The Sun.
London, England, 1834-03-22 00:00:00

TUTORS.

.0 NV.

only difficulty might by some of their lordships be hel d to
be in acting upon the principle. This was no speculative
question; it was no visionary or ideal grievance which was
complained of by the dissenters. The body was highly
respectable, and yet they were compelled to endure
grievances to which others of their fellow-subjects were
strangers, merely because they could not conscientiously
subscribe to the doctrines and discipline of our church
establishment. Heavy burdens bad been imposed and were
continued on the dissenters, from which the others were
free, only because they could not conscientiously adhere to
the Church of England. By the same rule, then, and by
the same parity of reasoning, he claimed for himself, aye,
and for their lordships too, not only the right to have a
church whose doctrines they could approve, and to
whose discipline they could assent, as he would claim for
the dissenters. He would at once admit all dissenters to
the same rights as he had himself, and which, under the
present law, they could not enjoy without injuring their
consciences, and, in injuring and invading their con-
sciences, degrading and debasing themselves, by affecting to
believe in the established church when their hearts were
strangers to arid far away from it. These were first prin-
ciples admitted by almost every man. Every man in
principle admitted the right of the dissenter to be relieved
from the grievances which really oppressed Kira. He
thought the dissenters could suffer no greater hardships
than the exclusion from academical honours and situation.,
and this he would say, that he thought it impossible, that
the common law, as applied to the Universities, or their
statutes, or their by-laws, could much longer continue in
their present state. If any man could find the existence
of such statutes, or laws, which excluded men from the
fair chance of obtaining information in law or medicine,
he would put it to the country to say whether, in the
nineteenth century, they were still to beallowed to prevail.
The medical profession was in many cases a gainful one,
and in all cases it was useful ; and he must say that the
medical education in this country was placed in a most
singular situation. It was directed by two bodies, one
of which claimed a monopoly in entitling a man to prac-
tice, and the other a monopoly in refusing him such an
education as would qualify him to practice. The one
had the privilege to make doctors, and the other the pri-
vilege to refuse them the necessary knowledge for such a
pburottetshseio. mnomeOnnte of them
hecameintcoouhlit m
s 1
profession
a Ate
ihasereritof Arts,himsel
under the necessity of going elsewhere to study fur some
years before he could practise as a doctor. The truth was,
these bodies had a monopoly of incapacity to teach, with
the monopoly of conferring a degree. A person, to be a
doctor, under such circumstances, studying in London,the
emporium of knowledge, or in the provincial towns, must,
at all events, go somewhere or other that, to the universi-
ties to obtain sufficient information. This was the case
with the adherents of the church of England. But sup-
pose the case of a conscientious dissenter. At Oxford he
could obtain no sufficient education to obtain a degree, and
then he must go to some foreign country, either to Paris,
or the north of Itily, or some of the Dutch Universities,
which formerly was very much the practice; or, at all
events, he must go to one of the Scotch Universities, as
if, forsooth, they could not teach medicine in England.
Such a person must go to a country where foreign laws
existed ; and he had known a case in which, rather than
let such a person do so, the determination towards the prac-
tice of medicine was abandoned. If the dissenter, however,
wished to follow the practice of medicine, he must, at all
events, go to Scotland, away from his family, a sort of
exile from his country and his friends, and, added to that,
at great expense; and all this before he could obtain the
means of earning his livelihood. Why, he asked, should
ell this difference be between the dissenters and the
churchmen, who were fellew-subjects, living in a common
coun ry ? Why all this, but because the dissenters con-
scientiously differed from others of his fellow-subjects in
matters of religious faith and discipline. This stain, how-
ever, upon our institutions could not much longer be per-
mitted to exist. The dissenters complained justly, as
they complained loudly, and not in a tone one iota
too loud for the fair and full expression of the grievances
which they endured. The noble baron would do some-
thing towards their relief, although he was afraid tae dif-
ficulty in doing so could scarcely be surmounted. But the
noble duke took a much easier method of settling the dif_
ficulty than would strike the mind of mostordinary persons.
The noble duke would not strike at charters, and of all
other charters, nut at University charters ; but he
would have all persons seeking academical education, and
of course, or nearly so, academical honours, to subscribe
to aricles which the noble duke seemed to think a sort of
foundation, or basis, or safeguard of what he was pleased
to call christianity. Butt the noble duke should not forget,
that, however pure and admirable he (the Lord Chancellor),
together with others of their lordships, considered the
doctrines of the established church to be, there were many,
very many, conscientious people, even in England, who
did not coincide with thorn. Every one did not con-
sider the doctrines of the church of England to be of ne-
cessity the whole sum and substance of Christianity. But
the noble duke again considered that there could be no
great difficulty in this matter, for be seemed to be
of opinion that if a Dissenter obtained entrance into
a University, and there qualified himself to take a degree,
at that very moment when they were so qualified
they must be stopped short in their career, unless
they subscribed to the existing statutes. This, indeed, was
a simple process; but it was a process which never could
be acted on. Suppose the noble duke bad to meet with a
sturdy Presbyterian upon this subject—with a Presby-
terian, too, who considered some of the doctrines of the
caurch of England as savouring of paganism, inasmuch as
it resembled Popery, as they would call it, in many of its
essential doctrines. Why the Presbyterian would not
accede to the church of England, because he did not con-
sider it to be the church of God ; and yet he should not
be deprived of civil right because he conscientiously
thought so. No man should be punished who acted con.
scientiously as long as he did not violate the law ; but
when lie found the existence of certain laws, whether of
the state or the universities, aggrieve him, it was neither
unnatural nor unreasonable that he should constitutionally
ask for their repeal. The exclusion from degrees in the
universities was a serious injury to many, even in their
individual capacity ; and it was, in his opinion, a still
greater injury to the honour and well.heing of the state.
He could not help thinking that the noble duke was
exceedingly mistaken in supposing that, because this
petition was signed by only sixty members of the
college, it had not the concurrence of many others.—
(Hear, hear.) Much more he thought must the noble
duke have been in error in coming to the conclusion
that all the non-resident members, amounting, as he said,
to some three or four thousand persons, were opposed to
the prayer of the petition. He Ira t reason to believe that
the fact was the other way. Indeed he knew of his own
knowledge many, very 'flirty, non-resid, nts who were
alt .gether opposed to this system of proscription. Sin-
cerely did he wish to see the time, and he hoped and
trusted he should see it, when this great anomaly would
be done away with ; when the existing grievant es would
be removed !rem the Dissenters, and the great blot and
stain removed from the universities, under which they at
present laboured. He sincerely believed that the time
was not far distant when this would take place. In the
meantime lie trusted that these lords' articles (if be might
he allowed to use a phrase of the Scottish parliament),
tie trusted, lie said, that these lords' articles would not
prevent not only any thing from being done, but
duke
and his friends appeared to be of opinion that
been done; that the question had hitherto not only not
cwasoeu;ldbrutotthrele,,ta.oinultdhceiorai,tobeen considered, but that it had not been propounded for
thing from being considered. As it was, t
nnootbhliencr
hadue
consideration. It had been (lane, and the caput were
the great absurdity of using endeavours to prevent any-
ul
assstiojn2o
inn theo n t
months;
jneacyt:
it
was
style,:
proposed
doisei
jli twice Michaelmas,
aet withinni,s
t)rettitiCie
disc
the
st
landord
soh! siopsi nl
would
st T elrotonk. liaetwtohuilsd n:iliteesvtieonnienasteroinnetowain,icinuriery
lord-
shipsoppos opposed tars, it.—(Hear,)
arguing
aer..
be
tixstoieisifnts.t
all
11:1:11).:1,eaenr‘hdsvo,
ivipr
slanders
theirtsd‘tie,mhdi
acinnh
isqaxi
nkvunsu,affijii
junrtoceolnsddi
manner. It
:hair
that
liwitiit:dcoviiueuemslylitdttini e:avpsanbeottetsseie'etielt:litrilleue,nuuipgruttyohir(lienreaoit
ntowedtsoeni fullest i n a
nt
dli themost tray; it
ink
man could utter, to say that those illustrious bodies
them, or the checks which they had it in their power to
could doubt but great benefit must be derived from an in-
quiry so instituted and so constructed, while even the
most timid could have nothing to apprehend ? He called
upon the heads of those colleges to consider, he was going
to say the fitness, but he would say the high expediency
of such an inquiry. Ile called upon them to look with
a fixed and scrutinizing eye into the whole of these sub-
jects, and to consider how far such inquiry, with a view

to the removal of certain disabilities, viou:l be conducive
to the community generally as well as to the established

church itself.

The Duke of WELLINGTON explained.
The Earl of DURHAM said the noble duke had re-
gretted the absence of the illustrious duke who was Chan
cellar of the University of Cambridge; hut be might also
lament the presence of another illustrious duke •(the Duke
o: Cumherland) who was Chancellor of the University
of Dublin, where the practice with respect to the adinis-
sion of dissenters to college honours was altogether at
variance with that of the Universities of England. The
noble duke bad, it appeared to him, passed over, some-