The Sun.
London, England, 1851-03-15 00:00:00

take his stand and resist ev ry attempt to interfere and tam-
per, vrith the doctrines and iseiriorl discipline of the Este-
blishod Church. But becnise. he held the Protestant Church
to be the best, the silliest, and the most free from idolatry and
superstitious mummeries, he did net on that account wish
by any means to coetiol the consciences of others, or de-
priss them of the free enjoyment end cxorci e of that which
they might consider as co istituting a more efficient rule of
faith.—(Hear, hear.) He .coked upon religious toleration
as a sacred prinsiple of portical economy, and which, acting
in unison with the fretst exercise of eke' libsrty, so far as it
could h rendered compatibk with the general interests of
organised s ociety, hat secure I to them the completed sys-
tem of Gee ernment which the wisdom and observe ion
man had vet devised. He held, Therefore, that toleration
ought to toy extended to all sects and classes of religious
thinkers, Without any distinction or limitation being drawn,
so long as -pablie decency and public peace and tranquillity
did not suffer from the exercise ef the doctrines or
iieculiar views of any re'igion. ( Hear, hear.) When
therefore the State was called upon to legislate upon matter.,
affecting ecclesiastical subjects, what delicacy, what for-
bearance, -what circumspection, was is not necessary to em-
ploy, so t eat, while wielding tie temperal sword to repress
abes,s, net to shock the spiritual eusceetibilities or estrange
tee loyal ;y eiethoee whose religious tenets might be, as in
the United Kingdom, at variance with those of a majority
of the people? It. should be remembered that religion was
t e chief bond of human society; that history. as well as his
person/.l experience in diplomatic red _tuns with a foreign
power, had taught him that quarrels and disseusions on reli-
gious matters produced the greatest scandal, and unhinged
the whole fabric of a State. Hear) While, therefo e, thee
were animated in the discussion of the subject bef -re the
House, they ought to have a •e y desire to soothe the excite-
meta which the recent attempt to complete the organisation
of a Reman Catholic hierarchy in England had not unnatu-
rally stirred up; to be prepared to deal calmly with the evils
which it had unhappily engendered, and to direct the atten-
lion, as it was their duty, to the consequences which he, for
ne, had reason for apprehending unless corrected, would
inevitably ensue. The Noble Lord at the head of the Govern- '
ment had been taunted with taking a step backward in
bringing this motion before the House. He had been told
that he had done that which his antecedents rendered
unworthy of himself and of the great Liberal party over
which he had hitherto with so much ability presided; but,
from the opinion he had ventured to form of the oble
Lord's character, he apprehended the', in the imperative
discharge of a duty towards his country, be would not be
deterred from the free exercise of his judgment even by
considerations of his political antecedents, or at the risk of
incurring :charges similar to those to which he had
alluded.-- (Hear hear) To his mind the Noble Lord was
no-. only best consulting the interests of the party which it
was alleged he was deserting, but what was of infinitely
greater importance, the interests f the country at large, by
esting as he had done. (Cheers from the Ministerial
benches.) And, as the enactments of this Bill—although he
regretted that recea: Parliamentary dirUculties had induced
the Noble Lor f to modify them, would in no way interfer-
with the legitimate exercise and enjoyment of religious
liberty, but would merely tend to connrol abuse, he would
give the Noble Lord— in the absence of a more stringent
propos:tion—his humble bus very cordial suppi rt.— (Cheers.)
Might he be permitted to add Clan although a humble Mem
bar of the House, it was with deep feelings of regret that he
found himself unable, atter mature cansideration, to arrive at
conclusions in unison with the . pinions which had been re-
cently expressed by one toward whom - for reasons which
the House would readily understand - he bore considerable
political a eachrne st, and to whom h looked up as called
upon to occupy the place unhappily vacated in the ad-
vocacy of those measures with which the country
was endowed ?- ( oud cries of " Hear, hear.") Oa the
mo 'el of that Right Hon. Gentleman's political principles lie
(Sir R. Peel) would readily fashion his own feelings; and
happy has was to thick that upon most s dijects he could do
so, thougei upon the present occasion, consiseently with the
feelings he entertained, he was fie ced to differ from him. -
(Hear, hear.) It was precisely because he (Sir R. Peel)
was an relvocate of civil and religious liberty, which he held
to be inseparably united together, so that yon could not de-
face the one without disfiguring the other, that he gave his
adhesions to legislation upon the to-c .lied Papal aggression
Divested of its Reified' influence, and apart, if possible, from
the question of spiritual jurisdiction which Rome had as-
sumed by that act, there really appeared to him no very
serious eseause of alarm. He saw no great cause of alarm in
the simsile abstract circumstance that the tinily of an indi-
vidual priest had been satisfied—a priest, be it remembered,
who ha, the meekness to promote his own elevation by the
atsuremie that the political consequences resulting therefrom
were smierficial and transitory in their nature.—( Hear, hear.)
He held that there was no great reason for alarm in the
simple circumstance that Dr. Wiseman had been permitted, as
by the stroke of a harlequin's wand, to shuffle off the
sombre vestments of a bishop in partilms, for the gaudy
trappings of a spiritual prince, and the title of an imaginary
see.—(Hear, hear, and laughter.) After all, a cardinal's hat
and hose had not always been reserved for even such impor-
tant functions, as from the present appointment one might
be led to imagines A Medici wore a cardinal's hat in petti-
coats, and did not history point a finger of scorn at Julius
111., who:, with no great self-respect, it must be admitted,
gave away the cardinal': hat which he had vacated on his
own nomination to the Pontifical chair, to the keeper of a
menagerie of monkeys which it was his Papal pleasure to
maintain..—(Laughter.) Pio Nono, it really seemed to him,
although but so recently and so forcibly reseated in the
affectioen of his people by a sudden, and certainly very ex-
traordinary burst of religious zeal on the part of Republican
France,--and, by the way, it really seemed as if the Citizen
President of the Republic were desirous of making some
amends for the Emperor's misconduct, as where the latter
was instrumental in establishing republics, - as. for in-
stance, the Ligurian, the Cisalpine, and the Partheno-
prean,—the former had destroyed the only one be could lay
his hands upon; end where the uncle, without much dis-
play, carried of from Rome a Pope beloved by his people,
the nephew, with a very great display, and with consider-
able expense, it would appear, since it requited '3o,' 00 men,
carried back to Rome a Pope whoa presence the Romans bad
made arrangements to dispens wi-h.—( Laughter ant
cheers.) He was about to say that P o Norio really seemed
to him to espir• to the character in which Hildebran4 and
I Gregory VII. were represented in an old picture which he re-
membered seeing at Naples, with a croz er ih one hand and
a whip in the other, trampling under food the crowns of so-
orereigns, and with the nets and fishes of St. Peter by hes
side. This representation of the fiery monk of Cluny
afforded no incorrecs Portraiture of the c' erecter which Pio
Norio, with all Ws virtues and weaknesses seemed d sirous
of enacting.—(hear, hear.) But Papal history teemed
with vagaries of this nature Let the crimes, the bigotry,
and he in -oleranee of the Papacy be for the more imme-
diate appreciation of those who, now that tt e day-spring of
liberty had been eclipsed in the blood of that great man
under whose auspices it was just begi• nag to dawn over
Central Italy, were by an arbitrary tyranny endeavouring
to counteract further development, forgetful that a day of
reckoning might not be far distant, and that, unless they
profited by the lessons afforded to them, the temporal power
of the Pope, in the balancs of jus• ice, might be found want-
ing.— (Hear, hear.) But let us be careful,
" Lest, from the bounded level of our mind,
Short views we take, nor see the lengths behinds"
but as to regulate our appreciation of the recent invasion of
the prerogative of the Crown of England, as not to limit
ourselves to the immediate effect's, bus to the 4o sequences
likely to ensue. This was not the firs time at which this
country, with reference to the usurpation of authority
to appoint archbishops in this resins, had bad just cause to
complain of Rome. So far back as the reign of King John
he found Innocent 111. nominating an archbishop
to the see of Cante 'leery, whose authority and
jurisdiction John refused to recognise. The Pope
consequently placed this country under an intereict and
prohibited the King's subjects from rendering the homage
which was justly due to their sovereign, and very generously
gave this country to the King of France, whom, only a few
years before, he had also excommunicated.—( Hear, hear.)
id not eo X., in his infallibility, give to Henry VIII. the
title of " Defender ef the Faith," in consequence of a work
which he wrote on the Seven Sacraments against Luther;
yet, in a very few years after this same title was abolished,
the Fa-nese Pope (Paul ill.) promulgated the bull
In Cana Domini, w.th a view of asserting the
Pope's authority, and, at the same time, of excommuni-
cating Henry in England. These ecclesiastical thunder-
bolts, in the hands of the madmen who in the
early and middle ages usurped to tin mselyes this authority,
before the light of science and literature had disp ailed the
dark clouds of supersti ion, had a very powerful influence
over risen of ig orant minds. Then, again, in the recent
case of Piedmont, in consequence of the Sicardi laws which
had abolished certain ecclesiastical privileges, we had
witnessed another display of the power of the Roman Ca-
tholic Church at the eath-bed of one who had been instru-
mental in their adoption, but which display had nearly
Prove,' fatal to the bigotted prelate under whose auspices it
had been planned.—(Hear, hear.) Thank God we had no
serious ground for apprehension on this score in
the present day. The people ef this country,
happy in the enjoyment of civil and religious
liberty —proud of the person of their beloved overeign,
who had endeared herself to their affections by even firmer
ties than those which might naturally have at-
tached her to them—would laugh to scorn the important
attempt of that miserable political impostor to estrange
them from their duty. The Right Hon. Gentleman the Se-
cretary of State for the Home Department, in the debate
on the introduction of the Bill, said that if the mea-
sure were adopted he knew no reason for ente-taining
any apprehension of the loyalty of her Majesty's Roman
Catholic subjects; but he (Sir R. Peel) apprehended that
there were many in that House who would be inclined to
question, however painful it might be to do so, the accuracy
of that statement, and he disposee to attribute it either to a
too confiding spirit, which the loyalty of the Right Hon.
Gentleman had given expression to, than to any substantive
proofs he had adduced in support of it. He regretted, how-
ever, that the _Noble Lord, in attempting to legislate for Eng-
land, should have extended the enactments of the Bill to Ire-
land, the ecclesiastical condition of which, from the fact that
three-fourths of the inhabitants were Roman Catholics,
rendered it by no means synonymous with England.
Indeed, he could have wished that while establishing even
severer restrictions against Papal aggression in England
they had left Ireland, at all events for the moment, altoge-
ther untouched.—(Loud cries of" Rear, hear.") He
appre-
hended it to be quits possible to make a distinction ip
legis-
lating upon these matters between England and Ireland.
They could not conceal from themselves the fact that the
Bill before the House, although shorn of
its fair proper-
,
lions, would produce, if it had not alreadye serious
Majesty ':cited s dotni•
hostility and opposition in that part of her
nions. Experience had taught them howiotnena
icniodushtehetlornsnstid
Roman Catholics were cf their re.rgand
exp
science had
no fault with them on that scoret.
attempts to interfere,
also taught them how futile were
even in an indirect manner, withss' a
hantntihtaddy
acognrseiadtermeda
majority
oribtye
the free exercise of a religiononof which
d profession id faith. Let the
House then cease to
of them in one common b
direct their energies in this particular
channel ; or, if they must
legislate, let them not be guided by II
applicable to England, but e latch, as I
what, PerhaP''
regarded Ireland, I'tht b
was altogether idle and unprofitable. 'she
display of Protestant feeling recently exhibited in this
country certainly afforded some security against successful
aggression on the part of Rome ; and, although it had
been said that an attempt to get up an anti-Catholic
demonstration in the north of England had failed, his
belief was, that whatever artifice the Roman Ca-
tholicmight employ to excite a fictitious sympathy iu
their behalf on the present occasion, the Protestant people
of England did not need the exertions of any indivi-
dual to give vent to their unanimous disapproval of
the conduct which Rome had recently adopted. 1n an ad-
dress, sigeed by 40,000 Roman Catholics, recently presented
to her Majesty by three Roman CatholiCPeers, he found the
expression that they were ready "to give to Caesar the things
that were Caesar's, and to God the things that were God's;
but, remembering that this expression was susceptible of a
Jesuitical interpretation, he did not consider it by
any means
satisfactory.— (Hear, hear.) But what had experience taught
him personally in diplomatic relations to foreign
powers in a
very crit eel juncture of affairs with respect to ecclesiastical
differences? A Passive observer under the instructions of the
Noble Lord at the head of foreign affaiis, s hatever others
might suppose to the contrary, and directed not to interfere,
he had witnessed inactively, but not without emotion, the
mighty 6truggle of liberty ag dust despot am andintolerance