The National Register. — London, England, 1819-03-21 00:00:00

,Jiet (114/sy/44, 7 71 7Dir P. ationat ir Na 552.--VOL. XII.] The press of other important matter in our long Posts script of last week, prevented us front noticing the Pa. . tition of the English Catholics presented by Lord Nugent to the House of Cautmous. It has been customary for marry years for the English Catholics to separate their cause from that of the Catholics of Ireland, at least as far as presenting a distinct Petition for relief from their civil disqualifications does so. •Anxious, however, to avoid all cause of jealousy or dissatisfaction among their brethren, they have still forborne to petition for any pe culiar or exclusive privileges, and have endeavoured, as fates possible. to connect the relief of the whole Catho lic Body with their own. His Lordship, therefore, no doubt, in conformity with the instructions lie had re ceived, declined making any further motion upon the Petition than simply that it etcli e upon the table, wa i t .. as he then intimated, till the fate of the Iri,it Pe tition, about to be presented to the !louse of Commons by Mr. Grattan, and by Lord Grey to the House of 'Lords, should be decided. Should this last mentioned lid of its object, which it is rather expected it will nut, as, among other grounds of hope, Lord Liverpool is himself said to have been at last convinced of thejiastice and policy of concession, some further measure, on be half of the English Catholics will be then adopted. So strong, indeed, and so entirely unultiectionable ap pear to be the claims of our English Catholics, that had they chosen to prefer a different course of proceeding, and to have at once insulated their own question, it is httilly possible to conceive upon what grounds it could bate been resisted. The common claims of the whole •Catholic Body, and the unreasonableness of the restric• lions u, whioh their.eivil rights continue to be sul t jected, are -tapies which hate been over and over again urged by all the istadiera of eloquence and tb. force of truth. AVhatever sanction the weight of authority can confer on any measure, or what onewould think an unanswerable argument, the union of even the most eager of 1)01i:ie.:al opponents' on inivetsubjects, has been repeatedly thrown intwilse balance of our Parliamentary divisions on Ca tholic Emancipation, and yet those ponderous materials, ignorance, bigotry, and intolerance, have outweighed the whole, and may do so again. We are no friends to a rash and hasty spirit of legislation; we would have even abuses apparently the most flagrant, well and de liberately considered before they are swept away, lest Cie very mode or lime of effecting their destruction -should itself occasion mischief. We arc, therefore, neither astonished nor indignant at the course of cor rection and improvement which the lapse of lintels perpetually demanding in our social and civil institu tions, being somewhat more tardy and obstructed than our most honest and zealous politicians would frequent ly contend for. We have seen a cobweb rudely brushed from the corner of a mirror, and the glass shivered to pieces by the seal of a cleanly house-maid. But this reasoning is happily no longer relevant to the point now at issue. The complaints and prayers of the Roman Catholics for admission to their civil rights, have been almost constantly before the Legislature ever since the Revolution. Objections which were then, perhaps 'Andy thought insuperable, have gone on gradually disappearing. The family of the Pretender, which was always urged as the natural rallying-point of their alle giance, is now extinct. The progress of society, and the general spread of knowledge have taught the Catho- . br, as well as others, to distinguish between civil end nil loos obedience. The interference of L'opes in.the temporal affairs of Princes and Slates, is r ow no Imager heard of. The British Catholics of, the.pretott day dif fer lust as widely froin.the politics of Bellarmio-. as the Clergy of the.-Establishou....Church now differ from hose %silo maintained, as an . orthodox doctrine, the divh e a of Kings in the days of Same'. A naore unirersai Our sing, tondutution anb t aims. SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 1819. acquaintance with history has (anther taught us, when we remember that Protestants were once persecuted and burnt by Catholics, not to forget, also, that Catholics were persecuted and burnt by Protestants in their turn, and has shewn us that to the sink ti sociev, rather than to any inherent property of their faith, the violence and errors of both parties are to be referred. To all this we may still further and particularly add, the many and glorious opportunities that have beet, afforded to the Catholics of proving, by positive facts, their unquestionable loyalty to the throne, and attachment to the constitution.— Tinoughout the late arduous and protract,d struggle, their blood has flowed qaite as freely in their country's cause as our own, and their share of the ',italic barclens has been borne with as exemelary a p,itiellee. Lastly, we must not forget to mention, that all those obnoxious and anti-social tenets, so long charged upon them, and so generally believed, have been formerly and soienitily disavowed by every Catholic university and college in Europe. Nor has the more abstract question of moral and political justice, as connected with their cause, been less successfully argued and determined in their favour. All the greatest masters of human reason and philosophy have agreed that conscience, inasmuch as it is beyond the reach of laws, and even ond the eon trolli of a man's self, can never be a pripi.r object of hu man legislation ; and that it is equally a violation cf all equity and justice, either to demand the performance of an impossible duty, or to abridge a star of whatever rights and priaileges belong to the society in which he lives, for not doing that which he has it not in his power honestly to pet Piens. No civil Magistiate," says Locke, " can have mole than any other man, the care of souls. It is not committed to loni by God, nor can any such power be vested in him. e ven liy consent of plot people." The rights of con,eiiatee are namral rights, both antecedent and superior to alp human insti• unions. They are what laws never gas c, and is hat laws cannot tale awa:'. Any particular church, also, is no more than a free and voluntary society. Men are not born either Catholics or Protestants, nor bound by any natural connection to any sect or denomination whatever. Nor again, is a church establishment any proof of the truth of the doctrines maintained within it. For otherwise the faith of Brantah would be true in India, of Malio met in Turkey, and of Christianity in Italy, France, and England; and if it were, you cm still base no power or authority to compel a man to follow even truth itself, if he prefer being a disciple of error. if then you can have tin right to interfere with liberty of conscience, you can certainly ti the tin just plea for re ligious disqualificatious. You may erect a national reli gious establishment, and may clothe it with whatever dignities and emoluments you may think most condu cive to its welfare, and best adapted to promote its pro per end, the spiritual advantages of all its members.—' And as an established religion necessarily pre-supposes that it is so constituted by the consent of the majority of those who are to live under it, that very circutn stanee renders it the bounden duty of all, even of thine who arc not associated its thecommunion of its worship, to contribute to its maintenance, and to do nothing , which may direetly tend to injure or overthrow it. It is a natural ally of the state, and entitled to a civil alle giance equally:extensive. But here all civil jurisdiction, in matters purely sp'ritual, necessarily ends. Offences against a national religious establishment, are offences against the state; but until any individual has actually committed some overt act of aggression, you have no right to legislate upon his presumed hostility. Yon have no right to subject him to any civil disfranchisement when he has incurred no forfeiture. These distinctions are the more important, as they contribute to set in its proper light the nature of that obligation which has so long been considered by many, and unfortunately i 2 ttr+ [PRICE 911.1. among those by our venerable and afflicted Sovereiitit himself, as an insuperable bar to any eoficession, in die Catholics, we mean the Corfmation Oath. if the proper interpretation of this oath be to sanction and enforce the principle of civil exclusions on the sole ground of speculative opinions in religion, then we have no hesitation in saying that it is an obligation which cen never justly be imposed, which is better broke than kept, and which, in fact, has been broken above a hundred (lines. But we must contend that it fairly ad mits of no such harsh and unnatural construction, and that poverty explained, it neither imposes nor justifies any interference, on the score of religious opinions, with the civ it capacities of our fellow-subjects. Such then is the real state and eh-erect: 1. of this inti.ortant .11:'; we need nut hesitate to assert that the sentiments sse have pqt together upon* it, are those of all the liberal and enlightened part of the community. We sq no thing of a mild and tolerant spirit of conciliation being both best suited to our professions, and the best policy for the interests of the Church Establishment, nor of persecution being.ahe strongest ligament we can apply for cementing and keeping together the whole body of those who dissent from it. Our argument rests upon the highei•growtd. of. imprescriptible right and moral justice; and upon this firm foundation we shall now leave it, adding only a few words upon the peculiar fea tures of the RtitiOn presented to the House. 'lt was signed by upwards of 10,000 names, amongst which are, 13 Peers, 12 Baronets, and, what furnishes a cu rious and very interesting fact, the only five names that now remain of those who signed Magna Charta, and thus laid the foundation of British liberty, aye subscribed to this document, now prajing to be achuitte 1 to share the blesiings their fercfathers procured to the country, and, to use his Lordship', beautiful and inipress:ve lan guage, that they may no longer be " aliens in their na tive land." We are sorry to observe, that the Political Horizon in France wears but a lowering and uncheering aspect to the friends of peace. The Ministry over and over again defeated by the Opposition in the Upper Chamber, hare had recourse to an unprecedented creation of 64 new Peen; and amongst these are nuurlsered 34 of the old Officers and adherents of Napoleon. The profession of these men is arms, and no workman is well-pleased to Le long destitute of employment. Extract of a letter from Buenos-Ayres, dated Dec. 16.—" Lord Cochrane has arrived in Chili, end en the 4th inst. entered St. Jag°, where he has been received with every mark of respect. lie has been offered the command of the Chili squadron, which he is expected immediately to assume. The merchant vessels in Valparaiso arc like!" to be much distressed for seamen, every one is running to join Lord Cochrane. French papers of ISlonday and Tuesday have j..:st reached us ; they arc totally devoid of interest. The French Funds are 66.40. Bank 1500. The Penitentiary at Milbank contains at present log males and 143 females ; it is to hold ultimately 400 ; the prison is extremely healthy. On Monday last Captain Mosby . exhibited at the bar racks, Yarmouth, his apparatus fur extinguishing ire. He had politely invited the Mayor, Edmond Preston, Esq. the deputy Mayor, and whet gentlemen, to inspect and wit nes the advantages amending its application. All present were much gratified, but it appeal. d to be the grue►al pension that the ingenious contrivance is better adapted to private than to public use. The ■pporatas consists of a copper vessel about SO inches long, aml of a sufficient ea piteity to hold four gallons of impregnated water and condensed air, having as a neck a brass pipe wills a stop cock, on taming of which the water is propelled by nor conipteased air a height of 35 nr 40 fret. The weight of the whole when filled, is about 401 h., and so portable as to be easily conveyed to tiny room, or part of a house, where a fire is breaking out, mud played upon it with cc*. lain aid great effect. (1 • 4 i s. I - :4 i VI 1 (d ► 13 i so (1) ) :11 (14 ictur, 4 here Se W