Sitting of 17 July 1851

MINUTES.
NEW MEMBER SWORN—For Arundel, Right Hon. Edward Strutt.
PUBLIC BILLS.—1° Representative Peers for Scotland; Commons Inclosure (No. 2).
3° Marriages (India).

HARWICH ELECTION.
MR. BANKESmoved that it be an instruction to the general Committee of elections to select a Chairman and six other Members to be the Select Committee to inquire into the allegations of a petition relative to the last election for the borough of Harwich. He had stated originally his intention of moving to suspend the writ for Harwich till the Minutes of evidence taken before the Committee were laid before the House; but he understood that those Minutes only related to the time of closing the poll. He should, therefore, not move the suspension of the writ.
Motion made, and Question put—
"That it be an Instruction to the General Committee of Elections, to select a Chairman and six other Members to be the Select Committee appointed to inquire into the allegations of a Petition relative to the last Election for the Borough of Harwich; and that the Members so selected do constitute the said Committee, with power to send for persons, papers, and records, and that Five be the quorum."
MR. COBDENdid not intend to oppose the Motion which the hon. Gentleman had made, because it was for an inquiry into the conduct of the Government; and as they had acceded to it, it would he unbecoming in him to interfere. This Committee, however, would make the fourth which had sat upon this borough during the present Parliament; and, in fact, since 1837, there had been no election for it, that had not been followed by one or more Committees. The character of Harwich was well known; for it stood pre-eminent for corruption in every possible form. Now he had taken some pains to investigate the character of the borough, and he wished before a new writ was issued to lay before the House the evidence contained in their blue books upon the subject. He did not wish to go into the matter then, but he wished to stipulate that forty-eight hours notice should be given before the writ was moved for; because it was his intention to take the sense of the House upon the question, and he had not the slightest doubt that it would be unanimous not to issue a new writ for Harwich.
MR. T. DUNCOMBEsaid, the House ought to be satisfied that there was a primâ facie case for inquiry, before they appointed a Committee. The hon. Mover of the Instruction (Mr. Bankes) had laid no grounds for a Committee; he did not say he even believed in the allegations of the petition. The petition was one of the loosest he had ever seen; it merely stated that the Whigs did this, and the Conservatives did that. He did not object to the inquiry, but he thought it would be a waste of time unless some definite ground was laid. Harwich was a place that ought to be disfranchised without inquiry; nothing was more notorious than the corruption that had been going on there; and the House might very well legislate on public notoriety in such cases as those of Harwich and St. Albans. They had disfranchised Sudbury; it was only due to its memory that those places should follow. They were to have a new Reform Bill next year; he hoped it would contain as large a Schedule A as the former one.
MR. J. STUARTprotested against the doctrine asserted by the hon. Member for Finsbury (Mr. Duncombe), that the electors of Harwich ought to be disfranchised without any inquiry, and without being put upon their trial. This would deprive the electors of their property. It appeared that the franchise of the electors of Finsbury was to be held sacred and indefeasible, but that of the electors of Harwich was detestable, and might be taken from them in any manner, however arbitrary and despotic. The electors of Harwich lived under a system of equal laws; but the hon. Gentleman advocated a mode of confiscating their rights worthy of the days of the French Directory.
MR. B. OSBORNEprotested against the electors of Finsbury being likened in any manner to the electors of such a place as Harwich. If the electors for Finsbury had been over and over again convicted by that House of inveterate bribery and corruption, the hon. and learned Member for Newark (Mr. Stuart) would have had some grounds for his remarks; but as the electors of Finsbury were a constituency who were not in the habit of being bought, the hon. and learned Gentleman had no right to make so invidious a comparison.
MR. J. STUARTsaid, the charges in the petition were not charges of bribery.
SIR BENJAMIN HALLsaid, the borough of Harwich had become a disgrace to the country. What the hon. and learn-
912
ed Gentleman (Mr. Stuart) called the property of the electors, was precisely what ought to he taken away from them. Newark was as complete a nomination borough as Harwich, and both ought to be put in Schedule A. The hon. and learned Gentleman had, on a previous occasion, defended Newark, on the ground that such places afforded seats for gentlemen of his profession. He thought there were too many lawyers in the House already, and wished they were out of it. Could any one get up and contend that Harwich was a place which ought to return two Members? Whenever the writ was moved for, he would assuredly move as an Amendment that the writ do not
MR. VERNON SMITHthought the question as to Harwich was rather the paucity of its constituency than its corruption, but still that was not the subject involved in the hon. Member for Dorsetshire's (Mr. Bankes') Motion, which asked for a Select Committee to consider a petition against the conduct of a Government officer. It might be all very well for the Government, from a delicate sense of honour, to hastily consent, as they had done, to the inquiry; but he thought the House ought to interpose to see that its own time and the public money should not be thrown away on such light grounds; and before the inquiry was acceded to, the hon. Gentleman ought to make himself responsible for the proof of some of the allegations of the petitioners.
MR. HUMEhad never known a Committee appointed to inquire without some substantial evidence being laid before the House. Such was the case when he moved that Mr. Attwood should be prosecuted. If ever there was a case requiring summary proceedings, it was that of Harwich. Yet the House ought to know who was the responsible party in this inquiry, and at whose expense it was to take place. It was a perfect mockery to have disfranchised Sudbury, if Harwich was allowed to send Members to Parliament.
MR. DISRAELIsaid, that if Government had thought fit to accede to this Motion—and of course they had not acceded to it without due consideration—it was not proper for the House to stand forward and prevent an inquiry into a subject which concerned the privileges of that House. The real point before them was—would they consent to an inquiry into the conduct of a Government officer charged with im-

913
proper interference at a public election? And it was manifestly irrelevant to that question whether the electors of Finsbury or of Harwich were most deserving of disfranchisement, because no one could surely contend, because the borough of Harwich was corrupt, that a Government officer might exercise undue interference at the election. He hoped the House therefore would not allew itself to be distracted from the real question before it; and he might remind the hon. Member for Montrose (Mr. Hume), that he had formerly advocated an inquiry into the election for Stamford, although there was no information and no document before the House; and the hon. Gentleman then spoke and acted only on the ground of the petition presented to the House. The hon. Member for Marylebone had made an unfair attack on the hon. and learned Member for Newark (Mr. J. Stuart), and talked of having no lawyers in the House; but he might have remembered that there was once a Parliament without lawyers, and that earned for itself the title of the Parliamentum Indoctum. He (Mr. Disraeli) thought that the presence of lawyers added much to the weight of the debates. It was rather imprudent to lay down rules for distinguishing classes of Members. Suppose one hon. Member would say there were too many baronets in the House. It might be as possible to make out a case against the baronets as against the barristers; but he should be sorry to see that ancient and respectable order excluded from this House. The Motion before the House was for an inquiry into a certain account of an alleged improper conduct of the Government officers at the last election for Harwich, to which inquiry the Government had assented; he, therefore, thought the House should not throw any obstacles in the way of the inquiry.
MR. EVELYN DENISONsaid, one important question was—who was to act upon this Committee? The General Committee on Elections had no power in such an inquiry to compel the attendance of Members on the proposed Committee. He therefore objected very strongly to throwing the task of selecting the Members to serve in this investigation upon the shoulders of the General Election Committee, and thought it would be much more in accordance with the usage of the House to undertake the nomination of the Committee itself.
MR. BANKESsaid, that, in the way
914
in which he proposed to constitute this Committee, he had only followed the precedent laid down by the noble Lord at the head of the Government in the case of the Stamford Election Committee. He entirely left the House to decide whether it would agree to or reject his Motion; it was a matter of perfect indifference to him personally what the issue might be. He had merely presented the petition, because it had been entrusted to him to do so by several respectable electors of Harwich, and because it referred to the privileges of that House; but he could not undertake in any manner to bind himself to substantiate the allegations.
The House divided:—Ayes 82; Noes 80: Majority 2.
Motion agreed to.

HAWLBOLINE.
Order for the House going into Committee of Supply read. Motion made, and Question proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."
MR. SERJEANT MURPHYrose to call the attention of the right hon. Baronet the First Lord of the Admiralty, and of the House, to the great want of accommodation for the repair of steam vessels at Hawlboline. A pledge had been given by a former Government that this accommodation should be provided, but nothing had yet been done to redeem that pledge. The result was that great inconvenience was frequently felt by steam ships in the Translantic voyage, and which, after putting into Cork Harbour in a disabled state, and being unable to have their repairs effected there for want of the proper factories and of other appliances on the spot, were compelled to be towed to Liverpool, or some other port better provided for that purpose. Among other instances of this was the case some months ago of the Translantic Company's steamer, the Atlantic, which, after sailing from Liverpool, on her voyage to America, met with an accident to her machinery, when she endeavoured to make for Halifax, but encountering a heavy gale she was driven back to Cork Harbour, with the view of refitting, if that could be done there; and although there were operatives and mechanics there, yet there was no accommodation for repairing, and therefore she had to be towed back again to Liverpool. Above 1,000,000 l. of money had been expended on the works at Keyham Harbour; and after all that expenditure they would be useless for the ob-

915
ject for which they were designed. He thought, therefore, it was not asking too much to propose an outlay of 200,000 l. for the object of his Motion. The Transatlantic Packet Station Committee, he was aware, had reported unfavourably of any port in Ireland; but he hoped the Government would be induced to reconsider their decision, and that the time might come when it would be deemed desirable to establish a postal and a passenger depot at Cork, as well as a station for the purposes of transatlantic communication. He was the more disposed to entertain such a hope, seeing that the report of the Committee to which he had alluded spoke of Cork Harbour as a good and safe harbour, and accessible as a refuge for ships in a gale. He trusted, therefore, yet to see Hawlboline provided by the Government with the necessary establishments for effecting repairs for the steam navy; and to see it also adapted as a refuge harbour for the merchant service.
Amendment proposed—
"To leave out from the word 'That' to the end of the Question, in order to add the words, 'a Select Committee be appointed to inquire into the want of accommodation for the repair of steam vessels at Hawlboline,' instead thereof."
SIR FRANCIS BARINGregretted that he must oppose the Motion of his hon. and learned Friend, for it was rather satisfactory to him, after the attacks that had been made upon the Admiralty, to be put upon his trial for not having spent more money. The House should consider it as a question relating to the naval service, for the country was not bound to erect factories on the chance that they would be useful to the merchant service. The late Lord Auckland had under his consideration the question of erecting a factory at Cork; but experience had shown that we had a sufficient number of factories for the naval service, and the Admiralty had concluded that it was not necessary to have a further outlay in Ireland. It might be, certainly, for the advantage of Cork to have a factory there; but, looking to the general interests of the country, it was not thought desirable to establish other factories than those already in existence, without a strong necessity for so doing. 200,000 l. might establish such a factory as the hon. and learned Member desired, but, when established, the cost of maintaining it would be very considerable. The public service did not require another factory at Cork, and, therefore, he was
916
not prepared, on the part of the Government, to hold out any expectation to his hon. and learned Friend that any such would be established. He could not agree to the appointment of the Committee.
MR. ROCHEsaid, the objection of the Irish Members was not that the Admiralty did not spend enough money, but that Ireland had no share in the establishments to which the right hon. Gentleman alluded. The works going on at Devonport, when completed, would not cost them less than 1,200,000 l., and they had expended at least 2,000,000 l. at Holyhead—yet they refused to spend a single sixpence upon any Irish port. What Ireland wanted was, to have her natural resources developed; but then, they were told, she must rely upon private enterprise. Why, England herself, with all her superior advantages, had not been left, in the matter of her naval establishments, to private enterprise; and the Government were lavishing hundreds of thousands upon Holyhead and Devonport. In refusing the Motion of his hon. and learned Friend, they would be adding another to the long catalogue of acts of injustice of which Ireland had to complain.
CAPTAIN BOLDERO,in order to show the inconvenience that arose from the absence of accommodation at Hawlboline, would call the attention of the House to the fact, that only the other day the 12th Lancers, which were ordered for the Cape of Good Hope, had to be brought from Ireland to England before they could embark; and then, instead of sending them out in steam vessels, which could have taken horses and all in a short passage of six weeks, they had, notwithstanding the critical position in which Sir Harry Smith was left, been sent out in sailing vessels, which could not accomplish the distance under some months.
ADMIRAL DUNDASsaid, the Admiralty had no orders to send the troops from Ireland to the Cape, but the orders were to bring them to England in the first instance. Had the order from the War Office been to send the troops direct from Ireland to the Cape of Good Hope, that order would have been complied with. No less than five steam vessels had been used in the transmission of the troops.
DR. POWERbegged to remark, that one of the inducements held out to Ireland previous to the passing of the Act of Union was that Cove, now Queenstown, would be made a naval station; but from

917
that day to this the promise had never been fulfilled. Since that period there had been only about 14,000 l. expended on the erection of a quay at Queenstown.
COLONEL CHATTERTONwould be very glad to hear what reply the hon. and gallant Admiral the Member for Greenwich (Admiral Dundas) had to make to his hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Chippenham (Captain Boldero), and also if he would inform the House and the country why the 12th Royal Lancers were sent from this country to the Cape in sailing instead of in steam vessels, and without their horses, at a time when the presence of cavalry was so much required at that colony, and the despatches of Sir Harry Smith so urgent for a reinforcement of that arm, in consequence of the ill conduct of the Cape Corps of cavalry. He would take that opportunity to complain of the beggarly parsimony of the naval department towards Ireland, in not providing in Cork harbour a suitable flag-ship for the admiral, who was now frequently obliged to hoist his flag on board a wretched un-seaworthy craft.
ADMIRAL DUNDASsaid, that the Government had a twodecker and a screw-propeller at Cork at the time; but the 12th Lancers were sent out without their horses, as they would be amply provided with horses on their arrival at the Cape.
ADMIRAL BOWLESsaid, it could not be denied but that the harbour of Cork was one of the greatest importance to be kept up as a naval station, both as regarded convenience and economy.
SIR HENRY BARRONhoped the House would not divide without further discussion. The principle at issue was whether they were to increase the whole of the establishments in England, to the entire disregard and neglect of Ireland. Were they to treat her as a portion of the United Kingdom, or studiously to exclude her? Cork was acknowledged to be one of the finest harbours in the United Kingdom, and acknowledged to be one of the greatest importance in the trade of the western world—a trade which was daily increasing. A naval arsenal had been established there in time of war, and it was then found to be of the greatest use; but the danger having passed away, they were now gradually abandoning it. Hundreds of thousands were lavished on Woolwich, Deptford, Sheerness, Portsmouth, and other naval establishments in England; but unfortunate, depressed, wretched Ire-
918
land, was utterly neglected. Ireland was made subvervient to English interests. Her trade and agriculture had been destroyed, and in refusing this Committee now, they were still further showing that Parliament had no regard for their condition, and would not sympathise in her sufferings.
Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
The House divided:—Ayes 104; Noes 26: Majority 78.
Main Question again proposed.

THE HORFIELD ESTATE.
MR. P. MILESsaid, with the permission of the House, he would now proceed to vindicate the character of his right rev. relative the Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol from the attacks of the hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Horsman). It was not his intention to make any comment upon the language employed by the hon. Gentleman in making those charges, which affected the character of the right rev. Prelate; but he hoped the explanation he would be able to afford would be deemed satisfactory by the House. The principal charge advanced by the hon. Gentleman was, that there was a moral responsibility incumbent on the part of the bishop not to renew the lease of the Horfield estate; and he had grounded the charge upon the fact, that the two previous bishops had not renewed the lease of that estate. Now he (Mr. Miles) must observe, that although Mr. Murray, the former secretary to the Ecclesiastical Commission, had been very severely pressed by the hon. Gentleman, he was scarcely able to say that there was any such moral obligation; and if he (Mr. Miles) could show that no obligation of any sort, direct or indirect, existed on the part of the bishop not to renew the lease, he thought he would, in a great measure, have answered that part of the charge. He found that Mr. Murray himself, when examined on this very point by the hon. Gentleman, stated that he considered that—
"As the bishop possessed (and probably the Commissioners will take the same view of the case) a strict legal right, if he pleased, to renew that estate for lives, he might consider that he acquitted himself of the moral responsibility, and others may think so too, if in exercising that legal right he did not do it for his own benefit, but for the general benefit of the Church."
The hon. Member (Mr. Horsman) never mentioned that both Bishop Gray and

919
Bishop Allen, the present bishop's predecessors, had attempted to renew the lease. With regard to Bishop Gray, he (Mr. Miles) had a letter from a son of that prelate, stating distinctly that a sum of money was offered to Bishop Gray to renew the lease, but that he, not considering the sum sufficient, refused to renew. Then with reference to the case of Bishop Allen, he (Mr. Miles) had it upon the authority of the registrar of the district, Mr. Clarke, who had been in communication with Bishop Allen on the subject, and who stated distinctly that Bishop Allen wished to have renewed it, and entered into negotiations for that purpose. It had also been stated that when Bishop Allen was translated to Ely, he recommended that this lease should be allowed to fall in for the benefit of the see. Without wishing to throw any imputation on that right rev. Prelate's memory, he (Mr. Miles) could only refer to the fact, that while he was in possession of the see he did attempt to renew the lease. Mr. Clarke said—
"The bishop has been most hardly treated in this business. The real points in the case are not many. I know from Mr. Marmont (Mr. Shadwell's agent) that if Bishop Gray had happened to live a little longer, a renewal of the lease would have been arranged. It is not true (as alleged by Mr. Horsman) that the negotiation for a renewal was entered upon on the dropping of one life, and was broken off on the death of two—the fact being that no negotiation was ever entered upon until two lives had dropped. With respect to Bishop Allen, it is notorious that, when Bishop of Bristol, he felt himself at liberty to renew the lease (this can be proved, if necessary, by my father, who was very much in Bishop Allen's confidence, and had discussions with him upon the subject), and we all well know that when our present bishop took the see of Bristol, and became possessed of the endowments, not a shadow of a condition was ever expressed or implied that his Lordship was to stand, with respect to the Horfield property, on any different footing from that on which he stood with respect to the other endowments of the see."
He (Mr. Miles) therefore thought, then, that it was perfectly clear that both Bishop Gray and Bishop Allen would have renewed the lease if a sufficient fine had been offered. The Bishop of Gloucester had stated in his published letter that he had been distinctly informed by Bishop Allen himself that he accepted the see without any conditions whatever as to the renewal of the lease of the Horfield estate. He thought, therefore, that that part of the case was fully answered by the bishop himself, and that it was unnecessary for him (Mr. Miles) to dwell upon it. In 1848 the hon. Member for Cockermouth
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(Mr. Horsman) asked a question on this subject, and it was then first intimated that there was a moral obligation on the part of the Bishop of Gloucester not to renew the lease. When the fact that such a question had been put, came to the knowledge of the bishop, he, on the 22nd of July, 1848, wrote a letter to the noble Lord at the head of the Government in these terms:—
"I lose no time in assuring your Lordship that no such engagement or understanding as is here insinuated ever took place; nor were there any other conditions mentioned or implied, directly or indirectly, except those which are detailed by the Order in Council of October 5, 1836, by which the see of Glocester and Bristol was constituted, and which leaves mo at perfect liberty to deal with that estate as with the other property of the see. Indeed, I never heard, till a few days ago, that such an opinion as that spoken of by Mr. Horsman had been broached. Allow me to add, that in offering to dispose of my interest in this estate to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, my sole motive has been to promote objects of public benefit and improvement."
In November, 1848, the Ecclesiastical Commissioners wrote to the Bishop of Gloucester to the following effect:—
"They consider the circumstance of their having entered into a contract to purchase my right of renewal in the Horfield estate (which, in the event of their belief in the existence of any such engagement or understanding, they would not have been justified in entertaining), was by them considered as sufficiently proving that there was no impression on their minds that any such engagement or understanding existed."
He now came to the correspondence which the hon. Member for Cockermouth alluded to as having taken place between the Ecclesiastical Commissioners and the bishop; and he must say that when charges of this kind were brought forward, he thought hon. Gentlemen ought to be very careful in their statements. Now, the hon. Member for Cockermouth had made a mistake of no less than five years in the date of that correspondence, for he alluded to it as having taken place in 1842, while it really did not take place till 1847. The account the hon. Gentleman had given of this correspondence seemed to him so exceedingly confused, that he (Mr. Miles) could scarcely make out where the hon. Member had got his information. He found that the hon. Gentleman said—
"Under these circumstances, the Ecclesiastical Commissioners were surprised at the commencement of 1848 by receiving a communication from the Bishop of Gloucester, stating his intention to renew the lease, and giving them the refusal of it for the sum of 11,500 l. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners desired their secretary to write to the bishop, reminding him of the moral obligation he

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was under not to renew the lease. The bishop answered that he knew nothing of moral obligations, that he had a legal right, and if the Commissioners did not choose to pay him 11,500 l., he would renew the lease, and alienate the property from the Church."
He (Mr. Miles) had the authority of the Bishop of Gloucester to repeat what the right rev. Prelate had already stated in his letter, that there was not one word of truth in that statement. The hon. Member for Cockermouth also said—
"Matters remained in this state until 1842, when the old life, Dr. Shadwell, was taken ill, and then it began to be rumoured abroad that the Bishop of Gloucester meant to renew the lease. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners were alarmed, and caused their secretary to write to the bishop, alluding to the rumour which had reached them, and expressing a hope that it was not correct. The bishop wrote a reply, in which he said that he felt insulted at the suspicion entertained of him, that if he were to renew the lease he would do something unbecoming a bishop, which would leave a lasting reproach on his family. The bishop's words printed in the report of Ecclesiastical Commission were—'I am sorry the Commissioners suspect me of acting so very,' and then a blank was left for a word, and the sentence concluded 'a part.'"
With regard to the word left blank in the letter, that merely arose from the manner in which the Society to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners had chosen to print it. The real facts of the case appeared to be these:—In 1847 a negotiation was opened for the sale of the Horfield estate to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, through Mr. Murray and the bishop's secretary. Subsequently, an offer was made by the bishop himself to the Commissioners to sell the lease for 11,500 l., but the negotiations on the subject were broken off, as had been already stated, in consequence of some legal technicalities. From that time to the death of Dr. Shadwell, it appeared that no measures were taken either by the Commissioners or the bishop to make any arrangement, and ultimately, on the death of Dr. Shadwell, the bishop leased the estate to his secretary. Great stress had been laid upon the statement that the lives of the bishop's three children were inserted in the lease; but the fact was that the lives wore those of the three Royal Princesses. Allusion had been made to the value of the Horfield estate; and to set that matter clearly before the House, he (Mr. Miles) would show them, on the authority of Mr. Clarke, the registrar, what was its exact value. Mr. Clarke said—
"The present income received from the Horfield property is as follows, namely—
922

Gross rental of demesne lands.

£327

3

0

Gross amount of rectorial rent-charge

191

10

0

[This amount is now reduced by the corn averages.]

Lord's rents, &c.

26

13

3

£545

6

3

"The above is, you will observe, the gross amount, from which are to be deducted repairs (and as to the tithes, rates), costs of collection, and other usual deductions."
Now, when the Bishop of Gloucester leased the Horfield estate to his secretary, he gave up a living he had held, in commendam, in Northamptonshire, of the value he (Mr. Miles) believed of between 700 l. and 800 l. a year, so that, so far as he was concerned, his income was diminished by the arrangement. This, it should be observed, was a copyhold estate. Hon. Gentlemen were no doubt aware of the difficult nature of copyhold tenure, and it was on account of those difficulties that the bishop was absolutely compelled himself to retain power over the lease, because he could not enfranchise the copyhold, nor could he give any title that would enable improvements which were most desirable to be effected. He (Mr. Miles) thought he could not do better than read the bishop's own statement of the reasons which had influenced him:—
"1. It was no fault of mine that the estate hung on such a tenure; nor, if the story of the lease being intentionally left unrenewed by my two predecessors had been as true as it is untrue, could that have been a tie upon me, unless the facts had been communicated; whereas the case was the very opposite. 2. When the estate came into my hands I could no longer make it available for settling a sum upon my diocese for the benefit of small livings. The law officers having cast a slur upon my title, no one would have purchased a contingent lawsuit. I therefore leased it for three lives to my own secretary, as a means of retaining in my own hands the lull and entire control and direction of all that should be done. They who condemn me for so doing are bound to state what I ought to have done. As far as I can see, there were only three possible courses open to me:—1. I might have left the property as it was, in hand, during my incumbency. 2. I might have leased it for twenty-one years. 3. I might lease it for three lives. Upon the first plan I must, have left the property in a state of progressive deterioration—have appeared regardless of my professed desire of amelioration; not a hovel would have been erected upon such a title as I could have given; enfranchisement, drainage, &c, would have been out of the question. In the second case, there would have been a still greater obstacle in the way of any good being effected. The tenure would have been too short for building—there would have been legal difficulties in the way of enfranchisement—the tenure of the lord-farmer being less than that of the copyholders, and the danger of a lawsuit would have prevented any one from purchasing

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such an interest. Nothing could have been done to the estate till the term had completely expired. The only remaining course was that which I have adopted. It was the only method by which I could do any good to any interests. Whether my views were selfish or not, let the world judge. In the first place, I thought that the increase of income offered a fair opportunity for resigning a rectory which I held in commendam; which I did after a complete repair of the rectory house, which happened to be just then in progress. I immediately took measures for commuting the manorial rights into land, and procuring such a consolidation of the property as might render it available both for building and for agricultural occupation. Both these operations are in progress at a considerable expense. As the income I have sacrificed in consideration of Horfield is about the same in amount as the rental, it follows that the estate has proved to me a loss, and never can in my life be anything but a loss, and this I have encountered for the ultimate benefit of the estate of the Church."
He (Mr. Miles) trusted that he had succeeded in exonerating the Bishop of Gloucester from any blame throughout these transactions. For his own part, he did not think any one could consider that the bishop had been actuated by sordid motives. He felt that it was unnecessary for him to pass any eulogium on the character of the right rev. Prelate, who was justly esteemed in his own diocese for his liberality and kindness. The subscriptions of the right rev. Prelate to charitable objects were as large—indeed, he (Mr. Miles) believed that, in proportion to his income, they were larger—than those of any bishop who had held the see. Although the hon. Member for Cockermouth had brought forward these charges in, he must say, rather harsh language, of that he (Mr. Miles) did not complain; but, in his opinion, and he hoped in that of every Member of the House, the right rev. Prelate—to use the language of the hon. Member for Cockermouth—might, notwithstanding all that had passed, "hold up his head in public as an honest man."
MR. HORSMANsaid, that it was impossible that the hon. Member for Bristol (Mr. P. Miles) could have made this statement more fairly than he had done, or that he could have criticised his (Mr. Horsman's) conduct in a manner less discourteous to himself. He (Mr. Horsman) wished to say, however, in reply to the hon. Gentleman's statement, that this was not to be regarded as a question between the right rev. Prelate and himself. The charge he had made was not confined to the individual Prelate of whom he had spoken, but was one in which, as part of a system, other persons were largely
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implicated. This question of the alienation of Church property by prelates of the Established Church was not new, nor was the instance he had cited a singular one; and if it were a true indictment against the Bishop of Gloucester that he had devastated the estates of the Church, there were others who would also be implicated by the verdict. He (Mr. Horsman) had spoken from the evidence laid upon the table of that House. He knew nothing of the circumstances independently of that evidence. He had spoken of a public question, as a public man, from that evidence which had been placed before the House. The hon. Member for Bristol had, however, made scarcely any allusion to that evidence. It was quite true, as stated by the hon. Gentleman, that when the present bishop succeeded to the see of Bristol, the estate rested on a single life. He (Mr. Horsman) might remind the House of what he had before stated, that the two prelates who were predecessors of the present bishop in the See of Bristol had refrained from renewing the lease of the Horfield estate. He had also stated that one of those prelates, Bishop Gray, had attempted to renew the lease when the lives first dropped, two having dropped in the same year, and that he, not being able to agree as to the terms, gave up the idea of renewing some time before his death, saying that, rather than take an inadequate fine, he would allow the estate to lapse to his successor. He (Mr. Horsman) had also stated, that Lord Melbourne was acquainted with the circumstances on which this estate thus fell by Bishop Allen. He (Mr. Horsman) must now ask the House to allow him to refer to the evidence upon which he had spoken. He spoke first upon the evidence of Mr. Richards, who had been for twenty years the perpetual curate of Horfield, and whose statements had not been alluded to elsewhere. Mr. Richards appeared before the Committee; he was well acquainted both with Bishop Gray and Bishop Allen, and he said he knew all the circumstances connected with the estate of Horfield during their lives. Mr. Richards said—
"I had a great number of conversations with him (Bishop Gray), and I furnished him with a good many particulars of that property at that time; he used to talk to me a good deal about it at different times. First of all he asked 10,000 l. for it. There was a doubt whether the copyholds had not been forfeited, and in that case they would have come into hand, and that made him ask rather more.

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"Did the attempt to renew break off in consequence of the parties not giving that sum?—Yes.
"Was he in treaty for the renewal of that lease up to the time of his death?—No, he was not.
"Had he given up all idea of renewing at that time?—Yes; he stated to me that he should not take the sum that had been offered, or anything like it; that he would rather it should go to the see after his death; that the see should have the benefit rather than his family, by receiving that small sum which he would get for it.
"At the time of Bishop Gray's death, you can state from conversation with himself, that he had given up the idea of renewal?—Yes; he had given it up some time before his death."
Now, that statement might be correct or not, but it was the precise statement which he (Mr. Horsman) made the other night; and let it be observed that this was the evidence of a gentleman who had, perhaps, better opportunities than any other person of knowing what Bishop Gray's intentions were. From a letter written to Mr. Richards by Bishop Gray's son, he obtained this confirmation of that evidence:—
"You were quite right in denying, before the Committee of the House of Commons, that the non-renewal of the Horfield lease by my late father, when Bishop of Bristol, was attributable to his sudden removal by death. His last illness was protracted, having lasted upwards of a twelvemonth, and its probable termination was foreseen by his family for some time before his death. Negotiations for a renewal had been going on, I think I may safely say, not less than three years before that event (I speak, however, from memory), at an early stage of which it was estimated that the then lessee (Dr. Shadwell) was prepared to pay the same fine as upon the last renewal. At a later stage some months before my father's death, a larger sum (either 5,000 l. or 6,000 l.) was offered as a fine for the renewal of the lease. On both occasions the fine was refused as inadequate. Upon either, my father might have renewed the lease, had he been so minded. He was, however, as you know, not the man to do dirty work by enriching his family at the expense of his successors."
They had thus the statement of Mr. Richards, corroborated by that of Mr. Gray, and he would ask the House to observe that Mr. Richards was a clergyman of that party in the Church which was disposed to deal tenderly with the character and acts of bishops. Mr. Richards was an admirer of the right hon. Member for the University of Oxford (Mr. Gladstone), and of the Church principles of which he had been so able an exponent, and went to Oxford at the last election to give a plumper for the right hon. Gentleman. The hon. Member for Bristol (Mr. P. Miles) had not alluded to the evidence to which he might have alluded, taken before the Church Leases Committee, and which was strongly in favour of his view of the case. But the hon. Mem-
926
ber was not the only defender and champion of the Bishop of Gloucester; the case of the bishop had been stated "elsewhere" if not more ably, certainly a great deal more artistically than the hon. Member had thought himself justified in stating it. If the evidence which he (Mr. Horsman) had quoted was at all to be upset, he thought the House would agree that the evidence which had been adduced in "another place" to upset it, was likely to be the strongest for that purpose, and to be put forward in the most skilful manner; it certainly seemed to have created the strongest impression. But let the House hear the evidence of Mr. Vincent Stuckey before the Church Leases Committee of 1838; the gentleman whose evidence had been brought forward to show that his (Mr. Horsman's) statement about Bishop Gray was unfounded. A right rev. Prelate elsewhere (the Bishop of Oxford) said, "Now, I will give you two witnesses of undoubted character and unimpeachable veracity;" and the first was Mr. Stuckey. But before passing to Mr. Stuckey, let the House hear Mr. Richards's evidence:—
"Do you know whether, by Bishop Allen, anything was done in the way of renewal?—When Bishop Gray died, I wrote to Lord Melbourne, who was Prime Minister, and told him I could make a communication to him which would be of great benefit to the see, if my name did not appear to any future bishop.; and his Lordship replied, that any information I gave him should be considered private. I then stated to him that the lease had not been renewed by Bishop Gray, for the reason that his family should not receive the benefit of so small a sum as had been offered; that he would rather the see should have the benefit instead. After Bishop Allen was appointed, when I was dining with him, he referred a good deal to the Horfield property, I being the only resident gentleman there, and at last I said, 'I think Lord Melbourne has not behaved very honourably in communicating my letter to you?' and he said, 'I did not say it was your letter; it was the letter of some one; the name was taken off; my name was taken to Bishop Allen by Lord Hotham.
"What did that letter of yours suggest?—That before the bishopric was given to another party a stipulation should be made with him that the property should fall into the see, in order that the see might have the benefit of it instead of the individual; for the income of the see was small, and it was thought that by that property falling into it, it would make a greater amount.
"Was that at the time the union of the two sees was contemplated?—No, long before that.
"The contents of the letter which you wrote were shown to Bishop Allen?—Yes.
"Have you reason to suppose that your suggestion had been laid before him, with the view of its being acted upon?—I do not know whether it was or not, but I know that there was

927
no attempt at a renewal during Bishop Allen's time.
"Was there anything in the mode of Bishop Allen's communicating to you what had passed which led you to infer that it had been pressed upon him?—He did not seem quite pleased about it; and we were not on the best terms about it.
"Did not that, coupled with the fact of there being no attempt at renewal during Bishop Allen's time, lead you to infer that your suggestion had been approved and adopted by Lord Melbourne?—Yes.
"You are quite certain that, during his time, there was no attempt at renewal?—There was no attempt, I think; and I think Dr. Shadwell would have communicated it to me if there had been."
That was the evidence upon which he (Mr. Horsman) made his statement respecting Bishop Allen. No doubt it was circumstantial evidence; there was no positive proof that Bishop Allen had been pledged by Lord Melbourne not to renew, but there was very strong circumstantial proof. But that was not the only proof; there was a letter of Bishop Allen himself upon the subject:—
"As I was prepared, if my opinion had been asked by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, to have recommended the Horfield property, in the diocese of Bristol, to be assigned over to the Commissioners for the building of a palace, and for other purposes under the Act, before a new bishop was appointed, so in my own case I can have no objection to the St. Alban's property of the see of Ely, which is nearly similarly circumstanced as to the age of the remaining life and life tenure of the leases to the Horfield property, being transferred to the Commissioners, it being my decided opinion that neither of these leases should be renewed for lives, and that upon their expiration the fines for the full terms of twenty-one years should he at the disposal of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners for general purposes."
It was upon this evidence—the testimony of Mr. Richards, the recorded opinion of Bishop Allen, and his act in accordance with it—that he (Mr. Horsman) made his statement avowing that he did so upon evidence on the table of the House. How was this met? No portion of this evidence had been referred to by the hon. Member (Mr. P. Miles); but in another place it had been stated, "Here are witnesses of unimpeachable veracity, by whom this evidence is to be set aside." The first witness was Mr. Vincent Stuckey; and the right rev. Prelate quoted Mr. Stuckey as saying, "The two late bishops (Gray and Allen) refused to renew because the lessee refused to give the fine asked." If any Gentleman would turn to the evidence, he would find that Mr. Stuckey's answer, when he was examined, was, "I understand the two late bishops refused to renew, because the lessee refused to give
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the fine they asked." Now, the House would observe, that the two witnesses whom he had quoted, who spoke strongly upon the subject, and whose evidence it was sought to set aside by that of another person, had the same opportunities of knowing the particulars of these transactions as this other witness; that their evidence was given under circumstances quite as favourable to the truth, and that they spoke positively on the point. But what said Mr. Stuckey? Here are his several answers:—
"What I state comes not from my own knowledge, but what I learn from others." "The manor is held for one life, as I understand."
"Does he grant it out for leases on lives?—So I understand." "The present bishop will not take the offer of renewal, as I understand."
"The present bishop has refused to renew?—I understand the two late bishops refused to renew because the House refused to give the fine they asked."
Mr. Stuckey gave his answers cautiously, and took pains to show that he knew nothing himself of the matter. However, he was adduced as a witness of unimpeachable veracity, knowing the circumstances of the case. Immediately afterwards, in the same speech, the right rev. Prelate (the Bishop of Oxford) having now enlisted the sympathies of his audience against the statements unfavourable to the bishop, proceeded to enlist them against the party by whom the bishop considered himself aggrieved, and he read this part of the Bishop of Gloucester's letter to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners:—
"I learn that a report of my intention to re-grant this lease for lives, as heretofore, has been several times matter of conversation at the board, and has been spoken of in terms of condemnation. Of the existence of the report I was aware, as well as of its origin; the authority being certain printed evidence given before the Ecclesiastical Leases Committee of the House of Commons some years ago, by a land surveyor of this neighbourhood, who stated that he understood such to be the intention of the bishop. [This person, to whom I never spoke, is notorious for his unfriendliness to the Church and Churchmen.] His assertion, as coming from an individual who could know nothing about me, I treated like a newspaper report, with silent contempt. To have noticed it publicly at the time would have been thought by some presumptuous, by others ridiculous."
Now, who was the party here referred to? Why, this very Mr. Stuckey, [Mr. P. MILES: No, no! Mr. Sturge.] Well then, if it was Mr. Sturge, his complaint of the right rev. Prelate's suppression applied equally to him; for Mr. Sturge was the other witness of unimpeachable veracity whom the Bishop of Oxford adduced against Mr. Richards, omitting,

929
however, to give the Bishop of Gloucester's own character of Mr. Sturge. But Mr. Sturge himself did not pretend to be able to speak with much knowledge on the subject; and his evidence was given twelve years ago with reference to a different inquiry. But if Mr. Sturge's evidence was so strong, and he was to be so much relied on as a witness, his testimony might at least have been quoted in his own language. He said, "I know there was a negotiation between the late Bishop of Bristol and the present holder, the lessee." Now, it was impossible to come to the conclusion that by the late bishop was meant Bishop Allen, for at the time this evidence was given before the Church Leases Commission, that prelate was living, and was Bishop of Ely; and had he therefore been meant, the witness would have said "the last bishop," or "the present Bishop of Ely." He undoubtedly meant Bishop Gray, who had then only been dead three or four years; and so read, the evidence coincided exactly with the evidence of other parties with respect to what took place under the episcopacy of that prelate. But the right rev. Prelate, reading that evidence in "another place," read it thus: "I know there was a negotiation between the late Bishop of Bristol (Bishop Allen) and the present holder, the lessee;" the words "Bishop Allen" being inserted by the right rev. Prelate himself, and not being in Mr. Sturge's answer. But there was another piece of evidence brought forward—the statement of the Bishop of Gloucester himself. He said he had had conversations with Bishop Allen, and that Bishop Allen told him he was at liberty to renew. He (Mr. Horsman) could only say, as to that, that we had positive evidence of witnesses who were in communication with Bishop Allen, and we had his own letter on record; and, without at all questioning the veracity of the Bishop of Gloucester, he preferred the recorded evidence of one bishop, supported by his acts, to the recollection of another some years afterwards. Now he (Mr. Horsman) admitted that when the Bishop of Gloucester was appointed to the united sees of Gloucester and Bristol, he had a legal right to renew the lease of the Horfield estate, and that he was under no pledge of non-renewal. The matter appeared so well understood that the Ecclesiastical Commissioners did not consider it necessary to have any pledge whatever. He would come now to the correspondence which he
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(Mr. Horsman) was stated erroneously to have said commenced in 1842, and the existence of which was denied; and the hon. Member (Mr. P. Miles) said that his (Mr. Horsman's) statement was extremely confused, and it was impossible to make out what he meant. His statement was a very plain one, and the evidence in all material points bore it out amply. He stated that in 1842 there were rumours that the Bishop of Gloucester intended to renew the lease; that the Ecclesiastical Commissioners were alarmed; that they had desired their secretary to represent to the bishop the moral obligation he was under not to renew; and that the bishop wrote a letter, in which he stated what would be the opinion he should entertain of himself, or the world would entertain of him, if he were to renew. Now he admitted there was this inaccuracy, that he had spoken as if the first communication made was from the Secretary to the Ecclesiastical Commission to the Bishop, whereas between 1842 and 1847 there were two rumours, and the communication in 1842 was made at the instance of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, but was not made by the secretary. That rumour died away, but when it was revived in 1846 a communication was made to the bishop by the secretary. So that he (Mr. Horsman) must admit he made an omission in regard to date, in not stating that there were two rumours, but he maintained that there was no omission affecting the morality of the affair. Mr. Murray, the Secretary to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, stated—
"About the close of 1842, or the beginning of 1843, a rumour reached the Commissioners that Dr. Shadwell, the remaining life in the lease, was in danger, and that it was understood that, upon his death, either a new lease for lives would be granted, or a lease for the benefit of the bishop's family. This rumour became the subject of anxious conversation at a private meeting of some of the Commissioners, and it was agreed that one of the party should write frankly and confidentially to the bishop. This I understand to have been done; the letter being that referred to in a letter from the bishop, dated 9th February, 1847, to which I shall have occasion more particularly to allude."
[Mr. MILES: That was in 1842.] At the close of 1842, or beginning of 1843. That bore out the first part of his statement. He had indeed omitted to refer to the communication which was made to the bishop at the instance of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners by one of their body, because neither his letter nor the reply of the bishop were in evidence; and, besides, this

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was a matter of detail which did not appear to hear materially upon the merits of the case. Mr. Murray continued:—
"Dr. Shadwell's health rallied, and nothing further of importance occurred till the close of 1846, when the Commissioners, finding themselves possessed of sufficient information respecting the revenues of the united sees, determined to pass a scheme for settling its condition upon the next vacancy. Upon this occasion the circumstances of the Horfield estate were again considered, and, inasmuch as it had not come into the calculation as producing anything to the see beyond the small reserved rent, the Commissioners felt themselves at liberty to treat it as further surplus; and they accordingly determined that, at the next vacancy, it should be transferred from the see to themselves, for the purpose of the Episcopal Act; and the Order in Council for effecting this passed in June, 1847. In the meantime, after the decision of the commissioners, but before it was formally ratified, namely, in February, 1847, it was reported that Dr. Shadwell's life was again in imminent danger; and as the rumour was again accompanied by an expression of belief that the bishop was contemplating the grant of a new beneficial lease, the commissioners authorised me to confer with the bishop, either directly or through his secretary, with a view to some arrangement for commuting the bishop's interest, and so obtaining immediate possession of the property, subject only to the subsisting lease. I lost no time in conferring with Mr. Holt, of Gloucester, on whose discretion, as the secretary and confidential adviser of the bishop, I fully relied. I communicated to him the hope of the commissioners that the bishop would abstain from granting a fresh lease for lives, and my conviction of the disappointment which would arise from an opposite course; and we separated with an understanding that Mr. Holt should immediately communicate with the bishop, and endeavour to impress upon him the importance of making some arragement which should recognise the peculiar obligation supposed to attach upon his possession of this estate."
That was the letter to which he (Mr. Hors-man) alluded as having been written by the direction of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, upon the rumour reaching them of the illness of Dr. Shadwell, and the intention of the Bishop of Gloucester to renew the lease. Mr. Murray afterwards (questions 1,708–21) stated that there was an understanding with the board that there would be no renewal on the part of the bishop, and that he was authorised to say so to him. At question 2,299 he said that by "the peculiar obligations" to which he alluded, he meant moral obligations. He now came to a part of this evidence which had been strangely overlooked by every party who had set up anything like a vindication for the Bishop of Gloucester. The bishop himself, in his letter, positively denied that he gave any answer like that which he (Mr. Horsman) had attributed to him;
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and the hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. P. Miles) said that he was extremely inaccurate in saying that there was a letter written in 1842, when, in reality, it was written in 1847. The hon. Gentleman had not, however, alluded to the bishop's letter, or to the defence for him which had been made elsewhere, and by which every one would be led to suppose that the statement that there was a letter of the bishop in reply was a fiction from beginning to end. Now, what was the description which he gave of that letter in his former speech? Why, that the bishop said he felt insulted by the suspicion that he was about to do what the rumour had attributed to him; that he said that if he did so, he should be acting in a manner unbecoming a bishop, and that he should leave a reproach to his family. He further stated that upon that letter the Ecclesiastical Commissioners desired their secretary to write to tell him that they had felt very much reassured by his letter, and that they were sorry that they had hurt his feelings. Now, with respect to that letter it had been said by a right rev. Prelate in another place—
"The idea that this reply was a genuine document had produced an impression very injurious to the character of his right rev. Friend. But what would their Lordships think of it, when he informed them that no communication of any kind whatever passed in the year 1842, and in the five subsequent years, between the Ecclesiastical Commissioners and their secretary on the one hand, and the Bishop of Gloucester and his secretary on the other? In the year 1847 a new scheme was carried out as to the charges to be imposed on the different bishoprics, and among others on the bishopric of Gloucester and Bristol. It was made to appear to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners that a larger charge should be imposed on that bishopric than that which had hitherto been paid. They drew up a scheme accordingly, and placed on the bishopric a larger charge; and they determined to transfer to themselves, on the next avoidance of the see, the Horfield Manor estate, which, by reason of its having so long rested on a single life in the lease, had not entered until then into the calculations of the Commissioners. This was intimated to his right rev. Friend; and he, thinking it was unfair, not so much to himself as to his successor in the see, entered into communication with the Commissioners on the subject. This communication in 1847 was carried on between the solicitor of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners on the one side, and the solicitor of the Bishop of Gloucester on the other. No hint was given on either side that a moral obligation was involved in the transaction."
Now, let the House observe the ingenuity of that statement. By the statement that no letter was written by the secretary to

933
the Ecclesiastical Commissioners in 1842, people were led to infer that no letter was written at all in 1842, the letter of the individual bishop, writing frankly and confidentially, being altogether omitted. Then, by stating that the communications were between the solicitors in 1847, and that between them there was no mention of moral obligation, it was left to be inferred that no mention of moral obligation was made in 1847 by any one; and then, it being said that it was these representations which made people believe there was a genuine letter from the bishop, the audience would be led to infer that there was no genuine letter in existence from the bishop at all. [Mr. GLADSTONE: Oh, no!] Surely, if the right rev. Prelate who said that he was desired by the Bishop of Gloucester to state his case for him, knowing that he was addressing an audience which had not the evidence before them, and could not judge of it in the slightest degree except from his statement, gave such a colour as he had described to that statement, he was entitled to say that if the case had been strong, it would have spoken for itself, a plain, unvarnished tale; but that if it needed the hand of an artist to give it a colour, it was evident that its advocate felt it to be somewhat defective. Now, the letter which was written by the Bishop of Gloucester, and which had not been referred to either by the hon. Member (Mr. P. Miles), or the right rev. Prelate in another place, contained the whole case on which he had grounded his statement. He admitted, as he had already said, that when the bishop succeeded to the see, there was no pledge or stipulation of any kind given by him, and that up to 1847 there was no proof of any understanding, or of any moral obligation admitted or acknowledged on his part, or on that of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. But now the secretary was desired by the Commissioners to write to him, telling him that they felt that there was a moral obligation on him not to renew, and that a rumour had reached them respecting his intention, which had given them much pain and anxiety. The bishop said in his letter to the rural deans, "I unbosomed myself without reserve to the Commissioners." Here was the unbosoming. The authority to Mr. Murray to communicate to the bishop was given on the 3rd of February; the letter was written on the 9th. This was in 1847. The letter was in answer to the communication in
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which Mr. Murray stated that there were "peculiar," by which he meant "moral" obligations,
"I am called upon to address the Ecclesiastical Commissioners on the matter of a conversation which took place last Friday, by their desire, between Mr. Murray and Mr. Holt, my secretary, as to my intentions in case the lease of Horfield Manor should fall during my incumbency. I learn that a report of my intention to re-grant this lease for lives as heretofore, has been several times matter of conversation at the board, and has been spoken of in terms of condemnation. Of the existence of the report I was aware, as well as of its origin; the authority being certain printed evidence given before the Ecclesiastical Leases Committee of the House of Commons some years ago, by a land surveyor of this neighbourhood, who stated that he understood such to be the intention of the bishop. His assertion, as coming from an individual who could know nothing about me, I treated, like a newspaper report, with silent contempt. To have noticed it publicly at the time would have been thought by some presumptuous, by others ridiculous. However, the manner in which I spoke of this evidence in conversation, is at least a proof that I did not meditate acting the very "—[then there was a large dash in the evidence]—"part which he had assigned me."
The hon. Member had said there should be accuracy in quotation, and that the published report of Mr. Murray's evidence should be taken. He (Mr. Horsman) was quoting from the blue book; the hon. Gentleman opposite had another document in his hand, perhaps the bishop's letter to the rural deans. [Mr. P. MILES: Yes!] Well, that was a private letter, marked on the title page "Not published." Mr. Murray's evidence in the blue hook was corrected by himself, laid on the table of that House, and published. Besides, let any man able to criticise the English language, any master of composition, or at all acquainted with it, say whether he could make sense of the sentence thus:—"I did not meditate playing the very part which he assigned me?" It would not have been English. And this from such a scholar as the Bishop of Gloucester! However, the context would explain the bishop's meaning. He was unbosoming himself, without reserve, to the Commissioners. He had been extremely reserved throughout these proceedings, both with regard to his estates and his charities; but when that reserve was once broken through, when the floodgates were once overflowed, the tide was not easily dammed up again. That there might be no mistake, he proceeded:—
"I am certainly hurt that among persons of the station of the Commissioners I should be sus-

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pected of knowingly doing any thing which was either wrong in itself, or disparaging to the character of a bishop. Had I been actuated by selfishness or rapacity, the occasion of this discussion would probably never have occurred. It is painful to speak of oneself, but it is known in my diocese that I have made several large sacrifices of my private interest to public advantage, which ought to have saved me from such suspicions. Next to the mens conscia recti, I esteem a good reputation the most precious of worldly possessions; and while I have the common feelings of mankind in regard to a provision for my family, I should abhor the idea of bequeathing to them any thing which carried along with it a particle of reproach."
Were not these the very expressions which he (Mr. Horsman) quoted as being contained in that letter of the Bishop of Gloucester? What was it that would he derogatory to his character, and fixing reproach upon his family? Why, Mr. Murray stated it specifically. He said the rumour and the suspicion he was directed to convey was, that a new lease for lives would be granted, or a lease for the benefit of the bishop's family; that it was by the suspicion of which the bishop was hurt, and which, if true, would be disparaging to the character of the bishop, and would leave behind a reproach on his family. Now, what was Mr. Murray's own comment on this evidence? He says—
"It appears from this letter, that the bishop himself felt that there were some peculiarities in the case of Horfield which distinguished it from the other life leaseholds of the see. He treats the report of his intention to re-grant the lease for lives, as heretofore, as a calumny. The Commissioners were reassured by this letter as to his intentions. Letters were written for the purpose of explanation to the bishop, to satisfy his mind that nothing painful towards him was intended by the Commissioners."
Why did the bishop think that such a calumny, so disparaging to his character, so reproachful to his memory, unless his doing what was referred to would be doing something he believed improper? A person was not affected by the suspicion of doing that which he felt there was nothing wrong in his doing. On the contrary, throughout the whole letter there were indicated the feelings of a man who admitted he was under that obligation to the Commissioners which he knew he was under, and believed that if he were violating that obligation he would be incurring disgrace. One word with respect to that letter, and the erasure which he (Mr. Horsman) was so often accused of having invented. The evidence he had quoted respecting the term, the epithet, supposed to have been left out, was the evidence of Mr. Murray,
936
given before a Committee of the House of Commons. Mr. Murray had charge of the records of the Commission; he had the letter in his hand—he quoted from that letter; Ecclesiastical Commissioners were present; there were four Ecclesiastical Commissioners members of the Committee. Mr. Murray was cross-examined by the right hon. Member for the University of Cambridge (Mr. Goulburn), an Ecclesiastical Commissioner. The bishop himself complained that Mr. Murray was permitted to correct his evidence after it was in type. There was no carelessness, therefore, and no concealment from the bishop. Yet, at the end of three years, when he (Mr. Horsman) quoted that evidence, the Bishops of Gloucester and of Oxford came forward and said boldly that it was on his part an embellishment and a fiction, and that nothing whatever existed to justify him in making his statement. Hon. Members could refer to the book and satisfy themselves of the accuracy of what he had stated. [Mr. P. MILES: It quite justifies your remark.] He was obliged to the hon. Member for the admission. It might have been alleged that he had been misled by the evidence; but that was not the charge which had been made against him. The Bishop of Gloucester himself knew that the evidence had been given, and had the power of being examined before that Committee, as other members of the episcopal bench were; every possible opportunity there was—every possible motive to actuate the Bishop of Gloucester in coming forward and contradicting what had been stated by the confidential officer of the Commission; and yet up to the present time they were uncontradicted by any public document whatever. And now what hon. Members learned was, that the Bishop of Gloucester did contradict the statement in a private letter—in a letter which had not been published. "Oh," said the Bishop of Gloucester, "Mr. Murray was the evil genius of the Commission." His (Mr. Horsman's) opinion rather was that the Commission was the evil genius of Mr. Murray. Mr. Murray entered the service of that Commission a man of good character. He was demoralised and debauched by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners who placed temptations in his way to which he owed his ruin. Mr. Murray, when he gave his evidence, was the Ecclesiastical Commissioners' own witness, holding his office for life; he was their confidential agent, their pet; his interests were

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identified with them; he was put forward, not to disclose, but to conceal; he withheld a great deal more than he disclosed; he was a most reluctant witness; the eliciting of every fact was like drawing one of his teeth. The testimony was not his oral testimony, but he spoke from letters; and it would hardly do to say that Mr. Murray was not a credible witness, and, above all, that he was the evil genius of the Commission. He (Mr. Horsman) now wished to direct the attention of the right hon. Member for the University of Oxford (Mr. Gladstone), who would probably take part with his usual ability in the discussion, to this letter of the Bishop of Gloucester. If the right hon. Gentleman could reconcile that letter with the subsequent proceedings—if he could show that after writing that letter there was no acknowledgment of moral obligation either put by the Commission or assented to by the Bishop of Gloucester—he (Mr. Horsman) might hold himself in error; but, notwithstanding all his confidence in the abilities of the right hon. Gentleman, he had still more confidence in his conscientiousness, and he thought it impossible that he could ac-accomplish so difficult a task. He (Mr. Horsman) would admit an inadvertence in his former statement, if it were in any respect material; he had left it to be inferred that the letter was written in 1842 instead of 1847. But the question did not turn on the mere fact of the letter being written in one year or another. Was the letter, whether written in 1842 or 1847 irreconcilable with the subsequent proceedings? That was the question. He came now to 1848. The Bishop of Gloucester in that year made an offer of the lease of Horfield to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, stating that there was another party who was willing to renew the lease if they did not buy his interest. The Commissioners referred his offer to a Committee, which was presided over, as the bishop said, "by Sir James Graham, who was not likely to perpetrate a job." Well, he certainly rather admired the way in which public opinion was acting on our prelates, for a few years ago, if he had wished to show the public that it was impossible that a job should be perpetrated, he would have said the Archbishop of Canterbury was in the chair, and that was the security; or the Bishop of London was in the chair, and he would not perpetrate a job. But no; the right rev. Prelate said the right hon. Member for Ripon
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was in the chair, and that was the security against the perpetration of a job. He did indeed himself so far agree with the right rev. Prelate, that he thought the fact of the right hon. Gentleman being in the chair on that occasion was a greater security against the perpetration of a job, than the presence of the whole bench of bishops would have been. He made them a present of all the value of that admission. Subsequently, on the 7th of July, there was another meeting of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, and it was stated that the Bishop of Gloucester had offered his interest on the most liberal terms; and the Commission passed a resolution in which it was stated that the bishop was under no obligation, legal or equitable, to deal with the Horfield estates otherwise than any other estate of his see. He (Mr. Horsman) admitted that he was under neither a legal nor equitable obligation, according to the lawyers' term; but the Ecclesiastical Commission did not say that he was under no moral obligation. It was said the right hon. Gentleman of whom he had spoken as Chairman of the Committee assented to the transaction being carried out. He (Mr. Horsman) not only admitted that the right hon. Gentleman assented, but believed he was urgent; because, having been himself in communication with the Attorney General, and having asked that the passing of the Order in Council should be postponed, he recollected the Attorney General stated he must do his duty, because there were parties on the other side wishing, on the part of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, to press forward. He was not appalled even when the right hon. Member for Ripon was cited as favourable to this transaction, because there were two stories told as to the motives which actuated the Commissioners. One party said they agreed to this transaction as being a very liberal one on the part of the right rev. Prelate; but Mr. Murray suggested a very different view of the matter, or rather stated a very different motive which actuated the Commissioners. Mr. Murray said, assuming the bishop's full legal right to lease for lives, and it now appearing clearly that the bishop intended to act on that right, the Commissioners, in order to save the property from a further long and indefinite alienation, consented to the terms. He (Mr. Horsman) could conceive the right hon. Gentleman, who was himself in the

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chair on the occasion, feeling himself quite justified in sanctioning a transaction which he thought not desirable, as the only way of avoiding another transaction which he thought more objectionable still. He could appreciate the motives that actuated the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. He said the other night he thought they acted on right motives, but most improperly. The transaction was one that was stopped by the Government, and censured both in that House and out of it. What he stated the other night was stated in the presence of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners—the statement was made in the presence of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the University of Cambridge (Mr. Goulburn), from whom he had expected some explanation in that House. He knew that after the statement was made, the right hon. Gentleman must have been asked whether it was correct or not; but the right hon. Gentleman had declined to say anything in the smallest degree implying a doubt of that statement. The right hon. Baronet the Member for Ripon (Sir J. Graham) was present on the occasion, and they might have expected to receive an explanation from him without any appeal from Members of that House. Both the right hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Bristol (Mr. P. Miles) were Members of the Ecclesiastical Commission; and Gentlemen in their position, and with their responsibility, could not sit still while charges were made so unfounded as they were described to be. Not only were all the statements uncontradicted for three years, but the statements made by him (Mr. Horsman) were uncontradicted for a fortnight though it was obvious that after the statement had been Made, Gentlemen on both sides of the House must have referred to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners present to know if the statements were correct. But what was the fact? The hon. Member for Bristol having given notice of a Motion declined to proceed. The matter was brought forward in another place, it being obvious, undeniable, impossible to resist the conclusion, that no answer was attempted in this House, because Gentlemen holding the highest position there, who knew all the circumstances, would not lend themselves to an attempt to vindicate the Bishop of Gloucester in proceedings which the Ecclesiastical Commissioners could not have justified. There was another point to which he wished to call attention. The
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Bishop of Gloucester had offered his interest to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners for 11,500 l., and one justification urged for his doing so was, that he had lost 5,000 l., the amount of a loan given to the College of Bristol, which, being a bad debt, might not be repaid. What was the financial condition of the see of Bristol at the time? In the very appointment of the Bishop of Gloucester, in the very arrangement made at the time the sees were united'—if he (Mr. Horsman) might use the expression without offence—there was a job. The Act by which the sees were united received the Royal Assent in August, 1836. The Order in Council to unite the sees was adopted in October, 1836. An Act of Parliament had previously passed on the subject of commendams., The bishop was to receive the temporalities of both sees. The question was whether he should keep his commendams. The see of Gloucester was estimated by Bishop Gray at 2,270 l. a year. The see of Bristol was estimated by the Bishop of Gloucester, when he succeeded to the united Bees, at 925 l., and he returned 3,125 l. as his probable future yearly income. He stipulated, therefore, to keep his commendams, notwithstanding the 6th and 7th William IV., cap 77, sec. 17. The income of the united sees was fixed at 5,000 l. a year. If the bishop's income amounted to 5,000 l. a year, he ought not, by his own admission, to hold his commendams; but he made out that he had not an income of 5,000 l. a year. He had a palace built, at a cost of 23,000 l. He complained subsequently that he had two episcopal residences to keep up, and he asked for the house attached to his canonry as a London residence. The average income in fourteen years had been 7,282 l. a year: and in 1838 alone, this Prelate, whose loss of 5,000 l. justified him in selling his interest in Horfield, appeared from his own return to have received an income of no less than 11,107 l. He had in fourteen years, from episcopal sources alone, 34,000 l. over the sum he said he should receive. He (Mr. Horsman) said, the other night, that he thought the Commissioners were wrong in making no stipulation as to Horfield, and in allowing the bishop to retain the commendams; but what was most wrong was, that when they found him determined to renew the lease unless they bought his interest, they did not avail themselves of a clause in the Order in Council investing him with the

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temporalities of the see of Bristol, by which was reserved to the Commissioners the power of reconsidering anything that Order provided. They were justified in saying, "If you renew that lease, we shall review this Order in Council." He (Mr. Horsman) now came to the last point. That which the Ecclesiastical Commissioners anticipated with alarm had been accomplished. The bishop had renewed for three lives. On a former occasion, he (Mr. Horsman) had stated his belief that the bishop had renewed on lives in his own family. He had the report of his speech, as given in the Times, and he was there reported to have stated "as he was informed." There was a great mystery in the transaction, and he had tried to get the best information. But it was some comfort to know that, when inaccurate, he was not so on the side of injustice. The hon. Member (Mr. P. Miles) had told the House what were the lives. They were the lives of three infant children of the Royal Family. The bishop had taken lives from a family which was notoriously one of the longest lived in this country, thus associating the Royal Family and the Queen of England, the head of the Church, with a transaction most injurious to the Church. That, he thought, was not the least unhappy or least discreditable feature which marked the whole transaction. The Bishop of Gloucester, as far he could, had taken to himself legal possession of the estate for three lives; but he doubted whether the title would be legal after the death of the bishop, an Order in Council having been passed limiting his interest to his own life; and it might be doubted, if after that the bishop had power to grant this lease for three lives. As to the morality of the transaction, he would let it rest on the bishop's own statement, in a letter addressed by him to the rural deans. Let the House see the equivalent which the Bishop of Gloucester was said to have given in return. The case stood thus:—The Bishop of Gloucester gave up 500 l. a year for the life of a prelate who was about sixty-eight years of age, and had taken in return immediate possession of 545 l. a year for three lives, and also for those three lives, full possession of an estate, subject to the interest of the copyholders, producing a rack-rent of 3,000 l. a year; but before those three lives fell in, buildings might be erected on it to the value of 30,000 l. That was the equivalent given by the bishop: 500 l. a year for an
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estate yielding at once 545 l., and an accruing and advantageous lease for three lives, whereby the estate was placed absolutely at his disposal, and secured to his family. What was the value of the interest of the Bishop of Gloucester in this estate for three lives? Mr. Finlayson said—
"It is easy to propose three lives on whose existence a lease is of the same value very nearly as a lease for a term of 72½ years."—"It is quite evident that, if the owner of an estate is able to dispose of it so as to grant away from his heirs more than 94 per cent of the whole inheritance (which is the case where a lease on the three lives before-mentioned is granted), the heirs may be said to be nearly altogether denuded of their inheritance."—"The first conclusion which presents itself, therefore, to the mind of the inquirer is, that the power conferred on a tenant for life to grant leases on three lives is a power which amounts very nearly to the faculty of extinguishing the expectations of the heir."
The bishop, he believed, was enfranchising the estate, by entering into arrangements with the copyholders; but here was a most valuable estate of the Church alienated from the Church for three lives. It was said the Bishop of Gloucester had benevolent intentions with reference to this estate. Supposing he died intestate; for three lives the estate would be absolutely the property of his heirs. It might be said there was a moral obligation on them to give it up. But would they not be in the same position as the bishop? Had they not legal rights? As there was a sort of necessity alleged for the bishop acting as he had done, so there might be a necessity on their part of keeping the estate from regard to the memory of their parent. Men sometimes changed their minds; and episcopal minds were as changeable as others. Supposing the bishop changed his mind. After the case made out for him by a right rev. Brother of his, who had put his act on so high and strong ground, he might feel to have good right to keep the estate. Or suppose the lessee chose to resist, what course would the Bishop of Gloucester take? He might go to the Court of Chancery. He believed that under the Common law the bishop's interest in this estate was not recognised; but in the Court of Chancery the bishop might have redress. Or suppose the lessee chose to follow the example of Mr. Murray, and levant—what could be done? On the one side, the bishop could not assert his interest without the intervention of the lessee; and, on the other, if the lessee chose to leave the

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country and his ownership, the power given to him by the lease would be a very great detriment to the see. But they were told that what the bishop had done he had a perfectly legal right to do. He admitted it; but the more shame to our legislators. It was because the legislation of the Church had been left to the bishops of the Church, that such legal power was possessed. But though the Bishop of Gloucester might have a legal right to this estate, he had violated a moral obligation by his proceeding. Take the analogy of a Court of Law. Take the case of a trustee of any charity. It was notorious that such a trustee could not lease to himself any of the charity estates, nor to a co-trustee. What he could not do directly, he could not do indirectly. The lease to his secretary, therefore, would be void; and even in this case there was a suspicion attaching to it, because the Bishop of Gloucester could not grant a lease to himself, and he was obliged to do it indirectly, and avail himself of the power that was left to him enabling him so to do it. But Church lands stood in a different position from charity lands. The Legislature seemed at first to have thought the sacred character of the bishops was a sufficient guarantee that the property of the Church would not be alienated; but subsequently, when it was found that Church property was alienated, and that the Church was thereby injured, various laws were passed to restrain and limit the power of the bishops. The preamble of the statute of the 13th Elizabeth showed exactly what were the intentions of the Legislature at that time, what abuses were complained of, and what matters were intended to be remedied. The preamble ran thus:—
"And for that long and unreasonable leases made by colleges, deans and chapters, parsons, vicars and others having spiritual promotions, be the chiefest cause of the dilapidations and the decay of all spiritual livings and hospitality, and the utter impoverishing of all successors incumbents in the same; Be it enacted," &c. &c.
By that Act ecclesiastical dignitaries were not allowed to lease estates beyond three lives or twenty-one years. Those restrictions were not sufficient, and in 1836 an Act was passed restoring more fully the fiduciary character of the bishops. The Legislature then gave to our prelates fixed incomes. A bishop coming into possession of the see of Gloucester and Bristol under that Act knew he was to have an income of 5,000 l., and although the management of the estates of the see was left in the
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bishop's hands, everything beyond the 5,000 l. a year was manifestly a trust; and Parliament did not expect that when they left the management of the estates of the see in the hands of the bishop as a trustee, that he was himself to become the great devastator of the Church, and alienate the lands of which the management was so left to him. And observe how that was done. The Bishop of Gloucester made no return, whatever of what he received from the acquisition of this estate. he made his return independently of it under the Act of Parliament. He derived no income from this estate; he invested capital upon it to make it valuable. A few years hence every sixpence he had laid out on the estate would tell immensely. In the meanwhile he retained merely 5,000 l. a year; but when he died he left a valuable estate to his family, which he had thus alienated, and which by his management during his life he had taken care should make a good return. Was it any answer to all this to be told that the Bishop of Gloucester had legal rights? that what the Bishop of Gloucester had done, other bishops had done? and that when he complained of their doing so, was it any answer to him to say they were exercising legal rights? Had the bishops no influence, no power, no responsibility but that which was vested in them by Act of Parliament? He held that a bishop, of all other persons, had the estates vested in him by the Church under the highest moral responsibility. He was placed in that position in order that he should be a light and example to others. We expected that our bishops should set an example of piety, of self-devotion, of indifference to worldly interests; that they should be guides and examples to others in all those unworldly and higher avocations and duties of which they were intended to be both the teachers and the observers. A right rev. Prelate the other night, in a debate on a question connected with the Church, said that the Church was weakened through its divine mission being forgotten. But from whom came that forgetfulness? When the House looked at the return recently laid on the table upon the Motion of his hon. Friend the Member for Marylebone (Sir B. Hall)—when they looked at the description given there of the proceedings among the episcopal body, the scramblings that seemed to be going on, the way in which they tore at each other—complaints that one was getting

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more than his neighbour—that some were receiving 1,000 l. a year more than they ought to have—and others receiving 1,000 l. a year less than they expected to have; and when they found that the prelate who got some thousands more than the income intended for him by Parliament did not pay what the Order in Council directed him to pay to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners—when they found that those who got 5,000 l. or 10,000 l. a year more than was expected or intended, made no return or abatement on their part—and when they saw the manner in which three prelates alone, in the course of fourteen years, had received nearly 250,000 l. more than those sees were intended to receive by Act of Parliament—he said it was the bishops who had forgotten the Divine mission of the Church. And yet he was accused of making attacks on individuals. He answered it was only by individual examples that great abuses could be exposed and rooted out. In all these cases it was the Church that suffered. They were told that they ought not to attack the venerable prelates, who were old and infirm. Let him ask this question. Take the 250,000 l. which had gone into the pockets of three prelates alone; consider how many clergymen and churches that money might have provided for; consider to how many poor cottages it might have brought home the blessings of religious truth; and when he was told that the bishops whom he attacked were old and infirm, he would ask what was the number of persons old and infirm who had been deprived in their last moments of the blessings of Divine instruction, who had seen their children sinking into vice, their families dispersed, their sons sent as criminals to penal settlements, to the hulks, or to the gibbet, and they themselves sent down brokenhearted to the grave? How many of these poor families might have been saved from ruin if that which was bequeathed for the special purpose, by the benevolence of former generations, had not been by the bishops of the Established Church diverted from it—if they themselves had not been the devastators, the robbers, and the plunderers of the poor, whom it was their Divine mission to guide—if they had not themselves done injury to the Church, by tending to destroy confidence in that truth of which they were the appointed guides, and of which they ought to have been the Divine teachers.
MR. GLADSTONE: Mr. Speaker, when it was arranged, with some departure from the ordinary course of business for the night, that we should enter into the discussion of the case of Horfield Manor, I must confess I little anticipated the nature of the statements that have been made by the hon. Gentleman who has just sat down. The hon. Gentleman has entered into a vindication of himself, which I, for one, am bound to confess was much needed; and, departing from the subject of Horfield Manor, seriously to the public inconvenience, and little to the advantage of the particular question with which the hon. Gentleman has dealt, he has passed from the defence of his own statement to speculations on the future condition of Horfield Manor: now the future condition of Horfield Manor had nothing whatever to do with his statement. The hon. Gentleman then proceeded with his observations on the revenues of the sees of Bristol and Gloucester—from the revenues of the sees of Bristol and Gloucester to the revenues of all other bishops, to a general disquisition on their duties, and to a denunciation of them, in terms which I think are violent and unwarrantable—as robbers, devastators, and plunderers of the Church. In regard to the general system established by law, the hon. Gentleman spoke in words which I fully confirm. He said that the badness of our legislative arrangements were matters discreditable to ourselves. I sincerely agree with the hon. Gentleman in that doctrine. I agree with him in the badness of the system which prevails; but it is one thing to denounce a bad system, and it is another thing to judge with great severity those who are merely acting under a bad system that has been long established. And it is a great stride further, not only to deal with them with great severity, but also to misrepresent the transactions in which they are engaged. I shall touch lightly on the points in the hon. Gentleman's speech that I think external to the main question. He speaks of the income of the see of Gloucester—it is difficult to follow the hon. Gentleman—he did not give us in precise terms his returns; he may be right, and I wrong; he stated that in 1848 the income of the see of Gloucester was 11,107 l. [Mr. HORSMAN: With the commendams.] I beg pardon; the hon. Gentleman did not say with the commendams. He said there was a surplus of 34,000 l. from the episcopal estates alone. I am in

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the judgment of the House, and I ask if the hon. Gentleman has not stated the revenues of the sees of Gloucester and Bristol, from episcopal sources alone, to be 11,107 l. in 1848? I understand his meaning now; but on this and on many occasions, his omissions, most unfortunately, are inconvenient, for I understood him to rate the commendams at 1,700 l. a year.
MR. HORSMAN: I read from a paper that I hold in my hand. I said the Bishop of Gloucester told the Commissioners that he put down the income—
MR. GLADSTONE: I have said nothing about what the Bishop of Gloucester told the Commissioners; but I have said that the hon. Gentleman stated the revenue of the sees of Gloucester and Bristol to be, in 1848, 11,107 l. He now says he intended to include the commendams, and it will give you an idea of the hon. Gentleman's accuracy when I tell you that the commendams which are now added are stated to be 1,700 l. a year. It would now appear, according to the hon. Gentleman's statement, that the income of the sees of Gloucester and Bristol is 9,407 l. a year, for the whole income was stated to be in 1848, 11,107 l. Now here is a paper, ordered by the House of Commons, the 16th of June, 1851, according to which the revenue of the sees of Gloucester and Bristol, in 1848, was not 9,407 l. a year, but 6,200 l., subject to a deduction of about 200 l. I will not charge the hon. Gentleman with inaccuracy; out when he says that the Bishop of Gloucester received from episcopal sources alone this surplus of 34,000 l., how in the world is it possible that his statement can be correct? [Mr. HORSMAN: I said 34,000 l. over his own calculation.] That is immaterial. If over his own calculation, I can find nothing to verify the statement of the hon. Gentleman. In page 398 of the return of the 16th of June, the following are the net returns from the joint sees:—In 1844, 3,500 l.; 1845, 3,400 l.; 1846, 7,600 l.; 1847, 2,900 l.; 1848, 6,000 l.; 1849, 4,500 l.; 1850, 3,900 l. That was for the last seven years; and how was it possible for the hon. Gentleman to make a surplus of 34,000 l. over the bishop's calculation, or over any other calculation, if those figures be correct? [Mr. HORSMAN: I said over his calculation since 1836.] Yes, over his calculation since 1836. I have given a return for the last seven years; let us take the year 1848, in which
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he stated the income to be 11,107 l., and let him say how he can vindicate that statement on the basis of facts as they are stated in this official report. I readily concur in what the hon. Gentleman says, with ragard to the duties of bishops, the motives by which they should discharge their offices, and the views they should take of their own position as trustees of the Church and of the powers confided to them. I entirely agree in all he says in the abstract on the subject; but I am bound to say that our laws and political arrangements proceed on a different order of ideas. [Mr. HORSMAN: Hear, hear!] The hon. Gentleman owns it—they proceed on a different position; they contemplate a close connection between the bishops and the world, and the views, perhaps, of the Minister; and if we have that legislative system in existence, it is not fair to come down upon those who are, to a great extent, the creatures of it, and find fault with them because they don't come up to your abstract, and, I will say, your sound, notions of the episcopal duties? I now come to the manor of Horfield, with which our business is. If the hon. Gentleman wished to have a discussion on any other questions, we ought to have had a distinct notice with respect to those other questions. The question in respect to the manor of Horfield divides itself into two parts. First, has the Bishop of Gloucester taken a course that calls for the censure of this House? and, secondly, whether the hon. Gentleman, as a Member of this House, has exercised due diligence and care in the statement he has submitted to the House, and by which, as he must recollect, he wrought up the House on the occasion he made it to a high state of feeling and of excitement. The hon. Gentleman has entered into the future; he says the property alienated from the Church is worth so much now, and will be worth so much hereafter. He is perfectly right, and has stated a great deal in that part of the case which is matter fit for the serious consideration of the Bishop of Gloucester. I hope, and I feel convinced, that the Bishop of Gloucester, for the sake of his own character, will show that he has not the slightest intention of doing what the hon. Gentleman has thought fit to impute to him; but the hon. Gentleman has no right to judge of acts that are not done. The Bishop of Gloucester has certain legal powers, and by pushing them to extremes he may deprive the Church of advantages

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that it might otherwise enjoy; and I am glad, by the picture that has been drawn, his attention has been called to the evil which may be done—it is well he should have it before him—but let not the House confound the possibility of those apprehended evils with an attack made upon the Bishop of Gloucester, for a violation of absolute pledges and a breach of engagements, and doing that which would be a fair matter for arraignment at the bar of this House. The hon. Gentleman, I think, will agree with me that in one point he must sympathise with the Bishop of Gloucester. When he states that the bishop has this power over the manor of Horfield, and may leave it to his family, he must feel this much—that, whatever may be the intention of the Bishop of Gloucester, he cannot as a gentleman declare that intention at this present moment. No Gentleman could expect that he would so declare it, for if he did, it would deprive of all grace whatever acts he may hereafter contemplate performing on the part of the Church. I think the Bishop of Gloucester is bound to say, I will act upon my own discretion—I will act upon my own responsibility. If he does say that, and if he uses his powers injuriously to the Church, or if he uses them against right principles, then you may condemn him; but it is not fair to condemn him beforehand, because the law has invested him with powers which you have not, up to the present moment, the slightest indication of his having any intention to abuse. I will state—what was, I think, unfounded in the statement of the hon. Gentleman, according to the impression it made on my mind the other night. The first charge was this, that Bishop Gray, at a certain period before his death, determined not to renew the lease of Horfield, but to let it run out, so far as he was concerned, for the benefit of the Church. Is that allegation sustained? In my opinion it has entirely broken down. The hon. Gentleman himself has quoted a letter to-night, written by a son of Bishop Grays which plainly declares that, so late as a few months before the decease of Bishop Gray, an offer was made to him for a renewal of the lease, which he refused; and why?—because the offer was inadequate. That is the first allegation of the hon. Gentleman. The second allegation was, that Bishop Allen had been bound by Lord Melbourne not to renew the lease during his incumbency. I will not speak of that charge, because the hon. Gentleman aban-
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dons it. He does not at all pretend that there is any reason to believe that Lord Melbourne ever imposed such an obligation on Bishop Allen. [Mr. HORSMAN: I don't admit anything of the kind.] The House understood the hon. Gentleman on the former occasion to speak of a matter which, if not within his personal knowledge, was at all events beyond reasonable doubt. With regard to Bishop Allen, I shall only say, in my opinion, the hon. Gentleman has totally failed in proving that Bishop Allen had made arrangements to renew the lease of Horfield, on the ground of promoting the interests of the Church. Bishop Allen wrote a letter, in which he said he thought it quite right that the Ecclesiastical Commissioners should take the lease of Horfield into their own hands. But then the Ecclesiastical Commissioners were not to renew the lease to the prejudice of Bishop Allen; they were to become the purchasers of his interest in the lease; and the transfer of the lease to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners would have been a matter of perfect indifference to them. The statement of the hon. Gentleman was, that Bishop Allen was determined to sacrifice his own personal interest, and not to renew the lease. I say, on the contrary, that Bishop Allen had no such intention. The hon. Gentleman has referred to the letter of the Bishop of Gloucester. The hon. Gentleman, on the former occasion, said the Secretary to the Ecclesiastical Commismissioners wrote to the Bishop about his moral obligation; that the bishop wrote back to him to say that he knew nothing about moral obligation, but that he wanted to stand on his legal rights. [Mr. HORSMAN here made a motion of dissent.] The hon. Gentleman appears to dissent. I will only state what is in my own recollection, leaving it to him to contradict me. The hon. Gentleman imputed distinctly to the bishop, either in writing or in words—it makes little matter which—the declaration that he knew nothing about moral obligation, and that he meant to stand on his legal rights. Does the hon. Gentleman adhere to that portion of his statement?
MR. HORSMAN: I adhere to all I said before. I will not adhere to the right hon. Gentleman's representation of what I said.
MR. GLADSTONE: Well, I have stated my representation of it, and that to the best of my recollection, and if I ant incorrect in my statement, hon. Members who were, with myself, auditors of the

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hon. Gentleman's charges, can easily confute it. I contend, therefore, that that portion of the charge has totally and entirely failed. Again, I understood the hon. Gentleman distinctly to state, that when an arrangement had been made between the Ecclesiastical Commissioners and the Bishop, that arrangement was stopped at the last moment, in consequence of its being detected as a job. Does the hon. Gentleman adhere to that portion of his statement? He has not given us one jot or tittle of evidence in support of that portion of his statement; and the absence of evidence on this point is most material, because the hon. Gentleman well knows that a distinct allegation has been made elsewhere that the failure of that arrangement had nothing to do with any disapproval of it on its own merits, but simply resulted from a technical and legal point which arose in the course of the negotiation. But these to me were the most material allegations in the speech of the hon. Gentleman; and they have all vanished away, as I measure them by the speech which the hon. Gentleman has delivered to-night. He has laboured indeed—and very unnecessarily—his statement with regard to the letter of the Bishop of Gloucester to the rural deans of his diocese. Another point also on which he has said so much, with regard to the accuracy of the bishop's writing, as to whether an epithet followed the word "very," or did not follow it, is comparatively a very small question. The main question is, what was the act that the bishop was then describing? The hon. Gentleman says a statement has been made to produce the impression that no letter of this nature was written by the Bishop of Gloucester. I think the hon. Gentleman is entirely wrong, and that he has taken the effect of that statement from reports, on which, though generally faithful and accurate, it is not safe always to rely when minute particulars are in question. Now, the statement made was this, that no letter had been written by the Bishop of Gloucester of the nature to which the hon. Gentleman had alluded. The hon. Gentleman said the Bishop of Gloucester had written a letter, in which he treated as disparaging to himself, the idea that he was about to renew the lease. That part of the charge quite falls away, because his charge was that the bishop had renewed the lease, and thereby had done an act which he in a former letter bad treated as disgraceful to himself.
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Now what the bishop meant to treat as disparaging to himself, was the idea that he was going to renew the lease for lives, on a particular tenure, in connection with the copyholds, which he thought so injurious to the Church. I must say, so far as I am able to follow the statement of the hon. Gentleman, which I cannot avoid complaining is very obscure, that he has failed entirely in proving his case, with regard to the imputations that he, on a previous occasion, threw out on the Bishop of Gloucester. The truth is, that the Bishop of Gloucester has made use of the rights which he possesses in common with every ecclesiastical proprietor. You may say ecclesiastical proprietors ought not to possess such rights. That is a matter which you are at perfect liberty to allege; but I say an opinion on the merits of a system is one thing, and the misapprehending, the misconstruing, and therefore the misrepesenting the acts of the man who acts simply under that system, is another matter altogether. I say that it is a hard and cruel thing that the Bishop of Gloucester should be held up to obloquy in consequence of the defect of this system, when I believe he has been acting with munificent intentions towards the Church of which he is a bishop. I grant that the Bishop of Gloucester is under no legal obligation whatever with respect to this matter; and whether he is under any moral obligation or not, my belief is, that he does intend to act on the principles which he has laid down for himself with regard to this lease of Horfield Manor. He has stated that he thought it his duty to make this lease subservient to the interests and purposes of the Church. His conduct differs from that of ecclesiastical proprietors in general. In the first place, as a fine was to be taken on the renewal of the lease, he made an offer to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, which they have described as a liberal offer, and consequently demanding their acknowledgments on the ground of its liberality. Then, as respects the destination which he intended to give to the money to be received for the renewal of the lease, the intention of the Bishop of Gloucester was to apply the greater part of whatever money he might receive for the renewal of the lease to the very purposes which the hon. Gentleman is so laudably desirous to promote—namely, the augmentation of the smaller livings in his diocese, and the increase of the stipends of the poorer clergy.
MR. HORSMAN,in explanation, said he must repeat his previous statement as to the excess of income which the Bishop of Gloucester would receive in a given time from episcopal sources over what the right rev. Prelate said he would receive.
SIR JAMES GRAHAMsaid, he was not quite sure that such a discussion as this would have a tendency to promote the public interest. If he remained silent on this subject, he was afraid his silence might be misconstrued; at all events, he thought silence on his part would not be respectful towards the House. He was not a member of the Ecclesiastical Commission until 1841, and therefore he had no direct cognisance of the proceedings of that Commission of an antecedent date. He wished also to remark that he had frequently, on former occasions, expressed a strong opinion that the law with regard to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, until amended last Session, was not in a satisfactory state. He entirely disapproved of the distinction between the episcopal fund and the common fund; and he had always thought that the arrangement made with respect to the incomes of the bishops, in allowing them for seven years to receive the whole revenues of their respective sees, on the condition that they should repay annually a stipulated sum, was a most disadvantageous arrangement to the prelates themselves, but more particularly to the interests of the Church. He rejoiced that last year, prospectively, an effectual remedy was applied by the Legislature to what he thought was a great evil as it respected the interests of the Church. He could have hoped and wished that there might have been some forbearance shown in canvassing the past arrangements, which in his judgment were inexpedient, but which were now at an end. He had no acquaintance with the Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol, except such acquaintance as arose from the intercourse at the Board of the Ecclesiastical Commission, of which they were common members; but, as a member of the Church of England, and as a member of the community, he (Sir J. Graham) must say he had always regarded the Bishop of Gloucester as an accomplished scholar; as a gentleman of high reputation and character; and, above all, he must say he had always considered him not a niggard in pecuniary matters. He had always thought that in the University to which the Bishop belonged, in the Church, and in the diocese in which he
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was best known (and he must say the right rev. Prelate had arrived at an age somewhere about 70 years)—he had enjoyed a spotless reputation, and a high character as a ripe scholar and man of honour. He (Sir J. Graham) considered it most unfortunate that transactions of a description which the hon. Gentleman the Member for Cockermouth (Mr. Horsman) had thought it his duty to bring under the attention of the House, should for one moment, or in the slightest degree, have cast any shade of doubt over that spotless reputation. But he must say, with respect to those transactions, the part which he (Sir J. Graham) had personally taken, led him to entertain no suspicions whatever either of the motives or of the conduct of that right rev. Prelate. He (Sir J. Graham) had no doubt of his legal and equitable right to exercise the power over the estate of Horfield which, it was said, he had exercised. He (Sir J. Graham) assisted in negotiating with the right rev. Prelate as a member of the Commission; and after a full inquiry into this point, he was satisfied that the right rev. Prelate's rights, both legal and equitable, were indisputable. His right hon. Friend (Mr. Gladstone) who preceded him, had explained to the House all the circumstances which gave rise to the transaction. He (Sir J. Graham) was satisfied that it was the intention of the Bishop of Gloucester to apply the funds which would have arisen from the sale to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners to purposes conducive to the benefit of the Church in his diocese, and most assuredly not for any personal profit or advantage. He was really sorry they could not resume the ancient habit of free conference, because the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Horsman) had referred to the speech of a bishop in another place. If they could meet the bishops face to face, and debate those matters with them on equal terms, he thought the hon. Gentleman would not have rejoiced so greatly in the conflict which he maintained behind their backs, for he firmly believed he would have found that the right rev. Prelates were quite a match for him. But he would put it to the hon. Gentleman, was it really worthy of him to hold up the Bishop of Gloucester, a gentleman possessing the character which he (Sir J. Graham) had ascribed to him, as "a robber" and a "plunderer"? He believed the hon. Gentleman was not unfriendly to the Church; but would one of its bitterest enemies condescend to use the language

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which the hon. Gentleman had employed with reference to the character of the Bishop of Gloucester? He almost blushed for the hon. Gentleman as he listened to the language which fell from him in reference to that right rev. Prelate. Again, he (Sir J. Graham) said he was himself satisfied that the Bishop of Gloucester had a legal and equitable right to deal with this estate. Possessing that right, he had also reason to know that the right rev. Prelate was determined to exercise it. With all due deference to the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Horsman), he (Sir J. Graham) altogether disbelieved that either Bishop Gray or Bishop Allen had hesitated in the least as to their right to exercise a similar power: He did not believe that Lord Melbourne ever imposed any conditions whatever with respect to the exorcise of that power by Bishop Allen. He did not think that Lord Melbourne had any right to make such a stipulation; nor did he think it would have been consistent with the high character for generosity of that noble Lord to have imposed such conditions. He thought the evidence was conclusive that Bishop Allen had negotiated for a renewal of the lease, and that, like Bishop Gray, he only failed to execute the lease because he did not obtain what he considered was the full value of its renewal. The Bishop of Gloucester had placed himself in a position which enabled him to exercise a testamentary power, complete in all its parts, over this property. The Bishop of Gloucester had a legal right to dispose of it as he thought fit. But if the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Horsman) would abstain from pursuing that right rev. Prelate with such relentless animosity, and would cease to ascribe to him all the worst motives and the worst intentions, his (Sir J. Graham's) firm belief was, that the Bishop of Gloucester, who would not yield in the least to any compulsion, would falsify by his spontaneous acts all their unworthy suspicions. Still, not being on intimate terms with the Bishop, and only judging of him from his past character, he (Sir J. Graham) was of opinion that the right which the Bishop had now legally and equitably acquired, to the full possession of this property for three lives, would not be exercised by the Bishop in a manner unworthy of his high position in the Church, or of the sacred interests of which he was the trustee. He (Sir J. Graham) might not live to see it, but he should be much disappointed if the right rev. Prelate did not prove it. On the whole,
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during the remainder of his life, the Bishop of Gloucester must be content to live subject to such charges as the hon. Gentleman the Member for Cockermouth might prefer against him. He had lived down past accusations of a similar kind—his reputation would survive him—.and his acts, if he (Sir J. Graham) mistook not, would falsify the description given of him by the hon. Gentleman.
SIR BENJAMIN HALLwas quite confident that some good result would arise from these discussions, however unpleasant they might be for any Gentleman to bring forward. However distasteful it might be, it was necessary in bringing forward any measure of reform in the temporalities of the Church, to quote individual cases, in order to show the abuses which were practised by certain parties on the episcopal bench. But he rose more especially to express a hope that the Government, who were the proper parties to take up the matter, would go into the whole question of the temporalities, and that they would appoint a Commission to inquire into the whole of the temporalities, that they might have at least some correct information upon the amount of the Church property. Don't let them, however, leave it to the present Ecclesiastical Commissioners; for there were too many interested parties upon it. Let them have a Commission like that appointed to inquire into the subdivision of parishes, who would give an impartial statement as to the property of the Church. He wished now to ask a question of the right hon. Member for the University of Cambridge (Mr. Goulburn). A return had recently been obtained, which had attracted great attention in Parliament and the country. That paper purported to give the gross incomes of all the archbishops and bishops of our Church; and in a second series of columns there appeared the sums paid, in order to reduce those gross incomes to the sums specified in the Act of Parliament. Now, he wished the public really to know whether this fully reported the incomes of the bishops, or whether it was what Mr. Murray had called a "fallacious" return. The bishops were requested to make at septennial periods a return to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners of the value of their sees, and of all the profits they had derived from them during the previous seven years. Now he would take this case. He had shown to the House that the Bishop of Durham had received 29,000 l. more

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than the income assigned to his see, and he (Sir B. Hall) wished to ask whether, if he had granted (he did not say he had, but supposing he had granted) a lease to trustees for his own benefit, or for the benefit of his family or friends, and no money had passed, the full value of the lease so granted would have entered into his accounts?
MR. GOULBURNthought it would only have been fair for the hon. Gentleman (Sir B. Hall) to have given him notice of his intention to ask that question. It so happened, however, that, with regard to the Bishop of Durham, he (Mr. Goulburn) was not able to give the hon. Gentleman an answer; but he knew that the principle on which the Ecclesiastical Commissioners settled the future incomes of sees was regulated not only by the amount received, but by other circumstances which would tend to give a fair result for the future. By the returns which the Bishop of Loudon made of his income for the last seven years, it appeared that he especially granted a lease, not for lives but for years, of some property; and the fine which would have been taken if that lease had been granted to an individual in the ordinary way, was brought to account in the septennial period.
SIR BENJAMIN HALLsaid, the right hon. Gentleman had misunderstood his question, and he would now put it more clearly to him. At page 234, in the second return, it was stated that the Bishop of London, in 1843, returned his income at 13,519 l., and in that year he granted himself a lease which was worth 12,000 l., but which he had only entered as 2,169 l. Therefore he (Sir B. Hall) presumed that this was what Mr. Murray called a "fallacious return" as regarded the Bishop of London.
MR. GOULBURNsaid, the Bishop of London, in the case referred to, had made a large sacrifice. He had the power of granting a lease for lives, but he granted a lease only for years, which was the most profitable way of dealing with the property for the interests of the Church. If he had granted a lease in the ordinary manner, the whole fine which he received would have appeared in the return for the year in which the lease was granted; but not taking the fine, the full fine which would have been received by the Bishop was divided over the several years over which the lease had to run.
SIR ROBERT INGLISsaid, from the
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first year in which the present Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol was appointed to the see he now held, he appropriated tea per cent of the income of that see to the augmentation of the livings of the poorer clergy in his diocese. That was some intimation of the conduct which the right rev. Prelate was likely to pursue in the disposal of his present income. When Her Majesty's Government were invited to issue a Commission to inquire into the general state of the episcopacy, he hoped the House would not adopt the suggestion that had been made, that the bishops were the creatures of the State, and were dependent on the Minister of the day. On the contrary, they were the most ancient estate in the realm, and their, independence was as high and as sacred as any other proprietor in the land.
MR. AGLIONBYsaid, he could not avoid noticing the statement of the right hon. Baronet (Sir J. Graham), that the Bishop of Gloucester had "a legal and equitable right to deal with the property." He was afraid that the right hon. Baronet only used those expressions in a legal sense. Would he go further, and say that he considered the bishop had a moral right? He had also another question to ask, which, of course, if it were an improper one, he did not desire should be answered. He wished to know whether the approval which, as a member of the Ecclesiastical Commission, the right hon. Baronet had expressed of the bishop's, offer, was not a rather qualified one? and whether he had not accepted it as the better of two bad alternatives? His hon. Colleague had been charged with personal motives. [Sir J. GRAHAM: No, no!] At all events, "relentless animosity" had been imputed to him by the right hon. Baronet; but he could assure the House that his hon. Friend's attack was solely against the system. The best mode of meeting, or rather preventing, these charges, was, for the bishops to be satisfied with the incomes allotted to their sees by the Act of Parliament.
MR. WAWNwas sorry to find the right hon. Baronet (Sir J. Graham) defending conduct which they would severely condemn in persons of a humbler station. The borough he had the honour to represent (South Shields) was entirely Church property, and the tyrannical manner in which the dignitaries behaved, was such as to disgust all well-thinking men. Years ago, when the right hon. Gentlemen oppo-

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site occupied the Treasury benches, he had boldly stood forward and declared that if there were Church robbers, they were inside of it, and not outside.
MR. MANGLESbegged to ask the right hon. Baronet if he intended to answer the question of the hon. Member near him (Mr. Aglionby)?
SIR JAMES GRAHAMsaid, the question put to him by the hon. Member for Cockermouth (Mr. Aglionby), was, whether he would declare that the Bishop of Gloucester was under a moral obligation to renew this lease? He would read to the hon. Gentleman the Resolution, to which he (Sir J. Graham) was a party, from the Minutes of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners:—
"The Bishop of Gloucester having been under no obligation—legal or equitable—to deal with the Horfield estate otherwise than with any other estate of his see, and having made, with regard to that estate, a liberal offer to the board, the board are anxious to bring the negotiation to a termination, and desire that the secretary be directed to bring it to a close as soon as possible."
He (Sir J. Graham) was of opinion, and still continued of opinion, that the bishop, having a legal and equitable right to fill up the lives in the lease, did offer to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners very liberal terms, far below the market price of his legal and equitable right, and that he made that offer to the Commissioners with a desire to serve the interests of the Church generally.
MR. REYNOLDShoped that if there was to be a reform in episcopal revenues, Ireland would not be forgotten. He held in his hand a very important document, namely, a copy of the concordat between the Queen of Spain and his Holiness the Pope. By that he found that the salary of the Archbishop of Toledo would be 160,000 reals or 1,600 l. a year; that of the Archbishops of Granada and Santiago, 1,400 l. each; and so with the Archbishops of Tarragona and Valladolid. He might not pronounce these names rightly, for he begged them to understand that he was no Spaniard, but an Irishman. The Bishops of Barcelona and Madrid were to have 1,100 l. of Cadiz, Cordova, and Malaga, 1,000 l.: twenty-four suffragans, 900 l., and twenty others, 800 l. The Patriarch of the Indies, not being an archbishop or bishop, would have 1,500 l. a year, and those prelates that were cardinals 200 l. a year extra. He hoped, then, that when they saw prelates with flocks whose salaries ranged from a minimum of 800 l. to a maximum of
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1,600 l., the awful extravagance of an Archbishop of Armagh, with an income of 17,000 l, a year, would be put an end to.
MR. LENNARDsaid, that the right hou. Baronet the Member for Ripon (Mr. J. Graham) had shown himself in the answer which he had given to a very plain question, a perfect adept in that mental fencing in which he had said the prelates were so skilful. He had said the transaction in question was justifiable in a legal and equitable view. He had been asked, did he justify it morally? If he had thought this an improper question, he might have declined to answer it; but instead of doing so, he read a long statement which was altogether unsatisfactory. He should like to hear whether the transaction was one which he could say was justifiable in a moral as well as legal point of view.
Subject dropped.

SUPPLY.
House in Committee of Supply; Mr. Bernal in the Chair.
Motion made, and Question proposed—
"That a sum, not exceeding 148,490 l., be granted to Her Majesty, to defray the Charge of the Consular Establishments Abroad, to the 31st day of March, 1852."
MR. URQUHARTrose to move, as an Amendment, that the Vote be reduced by 4,000 l. The Special Committee upon Official Salaries had not, it was true, made any report upon this branch of the subject, but they had recommended their own reappointment this Session, in order that this portion of the subject might come under their consideration. That Committee, however, had not been reappointed, but he thought that the House had sufficient materials before them themselves to insist upon a reduction in these establishments. He believed that our consular establishments were generally the most defective branch of the Administration. He had had some experience of the service, and anything more disorganised, more irregular, or less fitted for the performance of the duties of their office, it was impossible to conceive. In contrast with our consular establishments was that of France, which had been organised under the former estate in an admirable manner. The Consuls of France, unlike our own, had legal acquirements and legal knowledge. Their previous acquirements were also tested by an examination, and when they had once attained a certain grade, their advancement was regular, and strangers to the service

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were not put over their heads. He could not admit that in such a matter our great commercial nation ought to he behind a country like Trance. Our Consul at St. Petersburg, with 750 l. a year, was appointed without previous service in that capacity. The English Consul at Paris had but 200 l. a year, while the Consul at Warsaw had an income of 1,000 l. allotted to him—a discrepancy which could not he reasonably accounted for, but the duties of which would, he believed, be amply remunerated by a salary of 500 l. a year. The Consuls at Havanah and at Manilla had 1,000 l. a year each; but 500 l. would be quite enough for the services which they performed. He had no objection to make to the salary of 600 l. enjoyed by our Consul at Lisbon; but he thought the sum of 1,000 l., paid to the Consul General of the Austrian States, was excessive. He next came to the consulate of Greece. Our Consul at Patras had 700 l. a year, a sum which was perfectly preposterous, and a much smaller amount than 500 l. a year would be amply sufficient for him. The salaries of 800 l. and 900 l. a year, paid to the Consuls General at Belgrade and Bucharest, were also much too high. He had also to complain that some of these officers were not very constant in their attendance at their posts. On these three last-named appointments a legitimate reduction might be made of 900 l. The Consul General at Constantinople, who received 1,500 l. a year for his services, would be well paid by 1,000 l.; or even by 800 l. a year. The Consulate in Syria had been very properly abolished; but why not dispense with the functions of a Consul in Egypt also? In Tripoli, the salary of 1,600 l., given to the Consul General, ought to be reduced to 600 l. a year. This surely might easily be effected, since the Government had reduced the salaries of our Consuls at Boston and New York from 400 l. and 700 l. a year, to 200 l. and 300 l. respectively. At Montevideo the Consul General had a salary of 1,400 l., while at Buenos Ayres, for what reason he could not see, a far less salary was paid. The reductions which he thought should be made in our consular establishments amouuted to 16,250 l., independently of the case of Borneo, which he intended to bring as a separate Motion before the Committee. He would not, however, ask the Committee to agree, on so short a notice, to a reduction of 16,250 l., but would confine his Motion to one-fourth of that sum.
Motion made, and Question put—
"That a sum, not exceeding 144,490 l. be granted to Her Majesty, to defray the Charge of the Consular Establishments Abroad, to the 31st day of March, 1852."
VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, the hon. Gentleman who had just resumed his seat considered our consular service ill organised and inferior in efficiency to the consular services of other countries. He (Lord Palmerston) was perhaps better qualified to speak on that head than the hon. Gentleman, as knowing more of the manner in which our consular officers performed their duties. And he would take upon himself to say that, without any exception, no consular service in the world was better performed than the consular service of this country. The consular service of France might be organised in a more regular manner, or more conformably with the views of the hon. Gentleman; but he (Lord Palmerston)—and, he was sure, every one else who filled his office, could bear testimony to the fact, judging from their ability and the manner in which they discharged their duties—that, in point of efficiency, a better consular service did not exist in any country. Their duties were very various and arduous; not only had they to perform all kinds of duties with regard to commercial interests on the spot, but they had to collect valuable information from all sources and of all kinds, which was regularly submitted to the Foreign Office and to the Board of Trade. He would also venture to say, that in point of efficiency and ability, instead of meriting the censure of the hon. Gentleman, they were entitled to his praise and commendation. Among the different appointments which he referred to, he put first and foremost that held by a person who had the misfortune on a former occasion, and in another country, to have had some little difference with the hon. Member; of course that consideration could not have weighed with him for a moment in wishing to reduce the salary of the Consul at Warsaw. Now, any one who knew anything at all of the scale of expense incurred at Warsaw by the gentleman who held the rank of consul, and represented a great country like England, would be of opinion, on comparing his salary with that of similar officers there, belonging to other countries, that the sum was rather below than above the amount that a person in his position required. He said that, in

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Paris, we had only a Consul at 200 l. a year, and asked why one at Warsaw required a higher sum paid to him? The English Consul at Paris, he should explain, was a consul's clerk, who merely performed subordinate duties under the direction of the embassy; and the only reason he gave him the rank of consul was, that it would better enable him to perform certain duties of routine; but he was not an independent officer, who received instructions from the Secretary of State, but simply a consul's clerk, attached to the embassy of Paris. Now, with regard to the Consuls in Wallachia, Servia, and Moldavia, they all had duties more of a political than of a peculiarly commercial nature; and those provinces were parts of the world in which there were countries of very considerable interest, and therefore it was important to have persons who were qualified to give both political and commercial information. It did so happen that one officer was absent on account of ill health, at the period to which the hon. Member adverted; but it was not expected that every officer, stationed in a foreign country, should perpetually remain at their posts—they must occasionally have leave of absence, either in regard to private affairs, or on account of ill health. If consuls were never allowed to move from their respective stations until no events of interest happened, they would be put to the greatest inconvenience. The hon. Member said that the Consul General at Constantinople ought to have his pay reduced, because, at a former period, he (Lord Palmerston) intended to abolish the appointment. Like the hon. Member, he had an impression at one period that the office might be dispensed with; but, on further examination, he was satisfied with regard to the importance of the office, and that it was right and proper for the public interest to maintain the Consul General at Constantinople. The salary he received, looking to the importance of his duties, was not more than he was fairly entitled to. With regard to Smyrna, the hon. Member said the Consul received 600 l. a year, and that as the Committee on Official Salaries recommended 500 l., he thought the sum ought to be reduced to that amount, as a model for the salaries of all other consuls. He (Lord Palmerston) believed that the Consul would tell him that the 600 l. a year was a very small salary, considering the duties he had to perform. There was great commerce at Smyrna, and, having regard to
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the expense of living at that place, he could not suppose the Committee would adopt the dictum of the hon. Member. With regard to the Consul General at Egypt, the hon. Member observed that the office of consul-general at Syria had been abolished, and that, therefore, the same course might he adopted at Egypt. After the campaign in 1841, previous to which, it was important to have an officer in Syria, not merely commercial, but political, with the rank of consul-general, he thought the same reason no longer existed, and he took advantage of the vacancy in the office of the embassy at Constantinople to transfer to that capital the Consul in Syria. But the same ground did not apply to Egypt. It stood in a very different political position to Syria. Egypt was governed by a Pasha, who was hereditary, and did not stand in the same relation to the Porte as other Pashas. He had to pay a fixed tribute to the Porte, receiving the revenues into his own treasury—and he was, therefore, not to say independent, but to a certain extent governor-in-chief of the province of which he was Pasha. The Consul General in Egypt had political and judicial, as well as commercial duties to perform, and his position was, in many respects, arduous and responsible. Moreover, Egypt was now the great thoroughfare for English travellers passing to and from India, and the Consul General had duties of hospitality devolving upon him that materially infringed on his income. With regard to Tripoli, he intended to abolish that Consul Generalship, and was only waiting for authentic information as to the length and period of the services of the gentleman who now held the office, in order that it might be precisely determined to what sum he was entitled on the abolition of the office. With respect to the Consuls General for South America, they were diplomatic and political officers, as well as commercial officers. The hon. Gentleman wished to know why a larger salary was given to the Consul General at Monte Video than at Buenos Ayres. The reason was, that at Buenos Ayres there was a Minister Plenipotentiary, and the Consul was merely a commercial officer; whereas the Consul at Monte Video had duties of a diplomatic and political, as well as of a commercial character to perform, and acted in some sense as a Chargé d'Affaires. With respect to the Consul General at Venezuela, that gentleman had very lately rendered most

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signal service in dealing with the Venezuelan Government upon a matter of great interest and importance to the British merchants. By the enactments known always to the Venezuelans as the law of despair, the debts due to British creditors had been doomed by the Executive Government to confiscation. But owing chiefly to the exertions of the Consul General, the law of despair had been annulled, and it was to be hoped that they would soon receive intelligence that the claims of the British merchants, who were likely to be severe sufferers from that enactment, had been settled in a satisfactory manner. With regard to the Consuls in North America, the salaries of two of them—those at Boston and New York—had been already reduce. The reduction had been even carried to a point which at a first glance might appear too low; but this had been done in consideration of the large amount of fees which the Consuls at these ports were entitled to receive. Should there be any falling-off in the amount of the fees, such a diminution of income might, perhaps, furnish a sufficient reason for restoring the Consuls to their original salaries. The Consul Generalship at Algiers had been abolished, and a Consul and Vice-Consul had been substituted. He was about to abolish the Consul General at Tripoli; and the Consul General at Syria had been abolished without any substitution whatsoever. After a most minute and careful consideration of the entire question, he was compelled to say that he could see no reason whatsoever for the redections proposed by the hon. Member. It was impossible to lay down any general rule by which to regulate the precise salary to be paid to the different Consuls. The amount must of necessity depend on the expense of maintenance in various places, and in the number and nature of the duties to he performed. Sometimes the Consul was a resident merchant, with an establishment of his own, and could, therefore, afford to discharge the duties of the consulate at a much smaller cost than a person who had been specially deputed from this country for that purpose. The special circumstances of each particular case must, in every instance, regulate the allowance, and it was impossible to lay down an inflexible rule on the subject. He could only say, in conclusion, that the subject of consular expenses was one that had at all times commanded his serious
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attention, and that it should always continue to do so. He would endeavour henceforward, as he had ever done, to keep down the expenses, by abolishing all offices that were not absolutely essential, and by reducing such salaries as might appear to be greater than was necessary.
MR. ALCOCKfelt bound to express his dissatisfaction at the conduct of the Consul General at Peru. He thought it the duty of a Consul to exert himself to facilitate commercial affairs. Bat in the case of Peru, in the important article of guano, the Consul had not done his duty. A monopoly was kept up by the Peruvian Government. The importation was all but checked, in consequence of the heavy duty placed on the article, which would not have been the case had the Consul exerted himself. He wished, therefore, that the British Consul General at Lima and the Government at home would use their influence to break up that monopoly, which had the effect of maintaining the present high price of Peruvian guano; and he thought that by the imposition of very high customs duties on that article, the Chancellor of the Exchequer would be able to bring the Government of Peru to its senses.
VISCOUNT PALMERSTON: I can assure my hon. Friend and the Committee that if guano is not more plentiful in this country, the fault does not rest with the Consul General at Peru, and indeed I may with all sincerity add, that still less does it rest with me. It is now two or three years since the right hon. Baronet—whose loss we all so much deplore—Sir Robert Peel, who took more interest in the prosperity of agriculture than many gave him credit for—applied to me to persuade the Peruvian Government not to continue that monopoly, which they now adhere to, but to permit guano to be imported into this country in greater abundance. We made the attempt twice, but without success. The Peruvian Government represented that the sale of guano here supplied them with the means of paying their bondholders, and that they could not increase the supply, for that if they did, the price would fall, and they would consequently be unable to fulfil their engagements. I am very far from saying that this was a just or sufficient reason, or that in porsuing this course the Peruvian Government acted in the manner best calculated to promote even their own interests. On the contrary,

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I believe that even with a view to their own advantage, their policy was a most mistaken one, for a larger consumption of guano would have supplied them with increased means for paying their debts. Whether the course suggested by the hon. Member would operate beneficially on the Peruvian Government, or cause a larger importation of guano, is another question. I confess to some doubts on the subject; for certainly the idea of imposing a prohibitory duty on an article with a view to obtain a large supply of it, is, to say the least of it, new and unusual. And I cannot help expressing it as my opinion, that if the proposed prohibition were to deprive the Peruvian Government of the means of paying their debts, the Peruvian Government would be likely to submit to that deprivation with much greater fortitude than the agriculturists of England would exhibit on being deprived of guano.
MR. W. WILLIAMSsaid, he complained of the consular establishments of the country generally, as being salaried upon an extravagant scale. He saw no use in a consular establishment both at Alexandria and at Cairo; and he thought that one instead of the two would be sufficient for all necessary purposes. If our Consul General of Egypt indulged in hospitality, as the noble Lord had stated, he thought the taxpayers of this country ought not to be called upon to pay for it. He would support the Motion of his hon. Friend opposite.
VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, that however it might be thought unfair to tax the people of this country for the hospitality of the Consuls in Egypt, he was of opinion that it would be still more unfair that the Consuls themselves should be taxed for that hospitality which they were in a manner compelled to show towards English visitors in that country.
MR. LENNARDbegged to ask if there would be any objection to laying before the House for the future a statement of the amount of fees received by the different Consuls? The Consul at Rome was in the receipt of a large income from fees, of which nothing whatever was known.
VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, he had no objection to such a statement being made. No part of those fees were included in the Vote asked from the Committee.
The Committee divided:—Ayes 43; Noes 153; Majority 110.
MR. URQUHARTobjected to the Vote for the salary of Sir James Brooke as British Consul at Borneo, and Governor of Labuan, on the ground that he had been engaged in commercial transactions since his appointment to that office.
VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, that, as Consul, Sir James Brooke had carried on negotiations with the Government of the kingdom of Siam, and other States. He was not aware that he had been engaged in any commercial transactions.
MR. URQUHARTwas not satisfied with the general statement of the noble Lord, as he had evidence to prove that Sir James Brooke had been engaged in trade.
MR. HAWESsaid, that Sir James Brooke might have been engaged in transactions bearing the character of trading transactions before he was Governor of Labuan; but he had the distinct assurance of Sir James Brooke himself that, since that time, he had been engaged in no commercial transactions whatever.
Vote agreed to.
(2.) 16,000 l., Ministers at Foreign Courts, Extraordinary Expenses.
MR. EWARTwished to know whether the suggestions he had made on a previous occasion, which had been assented to by the noble Lord the Secretary for Foreign Affairs, concerning the necessity of examining the candidates for diplomatic offices as to their qualifications for such offices, had vet been carried into effect?
VISCOUNT PALMERSTONreplied, that he quite agreed in the suggestions that had been made by his hon. Friend, and could only plead as an excuse for not having carried them into effect, the overwhelming pressure of business during the present Session of Parliament. He quite agreed that the candidates for diplomatic offices ought to be subjected to some test of the nature that was proposed, and trusted that by the next Session he should be able to satisfy his hon. Friend.
MR. W. WILLIAMSwished to draw the attention of the Committee to the state of the diplomatic establishment in Greece. Besides the salaries of the diplomatic officers, there was a charge of 659 l. for translation and other extra expenses. He could not conceive, either, the necessity for having a Minister with 2,075 l. per annnm—besides other officers—for such a petty State as Wurtemburg. There were also extra charges amounting to 588 l. for

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the diplomatic establishment of that State. He thought the expenses of our establishment at Buenos Ayres were also too great.
VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, that there were many documents, statistical and commercial, which the Ministers were obliged to send over to this country, which required great, labour in their preparation, and for which several persons had to be employed in translating, copying, &c. With regard to Wurtemburg, that was one of the States belonging to the German Confederation, and, as such, was of peculiar importance, especially in the state in which Germany had been placed for the last two years. The Minister at Buenos Ayres had to draw an extra sum of money on account of some extensive calculations that had to be made there with respect to bills of exchange.
MR. URQUHARTsaid, very little had been done to make Englishmen the direct mode of communication between the Ministers of the Porte and this country. The Turkish Ministers, as well as the noble Lord (Viscount Palmerston), communicated in the French language. He proposed that the Vote be reduced by 750 l. for interpretation.
VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, it was desirable that the interpreters in Turkey should be British born, as they were in most other countries. Some years ago, he had applied to the Vice-Chancellors of Oxford and Cambridge Universities for a supply of young men for the embassies, who were good linguists, and could supply in Turkey, for instance, the place of the present dragomen. The Vice-Chancellors had endeavoured to supply that want, and he hoped that when vacancies occurred in the office of dragoman on the Turkish embassy, to be able to supply their places with Englishmen; but it would not be right or proper to displace the present occupants of that office. If the hon. Member for Stafford had meant to insinuate that the head of our embassy in Constantinople was not qualified to communicate in the French language, he was much mistaken, for Sir Stratford Canning was a complete master of the French tongue, the ordinary language of diplomacy. The Grand Vizier and the Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs both spoke French. But there were many matters which passed between our Embassy at Constantinople and the Turkish Govern-
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ment, in which the head of the embassies, or the heads of the Government, did not interfere, and in which it was necessary to employ dragomen.
MR. URQUHARTsaid, he objected very much to the employment of dragomen (not English) in State matters requiring confidence and security. He did not consider the explanation of the noble Lord at all satisfactory.
Vote agreed to; as were also the following Votes:—
(3.) 108,205 l., Superannuation Allowances.
(4.) 3,750 l., Toulonese and Corsican Emigrants, &c.
(5.) 2,008 l., Vaccine Establishment.
(6.) 325 l., Refuge for the Destitute.
(7.) 4,450 l., Polish Refugees and Distressed Spaniards.
(8.) Miscellaneous Allowances, formerly on the Civil List, Hereditary Revenue, &c.
The CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, the item for Dissenting Ministers had been frequently objected to in that House, and the Government had come to the determination not to propose such an item hereafter. He hoped, however, that as no notice of the withdrawal of the Vote had been given to the parties interested, the Committee would have no objection to agree to the present Vote.
MR. W. WILLIAMShad great objections to the Vote. He would move that the Chairman report progress.
MR. HINDLEYhoped that the hon. Gentleman would be satisfied with the explanation given by the right hon. Chancellor of the Exchequer. He was sure that the determination of the Government not to propose the item for the relief of Dissenting ministers would be satisfactory to the Dissenting interest.
MR. KERSHAWthought the Government had taken a course which was wise, and for which he was exceedingly thankful. He hoped that the Government would be true to their promise, as to the withdrawal of the item in question.
COLONEL SIBTHORPdid not care for the promises of Government, and hoped that the Committee would be divided, especially as he objected to the proceeding with the business at this hour [a quarter to one o'clock] in the morning. The right hon. Chancellor of the Exchequer threatened the House, the other evening, that if they did not pass the Votes they

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would be detained until the middle of August. Well, he did not care if they were; he had nothing else to do than his duty in that House. The fact was, that the Government wanted a nice comfortable prorogation, and to pocket their salaries.
MR. LUSHINGTONhad, year after year, made objections to the Vote for the support of Dissenting ministers, and he had come down to the House that evening for the purpose of renewing his protest against it. However, after what he had heard the right hon. Chancellor of the Exchequer say, he thought it would be unreasonable if he should say any thing on the subject at present. He had reason to think that a great body of the Dissenters would be very well satisfied with the course proposed. He trusted, therefore, that his hon. Friend the Member for Lambeth would not persevere in his Motion.
MR. W. WILLIAMShad received so many representations from all parts of the country against the item in question, that he had felt it his duty to object to it. However, as the Government had promised that this should be the last year that they would ask for it, he would not offer it any opposition. There were, however, other items in the Vote to which he objected, and he therefore hoped that the Committee would not proceed further with these Votes on the present occasion.
Vote agreed to.
(9.) 650 l. Foundling Hospital, Dublin.
The CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, it was determined by the Government to reduce the grants to the Dublin hospitals, with the exception of two, to which medical schools were attached. The fever ward at the House of Industry would still continue to receive the diminished allowance.
MR. GROGANinquired whether the Government would lay on the table of the House the recommendation of the Lord Lieutenant, with reference to the continuance of the grants to the Dublin hospitals.
The CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, that the letter of the Lord Lieutenant, containing the recommendation, was not a public one.
Vote agreed to.
House resumed; Resolutions to be reported To-morrow.
The House adjourned at a quarter before Two o'clock.

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS.—1a Stock in Trade; Turnpike Acts Continuance; Turnpike Trusts Arrangements.
Reported.—Militia Ballots Suspension; Assessed Taxes Composition; Public Works, Fisheries, &c.
3a Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction; Highway Rates; Loan Societies.

OATH OF ABJURATION (JEWS) BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
The LORD CHANCELLORsaid: My Lords, the Bill to which I have to call your Lordships' attention, is one of the shortest which has come under your consideration during this Session of Parliament. The sole object of the Bill is to omit certain words from the oath of abjuration which is tendered to all Her Majesty's subjects presenting themselves to take their seats in Parliament, those words being "On the true faith of a Christian," and which, being attached to the oath of abjuration, have the effect of excluding conscientious persons professing the Jewish religion from admission into Parliament. Your Lordships will readily see, from this description of the object of the Bill, that the subject upon which I have to address you is by no means novel; it has been, in fact, so often under your Lordships' consideration, that it cannot be expected that anything very new can be produced on the subject. Argument has been often urged in this and the other House of Parliament of a most cogent nature; eloquence the most splendid has been applied to it, and declamation almost inexhaustible has followed in the discussion of it; but although the subject is not new, and although it has been often before your Lordships, I think you will agree with me that these circumstances do not form any just reason why the subject should not again be submitted to your consideration. It has often been said that in the result truth always prevails, and no doubt it does. But, my Lords, it has pleased Providence that the discovery of truth should always be the reward of inquiry and deliberation, and that its brightness and force should not be always apparent upon the first view of the subject to which it is to be applied. Repeated consideration and repeated discussions have on many occasions at last placed subjects in such a light before the Legislature, that the most confident opinions
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which had been before entertained—the most declared hostility and the most inveterate prejudices, have at last succumbed to the force of reason. The present subject, my Lords, is not at all to be excluded from that category. Your Lordships are aware that in years gone by the attempt to extend civil and religious liberty to the Jew, has put the whole country in a flame of indignation. Your Lordships know that in a former reign, when an Act had passed through both Houses of Parliament to naturalise foreign Jews, the ferment in the country was so great, and the alarm so high, that in the following year it was found expedient, or rather it was deemed imperative, to yield to the fancied necessity for the repeal of that law. For a long period after that were the Jews subject to all the civil burdens which attach to the other subjects of this country, and yet were excluded from all its civil privileges. But, my Lords, after repeated discussions, the opposition which had been so constantly made to the relief of the Jews from the disabilities under which they laboured, gave way, and your Lordships are aware that very recently an Act passed through the Legislature which admitted Jews to the exercise of municipal rights. It is, therefore, I think, abundantly proved, that there is no inconsistency, no impropriety, in again bringing the question under your Lordships' notice, upon which you have formerly given a hostile opinion. Amongst the characteristics which attach an inestimable value to your Lordships' House as a part of the constitution, this is by no means the least, that you afford a barrier to sudden innovation. Your Lordships' stake in the country, in common with the rest of Her Majesty's subjects, and added to that a stake of greater value, make your Lordships justly cautious when great alterations are proposed; and the country has frequently acknowledged with gratitude that this House has paused when alterations like the present were brought under its consideration, and have thus given time to the country to deliberate calmly on the changes which it might have sanctioned without sufficient consideration. But while your Lordships offer a barrier to sudden and dangerous innovation, it may be also known of your Lordships that it is not in this House that a permanent opposition is made to the general sense of the nation. Your Lordships deliberate, and deliberate cautiously; but if, after full deliberation, the sense of

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the country is calmly and steadily expressed in favour of a particular measure, and your Lordships see that the innovation desired is not likely to be prejudicial to the country, then your Lordships yield to the wish of the nation; and numerous, indeed, are the instances in which your Lordships have given invaluable counsel and assistance in ameliorating and improving the existing state of things. The Bill that I now present to your Lordships has five times passed the House of Commons. You are aware of the fact to which I have already referred, that in aforetime the country, always alive to anything that affects its religion, was strongly excited upon propositions for the amelioration of the Jews, and that it has now expressed itself strongly in favour of the proposal for emancipating the Jews from the disqualifications to which they are now subject. Upon the present occasion, and upon previous occasions, your Lordships have had abundant opportunity of forming a judgment of what are the opinion and feeling of the nation upon the subject after further consideration. Will it be said that the absence of petitions in favour of this Bill is a proof and sign of the indifference of the country on the subject? It is, my Lords, a very unhappy time for such an argument. You have lately had an opportunity of correctly appreciating whether the people of this country have become insensible to anything which it thinks affects its religion—that religion which is established by law. Never was there a time when the country had shown itself more sensitive upon that subject; and although there have not been many petitions in favour of this measure, how different is the state of the petitions against it from that time when apprehensions were entertained that a course was about to be adopted which was likely to be injurious to the Established Church or to the Christian religion. I therefore say that a more unfounded conclusion could not be adopted than the conclusion that from the absence of petitions the country is indifferent to the fate of this Bill. The circumstances of delay which have marked the progress of this measure—the mere circumstance that such a Bill has passed the House of Commons five times—must have put the country sufficiently upon its guard; and if any well-founded apprehensions were entertained, if any opposition was deserved, those apprehensions would have been expressed, and that opposition
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offered; but, notwithstanding that the Bill has been so often brought forward, how very few petitions have been presented in opposition to it. I have, therefore, to pray your Lordships to do an act of justice to the Jews. In calling upon your Lordships to make an alteration in the law, it will, perhaps, only be proper that I should recall to your Lordships' attention the position in which the Jews, as a body, are now placed—although there is very little relating to this subject that has not already passed under your notice. Whatever apprehensions have been heretofore entertained in regard to the Jews in respect to their admission to the rights and enjoyment of citizenship, it must not be forgotten that your Lordships have, contrary to former impressions, consented to put the Jews, in the fullest and freest manner, in the possession of that enjoyment and those rights. They are now capable of acting as magistrates; they are now capable of filling all municipal offices; they may now sit in judgment upon the life and death of Christians; and we now rely upon their oaths for all that is valuable in society—liberty and property of every kind are matters on which they have power to adjudicate. What is the experience of the manner in which the duties which correspond to those rights have been performed by the Jews? Who has been ever heard to complain of any injustice, any partiality, any misconduct on the part of the Jews in the exercise of their judicial and magisterial functions? None has been made that has ever reached my ears. Your judgment of them has been fully confirmed; the Jews have honourably performed the duties you entrusted to them, and you have permitted them to retain those rights, the duties corresponding to which have been so faithfully performed. What then remains to be done for these individuals who have proved themselves so trustworthy? That which the present Bill proposes to remove, and which is, I believe, the only barrier to the admission of the Jews to the perfect enjoyment of civil and religious liberty in this country. It cannot be denied that Jews are British subjects. Now, what are the rights of British subjects? I apprehend that British subjects are all, without regard to religious opinion, entitled to the free exercise and enjoyment of all civil rights, with one exception. In the language of a right rev. Prelate I entirely agree, when he said that all those rights

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are trusts. I freely admit that there must he a capacity for the faithful and full discharge of those trusts before those rights can be conceded. Society, which is associated for purposes of mutual benefit and mutual advantage, affords no right to any man who is not able to discharge the duties which attach to the right. There are no rights inconsistent with the capacity for the faithful and full discharge of those duties; and if it should appear to your Lordships that there is anything in the faith or in the conduct of the Jews which prevents them from adequately discharging the trusts confided to them, I admit that I have no further ground to proceed in this matter. But I insist most respectfully, that no man can with justice and reason assert that there is anything in their faith, anything in their conduct, which unfits them for the full and faithful discharge of the duties of that position in which they seek to be placed. My Lords, what are the requisites for the full discharge of those duties? First of all, intelligence—have the Jews sufficient intelligence? Where will your Lordships find more? Do they understand and value the rights of property? Nobody better. [A laugh.] Do they furnish security, my Lords? I wish, my Lords, that to every proposition I have to assert, I could obtain from your Lordships so ready and audible an assent as that you have just given to my proposition, that the Jews are fully acquainted with the rights of property. But, my Lords, it is not an inconsiderable qualification for a legislator that he should understand and properly estimate the rights of property; and the good-humoured expression which has just fallen from your Lordships shows there are various senses in which the rights of property may be understood. When I used the term, I applied it to its best purpose. My Lords, in what manner do the Jews discharge all the social duties of life? I believe in the most exemplary manner. I believe they discharge them to as full an extent as their Christian brethren. I do not stop to inquire whether there is any difference between the conduct of the humblest of that class, and the humbler classes of other sects. I believe there is but little. I believe if there he any disadvantage, it is the result of the lamentable and degraded position in which they have long been placed by cruel and oppressive laws, and from which this Bill is calculated to relieve the whole community. My Lords, are they respecters of
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oaths? Yes, they are. What occasions the necessity of my present intrusion upon your Lordships? It is because they are respecters of oaths, it is because they are respecters of the faith they have received from their ancestors, and because they will not do so as some have done—pledge themselves upon the faith of a Christian, which they are not—that the Jews are now excluded from Parliament. When I look at these British subjects bearing their equal burdens in every respect, discharging all the duties which attach to that relation in a manner perfectly unobjectionable—it seems to me that I throw a great onus upon those who seek to withhold from them a full and just participation in civil rights. My Lords, do you find them an association inconsistent with the peace of the country? Do you find them united for the purpose of disturbing the public peace? Are they found among the disloyal and the turbulent classes of the United Kingdom?—No. Do you find them active in commotions and agitations for the extension of civil and religious rights which they do not understand, and which, if they had, they knew not how to exercise?—No. Their conduct is altogether unexceptionable as subjects and as citizens. What, then, are their claims to those rights which I now propose shall be conceded to them? I will not in my own language state what I conceive those rights to be, but I will repeat them from a very great authority, who, in expressing his own opinion, embodies the opinion of other wise men, and has gained for himself an European reputation by the eminence of his talent. Vattel says—
"The prince, the conductor, to whom the nation has entrusted the care of the Government, and the exercise of the sovereign power, is obliged to watch over the preservation of the received religion, of the worship established by law, and has a right to restrain those who attempt to destroy or disturb them. But to acquit himself of this duty in a manner equally just and wise, he ought never to lose sight of the character in which he is called to act, and the reason of his being invested with it. Religion is of extreme importance to the peace and welfare of society; and the prince is obliged to have an eye to everything in which the State is interested. This is all that calls him to interfere in religion, or to protect and defend it. It is, therefore, upon this footing only that he can interfere; consequently he ought to exert his authority against those alone whose conduct in religious matters is prejudicial or dangerous to the State; but he must not extend it to pretended crimes against God, the punishment of which exclusively belongs to the Sovereign Judge, the Searcher of Hearts. Let us remember that religion is no further an

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affair of State, than as it is exterior and publicly established; that of the heart can only depend on the conscience. The prince has no right to punish any persons but those that disturb society; and it would be very unjust in him to inflict pains and penalties on any person whatsoever for his private opinions, when that person neither takes pains to divulge them, nor to obtain followers. It is a principle of fanaticism, a source of evils, and of the most notorious injustice, to imagine that frail mortals ought to take up the cause of God, maintain his glory by acts of violence, and avenge him on his enemies. 'Let us only give to sovereigns,' said a great statesman and an excellent citizen, 'let us give them, for the common advantage, the power of punishing whatever is injurious to charity in society. It appertains not to human justice to become the avenger of what concerns the cause of God.'"—Vattel, liv. i., chap, xii., s. 133.
So, too, say I. If your Lordships can be satisfied that there is anything attaching to the Jews which renders them unfit for the full discharge of legislative duties—if there is anything in their conduct or principles prejudicial or injurious to the State, there is no ground on which I can ask you to pass this Bill. But if there be no ground for rejecting it on those accounts, let not your Lordships exclude them from privileges to which they are well entitled, on account of their private opinions, or of pretended crimes against God. Under such circumstances, upon whom is the onus? Upon whom rests the burden of proof, that men so conducting themselves should be excluded from the equal enjoyment of those civil and juridical rights to which the rest of their fellow-countrymen are admitted? I say the onus is on those who oppose; and, although I have not had the opportunity of considering, to the extent which I should have desired, the present subject, I have taken some pains to ascertain the nature of the objections urged against the admission of the Jews into the Legislature. I think they resolve themselves into two. One of these two is not very intelligible to my mind. It is said the Jews are of no country, and, therefore, they ought not to be admitted to a participation of political rights in any country. Why and how are they of no country? Is it because no country has chosen to admit them into a full share of political enjoyment, or is it not? But that is not the fact. When it is said they are of no country, is it meant that they entertain hopes, and look forward to some future period when they shall be restored to an united kingdom according to the predictions of their prophets? Does that prevent them being of any country? Have
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they been permitted, until very recently, in any respect to become part of any country? They have not. It is what they prayed—it is what they asked. The period at which they may expect this prophecy to be accomplished, is distant and uncertain. Are your Lordships, therefore, to conclude that they will attach themselves to no country in the meantime—that they are not anxious to acquire rights in the country in which they are sojourners, and that they have no desire to become guardians of the property which their ancestors have gained? Where is the ground for the opinion? I apprehend that the Jews who have been born and bred in this country, who are for all essential purposes as much subjects as the men of any other religious persuasion, feel themselves just as much British subjects and of the country as any other sect. Will they have a less interest in the peace and prosperity of the country during that uncertain interval which is to exist until their restoration to Judea, if they are admitted to participate in our rights, than they have now when refused admission to them? I apprehend not. My Lords, admit them to the perfect enjoyment of their rights, and I apprehend your Lordships would soon see that every mark of distinction in a political and civil sense will be lost. I may, perhaps, be allowed to trouble your Lordships with an extract from the correspondence which took place between Mendelssohn, the celebrated Jewish philosopher, and the equally celebrated Lavater upon this very subject. Lavater wished to put certain religious questions to that eminent Jew, and that wish led to a correspondence between them. The Christian spirit displayed in the writings of Mendelssohn is remarkable—is equal, in my estimation, nay, superior to that of most of the persons calling themselves Christians, that I have seen or heard of. Mendelssohn, perhaps, might not take it as a compliment when I ascribe a Christian spirit to his writings; but everything that is mild, everything that is charitable, everything that is generous, is to be found there. In remarking upon the condition of his country, he says—
"The station allotted to my brethren in the faith, in civil society, is so incompatible with the expansion of the mind, that we certainly do not increase our happiness by learning to view the rights of humanity under their true aspect."
He then proceeds—
"Our rabbins are so remote from proselyto-mania that they enjoin us to dissuade, by forcible

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remonstrances, every one who comes forward to be converted…We are to hold up to him a faithful picture of the misery, tribulation, and obloquy, in which the nation is now living, to guard him from a rash act of which he might ultimately repent."
Then he said—
"We alone consider ourselves as bound to acknowledge the authority of our laws, and this can give no offence to our neighbours."
Again—
"I am one of an oppressed people who have to supplicate shelter and protection of the ascendant nations; and these boons they do not obtain everywhere without more or less of restriction.…What gratitude do not my brethren owe to the nation which suffers them, without molestation, to worship the Supreme Being after the rites of their ancestors; and the Hebrews should, therefore, be scrupulous in abstaining from reflections on the predominant religions, or, which is the same thing, in touching their protectors, where men of virtue are most tender."
In another part of the same correspondence, he said—
"Joseph II., Emperor of Germany, issued (about 1781) the memorable 'Decree of Toleration,' which rendered the condition of the Jews under his sceptre comparatively comfortable."
After this, he added—
"God, in his mercy, has raised up illustrious and virtuous individuals to rouse the better feelings of the nation against the oppression and sufferings of brethren living under their protection. … The riches of a country consist in the industry of its inhabitants. The liberality and toleration of Holland rendered that State one of the most fertile and wealthy of Europe. It is objected that Jews are too indolent for agriculture, and too proud for mechanical trades; that they would uniformly select the arts and sciences as less laborious and more profitable. But it would not be so if the restrictions were removed; 'men of genius and talent will of course embrace the learned professions; those of inferior capacities will turn their minds to mechanical trades, &c.' and each will contribute, according to his station in life, his quota to the aggregate of productive labour."
Is there any reason to doubt the accuracy of that statement? Has anything like this occurred in our own country, and is there no cause here which would account for similar indolence? Have the Jews not been precluded from being apprenticed to any trade in almost every large town in the kingdom? Have they not been excluded from carrying on those trades which the subjects of the country were generally permitted to do? Certainly they have. And I have heard it remarked that the cause why so many of the Jews are connected with the trades in money and jewellery, is the result of a long association
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—that the cruelty and persecution of the nations wherein they dwelt so frequently attacked their property and spoiled them, that it was found necessary to have it in the most convertible and portable form, when the necessity for their withdrawing from persecution might arise. Circum-cumstances have, however, now greatly changed. They may now be apprenticed, and many other restrictions have been removed; and those who make the remark about their aversion to trades, overlook the impediments which had been thrown in their way of pursuing professions like other men. The allegation that they have no country, ought to be no objection to the passing of this Bill; they have no divided allegiance, either spiritual or temporal. When you say they have no country, surely in whatever sense you say it, they cannot be, and are not, insensible of the value of the protection and the enjoyments which they possess in the country where they now reside. They have no rival allegiance—they have no country to whose prosperity they can look with more interest than that in which they live. Therefore I should say, the fact of their having no country, in the sense in which the term is used, gives the best security for the country which protects them. Can it be said they would be influenced in their allegiance, in their obedience, in their desire to advance the prosperity of the country, because they look for the accomplishment of distant and uncertain prophecies? You might as well suppose that the conduct and opinions of other men would be influenced by the anticipation of the millennium. In this country give them protection—give them the rights enjoyed by your other subjects—give them the enjoyment of the British constitution, and there is no reason to suppose you will have less faithful, less obedient, less loyal subjects of the Crown, than any other class of mankind. My Lords, I refer to what their conduct has been when under persecution, when under restriction, in order that your Lordships may judge what it will be when they are justly admitted to the enjoyment of more perfect freedom. I therefore submit to your Lordships that in reality, of all classes, the Jews furnish the least objection to the possession of proper qualifications for legislation. On the policy of such a measure, I will name to your Lordships the opinion of another man, whose name I have never heard mentioned but with the highest admiration, and the most

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profound respect. He was a Dissenter, but a Dissenter gifted in a remarkable degree. The late Rev. Robert Hall, of Leicester, after alluding to the Jews, and stating that there could be no salvation except through the merits of Jesus Christ, said—
"Nor ought it to be forgotten that it is impossible to continue in the Papal communion without committing idolatry, a sin against which the most fearful maledictions of Scripture are pointed. Notwithstanding this, however, all candid Protestants acknowledge the possibility of salvation within the Romish pale."
In another passage Mr. Hall said—
"We should, therefore, be inspired with an increased tenderness and respect for the seed of Abraham, as containing, notwithstanding its occupying a distinct fold, a portion of the true Church of God. If we can be induced to hope that He has still a people among them, we shall be ready to look upon them with something like fraternal affection, and to embrace every opportunity of reprobating and removing the cruel privations and restrictions imposed by Christian nations, who, absurdly imagining that they do an acceptable service to God by their persecution and depression, are in reality treasuring up wrath by aggravating the affliction of those whom He has smitten. It is surprising that any man can read the ancient prophecies with attention without perceiving that He surveys the treatment of His ancient people with a jealous eye, and that while He signalizes his displeasure against them by the course of His providence, He will enter into a severe reckoning with those who shall be found 'to help on the affliction.' A large arrear of guilt has been contracted by the nations of Christendom on this account; and in this age of liberality, when such mighty efforts are made to procure the removal of political disabilities on the score of religion, it is surely high time their attention was turned to the oppressed and persecuted children of Abraham. Their political emancipation and restoration to the equal rights of citizenship might be reasonably expected to soften their prejudices, and dispose them to a more faithful hearing of the Christian cause. As the basis of all social virtue is laid in justice, so by none should its obligations be deemed more sacred than by those who make loud professions of Christian zeal and exalted charity."
My Lords, it is true that remarks of a caustic nature are sometimes made against the Jews; but that great and good man calls attention to the fact, that God will mark those who rejoice in their calamity. God hardened the heart of Pharoah not to let them go. I trust that God will not harden the hearts of the Peers of England against them so that they may not be admitted into the Legislature of this land. Although the Almighty, in the inscrutable ways of His providence, may think fit to afflict a portion of mankind, is it the part of a Christian to endeavour to aggravate
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that affliction? Nay, is it not obvious that Divine vengeance has been brought down on nations for the perversion of that duty which Christianity commands? It is your duty to relieve distress. It is no part of your duty to add to the cup of bitterness which that nation has been compelled to drink. I would say, Leave to the Almighty the accomplishment of His own objects, and do you soften wretchedness and distress, and relieve the persecuted. Does any man suppose that by any act of his he can avert the accomplishment of prophecy, or add to its force? Assuredly not. The Jews undoubtedly have been placed Under the Divine displeasure; but that furnishes no ground, no pretence to a just mind, for withholding from them those rights to which their political station entitles them, and which they are competent to discharge. My Lords, it is next said, that this is a Christian country. Thank God it is, and I may say, thank God I believe it will ever remain so. But will any man say it will be less so because we admit a few Jews into Parliament? My Lords, who most unchristianises a country—the faithful Jew, adhering to his creed and his faith, refusing to adopt any form or obligation, the force of which he does not feel, or the indifferent (or it may be the infidel) Englishman, who will swallow all oaths re-pecting religion with perfect ease? What security do you take, what test do you apply, to provide that you shall have honest Churchmen in the Legislature? You do that, perhaps, which, in one sense alone, you can do. You call on men to pledge themselves in a certain form of words; but you cannot read their hearts. But is it certain that infidelity will be excluded from Parliament by abjuration oaths? Notoriously not. I say therefore that the words, "on the true faith of a Christian," ought to be omitted from the oath of abjuration, and that it is a form which ought no longer to be enforced. I say you will not less Christianise the country, and the Legislature will not be the less a Christian Legislature because you admit a few Jews into it. What danger can you incur? Surely, when men are assisting in all the exigencies of the State, you should show some disqualification when you exclude them from the enjoyment of political rights. Do you fear their loyalty? Do you fear the proper discharge of their duties in civil life? Do you fear that they can overturn your religion, or bring it into jeopardy? What must be the result of

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the slightest indication of any such attempt? But of all men, who are the least likely to make it? The Jew will not admit you to his faith. His faith is confined to the seed of Abraham. He is too proud, too jealous of the promises to his nation. He has no rivalry to set up. It is said that his peace is in the peace of the city where he dwells, and he is told to pray for the peace of that city. Tell me the motive of the Jew to endeavour to impeach the Christian religion in any respect. Where is the evidence that the Jew has ever in any respect shown any disposition to make proselytes, any disposition to affect the Established Church? What gives at least one great security for the peace and prosperity of this country? Undoubtedly the Christian religion and the Established Church. And the Jew is interested in all that prosperity because it tends to the security of his own property. Not by the charms of eloquence calculated to withdraw your attention from the main subject—not by exaggerations and statements which experience and facts do not confirm—but by the words of truth and soberness let the House be informed, judging of the conduct of the Jew as a citizen, what is reasonably to he expected from him in the character of a legislator. You have peaceable and loyal subjects contributing to the wealth of the country, and having every motive to promote its peace. Whence does the objection come? Having examined the objections, it appears to me that the arguments resolve themselves into the two points I have mentioned, and they do not appear to be supported either by facts or arguments which ought to satisfy your Lordships' minds. Then, my Lords, if I am correct in saying that the conduct of these men throws the onus on those who oppose them, and if that onus is attempted to he discharged only by the objections I have mentioned, I ask, do they furnish any just ground for exclusion? My Lords, if you want to find an example of the sublimest adherence to faith, of the sublimest wisdom, and qualities of the highest order, where do you look? To the ancient Jews. Where do we find such specimens of divine truth, delivered with such force and beauty of lauguage, as are to be met with in the writings of the Jews? You have their failings recorded, it is true. But it has pleased Providence to record in those ancient chronicles the failings of great and good men for wise purposes—not to degrade their character, but that we might learn wis-
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dom, and that "he who thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall." Of all nations, which stands the highest in sublimity? The Jews; and there is not a nation that has not cause to envy them. Shall I be reminded, as an argument against this Bill, of the circumstance that the Jews had crucified our Lord? Is it for your Lordships to enter into the question how ancient prophecies, written when the Jewish nation was the favoured of God, but which predicted that His people should be the murderers of His Son, were fulfilled by the event? Your Lordships have good example how you should deal with this question. Our Saviour, at the moment when He expired upon the cross, said, "Father, forgive them! they know not what they do." Ought not this also to be the language of your Lordships? If they knew not what they did, and if it pleased Providence to blind them to the force of truth when the eyes of others were opened, who shall say that the decrees of Providence are not wise and good? I present to you, my Lords, the Jews as good citizens, as faithful to their creed, of which it is no part to make any attempt inconsistent with the public good in any temporal and every spiritual point of view. Why, then, withhold from the State the benefit of the wisdom and experience of these men? Or why from the Jews the rights to which they are justly entitled? Your Lordships having had the subject repeatedly under consideration, I pray of you to bestow upon it once again that intelligence and that wisdom which I ascribe to your Lordships; and I do trust you will perceive that, whatever impression you may have heretofore entertained, that wisdom and justice will dictate to you at last that there is no longer any reason for that exclusion of the Jews from those highest civil and political privileges to which they aspire. I call upon your Lordships to "do justice and love mercy." The noble and learned Lord then moved that the Bill be now read a Second Time.
EARL NELSONsaid, he would not attempt to follow the noble and learned Lord through the sermon he had just delivered; but in listening to the address of the noble and learned Lord, he could not help feeling thankful that the noble and learned Lord had delivered that speech from the eminent position which he occupied, and not as a bishop of the Church; and he was afraid if the Jews were admitted to Parliament, they would often hear the expression of

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similar opinions. The noble and learned Lord had talked of the concessions which had been made to the Jews. He (Earl Nelson) was thankful for those concessions, but could not see why, when they had been made, the whole of the noble and learned Lord's argument should be directed to the condition of the Jews before the granting of such concessions. The noble and learned Lord confounded the Jews at the time of Pharaoh with the Jews of the present clay, and had argued that, because we had admitted them to civil and municipal offices, such as those of judge and sheriff, that we were to admit them to seats in the Legislature. The noble and learned Lord did not seem to see the difference between making laws and administering them. The noble and learned Lord lauded the benevolence of the Jew; but it was trifling with the argument to adduce this trait in their character, for whether they were benevolent or not—and he (Earl Nelson) admitted that they were—had really nothing to do with the question. The noble and learned Lord next alluded to the state of feeling in the country, and observed that the question had been carried five times in the House of Commons. In this, however, he was certainly mistaken, for he believed it had been assented to only four times. He (Earl Nelson), however, would rather take as an index of the state of public feeling, the majorities by which those Motions had been carried in the Commons, and the petitions that had been presented for and against the measure. The noble and learned Lord had admitted that few petitions had come up in favour of the Bill, but had himself accounted for the fact by observing that the country had been agitated by another question which had occupied them. If the feeling of this country was emphatically and progressively in favour of the admission of the Jews into Parliament, how was it that so few petitions had been presented in favour of this Bill? and how was it to be accounted for that the second Bill introduced for this purpose into the House of Commons had been carried by a smaller majority than the first? How was it to be explained that the third Bill, brought in last year, had been received with so much apathy, that it had never reached the House of Lords at all? And, above all, how could it have occurred that of all the majorities whereby the Bill had ever been carried, the smallest and most insignificant was the last? How did it happen that the majo-
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rities had dwindled away, division after division, until the original majority of 90 had been reduced to 25? All these facts proved more eloquently than could a thousand arguments, that if there ever had been any feeling amongst the public in favour of this measure, that feeling was steadily and rapidly declining. The noble and learned Lord did not make much of the argument that the words "on the true faith of a Christian" were not intended to exclude the Jews. He (Earl Nelson) allowed, indeed, that they were not at first intended to exclude them; but in the time of the first two Georges there were two Acts passed, in which these words were considered as virtually excluding them, and as meant for nothing else. For in these Acts, which were for the purpose of naturalising the Protestant and other bodies in America, no other words than these, "on the true faith of a Christian," were considered as affecting the Jews. At all events, now, the words had the effect of excluding the Jews; and whatever were the reasons, right or wrong, for introducing them, it was for their Lordships to decide whether they would strike out the words. It had been said to be absurd to talk about a Christian Legislature, since the Legislature was not now Christian. It was true that in one sense the Legislature was not bonâ fide Christian; but that very fact was one of the strongest arguments against the Bill, for from that fact the relations between the Church and State had been greatly shaken. And was it right at such a time as this to increase the mischief, instead of removing it? In another sense, however, the Legislature was Christian. It was professedly Christian; and the profession, even if occasionally accompanied by deception, was still for good. If the restriction were removed, where would Parliament stop? Lord Shrewsbury had on some occasion said he wished Catholics to be as free to vote and use their own discretion as to matters of Church and State as the Jews would be under this Bill; and if Jews were allowed a seat in Parliament without being bound by any restriction as to the Protestant Church, how could the same liberty be refused to every class of Christians? He hoped their Lordships would see the injustice of allowing the Church to remain in her present anomalous position, and the danger of separation of Church and State, if the difficulties of her position were increased; and the awful responsibility which

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would be incurred by Parliament if voluntarily and unadvisedly (for the country desired not the measure) the only standing ground interposed against the admission of infidels of every class were removed. He would add that he hoped their Lordships would well weigh one inevitable effect of the admission of such persons into Parliament, which would be" that the ordinary Parliamentary courtesy would gradually restrain the expression of those sentiments of attachment to the Christian religion, which surely should not be suppressed in the legislation of a Christian country. On these grounds he would move that the Bill be read a second time that day six months.
Amendment moved to leave out "now," and insert "this day six months."
LORD WODEHOUSEsaid, he was surprised to hear the noble Earl declare that the words "on the true faith of a Christian" were, if not originally introduced, at least intentionally retained, for the purpose of excluding Jews. He thought it was agreed on all hands that these words had accidentally shut out the Jews, and were not originally intended for the purpose. Nothing could be more indisputable than that those words were only introduced to give an ordinary and solemn sanction to an oath taken by a Christian gentleman. Although, however, this was so, he would rather take the question on this broad ground—whether it were advisable to make the concession of civil privileges dependent upon religious professions? He perceived with some regret that the Bill only applied to gentlemen professing the Jewish religion; for he believed that upon the same grounds on which Jews ought to be admitted, those who professed any other religion ought also to be admitted. He should be glad to see a Bill framed upon that principle, and logically consistent, enabling any gentleman, of whatever religious opinion, to take the oath, and take his seat in Parliament, omitting the words "on the true faith of a Christian," whenever he objected to take them. The usual argument against such a measure was, that by excluding Jews the Christian religion was upheld. He could conceive that on general grounds of policy it might sometimes be advisable to exclude certain classes of citizens from the possession of full political rights; there might be grounds of State policy dependent upon the various circumstances of different countries and different times; but the principles of the Christian religion were irreversible and im-
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mutable; and he did not believe that, if the Bill were rejected in the slightest degreee upon religious grounds, their Lordships would act, in any degree, in the spirit and essence of that religion. He regretted that the right rev. Prelates had been among the warmest opponents of the measure; and it was indeed chiefly owing to the eloquent opposition of some among them that such a measure was not already law. He ventured to ask those right rev. Prelates whether they found in the books or the principles of the Christian religion any injunction, or any shadow of countenance for the idea, that where Christians were in a majority in a State, it was their duty to reserve for themselves exclusive possession of the highest civil privileges? He did not believe that any such injunction could be found; and though in the present age no one would contemplate the revival of the system under which the Jews were formerly tortured, or slain, or banished, yet he maintained that, logically speaking, the spirit by which they were excluded from Parliament was practically the same. If their Lordships were bound, for the sake of upholding the Christian religion, to exclude Jews from sitting in the other House, on what grounds could they refuse, for the sake of preserving the purity of the Christian religion, to exclude Roman Catholics and members of dissenting communities? Of course he should be told there was a wide distinction between the cases; for that Catholics, Protestants, Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Dissenters, Unitarians, and Quakers, however they differed, were of the same Christian religion, and were bound together by one bond of union and brotherhood. He wished he could believe it. He wished it could be said in any sense that Christians were bound together by any bond of union. On the contrary, unhappily, the truth was, that the most bitter dissensions that had ever distracted Europe had proceeded from the dissensions of Christians. And could it be said that the admission of Jews into Parliament would bring in any more elements of hostility? or were their Lordships, for the sake of a mere visionary dream of Christian unity, to continue a restriction which placed a stigma upon a most deserving class of Her Majesty's subjects? It was said that the Jews were aliens; but unless their Lordships looked to ancient prophecies—which surely could scarcely be cited in such a discussion, and in which it was stated that the Jews should wander over

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the face of the earth, and at some time return to their promised land—how could it be said that they were aliens? They were no more so than the descendants of any families who had settled in England who were originally foreigners, but whose children were English in birth, and were Englishmen in right. Sometimes the money-power of the Jews was spoken of as an element of danger. Surely this was a most unworthy argument for a Christian. Had it never been heard of how Christian money was spent at elections to corrupt Christian men? and could it be pretended that any greater corruption would be introduced by the admission of Jews. It was said again, that their admission would poison Parliament—the great "artery" of the constitution. Had it, however, been forgotten, that every channel which led to that artery had already been allowed to be so "poisoned?" This was an argument which Christians would do well not to use. The Jews were permitted to occupy the highest municipal offices, and when the electors had appointed a Jewish gentleman to a high municipal office, and when by a long and faithful discharge of his duties he had obtained their confidence, with what consistency could their Lordships say to those electors that they must not elect him to represent them in Parliament? Surely this was not consistent; and he earnestly hoped that, by supporting the Bill, their Lordships would remove the inconsistency; and, above all, sanction the great principle that the possession of the highest civil privileges ought not to he dependent upon religious profession.
The ARCHBISHOP of DUBLINsaid, that he had so very long ago, and so very frequently, placed on record his opinions on the question now under consideration, not in their Lordships' House only, but also in published and printed works, that there was the less necessity for his trespassing at any great length upon their Lordships' attention on the present occasion. But the very fact of his having explained his views on many previous occasions, rendered it necessary that he should address a few remarks to them, to show that neither the lapse of time, nor facilities for more mature deliberation, had in any degree modified those opinions which he had from the first put forward upon this important subject. He had not, either in respect of this question, or of that other question, scarcely less important, which had occupied their Lordships'
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attention a few evenings since, changed the opinions which, through the press and otherwise, he had promulgated to the public many years ago:—on the contrary, he adhered to those opinions all the more stedfastly, because he found that neither by learning nor by ingenuity had any refutation of them been as yet devised. The grounds upon which he had hitherto voted for this measure were not those that were usually taken up by its other advocates. He did not mean to take exception to the arguments upon which others based their advocacy of this measure; but he claimed for himself, if not the merit, at least the distinction, of viewing the question through a different aspect. He had never advocated the admission of Jews into Parliament, but he had all along advocated the leaving the constitutional privilege of free choice to the electors. He had never advocated the cause of the Jew any more than that of the Hindoo, or the Mahomedan; but throughout his life he had declared that the restrictions ought to be removed which were now placed upon electors with respect to the persons whom they might think fit to return to Parliament as their representatives—unless, indeed, it could be shown that some political danger would arise to the commonwealth from the electors being permitted to make a free use of their own judgment. He had said nothing against the Jews, and he had sedulously guarded himself against saying anything in their favour. He did not consider that the cause which he was advocating was that of the Jews; he rather regarded it as the cause of the Christian inhabitants of this country, that no secular penalty or civil disabilities should be imposed upon persons of the Jewish persuasion. The real question at issue was this—shall the Christian population of this country be permitted to enjoy the unfettered exercise of a political right; or shall the exercise of that right depend upon the religious professions of the party in whose regard they may choose to exercise the right? Now, the more he thought, and the more he heard, and the more he read, the more profound became his conviction that it was in the highest degree impolitic and inexpedient to attach secular or civil disabilities to the profession of any description of religious opinions. Neither could he understand upon what principle of Christianity any such disabilities could be justified, seeing that the Divine Founder of Christianity had himself declared that

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his kingdom was not of this world, and had enjoined upon his disciples the duty of rendering unto Cæsar those things which of right appertained even to that idolatrous emperor. Even at the risk of incurring the imputation of tedious repetition, he must again declare his conviction that this was not the cause of the Jews, but rather that of the Christians. The question which their Lordships were called upon that night to determine was simply this, whether the free Christian electors of this country were to he at liberty to send what man they pleased to represent them in Parliament, or whether the exercise of that privilege was to be encumbered by considerations having reference to the religious faith of the man by whom they might desire to be represented. The question was not whether Jews should sit in Parliament, but rather whether in this free and enlightened age the Christian electors of this Christian nation should have the right to choose whom they liked as their representative, or whether their hands were to be tied in that respect. He would vote in the affirmative of that proposition. He admitted that the present Bill did not take a proper hold of the subject, and he entirely concurred in a sentiment expressed by his dear and lamented Friend, Bishop Coplestone, which he found in a letter which had been recently published, that the question had not yet been placed on its true basis, and that a Bill having such an object as the present ought to have been introduced avowedly as for the removal of all religious disabilities, and not simply for the relief of the Jews. But although the Bill was not presented in that shape which would most faithfully illustrate its tendency, and although it was not brought forward in the manner most consistent with the principle promulgated, nevertheless their Lordships should seek to view it in its legitimate aspect, and should endeavour to arrive at a, right conclusion, and to do so on right premises. The Members of the Government did not always find it possible to take a great and comprehensive view of a question; they were oftentimes compelled by the difficulties of their position to apply a measure of great and universal importance to the purposes of a particular case. He gave the Members of Her Majesty's Government the benefit of this admission; but he should not be tempted by any such consideration to view the
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question in any other light than that which he believed to be the legitimate one. Again, he said it was his deliberate conviction that they ought to remove all religious distinctions from the exercise of political rights, unless, indeed, it could be shown that such religious distinctions were inseparably connected with some political or civil danger to the community, and that was not even contended for in the present case. He had never said that there was no political danger to the community in the admission of Catholics into Parliament, but he had always said that it was better to brave that danger than to depart from the benignant spirit of the Christian religion. He believed that whatever danger threatened the Church, was greater from Roman Catholics and all classes of Dissenters, than from Jews. He had no apprehension that Jews would Judaize the State. It was said that the retention of these words in the oath, "on the true faith of a Christian," was doing honour to Christianity. He would retain the oath in its present form, if he could think that in its present form it did honour to Christianity; but he could not reconcile himself to any such conviction—he thought that the oath in its present form was a dishonour to Christianity; and he believed that it was an imputation on Christianity to suppose that it could be so honoured, and should be so supported. He trusted that no one would consider him as indifferent to the Christian religion; neither was he indifferent to Protestantism, nor to the Church to which he belonged—yet he did not consider that by the admission of Dissenters to Parliament he was doing dishonour to the Established Church, or dishonour to Protestantism by the admission of the Roman Catholics. If that were acknowledged, how could it be said to be a dishonour to Christianity to admit the Jew, if the electors thought fit to elect him? The cases were perfectly parallel. In a word, he could not comprehend how the religion of Christ could be strengthened or dignified by restricting the electors of this country in the exercise of a political right. He had heard it curiously alleged by some that the success which Providence had been pleased to vouchsafe to the British arms in India, was in itself a sufficient reason why such restrictive laws as these should be retained upon the Statute-book. Now, he must say that this train of reasoning appeared to him to be rather more remarkable for its ingenuity than for its truthfulness. He should be sorry, indeed,

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that it should be thought that either calamity or defeat, victory or disaster, could make him indifferent to Christianity; but he confessed his total inability to comprehend how the victories in India could be connected with the maintenance of the civil disabilities—he would not call it of the Jews—but of the Christian electors at home. The State was always found quite ready to avail itself of the services of all persons, of whatever persuasion; and with respect to the victories in India, where would those victories have been, if all the soldiers who would not take an oath "on the true faith of a Christian" had been disbanded? Nine-tenths of them, he believed, were Mahometans and Hindoos; but yet the State was ready to make use of their services against the enemy, and would be perfectly consistent in making use of their services in that or the other House of Parliament, if the electors thought fit to choose them. He conceived that the electors had a right to demand this as British subjects, and still more as Christians and as followers of Him who declared that His kingdom was not of this world, and who disavowed all connexion with political ascendancy and political power, and had deprecated any attempt to use spiritual affairs for the propping up of temporal kingdoms.
The EARL of SHAFTESBURYsaid, it is impossible to approach this question with indifference, or without a deep conviction that it demands our most serious and respectful consideration. The greatness of the principle involved, and the political feebleness of those in whose behalf it is urged, are weighty reasons, when combined, to command a more than ordinary attention to the measure now submitted to your Lordships. Yet, I much regret that this question has been revived. Nothing new has occurred to alter our opinions: the same proposition is before us, and we must offer it the same resistance; and, in fact, we must resort to the same arguments, for the question is so simple that it cannot be regarded in different lights. It is one altogether of principle, and does not afford the aid and variety of numerous details. I regret that the noble Lord who spoke last but one (Lord Wodehouse) made a remark to the effect that all those who opposed this measure were more or less tainted with a spirit of persecution, and that, though the time was past for the whip or the rack, yet the spirit of persecution remained. I regret that that obser-
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vation fell from the noble Lord, for in what a way might it not be replied to? Might we not retort and say, that if we are tainted with a spirit of persecution, you are tainted with a spirit of infidelity? I will not use that retort, for I know you are not tainted with such a spirit; but I implore your Lordships to abstain from such imputations, and to allow this debate to be conducted as similar debates hitherto have been, both in this and the other House, with great moderation and fairness. I must, however, guard myself and those who think with me against a charge of bigoted hostility to the Jewish race; we do not reject them because they are aliens, though, despite the assertions of some of their friends, they are a distinct nation, and will ever remain so; but it is their concern, and not ours, if they choose to make the effort of sinking their distinctive honours in the confusion of the Gentiles. We do not exclude them as a disloyal, base-minded, or incompetent race of men, as an inferior class; very far from it; neither do we exclude them because they are few; the principle on which they stand and on which we resist is the same, whether they be one or 1,000,000. Still less do we exclude them, as it is often affirmed, and specially by the late Sir Robert Peel, in any sense of vengeance or chastisement. God forbid! First, we have no warranty to do so; secondly, we know not the descendants of the guilty; thirdly, for the matter of that, the Gentiles were, to say the least, quite as much partakers as they were of the sin of the crucifixion. The truth is, that our difficulties are not in respect of them as Jews, but arising within ourselves; not in anything peculiar to the race, but grounded on the rigour of our own principles. Here, then, is the simple issue; for the purpose of admitting the Jews to Parliament we are-summoned to make an alteration in the oath taken at the table by the Members of tooth Houses; and that, according to the terms of the Bill, "that whenever any of Her Majesty's subjects professing the Jewish religion shall present himself to take the said oath of abjuration, the words 'upon the true faith of a Christian' shall be omitted out of the said oath in administering the same to such person." The Jews now demand admission to the Legislature; it is, in fact, all that they can demand. On this point we have the authority of one of their own advocates, Dr. Van Oven, who said—"The only serious disability which remains to the

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Jews is their exclusion from Parliament." Now, we venture to assert that, admitting all former demands to be reasonable, this is of a different complexion; it is one which I will endeavour to prove that they have no right to make, nor we, on our part, any power to concede. Now, consider what the Jew demands—look first to his peculiar character and position. We will readily admit that he is on honourable and upright man, liberal and humane, with adequate intellectual acquirements. But his very existence and profession are perpetual and manifest protests against the reception of Christianity; he declares it to be in all its forms, circumstances, and capabilities false and fraudful; he cannot take shelter, like the infidel, under the plea that, however erroneous it be, the general submission to it is beneficial as a means of public order, because the general acceptance is a reflection on himself, and stamps him with a disagreeable notoriety. This is the well-known creed and feeling of his nation all over the world, in every people and kingdom under heaven; it is, therefore, not the opinion and resolve of an obscure and scanty class, suddenly and capriciously entertained—it is the faith of a whole people, the inheritance from their forefathers, universally, openly, and consistently maintained. His very existence, as it were, depends on such public and determined protests; and, if he be conscientious, he must take no middle course—he must publicly assert it, seek by all legitimate means to diffuse it, and lend no aid, direct or indirect, to the advance of its adversary. Now, with all these feelings and principles, with all these open manifestations and secret sentiments, he demands a seat in the British Legislature, to make laws that shall indirectly affect the Church of Christ, and directly the Church of England, which is a branch of it; and this he does openly professing his hostility to the faith, name, and very book of our religion, admitting that the simple recognition of it condemns him. Nay, he does more. In this spirit, and with these declarations of antipathy, he summons us to make the concession by doing what seems to exhibit our utter indifference to it. He denies the "true faith of a Christian," and then summons us to withdraw the words as improper or unnecessary—he summons us, at least, to avow that the declaration is unnecessary. Is this within the limits of legitimate demand? Has any man a right to demand this of an-
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other? Nor have we, I think, a right to concede it. Here is a declaration that, either actually or virtually, has been made by every one assuming a seat for more than 200 years. We are summoned to repeal it, not because it is false or unnecessary—for, if so, you would have moved its repeal irrespectively of this question, and when you abolished other needless oaths—but because it is inconvenient, and excludes the great antagonists of the Christian name. We cannot think that we have a right so do deal with solemn professions. If it were a question of repealing all oaths, the subject might be differently regarded, but it is a question not upon the principle of oaths generally, but on the expediency of this. We may give to the Jews a share in our privileges and our power, but we have no right to admit them to a share of government in ecclesiastical things, and simultaneously declare that Christianity is not necessary to the character of a legislator; no right to admit them to a power of making a public, legal, legislative effort for extirpating Christianity. You cannot quote the case of Dissenters, and Roman Catholics, inasmuch as, however hostile those persons may be to the Established Church, or to any other of our institutions, yet they are not, as in the case of the Jews, hostile to the very name and vitality of the Christian religion. Nor may you answer us, as the Lord Chancellor has done, by asserting the inherent vigour of Christian truth, and the utter impossibility of danger to it from the presence and activity of Hebrew lawgivers. We agree with you; but this is not a question of details, but one altogether of principle. Great principles are confided to our care, and given for our guidance, and we have no more right to surrender a principle for public or private convenience, than we have to do a dishonest action. I was astonished to be met here by the Lord Chancellor with the taunting query, "What do you apprehend?" We reply, that the sacrifice of principle is always perilous, and that no man can affirm that evil results will not occur because we are unable to specify them; they may be, and possibly would be, of a nature totally different from those that arise on practical questions, but, nevertheless, equally formidable. We maintain, therefore, that we have no right to concede this demand. We may give up what is our own, our safety, our dignity, nay, exclusive power or privilege, nay, the fabric even of the Church, if we

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will; but we can neither assert what is false, nor, as in this case, consent to withdraw or suppress what is true. Mark you, my Lords, this is no ordinary matter; you do not assert in this oath, by way of exercise or amusement, that parallel lines will never meet, or that two and two make four; you assert the great and dominant principle of all public and private morality; you assert the alpha and omega of all legislation; you erect the pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night to guide us on our path; and will you not, by this immolation of truth to expediency, be guilty of misleading many of your fellow-subjects, and teach them to believe that the assertion of such mighty principles is now become antiquated and unnecessary? Now, a very serious consideration arises, whether it would not be better, if such repeated changes are contemplated, to repeal oaths altogether? I should prefer things remaining as they are; but I should prefer that abolition to any further tampering, which is inevitable. I very much doubt the propriety of successive changes of an oath to suit successive occasions. Let us fairly understand what is the value of oaths. It has been said they did not keep out Bolingbroke, Gibbon, and others, and thus their value is denied; but how often have I heard their strength denounced in excluding Roman Catholics, and now Jews; but surely in quoting the oaths of Bolingbroke and Gibbon you take a very imperfect view of the oaths sworn at this table. They are not simply the personal assurance of the individual, but the declaration of the national sentiment. The nation cannot swear and profess; it therefore does so by its representatives. Bolingbroke and Gibbon took the oath and jeopardised their own souls; but they bore a public testimony and yielded to the principle of the nation. Many advocates of this measure say, the exclusion of the Jews was never intended by the words "true faith of a Christian." That may be good for a legal argument, and against those who maintain the admission of Jews to be unconstitutional; but nothing to us who resist it on religious grounds only. We do not say that we should have put into the oath the words now proposed to be removed in the case of the Jews; but we find them there, and we cannot retreat from them without a sacrifice of principle, and without declaring that the words and the sentiment are equally useless. The noble and learned Lord (the Lord Chan-
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cellor) has said that the Jews are admitted to corporate honours, and has argued that there is an inconsistency in excluding them from legislative functions. But there is the widest difference between administrative and legislative functions. The first are given by a Christian head, and the party who assumes them knows he must use them for Christian purposes, and is bound within the limit of the law; but, in respect to legislative functions, the individual who discharges them acts as he pleases, and is responsible to no one. I know that Quakers and others have been admitted into the other House, who are not required to use the words "on the true faith of a Christian;" but they all approach the table professing Christianity, and do not profess to be antagonistic to the Christian faith. No one can deliberate on this question without a deep sense of the mighty debt that is due to the Jewish people from all the nations of Christendom. We owe them much, very much, for the wrongs they have endured, and much for the services they have performed; they ought to be "beloved for their fathers' sakes." I am sure I speak the sentiments of all who oppose their claims when I say that we would willingly show every honour to their orderly demeanour, their surprising energy, their intellectual greatness. We would make them every compensation, and atone for the past by the liberality of the future; but, unfortunately, they demand the roc's egg; they require that which is not ours to give, they seek from us (such is our opinion) a surrender of the truth; and we are compelled, with intentions and feeling the most friendly and respectful, to assume an attitude of apparent hostility. I am very loth to believe that this ambition to sit in the British Parliament, or to take part in the councils of any empire, is the predominant desire of the Hebrew nation—for a nation they are, and a nation they will continue to be to the end of time. It is vain for some Jewish advocates of the question to assert that they are lost, sunk, confounded in the mass of the surrounding community; it is an untrue and a degrading assertion; untrue, because directly opposed to holy writ, which declares that "the people shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations," and again untrue, because disproved to every one who reads a book, or converses with travellers, or perambulates the streets. Degrading it undoubtedly is, for it denies to them all the glories of their future ca-

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reer—a career the most brilliant, the most extensive, the most durable, and the most blessed in the entire history of the human race. So much for them; for ourselves, we must reply that a great and holy principle has been confided to our charge; responsible for the sacred office, we must keep it in all its integrity. It is a principle, which, with every sentiment of veneration and sympathy, we will not, and we cannot, yield to any authority less than that which originally imposed it.
The EARL of CARLISLEsaid: As on most subjects I would fain hope I have the happiness of agreeing with my noble Friend who has just spoken, so, when constrained to differ from him, I always respect and admire his principles and motives, and his courageous and consistent assertion of them, so much so that I am always inclined to regard my own opinions with some degree of suspicion when they do not accord with those of my noble Friend. My noble Friend has been recently most worthily selected to fill the very honourable post of Chairman of the British and Foreign Bible Society; and I could not hear his speech without regretting that in taking that chair he has not inherited the sentiments which his meek and pious predecessor, Lord Bexloy, always [professed on this subject. With respect to the question before the House, after the clear statement of the noble and learned Lord on the woolsack, and the arguments of the most rev. Prelate (the Archbishop of Dublin), well worthy of his Christian character and logical reputation, and remembering also that when the question was last before your Lordships I stated my opinion fully respecting it, I should now hold it to be inexcusable in me to trespass long on your Lordships' time in recommending this question to your favourable consideration. The question does not admit of many fresh views or arguments, though, in my humble judgment, the lapse of time and the course of events have materially! strengthened the already subsisting reasons for its favourable reception. My noble Friend expressed his regret that an attempt should now be made to revive this question; but your Lordships will remember that the noble Earl who moved the rejection of the Bill, made it an express ground of argument against proceeding with it, that we abstained from bringing it before your Lordships' House last Session. Allusion has also been made to the absence of petitions. I do not pretend that there
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has been any great number of petitions either on one side or on the other; but it was mere accident that prevented either myself or one of my Colleagues from laying on your Lordships' table a petition from the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Common Council of the city of London, which was agreed to this day without an expression of dissent, I believe, among the whole of that important body, and which proves that they persevere in those generous and liberal sentiments which they have hitherto entertained in reference to this question,; and which they have taken the most practical method of exhibiting. For the reason I have just stated, I wish to narrow my observations to one single point, the more especially because I believe it is the only one of any weight or substance with which the promoters of this measure have to grapple. I mean the conscientious view—the view of principle, as my noble Friend described it—the religious objection entertained to the measure; because, apart from this, I know your Lordships—as, indeed, has been admitted by some—would not apprehend any merely political ill consequence or danger from granting emancipation to the Jews. Their limited number, the character they have constantly borne in this country, and the whole tenour of their habits, are a guarantee against any such apprehension. Apart, also, from this religious objection, I know your Lordships would not grudge to your Jewish fellow-countrymen the attainment of wishes which so many entertain, of being placed on an even level with their more fortunate fellow-subjects. The only reason, I am persuaded, with the opponents of this Bill for refusing their assent to it, consists in a feeling on their part, as expressed by the noble Earl, that to give that assent would be an act, as it were, of disloyalty towards the Divine Founder of our religion; and that whereas the only thing worth striving for, or worth living for on earth, is the extension of His empire, such an association with His enemies as this Bill is said to contemplate, such an act of grace and condescension towards those who are represented as bound to protest against the continued existence of Christianity, would be to invade His rightful supremacy, and to deprive Him of a portion of His rightful honour. Now, if this objection were well founded, I fully admit that it would exclude all further controversy, and would quite conclude the question; but that is not the view I humbly entertain on this

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question. He did not certainly treat this as a question of indifference, or look upon the religious objection as a thing which mainly belonged to the domain of theology, and which ought to be excluded from the concerns of life and the ordinary current of political affairs; but he held that loyalty, devotion, and attachment to any cause or to any service were best exhibited by imbibing as much as possible of its spirit, and exhibiting as much as possible of obedience to the principles which it entertained. Now, bow do I read the precepts of Christianity as I believe they may be legitimately applied to the question before us? I need not assure your Lordships that I should shrink from making any light reference to a solemn authority; but I feel that this is a question which, upon either side, can only be worthily discussed by being discussed upon religious grounds. There is, first of all, and always, then, the pervading rule of our divine faith, "Do unto others as ye would that others should do unto you." I admit that this must be construed, in the transactions of human affairs, with reference to the conditions and circumstances to which it is to be applied. But the circumstances of the case now before us are the admission of our Jewish fellow-countrymen to the share which naturally accrues to them in the legislation; and, therefore, in the practical government of the country of which they are the rightful citizens. Now, here, as applied to those special circumstances, comes in, I conceive, most expressly the authoritative declaration which has been quoted to-night by my most rev. Friend the Archbishop of Dublin, "My kingdom is not of the world." If His kingdom had been of this world, a special declaration of fealty might very properly have been required. The kingdoms of this world may very appropriately lay down such regulations as they think fit in matters pertaining to them. They may very consistently attempt to regulate the duties and privileges of those upon whom they confer the right of citizenship. It is quite true that the kingdoms which are not of this world have also duties and privileges of an infinitely higher character than any belonging to the kingdoms that are of this world; but, then, I contend that those duties and privileges which are not conferred by the kingdoms of this world ought not to be withheld by the coarse machinery of oaths, declarations, privileges, monopolies, and exclusions. I shall not go into the ques-
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tion of the origin of the words which it is proposed to repeal. I believe it is generally admitted that their insertion into the oath of allegiance was the effect of political accident. You say you rely upon these words for excluding the Jews from taking any share in the legislation of the country. But the Jew is called upon to exercise many other privileges from which he is not debarred by the oath of allegiance; and those duties which he is called upon to administer, infer more delicacy and involve more danger—where questions occur, for instance, between man and man on the magisterial bench, or, it may be, questions concerning the sanctity of public worship—which the Jewish magistrate may, in many cases, decide by himself, unchecked by the presence of other magistrates; I say that these duties infer more delicacy and involve more danger than those which a Jew would be called upon to discharge in Parliament, where he would be checked, controlled, and watched by a large preponderance of Christian colleagues. But, as I said, I don't wish to raise the question of the origin of the words which it is proposed to repeal. The question which we have to deal with is this:—Is it, under present circumstances, advisable to retain them? And here I cannot help congratulating those with whom I act on the admission of my noble Friend (the Earl of Shaftesbury), that he did not think, it likely the words would now be proposed, if they had not been found already there. But with respect to the defence which is attempted to be set up for seeking to establish Christianity by the machinery of oaths and declarations such as this, I have to say that I conceive that if Christianity did require any test derived from itself to be imposed as a condition for transacting worldly business, it would be infinitely more in correspondence with the true spirit and genius of Christianity to impose such a test upon the ground of conduct rather than of belief. But your Lordships will all feel that that would not be practicable. To introduce a test of conduct, would probably be to introduce more evils than it would obviate; because it would only lead to hypocrisy and concealment. But if we find ourselves unable to exclude persons from taking a share in our legislative councils because they are profligate or profane, do not let us try to exclude those whose want of belief in the doctrines which we profess, may make them worthy objects of our

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compassion, but whose conduct does not disentitle them probably to the esteem and confidence of their fellow-subjects. After all, this was the habit of Paganism, and not of Christianity.
"Jurandasque tuum per nomen ponimus aras."
Christianity, viewed in the light of its sublime character, and its own divine pretensions, does not stand in need of any such earthly bulwarks. If these bulwarks are unavailing, as I conceive them to be—if Christianity does not require nor command—and I challenge the most vehement opponents of this measure to show me the place in which Christianity does require or command them—but, if Christianity does not require nor command them, then I contend that to act in the spirit—I will not here raise the question of justice—but I say to act in the spirit of kindness and generosity is the course which would be most consistent with Christianity. I have confined myself to the task which I originally prescribed to myself. I have not attempted to deal with the question of policy or prudence—I have not adverted to the topics which might have been brought forward respecting the disposition of constituencies with reference to Jewish representatives, or respecting the risk which you incur by persevering year after year in refusing your assent to a Bill sent up to you by the House of Commons on a matter concerning the composition of their own body. Neither have I alluded to that which I firmly believe—that sooner or later your Lordships will give your assent to this just and healing measure. I have urged it merely as a question of Christian principle, and I have only further to say that, seeing that your Lordships would be acting in accordance with the genius of the Gospel, and in conformity with the spirit of religion, "to do as you would be done by," especially where no danger can arise from so doing, I trust that your Lordships will not wait for a repeated experiment of this long-protracted struggle either with the nation at large, or the other House of Parliament, but that you will at once firmly and spontaneously give your ready assent to the second reading of this Bill.
The EARL of WINCHILSEAagreed with the noble Earl, that the question was one of a strictly religious character. The whole question lay, however, in a nutshell. Our Government was essentially Christian, our Legislature and everything connected
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with the country was founded upon Christianity; and for the purpose of admitting the Jewish people into Parliament, we were called upon to renounce that Christian character. He solemnly believed that if their Lordships consented to the measure, they would do greater violence to the religious feelings of the great body of the people of this country, than, had been done by any measure which had ever passed that House. He believed that the principal reason why so few petitions had been presented to their Lordships' House upon the subject, was the perfect confidence entertained by the people that their Lordships would not for a moment entertain so unchristian a measure. This measure went to the removal of Christianity from the State; and if it were adopted, he defied them ever to shut the door against all infidels and heretics, of whatever class they might be; it would become perfectly unimportant whether he were a Christian of not. The noble Earl (the Earl of Carlisle) had challenged any one to resist this proposed concession upon scriptural grounds. Why, it was upon the grounds of Scripture that he chiefly founded his opposition to the measure. He found it expressly declared—"Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not the Father nor the Son;" and, "He that abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed, for he that biddeth him God speed, is a partaker of his evil deeds." Would it, then, be said that such a concession as was contemplated by this Bill, was not in complete violation of this direction given in the inspired word of God? This was a most serious question, and, as he had said before, one of a strictly religious character. If they abandoned this declaration of Christianity, they might depend upon it that God, who had made that Christianity the very foundation of England's greatness—of her moral greatness and prosperity as a nation—would visit her people with those curses which had fallen upon the Jews for the rejection of that Saviour who died to save the world, and of that religion which we must consider as the greatest of all worldly blessings. It was not upon the ground that the Jews would abuse the privileges which they sought, that he opposed the Bill, but because he thought it could not be conceded without impairing the foundation of Christianity, on which England's greatness and God's blessing depended.
The EARL of WICKLOWsaid, he had listened with the greatest attention to the speech of the noble Earl opposite (the Earl of Shaftesbury), who had spoken against the Bill, and he confessed it appeared to him that all he had said resolved itself into the oft-repeated argument, that because this was a Christian country, we ought to have a Christian Legislature. The noble Earl had stated, to his great surprise, that if these words now proposed to be omitted had never been introduced, no one would now have introduced them—because he inferred that the noble Earl thereby admitted the whole case to be against him. The noble Earl had proceeded to say that because for 200 years those words had formed part of the oath, Parliament had no power to make an alteration; but the noble Earl must have totally forgotten that in every alteration during those 200 years, for the admission to Parliament of sectarians, Quakers, and Roman Catholics, the words had actually been omitted, therefore the argument of the noble Earl on that point lost all its force. It was unnecessary for him to occupy their Lordships' time at any great length upon the one great argument, that because this was a Christian country it should be entirely a Christian Legislature, because the admitting that it was a Christian country was of itself a security against any danger arising from the admission of Jews to Parliament. But he denied that this was a Christian country in the sense in which the term was accepted by those who used it. The Jews possessed every privilege except that of sitting in Parliament. The Arians possessed every right, including the sitting in Parliament. So had the Socinians; and he asserted that from the true Catholic doctrine of Christianity the Socinians were as far removed as the Jews. He therefore must candidly admit that, considering the Jews as loyal, as honourable, and as conscientious a people as any portion of the community, he thought great injustice was done them by the Legislature still withholding the right of sitting in Parliament; and after the repeated declarations of that injustice by the other House of Parliament, and when no one could point out any danger, or even inconvenience, likely to arise from granting redress, should their Lordships still determine to resist, they would be exceeding their duty, in thus refusing the wishes of the people at large, and the demands of their representatives. Upon every princi-
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ple he felt strongly in favour of the admission of the Jews; but at the same time he felt bound to say that he objected in the strongest possible manner to the mode in which it was now proposed to remove those disabilities. His objection was to the imposing on any of Her Majesty's subjects the necessity of taking any oaths, to which great objection arose. In 1849 the Bill introduced by Her Majesty's Government was entitled an Act to alter the oaths required to be taken by the Members of the two Houses of Parliament, excepting those professing the Roman Catholic religion; the preamble of the Bill declared that it was expedient to alter those oaths generally. The present Bill was not so framed; it was merely a Bill to regulate the mode of administering the oath of abjuration to persons professing the Jewish religion, and he was anxious to hear the reasons for Her Majesty's Ministers having abandoned their opinion of the expediency of these alterations. It was a monstrous injustice to those Members of this House and the other House who felt sincerely desirous that an alteration should take place in oaths generally, that the Government, having declared it expedient to make those alterations, should now abstain from introducing a measure for the purpose. Allusion had been made to the vast majority with which the Bill passed the House of Commons in 1849, and the diminished number now; but was not that fact to be traced to the imperfect character of the present Bill as compared with that of 1849? To show that some alterations were required, he need only refer to the Cemeteries (Ireland) Act. He asserted that if an Act was to be passed for establishing the spiritual power of the Pope in this realm, it could not be better done than by that Act. Therefore, to ask Members to come to their Lordships' table and declare that they did not believe that the Pope had any spiritual authority within this realm, was to ask them to commit a direct violation of truth. Neither was it just to call upon them to declare that the Pope ought not to have any spiritual authority within the realm, because they had admitted the Roman Catholics to the full participation of the rights of British subjects, and it was utterly impossible for the Roman Catholics to exercise their religion without submitting to the spiritual authority of the Pope. He was anxious that something should be done before a new Parliament was summoned. In the other

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House it was quite optional whether those who were elected would accept seats or not, and only those who had no objection to the oaths would be likely to return to Parliament. But their Lordships, by their birthright, had a right to be legislators, and, therefore, upon them the force of this objection particularly pressed. The noble Earl had alluded to Lord Bolingbroke and Gibbon having disregarded the oaths, and having come, as the representatives of the people, to take the oaths which the people collectively could not take. He (the Earl of Wicklow) believed that such was the moral and religious feeling of the great body of the people of this country, that they would at once decline to take those oaths. It was only from the upper classes, from the aristocracy, from persons taking high office, and from Members taking their seats in Parliament, that those oaths were required. But if the Legislature were to pass an enactment that any person entering trade or business should be required to take the oath of supremacy—any enactment which would affect the great body of the people—he would venture to say it would raise a cry which would force the Legislature to make those alterations which he now so strongly pressed upon their Lordships. With these feelings he should be very reluctant to give his vote for the second reading of this Bill, but he overcame that reluctance in the hope that should it be read a second time, the House would make those alterations in Committee.
The DUKE of ARGYLLsaid, he was extremely anxious to follow the noble Earl on the cross benches (the Earl of Shaftesbury), haying listened to his speech with great interest and admiration, and although two speakers had intervened, he was still anxious so to follow him, because their Lordships must feel that his was an admirable, closely-reasoned argument, so far as argument on the subject was capable of being closely reasoned; and the two noble Lords who had succeeded had by no means exhausted that argument. He fully concurred with the noble Earl in deprecating, in the advocacy of this measure, any allusion to the spirit of persecution; for, although he did not believe that his noble Friend opposite (Lord Wodehouse) intended that phrase in an offensive sense, yet it must obviously bear an offensive meaning in the eyes of any one who agreed with the noble Earl on the cross benches (the Earl of Shaftesbury),
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as it involved a supposition of facts totally inaccurate. He (the Duke of Argyll) should not easily forget having been present, four years ago, at a great public meeting in the city of Glasgow, at which the noble Lord at the head of the Government was present by invitation. He (the Duke of Argyll) attended merely out of curiosity, as an individual among the crowd, and he heard, with infinite surprise and regret, the noble Lord say on the platform that, for the purpose of enjoying a hit of persecution, the House of Lords had refused the admission of the Jews into Parliament. He deprecated such language in the mouth of any one, but, above all, he deprecated it in the mouths of those who were in a position of authority. He deprecated it the more especially because he had encountered the greatest possible difficulties in arriving at a conclusion on the question, and he had approached it, he knew, in no spirit of persecution; and the desire to retain disabilities on account of religious belief had no part whatever in his consideration of it. But the noble Earl had put the argument in so close and logical a form, that he (the Duke of Argyll) was compelled to admit that unless he could follow it, and point out some fallacies, he could not defend the vote which he was prepared to give. If the noble Earl would allow him, he would go through the argument seriatim. First, the noble Earl said the concession they were called on to make, was a different concession from any they had hitherto been called on to make. He admitted that it was different; but he held that it was different in degree, but not different in principle. The first statement which his noble Friend made was, that the presence of a Jew was a standing protest against the truth of the Christian religion. His noble Friend would admit, probably, that the presence of a Jew in a court of justice, administering the laws of a Christian country, or his presence in his own private dwelling, was not a standing protest against the truth of the Christian religion, in the sense in which he put it. The noble Lord said only that when the Jew was admitted to either House of Parliament, his presence was a standing protest against the truth of the Christian religion. He (the Duke of Argyll) admitted that, in a certain sense, the presence of a Jew in any society whatever was a standing protest against his belief in the truth of the Christian religion. Knowing that the Jew

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did not admit the truth of the Christian religion, his presence in every and any society was a protest against his belief in the truth of the Christian religion; but it was not more so in Parliament than anywhere else. The noble Earl said, in illustration, there were certain words in an oath required to be taken by a Jew before he entered Parliament, though not in the oaths he was obliged to take before he entered other positions in society, and Parliament was now requested to withdraw those words because they were either improper or untrue. That was not the fact. That was not the ground upon which the demand was made. The ground was, that the words were not binding upon his conscience. The Jew said, "These words are introduced because they are binding on your consciences. I am perfectly fit to fill the situation to which I have been elected, and I am willing to take that oath, but I wish to omit those words, not because they are improper for the purpose for which they were introduced, but because I cannot fulfil that purpose. They may bind your conscience. I do not ask you to withdraw them because they are improper, but simply because they are not binding upon my conscience." He came now to the historical fact, with regard to the purpose for which they were introduced. The noble Earl evidently considered that they were introduced in the nature of a religious test. He (the Duke of Argyll) believed that it was historically untrue that they were in the nature of a religious test. He believed the words were solely introduced as the natural form of testifying, by an appeal to Christianity, the solemn obligations under which the Member took his seat. So far it was an argument for the demand. The noble Earl said, when they introduced Jews into Parliament, they would give them the power, so far as that might be, of extirpating Christianity, and that the object of a Jew must be to exercise hostility to Christianity. So far as the fact of the matter went, and so far as the actual condition of Jews went, as proof, he believed it was untrue that they possessed any proselytising spirit whatever. He did not believe that the Jews were anxious in any respect to inculcate their own, or to eradicate the belief of others. The noble Earl admitted that the influence might not be very great; but he said, so far as it went, whether it was the admission only of five or six Jews, it would be hostile to Christianity, but it
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was a question of principle, and from the principle they could not depart a hair's breadth. Then he (the Duke of Argyll) contended that the principle had been already departed from. The noble Earl had drawn a distinction between the administration of the law, and the making of the law. But admitting that there was a difference, nevertheless the principle was gone. As a matter of fact the Jew was admitted to the elective franchise, although, by the accidental circumstance of the introduction of these words, he could not sit in Parliament. The Jew was an elector, and every elector exercised a legislative power, through which the House of Commons acted. Therefore, he contended that the Jew was already admitted to the exercise, in a minor degree, of the administrative power. He admitted it was in a very minor degree; but his noble Friend said the question was not one of degree, but an abstract principle; and he (the Duke of Argyll) contended that as the mere theoretical operation of an abstract principle, degree being excluded from view, the principle was absolutely gone already. Then the noble Earl next said, "But I have been told I may be answered that avowed infidels have been allowed to take these oaths." He admitted that was perfectly true, and referred to the cases of Gibbon and Bolingbroke, but then he said, "It is a very great satisfaction to my mind, that, although the electors chose a man, whom they knew to be an infidel, and the House of Commons, on admitting, knew him to be an infidel, it is an immense satisfaction to my mind that he was obliged to go through the form of declaring on the true faith of a Christian." He (the Duke of Argyll) confessed he could derive no pleasure whatever from that circumstance. He conceived that the allusion to that matter brought the greatest and strongest objection that could be brought against any oath involving a declaration of religion. They invited a hypocrite under high premiums to increase the amount of his hypocrisy, and the noble Earl said it gave him great satisfaction. [The Earl of SHAFTESBURY intimated dissent.] The constituency could not take the oaths, and it was acknowledged that the constituency knew Bolingbroke was an infidel before they elected him to take the oaths for them. It was also known to the House of Commons; and yet the noble Earl said it was a great satisfaction to his mind that Bolingbroke was obliged to take the oath, and declare on the true faith of

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a Christian. [The Earl of SHAFTESBURY again intimated his dissent.] He (the Duke of Argyll) understood the noble Earl to say so, and if he was in error he did not understand him at all.
The EARL of SHAFTESBURYexplained that he did not express any satisfaction that the oath was taken by Lord Boling-broke and Gibbon; on the contrary, that it brought themselves into jeopardy. Whatever satisfaction he expressed was at the fact bearing public testimony to the observance of the principle.
The DUKE of ARGYLLdid not see the difference between the explanation and his statement. The instances referred to did bear testimony to the great public principle that all representatives should go through that form. But, so far as the public principle that the constituencies should only elect men who professed to be true Christians was concerned, that principle was broken through in knowingly electing an infidel. First, the constituency knowingly elected an infidel, and the House of Commons imposed upon the infidel a form of words implying that he was a true Christian. If he could understand the argument, the explanation of the noble Earl had not removed any of the surprise which had occurred to his mind on hearing the noble Earl express satisfaction in relation to those cases which he had quoted. But even supposing it was a satisfaction of the principle that Bolingbroke should have taken that oath, it must first be proved that these words were intended to establish any principle at all. The noble Earl seemed to admit that the words were not intended to establish any principle, for he said, if they were not in the oath, he should by no means wish to introduce them; but, since they were in the oath, he was not prepared to strike them out, because it would appear in the eyes of the people as an abandonment of Christianity. Would not the objection to the striking out the words be disposed of by the noble Earl instructing the people in the historical fact that they were not introduced for the establishment of any principle whatever, and that the abandoning of them was not intended as the abandonment of any principle whatever? The objection could he easily removed by the noble Earl passing over the opinion he now held, and joining the ranks of the supporters of this measure, who felt, as they were bound to feel, that no misapprehension ought to exist in the minds of the country, that in
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doing what they proposed Parliament was declaring, or intended to declare, in any manner whatever, their indifference to the great truths of Christianity. There were other arguments against this measure, which the noble Earl did not use himself, which he heard often used in society. He had been told by many who were not very keen and anxious opponents to this measure, but were in this state of mind, that they could not bring themselves to the point of incurring the personal responsibility of withdrawing this declaration—they said they were willing to admit the Jew to every other society of which they were themselves members—they were willing to introduce the Jew to the Royal Society, or any literary society, because the objects of such societies were not incompatible with the opinion and feelings of his religion; but that it would be an improper thing to introduce a Jew into Parliament, which had to legislate for a Christian community. Now, it was not contended that the Jew was hostile to our ecclesiastical establishments. No one with a sense of justice, truth, or common sense, would say that the Jew was so hostile as those Christian Dissenters who were already admitted to Parliament, for he, of course, was comparatively indifferent to all questions of Christian polity. It was not contended that the Jew would not take care that the laws of property were sufficiently defended. It was not contended that in reference to any one principle of law—any ordinary action of the Legislature—the Jew was incompetent or disqualified. The noble Earl distinctly told their Lordships that the one simple point on which the Jew was to be refused admission was, what he called a principle, but for which he (the Duke of Argyll) would substitute the words—an ancient traditional feeling. As regarded the difference between Parliament and the Royal Society, it was said all our laws ought to be made in the same Christian spirit. He most fully admitted the principle; but he contended that the principle, if good for anything, was of universal application. Our inquiries into the laws of nature, of science, or of history, ought all to be conducted in a truly Christian spirit; and he was prepared to contend that, if the noble Earl would admit the Jew to any literary and scientific society of which he was a member, and would not admit him into Parliament, on the ground that their affairs ought to be conducted in a truly Christian spirit, the

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noble Earl was guilty of a logical inconsistency. He (the Duke of Argyll) was prepared to vote for this measure, not merely because he had never been able to see an argument stated in clear logical form, which was not capable, more or less, of being cut up on close examination, but he was prepared to vote for it on the broad principle alluded to by the most reverend Prelate who spoke early in the debate. He (the Duke of Argyll) had immense admiration for that theory propounded by the late Dr. Arnold, with respect to the connexion between Church and State. He considered that in a theoretical point of view it was the highest position to which human society could aspire, that the Church should be at one with the State, and the State with the Church, on all occasions. But he must also recognise the fact that we lived in a time of great religious divisions and religious controversies, and probably in this world this theory never would be realised. Failing the full realisation of that theory, he feared they must fall back upon the opposite principle, that of keeping the civil and the spiritual wholly distinct. He was quite aware of the use which his noble Friend might make of that argument, and he would be quite prepared to meet him upon it on Monday night, if he should then choose to advert to it. In the meantime, he would repeat that the spiritual and the civil must be kept wholly apart and distinct; so that as it was admitted to be wrong to interfere with the faith of individuals, it might also be held to be neither just, nor right, nor reasonable, to demand that a man who was entitled in every other respect to sit in Parliament, should be excluded simply and solely on the ground of his spiritual belief.
The BISHOP of NORWICHsaid, he could not consider the measure which was now proposed as in any way affecting the interests of the Christian religion, or the Christian character of this assembly. Surely no one would seriously contend that after the admission of Jews into Parliament there would be fewer Christians in the country, or that Christianity would be less real and vital than at the present moment. It seemed to he admitted on all hands that the oath which now excluded the Jews was not intended at any time to be a religious test, and no one could explain in what sense the character of the Christianity of the country would be affected by it. Let them look at the mat-
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ter attentively. Did any one of their Lordships suppose that the Christianity of any one of them would be either more or less real and influential if Jews were admitted to the other branch of the Legislature than it was now? Or would any one undertake to say that the constituencies which had returned Baron Rothschild and Mr. Salomons to Parliament were less Christian than any of the other constituencies of the country? Or let them take it as a matter of principle. No one contended that the Christian character of the British people was injured by the admission of Jews to municipal offices, and to the position of magistrates. Why, then, should they hold that the Christian character of Parliament, which was the simple reflection of the nation at large, would' be injured by the introduction of a few Members of the Jewish persuasion? But while he contended that this measure was incapable of inflicting injury upon the Christian religion or the Christian name of the country, he must say that he saw something like an injury inflicted upon the Christian character by thus, year after year, refusing to deal with the measure which was embodied in this Bill. He could not but think that it was something disparaging to Christianity, that whilst they professed to be divested altogether of that wicked and persecuting spirit towards their Jewish brethren, which was the reproach of Christendom in former times, they were pursuing a course which he would not say was a remnant of the same spirit, but which, without doubt, had a tendency to revive the recollection of that spirit. He did not think that this was something disparaging to their Christianity as a nation. Let them set up as an index of their Christianity the profession of a creed by a body of men who were elected with a view to totally different qualifications; and he did not think that that would do a service, but rather he thought it would do a great disservice to the sacred cause of Christianity, by perpetuating as her safeguards tests of creed, which were neither real nor just. Believing that such conduct would do a great disservice to the sacred cause of Christianity, he would give his cordial support to the second reading of this Bill.
LORD ABINGERsaid, he would not have trespassed upon their Lordships' time, but for the taunt which had been thrown out, that no arguments were used in opposition to the measure. He agreed with the noble Earl (the Earl of Shaftesbury),

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that whatever might be the technical effect of the oath, there could be no doubt that it was never intended by the Legislature that a Jew should be admitted into Parliament; and he was reminded by the arguments which had been used on the other side of the answer of a Grecian legislator, who, on being asked why he had not introduced into his code a punishment for the crime of parricide, replied, because he could not suppose that so great an offence would ever be committed. He would proceed to state an argument against the admission of the Jews which had occurred to his mind, and which he had never heard satisfactorily answered—not that he was vain enough to suppose that he could impart any novelty to the debate, but he must own that the argument had considerable weight on his mind. It appeared to him that the Jews, as a nation, were not entitled to demand complete participation in all the privileges of our constitution, until they placed themselves in a similar position, in point of manners and habits, with the British people. Now, the Jews had cut themselves off from alliance with all civilised nations, and kept themselves separate from the people of every other country. Now, he contended that every State which pretended to enjoy independence ought to possess in its legislature some conformity in religion, manners, laws, and customs. As an instance of what he meant, he might state that it did not seem to be advisable that there should be a union in one legislature of Boers, of Englishmen, and of Hottentots, or of the Poles and Germans, or of the Dutch and Belgians, or of the Hungarians and the Sclaves. These experiments in legislation had been often tried, especially of late years; but they had never succeeded, and he believed that the same differences existed with regard to the Christians and the Jews. He contended that the first duty of every nation was to provide for the free action of its different functionaries, and with that view to deny political association to all persons who differed so extremely from themselves as to leave little or no hope for harmonious and united action. A challenge had been thrown out that nothing but abstract theories had been objected to the Bill; he would, therefore, endeavour to draw some practical conclusions. Much toleration was extended to eccentric conduct in the name of religion; but there was a limit to this latitude. To illustrate this position by an extreme case: Thuggee
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was a religion, yet not tolerated, because it was destructive of person and property; and if any sect or tribe should be found to propose a community of women and the exposure of infants under the name of religion, such a sect would be justly held the enemies of the human race. But much less a deviation from the general habits of mankind upon the great subjects of property and of marriage would constitute greater differences between nation and nation than the difference of climate or language. All government and laws related more or less to these two subjects. It was the latter in which the Jews differed from the rest of mankind. What other nation was so anti-social as to ally itself by marriage to no other people, and to suffer none to be allied to it? This was the secondary cause by which the Jewish nation had remained distinct and separate from all others; and for this they would continue strangers and sojourners in all other nations. It was said by a competent judge, and he believed it to be quite true, that the blood of the Chaldeans ran as purely in the veins of the Jews at the present day as it did in the time of Abraham. Now, what was the cause of that distinction? It was the same cause which had ever left them distinct—the cause which expelled them from Egypt—the cause which prevented their entire absorption—when conquered by so many various nations. No one contradicted the proposition that the Jews were a separate and distinct people, and he had pointed to the cause which had made them so—a cause which was not likely to be suddenly removed. Being thus separate by their own laws, if admitted into our legislature they would form a party having separate interests, and would act by a combined force. But their Lordships would observe that the ground which he took did not go to deprive them of all future anticipation in enjoying political privileges. If they would give up the usages and habits which now constituted them a separate and distinct people, then no doubt a very different question would arise. But at present he thought there was danger in admitting the Jews; and though their Lordships might fancy that he was something of an alarmist, he would mention a case in which there might be serious danger from the admission of the Jews. Suppose that twelve Jews in all were returned to Parliament, would it not be certain that these twelve Jews would be backed up and

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supported by as many Christians; and 24 men, he need not tell their Lordships, closely compacted together, might, if they chose, dictate their own terms to the Government, and command whatever places or offices they chose to ask for. If the Jews were admitted into Parliament, the consequences must be frankly accepted. But one of those consequences would be that that party who were not the party of order, or friendly to our institutions, would receive a large reinforcement; and a time was coming when he thought all men friendly to them would feel it necessary to combine against the approaching storm. Would it be prudent to add the Jews to the number of opponents? He had no personal antipathy to the Jews; but he could not believe that in the absence of a common ancestry, kindred, literature, or a sense of chivalry, so intimately united with Christianity, the Jews would be patriots. But there was another reason against the measure. He believed that the better part of the country disapproved of the admission of the Jews to Parliament; and if their Lordships gave their consent to the admission of Jews to the Legislature, he believed that their influence and character in the country would sustain a blow from which they would not easily recover. The confidence which the country reposed in the House of Lords was strong, though it might not be loudly expressed; and as he had himself sprung lately from the ranks of the people, he had not lost the habit of representing them in Parliament, and he was sure he was speaking their sentiments when he said that their Lordships would lower their character in the country by acceding to this Motion, and thus giving up one of the greatest safeguards to the religion of the country. Let them, at all events, wait until by some change in their own laws, the Jews gave reason to hope that they might amalgamate with this nation, and thus become entitled to share in all its privileges.
The EARL of GALLOWAYopposed the Bill upon Christian principles. It was written in the New Testament that without faith—that was, faith in Jesus Christ—it was impossible to please God. Now the Jew not only had not that faith, but so long as he was unconverted to Christianity, he could not have it; and therefore, in his administration of the affairs of the nation, he could not please God, because, though he had the Scriptures of truth in his hand,
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he not only neglected but rejected the truth contained in those Scriptures, and was therefore unfit to legislate for a Christian people.
The LORD CHANCELLORreplied. It appeared to him that the result of this debate might very shortly be summed up. There had only been two objections advanced against the measure, on which any stress was laid. One of these was, that the Jews were a separate and distinct nation; and the other argument was, or rather the result of all the other arguments was, that the retention of the words objected to in the oath involved a great principle, and that the words "on the true faith of a Christian" operated as a national declaration that this was a Christian people. Now, with regard to the first of these objections, he wished to know how it bore upon the question in hand. In what sense were the Jews a distinct people? Was it meant that they owed allegiance to any other Power and Government? Did they mean to gather from that proposition that they were less likely to continue to be good subjects after they were admitted to Parliament? There was no doubt that in a certain sense they were a separate nation, that was to say, they held that the great promises in the Old Testament, on the fulfilment of which they rested their hopes, were limited to the seed of Abraham, and with that opinion they refused to intermarry with other people, but preserved themselves as a nation separate from all the rest of the world. But how did that bear upon the present subject? How had that worked hitherto? Had that circumstance hitherto ever led the Jews to offer any resistance to the Government under which they lived? Had it induced them to form clubs or associations among themselves of which the objects were inconsistent with the peace of the Government—had they ever refused to discharge the duties attached to the rights of citizenship in the various countries in which they lived? If none of these things could be alleged against them, then what was the value of the argument? Supposing that they did hope at some future time to be restored to their own land, how did that bear upon the question of refusing them the rights of citizens during the period, uncertain as it might be, that they remained in this country? Or, grant that they were a separate people, they were still subjects of the State wherein they lived, bearing all its burdens, and interested in

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its fortune and prosperity? What, then, was the practical effect of this argument? None whatever; for the noble Lord who used it had not followed it out to any useful purpose. Yet that was the whole amount of one of the objections urged against the measure. What was the other argument? They were told that the retention of the words "on the true faith of a Christian" involved a great principle. Now, he believed it was perfectly well known—it was an indisputable fact—that these words were not introduced with any other view than this—that the party who took the oath should pledge himself to its subject-matter on the Evangelists, as that which was most binding on his conscience. It had no relation to any one beyond the individual who uttered the expression—it was intended to bind him as an individual, and in no other respect. In this point of view, what became of the principle? But suppose it was maintained to be a principle in this respect, that it was intended as a declaration, uot of the faith of the individual who took the oath, but as a declaration of the faith of the nation, then he would ask their Lordships to inquire whether they had not already destroyed that principle? Did they require the Quakers to utter these words, or the Moravians, or the Separatists? No, they did not. What, then, had become of the principle? They had relaxed this oath—in most cases wisely—with reference to the classes to whom he had referred—and how could it be set up as a great principle in the case of the Jew? Then, it must be remembered, that the Jews had already been admitted to the office of magistrate, and to municipal places of trust and dignity. It had been contended that there was a great difference between the making of a law, and the executing it when made. But he must say, it appeared to him that the difference was all in favour of the executive. As a great man once said, "I care not who makes your laws, so that I am allowed to construe them;" so he said, that the mere making of a law was only a waste of so much parchment. The value of the law depended upon the hand that executed it. Now, if that were so, he was at a loss to conceive how they should scruple to entrust the Jew with the power of making the laws, when they had already entrusted him with the power of executing them. His noble Friend opposite (the Earl of Shaftesbury) had said, that it would he a great shock to the moral feelings of the
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country if they passed this Bill; but why it should be more a shock to the moral feelings, than to allow them to be elected to the municipal offices, he could not understand. It had also been said, that there was no reason why this Bill should have been again brought before them, as it contained nothing new or distinct from the Bill which they rejected last year. But was it nothing new that the Commons should, year after year, send up the same Bill to their Lordships for reconsideration? The noble Earl said, the Bill had only been rejected four times; but he must say, that every time the Commons sent this Bill back to them, it came with renewed claims to their consideration. Their judgment, he was sure, would be received with great respect; but he need not say what would be the tendency of persisting in withholding their just rights from the subjects of this country with respect to the representation in the other House of Parliament. Did their Lordships think it would increase the respect in which they were held, if they told the Commons they had rejected the Bill last year, and that that was a reason for rejecting it again? Every one felt that the important and valuable position occupied by their Lordships, as an impediment to hasty legislation and change, insured them confidence and respect; but opposing that which he must take to be the sense of the country, as expressed by the House of Commons, would not increase the respect and love in which they were held. If they rejected the Bill, he could not promise they should not have it again. The right rev. Prelate (the Bishop of Oxford), who had risen with an intention to speak, but whom their Lordships would not now have an opportunity of hearing, had in a most able speech last year addressed them on this question; but though the right rev. Prelate possessed all the qualifications of a statesman, he had in effect only proved that no strong objections could be made against the admission of Jews into Parliament; and if, after the arguments they had now heard, their Lordships persisted in rejecting the Bill, the general opinion would be, that they were not acting in the spirit of Christianity, nor in conformity with the principles they professed, in withholding their just rights from those who had given such proofs of their fitness for the enjoyment of all civil privileges.
On Question, that "now" stand part of the Motion,
Their Lordships divided:—Content,
Present 60; Proxies 48; Total 108:—Not-Content, Present 82; Proxies 62 Total 144:—Majority 36.
Resolved in the Negative.

List of the CONTESTS.

Lord Chancellor

Torrington

ARCHBISHOP.

BISHOPS.

Dublin

Cork

DUKES.

Hereford

Argyll

Manchester

Cleveland

Norwich

Newcastle

Chester

Norfolk

BARONS.

MARQUESSES.

Ashburton

Clanriearde

Beaumont

Donegal

Broughton

Lansdowne

Byron

Westminster

Camoys

Headfort

Colborne

EARLS.

Cranworth

Albemarle

Dufferin

Bessborough

Erskine

Bruce

Foley

Carlisle

Harris

Charlemont

Holland

Chichester

Kinnaird

Cowper

Leigh

Fingall

Lovat

Fitzwilliam

Monteagle

Granville

Overstone

Grey

Saye and Sele

Minto

Stanley of Alderley

Morley

Sudeley

Scarborough

Suffield

Strafford

Vivian

St. Germains

Wodehouse

Wicklow

Wrottlesley

VISCOUNTS.

Willoughby de Eresby

Canning

Proxies.

Hamilton, Duke of

Teynham, Lord

Sutherland, Duke of

Dunally, Lord

Somerset, Duke of

Roxburgh, Duke of

Rosebery, Earl of

Campbell, Lord

Clarendon, Earl of

Fortescue, Earl of

Denman, Lord

Yarborough, Earl

Burlington, Earl of

Ducie, Earl

Howden, Lord

Kenmare, Earl of

Falkland, Visct.

Huntingdon, Earl of

Monson, Lord

Mostyn, Lord

Devonshire, Duke of

Abercromby, Lord

Dorchester, Lord

Bateman, Lord

Auckland, Lord

Vernon, Lord

Wenlock, Lord

Durham, Bishop of

Bolingbroke, Visct.

Lindsey, Lord

Glenelg, Lord

Godolphin, Lord

Londesborough, Lord

Hertford, Marq. of

Arundel, Lord

Milford, Lord

Lismore, Visct.

Lovelace, Earl

Methuen, Lord

Brougham, Lord

Spencer, Earl

Stourton, Lord

Kingston, Earl of

De Freyne, Lord

Leinster, Duke of

Sligo, Marq. of

Carew, Lord

Stuart de Decies, Lord

Bill to he read 2a on this day six months.
House adjourned till To-morrow.