The Sun.
London, England, 1829-03-28 00:00:00

the alleged dispensing power which Catholics believed to
be vested in the Pope. The words followed the declara-
tion that the oath was taken without any equivocation or
mental reservation whatever, awl were these :—" And
without any dispensation already granted by the Pope, or
any authority of the See of Rome, or any person what-
ever ; and without thinking that I am or can he acquitted
before God or man, or absolved of this declaration, or and•
part thereof, although the Pope, or any other person or
persons, or authority whatsoever, shall dispense with or
annul the same, or declare that it was null and void from
the beginning." The Pion. Baronet concluded by pro.
posin7, that these two passages should he inserted in the
body of the oath now to be taken, because lie considered
them as affording a security to Protestants, while, he con-
tended, that they could n..t be said to interfere with the
Papists to a greater extent than at any other period of their
leg islation.
The declaration upon the subject of keeping faith with
heretics and infidels being read, as an amendment upon
the amendment— _ _

Mr. Secretary PEEL admitted at the outset, with all
freedom and sincerity, that of whatever security the Pro-
testant possessed in these words, of that security he had
been deprived by the emission of the words to which the
Hon. Baronet alluded.—(Hear, hear.)—He had no diffi-
culty, however, in saying at the Pante time, that those
who supported the Bill consideral it to be whory untie-
emery that they should require those persons they were
about to admit to a participation in the privileges of the
Constitution, and to an equality of civil rights, to make a
formal disclaimer that it was unlawful for them to murder
and destroy their fellow-subjects, under the pretence of
their being heretics or infidels.—(Hear, hear.)—'l hey
thought that by continuing these words, they would en-
cumber the Bill with a most unnecessary disclaimer, the
taking of which, as an oath, would have the effect of
weakening the force of others, and dividing the attention
of the Catholics at the time they were called upon to take
the oaths.—(Hear, hear, hear.)—He confessed, indeed,
that lie had a very great reluctance to call upon the Ca-
tholics to make any such disclaimer.—(Hear, hear.)....
The lion. Baronet had also charged him, and those who
framed the Bill, with having omitted the disclaimer upon
the subject of the dispensing power which Catholics are
supposed to believe to be vested in the Pnpe. If there
were any persons who really be'ieved the Pope to posses.
a power of that description, what security, he would ask,
had the Protestants for the maintenance of any oaths
whatever ? Was it not as much in the power of the Pope
to relieve the Catholics from the effect of any oaths the
Protestants might impose upon them, as it would be in
his power to relieve them from those contained in the pe-
seta Bill ? For his part, he thought that the obligation
which required a man to make a declaration in the pre-
sence of his God, and in the plain and nefinary sense and
meaning of the words, without any evation, equivocation,
or mental reservation whatsoever, was quite sufficient to
entitle him to belief. If they did not believe a man who,
in the presence of his God, took an oath of that descrip-
tinr, how could they believe him upon the strength of any
oath which they might impose ?—(Hear.)—lt ought to be
recollected, that it was by the force of oaths the Catholics
were excluded from all those rights which they claimed,
and which the Bill now before the House was intended to
concede to them.—( Hear. )--There were no laws to exclude
them. There was no clause in any Act of Parliament
which prevented the Catholics from taking a seat in that
House, or accepting office, and it was solely through the
indirect operation of the oaths required from him, that the
Catholic continued excluded from the enjoyment of political
rights.—(Hear.)—lf, then, the Pope could dispense with
their oaths, he would ask, as several Hon. Members had
dme before, what has hitherto prevented the Catholic from
taking advantage of that power, and swearing any oath
which might be placed before him.—(Hear.)—lf they
admitted the Catholics to take an oath in every civil pro-
cess—if they admitted him to give evidence in a Court of
Justice, and sit upon Juries—if they allowed the Catholic
to decide, in their capacities, upon subjects intimately con-
nected with the rights end the privileges and the lives of
the Protestants, was it not perfectly unnecessary to call
upon him now to make a declaration, that because you
concede to him an equality of political rights, he must
declaim being entitled to murder or destroy those persons
he considered heretics or infidels.—(Hear.)—lf they
thought such an pith ought to be demanded from the Catho-
lics, then he would say they aught to go much farther, and
disqualify the Catholic from eating as a Juror, from giving
evidence in a Court of Justice, and from taking upon him
any civil office, without the same disclaimer.—(Hear.)—
Pee his part, he repeated, he did not think it necessary to
eneunei,er this Bill with any such provision, and he should
therefore oppose the Hon. Baronet's Amendment.
Mr. WILNOT HORTON considered the whole of
the clauses cotulected with these oaths to be so unneces-
sary, after the disclaimers of the Catholics, that if he
thought it probable he would be supported, he should
move that they be omitted aleocether.
Mr. TRANT thought they ought not to part with their
oaths, which formed the best security of Protestants, and
which no dispensing power of the Pope could touch.
He
meant the oath against that tranaubstantiation which
formed a part of the Roman Catholic religion. From the
taking of this oath, no Pope could relieve the Catholics,
and that would be their best security.—(Hear, hear, and
lenghter.)—The Right Hon. Gentleman, the Member for
Newcastle-under-Lyme (Mr. Wilmot Horton) had refer-
red to the declaration of the Catholic Bishops and to the
opinions of the Pope. Now he (Mr. Trant) would
ask the Bight Hon. Gentleman, why he did not at the
time be was is Rome, ask his friend the Pope?--(Laughter. )
He repeated the word friend—(Continued laughter)---for
he believed the Right Hon. Gentleman and the Pope had
been very intimate ; end he would ask him why he did
not advise his friend the Pops to call a council upon this
subject, in order that they might do away with the decla-
ration of the Council of Constance, that TM faith was to
be kept with heretics? Until that Council was called, he
should adhere to the old fashioned notions of our ane.estors
upoat this subject.
Mr. C. WYNN thought the Hon. Member for Dover
(Mr. Trent) did not quite compeeltend the nature of a
General Council.—(Hear.)
General PE tCHY supported the Amendment.
:41.r. G. MOORE thought his Right Hon. Friend
&Mr. Peel) had somewhat underrated the importance of
the question connected with the opinion of a dispensing
power.
After a few words from Mr. Eter.cooar and Dr. Lusn-
txtrow the Amendment wig negatived without a division.
Sir R. VYVYAN then propeeed his second Amend-.
mene upon the subject of the dispensing power of the
Pope.
That Amendment was also negatived without a division.
Colonel SIBTHORPE then moved a clause to the ef-
feet—" That Roman Catholics should have no controul or
management over Schools, Almshouses, or other Chari-
table Institutions attached to Corporations, and which were
established on Protestant foundation."
Air. Secretary PEEL said that the Hon. Gentleman ap-
peared to view all securities with contempt, for he thought
the present Bill gave every reasonable security that could
be required, yet the Hon. Member was not satisfied with
it. He thought that the clause propose.: by the Hon.
Gent. was one that would be productive of great inconve-
nience—it would exclude Roman Catholics from being
Trustees to Protestant Charities. It might happen that
Protestants might make .endowments to charitable insti-
tutions from their confidence in Trustees who might hap-
pen to be Catholics. Again, it might so happen that the
trusteeship, though originally given to Protestants, might
de.olve upon Catholics, which it would be unfair to de-
prive them of; and when it was considered that it. was
proposed to extend this provision to almshouses—(hear,
hear,)—he thought it was one likely to be productive of
great hardship anti inconeenience.
Lord MILTON instanced a.ease of hardship of the kind
adverted to by the Right Hon. Sect-et-elev.—namely, that it
would prevent the present Roman Catl(olie Puke of Nor-
folk from being trustee to a charity which might ha,ye been
indoor/ell by a Protestant ancestor.
Mr.. W. HORTON said that the effect of this clause
would be to prevent Mr. Petre, a Roman Catholic Gentle
man, !vho warn a large subscriber for the repair of York
Minster, from being
.a trustee or member of a Committee
for that purpoce.—(Heae,)"
Sir CHARLES WETHE2ELL, who spoke from the
front Opposition Bench, near the her, supported the clause
of his Hon. Friend (Colonel Sibthorpe.) It was a clear
proposit'on that could not be controverted, that all the
schools established in this country since the Refortseeti,oel
were of Protestant foundation. All tke echoole, or at least
by far the greater part of them establailued in England
from the reign of Harry the Eighth to that of William,
were founded with the view., and on the principle of pco,
e?oting the Protestant religion, and were essentially of
Protestant foundation. Moat of those schools, it should
he borne in mind, were not of ecclesiastical, but of lay
3enndatiet, and, in many instances, the Mayors of ,Cor-
pnrations had the power and privilege of nominating school
masters to the schools attached to the Corporations over
which they may be appointed to preside. Thus an oppor-
tunity might be afforded to the Mayor of a Corporation
(Iv by this Bill a Roman Catholic might be a Mayor) of
directing the funds of a charitable itistitution from the
purpose for which it was intended—namely, the promotion
of the Protestant religion—to totally opposite purposes, by
the appointment of a Roman Catholic schoolmaster. He
eteahee to know if this was an infringement necessary to