§ LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY, in rising to call the attention of the House to the correspondence relative to ecclesiastical subsidies in Ceylon; and to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies for explanations of his despatches of 19th November 1880, and 14th June, said, he desired to call their Lordships' attention to the Correspondence recently laid before Parliament on the ecclesiastical subsidies in Ceylon. This Correspondence referred to two subjects which were distinct—namely, the maintenance of the Bishop of Colombo and his clergy, and the maintenance of the Reformed Church at Wolfendahl. With regard to the Bishop, he should say nothing of the intrinsic merits of the Bishop of Colombo, because it would weaken the line of argument he was going to take, because he had better leave that to other noble Lords and to the right rev. Bench, and because he was bound to believe that the only grounds of action of the Secretary of State for the Colonies were those stated in paragraph No. 2 of his despatch of November 19 of last year—namely, the small number of persons supposed to be benefited out of the general taxation of Ceylon. For the Secretary of State this was, therefore, a question of population, and if the population of Ceylon were limited to the 250,000 Christians, of whom 190,000 were Roman Catholics, the inequality which had moved the Secretary of State would be great; but as there were 2,150,000 non-Christian inhabitants of the Island, other considerations must be taken into account. 1882 According to the figures adopted by the Secretary of State's despatch, there were some 470,000 Hindoos in Ceylon. He proposed to eliminate these altogether from the discussion, because most of these were poor Coolies employed on the coffee plantations, and were, for the most part, only temporary sojourners in Ceylon, and were not affected by taxation. Those who belonged to the few Hindoo temples in Ceylon might be classed with the Buddhists. Now, the 1,500,000 Buddhists and the 180,000 Mussulmans of Ceylon would be equally dismayed and alarmed for the property held by themselves as religious communities when they found the Government disendowing its own religion; and there were indications in this Correspondence that the temple lands of the Buddhists were threatened with attack and spoliation, or with new taxation, which would have the same effect. As to the Mussulmans, it was to them but a very slight grievance, if it were a grievance at all, that some portion of the public money derived from general taxation should go to the maintenance of a representative of the religion of the State; but it would be a great grievance to them to be subjected to a State and a Government without any religion, such as the English Government would appear to be if the policy of these despatches were carried out. He could not conceive any greater humiliation for the Mussulmans than to be under a Government which had discarded religion and its ministers, and which hung out the colours of infidelity, or, as it was now called, agnosticism. In the meantime, this grievance was as nothing compared to that from which the Mussulmans of Ceylon were actually suffering. Though they were from 170,000 to 180,000 in number, and were the most intelligent, active, and wealthy of the Native communities, they still had no representative in the Legislative Council. He hoped that the regard for equality of the noble Earl would induce him to remedy this before long. So far he had spoken on general principles; but to come to particulars, the Mussulmans in Ceylon often spoke to him of the Bishop of Colombo, but they never said anything against him or his office; and, though this subject had probably been discussed in the local newspapers, it had not been alluded to in the letters 1883 he had received from that Island. He might say much the same as to the Buddhists; although it appeared to be inconsistent with their tenets, yet they were much attached to public worship, and would think ill of a Government which discouraged it. The most ancient mosque in Ceylon was originally built on temple land, which was leased by the Buddhist priests to the Mussulmans; and when they found that the building erected by them was dedicated to public worship the Buddhist priests refused to take the money reserved as rent for the land. The Governor of Ceylon, Sir James Longden, wrote to the Secretary of State to the effect that the ecclesiastical subsidies might be withdrawn in Ceylon because the circumstances were different from those in Trinidad, where he had opposed such a measure. He thought that the difference was, however, all against the policy of the noble Earl, for in Trinidad less scandal would be caused than in Ceylon, where the exemplary demeanour and learning of the Buddhist priests made it the more essential that a State professing to be Christian should not desert the Held. If the Government persisted in the course laid down in these despatches, it would be more easy to believe that it was indifferent and hostile to religion than to believe the excuses on account of economy or of equality put forward in this Correspondence. He trusted that the noble Earl would reconsider his decision, even though he should reduce the stipend of the Bishop and reduce the number of the clergy who were now supported by the Government of Ceylon, and that he would not sever the connection between Church and State, and throw to the Bishop a freedom which he did not require, or, as the noble Earl's despatch worded it, "relieve him from all State interference." At the same time, in order to satisfy those feelings which were raised by consideration of the statistics of the population, some assistance might well be granted to the Portuguese, who, in general, were not as wealthy as the other classes of the Christians. It appeared from the Correspondence that the Dutch Reformed Church willingly joined the Church of England, and rallied to that Church in 1796, and had shown no signs of wishing to separate from it. As for the unofficial Members of the Legislative Council who had 1884 raised this question, and who, in a heathen and idolatrous country, had called upon the Government to withdraw its countenance and support from the established ministers of religion, the more fitting attitude for the Government towards them would be that which was adopted by His Majesty's Ambassador at Constantinople some 200 years ago, who, when the Quaker persisted in keeping on his hat before him, said the Turks were right, and that the man must be mad. The Government of Ceylon might get over the difficulty caused by the steps taken and related in this Correspondence by making grants of some of the land still at the disposal of the Government to the different Churches. The case of the Church of Wolfendahl, belonging to the Reformed Dutch Church of Colombo, stood upon a different ground. The decision of the Secretary of State, in his despatch of June 14, was open to all the objections which might be made to his decision against the Bishop of Colombo; but, besides that, it was a distinct violation of the engagements of the British Government at the time of the capitulation of the Dutch in 1796. It appeared to be only a quibble to endeavour to evade that engagement by saying that the Dutch clergy voluntarily left Ceylon in 1806. The Dutch settlers did not leave, and were now there, and were known as Burghers. They required and had a claim to the stipends stipulated for their clergy in 1796, and it made no difference to them whether the original clergy left voluntarily or had all died of an epidemic. Least of any could our Government afford to disregard and break its Treaty engagements; and, even if the Secretary of State attached any value to this quibble of the Law Officers, the matter in dispute was too trifling to make it advisable to risk the opposite view which was taken by the Dutch Burghers. This was not the only Colony in which Treaty obligations had been set aside and disregarded and hostile comment provoked on the part of the former countrymen of the Colonists whose rights had been set aside.
THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURYsaid, it was important that they should know whether the disendowment referred to by the noble Lord had been effected, and, if it had not, whether there was time for consideration. It 1885 could hardly be considered as actually done; because, so far as he knew, there was a Legislative Body in Ceylon, and the only record they had of the opinion of that body was to the effect that it ought not to be done. The Secretary of State, in his despatches, seemed to contemplate that the thing would be done. He presumed it would be done by votes, in obedience to orders from head-quarters. The objections raised to the proposal were, first, that it was a violation of Treaty obligations; and, secondly, that it was inexpedient in itself. As to its being in violation of Treaty obligations, that, at all events, was a very important matter, and it had, probably, been considered by the Law Officers of the Crown. There was a Proclamation following the Treaty, which, to uninstructed persons, seemed to be an acknowledgment of the obligation of maintaining the Christian religion on the part of the Government which succeeded the occupation of the Dutch. At the time of the cession of Ceylon by the Dutch there were two great religions in the Island—one the original Buddhist religion, professed by the great majority of the inhabitants, the other the Christian religion, professed by a large body. At that time the Government issued a Proclamation, stating that both those religions should retain the rights ceded to them by the Dutch Government. But it was said that instead of one body of Christians in the Island there were now several; and, no doubt, there was a temptation to apply to Ceylon the principles which had been applied in other places where there were different Christian denominations. But when they considered the Papers they would find that not even all the congregations of the Church of England were subsidized. Some successors of the old Dutch congregations continued to receive those stipends, and they were under the Bishop of Ceylon, although they were, by descent, the representatives of the old Dutch Presbyterian congregations. Many of their ministers were actually persons whose ancestors were of those Dutch Christians, or belonged to the Native Churches which grew up under Dutch protection. Now, the question was raised—Why give the subsidy to the Church of England and not to the other bodies? It was a sufficient answer to 1886 this to say there was a large heathen population, consisting also of various bodies. The most important was the Buddhist, which received this subsidy; but there were other heathen denominations existing throughout the country who received no subsidy. To those who said that the Bhuddist body should be disendowed as well as the Christians the answer was plain—if you promised a sum of money to one person it was no reason he should not get it because other persons to whom you made no such promise got none. The noble Lord said that the Buddhists were not endowed; but they were secured by the Government one-third of the landed property of the whole country. Not only so; but in the cultivation of this land they were secured from taxes which fell on all the other inhabitants of the Island. That, of course, increased the incidence of taxation on the other inhabitants; and, therefore, the Buddhists were practically endowed with a large sum of money. If they endeavoured to disendow the Buddhist body they would lose possession of the Island, because one-third of the land was in their possession, and they constituted an overwhelming majority of the population. Consequently, it would be dangerous to tamper with the rights secured to them by Treaty. Now, he was surprised that some of those who were so eager against endowments of all kinds should be discontented with endowing their Christian brethren in Ceylon, while they were bound to maintain so very large an endowment of a heathen religion. The case of Jamaica was not analogous to the present, because in Jamaica no heathen religion received large amounts of public money. It would, besides, be highly undesirable to show in Ceylon our readiness to shake off all recognition of the Christian religion on the part of the State, especially as the Proclamation at the cession of the Island made such loud declarations that the Christian religion, which the Dutch had left in a nourishing condition, was to be maintained by the Government that succeeded them. The course pursued in a good many instances by the Colonial Office lately, of disestablishing and disendowing Churches, was one which, to say the least, required to be taken with caution. It was now proposed to sweep away the corporation sole created by 1887 Letters Patent in the Bishopric of Colombo. This experiment ought, in his judgment, to be made with great caution. It was in the power of the Crown to create corporations; but it was not quite clear that the Crown could by its own act supersede them. The gravest complications as to property had been introduced in various Colonies by the off-hand way in which the Colonial Office had dealt with these matters. A serious law-suit had recently arisen with reference to property at Grahamstown, in the Cape Colony; and a very important question would have to be decided before long by the Privy Council as to whether the corporation of the Bishopric of Grahamstown was still in existence, although the Crown had, for the time, failed to appoint anyone to occupy the corporation. The result at present was complete confusion as to all property connected with this matter. So in Ceylon the same difficulties might arise which had occurred in other Colonies, where the seeds of many law-suits had been sown by the way in which this matter had been dealt with. Therefore, although he did not expect the noble Earl to alter his views on the subject, he hoped he would not fail to give full consideration to the difficulties that might arise from the course he was about to adopt.
THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYsaid, he was not prepared to admit, in the slightest degree, that the action of the Colonial Office, either in that or the other matters referred to, had been either rash or hasty. The decision affecting the Cape Bishopric to which the most rev. Prelate referred took place many years ago, before he was in the Office which he now had the honour to hold; and the effect of it, as far as he remembered, was that the Letters Patent could not be legally maintained. He could not admit the truth of the allegation that the action of the Colonial Office had sown the seeds of many legal disputes in regard to ecclesiastical matters in the Colonies. The Colonial Office had, in all these instances, advised that a statute should be passed in each Colony to enable the disendowed Churches to transact their work and to hold property. He agreed, indeed, with the most rev. Prelate that it would be a great hardship and a scandal to the Church if measures were not taken to enable the 1888 Church to administer its affairs in a satisfactory manner. With regard to the particular question now before the House, he must point out that the most rev. Prelate had spoken of the Buddhist endowment as if it were the same thing as the endowment which was about to be done away with. The Buddhists in Ceylon had possessed, from very ancient times, large tracts of land, which were known as temple lands, while the very small endowment which was now given to the Anglican and the Presbyterian Churches came directly out of the taxation of the Island, and was paid by the Government. With regard to any lands which the Church possessed, it was distinctly provided in a despatch, which he wrote on the subject, that there was to be no interference.
THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYsaid, he did not know; but he did not think that because they were bound by Treaty to respect the privileges of the Buddhists, therefore they were bound, for all time, to extend the same privileges to other religions. This was a question, not of Christianity, but of a variety of Christian denominations. There were in Ceylon large numbers of Buddhists, Mahomedans, and Hindoos, a considerable number of Roman Catholics, and a handful of Anglicans and Presbyterians. They endowed this handful of Anglicans and Presbyterians; but they totally disregarded the claims of the Roman Catholics, Mahomedans, and Hindoos. Such an injustice could not possibly be defended. When he held Office before this question came up for consideration, and some persons at that time desired that a change should be made; but nothing was done, because it did not appear that there was any feeling in Ceylon in favour of the change. Since then, however, a strong feeling had been expressed by a considerable number of persons in Ceylon that these endowments should be put an end to. Therefore, he thought, the time had come when the change might be made, not rashly, but after the consideration of many years. There were nearly 250,000 Christians in Ceylon. Of these, 190,000 were Roman Catholics, and 45,000 belonged to unassisted Protestant denominations, leaving only 1889 15,000 Anglicans and Presbyterians, who received a State contribution of £10,000 a-year. If the endowment of the latter was continued, could it possibly be maintained that the Roman Catholics ought to receive nothing? If there were Treaty obligations requiring them to keep up this endowment, he should have considered that they were absolutely bound either to continue it or to give a sum of money by way of compensation. But he thought the most rev. Prelate could not have referred to the actual words of the Treaty, which said—
The clergy shall continue in their functions and receive the same pay and emoluments as they have from the Dutch.The only question which could arise was whether the present Dutch Church in Ceylon was entitled under the Treaty to continue to receive some stipend? As there might be a legal doubt on this point, he referred it to the Law Officers, who gave it as their distinct opinion that the Treaty did not apply, for shortly after its conclusion the whole of the Dutch clergy left, and the payment made to them came to an end, and the present payment could not be held to be made under the Treaty. The Bishop of Colombo had urged upon him the necessity of giving sufficient time to the Church in Ceylon to make arrangements, and a period of five years had accordingly been granted for the purpose. He might observe that the Bishop said he was not prepared to advance on behalf of the Church of England in Ceylon, as a whole, any claim for a continuance of the State assistance, and he added—I am not aware that as a Church we have any right to it, nor am I sure that its permanent continuance would be to our ultimate advantage.This was not merely a question of the disendowment of a Church. It was a question of justice to the various inhabitants of the Island. To give a concurrent endowment to all these religious communions would be out of the question for various reasons, and, amongst others, that it would impose a burden on the revenues of the Colony which they could not bear. The strongest possible case had been made out for putting an end to this small endowment, which was not at all necessary for the maintenance of the Church in 1890 Ceylon; and he could not hold out any hope that the policy on which Her Majesty's Government had determined in respect to this matter would be departed from.
THE EARL OF CARNARVONdesired to know whether all the details of the proposed arrangement had been settled, or whether there was still room to modify them? He trusted care would be taken to prevent legal complications in. regard to Church property if disestablishment took place. He also trusted that his noble Friend would make the transition as gradual and as easy as possible.