The Express.
London, England, 1850-07-10 00:00:00

noble lord the member (or Bath (Lord
doubtedly, in dealing with the question, el. rk..e
_ _

moderation. He (Mr. Locke) tell the ooble
titled to respect: because, however much he al.
with him as to the rules and obsernnces

Sabbath should be kept, there was liedoat,t ,t*

of the noble lord's views, or of the moderatien w,

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.6:.h he

had brought them forward. (liear, hear.) The
member for Bath had relied much on the caster
of petitions entrusted to him for presentation mi
the question, and he (Mr. Luke) would Tie
concede that, if the question were to be deci,'.e.t
by the number of petitions, the preponderance would be
greatly in favour of the noble lord, as his petitions were
much more numerous and largely signed, and signed, he had
' no doubt, by most excellent and influential gentlemen.
(liear, hear.) But when they recollected how easy it was
to get up petitions and procure a large amber of signs-
tures—(hear, hearl—ho thought the house would not be
acting wisely in deciding so important an issue oil so
fictitious a test. (Harr, hear.) The most noisy and clamor-
ous petitioners were not always the wisest or the most chari-
table in putting a construction on the motives which
induced others to oppose the views entertained by
themselves. (lieu, hear.) lie would remind the
noble lord how dangerous it was to put in mo-
tion the organised machinery. of the conventicle.
(Haar, hear.) Because men's minds got influenced, sad
when brought into collision they hurled denunciations
against thole with whom they ditlered ; and, forgetting the
precepts of their coninion Christianity, they did not hes::ate
to darken the characters of those who la not subscribe to
the same views as themselves. (Boar, hear.) Now, the
resolution which he intended submitting to the house was se
follows :

That, whilst this how acknowledisse wi:h avau.
nution in the amount of timidity labour ettivted by
rungementa in the Post-otnoo, A conoot but be .0114.0
public inconvenience which has arisen hoar the Lou:
delivery or collection of letairs on Sundays,and
address be therefore presented to her Majesty, praying
be imutiously pleased to mow an Inquiry to be net:,
amount of Sunday labour might not be reduced without
putting an end to the collevtiou and delivery ,i 1 letter%
days; and that, pending Allkt her elf: be
pleased to give enters that theeollection and delivery of :cum, ae.
ea
Sundays shall be continued as heretofore.
(Hear, hear.) In the nest place, then, he hopeil to be per-
mitted to say that he did not think her Majesty's piton-
meat had received that amount of credit for the OiettlJ6l
which they had made in reducing post office labour to which
inion
they were fairly entitled. (Hear, hear.) In his op
the benefit they had dons in the aggregate had not been
placed sufficiently prominent before the public, who
certainly should be made aware of the great teluetion
in
the amount of Sunday poet-office labour which her Ma-
jesty's ministers hail effected, u proved by the admir-
able report of Mr. Howland Fla (Hear, hotel It
appeared by the Quarterly Review of the prestos
month, that on the 7th January 40 money order
offices had suspended
_payment on Sundays. Throughout
England and Wales, 450 provincial branch post.offices had
been relieved, whilst at a later period, 234 additional pro-
vincial branch post-offices in Ireland were also relieved.
(Hear, hear.) The Quarterly went on to state that -.the
combined effect had been to relieve, every Sunday, tt9
persons from an average of 51 hours' butting." (leo.
hear.) Now these reductions were in the act of being mule
when the noble lord (the member for Bath) introduced ha
measure, and when the house, forgetting these redac-
tions, stopped in with a view to atop .I'll
postal communication throughout the country by stopping
all Sunday labour in the post-offices. It might be difficult
he was of
to adduce mathematical proof of the emertion, yet
opinion that postal communication had not been, nor would
it 1)• stopped. (Hear, hear.) Then might be shifting Old
shuffling of the burthen ; but no reduction in the *MP"
amount of labour nocenzi to carry on the requited commit-

nvent
at-
the Kr,,it