presented a Petition against the Ministerial Plan of Education in Ireland, from the Synod of Galloway, and signed on its behalf by John Milroy, the Moderator. The assembly from which this petition had emanated was very large, and the feeling on the subject by those who attended was nearly unanimous. The petitioners expressed the most decided objection to the principles of the plan, or of any similar plan, which excluded from the schools the use of the Bible. He entirely concurred with the prayer of the petition.

had received a letter from a clergyman who attended the synod from whence this petition had emanated, which declared that, so far from that petition being carried unanimously, as represented by the hon. Baronet, it was only carried by the casting vote of the Moderator. Although he was anxious not to say anything likely to provoke a discussion, yet he could not allow the petition to be received without expressing his conviction, that the opinion expressed in it as to the principles of the system proposed by Government, was founded on an entire mistake, as were many of the speeches of hon. Members on the same subject. The petition stated, that, by the proposed system, only certain portions of the Scriptures would be allowed to be used. That was a mistake: for there was to be a general system, to embrace a moral, a literary, and a classical education; and in addition to that, there was to be separate religious instruction for children of the different religious persuasions: two days in the week were to be set apart for this purpose, when the Protestant instructor might put into the hands of the Protestant youths the whole of the Bible. The object was not to take the Bible out of the hands of the Protestant, but to prevent the Protestant from having anything to do with the religious instruction of the Catholic, or the Catholic with the Protestant. Only such portions of the Scriptures were allowed to be introduced into the general plan as should be approved of by the General Board, so that, under the plea of instruction, nothing should be introduced to which the clergymen of the different persuasions could object. By attending to this point, a collision of opinions and feelings would be prevented, and the good work of a joint instruction carried on. But as to the objection, that portions only of Scripture were introduced into the general instruction of youth, he was at a loss to imagine how this could be said to act prejudicially against Protestant interests, when, independent of the two days in the week set apart for the purpose of exclusive instruction, there was nothing to prevent it from being extended to the Protestant children on every day in the week, except only during the period set apart for public instruction. If he could for one moment think that this joint system of instruction would in the slightest degree interfere with Protestant children, by instilling Catholic principles into their minds, he should be one of the first to object to the measure; but his conviction was decidedly the contrary, and he thought the benevolent views of Government could not be carried into effect by any other plan; for if the Bible were allowed to be introduced generally among the children of the schools, compelling those of the Catholics to join with the rest, it would act indirectly on these as a system of exclusion, while the object of the Ministerial plan was, to bring the Protestant and Catholic children together, in order that both might partake of its benefits. He was convinced that, so far from violating the religious feelings of the Protestants of Ireland, it would have a directly contrary tendency. He was as fully persuaded as any hon. Member of the great blessings which had been bestowed on Scotland, since the Reformation, by all classes studying the Scriptures; but there was a great difference between the religion and habits of the people of that country and those of Ireland.

deprecated every attempt to interfere with the religious education of Catholic children. Let Protestants educate their own children as they chose, and all that Catholics asked was, to be allowed the same privilege. The grossest oppression had been practised in compelling Catholic parents, under the penalty of starvation, to send their children to the Kildare-street schools, and against this system he had loudly protested. In the new system the Bible was not used as a class-book for four days in the week, and this was the only restriction imposed, as on Fridays and Saturdays Protestant children were to have the Scriptures, and if they did not then read them it would be the fault of the Protestant instructors. A great deal of cant and hypocrisy had been bestowed on this subject out of that House, one half of which must be attributed to the plans originating with a reforming Ministry, a similar plan having been previously approved of, even by many of the clergy of the Established Church. Some persons rejoiced that the poor Irish peasant was exposed to the risk of excommunication; but he pitied the man who could rejoice at the idea of these miserable beings having only a choice of evils, either quarrelling with their priests, or suffering starvation by quarrelling with their landlords. He was extremely sorry to see the intelligent people of Scotland led astray upon this subject. They had a right to establish a system of education suitable to their own religious opinions; but that system was not necessarily suitable for Ireland. Indeed, it was very unsuitable, and the Scotch had no right to force a system upon Ireland at variance with their religion and habits. The Irish might be wrong, but they sincerely believed that it was not advisable to allow children the unrestricted use of the Bible. They thought it introduced a familiarity inconsistent with the respect due to the sacred volume. Such were their opinions, and, whether they were correct or incorrect, they had a right to be consulted in the education of their children, and he would put it to the hon. Members for Scotland, whether they would allow the clergy of another creed to interfere with their clergymen, and prevent them teaching the children of Scotland according to their own creed and method.

thought the hon. and learned member for Kerry ought not to have introduced topics into his speech which, from their irritating nature, must necessarily beget angry discussion. He assured the hon. and learned Member, that party feeling was not the source of the opposition which prevailed in Scotland to the Ministerial plan of education for Ireland. The hon. and learned member for Kirkcudbright was wrong in charging the parties who had forwarded these petitions with ignorance. The subject had been discussed in several Synods, and they had not come to a hasty or rash conclusion on the question. They had directed their attention particularly to the point alluded to by the hon. and learned member for Kirkcudbright, and, in their opinion, the Scriptures were improperly excluded. It was said, that Protestant children would have the unlimited use of the Bible on certain days, for which a provision was made; but, then, the teachers might be Protestants, or they might be Catholics, and against this no sufficient provision was made. The fundamental principle of Protestantism was, that all the Scriptures should be read, and, therefore, the Synods were right in their prayer that the Scriptures should not be given to the children of these schools in a mutilated form. He would appeal to the hon. Members from Scotland, whether it had not been understood to have been the invariable practice, since the time of the Reformation, to educate the children of that country from their infancy by reading in the Holy Scriptures, and whether, if there were anything superior in the intellectual condition of the Scotch, it was not to be attributed to the keeping up this system of instruction—that of training up their children, from their earliest years, in the reading of the Scriptures: and seeing the good effects which had followed that system, it was not to be wondered at that they had such an attachment to it, and expressed themselves in their petitions so strongly in its favour.

must deny, that the principles of the plan, as the hon. and learned member for Kirkcudbright had said, were mistaken in Scotland. His countrymen had had an opportunity of examining the measure, and had arrived at the conclusion, that it was calculated to injure the interests of Protestant children in Ireland. The parties who had forwarded these petitions had not been in the slightest degree influenced by political motives; and the hon. and learned member for Kerry had been equally mistaken when he said, that the intelligence of the Scotch people had been led astray on this subject; their reputation for intelligence stood on too high ground to be affected by such observations. The hon. and learned Member had asked, if the Irish were to interfere with the system of the education of the Scotch, how would it be liked? Such interference in Scotland would make very little progress. It was from feeling the benefits of their system that the Scotch were so anxious to extend it to others; and he should be sorry that, knowing its good effects, any of his countrymen should be found opposing these petitions. They considered it the duty of a Protestant Government to support a system which would not interfere with the fundamental principle on which Protestantism was founded—the reading, unmutilated, the Holy Scriptures. This was a most important petition, and would, he trusted, be received by the House with that respect which was due to the reverend body from whence it emanated.

said, the hon. member for Kirkcudbright had commenced his observations by saying, that those who opposed this measure were all in the dark as to the main principle of the measure introduced by Government. Did that hon. Member mean to say, that the Synod of Ulster, and other parts of Ireland, were such a set of blockheads that they did not understand the nature of the system proposed by Government, and that they were so ignorant as to render it necessary that they should be enlightened by the superior wisdom of that hon. Member? He must tell that hon. Member that, notwithstanding his explanation, he had thrown no new light on a subject so well understood. The hon. and learned member for Kerry had also said, that the opposition which had been raised against this Government measure was founded in cant and hypocrisy, and a political feeling. He would take it upon himself, however, to deny positively and most indignantly that such motives had, in the slightest degree, influenced the opponents of the measure. He was waiting for an opportunity of presenting a similar petition, which was signed by many Whigs, as well as Tories. The opinions of these petitioners were founded in truth; and, therefore, the opposition to the measure would daily increase in strength, and would never rest until it succeeded. The system of the Kildare-street Society was one in which all religious persuasions were brought together without interference on the score of religion—it was working well; but was now to be extinguished by an exclusive system. With respect to Irish landlords interfering with their tenantry in the way described by the hon. and learned member for Kerry, he threw that imputation back with all the scorn it so well deserved; and he defied the hon. and learned Member to produce a single case in support of his imputation. It appeared to be the fashion of the present day to excite mob-hostility against the gentry of the country. It was a system which had been acted on out of doors, and appeared, on the resent occasion, to be acted on within doors: he deprecated these observations, which tended to dissever the ties of society. The landlords in the north of Ireland were well disposed and charitable, and had the interests of their tenantry at heart quite a much as the hon. and learned member for Kerry, or any of those who supported his opinions.

asserted most confidently, that this subject had been taken up by the clergy of Scotland with the purest spirit and feeling as to the measure itself. No men in this kingdom were actuated less by political feelings on all occasions than they; and his hon. friend, the member for Kirkcudbright, must, he was sure, be misled. The sentiments of the clergy of Scotland were felt and expressed on these simple grounds; that they, from the sanctity of their office, and being appointed to superintend education in Scotland, had felt it their duty to come forward on this occasion, because they considered the principles introduced by Government, in the proposed system of education for Ireland, in decided opposition to the principles they, as Protestants, thought it essential to support. It was, therefore, wrong to attribute the opposition of the Scotch clergy to political feelings.

assured the hon. Member, that he had not charged the clergy of Scotland with doing anything on the grounds of hypocrisy and cant, as attributed to them in the observations made by the hon. member for Kerry; nor had he presumed to say, that he had thrown a new light upon the subject. He had simply said, that the question was not properly understood, and that persons were wrong who said, that only a portion of the Scriptures was allowed to be read. He believed that the opposition of the Scottish clergy arose from sincere piety, and it was not his intention to cast any reflection on that reverend body, for whom he entertained as sincere a respect as the hon. Baronet.

should not have risen but for the hon. member for Kirkcudbright, who had a second time made the same erroneous statement with reference to the real objections to the proposed plan of education. Because he himself had misconceived the grounds of opposition to it, he imagined that those who opposed the system laboured under misconception. No person could be so absurd as to suppose that the Government meant to deprive Protestant children of the power of reading the Bible out of the schools, although they might be indifferent to the subject; but what the opponents of the measure protested against was, that the Bible, in its simple and entire form, was excluded from the schools properly so called, that was to say, when the children were assembled in them for the purposes of national education; and that extracts made by this new motley Board, were to be substituted for the whole Bible. The hon. member for Kerry was mistaken in saying that the heads of the Established Church had agreed to such a plan as this. They did not object, nor did he, to extracts from Scripture, properly made use of; but they never countenanced the idea of their superseding the use of the whole Scripture; and, so far from the former system having led to discord, and failed, as stated by the hon. Member opposite, he verily believed, that it was because it proceeded so har- moniously and successfully, that the Government raised an antagonist system to it, at the dictation of that irresponsible power which had for some time governed the Government of Ireland.

I am much pleased that the hon. member for Dublin has at last admitted, that the Protestants of Ireland are not excluded from the use of the Scriptures, as has been repeatedly asserted by the opponents of the present system. But the sole objection of the hon. Gentleman appears to be, that the Catholic children are not obliged to submit to a system which is not sanctioned by the teachers of their religion. Why, this is the same old species of domination which has been so long exercised over the people of Ireland by the faction to which he belongs—a power which God or nature never intended they should possess, and which they never shall exercise again in Ireland. The hon. member for Londonderry, in the course of his violent harangue, thought proper to indulge in animadversions upon me of a very unwarrantable character. The hon. Gentleman is perfectly welcome to abuse me; his censure is much more pleasing to me than his praise, because I should at once begin to suspect the integrity of my own conduct, if I should, by any chance, have the misfortune to be encumbered with the hon. Member's commendations. The hon. Member has talked of the synod of Ulster, and he asked, are they to be considered as a parcel of blockheads, incapable of forming an opinion upon the subject of Irish education. I will tell the hon. member for Londonderry, that the Catholic clergy of Ireland are just as capable of forming an opinion upon what system of education is best suited to their own flocks as the synod of Ulster can possibly be; and, notwithstanding the assertion which has been made, I again deny the right of those gentlemen to dictate any system of education which is opposed to the feelings and the consciences of the people. But the fact is, a large body of the Presbyterians of the north of Ireland are favourable to the Government plan of education. In proof of this, it is only necessary for me to refer to the petition recently presented to this House, in favour of the Government plan of education, from the seceding synod of Ulster; a most respectable, moral, and intelligent class of Christians; and surely the opinions of this society are entitled to respect and con- sideration? The hon. Gentleman has thought proper to state that I have charged the landlords of the north of Ireland with arbitrary and oppressive conduct. I have made no such charge against the landlords of Ireland as a body. But there are instances of individual landlords who have been guilty of grievous oppression, and I am ready to prove what I assert. The case of Mr. Synge alone, is quite enough to justify all I have said. That gentleman turned out eleven families to starve in one day, because the parents refused to send their children to his schools; and it has been stated by my hon. friend, the member for Clare, in this House, that Mr. Synge's conduct was the origin of the disturbance which has taken place in that county. One important fact has, however, been elicited in the course of this discussion, which is to be found in the speech of the hon. member for Dublin, namely, that the new system of education does not exclude the Protestants of Ireland from the reading of the Scriptures. The hon. Member distinctly admitted, that the Protestant children have two days in each week allotted them for the reading of the Scriptures, whole and unmutilated. This is a fact which cannot be denied. The Protestant children have two days in the week for the perusal of the entire Scriptures, and selected portions are read every other day in the school; but, notwithstanding all this, it has been stated in petitions to this House, over and over again, and repeated by hon. Members, that by the plan of education brought forward by his Majesty's Ministers, the Protestant children are excluded from scriptural education. I must again repeat, what I have often before stated, that never was there a subject in which so much cant and hypocrisy were mixed up, as in the very question which forms the subject of this evening's discussion.

felt, that he should not be acting as an honest man, or doing his duty towards an absent and a calumniated friend, if he did not state to the House some facts, in answer to the aspersions which the hon. and learned Member had cast upon Mr. Synge. The hon. and learned Member said, that the conduct of Mr. Synge was the cause of the disturbances in Clare. He had lately had occasion to contradict the same assertion. He did not wish to deal in recrimination, or he could easily state who was the original cause of the disturbances in Clare. Mr. Synge, a most respectable individual, possessing considerable landed property, felt it his duty, as a Protestant, to promote the education of the children on his estate. The parents were most anxious that their children should attend his schools, but the Roman Catholic priesthood denounced those schools, and compelled the people to withdraw their offspring from those places of instruction. It was perfectly true, that Mr. Synge ejected some families for not sending their children to school; but, so far from turning them out to beggary, he provided for them, and rendered their situation more comfortable than it was before. This humane individual was fired at, and several balls lodged in his body. The cause of this murderous attack was the atrocious conduct of a stipendiary priest, who stood up in his chapel, and denounced Mr. Synge as a kidnapper for the devil. This was sufficient to point him out as an object upon which the assassin's weapon was to be employed. The influence of the priesthood was at that moment directing the assassin's knife, and sending hundreds of persons to a premature grave.

appeared at the Bar with his Majesty's Answer to the Address of the House of Commons. The noble Lord then read the King's Answer, as follows:— "The state of public affairs since the 10th of May, will satisfactorily account to the House of Commons for any delay in returning my Answer to the Address of this House. I trust that the object of that Address will appear to my faithful Commons to be accomplished, since the necessity of any change in my Councils has been avoided. "WILLIAM R."

said, that he would avail himself of that opportunity, pursuant to the notice which he gave on Friday last, to call the attention of the Attorney General to the state of the Public Press at the present moment. It was true, it might be said, that the proper authorities were vested with ample powers to preserve the peace and good order of society; but that appeared to him to be no reason why he should not bring under the consideration of the House, the scandalous, licentious, and treasonable articles, which day after day issued from the Press, with the view of inducing the Attorney General to institute prosecutions against the publishers of those articles. Some of the articles which had appeared in the public prints were of such a description that he should not be discharging his duty properly if he gave them that extended publicity which would be the consequence of his reading them in that House. Indeed, they were of so obscene and scandalous a nature, that he should be doing no service to the cause which he was then advocating if he read them publicly. He would select one article as a sample, by no means the worst, of the publications with which the Press teemed. The article was to be found in the "Satirist," weekly paper, of Sunday, May 13th, and was headed "the King and Queen are where they please, and how they please. Who cares?" After some prefatory remarks the article proceeded as follows:—'What the devil is the House of Brunswick to us, abstractedly regarded? Nothing more than that of the poorest sausage-spinner in Germany. The people of England, wishful to avoid the ceaseless squabbles of ambitious nobles, chose a foreign family, about the most ancient in Europe, to fill the proudest station in the world, i. e. the Sovereignty over a free and victorious nation. That family were especially distinguished by the negative sort of character which is, perhaps, the best in a limited monarch. From the first George to the first William of the family, not a man among them has evinced the slightest personal claim to consideration on the score of mental power or moral energy. Of mulish, dogged obstinacy, they have given abundant proof. And what better mark could have been shown of the all-enduring loyalty of the British people, than the alacrity with which they were willing to forget the Georgian æra, from the reign of the first fool of the name to that of the fat compound of all mean ingredients, inclusively, when, in the present King, they beheld a man willing to sympathize with his subjects and to re-dress their wrongs? But now—now that the mask has been laid aside, their indig- nant rage succeeds to a long-suffering, long-trusting loyalty. The principles that placed the family on the Throne—that so-much-hacknied phrase, the principles of liberty—have found a fatal opponent in the person of William 4th. So be it: in the people those principles have supporters, advocates, champions, whom Kings cannot enchain, nor military Dukes destroy. Wellington may smile at this. Let him try. For our parts, we publicly, solemnly, strenuously implore our countrymen to bear in mind the great constitutional truth, that the same power by which our fathers were enabled to confer on the family of Brunswick the Crown of England, when the so conferring it was favourable to the freedom and happiness of the British people, that same power would be justifiably and patriotically exercised by us in removing the Crown from the head of any member of that family who should forget the principles which had called his ancestors to the Throne. Yes; should it unhappily become a question whether England should be free—that is to say, whether the rotten boroughs should be abolished and the great towns enfranchised—in other words, whether Earl Grey's Bill should pass, or King William 4th take his chop at Holyrood with Charles Dix—we say, let England be free, and let there be two X's in the alphabet of monarchical imbecility.' The publication went on to say, 'A word to the Queen. This illustrious lady, "second personage in the realm," "Royal Consort," and all that fine fudge, is nothing more than a marvellously ill-favoured German woman, who, never having been guilty of an idea, most gladly grasped at the delusion that she had one, when Whiskerandos Cumberland filled her frivolous head with his own deep cogitations on the subject of Reform.' In another part of the same paper this passage occurred:—'Of the persons here alluded to, some are Germans—low, artful, nursed in despotism, and devoted to it—connected and in daily correspondence with despotic Princes and Ministers, following their guidance and constituting their tools—employing the resources of England, profusely bestowed upon them, even by the Whigs, to crush her people, and bribing the venal, who are every where to be found, to support them in their base ingratitude and daring machinations against a people who have redeemed them from beggary. The Queen and the Duchess of Kent are among the most active of these intriguers.' Again the writer proceeded—'Meanwhile, the enemies of the nation—the Queen, the Duchess of Kent, the Duke of Cumberland, and Mrs. Jordan's son—obtained an opposite promise, and kept incessant watch over his conduct. This was the reason why the Anti-reforming Peers were latterly so bold, and the Ministry so full of timidity and embarrassment. But the age is gone by when intrigues like these can be conducted with impunity. The persuaders of the King in this matter are the enemies both of the King and of the nation; and history records none who better deserves the doom attached to such conduct. The well-earned fate of another German Queen should have been before their eyes, or, at least, the more recent one of the Duchess of Berri.' It appeared to him impossible that such publications as these should be allowed to continue. It was quite clear that they were put forth for the purpose of bringing the King and Queen into contempt, and he felt that he should not discharge his duty as a loyal subject, if he did not take this opportunity of protesting against such scandalous libels being suffered to remain unpunished. He thought it became him publicly to call upon the Attorney General to give some explanation as to the course which he might think fit to pursue upon the subject. He understood the hon. Under Secretary of State for the Home Department to have argued, that it was best to leave such publications to the indignation and contempt of the virtuous classes of society. To the hon. Under Secretary, who was an honest man, of upright mind, the contempt of the virtuous portion of the community would doubtless be a great punishment; but he would ask, whether the persons who could sit down to write articles of such a description as that which he had read to the House, were likely to possess feelings which could be operated upon by the moral power of public opinion. He believed that they possessed feelings of such a gross nature as would be sensible only to physical punishment. They were the pests of society, and ought not to be allowed to continue. He would take an opportunity of calling the attention of the Attorney General in private to some other publications, which, as he had before stated, were of such an atrocious nature, that he could not venture to read them publicly. He had, he thought, done enough to afford the Attorney General an opportunity of declaring what his intentions were with respect to the present licentious state of the Press.

thanked the noble Lord for the courtesy he had shown him, in giving notice of his intention to put the question, as it had afforded him an opportunity of considering whether any answer could with propriety be made to it. On a former occasion the noble Lord had privately drawn his attention to other disgraceful publications, and he had then mentioned the delicacy and difficulty of his situation, anxious as he was to preserve due respect to the laws, and at the same time not to infringe upon the rights of the public. In general appreciation it was thought that the Attorney General had a power, which he did not in fact possess: it was really taken for granted, that he was a sort of officer going about with an extinguisher, at once to put out all objectionable publications—that he had nothing to do but to issue his fiat, and the publication was at an end; but, he had in truth, no peculiar authority. He did not deny that he had a peculiar duty, but he could only issue ex officio informations, which must afterwards be tried by a Jury, and subjected to the usual uncertainty of such proceedings. The noble Lord had himself drawn into a fuller and broader light a publication, of which few, perhaps, had heard, and it was his (the Attorney General's) firm opinion, founded upon experience, that a libeller thirsted for nothing more than the valuable advertisement of a public trial in a Court of Justice. Triumph there made him rich, and defeat gave him all the honours of martyrdom. Even martyrdom was found to have its pecuniary advantages also, while it procured the wretched author a much better lodging in a prison than, while at large, he had ever been accustomed to occupy. Punishment was, therefore, ineffectual, and he entirely agreed with the Under Secretary of State, that the contempt of well-regulated minds was generally the best treatment for libellers, however, revolting or disgusting their productions. He did not entirely agree with the noble Lord that the writers of such libels would not feel that contempt; they would feel it at least in pocket, for the public would soon turn with loathing from the pernicious pandarism of the press. He hoped, too, that the multitude of such publications would check their circulation, and as the poison would become anything but a rarity, people would cease to value and regard it. The very neglect with which they had been treated by the public authorities for a long course of months had of itself diminished the number of licentious publications, and many had fallen, which, by means of prosecution, would have been elevated to importance. In reference to the question of non-prosecution, it was impossible for him not to advert to the conduct of his predecessors in office—not to cast blame upon them, or to relieve himself, but merely to show that they set the example which he had only followed, leaving obscure publications, however offensive, to perish in their obscurity. Even his learned friend opposite (Sir C. Wetherell) had not departed from the forbearance of those who went before him, and he had refrained from prosecuting the most offensive publications in the most trying times. Such had been the course adopted in 1819, when certain publications did not stop at invective obloquy, but even recommended assassination, and openly called upon their readers to sow the streets of London with forged Bank notes. These were allowed to pass without prosecution, and for the plainest of all possible reasons—that to prosecute would have been to play the game of the libellers. The noble Lord admitted, that some of the productions of which he complained were so scandalous and obscene, that he could not do more than advert to them. If so, why should they be exposed in an open court of Justice? It was undoubtedly and lamentably true, if the evil of libels were the reading of them, that prosecutions made innumerable readers, and in cases of private libel, a proceeding before a Jury often served chiefly to disseminate the slander. He might, perhaps, be allowed to advert to a remarkable occurrence which had happened to himself. On the evening of the day when he first sat as Common Serjeant of London, a trial for a libel of a most atrocious description was brought before him, without preparation: it was contained in a paper called The Republican, which had gone on for some years unprosecuted by Sir J. Copley, the then Attorney General. The libel was a resumé, or summing-up, of all the most offensive parts of the work, and the indictment contained eleven counts, six for blasphemous libels on the Bible, and the rest for sedition, exciting the people to tumult and insurrection. The prosecution was not instituted by the Attorney General, but by the "Constitutional Association," as it was called, which took the matter out of his hands. The libels were established (indeed they could not be doubted), and the defence made by the accused rather aggravated his crime, if such a crime could be aggravated by anything said by the party on trial. After this defence, it could not be put, even as a doubt, to the Jury whether the prisoner was acquainted with the nature and effect of the publication, and as he was indicted without a name, in order to avoid difficulties as to identity, he (the Attorney General) was called upon to pass sentence upon him immediately. Two Aldermen were on the bench with him, one of whom thought that two years' imprisonment should be inflicted, while the other was only for half that term. The middle course was taken, and the offender was sentenced to a year and a half's imprisonment for a very complicated and multitudinous libel. He had been much censured as a severe Judge on this occasion; a petition had been presented to the House in behalf of the prisoner, which he had refused to sign, on the ground that his trial was most fair and impartial; but he (the Attorney General) was not aware that the public had been much benefitted by any part of the proceeding. For himself he could say, that he was much happier the moment the eighteen months had expired. As long as a writer honestly expressed his opinions, and his opinions only—as long as it was possible to give him credit for sincerity—he (the Attorney General) was greatly disinclined to prosecute. The case was widely different when a writer's object was to incite to crime, and in the instance to which he alluded, the defendant was only twenty-one years old, and, perhaps, had no improper motive. When, therefore, the term of imprisonment expired, it was a great comfort and gratification to him (the Attorney General). Why did he say this? Because, the liberty of the Press being established in this country, men were invited to publish their honest opinions, and there ought to be no torturer behind, who might prosecute them, and throw them into a dungeon for an un- defined offence. The very existence of the liberty of the Press ought to make Attorneys General cautious how they proceeded to extremities. The only question, undoubtedly, which a public officer ought to ask himself was, what was his duty, and how could he best execute it? he (the Attorney General) was not disposed to shrink from it; but this he must say, that from the year 1822 to the year 1829, there was almost a total cessation of prosecutions for libels; not because they were not rife and aggravated, but because it was thought wiser policy to let them alone. What had happened in 1829 was very remarkable. His hon. and learned friend (Sir J. Scarlett) was then Attorney General, and a most gross and scandalous libel was printed, not in an obscure publication, like The Satirist, hunted out of some corner, but in a well-known newspaper, The Morning Journal, supported by a considerable capital, and by great names; that libel was directed against his present Majesty, then Duke of Clarence, and it boldly asserted, that by his vote on the Roman Catholic Question he had forfeited his right to the Throne, and never could recover his title to it. Yet for this publication no prosecution had been instituted; and when the Editor of The Morning Journal was afterwards proceeded against, the Jury wished that he should not be brought up for judgment, and even that he had not been prosecuted, on account of the excitement prevailing in the public mind. He begged also to state, that in that year a noble and learned Lord, who was reported to have spoken lately in another place, was not only then a member, but a leading member of the Government; yet the libel on the Duke of Clarence was passed by unnoticed. On this point he did not mean to blame the Ministers and law officers of that day, but merely to remark, with the example before him, that it would have been quite as wise if the Lord Chancellor of that day had exhibited equal forbearance in his own case, and had not indicted the Editor of The Morning Journal, in the Court of King's Bench, for a paragraph which stated that he had accepted a bribe of 30,000l. for making the hon. member for St. Mawes, Solicitor General. That was so improbable a calumny that no Lord Chancellor since the Revolution, but the noble and learned Lord, would have thought it necessary to prosecute it. The case of The Morning Journal was carried into court, and the prosecution begun by the Lord Chancellor in his individual capacity, though, subsequently, the Attorney General, for some hitherto unexplained reason, thought proper to proceed against the defendant by an ex officio information. Thus it seemed that the ex officio power of the Attorney General had been allowed for a long time to sleep, and had it not been awakened for the purpose of proceeding against The Morning Journal, that paper would have expired much sooner in the contempt and derision of all parties. In fact, it owed 800l. for stamps, and as the process for that sum was sent in on the eve of the trial, a degree of sympathy was excited, and subscriptions from Dukes and Peers were poured in from all quarters, which supported it much longer than it would otherwise have existed. For these reasons he was averse to proceedings of the kind, and had only prosecuted ex officio cases which incited to crime, and aimed at the disturbance of the public peace. Even to this extent he had met with little encouragement from Juries, for it was impossible to tell whether even a single individual amongst them, by his obstinacy, might not defeat the ends of justice. In the cases of Carlile and Cobbett the Government had prosecuted, and he had very recently met with Carlile's statement to him, which, if the House had any curiosity on the subject, he would read to them. In the case of Cobbett, Government was defeated, and the Jury discharged, owing to the perseverance of one juryman; and it was impossible for the prosecutor to dig into the heart of society on every occasion, in order to ascertain what were the political sentiments of those who were called upon to try the accused. Such was his (the Attorney General's) answer to the noble Lord's question; and if he thought proper to submit any papers to his private consideration, he would promise to give them his best consideration. Allusion had been made to slanderous attacks upon females of the highest rank. Nothing could be more disgusting; but it seemed to him that it would be taking a great liberty if he proceeded without special instructions. By a trial in a Court of Justice they might sometimes be placed in a worse situation, for which they certainly would have no reason to thank him. In the present excitement of the public mind, no doubt many improper productions had issued from the Press, but he hoped that the final settlement of the great Question would now render their recurrence improbable. He was happy that the censure upon his conduct for not proceeding against newspapers was impartial; at least, it came from all quarters; and, certainly, if he selected any one for prosecution it would be The Times of Friday last. That paper had utterly falsified what had occurred in another place, and had put forward, as the report of a speech, what could be nothing but a base and malicious invention of some abominable libeller. This writer actually had the impudence to say, that a noble and learned Lord, a criminal Judge, had not only advised the prosecution of an article which appeared in a previous number of The Times, but said that he would not form part of an Administration which would allow that paper to go without being prosecuted. This language was put into the mouth of an individual who held the highest legal office in the State in 1829, when the audacious attacks were made upon his present Majesty, to which he had recently alluded, without calling for any interference on the part of the Government. That noble and learned Judge, who might be called upon at the Old Bailey to preside at the trial, was represented in the newspaper as having himself prejudged the question in the most positive terms; and, after pronouncing, that certain articles were a notorious libel, the noble and learned Lord was said to have called upon the Attorney General to prosecute; nay, to such an extreme of infamy had this abominable Reporter gone, that he had represented the noble and learned Judge as accusing the Attorney General of misprision of treason for not commencing a prosecution. Suppose the Attorney General were to prosecute, and that noble and learned Judge were to preside, what chance could the unfortunate accused have, in such a case, of acquittal? The case, too, might be brought before the House of Peers under writ of error, and then it would be the peculiar province of that noble and learned Judge to advise their Lordships. To assign such a speech to such a person was, therefore, a libel of the most gross and injurious character; and that it was so was evident from another circumstance, that the speaker was made to go out of his way to attack the Attorney General; for what had it to do with the subject of the debate, and the attendance of the noble Lord upon the King at Windsor? The whole was a foul and atrocious libel, for which he would undertake to prosecute the paper, as soon as the noble and learned Lord denied upon oath that there was any truth in the representation. He (the Attorney General) was the less willing to believe that anything of the kind could have fallen from the noble and learned Lord, because they had formerly been upon terms of intimacy: he owed great obligations to the noble and learned Lord, who was something his senior when first he began to enter into the conversation of men. By his excellent judgment and sagacious mind that noble and learned Lord had confirmed him (the Attorney General) in his attachment to liberal opinions, which he, for one, would never desert nor betray. He did not here speak of notions confided to him as a friend, but of declarations boastfully and ambitiously brought forward by the noble and learned Lord, many years ago, according to which he was to take and keep his place in society. "I am (said the noble and learned Lord) a disciple and admirer of Sir Samuel Romilly; I hate and despise bigotry, and, therefore, I maintain the justice of Catholic claims; and I think Reform in the Representation of the people essential to the preservation of the peace of society and the welfare of the State."

thanked the noble Lord who had introduced the subject, for calling the attention of the House to it. He must also praise the noble Lord for the manner in which he had introduced it, and must express his concurrence in the opinion, that an Attorney General and a libel might co-exist, although that was not formerly the general notion. He agreed that every libel ought not to be prosecuted; but he did not on that account hold, with the Attorney General, that he was at once to be driven from the field by writers of every description in pamphlets, newspapers, and emphemeral publications. The question adverted to the general state of the Press, a matter very fit for the attention of the Attorney General, and it had particular reference to the personal attacks upon the Queen. The Attorney General answered, that he had not prosecuted, because he had had no particular instructions; but what, then, had become of her Majesty's Attorney General and Solicitor General? Had the hon. member for Middlesex, or some other economist, abolished the places of those officers, that he did not see either of them present on an occasion like this, when such infamous, unmanly, un-gentlemanlike, un-English-manlike libels were under discussion? [Mr. J. Williams made himself obvious to the Hon. Member.] He was happy to see, that one of them, at least, was in his place, and he might, in his presence, express his doubt whether, under such circumstances, it was either the duty or the practice of the law-officers of the Crown to wait for express instructions. The Attorney General had entered into a long, and he must call it a delusive, statement, into which he had introduced a sort of episode about himself, which might be very pleasant, although he could not congratulate the hon. and learned Gentleman on its logical connexion with the subject of discussion. The upshot of his speech was, that the Attorney General was in no case to prosecute, and he had attempted to strengthen his argument by reference to certain libels upon his Majesty when Duke of Clarence, which he (Sir Charles Wetherell), as was asserted, ought to have prosecuted. He doubted, however, whether he was in office at the time; and, at all events, at that date his hands were tied, and his teeth drawn. Who was it that called on the Attorney General to restrain the Press? Who was it that called on him to restrain the freedom of debate? No one that they had heard yet. The Attorney General said, that freedom of opinion ought not to be extinguished. He agreed with the Attorney General in that respect; but they ought to see whether there were not some who, acting on their own views of freedom of opinion, exercised the greatest tyranny towards others. The Attorney General said, that there had been a great degree of excitement on the subject of the Reform Bill; that was true. The excitement had been greater than, perhaps, was ever known on any question, and a large allowance must be made for that excitement; but, then, though he did not call on the Attorney General to look into every book and every sheet that was published, with a view to search out libels, yet, when the Attorney General asked, whether it was his duty to extinguish the Press, he (Sir Charles Wetherell) had a right to retaliate the proposition, and to say, that no man who filled the office of the hon. and learned Gentleman ought to suffer the House of Brunswick to be libelled as it had been. The hon. and learned Gentleman's arguments, if they were worth anything, came to this, that no ex officio information ever ought to be filed; for, if prosecutions were to cease because libels were too numerous to be encountered, then the very number and the very atrocity of the libels became the ground of their indemnity. No one would pretend to deny, that, in modern times, these cases of libellous publications were most gross and crying evils; yet the hon. and learned Gentleman seemed to fancy, that he had worked his salvation as Attorney General by having brought the authors of two libels into a Court of Justice. These two prosecutions were in the cases of Cobbett and Carlile, for recommending the burning of hay-stacks; and the Attorney General supposed that, because he had prosecuted these two cases, notwithstanding that the Crown was libelled, that the Queen was libelled, that the whole of the Royal Family were libelled, that both the Houses of Legislature were libelled—notwithstanding all this, the hon. and learned Gentleman thought he had done sufficient to work out his salvation as Attorney General. But the hon. and learned Gentleman was wrong in that respect; for, though recommending people to set barns on fire was a grievous offence, yet, in the preservation of the Monarchy—in the preservation of the monarch and of the family of the Monarch, and of the personal respect due to the Monarch and his family—the considerations were fully as important—fully as important as whether, under particular circumstances, a man had or had not burnt a barn or a haystack. But the learned Attorney General did not go by that rule; he put the British monarchy in one scale, and these recommendations to burn stacks of hay and straw in the other; and, though he must say, that the British monarchy was of more value than the haystacks, yet the hon. and learned Gentleman, the Attorney General, did not seem at all to entertain that opinion. "No," said his Majesty's Attorney General, "I care little for that; as long as I can get hold of men who have recommended others to burn three loads of sainfoin." That was the judgment of the Attorney General. But then, said the Attorney General, it was not usual nor proper for this House to call the attention of the law-officers of the Crown to cases of libel. Generally that was true; but there were cases in which that House had done so, where the Attorney General had appeared to allow them to pass too much unnoticed. The hon. and learned Attorney General, however, was not content with making these grounds of defence for himself, but he must needs lug, head, neck, and shoulders into this debate a noble and learned Lord who had had nothing to do with it. What had that noble and learned Lord done to call for this treatment at the hands of the Attorney General? Why was he thus treated? Why, but because he had been called on by his Majesty, in his character as a Privy Councillor, to do that which he was bound to do—yes, bound to do—bound on oath to do it—for every Privy Councillor took an oath to advise his Majesty to the best of his power, whenever he should be called on by his Majesty to do so. For doing that, he had been visited by the hon. and learned Attorney General, and in his absence also, most severely; and the hon. and learned Attorney General had, in that way, replenished the barrenness of his speech with a fertility which had nothing to do with it. It had been said, that the House of Lords ought not to recommend prosecutions for libel, for that these cases of libel might afterwards go up to that House upon writs of error; but that was no argument against individual Peers expressing their opinions on such questions; for if it were, then no Peer who was a Privy Councillor ought, in that character, to recommend a prosecution for libel, because, in his other character of Peer, he might afterwards have to adjudicate on that very prosecution. But did the Attorney General need such recommendation in order to make him see what was necessary? He was prepared to go as far as any man in allowing full liberty of opinion, but personal abuse and political intimidation were a sort of tyranny exercised by the Press, and were now grown so virulent, that he put them on quite a different ground, and altogether discarded them from the rule as to the liberty of the Press. Were not most of the articles now written in the papers, written, not to convince, but to intimidate—not to influence the judgment by reason, but to beat down opposition by threats—intimidating the King and the Peers for daring to exercise those rights for which the Attorney General professed himself the advocate. The Press had taken the liberty of dictating to the House of Peers the manner in which they should act, and to threaten the Crown with extermination, unless it gave way to the free exercise of the opinion of all others but itself. The Press, too, had forbidden either House of Legislature to exercise its influence against that one-sided leader of public opinion. Of all the tyrannies that had ever existed—the tyranny of military despots—the tyranny of the Romish Church—of all tyrannies, civil or religious, the greatest was that of the Press, which, while it proclaimed freedom of opinion on one side, threatened with danger, disgrace, and death, those who should use that freedom of opinion on the other. He appealed to every man, whether that was not the moral and practical object of the present state of the Press, and of the Attorney General's conduct with respect to it, whose argument amounted to this; that, because recently there had been a great degree of excitement in the public mind; because the liberty of the Press, at first not attacked, had afterwards grown larger, and then become monstrous, and from monstrous had become overwhelming; and because it had become overwhelming, they were to give way to it at once. He hoped that, at least the Queen's Attorney General did not maintain that doctrine. The papers had been attacking the Queen for the last four or five months; at first gently, and at a distance; but the Attorney General did nothing, because he thought there was no doing anything with them, and that, if he approached them, he should get a slap in the face. When asked, why he did not go on against them, his answer was, that it was a bad matter, which could not be mended. Indeed, then it seemed, that there were degrees of progression, and the public Press had, at length, been allowed to arrive at that degree, that it dealt out proscription and extermination to two royal personages, unless they partook of the exercise of the "free opinion" which the Press alone thought fit to tolerate. Then the House had heard again that hackneyed doctrine, that hackney, cabriolet, or hackney-coach doctrine (and he did not complain of it because it was hackneyed, for he knew that via trita was often via tuta); but they had heard again that night that hackney-coach argument, that prosecution gave publicity to libels where, if the Attorney General was asleep, they would not have been read. That was a common card trick—a common écarté trick of argument, which had often been used before, but which was now exploded and rendered ridiculous. What was the result of that argument, but that there ought to be no prosecutions for any libels whatever, however atrocious? He now came to another argument of the hon. and learned Attorney General, who had complained of the libels of The Times. He (Sir Charles Wetherell) had not named The Times; for it was not their Times; it was The Times of the other side; it was the Attorney General's Times. It was a paper conducted by a very able writer; it was supposed to have very official knowledge; it received contributions from the most brilliant pens in this country; it was a kind of miscellany to which Gentlemen on the other side of the House united to contribute; it prided itself on the merit of publishing papers and letters, which, constitutionally, no man could know—no; none but a Cabinet Minister. It was a paper which knew what passed between the King and his Privy Council; it was prophetic as to what was to happen. His hon. and learned friend never read The Times; of course he could not; but if he did, he would find in its columns in the morning what was to happen, and what could only constitutionally be known to Cabinet Ministers. It united a growing power to great intelligence, and to great facilities for acquiring information; and, as he had before said, it knew of papers with which it could not become acquainted but in the most improper and unconstitutional manner. But who attacked it? Not he (Sir Charles Wetherell) but the Attorney General. Why? Because it had attacked him in reporting the speech of a noble and learned Lord, who, in another place, had entered on the question whether the Attorney General had or had not done his duty. But, on this occasion, he (Sir Charles Wetherell) must step in to defend The Times, and when the subject was Lord Lyndhurst's doctrine, he must assert that the noble Lord had done nothing more than his duty. The statement made in The Times was defensible on every principle known to the Constitution; and if the Attorney General prosecuted the paper, though he was not fond of making an offer of his services, he would defend The Times from that prosecution. The papers had libelled the Queen—not for a moral, but a political offence. They must all recollect, that the hon. Baronet, not now in his place, had called on the Attorney General to prosecute a certain paper for its libels on the late Queen; and if he were here now, he would, no doubt, with his accustomed eloquence, demand the same interposition on behalf of her present Majesty. It was true, that it was not the duty of this House to look out for prosecutions; but if the Attorney General neglected his duty, it would become the duty of that House to do this; for otherwise, if the Attorney General was a Reformer, there would be no such thing as a prosecution for libel.

I was a silent, though zealous supporter, of that Bill to which the hon. and learned Gentleman has alluded; and from that charge, in both respects, he is certainly exempt—for supporter of it he undoubtedly was not; but as to silence, in the number of his speeches the hon. and learned Gentleman defied the power of arithmetic; they were beyond the means of reckoning, and human patience lagged behind his continued and unremitting exertions. My hon. and learned friend has called on me, as Attorney General for the Queen, to prosecute the Papers. In the first place, he attributes to me an honour that I know not I possess. Very early in the recent events I had the honour of resigning my office, and how far that resignation was effectual I do not know. But, in the next place, suppose it was otherwise, and that I was the Queen's Attorney General, I am not aware that I should possess the power of filing an ex officio information, even for a libel upon her Majesty. If not, then why am I to be appealed to? The Queen, though in many respects unlike other married ladies in the distinct rights and privileges she enjoys, is but the first subject of the realm; and, if she comes into the King's Courts, must appear there as a subject; and it would, therefore, be impossible for me, without a sort of earnestness of zeal, resembling that which the hon. Gentleman has exhibited, to take the step which he, without the law, supposes I might have resorted to. Through the whole of his argument—which, indeed, has not been much curtailed, and which, as there was no question before the House, he has carried to an extent beyond what might have been anticipated even from him—he has supposed that prosecutions for libel, and an end of libelling, are convertible terms. In making that supposition he has been unmindful of all the events of past history—unmindful of the occurrences which took place in the times of other Attornies-general, of those who prosecuted the public Press, and of those who were on the best terms with it. He has forgotten the Attorney-generalship of Sir Vicary Gibbs, who had nearly one-half of the public Press under prosecution. Did those prosecutions produce the desired effect—did they put an end to the system of libels, or stifle the indignant spirit which the public felt for the number of prosecutions then instituted? Directly the reverse. On many of those prosecutions the Attorney General was foiled—the public spirit rose in proportion to the violence of the attacks, and, so far from those attacks producing the effect that was desired, they produced the directly contrary result. Take, Sir, the converse of this proposition—take the example of a noble and learned Lord, who was Attorney General subsequently to the time I have mentioned. I may be mistaken, but I believe I am not, when I say that he had a virgin Attorney-generalship, like an hon. friend opposite me, he filed no ex officio informations whatever; and I will undertake to say, that no change more observable than that between his time and the time of the Attorney-generalship of Sir Vicary Gibbs could possibly be imagined. The circumstance of Sir John Copley's moderation and forbearance, in contrast with that of his predecessor, produced that effect which the hon. and learned Gentleman opposite thinks is to be produced by an over-zealous discharge of duty, but which I confess I think is not to be produced by that cause, for such conduct I believe to be more likely to fan the rising flame than to produce that quiet which he supposes. Does the hon. and learned Gentleman think that no allowance is to be made for a period of excitement? Does he believe it to be possible for the people to feel strongly and the Press to be silent? that the people should have strong feelings, should use strong language, and strong expressions, but that the Press should lag behind them? Does he wish it, does he desire it? If he does, I tell him that it is impossible, and would be improper; and I should have thought that his experience and knowledge of philosophy would have taught him that such an extraordinary difference, instead of assuaging, would have promoted and increased the irritation. I must ask my hon. and learned friend, as he puts questions to me with such freedom, whether it has never occurred to him, that, when any strong feeling exists, it may be continued by opposition, which is now known to be ineffectual, but which is still offensive? Cannot he find, and cannot the noble Lord discover, that it is just conceivable, that the time has arrived, when, in a case of this kind, the sort of hostility to which I have alluded may take away all the grace from concession, and that the effect of this hostility will be, to make the people believe that, instead of this measure being granted readily and willingly, it has been extorted from the parties who have granted it? The lecture which the hon. and learned Gentleman has read, may produce its effects upon my hon. and learned friend, who can file an ex officio information, but not upon me, for I cannot.

, in explanation, said, that he never asserted the Queen's Attorney General could file an ex officio information, but he might have gone to the King's Attorney General, and asked him to file one.

I think that an unfortunate departure from the usual practice has been made this evening by the Attorney General, who, in answer to a simple question, has delivered a speech which, from its tenor, must clearly have been matured in expectation of my noble friend's question. If, indeed, any attack had been made on the Attorney General by my noble friend in introducing this question, the learned Gentleman might have been justified in the course he has pursued; but, nothing could be more temperate or more courteous than the manner in which my noble friend brought these newspaper paragraphs under the notice of the hon. and learned Gentleman—paragraphs, too, which he himself admits to be libels on the highest persons in the realm. So courteous, indeed, was the manner of my noble friend, that I believe he did not even ask for an immediate answer to his question. In one part of the hon. and learned Gentleman's speech I entirely concur. There is no man who has had official experience connected with the Press, who can fail to be sensible of the danger of any crusade rashly directed against it. There are considerations of delicacy and prudence always to be attended to; and if you were to produce a hundred libels of the most disgusting nature, and at the same time show me, that the Attorney General had not prosecuted one of them, I certainly should not, from those two premises alone, draw the conclusion that he must necessarily have neglected his duty. In cases of obscene, or irreligious, or seditious publications, there are other considerations to be weighed beyond the simple one whether the strict letter of the law has or has not been violated. There is a question of political discretion as well as one of mere law. There are undoubtedly cases in which it is absolutely necessary that the Government should appeal to the law of the land, lest continued impunity should raise the belief that scandalous libels are viewed with indifference by the Government. In some cases it would be the duty of the Government, even if Ministers foresaw that a Jury would acquit, to throw that responsibility on the Jury; and I have known instances in which, when the law officers have, from the temper of the times, anticipated acquittals, I have signified to them the determination of the Cabinet, that they must nevertheless prosecute. I do not say that such a case has now arisen; I am only arguing on the general principle: but I entreat the Government to consider that principle, and ask itself seriously, if the time has not at length arrived when forbearance on their parts may produce greater evil than acquittal by a Jury; whether it will not amount to a notification that the libeller may henceforth enjoy complete and systematic impunity. There is danger in the impression, that, the more atrocious the libel, the more secure will it be from punishment, from an unwillingness to increase its publicity by prosecution. The part of the hon. and learned Gentleman's speech which I heard with the deepest regret was, the avowal of that opinion which was not necessarily extorted from him on the present occasion, and which, if it generally prevails in the King's councils, will be not only fatal to this Government, but to the existence of all Government. The doctrine which has been laid down by the hon. and learned Gentleman is no other than this—that no man ought to be prosecuted for the publication of his opinions, provided those opinions are sincere. Sir, I am sure that real and effective Government cannot co-exist with the practical adoption of that doctrine. Sincere opinions! Who is to determine whether opinions are sincere or not? The hon. and learned Gentleman said, in another part of his speech this evening, that he could not dive into the hearts of men—that he could not be a spy on their secret sentiments. True, but how, then, is he to know, when he meets with a libel full of sedition, whether the author of it be sincere in his opinions? Such a libel may be written by a man whose avowed object is confusion and anarchy, but who may be sincere in holding opinions which he knows will lead to the disorganization of society, and who will propagate them with the more zeal because he sincerely entertains them. But where is the test by which sincerity in opinions is to be tried? Is the mere avowal of sincerity to shield a libeller from prosecution? The sincerity of a man's opinions has nothing whatever to do with the policy or the justice of prosecution. The question is, whether the doctrines themselves are dangerous to the peace and happiness of society, and if they are so, it is the duty of the King's Government to shield society from the consequences of the public propagation of those doctrines. The hon. and learned Gentleman has announced a great latitude of opinion: with that opinion, so far as his mere personal capacity is concerned, I do not quarrel; but I complain, that the learned Gentleman has assumed the robe of the Attorney General for the purpose of paralysing the just authority of his office. It is the official station which he holds that makes his doctrines dangerous. Entertaining high respect for the learned Gentleman's private character—entertaining, also, high respect for his consistency in public life, yet I cannot conceive how he is able to reconcile the sentiments which he now avows, with the duties which devolve on him as the King's Attorney General. I would take the liberty of putting this question to him: I wish to ask him, what he thinks would have been the fate of the present Government of France if that government had acted on the doctrine that the publication of any opinion whatever, provided only that it was sincere, ought to be permitted? Suppose the learned Gentleman, on the establishment of the government of Louis Philippe, had been appointed that monarch's Attorney-general, would he have acted on the same principles as those which he now avows? or, if he had, would that government have withstood the reiterated attacks of the Press? Does he mean to assert, that every sincere Carlist and every sincere Bonapartist ought to be allowed to assail with impunity the new government of France, and to encourage the people to open resistance? I will venture to say, that that government would not have existed for three months if it had pursued that course. But so far from attempting to act on that doctrine, the French ministry found it to be absolutely necessary, notwithstanding the extreme principles of liberality professed by that ministry, notwithstanding that M. Perier (the head of the ministry) had for many years been the determined opponent of the different governments of Charles 10th—I say the French ministry considered it absolutely necessary, for the salvation of the monarchy, to institute no less, I believe, than three or four hundred prosecutions against the Press in one year. And yet surely these prosecutions cannot be attributed to any desire on the part of M. Perier to control the liberty of the Press. The foundation of the present French government was laid in resistance to the illegal attempt of the former government to subdue the Press. But M. Perier said, and wisely, in my judgment, "If these attempts are made, both by the revolutionists and the Carlists, to excite the public mind against us, we will not have recourse to illegal ordinances, but we will have recourse to the Juries of the country and the laws of the land." And yet, all these opinions published in the French ultra papers, subversive of the government of Louis Philippe may be very sincere opinions. I do not doubt that the revolutionary papers are sincere, as well as the Carlist papers; but surely it is monstrous, to contend that sincerity in hostility ought to shield the enemies of a government from the enforcement of the ordinary law. The hon. and learned Gentleman has given us an account of the manner in which he acted when sitting in the capacity of a Judge. He has told us, that he had before him a culprit charged with a most scandalous publication, revolting to the best feelings of nature—not merely calling in question the truths of religion, but calling them in question in a manner so indecent, that no rational being could listen to either the substance or form of the publication without the utmost indignation and disgust. Now I can well understand that the hon. and learned Gentleman might doubt the policy of prosecuting this man—the policy of bringing these doctrines under the notice of the public. But this is not what the hon. and learned Gentleman said. He referred to the length of the man's imprisonment, and considered the sentence passed by himself, though warranted by law, to be morally unjust. He declares, that he felt uneasy during the continuance of the confinement of the man, and experienced great relief in his mind when the term of that imprisonment expired. The King's Attorney General publicly avows, that he considers it morally unjust to bring before the public tribunals, and punish acccording to law, those who sincerely entertain and publish opinions offensive to religion, or dangerous to the existence of government. If this be so, I foresee the establishment of a more sordid and degrading tyranny than any to which society has ever yet been exposed. To tell us that there is impunity for any libel against religion or Government, provided only that the opinion expressed is sincerely entertained—is, in other words, to tell us, that the grossest injuries may be committed—grosser than any inflicted by the confiscation of property—grosser even, to a man of honour, than any that can threaten his life—and that every hope of redress is excluded. Sir, this is a novel, and, I believe, a most dangerous doctrine. The hon. and learned Gentleman has referred to the early periods of his life, and has told us, that he derived from high authority those lessons of constitutional learning which he has observed in his subsequent course. But let me ask him, did Mr. Fox, Mr. Sheridan, or Lord Erskine, think that, because men sincerely held opinions, it was, therefore, perfectly safe to allow them to promulgate them without notice or prosecution? Does the learned Gentleman recollect the libel of Mr. John Reeves against the two Houses of Parliament? If not, I can inform him, that the persons then in Opposition never sanctioned the doctrine, that because Mr. Reeves really entertained the opinion that the House of Lords and the House of Commons were branches which might be lopped off without injury to the monarchy, which was the trunk, he ought, therefore, to go unquestioned for giving publicity to such a doctrine. If I remember right, Mr. Sheridan made two motions on that subject; the one was, that the libel should be burnt by the common hangman, and the other was, that Mr. Reeves should be prosecuted by the Attorney General. In vain did Mr. Reeves say, that he was sincere in his opinion; he was prosecuted at the instance of the learned Gentleman's high authorities, and in spite of his sincerity! It is, certainly, true, that the learned Gentleman somewhat qualified his doctrine by saying, that the sincere opinions must not excite to acts of violence. But doctrines subversive of society may easily be propagated, which at the same time shall not incite to direct violence. For instance, it has very lately been maintained, that the time for putting an end to the discipline of the soldier has come. The men who entertain this opinion, publicly proclaim, that it is not the duty of the army to array itself on the side of the law; and shall such persons with safety be told, that they may publish this doctrine, and do what they can to induce the soldier to forget his duty, and violate his allegiance? Are we, too, to be told, that it is not the duty of the Attorney General to stand forward and appeal to the laws of the country in such a case? I cannot but deeply lament when I hear such doctrines promulgated by those in authority. It is clear, that it is not merely the Reform Bill that we are engaged in passing. It is not merely this one experiment which we are going to make on the Constitution of the country—an experiment which even its advocates say, though necessary, is dangerous. No; what I lament even more than the passing of the Reform Bill is, that when the public mind is excited, the Government does not take measures, measures that are quite compatible with the success of Reform, to allay the public fever, and assuage the hot-headed violence that is abroad. In the present state of the public Press, the Attorney General has expressed himself in a manner wholly uncalled for, and stated views and sentiments that, in the Attorney General, cannot be otherwise than mischievous. He has stated, that it is painful to his conscience to sentence a notorious offender for a gross libel against religion, because that libel might, by chance, contain the offender's sincere opinions. By such expressions as these, he has tied his own hands, and will be incapable of instituting with effect any prosecutions that may hereafter be necessary. Let it not be supposed that I am bringing any charge against the learned Gentleman for his official conduct heretofore. So far from it, I witnessed with pleasure his manly prosecutions of Mr. Carlile and Mr. Cobbett; though I cannot help observing, that he did not then stop to inquire whether the libels which he prosecuted, contained the sincere opinions of those writers. No; he only inquired whether the libels were mischievous in their tendency. He inquired into their probable effect—he found they were calculated to encourage incendiarism, and he, therefore, prosecuted the authors. What was the result of those prosecutions? One was convicted. It is true the other escaped; but under what circumstances? "Eleven of the Jury," says the hon. and learned Gentleman (though, by the way, I do not know how he got at that fact) "were for a conviction; but the twelfth, who was a friend of Mr. Cobbett's, starved the eleven into acquiescing in his opinion." But surely such an accident as this is no argument against future prosecutions; and to be deterred from prosecuting, because, by accident, there has been one man on a Jury able to control his fellows into an improper verdict, is to be deterred by a phantom which should not be allowed to terrify a manly mind. I cannot help hoping that the opinions expressed by the hon. and learned Gentleman, have been expressed incautiously and without mature deliberation. At all events I can assure him, that nothing would give me greater pleasure, than to learn that I have misunderstood what he said; for, in the present times, and in those which I foresee will succeed the present, I cannot conceive any opinion more dangerous to the government of the country than the doctrine, that a man may not only maintain, but propagate, any principles among the deluded and infuriated multitude, provided he sincerely entertains them.

I hope I may be allowed to trespass on the indulgence of the House, as I cannot help explaining, somewhat fully, that which the right hon. Baronet has most grievously misunderstood. I never said that, in my judgment, sincerity of opinion was to protect a man from prosecution; on the contrary, I said that I could not dive into men's hearts; I also said, that it was not my personal feeling that was to regulate this matter; but my feeling of what was due to the security of the public and to the honour of the Crown. More than this is unnecessary; and, while I entertain these principles, which I believe to be as just as I know them to be sincere, I shall not take the advice of the right hon. Gentleman (though I receive it with all the candour that is due to it), to resign my office into hands in which the duties of it may not, perhaps, be more conscientiously discharged, even though the right hon. Baronet himself should appoint my successor. I do not know what his opinion of the duties of an Attorney General may be, but my opinion is this—that he is to do all that in his conscience he believes to be right, for the purpose of protecting the peace of the country and the honour of the Crown. The right hon. Gentleman has asked me my opinion of the conduct of the French government. In the first place, I beg to say, that there is no sort of parallel between a new government emerging from the revolution of the barricades—between the ancient and long-established government of England, and the new government of France; but I believe that, instead of the latter having been strengthened, it has been materially injured by the multitude of prosecutions that the French ministry have thought proper to institute. As to the example set by Mr. Fox and Mr. Sheridan in the case of Mr. John Reeves, I think, at all events, that that is not an example in favour of such prosecutions, and, least of all, by order of the House of Commons. I believe that it is now very generally felt, that it would have been much better to have left Mr. Reeves's case alone, and to have let him go forward in his foolish extravagance without molestation: the prosecution, however, arose from the folly and heat of the party feeling of the day, which, I must say, was provoked by the still greater folly of the party feeling evinced by the other side. I, therefore, again beg to say, that I distinctly disavow that which the right hon. Gentleman has assigned to me, though I might, in my ill command of language, have led the right hon. Gentleman to the conclusion to which he came. Let me also remind the right hon. Gentleman, that I looked to other consequences besides that which he has quoted, as if it had been the solitary one on which I rested my argument; for, though I said that sincerity of opinion was one of those circumstances which would make me reluctant to prosecute, yet I only mentioned it as one of numerous others which would weigh with me, as Attorney General, before I committed the honour of the Crown to the uncertain issue of a legal prosecution. Indeed, I may say, that I mentioned all the objections which the right hon. Gentleman has himself laid down, and particularly that of giving a greater publicity, and thereby increasing the atrocity of the venom. I admit that, throughout the whole of this debate, we have, in a manner, been letting out secrets; and I, therefore, think it would have been better if such a question had not been put in this House as that proposed by the noble Lord (Lord Stormont); for even the arguments of the right hon. Gentleman himself—built as they are on official experience—are encouragements to the repetitions of libel. I, therefore, think that it would be much better not to discuss these matters, whereby we shall be avoiding, as far as we can, the introduction of them to the notice of the public. The right hon. Gentleman has also thought proper to make a sort of reprehension on me for entering so largely on this subject, when it only came before the House in the shape of a question proposed to me—I admit, in a most courteous manner—by the noble Lord. But I would ask the noble Lord himself, whether, after what has been said in this House and the other House of Parliament, and whether, after his having given notice of this very question, it would not have been a surprise to him, and an apparent dereliction of duty in me, if I had not taken the opportunity of stating some of the reasons which, in my view, make these prosecutions unadvisable? I really think, after all, that there is no great difference of opinion between us on the principle of the thing: we have only stated some considerations, which have more or less strength according to our different situations; but I do not feel that, in any thing (except as to the sincerity of a man's opinions), I differ from the right hon. Gentleman—unless, indeed, in degree. With respect to the particular case I mentioned to the House, I did so because I thought it was a strong illustration of the want of power on the part of the Attorney General to put an end to a libel; for, notwithstanding the abhorrent nature of the publication, the public feeling was far from going along with the sentence, and I myself (as I must again repeat) was glad when the term of the man's imprison- ment had expired; not that I believe the sentence was unjust, but because I felt that he was a young man just come to town, who probably did not know what he was doing, and who was led away by a false enthusiasm in an honest belief of the sincerity of his cause. I now only have to thank the House for its indulgence in having listened to me, and again to repeat, that, as Attorney General, I am giving up no power that belongs to the Crown. I am only standing up for a careful and forbearing use of it, which, I believe, will not only conduce to the protection of property, but to the well-being of the whole community.

I think that all who heard the hon. and learned Gentleman will confirm me in my impression, that he laid down the doctrine that the sincerity of opinions was an apology for a libel, without any qualification whatever, excepting that the libel must not incite to actual violence. I certainly recognise a distinction between the new government of France and the ancient government of England; but no distinction that is available to the learned Gentleman's argument on the injustice of punishing sincere opinions, and I can see many circumstances, even in this ancient government, which may call for the active interference of the law for the purpose of repressing the too great licentiousness of the Press.

thought it would have been quite inconsistent of his Majesty's Government to turn round and institute prosecutions against the Press, when so much had been done by them and their supporters in that House to inflame the public mind. He believed hon. Members were not acquainted with the violent and scandalous libels which were every day published. Some spoke of his Majesty being under petticoat government, and advised the people not to put their trust in princes. Her Majesty they spoke of as bringing with her all the political infection of her tyrannous country. Royalty was denounced, and the block was said to be the best place for kings. The cry of others was, "Down with the Priests and the Lords," and, conjoined with this, the people were told that the nobility and gentry unjustly took their property from them. The hon. Member then read several other violent extracts from publications, the titles of which he did not mention, and concluded by stating that he should every week bring down extracts from such of those publications as came under his notice, and, after holding them up to the reprobation of the House, the responsibility would rest on his Majesty's Government if they did not prosecute the libellers, and put an end to such inflammatory and seditious publications.

I hope that the hon. Gentleman will not persevere in reading those papers to the House once a week; for he very truly says that it is probable that a great number of the Members of this House do not know even of the existence of the Papers from which he is to quote; to which I may add, that it is also probable that a great majority of the people of England are equally ignorant of them; and, therefore, if the hon. Gentleman, week after week, reads all the most objectionable passages, he will be in a fair way of giving them a prosperous sale. Agreeing in much of what has fallen from the right hon. member for Tamworth, I think that one of the dangers of prosecuting these libels will be, to give the defendant an opportunity of making an impudent defence in a Court of Justice, whereby the publicity of his paper will be very much increased. But there are other circumstances which we are also bound to take into consideration—the state of the excitement in the country at the present moment, for instance; though, at the same time, I admit, that whatever that excitement may be on general political subjects, it cannot at all justify the personal attacks which have lately been made. I am sure that in making this statement I am only expressing the general feeling of the House; but if we once enter into a crusade of prosecutions of this sort, so far from doing good to the cause of government, morality, or freedom of opinion, so called, I am afraid that we shall be inflicting on all these a most serious injury.

thanked the hon. member for Dundalk, on behalf of the proprietors of the papers he had taken so much pains to bring into notice. As to Mr. Hetherington, with whom he was intimately acquainted, he could take on himself to say, that that Gentleman was very sincere in his opinions. The Attorney General had given him infinite pleasure by the speech which he had delivered that night. He never thought to have lived to hear such a speech from an Attorney General. He went the whole length which the hon. and learned Gentleman went; and his speech had given him (Mr. Hunt) so much satisfaction, that he could be almost content to die without hearing another speech. As to the person who had been sentenced by the Attorney General when Common Serjeant, he was one of Mr. Carlile's men, named Humphrey Boyle, and it was not the severity of the sentence which had given dissatisfaction, but the man made a very bold defence, and some persons supposed that the sentence was more severe because of the boldness with which the defendant maintained his opinions. Now, he wished to ask the hon. and learned Gentleman whether he had not increased the man's imprisonment, because he had made what was called an impudent defence. [The Attor-General: Certainly not.] Well, at all events, it had so been reported. He also wished to know why the prosecution against Mr. Cobbett had been suspended? Was it not because Mr. Hume had written to Earl Grey, to dissuade him from the prosecution, because Mr. Cobbett was so strenuous an advocate for the Reform Bill? He understood that it was; and if the Attorney General would not afford any information on the subject, he would, some day move for a copy of the letter. The effect of suspending Mr. Cobbett's prosecution was, that Mr. Carlile was tempted to write a still stronger article the following week, for which he was prosecuted and convicted. Only a week back, and coaches, omnibuses and all were christened Adelaide. Half the boys and girls, too, who were born were christened Adelaide; and now the name was all at once wiped out from the omnibuses, and the boys and girls were ashamed of it. He remembered when he came first to London—he was then fourteen years of age—that he had to walk from the Saracen's Head to Newgate, and in the Old Bailey he perceived a very bad smell. He found that this arose from the burning of a woman who had been found guilty of coining farthings. There were no laws to exempt females from punishment, and if the Queen had done any wrong—though he did not say she had—she might be liable to punishment. At least there was nothing, as the hon. Member said, unmanly, offensive, or ungentlemanly, in calling a woman to account. He would not trespass further on the attention of the House, but sit down, thanking his Majesty's Government and the Attorney General for having acted, as he thought, a very prudent part in abstaining from prosecution.

congratulated the Attorney General on the compliments he had received from the hon. member for Preston. When it went forth that the member for Preston approved of the course taken by the Attorney General, in not prosecuting the Press, it would no doubt be highly advantageous to the hon. and learned Gentleman. The compliments must be doubly valuable, inasmuch as the hon. Member had accompanied them by some observations equally laudatory on Mr. Hetherington, the Editor of The Poor Man's Guardian, a paper published, as Mr. Hetherington expressly declared "in defiance of the law, in order to try the power of right against might." He mentioned this, because this was one of the publications which fell within the Attorney General's own description of publication which ought to be prosecuted, for it was an incitement to crime. With respect to the subject under discussion, he was of Blackstone's opinion as to libel, and thought that the best way to preserve the liberty of the Press was to restrain its licentiousness.

said, he should not presume to offer any advice to the Attorney General, as to what publications should be selected for prosecution—that was no part of the duty of the House of Commons. If an Attorney General misconducted himself, let a charge be brought against him, and let the House deal with that charge as justice should require; but it appeared to him that that House would not only waste time, but would act most inexpediently if, in that preliminary stage, it expressed any opinion that certain publications ought or ought not to be prosecuted. The Members of that House were not the constitutional judges of such a question. When an officer of the Crown neglected his duty, then would be the time for the House of Commons to interfere; but to point out such matters would only prevent the officers of the Crown from doing that duty which, he was sure, would be performed creditably to the individual to whose hands it was confided, and advantageously to the country.

said, that in moving that this Bill should be now read a second time, it was not his intention to enter at all into the clauses of the Bill, as it had been in the hands of Members for many months. But it appeared to him advisable to remind the House that this Bill, following up the principles of the English Reform Bill, had been carried to a second reading in the last Session of Parliament, by a larger majority than any other question during the Session. He should, therefore, feel that he was doing very wrong if he detained the House by any repetition of the arguments in favour of the measure, or by any observations on its necessity. Reserving to himself the privilege of reply to any objections which might be urged, or in explanation in case of any inquiries, which Gentlemen were, of course, at full liberty to make if they thought proper, he should confine himself at present to mentioning in a very few words the changes which the parties to whom the care of the Bill was confided had thought it would be right to introduce into it, and he trusted, that after the second reading the House would have no objection to allow the Bill to be committed pro forma, in order that those alterations might be made in it. The first change which it was necessary for him to mention was the separation of the county of Argyle from the isle of Bute. In the next place in order to meet other objections, a slight change was proposed with regard to the proprietors of 10l. tenements in boroughs. The only other material alteration, except verbal alterations was one which related to the machinery of registering votes, which was to be transferred from the Sheriff's clerks to the town clerks. There were some minor changes, with which he did not feel it necessary to take up the time of the House. He should, therefore, conclude by moving that the Bill be read a second time.

said, that after the protracted discussions which had taken place upon the general question of Reform, and as the working of the Scotch Reform Bill was but part and parcel of the greater measure which had already received the sanction of the House, he should feel himself guilty of an unpardonable waste of time if he were to repeat the arguments which had been urged with much greater force by many of his hon. friends. But it was impossible for him to allow this motion for reading the Bill a second time to pass, without declaring, in a few words, his unchanged opinions with regard to the whole question of Reform. The hon. member for Winchilsea had complained of the excitement of the country, which he attributed to the opponents of the measure. After the declarations which had been made by his Majesty's Ministers, of their having security for carrying the Bill, he felt that any thing that he could say would be of little avail; but yet he could not, even at the risk of being charged by the hon. member for Winchilsea with offensive perseverance, refrain from expressing his opinions of the evil effects which the measure would produce to the country. After what had been said by the learned Lord Advocate, he was not disposed to give the House the trouble of dividing upon this question. He should only enter his protest against the measure, and say, that no man would rejoice more than he should, if the learned Lord could use any arguments which would remove his apprehensions of the great and serious evils which were likely to result from this fearful experiment. There were three great principles in the English Bill of Reform; disfranchisement, enfranchisement, and an extension of the suffrage. The third of these more particularly applied itself to Scotland. With regard to the principle of disfranchisement, with the solitary exceptions of the two county towns of Peebles and Selkirk—which exceptions would, he hoped, disappear in Committee—there was no place at present enjoying the franchise which it was proposed to deprive of it altogether. With regard to the principle of enfranchisement, he was not aware that the most violent Anti-Reformer connected with Scotland objected to additional Representatives being given to the large manufacturing towns of that country. On the contrary, it was contended that, from change of circumstances since the Union, the proportion of Representation then given to Scotland, as also the proportion given to it under this Bill, was not large enough, especially when the practical effects which would be produced by the annihilation of those small boroughs in England were considered, through which, by means, perhaps, not the most regular, persons connected with Scotland had hi- therto been enabled to come into the House. He had no doubt that the hon. member for Perth, who had given notice of his intention to submit a motion upon this subject in Committee, would be able to make out such a case as would satisfy the House of the reasonableness of the expectations entertained by Scotland with respect to it. As to the extension of the suffrage, if it had been thought right to extend it in England, where it was already popular, there could be no doubt that it should also be extended in Scotland, where it had never been contended that the Representation was popular. Perhaps, if Parliament had decided that the occupation of a house of a certain value, in an English borough, should be a sufficient qualification for a party's voting for a Member of Parliament, he saw nothing so peculiar in the constitution of large cities in Scotland, as to render that which Parliament had deemed fit for London, Bath, Manchester, and Liverpool, unfit for Edinburgh, Aberdeen, and Glasgow. The greatest objection he should have to urge in Committee was to the nature of the franchise which it was intended to establish in the counties of Scotland. He did not wish to retain the present qualification for counties, and should be willing to put an end to all merely nominal qualifications; but if the learned Lord had wished to give facility to the creation of nominal and occasional votes, it would hardly have been possible for him to devise a phraseology which could more completely accomplish that object than the words of the Bill would do. In his opinion, all must agree that any right of franchise in the counties of Scotland, however small it might be, should be derivable from land. One of the great arguments urged in favour of the English Bill was, the increased influence given to the agricultural interest in the increase of county Members. Now, the practical effect of the change proposed to be introduced into Scotland would be nearly to annihilate the agricultural interest, and to give undue weight to the owners of houses in large towns, which were not royal boroughs. Indeed, the number of persons who would vote in respect of house property, without having any permanent interest in land, would be so great that the Members returned for the Scotch counties would rather represent the commercial and manufacturing than the agricultural interest. Those in- terests, rightly considered, ought not to be placed in opposition; but questions would arise in legislation, the decision of which, one way or the other, it was thought by the people, would benefit one interest and not the other. And as, under this new system, the House would be more liable to be acted upon by popular impressions, taken up without due information, it became doubly necessary that there should be persons representing those separate interests. On a former occasion, when presenting a petition from a number of persons possessed of freeholds, who would by the Bill be deprived of the right of voting, he had stated, that a further effect of it would be, to introduce confusion into the titles of small proprietors in Scotland. He would not then go into technical details, but when in Committee, he hoped to be able to show, that a sweeping change of this kind had to overcome many difficulties. He could not expect the Lord Advocate, or the noble Lord near him, to look with a favourable eye upon suggestions which came from one who described himself then, as formerly, an uncompromising opposer of the measure, but he trusted they would apply for advice to those who supported them all through this question, and they would doubtless find, that it was generally thought, even among the Reformers of Scotland, that no great degree of prudence had been shown in the selection of the qualification for county voters. He might state, without fear of contradiction, that the excitement in favour of Reform, which was appealed to as prevailing in Scotland, rather regarded the state of the borough Representatives to large towns than the peculiar qualification which it was proposed to establish with respect to counties. If the noble Lord opposite would agree to the proposed amendment of the right hon. member for Perth, to allow the large counties of Scotland to return two Members instead of one, his (Sir George Clerk's) objection would be in part obviated, for if the commercial and agricultural interests were almost equally divided, the latter would at any rate return one Member. There was another mode in which a part of this objection might be obviated, though the suggestion of it might not be received with favour by English Members, namely, that those who were to vote in respect to house property should be thrown into the constituency of the borough near to which that property was situated—a plan something analogous to the system of contributory boroughs prevailing in Wales and Scotland. It could not be denied, that a man who derived an income of 10l. per annum from land, had a more valuable property than one who derived the same amount of income from a house, for the former was of permanent value, whilst the latter was liable to continual fluctuations and constant deterioration. The average price of land was about thirty years' purchase, whilst the average price of a house was about twelve or fifteen years' purchase; so that it was a moderate calculation to say, that house property, producing the same amount of income as property in land, was only half the value of the latter. The qualification for voting for counties should, therefore, be confined to persons who had a freehold, giving to all persons, however, who had inferior rights of property, power of going to the persons who held superiorities over them, and requiring them to sell their superiorities at fixed prices. A similar principle was followed with regard to tithes a century and a half ago. It might be said, that this would involve proprietors in considerable expense in making out their titles, but he had already stated, that the practical effect of the Bill would be, to render it necessary for all proprietors to renew their titles. He had ventured to make these suggestions, not with any view of throwing unnecessary difficulties in the way of the Bill; for, however much he might regret its passing, he looked upon it, as far as this House was concerned, as practically carried. His wish, therefore, was, as far as possible to obviate, in some degree, a few of the evils which must, at any rate, attend its passing. Such being his object, he sincerely hoped that the Lord Advocate, and the noble Lord opposite, would take into their councils, not Anti-Reformers, but some of the most zealous Reformers in Scotland; as he was certain they would then have pointed out to them the inconveniences that must attend the system they had adopted with regard to counties, and would, for the sake of the agricultural interest, make some alteration in it. No person would be more delighted than himself to find that the evils he anticipated from the passing of this measure did not take place. He hoped that that Providence which had so long made this country more prosperous than any other portion of the civilized world, would, in its goodness, avert from the country those mischiefs which, he feared, they were about to bring upon it.

said, it ought to excite no surprise that he took part in this discussion, since he had, on a former occasion, submitted a Motion to the House for the Reform of the Scotch Representation. He very well remembered the trial and imprisonment of Mr. Muir and Mr. Palmer, for having promoted Reform in Scotland. They encouraged the people of Scotland to petition for their rights, and for this they were punished. The words they used were—"to claim for themselves a full, fair, and free Representation of the people in Parliament." These very words were now ringing from one end of Scotland to the other, and for using them were Muir and Palmer sent to Botany Bay. They were sentenced to be transported for using words that were now idolised throughout Scotland. They were treated as if they had been guilty of highway robbery. They were sent to the hulks, where he had visited Mr. Palmer, and found him loaded with irons, and placed amidst housebreakers, footpads, and highwaymen. These men were punished for saying that Scotland was entitled to a full and fair Representation. That was forty years ago. What a change had now taken place! The actions for which men were then punished were now idolised throughout the country. What had brought about this change? Had not persecution tried to prevent it? Banishment had been tried; other punishments had been tried; but they had not prevented the effect of those principles which were calculated to benefit society. The measure of Reform was now beyond the power of man to stop it, and he was convinced that it was calculated to add to the happiness of the people. What was the cause of this great change? For forty years the Government had opposed it. Had it been brought about by the Whigs and Radicals out of office? Was it the fruit of Whig or Tory councils? Gentlemen had talked of reaction; but those who looked upon the events of the last ten days would never talk of re-action again. There was scarcely a town in England and Scotland which had not come forward in favour of the Bill. He had taken the pains to inquire after those which had opposed it, and he had scarcely found one. There was no re-action, and he should be glad now to hear any man assert in that House that there was. The whole people were in favour of Reform, and that showed a great change in the opinion of the country. Was that the result of the misrule of the last forty years? Did it arise from the pressure of enormous taxation? Was it caused by that change of the currency which had at once doubled the amount of the taxes paid by the industrious classes, though it did not come into full operation till 1825? Whether arising from these or other causes, there now was a general feeling in favour of Reform, and when that Bill which had been so well fought in that House became the law, he did not doubt that the Members who had stood by it and done their duty, would receive, what they were well entitled to—the thanks of the country.

said, he should be happy if the results which the honourable Gentleman predicted were to come to pass. After the course which things had taken, he felt that it would be useless for him to oppose the measure, and his object, therefore, was, to make it productive of as little mischief as possible. The great change which was now about to be made was not a restoration, or a correction of abuses. It was a clear and distinct new Constitution. He would show this by the learned Lord's own words, on moving that the former Bill be read a second time. 'He would then at once declare that the object of the Bill was, not to take away any part of the system, but to take down the whole of it—to take it down altogether, for the whole principle was bad. He gloried in making the avowal that no shred or rag, no jot or tittle of it was to be left.'^* These words were certainly delivered in the set phrase of speech, but the sentiments were the sentiments of Jack Cade, the first English Reformer. He said, "I've thought upon it: it shall be so. Away, burn all the records of the realm; my month shall be the Parliament of England." Such, too, were the sentiments of the learned Lord; his were precisely the sentiments of Jack Cade. The learned Lord argued that a great change was necessary, and he said, if he understood the learned Lord right, that by greatly extending the franchise, the people would be satisfied, and the means of their prosperity provided.

^* Hansard, (third series) vol. vii. p. 536.

But in Ireland the franchise was much more extensive than it had ever been in Scotland, and he had yet to learn that the people of that country were either satisfied or prosperous. He had always understood that they were discontented and miserable. Other causes were assigned for this, but certainly the extent of the Representation had not saved Ireland from being more wretched than Scotland. Turning to England, he begged leave to ask, whether the advantages possessed by this country were so great that Scotland ought to be anxious to change her own institutions for those of England? He saw no such difference in the prosperity of the two countries. The Bill would effect a total change in all the existing institutions under which Scotland had so long thriven—a change, too, which would, in his opinion, be anything but beneficial. It was, however, argued on the other side, that if those ancient institutions were so valuable, why were not the Gentlemen from Scotland a little more strenuous in their defence of them? He, however, thought that an ample apology had been on many occasions offered on their behalf, which, though it might not be so wittily or so eloquently urged as it might have been had any of the hon. Members from Ireland been their advocates, sprung from as ardent a feeling of patriotism as any defence of their own rights. The change in the character of the electors might change the description of Representatives who would be sent to that House; but though they might be more eloquent—though they might be able to address a large and popular assembly with greater effect, yet the interests of the country would not be better taken care of than they were at present. The principles of the Bill being admitted, he had a right to call upon them to apply those principles impartially. To show the injustice with which Scotland was treated in the appointment of her Representation, he should refer to the same data by which the English Representation had been guided, in order to show how differently the former country had been treated in this respect. The census of 1821 states the population of England and Wales to amount to 11,978,875, that of Scotland is stated to be about 2,093,000, which is considerably above one-sixth of that of England. The revenue contributed by England amounted at the same epoch to 40,900,280l.; that derived from Scotland to 5,113,353l.; the proportion which the latter country bore in this respect to England, was about one-eighth. Now, compare the relative proportion between the number of Representatives sent by the two countries, and let the House answer whether Scotland had justice done her, and whether it was fair to lay down certain principles upon which the extent of Representation was supplied in England, and to show so total a disregard to those principles, when the Representation of Scotland came under their consideration, as to deny their application to the situation of that country. He could not help expressing a strong hope, that the suggestion which had just been thrown out by the hon. member for Edinburgh (Sir George Clerk) would meet with the consideration which, in his opinion, it so well merited. The Bill as at present constructed would tend to make all the Judges and the clergy in Scotland political partisans, and it would have the effect also of inducing the gentry there to lavish their property in contested elections. Unless the modifications of the franchise which had been recommended, and the other alterations which had been suggested, were to be carried into effect before the Bill left that House, he was convinced it would prove, not that benefit which the people so ardently expected from it, but as great a curse as was ever inflicted on them.

contended, that the Scottish people had expressed an intense desire for Reform, and that they had also expressed their wishes to be in favour of even so large a Reform as that which it was proposed to effect by the Bill before the House. Hon. Members had been pleased to say, that Scotland had derived the chief of her present advantages, both in wealth and other respects, from the benefits which were conferred on her since her union with England; but those benefits were, in his opinion, chiefly the result of her own industry; nor did the chief of her popular institutions—namely, her Church, arise from her connexion with England. The Church of Scotland had stood the test of time, and had thereby proved the excellence of the principles upon which that structure was based, and moreover he asserted, that the very reason why the Church of Scotland had proved so excellent an institution was, that it was founded on such popular principles, and not on any legislative proceedings. It was sufficiently notorious to all that the Church of Scotland was reared in despite of the strenuous exertions of the reigning prince to extinguish its growth, and to put it down altogether; and that prince was assisted in no small degree by the Members of the Legislature, who, in their eagerness to appropriate the Church property, had shown themselves, during that struggle, much more ready to assist than to resist the endeavours which were then made to quell the growth of that Church, which was now so great a blessing to the land, and which now proved to be the most valuable institution possessed by Scotland. It was not, either, an unknown circumstance that the majority of forty-five who sat in that House, and of the sixteen who sat in another place, as Representatives of Scotland, had ever been celebrated for paying more attention to their own interests than to those of their nominal constituents, the public; and, with very few exceptions, those hon. and noble Representatives would be found to have voted constantly in the Treasury majorities, for which they did not go unrewarded, nor did they neglect the frequent opportunities which occurred to remit the proceeds of their gains to Scotland. Generally speaking, the county Representatives in Scotland were chosen, under the present system, by the nomination of several noble Lords; and they would be found, with very few exceptions, to be selected with a view to give support to the Ministers. The hon. Member opposite (Colonel Lindsay) was certainly an exception to this remark; for he was chosen as Representative for the county, solely because of his Anti-Ministerial opinions. It was, however, useless to enter into any lengthened argument upon the necessity of granting Reform to Scotland, for it was only necessary to show the House the miserable state in which that country had for years been in that respect, to convince them that the present Bill was a mere measure of justice, and that it ought to be conceded without any material modifications, or any further delay. Under the present system of Representation, the Members from Scotland had enjoyed for a series of years an uninterrupted career of prosperity, both in great and in small things; although, in many cases, the trifling and inferior posts in the Customs and Excise, were not personally available to them, yet such small blessings were highly acceptable to their friends in the borough. But this system ought to be put an end to, and neither Scotland nor her Representatives ought any longer to be degraded by such a traffic, or to be subjected to the reproach which was justly cast upon her people on that account. With respect to the future extension of the franchise, he was desirous to see that privilege conferred wherever the claims of education gave a title, and he thought that it ought to be bounded by that condition. There was one most important feature in connexion with this subject, which he could not pass over, and with which he should conclude his observations. He would entreat the learned Lord to keep the clergy of Scotland perfectly unconnected with political matters. He implored the Government to do so, because the influence which the Scotch clergy exercised over the people was well known; and if there was the least chance of the clergy being converted into political agents, or of even a portion of them being so converted, no idea could be formed of the miserable results which might arise. He hoped and trusted—believing, as he did, that the sentiments of a large majority of Scotch Members, on both sides of the House, were in favour of this view of the case that his Majesty's Ministers would be pleased to take this matter into their most serious consideration. The case might be widely different with regard to England. He drew no parallel between the cases of the two countries, for it was well known, that the constitution of the Church of Scotland stood on a perfectly different footing from that of the Church of England. At present, he believed, that not above twenty Scotch clergymen were entitled to exercise the franchise. The hon. member for Edinburgh said, he anticipated great evils from the Bill, and, though he was not one of those persons who fell under the description of the hon. Baronet, the member for Edinburgh, as golden dreamers—persons who expected the Reform Bill to work miracles in Scotland, and to remove all the difficulties and burthens under which they laboured in that country—he was still one of those who believed, that after the mature and lengthened consideration which the subject had received from the Legislature, the Bill before them could not fail of producing the effects which it was intended to bring about, and he certainly participated in the hopes which had been expressed by hon. Members who supported the Bill, of its ultimately being attended with the best results.

concurred in the observations which had been made by the hon. Baronet, the member for Edinburgh; at the same time he must observe, that whilst he was ready to admit the necessity which existed for some change in the Representative system of Scotland, he could not but look upon those which were contemplated by the present Bill, as not only of too sweeping a nature, but as tending to produce the most alarming consequences to that country. He did not deny the existence of a strong feeling throughout Scotland in favour of Reform, but he could not help noticing, that very great difference of opinion existed amongst the Members who advocated Reform and supported the Bill: the learned Lord Advocate asserted that the cry for Reform arose from the increased intelligence amongst the Scottish people; whilst another hon. Member declared it to have originated in the tyranny of a Tory Government. The hon. Member opposite (Mr. A. Johnstone) had been pleased to cast the stigma of interest over the conduct of the forty-five Representatives of Scotland in that House. He must, however, deny that those Representatives had been actuated by personal motives, or that they had only sought to serve their own interests in voting with the Ministers. He contended that in their parliamentary conduct they had ever acted for the benefit of that country on behalf of which they sat there, and the imputation cast upon them by the hon. Member was wholly undeserved by them.

expressed a strong wish that the present Bill should prove a final measure with respect to Reform in Scotland, which, in its present condition, he feared it would not be. It was on this account that he had felt extremely glad to hear from the Lord Advocate, that it was his intention to extend the 10l. franchise in Scotland, in the way that had been explained to the House; and he could not, for these reasons, follow the right hon. member for Edinburgh in the counsel which he gave the House, to shorten instead of widening the extent of the franchise, because it was his opinion, that such a course would render it necessary at some future period to pass another measure, granting that which he now proposed to refuse. For himself, also, in his condition as a country gentleman, and as such interested in the agriculturists of Scotland, he must confess, that he did not participate in the fears which were entertained by the right hon. Baronet, that the operation of the Bill would have an unfavourable effect upon the agricultural portion of the population of Scotland.

said, the question had often been asked—whence arose the cry for Reform? and answers as contradictory as various had been given to that question. In his opinion, the demand for Reform originated in the distress which pervaded all classes. Whether that distress had resulted from the changes in the currency, the introduction of the free trade system, or from the other assigned causes, he knew not; but he must say, that the commerce and manufactures of the kingdom were in a state of deep distress and depression, and it was to Reform, that all people were taught to look for relief from the condition in which they found themselves. The only answer, in fact, which was now made to their demand for relief was, that Reform should be granted to them, and they would find relief from that; relief, not only from taxation, but also from the other burthens under which they groaned. The several classes of people accordingly framed to themselves the species of relief which they were to derive from the Bill: the agriculturist looked to it as a sure means of lessening the poor-rate, and of raising the price of his labour: the manufacturer looked to it as the means of again reviving the prohibition on the importation of rival manufactures from foreign lands: the merchant as a means of securing to his ships that share of employment, of which they had been deprived by the interposition of the ships of foreign nations under the new system; and the disappointment which each and all of those classes would experience in the failure of the Reform Bill to produce these expected effects, would equal the excitement which had been raised in its favour throughout the country. The people generally, also, looked forward to the attainment of the small share of political power which they would gain under the Bill as a means of personal advantage, and if such did not prove to be the case, they would wreak the effects of their disappointment on the heads of those hon. Gentlemen who had taught them to expect such results. It was, however, not the Question of Reform or no Reform which they were that co evening called upon to discuss; that Question had already been decided, he was sorry to say, by the delegated authorities in that House; but with respect to the Bill before them, he was ready to admit, that if it could be shown by the Act of Union, that the people of Scotland were entitled even to a much larger measure of Reform than that, he should be very ready to grant it. He did not conceive that the Bill was such a measure of Reform as the people of Scotland had a right to expect. It seemed inconsistent with the principles of that Bill which they had already passed, and if he could establish that, he should have a right to call upon them not to satisfy themselves with a blind adherence to any measure, simply because it was the measure of the Administration of the day. He had a right to call upon the House to adopt a measure similar in principle to the English Bill; and he had a right, if he could prove that this which was before them, was contrary to the articles of the Union, to call upon the House to pass a Bill in conformity with those articles. If he could show, that this Bill was inconsistent with the other, or with the principle that hon. Members themselves were so bent upon establishing, that the people had a right to claim what they considered they wanted, and not what the Legislature might consider that they required, then this was not the Bill that should have been brought forward. If he looked to the preamble of the English Bill, and read it aright, he found it to run thus:—that all decayed and inconsiderable boroughs were to be disfranchised—that the elective franchise was to be extended to larger and more considerable towns, at present unrepresented—and the franchise, generally extended, by reducing the scale of qualification. The original object in establishing the return of Knights of the Shire was, to counteract the democratical influence which would be created in Parliament by adding to the Representation of large towns, and reducing that of inconsiderable boroughs. This latter, however, was the same principle as that applied in the English Bill. But upon what principle did Ministers act with regard to Scotland? Why, they not only did not increase the number of Scottish knights of the shire, but took away some of those which she returned already, and gave Scotland, under the new system, not Representatives of the people, but Representatives of the Barons or others holding their lands by tenure from the Crown. The power of returning thirty Members was taken from the landed interest to confer it upon the manufacturing interest. In the preamble of the Scotch Bill, the laws for returning Members to Parliament, as settled at the time of the Union, were stated to be defective; however, the laws for electing Members of Parliament, as settled at the time of the Union, were not defective, and therefore he maintained, that the preamble stated that which was not the fact. The learned Lord opposite had stated the object of this Bill; but he (Lord Loughborough) would ask him—why was it not founded on the same principle as the English Bill? In the Articles of the Union it was expressly stated, that the law relating to the civil government should be the same throughout the kingdom; and that the law relative to private right should be altered by the Parliament of Great Britain alone. Perhaps the noble Lords opposite might argue the question in this manner:—they might tell the House, that the Representation of Scotland was a matter of private right, but if it were, then the Representation of England was equally so. It was either a matter of public right, or of mere arbitrary legislation. The ten largest counties in Scotland returned in all ten Representatives. He would take no undue advantage, and therefore referred to the ten largest counties in Scotland, and on comparing these with ten counties in England, he found that the latter returned thirty-four Representatives. In Scotland the proportion which Representation bore to population was about one Member to 94,000 inhabitants. In England it was in the proportion of one Member to 64,000 odd. Now, on what principle of justice—on what principle of fairness—on what principle known to the Constitution of this country—was such gross injustice (he could call it by no other name) tolerated? It was not his intention to offer any opposition to the principle of this Bill specifically, for he must beg to enter his protest against the measure as founded on any principle whatever. He considered it contrary to all rule and practice; contrary to the Articles of the Union, and to every principle of equity and justice. He could not conclude without expressing a hope that the noble Lords opposite would not object to submit (as they had already done in the case of the English Bill) to any amelioration or alteration. He trusted the noble Lord would not forget the special nature of the various tenures by which land was held in Scotland. He assured the noble Lords, that if they objected to any alteration, they would subject the people of Scotland to a very heavy tax. Many people held their lands under Charters, and this description of tenure, taken in connexion with the rights of superiority, would be materially affected, in many cases, by the operation of this Bill, since the Bill, as it at present stood, would often be productive of great injustice. He would not, however, offer any opposition to the Motion, perceiving it would be nugatory, but would content himself with entering his protest against it, the Bill being at once unconstitutional and unnecessary; and he trusted to the generosity of the noble and learned Lord to allow of such amendments and alterations as might be found necessary.

denied, that the question of Reform had been decided by a delegated majority, in any improper sense of those words, but by an uncorrupted and independent Parliament—independent alike in their principles and in their circumstances—independent of the Crown and of the Administration—but not of the country. He thought the noble Lord might have spared that observation, the more especially as none of those who preceded him in the discussion of that night, cast any reflection upon the decision which the majority of the House had come to on the Bill which had already passed. Judging from what he had heard of it, he should say, that there was nothing new in this Bill; but he would shortly advert to the observation which was made by the hon. member for Edinburghshire, with respect to one great change it introduced—he meant the qualification. When this measure was originally introduced, he thought that the 10l. qualification, or vote, being introduced, was such a species of revolution, that it was some time before his mind could be reconciled to it. He had found, however, that there was a disposition—a very proper one—to introduce into the Representation the tenantry of the country; at the same time to prevent any dangerous results arising from establishing too low a franchise in the towns. Under all the circumstances, it appeared to him that they could not hope to have an independent tenantry if the Representation were withheld from them. On this ground, and on this ground alone, he now expressed a hope that his Majesty's Ministers would not be induced to make any alteration in the qualification they had established, but that they would allow the 10l. qualification in counties to remain as it now was. He had always objected to there being a provision in the Bill which allowed the introduction of those who had votes in populous burghs, or other places, into counties. This Bill, he was aware, did not enable the person who voted in right of certain property in an ancient borough, or in a place which was made a borough, to vote also for the county. If it contained such a provision, he should object to the principle. It was idle to say, that there was no difference between borough and county interests. Perhaps indeed, there was not in reality; but, at all events, it was plain that it was generally considered that their respective interests were not alike. If the votes of the borough Members and the county Representatives were compared, it would be found, that they differed materially on many most important questions. There was one objection which he certainly still entertained to this Bill. He should be disposed to say, that the landed interest had not been sufficiently attended to. The existing proportions of borough and county Members ought to have been altered, it was true; but not to the immense extent in which it had been. On looking over the proposed alteration, it appeared to him that the Representation of counties in Scotland was decidedly not what it ought to be. He did not know whether the right hon. and gallant Gentleman opposite meant to bring forward any motion relative to this part of the subject; if such a motion were brought forward he should certainly vote in favour of it; at the same time, he should adhere to the proposed aggregate number of Scotch Members. The noble Lord (Loughborough) had said, that if Reform was to be given to Scotland, he wished it to be of the same description as that which had been given to England. Did the noble Lord wish, then, to reduce the 10l. franchise? What would be the necessary consequence of assimilating the system of Representation in Scot- land to that of England? If the same system of Representation were given to Scotland as was established in England, the franchise must be reduced, in some parts of Scotland, to 40s. The noble Lord, he presumed, was not prepared to reduce that which was already a low-enough qualification—namely 10l. to 40s. The people of Scotland, he thought, would have been dissatisfied with the 40s. freeholders. In point of fact, the county Representation had been as pure as it could be; and he believed the people would not have been satisfied if they had been told, that he would give them the elective franchise, but that they should have it in this particular way. Upon these grounds, he felt it quite impossible to support any alteration of the kind which the noble Lord seemed to contemplate. The hon. member for Edinburghshire said, that he objected to the introduction of voters in towns. He (Mr. Cutlar Fergusson) also objected to the introduction of town voters, if they were of that description that they could not, of necessity, have the same interests as the other class of voters; but this he contended, that the immense population introduced into the Representation of Scotland was a population composed, in a considerable degree, of persons connected, more or less, with the landed interest. The interests of the voters in these boroughs were not in the least degree at variance with those of the land owners; on the contrary, their habits of association and connexion with the gentlemen of the neighbouring counties seemed to afford about the best counterpoise that could well be devised. He believed, therefore, that the landed interest of Scotland would still preserve that great and honourable place which he hoped and trusted it always would retain in the Representation of that country. He had already stated, that he objected to the introduction of the inhabitants of populous places into the Representation of counties. As an instance of the effect of this system he would cite the cases of Greenock and Port Glasgow; in the former Bill they were joined together—by the present measure Port Glasgow alone was taken, and some of the voters of Greenock were, in fact, disfranchised, while a large number was thrown into the county. He should, at the proper time, submit a proposition to the House upon that point. That the Scotch Members returned under the present system paid every attention to local interests he admitted, but he could not say so much for their endeavours to amend and improve the institutions of their country. Their principal use was, to swell the Ministerial majorities. When the question of the American war was under consideration, the Scotch Members voted in favour of its continuance; and that war would have been put an end to long before the protracted period of its termination, had the Scotch Members given a just and proper vote. At the same time, it would be difficult to find men more independent than the Scotch Members. He did not believe that they had sought for "jobs" a bit more than the English Members. He trusted, however, that hereafter we should have better times; not that he expected corruption in Parliament would be altogether got rid of in his lifetime; still less did he expect, that Reform would bring with it that abundance of good, and that extinction of evil, which some persons believed it would immediately produce. He was not one of those Reformers who entertained such a doctrine; on the contrary, he had always told the people that they would not derive such vast improvement as they expected from Reform. The people of Scotland, however, did not take up the question in that light—they considered themselves degraded by being shut out from the Representation of the people. The noble Lord said, that he considered the present system of Representation to be perfect; that was strange, for it was universally allowed to be defective. Could it be necessary to prove that, when powerful individuals could influence the return for a whole county, and a self-elected junta returned the Members for each borough? He believed no one would concur on this point with the noble Lord. The Representation of Scotland was universally condemned. No one would stand up for it in either House of Parliament. Even a certain noble Duke had so far acceded to the principles of plain common sense as to admit, that property ought to be, in some degree, connected with Representation. He would only add, that this measure of Reform was at no period so popular in Scotland as at present. There had been no time, from the 1st of March, 1831—on which day the noble Lord brought forward the Reform of Parliament Bill—up to the present moment, in which that spirit, that desire, that determination, so universally expressed to obtain Reform, had not continued to increase. He rejoiced that the people of Scotland were quiet and peaceable. That the feeling in favour of Reform was most determined in that country he knew and admitted; but he knew, also, that if, pending the final decision of the great question, a spirit of outrage or violence should arise, it would be put down by the same, better and yet more powerful spirit which obtained for Scotland its civil and religious liberty.

did not rise to prolong the debate, but merely to enter his protest against the Bill. There could be no doubt that the Parliament was now placed in a situation very different from that in which it formerly stood. At that time the House of Peers had not agreed to the second reading of the English Reform Bill; but having now done so he concurred with his hon. friend (the member for Edinburgh) that it was quite impossible to withhold from Scotland Reform altogether; and, though he was as convinced as ever, that this measure would be destructive to the essential interests of that country—not only in a political point of view, but with respect to the manner in which titles were made to property—that if he were certain, even now, that by any means in his power, he could retard the progress of the measure, he would do so without hesitation: but as the other House of Parliament had already agreed to an extensive Reform in England, and as this House, on a former occasion, agreed to a Bill nearly similar to that, he should consider himself trespassing most unnecessarily on the time of the House, were he to offer an ineffectual and hopeless opposition.

expressed his most unqualified dissent from, and opposition to, this measure. With regard to the manner in which it had now been introduced to the notice of the House, he could not forbear expressing his astonishment. They had been told that there was no reaction; and the hon. Gentlemen opposite—trusting, no doubt, to the strength of their majority on that side of the House, had not condescended to offer any argument whatever in favour of the Bill. They had heard no sort of description of the nature or objects of the Bill, or of its probable tendency or consequences. He could not forbear from expressing his regret, that those who were able, and ought to be willing, to give a full explanation upon this subject, had not thought proper to afford it. He regretted that an hon. Gentleman, so well qualified as his hon. friend, to give an account of the probable consequences of his measure, had not done so; but he trusted that he would be induced to do it before the House came to a decision. However his Majesty's Ministers, backed by the mob, might coerce the House—however they might coerce the votes of its Members—they should not coerce him. He was well aware that his individual vote was of very little importance on this occasion to any party in the House; but it was of some importance to him that he should preserve his own consistency; and he should be ashamed of himself if he could sit in that House and allow this Bill to pass without giving it his most decided opposition. This could only be done by dividing the House upon this question. His opposition was principally directed against that part of the Bill which related to the county Representation. With regard to the boroughs, he should not oppose the principle of the Bill, although, perhaps, some of the details might require amendment. He would not trouble the House further, but he could not sit down without expressing his regret, that the hon. and learned member for Kirkcudbright should have withdrawn his opposition to this Bill, and departed from those principles with respect to it which he formerly entertained.

said, his hon. friend had totally misunderstood him, in supposing that he had departed from any ground he ever took up on this subject. He stated to the House, that if the hon. and gallant Gentleman would bring forward a motion for increasing the number of Representatives for Scotland, he would vote in favour of such a Motion. With regard to his present vote, he would remind his hon. friend, that he had voted in favour of the second reading of the former Bill, and therefore he had not changed his opinion, by voting for the second reading of this Bill.

said, that he was as anxious to preserve his consistency as the hon. Baronet was his. The hon. Baronet, however, who had hitherto objected to the Bill entirely, now had no objection to the borough Reform. That principle comprised one-half of the Bill, and he congratulated his countrymen with the utmost sincerity on their having thus acquired the support of the hon. Baronet to the borough Reform, somewhat at the expense of the hon. Baronet's consistency. As the hon. Baronet had so far changed his opinions in the lapse of a few short months, he (Mr. Hume) did not despair of finding him altogether on the side of Reform in a short time. There was only one part of his speech on which he wished to make any observation. The hon. Member had said, that his Majesty's Ministers had been overawed by the mob; instead of the mob, he should have said the whole community. The hon. Gentleman proceeded on a mistake; he supposed that none but a limited number of the lower classes were anxious for this Bill, and therefore he opposed it. But the fact was, that it was the people of Scotland who called for this measure; for it was in vain to deny, that the people of Scotland were to a man in favour of this Bill. He would make one other remark before he sat down. It appeared to him that the hon. Gentleman did great injustice to the learned Lord, who had displayed great good sense and sound judgment in not pressing upon the House any argument to prove that Reform was wanting in Scotland. Reform had been so long required in Scotland, that no man could refuse it, except him who, for "consistency's" sake, happened to be opposed to it. In conclusion, he would only observe, that he hoped this measure would conciliate the whole of the people of Scotland: it would tend to raise them in their own estimation, and to make them even better citizens than they had hitherto been. He was satisfied that no measure was ever proposed which was hailed with greater satisfaction throughout the country than this.

said, though he could not concur in the view of this subject that seemed to be recommended by the learned Lord, of allowing the present question to pass without discussion, he would not trespass on the time of the House at any very great length; but still he considered the question of far too much importance to his country to suffer this Bill to pass a second reading without briefly expressing his sentiments upon it. Before he proceeded further, he would beg to notice one remark which had fallen from the hon. Baronet (Sir Charles Forbes), with regard to his consistency. In his opinion, that hon. Baronet's consistency would be better consulted by his dividing on that Motion of which he (Sir George Murray) had given notice, with respect to an addition of Members to the Scotch counties, than by dividing the House on the second reading of the Bill; because it was quite clear that his hon. friend did not object to the general principle of the Bill, so far as it went to make an alteration in the system of borough Representation; and it would, perhaps, be better to pospone dividing until the particular part of the Bill to which he had alluded came before them. He concurred in the sentiment expressed by the hon. Baronet with respect to the borough Representation; and he believed that few persons connected with Scotland, or acquainted with that country, but must admit, that the borough Representation there required great alteration. It appeared the more necessary that he should be permitted to occupy some portion of the time of the House on the present occasion, because he stood in a position different from that of some of those hon. Gentlemen, of whose judgment and character he entertained the highest opinion, but from whom he differed in this respect, that he had never been at any time an uncompromising enemy of the principle of Reform: all that he had ever required had been, that the measure of Reform to be introduced should be moderate and temperate in its principle—that it should not be effected by sudden and violent changes—and that those changes in our political system should not be pushed at once to too great an extent. The chief ground of objection which he entertained to the plan of his Majesty's Government was, that the changes proposed were too extensive and too general, and too hastily to be carried into effect. He had never been able to separate in his view of it, the measure of Reform into three distinct parts, and, indeed, the whole ought to be considered as one great measure. He was convinced that great inconvenience had already arisen, and also that more would arise, in consequence of the measure having been divided into three separate parts for the three different portions of the United Kingdom. It was greatly owing to this that the measure was so extremely unjust to Scotland, and that the people of that part of the empire had not been treated in the way they had a right to expect. It was not treating Scotland and Ireland fairly, to separate their interests from those of England. In former times, when there existed three independent Legislatures, and they negotiated for the purpose of uniting into one, each did the best they could for their own interests; and in these unions the preponderance of England in wealth, power, and patronage, gave her somewhat of an undue advantage; but in the present day, England, Scotland, and Ireland, stood in a different situation. The union of Scotland with England, and the subsequent union of Ireland with Great Britain, altered the relation of the countries. They had not now separate Legislatures, adjusting separate interests, but a united Legislature, consulting together for the common interests of a United Kingdom; and, therefore, they should not legislate separately for these parts of the United Kingdom, but alike for the whole; and all parts of the United Kingdom should be treated in the same manner, and placed on the same footing with respect to any advantages which were to result from a general measure. In his opinion, what was due to one part of the United Kingdom was clue to the others, and in legislating they ought not to make a distinction injurious to any part. Whatever advantage England proposed to attain by the Reform Bill, Scotland and Ireland had equal claims with England to participate in those advantages. Upon what ground had the demand been made for Reform? The excitement which had been raised, and which still prevailed on this subject, had been chiefly owing to the great number of nomination boroughs which existed in England, and also from a number of boroughs having become decayed, and having fallen below that standard which it was thought should authorize them to return two Members each to that House. The existence of this state of things had excited considerable discussion and dissatisfaction, and the consequence had been, that the House had passed a Bill to disfranchise fifty-six boroughs, which, it was contended, fell under the character of nomination boroughs; and to take away one Member each from thirty other places, besides two Members also from Weymouth. Now, the deficiency occasioned in the House, in consequence of this large disfranchisement, had been filled up by conferring the franchise on a large number of English towns, and on several English counties; but he would contend, that these seats did not belong exclusively to the people of England. The pretext for taking them away was, that they belonged, in part, very improperly, to individuals, and were, in part, superfluities. On these grounds they were made disposable for the benefit of the people by a united Parliament; and the advantage of the whole United Kingdom should be equally consulted in the allotment of them. He would contend that any deficiency that might exist in the Representation of the people, in any part of the United Kingdom, should be supplied by means of these disposable seats. By means of them, Gentlemen, connected with any distinct interest, not adequately represented, had found their way into that House, and the paucity of the Representatives for Scotland was not so much felt, as it would otherwise have been, because Gentlemen, connected with that part of the empire, were enabled, by means of these boroughs, to obtain a voice in the Legislature. The Legislature, therefore, on depriving these places of their right to return Members, should have made these seats disposable, without partiality, for all parts of the United Kingdom. In the enfranchising clauses of the measure of Reform, a direct voice in the Legislature had very properly been given to those places which, in the course of time, had risen into importance and wealth in the country, and which, from peculiar interests connected with them, appeared to require a direct share in the Representation. This principle had been applied to counties as well as towns, as regarded England, and it should have been made equally applicable to the whole United Kingdom. A due share of the disfranchised seats should have been given to all parts of the Kingdom. But how had the allotment been actually made? The whole number of seats which were to be filled up in consequence of this disfranchisement was 144. The great mass of Representation taken from these disfranchised places was still to be retained for England; for Scotland was to have only eight, and Ireland only five additional Members—a portion small, indeed, when compared with the 131 Members given to the towns and counties of England. He did not mean to say that there might not be particular circumstances which might prevent the application of the principle to the full extent in some parts of the United Kingdom; but, in point of principle, he could admit of no distinction. In regard to Scotland, he would maintain, that there existed no circumstances either to impair or to postpone her claims. Scotland should have been treated in the same manner as England, and should have had an equal proportionate share in the disposable Representation. When he compared the amount of the population of several cities and towns in Scotland with places in England to which Representatives had been assigned, he could not imagine on what ground they could be withheld from the former. Again, he had never heard any reasonable ground assigned for excluding the popular and wealthy counties of Scotland from an increased number of Members. In point of population, the claims of Scotland were undoubted; but he could mention other grounds also—the commercial wealth and enterprise of the people, their ingenuity and industry in manufactures, and their well-known and distinguished skill in agricultural pursuits. Indeed, there was no people who had a fairer claim to full Representation than the people of Scotland. No nation had improved so much during the last century, and had increased more in wealth and prosperity. He might also advance another claim, founded on the intelligence, and on the high moral and religious character of the people of that country, which was universally acknowledged. As, however, an opportunity would occur in the Committee of urging the claims of Scotland to an additional number of Representatives, he would not trespass further on the time of the House then. He must, however, say a very few words with regard to Ireland. It had been urged by some hon. Gentlemen, that Ireland was not in a condition to receive the full share in the Representation to which that country would otherwise be entitled, in consequence of the agitation which prevailed there, and of the turbulence of the people, which rendered it unsafe to give a greater share in the Representation to the people: but this turbulence could not justly be imputed to Ireland, nor made a matter of charge against the people of that country; but rather, it should be charged to the conduct of the Government. It should be recollected what a system of misgovernment had long prevailed in Ireland, and he was sorry to say that, so far from that hopeless mismanagement having been diminished by the present Government, it had, on the contrary, been greatly in- creased. It was the anxious wish, and the sound policy of the Government to which he had the honour to belong, to seek to remove the calamities which misgovernment had brought upon Ireland, by endeavouring to extinguish those flames of religious dissension which had burned with so much fury; but, unhappily, since the passing of that great measure which had that object in view, those religious flames had been re-lighted, and other causes of dissension had been added, which had raised so much discontent, and spread so much agitation throughout the country, that it might not be proper nor safe to extend to Ireland, immediately, that increase in the number of her Representatives, to which otherwise she would have been fairly entitled. Among the first causes of dissension which had been introduced into that country, had been the new plan which had been proposed with regard to the maintenance of the Church, and a new system of national education, which the Government had brought forward for the children of the great body of the people. Under these circumstances, it might be proper, perhaps, to defer giving more Representatives to Ireland; but nothing could be more unjust than to impute the agitation which prevailed in that country to the people, or to charge it against them as a crime, when the evils which prevailed there were mainly to be attributed to the Government itself. Let the claims of Ireland be postponed, if necessary, until that country was more fit to profit by them, but let not the doors be wholly shut against her. The same objection, however, did not apply to Scotland; and he must say, that that part of the empire had been treated with the greatest injustice. Much had been said, and many disputes had arisen, with regard to the true principles of the English Bill. It had been said, that it united the principles of enfranchisement, disfranchisement, and extension of the elective franchise. He had no objection to the disfranchisement going to the extent that it did in the English Bill; at the same time, it would have been advisable that enfranchisement should have preceded disfranchisement—for, in his opinion, this would have been the more safe mode of proceeding; for, by disfranchising first, they should have thereby avoided laying down the abstract principle, that there should be no such thing as nomination in the system. He was no uncompromising advocate of nomination, but where would this abstract principle lead to?—every borough in which there was a dominant interest would, by the application of that principle, be deprived of the right of Representation. He was aware that the noble Lord (Lord John Russell) had endeavoured to draw a line between nomination and that which he called the legitimate influence of property; but it would be found very difficult to make the distinction sufficiently understood and sufficiently respected, and by having laid down the principle of destroying all nomination in the first place, they would be speedily involved in a question as to the legitimacy of the influence of property where it had an entire preponderance. If he was not much mistaken, already, some few months ago, a petition had been presented to that House from the borough of Ripon, complaining of the undue influence which a large property in the neighbourhood gave to the owner of it in the election of Members for that borough. And since then, the right hon. Gentleman, the member for Stamford, had presented a petition from that town, nearly of a similar character, and which stated, that in consequence of the line drawn by the Commissioners for the limits of the borough, including within it a large portion of the property of a neighbouring Peer, the elective franchise would be rendered so dependant on that family as not to be worth possessing. Similar complaints would, no doubt, arise relative to the influence of other properties in other quarters, and this would become a continued source of dissension, and a ground to demand further changes. But whatever disputes might have arisen respecting the real principles of the English Bill, there could be no difficulty in making out the principle of the Scotch Bill, even from the statement of the learned Lord himself. That principle was undoubtedly subversive. The learned Lord Advocate for Scotland had stated in bringing forward his Bill, that the old political system of the country was to be wholly overturned and destroyed. He had heard hon. Gentlemen complained of for representing the English Bill as revolutionary. He was unwilling, at all times, to make use of terms which might be displeasing to any hon. Gentleman, but he believed that imputation to be true. However, he was by no means alarmed by the sound of a word, for a revolution might be productive of good, as it might also of evil, to the community. In its proper signification it merely meant a change. There was a time, and that by no means remote, when the people of this country justly gloried in the term revolution, because it marked the period of the adjustment of our Constitution upon wise and prudent principles. But the events which had more recently taken place in a neighbouring country had given a new meaning to the term, and that word was now generally used to imply a restless succession of changes productive of no permanent advantage to the State, and communicating discontent and alarm to surrounding nations. Whether, however, this Bill for Scotland were for good or evil, it was confessedly a revolution. He admitted, that there were great defects in the present political system of Scotland, but he should have been better satisfied with the changes proposed to be introduced by the learned Lord, had he adhered more than he had done to the basis on which the present system had so long rested. The extension of that basis should have had his (Sir George Murray's) full concurrence and cordial support, but its total subversion he could not but consider as a dangerous experiment. He must repeat that he had never made the least objection to altering the present system in Scotland, for any one acquainted with that country must admit that it abounded in anomalous imperfections. But such improvements might have been easily and safely introduced into the old system, as would have removed the objections to it without at once resorting to the hazardous measure of completely destroying it. He had heard the hon. and learned member for Calne contend, that a great change was a great evil; and, if he was not much mistaken, he had also heard the same opinion expressed more than once in another place by a noble and distinguished individual, with whom that learned Gentleman was politically connected, and for whose character he (Sir George Murray) had long entertained the greatest respect. He would not, however, go so far as the learned Gentleman, but he might safely assert, that a great change was always attended with a great risk. If this risk from a great change were incurred without a great probability, or almost a certainty, of deriving great and permanent advantages from it, he for one should feel himself bound to oppose it. But what had been the condition of Scotland under its present political system? No country in the world had, during the last century, advanced more rapidly and more steadily in a course of prosperity. Everything connected with that country had gone on in a progressive improvement most gratifying to witness. This improvement had not been limited to any particular branch, or to any particular portion of the country—it had diffused itself universally throughout every department of commerce, of manufacture, and of agriculture, and had spread itself over the whole surface of the country. But to what did the learned Lord attribute this extraordinary, this happy improvement of his native country? The learned Lord had said, that Scotland derived all these advantages from her good fortune in being united to a country under a better system than her own, in short from her connexion with England. But was this a satisfactory argument? Was this bad compliment of the learned Lord to his country to be received as sound doctrine, when it had been over and over again broadly asserted, that the system of Representation in England had been a system of corruption and of misgovernment for the last 150 years. Yet this had been urged by several Members connected with the Government, and had been the great argument for the measure that had been introduced by his Majesty's Ministers. How Scotland could owe the advantages she possessed to her connexion with a country in which such a defective system existed, and called so loudly for Reform, the paradoxes of the learned Lord had not satisfactorily explained. But it might be asked, what advantage was Scotland to derive from the complete abandonment of the old political system of the country? All that the learned Lord had stated amounted to this—that he promised that Scotland should become ten times more free, and ten times more prosperous; but he was sorry to say, that this did not appear to him to present a very substantial security against all those risks and dangers which must ever accompany a sudden, violent, and general alteration of the institutions of a country. With regard to the extension of Representation given to the towns in Scotland, he agreed entirely with the Bill as far as it went. It was most desirable and just to extend the right of Representation to the large towns of the country, He entirely concurred in the propriety of giving two Members to the capital, and also the same number to that great emporium of trade, the city of Glasgow. It was with the most perfect propriety also that a separate Member had been given to each of the towns of Aberdeen, Paisley, Dundee, and Greenock, and to the city of Perth. No places had juster claims to Representatives than these towns; but there were others, also, which had extremely strong claims, and, as it appeared to him, one stronger than some places in England to which Members had been given, but these Scotch towns had been passed over: he would only detain the House by mentioning the town of Inverness, which was a place of great and rising importance, and which was situated in a part of the country from which comparatively few Representatives were returned to Parliament. He trusted that, on consideration, the learned Lord would still use his influence to obtain a Representative for that town. The greatest injustice of the present measure would fall upon the agricultural interests of Scotland. This interest did not only gain nothing, but it suffered a great diminution of weight by the change which the Bill introduced. He regretted extremely that it was not proposed by Ministers to give to that interest in Scotland the additional share in the Representation to which it was most justly entitled. Great as was the industry and intelligence of the manufacturing interests in Scotland, those interests had not improved more rapidly, nor were they of greater importance than the agricultural interests of that country. Undoubtedly, the extended franchise in the counties was to be conferred on a class of persons very respectable; but it ought not to be forgotten, that a very large portion of those persons who were hereafter to vote for the county Representatives had no connexion whatever with the agricultural interests. And he greatly feared, that the number of those voters would, in some counties, completely overwhelm the agricultural interests, which undoubtedly had, at present, a predominant influence in the election of the county Members. He might be told, perhaps, that this was completely compensated by giving the right of voting to the farmers. No man could entertain a higher respect for any body of men than he did for the farmers of Scotland. A more respectable, intelligent, and excellent class of persons, a class more at- tached to their country, or more desirous of promoting its best interests, did not exist. He feared, however, that the arrangement which had been proposed, so far from being beneficial to the class of farmers, would turn out to be injurious to them, and would tend considerably to destroy, or at least to diminish, their independence. He had not a sufficiently accurate and extensive knowledge of the farmers of England to speak with confidence, but he believed that the great portion of the farmers of Scotland were more independent of their landlords than those of England; and he feared, if this Bill should pass in its present form, many landlords would be gradually tempted to look to attaining political influence, rather than to the well-being of the farmers, and that electioneering ambition, and strong political feelings, would lead to collision between landlord and tenant, and to arrangements affecting the distribution and the extent of farms, and the nature of leases, which might prove by no means conducive to the agricultural prosperity of the country. There was one part in the former Bill which he was happy to find, that the learned Lord had consented to strike out, in one instance at least, in the present—he alluded to that part which mutilated some of the counties. He did not see what possible advantage could be derived from that plan, and he was convinced that much mischief would result from it; he, therefore, rejoiced that it had been in part abandoned. He was happy to hear the learned Lord state, that the district of Cowall was not to be dismembered from the county of Argyle. But on what principle, or upon what pretext, was a portion of Perthshire still doomed to be disunited from that county, for the purpose of being added to two neighbouring counties? Nothing could be more unreasonable or more unjust. The immediate result would be, the placing the return of Members for these two counties under the control of certain families, for whom he entertained personally the most sincere respect; but when the people were told, that the object of this measure was to destroy nomination, to break down the power of an oligarchy, and to give greater freedom to elections, it was a gross deception to introduce a clause into the Bill, the sole result of which would be, in as far as it could be understood, to place the counties, for whose increase Perthshire was to be mutilated, under the influence of the families of Lord Abercrombie and of the hon. member for Kinross and their connexions. It was not merely his opinion, but the general opinion in Scotland, that the predominant interest already enjoyed by these two families in the two counties of Kinross and Clackmannan would be increased by the dismemberments of the county of Perth. He had not the least doubt that it was known to the noble Lord, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and to other members of his Majesty's Government, that there was a county in the north of Scotland as completely under the influence of a patron, as were ever Gatton and Old Sarum. He did not complain of a family possessing that influence—he did not object to the fair influence of property—but when Ministers told the people of England and of Scotland, that one great object in passing the Reform Bill was to destroy nomination, and break down oligarchical influence, they ought not to dismember one county to place two others under an oligarchy of two families, and maintain in the hands of another family the absolute nomination of a county Representation. He was not opposed to the liberties of the people—God forbid; and his objection to this Bill had always been—not that it increased the liberty of the people—not that it tended to lessen influence—but that it went to concentrate power in one branch of the Legislature, which must inevitably be injurious to the liberties of the people. The great principle to which the prosperity of this country was owing, was to be found in the separation of power, and the distribution of it among the different branches of the Legislature. If, then, a measure were adopted which would concentrate power in any one quarter, the liberties of the people would be endangered, and the principle of the Constitution destroyed; and he would go so far as to say, that if all power were placed in the hands of the people, it would soon be found that this arrangement was the most disadvantageous possible for the people themselves. If an irresistible control was placed in that House—the prerogatives of the Crown infringed, and the independence of the House of Peers destroyed—and if, at the same time, that House was made wholly dependent on the varying will of the people—everything would have been done which was in the power of the Legislature towards preparing the way for the future destruction of the liberties of the people. He would only further allude to the means that had been employed to uphold and carry forward the great measure projected by his Majesty's Ministers. In the first place, the people had been deluded into the expectation of blessings which no reasonable man anticipated could possibly result from this Bill—more, indeed, than any reasonable man could expect would result from any measure whatsoever. Next, whilst under the influence of this delusion as to the consequences of the measure, the people had been industriously kept in a constant state of violent excitement, and had been unhappily led to acts of riot and of outrage, which had assumed the character, and produced the effect of intimidation, in many places. And in addition to this excitement—and to this intimidation effected by means of the delusion of the people—the Crown had been placed in such a situation that it hardly seemed to possess any longer the power of acting independently for itself; and the Crown being no longer in a condition of constitutional independence, its prerogatives were to be made use of for the destruction of the independence of another branch of the Legislature. He could only express his regret that such means should have been resorted to, and that his Majesty's Ministers should have deemed it necessary to bring forward a measure for the improvement of the Constitution of the State, founded on such principles, carried to such an extent, and formed by such means, as those which he had stated.

could not support the measure, because he considered it likely to be productive of great injury to the country.

said, that while he still entertained as strong objections as ever to the whole principle of the Reform Bill, he still must admit that that principle was decided by the result which the House had come to on the second reading of the Bill. He contended that the whole character of Scotch Representation, so far as practical utility was concerned, afforded the strongest argument that could be urged against that decision. He would not now oppose what appeared to be the general feeling of the House, but would acquiesce in the second reading of the Bill.

protested against the Bill as uncalled for by the state of the Representation in Scotland.

wished it should go forth to the public, by means of the Press—if the Press were not sold to the Government—that the advocates of this measure presented an extraordinary disparity as compared with its opponents. He wished to know, out of a number of 658 Members, how many now sat upon that (the Ministerial) side, and upon this (the Opposition)? If the people and their Representatives knew each other's feelings on the question of Reform, the Bill would never have passed: they might bully a King, but they could not bully a subject.

moved the Order of the Day for going into Committee on the Roman Catholic Marriages Bill.

would have opposed the Motion, but that he had agreed with the hon. Mover that he should be allowed to make considerable alterations in the Committee.

begged that more time might be given to the discussion of so important a measure.

thought, that the law was so anomalous with regard to the most sacred relation of life, that it could not be suffered to remain, as at present, different in every different part of the empire.

severally objected to proceeding at that period with a measure which was undoubtedly of great importance.

suggested that the hon. Gentleman should withdraw the Bill, and he would pledge himself to bring in a Bill next Session calculated to attain the object the hon. Member had in view, and not be liable to the serious objections to which this Bill was liable.