Sitting of 19 May 1857

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS. —1° Sheep, &c. Contagious Diseases Prevention.
2° Ministers' Money (Ireland).

THE SAVINGS-BANK BILL.

  QUESTION.
  MR. COLLINSasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what time he intends to fix for the Second Reading of the Savings Bank Bill issued on Saturday, and also whether he will incorporate in the Bill the rules which it is proposed to give the Government power to make for the future regulation of these banks.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, that the Bill stood for a second reading to-morrow, and as there appeared to be little or no objection to the principle of the Bill which was intended to give the Government a security as a guarantee to depositors, he proposed to read it a second time on an early day, say Friday or Monday, without discussion, to commit it pro formâ, in order to introduce certain Amendments which he contemplated in consequence of suggestions which had been made to him, and then to fix a convenient day for its consideration in Committee. As the real discussion would turn on certain clauses of the Bill which were objected to, he apprehended that it could be carried on much more conveniently in Committee. He would take the present opportunity of answering a question put to him yesterday by the hon. and gallant Member for Westminster (Sir De L. Evans) in reference to the Report on Military Education. That Report was ordered to be printed by the House in July, 1856. It was printed and circulated to every Member, but there was a voluminous appendix, which it was not thought desirable to circulate on account of its bulk and of the expense, but copies of it were sent to the

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  office for the sale of Parliamentary papers, and any Member who desired to have a copy could get one on application there. He understood that the hon. and gallant Member had himself received a copy, both of the Report and Appendix.
  MR. HADFIELDsaid, he wished to know whether the Savings Bank Bill would be reprinted, and time allowed before its recommittal for communication with the, country?
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, that the Bill would certainly be reprinted after its committal pro formâ, and sufficient time allowed before the next stage for the purpose referred to by the hon. Member.
  MR. BARROWsaid, he wished to inquire if the regulations alluded to by the hon. Member for Knaresborough (Mr. Collins) would be introduced into the Bill?
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, he proposed to make some alterations in the clauses by which power of making regulations was conferred on the Government, but he did not propose to set out in the Bill the regulations themselves.

  THE CHELSEA BRIDGE—QUESTION.
  SIR JOHN SHELLEYasked the First Commissioner of the Board of Works al what period he expects that this bridge will be opened? also, whether it will be a toll-paying bridge, and if so, what is to be done with the tolls received after the expenses of keeping up the bridge has been defrayed?
  SIR BENJAMIN HALLsaid, he hoped the bridge would be opened in August next. The Act of Parliament declared that it should be a toll-paying bridge, am also provided for the disposal of the toll received. They were to be applied in the first place to the maintenance of the bridge, next to paying the expenses of its construction, and lastly, if the time should ever arrive when there was a surplus, the surplus was to be paid into the fund for the purposes of metropolitan improvements.

RATING OF MINES COMMITTEE.

  NOMINATION OF MEMBERS.
  MR. HADFIELD MR. HADFIELD moved that Sir JOSEPH PAXTON should be added to this Committee.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That Sir JOSEPH PAXTON be added to the Select Committee on the Rating of
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  Mines." But notice being taken that the House had ordered that this Committee should consist of sixteen Members, and had already nominated that number;
  MR. SPEAKERstated that no other Member could be added, without leave of he House previously obtained, and that the Question therefore could not be put.

  AGGRAVATED ASSAULTS BILL.

    MOTION FOR SECOND READING.
    Order for Second Reading read.
    Motion made and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
    SIR GEORGE GREYsaid, he felt it his duty to oppose the further progress of this Bill. The present law empowered two magistrates and a stipendiary magistrate to commit to prison for a period not exceeding six months, and to impose a fine not exceeding £20. The Bill of his hon. Friend reduced the maximum of imprisonment from six months to two, and repealed the fine, both of which alterations he (Sir G. Grey) thought uncalled for and injudicious. But there was another feature of the Bill to which he objected still more strongly—namely, that which gave power to two ordinary magistrates, and to one stipendiary magistrate, to order the punishment of whipping. If that provision was adopted, it would be the only instance on record in our statute book in which, without the intervention of a jury, a magistrate could inflict the punishment of whipping on adult males. While participating in the general indignation against persons who committed these offences, he must protest against the infringing one of the great principles of our law, and the entrusting such a power to one or even two magistrates without the intervention of a jury. The only case at all analogous in the present law was, the power given to justices at quarter sessions to inflict the punishment of whipping on incorrigible vagrants—persons, that is, who had been repeatedly convicted of vagrancy; but a court of quarter sessions was very different from a single magistrate, and, in point of fact, the punishment was never inflicted. He could not see that any ground had been laid for an alteration of the existing law, which he believed had worked well, or for introducing a new punishment, which, however it might be deserved in some cases, ought not to be inflicted, he thought, without the intervention of a jury. With

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    regard to the frequent appearance of reports of assaults on women in the newspapers, that was owing to the circumstance that the parties committing them now got brought to justice as they deserved, whereas formerly, from the expense and uncertainty of a trial at the sessions, they almost invariably escaped. He should therefore move that the Bill be now read a second time that day six mouths.
    Amendment proposed, to leave out the word "now," and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day six months."
    MR. DILLWYNsaid, that the right hon. Baronet had taken a different issue to what he had expected. He (Mr. Dillwyn) did not mean to say that the present law had done no good; his argument was that it had not reduced these offences to the minimum number. His reason for proposing a diminution of the period of imprisonment from six to two months was that generally six months' imprisonment of the husband meant six months' starvation or dependence on the parish for his wife and family. He should be glad that these cases should be submitted to juries were it not that the adoption of such a course would give rise to much delay and considerable expense, which would defeat the objects of his measure. He proposed to substitute the punishment of whipping for that of imprisonment, because those who committed these offences were usually such savage brutes that an appeal to their sense of feeling was the only one which was likely to be attended with success. He did not deny that the present system bad reduced these offences, but what he said was, that it had not reduced them to the minimum which the country had a right to expect. He would, therefore, ask the House to try the measure he proposed as an experiment. If he failed, if crime was committed to the same extent as at present, by all means he should say repeal it, and try some other. He did hope, therefore, as no other plan had been suggested as yet, the House would allow the Bill to be read a second time, and allow the remedy to be tried, which he had proposed.
    Question put, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
    The House divided:—Ayes 86; Noes 221: Majority 135.
    Words added; Main (Question, as amended, put and agreed to. Bill put off for six months.

  MINISTERS' MONEY (IRELAND) BILL.

    SECOND READING.
    Order for Second Reading read.
    MR. FAGANrose and said that, in consequence of what had taken place a few evenings before, when the Bill had boon introduced, and in consequence of the Amendment placed on the paper by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the University of Dublin, and considering also that there were a great many Members in the House who had not been present at the former discussions upon its subject, he must claim the indulgence of the House while he entered somewhat fully into the reasons why he claimed their votes in favour of the measure under their notice. In the first instance, he might be permitted to refer to a matter personal to himself. If any private Member were liable to adverse criticism for presuming to introduce an important public measure, he was that individual. On the first day of the Session the First Minister, in the course of a casual conversation, stated, in reply to an inquiry from himself, that it was the determination of the Government to take the measure into their own hands. Subsequently the noble Lord the Member for Tiverton, with that delicate courtesy which he (Mr. Fagan) highly appreciated, communicated to him that as he (Mr. Fagan) had so long had charge of the measure, and devoted his attention to it, he (Viscount Palmerston) thought he was entitled to the option of either permitting the Government to take it out of his hands or to take charge of it himself. On an occasion of this kind he hoped he was above personal considerations, and the first impulse of his mind was to leave the responsibility and the entire conduct of the measure to the Government; but, having consulted those of his friends who had been mixed up in it, he found they were unanimously of opinion that he should persist in bringing it forward himself. Nor did he regret this, for certainly, the state of public business showed that as a Government measure it would hardly have been standing for a second reading at so early a period of the Session. He humbly said, however, that be did not think the question had, up to the present time, suffered from being in his hands; but if the friends of the measure thought that, after the division of that evening, which he hoped would be a triumphant one, he should commit the care of the Bill to the

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    Government, he would most heartily adopt that course. He should now proceed to give the House a short history of the tax before he stated the reasons why he thought it should be abolished. It had been first imposed by Act of Parliament in the reign of Charles II. upon the city of Dublin and other corporate towns in Ireland having the cure of souls, but which did not at the time possess any provision for the maintenance of the ministers of the Established Church. The Lord Lieutenant and Privy Council had authority given them to name the towns upon which it should be levied, and had fixed for that purpose, besides Dublin, upon the towns of Cork, Water-ford, Limerick, Clonmel, Kilkenny, Drogheda, and Kinsale. Now, it appeared somewhat remarkable that those eight towns should have been chosen for the payment of the tax, inasmuch as they were inhabited principally by Roman Catholics, while Belfast, Enniskillen, and other flourishing towns in the north of Ireland, the greater proportion of whose inhabitants were members of the Established Church, were exempted from the operation of the tax altogether. This Act of Charles II. was passed in the year 1665—three years after the Act of Declaration of Charles II.—when that Act had been made more adverse to the interests of the Roman Catholics. It had been argued by the hon. Member for the University of Dublin that the house property had originally belonged to Protestants, and had subsequently been transferred to Roman Catholics, and that therefore the Roman Catholics had no reason to complain. He (Mr. Fagan) was a disciple of Adam Smith, and he believed with him, and with Ricardo and M'Culloch, who entertained the same views, that all taxes on house property were essentially a tax upon the occupiers and not upon the property. Therefore it was that lie had not agreed with the statement made by the hon. Member for Enniskillen before the Court of Chancery last Session—namely, that this tax was originally a tax upon the Protestant inhabitants of those towns for the maintenance of their own religion and ministers of their own persuasion. Assuming that to be the case, however, it only proved that they might as well expect to stop the rising tide as stop the entrance and growth of the national religion of a country when the people were faithful to that religion. The Act had in 1689 been
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    felt to be so unjust, that when James II., in that year, assembled a Parliament in Ireland—a Parliament not recognized in this country because it was assembled by him—that Parliament had passed an Act abolishing ministers' money. In the preamble to this Act the tax was declared to be "a new inquisition, which had become very grievous." That, he contended, was a convincing proof of the feelings of the people of Ireland on the subject, when, some twenty-eight years after its enactment by Charles II., it had been repealed by an Irish Parliament convened by his own brother James. Attempts had been made to prove that this tax had not been felt as a grievance by the Irish people, because the question had not till a comparatively recent date been brought before that House. The reason was that for the 150 years that the tax had endured, it had been but a small infliction compared with the great grievances to which Ireland had been subjected. The hon. Gentleman proceeded to mention the various penal enactments against Roman Catholics in Ireland, from the reign of William III. down to George IV., and continued: That was why they had heard nothing of this ministers' money tax, because Ireland had been oppressed with so many greater evils. But in the year 1842 it had been brought for the first time to the notice of that House by a former colleague of his own, Mr. Serjeant Murphy, then one of the Representatives for Cork, who had proposed the abolition of ministers money; but then there had been no substitute proposed, or, at least, the hon. Member had not thought of a substitute. He (Mr. Fagan) had not the honour of a seat in Parliament until 1847, but in 1848 he brought the question under the consideration of the House. He then proposed that a substitute should be found in the funds of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. Those funds then amounted to about £70,000 a year, but he showed that year after year they would be in process of being increased until they amounted to £100,000 a year. A Select Committee was appointed to consider the subject. He objected to that course, because he thought that a sufficient argument in favour of the repeal of the tax was to be found in the annually increasing income of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, and he regarded the Select Committee as another mode of shelving the question. However, the Select Com-

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    mittee went into the inquiry, and he saw some hon. Gentlemen opposite who were Members of that Committee. They reported that the augmentation of the funds of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners might be rendered available as a substitute for ministers' money. They recommended an amendment of the Church Temporalities Act, and they added that, although a new trust would be necessary, compensating advantages would be found in the social, moral, and religious considerations which demanded the repeal of the tax. At the time of the appointment of the Ecclesiastical Commission, church rates existed in Ireland, though not to so large an amount as in England; the sum thus raised was only £70, 000 a year; but it was felt to be so great a grievance and insult to contribute to it that there was a general rising against church rates in Ireland, and for two years the churches were left without repair. Now, who was the individual who came down to that House and proposed the abolition of church rates in Ireland? It was the present Earl of Derby, the leader of the party which was represented by the right hon. Gentleman opposite, and from which the opposition to the repeal of ministers' money proceeded. The reasons that induced that noble Lord to propose the repeal of church rates were ten times more applicable to this tax. In the debate on the Church Temporalites Act Lord Derby, then Mr. Stanley, declared that it was the general opinion that, for the sake of the tranquillity and good order of the country, a different distribution of church property ought to be made, the mode in which the money was collected being in many instances more annoying to the Roman Catholics than the mere amount collected. This remark exactly applied to the case of ministers' money. The sum of £12, 500 was not in itself a very heavy tax; it was the religious feelings which its imposition excited that made it odious. Lord Derby further stated that the measure of the Government was one which the best friends of the Church thought would be advantageous to that body, while it would afford relief to the people of Ireland, and also tend to promote union, not only between Catholic and Protestant, but between Ireland and England. Such were the sentiments of Lord Derby, the leader of the great party Opposition which now threatened a violent resistance to this Bill. Was there anything in the present state of things which should make them depart
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    from the views thus expressed by Lord Derby? He (Mr. Fagan) ventured to say, if this Bill went up to the other House, that that noble Lord would not recede from the opinions to which he had formerly given utterance. He (Mr. Fagan), and those acting with him, had not proposed, as a substitute for ministers' money, to tax any churchman, or to reduce any bishopric. They had merely proposed that as by a recent Act of the Government, the Ecclesiastical Commissioners were in possession of ample funds to pay £12, 500, they should not come down to seven towns and create and intensify religious differences by the collection of that tax. What, however, was the substitute of the Government of the day for the removal of church rates? Lord Derby proposed, in the first instance, that ten bishoprics should he destroyed, and that when each fell vacant by death the whole of the property and incomes attached to it should pass into the hands of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. He also proposed a tax on all benefices above £300 a year; that all benefices where Divine service had not been performed for a certain period, should, with due regard to vested interests, go to swell the funds of the Commissioners; and that the tithes of all livings above £800 a year should, on their avoidance, be appropriated to the purposes of the Commission. Another arrangement which he made was that bishops' leases might on certain terms be converted into perpetuities. Mr. Finlaison, one of the ablest actuaries of the day, computed the value of those leases, when so converted, at £1, 500, 000; and on the plan being first adopted, an income of £40, 000 a year was obtained by the Commissioners from this source. This sum had, however, since then greatly fallen off; and he (Mr. Fagan) thought that these perpetuities ought to be made more available to increase the funds of the Commission. This might easily he accomplished if the state of the law were only improved. For that purpose he would suggest that there should be a larger bonus given to the purchaser and to the new tenant, to enable them to go on, and where those I purchasers left the purchase money on mortgage in purchasing the land, that, they should only be called upon to pay 3 per cent interest instead of 5. If that suggestion were adopted, the result would be an almost unlimited income to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. At present no persons holding bishops' leases would come

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    in and purchase. In 1848 the income of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners was £70, 000. Now it was over £100, 000, and there was a yearly increase because the avoidances of benefices had not all yet occurred. Their expenditure for church purposes, which underwent very little alteration, was £35, 000. Of this sum £22, 000 went to pay sextons and parish clerks, and a clergyman of the Established Church had informed him that by consolidating the offices of these functionaries £8, 000 of this £22, 000 might be easily saved. He ventured to suggest, also, that the means for providing the elements for the Communion should be collected at the offertory, and not taken from the funds of the Commission. The next item of expenditure was that for Dublin curates; and here he would say that he believed it was entirely by inadvertence that the ministers' money had not been included in the Church Temporalities Act of Lord Stanley. A large portion of these funds was appropriated to the defraying of the expenses of working the Ecclesiastical Commission. He had no desire to inflict an injury upon any private person for the sake of the public good, but the information which he had received justified his suggestion that if there were only one instead of two paid Commissioners the work would be admirably done. The greatest item of expenditure was that relating to the repair and rebuilding of churches. It was a remarkable fact that during the last year the Commissioners paid away £12, 500 under that head, the average expenditure being several thousand pounds less. The sum expended last year was only equalled in two previous years since the establishment of the Commission—namely, the first year of the Commission's existence, when several churches were found to be in great need of repair, and the year of the great storm, when three-fourths of the churches were unroofed. He did not wish to impute bad motives without cause, but the extraordinary large expenditure of last year certainly gave rise to the suspicion that the Commissioners were determined to reduce as much as possible the surplus which the Chief Secretary for Ireland had said was in their hands. He (Mr. Fagan) had been told that the expenditure was wasteful, and that in some instances churches had been repaired in which no Divine service was performed. He was glad that after the many laborious efforts which he had made in Parliament to put
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    an end to this tax, and the many barren promises of support which he had received from Prime Ministers, the noble Lord now at the head of the Government was about to exercise all his influence in favour of this Bill. He could assure the noble Lord that his manly determination had gained for himself and his Cabinet more favour among the Roman Catholics of Ireland than any Government measure had gained for preceding Administrations since the passing of the Act of Catholic Emancipation. The Government of Lord. Aberdeen entered into a compromise with him (Mr. Fagan) on this question; but he at the same time declared that he should never cease his agitation until the tax was totally abolished. By that compromise all £10 houses wore exempted from the tax; and, although the Conservative Members were now present in large numbers for the purpose of opposing this Bill, yet they agreed in that compromise. That compromise and this Bill involved the same principle, and if hon. Gentlemen opposite did not think that the exemption of £10 houses was a violation of church property, neither should they oppose the total abolition of the tax when that abolition was justifiable as a State necessity. The present Chief Secretary for Ireland before his accession to that office always voted with him in the minorities upon this question, but as an instrument of the Government he was, of course, bound to see that the Act passed during the Administration of Lord Aberdeen was enforced when several of the Roman Catholic corporations refused to levy the tax. When the matter came before the Chief Baron of the Court of Exchequer he said that the Act of Sir J. Young was inoperative; but, strange to say, that learned Judge added, that as it was the intention of the Legislature that it should operate it was his duty to compel the corporations to collect the tax. The law advisers of the corporations advise them that the Chief Baron had laid down bad law, and unless this Bill put an end to the discussion the matter would ultimately be taken by way of appeal to the House of Lords. The two conflicting principles at work were, on the one hand, the principle of religious liberty, and on the other, that religious ascendancy which found championship in hon. Gentlemen opposite. The noble Lord recommended religious amity. The party opposed wished to keep up a small abuse, in order to secure the existence of a larger one. On the one

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    hand he had been accused of violating his oath in attempting to procure the repeal of this tax; on the other, he had been taunted with over fastidiousness with respect to that oath. He admitted that by that oath he disclaimed any intention of weakening the Established Church, or of injuring the Protestant religion. He conscientiously believed, that instead of injuring the Protestant religion by removing the excrescence which this tax constituted, he was benefiting it. He would not willingly do anything to infringe on the oath he had taken, and would sooner die a thousand deaths than violate his oath in advocating this measure. Thanking the House for the patience with which they had listened to him, he moved the second reading of the Bill.
    Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."
    MR. NAPIERrose to move the Amendment of which he had given notice, viz.: That the Bill should be read a second time that day six months. In dealing with this subject he would confine himself entirely to the principle of the Bill. That principle had been resisted by every Government that had been in power since he entered Parliament ten years ago. It was resisted by the Government of the noble Lord the Member for the City of London on several occasions, by the Government of Lord Aberdeen, by the Government of Lord Derby, and also by the Government of the noble Lord who was now the First Minister of the Crown. The principles involved in the Bill violated the sacred rights of property, and contravened the Church Temporalities Act, which he took to be a final settlement of the property question of the Church. What had fallen from the hon. Member, who introduced this subject, when he alluded to that Act, read to the House this lesson—that no concessions, however generous or liberal, would satisfy those whose ultimate object was the destruction of the Church Establishment of this country. He (Mr. Napier) could not expect in his arguments against this measure to make any impression on those who desired to make their voluntary system compulsory; nor could he expect to make any impression on those who voted with the late Member for Rochdale (Mr. Miall) when he proposed to set up all church property in Ireland to auction; but he did hope to make some impression on the attached members of the United Church of England and Ireland, and on
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    the minds of sound constitutional Nonconformists; and he was not without hope of making some impression, if not on the vote, at least an the opinion and judgment, of the noble Lord at the head of the Government, for he believed the noble Lord had been misled into the position of supporting this Bill by an inconsiderate pledge given on the eve of last election. He spoke advisedly when he said he was misled into that position by the conduct of the Irish Government, and more particularly of the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Horsman). In treating this question it was essential there should be no controversy about the facts of the case, and he would therefore call the attention of the House to those facts, which were indisputable. The hon. Member (Mr. Fagan) alluded to the early history of this charge, and had adverted rather indistinctly to its connection with the Act of Charles II., and the declaration of that Monarch involved in the Act. This charge arose after the Restoration, and it was not an unimportant part of the question to consider that if the owner of property, having perfect and complete power over it, put a charge upon it for religious purposes sanctioned by law, and if that property should afterwards come into the hands of persons who did not concur in the religious views of the owner who imposed the charge, they would, according to the principle of this Bill, be justified in refusing to pay the charge so imposed, though the property was acquired subject to it. That was exactly the state of things involved in this question. The declaration of Charles II. adverted to the importance of encouraging the plantation of Protestant colonies in Ireland. The north of Ireland had already been largely colonised by Protestants, and it was thought desirable to plant other parts of Ireland, and especially the towns, with English settlers. The words of the declaration were "That all Papists who for the public security have been dispossessed of estates within any corporation, shall be reprised out of forfeited lands near the said corporation," and reference was particularly made to three corporations—those of Cork, Youghal, and Kinsale, the very baronies being mentioned from which they were to be recouped for property which they had lost. The declaration then went on to state that Protestant plantations should be settled, churches should be built, and maintenance for ministers thereof provided, and then followed the "new rules"

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    for encouraging religion and inducing English settlers to settle in those towns. Then let the House attend to the language of the Act which immediately followed, and in which the charge was imposed. It distinctly gave to the Lord Lieutenant a general power to "lay a charge on houses in Dublin and the other corporate towns, and to raise sums to be paid to the parochial incumbent having actual cure of souls therein." The sum was not to exceed 1s. in the pound, and no house was to be valued above £60 a year, and then, after some words more explicitly declaring the charge to be good and effectual in law, as if it were payable out of the house in each case, it gave as the only remedy for non-payment distraint upon the goods found upon the premises. The Law Officers of the Crown would admit that where no personal remedy was given in the case of a charge, and where the remedy was only by distress, it must be held to be strictly and peculiarly a charge on property. The statute clearly made it a charge on property. The Crown and Parliament having complete power over this property, and having recouped those who had suffered the loss of any part of it, then imposed on the property this charge for the support of parochial ministers, the persons then bound to pay the charge being Protestants and Protestants only. The hon. Member opposite (Mr. Fagan) spoke of a precedent for the proposal in his Bill; and what was that precedent? It was the one set by James II. in 1689, when he attempted to repeal this Act of Charles II. That was the precedent which was held forth to be followed by the Protestant Prime Minister of the present day, and on the ground of that precedent he was asked to repeal a charge which was originally imposed, not on the property of Roman Catholics, but on Protestants, for no Roman Catholic could in those days hold property at all. He held that this which was the property of the United Church of England and Ireland, ought to be secured by as good a title, as were the estates of the hon. Gentlemen he saw around him, and which they so honourably enjoyed. He would now come to the Church Temporalities Act. The hon. Gentleman opposite gave it as his opinion that Lord Derby meant to include ministers' money in that Act, but the hon. Gentleman would find that in the very next Session after that Act passed there was an express reference made to parishes in
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    which ministers' money was paid, and a section was introduced placing them on the same footing with rural benefices. Mr. O'Connell and Mr. Sheil were then in the House, and, though they were not sparing of their demands, and went as far as they could go with reference to Church property, there could be no doubt that they considered this as a permanent property of the Church. The Parliament abolished church rates, suppressed bishoprics, and taxed the clergy, but with this subject of ministers' money brought prominently before them, did not think that they were justified in touching it. It had never been suggested to confiscate the incomes of these parochial clergy; on the contrary, it was acknowledged by the Roman Catholics themselves that they were hard-working, meritorious men, and that it would be gross injustice to deprive them of one farthing of their incomes. What was the ground of objection to this tax? The proposition of the hon. Member was to take away from these meritorious men the income which they derived from a tax laid on property originally of Protestants, and which when it passed into the hands of Roman Catholics was taken with this charge upon it, for the simple reason that a proportion, though not a majority of those who were called on to pay the tax were Roman Catholics. Was this a principle which the noble Lord at the head of the Government would have his Parliament sanction? Was it a principle which any honourable man would sanction, that in a case, where no question could be raised between a debtor and his creditor but that of religion, a debtor should be allowed to repudiate a charge simply because he was of a different religion from his creditor? There was really no determining where such a proposition would stop. It would apply to the case of the tithe commutation. If the Roman Catholic tenant complained of the tithe rent-charge, the answer which he got was that it was part of his rent, that it had entered into the contract made when he took his land, that it was as much the property of the Church as the rent was his landlord's property, and that he had no more right to refuse the payment of the one than of the other. Two thirds of the charge were paid by the city of Dublin—by Protestants as well as Roman Catholics. It was a purely local charge, which people took into their consideration when they took a house, just as they did any other local charge; and was it reasonable that the whole should

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    be swept away now, just because, forsooth! the noble Lord at the head of the Government, on the eve of the elections, misled by the Irish Secretary, and pressed by the hon. Member for Cork—a city which paid only one-sixth of the tax, and where, by the way, a very smart contest was then anticipated—had entered into certain stipulations, and allowed himself to give an imprudent promise of support to the Bill? The noble Lord had doubtless found out his mistake by this time, and would be glad to get out of the position to which he had committed himself, if it were possible with honour; it was to be hoped that some of his colleagues would come forward and extricate him. Let the House bear in mind the trusts of the Church Temporalities Act. That Act vested the property of the Church in the hands of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, but entirely for Church purposes. The various trusts were recited in the Act, and it was specially directed that any surplus revenues, which should remain after the necessary trusts had been fulfilled should be applied to the augmentation of the incomes of the hardworking clergy whose benefices were under £200 a year. Now, he believed, it would not be denied, that in the Irish branch of the Established Church there was a large body of meritorious and faithful men, and the House, perhaps, will learn with surprise, that the incomes of nearly one-third of the beneficed clergy of Ireland were under £150, while there were a very great many under £100, and the surplus applicable under this provision had not been such as to raise many of the incomes to £100. The trust, therefore, in the Act, to which he had just referred, was, he need hardly say, received with great favour. Yet so great were the demands upon the Commissioners that, up to that moment, they had never in their hands a sufficient surplus to augment the livings which were under £100 a year. Parliament was asked, then, on the one hand, to apply this surplus to relieve certain persons, many of them wealthy Protestants, from the payment of a tax on their property which they had acquired with that charge upon it, and on the other to prefer the augmentation of the incomes of hard-working clergy whose incomes were under £100 a year—which would they choose? He did not then really believe there was an honourable man in that House who, if he were to lay aside political considerations, could put his hand to his heart and say that, consistently with the provisions of the Temporali-
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    ties Act, it was fair thus to abolish the tax of ministers' money. His proposition was, that they had got no surplus to deal with until the requirements essential for the maintenance of the Church were first satisfied. That certainly was the spirit of the Act of Parliament. He did not stand there to defend an ecclesiastical abuse; on the contrary, he was as anxious as any one to make Church property more available for the growing wants of the times. But that should be done consistently with the principles of property. Now, after the Temporalities Act—which, however, was regarded at the time as a final settlement—came the Tithe Rent-charge Act, whereby 25 per cent of the tithe composition was given up, on the ground that it was better for the Church to take 75 per cent charged upon the superior proprietor. He himself was of opinion that that was a wise and beneficial settlement; at the same time, he could not agree in the notion that it implied a surrender of principle; it was simply an arrangement on the part of the Church as a fair settlement. When that was settled the only subject upon which a grievance could be got up was ministers' money, and accordingly an agitation was raised against that. To this tax there were two classes of objections; the general objection, which, if it were good, applied equally to the tithe rent-charge, and the objection arising out of the inequality of the assessments, the remedy by distress, and the unsatisfactory state of the valuations of property according to which it was raised. These latter objections were admitted by the friends of the Church, and it was on that ground that his hon. Friend and Colleague (Mr. Hamilton) moved for and obtained the Committee of 1848. That was under the Government of the noble Lord the Member for the City of London, and at a time when the hon. Baronet the Member for Canterbury (Sir William Somerville)—a useful, I able, and honourable man, who always acted courteously, candidly, and frankly—was Irish Secretary. Unfortunately, he was embarrassed by representing Drogheda, one of the towns interested in this subject, and his seat being in jeopardy he felt himself in some embarrassment how to act, and determined to remain away from the Committee. The consequence was, that Committee was packed so as to leave the Protestants at the mercy of the Roman Catholics. Mr. Sheil was chairman, and ultimately a Report of a most singular

    555
    character was carried by one vote. That Report was that, "having examined into the state of the Ecclesiastical Commission, the Committee was of opinion that the income of the Commissioners was adequate to their expenditure." That was to say they judged of the adequacy of their income by the expenditure before them—a rather curious mode of calculation, while what was insinuated was, that they spent quite enough, and that therefore any sum that accrued beyond their actual expenditure might be applied to other purposes. There was in the original draught of the report a passage stating, that if the funds never increased, the Church would suffer no injury, but that was finally omitted. The evidence upon which the report, such as it was, was founded, was this. The Chairman asked one of the Commissioners if their income was adequate to their expenditure, and the reply was—"We regulate our expenditure by our income." The other Commissioner had, in most graphic terms, stated the deficient state of the funds, the inability to meet necessary demands, the imperfect nature of the repairs done in churches, and subsequent experience had verified the correctness of his statement. The hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Fagan) thought himself fortified by this Report, and on the 27th of March 1848, he proposed a Motion for the abolition of ministers' money. That Motion was opposed by the right hon. Baronet opposite (Sir G. Grey), who was then Home Secretary, and who, after referring to what he justly termed the very peculiar language of the Report, said—
    "If it afterwards appeared that the Ecclesiastical Commissioners had ample funds in their hands for the accomplishment of the objects for which they were appointed, and that any surplus remained, then it might be fit and right to apply that surplus, and substitute it for ministers' money."
    That was in the spirit of the noble Lord's (Lord John Russell's) famous appropriation Resolution, which was much exceeded by this Bill, for the spirit of that Resolution was, that when all the demands of the Church should he satisfied, then the surplus should be applied to educational purposes. If any one could find that surplus, he (Mr. Napier) should be very much obliged to him, because it would imply first the supply of all the spiritual demands. The Motion of the hon. Member for Cork was lost, and among the majority were the noble Lord opposite (Lord John Russell) and the right hon. Baronet the Member
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    for Canterbury (Sir W. Somerville). In 1850 the hon. Member repeated his Motion with a similar result. In 1851 the noble Lord (Lord John Russell) began to consider whether something might not be done; a Bill was set going, but the Government, of the noble Lord came to a termination, and that measure was not brought forward. In 1852, when Lord Derby was in office, the hon. Member again brought forward his Motion, having, however, changed his plan, for he said, he did not wish the Commissioners to postpone any of their trusts, and suggested that property might be made available by the sale of perpetuities, which plainly showed that the hon. Gentleman did not contemplate the abolition of ministers' money as long as there were not sufficient funds to satisfy the trusts of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. Well, there was no suggestion on the part of the Government that the funds were sufficient; but, on the contrary, his right hon. Friend the Member for the University of Cambridge (Mr. Walpole), then Secretary for the Home Department, opposed the Motion, and stated that the Government had it in contemplation to introduce a measure to remove the inequalities in the assessment of this charge. The Motion of the hon. Member for Cork was again rejected. Then, when Lord Aberdeen came into office, Sir J. Young, who was well versed in Irish statistics, applied himself to the subject, and framed a Bill which certainly conferred a great boon on certain portions of the community. He exempted houses under £10, and for the valuation under the Act of Charles II. he substituted the Poor Law valuation, and he also exempted future houses, in order not to discourage improvements. And who was the Home Secretary at the time that Bill was introduced? Why, the noble Lord the Member for Tiverton — it was the noble Lord who, as Home Secretary, had peculiarly the charge of the Bill. The Bill was also supported by the right hon. Gentleman (Sir G. Grey), by the noble Lord the Member for the City of London, by his right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds (Mr. Baines), by the present Attorney General, and by the right hon. Baronet the Member for Marylebone (Sir B. Hall). That Bill was carried by a majority of 203 to 97, and it was undoubtedly a very great boon, for it cleared away all objections of the second class, and left nothing but the naked abstract

    557
    objection founded on the difference of religious creeds. At that time the argument was advanced, that by relieving small occupiers the principle of ministers' money itself was abandoned; but that argument had been most clearly refuted by the noble Lord at the head of the Government. Well, but how was it that that Act had not been carried out? He would tell them presently. Now, he wished here to pause, and ask what was the meaning of that clause in the Roman Catholic oath—"I will defend to the utmost of my power the settlement of property?" They had it on the authority of the late Sir Robert Peel, that that clause specifically pointed to the declaration of Charles II., by which it appeared that ministers' money was to be made a charge with the special intention of encouraging a Protestant settlement in corporate towns in Ireland; for it was perfectly plain, as was afterwards shown in the time of James II., that if the religions objection were to prevail, the arrangement might be upset at any time. He was willing to admit that the amount involved in the tax was small, but the principle was a large one; and if the religious objection were once allowed, the principle on which the property of the Established Church rested would be shaken to its very foundation. If Sir John Young had continued in office, they would not have heard one word of the present Bill. Well, then, in 1855 the hon. Gentleman brought in a Bill to repeal the Act of Sir John Young, an Act which was also endorsed with the name of the noble Lord now at the head of the Government. Well, it was expected, after the support which that measure had received from the Members of the Government, that the proposal would have at once encountered the opposition of Ministers, especially that of the noble Lord at the head of the Government. In place of that, when he (Mr. Napier) rose to oppose the hon. Gentleman, he was quietly put aside by the noble Lord—of course with his usual bonhomie—and the Bill was introduced. The second reading was fixed for after Easter. But what had occurred in the meanwhile? Why, the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for Ireland went to that country, and there a deputation was received by him upon this subject. Let the House observe that the collection of this money was placed upon the same footing as other rates levied upon property, and then let them also observe who were the persons who complained of the rate. Why,
    558
    they were not the persons upon whom it was levied, but those upon whom the collection of it was thrown. Now, what was the state of the case? A law had been passed requiring certain persons to collect a certain impost, and yet those persons waited upon the Secretary for Ireland, and were most courteously received by him, in order, as it appeared, to announce to him their determination not to obey the law, and their refusal to collect the tax. On the very face of the Act it was stated that the persons who were charged with the collection of this rate should, if they came into default, be looked upon as debtors to the Crown. Notwithstanding that such was the case, the right hon. Gentleman, instead of saying to the deputation, the law is so and so, you are bound to obey the law, informed them that their remonstrances should receive the best consideration. Of course, therefore, the corporations, seeing that they had got hold of a pliable Government, saw the advantage of pressing it; and in the end the right hon. Gentleman promised to put himself in communication with the Law Officers of the Crown. The course of the Government was condemned by the noble Lord the Member for the City of London, who told them to take a decided course one way or another, and that he would support them. Indeed to make, the law depend upon the conduct of the corporations was the strangest thing in the world. Well, the Government took proceedings, and they got judgment against the corporations. A writ of error was threatened, and the Government, disappointed at their own success, were brought to a stand-still. The Bill of the hon. Member then came forward for the second reading, and was thrown out; in the subsequent year it was again introduced, and the right hon. Gentleman declined to offer any opinion on the first reading; but at the second reading, on the eve of the elections, he made one of the most extraordinary statements he (Mr. Napier) had ever heard from a person holding an official position. After adverting to the Committee of 1848 he stated—
    "There were many Protestants in Dublin who had no objection to paying ministers' money, and therefore it was felt that the tax ought not to be redeemed altogether." [The right hon. Gentleman must have meant to say "abolished."] "That proposal met with a great deal of consideration at the hands of the Government, and he confessed he regarded it with favour himself, the more especially as the great bulk of the tax was levied Dublin, where those hospitals were. But it raised a question with which the House was

    559
    familiar, namely, the appropriation question, that was to say, whether they ought to take away the funds of the Established Church and apply them to other purposes. Now, it was quite evident that this last plan could never he carried into effect without the concurrence of Gentlemen on the opposite side of the House, and with that concurrence he was afraid it would never meet."
    The proposition to which the right hon. Gentleman alluded was, in fact, to apply the tax levied in Dublin to the maintenance of the hospitals, and thus to save a sum of £10,000 per annum to the consolidated fund. That was in his (Mr. Napier's) opinion, a course which involved not truly an appropriation—but he might say—a confication of the funds in question. The right hon. Gentleman, however, had thought fit, upon the occasion to which he was referring, to endeavour to make out that the Ecclesiastical Commissioners possessed a fund ultra the purposes of their trusts, which ought to be disposed of in the manner he had described. That was a proposition, however, which he (Mr. Napier) was prepared most emphatically to deny. The right hon. Gentleman in support of his view of the case had made statements which clearly showed that he had confounded the sale of perpetuities and other items which formed part of the permanent income of the Commissioners, with their annual receipts. He had endeavoured to prove that they possessed a surplus fund which ought to be applied to a particular purpose; but the Returns for the three years, after the passing of the Act of Sir J. Young made it perfectly evident that no such surplus existed. The first of these returns was that which contained the Report of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners for the year ending the 1st of August, 1854. In that Report the Commissioners had made the following statement to Earl St. Germans, then Lord Lieutenant of Ireland:—
    "We have much satisfaction in bringing these particulars as to the assistance afforded by private contributions under the notice of your Excellency as by this means much has been accomplished in the extension of church accommodation, and in providing for the pressing wants which otherwise must have been to a great degree postponed had the Commissioners been altogether dependent upon their own resources. And we beg to observe that the Commissioners fail not on every opportunity to represent the urgent necessity of their being liberally aided from private sources, in their endeavours to meet the numerous demands upon them, the funds at present at their disposal being wholly insufficient for the several purposes to which they are applicable."
    The next Report was that for 1855, in which the Commissioners, after having re-
    560
    ferred to the expenditure which they deemed to be necessary for the repair of many of the rural churches, went on to say;—
    "These cases have been consequently added to the list of churches requiring to be rebuilt; and we regret to state that several of the objects contained in these lists must necessarily be postponed for some time, the funds available in each year for such purposes, after providing for other charges of a fixed nature, being insufficient to carry on very many of the buildings reported to be necessary, leaving other trusts created by the Church Temporalities Acts—such as the building of glebe-houses, the purchase of glebes, wholly unprovided for, as also the augmentation of small benefices, except to a very limited extent. The Commissioners, however, supply the usual requisites for the celebration of Divine service in such licensed places of worship as have from time to time been brought under their notice, of which sixteen have been added to their list this year."
    The most remarkable, however, of these Reports was that relating to the year 1856, which was signed by the Lord Chancellor of Ireland, and he would, with the permission of the House, read from it an extract, which was as follows:—
    "A larger amount from private subscriptions might have been received had the Commissioners been able to afford the assistance required from them in several other cases; but the fund under their administration being insufficient for the several purposes to which it is applicable, they were obliged to require, under their existing regulations, a larger amount of subscription than the respective parties were prepared to give; and we have to state to your Excellency that in their endeavours to provide for the most urgent demands on their funds the Commissioners have for the present been obliged to refuse, unconditionally, many applications from the clergy and others, which, under different circumstances, it would have been very proper to have complied with. The difficulties with which they have had to contend in this respect, and the dissatisfaction occasioned by their refusing to comply with many reasonable demands, are likely to be much increased during the ensuing year, owing to a considerable defalcation in their funds, from the non-receipt of a large portion of the moneys which, pursuant to the provisions of the Act 17 Vict., cap. 11, should have been levied by the collector-general of rates in the city of Dublin and the respective boards of guardians and other bodies for the payment of ministers' money."
    Now, he would ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he was prepared to contradict the statement of the Lord Chancellor of Ireland, whose signature, as an ex officio Commissioner, was attached to that Report? And yet the right hon. Gentleman said that the Ecclesiastical Commission had an income of £146,000, and a surplus which they could easily appropriate to the payment of ministers' money. The right hon. Gentleman had adverted in his speech of the 18th of March to a letter which had been

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    addressed by Lord Carlisle to the Archbishop of Dublin on the 13th of February, but to the answer which had been given to that letter no reference had been made. The letter in question he (Mr. Napier) might state bad been written with the view of obtaining the co-operation of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners with the Government for the purpose of procuring a Committee to ascertain, whether the working of the Commission might not be less expensively carried out. To that proposal the Commissioners in their reply of the 15th of February were perfectly ready to assent, but, at the same time, reiterated their former statement as to the inadequacy of their funds. In what, then, did the charge of the right hon. Gentleman consist? The Commissioners stated that their income was not sufficient to meet the pressing claims which were imposed upon them under the Church Temporalities Acts. If the right hon. Gentleman did not believe that statement to be correct, what would have been the proper course for him to have pursued? Why, clearly, instead of committing the Government to this Bill, on the eve of the elections, to have instituted an examination into their accounts, and to have obtained the best information upon the actual state of the question? Was any return obtained since the Parliament had assembled? And was the most accurate information sought for by the Government before they pledged themselves to support the present Bill? The Commissioners were much aggrieved by the conduct of the Government. He asked for inquiry, and he was in a condition to prove beyond a doubt that so far from the Ecclesisastical Commissioners having a margin of income applicable to ministers' money, their funds were so deficient as to be unable to reach some of the most important trusts created by the Act. The revenue of the Commissioners from permanent sources amounted to £93,591 13 s. 9d. The terminable income, including £11,577 ministers' money, to which the Commissioners were entitled, but which was not collected, was £17,362. The permanent outgoings, such as repairs of churches, &c., amounted to £98,056 8s. 7d. The average of grants during the last three years for new churches were £9,464, and for the enlargement of churches, £3,636, leaving the purchase of glebes, building, &c., of glebe houses, and the augmentation of benefices without any means of supply. On many livings there were no residences,
    562
    nor any means of obtaining glebe or glebe houses. All these trusts were unfulfilled. Well, he now asked what became of the available surplus out of the income of £146,000? It was gratifying to see the extension of church accommodation in Ireland, but the Commissioners were daily unable to avail themselves of offers for church extension, because they could not supplement private subscriptions by aid from their own funds. He was attached to the Church on principle, and he held that, consistently with freedom of conscience, everything ought to be done to make it an instrument of good for the spiritual welfare of the people. What did a member of his own profession, who opposed him at the late general election, and who was supported by the whole strength of the Government, say relative to this plan of abolishing ministers' money? He said that if he were elected he would oppose to the utmost of his power this measure for taking away, indirectly, a portion of the revenues of the Established Church, which could not be directly spoliated. An authority who ought to have great weight with Scottish Members — Dr. Chalmers—declared that he should hold it to be a false and ruinous step to alienate one farthing of the revenues of the Irish Church. He held in his hand a list of benefices of the poorer class, which would show the numbers of clergymen in the receipt of very small incomes, who, if there were a surplus, ought certainly to be first considered. He should be much indebted to the Government if they could make a surplus; and if they could do so by the more economical working of the Commission, or by making their resources more productive, he would heartily co-operate with them. But, while the trusts were unfulfilled which the Commissioners were appointed to carry out, he would not be a party to set them aside and hand this money over to persons so well able to pay it. When he remembered the speech of the noble Lord at the head of the Government, in answer to Mr. Miall, on the Irish Church, he did not believe he would join in an attack upon the property of that Church. What were the reasons given by Lord Castlereagh why Ireland should consent to the Union? He said—
    "One State, one Legislature, one Church; these are the leading features of the system; and, without identity with Great Britain in these three great points of connexion, we can never hope for any real and permanent security. The Church in particular, while we remain a separate country, will ever be liable to be impeached on local

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    grounds. When it shall once be completely incorporated with the Church of England, it will be placed on such a strong and natural foundation as to be above every apprehension and fear from adverse interest, and from all the fretting and irritating circumstances connected with our colonial situation. As soon as the Church Establishments of the two kingdoms shall be incorporated into one Church the Protestant will feel himself at once identified with the population and property of the empire, and the establishment will be placed on its natural basis."
    Would the noble Lord (Viscount Palmerston) attack the property of the English branch of the Church? Would he consent to a diminution of its resources, however small? He was sure he would not. To carry out this proposal it would be necessary to have a fund at once to draw upon, and was the House prepared to cripple the Irish Church just when she was beginning to prosper? If the Government would deal with the Irish Church and administer its patronage as if it were the English Church, he would give them all the co-operation in his power. He wanted no sinecures or abuses; but when it was proposed to confiscate the property of the Irish Church, he appealed fearlessly and respectfully to the Parliament of Great Britain. When he brought, forward his landlord and tenant measure the cry raised against him was that he was trenching upon the rights of property. And yet in this Bill they were confiscating the rights of property the most sacred. He could understand why persons who objected to every description of church endowment should support this measure, but that statesmen professing to be members of the united Church should vote for a measure of church confiscation like the present, was to him incomprehensible. He regretted that the noble Lord at the head of the Government had committed himself upon the question, and that it had thus been made a party question. The Bill involved a most important principle, and should not be treated as a mere Irish question. It was an Imperial question of great moment. He had endeavoured to submit it fairly and dispassionately to the House, and he hoped that before the debate terminated the House would see its way to the rejection of the Bill. The right hon. Gentleman concluded by moving that the Bill be read a second time that day six months.
    Amendment proposed, to leave out the word "now," and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day six months."
    Question proposed, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
    SIR GEORGE GREY: Sir, I wish to take an early opportunity of stating to the
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    House the grounds on which the Government feel it their duty to support the second reading of this Bill; and I trust I shall be able to show that I am not taking a course inconsistent with what I have either said or done on this question on any former occasion. I would remind the House at the outset that much that has been stated relative to the Act of Charles II., by which this tax was originally created, has really no reference to the practical issue which we are now called upon to determine. That Act was repealed in 1854, when another Act was passed which only partially continued the tax, and provided that it should be levied in a very different manner from that which had previously prevailed. It may be right to consider the Act of Charles II. in connection with the circumstances which existed before 1854, and this brings me to what the right hon. and learned Gentleman said regarding the conduct of preceding Governments. If I understood him aright, he objects to this Bill on principle. He says this tax is a part of the property belonging to the Established Church; that this measure violates ecclesiastical property; and that its principle has been resisted by every Government,—by that of my noble Friend the Member for the City of London, by that of Lord Aberdeen, by that of Lord Derby, and also by the present Government. I altogether deny that proposition, and I hold it to be very ill-judged on the part of a friend of the Established Church in Ireland to rest the security of its property, and still more to rest its existence as an Established Church, upon such a miserable footing as the maintenance of this tax, of which it had become impossible for the Church to avail itself, and which had been subsequently modified in 1854. What were the circumstances of the case previous to 1854? Was the Church Establishment really in possession of a valuable property guaranteed by law, and did the complaints only come from those who refused to pay the tax? The fact, I believe, was that the complaints against the tax came more from the clergy, who had a legal right to receive it, but from whom it was practically withheld, than from those by whom it ought to have been paid. It is stated with great truth in the Report of the Committee, and supported by the evidence adduced before it, that—
    "It is not an exaggeration to say that popular odium attaches to this tax; nor is it to those by

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    whom it is paid that this antipathy is confined. This source of livelihood is an object of dislike to the clergy, by whom it is most painfully collected from the reluctant and the poor. Several clergymen have been examined in the course of this inquiry, all of whom concur in the expression of a strong desire on their own part and on the part of the clergy that some substitute for ministers' money may be provided."
    The Report further stated that many clergymen had abandoned the attempt to collect their income in this form, because they felt that it would deprive them of all chance of influence as Christian pastors over those to whom they wished to minister, and that it would bring them into constant hostility with those with whom they desired to live in peace and amity. In this state of things the question forced itself upon the attention of this House; and what has been the course pursued with regard to it by successive Governments? The right hon. and learned Gentleman says that the Government of my noble Friend the Member for London opposed this measure on principle, as he opposed it himself to-night, and that on several occasions when it has fallen to my lot to address the House on the part of the Government, I also have resisted it on the same ground. What is the fact? In 1849 and 1850, subsequently to the Report of the Committee of 1847, when this measure was brought forward, I did not oppose the Motion of the hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Fagan) on the principle laid down by the right hon. and learned Gentleman—namely, that this tax was the property of the Established Church, and could not be alienated, and that the burden ought not to be transferred to the funds of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. I did not even on the part of the Government of that day give a direct negative to the Motion. On the contrary, on both occasions, admitting the full force of the objections offered to this tax, both by those who were bound to pay it and those who were entitled to receive it, I met the Motion by moving "the previous question," stating distinctly that I did so with the Report of the Committee of this House before me, with which I, in the main, agreed. That Committee was unwilling to withdraw from the specific purposes to which they were then appropriated any portion of the funds of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, and it recommended—in which recommendation I concurred—that when their sources of income had sufficiently augmented, of which there was an
    566
    early probability, this tax should be abolished, and the support of the clergy legally entitled to receive it be henceforth thrown on the funds of the Commission. That, I think, is a sufficient answer to the assertion of the right hon. and learned Gentleman, that I then subscribed to the doctrines which he has advanced tonight. It is said the Report of the Committee was carried by the casting vote of the Chairman. That is not the fact. Two draught Reports were submitted to the Committee, the one by the Chairman, and the other by the right hon. and learned Member for the University of Dublin. Divisions afterwards took place regarding paragraphs in the Report, and in one instance, when eleven members were present, five voted one way, and five the other, and the Chairman gave a casting vote. But when the question to be decided was, which of the two Reports they should adopt, seven Members voted for the Chairman's Report, and only five for that of the right hon. and learned Member for Dublin University. This shows that the majority of the Committee was in favour of the recommendations subsequently reported to the House. The existing evils were unanimously admitted in the Committee; the tax was allowed to be onerous, odious, and impossible to be collected, inasmuch as it was levied in small sums from the occupiers of houses, who were mostly Roman Catholics, for the support of Protestant ministers. It was also generally agreed that the clergy ought not to suffer prejudice from the abolition of the tax, but should receive an ample equivalent, and one that would relieve them from the embarrassing position of being the recipients of a nominal income, which they could not, realize without endless delay, vexation, and expense. One other proposition was made to the Committee, and that by a clergyman who was examined before the Committee. It was, not that the tax must be maintained as sacred property which no unhallowed hand must touch, but that it should be abolished, and the sums necessary to replace it be supplied, from time to time, from the Consolidated Fund. That suggestion, however, was very properly rejected by the Committee, which then adopted the Resolution—that it was expedient the tax should be repealed, and its value paid to the clergy out of the funds of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, as soon as the augmentation of those funds enabled the Commissioners, without sacrificing the

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    objects to which their present income was devoted, to supply the requisite substitute. It is said that the funds of the Commissioners are insufficient to meet the purposes to which Parliament intended them to be applied; and no doubt if those funds were to be multiplied tenfold, ample use could be found for them by zealous and active members of the Church, who might wish to build new churches, to enlarge old ones, and to increase the number of her ministers. The practical question, however, is not whether the time ever will arrive when all these objects shall have been exhausted, but whether the purposes contemplated by Parliament, when it placed these funds in the hands of the Commissioners, have been so far satisfied, that it is competent for them to apply part of their surplus to the maintenance of those curates and incumbents in cities and towns, who have had hitherto to struggle against the most inadequate incomes, owing to Parliament having assigned to them a resource of which they cannot practically avail themselves? By this means the efficiency of the Church will be more effectually secured than if the Government were to go on involving itself in endless litigation in order to collect an odious and unpopular impost. Indeed, on the ground of expense alone, to say nothing of the other evils incident to the present system, it would be better to adopt the plan of paying the amount of the tax out of the Consolidated Fund, than to waste an equal or even greater sum in vexatious litigation. I must call the attention of the House to the real effect of the Act of 1854, because the right hon. and learned Gentleman has told us, that, if we sanction the principle of this Bill, we shall act in violation of the sacred duty imposed upon us to maintain the property of the Established Church. Now, what was the object of the Act of 1854? Under the Act of Charles II. the clergy were entitled to the proceeds of this tax, which was chargeable upon Houses. I won't now enter into a discussion with the right hon. and learned Gentleman as to whether it was the owner or the occupier of a house that was made liable to the tax, but I will grant, for the sake of argument, the position laid down by him. The clergy themselves were entrusted with the means of enforcing payment of the charge, and they appointed their churchwardens to collect it. They had the power of enforcing payment by distress, which is the most
    568
    effectual means of doing so. As I have already said, the collection became impossible. The clergy had merely a nominal income, and under these circumstances the Act of 1854 was passed. That Act received the approbation and support of the right hon. and learned Gentleman. And what did it do? Its provisions were shortly these:—The Lord Lieutenant of Ireland was directed by it to ascertain, by persons to be named by him for that purpose, the gross amount payable in 1853, the year preceding, on all houses chargeable to the tax in Dublin and the seven other cities and towns in which the tax was leviable. Having done so, that payment was not to be absolutely continued, but, in the first place, the Ecclesiastical Commissioners for Ireland were directed to pay 75 per cent. of that amount thereafter to the incumbents of those parishes in which the tax might by law be collected, and to all others who derived their incomes from that source. There was a deduction of 25 per cent. from the gross amount, and the clergy were much better off with the 75 per cent. paid to them by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners than they were before the Act of 1854 was passed, because they, no doubt, lost far more than 25 per cent. in the collection of the tax. The right hon. and learned Gentleman says it is true that the Ecclesiastical Commissioners had to pay 75 per cent. of the tax, but they were to be recouped. But that is not the fact. One portion of the Bill had no connection with the other. This 75 per cent. of the actual amount ascertained to have been payable previously to the passing of the Act of 1854 was made an absolute charge upon the funds of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. They were bound, without any reference to repayments, to pay the incumbents in question this 75 per cent. of the tax. I think that part of the Act was quite right, because it relieved the clergy from a position in which every one grieved to see them placed, and it, in fact, carried into effect the recommendation of the Committee of 1847. Having made this charge of 75 per cent upon the funds of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, it directed the Lord Lieutenant to make a distinction between the houses rated no higher than £10 and those rated above that amount. With regard to the former class of houses, the tax was absolutely and for ever abolished. That was the proposition embodied in that

    569
    Act, approved by the right hon. and learned Gentleman, and sanctioned by Parliament. If, then, the House, with the approbation of the right hon. and learned Gentleman, exempted a certain class of property from a tax which he now says was made perpetually subject to it by the Act of Charles II., with what consistency can he contend that if we attempt to carry the principle of the Act of 1854 still further, we are sacrilegiously touching the property of the Church? How can a supporter of the Act of 1854 contend that the principle embodied in it will subvert the settlement of property in Ireland and annihilate the Established Church? The right hon. and learned Gentleman may tell us that the number of £10 houses subject to this tax was so small that they were not worth taking into account, and his support of the Act of 1854 was therefore no real violation of the principle for which he so earnestly contends this evening; but what said Sir John Young when he introduced that Act? He said it would be a very great boon to the inhabitants of those cities and towns in which the tax was leviable, because three-sevenths of the houses in Dublin would be relieved by his Bill; while in Cork 4 out of 5, in Clonmel 8 out of 9, in Drogheda 10 out of 11, in Kilkenny 10 out of l3, in Kinsale 6 out of 7, in Limerick 13 out of 14, and in Waterford 5 out of 9 houses would be exempted. If, then, it was competent for Parliament, without violating moral obligations, to pass the Bill of 1854, which interfered to so great an extent with the Act of Charles II., why is it less competent for the House now to give its sanction to the second reading of this Bill? But that was not all that was done by the Act of 1854. It enacted that in future the portion of the tax still leviable should be collected by the corporations of the different towns and cities subject to that tax. The payment, however, to the clergy was to be made by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners in the first instance; and the corporations, when they had collected the tax, were to hand over the amount to the paymaster of the civil service, who was finally to hand it over to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. It was quite clear that the framers of the Act anticipated considerable difficulty in the collection of the tax, inasmuch as, if it were not collected, they provided that the amount should be considered as a debt due to the
    570
    Crown, and power is given to the Lord Lieutenant to compel the corporations, by ordinary process of law, to collect it. And what was the result? The clergy, I believe, were entirely satisfied. I am not aware that any complaint whatever has been made in consequence of that Act. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners have no doubt had to pay the greater portion of this tax, and they have hitherto received very little of it back. I am not at all aware that the Established Church is more insecure in consequence of the Act of 1854. I believe that the payment of this sum to the clergy by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners has had quite as beneficial an effect as if it had been appropriated to the building of now or the repair of old churches. But the right hon. and learned Gentleman insinuated rather than openly avowed a belief that the Government had refused to enforce this law. I believe that that is an entire misapprehension. The Government, finding that this tax was not collected, and knowing the requirements imposed upon them by the Act, instructed the Law Officers of the Crown to commence proceedings to enforce payment. The power of distress, be it remembered, was taken by the law, so that you could not, even if you had the wish, issue a distress against the miserable occupants of these houses. The only remedy left was to file informations against the defaulting corporations in the Court of Exchequer. Informations were accordingly filed, but I believe that up to the present moment judgment has been obtained in only one case. Judgment has been obtained, but not one farthing of money has been obtained, because the counsel who conducted the case avowed that it should be carried by way of appeal to the Court of Error, and if the same decision as in the court below should be given there, that then it should be taken to the House of Lords. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners are still out of pocket, and if this Bill does not pass, we shall be involved in almost interminable legal proceedings, for the purpose of compelling these corporations (by process of law, and at the public expense) to make the collection and to hand it over to the Paymaster of the Civil Service, who has again to hand it over to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. This unfortunate Act of 1854—unfortunate not as regards the clergy, but unfortunate as regards the machinery which it provided

    571
    for the collection of the tax—has notoriously failed to effect its object; and yet it is to be retained for the sake of the principle which the right hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. Napier) maintains is involved in this impost. A question has been raised as to whether the contingency I contemplated in 1849, when I moved the previous question as an Amendment on the Motion of the hon. Member for Cork—namely, an increase in the funds of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, has taken place to the extent anticipated. I have only to say that it is difficult from the reports on the table of the House to arrive at the exact amount of income available in the hands of the Commissioners. The right hon. and learned Gentleman opposite called in question the statement made by my right hon. Friend (Mr. Horsman) on that subject; but I have no doubt he will be able to show from documents in his hands that he was fully borne out by facts in the information he then communicated to the House. Let me say, however, that it is admitted that the contingency which I contemplated in 1847, and which I referred to in 1849, has actually come to pass, that additional sources of income have arisen, and that the funds in the hands of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners have augmented to a much greater degree than is required to defray this £12,000 of ministers money. I cannot go into particulars, but I believe the income derived from all sources by the Ecclesiastical Commissioner in 1847, was only £68,000, and that it now amounts, by the admission of the right hon. and learned Gentleman, to at least £93,000, thus leaving, after former claims are met, a large margin for the charge now under the consideration of the House. I do not say that this sum could not be beneficially employed in other ways; but I think the importance of the claim before us will hardly be denied. The question before the House is, whether we are to go on with the present discreditable state of the law, or to adopt a conclusion which it is most desirable for the sake of the public peace, should be arrived at without unnecessary delay? Are we by endeavouring to recover the whole amount from these corporations, to come into perpetual collision with those who are the guardians of the peace of those towns, and with whom it is desirable that the Government should act in concert for the
    572
    good government of the country? I believe that the interests of the Established Church itself would be better promoted by a change of the existing system than by an adherence to a principle which it is found impossible to enforce. Let me upon this point read to the House an opinion addressed to the Committee of 1847 by the Dean of Limerick, now advanced to the Bishopric of Derry, and which, I think, reflects great credit upon him. He said—
    "Since I have come to Limerick I have given the subject the best consideration I could, and from observation and inquiry I have arrived at the conviction that there can be no transference of a liability from the occupying tenant to the landlord which can be attended with any beneficial results; it would still remain a fretting sore, and the more stringent its obligation was made on the landlord, by mixing it up with the payment of municipal taxes, the more inconvenient would it be felt. Besides, were it thought desirable to make this transference of liability, I do not see how the matter could be worked. In the old towns, like St. Mary's and St. John's, the derivative interests are so many and complicated as to render, in my opinion, legislation impossible. In truth, I know not where the burden can be placed, save and except where it ought to have been placed when the Church Temporality Act was passed,—namely, on the funds of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners; and on the same principle on which they make payments to curates and have augmented small livings, ought they to provide for the clergy whose misfortune it is to have their incomes, in whole or in part, dependent on ministers' money. But to this it may be replied that for many years you would cut off all the means of building new churches. My answer is simply this—that there is only a choice of evils, and that of the two it is by far the most important to provide for the proper maintenance of the clergy in such places as Dublin, Limerick, Waterford, &c. The whole amount of the property is comparatively small, and were the clergy to have a fixed stipend—say the amount of ministers' money as it now is, reduced by taking off one-fourth, as in the case of the commutation of tithes into rent-charge, I cannot but think that with the prospect of the falling-in of two bishoprics at no distant period, and the gradual augmentation taking place from suppressed livings, combined with economical arrangement, the difficulty might be met and obviated for ever."
    The funds now in the hands of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners are sufficient for this purpose, and the only question is whether the House will sanction such an appropriation of them, or refuse it by rejecting the Bill of the hon. Member for Cork. The right hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. Napier) alluded to the tithe rent-charge. It may be a plausible suggestion to make, that, as the tithe rent-charge has removed all those difficulties that existed

    573
    in the collection of tithe, a similar course might be taken in the present case, but in the letter I have just read there is an unanswerable objection to the proposal of merely transferring the burden from one class to another. It is there shown how useless it would be in those towns to transfer the charge from the occupiers to the owners of property. That course would, no doubt, have been taken by previous Governments had it been practicable; but I am bound to say that I know not any practical suggestion that has been made, but that contained in the Bill before the House, that is likely to meet the difficulties of the case. For these reasons I shall give my hearty concurrence to the second reading of the Bill.
    MR. WHITESIDEsaid he was somewhat surprised that the reasons given by the right hon. Baronet for supporting the Bill did not lead him to take the same course on former occasions. The hon. Member for Cork had made use of words which he would never forget, and the true meaning of which was perfectly understood by those who were familiar with the designs of the party to which he belonged. He said that "though the sum was small, yet this question carried a large principle with it." And then the right hon. Baronet came forward, and advanced the weakest and worst arguments which could be addressed to a thoughtful assembly on this subject. He said that the opponents of this measure had no principle to sustain them in maintaining this tax, because they had relieved poor occupiers who inhabited houses under £10 a year. Having conceded something, the Minister of the Crown argued, you must concede everything; because you have submitted to a loss of twenty-five per cent. for the sake of the poor, you must give up all that remains. In dealing with this subject, from a knowledge of the course taken by the noble Lord at the head of the Government and the Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant, the right hon. Baronet felt himself placed in a difficulty, glossed over the principal facts of the case, and came to a conclusion which he said was satisfactory to his conscience, but which he (Mr. Whiteside) thought ought not be satisfactory to the conscience of any right-minded man. The language used by the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant was such as would raise the question of church rates in England, the question of the annuity-tax in Scotland, and
    574
    the whole question of the appropriation of the Church revenues, and he (Mr. White-side) quite concurred with the right hon. Gentleman's argument that that made this question one of great importance. All these questions might be raised on the ground of expediency, which was a plausible mode of argument at the present day, but he believed nothing to be expedient that was not just. He opposed this Bill because it was not just, and if it was not just he defied any man to prove that it was expedient. The hon. Gentleman who brought forward this question on a former occasion (Mr. Fagan) told them that James II., amid all his cares and troubles, found time to repeal this Act. When he heard him use these words he began to reflect on what were his cares and troubles. His cares were to confiscate and extirpate and subdue whatever there was of Protestantism in Ireland, and upon the ruins of civil and religious liberty to build up such a system of tyranny as was suited to his implacable nature; and his troubles were brought upon him by the opposition he received from those whom he endeavoured to coerce; by the struggles of the fathers of those he (Mr. Whiteside) now represented, and by their efforts to carry out the very principles which he was maintaining in that House. No doubt the tax was originally established, as was shown by the Act of Settlement and the 14th & 15th, 16th & 17th of Charles II., for the express purpose of establishing the Protestant interest in these towns. The hon. Gentleman asked why the tax was not imposed on Enniskillen, for instance. For this simple reason, that the Protestant interest had been then established there already, and well was it for Ireland and England that it was so. Charles II. was advised that it would be impossible to accomplish that object without imposing a tax on the property in those towns, in order that the settlers might have the word of God preached to them in their own language. It was good advice, and he acted upon it though he did not believe in it; not that that was at all an unusual thing in him, for he seldom believed in anything he said or did. There was no injustice done to the Roman Catholics in the corporate towns in imposing the tax. The historian Leland gave this account of the transaction:—
    "Innocent Papists, although they had taken lands in Connaught, were to be restored to their estates, and the persons thus removed to be re-

    575
    prised. If they sold their Connaught lands, they were to satisfy the purchasers. But as the modelling of corporations seemed essential to the security of Government, and, as it was a point determined that they should be formed entirely of English inhabitants, there was an exception inserted in this article. Those innocent Papists whose former estates lay within corporate towns, instead of being restored to their possession, were to be reprised in the neighbourhood, so that the corporations should be formed entirely of men friendly to the monarchy.
    The property was essentially Protestant, the inhabitants were Protestant, and when Roman Catholics settled in those corporate towns they had to receive a licence, and the English Parliament quarrelled with the Irish Executive for granting these licences. The hon. Gentleman was right in saying that James II. reversed that Act. He did reverse it, just as he would have reversed any Act which gave any right or permitted the free exercise of his religion to any Protestant. He was surprised that the hon. Gentleman should have referred the House to such a precedent as that to justify his proposal. From that time there was nothing in the Statute Book to interfere with this impost. It was imposed by lawful authority, and for a good purpose, on the property of Protestants, and on that property it had continued to the present day. The persons for whose benefit it had been created had always performed the duties which were imposed on them with it. There was no breach of trust alleged, and the question now was why was the tax to be abolished? Was the abolition to be granted simply because it was asked for? If that were the case, then he could promise the House a regular Motion every year from the hon. Gentleman, asking for what remained of the church property in Ireland. He should not have made this observation had not the hon. Gentleman voted last year for Mr. Miall's Motion for the sale of the whole of the property of the Church of Ireland—a Motion which was a revolutionary Motion—a Motion which ought to have been made in the National Assembly. This Motion was a mere trifle compared to that, but the hon. Gentleman brought it forward as a small instalment, in order that he might afterwards work out that which might be collected to be his ultimate object from the words which he had used, that "though the sum at issue was small, the principle was a large one."
    MR. FAGAN: The hon. and learned Gentleman is quite mistaken in thinking
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    that I voted for Mr. Miall's Motion. I purposely abstained from voting on that occasion.
    MR. WHITESIDEwas glad to be told that he had been misled on this point, and willingly withdrew all he had said upon it. Certainly several hon. Gentlemen who acted with the hon. Member for Cork had voted for that Motion; but the objects of the two Motions were exactly the same. The hon. Gentleman argued that there was no principle involved in dealing with the Church property; and, having recapitulated with great minuteness all that had been taken already from the Church of Ireland, in the shape of tithes, church lands, and church rates, then asked what you have now to say why this portion of the income of the clergy also should not be taken away? He did not remember whether the noble Lord the Prime Minister was in Lord Grey's Government when the Temporalities Act was introduced; but the language of Lord Grey and of Lord Lansdowne (he took Lord Lansdowne because he seemed to be the most Conservative of them all) was very different from that which was used now. Lord Grey declared that he brought forward the measure in support of the working clergy, of the laborious members of the Church. He insisted that the measure would not trench on the real interests of the Church: that there would be an income of £20,000 for the increase of small glebes, and £50,000 for the increase of small livings, though neither of these objects had ever been fulfilled. Lord Lansdowne was more particular. He said—
    "He would beg of noble Lords to consider what would have been the result if, when the measure of the union of the two kingdoms was arranged, some such provisions as those of this Bill had been made? What would have been the situation of the clergy if the sum of £50,000 a year had at the time of the Union been set aside for the improvement of small livings; if £20,000 a year had been devoted to the building of churches, and £10,000 to the erection and improvement of houses for the inferior clergy? These were advantages which could not, of course, be expected to flow all at once from the Bill before the House, but they might be expected to result from it in the course of some time, and when they did occur would they not be of the greatest advantage to Ireland?
    These were the feelings which prompted the Government in introducing that measure, and Parliament, while it consented to the proposals made in that Act, refused to touch ministers' money. There was not one Roman Catholic Gentleman in the House at that time who asked for the

    577
    abolition of the ministers' money. Neither Mr. O'Connell nor Mr. Sheil did so, their policy being to take all that was offered, and then grumble and ask for what more they could get on the next favourable opportunity. That was called a permanent settlement, and one of its effects was to make the fortunes of many Roman Catholic gentlemen. They hit upon the plan of taking all the church lands they could get in perpetuity, at a diocesan valuation, and in some cases they got lands at five or six years' purchase. If he were not mistaken, the right hon. Gentleman in the chair drew the attention of the House to this mode of spoliation, and afterwards the real value of the lands was required to be paid for such lands as were in future converted from leaseholds into perpetuities, and thus this mode of spoliating the Church was checked. As long, however, as they could have got church lands for next to nothing, they would have extended to ministers' money the courtesy of Polyphemus, and have devoured it last. At a subsequent period this question of ministers' money was agitated. It was examined into by a Committee of that House, the Report of which the House was now asked to affirm. It was most amusing to read the extraordinary law of property which was laid down in that Report. Nowhere was there more clearly displayed the strange affinity between men's pockets and their consciences. In fact, Swift's saying appeared to be true, that a conscience was of no use unless it stretched with the occasion. The moment a man was called on to put his hand into his pocket and pay a tax of this sort he discovered, to use Mr. Sheil's language, that "his paramount objection to ministers' money is one of a religious character." This was very strikingly exemplified in the evidence of one of the witnesses, a Mr. O'Flynn, whose opinions and views with respect to the nature of property were well worthy of being recalled to the attention of the House. He was asked by the right hon. Member for the University of Dublin whether it was against the conscience of a Roman Catholic to pay a charge created in favour of a Protestant clergyman, although the property might have been acquired with that charge upon it, and answered, "Yes, certainly; under whatever form you put it I should consider it objectionable." That was a bold and manly answer, and included all descriptions of property which happened to be
    578
    held by a Roman Catholic. He was next asked whether a Protestant could create a charge upon property in favour of a Protestant clergyman which would be recognized by a Roman Catholic when that property came into his hands? and his answer was, "he could not—a Roman Catholic could not pay it." That might be very good theology, but it was contrary to common honesty.
    "Although he should have taken the property subject to it?—Yes."
    This was laid before a Committee of grave men who were obliged to listen to Mr. O'Flynn propounding the views of his friends on church property.
    "And do you consider that a conscientious principle?—I do."
    "Suppose you were to take a house and then to pay ministers' money, but that you were entitled to deduct it out of the rent, would you still object to pay it?—I would.
    "Although you were entitled to deduct it out of the rent?—I would.
    "Suppose you were a Roman Catholic banker, and got money from a Protestant, would you object to honour his check?—No.
    "How do you draw a distinction?—That is not my own money.
    "Suppose your landlord is a Protestant, and you take a house from him at so much rent, and afterwards pay ministers' money, and save the property from distress thereby, being by law entitled to deduct the amount from the rent, you would still object to pay?—I would not have the same objection if I could deduct the amount from the sum paid to my landlord, supposing him to be a Protestant."
    This was a clear and scientific exposition of the principles of political economy.
    "Would you have any objection?—I would have a little objection.
    "Why?—Because I conceive that there should be no compulsion at all on religious matters.
    "You would pay because it is a charge on property?—It would not come out of my pocket.
    "If it be a charge against the rent there would be no reasonable objection to it?—Yes; the landlord might be a Roman Catholic.
    "Suppose the landlord to be a Protestant?—I would pay it, but still I would object.
    "Why?—Because I think clergymen should not be supported by any compulsory tax." [Cheers.]
    He understood that cheer. He understood the argument of those who were in favour of the voluntary principle, and he respected, while he differed from them; but those who supported that principle in this country would, if they promised to pay a man a certain sum of money, keep their engagement.
    "If it were a charge made by a Protestant on his own property you would have no objection to pay it?—No.
    "Then, the conscientious objection would be entirely removed if the charge was put by Protestants upon Protestant proprietors?—I would not consider that to be objectionable."

    579
    That was precisely the case with respect to this tax. It was imposed by a Protestant Parliament and a Protestant King upon Protestant owners and upon the property of corporations of which Roman Catholics could not at that time be members. The hon. Gentleman proceeded with his Bill and met with various fortunes. At last the noble Lord at the head of the Government undertook the settlement of the question. This part of the subject concerned the noble Lord. It concerned his consistency and his conduct as a Minister of the Crown, and he should be glad to hear how the noble Lord would justify himself. It could not be glossed over in the easy manner in which the right hon. Baronet (Sir G. Grey) had settled the appropriation principle involved in this measure. It was true an agitation was got up against ministers' money, but it was of a very modified kind, and was confined to certain towns in the south of Ireland. Until Her Majesty's Government encouraged the agitation the tax was nearly all paid in Dublin, and had been paid almost up to the present time. But it became necessary to deal with the subject, and the noble Lord (Lord Palmerston) then Secretary of State, Sir John Young, then Chief Secretary for Ireland, and the present Mr. Justice Keogh then Attorney General for Ireland, put their heads together and framed a Bill, which the same noble Lord, now that he was Prime Minister, called upon the House to assist him in destroying. In introducing that measure, which was seconded by the noble Lord, Sir John Young said that since the time of James II. no Minister had ventured to propose the abolition of this tax without providing a substitute for it; that the Minister he served (that was the noble Lord) could not act upon such a principle); that it involved the safety of the Church property, and the settlement of the Church Temporalities; that the Ministry (that was the noble Lord) felt all the considerations most forcibly, and consequently, while they removed every evil which had resulted from the practical operation of the Act, they were resolved to maintain its principle. Subsequently the argument took a religious turn. The hon. Member for Dungarvan (Mr. Maguire) argued that this tax was originally imposed not for the cure of the soul of a house, but for the cure of the soul of a man; and he, with great force and originality, insisted that it was a religious tax, and that the noble Lord, as a popular Min-
    580
    ister and one willing to remove a grievance, ought to listen to this argument. The noble Lord (Lord Palmerston) then rose, and, although he said but a few words, it was impossible that the subject could have been better argued than it was by him. He said—
    "He would beg the hon. Gentleman and those who acted with him to consider what was involved in the principle they advocated—that no person of one religion should ever be called on to contribute to anything connected with another. He would beg the hon. Gentleman to recollect how his doctrine would apply to the allowances made to Roman Catholic chaplains for attending upon the soldiers of the army and the sailors of the navy, and also other matters in which Roman Catholic interests were concerned. This tax had nothing to do with any religious question. It was a tax upon property, and it would be perfectly preposterous to make the rate upon a house dependent upon the religion of its owner. Was the imposition or non-imposition of the tax to be regulated by the religion of the head or of the immediate landlord, or was it to depend upon the religion of the occupier? If they adopted any such principle as that of the proviso, they would be involved in endless absurdities. The tax was one upon property, to which every man knew he was liable when he purchased it, and had really nothing whatever to do with religious feeling."
    Thus the objection taken by the hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Fagan) was, to use the language of the noble Lord, perfectly preposterous. That was, it was absurd, foolish, and contrary to reason and justice. Yet, the same noble Lord who made that speech could come to the present Parliament and, with the same equanimity of temper, with the same sincerity, with the same anxiety to convince, and with a majority at his back that made him more forcible than Demosthenes and more persuasive than Tully, would unsay every word of that speech, and persuade the House that the principles there advocated were utterly and entirely wrong. He would now insist that this was not a charge upon property, it was a charge upon persons, and that it was preposterous to call it a charge on property. He would turn the phrase the other way, and would turn it against those who then voted with him. He (Mr. Whiteside) on that occasion voted with the noble Lord, who had two or three times induced him to go into the same lobby with him, and he afterwards said to his friends that the noble Lord had acted upon a Conservative principle, and was himself much more Conservative than they had thought him to be. He (Mr. Whiteside) believed the noble Lord, because he knew that his argument was sound. He knew that this was a tax upon property.

    581
    Now, however, that the noble Lord had by a turn of fortune's wheel been elevated to the high position of prime Minister, he was, as soon as it suited his purpose, without a shadow of excuse, save to carry the elections, ready to sacrifice the property which, when Home Secretary, he pledged his reputation could not upon any principle of reason or justice be touched. Let not the House suppose that the bulk of the Roman Catholics objected to this tax. It was only the town represented by the hon. Member (Mr. Fagan) and one or two others which made any objection to it. Archdeacon Bell was for ten years in Waterford; during that time he was only three times involved in litigation upon this subject. His just rights were punctually paid by the correct and honourable men of that city, whom, had he (Mr. Whiteside) the power, he would first relieve from this payment, and not those of Cork. But, astonished as he was at the conduct of the noble Lord, he was much more astonished to hear the Home Secretary attacking the Bill framed by his own Government, and stating that no one could understand it, and it could not be carried into operation. These were the men to conduct the affairs of the nation. He thought that the principle involved in the Bill of Sir J. Young of exempting the £10 householders and reducing the amount by twenty-five per cent, was a just one, although perhaps it might be said that it was a reflection upon the class which in reality governed the country—and no doubt the £10 householders did govern the country, for did they not form the mass of the people, did they not elect the legislators?—to say that they could not pay this small impost. Was it wonderful, he would ask the House, that those who, like himself, were attached to the Established Church in Ireland should stand up for her property, when they found that no sooner was the question settled than it was sought by the very men who settled it, again to unsettle it. On a former occasion the hon. Member for Cork had proposed that the Commissioners should publish an annual Report, and that any surplus which might remain in their hands should be applied to the redemption of the tax. Now, to such a proposal he would be ready to assent, as he would be to any measure to remedy a proved practical grievance; but when the hon. Gentleman came forward, saying that he had a small Bill to carry, but a large principle to assert,
    582
    he felt himself bound to stand up and endeavour to maintain that which had been guaranteed by the noble Lord at the head of the Government when he was Secretary for the Home Department. For his own part, he believed that the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for Ireland had been the chief offender in this matter, and that he had brought the Government into a difficulty which they had not apprehended, unless, indeed, the noble Lord at the head of the Government was willing to adopt his views. On the 16th of April, 1856, the right hon. Gentleman made a speech upon the subject; and let the House remember how matters really stood. If the principle had been established that this charge should be abolished, Members from Scotland would naturally have said, "Abolish the annuity tax also." Some English Members would, with equal justice, have called for the abolition of church rates, while others might have asked for a general appropriation of church property for secular purposes. Such being the case, the right hon. Gentleman said,—
    "Now, the question relating to ministers' money in Ireland was not, as at first sight it appeared to be, a local or an isolated question; it involved subjects of imperial interest. It had been stated that the tax of ministers' money did not depend upon persons, but upon property, and that it was the possession of property, and that alone, which rendered persons liable to the tax. Now, putting the matter upon that footing, it became one of a class of questions with which that House was familiar. In England there were the church rates, and in Scotland the annuity tax, both of which were defended upon the same ground."
    He then refers to the defeat of Government through public opinion acting on its representations on the church rate question. He then refers to riots in Edinburgh which he ascribes to the attempt to maintain the annuity tax, adding—
    "That was a question precisely analogous to the present."
    Again, as to the resistance to church rates and ministers' money, he says—
    "The principle of the two complaints were precisely the same; namely, that the professors of one religion were compelled to support the professors of another. But in Edinburgh the annuity tax was not an old tax, and it applied exclusively to ministers of the Established Church in Scotland. The two cases were, however, precisely analogous in principle."
    The right hon. Gentleman, therefore, had placed the annuity tax in Scotland and church rates in England on the same footing with ministers' money in Ireland; that was, that they were all of them charges upon property. The House, there-

    583
    fore, could, from the words of the right hon. Gentleman himself, form some appreciation of the magnitude of the question which they were called upon to decide. The right hon. Gentleman then proceeded to narrate the results of his experience in Ireland, and he said—
    "With respect to every one of those municipal boards, they had met to record their determination not only to resist payment of the tax themselves, but not to allow others to pay it. When he was in Dublin a large deputation waited upon him, who stated in strong and decided terms, but in language respectful to the Government, that they would resist the payment of the tax to the uttermost. That was the communication which had been made to him, though, at the same time, it was not to be supposed that any Government would give up its duty. Although he had felt it to be his duty to make that statement, yet he must add that it would be the duty of Government to see that the tax was paid."
    Was it possible that a gentleman holding such a position could listen complacently to a deputation which informed him that not only would they not obey the law themselves, but that they would also prevent other persons from doing so? What would be thought if a deputation were to wait upon the Chancellor of the Exchequer and tell him that they had resolved not to pay any more income tax and to prevent other persons doing so; and if he said to them—Well, gentlemen, you are very hard upon me, but I will take the matter into consideration? The simplicity of the right hon. Gentleman appeared to him most remarkable. If he had had much experience of the country he would have seen that that deputation was only trying what they could get out of him. He went on to say the language used by that deputation was courteous but decided; but that it would be the duty of Government to see the tax was paid. It was curious how before an election the opinions of a Minister underwent a change. What reply had he given to the deputation from the south of Ireland which had waited on him. At that time the right hon. Gentleman had magnanimously determined to support the law. He had said—
    "If the state of the law were not what it was, he should have shrunk from an annual contest of this kind, but now no alternative was left to the Government—they were bound to proceed firmly, manfully, and upon principle—they were compelled to carry out the law. The question had long engaged the attention of Government, and he had carefully endeavoured to ascertain by what means a legislative change might be made which might do justice and be satisfactory to all parties."
    Now, the conclusion which he had drawn
    584
    from that speech had been that the right hon. Gentleman intended to carry the law manfully and fairly into effect, or, if not, that he intended to propose a settlement of the matter satisfactory to all parties, and he could assure the right hon. Gentleman that if he had done so he would have supported him. Thus had the right hon. Gentleman expressed himself, but then came the general election. Upon the eve of that event the hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Fagan) and the hon. Member for Waterford (Mr. Meagher) had arranged a speech to the following effect—"We beg to inform the Minister that we represent towns that return a certain number of Members to Parliament. We influence the returns of ten Members for counties. You, the First Minister, have been often in difficulties. The votes of the Irish representatives have carried many a Government successfully through this House. Mark what we now tell you. You know how our support may be obtained. Abolish ministers' money and we shall see what we can do to help you out of your difficulties." The right hon. Gentleman the Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant had been found open to conviction. In his case a fair argument fairly put was always sure to tell. He at once adopted the Ministerial jargon and said the Government would take the subject under their consideration. So the right hon. Gentleman had taken it under his consideration, and he who had first set out with saying that he would enforce the law, and if not successful in that respect propose a fair and equitable adjustment of the tax, had at length begun to see the question in a new light, and, persuaded by the convincing logic such as that to which he (Mr. Whiteside) had just adverted, he came down and told the House that he had considered all the difficulties, and after taking a review of what Sir John Young had done, and the errors of his Bill, and noticing that the difficulties were increasing, he finally announced that he had come to the conclusion that the tax was of such a nature that he felt coerced to provide for its abolition. The right hon. Gentleman had, in fact, settled his reputation by his latest speech upon the question. He (Mr. Whiteside) could understand the case of a statesman taking a clear view of the matter, and arriving at the conclusion that he would abolish ministers' money, together with all the rest of the church property in Ireland—a course which, so far as the Protestants of that country were con-

    585
    cerned, would do much to destroy their connection with this country. He was as strongly attached as any man to the connection between England and Ireland, yet if the Government were to adopt that course, and to overturn those institutions which Mr. Pitt, speaking the language of a gentleman and a British statesman, as well as Lord Castlereagh, had declared to be based upon fundamental principles, then would the Protestants of Ireland be at liberty to consider as to the course which they should take, and the House might rest assured that, although the Protestants of Ireland were ready to be the friends of this country, yet they would never consent to be her slaves. If they found that the clergy of their Church were, without due reason, treated with disrespect, then would the adamantine chain which bound them to England be severed. He had, however, been led away by these remarks from the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for Ireland. That right hon. Gentleman had made a speech, the language of which he would prove did not demonstrate that to do away with ministers' money was a proceeding either equitable or expedient. The right hon. Gentleman had asserted that as the objections to the tax were chiefly of a conscientious character, it would be justifiable to collect it for the support of certain hospitals in Dublin, the more especially as the greater portion of the tax was levied upon the inhabitants of that city. It was not, however, quite clear upon what principle the funds of the Established Church could with justice be applied to a totally different purpose. The right hon. Gentleman, then, would appropriate the tax to what he considered useful ends, but if he could not appropriate it to such objects he would abolish it altogether. That, in his (Mr. Whiteside's) opinion, was a somewhat curious line of argument to adopt. He must say, it appeared to be robbing the Church in order to give to the doctor. He could not, however, understand how the right hon. Gentleman could justify the abolition of the tax. Unless, indeed, he were prepared to sanction the principle that when a Roman Catholic obtained possession of property under certain stipulations, he was at liberty to set up his conscientious scruples in derogation of those obligations which he had legally contracted. If the right hon. Gentleman were not prepared to sanction that proposition, then was there no force in the
    586
    argument to which he had given expression. But to pass from the speech of the right hon. Gentleman, he must beg to remind the House that as agitation, had formerly been very much fostered by the Government in Ireland, so at the present day much was effected in the conduct of her affairs by means of deputations. There was nothing like them for attaining a particular object. One might not effect much, but a series of them was irresistible; and, acting upon that principle, he supposed a deputation had waited upon Lord Carlisle on the 14th of April last. The House had seen that upon the eve of the general election the Government had changed their intentions upon the subject of ministers' money, and had subsequently announced it to be their determination to support a Bill which proposed its abolition. The immediate result of that determination had been, that the corporation of Dublin, which had never previously resisted the payment of the tax, had passed a resolution upon the subject which they had submitted to Lord Carlisle on the occasion to which he had just alluded. The Resolution was as follows:—
    "That taking into consideration that Her Majesty's Government have expressed their determination to introduce a Bill early next Session of Parliament to abolish ministers' money, and the Attorney General has discontinued legal proceedings against the corporations of Cork, Clonmel, and other cities, for the recovery of ministers' money, we are of opinion that Government ought to direct the Collector General to discontinue the collection of ministers' money in Dublin, pending the passing of the Bill."
    The reply of the Lord Lieutenant was in these terms:—
    "I think Her Majesty's Government have assumed the responsibility of proposing a measure for the abolition of the impost called ministers' money to Parliament. What may be the result of their proposal I cannot take upon myself to anticipate. In the meanwhile I am not authorized by law to interfere with the liability of persons for the payment of the sums now due. I will consult with the law advisers of the Crown whether any steps should be taken for suspending the collection for a short period, till the decision of Parliament is ascertained."
    Now, the words of the Act of Parliament were to the effect that the Lord Lieutenant should order all sums due under the provisions of the Act to be recovered and paid into the hands of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, so that his Excellency was scarcely right in stating that "he was not authorized by law to interfere in the matter." Mr. Reynolds, who had been the spokesman of the deputation, who had long been a leading agitator on the subject of

    587
    ministers' money, and who had been the Government Candidate at the last election in opposition to his (Mr. Whiteside's) hon. Friends behind him (Mr. Grogan and Mr. Vance), had observed, in answer to the remarks of Lord Carlisle, "That that was all they could expect his Excellency to do," and had stated, that in the event of the Bill passing, the sum of £11,000, already paid to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, ought to be returned to the ratepayers of Dublin. Such had been the progress of agitation. The speaker first sought that the law should be suspended, and, having obtained a compliance with his wish, then, with inimitable coolness, asked that the money, which had already been paid in accordance with legal obligations, should be refunded. It was all a mere pretence to say that the tax could not be recovered, particularly with respect to Dublin, where, notwithstanding the agitation against it, £9,900 had within the last two years been obtained from persons who were willing to pay it. Why, there would be agitation for ever in Ireland if the local Government always pursued such a course as it had done with reference to this subject. If the Government had pursued a straightforward manly course, this just demand would have been paid without demur. He had been appealed to relative to this law-suit in Cork, and what were the facts? The opinion of the hon. and learned Member for Cork (Mr. Deasy) had been taken, and his advice was, that the corporations of Cork had no defence against the payment of the money. They were prosecuted, and the case was decided in favour of the tax. There was, indeed, a bill of exceptions, but on a collateral point. The commission for valuation issued by the Lord Lieutenant was wrong. Instead of directing the two Commissioners to make a proper valuation, they took the Poor Law valuation, which includes warehouses, slaughter-houses, &c., whereas the tax is only imposed on dwelling-houses. That was a fair exception, for it showed that the valuation was not fair. But what had that to do with the collection of the tax upon a proper valuation? What security had Parliament that when it abolished ministers' money, as it had abolished church rates, tithes, and the ten Irish bishoprics, it would not be told, "Now that you have given up ministers' money, nothing remains but that you should give up the tithe composition." The facts stated before the Committee ought to tell upon
    588
    any Ministry really attached to the Church of England. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners had stated the growth of the Church in Ireland, the need for the building of churches and the enlargement of glebes, and had certified that this money was necessary to enable them to execute the trusts that were thrown upon them, and he trusted that Parliament would not throw the burden upon the Ecclesiastical Commissioners of fulfilling these trusts, while it refused to give them the funds necessary for that purpose. The Commissioners had submitted a just and honest case. There had been no waste of the money intrusted to them, and if there were a surplus, the laborious parochial clergy would have the first claim. He put in no claim for the Irish bishops, but they were not overpaid. The Bishop of Cork had an income of £1,800, which was very small to meet the demands upon him. It was a sheer fiction to talk of the millions of property of the Irish Church. Their property is not equal to their wants, and the Lord Chancellor of Ireland had certified that the Commissioners had no money to meet these demands. The fact was, the Bill was introduced to meet the religious scruples of certain gentlemen who had incurred debts and did not wish to pay them. He trusted that the House would not yield to an objection without reason, justice, or necessity, and would not justify an attack upon church property, for which no excuse of a wise expediency could be pleaded.
    MR. HORSMAN(who had lately resigned his office of Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant) said, that he had listened with great pleasure, although with some surprise, to the speeches of the right hon. and learned Member for Dublin University (Mr. Napier) and the hon. and learned Member for Enniskillen (Mr. Whiteside); but, remembering that the eloquence of the latter was of so imaginative a character, and that the right hon. and learned Gentleman was a Member of a profession of which he was an ornament, and therefore a practised adept in its highest arts, he was not astonished that the eloquence of both wanted that foundation of truth and fact which was the basis of all true eloquence. When he listened to the accounts they had given of the early history of this Act and their statements of the proceedings of the Governments of the Earl of Aberdeen, the Earl of Derby, and of the noble Viscount, he could not help feeling that as historians they laboured

    589
    under the defect of that shortness of memory which was so often the accompaniment of the highest genius. No doubt the question was one of great difficulty—he had never denied that to be the case; but he contended that the graver part of that difficulty arose from the course which had been pursued by the Government of which the right hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. Napier), and the hon. and learned Member (Mr. Whiteside) were Members but which they had ignored. The last-named hon. and learned Gentleman had insinuated that upon a former occasion he (Mr. Horsman) had raised this into an imperial question, and had identified it with the church-rate question in England; but in making that charge the hon. Member had omitted to look at the speeches upon which it professed to be based. The fact was, that when replying on a former occasion to the speeches of the hon. Member for Cork and the hon. Member for Edinburgh, he told them that if they objected to ministers' money in Ireland and the annuity tax in Scotland on the ground that they ought not to be compelled to support a church of which they were not members, they made the questions about ministers' money and the annuity tax not local and isolated, but Imperial questions. The right hon. and learned Gentleman, however, very conveniently ignored that part of his speech. He (Mr. Horsman) had been careful to draw a distinction between the church-rate question in England and ministers' money in Ireland, but ministers' money in Ireland and the annuity tax in Scotland were precisely the same in principle. There was no doubt that church rate was as old as the Church itself. It was a part of the ecclesiastical property which had come down from early ages. But ministers' money in Ireland and the annuity tax in Scotland were the creations of a recent Act. He believed that they both owed their origin to Acts passed in the year 1665. They were certainly imposed in the same reign, and they had also this remarkable similarity, that, whereas church rate was applicable to the whole country, ministers' money was applicable to only eight towns and cities in Ireland, and the annuity tax only to the city of Edinburgh and the town of Montrose. The question, therefore, was not entirely new, nor was the assertion on the part of the Government of a new principle. Before the year 1833 there was a church rate in Ireland as well as in England, but in that year the
    590
    Irish church rate was abolished, and a Commission was established to provide funds for the payment of that rate which had been applicable to the maintenance of the fabric of the Church. An effort was made at the same time to do the same thing for England, but it failed. Now he would put it to the House whether, supposing church rate in England had been abolished, and there were about eight towns, such as Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, &c., in which local assessments were found to be made for the maintenance of the fabric of the Church and the support of clergymen, they would endure the existence of such exceptions to the supposed great measure by which church rate had been altogether abolished throughout the whole extent of the country. Why, then, should they act differently towards Ireland, in which notwithstanding the abolition of church rate, eight towns and cities were still virtually burdened with a church rate? The hon. and learned Gentleman opposite had given a description of the agitation which had taken place on the subject, and the mode in which it had acted on the present Government; and had stated that it was not of any importance until the present Government took it up. He had said that until the noble Lord now at the head of affairs had given countenance to the demands of the hon. Member for Cork he had stood no chance of success. But what were the facts? To his (Mr. Horsman's) knowledge this question had been agitated in Parliament for the last twenty years. He had seen every Ministry in succession oppose it. He had seen his hon. Friend the Member for Cork, year after year, gain upon the Government that opposed it; but he never did see it gain strength and standing in that House until the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for the University of Dublin and his learned Friend the Member for Enniskillen came forward as Members of Lord Derby's Government, and pledged themselves to propose a measure for its settlement. It was a most unfortunate event that during the Derby Administration legislation for Ireland was delivered into the hands of those two Gentlemen. They were the gemini, the twin constellation that were to guide the Administration of Lord Derby through all the difficulties of Irish legislation. And how did they commence? There were three prominent and difficult questions which they had to settle. These were the Land question,

    591
    the Maynooth question, and the Ministers' Money question, and every one of these the right hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. Napier) came forward to settle by throwing over all the principles and traditions of his party. Now, that was the first proceeding that gave a real Parliamentary importance to the agitation against ministers' money in Ireland. Upon the two other questions the House knew what were the propositions of the right hon. and learned Gentleman. They were propositions of the most extravagant description, and were acceptable only to the most extreme Members of an extreme and insignificant minority in Ireland which he (Mr. Horsman) believed had now died out. Although the hon. and learned Member for Enniskillen had that night severly criticized and wittily ridiculed the proceedings of the Government in reference to this question, he himself gave a public and solemn pledge, in 1853, that he would bring forward a measure to settle it, when he had no measure even shadowed forth in his own mind. But, as the brightest flower is ever the briefest, before there was an opportunity for the hon. and learned Gentleman to carry his measure the ministry of Lord Derby came to an end. [Mr. WHITESIDE: I never gave a pledge with reference to ministers' money in my life.] The hon. and learned Member for Enniskillen (Mr. Whiteside) and the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for the University (Mr. Napier) are so closely and apparently so happily united that they may be regarded as one flesh. Nor did he know that there had been any divorce between them. He had mistaken the former for the latter with reference to that solemn promise to settle this unhappy agitation about ministers' money. At that time he had not much acquaintance with the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Napier), but he was intimately acquainted with the right hon. Gentleman then the Member for Midhurst (Mr. Walpole), who was Secretary for the Home Department in the Administration of Lord Derby, and he well remembered having crossed the House to ask his right hon. Friend whether he would give his support to the promised measure. His answer was in the affirmative, and as he felt convinced that he (Mr. Walpole) would not have made that answer unless the matter had been discussed in a Cabinet Council, the Derby Government manifestly intended to do the very thing contemplated by this Bill—namely, to put an end to the agitation
    592
    about ministers' money. Why had they not given the Government the benefit of their deliberations, and assisted in bringing the question to a satisfactory conclusion? The hon. and learned Member for Enniskillen had just delivered a vehement speech against this Bill, but it was rather strange that a gentleman with such apparently strong feelings upon the subject should have actually become counsel to one of the defaulting corporations in their opposition to the collection of the tax. He had already been retained for the corporation of Cork, and he congratulated him upon the prospect of still further retainers from the other defaulting corporations; for there was every likelihood that his vigorous resistance to the tax on their behalf would enable him to die richer than Irish lawyers usually did. He would ask the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Napier) whether he saw any mode of escaping from the difficulty he was now using all his ingenuity to entail upon the Government? Again, when Lord Aberdeen came into office the hon. and learned Gentleman misstated the facts. The truth was that when that Government came in, and the hon. Member for Cork again brought forward his Motion, his (Mr. Horsman's) predecessor in office, finding himself pressed and likely to be left in a minority, brought in a measure of his own to save the Government from a defeat, but such was the feeling that he was only saved from that result by a majority of fifteen on the introduction of the Bill. With regard to the Committee of 1848, the fact was that there were two counter propositions and two different reports. On one of these, Sir J. Young—not then a Member of the Government—voted with both the Members for the University of Dublin and with the Member for the city of Dublin; and having proposed a measure in accordance with his known opinions and former associations, he did, in order to escape the difficulties of the question by a compromise, unfortunately resort to the counsels of the right hon. and learned Member for the University of Dublin. He brought in a Bill modelled by the right hon. and learned Gentleman opposite—oh, he begged pardon of him, but it was all on record, for there was a draught Report proposed and voted for; and the names of those who had voted had been laid upon the table. He voted with the two Members of the University of Dublin, and the Member for the city of Dublin. The Bill so adopted

    593
    by Sir J. Young, on the model of the right hon. Gentleman opposite, had really landed them in all the difficulties which they were in. When it was made a charge against the noble Lord at the head of the Government that he supported that Bill in 1854, and opposed that of the hon. Member for Cork, it should be remembered that his noble Friend was then acting with the Government in promoting a measure which had at least the appearance of settling the question, for no man could have foreseen the contradictions, and difficulties, and impossibilities of a Bill which was really a concoction of the ingenuity of the brain of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the University of Dublin. Well, what was that Bill? That Bill relieved all houses under £10 from payment of the impost, and this was believed to be a great boon, but it turned out to be nothing of the kind. It turned out that the parties who ought to have paid this tax were rated at 1s., 1s. 6d., and 2s.; but the collection had become so difficult, and odious, and expensive, that the clergymen who then had to collect it, as might be expected of gentlemen, rather gave it up altogether than collect it under these circumstances. The act then failed as a relief to the parties who paid the tax. Then those who paid the tax were allowed to compound it for fourteen years' purchase. That also failed. Then the collection of the tax was to devolve on the corporations, and that failed more than anything. With regard to these corporations they were principally composed of dissenters from the Established Church, who themselves objected to pay the tax, and a very little common sense and foresight might have prognosticated the failure of such a provision. Indeed, the only provision which succeeded was that relating to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. The right hon. Gentleman had accused him of negotiating with the representatives of municipal boroughs in Ireland upon this question. He had entered into no negotiations. Deputations from various corporations waited upon him, introduced by several Members of Parliament, and, as was his duty, he received them courteously. The interviews were short—the language of the deputatious respectful. They stated their views regarding the ministers' money. They told him frankly that they objected to paying the tax themselves, and that they had still greater objection to compelling others to pay it. He told them that as the repre-
    594
    sentative of the Irish Government, he had no power to enter into the merits of the tax, and no choice but to compel its collection, but that he would transmit their views to the Government, which he did by the next post. Now, the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for the University of Dublin had said a great deal about the statement in reference to the intentions of the Government on this tax being made on the day before the dissolution of the last Parliament, adding that it was obviously made at that time for electioneering purposes. He (Mr. Horsman) believed that the statement he made on the subject was, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman had said, made on the last day for the transaction of business which occurred prior to the dissolution, but it was a mere piece of claptrap to say that the one had the slightest reference to the other. It was a very simple fact, of which the right hon. Gentleman had certainly made the most. But it should be recollected that the right hon. Gentleman took care not to mention one other important fact, namely—that on the 20th of February he (Mr. Horsman) had promised to make that statement; and that after he had given that promise circumstances occurred which were not anticipated, and which led to the dissolution. The promise given on the 20th of February was in answer to an appeal from the noble Lord the Member for the City of London (Lord John Russell), who said that the Government were bound to do one of two things—either to propose a satisfactory plan for the settlement of the question, or to abolish the tax altogether. He (Mr. Horsman) gave a pledge that Government would do one or the other of those two things; and on the 20th of February, when nobody had any idea that dissolution would take place this year, he told the hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Fagan) that if he would fix the second reading of the Bill for a distant day, it would give the Government time to make up their minds on the subject, he could state the views of the Government on the subject, and consequently the second reading was fixed for the 28th of March. [Mr. NAPIER said he was not present at the second reading]. No, but the right hon. and learned Gentleman was present on the 20th of February, when he gave the promise to the House to answer the appeal of the noble Lord the Member for the City of London, and it seemed, he thought, to be pretty well

    595
    understood what the decision of the Government would be. Several friends of his (Mr. Horsman's) said to him that it would be impossible to suggest any satisfactory settlement of the question. While several friends came to the conclusion that the Government would be obliged to propose the abolition of the tax, another said, "I don't think it was so understood by the Member for the University of Dublin, or he would have been more savage." After the 20th of February, and before the day fixed for the second reading, there came a vote which was not anticipated, and the dissolution was determined upon. And so it accidentally had occurred that he (Mr. Horsman) had to fulfil the pledge he had given to the House on a very late day, and out of that circumstance the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for the University of Dublin had not failed to make great political capital. The right hon. and learned Gentleman had referred to a statement he (Mr. Horsman) made as to the funds of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, and called it a gross misrepresentation. Well, it so happened that he spoke from the Report of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, which Report had been printed and was in the hands of Members of that House; and he quoted at length that very paragraph which the right hon. and learned Gentleman had been at the trouble to quote against him to-night. The right hon. and learned gentleman accused him of making a gross misrepresentation as to the funds of the Commission. All he could say was, that he read what the Commissioners themselves stated as to their income, disbursements, and balance, and therefore the mistake, if any, rested with the Commissioners. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said that he had stated the income of the Commissioners in 1856 at too high a sum, because there was included in that year money arising from the sales of perpetuities and from private subscriptions. Well, he would show how much the right hon. and learned Gentleman was to be trusted when he dealt with figures. He (Mr. Horsman) made a comparison of the income of the Commissioners in 1848 with their income in 1856, and showed, according to their own statement, that, while their income in 1848 was £98,000, it was £150,000 in 1856. But the hon. and learned Gentleman accused him of gross exaggeration because there were sums in 1856 arising from the sale of perpetuities and from private subscriptions. Well, he
    596
    found that there were sales of perpetuities also in 1848; and that, while in 1856 the amount from the sale of perpetuities was £7,000, in 1848 it was no less than £9,000. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said that, while contemplating to bring this matter before the House, the Commissioners told him not to trouble himself about it, because he (Mr. Horsman) had promised to give an explanation, and the right hon. and learned Gentleman seemed to intimate that that pledge had been broken. He had that correspondence in his pocket. And from that it appeared that a letter was written by one of the most prominent members of the Ecclesiastical Commission, the Archbishop of Dublin, who read the statement made by him in the same manner as the right hon. and learned Gentleman, and that letter was forwarded to him (Mr. Horsman) by the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. He instantly replied that he took the statement from the accounts of the Commissioners, and was satisfied that he was quite right, and his letter concluded with this paragraph:—"I quite subscribe to your Grace's opinion, that any correction of such a statement, calculated to convey a false impression, would best come from the party by whom that statement was made; and if your Grace will have the goodness to communicate to me the nature of the correction which is desirable to be made, I shall have much pleasure in giving it to the House of Commons on its reassembling, either in your Grace's language or my own." Having had no reply to that letter he assumed that his letter had been satisfactory, but the right hon. and learned Gentleman, having some friend who thought the quarrel a very pretty one—perhaps the hon. and learned Member for Enniskillen, who was the Sir Lucius O'Trigger of the bar—offered to bring the matter before the House of Commons, and he was then told by the Chief Commissioner that he need not trouble himself. The hon. and learned Gentleman said the noble Lord the First Minister had been misled by the Irish Government and by him (Mr. Horsman) on this question, but he seemed to be ignorant of the duties of the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant. He was an officer entirely subordinate to the Government; he submitted to them information and facts for their consideration, but as to the decision they came to, or as to any principle or policy they resolved to adopt, he was a mere cypher. The Go-

    597
    vernment arrived at their decisions according to their own views, and upon their own responsibility, entirely irrespective of any opinions which the Chief Secretary might entertain. But he (Mr. Horsman) thought that the Government had taken a wise and politic course—one of which he more cordially approved than any other they could have followed. He had seen this question year by year growing in the House; he had seen the Liberal party more and more voting with his hon. Friend the Member for Cork, and the Government more and more dependent on the Opposition than upon their usual supporters, and he had been long enough in the House to know that, when you had a Government which depended for support on its opponents in resisting the fair, reasonable, and moderate demands of its own friends, the longer a course of that kind was persevered in the wore false the position of that Government would be, and the earlier it extricated itself from such a position the more would that step redound to its credit, and add to the strength of its own party, He hoped his noble Friend (Viscount Palmerston) would persevere in the course he had laid down, being satisfied that the strength and security of his position depended not on the forbearance of his opponents, but on the cordial and unfailing support of his friends.
    MR. BLAKE, as the chief magistrate of one of the towns which was affected by the tax, could not avoid offering a few observations to the House, as he was anxious to correct a few inaccuracies that had crept into the debate. In the first place, he must refer to the description given by the hon. and learned Member for Enniskillen (Mr. Whiteside) of the interview of the corporations with the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Horsman). Now, he had often heard that hon. and learned Gentleman make the best of a bad brief, but on the present occasion he must say his facts were very badly briefed to him. So far, indeed, from the deputation meeting with the reception described by the hon. Gentleman, he would say—adopting the description of a poor countryman of his—"they only just met with the height of civility, and nothing more." In fact, it was observed by several members of the deputation, on leaving the chamber in which the interview had been held, what a change office had made in the right hon. Gentleman—how soon Radicals became converted into High Churchmen! At all
    598
    events, the deputation took their leave with no other feeling than that of disappointment, and a determination to resist the collection of the tax by every means in their power. No one was better entitled than he was to speak out upon the question, for he had been the first to organize an opposition to the tax—an opposition which he was happy to say had proved most successful. The corporation of Water-ford had determined that every stick and stone of the corporation should be sequestrated rather than that they should become collectors, and they most successfully persevered in their resistance. He had seen the greatest cruelties practised in the collection of the tax. Beds had been dragged away from families, and women's petticoats had even been taken for the payment of the impost. On one occasion, two of a rev. Gentleman's collectors were sentenced' each to two years' imprisonment for the abominable cruelties they practised. In many cases the corporations had found it impossible to enforce the impost, the people invariably resisted it, and he trusted, therefore, that the House would remove it from the Statute Book. One day's bombardment of Sebastopol cost more than would pay the impost for a year. When Irish blood and sinew were wanted for the war the people heard nothing about ministers' money; but now, on the restoration of peace, writs were being issued in dozens by Her Majesty's Attorney General. He hoped that the House would put an end to an impost which was calculated, more than anything else he knew of, to engender the worst feelings amongst the Irish people.
    SIR FREDERIC THESIGERsaid, when the right hon. Gentleman the late Secretary for Ireland rose, after the powerful speech of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Enniskillen (Mr. Whiteside), I anticipated, from his known ability, and his familiarity with the subject, that he would have encountered the arguments of my hon. and learned Friend, and that he would have addressed himself to the important question under consideration. But I am compelled to say that the right hon. Gentleman, feeling much more interested in matters which were personal to himself than in the grave question before us, disappointed expectation, and never, in the course of his speech, did he address himself, in the slightest degree, to the arguments of my hon. and learned Friend. As those arguments remained untouched,

    599
    I ought, perhaps, to apologize to the House for rising, and, indeed, its impatience may be justified on the same ground. But I feel that, inasmuch as the debate, up to this time, has been confined to Members connected with Ireland, it has been made to assume a false and provincial character which is prejudicial to the satisfactory discussion of the question, for I quite agree with the right hon. Gentleman (Sir G. Grey), not in the speech which he made to-night, but in that which he delivered on a former occasion, when he declared that this is not a local and provincial question, but it is one of Imperial interest. And the right hon. Gentleman is mistaken in saying that he made that observation as applicable to the arguments which were addressed upon that occasion. The right hon. Gentleman stated that the question relative to ministers' money in Ireland was not, as at first sight it would appear to be, a local and isolated question, but that it involved considerations of imperial interest. Now, I think there cannot be a more fatal notion than for English Members to conceive they are not closely concerned with questions of this kind. By the Act of Union the churches of England and Ireland are inseparably bound together. They are united in one body, each being Members of the other, and we ought to feel that if one suffers the other suffers with it. Now, upon the present important question, I would warn hon. Members that it is quite impossible we can come to a determination to destroy church property in Ireland, which must be the effect of this proposal, without its bearing fruits that will ultimately drop upon the English branch of the Church. I call this a question of property, and not a religious question; because the noble Lord at the head of the Government, in the year 1854, distinctly gave that character to the proposal, and ridiculed the idea that the rights of property were to depend upon any change in religious opinions. The question itself has branched out in the course of discussion to a very considerable extent, though it appears to me to lie in a very narrow compass, and I will, if the House can indulge me, endeavour to lay the issue fairly and distinctly before it. Now, it is not denied that originally, at all events under the Act of Settlement, the 16 & 17 Chas. II., the property in this ministers' money was created. It was imposed as a tax
    600
    upon the only persons who could then possess property in the corporate towns, upon the Protestant community, and it was imposed for the benefit of Protestant ministers. In the course of time, however, the property which was so taxed came into the possession of Roman Catholics. Now, can any one suppose for a moment that the rights of property were to fluctuate with the changes of religious opinions, and that the new state of things discharged property from the obligations which lay upon it? No idea of that kind appears at any time to have been entertained, because I beg the House to bear in mind that this agitation upon the subject of ministers' money is of very recent origin. I believe that it was not until the year 1842 that we ever heard any opposition to the payment of the tax. I have, I think, the assent of the hon. Member for Cork, who introduced the Bill, to that assertion. Well, now see what took place in the year 1833, the year in which the Temporalities Act passed, and which, I say, definitively settled this important question of property with respect to ministers' money. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners were appointed, and a fund was created by the suppression of ten sees, and by the taxation of livings above the value of £300 a year. The fund which was so entrusted to the Commissioners was to be saddled with certain obligations. And, first of all, in consequence of the abolition of the church cess, it was saddled with the repairs and rebuilding of churches and chapels, with a provision for the maintenance of Divine worship, with the payment of clerks and sextons; and then, if any surplus remained after discharging these duties, it was to be applied, in the first place, to the building of new churches, where one-fifth of the amount was provided by voluntary contributions; in the next place, to the purchase and building of glebe houses, while its third and most important duty was to contribute to the augmentation of poor livings under the value of £200 a year. Thus matters were settled by the Church Temporalities Act. The hon. Member for Cork says it was probably the intention of the Legislature at that time to abolish ministers' money, but that the point was overlooked, and through the technical language of an Act of Parliament the tax was made to endure. I think, however, with great submission, that the hon. Member is in error in that respect;

    601
    because in the following year, by the Act 4 & 5 Wm. IV., ministers' money was recognised as an existing tax upon property, and nobody from that time down to the year 1854 ever suggested that there had been an intention of getting rid of the tax altogether. It was treated as an obligation upon property; and, as I have said, the agitation for its removal did not commence until the year 1842. Now, it has been observed in the course of the argument, without being denied—on the contrary, the assertion has been confirmed by the right hon. Gentleman late Secretary for Ireland (Mr. Horsman)—that every Government, without exception, down to the year 1857, invariably refused to repeal the tax unless a substitute was first provided. The right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for the Home Department says, that following out the suggestions which were made in the Report of the Committee of 1848, he admitted it was desirable to get rid of the tax, and, therefore, instead of meeting the proposal of the hon. Member with a direct opposition, he moved "the previous question." It is perfectly true he did so upon two occasions, but it is equally true that upon both these occasions the grounds upon which the right hon. Gentleman opposite opposed the repeal of ministers' money was that it would be improper to do so unless a substitute was provided; and as none had been suggested, he felt it his duty not to support the Motion. Well, now the right hon. Gentleman has to-night made use of a most extraordinary argument, one which I could hardly have expected from him. He admits, as every one must, that the Act of Settlement of Charles II. establishes ministers' money as the indefeasible property of the Church. But, says the right hon. Gentleman, in the year 1854 the Act of Charles II. was repealed, and thus the question is put upon a totally different footing, and the right to ministers' money having been taken away by the Legislature, we are left now at liberty to deal with it as we wish. That is the most extraordinary view of the Act of 1854 which I ever heard of. The right hon. Gentleman the late Secretary for Ireland said that my right hon. and learned Friends, the Member for the University of Dublin, and the Member for Cambridge University, when he was a Member of Lord Derby's Government, had pledged that his Government would take this matter into their consideration, and would propose a settle-
    602
    ment of the question, and I think that the right hon. Gentleman has rather taunted my right hon. and learned Friend with having supported the measure of the Government in 1852. Now, what did my right hon. and learned Friend then propose? With the knowledge that great objections were made to the tax, and that there were great inequalities in respect to it, my right hon. and learned Friend said he was quite ready to take the matter into his consideration, not for the purpose of abolishing the tax, but of removing the objections that had been raised to the mode of collection and the valuation, and, therefore, to render it more efficient for its purposes. In 1854 it was proposed by the Government, of which the noble Lord (Viscount Palmerston) was then Home Secretary, to introduce a Bill to effect the very objects intended by my right hon. and learned Friend. The right hon. Gentleman the present Secretary for the Home Department says that the Act of 1854 repealed the Act of Charles II. But was that the view then taken by the noble Lord at the head of the Government and Sir John Young? No; for the latter right hon. Gentleman stated that no Government, from the earliest period at which this question was agitated, had ventured to propose a repeal of the tax without a substitute; and the noble Lord, so far from supposing that the Act of 1854 was to operate as a repeal of the ministers' money, on that occasion argued that the question was one of property, that that was the ground upon which he was prepared to introduce his measure of 1854, and he ridiculed the idea of treating it as a religious question. There could scarcely be, in fact, a stronger recognition of the right to ministers' money than the Act of 1854, because by it measures were taken to remove all the objections to the tax, for the purpose of rendering it a permanent impost. But it did more; it removed any conscientious objections that could exist on the ground of this being an ecclesiastical tax, because it took away from the ministers, or from the ecclesiastical body, the power of collecting the tax, and it placed it in the hands of the corporations of the different towns. If the Ecclesiastical Commissioners were bound in 1854 to pay the tax to the ministers, no collection of it could be offensive to any religious feeling. What happened on that Act being passed? The tax, for a short time, was collected by the corporations. [An hon. MEMBER here

    603
    expressed dissent.] Well, by the collectors general of rates. It appears by the speech of the hon. Member for Waterford that seven mayors had assembled together for the purpose of resisting the collection of the tax. That was a very remarkable state of things, because the objections did not proceed from the tax-payers themselves, but from those who had control over its collection. An agitation was therefore raised by persons in authority, although one would suppose that such persons should have had a little more respect for the law, which was obligatory to collect the rates and to pay them over to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. The right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for the Home Department has not treated this question quite fairly, for he says that the Legislature had imposed on the trustees the necessity of paying ministers' money. That, no doubt, is true; but the right hon. Gentleman did not do the question justice by taking only a portion of the Act, for he should have stated that provision was made in the same Act for the collection of this money and the payment of it over again to the trustees. Those persons, however, it appeared, refused to collect it, and evinced their determination to resist the law. Well, in that case, what course ought to have been pursued by the Government? It seems that a deputation had waited upon the right hon. Gentleman the late Secretary for Ireland (Mr. Horsman) and intimated to him, in distinct terms, the determination of those parties not to obey the law themselves and not to permit any other persons to obey it. I think, however, that a little more vigour on the part of the right hon. Gentleman might have been exercised. The hon. Member for Waterford (Mr. j Blake) said, that the deputation was received by the right hon. Gentleman with the greatest civility. Now, I should have thought that the right hon. Gentleman under the circumstances should have pursued a different tone with a party of gentlemen who waited on him to announce their intention of not allowing the law to be put in force. But after a little time it was intimated that the Government would proceed to enforce the law. The right hon. Gentleman opposite sneers at my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Enniskillen (Mr. Whiteside), because, in one part of these proceedings, he was retained as counsel by the inhabitants of the city of Waterford. The right hon. Gentleman
    604
    expressed a hope that my hon. and learned Friend, from the number of fees which he then received, would die a rich man. Sir, I sincerely hope that he will live a rich man, and that he will, for a great many years confer a lustre upon society by the influence of his great abilities. It is scarcely possible to help observing, on the events which marked the course of this agitation. The right hon. Gentleman says that no Government, from the earliest period, would permit the repeal of the ministers' money. The noble Lord, however, thought it convenient, on the eve of the dissolution of Parliament, to signify for the first time his assent to the measure of the hon. Member for Cork, although, in 1854, he described such a Bill as one for interference with the rights of property, which he was determined to resist. The intimation given by the hon. Member for Cork, and another of the Irish Members, that ten of the Irish cities, with their surrounding counties, were greatly interested in the solution of this question, was not lost on the noble Lord, who soon afterwards stated that it was the intention of the Government to support this Bill. Well, let the Government take one of two courses—let them either arrange a mode by which a substitute can be raised, or let them take the bold course of at once abolishing the tax. The noble Lord has taken neither of these courses. He has not come forward to propose the abolition of this ministers' money as a question which it was necessary to settle; he has placed himself behind the hon. Member for Cork, and leaving this still the measure of that hon. Gentleman, has certainly shown neither much courage nor forwardness upon this subject. This seems to me a question of vital importance. It is quite impossible, if this principle be carried out, that it should not extend to other subjects in which we have an immediate interest. The hon. Member for Waterford says that this is a part, but not the entire, of what he expected. Many persons look upon the abolition of this tax as a measure that will be followed by the abolition of the Established Church in Ireland. The hon. Member for Cork says, that although the amount involved in this Bill is but trifling, there is a great principle at stake. I am alarmed to think that the passing of this measure establishes the principle that property is no longer to be held sacred and inviolable. The right hon. Gentleman the late Secretary for Ireland said, that there

    605
    was a difference between this tax and church rates, for that the latter had existed from the earliest period, whereas the former had only been established about 200 years. Let us turn to another question likely to engross our attention in a few days—I mean the grant to the College of Maynooth. How will this argument affect the continuance of that grant? The Government supports that endowment on the ground that the faith of Parliament is pledged to it; but that grant has only an existence of sixty years. My hon. Friend the Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Spooner) says from only the year 1845. I differ from him, on that point, and think that Parliament has been pledged for a period of sixty years. Well, if we are to be ruled by a Parliamentary principle, this ministers' money has an advantage over the Maynooth grant; but if the Government is disposed to give way on this important question, because it appears that the religious scruples of certain persons are offended by the exaction of this money, why should not the Government give way on the subject of Maynooth, when they know that many good and conscientious persons are offended at the money of the State being employed for such purposes? It is clear that you cannot forbear to carry out the principle of this abolition of ministers' money to church rates; and I cannot conceive, on the principle that this grant of ministers' money is to be repealed and abolished, how any description of property whatever can be safe. I shall therefore oppose the Motion for the second reading, on the ground that it endangers the security of all property whatever. I also feel that it is impossible not to anticipate the most serious consequences resulting from a recognition of this principle. I see nothing but danger and mischief arising from yielding to the measure of the hon. Gentleman, and I shall therefore feel it my bounden duty to support the Amendment.
    MR. J. D. FITZGERALDsaid, that the hon. and learned Gentleman who had just resumed his seat had accused his right hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Mr. Horsman) of having neglected his duty by casting overboard the question of principle involved in this discussion, and proceeding to a personal attack, He believed that it was the first duty of a Member of that House, to whom it had been imputed that he had misrepresented facts, to clear his character and let it stand fairly before the House; but he denied
    606
    that his right hon. Friend had neglected the questions of principle. On the contrary, he had spoken to them fully and fairly. He (Mr. FitzGerald) would not follow the example of the right hon. and learned Member for the University of Dublin and the hon. and learned Member for Enniskillen and treat this as a sectarian question, or one between Roman Catholic and Protestant, and he hoped to show, before he sat down, that this Bill ought to pass on totally different grounds. God forbid that the House should decide the question upon the ground that the creditor was a Protestant and the debtor a Catholic, or that property belonging to Protestants, and charged with a tax for ecclesiastical purposes, should be discharged because it had come into the hands of Roman Catholics. Neither would he pause to do more than notice the allegation which had been made by hon. and learned Gentlemen opposite, he believed without historical foundation, that when the Act of Charles II. was passed, the property in these towns was in the hands of Protestant owners and occupiers. When Dr. Ellmes, the Protestant rector of Limerick, was asked by the Committee, "Are you aware that when this tax was originally created it was placed upon Protestant property?" he replied, "No; I do not believe that to be the fact, because at the time it was created, 17 & 18 Chas. II., almost all the occupiers and most of the owners of houses were Roman Catholics;" and it must indeed have surprised the hon. Members for Waterford, for Cork, and for Limerick to hear that in the year 1665 the proprietors of houses in those boroughs were exclusively Protestants. One of the reasons why he thought the question ought not to be determined on such grounds as these was, that his experience had shown him that this tax was equally vexatious to the Protestant clergyman and to the Protestant or Roman Catholic owner or occupier, and that it had been condemned by every one who was anxious to promote the advance of Christianity. On this ground it had been equally assailed by all these persons. One and all agreed in the opinion that when a substitute could be provided this tax ought to be abolished. For the purposes of religion, of Christianity, and of good will, the position of Protestant clergymen, who were obliged to obtain from the poorest of the poor the tax upon which they were to subsist was very unfortunate. If this impost were to cease, the greater part

    607
    of the saving would go, not, as might be supposed from the speeches of right hon. Gentlemen opposite, into the pockets of Roman Catholic ratepayers, but into those of Protestant occupiers and proprietors of house property. The tax was condemned by the Committee of 1848 as an impost which led to most injurious animosity; all the rectors who were examined by that Committee agreed that the tax ought to be taken off; the only question was as to what was to be substituted for it, and the only substitute which could be suggested was a payment out of the funds of the Ecclesiastical Commission. He believed that the Government of Lord Derby were so convinced of the oppressive nature of the tax, that they were pressed to adopt measures to effect its abolition; and that it was only on account of their brief tenure of office that they had not done so. The hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Stamford (Sir F. Thesiger) committed a slight inaccuracy in saying that the Secretary of State under the Government of Lord Derby proposed to settle this question, and suggested the plan which was afterwards carried out by Sir John Young. The matter was left completely ambiguous, all that was said being that the Government had in contemplation a measure for the settlement of the question. During the Government of Lord Derby the hon. Member for Cork brought forward a Motion for the total abolition of the tax. The Government did not meet that Motion by a direct negative, but they moved the previous question, thus implying that they were prepared to settle the question. That Government, however, had no opportunity of doing so, for ten days afterwards they were thrown out of office, and Lord Aberdeen's Government succeeded them. Sir J. Young subsequently brought in a Bill upon the subject, and he was free to confess that there was only one portion of that Bill with which he concurred, and that was the provision which removed the rectors of parishes from the disagreeable position in which they were previously placed, and enabled them to draw their incomes from the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. Now, the present Bill did not interfere with that right. Sir J. Young took from the clergy the arduous and disagreeable task of levying the impost, and imposed it upon the corporations—a duty foreign to their constitution, and which necessarily brought them into disastrous disputes with their people. The represent-
    608
    tatives of those towns, with the exception of the Members for Dublin, objected to that proposal. The Bill, however, passed into law, and the inevitable result of it was to bring the corporations into collision with their ratepayers, or, if these corporations did not perform the invidious task imposed on them, to bring them into collision with the Government. From the very first the corporations indicated their intention of not becoming the collectors of this tax, and it had been his duty to state the course which the Government intended to adopt—namely, to carry the law into effect, and in so doing he had pointed out the difficulties which were in the way. The result of that course had been a scene of unhappy and expensive litigation. At the present moment there were seven suits pending in the Court of Exchequer in Ireland at the suit of the Attorney General, against the several corporations to enforce the tax. In one case judgment had been given for the Crown, and proceedings had been commenced in order to carry the case to the Court of Error, and thence before the House of Lords, and he could not certainly affirm that that tribunal would not reverse the decision of the court below. But, supposing the judgment were confirmed, how could it be enforced against a body corporate which had, after fulfilling its trusts, no property of its own? For his own part, he believed it was exceedingly difficult, if not impracticable to obtain the fruits of judgment in such a case, and a recent decision of the Court of Chancery confirmed him in that view. He did not look upon this impost as being church property, nor did the measure involve any question of appropriation. It was a question of taxation; the tax had been created by Act of Parliament; and, as it had been created by Parliament, so Parliament had a perfect right to abolish it. Was it, he would ask, politic for so small a sum as £12,000, per annum to keep up a continued feeling of strife and contention? If it were impossible to levy the tax, let the House see if there was anything which could be resorted to as a substitute for it. He thought that substitute might be found in the funds in the hands of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. He believed that by an economical management of the annual receipts of the Commission, which had increased from £68,000 in the year 1848 to £140,000 in the last year, a sum might be set aside to be applied for the purposes for

    609
    which the tax then under consideration was levied. He had before him the accounts for the year 1855, and in them he found one item alone amounting to £34,850 for "requisites for the celebration of Divine service in several churches and chapels." What the components of that item were he had not the materials to enable him to say. Moreover, there was £6,000 a year paid for salaries, and a salary of £1,000 a year to a solicitor, in addition to his professional outlay, and an allowance for clerks. These items might be considerably reduced. Even if that could not be done, Christians of other denominations by voluntary efforts raised means for the celebration of Divine service, and he did not think it too much to call upon his Protestant fellow-countrymen to imitate that example, if by so doing they could put an end to a continued source of strife and contention. For his part he believed that, without reducing the funds in the hands of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, or withdrawing those funds from the purposes to which they were now applied—the increase of ministers' stipends, the repair of churches, and the building of glebes—a large proportion of these items might, under a more economical management, be applied towards this £12,000. The tax was oppressive. It gave rise to opposition in every part of the country, and to continuous litigation, involving more expense than the whole tax. Eight towns came to the House, told them that they regarded it as most obnoxious, and prayed to be relieved from the impost. He thought the House would agree that a tax which assumed that character, which met with opposition on all hands—so small in amount, but so vexatious in operation, was one which ought to be abolished, and that it would be most unwise and impolitic to uphold such a source of irritation and ill-will.
    LORD JOHN RUSSELL: Although I have no doubt with respect to the Vote which I shall give upon this question, yet I own I am not so well satisfied with the reasons which have been given for that vote by two Members of the Government and a late Member of the Government, as to induce me to refrain from stating shortly the ground upon which my own vote will be given. Sir, I am not satisfied with the statement that the necessity for this vote arises from the imperfections of the Act of 1854. That Act, as I understand it, consists of four parts. One
    610
    part reduced by 25 per cent, the amount of ministers' money to be paid. To that part I think no objection has been made. Another part provided that, instead of the uncertainty that formerly prevailed, the ministers entitled to these stipends should receive them from the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. That I believe was a very wise provision, and has tended as well to the comfort and welfare of those ministers as to the comfort and ease of those who are called upon to pay the tax. A third part, of that Bill consisted of a provision that those who occupied houses under £10 a year should no longer be subject to the tax. That, again, I think, tended to prevent very vexatious and oppressive levies of small sums, and was likewise wise and proper. The fourth part of the Act, which provided that the corporations should levy the tax, seems to me to be the only part which could be said to have entirely failed, and that part undoubtedly has not worked satisfactorily; but the Government had the matter under their consideration, and I presume that, if by any other mode of collection—if by taking away this liability from the corporation, and placing it in any other hands, the collection of the tax could have, been made easy and successful, they would rather have preferred that course to the course which they have adopted, and have submitted it to the House. I presume, therefore, that the failure of Sir John Young's Act rather arises from the difficulty of the matter itself than from any imperfections which are to be found in the Act. Not finding, then, in that Act—upon which so much stress has been laid, and which by two Members of the Government, one of whom has lately left it, has been made the theme of so much objection, any reasons to necessitate the present measure, it appears to me that there is one ground, and that a very simple ground, upon which it can be fully justified. The Act of 1833, introduced by the present Earl of Derby, took away from the Church of Ireland part of its revenues for the system of what was called church cess, amounting, if I recollect rightly, to about £70,000 a year. That part of the revenues of the Church was taken away, on the ground that it was most vexatious in its collection; that it was felt as an oppression by the people; and that, in fact, it raised great hostility to the Church for whose support it was levied. In lieu of that revenue there were certain charges—that for building

    611
    and repairing churches amongst others—placed upon the Commission, which was furnished with funds, partly by the suppression of the bishoprics, and partly by a tax on benefices. That measure affected £70,000 a year of the Church revenue. It appears to me that, with regard to this £12,000 a year, there are the same objections as to the £70,000 a year—that it is vexatious and oppressive; that it is collected in small sums; that it does not tend to the welfare and comfort of the ministers of the Church who receive it, or to the general well-being of those who pay it; and as there were funds provided for the Church Commission, to meet the deficit caused by the abolition of church cess, so likewise I think there will be no difficulty in providing a substitute for minister's money. I own I cannot conceive how the right hon. and learned Gentleman opposite (Mr. Napier), who argued this case with so much ability, could contend that this is a spoliation of Church property; that it is a precedent which involves the ruin of the Church; that it is contrary to the principles of property altogether—when he had this precedent before him of 1833 in an exactly similar matter, and in which Parliament took a course exactly similar to that now proposed. There remains, therefore, it appears to me, one single question to be answered—namely, is it possible or impossible for the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, with the funds they have at their disposal, to furnish this substitute for ministers' money? I own I cannot doubt that it is possible; for taking, not the statement of the Attorney General for Ireland, but of the right hon. Gentleman himself, he admits that that income, which was £68,000 in the year 1848, was £93,000 in 1856. Taking that statement, you have an increase of £25,000 a year in order to provide a sum of £12,000 a year. This is a very short, but I trust, clear statement of the grievance that is suffered, and of the method in which it is possible to deal with it. I confess I think, that as the question does touch upon very important interests, as it is right that those who support this measure should have an opportunity of stating their reasons, in order that their views on other matters, touched by the same principle, might not be affected, and as, therefore, it is a matter which requires legislation, the question had better be undertaken by a Member of the Government than by the hon. Member for Cork. He says it was left to his own choice whether to undertake
    612
    it or let it alone. I should be glad to find that he gains credit from the people of Ireland for having undertaken the measure, but I fear he did not make a very fortunate choice when he took it upon himself, inasmuch as it has less chance of success than if the Government had made it a measure of their own. But, whether in his hands or the hands of the Government, I on these grounds support the second reading of the Bill.
    MR. WALPOLE: The last observation of the noble Lord, coupled with those with which he commenced, induce me to request him to reconsider his determination, which is distinctly and diametrically opposed to the noble stand which he has invariably made in defence of the system of church rates in England upon the ground that those rates were property belonging to the Church, which, if you take away, you strike at the foundation of all property, and are injuring the permanent institutions of the country. I do not wish to press the noble Lord's argument too far, nor do I think this impost, as it is called, is at all to be compared to church rates in England or to the church cess in Ireland; but I am confident that principles thus enunciated will, if acted upon, lead us into difficulties which the noble Lord himself will be the first to deprecate. The Attorney General for Ireland has told us that Lord Derby's Government had been prepared, as he inferred, to abolish this tax, because they met the Motion for its abolition by moving the previous question. Upon that occasion I stated the grounds upon which Lord Derby's Government was prepared to act, and if the House will follow me for a few moments they will see that those grounds were just and safe grounds. The objections to the impost were three. The first was its inequality, and the undue manner in which it pressed upon the poorer householders who fell within its range. The second objection, to the mode in which the tax was levied upon certain tenants in the towns subject to its payment was, that it was levied at the same rate of assessment as when the assessment had been first made, though their tenements had since become considerably depreciated in value. These two objections the Government of Lord Derby was prepared to remove. In addition to that we were ready to give to those, who might choose to take advantage of the privilege, the power of redeeming the tax, and I may add that these various principles were embodied in the

    613
    measure of Sir J. Young, which was introduced by the Coalition Government, of which the noble Lord opposite, who has just resumed his seat, was the leader, which bore on its back the name of the present First Lord of the Treasury, then Home Secretary, and which was supported by the right hon. Baronet the Member for Carlisle, the right hon. Member for Oxford University, and by every man of note on the other side of the House. The third great objection to the tax was that which was urged so temperately by the hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Fagan), and which consisted in the circumstance that its collection gave rise to religious differences and animosities among the inhabitants of Ireland. But how did the noble Viscount at the head of the Government meet that objection in the year 1854? He said, "You cannot argue the question upon the ground of religion. It is a question not of religion but of property." That was the opinion of the noble Lord, and I beg leave to say that the objection is one which cannot be admitted as of any more force against this tax than against church rates or any other impost of a similar character. There is, however, one point in connection with this subject which I am particularly anxious to press upon the attention of the House. This tax was first levied in the reign of Charles II.—a period of nearly 200 years ago—while it was not only not repealed by the Bill of 1854, but was absolutely confirmed, so that it has now two Parliamentary enactments in its favour. Well, that being so, let me ask what better claim does Maynooth possess to the sum which it annually receives? I am, indeed, one of those who think that the agitation for the withdrawal of the grant to Maynooth is a most unfortunate circumstance for the country. Upon that point I am aware that I unhappily differ from some of my most intimate friends. I feel it, however, to be my duty to speak what I honestly believe to be the truth, and it is my opinion that if you to-night assent to the second reading of this Bill you will afford to those who seek for the withdrawal of the grant to Maynooth an argument in support of their views which you will find it extremely difficult to answer. That grant, as well as ministers' money, owes its origin to Act of Parliament. Both alike give offence to the religious feelings of the inhabitants of two different countries. There are, then, but two ways of dealing with the question. You must
    614
    either admit that an obligation entered into by Act of Parliament must be religiously observed, or that the particular obligation being dispensed with, some equivalent for its removal should be given. I defy you to arrive at any other conclusion upon any principle of justice or of reason. This leads me to make an observation with reference to what has fallen from the right hon. Gentleman the Attorney General for Ireland (Mr. FitzGerald), who, taking up the Report of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, has referred to the fact that they have availed themselves of the assistance of a solicitor, at a salary of £1,000 per annum, to aid them by his advice in their proceedings; and, with reference to the argument of the noble Lord, founded upon the circumstance that while £12,000 was all that was required for ministers' money, the Commissioners were now in the receipt of £25,000 per annum more than in 1848. My answers to those remarks, implying that the funds of the Commissians have increased, and, therefore, that they possess sufficient money for the objects which they have in view, are two—In the first place, they were taking away what was secured to parties by Act of Parliament and was applicable to one purpose, to apply it to another purpose to which it was not legally applicable. And in the second place, until you are satisfied that the stipends of those poor clergymen, who receive only a miserable pittance of £100 or £150 per annum, and who now constitute one-third of the clergy of Ireland, ought to be reduced—until, in short, you are convinced that the trusts which the Ecclesiastical Commission was established to carry into effect have been fulfilled, you cannot say they possess a surplus in their hands, and that their funds ought to be turned to other uses than those which the law now sanctions. This is a subject with respect to which I am extremely anxious we should proceed upon no erroneous principle. I am solicitous that we should not break through those securities upon which property is based, and that we should, by steadily adhering to that principle, contribute, as far as lies in our power, to produce that peace throughout the country which it is so desirable to maintain.
    VISCOUNT PALMERSTON: I hope the House will give its assent to the second reading of this Bill, and I trust that in coming to that decision hon. Members will consider the question upon its own merits,

    615
    and will not be led away by the observations which have fallen from hon. and learned Gentlemen opposite, who combine this with a great number of other measures, and would make our decision depend on hypothetical questions not now under our notice. Those hon. and learned Gentlemen have endeavoured to show by a logical deduction that the towns in Ireland at present subject to this impost ought to continue to pay it, and, if the question were one of logic, I have no doubt that the hon. and learned Member for Enniskillen would succeed in convincing his clients, whom he is about to defend in their resistance to this impost, that upon the principles of logic they ought to be willing to pay it. This question, however, is not one to be determined upon grounds of such narrow description. It is a question of State policy, in our decision in reference to which we ought to be guided by considerations of a larger scope than those by which the hon. and learned Gentleman would have us influenced. Everybody must admit that ministers' money is a tax which has long been regarded as objectionable. Successive Governments have endeavoured so to modify its imposition as to remove those objections. The Administration of Lord Aberdeen hoped that the Bill of 1854 would remove the difficulties attendant on the collection of the tax. Such, however, has not been found to be the case. We are now told that in attempting to deal with the tax we are depriving the Church of her property. We ought, however, to bear in mind that the clergymen themselves, when they had to collect the tax, hardly ever succeeded in the attempt, and that it was upon that account that 25 per cent, was taken from its amount, and that they received a sum less than that to which they were nominally entitled. I am of opinion that the Bill of 1854 introduced a great improvement in connection with the subject. It secured to those clergymen the amount of their reduced stipends from the funds in the hands of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. The claim was transferred from the local tax to the revenues of the Commissioners, and therefore, so far as they were concerned, the clergy were placed upon a better footing, inasmuch as they had guaranteed to them the sum which it was thought they ought to receive. It was also supposed that by transferring the collection of the tax from the clergyman to a corporation that collection would be more
    616
    easily made, and that in that way the commissioners would be reimbursed for what they had advanced to the clergy. Experience has, however, shown that in that respect the Bill of 1854 has been a failure, that the collection of the tax has become the subject of lawsuits and controversy, and that it has entailed enormous expense. At the commencement of this year, therefore, Her Majesty's Government, having considered what course they would take upon a question which it was announced would be brought again under their notice, and after full deliberation, came to the conclusion that, as a substitute had been provided, and as the funds of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners appeared from the returns which were laid before the House, to be amply sufficient to provide this £12,000 a year, it would be desirable, for the sake of promoting peace and quietness in the country, and removing heartburnings and disputes, to place the charge permanently upon that fund upon which it had been placed in the first instance. We came to that decision at an early period of the year, and I trust this House will sanction it by agreeing to the Bill of my hon. Friend the Member for Cork. The hon. and learned Gentlemen opposite have taunted us with having shaped our course upon this question with a view to the elections that were about to take place. I am unwilling to say anything uncivil to the hon. and learned Gentlemen; but if we are taunted in this manner, I am compelled to tell them that we did not stand in need of such slender support as a stratagem of that sort would have afforded us. It was not to that quarter of the House which we looked; we looked opposite, and were content to rest our chance of the favourable decision of the country upon the course which had been pursued by those who sit face to face with us, and did not trust to any concessions we might be disposed to make the hon. Gentlemen whom we see below the gangway on our own side of the House. We came to our decision, not for any unworthy reasons, such as those which have been charged against us, but upon grounds of material policy, and our object was to put an end to an impost trifling, no doubt, in amount, but still important in its bearings on the peace and contentment of the country. We took our decision upon grounds which, I think, statesmen would be fully justified in accepting, and I am convinced that if the House should concur with us in the course we have adopted, so

    617
    far from the Church of Ireland being injured in her interests, we shall find that she will derive additional strength from the goodwill which this measure will produce, and that the funds of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners are amply sufficient to provide the means of continuing the payments to those clergymen who are affected by the Bill. My noble Friend (Lord John Russell) has said that this measure ought to have been taken up by the Government. It was our first intention so to take it up; but, feeling that my hon. Friend the Member for Cork (Mr. Fagan), had identified himself with the question, that he had perseveringly advocated the claims of those on whose behalf he speaks, I felt it was due to him to give him his choice as to who should have the conduct of the Bill, and, if he was desirous himself to propose it to the House, to express my willingness on the part of the Government to allow him to do so. But I hope the House will believe that, in supporting the Bill, we support it with all the earnestness and influence of the Government, and that, although the measure has been brought forward by my hon. Friend the Member for Cork, we are willing to take as much responsibility for it as if it had been moved by one of ourselves.
    Question put.
    The House divided: Ayes 313; Noes 174: Majority 139.
    Main Question put, and agreed to.
    Bill read 2°, and committed for Monday next.

    List of the AYES.

    Adair, H. E.

    Bouverie, rt. hn. E. P.

    Adeane, H. J.

    Bouverie, hon. P. P.

    Akroyd, E.

    Bowyer, G.

    Althorp, Visct.

    Boyd, J.

    Anderson, Sir J.

    Brady, J.

    Antrobus, E.

    Brand, hon, H.

    Ashley, Lord

    Briscoe, J. I.

    Atherton, W.

    Brocklehurst, J.

    Ayrton, A. S.

    Brown, J.

    Bagwell, J.

    Brown, W.

    Baines, rt, hon. M. T.

    Bruce, Lord E.

    Ball, E.

    Bruce, H. A.

    Baring, T. G.

    Buchanan, W.

    Barnard, T.

    Buckley, Gen.

    Bass, M. T.

    Buller, J. W.

    Baxter, W. E.

    Bury, Visct.

    Beamish, F. B.

    Butt, I.

    Beaumont, W. B.

    Buxton, C.

    Berkeley, hon. H. F.

    Byng, hon. G. H. C.

    Bethell, Sir R.

    Caird, J.

    Biddulph, R. M.

    Calcutt, F. M.

    Biggs, J.

    Calcraft, J. H.

    Black, A.

    Campbell, R. J. R.

    Blake, J.

    Castlerosse, Visct.

    Bland, L. H.

    Cavendish, Lord

    Bonham-Carter, J.

    Cavendish, hon. C. C.

    618

    Cavendish, hon. G.

    Greville, Col. F.

    Cheetham, J.

    Grey, rt. hon. Sir G.

    Clay, J.

    Grey, R. W.

    Clifford, C. C.

    Grosvenor, Lord R.

    Clifford, H. M.

    Grosvenor, Earl

    Clive, G.

    Gurdon, B.

    Cobbett, J. M.

    Gurney, J. H.

    Cogan, W. H. F.

    Gurney, S.

    Colebrooke, Sir T. E.

    Hackblock, W.

    Collier, R. P.

    Hadfield, G.

    Colville, C. R.

    Hall, rt. hon. Sir B.

    Coote, Sir C. H.

    Hanbury, R.

    Coningham, W.

    Handley, J.

    Conyngham, Lord F.

    Hankey, T.

    Cotterell, Sir H. G.

    Hanmer, Sir J.

    Cowan, C.

    Harcourt, G. G.

    Cox, W.

    Hardcastle, J. A.

    Craufurd, E. H. J.

    Harris, J. D.

    Crawford, R. W.

    Hassard, M.

    Crook, J.

    Hastie, Arch.

    Dalgleish, R.

    Hatchell, J.

    Davey, R.

    Hay, Lord J.

    Davie, Sir H. R. F.

    Headlam, T. E.

    Deasy, R.

    Heard, J. I.

    Denison, hon. W. H. F.

    Henchy, D. O'C.

    Dering, Sir E.

    Heneage, G. F.

    DoVere, S. E.

    Herbert, H. A.

    Devereux, J. T.

    Hindley, C.

    Divett, E.

    Hodgson, K. D.

    Dodson, J. G.

    Holland, E.

    Duff, G. S.

    Horsman, rt. hon. E.

    Duke, Sir J.

    Howard, hon. C. W. G.

    Dunbar, Sir W.

    Hughes, W. B.

    Duncan, Visct.

    Hutt, W.

    Dundas, F.

    Ingham, R.

    Dunlop, A. M.

    Jackson, W.

    Dunne, M.

    Jervoice, Sir J. C.

    Ellice, E.

    Johnstone, Sir J.

    Ellis, hon. L. A.

    Keating, H. S.

    Ennis, J.

    Ker, R.

    Esmonde, J.

    Kershaw, J.

    Euston, Earlof

    King, E. B.

    Evans, T. W.

    Kinglake, A. W.

    Ewart, W.

    Kinglake, J. A.

    Ewart, J. C.

    Kingscote, R. N. F.

    Fagan, W.

    Kinnaird, hon. A. F.

    Ferguson, Col.

    Kirk, W.

    Finlay, A. S.

    Knatchbull-Hugesson, E

    FitzGerald, W. R. S.

    Langston, J. H.

    FitzGerald. rt. hon. J. D.

    Langton, H. G.

    Fitzwilliara, hn. C. W. W.

    Levinge, SirR.

    Foley, J. H.

    Lewis, rt. hn. SirG. C.

    Foley, H. J. W.

    Lincoln, Earl of

    Foljambe, F. J. S.

    Locke, J.

    Forster, C.

    Lowe, rt. hon. R.

    Foster, W. O.

    Macarthy, A.

    Fortescue, hon. F. D.

    M'Cann, J.

    Fortescue, C. S.

    MacEvoy, E.

    Freestun, Col.

    Mackie, J.

    French, Col.

    Mackinnon, W. A.

    Garnett, W. J.

    M'Cullagh, W. T.

    Gifford, Earl of

    Maguire, J. F.

    Glover, E. A.

    Mainwaring, T.

    Glyn, G. C.

    Mangles, R. D.

    Glyn, G. G.

    Mangles, C. E.

    Goderich, Visct.

    Marjoribanks, D. C.

    Grace, O. D. J.

    Marsh, M. H.

    Greene, J.

    Martin, C. W.

    Greenwood, J.

    Martin, P. W.

    Greer, S. M'C.

    Massey. W. N.

    Gregory, W. H.

    Matheson, Alex.

    Gregson, S.

    Matheson, Sir J.

    Grenfell, C. W.

    Melgund, Visct.

    619

    Merry, J.

    Smith, J. B.

    Mills, T,

    Smith, rt. hon. R. V.

    Milton, Visct.

    Smith, A.

    Moffatt, G.

    Smith, Sir F.

    Moncreiff, rt. hon. J.

    Smyth, Col.

    Monsell, rt. hon. W.

    Stafford, Marq, of

    Moore, G. H.

    Stanley, Lord

    Morris, D.

    Stapleton, J.

    Mostyn, hon. T. E. M. L.

    Steel, J.

    Muntz, G. F.

    Stuart, Lord J.

    Napier, Sir C.

    Stuart, Col.

    Neate, C.

    Sullivan, M.

    Nicoll, D.

    Sykes, Col. W. H.

    Norreys, Sir D. J.

    Tancred, H. W.

    Norris, J. T.

    Taylor, S. W.

    North, F.

    Thompson, Gen.

    O'Brien, P.

    Thornely, T.

    O'Brien, Sir T.

    Thornhill, W. P.

    O'Brien, J.

    Tite, W.

    O'Connell, Capt. D.

    Tottenham, C.

    O'Donaghoe, The

    Townshend, J.

    O'Flaherty, A.

    Traill, G.

    Ogilvy, Sir J.

    Trelawny, Sir J. S.

    Osborne, R.

    Trueman, C.

    Paget, C.

    Turner, J. A.

    Paget, Lord A.

    Vane, Lord H.

    Paget, Lord C.

    Villiers, rt. hon. C. P.

    Palmerston, Visct.

    Vivian, hon. J. C. W.

    Pease, H.

    Vivian, H. H.

    Pechell, Sir G. B.

    Waldron, L.

    Peel, Sir R.

    Walter, J.

    Perry, Sir T. E.

    Warburton, G. D.

    Philips, R. N.

    Watkin, E. W.

    Pilkington, J.

    Watkins, Col. L.

    Pinney, Col.

    Weguelin, T. M.

    Platt, J.

    Western, S.

    Portman, hon. W. H. B.

    Whatman, J.

    Potter, Sir J.

    Whitbread, S.

    Power, N.

    White, J.

    Puller, C. W.

    White, H.

    Ramsden, Sir J. W.

    Willcox, B. M 'G.

    Ramsay, Sir A.

    Williams, M.

    Raynham, Visct.

    Williams, W.

    Rebow, J. G.

    Williams, Sir W. F.

    Ricardo, J. L.

    Willyams, E. W. B.

    Ricardo, O.

    Wilson, J.

    Ridley, G.

    Wingfield, R. B.

    Roebuck, J. A.

    Winnington, Sir T. E.

    Roupell, W.

    Wise, J. A.

    Russell, Lord J.

    Wood, rt. hon. Sir C.

    Russell, F. C. H.

    Wood, W.

    Russell, Sir W.

    Woods, H.

    Salisbury, E. G.

    Worsley, Lord

    Schneider, H. W.

    Wyld, J.

    Scholefield, W.

    Windham, Gen.

    Seymour, H. D.

    Wyvill, M.

    Shafto, R. D.

    TELLERS.

    Shelley, Sir J. V.

    Hayter, rt. hon. W. G.

    Sheridan, R. B.

    Mulgrave, Earl of

    List of the NOES.

    Adderley, C. B.

    Blackburn, P.

    Annesley, hon. H.

    Boldero, Col.

    Archdall, Capt. M.

    Booth, Sir R. G.

    Baring, T.

    Botfield, B.

    Bathurst, A. A.

    Bovill, W.

    Beach, W. W. B.

    Bramley-Moore, J.

    Bective, Earl of

    Bridges, Sir B. W.

    Bennet, P.

    Bruce, Major C.

    Bentinck, G. W. P.

    Bruen, H.

    Bernard, T. T.

    Buller, Sir J. T.

    Bernard, hon. W. S.

    Bunbury, W. B. M'C.

    620

    Burghley, Lord

    Laslett, W.

    Burrell, Sir C. M.

    Legh, G. C.

    Garden, Sir R. W.

    Leslie, C. P.

    Carnac, Sir J. R.

    Liddell, hon. H. G.

    Cecil, Lord R.

    Lisburne, Earl of

    Child, S.

    Lockhart, A. E.

    Christy, S.

    Lovaine, Lord

    Clark, J. J.

    Lowther, hon. Col.

    Clive, hon. R. W.

    Lowther, Capt.

    Cobbold, J. C.

    Lygon, hon. F.

    Cole, hon. H. A.

    Macartney, G.

    Conolly, T.

    Macaulay, K.

    Cooper, E. J.

    M'Clintock, J.

    Copeland, W. T.

    Malins, R.

    Corry, rt. hon. H. L.

    Manners, Lord J.

    Cross, R. A.

    March, Earl of

    Dalkeith, Earl of

    Maxwell, hon. Col.

    Damer, L. D.

    Miller, T. J.

    Davison, R.

    Miller, S. B.

    Disraeli, rt, hon. B.

    Montgomery, H. L.

    Dobbs, W. C.

    Montgomery, Sir G.

    Dod, J. W.

    Mowbray, J. R.

    Du Cane, C.

    Mullings, J. R.

    Duncombe, hon. A.

    Napier, rt. hon. J.

    Duncombe, hon. Col.

    Neeld, J.

    Dundas, G.

    Newark, Visct.

    Du Pre, C. G.

    Newdegate, C. N.

    Dutton, hon. R. H.

    Nisbet, R. P.

    East, Sir J. B.

    Noel, hon. G. J.

    Egerton, Sir P.

    North, Col.

    Egerton, W. T.

    Ossulston, Lord

    Egerton, E. C.

    Packe, C. W.

    Elphinstone, Sir J.

    Pakenham, Col.

    Elton, Sir A. H.

    Pakington, rt. hn. Sir J.

    Emlyn, Visct.

    Palmer, R.

    Estcourt, T. H. S.

    Paull, H.

    Farnham, E. B.

    Peel, Gen.

    Farquhar, Sir W. M.

    Pennant, hon. Col.

    Forde, Col.

    Pevensey, Visct.

    Forester, rt. hon. Col.

    Philipps, J. H.

    Forster, Sir G.

    Robertson, P. F.

    Fraser, Sir W. A.

    Russell, F. W.

    Gallwey, Sir W. P.

    Scott, Capt. E.

    Gard, R. S.

    Seymer, H. K.

    Goddard, A. L.

    Shirley. E. P.

    Greenall, G.

    Sibthorp, Maj.

    Gray, Capt.

    Smollett, A.

    Griffith, C. D.

    Spooner, R.

    Grogan, E.

    Stafford, A.

    Hamilton, Lord C.

    Stanhope, J. B.

    Hardy, G.

    Steuart, A.

    Heathcote, Sir W.

    Sturt, H. G.

    Henley, rt. hon. J. W.

    Sturt, C. N.

    Henniker, Lord

    Thesiger, Sir F.

    Hildyard, R. C.

    Tollemache, J.

    Hill, Lord E.

    Trefusis; hon. C. H. R.

    Hill, hon. R. C.

    Trollope, rt. hon. Sir J.

    Hodgson, W. N.

    Vance, J.

    Hopwood, J. T.

    Vansittart, G. H.

    Hornby, W. H.

    Vansittart, W.

    Horsfall, T. B.

    Verner, Sir W.

    Hume, W. F.

    Waddington, H. S.

    Ingestrie, Visct.

    Walcott, Adm.

    Jermyn, Earl

    Walpole, rt. hon. S. H.

    Johnstone, hon. H. B.

    Walsh, Sir J. B.

    Johnstone, J. J. H.

    Warren, S.

    Jones, D.

    Welby, W. E.

    Kendall, N.

    Whiteside, J.

    King, J. K.

    Whitmore, H.

    Knightley, R.

    Wigram, L. T.

    Knox, Col.

    Williams, T. P.

    Knox, hon. W. S.

    Willoughby, J. P.

    Langton, W. G.

    Willson, A.

    621

    Woodd, B. T.

    Yorke, hon. E. T.

    Wortley, Maj.

    Wyndham, Gen.

    TELLERS.

    Wynn, Col.

    Jolliffe, Sir W. G. H.

    Wynn, Sir W. W.

    Taylor, Col.

    House adjourned at One o'clock.

MINUTES.
Sat First in Parliament.—The Duke of Rutland, after the Death of his Father.
Took the Oaths.—Several Lords; several Lords took the Oath prescribed by the Act 10 Geo. IV., to be taken by Peers professing the Roman Catholic Religion.
PUBLIC BILL.—2a Divorce and Matrimonial Causes.

THE MARQUESS OF WESTMEATH.— PERSONAL EXPLANATION.
THE MARQUESS OF WESTMEATHsaid, he hoped their Lordships would extend to him for a few moments the indulgence which they usually granted to one of their Members who had to make an explanation in reference to a matter in which his personal honour and character were involved. His attention had been directed to an article in The Globe newspaper of the preceding evening in reference to a Bill now on their Lordships' table, and which contained statements in reference to himself utterly false, and, as he believed, undoubtedly libellous. But as regarded their libellous character, he would not trouble their Lordships—that would be a matter which it would be for another tribunal to consider.
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But as regarded that part which concerned his honour, he wished to take the earliest opportunity of contradicting, in the most positive manner, a composition which had been sent about on the part of the lady who did him the honour of bearing his name, but who had left his house of her own account thirty-eight years ago, and who did not appear to be as yet content to leave her husband in peace. The statements in The Globe were founded on a pamphlet which had been going the round of certain newspapers, and which had been placed on the tables of the clubs, with the view of vilifying his character. Their Lordships might say that they had nothing to do with a private matter of that kind; but he would remind them that the statements in question had been put forward at that particular time, in connection with a Bill which was to be brought under their consideration that evening. It was on that account that he did not wish to lose one moment in stating that, when that Bill got into Committee, he would take the opportunity of meeting the whole of the statements to which he referred by a positive and irrefragable contradiction, which would show that every one of them was unfounded, and that they had been characterized by an amount of perjury and conspiracy which could never have taken place in any court in this country in which testimony was taken viva voce. In the Ecclesiastical Courts, and in those courts alone, with which their Lordships were now about to deal, and which for the sake of justice and for the sake of morality he hoped they were about to annihilate, could such proceedings as those of which he complained have been conducted. He had only to repeat that it was his intention at the earliest opportunity to meet those atrocious libels with the complete and indignant denial which they deserved.

THE ARMY IN INDIA—REINFORCEMENTS.—QUESTION.
THE EARL OF ELLENBOROUGHsaid, he believed that in consequence of the intelligence recently received from India, it would be satisfactory to the House and the public, if the noble Lord the Secretary for War would state what measures he intended to adopt for the purpose of reinforcing the army in that country with European troops.
LORD PANMUREsaid, that the intelligence recently received from India had

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not been such as to create any apprehension in the minds of Her Majesty's Ministers for the safety of our Indian empire. But at the same time, as it was intended that the expedition to China should consist of troops that had originally been destined for India, four other regiments would be ordered to proceed to the latter country in the course of the next five weeks. The reason why they were not to be sent out at an earlier period was, that if they were to leave England before the second week in June they would reach their destination at a peculiarly unhealthy season of the year. If it should unfortunately turn out that an increase would be required in the number of European troops usually stationed in India, the regiments who would in the ordinary course of things be relieved by those who were to embark from our shores in the month of June would be retained in that country. But he did not apprehend that any necessity would arise for the adoption of such a measure.
THE EARL OF ELLENBOROUGHwished to know what was the number of recruits that were to be sent out to India?
LORD PANMUREsaid, that the number of recruits to be sent out in June would amount to 4000.

DIVORCE AND MATRIMONIAL CAUSES BILL.—PETITION OF LADY BULWER LYTTON—EXPLANATION.
LORD LYNDHURSTsaid, he found from the papers which had been laid on the table of the House that morning, in reference to the Divorce and Matrimonial Causes Bill, that a petition had been presented to their Lordships by Lady Bulwer Lytton, stating that she had forwarded to him a packet of valuable papers dated from Llangollen, in the year 1854, which she had not received back, and she prayed the House to order that a thorough investigation should be instituted into the matter, in order that she might have her property restored to her. Now, he should feel greatly distressed if it could be supposed for a moment that he had been guilty of any incivility towards Lady Lytton, or any other lady. He was quite sure that any such incivility would be quite foreign to his intention and his character. He would state in a few words the circumstances of that case. The lady had transmitted to him a very voluminous packet, containing many sheets of letter-paper covered in a very small hand, comprising the statement
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to which she referred. Her communication was dated from Llangollen, as she set forth in her petition. After the lapse of two months, he received a letter from Lady Lytton, begging that the papers might be returned to her. But by some accident he had mislaid her note, and as he did not, therefore, know her address, he had made up her papers and forwarded a letter for her to Llangollen, in which he stated that if she would have the kindness to send for the packet it would be delivered to her messenger. A short time afterwards he delivered the packet, sealed, to his porter, with directions that it should be given up to any person who should apply for it, according to the statement in his letter. In the course of a little time, he received a letter from Lady Lytton, stating that she had not received the packet, and expressing, at the same time, a surmise that it had in some manner or another got into other hands, and that it had, in fact, been purloined. All he knew, however, of the matter was that he had made up the packet, and that he had informed Lady Lytton that he would deliver it up to her messenger immediately on his describing it. That was a plain statement of the facts of the case as far as he was concerned. He knew nothing of what might have taken place at Llangollen, and he was not at all aware whether the surmise of Lady Lytton upon that point were or were not well founded. He was satisfied that he had himself acted correctly upon the occasion, and he was sure their Lordships would acquit him of any charge of having treated a lady with a want of proper courtesy.

THE CONTINUOUS-SERVICE SEAMEN.

  QUESTION.
  EARL TALBOTsaid, that a rumour had gone abroad to the effect that the Government were about to discharge the continuous-service seamen; and as such a proceeding would involve a breach of faith on the part of the Government towards those men, he thought it extremely desirable that a contradiction of the rumour had been given on the preceding evening in another place; but he could not help entertaining some suspicion of the perfect correctness of that contradiction, as he found that in a circular issued from the Admiralty on the 13th instant, it was set forth, that "the continuous ordinary seamen are to be discharged on shore." He

  483
  wished to know whether Her Majesty's Ministers could then furnish the House with any information upon the matter?
  EARL GRANVILLEsaid, he could hardly conceive anything more detrimental to the public service than the prevalence of a belief that the Government had been guilty of a breach of faith towards the men whom it employed for the national defence; and he was, therefore, very happy to be able completely to contradict the rumour to which the noble Earl had referred. The circular to which the noble Earl referred, conferred a boon and not an injustice. The number of seamen had not been diminished to the amount at which it was proposed they should stand. By the terms of the enlistment, these men were bound, if they should quit the service, to pay the sum of £12. Now, this circular directed that such men as chose to quit the service should be allowed to do so without any payment at all.

DIVORCE AND MATRIMONIAL CAUSES BILL.

  SECOND READING.
  Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
  THE LORD CHANCELLORrose to move the Second Reading of this Bill. which involved questions of the deepest possible interest to society in general. Their Lordships would recollect that last year a Bill on the same subject—and which was very nearly similar to the present one—passed that House, but at a period of the Session too late to allow of its being passed in the other House of Parliament. In consequence of that failure he introduced during the short Session which took place in the early part of the present year a Bill founded upon the same principles, but differing somewhat in detail from the measure to which he now invited the attention of their Lordships. The progress of that Bill, however, like that of many others, was necessarily arrested by the dissolution; and it now, therefore, became his duty to invite their Lordships again to the consideration of this most important subject. He could assure their Lordships that nothing would induce him to submit a Bill which he believed would have the slightest tendency to shake the confidence of the country in the permanency, if not the absolute indissolubility, of the marriage tie. He believed that the fact of that tie being absolutely binding
  484
  through life, except in very extreme cases, was the foundation of some of the best interests of society. Those who had paid attention to this subject would be aware of what had been the course of feeling, if he might so express himself, and the course of law and habit upon the question of divorce. Before the Reformation, when the Roman Catholic religion prevailed in this country as in the rest of Europe, marriage was considered as being absolutely indissoluble; it was regarded as a sacrament of the Church— an union so sanctioned by the highest authority of the Church as to be incapable of being touched or affected by any human tribunal. That state of things, though founded in some respects upon good sense—namely, upon the great importance of considering marriage indissoluble except in extreme cases—led to inconveniences of a very distressing character; the theory being pushed to the extremest length; the consequence was that, the absolute indissolubility of marriage being incompatible with the general feelings of society, a number of the most extraordinary devices, ridiculous in the extent to which they were carried, were hit upon in order to get out of the difficulty. Although it was a tenet of the Roman Catholic Church that marriages was indissoluble, yet it was at the same time held that certain circumstances preceding the marriage would render it invalid; that there might have been, for instance, what was called a pre-contract, or a contract for a prior marriage, impairing the validity of the subsequent union which it was desirable to dissolve. So, again, marriages could be contracted only where there was no consanguinity or affinity between the parties to render them illegal in the eye of the Church; and to such an extent was this notion carried that remote cousins could not marry without a dispensation having been previously obtained, and a marriage could be dissolved and a divorce, as we would call it, procured, by showing that there was some remote connection between the parties which rendered the union invalid. Lord Coke related that in one case a marriage was dissolved because the husband had stood godfather to the cousin of his wife. The effect of the Reformation was totally to change the feelings of the community upon this subject. Whereas, prior to that event, the doctrine of the Church had been that marriage was a sacrament and indissoluble, the opinion of the Reformers

  485
  was that there was nothing of a sacramental nature connected with marriage, which, they thought, though under the sanction of religion, to be a mere civil contract which ought to be dealt with in the same way as other civil contracts,—namely, by considering what was most for the interests of the parties concerned. Accordingly, when Henry VIII. and Edward VI. issued the commissions to certain divines and laymen for the purpose of framing a new code of laws for the regulation of the community more suited to the altered circumstances and feelings of the people, under the influence of the Reformed Church, the Commissioners, presided over by Archbishop Cranmer, enumerated in their work entitled Reformatio Legum Ecclesiasticarum a great number of causes for which they thought divorce ought to be granted. Adultery on the part of either spouse was one of those causes; unjustifiable desertion was another; capitales inimicitiœ or deadly hatred a third; and there were several other cases in which, according to the opinion of those early Reformers, divorce might be prudent and advisable. Their recommendations, it is true, were never embodied in the form of law, but they showed what were the opinions and feelings upon this subject of the first Reformers, ecclesiastical as well as civil. Moreover, they were, to a great extent, in harmony with the feelings of the community, and the consequence was, that soon after the publication of the Reformatio Legum the doctrines which it propounded, though they did not become law, were practically acted upon by society. The first instance in which the doctrines were applied was the case of the Marquess of Northampton, who, having in 1550, obtained from the Ecclesiastical Courts a divorce à mensâ et thoro, and being anxious to marry again, the question arose whether, when the Ecclesiastical Courts had granted a divorce, it was competent to the parties to remarry—whether, in fact, a divorce à mensâ et thoro amounted to a dissolution of the marriage or not. A commission was issued to certain functionaries to inquire what was the effect of such a divorce, and the Commissioners reported that it dissolved the marriage. In the meanwhile, however, the Marquess of Northampton had decided the question himself by contracting a second marriage; and eventually, in order to legalize all that had taken place, an Act of Parliament was
  486
  passed, confirming what had been done. This indicated that the opinion of our first Reformers was that the Ecclesiastical Courts had it in their power absolutely to dissolve marriage so as to enable the parties to marry again. There was a circumstance connected with the proceedings of those courts which strongly confirmed that view of the case. It was this—that in a divorce à mensâ et thoro the parties were required to enter into a bond that they would not marry again—implying that but for that security the nature of the proceeding was such as would enable them to contract another marriage. In that state of the law a case arose at the end of the reign of Elizabeth, in which the contrary doctrine seemed to be held. The case was that of a Mr. Foljambe, and it was then held that the effect of a divorce obtained in the Ecclesiastical Courts was not to enable the parties to marry again. He need not trouble their Lordships by going through the three or four cases which happened during the seventeenth century—the cases of Lord Roos, the Countess of Mansfield, and others—in which, divorces having first been obtained in the Ecclesiastical Courts, Acts of Parliament were subsequently passed to enable the parties to re-enter the marriage state. In two cases which occurred during the same period, no proceedings at all were taken in the Ecclesiastical Courts, but the marriages were dissolved and the parties permitted to marry again by the simple passing of Acts of Parliament. These precedents governed the practice of the whole of the last century, being followed more rarely in the early portion of it, and more freely afterwards. From 1715 to 1775 there were sixty Acts passed dissolving marriage, on account of the adultery of the wife. From 1775 to 1800 the number considerably increased, and amounted to two or three annually. In the first half of the present century, about two Bills a year had been passed for the same object. From the time when it was universally acknowledged that divorce by the Ecclesiastical Courts did not dissolve the vinculum of marriage, and that Parliament could pass Bills dissolving marriage, about 200 or 250 Acts had passed enabling parties, on account of the adultery of the wife, and, in some very few instances, on account of the adultery of the husband, to marry again. That fact indicated sufficiently that the feeling of the community was in favour of some re-remedy for the wrongs of a husband whose

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  wife was proved to have committed adultery more effectual than that afforded by the law administered by the Ecclesiastical Courts; and that being the case, the question was how far the feeling of the country in favour of such a remedy was a reasonable feeling, and one to which the legislature ought to listen. He had set out by stating that he thought no measure could be more injurious, more calculated to interfere with the social welfare of the country, than one which tended to shake the solidity of marriage and the strength of the marriage tie. It was observed by a most able Judge and most powerful reasoner, Lord Stowell, that "the knowledge that persons united in marriage must continue husbands and wives often made them good husbands and wives, for necessity was a powerful master in teaching the duties which it imposed." To every word of that he most heartily subscribed, and he thought any one would be acting very unwisely for the interests of the community who proposed a measure which would at all weaken that principle. But all experience showed that when marriage was held to be indissoluble in cases of the adultery of the wife, some subterfuge was resorted to in order to supply the defect of the law; in Roman Catholic times, by pretending that the marriage was invalid, and recently by the parties obtaining a private Act to give the relief which the Ecclesiastical Courts could not give. It was a state of things which had been often complained of, and led, in 1850, to issuing a Royal Commission to inquire into the whole subject. That Commission was directed to persons of the greatest eminence, amongst others, to the present Lord Chief Justice (Lord Campbell), Dr. Lushington, Lord Beaumont, Mr. Walpole, Vice-Chancellor Wood, Mr. Bouverie, and Lord Redesdale. Having fully inquired into all the points at which he had just glanced, they made a Report two years afterwards. The course which they recommended, their Lordships were asked to adopt in the Bill which he had the honour of submitting to them. The Commissioners recommended that whereas the practice had been growing for a century and a-half or two centuries of invariably allowing the husband an Act of Parliament to dissolve the marriage if adultery on the part of the wife were proved, and relieving them altogether from the vinculum of the marriage, that state of things should no longer continue, but the law should be made to adapt itself to the
  488
  practice and to what had been shown to be the wants of the community, and that a competent tribunal should be constituted, to do that which the Legislature had heretofore been in the habit of doing. The main object of this Bill was to constitute a court which should be competent to decree as a matter of right that relief in favour of persons who had just matter of complaint, which could now only be obtained by means of an Act of Parliament. The first question which demanded consideration was with regard to the mode in which the court should be constituted. The Commissioners recommended that the court should be constituted of a judge from the Court of Chancery (a Vice Chancellor), a judge from a court of Common Law, and an Ecclesiastical Judge. Substantially those recommendations were adopted in the Bill, except that, as these questions had hitherto come before the highest court, their Lordships' House, he proposed that the court should be constituted, not of a Vice Chancellor, but of the Lord Chancellor; not of a puisne Judge, but one of the Chief Justices, and of the Judge of the proposed Court of Probate. There were, of course, many details of the measure with which he need not trouble the House; but he would remark, that at the close of the last century, in 1798, Lord Lough-borough, for the purpose of preventing abuses in applications to their Lordships' House for divorce, established certain Standing Orders which had been acted upon ever since. According to those Standing Orders, no Bill for divorce could be read a second time, unless there were laid upon the table the proceedings in the Ecclesiastical Court, whereby divorce had been obtained from that Court on the ground of adultery; and further, unless the party suing for divorce had established a primâ facie title by having brought an action of crim. con. against the alleged adulterer, and obtained a verdict—though with regard to the proceedings by action of crim. con. they were dispensed with if circumstances rendered it impossible the action could be brought. The consequence of these regulations was, that the whole of those disgusting and disagreeable questions had to be inquired into three separate times before the ultimate remedy could be obtained; for the proceedings in the Ecclesiastical Court were conducted according to the particular form of that court, the action for crim. con. was brought in one of the superior courts of common law, and

  489
  tried in the ordinary way by a jury; and, finally, when the suppliant came to their Lordships' House, the whole case had to be proved over again by witnesses examined vivâ voce at the bar. To the investigation of the question on three different occasions there was the grave objection, if no other, that such complicated proceedings were too expensive for the pockets of any but the richest sufferers, and that relief was put beyond the reach of all but the wealthiest classes. He proposed, in lieu of those triplicate proceedings, that the tribunal he proposed to institute should thoroughly investigate the matter once for all; and he further proposed, instead of the inefficient mode of inquiry adopted in the Ecclesiastical Courts that the investigation should be conducted by vivâ voce evidence in open court, and that all questions of fact should be decided, save in exceptional cases, by trial by jury. He thought that would be the best, the cheapest, and the most expeditious mode, and the mode which would secure the greatest chance of giving satisfaction and arriving at the truth. He proposed, that on the husband complaining that his wife had been unfaithful to him he might come before the new tribunal, and on establishing his case, and establishing also the fact that there had been no improper conduct on his part—such as adultery, desertion, cruelty, or the like—he should be entitled to obtain at once a decree which would give him the same relief as he could at present obtain only by a private Act of Parliament. Since he first submitted this measure to their Lordships, he had received letters from various persons, complaining that the measure did not go far enough. There were many cases, it was said, short of the adultery of the wife, in which the husband ought to be entitled to relief. To those applications he had not thought it desirable to listen. Questions, for example, had been raised as to how far marriage was to be considered a subject on which the positive rule of Scripture prescribed what ought to be done. There were those who thought that, except for positive adultery, divorce should never be permitted. There were others who would give the text of Scripture a larger acceptation. He would not pretend to discuss the proper mode of interpreting the passages in question; but of this he was persuaded, that if this measure ever passed into law, the good feeling of the country would require, whatever might be the cor-
  490
  rect interpretation of those passages, that, in the interests of the community, they should be construed in the strictest mode. For that reason he had believed it would be impossible, and would certainly be unwise, to extend the relief to anything short of adultery. Another question of a different nature had also been raised. It was one upon which a great diversity of opinion existed. It was suggested that the same rules which governed their Lordships in granting relief to the husband should be equally extended to the wife. It had been the invariable practice in their Lordships' House to grant to a husband complaining of and establishing the adultery of his wife a private Act of Parliament, setting him free from the marriage contract. But the same rule had not been applied to the wife complaining of the adultery of her husband. Their Lordships had, no doubt, occasionally granted a divorce at the instance of the wife complaining of the adultery of her husband; but those cases had been extremely rare. It had even been the feeling of that House—indeed, it was a feeling common to mankind in general—that, although the sin in both cases was the same, the effect of adultery on the part of the husband was very different from that of adultery on the part of the wife. It was possible for a wife to pardon a husband who had committed adultery; but it was hardly possible for a husband ever really to pardon the adultery of a wife, and therefore it was that in their practice in that House their Lordships had always made a great distinction between the two cases. The only instances where marriage had been dissolved at the instance of the wife, were such as had been accompanied by some special circumstances—such, for example, as incestuous adultery on the part of the husband. The measure which he submitted to the House in the last Session was framed on that principle, and originally it proposed to grant divorces to the wife on that ground only. That Bill was referred to a Select Committee of their Lordships' House, and that subject was very much discussed both in the Committee and in the House. Some of their Lordships thought there were two or three other cases in which the privilege of divorce might be granted to the wife as well as to the husband. Two of those cases were incestuous adultery and bigamy; another was the case where the adultery had been coupled on the part of the husband with such cruelty as would have entitled the wife

  491
  to a divorce à mensâ et thoro even if there had been no adultery; a third case was adultery with desertion on the part of the husband. These grounds of divorce he had added to the Bill now under consideration. When the Bill was before the House last year it would be in their Lordships' recollection that the right rev. Prelate (the Bishop of Oxford) introduced a clause to the effect that in case of the dissolution of the marriage the adulterer should never be at liberty to marry the adultress. When that proposition was made he (the Lord Chancellor) raised, he believed, his solitary voice against it. It was carried nevertheless—he would not say by a coup de main, but by acclamation—as if such a proposition was ever likely to have a moral or a useful tendency. He himself thought it was a great blot on the Bill, and would be fraught with unmixed evil instead of good, because he believed that such an enactment would be the means of removing that which in every honourable mind must be the great check to the commission of adultery. Such a clause, he admitted, was always introduced into private Bills for divorce in their Lordships' House, but he believed was invariably struck out in Committee; at all events, it was always expunged in the other House of Parliament. Therefore it was that he had not thought fit to reintroduce the clause into the present measure. One other matter and he had done. In the Committee the question was agitated whether or not a clause should be introduced into a Bill of this nature prohibiting the action for criminal conversation. The Committee was very much divided on that subject; but eventually no such proposal was carried, and the Bill went down to the House of Commons without any such clause. There had however, been much discussion on the subject ever since, and he had thought that this was probably the best course. The objection to that action was that it was generally a scandalous exhibition; and that the feeling of mankind revolted at the notion of a husband making a sort of profit from his wife's disgrace arid his own dishonour. Why, then, were these action brought? Because it was a standing order of their Lordships' House that, unless a verdict had been obtained in such an action, no divorce should be granted. The question was whether, if the necessity for these actions was removed, it should be left optional with persons to have recourse to such proceedings if they thought fit.
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  But he thought the more reasonable course was that which he had proposed—namely, that whereas an action of crim. con. was now the necessary preliminary to a divorce, such action should in future only be founded on the fact of a divorce having been obtained. He confessed he could not quite satisfy himself that it was reasonable to say, after a divorce had been obtained by a husband on account of the adultery of a wife, that the husband should not be entitled to maintain an action for such grievous wrong, as he could do for any other legal wrong. He believed that actions of this description would very rarely be brought when they ceased to be absolutely necessary, and he merely proposed to assimilate the law in this respect to that of Scotland, where, although such actions were maintainable, they were very seldom resorted to. He thought, however, that cases might arise in which injustice would result from precluding husbands from proceeding by action for injuries of this nature, and he did not believe that the continuance of actions of crim. con., in the manner he proposed, would occasion any scandal. So much for the cases of dissolution à vinculo matrimonii. Short of this extreme remedy, however, the Commissioners recommended that the divorce à mensa et thoro—that was, divorces such as were now granted by the Ecclesiastical Courts—which absolved the parties from the obligation of living together, should still be granted as heretofore. He proposed to act upon this suggestion, and he had provided by this Bill that such jurisdiction should be continued, and should be exercised by the Judge of the Court of Probate. The Ecclesiastical Courts at present decreed separation à mensâ et thoro, not only in case of adultery, but also in cases of cruelty; and when such a decree was made the Court directed a payment under the name of alimony, regulated in amount according to the husband's means, to be made to the wife. He proposed to continue the present system, providing, however, that the alimony might be paid, if the Court thought fit, not to the wife herself, but to trustees for the wife; because he thought that would prove a more beneficial course. He proposed, also, to add a new clause, justifying divorce à mensâ et thoro—namely, unjustifiable desertion. It had often been a subject of complaint that if a husband deserted his wife for a great length of time, and subsequently returned, he was entitled, if he found she had earned

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  or succeeded to any property during his absence, to claim and appropriate it. He (the Lord Chancellor) proposed to remedy this evil by enacting that after a husband had deserted his wife without reasonable cause for a certain defined period, a decree of separation might be obtained, but that the parties might still cohabit again, if they thought proper to do so. He now came to a portion of the measure which he regarded as of the most essential importance, affecting as it did the social status of the husband and wife after a divorce had taken place, not à vinculo matrimonii, but à mensa et thoro. Although the Ecclesiastical Courts had now the power of decreeing divorce à mensâ et thoro, which precluded the parties from the right of insisting upon cohabitation, and so far separated them, yet, with regard to all their social relations, as between themselves and the community, those relations were scarcely if at all altered. He proposed that from the time when a decree was obtained for a divorce à mensâ et thoro separating the parties, although not dissolving the marriage, the wife should, with regard to all earnings of money, all accumulations of property, and as to all contracts, be placed on precisely the same footing as an unmarried woman—that her property should be entirely her own, and that her husband should have no right to touch it. That provision, he believed, would remedy many of those evils described, no doubt with truth, as the grievances of married women, of which he, in common probably with a great many of their Lordships, had lately heard so much. If his proposition should be adopted, whenever a husband had deserted his wife, and had so conducted himself that, upon any ground, a separation might he obtained à mensà et thoro, the wife might safely trade, or exercise a profession, and accumulate money, and she would be protected in the enjoyment of the fruits of her industry, just as if she had no husband. He was perfectly aware that this might, by some persons, be regarded as a very imperfect and meagre remedy for a state of things which ought to be dealt with on much broader grounds. There were some who, in considering the subject of divorce, would open the whole question of the relations of marriage; and his noble and learned Friend Lord Brougham, whom he hoped they would soon again see in his place, had during the last short Session introduced a Bill which would have had the effect of entirely altering the social relations of husband and
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  wife, so far as property was concerned, and which would provide substantially that there should be no community of goods whatever, but that the husband and wife should be as much distinct persons as brother and sister. He (the Lord Chancellor) would not allow himself to be led into any discussion of a subject so extraneous, and so beset with difficulties as this. The question of divorce was one of so much difficulty and extent, that it was ample enough to be dealt with alone; and if he succeeded, by the present measure, in improving the law of divorce, and of establishing on a rational footing what should be done when, unhappily, circumstances arose which naturally and justly led to a dissolution of the marriage tie, he should consider that he had accomplished a very important object, even although there might yet remain to be considered, on some other occasion, that still more difficult question—whether, indeed, the whole social relations of married life should be unravelled and changed. He would, therefore, conclude by moving the second reading of his present measure, reminding their Lordships that its object was to do away with the remedy of private legislation for such persons only as could afford to obtain a divorce by Act of Parliament, and in cases which were now relieved by the Ecclesiastical Courts, to give relief by a court especially constituted for that purpose; and, under cases of lesser evil, to confer upon the wife all those privileges which she was under the circumstances fully entitled to obtain. Having now explained the provisions of the Bill, he would ask their Lordships to give it a second reading.
  Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a
  THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURYsaid, the subject which had been brought before their Lordships in the Bill which his noble and learned Friend had so lucidly explained, was unquestionably one of the very highest importance, for it affected the social life of the community. It was also a most difficult subject, for it was impossible to foresee what might be the consequence of a new institution like that proposed. There was great danger, lest in endeavouring to apply a remedy to an existing and acknowledged evil they opened the way to greater evils than those which they desired to remove. The facilities of divorce, alluded to by the noble and learned Lord, which had been admitted in many of the Protestant States on the Continent, were no doubt intended not to injure morality but to obviate existing inconve-

  495
  niences: but those facilities had ended in so gross a laxity of morals that it was notorious that there was a strong desire in those countries to remove them, and to return to a state of things more in accordance with the system which happily in this country had never been set aside. On these grounds he had always felt it to be no slight comfort that in legislating concerning marriage they had authority on which they could constantly and with confidence rely, and which could not direct them wrong; that they could appeal to the Divine law, and proceed as far as that allows to proceed, and stop when it directs them to stop. This had always been his comfort in a distressing question on which their Lordships had been often called to decide,—the marriage of a widower with his deceased wife's sister. Believing as he did that the Scriptures forbad that union, he had never thought himself at liberty to listen to the plausible arguments from expediency in favour of such unions which he had heard on the other side. He took the same ground respecting the measure now upon the table. He appealed to the Divine law. No one, he thought, could deny that, according to the general tenor of that law, marriage, once contracted, was designed to be indissoluble—indissoluble, saving for one cause—a cause which destroyed the purpose and intent of marriage—saving for the cause of unfaithfulness. For that cause it was declared lawful for a man to put away his wife, and, by parity of reasoning, it would be lawful for a woman to put away her husband. Thus far the Bill of the noble and learned Lord proceeded on true principles, providing such precautions and safeguards as legal experience and a knowledge of human nature showed to be necessary. He did not see that they could refuse this liberty to an injured wife or husband; though, with respect to the legal expenses attending the procedure he regretted that circumstances which they could not alter rendered this relief less available to one class of the community than another. But here he stopped. He regretted that the Bill did not stop here: that one section of the Bill permitted the parties whose guilt had occasioned the dissolution of the first marriage to form afterwards a legal union; whereas the Divine law said, "Whosoever shall marry her that is put away committeth adultery." He could not venture to contravene the Divine law, even if he could not perceive its reasonableness; but surely in this case it did approve itself to their judgment.
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  The object of the proposal was to prevent crime. But surely they offered temptation to crime if they permitted the commission of crime in the first instance to lead ultimately to that result which had unhappily become the desired result, and to end in even permanent legalised union. Surely the first spark of guilty passion ought rather to be extinguished by the conviction that its indulgence could only lead to reproach and degradation. He believed that they would best consult the interests of morality and the comforts of social life if in legislating on this delicate subject they adhered closely to the principle which Scripture had laid down. On these grounds, while he voted for the second reading of the Bill, he must oppose in Committee the clause which permitted the guilty parties to be united in legal marriage.
  LORD LYNDHURSTsaid, he did not know what course precisely to pursue, as he had suffered under the misfortune of not having heard a word of what fell from the most rev. Prelate; he understood, however, that on the whole the most rev. Prelate supported the Bill; but whether it was on the ground of the tribunal which was to be established he did not know. For himself, he felt extremely anxious for the success of the measure. A Bill of this nature had passed through the House on three different occasions, and the subject was examined very attentively by a Committee of that House, and when afterwards the Bill went down to the other House, it went down sanctioned by a very considerable majority of their Lordships' House. He could not, nevertheless, disguise from himself that both in the House and out of doors there was very considerable opposition to the measure. It was opposed, as he understood, both on social and religious grounds. A noble and learned Friend of his, for whose opinion he had great respect, only last night, in the neighbourhood of that House, said he was strongly opposed to the measure. Another noble Friend of his, whom he might almost call a noble and learned Friend, had circulated in print a very able article in opposition to the very principle of the Bill; and a right rev. Prelate (the Bishop of Oxford) whom he formerly had had the happiness to have as his diocesan, who ornamented every subject he touched, and gave point and vigour to every argument he used, was one of the most strenuous opponents of the present measure. It was impossible, therefore, for him not to feel very considerable anxiety with re-

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  spect to the result of this discussion. He flattered himself a short time ago that the right rev. Prelate was not now present in the House; but the right rev. Prelate had recently made his appearance, and his active change from one position to another was a proof that the right rev. Prelate was preparing for a desperate conflict on this subject. It would not become him (Lord Lyndhurst) to enter into any Scriptural argument in the presence of the ecclesiastical array he had now the happiness to see before him. He said "the happiness," because on a former occasion their Lordships had not had the advantage of the intelligence, information, learning, and knowledge of that right rev. Bench on this subject. Considering, however, the feeling which prevailed on this subject, he should take the liberty of referring to authorities which he considered conclusive, as to the Scriptural doctrine that marriage might be dissolved in case of adultery. He maintained that that was the principle of the whole Protestant Church over and over again declared to be sanctioned by the express terms of the Scripture: it was supported by the concurrence of almost all authorities in the early period of the Church, and was sanctioned by Provincial and General Councils. This alone was sufficient authority to decide the question. And, with respect to our own Church, he would call their Lordships' attention only to that document to which his noble and learned Friend (the Lord Chancellor) had referred, the Reformatio Legum Ecclesiasticarum, drawn up by men partly ecclesiastics and partly civilians, all men of great learning and intelligence, who, after considering the subject fully and maturely, pronounced in favour of the dissolution of marriage in case of adultery. This was a body of authority which he for one felt, and all who had considered it must feel, was not to be resisted. On the other hand, he admitted that, according to the doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church, marriage could not be dissolved, because there it was regarded as a sacrament; but he thought he was authorized to say that the establishment of that principle must be traced to the Council of Trent—a Council which was anxious to extend the power of the Pope, and to enable the Emperor of Germany to crush the Protestants and destroy the Protestant religion. The authority of that Council, conducted on such a principle, the Protestant divines refused to admit. His noble and learned Friend had adverted to the various modes by which
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  the rigid rules laid down by the Catholic Church had been rendered, in some degree, flexible, and by which its provisions had been evaded. He (Lord Lyndhurst) would not enter minutely into that subject, but would draw their Lordships' attention for a minute to the rule of the Protestant Church. Our law on this subject, even after the Reformation, was derived from the time when England was under Roman Catholic rule, and with us, as with Roman Catholics, marriage was indissoluble even in case of adultery. Accidental circumstances had prevented the change of that law. The document to which his noble and learned friend had alluded, and in which a new system of laws was drawn up in the time of Edward VI., never, in fact, came into operation, and owing to accidental circumstances the law had continued, from the time when the Roman Catholic religion predominated in this country down to the present time, on the same footing. He was bound, then, to admit that, according to the law of the country, as it at present existed, marriage was indissoluble by any legal tribunal. That being so, as the Roman Catholic Church found it necessary to resort to some means of evading the operation of the law, so we also on our side had been obliged to have recourse to palliatives: and, during 150 years, as there was no regular tribunal by which marriage could be dissolved, even in the extreme case of adultery, applications had been made to Parliament for private Acts to effect the same object. Well, this practice had gone on so regularly, and with such uniformity, that every person knew that if his character was irreproachable, and his conduct could not be found fault with, he might have a Bill presented to that House for a divorce in consequence of the adultery of his wife, with a certainty of obtaining the desired result. Laws, if they were to be respected by the people, ought to be precise, defined, exact, and extended to all classes, embracing rich and poor alike—for all were equal in the eye of the law—yet every one knew that the present system was confined to the wealthy alone, that no person with a moderate fortune could have any chance of success in resorting to it, and therefore, that so far as the mass of the community were concerned, there was no law whatever on the subject. Upon these grounds he could not see how it was possible that any solid objection could be made to the principle of the alterations proposed by his noble and learned Friend. If it were right that marriage

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  should be dissolved in the case of adultery—and no one denied the right—surely such dissolution should not take place by occasional measures, but through the intervention of a public tribunal, open to all—to the poor as well as to the rich. But he (Lord Lyndhurst) remembered that, on a former occasion, the right rev. Prelate, (the Bishop of Oxford) supported by another right rev. Prelate, (the Bishop of St. David's) with equal ability, objected that the Bill would not answer the purpose which it professed to attain—because, he said, the tribunal it proposed to establish was such as would be accessible only to the wealthy. He said that men of the highest rank and station in the profession of the law would alone be engaged in it, —and he asked, "Do you suppose that justice can be cheaply administered by such a tribunal?" That was the argument urged by the two right rev. Prelates on a former occasion. The answer that I make to that argument is short, plain, and simple. It is this:—It does not follow that because a tribunal is composed of men of the highest professional eminence the expense of application to it will therefore be increased: on the contrary, the proceedings would be of the most simple description—a mere petition stating the complaint—there would be no written pleadings, no rejoinders, no labyrinths of that description; but the witnesses would be called to the bar, and they would give evidence vivâ voce, as they now did at the bar of their Lordships' House. It appeared to him that it would be impossible to establish any tribunal in which the proceedings might be carried on in a simpler way, or with less expense. In fact, he defied the "imagination of man" to conceive anything more simple. Another observation made by the right rev. Prelate was to this effect:—"What is to become of persons living at a distance? How are men in Northumberland or Carlisle to avail themselves of this new law? See how the expenses will increase if men from such a distance are to come to London to make their complaint. "In answer to that objection, he (Lord Lyndhurst) would observe that Her Majesty had power to direct the tribunal to sit in any place that might be desired; but it would not be necessary to recur to that power, because a petition might be presented to the Court from some person residing at a distance; the Court would consider what might be the most convenient spot for examination, and the examination would take place
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  there; the Judges would hear the evidence taken on the spot, and the decision would be given in London. A noble Friend of his said on a previous occasion, that it was impossible to come to a satisfactory conclusion on the subject of divorce àvinculo, that the subject was surrounded by so many difficulties and entanglements that the more you inquired into it the more difficult it appeared. Well, but when you mentioned difficulties, he (Lord Lyndhurst) would ask how was justice in this matter administered in other countries? In Scotland a divorce à vinculo was decided by the ordinary tribunals, without any difficulty. In the United States, also, no difficulty was experienced in administering this branch of the law by the ordinary tribunals; and if this were so in other countries, what difficulty there could be here he was at a loss to imagine. But then this class of objectors turn round and say, with inconsistency as it appeared to him, "This law is really only applicable to the rich;" and then they add, "but if you pass such a law for the poorer and humbler classes, it will be productive of the greatest mischief, of the greatest social evil, and it will demoralize the whole community." In answer to that, he (Lord Lyndhurst) would say, that his opinion was quite the contrary; he maintained that the direct tendency of the present law was to demoralize and degrade the lower classes. A man finds his wife committing adultery; he has no remedy; he cannot apply to a court of justice to dissolve his marriage; he therefore continues to live on with her, committing acts of brutal and degrading violence on her—or he turns her out, and she goes to live with the adulterer. What, he asked, was the effect of such a scene upon the lower orders of the people? Or, again, if he do not drive her forth, he acquiesces in her shame and guilt; the adulterer comes from time to time to his residence; he cohabits with his paramour; and what, he should like to know, could be more destructive of the morality of the lower orders? Did they mean to say—could they say—that the interposition of a court of justice, dealing justice alike to all, and dividing persons of that description, would tend to demoralize the state of society more than such occurrences as he had endeavoured to describe? Let them not indulge in any theories, any abstract reasonings, or any visionary ideas on this subject. What was the case in Scotland? The law there existed accessible equally to the poor and to the rich. Had it pro-

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  duced any bad effects there? Directly the reverse; and happily the evidence in this respect was all on his side. His noble and learned Friend (the Lord Chancellor) had referred to the Report of the Commissioners, and he (Lord Lyndhurst) was happy to state that men from Scotland of the highest rank, of the best informed minds, and of the greatest opportunity of observation, all concurred in saying that, so far from this extension of the law producing any bad result, it had a directly contrary effect; and he quoted this in answer to all those theories and all that eloquence which they had heard advanced on the other side. Having gone thus far, he must be allowed to remind his noble and learned Friend of some of his objections to his original measure, and to repeat, although this Bill was an improvement on the last, that it did not go far enough. The Committee which investigated this matter examined it with great attention, and he was happy to say that several of his (Lord Lyndhurst's) suggestions had been adopted, and were now incorporated in the Bill. He was sorry to add that it did not go to the full length that he expected, and he hoped that their Lordships would allow him to press some of his suggested amendments upon the House, in the hope that they might be added to the present measure. One of the objections which he entertained to the principles of the Bill, as it stood, was the great inequality which it recognized between the sexes. The inequality was extreme. No extent of adultery on the part of the husband could, according to this Bill, entitle the wife to a divorce; and hence the trite, but not not altogether unjust, observation, that men made the laws and women were the victims. The only argument of the slightest validity that he had ever heard adduced against placing the sexes on the same footing was that the mischief, resulting from the adultery of the woman—namely, the introduction of a spurious offspring into the house of the husband—does not result from the adultery of the man. But did it follow because there was this one point of difference that the rest of the case, as regards the woman, was not such as to require the interposition of the law? Was that the true and logical mode of argument—to select one particular fact in a case, and to say that therefore the whole case differed from another to which, with this exception, it was exactly similar? Suppose, as not unfrequently happened,
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  that a man lived in open, flagrant, notorious adultery, without disguise, without limitation in point of time—perhaps bringing his paramour home to his own wife, insulting her in this way, and treating her with great harshness and even cruelty—was he to be told that in such a case the wife was to be left without a remedy? Was not that such a state of things as to entitle the wife to a divorce? Did not justice imperatively call for a remedy? The husband might indulge in every species of infamy connected with adultery; he might violate every human law, and yet there would be no divorce. Take the case of Lord Audley—was there to be no divorce in a case like that? Was there to be no interference between the villain and his victim? Suppose the case of a double adultery—of a husband committing adultery with a married woman; in this case you have the spurious offspring introduced, and the analogy between the case of the man and that of the woman was complete. Was there still to be no interference of the law for the behalf of the woman? Was there to be no divorce? Let their Lordships do justice. Let them not suppose that if they allowed a woman to proceed against her husband for adultery, our courts would be filled with such applications; there was no foundation for such an assumption. Remember that this proceeding could only be instituted by the woman; and no one who knew anything of the female character could suppose that she would be easily prompted to institute a proceeding of this kind. Every man who has studied the female character must know that nothing but a long, deliberate, hopeless suffering—nothing but intolerable agony, would overcome her patient endurance—would induce her to come to the court for a divorce. Everything which a woman holds dear was at stake in such a case. She loses her home, perhaps her position in society—in all probability the guardianship and care of her children—all, in short, that she most values she forfeits if she successfully prosecutes an application of this sort; and he said, therefore, that the more they considered the more they would be satisfied that there was nothing to alarm them in the provision he was suggesting, and that such proceedings on the part of the women would be very few in number. As he had said, their Lordships ought not to legislate exceptionally, and he appealed again to the noble Earl opposite (the Earl of Aberdeen)

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  on this subject. He knew perfectly well that in Scotland the law was equal both as regards the man and the woman, and that the woman was equally with the man entitled to prosecute for adultery. Did any inconvenience arise from that state of the law? Had any evil resulting from it ever been pointed out? On the contrary, all the evidence they had was decisive on the subject. He referred again to the same document to which his noble and learned Friend had alluded. Here they had the evidence of most distinguished individuals, who, when asked if they would wish to see a change introduced into the existing Scotch law in consequence of any inconvenience resulting from it, give a positive answer in the negative, and say, "We adhere to the law because we approve of the law, and find no inconvenience resulting from it." But the case did not rest there. He relied upon the principle of our own ecclesiastical law, which did not dissolve a marriage for adultery either in the case of the man or of the woman, and punished both equally. The case of the husband by our ecclesiastical law is put on the same footing as that of the wife; that is the principle always acted upon. How then could they say that by extending relief in each instance they introduced a new principle? If the punishment at present inflicted was the same as regards both the man and woman, how was it that by carrying this punishment still further they were departing from the principle of the law? The right rev. Prelate (the Bishop of Oxford) referred me on a former occasion to St. Augustine, calling my attention to the voluminous works of that very learned, distinguished, and, I may say, curious individual. Well, St. Augustine puts the case of the husband, upon the authority of Scriptue, upon the same footing as that of the wife. He draws no distinction between the two sexes, and, as he had said, enforces his opinion by the authority of Scripture. But again, there was another authority to which he begged to refer—an authority of our own Church—he meant that great work to which he had before alluded, the Reformatio Legum Ecclesiasticarum. The learned body concerned in this work—consisting of sixteen divines of high rank, station, and learning, and an equal number of laymen of the same character, came to the conclusion that there was no distinction between the case of the man and the woman, and they express a strong and decisive opinion
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  on the subject. There was no authority on the other side. Conjecture and ingenious argument, entirely unsupported by any principle, might, indeed, be indulged in; but he thought there was nothing like the shadow of authority in support of the contrary view. It was true that in old times that House, composed of men only, not exactly administering justice, but legislating on this subject, legislated in favour of their own sex and against the other. But there had been even in that House authorities on the side of equality. Lord Eldon is one of those to whom he would refer. He at first seemed to have been opposed to granting to the woman the same measure of relief as to the man; but a great change took place in his views; towards the close of his career, when his accumulated experience was at the highest point, Lord Eldon, upon Mrs. Moffatt's case, observed, in almost the very words he was about to use:—"I see no reason whatever why a woman should not be entitled in a case of this kind to the same relief as a man." Moreover, this was not mere assertion on the part of the noble Earl; he acted upon his belief, for he moved the second reading of the Bill. Lord Brougham too, when Lord Chancellor, opposed this Motion. He (Lord Lyndhurst) knew, however, that the noble and learned Lord—he was unfortunately absent from this discussion—now felt strongly that what a man could do a woman should also have it in her power to do, and to this view he had given clear expression in writing. Lord Thurlow likewise expressed a strong opinion in the case he had mentioned, and lastly, he would refer to Dr. Lushington, that very learned Judge of the Consistory Court, who had spent his whole life in inquiries of this kind, and who had expressed a strong and decisive opinion on the subject. He might, perhaps, be thought to have overlaid this case with authority. A strong feeling, however, existed on the other side among certain persons. He had felt it his duty, therefore, to quote all the authorities he could, and it appeared to him, that as far as weight was concerned they were irresistible. He now left this part of the case in their Lordships' hands. But he would ask them to allow him, if he was able, to go a little further. He would beg, and most earnestly entreat their Lordships, if they could not go as far as he wished, for the relief of the other sex, they would consider whether they could not grant them at least

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  this—that when a man deserts his wife willfully—in the language of the law, maliciously deserts and abandons her—that that should be a sufficient ground for a divorce à vinculo matrimonii. It appeared to him that the arguments in favour of that proposition were unanswerable. They arose out of the very nature of the contract of marriage, of the objects for which marriage was instituted. Now what was the contract? The man promises during their joint lives to support, protect, and cherish the woman, and that he will never forsake her for another. There can be no more sacred promise, no more forcible engagement, no contract more binding. But if he disregards that promise, and abandons his wife, why was the contract still to be binding upon her? In commercial contracts if one party violated the agreement the other was released from it. Why should not the same principle be extended to cases such as he had mentioned? Then, what were the objects of the marriage ceremony? They were three in number. The first was the procreation of children, and training them up in the love and fear of God. That object was directly defeated by acts such as he had referred to. The second object was to guard against sin; but that was not only defeated by the desertion of a wife, but it usually led to the commission of sin. The third object of marriage is the comfort, society, and mutual protection of the husband and wife; but that was equally defeated by such acts as he had mentioned. Thus the whole objects of marriage were defeated by malicious, wilful abandonment of a wife; and under such circumstances he would ask whether it was just that a woman should be bound by a contract the whole objects of which have been defeated by the act of her husband? But then some may doubt whether what he proposed was within the Scriptures, and whether it had the sanction of any ecclesiastical authority. He would only say that the subject was discussed over and over again most carefully and most solemnly upon the Continent at the period of the Reformation, and it was then decided that not only were such acts grounds for dissolving marriage, but that such doctrine was sanctioned by Scripture. That was the result arrived at after argument, not only by ecclesiastics of the Reformed Church, but also by learned, pious, and eminent laymen. He could not do better than mention one, the most eminent jurist on the Continent of Europe—Grotius. He would only add, that in Scot-
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  land this subject was argued by a layman, Lord Stair, in a manner which cannot be surpassed. He hoped his noble and learned Friend would consider this point before he proceeded in Committee with the Bill, and he trusted that he would adopt his suggestion. If he did not, he (Lord Lyndhurst) certainly should feel it his duty to propose a clause, and to press it upon the House. Cases of the kind he referred to had come under his notice times out of number. A man marries a woman with some small means. He remains with her a short time, dissipates her money, and then abandons her. She struggles on by herself, until by some good fortune she receives a legacy, or by her industry accumulates a little money, when the man reappears, seizes the property, claims it as his own, and then acts the old part over again; until, the money being spent, he finally abandons her. This was not an isolated case. He had seen two or three cases mentioned in the Appendix to the Report of the Committee, which are given as examples, but he had heard and known of innumerable instances of this kind. There was a case once before their Lordships which he would venture to recall to their recollection. A young girl of fifteen years—partly by force, partly by fraud and contrivance—was carried off by a man to Gretna Green, and married to him. Some months after she was discovered, the man was indicted and sentenced to two years' imprisonment, Mr. Baron Gurney, the learned Judge, regretting that he was unable to add hard labour. The girl was made a ward in Chancery; her property was secured; but the man, after the expiration of his imprisonment, never made his appearance in society again. That, however, was a case which stood by itself. He would wish once more to call their Lordships' serious attention to the law of Scotland. Wilful desertion of a wife is by the law of Scotland a sufficient ground for the dissolution of the marriage, and the law was constantly acted upon without causing any inconvenience. His noble and learned Friend said something about Prussia, and the laws of that country. The facilities for divorce there were extravagant beyond measure, and the Legislature has had to reconsider them. What had been the result? They had decided by unanimous vote that adultery and wilful desertion were scriptural grounds of divorce, and have accordingly retained them as such.

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  With regard to Scotland, he could not avoid expressing the astonishment which all must feel at the difference between the law in that country and in this. They are both parts of the same empire, and are governed by the same Sovereign; the laws were made by the same Legislature; but yet the laws of each country are directly contrary. Bills were occasionally brought into Parliament to assimilate the law relating to commerce, or bills of exchange in England and Scotland; but they had never attempted to assimilate those laws which relate to and affect every family throughout the empire. It was truly singular neglect which permitted so extraordinary a state of things. Take the case of a man who marries in England, then proceeds to Scotland, where he is divorced and remarries. He then comes back to England with his Scotch wife, whither he is followed by his divorced wife, who appeals to the Ecclesiastical Court for a restitution of conjugal rights. She succeeds, and restitution of conjugal rights is awarded to her, while the man has also his Scotch wedded wife. Anything more extraordinary, more anomalous, could not be conceived. My strength, my Lords (continued the noble and learned Lord), does not enable me to follow the noble and learned Lord into all the points upon which he touched. I had intended to have said something about criminal conversation, but must postpone my observations to a future occasion. I must remark, however, that my noble and learned Friend has changed sides on this occasion. By the Bill of last Session he proposed to leave the law as it now is—that no divorce shall be granted until a verdict for damages for criminal conversation has been obtained. My noble and learned Friend now proposes to change that, and says you must have a divorce first, and an action for criminal conversation afterwards. My noble and learned Friend forgets the position of the Roman Catholic. He cannot obtain a divorce, and therefore, no matter how great his wrong, he is not to be allowed to bring an action against the seducer of his wife; consequently, to make the action to depend on the divorce, is practically to deprive a Roman Catholic of all redress. I do not know whether my noble and learned Friend has considered that point. There are some minor matters to which I need not now advert, but will briefly state my reasons for troubling your Lordships on this occasion. If I had post-
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  poned until the Committee the suggestion of these Amendments your Lordships would have been called upon to decide at once, but I thought the subject of so much importance, of such deep interest, that I deemed it wiser and more respectful to this House to bring these matters under its notice at this early stage, in order that your Lordships might have an opportunity of fully considering them before the Committee upon this Bill comes on. I intend to move these Amendments in the Committee, when I hope your Lordships will adopt, if not all, at least to a great extent, my views, and do justice to that portion of society which has no advocates of its own, which is subject to laws made by us, and which is sometimes the victim of those laws. I wish to rescue them from that condition, and I appeal, not to your Lordships' candour, but to your justice, to afford me the means of doing so.
  LORD WENSLEYDALE, owing to whose position, only a few detached sentences of his speech could be heard, was understood to maintain that the law of England, notwithstanding the attempt to change it in the Reformatio Legum, was, and always had been, that a marriage once made was indissoluble, and he could not, therefore, look, without great misgivings, upon a proposal which made such a sweeping alteration in the law of the land, and made it dissoluble by legal right. At present it could be dissolved only by special legislation. If the Bill should pass, and his noble and learned Friend should succeed in establishing his new tribunal, it was true that the means of procuring divorce would be more accessible; but though they might make the law cheaper, they could not hope to make it cheap enough to be available to the lower classes of the community. A tribunal established in London might be easily available to persons resident in London, but would be of small use to the poorer classes resident in the country. How could they possibly stop where his noble and learned Friend now proposed? On what conceivable ground could they refuse to extend to inferior Courts—Courts, for instance, for the benefit of the poor—the same powers which they gave to the new Court of Divorce for the benefit of the middle classes. Then indeed the poor would have an easy mode of putting an end to a connection which had become irksome to them by the commission of adultery, and this facility appeared to him to threaten consequences extremely pre-

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  judicial to morality, and be likely to lead to an extensive corruption of manners amongst those classes where public opinion has not so much influence to prevent the commission of such crimes, as in the higher walks of life. He therefore looked upon the principal clause of the Bill with great alarm as to its probable consequences. It had been answered that the Bill proposed nothing more than had long been the law in Scotland, and that in Scotland no such consequences had followed. But in Scotland the circumstances were quite different; they had long been used to that law, and the character of the people was different. Nevertheless, he thought that in many points the Bill contained much that was valuable, and as the Bill had already received the sanction of the House in the last Parliament, and had been in substance approved of by a Commission of learned and distinguished persons, he should assent to the second reading. His noble and learned Friend (Lord Lyndhurst's) objection to the provision that the action for crim. con. should only be prosecuted after the dissolution of the marriage was a very powerful one, and he (Lord Wensleydale) thought that the proposition ought not to be adopted. With these observations he should vote for the second reading of the Bill.
  THE EARL OF MALMESBURYsaid, he had no intention of offering any opposition to the second reading of the Bill; for he agreed with the noble and learned Lord who had just spoken that there was much good in it, and he should be sorry, therefore, to be instrumental in preventing its being read a second time. At the same time, he begged to state that it was his intention, on some future occasion, when the opportunity presented itself, to vote for any proposal which might be made to abridge the extensive and apparently unrestricted powers which it gave to parties divorced under its provisions to enter into the marriage contract again; for, if he understood the Bill correctly, the very act of obtaining a divorce, the Court being first satisfied that there was no collusion or conspiracy in the matter, would put the parties in the position of being able to marry again. He would suppose the possible case of two adulterous persons having obtained a divorce and afterwards marrying one another. Suppose they again committed adultery, and came before the Court for a second divorce, surely it could not be contended by the noble and learned
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  Lord on the woolsack that it would be for the benefit of morality or of society that those persons should be able to obtain a second and perhaps a third divorce, as was the case in Saxony and other parts of Germany? Further, he doubted if there was much morality in allowing a man to ask for a divorce, his wife having committed adultery, and the woman to marry again, supposing the husband had seduced her in the first instance, and lived in concubinage with her before their marriage. He thought that in a case of that sort the man himself must have been the means of so corrupting the woman's mind as to greatly mitigate the criminality of what afterwards took place. By the 19th clause he observed that power was given to the wife to apply for a divorce by reason of the husband having been guilty of incestuous adultery. Now, supposing the act of adultery were committed with a woman with whom, if the wife were dead, the man could not legally contract marriage, she coming within the prohibited degrees of affinity—supposing, for example, the man had carried on an adulterous intrigue with his wife's sister—then he wanted to know if the clause to which he had referred would override the existing law of England, which prevented a man marrying his deceased wife's sister, and put the wife in the position of a woman who was dead, or who had never contracted marriage at all? On the other hand, supposing the Bill for permitting a man to marry a deceased wife's sister became law, the women of England would, under the present measure, lose one of the three privileges which it proposed to give them, namely, that of dissolving the marriage on the ground that the husband had intrigued with the wife's sister; for, by the law of the land, it would then be no longer incestuous to marry the sister of a deceased wife.
  THE DUKE OF NORFOLKsaid, he regretted that the right rev. Prelate, who he understood had intended to move that the Bill be read a second time that day six months, had not carried his intention into effect. But he rose to express the astonishment with which he had heard the noble and learned Lord (Lord Lyndhurst), whose opinion had so much and such deserved weight in their Lordships' House, assert to-night that Popes and General Councils had been constantly in the habit of granting dissolutions of marriages. He challenged the noble and learned Lord to put his finger on a single case in which a Pope

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  or Council had dissolved any valid and completed marriage. He did not think he could point out one; at all events, it was the universal feeling of the Roman Catholic Church that marriage was indissoluble. For his own part, looking at the question from a purely Scriptural point, he thought the Bill so objectionable that, in whatever stage it should be opposed, he should be ready to lend his humble assistance in order to throw it out.
  LORD CAMPBELLsaid, their Lordships would receive with the sincerest respect what had fallen from the noble Duke; for the opposition of the noble Duke was consistent, because, according to his faith and the faith of his ancestors, marriage was a sacrament, and could not be dissolved. He was, however, speaking to an assembly, the great majority of whom were Protestants, and maintained a different opinion. All Protestant Churches held that, according to the precepts of the Divine Founder of our religion, for adultery marriage might be dissolved; and it seemed to him (Lord Campbell) to be straining and quibbling when any other interpretation was attempted to be put on the words of our Lord. As no attempt had been made to answer what he must call the unanswerable speech of his noble and learned Friend (Lord Lyndhurst), it would be absurd for him to go over the same arguments. At the same time he thought he might attempt, perhaps not unsuccessfully, to quiet the apprehensions of his noble and learned Friend (Lord Wensleydale), who complained that by this Bill they were altering the law of the land, for by the law of England marriage was indissoluble. That was a mere legal subtlety, spoken by a lawyer, and contrary to fact and common sense. For the last 200 years marriage by the law of England had been dissoluble for adultery. For 200 years it had been a matter of right that a husband whose wife had been unfaithful, and who had been a kind and attentive husband, might apply for a divorce, and a divorce he was sure to obtain. It was true that in Bills of divorce their Lordships nominally acted legislatively, but they really and to all intents and purposes acted judicially—they saw that the allegation of adultery was fully sustained, and then as a matter of course they granted the remedy prayed by the injured party. That had been the invariable course; and by the practice, therefore, of the law of England, any one proving adultery had a right to a divorce
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  and to marry again. He had the honour to be at the head of the Commission appointed in 1850; the object of the Commissioners was not to alter the law, but the procedure by which the law was carried into effect. They were shocked at the complexity of that procedure—first, that there should be an action for crim. con.; second, a suit in the Ecclesiastical Court for a divorce à mensâ et thoro; and then a petition for a Bill in their Lordships' House. The noble and learned Lord on the woolsack had spoken of the three different proceedings, but he had really understated them. There was a fourth. The whole matter might be investigated over again at the bar of the House of Commons; and, although of late years the House of Commons, out of decency, had accepted the evidence taken at their Lordships' bar, he had himself examined witnesses at the bar of the other House to prove the adultery for the fourth time. He thought these repeated exposures very much to the detriment of public morals. The Commissioners proposed that divorces should be obtained by a tribunal established to hear evidence and pronounce decrees instead of by sham legislation, and this Bill would give effect to their recommendation; therefore his noble and learned Friend might dismiss his apprehensions on the score of changing the law of England. Many persons were for putting the sexes on entire equality as to divorces, and his noble and learned Friend said there was no authority for making any distinction. But the wisest of all codes—the civil law—made a difference, and only gave the woman a divorce for adultery of the husband, when accompanied by aggravation—as bringing the concubine to the same house with her. [Lord LYNDHURST: That was the law of the Code Napoleon.] Yes; and was taken from the civil laws. He thought marriage should be dissolved where it was impossible that the parties should ever live together again. Where the wife committed adultery, it was contrary to the general feeling of mankind that there should be condonation, and therefore it was right that the power of divorce should be given; where the husband committed incestuous adultery, or adultery with such aggravation as would prevent the wife condoning, divorce should also be permitted; if all the purposes for which the contract was entered into were put an end to, the contract should be dissolved. To that extent he would go with

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  his noble and learned Friend, but no further. There seemed to be a general understanding that the Bill should be read a second time without further discussion. [The Bishop of OXFORD dissented.] He drew that inference from the right rev. Prelate's not accepting the challenge thrown down by his noble and learned Friend. But, however that might be, he could not omit drawing the attention of the noble and learned Lord on the woolsack to one or two points. He had heard no explanation of the manner in which the Bill would be applied to Ireland. For all that appeared on the Bill, an Irishman who had an unfaithful wife, would still have to petition the House of Lords. There ought to be a civil tribunal established for Ireland also—or at least some means for extending to Ireland the same facilities that were enjoyed by this country. With regard to the action for criminal conversation, he regretted that his noble and learned Friend had not taken this opportunity of giving a final blow to that system. He was ashamed of it. He had been taunted with it by foreigners, and had blushed when he was obliged to confess that such was the law of this country. He would also point out there were many classes of persons who would derive no advantage from this Bill—the noble Duke had mentioned the Roman Catholics, who could not obtain a dissolution of marriage, and who would have no other redress under the provisions of this Bill.
  VISCOUNT DUNGANNONsaid, he could not allow the Bill to go to a second reading without expressing—athough he stood alone—his heartfelt regret that such a measure should have been introduced. Honestly and sincerely, he looked upon it as striking at the very root of the best interests of society, civil, moral, and religious. It had been observed—and the observation he admitted had a very great degree of force—that it was hard and unjust that relief in matters of adultery should be open to persons who had power and position in society, and possessed the means of obtaining it, whilst it was practically denied to others in a different sphere and condition in life. Admitting, however, in the abstract, the extent of that evil, he could not but very much question whether the remedy now proposed was not worse than the original disease. The moment it was found that there existed a greater facility than heretofore for the dissolution of the marriage tie, he feared
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  it would supply additional encouragement to the indulgence of illicit desires, and that consequently the happiness which had hitherto generally characterised the social life of this country would be very materially impaired. He believed that it was the difficulty—the almost insuperable obstacles—which at present stood in the way of dissolving the matrimonial contract that most contributed to the well-being of society. It influenced parties when once they had contracted that tie to earnestly endeavour to pursue the course which was most likely to conduce to their personal and domestic happiness, and consequently they made it their object to set aside and get the better of those minor differences of disposition and of temper that might possibly exist between them. There was another point to which he desired to call their Lordships' attention. They were aware that the solemn tie of marriage was too often hastily entered into, and with very little forethought, more especially by the lower classes of society. He should look upon any greater facilities for the dissolution of marriage, such as were to be given by the present Bill, as a very great addition to that evil, and thought they would prove a source of misery among that class of people which it was painful to contemplate. He for one much regretted that any attempt should have been made to legislate upon this all-important question until the matter had been seriously discussed by the heads of the Church, and the opinions of the Church at large had been made known to their Lordships by the representatives of the Church, the most rev. and right rev. Prelates who had seats in that House. He had heard many powerful arguments upon the subject that evening, and none more so than those of the noble and learned Lord (Lord Lyndhurst) to whose eloquence and to whose power of argument he had again and again listened with admiration and delight, and from whom he differed with the greatest misgivings as regarded his own judgment; nevertheless, he was compelled to say that he viewed this measure with feelings of the utmost misgiving and alarm. He very much doubted if good could arise to society from its introduction; and, moreover, he very much apprehended that there was little chance of obtaining any essential Amendment upon it in Committee. He had hoped that the right rev. Prelate (the Bishop of Oxford) would have moved, as an Amendment, that the Bill be read a second time that day six months,

  515
  and felt regret at his not having done so; because he was convinced it would have come from the right rev. Prelate with a force which it was impossible for him (Visount Dungannon) to bring to bear upon it. But believing strongly that the measure was calculated to shake the very foundations of the best feelings of society—so much did he apprehend that evil consequences would result from it—that, although he might be charged with presumption for taking such a prominent part in the debate, he felt himself compelled to move, as an Amendment, 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 REDESDALEsaid, that after the most careful consideration he was convinced that the declarations contained in Scripture of the indissolubleness of the marriage tie were far stronger than the single passage which was quoted against it; and even that passage, so often cited as sanctioning the dissolution of marriage, appeared to him to contain the strongest possible injunction against it, for while it was said that man and wife were one flesh, it was also said that he who married a woman who had been divorced committed adultery;—how could it be said that he committed adultery unless the woman were still a wife? But setting aside the religious part of the question, which was scarcely a proper subject for discussion in that House, he would contend that upon the moral view the arguments against the proposed change were still stronger. He would ask their Lordships to consider what had been the moral character of the people of this country under the existing law. He believed there was no country in the world where, taking it from high to low, the marriage tie had been observed more sacredly, or had produced a greater amount of happiness, and he believed that had arisen mainly from the impossibility of obtaining a dissolution of marriage. And what had been the result? Those who knew the great body of the lower classes of this country knew that among them marriage when once solemnized, was regarded in a manner of which it was impossible to speak too highly. In the rural districts cases were very common where people who before marriage had been remarkable for the immorality of their lives had, after marriage, become respectable members of society. The noble and learned Lord Chief Justice said
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  that divorce was part of the law of this country—that divorce was sanctioned by law. But his way of putting the case was, he (Lord Redesdale) thought, more ingenious than true, because, as every divorce in every case required a separate and distinct piece of legislation, it could not be considered a part of the general law of the country. He (Lord Redesdale) was one of the Commissioners who inquired into this subject, and as his views had been somewhat misunderstood, he wished to say that he thought it would be much better to give up all exceptional legislation, to return to the original law of the country on this subject, and not to extend occasional legislation into a general measure such as that now under discussion. The noble and learned Lord on the woolsack had told them, that on the average two divorce Bills were applied for every year; was it then expedient, because their Lordships were called upon for this amount of exceptional legislation, that they should open the remedy to all the community. He admitted the exceptional legislation to be objectionable, but he wished to see it done away with, and not extended. He thought this experiment would be attended with great danger, for no one could tell what would be the result of facilitating divorce even to the limited extent proposed by this Bill. Their Lordships at this moment would not listen to any proposal for giving this power to any inferior tribunal; yet, if the principle of this Bill were admitted, how would it be possible to refuse hereafter to give the facility to all classes by extending the power to inferior tribunals? In some respects the Bill would undoubtedly tend to improve the existing law; but for the reasons he had stated he could not vote for the second reading. He should support the Amendment.
  THE BISHOP OF SALISBURYsaid, that as he had on a former occasion, when a very similar Bill was under the consideration of their Lordships, stated at some length the reasons which satisfied him that marriage was by the law of Christ indissoluble, he should scarcely have thought it necessary again to trespass upon their Lordships' attention, had not the noble and learned Lord (Lord Campbell) asserted that it was impossible to maintain such a position, and to argue against divorce à vinculo on the ground of Holy Scripture, except by a "quibble." He (the Bishop of Salisbury) must at once protest against

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  the justice of such a charge. He declared that he was incapable of "quibbling" on such a subject, and yet he was one of those who believed that the testimony of our Blessed Lord on this subject was, when well considered, distinct and emphatic, and that no sanction was given in the New Testament to divorce à vinculo matrimonii. Our Lord had spoken on this subject on three occasions. On one of them, when addressing the Pharisees (Luke xvi. 18) He prohibited divorce altogether; and this He did again a short time after, in reply to a question put to Him by His Disciples, when He told them—
  "Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry another committeth adultery against her. And if a woman shall put away her husband and be married to another, she committeth adultery" (Mark x. 11, 12)."
  He had also just before reaffirmed both to the Disciples and the Pharisees the original institution of marriage, and had taught them that God alone could separate those whom He had thus made one (Matt. xix. 4, 5, 6; Mark x. 6, 7, 8). It is true that, in answer to a question of the Pharisees on this last occasion (Matt. xix., Mark x.), and also in addressing the multitude as well as His Disciples in the first year of His ministry, He seemed to make, in the case of one sin, an exception to the general law which made marriage indissoluble (Matt. v. 32). But it was very difficult to admit this interpretation of our Lord's words, as such a concession to Christians would be at variance with the subsequent canon of St. Paul, who forbad the marriage of a person whose husband or whose wife, as the case might be, was living (1 Cor. vii. 10, 11; Rom. vii. 1, 2, 3). He (the Bishop of Salisbury) believed that such was not the true interpretation, and that in the two passages of the Gospels to which he had just referred (Matt. v. and xix.) no such concession was really made. He had satisfied himself that they did not favour that description of divorce which the present Bill was framed to grant, but that our Lord was only showing that the Rabbins had by their sophistries greatly enlarged the original limits of that compliance with the weakness of human nature which God had, in condescension to the hard-heartedness of the Jews, permitted Moses to make. There was, however, one point in which he (the Bishop of Salisbury) agreed entirely with a noble and learned Lord who had spoken early in the debate (Lord Lyndhurst)—and if necessary he could quote high authority in support of
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  his views—that man and woman should be placed precisely upon the same level with regard to this matter, and that an indulgence should not be allowed to the man which was denied to the woman. He (the Bishop of Salisbury) further maintained, that if (notwithstanding some difficulties) the question what was the mind of our Lord on the subject of divorce à vinculo, was not uncertain, even when the inquiry was confined to the letter of Scripture, such a conclusion was made more clear, and was confirmed by the subsequent teaching of the Church. If they referred to the history of the Church, the authority of the Fathers and of the General Councils would be found to go for the most part in the same direction. He could produce the strongest assertions by great authorities in every century of the Christian Church—including St. Augustine, the favourite author of the noble and learned Lord at the table (Lord Lyndhurst)—that it was not lawful so to separate husband and wife that they might re-marry. And he (the Bishop of Salisbury) would justify his own opinion on the subject by quoting to their Lordships a very plain and strong passage from that great Latin Father:—
  "Licite dimittitur conjux ob causam fornicationis, sed manet vinculum prioris, propter quod fit reus adulterii, qui dimissam duxerit etiam ob causam fornicationis."—[Aug. t. vi., p. 406.]
  With regard to the law of our country, about which he had been surprised to hear some doubts raised, he would remind their Lordships that there could be no question that the law of England before the Reformation was in agreement with the rule thus plainly expounded by Augustine, and that though at the time of the Reformation it was proposed in the Reformatio Legum to alter that law, the alteration, he was thankful to say, was not effected. He was satisfied from all the authorities he had consulted that according to the law of this country no divorce à vinculo matrimonii was yet allowed; and he thanked God that he had hitherto providentially prevented us from altering this law, because that law enshrined the principle that, as we believed there were no limits to the forgiveness of our sins by our Heavenly Father, so there was no limit to the forgiveness—let the sin have been ever so grievous, let the adultery have been committed under every possible aggravation—which any Christian man ought to be ready, if circumstances permitted it, to extend to a penitent wife. He knew that the general opinion was against him;

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  but as a minister of Christ, standing there not merely as a peer of Parliament, but as an ambassador of the great Head of the Church, he was anxious to testify his solemn conviction that there was no possible offence of which a wife could be guilty that the husband—if he hoped for forgiveness himself—should not be willing as a Christian to place within the limits of condonation. There might of course be considerations which might prevent the exercise in this way of such a forgiving Christian spirit, but the law should never allow either party to be placed beyond the limits of the hope of such pardon and reconciliation. He was borne out in saying this by the same authority he had before appealed to: St. Augustine's maxim was—
  "Tale igitur debet esse conjugium Christianorum ut nunquam tale divortium fiat, quin spes maneat reconcilationis."—[Aug. t. vi. p. 407.]
  He (the Bishop of Salisbury) did not, however, deny that the question now raised was surrounded with very great difficulties. That House had been accustomed to grant what were called privilegia, and he quite agreed with the noble and learned Lord at the table (Lord Lyndhurst), that if those privilegia were founded on the word of God the poorest man in the realm was equally entitled to them with the richest nobleman. But he believed that these privilegia had no such foundation and had been attended with the worst results, and that if their Lordships extended them to the poor man, so far from giving him a blessing they would give him that which would poison the happiness of his home. It was not that he would withhold a benefit from the poor, but that he would not inflict on them a curse. And this being his opinion about these so-called privilegia, he would have their Lordships do as the noble Lord who had first spoken had recommended. He would have them sweep away these privilegia, and put themselves in this respect on a level with the poor man, which was the only footing on which all Christian men ought to stand. But it was also felt by some that it was impossible for a special reason both to get rid of these privilegia, and also to maintain the law of the indissolubility of marriage. The objection to which he alluded was that if a man when separated from his wife was not allowed to marry again, he would be placed in a condition in which, unless he had the gift of continence, he must commit sin; but he (the Bishop of Salisbury) believed that every Christian
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  man could have this gift of continence. The learned and noble Lord (Lord Campbell) by his expression of his dissent showed that he was not aware of what he (the Bishop of Salisbury) was speaking; he was speaking of a gift which any Christian man might (if placed under the circumstances he alluded to) obtain. And he (the Bishop of Salisbury) was only pressing on their Lordships' attention a truth which was witnessed to by the same authority to which he had already appealed. St. Augustine had anticipated the objection in the following weighty and stirring words—
  "Non eos terreat sarcina continentiæ—levis erit si Christi erit—Christi erit, si fides aderit, quæ impetrat a jubente quod jusserit."—Aug. t. vi., p. 416.
  He (the Bishop of Salisbury) was fully persuaded that a Christian could master his circumstances and temptations, however powerless a natural man might be under such a trial; and he therefore entreated their Lordships not to be drawn by sympathy for those who were placed in such difficulties, to sanction such a measure of relief, but rather to resist any such change lest the safeguards of innocence should be sacrificed for the accommodation of guilt, and the relieving offenders from the inconveniences of sin. Then again there were other difficulties in respect to changing the law which had not been alluded to, but which ought to be considered by their Lordships before passing the present Bill. Let their Lordships consider in what position they would place the ministers of the Church of England. He did not question their Lordships' power or right to vindicate the supremacy of the law of the land, and to make enactments for all the members of the State; but he hoped their Lordships would remember that the law of the Church did not recognize the dissolubility of the marriage tie; and that questions of conscience must arise amongst the clergy, and that they had a just claim upon their Lordships to respect their scruples. At present the law of the land and the law of the Church were in harmony on this point; but if this Bill passed, it would then, it appeared to him, be impossible to reconcile what would then be the municipal law on this subject with the law of the Church. He (the Bishop of Salisbury) besought their Lordships well to weigh this, and not to place men like himself and the clergy, who were bound to set an example of loyal obedience to the laws of their country, in a position where it would, he

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  feared, be most difficult to reconcile the conflicting claims the law of God and the law of man would have upon their consciences, He (the Bishop of Salisbury) had said thus much as a Bishop, but as their Lordships shared the responsibilities and interests of his right rev. Brethren and himself, so did his right rev. Brethren and himself share their Lordships' responsibilities and interests as legislators of this great country. He most thoroughly admitted that, next to the great functions of the Church, there was no duty more holy or more sacred than that of a legislator, and, therefore, he spoke not only as a Bishop of the Church, but as one anxious for legislation on right principles, and for the social welfare of the community; and he did most seriously believe that, if they began to legislate in the direction of this measure, they would not be able to stop here; that if they once opened the door, they would not be able to close it again. Look at the miserable results such a course had produced in Prussia. He (the Bishop of Salisbury) held in his hand a translation of a book by Dr. Tiersch, and he wished their Lordships had all read the witness he bore to the demoralising influences of the relaxation of the law of marriage in his country. He would read them one passage:—
  "The evil has already spread in Prussia on every side, and penetrated to a great depth. Already for two generations has the seed which has been sown been ripening. The moral disgust at frivolous divorces and re-marriages is at an end with both the lower and the higher classes of the people which have sprung up under such a legislation."
  He (the Bishop of Salisbury) would also remind their Lordships, as the opinions of the Reformers in favour of such a change of the law had been so often alluded to, that Luther said that though the precedent given by Moses for complying with the hardness of the hearts of the Jews justified, he considered, the temporal courts in allowing such licence to false Christians, they who availed themselves of such a licence should understand that they were by such a relaxation treated, not as Christians, but as Heathens. He (the Bishop of Salisbury) quite agreed with Luther in this respect, and would only add to what he had already said, that when Moses legislated for the Jews, he was endeavouring to preserve them from falling into the state of the heathens around them, and that so his laws were an attempt to raise his people to a higher level; but that any
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  such alteration of the law, as now proposed, in a Christian country, could only be viewed as a sinking down from a higher state—the placing God's people on that sloping path which might end in unbelief, and the loss of the qualifications of a good citizen. Whether, then, he looked at the present Bill as a Member of the Legislature of this great country, or as one of the chief pastors of the Church of God, he considered that the step their Lordships were now asked to take was a downward step, and fraught with great danger both to Church and State, and that it was therefore his duty to oppose the second reading of the Bill, and so resist this change in the old law of the Church and State of England.
  THE BISHOP OF BANGORaddressed a few observations to the House in a very low tone, and was understood to concur in the views of the most rev. Primate.
  THE BISHOP OF LLANDAFFsaid, he thought that the distinction attempted to be drawn between the three passages in which our Blessed Saviour's words were given was too minute to commend themselves to the persons who read those passages. It appeared to him that in the passage quoted from St. Paul that Apostle was speaking of the normal condition of marriage, and not of particular exceptions to which our Blessed Saviour had drawn attention. He felt that it was not in his power to vote for the Amendment, though he had objections to some portions of the Bill.
  THE BISHOP OF DURHAMconcurred with what had fallen from his right rev. Brethren (the Bishops of Salisbury and Bangor), and as the law of the Church and the common law of England were both in harmony in proclaiming marriage to be indissoluble, he should vote against the second reading of the Bill.
  THE MARQUESS OF WESTMEATHsuggested that if the Bill were read a second time a clause should be inserted extending its provisions to Ireland.
  THE LORD CHANCELLORsaid, it was impossible to make a common tribunal for England and Ireland. It was his intention, as soon as they got the sanction of the Legislature to such a measure for England, to introduce a similar measure for Ireland.
  THE MARQUESS OF WESTMEATHobserved that he had known several Bills for the amelioration of the law introduced having reference only to England, with a promise that a similar measure should be

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  introduced for Ireland, but nothing of the kind had been done.
  THE BISHOP OF OXFORDsaid, that when he addressed their Lordships upon this question on a previous occasion, he stated that he felt some difficulty in resting his opposition to the measure on the ground of Divine prohibition, but that the preponderance of his opinion was, that the words of our blessed Lord had distinctly settled the question. Since then he had applied himself with all the diligence he could command to the study of the subject now under consideration. Day after day he had gone through the several passages of Scripture to which so much reference had been made, aided by the best light which history and authority could throw upon it, and the result of his inquiries was, that he acquiesced in the conclusions which had been stated by his right rev. Friends, and felt bound in conscience to oppose the measure. The charge of "quibbling" had been applied to the right rev. Bench, but he thought that such epithets, directed against Christian men who endeavoured to give what they knew to be an unpopular interpretation to God's word, without one earthly motive except their single desire to clear their consciences from sin, were clearly inapplicable. The "quibble," as imputed, was this:—Our blessed Lord was recorded by Matthew as having spoken, on a particular occasion, on the subject of divorce, and to have used certain words now cited in favour of the allowance of divorce. But our Lord at that time was speaking to the Jews, misled by the glosses of the Scribes and Pharisees, and he said to them that they had made void the law of Moses by their traditions with regard to the commandment which bade them honour their father and mother, and he showed them that on that subject no new commandment was required, but that they should simply return to the Mosaic code. So in this case, our blessed Lord was speaking to the Jewish race, and he said, "You have here, through the glosses of the Scribes and Pharisees, come to an understanding that you may for every cause give your wife a writing of divorce and put her away." Then he added, "but Moses never gave you any such authority; he only permitted you to put away your wife when you found uncleanness in her." The Evangelist who recorded this passage added, that afterwards our Lord retired into the house, and that the disciples
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  went and asked him what was the law of the new kingdom on the subject of marriage. Now, here we were clearly to look for an explication of the whole matter; and then, what did our blessed Lord say? He said, that in the new kingdom there could be no such divorce of those whom God had joined as would permit either, in the life of the other, to marry. It had been urged that St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, "Let not the wife, depart from her husband; but if she depart"—and their Lordships would observe that this was not given as a law but as an exception—"let her remain unmarried, or let her be reconciled to her husband, and let not the husband put away his wife." When the Bishops, after carefully considering this subject, therefore came to a settled conclusion upon it, he contended that they were not obnoxious to the charge of quibbling, especially when they could refer to such passages as the saying of our blessed Lord, "Every man who marries her, who is put away, committeth adultery." This brought him, however, to an important question. Was the woman who had committed adultery to be entitled, by reason of her sin, to greater privileges than those extended to other women—was the woman who had broken the vinculum by her adultery to be free to marry again, while the woman who had been unjustly put away was not to marry again? He had understood his noble and learned Friend Lord Lyndhurst to say, that the Popes and Councils of the Church had determined that marriage was not indissoluble. Perhaps, however, in such a case as this, where his noble and learned Friend had evidently been brushing up his ecclesiastical lore, he (the Bishop of Oxford) should be pardoned for starting a lawyer's objection, and for saying that he could not take these cases upon the mere assertion even of his noble and learned Friend. They must be cited before he could attach any weight to them. [Lord LYNDHURST: There was the case of Napoleon I., who married again in the lifetime of Josephine.] He received this case as cited, but thought it would not be reckoned as a very primitive authority upon the question. The re-marriage of Napoleon I. could certainly not have been pronounced upon or favourably viewed by any very early Father. Instead of believing that the Popes and the Councils of the Church laid down the dissolubility of marriage, the result of his own inquiries led him to a di-

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  rectly opposite conclusion. The Apostolical canons laid it down distinctly that no marriage could be so dissolved as that the parties could marry again in the lifetime of each other. Justin Martyr, St. Innocent, the Council of Carthage, 407 years after the death of our Lord, St. Jerome, and St. Chrysostom, all held this language, and his noble and learned Friend's great authority, St. Augustine, over and over again said the same. It was indeed quite impossible that language could be stronger than that used by St. Augustine upon this point. In his commentary upon St. Paul, after alluding to the Apostle's teaching on the subject, he said, "Hœc verba Apostoli toties inculcata, toties repetita, vera sunt, plana sunt, sana sunt," and added, "It is lawful, therefore, for a man to dismiss his wife for the cause of fornication, but the vinculum of the marriage lasts on, and it is not lawful for him to marry." [Lord LYNDHURST: In the early part of his works he does not say so, though towards the close of his works he may.] His noble and learned Friend had fallen into a considerable error on this point, as any great man might when he did not thoroughly understand his subject. No doubt he had been misled by marginal notes, by indexes, ponderous volumes, tomes. St. Augustine laid down, the indissolubility of marriage in every part of his writings, and especially in his commentary on the 5th chapter of St. Matthew, in those two grand treatises which had always formed for all Christendom the great storehouse of argument upon this subject. He then proceeded in his Retractions, which were about the last things St. Augustine wrote, though placed by the editors at the beginning of his works, and if he had changed his mind, he would certainly, with that extraordinary honesty which belonged to him, have there owned to it. He confessed that he had fallen into some minor errors, but he never said that he had altered his opinion that a marriage once contracted was by God's ordinance indissoluble. It must be borne in mind, too, that St. Augustine did not rest his question upon any notion of sacramental evidence. Noble Lords thought this alleged indissolubility of the marriage tie a mere invention of the Middle Ages, adopted by the Church of Rome at a particular time to bear out the sacramental doctrine. This was not so, however. It was made to rest upon God's ordinance. He (the Bishop of Oxford) had the misfortune to miss a portion of his noble and learned Friend's argument on a former
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  occasion; but if what had been attributed to him by the reporters were correct—and he did not suppose that those gentlemen whose reports were commonly so accurate had done him injustice—his noble and learned Friend was carried away a little in one of his flights. He had quoted a curious passage, apparently to show that it was doubtful whether St. Augustine believed that the great crime therein spoken of was a crime; but his noble and learned Friend did not say that St. Augustine introduced that same story with the words quod hominum sensus excludit—conveying by this his opinion that, according to the common sense of man, this was a sin against God. The argument was that there existed a high probability that the words of our blessed Lord referred marriage back to its original institution, and intended to state that it was indissoluble; and there was a certainty that He said that a divorced woman could not after adultery be married again. The stream of Church authorities, at their highest and purest sources, before the Middle age corruption set in, was clear and decisive in declaring this to be the doctrine of the Church, not resting upon any sacramental notions, but upon Scripture.
  LORD LYNDHURST: What I said was, that St. Augustine holds distinctly that adultery, whether committed by man or woman, is a justifiable cause of divorce. His only doubt I affirmed to be as to whether the parties should afterwards have the right to marry again.
  THE BISHOP OF OXFORDremarked, that the whole question depended upon the right of the parties to marry again. All he desired to press upon their Lordships was that his most learned Friend had not shown from St. Augustine that adultery was a justifiable ground for re-marriage. If their Lordships liked to call separation à mensâ et thora divorce, he granted that adultery was a sufficient cause of such a divorce; but if they meant that it gave the power to re-marry, then he maintained that it conferred no such authority, and it was because he believed that many noble Lords understood his noble and learned Friend to argue that St. Augustine justified divorce, and not merely separation, that he ventured to call attention to this point. This being so far the case, he must, of course, vote against the second reading of this Bill, which he believed justified and legalized the marriage of the divorced woman, undeniably forbidden by our Lord. He thought this would settle

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  the question for those who received the word of revelation. What hope would there be for the prosperity of this country if, in even one instance, the law of Christian Britain was made at variance with the law of Christ? This, however, was not his only objection to the Bill. He objected to it as a whole, and not alone because of its details. He objected to it because he thought it was dealing with a great subject in a most imperfect way. Even if he were prepared (which he was not) to grant the dissolubility of marriage, he must still oppose this Bill; he must oppose it on the ground that the marriage law of this country was a stain upon our statute-book. He believed that our law operated in the grossest and most unjustifiable way upon the woman, taking away from her those rights which God intended her to possess, and of which no human legislation ought to deprive her. But, because he felt indignant at the continuance of those odious, and worse than odious—unjust—laws which, in cases of actions for criminal conversation, condemned undefended and defenceless absent women, was he therefore to consent to still worse laws? He did feel indignant at the present state of the law, but still he felt bound to refuse his assent to a remedy which proposed to leave the greater portion of the present wrong unredressed. The Bill, too, came before them with a certain amount of false pretence, because it professed to put all classes of the community on an equality in this respect; while the fact was, that as it stood it would not afford, as it pretended to do, any relief to the great mass of the people of this country, and only gave more extended privilegia to the rich. The noble and learned Lord, no doubt, meant nothing of the kind, but he was a very sanguine man, and regarded the productions of his brain much as a too partial parent watched the progress of his spoiled child. The Bill, however, did come before the House under something like false pretences, because it assumed that the same right to redress should be given to the poor man as was possessed by the rich, which was not the case, and which was an impossibility. The very machinery of the court proposed to be established would be a bar to it. Let the House remember the counsel who must be employed in such causes—men of the greatest eminence, and who would naturally expect the heavy fees to which their abilities and learning entitled them. Then, again, there was the expense of bringing wit-
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  nesses. It was true a suggestion had been made that commissions might issue to take evidence upon the spot; but were their Lordships prepared to set aside the only machinery which at present formed the great bar to collusion? At present the greatest difficulty in that class of cases was to guard against collusion, but the plan of commissions would destroy the only safeguard which existed. At present the safeguard against collusion was that one of the two parties was bound in heavy recognizances to society and did not dare to forfeit them, because if she did she was cast out upon her admission of the guilt imputed to her. That safeguard, however, would not descend to the lower classes, who were not bound by fashion or governed by any secondary motives which would operate to prevent them from obtaining a licence for adultery under the proposed law. Just let the House consider the effect of the law. Every lawyer would say that, if this Bill were passed, in the end such causes must go down to the County Courts. Were their Lordships prepared for that? and yet if once they entered upon this course it was impossible to say where they would stop. At present the law said that all marriages were indissoluble, and only made exceptions in certain cases where the Legislature interfered by exceptional action. But the Bill proposed to declare it to be the right of every Englishman to have that relief, and it was impossible to suppose that such relief should be practically confined to men with more than £2,000 a year. He reminded their Lordships that, through God's blessing, they had inherited a nation and society in which, with all its many faults, it could truly be predicated that there was no nation in Europe in which upon the whole family purity was so much prized as among the mass of the people of these islands. That was the case under the existing law, and he would ask was it the course of wise and prudent men to enter rashly upon a change of that system in order to introduce one the consequences of which they could not entirely foresee? The history of every nation which had pursued that course showed that increased facility produced increased occasion for divorces, while at the same time morals were lowered, purity sullied, and the honour of married life invaded. He would warn them to consider what had been the consequences of such a course in France during the last century, and begged them to remember the words of Burke, who said that it had been the

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  wisdom of every Christian Legislature to add every conceivable safeguard to the purity of marriage, but the anti-Christian synod then holding its orgies in France had begun by breaking down all those restraints that made marriage mysteriously sacred, and by granting facilities for divorces, which destroyed the only securities for the purity of married life. France, however, taught by the dreadful experience of the past, had long recoiled from the fatal step she had taken, and was even now engaged in the attempt to re-establish the sanctity of the marriage tie—and thus while Christian England was being called upon to render marriage dissoluble, France, with experience of the miseries entailed by such a course, was making marriage indissoluble as the only means of preserving its sacredness. The noble and learned Lord (Lord Campbell) had stated that all Protestant Churches held marriage to be dissoluble; but he had not enumerated them. Perhaps the noble and learned Lord did not call the Church of England a Protestant Church, for she had never inculcated such a doctrine. If, however, they looked to the particular Church of Protestant Europe (Prussia) which had taken an opposite course, what did they find? Divorces increasing as facilities were increased. He might be told that this Bill did not propose to grant divorces for all causes; but so it had been in all countries. In all, the door at first had been opened only to admit divorces for adultery, but the consequence had been that all other causes were finally admitted. Reference had been made to the Reformatio Legum, but it was unfair to quote an isolated passage and to ignore all other portions of the book. While that code proposed to make adultery a ground of divorce, it also proposed in cases where a man had seduced a woman he should, upon proof, be condemned to marry her, and, if that were impossible, then that one-third of his goods should be made over to her. Such was the code which they were told was an exceedingly good one. He thought it was scarcely fair that those who held different opinions should be referred to such a book as a true interpretation of the word of God. It proved that the minds of great and honest men, in the first mastery of new truths, were almost intoxicated by the greatness of the draught; that in casting away a multitude of errors they were in imminent danger of losing hold of a multitude of truths; and when, therefore, they were told to go to the Protestant Churches
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  for a lesson upon this subject, he asked them to observe how the two systems had worked. The operation of the one they saw in England, with its purified Church and its great amount of matrimonial purity; and the effects of the other they beheld in Prussia, labouring now with difficulty to get back again into that state from which they were asked at the present moment to depart. Although in Prussia the proposition did not go as far as to bring back the law to the state in which it stood in England, it was a retrograde movement in that direction, carried as far as those who had the management of it could advance. Surely they had cause enough to do that. Many of their Lordships might have seen that very day, in one of these remarkable publications which were frequently sent to the daily press, a statement of the condition of things in Prussia. The result was that between 1820 and 1830, in a population of 12,000,000 there were 3,000 divorces, or twenty-seven to each 100,000; and if they struck out that part of Prussia in which the Roman Catholic religion prevailed, they would find that there was one in every 247 married couples divorced within a year. Were they, then, to be sent by the noble and learned Lord on the woolsack to what he was pleased to call all the Protestant Churches, if such had been the manner in which the system had worked for a long period among the singularly moral, calculating and passionless people of the Prussian provinces? We had received from God, in this respect, a great advantage—in laws purified from the abuses of the Middle Ages, and yet retaining the savour of ancient Christianity strong upon them. We had, under those laws, seen a population growing up the like of which could not be exhibited in Europe for domestic virtue and married purity. Their Lordships were asked to change altogether the condition of every married person in England. The Church taught the people that marriage was indissoluble except by death; but they were now to be told that they might take one another, not for better and for worse, but until the sin of one might enable him or her to put the other away and marry again. It might be long before the people would take advantage of the new law, for such changes seldom appeared in their full effects all at once; but slowly, step by step, it might change the whole moral aspect of the nation, and deteriorate the temper of the people. He therefore asked

  531
  their Lordships to pause. Let them pass laws that would give the woman her rights, but avoid mixing them up with those disputed and difficult questions which stirred the consciences of men. Let them not by a side-wind, while professing to remove the injustice which was done to women, abolish that marriage law which from the first had been the rule in Britain. He implored them to consider one other point. The Bill, if passed, would leave the conflict created between the law of the Established Church and the law of the statute-book unadjusted. It would place churchmen in an extremely difficult position. They were at present under a law to which it was their first duty to yield a ready obedience, and to which, by the direct action of legislation, they were required to declare their assent and consent. That ecclesiastical law was left where it was, and yet it was now proposed to subject them to a law which, if obeyed, would compel them to violate it. No set of men ought to be put in such a position, but especially those who should be leaders and examples in straightforwardness of conduct, and in simplicity of conscientious obedience at once to the laws of the State and to the laws of the Church of which they were members. The Bill, in short, was one of those haphazard pieces of legislation which changed great institutions without seeing the end of what it proposed, and which never failed to involve the people subjected to them in many and serious difficulties. He entreated their Lordships to remember that the question before them was a foundation one. It was not one of those little things which floated upon the surface of society; it reached its very roots, and must stir it for ages to come; and therefore, believing that the Bill contradicted, certainly and unnecessarily, one important fact of the teaching of our Lord—that it probably contradicted another—that it unsettled the whole of our existing law—that it made provision for all kinds of future entanglements—that it professed to give relief to persons whom it would never reach—and that it left the question of marriage in a hopeless state of confusion—he entreated their Lordships to pause before they took one step in advance, and to vote with him that the Bill be read a second time that day six months.
  THE BISHOP OF LONDONsaid, that their Lordships would excuse him if, even
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  at that late hour, he ventured to address some observations to them, for he felt that he should not be discharging his duty if, since his views upon this subject had not been expressed by any of his right rev. Brethren who had yet spoken, he did not state the reasons which would induce him to support the Bill. He thought that the argument derived from the Scriptures was one which could very readily be ascertained. The Sermon on the Mount—a portion of Scripture which he had yet to learn was not directed to all Christians—contained an assertion which he believed every Protestant Church regarded as decisive upon the question before their Lordships. And when in other passages they found a general statement that it was a crime to put away a wife, they must remember that general statements were seldom to be taken as holding in all cases in that qualification. If they were told that all children should honour their parents, it did not preclude instances of parents being wholly undeserving of the honour of their children. If they were told that there should be no separation between husband and wife, there might still be cases of such foul iniquity as to effect the utter disruption of the marriage tie. As to the testimony of the Fathers of the Church, he believed there was scarcely any subject on which a whole string of the Fathers could not be brought on one side and a whole string upon the other. If they turned to the case of the Duke of Norfolk in the State Trials, they would find Bishop Cousens quoting the Fathers quite as conclusively as the right rev. Prelate (the Bishop of Oxford), and as to the authority of the Mediæval Church, but on the opposite side. When it was so easy in practice to dissolve marriage by making it invalid, as the noble Lord on the woolsack had stated, they could hardly wonder that no difficulty was found in declaring it to be formally indissoluble. It was said that the law of the Church of England was that marriage was indissoluble. Of course there was no provision for the dissolution of marriage, but he was not aware of any authority for this broad statement, and those who argued from the fact that there was no provision for divorce without an Act of Parliament, to the doctrine that marriage was held to be altogether indissoluble, greatly overstated the case. If such were the law of the Church of England, why were the clergy called upon to re-marry persons whose marriages had been dissolved by private Acts. It appeared plain that the

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  mighty convulsion with which they were threatened by the right rev. Prelate ought to have come long ago, because the dissolving of marriage by what, to borrow a phrase from his right rev. Brother's speech, he might call haphazard legislation, had been in action for the last 150 years. In his conscience he believed that the time was come when that sort of exceptional arrangement ought to be done away with. It was, he was prepared to maintain, the universal opinion of Protestant Churches that in some grave cases marriages might be dissolved, and in those cases he thought it better that the dissolution should be pronounced by such a Court as was proposed by this Bill than by private laws. The present system was likely to do far more harm than good, and an opportunity now opened of satisfactorily settling the question upon an intelligible and religious basis. He therefore hoped their Lordships would read the Bill a second time.
  THE DUKE OF ARGYLLsaid, that seven right rev. Prelates had now given their opinions on this question, a majority of whom were in favour of the course indicated by this Bill, and among those who opposed it, the right rev. Prelate, the Bishop of Oxford, had changed his position. In the last debate the right rev. Prelate stated his opinion that the words of our Saviour gave express sanction to the dissolubility of marriage. It had been then well remarked that it was a moral and religious wrong to set about, by human invention, to checkmate that which was declared to be the Divine permission. The right rev. Prelate found his position untenable, and very naturally, under the influence of his long-sustained objections, was now disposed to give greater weight to the argument that the dissolubility of marriage was opposed to the doctrines of the Church. He was himself disposed to agree with his noble and learned Friend (Lord Campbell) that no rational man could read the passage in St. Matthew without coming to the conclusion that distinct permission was given to marry again in case of divorce by reason of adultery. He had some reason to complain of the language of his right rev. Friend (the Bishop of Oxford) when he said the Bill came before the House under false pretences, inasmuch as it would still fall short of giving to the poor equal facilities with the rich. But even if it were true, which he (the Duke of Argyll) did not admit, that the benefits of this Act could not be enjoyed by the poor,
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  it was no argument against the Bill, so far as it went. The present system is at least infinitely more exclusive; it reaches, let us say, some 5 per cent of the population. If the benefits of this Bill should reach only some 50 per cent of the population, if it were conceded that it was founded on a right principle it was a great step in the right direction. One objection to the new tribunal was its cost, arising out of its holding its sittings in London, which, the right rev. Prelate said, would preclude the poorer classes at a distance from availing themselves of its jurisdiction. But that objection did not hold good. Look at the case of Scotland. Though parties seeking divorce in that part of the kingdom had to go to a central court situate in Edinburgh for that purpose, and had often to travel great distances, it was an established fact that of the whole number of divorces in Scotland the vast majority had been cases among the poorer classes. From November, 1836, to November, 1841, the Court of Session in Edinburgh pronounced ninety-five sentences of divorce agrave; vinculo—the parties concerned all belonging to the humbler classes, except in a single instance, in which a lady of rank sought divorce from her husband. The inconveniences from having to attend a central court were quite as great—indeed, greater than they would be in England, where the facilities of railway travelling are greater in proportion; and, therefore, he saw no reason why the remedy should not be as cheap in England as in Scotland. There was but one plain and obvious ground for limiting the courts through which divorce should be accessible. The danger of collusion must be met as far as possible. The cause, therefore, must be heard by some court capable of sifting the evidence. But if the local courts were or should become capable of sifting the evidence, he saw no reason why the power of granting divorce should not be extended to them. When he read in The Times of that morning the communication from the correspondent of that journal at Berlin on the subject of the operation of the law of divorce in Prussia, he well knew that it would be used by his right rev. Friend (the Bishop of Oxford) in the debate of that evening to support the view he took of this question, But he (the Duke of Argyll) denied that the case of Prussia was in the slightest degree relevant to the case under consideration in their Lordships' House. For example, the not having any children and

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  mutual consent was one of the grounds of divorce in Prussia; but we in this country grounded ourselves upon principle. We said we had a clear intimation in the Divine law of one ground, and one ground alone, on which divorce was permitted, and we thought that where there was the Divine permission we ought to grant it; but, because we admitted this one ground of divorce, authorized as it was, there was no reason for fearing that we must afterwards admit other grounds of divorce. He would only further express his entire concurrence in an observation which had fallen from the venerable Prelate who presided over the Church of England, when he expressed his gratitude that on this question we had the comfort and guidance of a clear expression of the Divine will. There were many questions within the debatable land which lay between politics and religion, on which that House should always be ready to defer to the opinion of those Fathers of the Church who had seats in the House. There were other questions in which no difficulty could arise, and with respect to which he thought it ought to be not only the privilege, but the duty of the lay members of our Christian Legislature to form their own view of the words of Scripture and of their duty as a Legislature, and, having formed an opinion, to act upon it with decision and energy. The present was one of those cases; and if their Lordships on his (the Duke of Argyll's) side of the House had not had on this occasion one member of the episcopal bench on their side—if they had found all the right rev. Prelates trammelled with doubts and difficulties derived from the traditions of a corrupt age, he should still have asked the House to do two things—first, to grant the remedy of divorce on that one ground on which Scripture had permitted it to be given; and, secondly, not to attempt to extend the ground of divorce beyond that clear point.
  THE BISHOP OF LINCOLN: My Lords, I shall trespass very briefly on your indulgence; but I am unwilling that we should go to the vote without a word of explanation, lest others of your Lordships should share the errors into which the noble Duke below me (the Duke of Argyll) has fallen, in supposing the amount of difference of opinion on this Bench to be much greater than it is. I believe that my right rev. Brethren are all agreed (with the exception of my right rev. Brother on my left, the Bishop of Salisbury), that divorce is per-
  536
  mitted in Scripture in the case of the adultery of the wife. We all agree, as far as I am aware, that it is not permitted to the divorced adultress to marry again—at any rate with the partner of her guilt. This prohibition I, for my part, consider so essential, and so important to public morality, that I find myself obliged to vote against the second reading of a Bill which omits to provide for it.
  Legislators, my Lords, must not be optimists. They must treat human nature, not as it might be, not as it ought to be, but as it is. And taking it as it is, can we doubt that the permission to the adulterous parties to marry will greatly increase the temptation to adultery? Look, for example, at the numerous cases of ill-assorted marriages, where the parties discover, when too late, that they have made their choice and have chosen amiss; when the woman especially finds that she has thrown her one cast in life, and has lost. Suppose a wife, under such circumstances, solicited by the tempter, will it not add tenfold power to the temptation should the thought cross her mind, that, by yielding, she may not only free herself from an unhappy, perhaps a hateful marriage, but may be enabled to contract another, which, in the moment of temptation, at least, promises to be one of happiness?
  I will take this opportunity of alluding to another omission in this Bill—if omission it can be called. Much has been said—much more than they deserve—of the abuses of the Ecclesiastical Courts. Much has been said, especially, of the need of legislation on the subject of divorce. But much more has been said—and most justly—of the evils attending the present system of trials for criminal conversation, when the infidelity of the wife and the guilt of the adulterer are measured by a money standard. But this Bill omits to abolish these trials. The noble and learned Lord, indeed, removes them from their present position, and places them after the divorce is obtained, instead of before it; but this is only to make their character more objectionable than it is. At present the excuse and justification of an action for damages is, that it is a necessary step to an application to your Lordships for a Bill of divorce; but the husband who, after obtaining the divorce, shall, under the provisions of this Bill, bring an action for criminal conversation, will be self-condemned of seeking to compensate himself for his dishonour by a mere money payment.

  537
  Let us have no more, my Lords, of these disgraceful actions, the reports of which in the newspapers are the only authorized immoral publications—the only ones which the strong and impartial arm of my noble and learned Friend, the Lord Chief Justice, cannot reach. Let not twelve respectable men be put together in the jury-box to estimate, as best they may—while the ingenuity of counsel on both sides is chipping away the character of either party—the money value of a husband's dishonour and of a woman's guilt. Place the adulterer in the criminal's dock; let him stand in the face of the Court by the side of the forger and the burglar, who are not more guilty than he. Let the people understand that adultery is not a foible to be treated lightly, nor a fault to be compensated by a money fine, but a crime against the laws of man, as well as a sin against the laws of God.
  On Question, "That 'now' stand part of the Motion?"
  Their Lordships divided:—Contents 47; Non-Contents 18: Majority 29.
  Resolved in the affirmative; Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the whole House on Monday next.

  CONTENTS.

  Canterbury, Archbp.

  St. Asaph, Bp.

  Cranworth, L. (L. Chancellor.)

  Winchester, Bp.

  Granville, E. (L. President.)

  Panmure, L. (U. P. S.)

  Abinger, L.

  Harrowby, E. (L. Pr. Seal.)

  Aveland, L.

  Belper, L.

  Brodrick, L. (V. Midleton.)

  Breadalbane, M. (L. Chamberlain.)

  Calthorpe, L.

  Westmeath, M.

  Campbell, L.

  Clandeboye, L. (L. Dufferin and Claneboye.)

  Spencer, E. (L. Steward.)

  Abingdon, E.

  Congleton, L.

  Airlie, E.

  Crewe, L.

  Amherst, E.

  Foley, L. [Teller.]

  Clarendon, E.

  Hunsdon, L. (V. Falkland.)

  Munster, E.

  Romney, E.

  Lyndhurst, L.

  Stanhope, E.

  Polwarth, L.

  Ponsonby, L. (E. Bessborough.) [Teller.]

  Eversley, V.

  Sydney, V.

  Rivers, L.

  Stanley of Alderley, L.

  Bangor, Bp.

  Sundridge, L. (D. Argyll.)

  Bath and Wells, Bp.

  Carlisle, Bp.

  Talbot de Malahide, L.

  Kilmore, &c., Bp.

  Truro, L.

  Llandaff, Bp.

  Wensleydale, L.

  London, Bp.

  Wycombe, L. (E. Shelburne.)

  Ripon, Bp.

  NOT-CONTENTS.

  Norfolk, D. (E. Marshal.)

  Beauchamp, E.

  Carnarvon, E.

  538

  Hardwicke, E.

  Durham, Bp.

  Mayo, E.

  Lincoln, Bp.

  Nelson, E. [Teller.]

  Oxford, Bp.

  Powis, E.

  Salisbury, Bp.

  Talbot, E.

  Petre, L.

  Dungannon, V.

  Redesdale, L. [Teller.]

  Stafford, L.

  Chichester, Bp.

  Wynford, L.

  House adjourned at a quarter-past Ten o'clock till To-morrow, half-past Ten o'clock.