The Sun.
London, England, 1860-01-02 00:00:00

ELECTION INTELLIGENC'E.

READING.

MEETING OF THE LIBERAL ELECTORS.

A large meeting of the Liberal electors of Read-
ing took place on Wednesday evening last, in the
New Hall. The chair was occupied by the late
Mayor, Mr. C. J. Andrewes ; and on the platform
were Sir Francis Goldsmid (the Liberal candidate) ;
the Rev. W. Legg, 8.A., pastor of Broad-street
Chapel ; Mr. Alderman Darter, Mr. Alderman Wal-
ford. Mr. Councillor Boorne, Mr. Councillor Collier,
Mr. Councillor Clark, Mr. H. H. Cowslade, Mr. T.
Rogers, Mr. C. Barber Mr. Easton, Mr. S. Gostage,
Mr. Barrett, Mr. S. Beggs, Mr. Leach, Dr. Buck,
Mr. Chancellor, &c.
Sir F. GOLDSMID, on stepping forward to address
the meeting, was loudly cheered. He commenced
by remarking there were many new voters whom
the last registration placed on the list, and of
whom, he was told, the Conservative Association
boasted they were entitled to two-thirds. (Laugh-
ter.) Now, he had no doubt, from the result of
his canvass among these, that the majority of
them would enrol their votes in his favour. (Hear,
and cheers.) Many electors, too, who at the last
election supported the Conservative cause, had seen
the error of their ways ; and when they put these
things together they would find no difficulty in
understanding the grounds upon which he based
the conclusion that the week after this would see
him placed in the position to which he aspired.
(Loud cheers.) Thus much would be about all ho
need say, if he had simply to give an account of his
own proceedings ; but he must advert to the pro-
ceedings which had taken place on the other side.
The course taken by the Liberals was straightfor-
ward aid simple, but the course which they had
seen adopted on the other side was one of going
backward and forward, and one which required
some attention to understand. (Hear, hear, and
laughter.) Beside that, there was a matter to
which he desired to advert, and that was the
attempt to put forward, in order to injure his posi-
tion as a candidate for their suffrages, the cry of
religion. He would refer to the handbill signed
by Dr. Cowan—(hisses, and cries of " Shame ! ")
and circulated in the town ; it was reducible to two
propositions, the first being that those who would
vote for him would reject Christianity ; and the
second, that in electing him as their member they
would run the risk of bringing down upon this
happy country the judgments of Heaven. (Deri-
sive cries, and laughter.) He would now examine
that extraordinary document, and request them to
consider with him what was the doctrine of the
Christian religion upon this subject ; he did not ask
them to take his opinion upon the matter, but he
should say, if he might imagine cr judge for him-
self on the subject, that the Christian religion,
being a religion of peace, could not adopt as one of
its principles that those who held other religious
views should be deprived on account of their con •
scientious adherence to them of privileges to which,
as citizens, they were entitled. While that might
be his own opinion, he did not ask them to take it,
but to consider the opinions of Christians as eminent
for their piety as Dr. Cowan ; of politicians who were
far more entitled to respect for their experience and
deliberate judgment than either Mr. Benson or Mr.
Simonds ; and of ministers of religion, belonging
to both Church and Dissenting bodies, who were to
the full as able and as zealous in their attachment
to Christianity as the clergyman who, a fortnight
ago, he (Sir F. Goldsmid) was told, chose his pulpit
as the place for the utterance of a political diatribe.
(Shame.) When the opinions of all those pious
Christians to whom he had referred were in favour
of the Admission of the Jews into Parliament, he
woull ask what grounds Mr. Benson or his sup-
porters had for declaring that the electors of Read-
ing would abandon Christianity if they adopted the
views of all those eminent persons? (Hear, hear.)
The person to whom he would first refer was he who
brought forward, as long ago as 1830, a bill for the
removal of the Jewish disabilities—Mr. Robert
Grant, afterwards Sir Robert Grant. He was a per-
son not merely of professed Christianity but he was 1
a man commanding and deserving, from his religi-
ous life and conversation, the highest respect of
Christians who knew him. On that occasion he did
not succeed, but in 1833 he brought forward the
bill again, and succeeded in carrying it through the
House of Commons. (Cheers.) Now, the next per-
son to whom he would refer was Lord Bexley, who
in the same year brought forward the bill in the
House of Lords. He was not only a Christian but a
Conservative also, yet he professed Christianity and
Conservatism of a different class from those of the
Tories of Reading—(cheers)—and considered that
neitherhis attachment to the one nor the other pre-
vented him exerting himself to procure justice for
the Jews, by their admission into Parliament.
(Cheers.) On that occasion the present Archbishop
of Dublin and the then Bishop of Chichester spoke
in favour of the bill proposed by Lord Bexley. The
bill was passed again and again in the House of
Commons until 1858, and during that time many
persons, distinguished for their religious zeal, were
exerting themselves in favour of the measure.
Among these were Dr. Thirl wall, Bishop of St. Da-
vid's, and many other bishops ; and on the very last
occasion, when the bill was brought for ward and car-
ried, seven bishops of the Established Church voted
in favour of it, (Cheers.) Then to return to the Dis-
senters; during the whole of the period—or at all
events during a large portion of the time—petitions
were sent from all parts in favour of the measure.
The deputies of the four Dissenting denominations
were always among the petitioners. He might
mention the names of a number of eminent indivi-
duals, but he would only select two, because they
were conspicuous as being persons remarkable for
their religious zeal, while at the same time they
took an active part in favour of the removal of the
Jewish disabilities. The fact was Sir William Page
Wood, now Vice-Chancellor, who was known as
belonging to what was called the High Church
party, but who was one of the most liberal of men,
and a most zealous Christian, and who was one of
the most generous benefactors to churches and
schools for religious education that could be found.
He exerted himself to procure the admission of the
Jews into the Legislature, by endeavouring to show
that the law, even before it was altered, sanctioned
their admission. He would next refer to Lord Car-
lisle, who was a distinguished member of the Evan-
gelical party. He was a liberal man, and disposed
to good works, and the first speech he made was in
support of the removal of the Jewish disabilities.
(Cheers.) On a subsequent occasion he brought
forward in the House of Lords the bill fee that pur-
pose, and throughout the whole of the struggle—
from 1833 to 1858—he did whatever lie could in its
favour. That furnished another example of not
only a Christian, but an eminently pious and bene-
ficent Christian, who warmly supported the admis-
sion of Jews into the House of Commons. (Cheers.)
lie would not multiply individual instances, for he
might detain them all night by noticing these ; but
would now refer to great bodies of Christians who
had displayed in the most conspicuous manner
those same opinions, and he would first allude to
the citizens of Laudon. (Cheers.) If this consti-
tuency would contract guilt by returning him (Sir
F. Goldsmid) to Parliament, the citizens of London
must have incurred far greater guilt by return-
ing a Jew time after time until the measure was
passed, allowing Jews to sit. (" Hear," and
cheers.) In 1817 the city of London returned
Baron Rothschild to the House of Commons, and
again and again they submitted to the loss of the
services of one of their members rather than aban-
don that which they considered to be one of the
greatest principles of civil and religious liberty—
that no man should Ise debarred, on account of his
conscientious views, from enjoying privileges to
which he was entitled as a citizen. (Cheers.) But
he had not yet done. There was another body,
more important far than the citizens of London, a
body which represented the whole of this kingdom;
the august assembly of which Mr. Benson was seek-
ing to be made a member, but which, according to
his own statements, had rejected its Christian duty
and its Christian faith;. he, of course, meant the
House of Commons. (Cheers.) During the 25 years
from 1833 to 1858, whenever the question W4S
brought forward—which was some 10 or 12 times
—the House of Commons passed the bill for the
admission of Jews into Parliament by large and in-
creasing majorities. (Cheers.) Thoso acts were the
acts of an assembly elected by the nation, and yet
they did not call down upon tile people of this coun-
try that judgment which, Dr. Cowan so impiously
predicted. On the whole, then, he would say, that
when they found that all those eminent Christians,
belonging to all parties in the Church and to all
denominations of Dissent, that all tho3e,g,reat bodies
—the citizens of London and electors of other bo-
roughs, and' the Parliament which represented them
all, were in favour of the removal of the obstruction
which prevented .Tews from taking. put in the na-
tional legis7ation, lie did feel that the cry which had
been raised against the Jew in Iteading was got up
entirely for party purposes. (Ikar, hear, and cheers.)
This objection was not a religious but a political
one—(cheers)—and they would find with reference
to men who opposed, or were in favour of the ad-
mission of Jews into Parliament, that it was not
as they were Christians or not Christians—not as
they were religious or not religious, but as they
were Tories or Liberals. (Hear, hear, and
cheers.) The ministers of the Established Church,
from the connexion of the Church with the
State, were often Conservatives in politics ;
but though it thus happened that many.
ministers of the Established Church might be op-
posed to the admission of Jews to Parliament, he
had already shown them that that portion was by
no means shared in by all (as distinguished prelates
and clergymen of the Established Church were in
favour of the admission of the Jews), and that Dis-