The Sun.
London, England, 1846-05-06 00:00:00

BUSINESS DONE IN FOREIGN RAILWAYS AT THE

LONDON STOCK EXCHANGE, MAY 5.
Boulogne and Amiens, 12%—Dutch Rhenish, 74—East Indian,
Ili—Great Indian Peninsular, 34 —Luxembourg, :2%—Namur and
Liege, 43—Orleans and Bordeaux, 11%—Over Yssel, dis.—
Paris and Lyons Constituted, 8 4—Paris and Rouen, 40%—Rouen
and Havre, 3034—Sambre and 3leuse, 174.

TEE NEWS TitADE._We have recently ascertained
that a system prevails at the News-hall of inserting printed bills,
advertising various publications and remarks, in the newspapers
packed up for post there, and in some instances the covers in which
the papers are inclosed are made the medium of publishing adver-
tisements of quack medicines, or notices of publications, which
could in no other way be presented to public attention. It be-
hoves the managers of the News-hall to put a stop at once to
this nefarious system, which threatens destruction to their
own business, and disappointment to their customers.
Parties who have evidently no right Ito admission to
the News-hall, have obtained access there, and by bribing
some one in authority, have been allowed to distribute printed bills
and notices to be circulated by being folded in and round the news-
papers. It cannot be too clearly understood that the insertion of any
printed bill or paper in any newspaper to be forwarded by post, or
any writing or printing on the cover except the address of the party
to whom the paper is sent, and the name of the newavender by whom
it is forwarded, renders each newspaper liable to the payment of the
fall postage, according to the weight of the said paper. There is no
doubt that the authorities at the Post-office are fully aware of these
attempts to defraud the revenue by publishing bills through the
Post-office, and we have no doubt that many of the I delays
complained of have been occasioned by the necessity of examining
the newspapers,
with a view to detect this disgraceful fraud.
The remedy is in the hands of the newsmen connected with the
News-hall, and if they do not at once and without further delay take
the necessary measures for effectually prohibiting all printed or
written bills from admission to their hall, we shall feel it oar duty
to publish the names of those newsmen who use that establishment,
and suffer the interest and convenience of their customers to be
sacrificed by
such a system. We are authorised to state, that the
full postage
will be chaved on all papers found to contain any
printed bill or writing, or any printed or written statement on the
envelope, except th 'address and the name of the newsvender. In
conclusion, to avoid fraud in any department through which the
newspapers for the country may be transmitted, we strongly recom-
mend the name and address of the party to whom the papers are
s___,ent to be written on the newspaper. This protection has been con-
ea 09 the Post-ollice.—Titnes-
rATAL ACCIDENT AT AN HOTEL.—On Tuesday Mr.
Waklev
' held an inquest at the London University College, on
the body of
...Lomas Wells, aged 53 years. The deceased was head
waiter at Hicks's Hotel, Duke-street, Manchester-square, and bore a
most excellent character. Abent 'half-past eleven on Friday night
he was about to descend the kitchen stairs, when, being seized with
a fit, he fell, and was precipitated to the bottom, striking his head
against the stone floor, and he sustained an injury which proved
fatal. surgeon
was immediately called, who recommended his re•
moval to the hospital, and he was forthwith taken thither, but ex-
pired in a few minutes after his admission. The house-surgeon
proved death to be the result of the injuries consequent won the
Venlict—" Acchlent4l detail."

IMPERIAL PARLIAMENT.

(THIS DAY.)

HOUSE OF COMMONS.

The SPEAKER took the Chair at Twelve o'clock.
Mr. P. HOWARD presented petitions in favour of the
Roman Catholic Relief Bill from Carlisle and several other
places.
The Dublin Markets' Bill and the Dublin Cemetery Bill
were severally read a second time, and ordered to be com-
mitted this day week.
The Committee on the Danish Claims was postponed.
Lord J. MANNERS presented a great number of petitions
in favour of the Roman Catholic Relief Bill.
The Bristol and Birmingham• Railway Bill (Ashchurch,
Tewkesbury, and Malvern line) was read a second time, and
ordered to be committed.
Sir W. SOMERVILLE presented a petition from the
Roman Catholic Archbishop of Dundee in favour of the
Roman Catholic Relief Bill. _ .

On the order of the day being read for the House to go
into Committee on the
ROMAN CATHOLIC RELIEF' BILL,
Mr. COLQUHOUN objected. The Bill contemplated al-
terations in the established laws of the realm, alterations of
the most important and fondamental laws, which had been
opposed for many years in that House. lie wished to say to
the Hon. and Learned Gentleman opposite, that if he would
confine himself strictly to the points in Committee which he
had proposed on a former occasion, he (Mr. Colquhoun)
would withdraw all opposition, and would give every assist-
ance in his power. He trusted they would not alter those esta•
blished laws which had passed for the protection of the public
against ecclesiastical encroachments. He distinctly charged
all the responsibility of this measure upon her Majesty's
Government. The first great change would be an alteration in
the Act of Supremacy. The proposed measure would take away
all the penalties for denying the Act of Supremacy. It
would de away with certain oaths that parties holding high
and responsible situations were now obliged to take. If all
penalties for denying the Act of Supremacy were done away
with, it would become a mere abstract principle, and worthy
no longer to be on the statute-book. It was found necessary
iu the time of Elizabeth and William 111. to protect the con-
stitution from ecclesiastical encroachments by stringent
laws. He would ask, was eccleSiastical power and ecclesias-
tical ambition less now than it was in those days ? He found
by the Emancipation Act of 1829 that several great officers
of State, and also the Sovereign, could not hold their
station if they were Roman Catholics. If a Roman Catholic,
the Sovereign could not sit upon the throne. By the Act of
1829 it was provided that no Lord Chancellor, Lord• Lieu-
tenant, Lord Commissioner, or Regent, could, if a Roman
Catholic, hold any of those offices. Suppose a Lord Chancellor
should take the oaths of supremacy, and then afterwards,
in imitation of many clergymen of the Church of England in
the present day, take up with the principles of the Church
of Rome, what security would there be for the public if all
the penalties attached to such an offence were done away with?
Well, then, the case of laymen being as dishonest as church-
men was not an impossible contingency, and yet they were
about to abolish one of the Acts of Parliament, the Act of
Charles 11., and they would afterwards repeal the important
Act of William and Mary, and thus the oath which was now
applied as a test would be then of no avail. Would the
Right Hon. Baronet affirm that the fears entertained by him
were groundless? Let the Right Hon. Baronet tell him how
these fears were to be allayed. They had now the oath of
supremacy, which bad been and still was defended
by some of the greatest minds in the country
as part and parcel of the constitution, but they
intended by this measure to repeal it. He wished
to call the attention of the House to one remarkable fact con-
nected with the Act of 1829, which enacted the oath at pre-
sent taken by Catholic Members in that House—the oath
which allowed the civil supremacy of the Sovereign, but was
silent as to the spiritual supremacy of the Pope. Would the
Hon. Member for Winchester inform him where the distinc-
tion was drawn between these powers—where the civil su-
premacy of the Sovereign terminated, and the spiritual su-
premacy of the Pope commenced ? This was a matter which
agitated all the Courts of Europe at that very time,
and it was then a claim of the Court of Rome,
that her right to dictate to the Roman Catholic subjects of
this country should be recognised. Lord Beaumont, a Roman
Catholic for whom he (Mr. Colquhoun) entertained the most
sincere respect, said that the supremacy of the Court of Rome
in civil matters ought not to be acted on by her Majesty's
Roman Catholic subjects, and the Noble Lord was supported
by a most respectable proportion of those hold-
ing the same religious opinions. The Honourable
Member for Winchester alluded to the objection
taken by the Bishop of Malta to the oath,' and he drew an
inference altogether erroneous from that fact. The Hon.
Member was in error as to the real facts of the case, and
therefore wrong in the inferences he deduced from them.
The objection of the Bishop of Malta was not to the Act of
Elizabeth, which it was now proposed to repeal, but to the
Act of 1829, and what was his objection ? Why that he, in
1835, referred that oath to the Church of Rome, and the reply
was that it was inadmissible. What security, then, had the
Right Hon. Baronet that the Roman Catholics of England
and Ireland would not adopt the same opinion as the clergy-
men of the Church of Rome did? Was he not, indeed, certain
that the unity of that Church would compel them to do it.
The House would observe, that by this Bill there would be
an alteration in the oath of supremacy, and the Bill repealed
the statute of Elizabeth, which forbade the introduction of
Papal bulls or other instruments from the see of Rome.
When this Bill was passed anything in the shape of Papal
rescripts might be sent into this country, and they would
become binding on the Roman Catholics. Was there a
single state of Europe that allowed the laws of Rome to be
sent into the country without being examined? No Papal re-
scripts were admitted into France or Spain without being first
examined. This Bill would give increased power to the
ecclesiastics of Rome, which power would be superior to the
state. Tke very parties to whom it would give increased
power were those who were the most prominent in the
movement for the severance of one portion of the empire
from the other. He could not contemplate this increased
power being given to the ecclesiastics of Rome without the
most serious alarm. If they repealed the oath of supremacy,
they declared that the Queen's jurisdiction was not entire
over the ecclesiastics of the Church of Rome. This he
could not support. He thought it would be fatal to
their policy, dangerous to the peace of the empire, and
would be giving a premium to those men who wished to
carry on that agitation which had been so effectual in
France and in other parts of Europe. He could
not give his consent, therefore, to such a Bill as this.
The Hon. Member then quoted the opinion of the French
Parliament in 1762, which was, that having extracted
certain passages from 147 Jesuit authors' works, and having
them collated, they considered that they taught theft, per-
jury, and licentiousness of every kind ; and they
moreover stated, that these passages were approved of
by the Jesuits of all classes, by their theologians and
principals. He would appeal to the Right Hon. Baronet at
the head of the Treasury to prevent such an enactment, for
it proposed very serious changes in the Act introduced by
the Right Hon. Gentleman himself—he meant the Roman
Catholic Relief Bill of 1829. As for himself he mould enter his
protest as repealing the Act of Supremacy, and endangering
the best interests of the State; he would,ltherefore, move
that the House do go into Committee upon this day six
months.
Sir J. GRAHAM was anxious that the Hon. Member
who had charge of this Bill should postpone it until the Bill
which was now before the other House of Parliament was
before them. 'The Bill now before the House was founded on
the report of the Criminal Law Commissioners, but the Bill
before the House of Lords, and which was now awaiting its
second reading, went much farther than that. Upon that
Bill several suggestions had been made in the other House,
and those suggestions were now under the consideration of
the servants of the Crown. On these accounts he trusted
the Hon. Member would postpone the consideration of his
Bill till a future period.
Mr. WATSON could not accede to the suggestion of the.
Right Hon. Baronet the Secretary of State for the Home
Department. This Bill had been, in fact, brought into
the House in 1843, and in 1844 a Bill had been
passed which comprised many of the clauses of this Bill,
but the effect of it was totally lost ; and he had, consequently,
brought in a Bill in 1845, which, although it had been stated
that the matter of it should be considered, the
session had passed over without any member of the
Government giving an opinion whether they were favourable
tothis Bill at all. This Bill had been introduced early in the
session, and whether the Bill in the House of Lords was in-
troduced at all, the House would certainly have to come to a
decision on several of the clauses in his Bill ; and it appeared
to him that there could never be a better opportunity of
coming to that decision than the present moment, and he
must therefore press on the Bill.
On the motion being put, '
The Earl of ARUNDEL and SURREY said that not
having been present at the last discussion, he wished to say
a few words on the present occasion. He should not have
entered on the subject of the Jesuits but for the last observa-
tion of the Hon. Member who had moved the amendment.
He believed that there was no order of men who had been
more ill used than the Jesuits, for he felt assured that they
were as high in intellect, as glorious in virtue, as any body
of men upon earth. Go to Rome, and anywhere and every-
where, and see the Sisters of Mercy, those angels upon earth,
and observe whether, under the trials of life, they were not,
like all the other regular orders, promoting the cause of
religion and charity. He could not have conceived a greater
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and
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mistake than that which it was evident prevailed respecting
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hearty support.
Sir R. PEEL regretted that the Hon. and
Learned Gen-
tleman would not accede to the proposition of his Right Hon.
Friend. It was very unusual for any Member of Pasha.
ment to persist in a proceeding upon which the Government
had stated that they were not prepared to give an opinion. The
Hon. and Learned Gentleman required that the Government
should express their opinion before their own Bill, which was
before the other House, was brought into that House.
It would not be just to remove from the statute-book disabil-
ities affecting the Roman Catholics, while the Protestant
Dissenters were to be left unprovided for. He acknow-
ledged the justice of that principle, and a Committee was
appointed to inquire into the matter. The Government were
unwilling to throw any delay in the way of the Bill. He
thought the proposal made was so reasonable, that unless
the Hon. and Learned Gentleman agreed to it, he should
certainly dissent from entertaining his Bill.
Lord JOHN RUSSELL thought if the two Bills were be-
fore the House, the proposition of the Right Honburable
Gentleman should be acceded to. On one part of the
subject, the Criminal-law Commissioners had offered
no opinion.—(Hear.) When the Right Honourable Baronet
had referred the subject to the Criminal-law Commissioners
they reported that they had found several very vexatious
penalties under various statutes, and they proposed a mode
by which these vexatious laws might be expunged from the
statute book, and the law be rendered more perfect and
uniform. But when they came to existing penalties
which were in full force under the Act of
1829, the Commissioners said that that was not a
point which came properly beneath their notice. It involved
political considerations, and was a subject that should be
referred to the Government. It was a question for the House
to consider whether the penalties imposed by the Act of 1829
should be modified or repealed.
Sir JAMES GRAHAM said, he was not prepared to agree
to the repeal of the clauses in the Bill of 1829, which were
contemplated in the present Bill. At present it was very
inconvenient to discuss the provisions of the Bill. It would
be necessary to take the sense of the Houseupon thee: clauses.
If the course he had proposed was acceded to by the Hon.
and Learned Gentlemen opposite, the Government Bill
would be brought in, and would be discussed fully in con-
junction with the Bill of the Hon. and Learned Gentlemen.
He must say that the course he had proposed was-quite con-
sistent with the rules of the House, and, if agreed to, would
give the House the opportunity of fully discussing the
matter.

Lord J. MANNERS thought that alterations proposed by
the measure before the House would not affect the general
question.
Mr. WATSON had no objection, if they went into Com-
mittee, to discuss the clauses contained in the Bill of 1829.
He should, however, persist in his motion for the House to go
into Committee, and should, if necessary, take the sense of
the House Linen the =tact

Aftef A fe,r From Mr. COLQUHOUN,
Mr. O'CONgtirt elairad the right to say one or two words
before passing these elatiesg, rt. 4 Jie had been personally at-
tAeked by the Hon. Member oosite(Mr. Colquhoun.) The
HotibnraMe Member had taxed him with having been
in error With regard to Galileo's connexion with the Court of
Rome. He admitted that he was inaccurate in some of his
details, but he did assert that in the main facts he was perfectly
correct. Leo the Tenth had patronised Galileo, and he
it was that bad been mainly instrumental in publishing the
Copernican system of the universe. He again asserted that
Galileo was only in
.prison for some three days. So much
with respect to that charge. He would now glance at the
Hon. Member's remarks with respect to the Roman
Catholics. The Hon. Member suggested that they should
take the example of France in religious matters.
Mr. COLQUHOUN—No, no.
(ugrr surrore.)

RAILWAY COMMITTEES.

(THIS DAY.)

GROUP IV.
The Select Committee appointed to consider the merits of the Bills
comprised In this group, re-assembled at the usual hour this morning,
and proceeded with their labours.
It was arranged that each party should, before to-morrow morn-
ing, put in a report, in compliance with the resolutions of Mr. Dun-
combe.
Mr. Ilux said he had an application to make to the Committee.
Re appeared for a landholder In opposition to the Aberdeen, Banff,
and Elgin line, and he should be prepared to show that it was tainted
with fraud from beginning to the end. Before he could go into his
opposition, however, he wished to be furnished with copies of the
reports and documents required to be put in by the resolutions of the
House.
The Committee directed the parties to deliver the required infor-
mation before fouro'clock to-morrow, and appointed Friday for going
into the opposition of the landholder in question.