The Sun.
London, England, 1832-03-17 00:00:00

Ni
tss
ahridge their comforts, and would c
had hitherto subsisted by their labou ;;;I '
p irochial aid ; they therefore pray
ihridgement of their hours of labour migh
The Hosr. Mamma also presented a petitio •
• ir6
salllP subject from certain operatives in Staffordshire.
Both the petitions were ordered to be priated.
IRISH NATIONAL EDUCATION.
Mr. SHAW had several petitions to present respecting
National Education in Ireland, signed most numerously
and respectably, and by many persons of great influence.
The first was from thirty-five clergymen of a Manery (we
could not hear the name of it) in the diocese of Norwich ;
N.e second was from a place in the North of Ireland ;
the third was from the county of the city of Coik,
respectably signed by nine Noblemen, and alm,st all the
resident gentry to the number of 4,116 persons; the
Ith was from the minister, elders, and coneregation of the
Presbyterian Church of Usher's-quay, Dublin, and the
iifth from Archbishops, Protestant clergy of various deno-
minations, and Protestant laymen of Leland, to the
number of Pl,OOO persons.—(Hear, hear.) He was un-
willing on that occasion to enter into a war of opinion
with Hon. Gentlemen opposi-e, but while he conceded
to the Right Hon. Secretary for Ireland, and to his
learned Friend the Solicitor-General for Ireland,
and to those who entertained opinions different from him-
self, the free use of those opinions, he claim d for himself
and for those who thought with him, tie ri,sht to exer-
cise his- own opinion and to act according to his own
judgment. But he protested against the assertion of the
Learned Solicitor-General, that this subject was
not understood by those who opposed it. W. 1.,
the Protestant Bishops of Ireland, almost without
exception, had opposed the system recommended by his
Majesty's Government ; seventeen of them had signed a
srotest against it, and had warned all their clergy against
promoting or encouraging it. The Irish Bishops and the
Presbyterian Synod of Meter were, surely, as likely
to understand a IgAtset relating to a mar' in -
avbieh -
cation of the poor commit.ed to their eh it ge—as
the Right Hon. Secretary for Ireland, or the Darned
General.—(Hear.) The Archbishop of Tuam pre•
sided at the meeting at which the petition, signed by
13,000 persons was agreed upon ; and it was also signed
by Serjeant Pennelather and two King's c ounsel, who
were well known to many Members of the House, and who
were as fully competent to form an opinion on any subject
submitted to them, and to deal with it as candidly as the
Learned Solicitor-General. Therefore it was in vain to
say that such persons did not understand the subject. But
to deal fairly, it did not appear to him that the Solicit, r-
General or the Right Hon. Secretary understood the
nature of the opposition to the system. They stated that
the opposition was to extracts from the Scriptures.
Now the opposition was not merely to using extracts,
but to the making such extracts a substitution for
the entire Bible. They objected to any system of
national education in which there was a substitution
of a portion for the entire word of God, because it wee
inconsistent with their feelings and their wishes.
The objection was not to extracts, together with other
religious books, being made part of the religious educa-
tion of children in Ireland, but the petitioners insisted
that the foundation of that education should be the pure,
simple, and entire word of God. It seemed, as he con-
ceived, to be taken for granted, that those persons who
opposed the system charged the Government with having
tor their object the taking of the Holy Scriptures out of the
hands of the Protestants altogether ; that was a most erro-
neous notion ; but he maintained that the petitioners were
justified in placing ne reliance on Ministers in the sys-
tem they were adopting. In hie opinion there wan
but one recommendation to their plan, it was one which
had been alluded to by the Member for Armagh, namely,
that it carried in itself the seeds of its own destruction.
With the exception of one M-mber of the Synod of Ulster,
he (Mr. Shaw) had not heard any Protestant Irish clergy-
man speak in favour of this measure. How therefore could
his Majesty's Government expect that an experiment which
met with such decided opposition could ever succeed ;?
Those who opposed this measure were charged with do-
ing so upon political grounds ; there never was brought
forward a more unfounded charge, and he believed, that
would he proved this very night, as he saw a Noble Lord,
the Member for Liverpool, in his place, who had a simi-
lar petition to those he had just presented, to bring forward
from his constituents. He conscientiously believed it to
be the duty of every well-thinking and honest man to give
his most decided opposition to this measure, the very
foundation being based upon most erroneous notions.
The petitions were then read.
Sir R. INGLIS seeing the Hon. and Learned Gentle-
man, (the Solicitor-General for Ireland) in his place,
would take that lapportuai _aeking
seam of any of she-Me . his Majesty's Cabinet; a
few questions upon the snlect of these petitions, to which
he would expect a reply. He objected as much as any one
to long discussions upon petitions, but this subject, which
was of much importance, actually requiring discussion,
could not otherwise, -as it had already engaged the atten-
tion of the House, be gone into, but upon the presentation
of petitions. It was said there was no mutilation of the Bible

—if that were granted, for the sake of argument, be would
ask whether upon the Right Hon. Secretary's own chewing,
if any bey or master should introduce a Bible into the
school on any of those four days, not directly devoted
to religious instruction, he would not be guilty
of a violation of the rules and dicipline of the
school ? It was said that the system bad been re-
commended by the 14th report of the Commissioners of
Education. He begged, however, to state that that
report did net disturb any existing system, but was
merely supplemental. He did not think a system
of national education so latitudinarian in prin-
ciple, should be adopted by a Christian nation, which
being Protestant, had enjoyed so much the advantages
of possessing unniutilated the sacred Scriptures. He
trusted that Government would see in the combined
expression of public opinion from Episcopalian and Presby-
terian clergy, and from the laity of all classes, a proof of
the unpopularity of their system, and that they would,
therefore. unhesitatingly abandon it. They bad miscal-
culated both their own duty and the interests of those
persons whom they designed to benefit.
Mr. CRAMPTON hoped the Hon. Member for
Oxford would not consider him wanting in cour-
tesy if he declined, at present, to enter at all
into the discussion—the matter bad already been before
the attention of the House, and if it was thought neces-
sary to have a further discussion of it, it would be
much better that a regular notice of it should be given.
He, however, begged the House not to consider him as
acceding to what had fallen from the Hon. and Learned
Member =for the city of Dublin, and from the Hon. Mem-
ber for Oxford.
Mr. LEADER did not deny the respectability of the
petitioners. On the contrary, he believed that they com-
prised many of the Noblemen and Gentry, and respect-
able Laity of the districts of Ireland, but there was on
the other hand a million of people now petitioning for
education, on a footing with the present system, who had
long been hereav,d of that inestimable benefit.
Mr. LEFROY was firm in his belief that these petitions
spoke the true sense of the county. Government had
miscalculated the means to the end, and while he
gave the Right Hon. Secretary for Ireland crick for a
desire to achieve what was very important in a national
system, namely, a united education, he had taken the
very means to defeat his object.—(Hear, hear, hear..)
Neither Episcopalian nor Presbyterian clergy, nor
the body of the dissenting Laity, wird join in the si stem,
and the necessary result would be, as he hoped, that it
would be abandoned, as mischievous in principle and nu-
gatory in practice. The system was quite a felo de se."
Lord SANDON thought an attempt to conciliate
by compromise would be altogether fruitless and ineffectual,
and
beforehewou the h
would, therefore,
th
e, vote
shteaape of o
against the systemt. when it
came
Lord GROSVENOR did not think it possible that a
united system of education on the principles now recom-
mended could be carried into effect.
Mr. W. Y. PEEL thought, that from the very consti-
tution of this system it could net be brought to accom-
plish its objects, and the only way was, now that they
had withdrawn the grant from the Kildare-street Society,
to make no grant whatever.
Mr. H. GRATTAN believed that the Kildare-strest
Society had intended well, but, practically, it did not
work beneficially. Commission after Commission
had sat for twenty years—they bad thoroughly investigated
the subject of national education in Ireland. The body
of evidence which they had furnished was most complete,
mud a system founded upon their report, like the present,
be considered a fair, a just, a proper, and, he hoped, a
successful experiment. The present was merely a contest
among different parties who should educate the children.
It Hon. Members were disposed to give the system a fair
trial, he had no doubt it would succeed.
Lord INGESTRIE was determined to oppose the
.ystem. Petitions, it might be said, from the wholeof the
nroeltihgiinogn odfiiite the
specctuionnitryto.
Protestants of Ireland had been presented .to Parliament
against the proposed system. The Protestants of
consistent
tysteionhtedw, ithhow the
however, Ireland felt that this system would be giving
more to the Roman Catholic religion than was
or of the Roman Catholos, but he held that where there
was an established religion in a country, it was the ditty
of the government of that country to protest and keep that
established
t o say