The Sun.
London, England, 1834-06-03 00:00:00

but a small minority? (Cheers.) Sir, once admit this
principle, and what must follow ? Before you do admit it,
however, pray let me ask you to stop, and just con-
sider what is to follow. Where will you stop ? Now
answer that. Before you go on to this, let me, as a prac-
tical statesman, tell you that you cannot stop--that you
have not a glimmering of a hope of being able to stop, if
you once admit this doctrine of proportion. (Hear, hear.)
If ten is to be the rule, tell me why not twenty, or forty,
or fifty, or hundreds, at which I doubt not you will soon
arrive. (Cheers.) The hon. and learned member for
Dublin (Mr. O'Connell) offered the other night to take
the Protestants at one fourth ; since that time, however,
he has fallen to one-tenth ; and what reason is there that
he should not rise again to one-fourth? Once sanction
t' .loctrine of proportion, and you will have confusion
And bloodshed, and a more bitter spirit of personal
and party and religious malignity than ever you have
had to contend with yet. (Cheers.) In this country,
where all religions are equal in the eye of the law
(Ironical cheers from the Irish members),—l thank
you for that cheer, and I tell you, that in the eye of the
law they are equal—is it a matter of indifference to Par-
liament to separae the Protestant from the Catholic, so
that each may pursue his own form of worship, and be
identified with his own church ? Hear, hear.) May I
venture to tell you that if you begin to tamper and dabble
with church property, and make it appear as if nothing
worth in the eye of the country, that all church property—
all property derived for religious purposes, will soon be
looked upon as having an equally frail and precarious ex-
istence ? (Cheers.) Now I tell this house plainly—l tell
this house boldly—l tell it unequivocally, for I know lam
speaking the truth, that if you, the guardians or supposed
guardians of property, are ripe for this sort of work, the
people out of doors are not ( Great cheers) • and when I
tell you this, and you cannot deny or weaken it, I would
fain implore you to pause before you assent to bind your-
selves to a principle which you cannot carry at the present
time with the people's consent, and which you dare not
carry without. (Cheers.) I did not think there could be
found a Minister to propose such a—scheme I must call it
—I do not yet think you will find a legislature to carry it
----I am not certain you yet know of a Sovereign who will
give his assent to it. (Long continued cheering.) Now,
honestly speaking, I consider you have gone the full length
that you can or oughtto go, and most assuredly, that I will
go, in reforming the abuses of the church so far as these
matters are concerned. I think there are questions
which have still to be minutely examined, and evils
which require to be remedied ; and I for one will go
to work at the proper time with no feeble hand—l mean
with reference to pluralities (Cheers), nonresidence
(Cheers), and the internal discipline of the church. Here
purification is wanted ; in this respect you may do good—
You may make the church holier in the eyes of the people ;
by removing these blotches you may strengthen its supre-
macy over their hearts—you may strengthen it in its very
foundations, but you will do no good by involving your-
selves in the questn of a new distribution of its revenues,
alien to those purposes for which they are now liable.
(Cheers.) The hon. member for Middlesex (Mr. Hume)
has declared, that the principle now under consideration is
precisely the same as the one involved in the 147th clause
of the Irish Church Reform Bill, which was passed during
the last session of Parliament. I admit that many hon.
gentlemen took the same view of that clause which the
hon. gentleman himself took ; but he must allow I dis-
tinctly declared, on the occasion I allude to, that the pro-
perty to be dealt with by virtue of that clause was property
which did not belong to the church—which could not be-
long to the church—that it was a new property, raised by
legislative enactment upon and from an already existing
property. That I distinctly declared, as indeed did all my
colleagues who spoke upon the subject. (Hear,hear. ) The
house certainly did not look at it in the same light ; end
finding, from subsequent circumstances, that hon. mem-
bers would not admit the distinction, I felt it my duty—
seeing that it was considered as a question of appropriation
—to press its abandonment upon the house. I withdrew
that clause simply and solely because an interpretation was
put upon it unfairly, as I think, similar to that which can
fairly—of course to the only one which can at all be put on
the resolution before the house—and having said thus
much upon the subject, I do not think it neces-
sary to vindicate myself further. Indeed, I have al-
ready taken up more time—brief as it had been—than the
observations of the hon. gentleman deserved. (Hear,
hear.) If that clause bore the interpretation put upon it,
then am I glad, indeed, it was discovered in time ; for it
is a principle which, however fair and just in the eyes of
the hon. gentleman who brings forward this motion (Mr.
Ward)—and I give him full credit for honestly believing
it to be so—it is a principle, I say, which, however easily
he may assent to and follow up, I never can for one mo-
ment countenance. He tells us that the state has the right
to regulate the distribution of Church property, therefore
it is expedient to reduce that property—that is to say, be-
cause we have the right to superintend the fulfilment of the
condition on which this property was left—the sacred con-
dition that it should go towards the maintenance of the
Protestant church worship—which we, by the articles of
the union with Ireland, are again bound to maintain—he
calls upon us to exercise this right, not by fulfilling the
condition to protect and enforce which the right was vested
in us—not to turn it to any religious purpose whatever—
not to make it amenable to .any charitable object, to any
moral end—but to regulate it " in such a manner as Par-
liament may determine" that is, coolly put it in our
own pockets, or the pockets of any other persons that
we may at the moment fancy. (Cheers.) Finding that
government have, in fact, adopted the resolution, I think
that the moving the previous question only makes the
whole matter more unpalatable to several persons. Now,
my course of conduct has nothing to do with other
people's—l have done nothing in concert with any persons,
exeepting with those friends who retired with me from
the service of his Majesty ; I have spoken to no man upon
this subject ; I have advised with no man ; I care not
what others do ; I shall follow that line of conduct which
my own view of the proposition points out to be the most
proper and desirable. But I would beg hard to be allowed
to caution the house in its proceedings this night; to warn
it of the consequences ; to think how startling may be the
results of this night's vote ; and, above all, I would im-
plore honourable members to abstain from pledging them-
selves on this momentous question, before they know by
what men, at what time, and by what means the ulterior
proceedings consequent on this resolution are to be car-
ried. (Loud cheers.) I warn the house not rashly to play
with such a question, which, if once agreed to, it will be
most difficult to recede from—a question which will in-
volve. Ireland and this country in a state of excitement
unparalleled in past years--an excitement which will not
be of a passing and transient character—which will not be
confined within the period of the end of this and the be-
ginning of the next session—which may not, will not,
cannot be controlled, but which will burn for years
and years, destroying and blasting all. (Loud cheers.)
When I thus declare my adhesion to those princi-
ples upon which I entered office, which I have
clung to during the period I have had the honour to
be a minister of the crown, and for the maintenance
of which I now retire from that seat which I have pre-
viously occupied, I trust the house will do me credit for the
motives which have influenced and directed my conduct.
(Cheers.) Sacrifices have been spoken of, but I have
made no sacrifice. I have done nothing that could be con-
sidered a sacrifice when put in competition with the high
principle for which I unequivocally and unflinchingly con-
tend. (Cheers.) Thus situated, if I have made sacri-
fices, it can only be the loss of the friendship of those with
whom I have so long and so intimately acted, and the loss
of whatever character for honesty I may have possessed.
(Cheers.) But I feel, Sir, I am not thus placed.
(Cheers. ) I feel I have done nothing to deprive me of the
esteem of those whom I respect so much. Nothing to put
me under that ban which a forgetfulness of what was due
to myself would subject me. ( Great cheering.) Having
thus spoken so far, I may be permitted to add that I strongly
object to the hon. member for St. Alban's motion, but
1 coincide in-the propriety of carrying the
.previous ques-
tion. I have now, in conclusion, to apologise to the house
for the lengthened period which I have trespassed on its
indulgence (Cheers), to thank hon. gentlemen for the pa-
tience with which they have heard me. I have been placed
in a distressing situation ; I felt myself called upon to
enter on this explanation, and if I have expressed myself I
strongly, if I have hurt the feelings of any of my former
colleagues, God knows such was not my intention. No-
thing could be further from my thoughts. I have the
highest respect for them individually and collectively ; I
regret that our views do not coincide ; I lament that what
I consider the stern mandates of my duty prevent me from
treading the same paths with them. The right hon. gen-
tleman sat down amid loud and long continued cheers.
Strangers were then ordered to withdraw, but
Mr. SPRING RICE, having caught the Speaker's eye,
proceeded to state that he had listened most attentively to
what had fallen from the right hon. gentleman who had
just sat down, and could not help thinking, however his
admiration went of the ability and force of his address,
that he had said much which certainly most materially con-
cerned himself, but which did not generally bear upon the
motion then befo -e the house. With respect to the last
observations which had fallen from the right hon. gentle-
man, he (Mr. Spring Rice) with great respect, considered
they were totally inapplicable and unnecessary. Every one
acquainted with that right hon. gentleman must be aware
of the purity and uprightness of his motives, of his public
virtue, and, he might be permitted to add, of his private
worth. lie was assured his right hon. friend had acted
from the fairest and most honourable impulses ; but then
at the same time he would claim for others a like measure
lof fair and candid interpretation as to their conduct. He
3lr. Stanley) would of course concede to others what he
demanded for himself. If his former colleagues had
thought as he did, if they considered the general princi-
ple of church property would be involved by the vote which
they were prepared to give that evening, they would have
acte4 as he had done. (Cheers.) They would have taken
the position he did. (Cheers.) They had not done so,
because they felt the general principle would not be en-
dangered by the course at present submitted to the house.
There were, it was true, differences of opinion in the ca-
binet ; but upon what question had the right hon. gentle-
men split? Why upon the principle which resolved itself ,
to this—that if the revenues of the church of Ireland were]
ever SQ great; if they exceeded its wants, without any re-