did not depend upon argument at all, but upon feeling and sentiment, and as long as the people of this country were strongly attached to the Established Church, so long should we have Church and State united. The battle would be fought, not in the House of Commons, but in the streets of our great towns. On the one side were arrayed clergy, ministers, and virtue; and, on the other side, the vice and wickedness out of the gaols and workhouses; and when the latter prevailed, and people ceased to be attached to the Church, it would go, and the House could not save it, although it might break the fall. The Liberal party-taking advantage of this state of things-was trying to educate the people into willingness to destroy the Church, and it did not scruple to ally itself for this object with people of bad character, and opposed to religion. It would be far better plainly to avow the intention, and let the world know what was aimed at, for the destruction of the Irish Church was a step towards the destruction of the English Church. But the conduct of the Liberal party was reasonable, judged by their own principles. What, however, should be said of the union between the Irish party, which sought the separation of England and Ireland, and the antiChurch party, in a common onslaught on the Irish Church? ["No, no!"] Of course the leaders of the Opposition treated his opinions with disdain. But perhaps they would like to know how the matter struck an outsider, who did not expect to hold Office. Before Parliament met it was said Ireland would be the question of the Session; but in the speeches of the Leaders of the Liberal party he could find no suggestions, and no proposals were made save the impracticable ones of the hon. Members for Birmingham (Mr. Bright) and Westminster (Mr. Stuart Mill). It was said that something must be done; but no one knew what. Then there was a great debate in the House, and nothing turned up for Ireland, but something for the Liberal party. It appeared to be possible that if certain Gentlemen would change their opinions, and adopt a new line of conduct, the great Liberal party might just for once be re-united. There was courage in the attempt; but they had been obliged to make very serious admissions, such as that the Irish Church was not a real grievance, and did not injure any one in purse or person; that its abolition would not remove discontent; that the question must be remitted to the reformed Parliament; that it prevented the completion of the Reform scheme of last Session; and that the Liberal party was stultifying itself, as it had proposed nothing during the twenty years it directed the Government of the country. In the face of all these admissions, they had to say why they opened the question now. Their supporters out-of-doors bluntly said it was because they were out of Office; of course, it would not be decent to say so in the House; but the reason given was, that there was discontent in Ireland, and it was desirable to remedy a sentimental grievance. The right hon. Member for South Lancashire said this was felt as a grievance in Ireland, and that it was desirable to remedy it. He (Mr. Gorst) would admit that it might be desirable to remedy a real grievance in the midst of an insurrection, but not a sentimental grievance. He held that, however discontented a nation might be, justice ought to be done at whatever cost. But he also held that if a sentimental grievance, which did not injure any one either in his money or person, were redressed in the middle of discontent and insurrection, the conduct of the redressors would be put down to fear, and would do no good whatever. It was quite clear that if the Irish Church grievance was to be redressed, it ought not to be redressed when Ireland was in a state of insurrection, or, at all events, of discontent. Now, while it was very good policy to cure a real grievance in the midst of discontent and insurrection, it was bad policy to remove a sentimental one; because your conduct might be attributed to fear, and for that reason might not do the slightest good. Why was not the question brought forward during the fifteen years of contentment that preceded 1865? Unless a good reason could be given, people outside would impugn the conduct of the Leaders of the Liberal party. A distinct issue was raised by the Resolution, which in terms spoke of the Irish Church; but in reality was aimed at the existence and welfare of the English Church. The attack united the Irish Catholic party and the antiChurch party, and those two great parties were marshalled for the attack by hon. and right hon. Gentlemen, whom he might call deserters from that (the Government) side of the House, and who hesitated not to stultify themselves in their efforts to get into office. The Conservative party could meet the Resolution only by a direct The vo "That he was not aware of any other Scriptural authority for this system than that derived from the period when every man did that which was right in his own eyes." And, again— The voluntary system if it be understood to intend the exclusion of national and parochial provision for the support of religion, is only another phrase for the wish of the Devil, who is content that much should be professed to be done, so long as little be really done, to overthrow his kingdom." Though the voluntary system had been much praised, the evidence was that, while in the large towns of America it answered very well, in the country it amounted almost to a closing of places of worship. The other alternative was the endowment of all religious denominations. But it would be impossible to persuade the people of England or of Scotland to endow the Roman Catholics; and if you endow all denomina. tions you must endow Mormonism. What was called religious equality was nothing but the equality of truth and error. Between Protestantism and Popery antagonism prevailed, well expressed in the words of Old Evelyn negative, and, whatever the House might a result to which this measure would, in do with it, he was quite sure that course his opinion, lead, the foreign policy of the would be approved in the country. country would hardly ever be in accord SIR FREDERICK HEYGATE said, he with that of England, and then the quesdid not insist upon the Union of England tion of education would face you. When and Ireland being an insuperable obstacle once you meddled with this question of the to the disestablishment of the Irish Church. Irish Church, only two courses were open As long as there was a Parliament in ex- to you-the voluntary system, or the enistence it must have power to consider all dowment of all religious denominations. questions. The Act of Union was one of Now, as it was absurd to talk about the the most solemn Acts of Parliament, and voluntary system in a poor and thinly he did not believe the Union it established populated country like Ireland, though it would be maintained if there were different might succeed in large towns. religious arrangements in the two countries. luntary system had been well described by You could not have a voluntary system in an old writer, who saidone country and continue an Established Church in the other. The fund for the support of the Irish Church was described as being out of all proportion to its real wants. So long, however, as you treated the country as one united Empire, you were bound to look to the case of the Church in every part of the kingdom. Now, the Church statistics of Ulster had never been given in this House, and he should like to call attention to them. The total Church revenue in Ulster arising from rent, glebe-lands, tithe rent-charge, sums paid by the Ecclesiastical Commis. sioners, and value of the Bishops' sees, was £211,234; the number of clergy in Ulster was 684, and of the Church population was 401,392. Dividing the emoluments of the Church by the number of the clergy the income of each clergyman appeared to be £308, certainly not an excessive income considering the large size of the parishes. Dividing the number of the Church population by the number of clergymen, the average flock of each clergyman was 586 persons. He believed that if such a comparison were made in England, excluding certain large towns, the remuneration might be something like the same, but the average number of the flock would not be. In many communities in Dublin and in other counties the case was quite as strong as in Ulster. Then, again, the interest of the 500,000 Presbyterians must be considered, for their Regium Donum would be stopped. He was convinced that if you swamped Ulster in the whole of Ireland you must go a great deal farther. You could not separate one country from another in religious matters and maintain a union in all others. The prevalent religion of a country was its very spirit, forming its character, and controlling all its conduct and its relations, foreign and domestic. If you abrogated the Union, VOL. CXCI. [THIRD SERIES.] "The emissaries and instruments of the Church of Rome will never rest till they have crushed the Church of England, as knowing that alone to be able to cope with them, and that they can never answer her fairly, but lie abundantly open to the irresistible force of her arguments and the antiquity and purity of her doctrine." It was asked why, if the voluntary system answered among Roman Catholics in Ireland, it could not answer among other denominations. But there was an enormous difference between the spirit and the working of the two creeds. An omission of religious duty on the part of Roman Catholics was punished in this world. It was punished by a suspension of the offices of the Church, and the charges made by the Roman Catholic clergy under the so-called voluntary system were really compulsory. The hon. Member for Birmingham said 2 X that the process of disestablishment would be easy and gradual. Easy it undoubtedly would be "Facilis descensus Averni. make any sacrifice short of abandoning principle to secure it; but he could not see how the hon. Member could prove the prospect which he held out was anything but Sed revocare gradum, superasque evadere ad imaginary. He had listened attentively to auras, Hic labor, hoc opus est." The Protestants in Ireland might, perhaps, do without so many Bishops as they now had; the few cathedrals might do without deans and canons; though these were not paid as such, as was generally supposed, but in almost every instance were simply the clergymen of neighbouring parishes, with parochial duties. But if the clergyman of the parish died the "gradual" process would be this-His life-interest would be respected, but on the day of his death, even though the church was well filled, it must be closed, and there could be no more services unless an appeal were successfully made to the voluntary system. This was what was called gradual disestablishment. But the effects of these proposals were already perceptible, and he for one would prefer that the disestablish ment, if it were to take place, should take place at once. He did not at all approve of postponing the matter for the consideration of another Parliament. Few, if any, would stand up for the anomalies which existed in the Established Church of Ireland; but this was not a question of anomalies. He had letters without end from all parts of the country, many of them from Roman Catholics, and throughout but one idea appeared to be prevalent. One writer said, "The Romish population about here are beginning to exult at the prospect of becoming the Established Church." A Presbyterian clergyman, who, he might add, was a Liberal, and had voted against him at several elections, writing to him lately, said that the Presbyterian Church in Ireland regarded the withdrawal of the endowments from the Established Church as a heavy blow, and a discouragement to Protestantism in the country, and a great triumph for Roman Catholicism. The writer said it was moreover feared that at no very distant day we should witness the Establishment of the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland. And this enormous change was to be made to secure what he regarded as a purely imaginary result peace. The hon. Member Birmingham held out the prospect of the disendowment leading to the inauguration of an era of peace for Ireland. That result he regarded as so desirable that he would the speeches which had been made in the House, but he had failed to find that any corroboration had been afforded by the Roman Catholic Members. He thought it a somewhat remarkable fact that no Liberal Member connected with Ireland--and several had spoken-had referred to the proposal as likely to promote the result suggested by the hon. Member for Birmingham. The Roman Catholic Members, though they had not taken part in the debate, had significantly enough voted for the right hon. Gentleman opposite. He would ask these Gentlemen whether, in their opinion, a more peaceable condition of the country would ensue upon the adoption of the course proposed. They knew, and the fact was generally recognized by the Roman Catholics, that the question of education was of far greater importance to them, and its great importance was recognized, too, by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Calne, who had changed many of his opinions on Irish matters, some of those changes having resulted from sitting on Select Committees. Among other important questions, too, which demanded consideration were the law of Mortmain and the land question. But another object that was desired was what was called the overthrow of Protestant ascendancy. He desired, however, to ask the hon. Member for Birmingham, whether, in his opinion, Protestant ascendancy would be destroyed by this course? The hon. Member, as he understood, proposed to leave the church, the glebe, and the residence of the minister untouched, so that where an "obnoxious minister" previously resided, that obnoxious minister was to be maintained by voluntary contributions, still continuing his former duties and trying to persuade the people of the country to change their religion. There remained the fact that so many of the owners of land belonged to the "obnoxious" religion. There was, in his opinion, no means of getting rid of the Protestant ascendancy in Ireland short of the absolute banishment of the present race of Protestants in Ireland. He would pass over the remarkable comparison in this debate by the hon. Member for Kilkenny (Sir John Gray), in which he compared the Ulster settlers to the planters of the Southern States of Ame no joy at the downfall of their rival-no secret anticipation of their enthronement in its place? On every ground he opposed these Resolutions. They were fatal to the principle of the Union between the two countries; they treated England and Ire land as distinct nations; and they proposed no disposition of the confiscated endowments. In the case of Ulster and some other parts of Ireland, as appeared by the statistics he has given-which he quoted on the authority of Dr. Lee, whose ability and labours deserved every commendation there was no case. He wished, indeed, to see the Presbyterian ministers raised to a position of greater independence, and the utmost religious freedom professed by every denomination. Instead of promoting the stability of Ireland, the Opposition had thrown the apple of discord in the very midst of the people, and had set on foot a war of race against race, embittered by religious rancour. Amendment proposed, To leave out from the first word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "so long as the Union between Great Britain and Ireland continues to exist, it is just and consistent that the principle of the Established Church should be maintained in Ireland, and its endowment on & scale suitable to the wants of the population," (Sir Frederick Heygate,) posi-instead thereof. rica, and threatened them with a similar Question proposed, "That the words. proposed to be left out stand part of the proposed Resolution." CAPTAIN GROSVENOR: Sir, the Amendment of the hon. Baronet the Member for Londonderry (Sir Frederick Heygate) as it appears to me is precisely tantamount to a direct negative. He wishes the House to affirm that, as long as the Union exists, the Established Church in Ireland should exist also; but on this side of the House we wish the Union to exist for ever and the Established Church to disappear at once. The hon. Member for Cambridge, though he wandered over a great deal of ground through which it is unnecessary that I should follow him, did not fail in accordance with the never-failing tactics of his party to refer the proposition of the right hon. Gentleman for the disestablishment of the Irish Church and the support which it receives on this side of the House to causes with which it is going out of the way to suppose that they have any connection, and this is the more singular because the course is not far to seek from which they naturally and inevitably flow. Is it possible that hon. Gentle men opposite can have forgotten the debate which took place at the commencement of this Session upon the Motion of the hon. Member for Cork; is it possible that they can have forgotten the long speech made on that occasion by the noble Lord the Chief Secretary for Ireland, the satisfaction with which he dwelt upon certain statistics by which he proved that this is not the worst period of Ireland's adversity, the candour with which he admitted that notwithstanding this, throughout large districts of the country and large masses of the population there was a prevalent sympathy with Fenianism, and then the deplorable announcement which he made that Her Majesty's Government thought it best, upon the whole, to preserve a dignified neutrality in presence of the raging contest between a tendency to improvement and a tendency to decay? It seems to me Sir, that both the Liberal party and their Leader would have been faithless to the great interests confided to their care, if they had pretended for a moment to sanction such a policy; if any time had been lost by them in seizing upon the most salient point in the Irish difficulty and bringing it before the House in such a manner as not only to involve a discussion of its merits, but also to compel a decision upon its principle. But hon. Gentlemen opposite say that the great mistake has been to select this question of the Irish Church. They argue that if the Irish Church were disestablished to-morrow there would not be one Fenian the less, and though the assertion is sweeping it is not necessarily inaccurate. I am inclined to believe that even if the Church were disestablished to-morrow the active and actual Fenians in their very limited numbers might still remain undiminished. It is but indirectly that a Resolution of this kind can attempt to deal with the active organization of Fenianism; but I think it will be admitted that even that active organization will have received its death-blow when we can reach that smouldering sympathy with rebels so freely admitted by the Chief Secretary, that passive organization of Fenianism, founded upon a sense of wrong which has its depôt in the hearts of the people. I apprehend that to reach that is the object of those who wish to disestablish the Irish Church; and let me remind hon. Gentlemen opposite that an argument which they are in the habit of using, even if it had any foundation in fact, would not be conclusive against the possibility of attaining that end by these means. Their argument is that the disaffection of the Irish to our rule does not proceed from religion but from national antipathies. Time will not permit me to give this argument a very comprehensive refutation; but I will at least remind hon. Gentlemen that there is no antipathy so inveterate as not to require sustentation, that there is no antipathy so rooted but it may be expected to yield to the influence of softening suggestions from a friendly and respected source. And I will ask them to consider first, the enormous power for good or for evil which is vested in the Roman Catholic hierarchy; secondly, the course which we can pursue with the greatest probability of throwing its weight into the scale of order; and thirdly, the grave responsibility assumed by those, who pursuing a course diametrically opposite, risk the indefinite prolongation of a state of things which common sense and common humanity compel us all equally to deplore. And now let me turn to another argument which is also very popular with hon. Gentlemen opposite. They say that union between Church and State in Ireland rests upon the same principle as union between Church and State in England, and if either can be said to rest upon any absolute and well-defined principle, so far I agree with them; but upon this premise they build the conclusion that a blow struck at the one is a blow aimed also at the other, and that if the dissolution of the one be effected the dissolution of the other must follow in its wake. From this conclusion Sir, I entirely dissent. Union between Church and State as it appears to me is an admirably wise but purely political arrangement entered into for the general well-being of a nation. So long and in so far as it procures that end its maintenance is clearly advantageous and its disturbance would be a national calamity; but what is the wisest method of avoiding a calamity, which, from the very nature of the arrangement, some persons must always be striving to bring about? -surely, Sir, to restrict that arrangement within the sphere of its beneficial action, not to press it to a point at which ample experience has taught us that it becomes subversive of the very objects which it was devised with consummate sagacity to attain. In England this arrangement, this union, has been fraught with blessing; in Ireland it has produced nothing but a curse. be true, as has been more than whispered, that its origin was unhallowed, all the more reason why its end should be unregretted. Sir, for many years it was the custom to If it |