The Sun.
London, England, 1834-07-05 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, SATURDAY, JULY 5, 1834.

raise a sum, it mattered not what was the amount, to relieve
the people of Ireland from the payment of tithes, God forbid
that he (Mr. O'Reilly) should interfere with their humours ;
but he could not see that any good would result from the
proposition of the Right Hon. Gentleman.
Mr. SHAW was understood to say that he wished to know
from the Right Hon. Gentleman opposite how it was pro-
posed to provide for the sum of 120,0001. now proposed to
be taken out of the Consolidated Fund ?
Mr. STANLEY then rose, and said he hardly knew whe-
ther that was the proper opportunity to enter upon a discus-
sion to the principle of this measure. But the resolution in
the hands of the Chairman appeared to him to involve a
question so important that he thought it his duty, even in
that preliminary stage of the proceeding, to state the objec-
tions which he had to it. If, however, the House signified
to him that that was not the fitting opportunity for the course
which he meant to take he would reserve his observations for
another occasion, but otherwise he would take the liberty a
stating the grounds on which he felt himself called upon to
oppose these Resolutions, and to take the sense of the House,
and he could assure them he should do so simply as a matter
of duty, as to whether they ought to adopt these Resolutions
or not.----( Hear). Now he objected to the Resolutions in the
Chairman's hands, but in stating the grounds on which his objec-
tions were founded he gave his Right Hon. Friend considerable
advantage. He begged to assure his Right Hon. Friend that
he did not object merely to the charge proposed to be made
on the Consolidated Fund ; but, in point of fact, to his whole
plan, for his objections embraced as well the two resolutions
before the House as the manner in which the money was in-
tended to be applied. He objected to these resolutions, be-
cause they would not permit—because they were not only in-
consistent, but at variance with--and because, in short, they
would altogether prevent, at any future time, the accomplish-
ment of that great principle which it had been the anxious de-
sire of the Government during the last three or four years, to
establish—namely, the extinction of tithes through the medium
of redemption. It was this grand principle which should have
formed the leading feature of any measure brought forward
on this subject, and therefore it was that he objected to these
resolutions, conceiving them as he did to be nothing more nor
less than the commencement of a system of plunder.—( Vehe-
ment cheering.) He thought them, in the first place, in the
highest degree impolitic, and in the next he must say that he
regarded them as being the most dishonest.—( Renewed cheer-
ing.) He also objected to them because the system of plun-
der which they contemplated was not palliated by anything
that was either manly or straightforward, because they exhi-
bited all the timidity without the dexterity of even the most
unpractised shoplifter._( Renewed cheering.) His Right
Hon. Friend, he hoped, would excuse his using such a com-
parison ; and if the House did not think he was descending
too low, he would say that he had never witnessed anything
like the principle on which the Government were proceeding
in this instance, except among a class of persons who were
not generally received into society, but who were commonly
to be met with on race courses and at country fairs, the instru-
ments of whose calling were a small deal table and four or
five thimbles.—( Great cheering and laughter.) Yes, a class
of persons whose system of plunder was conducted by a dex-
terous shifting of a pea, and calling on the bystanders to say
which thimble it was under. As in that case the individual
who speculated on the manoeuvres of the juggler would have
his property taken from him by means which lie could net
comprehend, so would it be in the present instance.—( Hear,
hear, and laughter.) He would admit that his illustration
was a low one, but then he thought the House would agree
with him in saying it was the selfsame principle which his
Right Hon. Friend, which his Majesty's present Government
seemed to be following.---( Cheers.) But to complete the
picture, his Right Hon. Friend had got the pocket of the
Church, the pocket of the State, the pocket of the landlord,
the pocket of the tenant, the Perpetuity Fund, and the Con-
solidated Fund, under his various thimbles, and these he
shifted about from one thimble to another as he thought fit, at
the same time that he called upon them to say under which of
the thimbles they were to be found, and kept exclaiming,
" We have them under this thimble ; oh, no ! but they must
be under that ;" and so on until all the thimbles were taken
up, when it would be found that the property had alto-
gether disappeared, and that the speculator would have
disappointment for his pains.—( Hear, hear, and laughter.)
He repeated that the reason why he objected to the present
proposition which his Right Hon. Friend had brought before
the House was, because it involved the total defeat of a prin-
ciple which it had been the object of the Government for the
last three or four years past to carry into effect, and which he
considered of the utmost importance, namely, the gradual ex-
tinction of tithes by means of composition and redemption.—
( Hear, hear.) The Committee, he was sure, would excuse
him for recurring to transactions in which he had taken an
active part, for speaking of himself and the views which he
had always entertained on this subject.—( Hear, hear.) He
had the honour to be appointed to the office of Chief Secretary
of State for Ireland, in the winter of 1830, and to hold that
office down to the year 1833. At the period he entered office
as Irish Secretary, the opposition to the payment of tithes
commenced, and was subsequently carried on to a considerable
extent. The House must recollect the proceedings that took
place in 1831, and that it was then impossible to direct the
public attention to anything but the subject of Reform, which
was then the all-engrossing topic, and led to the dissolution
of Parliament in the month of May. A few days ago he found
the copy of a letter which he addressed to his Noble Friend
at the head of his Majesty's Government in Julic,
and in that letter he strongly stated it to be his view,
that it was absolutely necessary to interpose the authority
of the State, to preserve from destruction a spe-
cies of property which had been assailed, not only
by violence but fraud.—( Cheers.) He further stated to his
Noble Friend in this communication the difficulties which would
arise from imposing on the police new duties, duties that were
not only invidious, but, generally speaking, unsuccessful, and
calling out the military to meet the legal ingenuity of the op-
posite party. The certain result of such a system, he told his
Noble Friend, would be an increased hatred to the Protestant
Church, an increased irritation throughout the country, and a
positive encouragement to those who objected to the payment
of tithes to resist the law. He even ventured to recommend
to his Noble Friend, for the first time, that it would be expe-
dient to effect an extinction of tithes by means of composition
and redemption. He suggested that might be accomplished by
throwing the burden prospectively—he said prospectively—
upon the landlord, and bringing in a measure allowing the
landlord to relieve himself from the burden by making a pay-
ment equivalent to a given number of :years' purchase. He
stated these facts to the Committee in order to show that at
an early period of his official career he had directed the atten.
tion of the Government not only to the evils that existed, but
to the means by which he believed these evils might be remedied.
Conformably to the recommendation which he had given to his
Noble Friend at the head of Government, what had been done ?
Why, at the commencement of next session his Majesty,
in a speech from the Throne, recommended that Parliament
should effect some improvement in the laws relating to tithes,
and by that means afford the protection that was necessary
for preserving the property of the Established Church, in
order to remove the causes of complaint which then existed.
( Hear, hear.) His Noble Friend, the present Secretary of
State for the Home Department, moved for a Committee con-
formable to the recommendation of the Crown, and he would
beg the attention of Hon. Gentlemen to the words which his
Noble Friend used upon that occasion. His Noble Friend
said-4, The Committee would have to consider whether it
would not be wise to complete some more comprehensive
measure, the object of which should be to place the property
of the Church upon a firmer basis, more advantageous to the
clergy, and less grievous to the people, by facilitating the re-
demption of tithes, and applying the produce, under whatever
regulations might be deemed proper, to the maintenance of
the ministers of religion." Such were then the views of his
Majesty's Government on going into that Committee ; and at
that period, whatever other measures were contemplated, they
looked to the total extinction of tithes by the means he had
mentioned as the only way in which the question could be sa-
tisfactorily and finally settled—as the only means by which the
heartburnings and jealousy that existed could be effectually re-
moved, and the Protestant religion independently and securely,
maintained without shocking the feelings of the Roman Ca-
tholics. These, he repeated, were the views with which
the Government went into that Committee, and their object
was not only to extend the principle of composition but to lead '
by reduction to the final extinction of tithes. That Commit-
tee proposed (he referred to the second report of the Com-
mittee on Tithes) that in all future leases the landlord should
be made responsible for the payment of the tithe composition.
They also thought it desirable that while an additional obli-
gation, if not a pecuniary burthen, was imposed on the landed
proprietor, that. Parliament should hold out to him some easy
mode by which he could facilitate his own relief, adding their
belief that the landlords generally, if favourable terms were
offered to them, would gladly consent ; a feeling that ought
to be encouraged to render the annual charge on their estates
a fixed money payment. The Committee went on to show the
means by which tithes should in future be raised, and con-
cluded by recommending that a Bill should be brought in for
amending the provisions of the Tithe Composition Act, and
to render the payment permanent and compulsory. They also
recommended the establishment of an ecclesiastical corpora-
tion for the collection of the revenues of the church, and that
recommendation, he admitted, was carried into effect by the
present measure, according to which those revenues were to
be c(Alected by the State. And thirdly, and lastly, they ad-
vised the conversion of tithe into land. These were the recom-
mendations of the Committee of 1832; and what was the course
pursued by the Government in 1833, when he was a member of
it? Why, they endeavoured to remove the obstacles that were in
the way of the grand principle which they had laid down for
their own guidance one by one, and to approach it gradually step
by step.--( Hear.) But if these resolutions were adopted
what would be the consequence ? Would they not defeat the
whole course of policy which had been pursued by the Go-
vernment, and prove that Isis Majesty's Ministers were now
shrinking from a principal which they had formerly sanctioned?
—( Hear.) In 1833 the committee must recollect that the
difficulty in the collection of tithes was so great, so insuper-
able, on the part of the unassisted clergy, that, having esta-
blished a system of compulsory composition, he, on the part of
the Government, prevailed upon Parliament—but on the faith
that substantive measures for putting an end to the ques-
tion would shortly be introduced—to grant the sum of one
million for the purpose of paying the arrears of tithes owing
down to 1834. This sum, he repeated, was granted in the confi-
tdoesnecteatehtaht
emgetaiessutrioens tr;v ohunl
td
abne
al
te broughtrato nf o
nr forwardo
ni
lny 107834 e i fir
ennaml y_
stances but of principles had since takOn place, which left the
question as far from being settled as ever:--( Heat:, hear.) He
hs hr
oo
uu
gl should
tn ofowrwshaordrtlfyor adt
hv
ee r t e
oti
no p
othet
omn e aosfu ttlei
tst.;
es, commencing
oni
n. hmacdeennetibeenlneg_
mw latnh
(t. the r
.B
Gi lo thruordnu)c
oe dp
pions
iltBe h bye the
Member Rightfo r
niversity
of.; Cambridge. That Bill provided that in all cases o;future
leases the landlord, and not the tenant, should be the pex:,Y
. .

liable to pay the composition, and if it were paid by the tenant
he would be entitled to deduct the amount from his rent on
producing the Clergyman's receipt. This, however, had not
the effect that was anticipated from it. Where the rent was
245. the landlord covenanted with the tenant for the payment of
275., but he never applied for more than 245., leaving the 3s.
which belonged to the clergyman in the hands of the tenant,
as the production of the receipt was a matter of perfect indiffer-
ence to him. The Legislature evidently intended to throw
the whole burden of the responsibility and pressure of the tithes
on the landlord, and to leave him to make his own bargain with
the tenant ; but this, as he had stated, failed. In the Bill
which he (Mr. Stanley) introduced two years ago, this same
principle was carried still further. It was in that measure pro-
vided that the composition should be recoverable, not from
the tenant, but from the landlord, and from him alone. Now
a great portion of the land of Ireland was held by tenants
at will, or from year to year ; and it was further provided that
in all these cases the liability should attach to the landlord
alone, and the effect of this arrangement had been to reduce_
the number of tithepayers in one district from 16,000 or
17,000 to 9,500, and thereby of course greatly facilitating
the means of collection. These were the state of things in
November, 1833, and it would be recollected that at the
opening of the present Session his Majesty in the Speech he
delivered from the throne said—
" I recommend to you the early consideration of such a final ad-
justment of the tithes in that part of the United Kingdom as may
extinguish all just causes of complaint, without injury to the rights
and property of any class of my subjects, or to any institution in
Church or State."
These were the words put by the Government into his Majesty's
mouth at the commencement of the present Session.—( Hear,
hear.) And here was the principle on which the Government
were hound to act.--( Hear, hear.) Here was the principle of
the Bill which his Right Hon. Friend had introduced, the Bill
which he (Mr. Stanley) then held in his hand, but not the Bill
which his Right Hon. Friend now called upon them to sanc-
tion.—( Hear, hear.) Here was the principle of the Bill
brought forward at the beginning of the Session ; but not only
had his Right Hon. Friend thrown overboard the essential
parts of that Bill, but introduced into it principles that were
diametrically at variance with those with whom he had set out.
—( Cheers.) When his Right Hon. Friend brought this sub-
ject forward in February last, he made a very clear statement
to the House—much more clear and satisfactory than that
which he had made on the present occasion. He then stated
the measures which the Government intended to carry into
effect, but he separated the question of appropriation from the
other questions involved in the case, although he laid down
the principle as to whether hereafter the right of appropria-
tion might not rest with the State. The Right Hon. Gentle-
man's own words were—" Before he proceeded farther, he
would beg leave to caution Hon. Members of all parties
against admitting the impression on their minds that the
subject involved, in any respect, the question of the ap-
propriation of Church property. That was a question per-
fectly distinct from that which it was his duty to bring
before the Committee. The question of appropriation of
Church property had heretofore been the subject of
Parliamentary discussion, and might hereafter constitu-
tionally become so again. He fully admitted that point, but
he wished the Committee to understand that the question it
would have to consider was, how the property of the Church
could best be realized unconnected with any considerations
relative to its appropriation ; in short, the question which the
Committee would have to consider was simply and entirely one
of property, as much so as if it referred solely to the payment
of rent. That this was the fact was abundantly proved by
the fact that the opposition to the payment of tithes the
property of lay impropriators was as violent, if not more so,
as that offered to the payment of those which belonged to the
Church." His Right Hon. Friend went on to state the
means by which this property was intended to be rescued.
" The great end and object," he said, " of the measure
would be to find out the means of effecting a practical com-
mutation of tithes in the quickest possible manner into land,
and the best way, in his opinion, to accomplish this would be
to confer on that description of property now threatened with
annihilation all the security which it was in the power of
Parliament to confer upon it."' Such was the character of
the measure which his Right Hon. Friend said on the 20th
of February it was the intention of the Government to intro-
duce; but he should like to know how the present measure
could give to tithe property " all the security which it was in
the power of Parliament to confer upon it ?"—( Hear, hear,
hear.) This was a statement which his Right Hon. Friend
had made over and over again, but he (Mr. Stanley) had
said that the conduct of the landlords as to whether they
would or not redeem their tithes would mainly depend
on the course which the Government pursued. If they
found the Government offered them favourable terms--
if they found that it was the determination of the Government
to vindicate the law in asserting their rights, as they were
bound and ought to do, he had no doubt the landlords would
co-operate with them; but if, on the contrary, they found the
Government faltering in their purpose—if they found them
shrinking from one measure, and taking up another, abandoning
this principle and adopting that, not only would the landlords
refuse to co-operate with them, but they must expect that
their proceedings would not be sanctioned by the Members of
that House.—( Cheers.) Those Members who had supoorted
the Bill as it originally stood would not submit to the adop-
tion of the present measure with the same sort of obedience,
and therefore he asserted that not only the landlords but the
tenan` an,l indeed every man in the country, would despise a
Government which exhibited such ind,c,,dity and want of firm-
ness of purpose.--( Loud cheers.) The main object of the
Bill as it originally stood was redemption with a view to the
final extinction of tithes, and that he contended was the only
honest mode of treating the question. Redemption with a
view to that end was the principle on which the Bill was in the
firs instance framed, and it was that principle, and that prin-
ciple alone, which palliated such an interference with the
rights of property. But what became of that which was
the main object of the bill when the redemption clauses
were struck out ? They preserved all its unjust machinary,
while they deprived it of its just object.—( Hear.) But so
recently as the 20th of February his Right. Hon Friend
himself justified the principle of redemption, which had been
laid down on the ground that it was necessary for the state to
take into its own hands the collection of this property, and
that it ought, therefore, to be fairly compensated for the risk
and expenses it might be put to on that account, provided no
additional charge was to be thrown on the Consolidated Fund.
But what was his Right Hon. Friend's new scheme ? Why,
that the state should pay 120,0001. a year to carry this mea-
sure into effect. His Right Hon. Friend had, however,
omitted to state how it was that he expected to get back this
money. Now his Right Hon. Friend told them that if this
sum were paid, the landlords would hereafter be induced to
redeem their tithe. Would they ? Let him just see how that
matter stood. A deduction of twenty per cent. was to be
made from the tithe-owner to defray the expenses of collec-
tion, while the tithe-payer was to have a reduction of as much
as forty per cent. Over and above the expenses of collection,
there would be a difference of twenty per cent. to come out of
the Consolidated Fund, so as to make up the forty per cent.
to the landlord ; but how was this deficiency to be made good
to the state? Here then was another instance of his Right
Hon. Friend's thimble-shifting.
Mr. LITTLETON observed that forty per cent. would not
have to be paid in all cases.
Mr. STANLEY—In all cases where they did not charge
the landlord at the rate of seventeen years' purchase for his
tithes forty per cent. would have to be paid. He would not
say that four-fifths might not be a fair proportion, or that
where land sold at twenty years' purchase tithes should not I
sell at sixteen. His Right Hon. Friend had said that the
average price of land in nineteen counties was twenty years'
purchase, and the average price of tithes sixteen. But then
it should be recollected that in all these cases when the land-
lord failed or did not choose to redeem his tithes within three
years, he would have a permanent charge of 3i per cent. upon
the amount of the purchase-money fixed upon his property.
The Right Hon. Gentleman asserted that the titheowner
would get no more than 591. 10s. for every 1001., while the
landowner was benefitted to the extent of 40 per cent.
Mr. LITTLETON said that 40 per cent. was the utmost
that would be allowed in any case.
Mr. STANLEY—Whenever the tithes sold for less than
seventeen years' purchase the titheowner, he repeated, would
get only 591. 10s. for each 1001., although the benefit to the
tithe payer would extend to 40 per cent., and therefore his
Right Hon. Friend need not tell him that it was not intended
to go beyond that point. In all cases where the tithes happened
not to be worth seventeen years' purchase he (Mr. Stanley)
believed the advantage to the landlord would be full 40 per cent.
But he thought the Government would have done much better
if they had gone straightforward, instead of adopting so circu-
itous a course—if they had at once declared that they intended
to give a bonus of one-fifth out of the property of the Church,
and a second bonus of one-fifth out of the Consolidated Fund.
Now if this was really what they meant why did they not
manfully say so ? Why did they not at once go in a straight-
forward and candid manner to that which was their real pur-
pose ?—( Cheers.) In February last his Right Hon. Friend
proposed to throw the whole burden of tithes and their col-
lection upon the landlord, and to give him the power of re-
covering the arrears : but to this he (Mr. Stanley) did not
object, because, the arrears being the property of the tithe-
owner, it followed, if the landlord purchased the tithes, that
he would have a right to look to the tithepayer. He fully
agreed to all this : but surely he had a right to ask his Right
Honourable Friend why that which was expedient on the
20th of February should be inexpedient on the 4th of July.—
( Hear, hear, hear.) It was, he contended, contrary to every
principle of right and justice that the landlord, who was to be
put to neither risk nor trouble, should receive so large a bonus :
and it was idle to suppose that redemption would ever be
effected under this Bill. If it was the intention of the Go-
vernment to abide by that principle, why should they shrink
from enforcing it ? But if they did not mean to abide by it,
why not say so at once ?—( Hear, hear, hear.) Would it
not be better to adopt some equitable means of getting rid
of this annual payment altogether, instead of perpetuating it,
by making it a permanent charge at the rate of three and a
half per cent. on the amount of the purchase money ? It was
perfectly absurd to suppose that landlords either in Ireland or
England would redeem their tithes under such circumstances.
They now paid four and five per cent. for money, and the
low rate of interest which this measure proposed would
effectually prevent them from availing themselves of the law.
That House had already decided that this was the property
of the Church by appropriating it to Church uses through the
Act of last Session. That decision having been taken by
Parliament he now warned them that they could not resist it,
and he believed the Government did not, in reality, wish to
resist it.—( Hear, hear.) But he wanted them to speak out
as to what their wishes and intentions were.—(Loud cheers.)
He wanted to know in what light the Perpetuity Fund was to
be regarded. His Noble Friend had dropped some significant
words, to the effect that if the means of carrying their plan
into effect should fail they must look out for what other sources

could supply them. It appeared to them that the Church
property was to be applied, not for the spiritual edification of
the people, as his Noble Friend the Member for Yorkshire had
expressed it—( A laugh)—but to be given as a boon in the
shape of twenty per cent. to induce landlords to take upon
themselves the payment of tithe. What was the amount of
the fund at present? At the most it was 60,0001., and for
that paltry sum they were about to commit this petty larceny.
—(Loud cheers and laughter.) It was a petty larceny ; for
it had not the boldness or the openness of a robbery, besides
the insignificance of the amount. As to the pretence that the
object altered the character of the act, it was just as if a high-
wayman stopped him upon the road, and, putting a pistol to his
breast, said, " Give me your money ; you have too much,
and it is tempting, and to give it up will greatly increase the
security of your life."--( A laugh.) Just so his Right Hon.
Friend had told them, and he had given them no other rea-
son, that the property of the Church was to be taken from it
to make it more secure, and he would just as soon trust the
one party as the other.—( Hear, hear.) Nay, he would go
farther—he would trust the highwayman with his life, but
after the Government had once laid their hands upon this
fund he would not trust them with the remaining property of
the church.—(Loud cheers.) His Right Hon. Friend would
gain from this 60,0001., a revenue of some 3,0001. a year, and
upon this security he called upon the House to advance
100,0001. He wanted to know distinctly, did his Right Hon.
Friend and the Government mean or not to go for the whole
of the funds so advanced upon the Established Church ? If
they had made up their minds to that, let them fairly avow it
to the House and to the country.—( Loud cheers.) Let them
know upon what ground they were standing. He called upon
them to do this, as they valued the peace of Ireland ; as they
wished to avoid not only heart-burnings and animosities, but
bloodshed and murders.—( Hear, hear.) He called upon
them to act upon their opinions, whatever they were, and to
revoke that miserable abortion of an expedient, the Irish
Church Commission.—( Loud cheering.) He called it a mi-
serable abortion. Was it not so ? Why it was begotten, con-
ceived, and came into life in one short week.—( Immense
cheering and laughter.) He did not mean to say that some
such idea had not been started four or five months ago.—
( Cheers from the Treasury Benches.) But now this he would
say, and he called upon those who cheered to deny it if they
could, that from that period down to the night of the motion
of the Hon. Member for St. Alban's, the subject was never a
matter of discussion in the Cabinet.--( Cheers.) Nay, he
would say more—the Cabinet had repudiated it as a proposi-
tion, if not vicious in principle, yet absolutely impracticable in
operation.—( Loud cheering.) And why ? Because, they be-
lieved that if they durst have proposed it, the country would
not have accepted it.—( Vehement cheering.) This was the
consideration which the matter had received from the Govern-
ment, and it was after this that it had now determined to send
these Commissioners before their time—

" Into this breathing world scarce half made up,
And that so lamely and unfashionable,
That dogs bark at them as they halt by."
(Great laughter.) He had a right to say, then, that it was a
miserable expedient, struck off in the heat of the moment to
meet the motion of the Hon. Member for St. Alban's.—
( Cheers.) He said this because he had heard insinuations
that the late Cabinet had entertained similar proposals to
those now before the country. He felt bound to say, on the
part of his noble friends who had acted with him, that they
never had consented to entertain any such project as that of
the commission which had now been issued, and never would.
—(Loud cheers.) He now called upon the government to
say whether this Perpetuity Fund was to be viewed in a dif-
ferent light from the rest of the church property, or whether it
was to be understood that the mode of dealing with it was to
be applied to the'rest ? He asked of them from what sources
they meant to make good the deficiencies in the payments if
the Perpetuity Fund should be insufficient to cover them ? He
asked them whether, if without sending out their Commis-
sioners they had determined upon giving a reduction of forty
per cent. to the landlord, it was necessary for them afterwards
to institute the inquiry whether they had any surplus or not ?
!lad they not evidently made up their minds upon what they
meant to do ? And if they had—and he would rather hear
them avow it if it were so than have the question left in its
present doubtful state—let them recal the commission and
abandon at once a measure which, in this country was only
a subject of ridicule, and in Ireland be feared would be looked
upon with more serious feelings of distatc.—( Hear, hear,
hear.) He made this call upon the Government in a strong
belief of the inexpediency and injustice of this robbery, as
he conceived it to be, this confiscation of property without
the prospect of any one compensatory result. It was impossi-
ble that the measure could lead, as had Seen stated by his
Right Hon. Friend, to an adjustment of the question of
tithes ; it was not a measure of that character, but merely one
for tiding over the present session-.( Cheers)--leaving the main
question just where it was, with this difference, indeed, that
they would have added an act of gratuitous and useless confis-
cation to its other embarrassments. Before they did this he
wished to call their attention to the solemn warning given upon
this subject by a Noble and Learned Lord in another place.
He did not mean the Noble and Learned Lord the Lord
Chancellor of England, although he had stated in his place
that the clergy were co-partners with the landlord, and had
as good a right to their one-tenth as he to the other nine. He
meant to refer to the language of another Noble and Learned
Lord, holding a high official situation in Ireland, and who, by
reason of his office, must be still presumed to be consulted by
his Majesty's Ministers with regard to the measures affecting
that country. Tn IR:M. that Noble and L0.r.,..a Lard (Lord
Plunket), stated his opinion in Parliament upon the question
of church property. He said, " that it stood upon the same
principle as the private property of every man in the kingdom,
and was equally liable, but not more so than any other, to be
called upon to meet the exigencies of the State. But, he re-
peated, the property of one description was as sacred as the
other, and that to take away from, or infringe the rights of,
one class of property and not of all would be spoliation." The
Noble and Learned Lord then went on to caution the Legis-
lature against the consequences of such an act. He said,
" If they begin with the church let the landholder look to
himself.—( Hear.) Let the fundholder likewise take care, as
he lay still more convenient for such an operation than the
church."—( Hear.) The present Lord Chancellor of Ireland
then went on to speak of the Established Church in that
country as a political institution. He said, " With respect
to the Protestant Establishment in Ireland, he thought it
necessary not only that there should be an Established
Church, but that the Establishment should be richly en-
dowed."--( Hear, and a laugh.) He (Mr. Stanley) was
glad to hear that cheer, and especially from the the Hon. Mem-
ber for St. Alban's, because he hoped that he concurred in
the Lord Chancellor's opinion—" He wished that the esta-
blishment should be richly endowed to enable the clergy to
take their station among the Nobles of the land.—( Hear. )
But, speaking in a political point of view, he had no hesita-
tion in saying that the existing Protestant Establishment in
Ireland was the great bond of union oetween the two coun-
tries.—( Cheers.) If ever the unfortunate moment should
arrive at which the Legislature should rashly lay hands upon
the property of the church that moment would seal the doom
of the union, and terminate for ever the connection between
the two countries."—( Cheers.) This was the opinion of the
Noble and Learned Lord whom the Government must, of
course, be considered likely to consult upon such measures as
they were now taking. And if so, he could not but conceive
that the Noble and Learned Lord would be in a somewhat
embarrassed position if called upon to reconcile the present
principles of the Government with those which he advanced
in 1824.—( Hear, hear, hear.) He concurred with the Noble
and Learned Lord's opinions and principles of 1824.
(Cheers.) He believed with him that to apply to church
property the principles of the present measures, and so to
make distinctions between it and all other species of property,
was confiscation and spoliation, and nothing else.—( Cheers.)
Believing this, and believing the measure calculated to pro-
duce no compensation for the violence so done to the rights of
property in restoring the peace of Ireland, and feeling that it
was a departure from the principles which he had hitherto
assisted in carrying into effect, for all these reasons he should
certainly feel it his duty to take the sense of the Committee
upon the resolutions moved by his Right Hon. Friend.—( The
Right Hon. Gentleman sat down amidst great cheering.)

Lord ALTHORP said he was not all surprised at the
cheers which, from the other side of the House, had ever and
anon hailed the speech of his Right Hon. Friend—( Cheers,
and hear, hear)—for it was a speech which had verified all
his (Lord A.'s) anticipations which, during the time the Hon.
Gentleman had sat on the Ministerial benches, he had formed
as to what that Right Hon. Gentleman's speeches in opposition
would be.—( Loud laughter.) A plentiful admixture of the
terms " revolution,"—" robbery,"—" spoliation,"---" thimble-
shifting and riggery," sounded very stirring in an opposition
speech ; and the Right Hon. Gentleman seemed to know how
to use them to the best advantage; but beyond obtaining the
plaudits of the other portion of the opposition, these expletives
had but little effect. The Hon. Member had frequently been
talking of what he had done while Secretary for Ireland—the
measures he had taken and recommended to settle the tithe
question, and restore peace to Ireland—( Ironical cheers from
the Irish opposition Members)—that had undoubtedly been the
ultimate object of the Right Hon. Gentleman, and he (Lord
Althorp) would not say that he thought the means adopted by
the Right Hon. Gentleman were unwise ; but unfortunately
they were taken up too late.--( Hear, hear.) Had the Right
Hon. Gentleman flourished in an administration of times gone
by, the adoption of the means taken by him might have been
more successful ; but whatever the intrinsic wisdom of those
plans, he could not at all congratulate his Right Hon.
Friend on the success of his exertions.—( Cheers from the
opposition benches.) The question then arose whether Go-
vernment, having adopted those former plans, attempted to
carry them into effect, and found that instead of producing
peace and content in Ireland, they had entirely failed in ac-
complishing their objects--the question was, whether it was
not the bounden duty of Ministers to attempt to gain their
ends by other means ?—( Hear, hear.) Surely after having
experienced the utter impracticability of the former measure,
the Right Honourable Gentleman was not entitled to bring
forward as an objection to the present measure, that it
proposed means which were different from those which
had caused the failure of that former measure.—( Hear.)
The proposition in the former Bill was to have the sums
raised by the composition of tithe given in trust to an
ecclesiastical corporation, to be vested in land for the benefit
of the clergy ; but this idea had been abandoned. The more
immediate object in view had always been to relieve the occu-
pying tenant from the payment of tithe, and to fix it upon
the owner, and to effect this as soon as possible; and from
this principle the present measure did not depart. The
great object was to convert the tithe into a rent-charge
upon landlords as soon as possible, and this was the
reason why those landlords were offered such liberal terms
on condition of anticipating the period of five years ; not
that he by any means considered those terms as too high,
considering the security it would afford the Church, and
the peace it would restore to Ireland.—(Loud cheers.)