Sitting of 2 April 1824

ST. CATHERINE'S DOCK BILL.
Mr. Grenfellrose to move the second reading of this bill, and stated, that he should have confined himself according to the usual practice, to moving the second reading, in order, when that motion was carried, to refer it to a committee up stairs
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where alone it was practicable properly to examine it, if he had not known that an opposition was to be made to the present motion. The bill was calculated to secure to the public a very great public advantage; namely, additional dock and warehouse accommodation for the increasing trade and navigation of the port of London. Of the fact of this increase he needed no better evidence than the account of the exports and imports from 1798, when the present dock establishments were formed, to the present time. The increase of imports was from thirty millions to fifty-six millions; and this increase had been accompanied by a corresponding increase of the ships moored in the river Thames. The increase had been gradual and progressive. In 1798 it was thirty-millions, in 1806 thirty-six-millions in 1819 forty-six millions, in 1823 fifty-six millions. But besides this increase, the recent measure introduced by the late president of the board of trade, now master of the Mint, rendered more extended accommodation necessary. That measure, the Warehousing act, allowed above two hundred new articles to be lodged in warehouses in this country, and could not fail greatly to extend the deposit trade of the country, and to create a demand for additional accommodation. The company who were to be incorporated by the present bill, asked for no exclusive privileges.—They had no wish to interfere with the existing companies. They only wished to increase that accommodation in the port of London. It was natural that those companies which had had the monopoly of warehousing for the last twenty years, should wish to oppose the measure; but their hostility was the very reason which should induce the House to support it.
Mr. C. Calvertsaid, he could not be influenced to oppose the bill by any interest in the existing Dock companies, as he was not a proprietor in any one of them; but he opposed it on this ground, that there was at present accommodation for hundreds of thousands of tons of goods more than were brought to this country. He alluded particularly to the warehouses in the parishes of St. Olave and St. John's, Southwark, where gentlemen had invested their fortunes in warehouses, and whose rights ought not to be interfered with without necessity. He moved, "that the bill be read a second time this day six months."
Sir Joseph Yorkesaid, he should fire off his squib against this little blue-eyed nun of St. Catherine's. He understood this piece of business was supported by eighteen gentlemen and a half; that was to say, by eighteen gentlemen who put down 50,000 l. a piece, and one who put down 30,000 l. Where this money came from he could not tell; he hoped not from members of that House. He did not oppose the bill because there was already a sufficiency of Dock accommodation, for if the gentlemen chose to lose their money, they had a clear right to do so, but because the twenty-five acres of ground on which the docks were to be built, and which now contained 1100 houses and 10,000 souls, had been wanted twenty years ago by the London Dock company, and had been refused for sound and wholesome reasons. There were no reasons that prevailed twenty years ago that ought not to prevail now, unless it were said, that the late excellent queen Charlotte, who was now removed from this world to one infinitely better, had some property in that quarter, which there was a delicacy about touching, but which delicacy was now removed. He had a great affection for docks, as he thought the river itself should be kept free, as the high road of nations; but, as this new company wished to thrust itself into the place which should have belonged to the London Dock company, resting on those docks on the right, and on the Tower on the left, he should try to keep the contending parties separate.
Mr. J. Smithcould not discover in the copy of the bill which he had seen, any sufficient necessity for the measure. This perhaps might be shown in the committee; but, unless that was done, he should object to interfere, to the extent that was proposde, with private property.
Mr. Humesaid, that sufficient notice had not been given. There were 10,000 people who were entitled to six or eight months notice under the standing orders. These orders, which were rules for the protection of private property, should not be slightly superseded. On this ground, he should oppose the second reading.
Mr. Manningsaid, he had presented a petition from the London Dock company against the bill, in which it was stated, that they had foundations laid for ware-houses capable of containing 2 or 300,000 tons of goods, which had not been pro-
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ceeded with for want of sufficient encouragement. This went to prove that there was not that clear case of necessity which would justify the departure from their standing orders.
Mr. T. Wilsonsupported the bill. It was not enough to say, that there was room in the present docks, to render the establishment of new ones inexpedient. If the new Dock company could carry on the business at a cheaper rate; if they could afford better accommodation; or if the probability of a new and growing trade was made out, there was a good reason for passing the bill. The bonded trade could not be carried on in the warehouses that were not within docks.
Mr. Brightcontended, that the standing orders ought to be enforced. Here was a whole town thrown into confusion' by a sudden project, of which the parties who were to be expelled from their homes had no notice until the 6th of March. If a new dock was required, why not give due notice? What necessity was there for pressing the bill until next year? The fact was, that the parties would, by the delay, be compelled to pay a larger price for the ground than its present value. They ought to uphold their standing orders, which enjoined due notice, or else abandon them altogether.
Mr. Alderman Heygatesaid, that having presented two petitions against this bill, it should have his most determined opposition. He was surprised that his majesty's ministers should have given the measure any countenance by suspending the standing orders, when they found that its execution would be an act of tyranny and cruelty towards a large body of individuals. It was a cruel attack upon individual rights, without any paramount necessity. Let the supporters of the bill be called upon to show that the growing trade of the port of London indispensably required the new dock; but they knew that to attempt such proof was impossible, since it was notorious, that many of the existing dock companies had plenty of room unoccupied. There were in London at present six dock companies: two of them paid no interest; one paid 3½ per cent; the London Dock paid 4½ per cent; and two others, paid more than 5 per cent; because one of them had enjoyed a particular monopoly, which had just ceased, and the other had a monopoly which would expire in two

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years. What sort of prospect did this hold out? But, he might he told that this was the affair of the subscribers. If it was only their Own money which they fooled away, this answer might be valid; but they were to turn hundreds of people out of their habitations. To pass the bill was not to encourage fair competition; for what chance had a wharfinger against a body of subscribers, invested with parliamentary immunities, and whose fortunes were not answerable for their misconduct, except to the amount of their shares? This bill was one of those projects which had grown out of the high price of stocks, and which, if stocks fell again, would disappear like the South Sea bubble.
Mr. Haldimandsaid, it was perfectly true, that if consols had not been at 95, this undertaking might not have been thought of; but, if the interest of capital was so low that it forced itself into new channels and reduced the rate of profit in old ones, was it not natural that docks also should feel the influence; and how could that happen but through the competition of new companies? He corrected the statement of the gallant admiral, that this ground had been refused to the London Dock company. The fact was, that company had been authorized to purchase it, but had preferred a spot lower down, where they would have to pay less compensation money. The warehousing system could not be carried on, except in docks in the situation of the proposed one. He was not ashamed to avow himself one of the "18½ gentlemen" mentioned by the gallant admiral; but he should not have subscribed to it had he not conceived it would be a public benefit.
Mr. Butterworthopposed the bill, as a measure which would entail ruin on thousands.
Mr. Littletonopposed the bill, on the same grounds as the hon. member for Bristol. Every bill of this kind was an invasion of private property, for an alleged public purpose; and the thousands of persons whose property and means of living were affected by the bill, were—at least—intifled to notice. There could be no better occasion than the present, for setting their faces against the session-ally increasing disregard of their standing orders.
Mr. W. Smithsaid, that an extremely strong case had been made out against the violation of the standing orders, es-
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pecially as there was no immediate necessity for the Docks, which were only supposed to be necessary in consequence of the increase of trade, which it was supposed might arise from the bonding-system. The warehouses of the existing docks were not full, and never had been, except during a temporary influx of wine, when the French invaded Portugal; besides, the present warehouses were so constructed, that, by adding story on story, their capacity might be indefinitely increased.
The Chancellor of the Exchequersaid, he was so far cognisant of this bill, that the parties interested in it had, in the early part of the year, come before his majesty's government, to know whether they would have any objection to the measure. The answer given by the government was, that, in point of principle, they saw no objection to the establishment of a new dock, if it could be shewn that benefit to the public would result from it. So far they had expressed acquiescence; but they certainly were not aware of all the circumstances of the case. When so many interests were affected, the question as to the standing orders became one of considerable importance; and undoubtedly, if the standing orders had been strictly enforced, the bill would not have arrived at its present stage. Under all the circumstances, he thought it would be better to allow the bill to be read a second time, and to investigate its merits in the committee. If it should then appear, that the bill could not pass without occasioning great hardship to a number of individuals, this would certainly constitute a ground for its rejection at the present time. On the other hand, it might turn out, that the case, as it affected those individuals, had been greatly over-stated. Most of them, for instance, might be tenants at will; and in that case, the degree of hardship would be much less, because they would be compelled to quit, if the proprietors of the soil were disposed to acquiesce in the propositions of the subscribers to the dock. He repeated, that in principle he had no objection to the measure of erecting a new dock, with a view to extended competition and increased commercial advantages; and he could not object, therefore, to the second reading of the bill.
Mr. Wallacesaid, that with respect to the question as to the standing orders, those orders had been repeatedly dispens-

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ed with, and the expediency of dispensing with them in the present case had been decided by a majority of the House. There had appeared a paragraph in one of the newspapers, which would let the House into the secret of the opposition to this bill; it stated, that the parties whose interests were most strongly opposed to the measure, were the proprietors of the, East-India, West-India, and London Docks. If these three parties succeeded in obtaining the rejection of the bill, they would have a complete monoply of the trade; which would probably end in driving from the port of London its fair proportion of the trade of the country.
Mr. Grenfell,in reply, said, that so far from 10,000 persons being exposed to inconvenience from this measure, the whole number of inhabitants within the precincts of the parish of St. Catherine did not amount to 5,000. He might add, too, that out of 11 or 1,200 householders, 300 had expressed their assent to the bill. Upwards of 1,100 of the principal mercantile gentlemen in the country had concurred in the expediency of the measure.
The House then divided: For the second reading 74. Against it 55. Majority 19.

ANGERSTEIN COLLECTION OF PICTURES.
The House resolved itself into a committee of supply, On the resolution, "That 60,000 l. be granted, to defray the charge of purchasing, and the expenses incidental to the preservation and public exhibition of the Collection of Pictures which belonged to the late John Julius Angerstein, Esq. for the year 1824,"
Mr. Agar Ellissaid, he could not refrain from expressing his thanks to his majesty's government for having purchased this valuable collection of pictures. He was sure that every person who was at all acquainted with the arts, would agree with him in saying, that no private collection of pictures could be better suited to form the basis of a national gallery. All the pictures were of the very first excellence. Indeed, there was not one of them which it would not be almost a calumny to call a moderate picture. He trusted that the present would form a new era in the history of the arts in this country, and that the advantage which was now given to our own school of painting, by placing before it first-rate models, would tend to
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advance its character and renown. If there were any gentlemen in that House who disapproved of the expense to which these pictures were putting the country, he would ask them, whether they might not be productive of emolument to the nation, even in a pecuniary point of view? What was it that attracted so many travellers to Italy, but the numerous works of genius which were contained in it? And, if a similar collection were made in London, was it not likely that a similar cause would produce a similar resort of strangers to it? He hoped that his majesty's government would not stop short in the great work which it had undertaken, but would proceed steadily and progressively in it. He would not recommend it to purchase any more whole collections: for, in all probability, they must contain many moderate pictures, and moderate pictures ought not to be found in national galleries; but he would recommend it to purchase single pictures of acknowledged excellence, whenever any such pictures came into the market. By such means, they would obtain the best specimens of the best masters, and would so erect a gallery winch would be no less beneficial to the taste, than, it would be conductive to the glory of the country.
Mr. Bernalsaid, it appeared that there was to be a keeper of the gallery, at a salary of 200 l. per annum, who was to have the charge of the collection, and to attend; particularly to the preservation of the pictures, and that lord Liverpool was of opinion, that the person to be appointed to this office should be competent to value, and, if called upon, to negociate the purchase of any pictures that might in future be added to the collection. Now, he really thought that a salary of 200 l. was too small a remuneration to a gentleman possessing such qualifications.
Sir C. Longspoke in terms of the strongest praise of the pictures which formed the late Mr. Angerstein's collection. They were selected by the judgment of sir T. Lawrence, and appeared, on inspection, so exquisite to his majesty, that he it was who had first suggested the propriety of purchasing them for the nation. Indeed, they were generally considered the finest models of art that could be submitted to the contemplation of the artist. He agreed with his hon. friend, that the plan which the government ought to pursue in forming this gallery, would not, be to purchase whole collections, but to buy

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single pictures of undisputed excellence, and that, too, at a liberal price. With regard to the remarks made by the hon. member for Rochester, on the smallness of the salary to be paid to the keeper of the gallery, he would merely observe, that the person who was appointed to superintend it was as well qualified for such an office' as any man could be, and that he was perfectly satisfied with the salary annexed to it. If, at any future time, it was found insufficient, government could ask the House to increase it. It ought to be recollected, that this officer did not give up the whole of his time to the gallery, but was only required to attend in it Occasionally. There was another officer, whose duty it would be to devote his whole time to this collection.
Mr. A. Ellisbore testimony to the qualifications of the gentleman appointed to superintend the collection. He wished to know, however who was to superintend the superintendent?
The Chancellor of the Exchequersaid, the general control and superintendence would be in the Lords of the Treasury. He did not apprehend, however, that it would be necessary to exercise that control with any degree of violence.
Mr. Humesaid, that as it was at last determined to make a national gallery, and by so doing to rescue the country from a disgrace which the want of such an establishment had long entailed upon it, he trusted that responsible individuals would be selected to take care of the pictures which had already been purchased. Some regulation of that nature was rendered necessary, by the recollection of the injury which had been sustained in the British Museum by the want of it.
Sir C. Longtrusted, that he had convinced the committee, upon a former evening, that there was no reason to complain of the trustees of the British Museum. Indeed, he had cause to believe, that the hon. member for Shrewsbury who had brought forward the charge against them, was convinced that it did not rest upon any accurate foundations.
Mr. A. Elliswas so far from thinking that there was any ground of complaint against the trustees of the British Museum, that he had been about to suggest, that they should also be made trustees of this national gallery.
The resolution was agreed to.

CONSULS TO SOUTH AMERICA.
On the resolution, "That 34,450 l. be granted to defray the outstanding charges for Outfit and Salaries to his Majesty's consuls-general, consuls, and vice-consuls in Spanish America, in the year 1823; and also to defray the probable charge for Salaries to the said consuls-general, consuls, and vice-consuls, for the year 1824,"
Mr. Humerose to ask a question. Was it to be understood, that, after this grant was made to the consuls and vice-consuls in Spanish America, the British trade in that quarter of the globe was to be free from the imposition of any further toll, to them? He did not object to the amount of the salaries which it was proposed to give these gentlemen; for he thought that they would not get men of respectability to fill them, unless they were properly remunerated. He was, however, anxious, that our different consuls should be paid by the public, and should be debarred from receiving any fees, save such as were merely nominal, upon the delivery of certificates required in the course of trade. Whilst he was upon the subject, he would suggest a plan to his majesty's ministers, which several eminent merchants had informed him was calculated to obviatmany of the vexatious difficulties whice they sometimes experienced in foreign countries, owing to the uncertain nature of our consular fees. The plan was this— that the captain of any ship, on clearing out for a foreign port at the custom-house should be entitled to ask and receive a printed copy of the consular charges at all the ports at which he was likely to touch in the course of his voyage. It might be said, that such a plan could not be put into execution without some expense. He allowed that it would occasion some trifling expense; but it ought not to be regarded, when it was considered that it was incurred on behalf of the commerce of the country, and that that commerce was the chief source of its strength and revenue. He was certain that if our consuls were paid fixed salaries and were only allowed to receive certain small stated fees, many of the difficulties would be removed with which our commerce was at present impeded.
Mr. Huskissonwas, to a certain degree, of the same opinion with the hon. member for Aberdeen, with regard to paying our consuls out of the public revenue. He intended, within a short period, to bring in a bill to enable government to pay them

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out of the public purse, and to establish some uniformity in the system by which they were remunerated. At present nothing could be more vague and uncertain than the manner in which they obtained their emoluments. In some places they had fees, in others they had none; in some places they exacted high, and in others they exacted only trifling duties. He wished to reduce them all to one uniform practice; and to effect that purpose, he would give them fixed salaries and allow them certain moderate fees on the different commercial instruments which it was their duty to make out in the ordinary course of trade. He would also propose to levy a small tonnage upon all ships touching at the ports where we had consuls; and he would propose it for the purpose of defraying certain incidental expenses that were not paid out of the public purse; such as those for distressed or ship wrecked-seamen and others of a similar nature.
Mr. Humeexpressed himself well satisfied with the observations which had fallen from the right hon. gentleman, and said, that if there were any points on which he differed from him, they might be discussed when the right hon. gentleman brought his bill before the House. He would take that opportunity of expressing his thanks to the right hon. secretary for foreign affairs, for the attention which he had paid to a subject, in which, though he was not himself personally concerned, the public were largely interested. He alluded to our trade with the Brazils. He could not at present say what effect the regulations which the right hon. secretary had made might have produced abroad; but this he could not say, that they had given perfect satisfaction to all persons at home engaged in that trade. Before he sat down, he would suggest to the right hon. president of the board of trade, whether it would not be advisable, in any future regulation, to prevent consuls from deputing their duties at will to any person, they might choose to appoint as vice-consuls.

ARMY EXTRAORDINARIES.
On the resolution, "That 620,000 l. be granted to defray the Extraordinary Expenses of the army for the year 1824,"
Colonel Daviesobjected to the item in this grant, charging 2,300 l. for pensions to the knights of Malta.' His objection was founded on this ground—that, of the
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parties who received these pensions, some were not knights of Malta, and others were receiving pensions from the island of Malta itself. He considered this item to be as gross a job as ever was perpetrated by any administration. Last year he had not seen it in the estimates; and he had hoped it had been withdrawn for ever.
Mr. W. Hortonobserved, that the item in question was a payment made on account of the government of the island of Malta. A special injunction had been given to that government to make inquiry whether the parties who received these pensions were entitled to be considered as knights of Malta. That inquiry was not in progress; and it was thought right not to withdraw the pensions until it was concluded? The pensions had been granted to the parties who now held them from motives of humanity, during the French revolution—an event which had reduced the greater portion of them from comparative opulence to the most wretched state of want and destitution.
Mr. Humewished to draw the attention of the committee to the very great expense to which this country was put, on account of the islands of Guernsey and Jersey. They were, so far as this country was concerned, altogether free from taxation: the revenue of the Crown was wasted; at least no part of it was appropriated to the service of the islands, and the people of England were constantly called on to meet every expense. He observed a charge of 4,471 l. for extraordinary military expences, on account of the staff. Now, he had formerly moved for a correspondence between his majesty's government and the authorities in the islands, from which it appeared, that a part of this force was not wanted, and was really considered a nuisance. He had received a communication from a highly respectable individual, who stated, that nothing would be more grateful to the inhabitants of these islands, than the removal of the staff, for the support of which the people of England were obliged to pay. If those islands must have the protection of the British government, they certainly ought to defray a portion of the expense. It would shortly be his duty to present a petition to the House on the subject. It was the work of a gentleman who had gone through those islands; he had put his observations on paper; and he stated, very distinctly what, in his opinion

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the islands ought to contribute towards defraying the various expenses incidental to their government. It was a fit subject for the House to take into its consideration. He was quite sure the estimate might be reduced one half, without crippling the service in the smallest degree. He had himself made out a list of various items which might be greatly reduced. If the right hon. gentleman opposite would make use of any hint it contained, it was entirely at his service. It was fit the country should know what became of the revenue of these islands. Situated as Great Britain was, her expenditure ought to be lessened in every possible way; but though these islands were capable of producing a certain revenue, the people of England were obliged to pay for their civil and military establishment. The latter was wholly unnecessary; for the inhabitants of the islands would consider it a pride to clothe and arm the militia, but government would not allow it.
Mr. Secretary Peelunderstood the hon. member to say, that he could throw out some suggestions by which the expenses of Guernsey and Jersey might be lessened If the hon. member would favour him with those suggestions, they should receive the fullest attention. It was his duty to listen to such communications; and, if a curtailment of expense could be effected, that object certainly should not be neglected. When the hon. gentleman presented to the House the rather extraordinary document (for it was not a petition, but a two or three months' tour through Guernsey) to which he had alluded, he would read it with attention. With respect to the military part of the question, he might observe, that the constitution of these islands was of a very ancient date, and that no individuals were more jealous of their old customs than the inhabitants were. According to their laws, every male, from sixteen to sixty, was bound to military service. But it was deemed better to have a few expert soldiers, than an undisciplined rabble; which would probably be the case if they were left to clothe and arm themselves; and therefore it was necessary that a staff should be kept up.

CIVIL CONTINGENCIES.
On the resolution, "That 106,507 l. be granted to defray the charge of Civil Contingencies, for the year 1824,"
Mr. Humedirected the attention of the committee to an item of 1,810 l., being the amount of a bill drawn by Mr. James Walker, who was employed on an experiment relative to free labour amongst the negroes. A number of slaves had been given up to government for the purpose of this experiment; and all he said was, make use of their labour, teach them to support themselves, but do not call on us to maintain them.
Mr. W. Hortonsaid, the experiment was an important and a useful one. The commissioners who were now in the West-India islands had made a report on the subject, which would be laid before parliament. It would then be for the House to decide, whether this establishment should or should not be kept up.
Mr. Humesaid, he had stated, four or five years ago, that these slaves were perfectly competent to support themselves. In the possession of an individual, they would be a property; but in the hands of government they became an expense. If they were set free to-morrow they would maintain themselves, without assistance from this country. Such was the plain state of the case. He wanted no report from the commissioners to enable him to decide on a subject of which he could judge as well as themselves. He now begged leave to draw the attention of the House to a charge of 620 l. for conveying the insignia of the order of the garter to the king of Portugal. This was an expense which he did not think the public ought, to bear. If the country were to pay for honours granted by the crown, it ought to be shown that those honours were deservedly bestowed. In this case, the public, looking to the conduct of the individual selected, considered the proceeding rather as a disgrace than an honour. When the Portugese government had violated its contract with the people, was it becoming in an English parliament to vote a sum of money for defraying the expense of an honour conferred on the head of that government? He hoped that something might be stated to show either that the time formerly justified the granting of the honour, or that some very peculiar circumstances called for it at present.
Mr. Secretary Canningsaid, that as to the time, this honour was not of a recent date. It was conferred several years ago, when a similar mark of respect was bestowed on the king of Denmark, and

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various other sovereigns. Circumstances, however, intervened, which prevented its being then sent out. With respect to the conduct imputed to the king of Portugal, he would only say, that as the order was not bestowed on account of any event which had occurred in the interior of that country, neither could it, when once conferred, be withheld in consequence of any thing that had since taken place there.
Mr. Humewished to make a few observations on the charge relative to foreign ambassadors. He had last year shown, that the expense, on an average of the five preceding years, was 300,000 l. per annum. This, exclusive of what was paid for consuls, was a very large sum, and every means ought to betaken to reduce it. It would give him great satisfaction if he should find that he was mistaken in what he was about to state, relative to the expense of the embassy to Holland. It was said, that last year the Dutch government intended to reduce, in the diplomatic scale, the rank of the individual who was to act as ambassador to England; and that of course a gentleman of similar rank would be sent from this court to the Hague. He understood the Dutch government had come to a resolution of that nature; but that, so far from his majesty's government approving of the alteration, and seizing the opportunity which it afforded of reducing the expense, they had absolutely solicited the Dutch government to keep up the rank of the ambassador, in order that they might send one of equal grade to the Hague, and thus continue the usual rate of expense. He heard this with feelings of great regret; because, if the fact were so, it afforded a strong proof that no disposition existed to lessen the expense in this department. If the report were incorrect, he should be glad to hear it contradicted.
Mr. Canningsaid, the hon member had been quite misinformed, if he supposed that such a request as he had alluded to had been made by his majesty's government. It did not follow, as the hon. gentleman seemed to think, that a reduction of expense should naturally attend a reduction in the rank of the ambassador sent to this court from Holland. He believed that for fifty years, it had been the constant policy of this country to have an ambassador of the first class at the Hague, even though the Dutch ambassador was not of equal rank.
Mr. Humeobserving a charge for ex-
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penses incurred by sir William Congreve, in prosecuting his inquiries as Inspector-general of gas-light companies, wished to know by what patent he held that office? If it were an appointment under the crown, did it not bring the hon. baronet under the act of queen Anne? It certainly was a new office; for gas was not known in that queen's reign; and considering the appointment as a new one, was it of such a nature as to vacate the hon. baronet's seat in that House? He also wished to know what was the annual expense.
Mr. Secretary Peelsaid, the appointment took place in 1821, under an act of the legislature. At that time more fear was entertained of the danger which might be expected from the explosion of gas than at present. In 1817 and 1818 two acts were passed, which gave to the secretary of state the power of appointing an inspector. The appointment, therefore, was not in the crown, but in the secretary of state under the act of parliament. The hon. baronet had proved himself to be a most useful officer, and he received no more than a remuneration for the actual expenses he incurred. He had reported last year that the same degree of apprehension no longer existed as was formerly entertained; but still it was thought expedient, that the secretary of state should have an opportunity of knowing how the gas-works were going on; and he hoped, that next year, the same skilful individual would give him the benefit of his scientific knowledge. As this was not a new appointment under the Crown, it did not come under the ate of queen Anne; and of course did not vacate the hon. baronet'sseat.
Mr. Lambtonobserved, that the hon. baronet, in his reports, had furnished suggestions of considerable importance; some of which had been acted upon. Every one who knew the extreme danger to be apprehended from the explosion of those gasometers, must be pleased to see the attention of a gentleman of so much science and knowledge directed to the subject. He thought that the right hon. secretary, in continuing the office, did nothing more than his duty. The salary paid to the hon. baronet, was, he thought quite inadequate to his services.
Mr. Humedenied the assertion, that sir W. Congreve had made valuable reports on which the gas-companies had acted. He had, it was true, made reports, in which he spoke a great deal about the danger of our being blown up by the ex-

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plosion of gas—all of which was afterwards contradicted. The hon. member had spoken of the science and knowledge displayed by sir W. Congreve; but it appeared to him, that the hon. member knew nothing about the business. The hon. baronet asserted in his reports, that if the gasometer were approached by fire, it must immediately explode: but sir H. Davy, and other really scientific men, proved the contrary. He had no interest in this question, but the hon. member had; for he supplied the material of which gas was made. When the extraordinary bill was brought in on this subject, he, though not interested one way or other, found it necessary to have it sent to a committee up stairs, where evidence could be examined. Gentlemen talked of the danger of gasometers being blown up. He-repeated, that it was hardly possible for a gasometer to be blown up. The situation of gas-inspector was unnecessary; but if necessary, sir W. Congreve ought not to have been the person appointed to it; for no man could have any knowledge of chemistry who could make such a report as the one now on the table. At least the salary of the gas-inspector ought to be a definite one.
Mr. Lambtonsaid, that the hon. member for Aberdeen had treated him as an interested party in the present discussion, because he might be supposed to supply the article from which the gas was manufactured. The hon. member, however, if there were any force in his argument, would stand, in his own person, exposed to the effect of it; for, if he did not absolutely supply the gas companies with the material from which their smoke was produced, they might go to him, if they pleased, for the pipes which conveyed it.
Mr. Secretary Peelobserved, that Mr. Millington, to whom the hon. member had just adverted, said in his evidence, with respect to the danger from, the explosion of gasometers, that the blowing up of the one in Dorset-street would probably bring down all the adjacent houses in Fleet-street. Dr. Wollaston, too, had distinctly declared, that' his opinion as to the properties of gas had been altered by that very report of sir W. Congreve, to which the hon. member for Aberdeen objected. The most respectable chemical authorities, sir H. Davy among the rest, had spoken in strong terms of the danger likely to arise from the explosion of gas; and the House would say, under such
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circumstances, whether it was not fit that the secretary of state should have the means of knowing the condition of the gas institutions, and the precautions which were used, from year to year. The very report quoted by the hon. member for Aberdeen stated, in terms, the necessity there was for the secretary of state to be watchful on the subject; and, so long as sir W. Congreve would consent to hold the office of inspector, no person could be more fit to be intrusted with it. Upon the claims of that gentleman, generally, to the gratitude of the country, he should not say a word; because he was sure they were already sufficiently appreciated.
Mr. Leslie Fostersaid, that the possibility of the explosion of gasometers was sufficiently proved by the fact, that one gasometer had exploded and done considerable, mischief. He certainly approved of the appointment of an inspector.
Mr. Dawsondefended the appointment of sir W. Congreve.
Sir W. Congrevewould only say, that he had accepted the situation in question, under a conscientious belief, that the duties of it were most necessary to be discharged. As far as his experience had gone, he thought inspection from time to time, very necessary. In one instance he had found a gasometer floating in coal tar, instead of water; coal tar being an article of the most combustible description. In other cases, large fires had been kept in the neighbourhood of the gasometers; which he considered unsafe. He had also recommended, as a general principle, the use of smaller gasometers; and in some quarters his suggestions had been adopted.
Mr. Alderman Woodsaid, that he claimed from the secretary for the home department, in behalf of the city of London, that the gas-master, or general inspector, or whatever designation that wonderful person bore, should inspect the Mansion-house. There was a very large gasometer there, over which he himself had slept for two years. He spoke for the safety of future lord mayors, as it was most probable he should not, though he hoped frequently to dine, sleep there again. There was another gasometer, too, at the Bank, which perhaps would not be the worse for an occasional call, on the part; of the gas-master.
The several resolutions were agreed to.

ALIEN BILL.
The order of the day being moved for the second reading of this bill,
Mr. Humesaid, that it had been the determination of a number of members of that House, who were decidedly hostile to the spirit and principle of the Alien bill, to allow no one stage to pass, but to resist its progress from its introduction. In consequence, however, of rumours that had transpired respecting certain views, supposed to be entertained by the right hon. secretary for foreign affairs, they were most solicitous to obtain the benefit of his information on the subject, and to hear, from such an authority, the arguments upon which he considered it expedient that such an unconstitutional measure should pass. On a former night it had been contended by the right hon. secretary for the home department, that the powers sought by this bill were powers which the kings of this country had, for centuries, in right of their prerogative, possessed. And yet there was a right hon. colleague of the right hon. secretary (Mr. Wynn) who had denied that such a power was vested in the throne. It was natural, therefore, between these two discordant authorities, sitting in the same cabinet, for members of that House to feel most solicitous to know the opinion of the right hon. the secretary for foreign affairs, and to be made acquainted with the views on which he recommended its adoption. What, he would ask him, did he discover in the internal state of our relations, or in the character of our foreign policy, to justify the passing of a bill, which was at variance with the ancient policy and acknowledged hospitality of the country? Could its adoption be accounted for under any other impression, than that there existed a secret understanding between our government and the absolute sovereigns of the continent, to act in concert against those whom these sovereigns were disposed to persecute; that whenever the emperor of Austria, or the king of France, were pleased to declare a foreigner obnoxious to them, he was to be expelled from our shores? If there was no such concert, no such secret understanding—surely the House had a right to be informed what the actual motives were, and to obtain the fullest explanation, before it agreed to continue an act so hostile to our national character. Was there no law on our Statute-book in favour of foreigners seeking the hospitality
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of our soil? Had the great charter not acknowledged the principle? The very fact of an uniform and uninterrupted practice for centuries was a lull acknowledgment of our policy. Nothing could be more decisive of the principle than the very law which, on the trial of foreigners, entitled them to such a disposition of the jury, as allowed them to claim an array of half foreigners. From the period of the Revolution until the year 1793, the country never heard of such an act; and it was to be recollected that, during that interval, the country from one extremity to the other, was frequently in arms; that rebellion followed rebellion, and that there was a succession of pretenders to the throne. Who, that turned his attention to those countries over which the despots of Europe exercised an unjust influence —Switzerland, for instance, where unfortunate refugees were forced from the asylum they sought, at the mandate of these despots—who, he repeated, that considered the progress and probable result of such a state of things, was not persuaded that this country ought to take a decided course, and not be considered as in any way aiding and abetting such a system? We should get rid altogether of such trammels. We should take our stand in support of the freedom of mankind; and, with the rapid growth of education and knowledge, under our countenance, the system of despotism would speedily disappear. An Alien law was abhorrent to our policy. It was admitted by its advocates to be useless, as it was rarely exercised; but, on the principle of investing any set of men with arbitrary power, no matter how acted upon, it was most dangerous in the principle. Under these circumstances, he should resist the order of the day for its second reading, and move, as an amendment, that after the word "that," the following words be substituted:" It appears to this House, that from the Revolution in 1688, up to the year 1793, a period in which the tranquillity of this country was endangered and disturbed by pretenders to the throne, it was not considered necessary by parliament to invest ministers with such arbitrary power as the Alien bill confers: that it is contrary to the spirit of the British constitution, and hostile to the best interests of the civilized world; and in accordance only with the unprincipled declarations, and tyrannical acts, of the constitutional despots: that this House,

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therefore, deem it inexpedient to continue a power, mischievous, even if not used, and cruel and unconstitutional, whenever exercised."
Mr. N. Calvertsaid, he was one of those who never would join in any language of abuse applied to the sovereigns of foreign states; because he could not stoop to do any thing so unfair as to attack those who, from distance, were disabled from defending themselves. He thought the practice, to say the least of it, might lead to great national mischief. He could not support the amendment, though he objected to the bill.
The Speakerhaving again read the amendment, loud laughter followed, on account of the word "constitutional," which was then found in it.
Mr. Humesaid, there was no such word as "constitutional" in the paper; the words were "continental despots."
The Speakerordered the paper to be handed to Mr. Hume, who, upon reading it, presented another copy, in which the words stood as he proposed. The amendment was put, and negatived without a division. Upon the motion, that the order of the day for the second reading of the bill be now read, the House divided: Ayes 120; Noes 67.

List of the Minority.

Abercromby, hon. J.

Lambton, J. G.

Althorp, visc.

Leader, W.

Allen, J. A.

Leycester, R.

Baillie col. J.

Maberly, W. L.

Barrett, S. M.

Macdonald, J.

Benyon, B.

Marjoribanks, S.

Bernal, R.

Martin, J.

Birch, J.

Milton, visc.

Byng, G.

Monck, J. B.

Calvert, C.

Moore, P.

Calvert, N.

Newport, sir J.

Cavendish, hon. C.

Nugent, lord

Clifton, visc.

Ord, W.

Colborne, N. W. R.

Osborne, lord F. G.

Creevy, T.

Palmer, C.

Crompton, S.

Palmer, C. F.

Davies, col.

Pares, T.

Dundas, hon. T.

Pryse, P.

Farrand, R.

Rice, T. S.

Pergusson, sir R.

Robarts, A. W.

Gaskill, B.

Robarts, col.

Haldimand, W.

Robinson, sir G.

Hamilton, lord A.

Russell, lord W.

Honywood, W. P.

Scott, J.

Huskisson, hon. H.

Sefton, lord

James, W.

Smith, W.

Jervoise, G. B.

Smith, R.

Johnstone, W. A.

Stanley, E. C.

Jones, J.

Sykes, D.

Kennedy, T. F.

Tierney, right hon. G.

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Townshend, lord C.

Wood, Mr. ald.

Warre, J. A.

Wrottesley, sir J.

Whitbread, W. H.

TELLERS.

Wilkins, W.

Hume, J.

Wilson, sir R.

Hobhouse, J. C.

On the question being put, "That the Bill be now read a second time,"
Sir Robert Wilsonsaid, he rose to defend the right of the members of that House to express themselves freely upon the conduct of foreign potentates, and to repel the contrary principle implied in the observations of his hon. friend. They were bound to call things by their right names. If those sovereigns were tyrants, no gentleman could be wrong in designating them accordingly. It was not simply their right to do so; it was their duty to use that language towards them, which would best express the opinion the parliament of England entertained of their conduct, and to admonish the people of England of the steps which had been taken to give due expression to that opinion. When his hon. friend talked of those sovereigns having no means of defending themselves in that House, he seemed to forget that they were defended by their guards and armies—that irritated tyrants had reaching arms, and could strike those whom they never had seen. The House had no other means of exercising its power, but those strong expressions of the public feeling through its agency, which frequently had the effect of rescuing the victims of extreme and abused authority. He hoped his hon. friend would not attempt to deter the House from this important exercise of its duty. It was not using the language of abuse to those princes, but the language of solemn declaration in favour of liberty, and to prove to them incontrovertibly the general detestation in which the people of England held the crimes of tyranny. Upon the progress of the bill he would make only these observations. It had undergone very ample discussion—much more discussion than he had hoped for— and he should have concluded, that it was not likely that any thing more of weight could be added to it, but for that promise which fell from the right hon. secretary for foreign affairs the other day. He hoped that if the bill did pass, it would be presented to the public under more favourable circumstances of justification than those in which it stood at present. The argument was now con-

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siderably simplified: the bill was no longer defended upon the ground of power inherent in the prerogative. While on the other hand, he was equally ready to admit, that although the right of foreigners to land on these shores had been always allowed, the right of regulating that reception, and the residence of those who were received, must remain with the parliament. The right of passing a law to regulate the reception and residence of aliens, could not be seriously questioned: the only question was, as to the policy of passing such a law under the present circumstances of the country. He concluded that no gentleman in the House would deny parliament that power. Every country must have a right to pass bills of exception and exclusion, and more especially as they went to control the rights of foreigners to land and reside; seeing that that power was to be considered almost in the light of an European law. But, the subject for their consideration was, the policy of the measure at the present time. Their ancestors well knew that they had the right, but they seldom used it; thinking, as it would appear, that the disadvantages greatly outweighed any benefits to be attained by the use of it, because of the facilities which it would have afforded to an oppressive government to cover its rigours under the pretence of watching strictly over foreigners. Every one who had travelled in foreign countries knew, that with respect to nations, character is power, and that England was particularly strong in that kind of power. This bill had received modifications, it was said, for which he was not at all thankful. He thought they were against the general principle for which he would contend. It was said that, in its present form, no less than 9,000 foreigners out of 26,000 had been withdrawn from its operation: he disliked it so much the more. If those 9,000 were rich foreigners, they would tend greatly to lessen the opposition to the bill. He would rather that all should be included in it. With a bill so obnoxious in its principle, the wider the extent of operation the better; because, the general sense of indignation and injustice to which it would give rise would be so much more powerful in its manifestation. As to the statement which had been hazarded, that this power had never been abused, he could not allow the assertion to pass uncontradicted. He had sup-
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ported the case of general Gourgaud, who, after so many years of faithful service to his unfortunate master, had been cruelly treated. He thought that the conduct of government in refusing him permission to land, was nothing less than illiberal and ungentlemanly: he would not attribute it, however, exactly to the government, because they were not apprised at the moment of what their agents were doing, although they afterwards justified it. There was another case in which he could not but think that the power had been still more abused. He alluded to that of baron Eben, who had been banished by the king of Portugal after sixteen or seventeen years of zealous and faithful service; and yet government, though they could not charge him with any crime, would not permit him to land, because he was said to have been opposed to the kingly government in Portugal. These two cases showed that the powers given were liable to abuse, and that they had been abused. As to madame Mon-tholon and others, excluded on the general principle of not admitting any of the partisans of Buonaparte, it was clearly most ungenerous treatment for a free government. The House should seize this opportunity of proving to the Holy Alliance, and to the people of Europe, that all those bonds which had unhappily united them for a time, were now dissolved—that the interests of this country were no longer interwoven with their system. No opportunity could be more favourable for that purpose than the progress of the bill now in discussion. An opinion prevailed abroad, that this bill was passed at the instigation of the Holy Alliance, and that it could not be repealed without their consent directly expressed. He hoped that the House would prove most fully and satisfactorily, that the opinion was groundless; and to give them an opportunity for so doing, he would now move, "That the bill be read a second time this day six months."
Mr. N. Calvertexplained. He said, he had not wished to dictate any rule to guide the conduct of the House: he had only prescribed a rule for his own behaviour with respect to foreign governments, and the princes at the head of them.
Mr. Serjeant Onslowjustified the conduct of government in the treatment of general Gourgaud, and the other members of the suite of Buonaparte, and argued

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for the inherent right which existed in the prerogative to exercise the power asked for by ministers.
Mr. Secretary Canningsaid, he rose rather in fulfilment of a pledge into which he had been seduced a few nights ago by the soft persuasion of the hon. member for Aberdeen, than from any admission that the question required more ample argument; and still less did he feel it necessary to rise for the purpose of making any acknowledgment that, on any former occasion of discussing the principles of this bill, his own sentiments required any, even the slightest qualification. The hon. member for Aberdeen, in a style half complimentary to him, and half composed of serious censure on the measure itself, had done him the honour to oppose the principle of the bill to that which he deemed to be the general character and genius of his (Mr. Canning's) policy. If, however, the hon. gentleman should find any thing contradictory to the opinions which he had formed of him, in the arguments he was about to use in support of the measure; if he should find any thing which he might conceive to be opposed to the opinions which he (Mr. Canning) had professed, he would enable the hon. gentleman to thread those differences, to reconcile those seeming contradictions in his expressions, by producing, in one word, the clue of the labyrinth—the shiboleth of his (Mr. C.'s) policy upon this and every other public question; and that word was "England." His wish was only that of being found siding, on all divisions of opinions, with the interests of his country.
He was desirous of disclaiming at the outset, the slightest reference to the wishes of any other sovereign, to the feelings of any other government, or to the interests of any other people, except in so far as those wishes, those feelings, and those interests, may, or might, concur with the just interests of England. Perhaps, of all the questions that had been recently discussed in that House, the present bill had been the most subjected to the influence of the reigning vice of all discussion at the present day—the vice of exaggeration. If, without reference to time and place, we were to hear it asserted, that it was a monstrous and unheard-of proposition, that a sovereign state should arrogate to itself the power of determining what foreigners should be
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admitted into its territories, and on what conditions they should reside there, the assertion would appear so monstrous and so extravagant, that no one would venture seriously to repeat it. And yet all the strength with which it had been clothed by the opponents of the bill, had been by dressing up a proposition so simple and so absurd, with facts with which it had no connexion, and with suppositions which had no foundation. He must forfeit, he feared, some of the good opinion of the hon. member when he said, that in discriminating, in the arguments on this bill, between those which maintained its principle and those which were conversant in its details, he was inclined to give most consideration to those which confirmed the principle; and, the principle once established, though it might afterwards be shown that errors accompanied the exercise of it on particular occasions, it was still good for all times and circumstances. Being a principle of that force and generality it could not be done away, and the details must consequently form but a secondary consideration. He said, that the right must have existed, and must continue to exist, at all times and under all circumstances. He did not therefore say, that at all times and under all circumstances the power was equally applicable. But he would say, not meaning to take the power of the Crown apart from the authority of parliament, that if it were found that no such power as that of constraining aliens more than natural-born subjects existed, and upon any new and unexpected emergency the want of that power should be felt, that would be such a state of things as ought not to be allowed to exist, even if this temporary bill should expire; and he trusted that expire it would, without another renewal. [Loud cheers.] He repeated ins earnest hope and expectation, that it would expire without another renewal. But even in that case, with respect to the principle of power, government, of whomsoever it might be composed at the time, would not do its duty, if it suffered the principle to lapse into annihilation, or if by neglect they should afterwards allow the power itself altogether to escape from their hands. He hoped he should not be taunted by the hon. gentleman with throwing any thing out as a lure for popularity, when he thus candidly avowed, that his only consideration was, how to preserve the principle of the mea-

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sure; and, that being once effected, that he was little anxious about the details, and was not at all disposed to undertake to show how, by whom, and on what particular occasions, that power should be now exercised. When he said "now," he wished not to be misunderstood. Much argument had been wasted on the question of situation. Honourable gentlemen had gone back to former times to show that the power was or was not in the Crown, without the parliament; and, in his opinion, the precedents produced were equally strong in proof for either side of that argument. The power had undoubtedly been exercised by the Crown, sometimes with, sometimes without, the consent of parliament: but, it was absurd to be drawing comparisons between the exercises of power, with regard to the different parts of the constitution now, and in former times. Suppose a precedent were shown of Henry 8th having exercised this power with the consent of parliament, would that imply the least resemblance between the constitutional functions of parliament then, and at the present day? The consent of that parliament of Henry the Eighth, which voted the proclamation of the king to have the force of law, was surely something different from the concurrence of a parliament of the present day; and if to add any sanction to a strong measure against aliens, the monarch clothed it in the name of such a parliament, it was no proof that it was subject to any real control. The monarch, in fact, discussed his measures in parliament as in a large council, where his influence was as complete as in his own privy council. But, he did not want to prove that the power was originally with the Crown; that it was inherent in the prerogative. It was matter of perfect indifference to him, whether it was innate in the Crown to be exercised by the Crown, or in the Crown to be exercised with the consent of the parliament; or if it were lodged first with the parliament to be shaped by the parliament in its exercise, with the assent of the Crown as a branch of the parliament: there must be a power lodged somewhere in the constitution to deal with aliens, if it should be found necessary, more summarily than with their own subjects.
The question had been argued, as if this bill would form an exception to the practice of all other countries. It had been repeatedly urged how odious it would be in them to retain, a power which
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from its objectionable nature, was not claimed by the government of other states. But the argument was quite the other way. England was the exception. This country alone stood without the continual existence and frequent exercise of that power. He defied those who objected to produce facts. Let them show him any state in Europe from the most arbitrary to those supposed to be the most free—from the highest degree of despotism, through all the range of political inventions by which states were governed, down to the most widely-spread democracy—which had ever consented to be without the power of controlling the abode of aliens more rigidly than that of native subjects. Why, then, was this country to be deprived of a defence which no other state, of any kind—or at any period—would be without? Why was this country to divest itself of a power essential to its own security, when occasions might arise for bringing it into action?
Another argument used by honourable gentlemen opposed to this measure was, that the acquisition of power over aliens resulting from it would be inconsistent with freedom. Why, the experience of all history went the other way. He had before said, that all governments had had this power; but more particularly was it exercised by those governments which were considered the best of ancient times. Look at the ancient republics of Greece and Rome. Were gentlemen altogether to forget their classics on the present occasion, and overlook the instances which they afforded bearing on the present case? Let them look at Sparta, where the condition of the stranger was little better than that of the unfortunate Helot. Let them look at the polished rival of Sparta —Athens; and what was the condition of the alien who went to reside there for a time? He was, in the first place, obliged to put himself, during his stay, under the protection of some patron; or in default thereof, he was subject to every kind of inconvenience. But even under the patron, he was liable to have his goods sold, and his person sent to prison, for non-payment of the alien-tax. Let them look at Rome— at ancient Rome—in the days of her greatest freedom. Was the alien the object of any peculiar care? On the contrary, he was rather the object of peculiar jealousy. It was necessary that there, too, he should place himself under the protection of some patron; but that did not exempt him

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from the liability to be sent from the city without notice. Aliens were sometimes sent out, not by one or two at a time, but frequently in whole droves together, at the caprice of the tribunes, or consuls. Why did he mention these facts? Not for the purpose of urging them as reasons why we should now act in a similar manner, but to show that, at all times, such a power was exercised by those states most jealous of their freedom, and that the power was never held to be at all inconsistent with that freedom. Look at the practice of this country in ancient times. It was true, that aliens were invited, and that peculiar protection was given to alien merchants. Why? Why, because the only men who travelled in those days were merchants. Did it follow because encouragement was given then, that the same should be held out at the present day? And this brought him to notice what was the radical error of the arguments of gentlemen on this question; namely, that they made no distinction between the policy of an ancient state and that of a modern one. At that period of the Roman state, when the fight between the Horatii and Curiatii was to decide whether Alba was to be Rome, or Rome Alba —at that time the description of a set of aliens among the numbers of Roman citizens might be a matter of deep expediency, which could not afterwards exist. The jealousy of such an adscription in a future period of the Roman history was not inconsistent with the former measure. In the one case a new state approved of what was then expedient; in the other, an old state was jealous of what it looked upon as encroachment. Why, the rape of the Sabine women was considered a measure of expediency to supply the wants of the young state; but no man would go so far as to assert, that because such a measure had once been expedient it would be equally expedient that it should be resorted to at the end of every lustrum. Yet, it was by confounding two very dissimilar epochs in the history of states, and arguing the necessity or policy of certain measures in one because they had been found to exist in the other, that gentlemen who opposed this bill had so egregiously deceived themselves. It might be rational, when it was an object for England to collect capital and industry, to open her ports indiscriminately to those strangers who alone would resort to them, the merchants; but when the paths of industry were fully occupied, when the people were fully em-
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ployed, and the country overflowing with capital, it might be natural to look to the introduction of strangers with other eyes, and to see less of the advantages than of the perils of the influx. Let the House look at- the two kindred British states, happily joined in amity, though divided by institutions, which now occupy, perhaps, a greater space than any others in the eyes of the world. And here let him observe, that when he spoke of, and admitted, the freedom of America, he must add, that we in this country enjoyed as much freedom as was enjoyed there or in any other part of the world, and that our freedom was watched over and protected by a monarchy, which so far from being a check, was in reality its best and safest guardian. But, let the House look at the policy of the two governments. The policy of America was facility of admission; the policy with us was jealousy of admission. They wished to increase their subjects; we, to secure those we already possessed—to prevent them from going off, and others from coming to us. The difference of this policy was not the difference between despotism and freedom—No: one was the policy of a new, the other that of an old state. He would ask in what part of Europe could Englishmen travel with such complete freedom as foreigners could in this? On the continent, a man could not move beyond a certain limit without his passport, as had been truly observed by the hon. and learned Serjeant (Onslow): beyond that limit he felt the chain round his leg, which he possessed no means of lengthening. This fact at once put an end to the argument of invidious-ness, and that we were committing an outrage on foreigners, to which we ourselves were not abroad exposed; that this was the only despotic country of the world —that Turkey was not despotic—Russia not despotic—Austria not despotic-France not despotic, in comparison with the despotism of Great Britain. Let him ask, in addition, whether the police was not a source of inconvenience to Englishmen abroad? Why, a young Englishman had been kept in custody, some time back, for a whole night, for gallopping at night over the birdge of Geneva. What consolation would it be to this young Englishman who rode over the bridge of Geneva, and thereby almost shook the little republic to its foundation, that the despotism to which he was there exposed was not inflicted by "a malignant and a turban'd Turk,"

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but by the hon. and learned gentleman's (sir J. Mackintosh's) literary friend, M. Sismondi, or by his own arithmetical friend, sir Francis d'Ivernois? And yet, after experiencing all the inconvenience of travelling in foreign countries, some young English travellers returned, and declared that an Alien bill here would be a disgrace to the country!—He had said thus much of the measure as a general principle recognized by the states most attached to freedom. He had considered a certain power over aliens, as a thing which ought to be possessed permanently. He would not go into the details of the present bill, or the alterations which it might or might not be necessary to make, if it were to remain permanently on our Statute-book. He would not say whether the measure which might be eventually decided upon to supply the place of the bill should be a registry; but, without entering into any details of that kind, he would repeat, that when this bill should expire, it would be, necessary to introduce some measure, with respect to the power which the executive ought to possess over foreigners in this country. He was afraid, then, that he should not satisfy the hon. member for Aberdeen when, he not only declared himself in favour of the measure before the House, but of the general principle out of which it arose.
He now came to the measure before the House as applicable to the present times; for, having cleared the general principle, it remained for him to consider not whether this bill was good from beginning to end, but whether it was a modification of an admitted principle, suited to particular and existing dangers. Now what were the existing dangers? With regard to internal perils, he was perfectly ready to admit, that he saw none to the institutions of this country from the exertions of any foreigner, however disposed such foreigner might be to assail them. He firmly believed that, in the very worst of times, there was inherent in the English constitution, or he should rather say, in the constitution of the English mind, that which would repel the aid of foreign treason, and would not inoculate itself with any infection that was not at least of native origin. And therefore was it that his right hon. friend had introduced into this bill a modification of the former law, striking out from its operation all those foreigners who had been, for a certain length of time, domiciled amongst
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us, and with whose characters and connexions we had had the means of becoming acquainted. But the particular danger of the time was that which had been stated by the hon. gentleman who last spoke, and which had been frequently referred to in the course of the present session; namely, that there was a struggle now pending in the world, between extreme principles, and that this country was naturally and necessarily (and long might she continue to be so) the asylum for the beaten in that warfare. As that asylum we had a right to inscribe over our gate, not, indeed, with Dante—"Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch'entrate, "—"All ye that enter must leave hope behind;" but rather,—"All ye that enter must leave plots behind."—"You must leave behind your party feuds and your political squabbles, for you come here to seek an asylum for repose, not a workshop, where, without danger, you may forge new treasons." Those who courted a shelter had no right to question the terms on which it was granted. If then we did not make these terms, what must be the necessary consequence? That which we called an asylum would be felt and called by Europe and the world a refuge, a hiding place, for all who retired but to meditate fresh disturbances. He was anxious that the nations of the continent should not be disturbed; because, the contact of independent governments was often so close and nice, that the disturbance of a part might lead to the disturbance of the whole, and we ourselves might not be free from the contagion. He was anxious, therefore, for English purposes and English principles, that this bill should pass, as well as on account of the countries whose safety might be more immediately placed in hazard.
His gallant friend (sir R. Wilson), as well indeed as the hon. member for Aberdeen, had both spoken out plainly and fairly, and from both of them he certainty differed toto cælo: there was no point of resemblance or accordance upon this subject between them. They were of opinion, that, in this struggle of extreme principles England ought to side with those who espoused the extreme principles of liberty; that she ought to unfurl her banners at the head of that discomfited party; that she ought to array, under her standard, all those who were disposed to league together to overthrow the establishments of the world,—[No, no; hear, hear!]

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The hon. gentleman did not, perhaps, use those precise words; but in argument they went that length; and the shades of distinction between them must be nice indeed. What they contended for was this—that, while our unvarying principle was neutrality—neutrality recommended from the throne, advocated by the government, supported by parliament, and echoed throughout the country; while we would adopt measures the best calculated to preserve that neutrality, they would at once overthrow it. No doubt their object was laudable: no doubt they wished to accomplish magnificent purposes; but it was in direct opposition to the wishes of the sovereign, the parliament, and the people. But, it was somewhat unreasonable, somewhat too much to expect that we should conform to their views, and at once abandon our settled and approved course, for their scheme of national exaltation. At least before they called upon us to do so, they ought to try parliament upon the question—whether it was willing to adopt and pursue this new line of policy—a line of policy, the object of which was, not to keep down and soften animosities, not to reconcile differences— and promote general harmony and good will, but to exasperate into action these modern principles of extravagant liberty; to march at the head of the exiles of every country, against their legitimate governments, and ancient institutions. If parliament could be brought to adopt this new and exploded course, then he freely admitted, not only that this paltry Alien bill, but with the hon. member for Aberdeen, "wise in his generation," that the foreign Enlistment bill must be at -once repealed, and we must begin a new era in legislation. But, the House would give him leave to say, that when the hon. gentleman and his friends had attained this most desirable object—when they had converted parliament, convinced the sovereign, and induced his ministers to retrace their steps, they might still find themselves considerably disappointed. He should not be surprised if, after all their vehement denunciations, they were at last to come to parliament for something like the enactment of an Alien bill; for they assumed, that this country, unarmed with power to prevent the levying of war against a foreign state—the Foreign Enlistment bill; and unarmed with power to control the residence of foreigners, the Alien bill, the consequence would be, that nothing would
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be heard of in great Britain, but the fitting out of armaments against what were termed the despots of Europe. But, let him call the attention of those hon. gentlemen to one circumstance. There were two parties engaged in this struggle of extravagant principles. The one party might, indeed, carry with it the sympathies of mankind. They had all the common places of liberty on their side; but, unfortunately, their achievements had been few indeed. They had talked largely and done little; and the strength, at present, at least, was all the other way. Let him, then, put a case. His hon. and learned friend opposite (sir J. Mackintosh) had given notice a short time since, of a motion for the recognition of the independence of South America: but he had withdrawn it, because he understood that the king's ministers were prepared to consider any armament, fitting out in Spain, while the French retained a preponderating influence there, a French armament.
Sir J. Mackintosh.—I said, if any "considerable armament" were fitted out in Spain against South America, whilst that country was in the occupation of the French army, it ought to be considered as a French armament.
Mr. Secretary Canning.—Well, any "considerable armament;" and, let them see, if the hon. and learned gentleman tried other powers fairly, by this rule. What we had a right to say of France, France and other countries had a fair right to say of us. They might declare, that they would consider any armament sailing from j the ports of England for South America as a British armament; and his hon. and learned friend would admit, that this kingdom was at least as responsible for what was done upon her own soil, as France was responsible for what was done in Spain. Now, he said, that the Foreign Enlistment bill alone prevented the fitting out of armaments in British ports, and that the Alien bill alone kept foreigners under control, and prevented their treasonable machinations. If you stripped the Crown of the powers thereby given, there was no physical impediment to any number of foreigners, whether beaten or triumphant, coming to Plymouth or Portsmouth, fitting out an armament there, and sailing with it for the conquest of South America, whether for Ferdinand or his enemies. If France were to place herself in such a situation, we. should instantly assert, that it afforded a ground for going

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to war. It was ridiculous, then, to deny, that, if we pursued the same line of conduct, we might he justly called upon to answer for it in the penalty of hostilities. Then he maintained that it was for the interest of England, for the peace of England, and not merely for the interest and peace of foreign nations, that we should retain and, when needful, enforce, these measures. God knew when we should see the end of the prevailing agitations—when the struggle of opinion and principle would terminate! No man could wish for it more than he did; but he claimed these bills, in order that we might not be fooled, gulled, bullied, cheated, deceived into hostilities in which it was never our intention to engage. He claimed them for the preservation of peace—for the preservation of the character, reputation, and good sense of this country—to prevent it from being the laughing-stock and the dupe, instead of being the dread and the support of Europe—and that she might not be made by foreigners the starting-place of their animosities. So long as these extreme parties were in presence of each other, no measure but this Alien bill could save us from danger; and the moment we parted with it, we voluntarily incurred the hazard. We should then justly subject ourselves to the suspicion, that we had thrown this security away, with the express intent of affording the facilities of our shore, and the convenience of our harbours, for the promotion and encouragement of warfare; and he cared not whether that warfare was in favour of the one side or the other. Let us not deceive ourselves by supposing that the champions of freedom would make no use of our means and our ports. We well knew that, at this moment, there was scarcely a power in Europe that was not collecting from the capitalists of Great Britain, the sinews of war— that there was scarcely a single power that did not look for resources to the exchequer of our Exchange. He did not mean to justify the moral character of such loans; but we were all aware, that our monied men lent indiscriminately to all parties; without reference to any other consideration than the security which the borrower had to offer. In the best days of our constitution, it was known that hostile armies were led by English captains; but here were the captains of English Captains, whose resources were the springs on which the power of each side rested. The mo-
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ney-lender lent to each, and would lend wherever he got a security. He should therefore be sorry to trust the neutrality of the country to the morality of moneylenders; for get rid of the foreign enlistment, and let Ferdinand once show a little strength, and we should soon see him aided by the capitalists of this country, and an expedition sent from our ports, making another effort to crush the rising liberties of South America. [Cheers.] It was to prevent such a result that he was unwilling to part with the power which the Crown at present possessed by the acts now in force. He would maintain a strict neutrality, not only in act and deed; but he would reject any of those little flirtations that might tend to the violation of it. He hoped never to see England leading those armies which contended for extreme freedom against those who were called the despots of the continent. And here he was aware that he must, as he had often done before, guard himself against the contrary supposition. To those who thought, or said that they thought, that the measure upon the table had been produced at the dictation of any foreign government, or any set of governments,' he replied that he denied it, and he claimed that his denial should be as good as their imputation. He said it in the hearing of the Commons of England; he said it, thank God, in the hearing of the whole country; and, what was more to his purpose, he said it in the hearing of all those against whom the imputation was made—he rejected it as unfounded—he denied it (not in any offensive sense), as utterly false [Hear, hear]. Dearly as he valued all the ties by which European nations were held together, there was not a connexion that he would not sever at once, rather than allow any measure brought forward in that House to originate in a foreign source. He denied that this bill proceeded from foreign influence, or that it was at all founded upon considerations of the interests of other states.
The question, therefore, was, whether for the purpose he had mentioned, the provisions of the bill were adequate or too powerful—whether they trenched more upon individual liberty, than was necessary for our domestic policy? He took the liberty of assuming, that the purpose of the bill was the purpose of the House; because the measure was consonant with its recorded votes. What, then, did the bill do? Did it enable government to punish or im-

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prison, to seize and to confiscate? No; it only empowered them to remove from the kingdom the foreigner who, there was reason to suspect, was violating the asylum that had been afforded him. Lest, too, there should be any temptation to turn the power to any other account, there was an appeal to the privy council. He did not mention it as an effective process of law; but, it ensured notoriety. And who did not know that, in this free country, where a minister was compelled to act in the open face of day, nine times out of ten, he dared not act otherwise than in the honest discharge of his duty? This bill then enabled government to remove the-foreigner; and a still more valuable and a more available consequence of that power is, that it enabled them to permit him to remain. One example in point was as good, or better, than a thousand arguments; though they might be in point also. It had been his fortune, a short time since, to receive intelligence of the authenticity of which he could not doubt, of a plot being in agitation among certain emigrants against the peace of their native country. The plot was well got up, plausible in its object, and not deficient in means. This information, as it was his duty, he had communicated to his right hon. friend (Mr. Peel). His inquiries had led precisely to the same conclusion. What was done? Did they enforce the provisions of the Alien act? Did they send the parties accused, and to whom the plot was brought home with moral certainty, out of Great Britain, to be exposed to the vengeance of irritated royalty No. They had desired to see the individual principally implicated. They told him they were aware of the design, and informed him of the names of his associates. He did not deny its existence, though, as might be expected, he did not confess his own participation. They bade him go and be cautious; adding, that they should let his government know of the discovery of the plot, but conceal the names of the parties. In his conscience, he believed that they had thus prevented the completion of the scheme. Was this, he asked, an instance of abuse of the powers of the Alien bill. The case to which he referred happened with in the last fortnight; and, while his right hon. friend and himself were hesitating about this measure, this incident occurred, and completely satisfied them both, that they would act do their duty if they did not propose it to parliament. Now, then, the
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House had the history of the origin of this bill; and it knew the intentions of government in endeavouring to make it an enactment. He asked, then, hon, gentlemen on the other side, whether in the enactment or in the mode in which it had been applied, they saw any thing that roused their constitutional jealousy? But, he mistook when he talked of their constitutional jealousy—he ought rather to say, their continental jealousy. When this instance had been mentioned by his right hon. friend on a former night, a noble lord (Al-thorp)—who did not often deliver his opinions upon foreign policy, but when he did, what he said always bore the stamp of good sense—suggested,that all the advantage to be derived from a temperate use of the powers of the Alien bill might be attained by an act of parliament brought in for each specific case. The noble lord had had some experience in acts of parliament: he had one now before the House for correcting the practice of certain small courts, and when he got rid of that, he would really beg of the noble lord to try his hand a little further at legislation; and bring in a bill to arraign a foreigner in this country of treason against his own. At least he would have to encounter the difficulty of being without a precedent, in the history of any state, ancient or modern. He only requested the noble lord when he went home that night, to try his hand at framing such a bill; and, depend upon it, even the mighty undertaking of regulating the County courts would sink into insignificance before it. He must not only try a sew mode of legislation, but must erect new courts for his purpose, such as hitherto the imagination of man had never conceived.
That some measure should be devised by which a certain power over aliens should be granted to the Crown at the expiration of the present law, he would repeat; but, in the mean time, the present would act upon the principle, that prevention was better than cure, and he thought it better to act in that way, which would secure the interests of this country without inculpating individuals. He would repeat, then, that, in the present state of the world, such a measure as that before the House was, necessary. What satisfaction would it be to any foreign power against whom secret, combinations were plotting, and by whom we might be accused of suffering such, practices to be carried on—what satisfaction, he would ask, would it be, to say,

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that we had caught the party, and were about to try him by a law made for the purpose? Such a proceeding would not be so much our proper policy, as to take steps by which the practice might be prevented altogether. He admitted that, according to the present law, the innocent was often subject to inconvenience as well as the guilty. That must be the effect of all general Jaws: by the very nature of them, the innocent must be subjected to inconvenience. To detect the guilty, it would be necessary to cast the net very wide.
He must, before he sat down, protest against another species of exaggeration which he found to exist on this question. He meant that disposition to take it for granted, that all foreigners who fled from their own country to seek an asylum in this, must be models of their kind—more angels than men, though somewhat fallen, I and with, at least, "the excess of glory obscured"—heroes of the noblest order, and patriots of the purest water; forgetting the ancient jealousy which existed, with respect to the coming of foreigners into this country? Did they forget the line—
"London! the needy villain's general home;
The common sink of Paris and of Rome!"
He did not say, that the Alien bill had completely effected a beneficial change; but it was not to be taken for granted, that because a foreigner came to this country, he was persecuted and driven away from his own. Besides these illustrious heroes —these immortal patriots—these champions of freedom and martyrs—there were to be found pimps and quack-doctors, "et id genus omne,"—a striking instance of which was to be seen in a recent case at Manchester. He by no means intended to convey an impression, that all aliens were of this description; but he thought, when gentlemen on the other side assumed, that none but heroes and patriots arrive here, he had at least as good a right to assume, that persons of a very contrary description also found their way to our shores. All he contended for was, that there was a necessity for some such supervision—that the Alien bill was addressed to the specific danger of the times—and that it had hitherto been found effectual in suppressing, or he should rather say, in preventing it. He had not heard even an insinuation of an abuse of its powers. He would conclude as he began, with expressing his hope that the
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measure might not outlive the term for which its renewal was now proposed. Whenever the danger was at an end, he would return, with all his heart, to some more mitigated and moderate system of legislation; but for legislation upon this subject, he should still be an advocate, for the House would ill perform its duty to the public if it left the government without the means of protecting the country from the dangers to which he had adverted. [Loud cheers].
Mr. Tierneynext addressed the House, but for some moments he spoke in a tone quite too low to be audible in the gallery. He observed, that he felt it necessary to offer a few remarks to the House after the extraordinary speech of the right hon. secretary, in which he had throughout defended the bill, and had nevertheless expressed his readiness to abandon it for a more mild measure. If ever he had heard a speech an hour and a half long in that House, in which the speaker more decidedly looked one way and rowed another, it was that which the right hon. gentleman had just delivered; and, if he were one of the right hon. gentleman's followers in that House, he should think that, on the present occasion, he might vote against his patron, without much risk of giving offence. The right hon. secretary had charged gentlemen on the Opposition side with the figure of speech called exaggeration; as if he himself had not condescended to borrow a little from fancy in the course of his address. Why, the right hon. gentleman's speech was full of fanciful images—of aliens coming over in thousands and thousands, fitting out armaments, and then taking (as the sailors say) a fresh departure, to conquer their own country. The House had heard these fanciful statements, and they had also heard the right hon. gentleman charge others with making too free a use of the figure called exaggeration! But the right hon. gentleman stated that his object in supporting this bill was to support the interests of England. The House, however, had all this at second-hand—the right hon. gentleman having already announced it at one of those travelling parties which he had got round him in his late tour. It was stated in the hearing of the mayor, aldermen, and burgesses of Plymouth; and no doubt they must have been astounded at the declaration then, as the House was now. Now, he would take the right hon. gentleman's own text; and say,

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that he would also support the bill for the interests of England, provided it could be shown that it really tended to support those interests. If any member should prove this to his satisfaction, he should have his vote: but no man should have his vote in support of the measure, until that tendency of the bill was clearly demonstrated. Looking at the right hon. gentleman's observations, it struck him, that the right hon. gentleman was not half so friendly to the measure as he had pretended to be; for after having raked all foreign and ancient history on the subject—after having ransacked the annals of the ancient republics.—The home secretary having already gone through the whole History of England on the questions—after all this trouble, it turned out, that it was only within the last fortnight that the right hon. gentleman had made up his mind to bring it forward at all; and then, even that was owing to one of the luckiest accidents in the world. He would not follow the right hon. gentleman into his disquisition of ancient history: he would come to that period of English history— (which was, after all, the only one that had any thing to do with the matter) —he would come to that part of it which he looked upon as its best—he meant the period since the Revolution. This Alien bill, said to be so essential to our very safety as a nation, had no existence in all this long period. Putting out of our view the Alien bill of 1793, which was different from the present, it had been a law about ten years; and now we were so jealous of it, that if we were to believe the right hon. gentleman, the country could not go on without it. But, before this bill was in existence, England had been ex-tolled for her generous foreign policy, and had raised herself to greatness, without possessing an alien bill. This measure, which, in these perilous times, was to save the country, was to last, however, only for the next two years. Then the right hon. gentleman gave the House to understand we should hear no more of it, but something else would be introduced in its stead; but what that something else was he did not himself yet know. This conduct of the right hon. gentleman looked very much like a compromise somewhere; as if one part of the government had said to the other part, "Here we have been acting on the ancient principles of the constitution, for the last 25 years: and now you come with your new-fangled doctrines,
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your reforms in trade, and your inquiries into Chancery courts, and a thousand other novelties, as if you wanted to turn every thing upside down; you must give us something in lieu of all this—let us see, what have you got to give?" "Well, "said the colleague," what will you have?" "Oh! give us the Alien bill." "Well, take it for a couple of years or so; but at the end of that time it must be modified." And they had got it, and he did not see that it was likely to be of any advantage to them, except to show that they were not entirely beaten, and to give them an opportunity of worrying some poor devil of an alien, if they should feel so inclined. —The right hon. gentleman then proceeded to contend, that the bill was not called for by any existing necessity. If foreigners flocked hither in thousands, the power might be considered not unreasonable; but when they came in in dribblets, one now and one then, they, could not possibly call for the exercise of the power which was now demanded. Foreigners might come here either as emissaries for foreign purposes, or as fomenters of discontents here. That any danger was likely to arise from the latter, had been fully disclaimed in the king's speech, and in that of the right hon. gentleman; and any object which they might hope to gain in the former character would be defeated by the foreign enlistment bill, to which, by the way, the right hon. gentleman had adverted as fully as if it were a measure then before the House. Now, as to the possibility of foreigners fitting out armaments from this country against their own governments. In the first place, how were they to get men? He should like to know to what description of persons these foreigners could go, who would not give them this answer—"this is a bad time for you to apply to us for such a purpose; we have got plenty of work, and we shan't get half as much by going with you as we shall by staying at home. "They might, too, add—"this is a bad time for applying to us to serve any party purposes; party in this country is nearly extinct, and many persons think that the Opposition are playing booty, because the}' do not make a greater stir."[Hear, and a laugh]. The danger which the right hon. gentleman apprehended was altogether imaginary. The foreigners who came to this country arrived here as fugitives; and it was a new and painful thing for him to hear it stated, as aground for watching those persons with jealousy,

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that they were likely to enter into machinations against the governments which had oppressed them. But, it was said, that such machinations would be dangerous, inasmuch as they would involve this government in difficulties and disputes with foreign powers, whilst it was professing to observe the strictest neutrality. Now, he wished the British government to act impartially, on the principles which it professed. He thought that the Holy Alliance, and all the proceedings of the different congresses which had been held, were machinations against the liberties of the people of Europe. The crowned heads who composed those congresses had evidently bound themselves together to crush liberty on the continent, wherever it might arise. Had the British government remonstrated with foreign ministers against the machinations of their masters? Had it said, that their proceedings were likely to endanger the peace of Europe? Not at all! The machinations which government was willing to put down were those of the oppressed against the oppressors; not those of the oppressors against the oppressed. He really should like to know what the right hon. gentleman thought any number of foreigners who sought refuge in this country could, by any possibility, achieve. The right hon. gentleman had said, that loans were easily obtained. To be sure they were—when good security could be given. But, the experiment had been tried, not whether the poor foreigners who had recently arrived in this country could get loans, but whether they could procure a small pittance from the generosity of individuals to supply their pressing necessities; and he was sorry to say, that the result of the experiment had not been very flattering. On the other hand, it was notorious that loans for the assistance of crowned heads could be procured very easily in this country. Was it possible to apprehend any danger from the circumstance of four or five unfortunate foreigners meeting in a garret, to talk over the miseries which they had endured from their oppressors. Was the House of Commons to be called upon to pass a law like that proposed, in order to prevent four or five such unhappy persons as he had described from discussing, whether they might not, by some romantic attempt, rescue their wives and families whom they had left behind them, from the evils which they were enduring.
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It was most repugnant to English feelings to pass the bill upon such grounds. The right hon. secretary had, however, spoken with great gravity of a discovery which had been made within the last fortnight, of a plot which had been formed by certain foreigners against some foreign power. He would do the right hon. gentleman and the right hon. secretary for the home department this justice, that he believed them to be utterly incapable of degrading their country so far as to establish in it a system of espionage against poor foreigners here. The information, then, which had led to the discovery of the plot must have come from some foreign minister. He was sure of this, because he was convinced, that the right hon. gentleman would be above adopting the miserable course of tracking the footsteps of individuals, of whose names he kept a register. But, what had happened with respect to the plot in question? The right hon. gentleman said, that he acted a kind part with respect to the conspirator who had been brought before him. He remonstrated with him; told him he knew his accomplices, and gave him warning that, if he did not abandon the course in which he had embarked, he would be sent out of the country. Why, could not all this have been done without the Alien bill? If the plot had been discovered when no alien bill was in existence, the right hon. gentleman might have informed the government against which the conspiracy was directed, of the circumstance; and that was all that had been done in the present instance. On this occasion, therefore, the Alien act had been of no efficacy. The principle on which the bill was founded was, that machinations carried on in this country by foreigners against their own governments, were dangerous in the eye of the British law; and, by passing the bill, government took upon itself the task of watching the acts of foreigners, not because they were injurious to our society, but because they were hostile to those who had oppressed them. He had before observed, that foreigners in this country were not very likely to be able to effect much against their governments, by means of money or arms; but, they were able to injure those governments a great deal in one way—he meant by publications. Most of the continental governments were of that description, that the greatest injury which could be done to them was

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tell the truth of them [cheers]. Was it not very probable that foreign powers would make an application to prevent such publications from issuing from the press, by sending those who were inclined to compose them, out of the country. The right hon. gentleman shook his head? but, such applications might be made, and he had no doubt that they would be made: and then would arise the danger of war, which the right hon. gentleman was so anxious to avoid, if those applications were not attended to. No persons could differ more than the right hon. gentleman and those with whom he came in contact on the other side of the water. The right hon. gentleman said, that it was the policy of this country to acknowledge the South American states, when they should become clearly independent of the mother country: but the French ministers said, that to act in that manner would be to sanction the principle of revolution. He gave the right hon. gentleman credit for having treated such an argument with the contempt which it merited, and, instead of condescending to discuss the point, passed, as it were, to the order of the day. The difference of opinion to which he had just alluded was very strikingly exemplified on the subject of the late attack upon Spain. He believed that the right hon. gentleman was sincere in the disapprobation which in the warmth of his heart, he had last session expressed against the invasion of Spain. But, how was that invasion regarded by the French government? It had recently been proclaimed to the world in the speech of the king of France, with a degree of effrontery, and he would add of impiety, never before witnessed, that Providence had been pleased to bless his endeavours in the "most generous as well as the most just of all enterprises"—meaning the invasion of Spain. Suppose, now, one of the Spanish emigrants in this country were to be incited to write a pamphlet on the subject of "the king of France's speech, and to shew what was the real nature of the Spanish war, and suppose him to express himself, with regard to his most christian majesty, not in such decorous terms as he (Mr. T.) was inclined to observe towards him in that place. If the king of France were to complain to this government on the subject, and there were no Alien bill in force, ministers might say, "If you are aggrieved, you must seek your remedy by English law; the executive
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power can do nothing for you." But ministers could not give that answer as long as the Alien act was in existence, because the French government would immediately say, "You are bound to comply with our wishes, because you have established the principle, that you are to interfere to put down all machinations against our government." He did not know whether he had made himself understood upon this point [cheers]. It struck him as being a question of deep importance; and he implored the House to act as the supporters of ministers, and not to pass a bill, the effect of which would be to render those ministers liable to the very danger from which they thought it was calculated to protect them; namely, the danger of being embroiled with foreign powers on the subject of aliens residing in this country. He had really been surprised to hear the right hon. gentleman talk of the probability of great captains and heroes coming over to this country, and fitting out mighty armaments against foreign governments. If there was one hon. gentleman in that House who could believe that to be the case, he would do very right in voting for the bill. Certainly, nothing could be more inconvenient than to find, all of a sudden, a vast fleet assembled at Plymouth, having come God knew whence, and going God knew whither! But he had no doubt that some individual, who knew the manner in which a fleet was got together—who was aware that, in order to effect that object, it was necessary to publish advertisements inviting contracts for provisions, stores, &c—would comfort the right hon. gentleman, and tell him that he needed not to be under any apprehension on that score [hear, and a laugh]. The right hon. gentleman had a part to perform, and he had certainly performed it most ably for his colleagues. He had given them a speech with which, under all the circumstances, he thought they ought to be very well satisfied. But, throughout the whole of that speech, the right hon. gentleman had taken care to show that the Alien act was not a thing of which he greatly approved. He had treated it as a drug which was poured down their throats and had hoped that the dose would not be repeated two years hence. For himself, he must contend against the principle of arming government with powers to meet a case that might possibly arise. He thought it the wiser course for govern-

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ment to wait until a case should arise, which might require extraordinary powers, and then to apply to parliament for assistance. He hoped the right hon. gentleman would inform the House what powers the foreigners in this country would possess of disturbing the peace of Europe, if the Alien act were allowed to expire. If that right hon. gentleman made out a case of real danger, he would give him his hearty vote in favour of government. He was, however, satisfied that there was no danger to be apprehended, and that the Alien bill had its origin in the restless ambition, to use the mildest phrase, of the sovereigns of the continent. The right hon. secretary for foreign affairs had disclaimed this. He had said, that he would submit to no dictation from foreign powers. He believed the right hon. gentleman when he said so. But the right hon. gentleman had not originated the Alien act: he had found it existing when he came into office; and how it had been introduced as a part of the policy of government, he, of course, could not know. At what was called the settlement of Europe, after the fall of Napoleon, the great European powers had, he sincerely believed, entered into an agreement—he did not, of course mean an agreement on a stamp—that liberty should be crushed wherever it was possible to crush it. For this it was, that this country had spent hundreds of millions; for this it was, that they had restored the Bourbons. That family now found they could not maintain their newly-acquired power, unless they were assisted by extraordinary means. They, therefore, addressed the British government in these term?:—"We have spies and large armies to serve our purposes, and if an individual renders himself obnoxious, we can take him up, clap him in a fortress, and he will never more be heard of; but, in your free government, what can you do?" This being the case, it was determined that no persons who were obnoxious to the continental governments should be allowed to find a refuge in England. He was as satisfied that that was the origin of the Alien act, as that he was at that moment speaking [cheers]. It was extraordinary that, at the present moment, when this country was at peace with all the world—when our situation was prosperous—when every man was contented—when all domestic differences had subsided—and when there were no grounds for alarm, parliament, should be called
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upon to pass a bill, which had no other object than to prevent England from being the asylum of the oppressed. He was anxious that the character which England had acquired of being an asylum for the oppressed of all nations should be maintained. It would, he admitted, be a breach of neutrality, if the British government invited persons who were plotting against their own governments to come to this country, and sent ships to convey them hither. But, under present circumstances, only a limited number of aliens found their way here, to enjoy that freedom which they could not obtain in their own countries; and God forbid that in his lifetime the case should ever be otherwise! The moment a poor foreigner set his foot upon the shores of England, his chains fell from him, and he became as free as Englishmen, and entitled to all the privileges which they enjoyed, except with regard to certain distributions of property, which they were aware before they came here, that they would not be allowed to possess. The right hon. secretary for the home department, however, would not allow foreigners to enjoy those blessings. He set about watching them, in order to discover whether they were engaged in any machinations against their respective governments. He would advise that right hon. gentleman, who must have work enough of his own on his hands, not to undertake to be police-agent for other states [hear]. He did not use the term in an offensive sense; but it really appeared to him, that the information respecting the plot to which the right hon. secretary for foreign affairs had alluded, must have been furnished by some foreign power. He implored the House, at the present moment, when this country was triumphant, prosperous, happy and contented, and all Europe was moved by discontent—provoked by the treachery of their governments, by broken promises, and by assurances of the bestowing of constitutions never performed—to preserve, not a nominal, but a real neutrality, and to deal as fairly by the oppressed, as by the oppressors. This was the only course which England could steer with honour and advantage. He thought, with many other persons, that if England had taken a more decided part a short time since, much of what had happened might have been prevented. But he would not dwell upon that topic: it was wiser to consider the present than to regret the past. Neutra-

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lity was the policy which England must adhere to, and he opposed the Alien bill on the ground that it tended to provoke a breach of that neutrality. For the same reasons on which the right hon. gentleman had rested his defence of the measure, he (Mr. T.) opposed it—namely, for the interests of England.
Mr. Secretary Canningsaid, he felt it necessary, in consequence of what had fallen from the right hon. gentleman, to declare, that government had not received their information on the subject of the plot of which he had spoken from any foreign power.
Mr. Tierneybegged to ask, whether the information had proceeded from any persons who had been employed by government to look after aliens?
Mr. Canning.—"No."
Mr. Secretary Peelsaid, he would not have risen at all that evening, had it not been for the very pointed manner in which he had been alluded to by the right hon. gentleman opposite. It was, however, not a little gratifying to him to find, that, after all the blame which had been cast upon government, and after the many propositions which had been made for altering the constitution of that House, the right hon. gentleman himself was candid enough to acknowledge, that not only had the country been triumphant in war, but that with respect to her internal affairs, she was contented, happy, and prosperous. The right hon. gentleman's arguments against the bill were founded upon two assumptions; namely, those which refer to the motives of its first introduction, and to the objects to which it was to be applied, now that it had been introduced. The right hon. gentleman had said, that the Alien act was first proposed, in consequence of an understanding amongst the sovereigns of the continent, that liberty was every where to be put down. Now, he must say, that he had never heard of any such understanding, and that, for his part, no consideration on earth could ever have' tempted him, as an Englishman, and a minister of England, to propose a measure professedly for the internal security of this country, which had been either dictated or proposed by a foreign power. The object of the bill, according to the interpretation of the right hon. gentleman, was, to prevent the distressed from finding an asylum in this country. He could Only meet that assertion, by stating, the
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well-known fact, that in no instance had that asylum been denied. The right hon. gentleman had mentioned one instance which occurred before he (Mr. P.) was connected with the home department, upon which, therefore he was not prepared to give a decided answer; but he could state, that since he had held the office of secretary to the home department, not a single foreigner had been refused an asylum in this country, either on account of his political principles, or his previous conduct. The right hon. gentleman had said, that, from the period of the Revolution, up to the year 1793, there was no Alien act, and therefore he had contended, that there ought to be no Alien act now. But, did not the right hon. gentleman's own speech prove, that nothing could be more different than the state of Europe in the two periods? What was his own description of the present state of Europe? So agitated was the state of Europe, according to his own representation at the present moment, that every king was regarded by the constitutional party as a tyrant, and every friend to constitutional reform was regarded by the royalists as a rebel. The object of his majesty's government was to maintain a perfect neutrality; and they would neither permit the constitutional nor the monarchical party to make this country the theatre of their machinations. During the government of Spain in 1821, for instance, they would no more have permitted the monarchical party, than they would now permit the constitutional party, to make England, as his right hon. friend expressed it, the workshop of their intrigues. But, though there was no Alien act during the period to which the fight hon. gentleman alluded, the government frequently resorted to a much stronger measure—the suspension of the Habeas Corpus act—a measure which enabled them to imprison a suspected foreigner. It had been said by the late Mr. Windham, that sending a foreigner out of the country was no more than drowning a fish; but, the suspension of the Habeas Corpus act enabled the government not merely to drown the fish, but to put the fish in prison. The right hon. gentleman had put the case of a pamphlet, written by an oppressed Frenchman, and had asked whether, if the French government called upon us to send such a man out of the country, the requisition would be obeyed? Now, he did not

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know what the French government might ask in such a case, but, if it made such a demand, he well knew what would be the answer of his right hon. colleague. In the course of the last ten years many pamphlets of the description alluded to by the right hon. gentleman must have been written, and yet no instance of the oppressive exercise of the Alien act could be cited. If, therefore, they might judge of future dangers from the experience of the past, the right hon. gentleman's apprehensions were perfectly groundless. The right hon. gentleman had cautioned him not to become a police agent for foreign governments. He trusted he knew his duty as an English minister too well to submit to become the agent of any other country. He declared most distinctly and unequivocally, that he never had had the slightest communication with any foreign minister on the subject of the Alien bill. What could he do more than make this unequivocal declaration? He never had yielded, and he never would yield to such considerations as had been suggested by the right hon. gentleman, and he repeated, that he had never had any communication on the subject of this bill with any foreign power whatever. He asked for the bill solely because he thought that the interests of the country demanded it. Why, when it was the acknowledged policy of this country to be at peace, should we suffer foreigners to disturb that peace by making England the theatre of their machinations? The right hon. gentleman had said, that if it were found that machinations were carried on by foreigners in this country, so as to endanger the public tranquillity, parliament might be applied to, but surely it was better that his majesty's government should retain a power which had not been abused, than that such an expedient should be resorted to. The subject of the Alien act had been so fully and repeatedly discussed, that it was impossible to devise any new argument in support of it. He was satisfied that, if this act were repealed at the present moment, they would soon be under the necessity of resorting to much harsher measures. He considered the continuance of this act, under existing circumstances, an advantage to Aliens themselves. The hon. member for Southwark (sir R. Wilson) had assigned a singular reason for his opposition to the measure: he had declared his intention
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to oppose it, because it was rendered more palatable, because the power was rendered less liable to abuse; or rather because all possibility of abusing it was taken away. He had argued, that Aliens who had resided seven years in the country, were as likely as any others to plot against their government, and yet no precautions were taken against them. This might or might not be consistent with sound policy, but he would ask whether it did not conclusively prove "that foreign governments had nothing to do with this measure, and that his majesty's ministers had not acted on foreign suggestions? They had acted only with a view to English interests; they were ready to permit foreigners to take refuge in this country as an asylum, but not to allow them to desecrate that asylum, by converting it into a scene of intrigue and machination. On these grounds he sincerely hoped that parliament would consent to continue to his majesty's government for two years, the powers which the Alien act conferred.
Lord Althorpsaid, there were some parts of the speech of the right hon. secretary for foreign affairs, which he had heard with satisfaction. He alluded particularly to that part of it in which he had stated; that this was the last time he should apply to parliament for these powers. The right hon. gentleman had stated, some what inaccurately, an observation which he (lord A.), had made on a former occasion. He had not stated, that he should prefer a specific act of the legislature for each particular case, but that he should prefer a general act of parliament, making such machinations as excited the apprehensions of the government illegal, to a continuance of the Alien act.
The House divided: For the second reading now, 172. For the amendment 92. Majority 80. The bill was then read a second time.

SILK TRADE BILL.
The Earl of Liverpoolrose to move the second reading of this bill. The measure, he observed, was one of great importance; but, the more he considered the subject, the more he was satisfied that the effect of the proposed change would be advantageous to the country. He had been one of those who formerly entertained doubts of the propriety of permitting a competition in certain manufactures, but more mature consideration had convinced him of the impolicy of any restriction whatever. If it were possible for their lordships now to have any apprehension of injury from allowing the importation of foreign silk manufactures, that apprehension would, he trusted, be removed on learning, that in consequence of the change in the law proposed to be made by this bill, new silk manufactures were likely to be established in different parts of the country. Arrangements, he understood, were making at Manchester for the introduction of this manufacture, which would give employment to 30,000 or 40,000 persons. Indeed, there could be no doubt of the manufacturers of this country being able to compete with foreigners, without the protection derived from prohibitory laws. The principle of free trade, on which the bill was formed, would put the silk-manufacture on a fair footing; it was that of the quid pro quo; for the object of the bill was to reduce the price of the raw material, while it did away with the prohibitory system, and admitted the foreign-manufacture article under a protecting duty. The impolicy of prohibitions was now too obvious to be questioned. It was to be expected that foreigners would always obtain a superiority in some branch of manufacture or other, and this was not to be regretted. It was not desirable that other countries should not improve as we improved; for such reciprocal improvement was advantageous to all parties. Looking, however, at the silk manufacture on the extensive scale in which it was prosecuted in this country, in all its branches, he saw no reason to think that the competition of the English manufacturer would not be successful. In-
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deed, after the inquiries which had been made, he was perfectly satisfied, that the present bill would have a beneficial effect on the trade of the country. When the measure was first introduced, it was intended that the prohibition on importation should cease at the same period that the reduction of the duty on the raw material commenced; but it had since been thought reasonable, that the manufacturer should have the start, by being allowed the reduction earlier. Such were the principal grounds on which the present bill had been brought forward. His majesty's government might have easily introduced measures more generally popular; but what they looked to in this was, the establishment of sound principles, and the laying the foundation of a just commercial system. He concluded by moving, that the bill be now read a second time.
The Marquis of Lansdownconcurred most completely in the views which the noble earl at the head of the Treasury had expressed. They were, indeed, the same as those which he had himself long entertained on the subject. As to the last point on which the noble earl had touched, namely, the removal of the prohibition against the introduction of foreign silks, nothing could be more politic, or calculated to be more advantageous to the country. The principle of prohibition being once removed by this bill, he earnestly hoped it would never be permitted again to have a place in the British code. As to the effect of this bill, he retained the same sanguine opinion which he had formerly expressed. Whatever apprehensions some individuals might entertain, he had not the least doubt that, aided by the improvement of machinery, and the reduction of the duties on the raw material, the manufacturer of this country would be able to maintain his place against any foreign competition, The only question on which there could be any doubt was, that of the time to be allowed to the manufacturer. As the change was great, it was certainly but fair that a sufficient period for preparation should be granted.

IRISH TITHES COMMUTATION BILL.
The Marquis of Lansdownsaid, he had some petitions to present on the subject of the Irish Tithe Commutation Act, to which he wished to draw the particular attention of their lordships. In the last

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session of parliament, he had felt it his duty to support the principle of the measure introduced for the commutation of tithes, as such a measure had been long sought for in Ireland; but it was necessary that it should be impartial, in order to produce even a partial restoration of tranquillity in that country. In giving his support to the measure, he had thought it right to qualify that support with some exceptions; and if he now found it necessary to recal the attention of their lordships to the objections he had formerly stated, he should not advert to any one, of the justice of which he was not convinced he could satisfy the House and the J noble earl opposite. He should first remind their lordships, that he had stated, that the bill exhibited a prima facie inequality in its operation on the parties to whom it applied; in consequence of which many were disinclined to assist in carrying it into effect. A power was given by the bill of last session to increase the provision for the clergy, beyond what had been received for the last seven years. This he thought was fair; because it was but just that a clergyman should be allowed an increase, if he had received less than was due during the seven years; but instances might occur in which it would be equally just to give him less; and it would have been proper to have inserted a clause in the act, allowing the parishioners to state their reasons for reducing the provision. This reciprocity, however, was not allowed. Had such a clause existed, it would have taken away a plausible argument or just objection, which was seldom omitted to be urged against the measure; namely, that the parishioners, if they agreed to act under this bill, might have to pay more, but it was impossible they could have to pay less. He did not know whether it was owing to any dulness of apprehension on the part of the Irish peasantry, or from that confusion of ideas which was by some attributed to them, that they could not find out the justice of this regulation. They felt, however, that they were shut out from making a fair bargain, and thought that they perceived a design to make the arrangement unfavourable to them.—The clause which related to the machinery of the bill was equally objectionable. It was impossible for any one to foresee to what extent the expense of executing the bill might go; but, as the measure was altogether for the benefit of the church, it
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was reasonable to expect that the clergy would pay a share of that expense. On the contrary, the whole of the burthen was thrown on the other party. It was therefore by no means surprising, that this part of the arrangement should be regarded as unjust, both by the country gentlemen and farmers, who suffered by it.—Another ground of complaint arose from an obscurity in the bill, which it would perhaps be in the power of the noble earl opposite to remove. The noble earl must be aware, that nearly all the arrangements which had taken place under the bill, had been made under a clause introduced by a member of his majesty's government in the other House of parliament, the effect of which was, to give a power of altering the arrangement made, on the meeting of the vestry. It was understood, that the arrangement settled at the meeting should be final; but the result was, that a further proceeding was forced upon unwilling parties. Meaning only to come to a final settlement at the vestry meeting, they found that they were obliged to go on to something else; that having agreed to one arrangement, they were understood to have given their assent to any subsequent one which might take place. This provision, which was called the trap clause, had given great offence. It was therefore most desirable that the matter should be made clear, and all appearance of unfairness removed. That the act containing these objectionable clauses would be amended in the present session, he was encouraged to hope. By the votes of the other House of Parliament, which were before their lordships, he had, however, become acquainted with a bill introduced into chat House of a very extraordinary nature. If that bill should pass the other House, there would be proposed for their lordships' adoption a measure, which he did not hesitate to say was more subversive of the rights of property than any measure ever introduced into parliament. It was a bill which he must believe never could pass that House, or any assembly exercising a sound judgment. In the course of the last session, he had adverted to the three parties subject to the operation of the bill. One consisted of the holders of the existing tithes; and he supposed it was natural in them to wish to receive more than they had previously done. The tithe-payers constituted another party; and it was to be presumed that

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they would wish to pay less. The third party was formed of those who possessed land tithe-free, and who were not legally bound to pay any thing. It certainly did occur to him, that there lurked under the bill, a design to conciliate two of these parties, the receivers and the payers, at the expense of the weaker party who had hitherto not been bound to pay any thing. He had stated his suspicion, and had felt it to be his duty to point out the injustice of the course which appeared to be contemplated. What answer did the noble earl opposite then give? He said, that no compulsion was meditated against those who were hot bound to pay tithes; that, in fact, compulsion with respect to them was impossible, as they were empowered to vote, and no less than six votes were given them for their protection. He had no interest in this question; but he could not express to their lordships his astonishment at finding, that a clause was introduced into the bill before the other House, which went to deprive the persons to whom he had alluded, of the six votes to which they were at present entitled, and to place the largest holder of property in the country on the same footing with the smallest. If this bill passed into a law, the small proprietors would be able to out-vote the proprietors who possessed the greater part of the land in each parish, contrary to all the principles on which parliament had ever acted in cases of property; as, in the making of roads, canals, and so forth, the possessors of one tenth of the property of a parish would be enabled to control those who possessed the other nine-tenths. Could any thing be more unreasonable than this?—Another clause which he found in the bill now before the Commons was not less reprehensible. It empowered any person who might be appointed a commissioner, to order to be brought before him the title deeds of the estates, which any noble lord or any other person might have in Ireland. Was it possible that their lordships House, which had always manifested such a delicate regard to property, could sanction such a clause as this? Was it to be endured' that their lordships should be thus called upon to produce every title deed, every scrap of paper, connected with their property? It was impossible the noble lord opposite could give his assent to such a measure. It was impossible the learned lord on the woolsack, who paid
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so much attention to questions of property, could permit it to proceed.
The Lord Chancellorrose to order. It was, he said, the first time he had ever heard the clauses of a bill in progress through the other House of parliament made the subject of discussion in their lordships' House.
The Marquis of Lansdownconsidered that he was strictly in order, as he was speaking on a bill against which the petition he had to present was addressed. He was entitled to state—and he thought it but fair to call the attention of their lordships thus early to the subject—that the measure which was in progress in the other House of parliament, so far from being calculated to relieve the parties complaining of the act, would aggravate the evil under which they laboured. But, to avoid all dispute on the question of order, he would put the case hypothetically, and say he understood that so and so had been proposed elsewhere, which would come precisely to the same thing. He would state, that last year the average taken on the last seven years, had been considered too high, and it was thought right to correct it by giving the opportunity of an alteration at the end of three years. Notwithstanding this arrangement, it had been proposed, that when the average of the seven years should once be determined on, it should be irrevocable, and could not be altered at the end of the first three years. Such an enactment as that he had described, their lordships must perceive; would be no relief from the hardship complained of last session. He could assure their lordships, that in stating these objections to the measure, he was actuated by no opposition to the principle of the measure. He was most desirous of seeing it carried into effect, but wished the objectionable clauses of the bill to undergo amendment. In particular, he thought it due to the proprietors not liable to pay tithes, that they should be relieved from compulsion, and that whatever they did towards the execution of the measure, they should be permitted to do of their own free will. While the lay-holders and impropriators of tithes were not subject to compulsion in coming to an arrangement, he trusted their lordships would not be so unjust as to impose compulsion on those who hitherto had not been bound to pay tithes, and who surely were entitled to remain as free as the other party who received the tithes. He concluded by pre-

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renting a petition against the Tithe Commutation bill, from a parish in the county of Tipperary.
The Earl of Liverpoolsaid, he would not be induced by any thing the noble marquis had stated, to anticipate the discussion which would probably regularly come on, as to what alterations it might be proper to make in a measure now before the other House. Whenever that bill came before their lordships, it would be time to consider in what respect the bill of last session was defective, and what amendments it might require. What he wished now to explain was, the real state of the case with respect to the bill which was said to have failed. When he proposed the second reading last year, he had observed to their lordships, that neither he nor any person could expect the measure to be otherwise than imperfect, and that nothing more could then be expected than to establish the principle. It was under this impression that he stated his opinion of the effect which was to be expected from the bill last session; but that opinion was now completely changed. Many amendments were made with a view to compulsion, because it was supposed that without compulsion there would be no success. But, he was now prepared to say, that the measure had succeeded beyond the most sanguine expectation which any person had ever formed respecting it. He found that it had succeeded in more than one-tenth of the parishes. It had been carried into execution in 279 cases. It had besides been carried into effect in twenty-three cases since the meeting of that House, and fresh applications had been made for thirty-nine arrangements. With regard to what the noble marquis had stated on the subject of the clause, according to which, in some cases, the clergyman might receive more than had been paid on an average of seven years, he must observe, that the objection was far from being well founded. The reason of the provision obviously was, because the clergyman could not have received more than his right. There could therefore, be no reason for inserting a power to give him less than his due; but he might have received so much less than what he was entitled to, that in common justice it would be necessary to give an increase. Hence the necessity for the power which the noble marquis regarded as a mark of partiality. The measure had been carried into operation in a most li-
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beral manner in ten dioceses, and the amount per acre received by the clergyman in some of them he would state. In the diocess of Cashel, he received 1s. 3d. per acre; in Clonfert, 6d.; in Elfin, 11 d.; in Meath 11 d. In short, he could assure their lordships, that the measure had succeeded far beyond any expectation he had at first thought himself warranted in encouraging.
The Earl of Kingstonstated the fact, that in one parish there was no protestant church erected, the rector having objected to the expense of 75 l. a year for the salary of the curate; and the consequence was, that many Protestants went to mass, rather than go to no place of worship at all.
Lord Kingsaid, that after the many grants of public money for the erection of churches and glebe-houses, it must be very mortifying to the House to find their intention frustrated by those who ought to promote them. He had heard of a mercantile Hibernian reciprocity, but here was a clerical Hibernian reciprocity. Was the cure of souls a sinecure in Ireland, or would the Irish clergy content themselves with a mere salvage? Would they take the fee, and leave the sinner to work his own way to heaven as he could? The fact with respect to the clergy was as notorious as the sun at noon day.
The Earl of Clareinferred from certain facts which had taken place in his own county, that, in some instances, the composition had been taken too high, but, generally, he maintained the right of the clergy to church property to be as valid as that by which their lordships held their estate, and the measure against which the petitioners remonstrated to be necessary to the salvation of the Church.
The Earl of Darnleycontended, that, though the clergy might be legally entitled to claim the full amount of their tithe, the right could not easily be insisted on after the statements of his noble friend, which remained uncontroverted.—His noble friend had made out a charge of gross neglect Was the unwillingness of a rector to pay a curate 75 l. a year, a sufficient reason to prevent the building of a church and thereby compel the parishioners to charge their religion for want of a Protestant place of worship?
The Earl of Kingstonsaid, there was not a single statement in the petitions relative to the non-residence and neglect of the clergy, which he could not esta-

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blish by evidence at their lordships' bar.
Ordered to lie on the table.

UNITARIAN MARRIAGE RELIEF BILLS.
On the order of the day for the second reading of this bill,
The Marquis of Lansdownsaid, he should not have thought it necessary to have called their lordships' attention to this subject at any length, if it had not been intimated to him, that an opposition was intended to be made to the measure now before the House. The present bill originated in petitions which had been presented from the Dissenters in the last session of parliament, in which they complained of the necessity they were under, as the law now stood, of taking a share in the celebration of the marriage ceremony to which they could not in conscience assent. It was the first duty of the legislature, on civil grounds, to provide against the celebration of clandestine marriages; but, that being provided for, it was most important that marriage should be contracted with that solemnity which should give to it, in the eyes of the parties, the most lasting and binding obligation; When if it was the duty of the legislature to provide against clandestine marriages, it was equally their duty to give every facility which was possible, and to avoid every thing that had even the appearance of a violation of conscience; and on this ground, their lordships would find it necessary to adopt the proposition which he had now to submit to them. It had been said, that the present measure would include an alteration of the Liturgy. This was not the time to discuss whether such an alteration were desirable, as his proposition left that part of our church service entirely untouched. Their lordships, he was persuaded, would not think that persons who were tolerated by the law, ought in the ceremony of marriage, to be compelled to violate their consciences, and be brought into our churches, and appear to signify their assent to doctrines, which the law did not, in any other instance, call upon them to do. It was most important that marriage contracts should be entered into under all the circumstances most binding to the parties; and the object of the state being secured by publicity and solemnity being given thereto, that publicity and solemnity should take place in the manner which the parties thought proper. He there fore proposed, in the bill now before the House, that the class of Dissenters,
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commonly called Unitarians might, under certain regulations, be married in their own chapels, they having previously given security for their publicity, the publication of bans and the payment of fees due to the established church. He should have been pleased to have brought in a bill of a more comprehensive nature, including all dissenters from the Church, who could not reconcile it to their consciences to concur in the marriage ceremony. With a view, however, to practical benefit he had thought it best to limit the measure; for when this subject was formerly before the House, it was said by those for whose authority he had the highest respect, that there might be trivial objections taken, which the legislature was not bound to attend to; and it was also said, that it would afford facilities to clandestine marriages. It was then said, let us see the case of the individuals who have most reason to object to the law, and provide for that. The bill before their lordships attended to the case of the parties who, by the admission of some of the right reverend prelates, were acknowledged to have most reason, in foro conscientiæ to complain of the marriage ceremony. It was stated, with a spirit honourable to the church, that the moment a case appeared, in which the parties had conscientious objections, there would be a disposition to afford it relief. The bill went on to provide, that the chapels of the Protestant dissenters commonly called Unitarians might be registered, and after being so registered for not less than a year, their marriages might be celebrated in them. It was also provided, that ministers should be punishable, if they celebrated any marriage contrary to the act; and he should have no objection that transportation should be the punishment assigned for it. Although the publication of bans was perhaps the best security against clandestine marriages; yet, if any other should be thought preferable, such as registering the intended marriage, he should not object to it. Though the parties to be relieved by the bill were the furthest removed of any Protestant dissenters from the doctrines of the Church of England, yet that was no reason for the House to refuse indulging them; they being, in common with all dissenters, tolerated by the law, and unquestionably that class, who had most reason to object to the marriage ceremony as it now stood. It was on this allegation on their part, that

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the legislature was called upon to extend to them the required indulgence, and unless any noble lord could contend, that the Unitarian ought to be cast without the pale of society, or that he should not be allowed to marry, or, if he should have that permission, that the occasion of the marriage ceremony should be taken to subject him to what he esteemed a violation of his conscience—unless any noble lord was bold enough to maintain these propositions, he could not conceive any objection to the Unitarians being married in the way proposed by the present bill.
The Archbishop of Canterburysaid, that if the relief sought for, was to be obtained by removing the scruples from one description of men to lay them on another —from the smaller number to the larger— from the Unitarian dissenter to the members of the established church—he should certainly have objected to it. At the close of the last session of parliament, a bill was submitted to their lordships, proceeding on a very different principle; for whatever other faults it had, it was not charged with transferring to others the grievances which it assumed to redress. To that bill he had been adverse; and it was also opposed by others of their lordships, and was ultimately rejected. At that time there appeared a disposition in the House to give, in some form, relief to the Unitarians. That relief could only be given in one of two ways—either by enabling the Unitarians, under certain regulations, to intermarry in their own places of worship, or by an alteration of the form of the marriage ceremony in the church of England service. To the last he objected, and still did object; deprecating as he did any alterations of that kind. It might be said that it was only certain prayers that were to be omitted; but it would hardly be argued that as great alterations might not be brought about by omissions as by substitutions: besides, the omission was avowed to be in favour of persons who disbelieved the doctrine of the Trinity. If that measure had been carried, the Unitarians were to have made use of that form so mutilated; but it was rejected by the House, and he rejoiced that it was. The only mode of relief; then, was by this bill; the two-fold object of which was the ease of the Unitarian and the security of the church. The latter would be attended to in the committee, if their lordships should agree to the bill going to that stage. It had been said that it was extraordinary
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that this favour should be granted to the Unitarian dissenters, and yet be refused to others; but the ground on which the legislature proceeded was not favour, but a regard to conscientious scruples; and where such scruples existed they certainly were entitled to relief. There did appear some danger of clandestine marriages; but the consideration which was due to conscientious scruples outweighed that objection. The publication of bans in the parish church, when the usual place of worship of the Unitarian might be ten miles off, would leave a door open to evasion, which it would be desirable to avoid. As to the claim of the Dissenters generally, it was not rested on conscience; but objections stated as essential, were taken to the forms of ceremonies, few as they were, in our church, and inoffensive as they were in principle. He was friendly to the second reading of the bill; trusting that they might be able in the committee, to make such restraints and restrictions as would make it a measure which, while, in the first instance it consulted the conscientious scruples of the Unitarians, should, in the second instance, give the necessary security to the Protestant church at large.
The Lord Chancellordeclared, that no respect could be more sincere than that which he entertained for the most reverend prelate who had just addressed their lordships, although, on the present occasion, he felt that he could not conscientiously concur with the most reverend prelate on the important subject under their consideration. On the provisions of the bill he should not touch. They would be fit matter for the consideration of the committee, should the bill reach that stage of its progress. His present business was with the principle of the measure. In the first place, if he understood the principle of Unitarianism at all, it went to deny the doctrine of the Trinity. And here he begged leave to say, that he had nothing to do, on the present occasion, with the merits of the doctrines of the church of England. The church of England he was bound to support, without examining whether the doctrine of the Trinity was or was not a part of its doctrines. He belonged to that church: he always had supported it, and he trusted he always should support it. The first question that he had to ask, was, whether the measure should be preceded by some declaration to remove any doubts which might be entertained, and which he cer-

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tainly did entertain, whether to deny the doctrine of the Trinity was not at present penal? The repeal of the 9th and 10th of William had, in that respect, been much misunderstood. It was supposed, that the repeal of those acts made it legal to deny the doctrine of the Trinity. He did not believe that it did so. He did not believe that the repeal of those acts operated at all upon the common law. At any rate, the friends of the measure ought to endeavour to remove all doubt on this subject. That the acts in question were of a nature which rendered it extremely proper they should be repealed, no man living would deny; but he still doubted, whether their repeal affected the common law, by which it was a penal offence to deny the doctrine of the Trinity. The great objection which he had to the bill was, that it proposed a marriage between a member of the church of England and a Unitarian, to consult the conscience of the latter in preference to that of the former. It was evidently impossible to reconcile the religious opinions of the two parties. They were as different as light from darkness. Now, as to the existing legislative provisions with respect to Jews and Quakers, it must be recollected, that, in the cases for which those provisions were enacted, both parties must be Jews or Quakers. If, however, the present principle of granting this relief where only one of the parties dissented from the church, was to be allowed, where would it stop? If it were granted to the Unitarians could it be denied to the Roman Catholics? Why should such a privilege be granted exclusively to the Unitarians, who, of all classes of dissenters, dissented the most widely from the doctrines of the church of England? Nor had he less objection to allow the marriages made under such circumstances to be registered by ministers of the church of England. It was to make the church of England the servant and hand-maid of those who denied her first doctrines. The noble marquis had stated, that the repeal of the acts of William had given Unitarians the benefit of toleration. So it had. But what was given was only a repeal of certain pains and penalties to which they were before subject; and he believed it would be extremely difficult for any one to say, that the common law was at all affected by it.
The Earl of Liverpoolsaid, he should vote for the second reading of the bill; but if it should come out of the committee
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in its present shape, he should certainly feel it his duty to oppose it. He was prepared to give relief to the Unitarians quoad Unitarians; but he was not preparen to give that relief in such a way as should affect the rights and interests and security of the established church. That church had a right to expect that those who belonged to it should be married according to its ceremonial. Where both parties dissented from the established church, as the Jews and Quakers, he saw no objection to allow a different ceremonial; but not otherwise. How was it at present, when a Catholic married a protestant? The marriage was only valid when it was performed by a clergyman belonging to the religion of the state; although, in most cases, it was performed a second time by a Catholic priest. He could not therefore agree to a marriage being valid when performed by a Unitarian minister, unless both parties were Unitarians: nor could he allow the simple declaration of the individuals themselves, when they applied for the license, to be sufficient. He thought it was requisite that they should have a certificate from the Unitarian minister, that they were bona fide Unitarians, and did not assume the character for a temporary purpose. If the bill were so qualified, he should be ready to agree to it; but not otherwise.
The Bishop of Chesterexpressed his dissent from the bill, though he believed no noble lord was more decidedly friendly than he was to the principle of religious toleration. He agreed, that in the intercourse between the creature and the Creator, no restriction should prevail, but that it should be free as the air we breathed. But, this appeared to him not a question of religious scruples, but of civil jurisprudence; not of church doctrine, but of church discipline. It would be only to waste their lordships' time, were he to endeavour to shew the advantages of a national and established religion. Those advantages had been proved by many excellent writers; and among others by the excellent author of "Moral and Political Philosophy"—an author who required no praise of his, and to whom he was sure the noble lord opposite would be ready to pay the just tribute of his admiration. But, if it was clear that the establishment of a national religion was advantageous, it was equally clear, that that establishment must be upheld and

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protected by peculiar rights and privileges. That marriages should be celebrated in the churches of the establishment was one of the privileges which had been conceded to it; and, having been so conceded as a peculiar right and privilege, it ought not to be taken away without the assignment of valid reasons. The fair way of considering the subject was, to see what it was, according to the marriage ceremony of the church of England, that the Unitarian was called upon to subscribe, to declare, or to deny. In the first place, the Unitarian was called upon to subscribe his belief of the Scripture. He could find no difficulty in doing that. But, besides this, he was bound, in the progress of the ceremony, to say, "With this ring I thee wed, with my body I thee worship, and with all my worldly goods I thee endow: in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." But, were not these the words of Scripture? If the Unitarian believed in Scripture, what reasonable objection could he have to repeat those words? He might affix to them what meaning he pleased. Every one was at perfect liberty to do that. But, how could those words be considered as objectionable by the Unitarians, when the following words were used by the Unitarians themselves in the baptismal part of their form of prayer;—."I baptise thee in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." It seemed to him, therefore, to be impossible that they could object to words in the marriage ceremony of the Church of England, which they themselves pronounced in their own forms. So far, therefore, their lordships would agree, that the Unitarians had no just cause for complaint. He wished, however, to treat this important subject fairly and without reserve; and he would therefore observe, that the marriage service of the Church added a blessing by the minister, in the following words: "God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, bless," &c. But, would not the Unitarian be benefitted rather than injured by the blessing of the minister of the established church? He could have no objection to its being given in the terms which, in the apprehension of the minister of the church, adequately described the Being whom he adored. The Unitarian was not bound to assent to the accuracy of those terms: he might affix to them what meaning he pleased. There was no force or compulsion upon him to induce
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him to acquiesce in them. He (the bishop of Chester) would deal with a Unitarian as he should himself wish to be dealt with, under similar circumstances. Were he in a foreign country—in a country of Jews, of Catholics, or Mussulmen, —and it were necessary for him to marry, no consideration on earth should induce him to subscribe to any form of words, or to assent to any doctrines, contrary to his own conviction. But, in things indifferent in themselves, he should consider any objection as ridiculous, and should hold himself bound to comply with the established laws and ceremonies of the country. Now really, the objection of the Unitarians to conform to the marriage ceremony of the established church, seemed to be of the latter description. It did not appear to him, that by acquiescing in the terms of that ceremony, they could consider themselves, in foro conscientiæ, as sinning against any law, either of God or of man. As to the machinery of the bill, the present was not the fit opportunity to discuss it; but he would just observe, that in the bill which regulated the marriages of Jews and Quakers, it was provided, that both parties must be either Jews or Quakers. If the present bill passed into a law, let not the House lay the flattering unction to their souls, that the same privileges and immunities would not be required by all other sects of dissenters. Now, although he was far from wishing to say any thing against the Unitarians, he really did not think that they ought to be considered as a favourite sect. If, therefore, the other sects of dissenters were to be invested with the same privileges, let their lordships consider what a falling-off there would be in the number of marriages celebrated by ministers of the established church, and what a diminution of their emoluments. He certainly did not mean to lay any great stress on this last argument. If the dissenters were entitled to this indulgence, let it be granted to them—"fiat justitia ruat cœlum." But, unquestionably, the effect of such a measure would be—and especially in large manufacturing towns, such as those within his own diocese—to make little livings still less. Now, really, it seemed hardly fair to deprive the possessors of those little livings of a portion of that stipend which was already sufficiently scanty. Marriage fees formed a large part of the stipend of those clergy who always resided on their livings, faithfully discharging all their sacred

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functions, and from whom, therefore, it would be very hard to deduct so important a portion of their income. Such was the view which he took of the question. Whatever effect the arguments which he had urged might have on their lordships' minds, he could assure them that they had produced conviction in his own. He should be extremely sorry if the opinions which he had expressed should give offence to any person. It was far from his wish to give any such offence. But he was not so unobservant of the signs of the times, as not to remark, that those who were most clamorous for religious toleration for themselves, were the least inclined to grant even a little toleration to others. If, also, he had the misfortune to differ from any of those with whom it was his pride and pleasure to agree, that would be to him a source of still deeper regret; but every such circumstance was comparatively unimportant, when put in competition with duty. "Amicus Plato, sed magis amica Veritas." He trusted, that On all questions in which the interests and the stability of the church of England were concerned, their lordships would never show any thing like apathy or indifference; and that they would, on the present occasion, exclaim, if not in the exact words, at least in the spirit and feeling, of the ancient barons—"Nolumus leges Ecclesiæ mutari."
The Earl of Harrowbydeclared, that if he thought the bill before their lordships would, in the slightest degree, affect the interests of the church of England, it would not meet with a more determined opponent than himself. Nothing he had heard, however, satisfied him that such was the case. With respect to the first passage in the marriage ceremony, in which the bridegroom took the bride to wife in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, it certainly did seem strange that the Unitarian should object to words which were introduced into his own form of prayer; although he understood that there was some slight difference, such as the substitution of "into the name" for "in the name." That, however, did not appear to be a rational objection on the part of the Unitarian. But he could easily conceive that a serious and, in his opinion, it well-founded objection might arise in the mind of the Unitarian to the expression "God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost;" because the Unitarian conceived that the attribute of
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divinity was not attributable to two of those persons. The Unitarian gave an implied assent to the propriety of those expressions, however, if he allowed them to be pronounced over him in one of the most important acts of his life. He really did think that this might be considered a bona fide and conscientious objection. He would ask their lordships whether they would be satisfied with a marriage ceremony for themselves, in which the name of Mahomet was adjured. Marriage was a civil contract, to which it had been wisely determined to give a religious sanction. Of course that sanction was to be binding on the conscience. But, where was the propriety of involving in the marriage ceremony itself a violation of that conscientious feeling which it was expressly ordained to cherish? While he said this, he was as anxious as any man, that the security of the Protestant church generally should not be endangered, nor its authority diminished. With respect to the publication of the bans, he did not see why they should not be published in the Unitarian chapels. He was certainly not surprised at, indeed he could not regret, the existence of a jealousy on all matters which threatened to weaken the security of the church of England. But it did not on that account follow, that he should raise scruples "light as air" into matters of importance. He should vote for the bill going into the committee, in the hope that the objections to it might there be entirely obviated.
Lord Calthorpecould not help feeling that the degree of relief which this bill afforded ought to be granted to the Unitarians, as offering them an opportunity of being married without any violation of their principles; for he thought the strength of the Church did not, and could not, arise from persecution. She loved to relieve the honest scruples of men, if, at the same time, she could satisfy herself, that the measure of relief was consistent with the interests of those great and important truths which those men denied. Considering the remarkable observance of the decencies and proprieties of life by the sect of Unitarian dissenters, and considering their regular and exemplary discharge of the duties of their situations, which afforded the church a sufficient guarantee for the due and proper performance of this solemn rite by their ministers, the church ought not to press her forms upon them too strictly. At the same

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time, he could not help thinking, that she ought to do something which would effectually prevent them from being identified with her. Feeling, as he did, that the doctrine of the Trinity was affirmed by the English church; that it formed the base of her structure; and that it was infused into all her articles—he could not help thinking, that she was bound to shew to those individuals who differed from her in that essential point, however respectable they might be, that she could encourage no ecclesiastical communion with them. He wished to do justice to the merits of the Unitarians, and he should do them great injustice if he did not recognize the excellence of those patriotic virtues which had often placed them in the foremost ranks of the friends of humanity and truth; but while he said this, he could not refrain from broadly and decidedly expressing his dissent from the lamentable doctrines in which they believed. He called those doctrines lamentable, for they appeared to him to strip the christian religion of all that made her the grace, the hope, and the consolation of her followers. While, therefore, he respected the merits of the Unitarians, he could not help remembering that they held opinions at variance with what the English church considered as constituting the very essence of Christianity. The church of England had, indeed, marked that doctrine in a distinct and authoritative manner; and she considered those truths, not merely in the light of speculative doctrine, but as an active and fruitful spring of action. But though he spoke of the Unitarian doctrine with pain, he did not wish to speak of its professors with harshness; for that was not consistent with the true christian mildness on which all the articles and institutions of the church of England were founded. It did seem to him, that the church owed it to herself, to her supremacy, and to the high and important truths which she taught, to mark in this bill, her total dissent from the opinion of the Unitarian dissenters. He had no apprehension, that such a step as the passing of the present bill would lead to an injurious degree of indulgence, nor to a rash and indiscreet spirit of surrendering the privileges of the church. But, at the same time that he said this, he could not refrain from applauding the conduct of those prelates, who, fearing such a danger, had deprecated any alteration whatever. He could nut but rejoice,
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that the bench of bishops had refrained from setting a precedent so full of danger. He admired the service of the church of England; he particularly venerated the Liturgy, which he looked upon with an affection almost equal to that with which he viewed Holy writ itself, and he thought the bench of bishops deserved the thanks of every supporter of the church of England, for having offered their fair and open opposition to the principles of this bill, although at the same time, he differed from the members of that bench, as to the danger which they supposed likely to ensue. He did not think this would afford a means for the further extension of Unitarian doctrines; for, in his opinion, human nature required something more consoling, more heart-sustaining, than their cold and precise doctrines. He did not think that such of the bishops as supported this bill could be accused of inconsistency, because they had spoken and voted against granting any further concessions to the Catholics. On the contrary, he could easily conceive, that they might oppose one, and conscientiously vote in favour of the other. He thought this to be a measure not only of justice to the Unitarian dissenters, but to the church itself. He should give his vote for its being committed, though, with the view he had of the question, he should have thought it better for the church to have asked for the relief which this bill would give them, than thus to have accorded it as a boon to the dissenters. He called it a relief to the church, for the clergy must have felt uneasy in doing that which nearly amounted to profaneness; namely, calling on the Unitarian dissenter, when appearing at the altar, to do violence to his conscience, by professing sentiments which he positively disavowed, or by using expressions which obliged him to screen himself under mental equivocation and reservation.
The Earl of Westmorlandfelt it his duty to state the reasons on which he should be induced to vote against the bill. The first ground of his opposition was, that he absolutely and distinctly objected to the principle of the measure. When he said this, he did not wish it to be supposed that he was an enemy to toleration generally, when about to be extended to any man or set of men of any particular sect; but he objected to this measure because he considered it a complete alteration of the law of the land and of the church establishment. By the law of the land,

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for the purpose of protecting families in the possession of their property, and preventing frauds, the solemnization of the marriage contract was required to be in the church of England. To this general Jaw there were only two exceptions, in the instances of Jews and Quakers. On the policy of those exceptions he should not now stay to argue; it was sufficient that they existed and were recognized by the law; but, if they were to be extended— if other exceptions to the general law were to be created—he wished to know why the alteration should be special and not general? He saw no reason why the Unitarian should be put forward in preference to other dissenters. His next objection was, that by this bill the church was made a mere handmaid, an assistant, to this particular description of dissenters, in preference to all others. He could not conceive why, if the principle of extension of right were to be allowed, it should not be rendered general, if not universal. He did not see why the Unitarians should form the only exception to the general law of the land. On these grounds, he should feel himself bound to give his negative to a measure, which, he conceived, would, if passed, form a considerable alteration of the ecclesiastical law, and of the common law of the land.
The Bishop of Londonsaid, that at so late an hour of the night he would not take up much of their lordships' time, but would succinctly state what were the grounds upon which he intended to vote for this bill going into a committee. He thought the policy which had induced the legislature to place the solemnization of marriage in the hands of the church was a very wise one. It contributed to that publicity which was so desirable in its celebration; and thereby had a tendency to protect parties from having their ignorance or their credulity practised upon by the designing and the vicious. It secured the decent and solemn performance of that which the law held to have been, in its origin, a civil more than a religious contract. This might not be, indeed, a primary view of the subject; but it went to shew the wisdom of the policy which the legislature had pursued, in conferring upon it a certain distinction, by confiding it to the care of the church. It was in this view of the matter, that he thought no alteration ought to take place in the law, except upon very weighty reasons indeed.
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Now it appeared to him, that no general dissent from the doctrine of the church of England was a sufficient ground for effecting such alteration in favour of a particular class of persons. With respect to the class in question, if there was any entire and essential difference between their tenets and any doctrine recognized in our marriage-service itself, he was willing to admit, that that might constitute some ground for the sort of alteration he spoke of; but, in the present case, the fact was not so. Their lordships would remember, that some time since, there was brought into that House a bill which proposed to give relief to dissenters of all denominations, who entertained opinions that differed from those of the church of England upon particular doctrines. No sect or class was named in it. To that bill he ventured to offer objections as to the principle; but he supported the proposition for its going into a committee. In the present instance, the case was very different. In this bill, a particular class of persons was named, and their particular scruples were recited; and their lordships were told, that while the parties felt all this difficulty as to the solemnization of marriage, they were very much agreed in other points with the church. He could not agree with a noble earl in his view of such an application. It had been said, at the same time, that the Unitarians had made no particular profession of faith. Now, if any noble lord were to say to a Unitarian, that because he had married according to the rites and ceremonies of the church of England, he had therefore given up his own peculiar doctrine, and had recognized that of the Holy Trinity, the Unitarian would smile at the inference, as a calumny upon him. No Unitarian, he apprehended, had ever scrupled to be married in the church upon any such grounds. The measure before their lordships was not one which ought to override every other consideration; but, on the contrary, the House ought to take sufficient security that it should not, in any event, be abused by individuals for the purpose of clandestine marriage, or other improper purposes; that marriages to be solemnized under it should be solemnized with decency; and that, as far as possible, every fraud that it might be attempted to practise in consequence of such an act should be obviated. As the bill was at present worded, bans might be

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falsely and unduly published, and marriage licences might be forged; and yet no parties were named as responsible, and no punishment was assigned as the penalty for such offences. The exceptions in favour of Jews and Quakers had been adverted to, in the course of this discussion. He would be very willing to grant all that had been granted by the legislature to them, in these respects; but nothing more. As to the Jews, it allowed them an exemption from the operation of the marriage law, where both the parties were Jews. But, what was it that the dissenters asked? A similar exemption, where one only of the parties was a Unitarian. The Jews, again, married according to a very ancient and established form of their religion: but the dissenters prayed, that parties might be married according to their religious principles. What was meant by so vague and so extensive an application as this? Among the Jews and Quakers, the parties were liable, before the solemnization of their marriage, under the permitted exemptions, to be called upon for the proof of their connexion with those persuasions. Let their lordships observe, too, what securities there existed against clandestine marriages, both among Quakers and Jews. In the case of the latter, they were derived from his prejudices, his habits, his religion, the usages of the people, and even the authority of the synagogue. There had once been a case decided, by the learned and noble judge (lord Stowell) who now sat in that House, and who had formerly presided, with so much honour to himself and benefit to the country, in the consistorial court, upon the fact only, that one of the parties to a Jewish marriage was proved to have entertained opinions that were not consonant with the religious prejudices of the Jews. The Quakers, again, were another class, among whom the same securities would always exist to a great degree. The members of any branch of this society coming from one part of the kingdom were obliged to produce testimonials and certificates before they could be received or admitted into another body of the same connexion in a different portion of the empire. Without troubling their lordships with any further detail, he believed he might say, that courts of justice had never been called on to try a single case, in which the indulgence of the legislature to the marriage of Jews or Quakers had
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been to be regretted. With regard to the Unitarians, if they could give the same securities, possibly no harm might result from extending the same indulgence to them, but no such securities' did they offer. For these reasons he should feel bound to vote against the bill after it came out of the committee; although he should not oppose its being committed. He wished to add one remark as to the fees of the clergy, which, indeed, was a subject that he had viewed with considerable attention, and at the same time with no small degree of pain and uneasiness. It was certainly true, that many of the clergy were inadequately paid, and it was no less true, that a considerable part of their income arose from their fees on marriages. He was unwilling to deprive them of any part of their revenue, but at the same time he felt, that though that was important, it did not equal in importance the loss which the church would sustain by being deprived of the exclusive rights and privileges of solemnizing the marriage ceremony. According to the present system, the clergyman received a pleasure in uniting together the earthly destinies of two individuals attached to each other, and they remembered with satisfaction the person who had performed the ceremony of their union, and in offering him his fee they were influenced by no cold or repulsive feelings, and frequently added if not at the time, at least afterwards, a gratuity, offered with the purest and warmest benevolence. By the operation of this bill, the clergyman would be reduced to the character of the tax-gatherer; all the gracious part of his office being abstracted. On this ground, he felt a great difficulty in acceding to the clause which secured their fees to the clergy; though, at the same time, he felt very unwilling to offer a premium to the increase of dissenting ministers.
Lord Hollandsaid, the principle on which this bill proceeded had been so well developed by the noble marquis who had proposed it, that he did not think it necessary to enter into any further discussion on that point. He considered it as a proof that the church of England deserved the praise for liberality which had been bestowed upon it, when he heard the head of the English church express himself as he had done, in such a liberal and truly christian manner. There had been but few objections urged to the

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bill, and these had been so ably answered by the noble president of the council, that he should abstain from entering generally into the subject. He must, however, call on the noble lord on the woolsack, and on the right rev. prelate (the bishop of Chester), for a little further explanation. As to the latter, indeed, he could not but remark the truth of the maxim, that when a man was about to attack or destroy a principle, he first felt it necessary to express his loud and anxious praise of that principle which he was about to violate. The right rev. prelate had began his speech by dealing with plain truths in such a manner, as to excite suspicion by the extravagant praise which he had bestowed upon them. He had expressed his love for toleration in the most positive terms; but, unluckily, he did not appear to have much affection for the particular application of that general doctrine to which he seemed to be so much attached. He boldly avowed, indeed, that the scruples of the Unitarians ought not to be so much respected; and he had entered into a long and ingenious argument to shew that they were not entitled to much weight with the House. But surely the only true judge of the conscientiousness of those scruples was the man who entertained them; who was not to be judged by the reasoning of others as to their fitness or propriety. It was said, that the Unitarian, by the act of marriage, did not conform to the doctrines of the church of England, and that on other occasions he used the expression—"In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost;" but, with respect to that, there was this distinction, that he only used that expression as it had been used by the holy founder of the Christian religion, and when he was enabled to annex to it the particular sense which he thought it properly bore. It had been asked, what could the Unitarian hear in the performance of the marriage ceremony which was disagreeable to him? To that might be answered—the very doctrine, which he believed to be contrary to Scripture. That question had been followed up by another—"Does it do him any harm?" Why, could the right rev. prelate recollect the oath taken at the table of the House, and say that certain things contained in it were indifferent? Would he venture to declare, that, in his opinion, the invocation of the Virgin Mary, in the Romish church,
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would be a matter of indifference to a Protestant? If he could not, then let him judge the cause of others, and their feelings, by his own. It had been said by the learned lord on the wool-sack, that these objections had not been found out till the statute of William had been repealed. It ought to have been said, that until the repeal of that statute, the grievance had never been complained of. And why? because, when that statute was in force, a Unitarian could not avow himself; for if a man had declared himself a Unitarian he might almost as well have avowed himself a traitor. The same learned lord had asked, what was the common law with respect to Unitarians? Surely such a question from him must be unnecessary, for if he did not know, who could be expected to answer? If, on the other hand, he was satisfied on that point, why did he put the question so as to raise doubts and create alarms in the minds of those sectarians? Why did he go about —"Spargere voces in vulgum ambiguas?" Why did he insinuate, that the Unitarian doctrine was forbidden by the law of this country? He had asked, whether denying the Trinity was not an offence at common law. When he (lord H.) recollected the debates which had taken place in that House on the subject of religious liberty (for, with Locke, he should reject the word "toleration"), and the part which the learned lord took in those debates, it did seem strange that he should have chosen such a path on the present occasion. Surely the opinions of Locke, of Tillotson, and of Hoadley, must have been sufficient to satisfy his conscience; and it did seem very wonderful, that he should venture to differ from such authorities. If he referred to them, he would find that Locke had expressly disapproved of the Toleration act, because it did not extend specially to Unitarians. What could the learned lord, who had so deeply studied, and so warmly admired Locke—what could he say, when the opinions of that great man were found different to those which he now entertained? Could any man read the correspondence of that great writer, and not be convinced that in the passage, beginning "Cæteri tui similes", he had referred particularly to the Unitarians, who were also mentioned in his other writings? Surely not, and if they had any respect for that celebrated author, or for his opinions, they would pause before they

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ventured to disclaim and deny the principles for which he had contended. Christianity had been called "part and parcel of the law of the land." It was lord Hale. He believed, who first said this of Christianity; but the doctrine was afterwards more sensibly and emphatically laid down by lord Raymond. This happened in the famous case of the King v. Woolston. On that occasion the learned judge had said he would not allow it to be debated, whether Christianity was authentic, because it was in fact a part of the law of the land; but he begged it to be observed, that by this he meant Christianity generally, and not the tenets of any particular sect of Christians. Why, then, he must ask here, what was Christianity? Was it a belief in the Holy Scriptures, or was it a belief in certain expositions of those Scriptures by human beings? He would leave the noble and learned lord on the woolsack to choose, in the dilemma to which he must be reduced. If the first point were held, then The Unitarians were Christians in every sense; for they held the Scriptures to be as sacred as any of their lordships. They held them to contain the rule of right, and the rule of faith, and by them alone they stood. If it were said, on the other hand, that those persons only were Christians who believed the Holy Scriptures as they were expounded by the church, then, if the noble and learned lord held that, it followed, that he must be prepared to hold also, that before the reign of Henry 8th, the Roman Catholics were the only Christians in England; for until that period the Roman Catholic religion was part of the law of the land. —Another of the objections which had been raised was, that the proposed measure would make the church of England ancillary to the Unitarian dissenters. He did not see the force of this objection. Did the church of Ireland consider itself in the light of a handmaid? He did not believe it did. He suspected that, until the passing of lord Hardwick's marriage act, the church had never exercised that right which it was contended she could not forego without derogating from her dignity. All foreign marriages, previous to that period, were celebrated aocording to the lex loci; and all marriages duly celebrated by a priest, whether of the church of England or of Rome were binding. As to the pathetic part of the speech of the learned prelate, in which he had deplored the hard fate of the clergy-
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man, who, by this bill, would be deprived of his fees, all he had to say in reply was, that the bill provided they should have their fees. "But," said the learned prelate "those for which the bill provides are only the actual dues, and beyond these dues it is usual for parties to give a small gratuity on the solemnization of marriages which forms a considerable source of emolument to the officiating clergyman." Well! it might be so; but was it not at least as likely that an Unitarian would be willing to bestow as large a gratuity when he had his marriage solemnized and registered in such a manner as should satisfy the scruple of his conscience, as when it was performed in a manner irksome and painful to his feelings? It was said, too, by a noble lord, why should we grant this favour to Unitarians alone—why was it not granted to every other sect? After the answer which had been given to this question by the noble president of the council; he would not take up the time of the House any more than by saying—merely because the others did not ask for it, and they, the Unitarians, did. He could not help thinking that the Unitarians were very hardly dealt with. If general relief was sought for them, up jumped the noble and learned lord from the woolsack, and complained that it was too general. He said, that it did not appear what sort of dissenters they were— whether they were the disciples of Joanna Southcote, or Jumpers, or Shakers; and feared, if the relief were given in this shape they would not be able to make head nor tail of it. He therefore proposed that it should be postponed until the next session and then that the points should be discussed one by one. Then, when the next session came, the noble and learned lord said, why should we give relief to one? He (lord H.) said, it was the plainest and best way to give relief to them as they came to ask for it. If no danger should appear in doing so, he would grant it to all; but it did appear to him to be the most strange, unparliamentary, and illogical reasoning that could be imagined, to say "We will not give you the relief you ask for, because there are others who want it as much as you, and they do not ask for it." It might be a very good reason for granting the relief to all, but it could be no reason for withholding it from any. Highly as he held private judgment, he held religious liberty still higher, and he would not, therefore, have the member of

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any one church call on another for conformity to his opinion; but those who thought conformity absolutely necessary in other cases, must waive it here, for the marriage ceremony was merely a ministerial office of the clergy; and, if he might express his opinion on that point, he must say, that he should be equally well pleased to see that part of the office which consisted in registering the marriage, performed by a magistrate as by a clergyman. That however was not the Jaw, and on that subject he should observe no further. He should have been pleased if the clause relating to marriages by license had been left out, and the parties had been permitted to marry by bans in their own church. The right rev. prelate who spoke last, had said, that he felt more hurt at the loss of the exclusive privilege of marrying, than at the loss of the fees, for that the clergyman who performed the ceremony felt a pleasure in its performance. That was undoubtedly a good feeling; but if the clergyman felt any pleasure in solemnising the marriage according to forms obnoxious to the parties married, he must at least feel equal pleasure in confirming, by signing the certificate and registry of that marriage, the happiness of those parties who had been united to each other in a way which did not shock their conscientious scruples. If, as had been somewhat awkwardly expressed, Christianity was part and parcel of the law of the land, and Christianity was founded on the Holy Scriptures, as the rule of faith, then was the Unitarian a Christian, and then could he say, that in no manner did he offend against those laws which allowed him the full liberty of extending his opinion, and diffusing the principles of his sect. If he was no enemy he should be treated as a friend, and allowed that liberty in the point of marriage, which the Jaw did not refuse him in any other respect.
The House divided: For the second reading 35. Against it 31. Majority 4.