion. I concur with those who think that the Clause No. 2, on this subject, is not broad enough as a base of legislation. I think that the law as it now stands is too narrow and circumscribed, and that we should give further liberty, without prejudice to the public peace, or incurring the risk of offending the feelings of the country with respect to the performance of the religious rites of the Roman Catholic religion. With regard to the se- cond provision, that which forbids the use of any insignia of office in a Roman Catholic place of worship or elsewhere, except in a place of worship belonging to the Established Church, I am not prepared to consent to the repeal of that law. I do not regard it as an important matter whether these insignia are or are not carried to the church under any circumstances. I do not think it of vital importance whether the insignia of temporal office be or be not carried into the house of God. That is a question upon which a difference of opinion may fairly exist; but I do say, that if you continue the present Establishment, if you continue to the Church the position and standing of an Established Church, then I think the law is one in harmony with the existence of such an Establishment. I think, that carrying the insignia of office into the Established Church, is an appropriate and inoffensive acknowledgment of that Establishment, and that the practice should not be extended to others. We now come to the question that is unquestionably the most important on this subject, I mean the admission of religious orders into this country. I know well that we must look upon these religious orders in a religious and spiritual sense as in the highest degree antagonist—that we must expect from them the most active aggression against all that characterises our system of religion, or that does not belong to their own; but I cannot make up my mind that it is a sound or reasonable ground to exclude from this kingdom all persons, subjects of Her Majesty, and otherwise entitled to reside in it, for the simple reason that they belong to one of those religious orders. The hon. Member for Surrey has quoted with great effect some of the rules and principles that are incumbent on the Jesuits, and then argued that the whole of these were characteristic of the members of the Church of Rome, and the religious orders of that Church. Now, I cannot but draw a broad distinction between the Jesuits and the other religious orders of the Church of Rome. I will not weary the House by referring to original documents; but it appears to me that there is a spirit of exaggeration in the views of obedience and the principles laid down with respect to the doctrine of obedience amongst Jesuits, which, in certain circumstances, would render them dangerous to society as now constituted in this country. I will not raise the question whether any practical danger exists at this moment; but I do contend that the laws of the Society of the Jesuits are not, when they are judged in the abstract or letter, safe and secure laws, either for civil or national societies. But I have not heard any such charge advanced against the members, or the rules and principles, of any other religious order. Therefore I say it will not do on that ground to allow such a law as now exists to stand on the Statute-book. We may be fairly called upon, after the lapse of eighteen years, and after the great change that has taken place in the constitution of Parliament, and the many alterations which that Parliament has brought about—we may, I say, be fairly called upon to show cause for continuing those exclusions on the Statute-book. Good reason may be shown for protection of some kind with regard to parties like the Jesuits, who appear to lay down principles that clash with civil and political duties; but I can find no such cause with respect to the members of other religious orders. If you tell me that by their religious activity they are more dangerous than the secular clergy, my reply is, that they may possibly be so; but, whether truly or not, we have no right, on the ground of their superior religious activity, to exclude them from Her Majesty's dominions. I think, therefore, as regards the members of these orders, and looking closely to the reasons which exist for continuing these particular enactments—I do not know that they come under any obligation to render themselves dangerous members of society. I do not know that we are entitled to go so far as to demand of them that they shall be registered and placed under any kind of supervision, or, whether directly or implied, regarded as suspicious persons. As to the Jesuits, I certainly have certain reservations, and I consider that in Committee we shall be best able to settle what course ought to be followed on this important point of the question; but, with that reservation, it appears to me that the clause should be carried further than it has been. Permit me to say, that I think a case has been made out for entering into the further consideration of this Bill; and with that impression I shall record my vote for the second reading.

MR. SHEIL

I rise for the purpose of making a very few remarks, principally in reference to the very excellent speech—both morally and intellectually excellent—which has been pronounced by the hon. and learned Member for Midhurst. I agree fully in the definition which he has cited, as laid down by a great philosopher and champion of civil and religions liberty. But, with respect to that Act of 1829, let me state to the hon. and learned Member a singular and most remarkable circumstance, which I am sure he has overlooked in the speech which he has pronounced on this question, and which involves, as I have no doubt he will admit, a practical grievance. By the Act of 1829, Roman Catholics are excluded from the Chancellorship of Ireland. There is the strongest reason for excluding Roman Catholics from the Chancellorship of England, because the Lord Chancellor of England has great ecclesiastical patronage; and I believe that those who framed the Act of 1829 were under the impression at the time that Act was brought in that the Lord Chancellor of Ireland enjoyed ecclesiastical patronage analogous to that possessed by the Lord Chancellor of this country. But such is not the fact. The Lord Chancellor of Ireland has no ecclesiastical patronage what ever. And if the doctrine laid down by the hon. and learned Gentleman be well founded—if he adheres to his principles—I ask him for what reason, or rather under what pretence, a distinguished Catholic barrister is shut out from the highest honour of his profession. This is a practical grievance. Other grievances may be fanciful and imaginative, but this is a grievance that he will admit not to be imaginary; it is pregnant with grievous reality. We all remember, or most of us do, a most remarkable Member of this House—the late Sir Michael O'Loghlen, who, as Attorney General for Ireland, obtained the suffrages and applauses of men of all parties in this House, and who was afterwards raised to the office of Master of the Rolls, where he distinguished himself in such a manner that every one said, "What a wrong is it that this man cannot be Lord Chancellor of Ireland!" He was Master of the Rolls. There was also Mr. Woulfe, a Catholic, who had been raised to the office of Chief Baron of the Exchequer; and Mr. Pigot, also a Catholic, who now holds that office. A Roman Catholic may be Chief Justice of the Queen's Bench, where life, and what is more valuable than life, may be at stake—where the safety of the State may be involved. Now, I ask the hon. and learned Member for Midhurst—himself a distinguished member of the bar—if he were at the Irish bar—I beg his pardon for making the supposition—and if he were a Roman Catholic and were Attorney General, and if the Chancellorship of Ireland became vacant, would he not consider it a grievance if he found his religion to stand in the way of his promotion? In these few words I think I have said enough to show you what a wrong is committed in this matter.

MR. GOULBURN

said, as he had had an opportunity of expressing his views on this Bill not many months ago, it was certainly not his object to address many observations to the House on the present occasion, more especially because he conceived that, in the present state of the House, that Member conferred the greatest benefit on the community, and on Ireland in particular, who did not enter into any lengthened debates. He could not, however, after the speech of the right hon. Gentleman, avoid making one or two observations on the subject before them, because he saw in the speech which the right hon. Gentleman had delivered the strongest possible argument why they ought not, on the present occasion, to adopt the Bill under consideration. The right hon. Gentleman said, that the grievances which the Bill professed to remedy might be fanciful and imaginary; but that there was a real grievance which the Bill did not allude to, and which pressed on the whole of the Irish bar, and on the whole of the Roman Catholic population of Ireland, namely, an enactment in the measure of 1829, which in the opinion of the right hon. Gentleman the House ought to repeal. What then could show stronger the danger of tampering with the subject, than to see a Member of Her Majesty's Government, and a Gentleman who, above all others, might be interested in altering the Act, taking the earliest opportunity of announcing that it was his opinion—an opinion, it was to be presumed, sanctioned by those with whom he acted—that the House ought to repeal one of the most stringent provisions, and one of those most insisted on at the time the Act was passed, and which he never heard objected to until the right hon. Gentleman addressed the House? How were they to know but that other points in this Act might be objected to by other Roman Catholics, who would be equally interested in some other views, as the right hon. Gentleman was, with regard to his own profession, and which would give rise to contentions and religious animosity in the country? On that ground he should resist the second reading of this Bill. His right hon. Friend who preceded the right hon. Gentleman, confirmed the right hon. Gentleman's views, that the grievances to which the Bill applied were but fanciful and imaginary. His right hon. Friend felt, what could not be denied, that these clauses of ancient Acts of Parliament stood on the footing in which they had been placed in the speech of the hon. and learned Member for Midhurst—a speech which must have commanded the attention of the House, and which reminded him how much they were likely to be benefited on all future questions, in which legal discussions were involved, by the presence of the hon. and learned Gentleman. His right hon. Friend suggested that it might be desirable to draw a distinction in respect to the Act of 1829 between the different religious orders. He had no doubt of the ability of his right hon. Friend to prepare an Act of Parliament suited to meet the difficulty; but he certainly should be sorry to see the British House of Parliament embarked on such an undertaking. All the House knew of these religious orders was, that they each depended on a superior who might be a foreigner, and who might be under the influence of some foreign jurisdiction; and Parliament accordingly reserved in the Act of 1829 the power of dealing with them whenever they might become mischievous. That Bill of 1829 did not involve the religious orders in any particular grievances. He heard it as a complaint against the Bill that it left the entire power of proceeding against these parties in the hands of the Attorney General. It was not in the power of any individual in the country to take up a case against a Jesuit, and who might wish to do so because he was opposed to him in religious faith. The Act of 1829 vested exclusively in the Attorney General the power of bringing an indictment against such a person; and he would caution the House that, if they dealt with these religious orders in a way to excite the feelings of this country, they incurred the danger of having application made to them to alter the law so as not to leave it to the Attorney General alone to proceed against them, but to leave them, like all other cases, open to general prosecution. Having, as he already remarked, expressed his opinion on a former occasion with regard to this Bill, he would not trespass further on the House at present, except to observe that he still retained the opinions to which he had given utterance.

MR. HUME

was quite surprised at the speech of the right hon. Gentleman who had just sat down, as he had thought him incapable, after his long experience in the House, of assigning as a reason for not going into Committee on the Bill, the fact that one hon. Member had stated an objection which was not contained in the Bill. It seemed to him to be a monstrous abuse of the power which individual Members possessed, that because some other hon. Member should point out a grievance which nobody proposed at the present moment to interfere with, he was therefore to object to consider a grievance brought regularly under his notice. The right hon. Gentleman said that no Member of the House of Commons objected to the Bill of 1829. [Mr. GOULBURN: I did not say that.] He had himself objected to many provisions of the Act; but, like others, he waived those objections in his anxiety to have the question settled. He, for one, thought that no subject of Her Majesty ought to be liable to civil disabilities on account of religious opinions, be he Jew, Greek, Hindoo, or Mussulman; and it was remarkable that the Hindoos and Mussulmans enjoyed all their religious rights under the British Crown, while Roman Catholics who lived among ourselves were subjected to unjust restrictions.

MR. CARDWELL

was anxious to express, and he thought he could do so in almost a single sentence, the motives which weighed with him in giving his cordial concurrence to the second reading of this Bill. He thought there were very few Members of the House who must not feel the very great inconvenience arising from having discussions of a very delicate nature, and tending naturally to promote feelings which they were all desirous to discourage, renewed for two or three successive Sessions. They could not set the House off Commons afloat on religious discussions, and on subjects on which religious opinions differed, without creating a great tendency to public mischief and religious discord. This was the third Session in which they had been engaged with this Bill; and he hoped the present Session would not come to a close without bringing it to a practical end. He hoped that in the interval which would elapse before the Bill again came before them, the Government would consider the question, and that the right hon. Baronet would carefully weigh the several provisions of the measure; that he would satisfy his mind what the actual condition of the Roman Catholic subjects of the Crown was; whether there were practical grievances of which they had ground to complain; and whether there were not on the Statute-book obsolete but offensive penalties affecting the Members of that persuasion. He believed the right hon. Baronet would find on both sides of the House an almost unanimous feeling to go into Committee for a practical object, namely, the abolition of such grievances. He hoped that when they had satisfied their Roman Catholic fellow-subjects of their earnest desire to remove all real grievances, they would, under the guidance of the heads of their body, agree with the House in saying, "For God's sake, do not let us have in every Session of Parliament a discussion which can lead to no practical good, but which tends to the dissatisfaction of all men, and produces that enormous evil—religious differences among our fellow-subjects."

MR. FARRER

was unwilling to give his first vote on a religious question without expressing his opinion. He agreed with an hon. Gentleman who had observed that the business of the House would be better conducted were hon. Gentlemen to retain their seats, and profit by the counsels of those who had greater experience, and should act on that advice. The arguments urged on the other side of the House had not in the slightest degree altered his opinion that concession to the Roman Catholics should not be carried further. If it was said the clauses sought to be repealed were no longer acted upon—why should the peace of the country be disturbed by the attempt to repeal what was inoperative? He would not on that, almost the first occasion on which he had taken part in the proceedings of the House, refrain from avowing his conviction that further concessions to the Roman Catholics was dangerous to the country, and likely to prove prejudicial to the interests of all classes.

MR. J. STUART

objected to the first part of the Bill, inasmuch as it affected the supremacy of the Crown. He had taken an oath at the table of that House, by which he was bound to hold the Crown supreme in all matters, ecclesiastical as well as civil, within these dominions. It was the constitution of this country not to tolerate, and it never had tolerated in any matter, ecclesiastical or civil, the interference of any foreign Power with the supremacy of the Crown; and if the right hon. Baronet opposite (Sir George Grey) should find, upon the true interpretation of the first part of this Bill, that it trenched upon the supremacy of the Crown in matters ecclesiastical, he claimed his vote against that part of the Bill, as well as his intended, vote against the second part of the measure. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for the University of Oxford (Mr. Gladstone) said he did not very well understand the present state of the law with regard to the supremacy of the Crown in matters ecclesiastical. He could have no doubt as to his opinion on that subject, an opinion founded, as he believed, upon the strictest constitutional views. They were all agreed the first part of the measure related to that part of the Statute of Elizabeth which imposed penalties upon persons who disputed the supremacy of the Crown. The right hon. Baronet (Sir G. Grey) had said that the only supremacy which the Church of Rome asserted was in matters purely spiritual. [Sir G. GREY: No.] He was extremely grateful to the right hon. Baronet for putting him right. As he now understood him, the right hon. Baronet entertained no such opinion as that in matters spiritual any foreign Power had a jurisdiction in this country which interfered with the supremacy of the Crown. If that were the position of the right hon. Baronet, he (Mr. J. Stuart) would show him it was impossible he could support the first part of this Bill. The short description of the measure was "a Bill to repeal certain parts of the Statute of Elizabeth." That part of the Statute of Elizabeth which was affected by this proposal related to the offence of printing, or preaching, or disputing by words, the supremacy of the Crown in matters spiritual and ecclesiastical. It was the supremacy of the Crown in matters ecclesiastical, however, that was established by the common law as much before the Reformation as it was after; and what had been the effect upon the constitution? Why, that even before the Reformation the doctrine of the supremacy of the Crown prevented the interference of any foreign Power in matters ecclesiastical in this kingdom. They were then asked to repeal that part of the Statute of Elizabeth which said that penalties could be inflicted by the common law upon persons who denied the Crown's supremacy—and upon what grounds? The right hon. Gentleman the Member for the University of Oxford (Mr. Gladstone) had not adverted to the Statute of Elizabeth as declaring the common law; but the fact was, that if they repealed the Statute of Elizabeth, they would repeal the declaratory enactment of the common law of the Crown's supremacy. He would remind the noble Lord the Member for Arundel (the Earl of Arundel and Surrey), that though his religious opinions were tolerated, they were not permitted to interfere with the legislative enactments. The supremacy of the Crown in all matters ecclesiastical, as well as civil, had been the law of England from the time of the Conquest; and was as much the law before the Church of England had purified itself from the errors, in doctrine and discipline, of the Church of Rome, as since the days of the Reformation and Queen Elizabeth. The case of the Archbishop of York, in the reign of Edward I., who was punished by law for obeying the Pope against the command of the king and the law of the land, was a sufficient instance of this; and the parallel case which had occurred within the last month of the Pope sending his mandate to the Irish Roman Catholic bishops, to disobey the Act of Parliament as to the colleges, was proof enough of foreign interference with our municipal laws, and reason enough for not repealing any enactment which declared the supremacy of the Crown. Under these circumstances he should not give his vote for the repeal of any clause in any Act which declared that by the common law of England it was an offence to deny the supremacy of the Crown of England in matters spiritual and ecclesiastical.

The House divided on the question, that the word "now" stand part of the question:—Ayes 168; Noes 135: Majority 33.

List of the AYES.
Adair, R. A. S.	Caulfield, J. M.
Aglionby, H. A.	Cayley, E. S.
Alcock, T.	Childers, J. W.
Baines, M. T.	Clay, J.
Baring, rt. hon. F. T.	Clay, Sir W.
Bellew, R. M.	Clifford, H. M.
Birch, Sir T. B.	Cochrane, A.D.R.W.B.
Blackall, S. W.	Colebrooke, Sir T. E.
Blake, M. J.	Courtenay, Lord
Bouverie, E. P.	Craig, W. G.
Bowring, Dr.	Crawford, W. S.
Bright, J.	Damer, hon. Col.
Brockman, E. D.	Davie, Sir H. R. F.
Brotherton, J.	Dawson, hon. T. V.
Browne, R. D.	Devereux, J. T.
Bunbury, E. H.	Drumlanrig, Visct.
Burke, Sir T. J.	Duncan, Visct.
Buxton, Sir E. N.	Dundas, Sir D.
Callaghan, D.	Ebrington, Visct.
Cardwell, E.	Ellice, rt. hon. E.
Carter, J. B.	Evans, J.

Ewart, W.	Paget, Lord G.
Fagan, W.	Parker, J.
Foley, J. H. H.	Perfect, R.
Forster, M.	Peto, S. M.
Fortescue, hon. J. W.	Pilkington, J.
Fox, R. M.	Pinney, W.
Freestun, Col.	Power, N.
Gardner, R.	Price, Sir R.
Gibson, rt. hon. T. M.	Raphael, A.
Gladstone, rt. hn. W. E.	Rawdon, Col.
Gower, hon. F. L.	Reynolds, J.
Grace, O. D. J.	Ricardo, J. L.
Graham, rt. hon. Sir J.	Rich, H.
Granger, T. C.	Robartes, T. J. A.
Grattan, H.	Roche, E. B.
Greene, J.	Romilly, J,
Gregson, S.	Russell, F. C. H.
Grey, rt. hon. Sir G.	Sadleir, J.
Grosvenor, Lord R.	St. George, C.
Haggitt, F. R.	Salwey, Col.
Hall, Sir B.	Scholefield, W.
Hastie, A.	Scrope, G. P.
Hayter, W. G.	Scully, F.
Hervey, Lord A.	Seeley, C.
Heywood, J.	Seymour, Lord
Howard, hon. C. W. G.	Shafto, R. D.
Howard, hon. E. G. G.	Sheil, rt. hon. R. L.
Hume, J.	Simeon, J.
Hutt, W.	Slaney, R. A.
Jermyn, Earl	Smith, J. B.
Jervis, Sir J.	Smythe, hon. G.
Keating, R.	Somerville, rt. hon. Sir W.
Keogh, W.	Stanley, hon. E. J.
Keppel, hon. G. T.	Strutt, rt. hon. E.
Labouchere, rt. hon. H.	Stuart, Lord D.
Lewis, G. C.	Sutton, J. H. M.
Lincoln, Earl of	Tenison, E. K.
Littleton, hon. E. R.	Tennent, R. J.
Lushington, C.	Thicknesse, R. A.
Macnamara, Major	Thompson, Col.
M'Gregor, J.	Thompson, G.
M'Tavish, C. C.	Thornely, T.
Meagher, T.	Trelawny, J. S.
Mahon, The O'Gorman	Tufnell, H.
Maitland, T.	Turner, E.
Marshall, J. G.	Urquhart, D.
Mitchell, T. A.	Vane, Lord H.
Molesworth, Sir W.	Verney, Sir H.
Monsell, W.	Villiers, hon. C.
Moore, G. H.	Wakley, T.
Morgan, H. K. G.	Wall, C. B.
Morpeth, Visct.	Walmsley, Sir J.
Mowatt, F.	Watkins, Col. L.
Nugent, Sir P.	Westhead, J. P.
O'Brien, J.	Williams, J.
O'Brien, T.	Wilson, J.
O'Connell, J.	Wilson, M.
O'Connell, M.	Wood, W. P.
O'Connell, M. J.	Wyvill, M.
O'Connor, F.	Yorke, H. G. R.
O'Flaherty, A.	Young, J.
Ogle, S. C. H.	TELLERS.
Ord, W.	Anstey, T. C.
Osborne, R.	Arundel and Surrey, Earl of
Paget, Lord C.

List of the NOES.
Abdy, T. N.	Ashley, Lord
Acton, Col.	Baillie, H. J.
Adderley, C. B.	Baldock, E. H.
Alexander, N.	Barrington, Visct.
Arbuthnot, hon. H.	Bateson, T.
Arkwright, G.	Beckett, W.

Benbow, J.	Herries, rt. hon. J. C.
Bennet, P.	Hildyard, R. C.
Beresford, W.	Hildyard, T. B. T.
Blackstone, W. S.	Hodgson, W. N.
Bolling, W.	Hood, Sir A.
Bourke, R. S.	Hope, Sir J.
Bowles, Adm.	Hornby, J.
Bramston, T. W.	Hudson, G.
Bremridge, R.	Ireland, T. J.
Brisco, M.	Jolliffe, Sir W. G. H.
Broadley, H.	Jones, Sir W.
Broadwood, H.	Jones, Capt.
Brooke, Lord	Knox, Col.
Buller, Sir J. Y.	Lennox, Lord A.
Bunbury, W. M.	Lennox, L. H. G.
Burroughes, H. N.	Lindsay, hon. Col.
Carew, W. H. P.	Lockhart, W.
Castlereagh, Visct.	Lowther, H.
Chaplin, W. J.	Lygon, hon. Gen.
Charteris, hon. F.	M'Naghten, Sir E.
Chichester, Lord J. L.	Manners, Lord C. S.
Clive, H. B.	Manners, Lord G.
Cobbold, J. C.	Masterman, J.
Cocks, T. S.	Maxwell, hon. J. P.
Codrington, Sir W.	Moody, C. A.
Cole, hon. H. A.	Morgan, O.
Cripps, W.	Mundy, E. M.
Cubitt, W.	Newdegate, C. N.
Deedes, W.	Noel, hon. G. J.
Deering, J. P.	Ossulston, Lord
D'Eyncourt, rt. hon. C.	Palmer, R.
Duckworth, Sir J. T. B.	Plumptre, J. P.
Duncuft, J.	Reid, Col.
Dundas, G.	Renton, J. C.
Du Pre, C. G.	Richards, R.
Edwards, H.	Sandars, G.
Egerton, Sir P.	Scott, hon. F.
Egerton, W. T.	Seaham, Visct.
Farnham, E. B.	Sibthorp, Col.
Farrer, J.	Smyth, J. G.
Ffolliott, J.	Smollett, A.
Fitzroy, hon. H.	Sotheron, T. H. S.
Floyer, J.	Spooner, R.
Forbes, W.	Stafford, A. O'B.
Fox, S. W. L.	Stanley, E.
Frewen, C. H.	Stuart, H.
Gooch, E. S.	Stuart, J.
Gordon, Adm.	Thompson, Aldm.
Gore, W. R. O.	Tollemache, J.
Goring, C.	Trevor, hon. G. R.
Goulburn, rt. hon. H.	Turner, G. J.
Grogan, E.	Tyrell, Sir J. T.
Gwyn, H.	Verner, Sir W.
Halford, Sir H.	Vivian, J. E.
Hall, Col.	Vyse, R. H. R. H.
Halsey, T. P.	Waddington, D.
Hamilton, G. A.	Walpole, S. H.
Hamilton, J. H.	Welby, G. E.
Harris, hon. Capt.	Willoughby, Sir H.
Hastie, A.	Wodehouse, E.
Heald, J.	TELLERS.
Heathcoat, Sir W.	Inglis, Sir R. H.
Henley, J. W.	Law, hon. C. E.

Bill read a second time. To be committed.

Adjourned at Six o'clock.