The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1843-04-07 00:00:00

pn that could
opolv

went of this very r

He only called upon
to postpone its judgment by not allowing the ques-

matter might for the

be rt-

telt in the hands of the executive government.
After a few words from Mr. ACLAND, who opposed the

Lord ASHLEY replied, and withdrew his motion in the be-
lief that from what he had heard it might interfere prejudi-
cially with the exertions making by the government.
The motion was then withdrawn, and the house adjourned.

.--,--....,,.........-•-.

HOUSE OF COMMONS.-WEDNESDAY

The Pla'

_ rs of Interludes Bill and the Admiralty Lands
'sill were severally read a second time, upon the understand-
ch case should be taken on going

discussion in e

A petition was presented against the return of Mr. Fitzroy
Kelly for the borough of Cambridge, which was referred to

_
the committee of selection.
The Sudbury Witnesses' Indemnity Bill passed through
committee, and the Sudbury Disfranchisement Bill was read
a third time and passed, when the house adjourned at five
o'clock.

Ebe Eibtrpool Otanliarb.

FRIDAY MO RN ING, APRIL 7, 1843.

The opposition to the education clauses of the pro-
posed factory bill progresses apace, as indeed we anti-
cipated. On Tuesday evening petitions against them
were presented by Mr. Busfield, to the number of 40,
from various parts of the West Riding of Yorkshire ;
by Mr. Aldan', M.P. for Leeds, to the number of no
less than 160 (1) by some dozen other members, four
or five each ; making, in all, some 300 petitions in one
clay ! No slight movement this amongst the " minis-
ters and congregations of all denominations ;" and we
only pray that government may have firmness suffi-
cient to withstand such a pelting shower of dissenting
manifestoes.

Amongst these petitions we observe that a consider-
able number profess to emanate from parties calling
themselves " Sunday School Unions," " Catholic Sun-
day Schools," " Teachers of Sunday Schools," and
even from the " scholars" of such schools. Now we
can- quite comprehend how some dissenting congrega-
tions, of whom dissenting factory-owners are the lead-
ing personages, can have been brought to petition
against this bill. The fact that a restriction of the
hours of labour, for children under the age of 13,
forms a portion of the measure ; the fact that the hours
devoted to educational purposes must be an entire
forenoon or afternoon ; and the circumstance, men-
tioned by the factory inspector, by whose report the
necessity for this measure is so convincingly proved,
that " the principal obstacles in the way of education,
for the children of the factory population, he has
found to arise from the dissenting body ;" furnish to-
gether sufficient to dissipate any feelings of surprise at
the hostility of these parties to the present bill. We
can comprehend, too, by what process of ratiocination
dissenting ministers, whose attention to the course of
education in the existing factory schools has been so

exemplary (0, should view with somewhat of shame,
mingled with dissatisfaction, the adoption of a sys-
tem, worthy of the name of education, the superin-
tendence of which is to be placed in the hands of the
independent clergy of the Church of England. These
are intelligible affairs; but what Sunday school unions,

Sunday school teachers, or Sunday scholars, have pro-
perly to do with the matter in hand, we profess we are
wholly unable to divine !
It is true that, by the bill of Sir James Graham, the
children who attend the factory schools in the week-

days will be required to attend it also on Sundays.
0110[11-PT of Church of England parents will be re-
quired to receive Church of England instruction, on
those days, and to attend the - establlsllen place or
worship. The children of dissenting parents, on the
other hand, will not be required to receive anything

beyond scriptural teaching, and will be permitted ti
. _

attend their own places of worship, care being take
that they do so attend them

What earthly objection

offer to such an arrangement, if the motives whit]
;..,.,el them to their duties be in reality to promote th

spread of religious education amongst the rising corn
munity ? They lose. it is true, a few dissenting chil
dren, having the assurance that their moral and reli
training will be properly cared for, and that m
—no unworthy efforts at least—of proselytise
e exercised upon thorn. As a set-off against thil

ffbrts-

own sphere of usefulness must be

e never heard that the Sunday-schoc

afflicted with a

.ora of wealth; th

means to educate, at

disposal of dissenter:

ss when compared with the vastne

We have

i. We have hear

e lack of means bewailed.

nd - subscriptions for Sunday-school purposes un

means to meet the giant extent of the evils—
moral and spiritual destitution !

of those

It does therefore appear to us that, were the motives