COMMITTEE.

HL Deb 05 July 1869 vol 197 cc1108-65

House again in Committee (according to Order).

VISCOUNT LIFFORD

moved to insert after Clause 28 a new clause, the effect of which was to free Presbyterian churches and manses from debt. The case of the Presbyterians was a rather peculiar one. The Regium Donum, as their Lordships were aware, was first instituted by William III.; but the late Earl Fortescue, when Lord Lieutenant, effected a considerable change, it being arranged that the grant should be increased in proportion to the amount subscribed for the erection of manses and churches. The result was a large increase in the number of these buildings, and it was found inexpedient that the system should be continued. These churches and manses, however, had been built on the faith of that assistance, and the Presbyterians of Ulster, having for a long time been applying to various Governments for an increase of the Regium Donum, and being to a great extent in the position of an Established Church, now asked to be treated in the same way as that in which their Lordships had treated the clergy of the Established Church, and to be relieved from the heavy charges incurred in consequence of the expectations held out by the Government twenty years ago.

Moved, to insert after Clause 28 the following clause:— The said commissioners shall ascertain the cost incurred since the first day of January one thousand eight hundred and thirty-eight in respect of the erection of churches or meeting-houses and manses by the Protestant non-conforming congregations of Ireland, who wore at that time in receipt of or fulfilling the conditions necessary for obtaining Regium Donum, and shall pay over to trustees to be appointed by the general assembly, or synod, or presbytery, as the case may be, the amount so ascertained."—(The Viscount Lifford.)

EARL GRANVILLE

said, he thought the clause was inconsistent both with the proposals of the Government and with the decision of the House late on Friday night. The Government would be glad to make any reasonable concession to so respectable a body as the Presbyterians of Ireland, who had received the Regium Donum, but the proposal of the noble Viscount, that they should be re-paid the sums they had disbursed in erecting these houses, was almost out of the question. One of the conditions of the Regium Donum was that the manses should be built before the grant could be applied to a particular parish. If, therefore, the money had been subscribed, there was clearly no reason for reimbursing; while if it had been borrowed it was rather a fictitious arrangement for the purpose of meeting the conditions on which the Regium Donum was afterwards granted.

EARL GREY

said, he understood the facts to be these—An arrangement was made between the Presbyterians and the Government that, under certain circumstances, Presbyterian clergymen, where congregations were formed and manses were built, should be entitled to a certain amount of stipend. The Presbyterians, believing that these stipends were to go on, borrowed money for the erection of these manses. Now, it seemed to him unfair that when debts had been contracted and houses built on the faith of that arrangement, the Government should turn round on the Presbyterians and say—"A great change of policy is about to occur which will entirely put an end to that arrangement, and although you have incurred debts on the faith of our promises, we cannot redeem those promises, and you must struggle with your debts in the best way you can. His noble Friend (Earl Granville) had said that this clause was inconsistent with the decision of the Committee on Friday night. By that decision, most unfortunately as he thought, they decided that, though the vast majority of their Lordships believed it desirable in itself to give something to the Roman Catholics, they were bound to refuse it in deference to what the Government themselves seemed to consider ignorant prejudice on the part of the population. Now, if this was the case—if, in consequence of that unfortunate prejudice, their Lordships could do nothing for the Roman Catholics, he, for one, could not consent to aggravate the mischief of the vote of Friday night. They had already decided for the remission of the charge proposed to be made on the Established Church for their parsonages, and it was harsh to refuse anything to the Presbyterians, but after the decision of Friday they would only aggravate the evil by adopting the clause.

THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY

said, he did not intend to re-open the discussion of Friday night, but the noble Earl (Earl Grey) had not appeared to understood the argument of his noble Friend (Earl Granville). The Regium Donum was given to Presbyterian ministers on condition that any minister who might claim the grant had a congregation of not less than twelve families or fifty souls, and that there existed a church and house with an assured income of £50. That manses had been allowed to reckon towards that income, and it was obvious that the grant being only made on certain conditions it would be inconsistent with the principle of the Bill—the compensation of vested interests, that compliance with those conditions should be a ground for compensation.

Motion (by leave of the Committee) withdrawn.

Clause 29 (Enactment with respect to private endowments).

THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY

My Lords, I have placed on the Paper three Amendments in this clause, all bearing on the subject of private endowments, and I think I may say that they all appear to me to be consistent with the principle of the Bill. That principle I understand to be this—that while the Establishment, in the ordinary sense of the word, is to cease in Ireland, and while great changes are to be made with regard to the endowments, very jealous care is to be exercised with reference to private interests. Now the private interests of those at present in possession of any of the revenues of the Irish Church have been secured by the Amendment which your Lordships adopted as to the terms of commutation, such terms being given as will enable the Governing Body to attend to the private claims of each of those persons who have a life interest in the present revenues of the Church. Your Lordships adopted the term of fourteen years for the Established Church as well as for Maynooth, as the best way of securing those vested interests and as analogous to the liberal treatment adopted in the case of Canada, which has so often been alluded to in these debates. Another class of vested interests which your Lordships have already considered is that of the private interests of the clergy in the houses which many of them have erected, partly out of their own personal resources and partly out of building charges; the Committee being of opinion that the clergy would not have erected these houses if they had thought they were to be taken away the moment they themselves had ceased to live. Having thus, in perfect consistency with the principle of the Bill, secured the private interests of those at present in receipt of money or in the possession of houses in connection with the Church, we now come to another class of private interests to which we may properly apply that name, since they relate to private persons who, in past times, have left benefactions for the maintenance of the Established Church. And when I say for the maintenance of the Established Church I mean for the maintenance of that which, at the time of those benefactions, was the Established Church, for it would take a great deal to persuade me that those persons were so lightly attached to their Protestant faith as to leave the money merely to any Church which, in such a country as Ireland, might happen from time to time to be established. I hope and expect that the Government will not see any difficulty in acceding, at all events, to the first of my Amendments. Your Lordships are wisely jealous with respect to all such private endowments, of which there are many both in England and in Ireland. It is difficult, perhaps, even with the assistance of the Board established for the purpose, to ascertain exactly what are the endowments of the Roman Catholic body in Ireland, which are vested in private trustees, but no one can doubt that they are very considerable; and, I believe, the Roman Catholics would be extremely jealous of any interference with the private endowments of other bodies, which might, in time, lead to interference with their own. I have no information in this matter as to the Presbyterians of Ireland, but I know, with tolerable certainty, as to the great Presbyterian body of which the noble Earl (the Earl of Dalhousie) spoke some nights ago, that during its brief existence it has acquired very considerable endowments. Now, I am quite sure that it is not the intention of Parliament jealously to guard the private endowments of the Roman Catholic body and of the Presbyterian bodies, and to be reckless in its way of dealing with the private endowments of the Protestant Episcopal Church. Many sacrifices have been made by private members of that Church in order to confer private endowments on the body to which they belonged. It was stated, in the course of the recent debate that a Bishop of the Established Church in Ireland had left a large property to his family, though, whether, like some other Bishops, he had had the good fortune to succeed to a large fortune before he left it, I am not able to say. A list, however, has been published by Dr. Todd, of private endowments which, within his own cognizance, have been made to the Protestant Episcopal Church in Ireland. The list of these private endowments ends with the munificent bequest of the most rev. Primate who lately presided over the see of Armagh (Archbishop Beresford), a Bishop whose memory, I believe, will be long revered in Ireland as a most generous, noble, and kind-hearted man, and who, having himself succeeded to an ample fortune, was able to leave very large sums to the Church of which he was an ornament. The list, concluding with that most rev. Primate, goes back to a series of his predecessors, many of whom left large sums to the Church of which they were the heads. Primate Robinson left £1,000, which, with a bequest of Primate Boulter, at present amounts to £38,700, and has been kept separate in the accounts of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. I will not go through the list of benefactors, but fol- lowing them up we come to various Archbishops, and at last to the name of Archbishop Bramhall, who, in 1662, bequeathed £500 to the Church. Proceeding a little further we come to a gift of the same Bishop Bramhall, who secured for the Church a sum of money so large that in those days the interest was calculated at £30,000 a year. The same man, I say, in the year 1662, left the sum of £500, and are Her Majesty's Government about to respect the small sum left in 1662 and say that a totally different principle is to be applied to the far larger sum left at an earlier period? The very same man, a member of the very same Church, using the very same Liturgy, left both sums, and where is the difference between the two cases except this very important difference, that the one is a sum of £500, and the other produces £30,000 a year? If we had nothing to do with justice and were influenced only by motives of expediency, it might be well to draw the line at 1660; but I am sure that it is justice that has guided the course of Her Majesty's Government with respect to private endowments, and I cannot believe that the mere amount of the endowment makes such an extraordinary difference between the one case and the other. I do not know what is the reason why the year 1660 has been adopted, and I trust that Her Majesty's Government will not insist upon that year. We are told that the Church was in an unsettled condition before that time. We know it was not unsettled with respect to its Articles. There were, it is true, in Ireland, as in England, separate Articles answering to what were called the Lambeth Articles, but they were not the Articles of the Church of Ireland any more than they were the real Articles of the Church of England. Allow me to read a very succinct account of the matter which has been placed in my hands. The English Liturgy was established in Ireland by the Irish Act of Uniformity, 2 Elizabeth, c. 2, passed in the year 1560. If you look to the Acts of Parliament, you will find it there. I believe there can be no doubt that until within the last two or three years the Irish clergy subscribed to the Articles on the strength of a canon, passed in the year 1634, answering to our Canon of Subscription of the year 1604. Up to and even in the time when I myself with the most rev. Primate who presides over the Province of Armagh recommended to Her Majesty's Government that there should be an alteration in the subscription, all the clergy subscribed a canon of these same Thirty-nine Articles, according to the canon, and the date of that canon is, as I have said, 1634. It may be said that here and there Presbyterian ministers occupied livings in Ireland; but the answer is that here and there Presbyterian ministers occupied livings in England, and between the two cases there was no difference. There has been placed in my hands a reference to a work well known among Presbyterians in Ireland; it is Reid's History of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland, the first volume. That work, written by a Presbyterian, and highly respected as an authority, states that in the midst of the troubles in 1642 there arrived the regiment of Argyll and three other regiments from Scotland. Each of them had its Presbyterian chaplain, and the four chaplains of these regiments appear to have taken counsel together and. to have established alterations; and, in the year 1642, they held the first synod of Presbyterians in Ireland. That was during the very same time that the Presbyterian system was for a period the dominant system in England. But before 1660 Bishop Bramhall had collected the large sum of money which I have mentioned for the support of the Church of which he was a Bishop. Now, I am quite aware that the sources from which Bishop Bramhall obtained that money are said. to be somewhat doubtful. Your Lordships know that one of the most learned lawyers of the day contended that it is a very dangerous principle when a bequest has been made 250 years ago to consider what was the right of the original donor to the possession of the money. However that may be, it appears to me, on examining the matter, that there is no doubt this was a subscription collected by Bishop Bramhall for a particular purpose, well known to those who were subscribers, and made over to the Church of which he was a Prelate. It was a sort of Bishop of Derry's fund which he collected for the benefit of the Irish Church. Now, if it is said that the fact that the Sovereign having had anything to do with the money or any portion of the money takes it out of the range of private en- dowments, I may be allowed to road these words of the First Minister of the Crown— It may have been given by a public character, but, though given by persons holding a public position, its having been given in a private capacity evidently constitutes it a private endowment, Now, my Lords, in that very able argument to which I before referred, it is stated, not with reference to this gift of Bishop Bramhall, but to other matters, that the Sovereign was entitled to distribute this money as he pleased, and that it was maintained in Parliament at a subsequent period that there was no necessity for considering what the Sovereign had given, because it was his private property. It would be as difficult to prove that money belonging to the Sovereign having been given to the then Bishop of Derry, would invalidate Bishop Bramnhall's gift as that the fact of Her Majesty the Queen having munificently subscribed £3,000 to that fund which bears the name of the Bishop of London's Fund would invalidate the private character of that fund. But our Sovereigns, and Her Majesty not less than her predecessors, have been munificent in their contributions on various occasions. The funds collected by the Colonial Bishops bear with reference to one of those sees the name of Her Majesty as donor; does that take it out of the category of private endowments? Looking to the fact that a large portion of the money which Bishop Bramhall collected came from private resources, that Archbishop Laud, who was not likely to give money to a Presbyterian Church, and was certainly not a Roman Catholic, though many think he went too far in that direction, was a large contributor, apparently from his private means, I claim that this money given to Bishop Bramhall, as Bishop of Derry, belongs to the Church quite as much as the money which was afterwards left by Archbishop Bramhall when Archbishop of Armagh. It seems almost wrong after having placed this on the ground of justice and of legality, to resort to a lower argument. But some one who succeeds me may place this matter on the ground of expediency. My Lords, the persons at present in the enjoyment of these sums are the Protestants of Ulster. Your Lordships have no doubt looked to the Report of the Commissioners as to the number of Protestant and Episcopalian inhabitants of those parishes in Ulster. Your Lordships are probably familiar with the fact that, looking to the united diocese of Down, Connor, and Dromore, there are eleven parishes in Belfast with an aggregate Protestant population of 24,534; that of the remaining 133 one has a population of 5,000, one of between 4,000 and 5,000, six between 3,000 and 4,000, nine between 2,000 and 3,000, and seventeen between 1,000 and 2,000. I will not weary your Lordships by going through the whole list. The point which I wish to establish is that the Protestant population and the Episcopalian population of these parishes is so numerous that in point of policy, independently of justice, they have a claim to the benefit of that which the members of their own communion left them in former days. I should be very glad if something could be done such as was indicated by the noble Viscount (Viscount Lifford). It would be a great mistake to think there is any feeling on the part of the Episcopalian body of Ireland against the Presbyterians of the North of Ireland. The two bodies go hand in hand; they hold the essentials of the same faith, and if we looked to matters of policy they are the strength not only of that part of Ireland but of Ireland altogether. The industry of Ireland owes much to them, and while we are considering how we are to keep our Irish fellow-countrymen attached subjects of the British Throne, it will surely be a most unwise, as I maintain also a most unjust, policy, to deprive them, living as they do in such large numbers as I have described in Ulster, of that means of carrying on their worship which funds, left distinctly to them, have secured for them. Although it may be true that when the Protestants are crowded together in towns they may supply their wants, yet it must be remembered that in many places the population though large, is poor and scattered, and therefore I feel confident your Lordships will not consent to deprive them of that which seems to be so justly their own. I am sure Her Majesty's Government will agree with me that it will be a very dangerous thing to shake the faith which all people in the United Kingdom at present have in the security of private endowments.

Amendment moved, line 42, to leave out ("year one thousand six hundred and sixty") and insert ("second year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth.")—(The Archbishop of Canterbury.)

THE LORD CHANCELLOR

The most rev. Primate (the Archbishop of Canterbury) has rested his case for carrying back the period for the ascertainment of gifts of private endowment to the reign of Queen Elizabeth, in the first place, upon the passing of the 2nd of Elizabeth—the Statute of Uniformity. And then he selected two cases which I may safely say are the only two of the slightest importance as to the question whether you select 1660 or the 2nd of Elizabeth, the case of Archbishop Bramhall and the case of the Ulster grant by James I. If these two instances were put aside it would be a matter almost immaterial which of the two dates you take, except that you may, by selecting the earlier, occasion a very considerable expense by inquiring into minor endowments, an expense which would not be justified by the result. I will first consider the proposition with reference to the conditions of the statute of Elizabeth, and see how far it holds good that that Act fixes the period at which it is to be supposed various persons gave money intended for the support of the Reformed Anglican branch of the Church Catholic instead of the Roman Church. I had occasion on the second reading to point out that the Act of the 2nd of Elizabeth was not intended to exclude any portion of the great Irish nation from the benefit of religious instruction. It was an Act which contemplated religious instruction to the whole Irish nation, and in proof of that I cited one clause of the Act. The Celtic population were Roman Catholic in every sense of the word, and does it exclude them from the benefits of religious instruction? So far from that, it expressly enacts that, whereas they did not understand English, they shall continue to go on with Latin because they understand it better. We may smile at that singular notion, but can anything more conclusively show that the Act expressly included them as participators in the means devoted to public worship? Besides this, Queen Elizabeth fined and imprisoned everybody who did not go to church, clearly showing again, although we may smile at this means also, that she intended the whole nation should benefit. Therefore, any grant made at the time of Elizabeth was made for the whole country. Then comes Archbishop Bramhall's case, which may give rise to a very considerable amount of discussion before the Commissioners if the Amendment be adopted; and I confess the evidence, as far as I have been able together it from reading upon the subject, largely preponderates in favour of the view that Archbishop Bramhall gave nothing, or next to nothing, to the Irish Church. It is true Archbishop Bramhall obtained a large amount of money for the Irish Church, but as to how he obtained it the different biographers of Bramhall and Strafford disagree. Strafford's admirers say he procured the money, and they name this identical sum of £30,000 a year. Then Sir George Ratcliffe, Wentworth's intimate friend and constant aid in Ireland as a Privy Councillor, gives Wentworth the credit of restoring the £30,000 per annum. ''He got restored to the Church lands and tithes, sacrilegiously interverted, above £30,000 in yearly value." But I believe this is as mythical as any representation that has been made. What really happened in Ireland is this—Laud sent Bramhall to Ireland before he was made Bishop to inquire into the state of things there, Laud being advised that improper proceedings were occurring among the Anglican Bishops. Bramhall reported accordingly, and in his first letter to Laud, relating to the state of things in Dublin, he says, if I quote him correctly— I will first speak of offences in high places. And what do I find in Dublin? The parish church turned into the Lord Deputy's stable; the Cathedral vaults into wine vaults, where people get wine and also tobacco. And so he goes on describing enormities of that kind. He afterwards speaks of improprieties committed by the Bishops in the management of their sees, such as granting leases at small fines, insinuating that there was some private consideration passing between the Bishops and the lessees; and he represents the whole of the sees as in the state of complete devastation in consequence of those acts. Then it appears that, with the assistance of Strafford, he was able to squeeze compensation out of several peo- ple, and obtained very large sums of money, from which I believe this sum of £30,000 a year will be found to have come. But the whole transaction is one of considerable doubt, the investigation of which would not repay the Irish Church. I will not anticipate a proposition which my noble Friend behind me (Earl Granville) may make upon this subject, but I will now deal with the case of the Ulster lands. If ever there was a public fund it is the Ulster lands, which are public property upon every conceivable ground. These lands were obtained by the blood of the English in putting down a rebellion there, in the course of which three counties were forfeited; and James had at his disposal 833,000 acres of confiscated land, the disposal of which the most rev. Primate compares to a grant made by Her Majesty out of her private purse.

THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY

said, he had not addressed himself to that part of the question.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR

The most rev. Primate objects to my answering this argument because he has not come to it. I will content myself by resting my answer upon the broad foundation that the lands were won by English blood, and that James sold the greater part of them to the City of London, and used the proceeds as ordinary revenue. Something was said about the Presbyterians, and I must join with the most rev. Primate in offering a tribute of respect to them; but was it always the case that the Episcopal Bench respected the Presbyterians in the North of Ireland? You will find —if you go to Mant's Ecclesiastical History of the Irish, Church, the last edition of which was published in 1841—a series of lamentations on the part of that right rev. Prelate, who was Bishop of Down and Connor, at the introduction of the Irish Presbyterians by James, which he regarded as the greatest conceivable calamity, and he praised the Test and Corporation Acts. The most rev. Primate has alluded to the number of the Protestants in the North of Ireland; but if we divide them into seventeenths, the most convenient for our purpose, we find that 9–17ths represent the Roman Catholics, 5–17ths the Presbyterians, and 3–17ths the Episcopalians; so that in this part of Ireland, where the Roman Catholics are least numerous, they out- number the Presbyterians and Anglicans put together. I demur, therefore, to that being the period to be fixed upon as the period for marking when there was a special allocation of the funds to special purposes. I say that in 1660 you had got rid of the Articles of Usher, which clearly did effect an entire separation in principle between the English branch and the Irish branch of the Church. I do not believe that time is of the slightest importance. I do not believe that those who introduced the Bill have the least reason for desiring to alter it in any other respect; but if you say that the definition shall include property given by the Crown, by private individuals, and by the means described, it signifies little what date may be fixed.

THE BISHOP OF PETERBOROUGH

My Lords, it seems to me that the argument, as far as it has gone, is somewhat analogous to that afterwards to be raised upon the question of the Ulster grants; but I shall keep myself strictly to the question of the first Amendment moved by the most rev. Primate—namely, the substitution of the date 1560 for 1660. It seems to me, however, that a good deal of undue stress has been laid upon the amount the Irish Church would receive from Archbishop Bramhall's gifts. The most rev. Primate (the Archbishop of Canterbury) insisted upon the large amount and value of these gifts, and the noble and learned Lord who has just sat down insisted upon their small value; but really the question at issue is not whether the gifts be large or small, but whether the date 1560, which would include those gifts, or the date 1660, which would exclude them, is in itself the proper date to be agreed upon—a question quite independent of the amount to be received or lost by fixing the date. If by fixing the date at 1560 the Irish Church gets very little from Archbishop Bramhall's gifts, so much the worse for the Church; if by fixing the date at 1660 it gets a great deal, so much the better for the Irish Church; but we have no right to consider the worse or the better in the case; what we have to do is on historical and legal grounds to decide which of the two dates is a just and righteous date to fix. I entirely set aside the question of the amount of Archbishop Bramhall's gifts. Upon the same principle I deride the objection of the noble and learned Lord (the Lord Chancellor) as to the expense of the litigation that might be incurred on the part of the Irish Anglicans or Churchmen—it is difficult to find a correct definition for the members of the Irish Church — in establishing their rights under this grant. If it is difficult for them to prove their rights, if it involves expensive litigation, so much the worse for them; if it is easy, so much the better for them; and I think I can assure the noble and learned Lord that Irish Churchmen will be willing to take the chance of litigation which he desires to spare them, and that they will be perfectly willing to take what they can get. I set aside, then, as not properly speaking ad rem, those two questions as to the amount of Archbishop Bramhall's gifts, and as to the expense which might be incurred in proving claims to them. I now come to what I shall be excused for saying is the only real argument in the speech of the noble and learned Lord against the Amendment. There is not the slightest doubt that when Elizabeth passed her Act of 1560 establishing conformity for the Irish Church, she intended that Act to be one for the benefit of the whole nation. We say that the Irish Church is a benefit to the whole nation—but I will not press that argument now; but it is clear from the terms of the Act that Elizabeth intended the benefit of religious instruction to be conferred according to a particular form, which form is defined in that Act of Uniformity, and which form she thought of such great importance that she actually—as the noble and learned Lord has taken care to remind us, unfortunately for his argument—insisted upon imprisoning those who would not go to the churches where the services were conducted according to the Act of Uniformity. It is equally clear that the fact of Elizabeth having intended to benefit the whole nation does not at all touch the real question in dispute, which is not for whose benefit she intended the instruction to be given, but through whose lips and according to what formularies that instruction was to be conveyed; and, further, the fact that these ecclesiastical gifts, whatever they may be worth, were designed by Elizabeth for the benefit of the entire nation seems to me to be a strange reason for excluding from that benefit the entire nation, and for taking them entirely away from every religious denomination in the nation. It strikes me that this is a fair answer to the argument of the noble and learned Lord. He laid stress upon certain Articles drawn up by Archbishop Usher—I think 105 in number—and which he says had the effect of creating almost a severance between the two Churches, so as to make them distinct Churches in England and Ireland; and so, insisting upon as much distinction between them as between Presbyterianism and Anglicanism, he implied as a consequence that Presbyterians might have as good a right to these endowments as Anglicans. What is the fact as to these Articles of Usher? They were never signed by a single clergyman; they were never enforced by the Irish Parliament; they were passed by the Irish Convocation, a body whose acts had no legal validity, no more than those of the English Convocation at this moment. They were never accepted by the Irish Parliament; they were never binding on the Irish clergy; and the duration of these marvellous Articles, that are to effect this complete transformation of the rights of property, was simply nineteen years. They simply came from the study of Archbishop Usher, and, for anything I know, they have gone back to his waste-paper basket; and yet they are to deprive the Church of Ireland of grants of property which I believe to be strictly and legally her due. The only other argument I wish to notice is one dwelt upon more in the speech of the First Minister of the Crown than in this House, although it has been touched upon by the noble and learned Lord. It is said that between 1560 and 1660 Presbyterians were admitted to benefices in the Anglican Church, as it then existed, without requiring re-ordination; and this fact is supposed to prove so complete a fusion between the Presbyterian and the Anglican bodies that one has no more right than the other to these endowments. I exceedingly regret that I cannot accept this fact, and the inference drawn from it, because if I could do so there would be absolutely an end to this Bill altogether. If ordained Presbyterians could hold Irish Church revenues without re-ordination—and the fact proves that there was no practical difference between the two Churches—then I have another fact. At this moment any Roman Catholic priest may be instituted to any benefice in Ireland without re-ordination, and a priest might have been so instituted at any time during the history of the Irish Church. Therefore, if the argument goes to prove that the Presbyterian and the Anglican were practically one Church, then by a parity of reasoning the possibility of the Roman Catholic priesthood obtaining benefices without re-ordination goes to prove that the two Churches are really identical, and that there is no injury done to the Roman Catholic Church by the Protestant Church possessing endowments, when it is not possible to distinguish one from the other. If the argument is good for anything, it seems to me to come to this startling proposition—that the Irish Church in 1560, and up to within nineteen years of 1660, was a body so distinct as to be recognizable in history and law; that it was capable of doing and having committed in its behalf a great wrong—namely, the conveying to it of certain endowments which belonged to the entire nation; that, therefore, in this 19th century, the present Church is to be sorely punished for the wrong done by that Church between 1560 and the commencement of that nineteen years; and yet, when you come to these nineteen years, this body, so distinct for all purposes of punishment and suffering, becomes so confused a body that it is utterly incapable of holding any property whatsoever.

EARL GRANVILLE

My Lords, the right rev. Prelate (the Bishop of Peterborough) has obtained a reputation for eloquence distinguished by readiness in getting rid of the rubbish and going to the kernel of the matter; but I will confine myself to the rubbish which he got rid of rather than address myself to Ms arguments. I think there is some slight inaccuracy in the historical account which the right rev. Prelate gave of Archbishop Usher's desk and. waste-paper basket, because, unless my memory fails me, the Resolutions that he referred to were proposed in Convocation. I do not think, either, that I have any occasion to grapple with the argument that the possible admission of Roman Catholic priests removes any grievance under which they might otherwise labour. It seems to me, however, that there is considerable importance in the points which have been raised as to the amount of money which might or might not accrue to the Irish Church under the Motion of the right rev. Prelate, as to the difficulty of proving these grants, and as to the amount of litigation which might possibly ensue. With regard to the amount, I cannot help thinking—and it is not from any pretence to any historical or legal knowledge which is not open to all your Lordships—that there is great truth in what the noble and learned Lord (the Lord Chancellor) said, that very little money would be found to accrue to the Irish Church after these long and difficult inquiries had been concluded. But, whichever way you take it, this appears to me to be a very extraordinary Amendment for this House to send down to "another place." But now I come to the real point to which I wish to direct your Lordships' attention. I have said that it is not likely that the Irish Church—unless you adopt some mode of establishing claims hitherto not devised—should gain much advantage from the change proposed. If I mistake not, even if they obtain all that it is now proposed to include by these Amendments, the reversions which they claim will not amount to more than £300,000. The noble Earl (Earl Grey) suggested the other day what he thought would have been of immense advantage to the Church—that, instead of entering into these questions which must lead to endless litigation, it would be better for them to accept a sum of money. The noble Earl stated that he was informed that what we proposed to give the Church in the shape of private benefactions did not amount to more than £6,000 a year. The most rev. Primate (the Archbishop of Canterbury) fixed the sum at £8,000 a year, and, taking the larger sum, that would really represent a sum of £200,000. Again, it has been stated that the value of a reversion of the whole sum claimed by the present Amendment would not amount to much more than £300,000. That would give a sum of £500,000, which is exactly the amount, though it is not in the Bill, which Mr. Gladstone stated would be the amount of the private benefactions. Now, it appears to me that this sum, representing, as it does, exactly what was stated to the House of Commons—representing, as it does, the sum which the House of Commons was ready to grant—representing, as it does, exactly the sum at which the most rev. Primate values these two sets of benefactions—it would be, I think, an arrangement valuable in itself; one to which the other House of Parliament could not, upon principle, object, and which would have the inestimable advantage of clearing the ground, and at once closing the matter without either impoverishing the new Church Body, or without materially lessening what will accrue to the State. I must make an apology to your Lordships for rising so soon in the discussion. The other evening I made a proposal which I thought highly advantageous to the Church. I made it rather late in the debate; but I did not receive the slightest answer to the proposal which I had made on the part of Her Majesty's Government. The noble Earl (the Earl of Carnarvon) it is true, with his usual courtesy, expressed a hope that I did not feel hurt by his not giving any answer to that proposal. The Committee immediately proceeded to a division, and one right rev. Prelate asked me, while the House was dividing, why I had not made the offer earlier in the evening, as it was one which many would have been delighted to accept. I have, therefore, taken the opportunity of making this proposal to your Lordships at this early period in the discussion, and I think it is one which the right rev. Bench would do wisely in accepting.

EARL GREY

Do I correctly understand my noble Friend? Does he mean that he would give a lump sum of £500,000 to the disendowed Church as compensation for all these claims?

EARL GRANVILLE

Yes, but reserving the question of the glebes. To the Amendment to be proposed upon the latter subject the Government will offer the most strenuous opposition.

LORD DE ROS

said, he would remind their Lordships that Queen Elizabeth could never have intended that her endowments should be shared in by the whole of the Irish population, inasmuch as she regarded the Roman Catholics as not under her control, or subject to the protection of her laws.

THE EARL OF POWIS

said, there was a case in which certain parishes could prove, under the Amendment of the most rev. Primate, their claim to rent charges which had been devoted to their spiritual instruction, and he wished to know how their rights would be affected by the arrangement now proposed by the noble Earl (Earl Granville)?

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

said, he considered that it was a very inconvenient practice for Ministers to come down and make entirely new proposals at the very last moment. He would venture to suggest to the noble Earl (Earl Granville) that it would be better for the present to defer this matter so that the proposal might receive consideration. There was an important principle involved. Some of them were unwilling to admit that, because there had been a very slight alteration in the doctrine and practice of the Church, there had been a break in its continuity; but, if the noble Earl would allow the date of 1560 to be inserted, and the £500,000 to be offered as a composition for the whole period, the difficulty would be removed.

EARL GRANVILLE

said, the noble Marquess (the Marquess of Salisbury) would remember that, among the great number of Amendments placed upon the Paper, it was impossible for the Government to know which were likely to be supported by the House. The noble Lord opposite (Lord Cairns) had refused to furnish the Government—as he had a perfect right to do—with the information, and it was, therefore, impossible for them to be prepared with counter proposals. In one instance he had actually prepared a proposal, but was obliged to allow it to remain in his pocket, in consequence of the course which the Committee had pursued with regard to other Amendments. As he understood their Lordships were inclined to consider his proposal in a favourable light, he would not object to a postponement; but he certainly thought that the last proposal of the noble Marquess was not a very wise one, or at all in unison with his general desire to assume a conciliatory position towards the other House. He would, however, consent to omit the date altogether. It would be extremely unwise to adopt any course which, without being attended by any advantage, could only have the effect of irritating the House of Commons.

THE BISHOP OF LICHFIELD

said, he thought that it was of the utmost importance that a date should be fixed. He found it stated in the work of Fleury, the Roman Catholic historian, that about the year 1570, the Protestants adopted all kinds of expedients to extend their influence in Ireland; that their progress had surpassed all their expectations, and that they already saw themselves masters of the greater part of the kingdom.

EARL GRANVILLE

said, he would suggest that if the clause were to be postponed it would be better not to continue this discussion.

LORD CAIRNS

said, that the noble Earl (Earl Granville) had expressed a wish that their Lordships should not take any step which would cause irritation in the mind of the House of Commons. He should be sorry that anything done by their Lordships should have that effect, and he was quite sure that nothing done by their Lordships was intended to have that effect; but he doubted very much whether the House of Commons was in that sensitive state of mind which was always suggested from the Government Benches. It certainly would appear from certain postprandial utterances of one of Her Majesty's Ministers that some Members of the Cabinet did not manifest that perfect equanimity of mind which their Lordships had the pleasure of seeing always displayed by the noble Earl the Leader of the Government in their Lordships' House. He (Lord Cairns) was, however, perfectly ready to admit that, if the proposal of the noble Earl was to be considered, they ought not now to do anything in the way of amending the clause which would make it appear that they had rejected the proposal. He did not think it would be a convenient course to postpone the clause, for they were now approaching the consideration of an alteration in the other portion of it. It would be better to leave out the date; if this were done Her Majesty's Government might be informed on the bringing up of the Report, whether their' offer had been accepted: if the offer were accepted words might be inserted directing the Commissioners to pay over to the Church Body £500,000 in lieu of all endowments since the Reformation. Such words would not pledge Parliament to any particular date. In reference to what the noble Earl had said respecting his offer the other night of another Amendment of which no notice had been taken, he must remind the noble Earl that his offer on that previous occasion was made at the close of the debate, and it did not appear to him that the Amendment so offered by the noble Earl would have met the exigencies of the case. The noble Earl said he had several other Amendments in his pocket. He would suggest to the noble Earl whether, as notice had been given of the various Amendments of private Members, it would not be advisable for the noble Earl to put his offers on the Paper.

THE ARCHIBISHOP OF CANTERBURY

said, he was ready to do whatever the House desired in the matter. The noble Earl (Earl Granville) had appealed to the right rev. Bench as if they were the solicitors or the attorneys of the Irish Church. He should be rather ashamed if the right rev. Bench were dragged into a mere money calculation. They looked to the date from far higher interests. But as the calculations of the First Minister of the Crown in respect of the amount of the endowments before 1660 was disputed by other authorities, he thought that the parties on either side ought to look into the matter with the view of coming to an agreement on that point. He wished in his own name—and, he thought he might venture to add in the name of the Irish Church also—to thank the noble Earl (Earl Granville) for the conciliatory manner in which he had dealt with this point, and, likewise, with the question of life interests. He trusted their Lordships might regard that circumstance as an indication that the Government wished to treat this whole matter in a spirit of conciliation. He would withdraw his Amendment for the present.

Amendment (by leave of the Committee) withdrawn.

Amendment made, line 9, leave out ("one") and insert ("two.")

THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY

then moved the third of the Amendments which stood in his name. The whole difficulty in this case was whether the grant of the Ulster glebes came from the Crown, being the private property of the Sovereign, or whether they came from the Crown, being public property. It was the opinion of Sir Roundell Palmer—a very high authority upon such a subject—that they were given by King James out of landed property which had been confiscated to the Sovereign, in the same way as other portions of the same land granted to private individuals, whose descendants enjoyed them at the present day. The question of these Ulster glebes had come before Lord Langdale in the Rolls Court, and on that occasion Sir William Follett laid down the state of the case. What he now wished to direct the attention of their Lordships to was this point—that if the King had no right to grant the Ulster glebes, he (the Archbishop of Canterbury) did not know what right he had to grant the property now enjoyed by the Irish Society. How would the Irish Society be affected by a Parliamentary decision that James had no right to grant these Ulster glebes? Their Lordship would see that this question was an important one in respect of other property besides the glebes.

Amendment moved, at the end of the clause to add— When any real property becoming vested in the commissioners consists of lands which have been appropriated or granted as the glebe or glebe land of any benefice, by or in pursuance of any royal grant or letters patent since the second year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, the commissioners shall, on the application of the said representative body, made within six months after the first day of January one thousand eight hundred and seventy-one, by order vest such property in such representative body, subject to any life interest subsisting therein."—(The Archbishop of Canterbury.)

LORD DUFFERIN

said, he must object to the Amendment which he regarded as contrary to the principle of the Bill, and, indeed, calculated to stultify it. The proposal of the most rev. Primate (the Archbishop of Canterbury) amounted, in effect, to this—that we should proceed to re-endow the Established Church with a sum calculated at very nearly £1,000,000, and at all events, over £900,000. With what show of consistency could noble Lords, who wished for religious equality in Ireland, by means of concurrent endowment, leave the Catholics and Presbyterians in the position assigned to them by the Bill, while they gave to the Episcopal Church, besides the property already secured to it, the considerable sum he had named? These grants were put upon the footing of private endowments. Now, he would not enter into any historical disquisition as to the circumstances under which the grants were made. It was sufficient to remind their Lordships that, up to the end of the reign of Elizabeth, Ulster had been less subjected to English rule than any other part of Ireland. Until then the native chiefs had succeeded in maintaining almost a semi-independence, and at last endeavoured to throw off the yoke altogether. In this attempt, however, they were defeated, and, on their overthrow, King James was enabled to make his famous experiment of colonizing the North of Ireland with settlers from England and Scotland. When making this settlement James was also solicitous to reduce to order the ecclesiastical affairs of the district, which were in such a state of confusion that it was found impossible even to identify the ecclesiastical possessions of the ancient Irish Church. Persons of authority were, therefore, sent over to ascertain what was and what was not ecclesiastical property; and as soon as they had reported, the King made a re-grant of such lands as were declared to be the legitimate possessions of the Church. Such a title, however, did not place these grants to the Church in Ulster in any respect on the footing of private grants; and, so far, this was admitted by the most rev. Primate, who did not propose to deal with Bishops' lands. As to the Ulster glebes, as they were technically called, he (Lord Dufferin) maintained they must follow the destination of other ecclesiastical property. It was not upon technical or antiquarian grounds that this question ought to be argued. These endowments were handed to the Church by the King in his public capacity. They were intended to promote a great public benefit; they became the same sort of property and subject to the same incidents as property possessed by the Church in other provinces. Great stress had been laid upon the claims of colonists in Ulster, whose ancestors were attracted to that enterprize by the grant of these endowments. No doubt, the fact that the Church was constituted on a favourable footing did prove a certain attraction to the emigrants who passed over from Great Britain. But if that argument were good for anything, it might be urged with equal force by the descendants of all who have ever emigrated at any time to any part of Ireland, as all were attracted in an equal degree by the prospect of having the offices of their Church performed by an established body which received the support of the Government. Their Lordships should remember that a majority of the population of Ulster were Roman Catholics. The large manufacturing industry had attracted Roman Catholic residents, and even when King James was founding his colony in Ulster he took special care to leave a certain proportion of the Roman Catholics in each district. Inasmuch, therefore, as the population was so intermixed, and their mutual interests were so inter-dependent, he submitted that it would be extremely unwise to deal with that province in an exceptional manner, as any such exceptional dealing would be regarded by the majority of the population as an act of great injustice.

THE BISHOP OF DERRY

said, that as an Ulsterman and an Ulster Bishop he found it impossible to remain content with recording a silent vote on a matter with reference to which he felt so deeply. He wished, in the first place, to consider the equity of the claim, and in the second place, the policy of granting it. The first equitable principle upon which the claim to the Ulster glebes was based was this:—Speaking merely as a layman, and therefore subject to correction, it seemed to him that it was within the King's competence to grant these lands. There were repeated references to the plan in charters, letters, and other documents, and the argument made use of by the King was that he waived his own private right and his own personal advantage in consideration of the great object of the public good. But King James did not speak in this matter merely ex cathedrâ, merely as a King. He was constantly in communication with one whose name would have the greatest weight both within and without those walls—he meant Lord Bacon. From the 10th or 11th volume of the last edition of his works it will appear that however complicated the title might be and undoubtedly was in individual cases, he thought it remained beyond all practical doubt that the reduction of the long rebellion in Ulster left a vast tract of land legitimately at the disposal of the monarch. He (the Bishop of Derry) happened the other day to have studied a few chapters written by Lord Macaulay, a great authority with noble Lords behind him, and in the 23rd chapter of his history he argued the rights of the Crown with re- ference to the grant of lands, and what was his doctrine? Macaulay maintained that such grants, however unreasonable they might seem in themselves, however profligate in some cases, however un-unworthy favourites, were yet for a long worthily disposed of—given to minions or series of ages held valid. For instance, in the year 1696, when the King proposed to grant an enormous estate in Denbighshire to Portland, and the House of Commons remonstrated, they did not found their remonstrance on the ground that the Crown had not the right to make the grant, but simply that it was impolitic to do so. Macaulay said that in order to get rid of this Crown grant it would have been necessary to pass a retrospective statute, which, he added, would have been simply robbery, and the words which followed were substantially these—that such an act of robbery must have made all property utterly insecure; and that it was utterly unworthy of statesmen for a moment to indulge in the dream that any machinery which made property insecure was likely to make society prosperous. The second ground of equity was one on which a simple layman might feel mare competent to argue the case—namely, the improvement which had been wrought in those lands. It was easy to show by a whole host of contemporary authorities that the land in Ulster was at the time in a most miserable condition. Caulfield, writing in 1610, in an account of the escheated lands in Tyrone, said they were so poor that no rent was paid for them. There were three ideas which had been imported by Englishmen into Ireland, and which the Irish people would never be satisfied until they got rid of—the notion of landlord, the notion of tenant, and the notion of rent. In a very remarkable passage of his writings Dean Swift stated that James I. had been one of the greatest benefactors of the Church by the grant of those lands which he made in Ulster, and he mentioned that there were persons living in his time who remembered the land in such a very miserable and wretched condition that its value was only about 2d. an acre. The Government found fault with those who opposed their policy for not making sufficient distinction between the clergy and the laity; and in dealing with private interests they had shown fairness and tenderness. But what about those colonists who had come over to Ireland? If, for purposes of public policy, it was considered necessary to deprive the Church of the glebes, would it not be their duty to pay the descendants of the colonists the difference between the value of those glebe lands as they are and what they were when their predecessors came first into possession? There was a third reason why the Church had an equitable claim to the glebe lands. It could not be said that the plantation, in Ulster had utterly, or in a great measure, failed to fulfil the purposes for which it was intended. Plantations in those days meant more than market gardening or the sowing of potatoes, flax, or onions. It meant the plantation of glebes, with civilized Protestant men, and with those churches, free schools, and other institutions which they had enjoyed at home. It was a matter of great importance to discriminate between that which was primary and that which was secondary. Now the primary objects were, according to the expostulatory letter of James I., of the 6th of December, 1612, the safety of the country and the planting of civilization and religion; and in the charter they were stated to be to rescue Ulster from superstition, rebellion, poverty, and calamity, and to establish religion, obedience, strength, and prosperity. The hum of industry now rose from the busy and prosperous cities of Ulster; and among the causes which had given them that prosperity to Ulster, some place, at least, might be assigned to those glebes which had sometimes been the homes of genius, not seldom the abode of sanctity, and in almost all cases the centres of civilization. He belonged to a school of theology that had little sympathy either with high Anglicanism or with rigid Calvinism; and he though it hard that because their fathers had eaten the sour grapes of Calvinism, therefore the children's teeth were to be set on edge. He had sometimes been tempted to think that the existence of those articles was a proof of the identity between the Church of Ireland and the Church of England at that time; and in the depth of his episcopal heart, which, of course, was filled with all wickedness, he could not help thinking that this introduction of Calvinism was a mere pretext, while the possession of the glebe lands was the solid but profane reality. He must say, however, that the Episcopalians had got on very well with the Presbyterians of Ulster, and he had little doubt they would be able to do so in the future. The Presbyterians were a hardy, industrious, loyal, and religious race, but supposing that they had any right to these Ulster lands, which he did not admit, what was done by this Bill? Were they committing an injury upon the Episcopalians in order that they might do an act of justice to the Presbyterians? Not at all; but they committed one act of injustice upon the Presbyterians, and then they committed another upon the Episcopalians, and in the new algebra of disestablishment and disendowment two acts of injustice made one magnificent act of justice. Then they were told that if this act of justice were granted to the Episcopalians, there must be another to other denominations. He would not enter upon that question at present; but the claim now made was either just or unjust. It it were unjust, then in Heaven's name let them have no more of it; but if it were just, legal, and moral the argument that they were not to have these just rights because of other denominations, reminded him of Samuel Johnson's definition of envy—pain felt or malignity experienced at any happiness enjoyed or distress experienced by another. He would only say a very few words on the policy of the Amendment; but he wished, with all respect to the noble Lord behind him (Lord Dufferin), to state that this question of the disestablishment and disendowment of the Irish Church, however it might be regarded in England, was looked upon in the North of Ireland with very peculiar feelings indeed; in fact, he could hardly use exaggerated language upon this point. The measure was hated and detested by all Protestants, except a handful of Presbyterian ministers, who had learnt certain newfangled notions in consequence of their connection with Scotland. As a matter of fact he could assure their Lordships that in hundreds and thousands of peasants' homes prayer ascended daily to the just God that the measure might be defeated. He was convinced that noble Lords on the Government Bench were anxious to do what was right and just, and he therefore besought them not to treat the North of Ireland with a kind of Sangradoism, prescribing bleeding and hot water for all its ills. He appealed to their Lord- ships to send a message of peace to Ulster by accepting the Amendment of the most rev. Primate. This was a dark and heavy time for the Bishops and clergy of the Church which was so soon to be disestablished and disendowed. It was a thing to make a man's heart sink, his hand to tremble, and his knees to be very weak for a time when he saw the pinnacles of that ancient Church shattered to some extent by the storm which raged around them. But they looked with eyes suffused with tears, and straining through the mist, to discern the Church of the future. He trusted they could see her dim outline, not so grand or so beautiful, perhaps, as the former Church; but they hoped to see a fuller and richer light streaming upon her from the presence of her Lord; and it would give them great satisfaction if they could see below that supernatural light the rise of the star of peace upon their unhappy country. He believed that the adoption of this measure would be a message of peace; and for all these reasons—because the King had a right to grant these lands, because the improvements on those lands had been made by the clergy, because the Church had not failed in her mission, because the Amendment was just, because the Bill was an eminent departure from justice, and because it was an equal departure from policy, he entreated their Lordships to adopt this Amendment.

VISCOUNT MONCK

said, that in consequence of his personal connection with the Bill he had hitherto abstained from taking part in these discussions; but having a strong opinion on the subject of this Amendment, he trusted their Lordships would not think he was guilty of any impropriety if he ventured to make a few remarks upon it. It appeared to him that this Amendment, if adopted and combined with other Amendments that had been sanctioned by their Lordships, would nullify to a great extent the purpose of the Bill, and eliminate the principal means by which that object was to be attained. The purpose and object of the Bill was to introduce religious equality by disestablishing the Anglican Church in Ireland, and by withdrawing from the Church its endowments, so far as those endowments were given to her as an Establishment. He prayed their Lordships' attention to the effect of the Amendments which they had already sanctioned. By the Amend- ment moved by the noble Earl (the Earl of Carnarvon) fourteen years' purchase of the tithe rent-charge was secured to the Church Body. Now, by a return obtained by the noble Marquess on the cross-Benches (the Marquess of Clanricarde) it appeared that the sales of impropriate tithes in the Landed Estates Court produced on an average eighteen years' purchase; so that if property was worth only what it would fetch in the market, then the Irish Church would lose only four years' purchase of the tithe rent-charge. By the Amendment which was moved by the noble Marquess opposite (the Marquess of Salisbury) the glebe houses and surrounding lands were secured to the Church. And by this Amendment of the most rev. Primate (the Archbishop of Canterbury) the entire glebe lands, amounting to £950,000 in value, were also secured to her. If all these Amendments were cumulatively adopted he did not see that any disendowment of the Church would take place at all. The right rev. Prelate (the Bishop of Derry) had rested his support of the Amendment on the right of King James to make the grants. He had never heard the King's competency to make the grants called in question at all; but the question was in what character and on what ground did he make them. The right rev. Prelate had himself stated that ground when he said the grants were made in furtherance of a political object and for a public purpose; that object and purpose being Protestant ascendancy. But when that policy and purpose were abandoned by the State—and by statesmen on both sides of the House—it followed that the grant which was the consequences of that policy and purpose was also reversed. Another ground on which the right rev. Prelate had urged the Amendment was the improvement that had been made in the glebes by the Church. Now, if those improvements had been effected by the Church as a corporation there might be some reason in the argument. But that was not so; they were effected by the successive incumbents, who were but life tenants, and these improvements gave them no more title to the lands than would be the case in any other life tenancy. The third ground on which the right rev. Prelate relied was the plantation of Ulster, which he said was a plantation of morality and religion. But that only brought them back to the policy of Protestant ascendancy, which was now abandoned by common consent of all parties. The right rev. Prelate talked of the strong feeling that had sprung up in Ulster. He (Viscount Monck) would be the last man to say a word against the Protestants there—all his associations were connected with them—but it must be remembered that even in Ulster all the Protestants taken together still formed only a minority of the population. The right rev. Prelate talked of sending a message of peace to Ulster; he (Viscount Monck) was for sending a message of peace to Ireland; and that would be done, not by adopting the Amendment of the most rev. Prelate, but by accepting the Bill as it stood. If he were asked to state in a single sentence what had been the great mistake of the government of Ireland during the last 100 years since the relaxation of the penal code, he should say it was the refusal to give practical effect to the logical result of adopted principles. The state of things that existed at the time the penal code was in operation was a logical consequence of that code; the code had been abolished, and the principles which dictated it had been disavowed, but the policy which suggested this disavowal tad not been logically followed; hence all the misgovernment of Ireland which followed. For these reasons he hoped their Lordships would not accede to the Amendment of the most rev. Primate, but would pass the clause in the form in which it was presented by the Government.

LORD DUNSANY

said, he regretted that he had been unable conscientiously to vote on the questions which had been submitted of late. He was ready to go as far as most men in the way of giving perfect equality. Indeed, equality was necessary; but it might have been established in a form other than that proposed by the Bill, and one which he could not but think would, in the end, have been productive of better results. He feared that Amendments such as the present would create ill-feeling in Ireland. He lived on habits of intimacy with his Roman Catholic neighbours, but he was sorry to say that a feeling had sprung up in the country which had never existed before, and. which he could only express by the word hatred. Both among the Roman Catholics and Presbyterians there had sprung up that feeling towards the Established Church which he could only express in Scripture language—they would have no peace so long as Mordecai sat at the king's gate. The Moderator of the General Assembly of Ulster, had, only the other week, sent a letter to the papers, declaring that there would be no peace in Ireland as long as the Established Church enjoyed any advantages which the other Churches did not. But that was not the way in which grave questions of this kind could be settled. He, for one, would be ready to give to the Roman Catholic Prelates that social status which they did not at present enjoy, without depriving the Protestants of theirs. The noble Lord the Chairman of Committees (Lord Redesdale) said he saw no danger in Roman Catholic Prelates sitting in the House of Lords, to speak for the wants and wishes of the Roman Catholic population, and he was sure if that noble Lord did not nobody else would. He (Lord Dunsany) believed that the admission of those Prelates to that House would be attended with great benefit to all parties. He did not deny that if all the Amendments which were proposed in favour of the Irish Protestant Church were carried, they would interfere very materially with the principle of the Bill. But, admitting that to be the case, could not the Government, without loss of credit or strength, withdraw the Bill and introduce a greatly improved measure next year founded upon well ascertained public opinion. It was no disparagement, even to Mr. Gladstone, to say that he might be wiser in 1870 than in 1869.

EARL GREY

The question before us has been described as one of justice or injustice, and we have been invited to reject the Amendment of the most rev. Primate (the Archbishop of Canterbury) if we deem it unjust. I am bound to admit the argument urged by the Government that this grant of Ulster glebes was made by the King in a representative capacity, because we knew in those days many things were done by the Royal Prerogative which would in our day be accomplished by Act of Parliament. And I have always been of opinion that the property of the Church must be regarded as a public property held for certain great public objects, with which therefore Parliament is at liberty to deal. I cannot, then, admit the argument put forward by the most rev. Primate based upon the ground of strict justice. I should be glad if I could support this Amendment on the ground of policy. I have always affirmed that it is a matter of great public importance that the present Established Church should not, after its disestablishment, be left in a state of entire impoverishment, and that it is desirable we should not recognize the voluntary principle in the manner which this Bill proposes to do. This is most desirable for the interests of our own Church, because I am persuaded that by so recognizing the justice of what is called the voluntary principle in Ireland, we give instruction which will be used against ourselves. The effect of the course we are taking will be to unite all parties in Ireland—the Protestants who will be deprived of their property, and the Roman Catholics to whom we refuse to give anything, and we shall unite with them the numerically small but politically most powerful party represented in this country by the Liberation Society, who honestly tell us that this measure is a step towards an attack upon our own Church. I hold it to be most impolitic that we should settle this question in such a manner as to strengthen that party, and I cannot but hold that we are proceeding in that direction when we go so near to the total impoverishment of the Protestant Church. I should on that ground have been most anxious to accept the Amendment of the most rev. Prelate, and to vote for the proposition which he has made with regard to the Ulster grant; but that course is for me rendered totally impossible by what has already occurred in this House. My noble Friend who spoke first on behalf of the Government (Lord Dufferin), and the noble Viscount with spoke very lately (viscount Monck) have both referred to the decision of Friday night as bearing on this subject. The decision of Friday night has, indeed, a most important bearing on this question. The proposition of the noble Duke (the Duke of Cleveland) to grant houses and a moderate amount of glebe land to the clergy of the Roman Catholic and Presbyterian Churches was supported by a very great majority of the independent Members of this House, who have not lately been in Office, and especially by those independent Peers who are connected with Ireland and who have most stake in the country. Those whose judgment and experience entitle their opinion to the greatest weight were by an enormous majority in favour of the proposition. Those who supported the proposition of the noble Duke showed, with a power of reasoning, which has seldom been equalled, the great advantage which would be derived from the adoption of that proposal. I would refer especially to the speech of a noble Lord, a former Chief Secretary for Ireland (Lord Athlumney), who declared that the Amendment would be a measure of peace and conciliation to Ireland, and that the Bill without that Amendment would be a measure of a contrary character. How were these arguments met on behalf of the Government, and by the leaders of the Opposition? There was hardly one who ventured to argue the case upon its own. merits. Some Members of the Government distinctly admitted that, in their judgment, an arrangement of this question, founded upon the principle embodied in the Amendment, would be the best, and that it was the one which they should prefer; but they said that, unfortunately, so large a proportion of the inhabitants of England and Scotland were of a contrary way of thinking that, in deference to what they believed to be ignorant prejudice and mistaken views, they thought it their duty to refuse to be parties to a measure for applying Irish property in the manner best calculated to promote the welfare of Ireland. We saw what to me was the painful spectacle of a Minister of the Crown, in terms not to be mistaken, putting his resistence to the Amendments entirely upon deference to opinions which he considered to be a mistake. He said the verdict of the country was pronounced upon the question. That way of arguing the question involves a considerable alteration of what has hitherto been the practice under the Constitution. Is it to be the rule in future that the decision of great questions is to be taken out of the domain of Parliament, that Parliament is to cease to be a deliberative assembly, that it is to be converted into a mere meeting of delegates to register decisions arrived at out-of-doors, and that such questions are to be decided by excited multitudes in front of hustings and at election meetings? Are we to throw over the notion that we were formerly taught to entertain that it was the duty of honourable and high-minded men to refuse to make themselves in- struments of a policy of which they did not approve? Is it in future to be a sufficient excuse for a Minister of the Crown advocating a measure which he cannot defend upon grounds of justice and expediency, that the nation has pronounced a verdict which it is our duty to give effect to? In future are success, and success only, and the maintenance of a Government in Office, to be the objects to be kept in view, and not the deliberate consideration of the welfare of the nation? If your Lordships will seriously consider this you will see that it involves a very great innovation. Let me further call attention to the effect which the rejection of a measure upon this ground must have upon the minds of the Irish people. If they are to be told—"It would be greatly to your benefit that the clergy should have glebes and houses provided by the State, but it cannot be, because a certain proportion of the people of England and Scotland say they can be no parties to the endowment of error," when the Roman Catholics have gained their immediate object of pulling down the Church, and when they calmly consider the real grounds upon which the proposal was rejected, in what light will the matter present itself to them? Will it appear to them that this measure has been brought forward with respect for religious freedom and for the rights of conscience? Will it appear to them that it is a measure founded upon ideas of Christian charity and benevolence? Or will it appear to them that those who have used them as instruments to overthrow the English Church in Ireland do not intend to act towards the Roman Catholics in that spirit of equality and fairness which they have a right to expect? Is this or is it not likely to be the impression produced upon the people of Ireland? Is not the course proposed likely to convince them that they have not been equally treated? I therefore regret the vote of Friday night as a most disastrous vote—disastrous alike to England and Ireland, and calculated to strengthen the impression of injustice.

EARL BEAUCHAMP

I rise to Order. I put it to your Lordships whether upon the successive clauses of this Bill we are to discuss matters which have been already decided.

EARL GREY

The decision come to the other night bears directly and imme- diately upon the clause now before us, and that which otherwise would have been expedient has ceased to be so. If the noble Earl were more acquainted with the practice of the House he would not, under these circumstances, call a speaker to Order. The effect of the division the other evening was to refuse glebes to the Roman Catholics, and I have now endeavoured to show that this was a great mistake, in order to support my argument that in the face of that decision it would be unjust and unwise to adopt the Motion now before us, and thus to preserve, for the benefit of the Protestant religion, a much larger amount of glebe lands than was asked for in the case of the Roman Catholics. Though I believe that the proposal might have been agreed to with advantage if the House had come to a different decision on Friday evening, I think, under the present circumstances, its only effect would be to increase the ill effects which I foresee are likely to ensue from that vote. I trust that the question will not be allowed to remain where it is, but that some noble Lord will afford the Committee an opportunity of re-considering the vote at which they arrived the other evening, though I cannot entertain any very great hope that the attempt will be successful. Under these circumstances, therefore, I must refuse that concurrence to the Amendment of the right rev. Prelate which, under other circumstances, I should have willingly given to it. I will only add that by the forms of the House I am aware that it was impossible to avoid dividing the question of the grants to the Protestant, the Presbyterian, and the Roman Catholic Churches. I, however, supported the Amendment moved by the noble and learned Lord for the relief of the present Established Church the other evening, in the hope that the subsequent one, intended to confer corresponding advantages on the other Churches, would be carried also. But as that Amendment was rejected, it is only right that this should be rejected also, or that the Committee should, at some future period, have the opportunity afforded of rescinding the vote at which they arrived the other evening.

THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY

My Lords, I did not like to interrupt the remarks of the noble Earl (Earl Grey), although they wandered so wide of the clause now under discussion that the rebuke which he administered to the noble Earl opposite (Earl Beauchamp) was scarcely called for. I was anxious it should not be said we were desirous of stifling discussion, and I therefore remained silent while the noble Earl took us so severely to task for our conduct on what I shall call concurrent endowment. The noble Earl said that, by the course the Government had adopted, Members of Parliament were not allowed to support their own opinions, but were reduced to the character of delegates. If my noble Friend founds what he has said upon any remarks of mine, I utterly deny the interpretation he has placed upon them. What I said on Friday night was, that in 1866, 1867, and 1868, the question was before the country, and that at that time public opinion was not favourable to the proposal so much approved by my noble Friend and by Earl Russell. As to the conduct of the present Government, what I said was that when we went to the country last year we considered what our course should be, and we came to the conclusion that it would not be possible to propose any scheme of concurrent endowment; and we came to this conclusion openly and before the face of the country, upon grounds, as my noble Friend put it, of justice and expediency. We thought justice required that this measure should pass, and we thought that expediency required it should be so framed so as to meet with a ready acceptance both with Parliament and with the country. We thought, too, that these results could not have been attained if we had adopted the scheme which my noble Friend favours. I am glad that my noble Friend agrees with us as to the advisability of adopting this clause, which we defend on the ground that these grants to Ulster were, to a great extent, re-grants of land which formerly belonged to the Church, and also upon the ground that these grants were made for the general good of the country, and not for the special benefit of any particular portion of the community. I may, perhaps, allude to the argument employed by a right rev. Prelate (the Bishop of Derry), at an earlier period of the evening, when he said that the improvements effected in these lands by the Church constituted a strong claim for the retention of these lands. But the improvements referred to by the right rev. Prelate are generally due to the money and labour not of the clergy, but of the tenants who occupy these glebe lands. I cannot help thinking, too, that when the right rev. Prelate in his eloquent address referred to the great services of the Protestants of Ulster, and to their industry and intelligence, he overlooked the fact that a very large portion of the Protestants of Ulster are not members of the Episcopal Church, but are Presbyterians. I hope your Lordships will not agree to the Amendment.

LORD CAIRNS

I think my noble Friend (Earl Beauchamp) who a short time ago interrupted the remarks of the noble Earl on the cross-Benches (Earl Grey) was perfectly warranted in making the suggestion he did, for the greater portion of the last two speeches to which we have listened has been devoted to the discussion of matters perfectly foreign to the clause. The Committee has been favoured with a retrospect of our proceedings, consisting, as was natural, of a lament on one side and a triumph on the other, over the division which the Committee arrived at on the last night of the debate. Now, the proposal before us is to take out of the general mass of the property of the Church, for the benefit of the Representative Body, those particular glebes which were annexed to benefices in consequence of any Royal grants or letters patent since the second year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. I dwell upon this because both my noble Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and the noble Earl opposite (the Earl of Kimberley) have fallen into the error of regarding these glebes as being for the most part re-grants of land granted to the Church before the Reformation, and, therefore, pre-Reformation grants. This would be true if the grants claimed were all grants made to bishoprics in Ulster, because it would be perfectly right to say that during the fifty or 100 years that preceded the reign of James I. the property of the Bishops and the sees in Ulster had been diverted. I also desire to remind your Lordships of the amount of property involved in this Amendment. It has been differently stated, but the glebe lands do not exceed 100,000 acres; and would yield, I believe, about £40,000 a year. The noble Viscount (Viscount Monck) said that the noble Earl below the Gangway (the Earl of Carnarvon) had secured, by his Amendment the other evening, fourteen years' purchase for the holders of the tithe rent-charge. He said— Now, by a return obtained by the noble Marquess on the cross-Benches (the Marquess of Clanricarde) it appeared that the sales of impropriate tithes in the Landed Estates Court produced on an average eighteen years' purchase; so that if property was worth only what it would fetch in the market, then the Irish Church would lose only four years' purchase of the tithe rent-charge. That was said by one of the Commissioners under the Bill; but is the noble Lord aware of the scheme of the Government? It compensates the holders of tithe rent-charge on the value of their own lives, and upon the average they will receive something like thirteen years' purchase. The difference between thirteen and fourteen years' purchase represents the value of the additional work which the Church Body will have to do. But does the noble Viscount think the sales to which he refers are sales of impropriate rent-charge. This may be sold; but tithe rent-charge cannot be sold. Again, the noble Viscount will find in the Bill that those Irish landlords who are fortunate enough to have enough of money to purchase their tithe rent-charge will be allowed to do so not at eighteen years but at twenty-two and a-half years' purchase. The complaint is, therefore, not between eighteen and fourteen years, but between twenty-two and a-half and thirteen years' purchase. My Lords, a good deal has been said by the noble Earl on the cross-Benches, respecting grounds of policy and expediency; but I put this question on the broad grounds of justice. If it is not a question of justice the Amendment ought to fall. On the ground of justice it ought to be supported if it is to be supported at all. The question is not one of re-endowment of the Church; it is one of absolute right, and I put it on the same footing as that on which both sides are agreed in putting the private endowments, though there is a difference as to the date at which our recognition of the latter ought to commence. The grant of those glebe lands was part and parcel of a scheme for a territorial settlement of Ulster. English and Scotch settlers were invited to go over to the North of Ireland, not to establish a Protestant ascendancy, but to establish a Protestant population. As an inducement to such settlers, for every 2,000 acres taken and colonized by the settlers, sixty acres were given by way of glebe for the maintenance of a Protestant clergyman. Remember that at the time of which I am speaking the whole of those lands were in the hands of the King, to do whatever he liked with. He was under no control in that respect, and he not only had the right, but he exercised it. He made grant after grant to individuals. The colonists who went over from England and Scotland would have had a provision for their religion if they had remained in their own country, but unless those grants were made to them they would have had no such provision in Ireland. A contract was entered into with those colonists at that time. Is it for the present generation to break that contract? In his history Sir James Macintosh considers what is the proper course to be taken by a State when it puts an end to a religious establishment and resumes possession of the property. He says— What could Governments do morally and righteously? What is it right for them to do? What would they be enjoined to do by a just superior if such a personage could be found among their fellow-men? My Lords, we have no superior among us, but there is one in the United States. There the Parliamentary power is controlled by the Supreme Court. What we are going through now was experienced in the State of Virginia with regard to the Church of England. In 1606 the Church was established in that State, and James I. made a grant of glebes; and in the reign of Charles II., in 1660, a law was passed providing moans for the maintenance of ministers of the Established Church. In 1740, an Act was passed which provided a salary of 1,6001b. of tobacco for the clergyman of every parish, and that in every parish a good and convenient glebe of 200 acres should be purchased by the vestry, and the charge of the same should be met by all titheable property in the said parish. In 1784 the Church was disestablished in Virginia. In 1798 an Act was passed by the State of Virginia, the Preamble of which is as follows:— Whereas the Constitution of the State of Virginia hath pronounced the Government of the King of England to have been totally dissolved by the Revolution; hath substituted in place of the Civil Government so dissolved a new Civil Government, and hath in the Bill of Rights excepted from the powers given to the substituted Government the power of reviving any species of ecclesiastical or Church Govern- ment in lieu of that so dissolved by referring the subject of religion to conscience; and whereas the several Acts presently recited do admit the Church established under the Regal Government to have continued so subsequently to the Constitution; have bestowed property upon the Church; have asserted a legislative right to establish any religious sect; and have incorporated religious sects, all of which is inconsistent with the principles of the Constitution and of religious freedom, and manifestly tends to the re-establishment of a National Church. The Act of 1801 has the following Preamble:— Whereas the General Assembly on the 24th of January, 1799, by a law of that date repealed all the laws relative to the late Protestant Episcopal Church, and declared a true exposition of the Bill of Bights and Constitution respecting the same to be contained in the Act entitled 'An Act for Establishing Religious Freedom,' thereby recognizing the principle that all property formerly belonging to the said Church of every description devolved on the good people of this Commonwealth on the dissolution of the British Government here in the same degree in which the right and interest of the said Church was derived therein from them. And although the General Assembly possesses the right of authorizing a sale of all such property indiscriminately, yet being desirous to reconcile all the good people of this Commonwealth, it is deemed inexpedient at this time to disturb the possession of the present incumbents. The Act proceeded to direct the overseers of the poor within each county wherein any glebe land was vacant, or should become so by the death or removal of any incumbent, to sell all such lands and every other property incident thereto, and to appropriate the money arising there from to secular purposes. Now, can anything tally more exactly up to that point with what is occurring now? In pursuance of this law, the municipality of Alexandria sold the glebe lands. I must remark that the limit of the Parliamentary power of the various States is as follows:— No State shall pass any Bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law impairing the obligation of contracts. The question came under the consideration of the Supreme Court of the United States, and the result was a decision which was received as a leading authority in all parts of that country. The Court held that the Legislature had perfect power to destroy the Establishment, to take away all public right of patronage and cure of souls, and all compulsory legislation for the support of the Church, but that it had no right whatever to take away the glebe lands which were acquired under the circumstances I have mentioned. The following extracts from Mr. Justice Story's Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States will give a general idea of the extent to which this prohibition of laws impairing the obligation of contracts operates as a protection to what are known in this country as the vested interests of individuals or corporate bodies— It has been already stated that a grant is a contract within the meaning of the Constitution, as much as an unexecuted agreement. The prohibition, therefore, equally reaches all interferences with private grants and private conveyances, of whatever nature they may be. But it has been made a question whether it applies in the same extent to contracts and grants of a. State created directly by law, or made by some authorized agent in pursuance of a law. It has been suggested that in such cases it is to be deemed an act of the legislative power; and that all laws are repealable by the same authority which enacted them. But it has been decided upon solemn argument that contracts and grants made by a State are not less within the reach of the prohibition than contracts and grants of private persons; that the question is not whether such contracts or grants are made directly by law in the form of legislation, or in any other form, but whether they exist at all. … And grants of land, once voluntarily made by a State by a special law, or under general laws, when once perfected are equally as incapable of being resumed by a subsequent law as those founded on a valuable consideration. Thus, if a State grant glebe lands or other lands to parishes, towns, or private persons gratuitously, they constitute irrevocable executed contracts. And it may be laid down as a general principle that whenever a law is in its own nature a contract, and absolute rights have vested under it, a repeal of that law cannot divest those rights or annihilate or impair the title so acquired. [Theodore Sedgwick, in his Statutory Law, p. 625, states the principle thus—'That a Legislature can no more withdraw its grant than a donor his gift when delivered, is now to be considered perfectly well settled.] A grant (as has been already stated) amounts to an extinguishment of the right of the grantor, and implies a contract not to reassert it. This was the rule adopted in the United States, which neither in their constitution nor in the doctrines of their law had ever been accused of too great leniency to endowments or establishments. The Legislature of Virginia had attempted to do what their Lordships were now asked to do in reference to these glebe lands; but they were controlled and prevented from doing it by the Supreme Court, upon the ground that the sacredness of grants would have been violated by the statute. Again, what was done in the ease of Canada, which was referred to by the First Minister of the Crown as the great precedent for this Bill? The Church was disestablished in Canada, and the property called the "Clergy Reserves," in which no particular localities had any interest whatever, were taken by the State; but the rectories created for the purpose of endowing particular localities were allowed to remain intact, and were regarded as property which was in no way to be disturbed. With regard to the case immediately under discussion, of the glebes and glebe lands in Ulster, I do not base it on the interests of the life holders, but on the broad and general ground that there would be a breach of the contract made with the settlers who colonized the country on the faith of these grants being made if those grants were resumed by Parliament.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR

I will not enter into a lengthened examination of the authorities cited by the noble and learned Lord (Lord Cairns) because if I did so the result would be a species of argument like those which are often heard at the bar of this House, though not in a political debate. I will content myself with remarking that the Supreme Court of the United States sit, as your Lordships are aware, as judges in reference to the action of single States, and the quotation laid before your Lordships by my noble and learned Friend amounts only to this—that the Supreme Court decided that the State Legislature of Virginia had not sovereign power to do what it did. No one, however, can question the constitutional right of the three Estates of this Realm to pass any measure they may deem beneficial for the interests of the United Kingdom. The proposal of the most rev. Primate (the Archbishop of Canterbury) is to give £40,000 a year in round numbers, £1,000,000 to the Episcopalian Church in Ulster. The Roman Catholics, who form more than half the population of the province, are to have none of it. The Presbyterians, who are as five to three compared with the Episcopalians, are to have none of it. It is simply to be handed over to the 300,000 or 400,000 members of the Episcopal Church in Ulster. It has been said that this was the case of a private grant, but the terms of the grant of King Charles I. show the contrary. It is clear that this grant is made for Imperial interests, and the King reserves to himself a right to resume the grant if these interests are not regarded. But King James invited settlers from Scotland as well as from England. It is true that the Episcopal Church was at that time in Scotland. But the bulk of the people there, were Presbyterians, as their descendants are now. The King also allowed a certain number of the best affected Irish Catholics to settle on the land, and Catholics now formed the bulk of the population of Ulster. Are these Presbyterians and Catholics not to be remembered in dealing with this property? My Lords, I do not think it needs a lengthened argument to show that these glebes come within the purview of the Bill. The speech of my noble and learned Friend was really a speech against the second reading of the Bill, and it therefore is really unnecessary to discuss the points which he raised. But before sitting down I should like to take notice of the repeated and extraordinary expressions made use of by the noble Earl (Earl Grey) as to the want of honour and right mindedness on the part of those who occupy these (the Ministerial) Benches on the subject of concurrent endowment. The noble Earl is not now present, but in his absence I may say that I give him credit for honour, high-mindedness, and integrity in the highest degree; but I must deny his right to constitute himself the judge of my honour, right-mindedness, and integrity, or that of the occupants of this Bench. What is the argument of the noble Earl? Because some of us have said that a certain course would have been desirable if there had been a common concurrence respecting it on the part of all the nation, the noble Earl declares that we are, therefore, lacking in honour and high-mindedness, for adopting as practical men the plan which the nation desires. Now, I have been brought up in a school of politicians which thinks that the will of the nation has a great deal to do with every great question of legislation. That will we have ascertained in the proper constitutional manner by an appeal to the constituencies, and he is unfit for a statesman who is not instructed by the expression of that will. A statesman is not to be dictated to by it; he is not to do—God forbid that he should!—one thing which he thinks is wrong because the nation has spoken; but if the thing be not wrong—if it be a mere choice between two things, one of which he may think better than the other, though he may think both good, I say that, as a wise Minister, he will be guided by seeing what is practicable and what is not practicable. The noble Earl has said—"You legislate for Ireland by the votes of the English and the Scotch.'' But he forgets that we have as great a majority in favour of our measure in Ireland as we have in England. Why, therefore, are we to thrust upon the nation, with a doctrinaire perversity, that which the nation has clearly declined to have. To adopt what we think right for the nation, independent of the will of the nation, is government upon paternal principles: and I think the time for such government has gone by. The right rev. Prelate (the Bishop of Derry) spoke of the despair, the dismay, the pain, and the anguish which the proposal of the Government has occasioned in Ulster. I only beg to remind him, in reply, that the town which gives its name to his see has returned to Parliament a Gentleman favourable to our measure.

THE BISHOP OF ELY

said, they were told that Church property was national property, and that all Churches and sects were to be placed on a footing of equality. In limine he demurred to the assertion that Church property was national property; it was public property, which the nation held in trust for the furtherance of great public interests. However, it had been determined that this property should be treated as national, and at the bottom of all the arguments which had been urged this evening against the Amendment was the feeling that if these glebe lands were retained by the Protestant Church in Ulster there would not be religious equality. Now, it must be remembered that unestablished Churches always acquired a considerable amount of property. Roman Catholics, Presbyterians, and other Dissenting sects in Ireland owned considerable property, and no one knew the amount of it. But everybody knew perfectly well what the property of the Established Church was. In appropriating that, therefore, you left to other sects their private property. True, you gave to individual members of the Established Church compensation for private interests, and you left the churches and the parsonage houses, from which he believed the Roman Catholics themselves would be sorry to see the ministers of the Church ejected. But this was all. Roman Catholics and Presbyterians had a great deal more than this, and therefore you would not have religious equality unless you gave the Established Church something else. He regretted greatly that the House had decided against the grant of glebe houses to Roman Catholics and Presbyterians, because that would have prevented the appearance of inequality; but he maintained that the grant of these Ulster glebes to the Church would, for the reasons he had stated, be a much nearer approach to religious equality. The noble and learned Lord (the Lord Chancellor) had stated that he should be ashamed of his religion if he did not think it could make its way even when stripped of its endowments. It was very easy to say that; but it was hard to let a Church grow up in the midst of a nation, under the protection of the Government, and then when it was no longer an infant Church, like the Apostolic Church, suddenly to turn it out upon the world. You might compare this to the case of a father who sent a young man out to the colonies at twenty and gave him £100. The young man in the full vigour of life might make his way and do well; but if the same youth grew up at home in peace and prosperity, and perhaps in luxury, and then at fifty were turned out to make a fortune for himself, it was not likely he would succeed. No doubt there was such a thing as Apostolic poverty, but noble Lords, who referred to it, might remember that it was poverty of the laity, as much as of the clergy. It was of the laity that we read that they sold their possessions and brought them to the feet of the Apostles. St. Paul, who set a noble example of poverty, continually advocated this principle, that as those who served the altar lived by the altar, so they who preached the Gospel should live by the Gospel. He drew a complete parallel between the maintenance of the Levites under the Law and that of the clergy under the Gospel: which proves plainly enough that though Apostolic poverty was the fittest condition for clergy and laity alike in the infant Church, it was never contemplated by the Apostles as the normal condition of settled Churches in the midst of wealthy communities. To strip the Church naked and turn it out into the world by the side of other Churches largely endowed and highly organized would be to place it in so trying a position that it would require something like a miracle to have it maintain itself.

On Question? their Lordships divided: —Contents 105; Not-Contents 55: Majority 50.

CONTENTS.
Canterbury, Archp.	London, Bp,
Dublin, Archp.	Peterborough, Bp:
	St. David's, Bp.
Beaufort, D.	Tuam, &c, Bp.
Manchester, D.
Northumberland, D.	Bolton, L.
Richmond, D.	Cairns, L.
	Chaworth, L. (E. Meath.)
Abercorn, M. (D. Abercorn.)	Chelmsford, L.
	Churston, L.
Bath, M.	Clarina, L.
Bristol, M.	Clermont, L.
Salisbury, M.	Cloncurry, L.
	Colchester, L.
Abergavenny, E.	Colonsay, L.
Amherst, E.	Colville of Culross, L. [Teller.]
Annesley, E.
Bandon, E.	Congleton, L.
Beauchamp, E.	Crofton, L.
Bradford, E.	Delamere, L.
Brooke and Warwick, E.	Denman, L.
Brownlow, E.	De Ros, L.
Cadogan, E.	De Saumarez, L.
Carnarvon, E.	Dunboyne, L.
Cawdor, E.	Dunsandle and Clanconal, L.
Dartrey, E.
Ellenborough, E.	Dunsany, L.
Feversham, E.	Egerton, L.
Hardwicke, E.	Fitzwalter, L.
Harrington, E.	Grinstead, L.(E. Enniskillen.)
Harrowby, E.
Leven and Melville, E.	Hartismere, L.(L. Henniker.)
Morton, E.
Nelson, E.	Headley, L.
Orkney, E.	Hylton, L.
Portarlington, E.	Leconfield, L.
Powis, E.	Moore, L. (M. Drogheda.)
Rosse, E.	Northwick, L.
Selkirk, E.	O'Neill, L.
Stanhope, E.	Ormathwaite, L.
Tankerville, E.	Penrhyn, L.
	Rayleigh, L.
Clancarty, V. (E. Clancarty.)	Redesdale, L.
	Ross, L. (E. Glasgow.)
De Vesci, V.	Saltersford, L.(E. Courtown.)
Gough, V.
Hardinge, V.	Saltoun, L.
Hawarden, V. [Teller.]	Scarsdale, L.
Hood, V.	Sheffield, L. (E. Sheffield.)
Leinster, V. (D. Leinster.)
	Silchester, L. (E. Longford.)
Melville, V.
Powerscourt, V.	Sinclair, L.
Templetown, V.	Skelmersdale, L.
	Stanley of Alderley, L.
Bangor, Bp.	Templemore, L.
Deny and Raphoe, Bp.	Walsingham, L.
Ely, Bp.	Wemyss, L. (E. Wemyss.)
Gloucester and Bristol, Bp.
	Willoughby de Broke, L.
Hereford, Bp.	Wynford, L.
Lichfield, Bp,

NOT-CONTENTS.
Hatherley, L. (L. Chancellor.)	Norfolk, D.
	Saint Albans, D.
	Wellington, D.
Cleveland, D.

Lansdowne, M.	De Tabley, L.
Normanby, M.	Dunning, L. (L. Rollo.)
	Fingall, L. (E. Fingall.)
Abingdon, E.	Foley, L. [Teller.]
Airlie, E.	Foxford, L. (E. Limerick.)
Albemarle, E.
Camperdown, E.	Lawrence, L.
De Grey, E.	Lurgan, L.
De La Warr, E.	Meredyth, L. (L. Athlumney.)
Essex, E.
Fortescue, E.	Monck, L. (V. Monck.)
Granville, E.	Monson, L.
Grey, E.	Mont Eagle, L. (M. Sligo.)
Kimberley, E.
Lucan, E.	Northbrook, L.
Morley, E.	Ponsonby L. (E. Bessborough.) [Teller.]
Spencer, E
Stradbroke, E.	Romilly, L.
	Rossie, L. (L. Kinnaird.)
Halifax, V.	Seaton, L.
Sydney, V.	Seymour, L. (E. St. Maur.)
Torrington, V.
	Somerhill, L. (M. Clanricarde.)
Abercromby, L.
Ashburton, L.	Suffield, L.
Belper, L.	Sundridge, L. (D. Argyll.)
Camoys, L.
Carew, L.	Talbot de Malahide, L.
Clandeboye, L. (L. Dufferin and Claneboye.)	Taunton, L.
	Vernon, L.
Clifford of Chudleigh, L.

Resolved in the Affirmative.

Clause, as amended, agreed to.

Clause 30 (Enactments with respect to mixed endowments) agreed to.

Clause 31 (Moveable chattels belonging to sees or churches) agreed to.

[Management of property by Commissioners.]

Clause 32 (Limitation of right to purchase fee simple in consideration of perpetual rent) agreed to.

Clause 33 (Sale of tithe rent-charge to owners of land).

THE EARL OF LIMERICK

, in rising to move in page 17, lines 19 and 20, after ("rentcharge") to insert— ("Less such sum in the pound as such owner shall be ascertained by the commissioners to have been, on an average of five years preceding the passing of this Act entitled to deduct for poor rates.") said, that the alteration he proposed would not make much difference in the amount of the surplus; but, at the same time, it was desirable that the clause should be so amended as to be freed from an error in the computation. The clause as it stood entitled the Commissioners to effect a sale of the tithe rent-charge at twenty-two and a-half years' purchase upon its nominal amount, without taking into consideration any deduction from it. Now, he proposed that the amount of poor rates paid on an average during five years before the passing of the Act should be deducted, and he might claim the support of the noble Viscount opposite (Viscount Monck), who had stated that the clear market value was only eighteen years' purchase.

Amendment moved, line 19, after ("rent-charge") to insert— ("Less such sum in the pound as such owner shall be ascertained by the commissioners to have been on an average of five years preceding the passing of this Act entitled to deduct for poor rates.")—(The Earl of Limerick.)

LORD NORTHBROOK

said, that the precise words of the noble Earl's Amendment were inserted in the latter part of the clause. Was it necessary to re-insert them? The matter had been argued at length in the other House, and the compromise eventually agreed to was approved by the Royal Commissioners.

LORD CAIRNS

observed that the clause provided for those who wished to purchase at twenty-two and a-half years' purchase, and for those who applied to let the charge lapse by the financial operations of the Government; but no course was defined for those cases in which the landlord, either from being a minor or other cause, did not apply, but simply remained quiescent. How would he be put in motion?

LORD NORTHBROOK

said, the question would be considered by the Government.

THE EARL OF LIMERICK

said, that he must press his Amendment, the explanation of the noble Lord. (Lord Northbrook) being unsatisfactory.

EARL GREY

said, he thought it would have been more straight forward if the Government had introduced a clause stating in express terms that, at the end of fifty-two years, the tithe rent-charge would wholly cease. At present, the Bill offered the tithe rent-charge at a price which no man in his senses would pay; and, in default of his accepting the offer, made a nominal loan to him, and caused the charge to lapse at the end of fifty-two years. But why should property, valuable for public purposes, be given to the Irish landlords fifty-two years hence? The difficulties of the country would be far less then than now; and if it were deemed advisable to give any- thing to the landlords, by all means let it be given now, when it would be of some service. He was utterly unable to understand any principle which could justify abolishing, after a certain number of years, a public charge upon the land of Ireland.

THE DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND

said, that many persons had purchased land in Ireland, subject to that charge, and he could not see the justice of giving it up. They would not only have to bear that charge during their lifetime, but to support their Church as well. How could this be reconciled with the principle of justice, upon which the Government professed to found their Bill?

LORD NORTHBROOK

said, the arrangement was somewhat difficult to understand; but it was to be observed that the Irish Church Commissioners distinctly recommended in their Report that this tithe rent-charge should be commuted—that it appeared to them that it would be expedient to empower owners to redeem on fair terms; and acting upon their recommendation, the Government had devised a financial scheme which would work satisfactorily to all the three parties concerned. First, the Exchequer lent money at 3½ per cent, which, considering the state of the money market, and that the Exchequer borrowed at the rate of 3 per cent, was not an unfair rate. Next, the new Commissioners would, no doubt, receive a capital of £9,250,000, in consequence of the arrangement. The Church fund would suffer in no way. Then, as to the landlords; they could buy up their tithe rent-charge at once, or find themselves relieved of it at the end of fifty-two years; and the arrangement was not a bad one for them. The gross rent-charge was £405,000, which gave about £9,250,000 at twenty-two and a-half years' purchase. The interest upon that was £320,000, at 3½ per cent; and, as the arrangement was made at 4½, there would be about 1 per cent put by to replace capital, for which fifty-two years would be sufficient.

THE MARQUESS OF CLANRICARDE

said, he could not understand how the present landlords would benefit when they had to pay their tithe rent-charge and support their Church as well.

EARL GRANVILLE

said, he was delighted to find that his argument on introducing the Bill directed against the charge that the Government had endeavoured to bribe the landlords by this proposal was quite unnecessary; it seemed now that the clause was of no value at all to the landlords, but rather the reverse.

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

said, that, as between landlords and lunatics, he preferred the landlords. He had been trying to think of a phrase that would not wound the susceptibilities of those on the Ministerial Bench, and he would say that this was not a frank-speaking Bill. It was full of conjuring tricks. Noble Lords desired, and he thought rightly, to give some grant to Maynooth, but instead of doing so in a straightforward manner the Bill estimated the value of the life interests in bricks and mortar. They desired to give compensation for the Regium Donum, and their plan was to take Regium Donum and Maynooth together, and calculate the life interests in the whole. It was wished that the landlords of Ireland should be dealt with liberally and justly; but the Bill contained, instead of a plain and simple provision, an extraordinary puzzle which would be without a parallel in the statute book. There were contradictions between parts of the Bill and the professions of the Government. They professed to be animated by a desire to do the best they could for the Irish Church; but the Bill was one of the most penurious and exacting Bills ever devised. If the Government had come forward boldly and allowed their clauses to represent their principles distinctly, without attempting to work round to those principles by the extraordinary devices of which this clause was a sample, they would have commended their proposals much more to thinking men out-of, doors and to the Members of their Lordships' House.

On Question? Their Lordships divided:—Contents 91; Not-Contents 64: Majority 27.

Resolved in the Affirmative.

Clause, as amended, agreed to.

Clause 34 (Commissioners may purchase surrender or assignment of lease), agreed to.

Clause 35 (Power of commissioners to sell their property).

LORD HOUGHTON

said, that to a certain degree the clause anticipated the question which it was understood was reserved for next year; one portion of it declaring that the Commissioners shall in the first instance offer to sell the fee simple of the land to the lessee or tenant. He thought their Lordships ought not to pass without some notice a clause involving a principle so important as that of giving the sanction of the Government to the sale of property for the purpose of creating small holdings. It appeared to introduce into the Bill a matter which was entirely alien to its principle, and one which had apparently been introduced with some ulterior object.

EARL GRANVILLE

entirely denied the interpretation that the noble Lord had put upon the clause. The clause was in perfect conformity with the principle of the Bill. Its object was merely to give the right of pre-emption to the actual lessees.

LORD CAIRNS

said, that the Commissioners could, if they desired, name a price sufficiently high to exclude all possibility of the land being purchased by the lessees.

Clause agreed to with an Amendment.

Clause 36 (Orders of commissioners operating as conveyance or mortgage to be liable to same stamp duty as conveyances or mortgages)

Clause 37 (Payment of money into bank)

Clause 38 (Accounts of capital and revenues)

Agreed to.

[Regium Donum and College of Maynooth.]

Clause 39 (Compensation to non-conforming ministers).

THE EARL OF COURTOWN

, who had placed on the Paper an Amendment to strike out this clause, said that he would not press his Motion, as he had reason to believe that it would not receive their Lordships' support. He desired, however, to enter his solemn protest against the application of an Irish fund to the relief of Imperial taxation; and though he thought that those who derived benefit from the Regium Donum and the Maynooth Grant ought to be compensated fully and freely, he could not help thinking that the nation was exhibiting its generosity at the expense of what was Irish money. He accepted the decision which had been arrived at as the decision of the majority of one House of Parliament, but not as the decision of the country, before whom the subject had never been fully laid.

Clause agreed to.

Clause 40 (Commutation of annuities of nonconformist ministers and professors at Belfast) agreed to.

Clause 41 (Repeal of Maynooth Acts. Compensation on the cessation of certain annual sums).

Amendments made.

LORD FITZWALTER moved "to disagree to the said clause as amended," which he believed to be repulsive to the feelings of the people of England and Scotland.

THE EARL OF CLANCARTY

, in supporting the Motion, said, he considered that there was no proper connection between the disendowment of Maynooth and the disendowment of the Protestant Church. Maynooth was a College established and endowed in permanence, no longer ago than 1845, with the deliberate assent of both Houses of Parliament, and it had thenceforth been constituted as the Royal College of Maynooth—one of the institutions of the country. He had strongly objected to and contended against the Bill for its establishment; but he saw no reason or justification for now disturbing it after its having been so deliberately established upon the good faith of Parliament. If the present House of, Commons wished to disendow that establishment, it was for them to provide out of funds legitimately at their disposal for such compensation as they might consider the collegiate body entitled to; but it was only adding insult to the injury already done to the Protestant Church in Ireland to take from the Church Body the funds required for the future capitalized endowment of an institution expressly designed for the teaching of doctrines the most opposed to those of the Reformed faith. The establishment of Maynooth had been undoubtedly the admission of the principle of endowing the Roman Catholic Church in antagonism to the national Protestant Establishment; but the concession had been made. He considered that the College had conferred no benefit upon the country. It had sent forth as teachers of the people a clergy generally narrow-minded, intolerant, and imbued with Ultramontane principles; whereas previously the priests of Ireland, for the most part educated abroad, came into the country with more enlarged views, and were better members of society. The Roman Catholic clergy had gradually come to be fully recognized in their parochial functions as parish priests; he would, therefore, consider it a very salutary exchange for the country, though it might be more costly, if in lieu of any endowment for Maynooth College, grants of glebe houses and gardens should be made, as proposed lately in Committee, for the residences of parish priests; but he conceived that there was nothing in the anti-Church movement to justify the abstractions from the funds of the Irish Church, for the purpose of relieving the Imperial Exchequer from a pecuniary burden that was imposed upon it by the deliberate vote of the Imperial Parliament.

THE EARL OF BANDON

said, he had always opposed the Maynooth Grant during the many years he sat in the House of Commons. It had signally failed to attain the object with which it was conceded by Parliament—the conciliation of the Roman Catholics. He could not see why the compensation for an annual amount which had been paid out of the Consolidated Fund should be paid out of the funds of the Irish Church.

LORD CAIRNS

My Lords, certain pledges were given, in the course of last year, by those who now form Her Majesty's Government, which, I think, were very clearly understood by the country. One of those pledges was that no part of the property of the Irish Church should be used for the endowment of any other denomination, or for the payment of the teachers of any other denomination. Another of those pledges was that the property of the Irish Church should not be applied for any other than Irish uses. In my opinion, neither of those pledges has been observed. That a portion of the funds of the Irish Church is to be applied to the payment of the teachers of another denomination is clear, and it is equally manifest that a portion of those funds is to be applied to purposes which are not Irish. The grant to Maynooth and the Regium Donum have both been paid out of Imperial funds. If compensation is to be given for them it also ought to be paid out of Imperial funds. I am not, however, prepared to vote for striking out the clauses relating to Maynooth and the Regium Donum. I think we are all agreed that, whatever may have been the policy of granting an annual sum to Maynooth, full compensation ought to be given for that grant. We are also agreed that compensation ought to be given for the Regium Donum. A good deal has been said in the course of these debates about liberality. Now, my Lords, I should be the last man to say that any want of liberality should be shown towards Maynooth or towards those who have been in receipt of the Regium Donum. The question, then, is whether the compensation should be given out of the funds of the Irish Church or out of Imperial funds. The Bill says that it shall be paid out of the funds of the Irish Church. If we strike that out, the consequence must be that we throw the charge on the Consolidated Fund. But the House of Commons, having fully considered the question, resolved to throw it on the funds of the Church. It appears to me that by adopting the Amendment we should be departing, if not from the letter, certainly from the spirit of our practice, because we should be doing what would be tantamount to throwing a charge on the Consolidated Fund. Therefore, though I think there has been a grave—without meaning any offence to noble Lords opposite, I will say a gross—violation of pledges in this matter, I am not prepared to vote against these clauses.

THE DUKE OF ARGYLL

My Lords, I wish to say that the noble and learned Lord (Lord Cairns) is entirely mistaken when he says there has been a violation of pledges made by those who are now Members of Her Majesty's Government. If the noble and learned Lord will be good enough to refer to the discussions which took place in the House of Commons last year, he will find that on two, if not on three, separate occasions my right hon. Friend who is now at the head of the Government was asked what was to become of the Maynooth Grant, and that, on those occasions, he announced that the grant must cease to be borne by the Consolidated Fund.

EARL GREY

said, he entirely dissented from the doctrine laid down by the noble and learned Lord (Lord Cairns). Charges imposed on the Consolidated Fund continued to be borne by that fund until they were put an end to by both Houses; but, according to the noble and learned Lord, they ceased when the House of Commons said they were to cease. To take the grant from Maynooth was a shabby proceeding, and another shabby proceeding was to charge the compensation on the funds of the Irish Church. This charge ought to be an Imperial one.

LORD CAIRNS

said, he had been misunderstood by the noble Earl. The Regium Donum never had been charged on the Consolidated Fund. The Maynooth Grant had been; but the compensation for both, if not paid out of the property of the Irish Church, must be provided for in the Estimates. It was, therefore, he had said that it would not be within the spirit of the practice of their Lordships' House to oppose the decision of the House of Commons on this matter, when, by doing so, their Lordships would be throwing a charge on the Estimates. He did not see how the explanation of the noble Duke (the Duke of Argyll) applied to promises made in Lancashire and other places as to the disposal of the property of the Irish Church.

THE DUKE OF RUTLAND

said, he did not object to the compensation to Maynooth, but he did object to its payment out of the funds of the Irish Church as a monstrous proposition. They were told that the House of Commons had refused to compensate Maynooth out of the Consolidated Fund. He was quite sure that, if applied to, the country would decide that out of the Consolidated Fund the compensation ought to be paid. If his noble Friend who proposed the Amendment went to a division he should support him.

THE EARL OF POWIS

said, he thought the Amendments their Lordships had made relating to the Irish Church itself would sufficiently tax the attention of the other House of Parliament, and if their Lordships were to strike out this clause relating to Maynooth they would render it impossible for the Roman Catholic Members in the House of Commons to acquiesce in those Amendments. In the interest of the Irish Church itself he trusted the clause would be agreed to.

THE EARL OF HARROWBY

said, he had long been of opinion that Maynooth was unjustly treated by public opinion. No doubt the principles of the Irish Roman Catholic clergy, when Maynooth was founded, were more Gallican—less Ultramontane—than they were now; and the difference had been attributed to Maynooth; but this was not just. The Irish Roman Catholic clergy had shared in the general change of principles which had come over their brethren in all countries; they had not escaped the contagion. But this was not due to Maynooth, but to causes common to them all, and even now if there was any tinge of Gallican principles to be found in Ireland it was to be found in Maynooth. He thought if that institution were broken up matters would be worse in Ireland than they were. Maynooth possessed a body of learned men; at their head was Dr. Russell, a learned Roman Catholic, a gentleman, and a scholar—a man who was well acquainted with the history of his own Church, and who would not make its principles bend to the politics of the day. It was desirable for Ireland that there should be such a body of learned men assembled in one large and well-endowed institution. Liberal opinions stood a better chance of obtaining ground in such an institution than in small and obscure episcopal seminaries scattered over the country, in which education for the Roman Catholic priesthood would otherwise be carried on. Maynooth had never been popular with the Ultramontane party. He should be sorry to see anything done in this Bill which would jeopardize a proper compensation being given to the College.

THE EARL OF COURTOWN

said, the clause contained provisions relating to the Presbyterian Widows' and Orphans' Fund, which would be lost if the clause were struck out, This he considered unjust after the House had passed the clauses relating to compensation to the recipients of the Regium Donum. He therefore hoped the noble Lord (Lord Fitzwalter) would not persist in his opposition to the clause.

On Question? their Lordships divided: —Contents, 146; Not-Contents, 22; Majority, 124.

Resolved in the Affirmative.

Clause, as amended, agreed to.

Clause 42 (Remission of debt to trustess of Maynooth)

Clause 43 (Regulations as to appeal).

Clause 44 (Possession to be given up of 24, Upper Merrion Street)

Agreed to.

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

said, that he should withdraw a new clause of which he had given notice— In the event of the formation and incorporation of the representative body hereinbefore mentioned, the commissioners shall pay over to the same the sum of £200,000 to provide for the payment of servants and agents, and other expenses connected with the constitution of the said body and the management of the affairs and property thereof. After the announcement of the noble Earl (Earl Granville) earlier in the evening, with regard to the grant of £500,000, he did not think it would be fair to press this clause.

Clause 45 (Compensation to Ecclesiastical Commissioners and their officers).

THE ARCHBISHOP OF DUBLIN moved an Amendment, securing to the Secretary, the Treasurer, and Solicitor of the Commission, "such an annual sum for their respective lives as shall be equivalent to their present annual emoluments."

EARL GRANVLLLE

said, he must object to the Amendment, which was unnecessary. These gentlemen were all on salaries, and at this moment had a right to superannuation.

THE MARQUESS OF CLANRICARDE

said, he hoped that his noble Friend would consider this, which was really a hard case.

Motion (by leave of the Committee) withdrawn.

Clause 46 (Compensation to vicars-general and other officers by annuities equal to their average income for the three years ending 1st January, 1869.

THE EARL OF BANDON moved in page 24, line 9, after ("registrar") to insert ("or deputy registrar, who, for twenty-five years before the passing of this Act, shall have performed all the duties of registrar.")

THE BISHOP OF TUAM

said, he should support the Amendment. He would urge upon Her Majesty's Government the duty of taking such cases into their consideration.

THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY

said, that there was a provision in the clause securing compensation to deputy-registrars who should for five years before the passing of the Act have discharged the office of registrars.

EARL NELSON

said, he trusted, that the claim of the diocesan architects would be also taken into consideration. As diocesan architects they received no salary; but as a perquisite of the office they were appointed upon Commissions to examine into the condition of glebe-houses, and their fees for that duty amounted, in some cases, to £100 or £150 a year. All he asked was that compensation, not an annual salary, should be given them.

LORD DUFFERIN

said, that although diocesan architects were a very worthy set of men, to whom the Church was under great obligations, yet it would be impossible to compensate them in the manner proposed. In fact, they had no recognized status to justify compensation.

THE EARL OF CLANCARTY

said, that these gentlemen had, if not a vested, an equitable interest, which ought not to be overlooked.

On Question? Resolved in the Negative.

Clause agreed to.

Clauses 47 and 48 agreed to.

Clauses 49 to 59 [Dealings with Property]

Clauses 60 to 65 [Power of Commissioners to raise money]

Clause 66 (Rules as to arbitration)

Clause 67 (Regulations as to vacancies).

Agreed to.

House resumed.

House to be again in Committee To-morrow.