The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1841-10-05 00:00:00

tershaff has vernindeci*ae that the pricy taiosnell do net bhanse,
-Well I but they have not introduced eny. They have not
introduced a single Romanist, nor kept one that they could
get out. (Much laughter and cheering.) Most of all do I
rejoice that there is not a single Romanist in the circle of
her majesty's household. She is surrounded by true-hearted
Protestants, who will let her hear the truth, and what are
the real feelings of her faithful subjects, who have been ca-
lumniated to her, but who are prepared to shed their blood
for her if need be. (Loud and continued cheers.) So far as I
am aware, there is not a single conservative connected with
her majesty's household at present, who is not a man
of unblemished moral character ; and none but such should
come near that palace which ought to be the palace of purity
and peace. But while we feel that there is much to encourage
and rejoice us in the present state of things, there is nothing
to lead us to relax our efforts, or repose in a dangerous and
self-complacent security. We have learnt not to trust to an
arm of flesh, and God has taught us that if we trust in any
arm save his own, it will surely prove a broken reed that will
pierce the hand that leans apon it. We have not forgotten
that our present noble premier, much as we admire'his talents
and his political tact, slowed, on a former occasion, the want
of that greatest element of character,. moral courage. And
we tear that he may still have that lack, and that he must be
supported by -the Protestant feeling of the country, against
the counter-tide of influence which the Romanists and priests
will bring to bear, to try to warp him from the straightfor-
ward course of Christian iegislation, and induce him to
tack about, mid turn like his imbecile predeces.ors, who
were serving Popery even when they seemed to be serving
Protestantism. (Cheers.) The ark. of the covenant is too
dear to our hearts, to induce us to devolve the custody of it,
even on the honoured Sir Robert Peel; or the more honoured
Duke of Wellington. We cannot but perceive already some
too obvious symptoms that our Protestant movement will
be looked upon with coldness and suspicion by our former
friends.. I passed by your town on the eve of the general
election, and much, I believe, of that change of public feel-
ing which brought in the conservative administration on
such a spting-tide of popular favour as had never before set
in since England had a representative government, was due
to the Protestant enthusiasm awakened and sustained by our
Protestant associations, though little acknowledged and less
thanked by those whom it' seemed to bring into power : 1
passed, 1 say by your town on that occasion, and while wait-
ing for the steam-packet, 1 • looktd at the addresses of your
representatives, and I was sorry to see, that though the corn
laws, and free trade, and other topics were touched upon,
. . . • .

there was not a single syllable about our Protestant interest
and institutions. Why, my friends, if your public were

ashamed to hold out the Protestant lig in Liverpool, where
will they show it? (Hear.) I see my reverend brother,
Mr. M`Neile, looks a little misgiving at me. (A laugh.)

_. .. _. .
Mr. M`NuiLE.—My look, which Mr. Stowell has so in-
terpreted, was a look of inquiry. In Lord Sandon's address
there was a distinct and emphatic reeo4nition of our
Protestant principles, in very excellerbt Christian terms.
(Cheers.) _ _ _ . ..

Mr. STOWELL.—Our reverend friend Mr. Parry has said,
that he would have been glad to find himself a false prophet,
by the Runtish relief bill bringing to pass all the good things
spoken of it, and none of the bad. And I can very safely
say,. that I am very glad to have brought a false charge ; but
assuredly, if my eyes did not deceive me, there was no refer-
ence in the address to our Protestant principles. (A voice
in the gallery.—" There were two addresses, a long and a
Short one.") Aye, well ; it was the short one I read. (A
laugh.) Ido not regret, Mr. Chairman, committing what
seems to he a mistake—it only seems to be so, for we are
both right and both wrong. (A laugh.) Ido not regret that
I introduced the subject, because of the feeling it has excited.
I trust it will convince any individual who may wish to be
come a candidate for your suffrages, that he must show the
flag of our Protestant church, dyed with the blood of our
martyrs, if he expects that Liverpool will return, him to re-
present her in Parliament. (Hear. and cheers.) Ido assure
you, that if our Manchester. electors had only brought fOr-
ward men of Protestant principles, and showed their Pro-
testant views, we should have returned one, if not too,—
(hear, hear)—and stood in some degree the rival of Liverpool.
Let me remark, in defence of Manchester, that while you
sent only 20,000 signatures to the petition against Maynooth,
we sent 27,000 ; and what is more to the point, while our
treasurer does not owe 6d., but has £lO or £l2 in hand, you
are more than £lOO in debt. Let it be seen, by your
contributions to-day, that Manchester has not the only
solvent association ; let us owe nothing, but to love one
another. Set us an example, and we shall be glad to
follow it as we have on former occasions. (Hear, hear.)
There are not wanting evidences that our conservative ad-
ministration will need the watchful eye and the earnest
prayers of the defenders of our Protestant principles. When
Sir Robert Peel regards the measure of 1829 as one on which
he is entitled to look with pride arid satisfaction, we cannot
but feel some degree of apprehension ; and though we do
not wish to embarass the government, or to force measures
upon it, we cannot hesitate to express our belief that that
measure will in the long run be repealed. (Applause.) Either
Rotnanism must be put back to her former station of not
being allowed to legislate far a Protestant country, or she will
creep in and turn the Church of England out of doors, and
establish once more her own dark despotism. Sir Robert
Peel is enamoured of his own act. We trust he will carry
out its enactments, and not allow so many Jesuits to be
creeping up and down, contrary to its express provisions.
We are told that it has hitherto been worked only by
whigs ; let it now be worked by a conservative ministry,
and it will work admirably. Let us see how this prediction
will be fulfilled. Whets one concession hes been made to
Popery after another, when one aid after another has been
granted to build Popish chapels and establish Popish
bishoprics, when the Church of England has suffered spolia-
tion, when her bishoprics have been cut down, her revenues
threatened to be appropriated, her provision for education
converted to the uses of Popery, her colonial endowments
torn from her and transferred to her antagonist—was this
carrying out its provisions. Let our conservatives work it
as it ought to be worked, and produce the fruits promised
from it, and we shall acknowledge we were in error. (Hear.)
I see another symptom in the attack of that wary and cau-
tious journal, the London Times, on our Protestant Asso-
ciations. While the liberal government was in power, it was
thought that they would be useful engines to help the cause
of conservatism, and bring the conservative party into office.
But now they think that we shall only embarrass and impede
a conservative administration. Our wish is not to impede
and embarrass, but to influence it to the truth as it is
in Jesus, as it is in the articles of our church, as tie
antagonist of Romanism, as the foundation and top stone
of the constitution of Eng'and, as the bulwark of her strength
and the diadem of her glory. (Applause.) The Times has
begun by throwing out insinuations against us, as being ex-
ceedingly political. That was more likely so long as the
conservatives were out of power. Surely we are giving proof
that we are no party politicians ! Our very radical opponents
must allow now that we are honest men. (Hear.) We are
not secretly actuated by a desire to put Mr. M`Neile and
some other of our friends into snug deaneries and bishop-
rics. (Much laughter.) We left that to their predecessors
in office, who made some their deans because they turned
round and attacked their own brethren. (Hear.) But,
when we now go on with unabated zeal and earnestness,
though against a conservative administration, we so certainly
deserve credit as honest Christian men. (Cheers.) It is
something more than party, something more than temporal
advantages, that we contend for; it is the truth of the living
God, undefiled by Popish superstition, units utilated by infidel
and latitudinarian lacerations, unbetrayed by hollow friends
within, unimpaired by open adversaries without. (Cheers.)
But I see greater danger still from the signs of the times,
which I would to God it were right for us to overlook or to
shut our eyes upon—l mean the now no longer concealed or
disguised wishes of many, that there should be a reunion of
the English and Romish churches. The British Critic has
got so far in advance of the age, as to tell us that Protestant-
ism is the corrupt religion of human nature. (Hear, hear.)
Poor, unhappy Ridley, and Hooker, and Latimer! who bled
at the stake for what they believed to be the truth as it is in
Jesus, but what this sage reformer of later days has disco-
vered to be " the corrupt religion of human 'nature."
(Haar.) Does he not know that Protestantism is Christi-
anity ? The name, as our worthy chairman has well said,
we owe to Popery, and not to ourselves. We should love to
be in harmony and peace, and that the storms of controversy
should be for ever-hushed from the firmament of the church.
But as long as the Church of Rome continues to bind her-
self to the creed of Pope Pius and the decrees of the Council
of Trent, we must protest against her. (Cheers.) In a pam-
phlet published by the Rev. Francis Diedrich Wackerbarth,
A. 8., we find the author addresSing our prime minister,
wishing to tell him how he may pacify Ireland.—"We have
at present, in Britain., two branches of the church Catholic
kept divided by the authority of the state, viz., the Anglican,
" established". (i. e. subjugated) "by the law," and the
Roman, persecuted by the law ; and what is it else than the
oppression and tyranny of the state, which for three centu-
ries has been grinding down the one as a bondslave, and har-
rying the other as an enemy, that keeps these two branches
from uniting under the shadow of the perennial rock I own I
am greatly at a loss to see. In doctrine (as Mr. Newman, Mr.
Oakley, Mr. Ward, the British Critic and others, have abun-
dantly shown) there is absolutely no difference between
them. Hear it, Latimer, Cramer, and ye other noble mar-
tyrs ! It is enough to bring you back from the other world
to protest against it. (Applause.) " Both maintain the same
faith, both administer the seine sacraments, both acknow-
ledge the sante spiritual vicar of the universal , Lord, both
teach the same principles of loyalty and civil obedience, and
one is even the daughter of the other." Why does he not go
back to his true mother, then? (Laughter.) For let me 'say
that the church of Rome was never my mother, nor yet the
mother of the church of England, unless this man be an
Irishman, and has been perpetrating a bull. and making the
daughter older than the mother. (A laugh.) Ba: onius tells
us that St. Peter first went to Rome in the year 44, and our
own author Gildas says that Christianity was first brought to
Eugland in the year 39, which was live years before it was
carried to Home. The first Christian King was the British
King Lucius, and Britain gave birth to the first Christian
emperor Constantine, who was born at York. (Hear.) Are we
to be told then, that she was the daughter of Popery? We
were her stave for a time. She was a cruel stepmother. Our
noble ancestors delivered us. And are those who received
their own episcopal ordination through those ancestors to
tell us we are mother and daughter, that we have the same
spiritual head, the same doctrines ? skway, away, with such
absurdity ! 1 hope this clergyman's spirited superior will
call him to order. [Several persons on the stage intimated
that he
was under suspension.] He has 'already been sus-
pended ! Here then is matter for congratulation. You might
have been taunted with the divisions in your own church, and
been referred to this man as an example. But the church
has done its duty ; the proper authority has suspended the
offender, and he is a clergyman no longer. (Cheers.) I wish
temporal and
scales
rulers would manifest the same
all our
between man and
spirit, holding the of justice equally
man, but determined to uphold the Protestant religion of' the
realm. I will read you this writer's proposal. " A union of
the Anglican Church with the Centre of Unity, might with
but little difficulty be accomplished.
.Letts fromhosehaetnetfeurltaining enact-
ments, which prevent the Anglican Bishops
such a scheme, be repealed, and let the Bishops of both
branches of the Church be requested to meet and concert
measures for bringing about so glorious a consummation,
and I feel persuaded that terms, and easy terms too),
under
rear
complete re-union of the Churches ofbe telgrirseekdi nugpder
And I
the Holy See, would very shortly
am moreover morally sure that however the State may choose
to harry and oppress, it cannot long keep the English
Church from the arms of our loved but long-lost mother."
The sooner he goes back to his long-lost mother the better.
(Laughter and cheers.) But, however, such productions
may do a little more than excite a passing smile, we must
return to the same point, and say in sober sadness and grief,
that there are men of a different character who task about
our being in a state of schism, and that we shall never be
well till we return. I should rejoice from my soul if the
Church of Rome came back to us, but we can never go back
to the Church of Rome. (Cheers.) There cannot be peace
with Rome without perfidy to our reformed faith; there
.cannot be peace with Rome unless we are prepared to sit
,down under the brand of schismatics and heretics. Such is
.the nature of the controversy. Either she is a schismatic
:and heretical branch of the church, or we have no right to
.be separated from her. There is no alternative. Either
'we must rush back to her arms, or hold up our arms in
eternal opposition to her. (Loud applause.) Other sects
;admit that there may be other branches of the church that
may be in union with Christ ; Romanism, gives us no quar •
ter, she leaves us no ground for our feet, she claims us as her
trenegade subjects, she tells us we are under her curse and the
'curse of God, and that 'dying so we must perish for ever.
'Therefore we have no alternative but to maintain the holy
*struggle, or allow ourselves to be schismatics and heretics,
mho have no right to be separated. (Hear.) In the name
'of our gospel, the gift of our Father in heaven—
for we call no man lord or master on earth in
the name of our freely-circulated bible--in the name of
our great trefortned constitution—in the name of our coun-
try, who bas derived all her glory from her Protestant cha-