was likewise appointed by the noble resistance to the Motion of my noble Marquess, to show that the selections Friend. The noble Duke rested the case made by him were free from any political upon the number of the Roman Catholics considerations, and governed by the in Ireland-the existence of Maynooth highest and purest motives. Next in College-and that he considered it objecyesterday's debate came the most rev. tionable that the Roman Catholic priests Prelate connected with Ireland. His ar- should be educated upon the Continent, gument in favour of the Bill proceeded where such differences of opinion now upon the supposition, that favour and en- prevailed upon religious subjects. The dowment, or persecution and intolerance, strong claims of my Roman Catholic felwere the only alternatives for the Govern- low countrymen upon the sympathies and ment to choose between with reference to consideration of the Government, I should the Roman Catholic religion. He stated be the last person to deny. The existence that he was not unmindful of his vow to of Maynooth College is also a fact that "use all faithful diligence to banish and must be looked to by the Government; drive away all strange doctrine contrary to but I wholly deny that the interest or God's Word." "There were different welfare of the Irish people will be at all ways," said the most rev. Prelate, "of consulted by the maintenance of that Colbanishing such doctrines. How was he to lege under the present system of discipline drive them out? By secular coercion? and instruction pursued there. If the by penal laws? by the bayonet? Was he College must be continued, still more if it to propagate and uphold what he thought is to be perpetuated, it is of the last imto be truth by drawing the sword in its portance that the Committee moved for defence? Sooner than do that, he would by my noble Friend should be granted, renounce his high station, and retire into that such modifications may be made in some humble situation of life." My Lords, it as may really render it an institution there was no question about persecution. conducive to the interests of the Irish The most rev. Prelate overlooked the real people. But I cannot for one moment question at issue, which is, whether error admit the soundness of the noble Duke's should be tolerated or cherished. Toler-objection to continental education for the ation, as opposed to persecution, I hold to priests. The freedom of opinion that at be perfectly consistent with the duty un-present prevails upon the Continent upon dertaken by a Protestant clergyman at his ordination; and I regret to feel myself called upon to remind one in the most rev. Prelate's position, that the weapon of a Christian's warfare-the only weapon which it becomes a Christian minister to wield for the purpose of banishing error and upholding truth-is" the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God." I must also remind the most rev. Prelate, that he has left his explanation of the vow he made at his consecration very incomplete. He only explained his sense of the first part of it, the duty he undertook of banishing all erroneous doctrine, &c.; he forgot to add that he had likewise vowed "openly and privately to call upon and encourage others to the same." In the absence of any explanation of this from the most rev. Prelate, the House, I think, will be in-deny that sufficient grounds had been laid clined to adopt that which was afforded by the right rev. Prelate who addressed your Lordships on the first night of this debate. I now turn, my Lords, to the case made out by the noble Duke for the introduction of this Bill, and the grounds of the noble Earl's (Lord St. Germans)

religious subjects is, I think, the very thing that should render it desirable that the Roman Catholic priests should be educated there. Nor can I think it at all consistent with the duty of a British Government to lend itself to maintain the immutability of the Church of Rome, or to shut out from the Irish Roman Catho, lics the same freedom of religious opinion as is enjoyed in other countries. It certainly does surprise me that the noble Duke, who must be aware of the variety of opinions prevailing in this Protestant land, and of the value that Englishmen in general attach to the right of private judgment, should have argued, as he did, for the maintenance of the College of Maynooth. My noble Friend the late Secretary for Ireland took upon himself to

for the Committee. Truly, I cannot conceive what stronger grounds could have been made for any Motion than those which were urged by my noble Friend. He adverted to the discipline of the College; he stated most explicitly the nature and character of the class books of in

[prehend that no noble Lord was capable of affording-an explanation of the oath different from what I had given. I regretted the circumstance the more, as although interesting to myself, the soughtfor explanation would have been of the greatest importance to a large proportion of the public-under present circumstances not a little excited upon the subject. The question, in fact, being whether the oaths taken by Members of Parliament, involve any obligation beyond that of allegiance to the Sovereign; and if so, what further obligations are implied. They have, by myself and others, been heretofore commonly viewed as likewise binding the Legislature to certain principles in legislation, on matters appertaining to religion, favourable to the Protestant Establishment, and opposed alike to Roman Catholic doctrine, and to any recognition of papal authority within this realm. And, no doubt could have arisen upon the subject, but for the opposite line of policy that has of late years been pursued, and which, particularly in the discussions upon this Bill, has found so many advocates within the walls of Parliament. I do not advert to this question, my Lords, with any desire of preventing your giving a fair consideration to this Bill. But, impressed as I am-and I am sure your Lordships are all equally so-with the paramount duty of a strict and faithful adherence to every sworn obligation, and being of opinion that the question of the obligation of the Oath of Supremacy is necessarily raised by the nature of the measure under consi

struction; and he showed you what had been the effect of that instruction upon the Maynooth students; and all that he stated he was prepared to prove by the most competent witnesses. What stronger case could have been made? I should have thought none; but the noble Lord (Lord St. Germans) showed that the case could be yet stronger, and unconsciously he made it so. My noble Friend, in order to show how little of real gratitude was felt by the Roman Catholic priests for this proposed endowment of Maynooth, quoted, among other things, the letter of Dr. Higgins (the titular Bishop of Ardagh), and the noble Earl thought he had a great triumph over my noble Friend, when he stated that this Dr. Higgins was not a pupil of Maynooth College. Why, my noble Friend never said he was; but the noble Earl was probably not aware that this Dr. Higgins, though not a pupil, had been a professor and teacher at the College; and the fact that he had from thence been promoted to a bishopric in the Roman Catholic Church, shows, I think, the kind of professor that the ecclesiastical authorities deem most deserving of favour and reward. I do not think my noble Friend could have had his Motion more ably seconded, than by the speech which the noble Earl has made for the purpose of opposing it. In the course of this debate, much has been said respecting the obligation of oaths. My Lords, I as a Member of this House cannot forget that I am bound by certain oaths; that in common with most of your Lordships I have declared, "that no Fo-deration, I have felt it right again to draw reign Prince, person, Prelate, State, or your Lordships' attention to the subject; Potentate, hath, or ought to have, any and I anxiously pray that this House, to jurisdiction, power, superiority, pre-emi- which the country looks up with so much nence or authority, ecclesiastical or spi- confidence, as the most faithful guardian ritual, within this realm. So help me of the principles of the British ConstituGod." Now, my Lords, it does appear to tion, and as a sure defence against any me, that the obligation of this oath would encroachment, by hasty legislation or be violated, were I to give my assent to otherwise, upon the civil and religious any measure founded as this is, upon the liberty which that Constitution at present principle of upholding the Roman Catho- secures to all classes of Her Majesty's lic religion; and by a necessary conse- subjects, will not allow this Bill to pass quence, the authority of the Pope as head without its having been clearly shown that of that Church, within this kingdom. And it is strictly in accordance both with the this opinion is certainly not weakened by principles of the Constitution, and with the fact, that when I upon a late occasion the obligations of Members of Parliament expressed it in this House, and challenged respecting it. One mode of interpreting correction if I was considered in error, the oath has, indeed, been privately sugno noble Lord was prepared to give a gested to me, and I believe it is that satisfactory solution of the difficulty. I which is in general adopted by those who repeat it, no noble Lord did afford-I ap- I deny its more stringent operation; it is

pable of being vindicated upon its own. merits. If the original institution of Maynooth was a violation of principle, as the measure before you most certainly is, it was not the less so because Pitt recommended it, nor because Mr. Perceval afterwards acquiesced in it; but the truth is, that although the original Act of instituting that College has proved in its effects upon Ireland to have been most impolitic, in principle it bears no analogy to the measure you are now called upon to sanction. From the provisions of the Act of 1795, it would appear not that it was a College intended, as represented by the noble Lord (St. Germans), for the instruction of the Roman Catholic priesthood, but that it was little more than an Act of Toleration, enabling Roman Catholics to endow, at their own expense, an institution for the education of persons of their own communion. It was deemed at the time of importance, that such persons should not be obliged, as before, to resort to French and other continental seminaries, where infidelity and Jacobinism had poisoned all the streams of education; and as the Roman Catholics of Ireland readily lent themselves to what appeared to be for the general interest, it was an act of grace, not ill merited, that the Irish Parliament, in the year '95, and the three following years, made grants for completing the buildings. These grants ceased in 1799; but in 1800, the last Appropriation Act of the Irish Parliament, having included a sum towards defraying the charges of the Establishment for one year, this by the Seventh (the financial) Article of the Act of Union, became necessarily an annual charge upon the United Kingdom for the next twenty years. If the Executive has failed of looking to the proper application of this annual grant, or of exercising a proper control over the College, and if in consequence of such neglect the institution has become as objectionable as all agree,

that the oath only implies on the part of the person taking it a repudiation of any personal subjection to papal authority. To this view of it, my Lords, I can by no means subscribe. Clearer and less equivocal language might and would have been chosen for the purpose, had it been intended thus to limit its application. But looking at the history of the oath, the circumstances under which it was originally framed, and at the express object for which it was enacted, as set forth in the 1st Eliz. c. 1, viz., for the better observation and maintenance of that Act; i. e. of a certain policy expressed in a series of enactments, excluding the Pope from every exercise of ecclesiastical or spiritual authority within the realm, and transferring all such authority to the Crown; and coupling these with the plain grammatical and most obvious import and meaning of the form of words in which the oath, as since amended, is now required to be taken by Members of Parliament-it certainly does appear to me, that it is incapable of being restricted to the mere personal feelings and acknowledgments of the person taking it; that as a qualification for office, or for a seat in Parliament, it could never have been intended to be so utterly inoperative and nugatory, and that if of any force or obligation whatever, it must have a bearing upon such a question as that now submitted to Parliament, which is practically whether Parliament will bind this country by a perpetual Statute to maintain out of the public funds a College for the education of Roman Catholic priests, and in direct connexion with the Church of Rome, and in absolute subjection to papal authority; thus depriving the Sovereign of her rightful su premacy and due power of control over an ecclesiastical Establishment within this realm. The noble Duke and others who have advocated this measure, have referred to the Act of 1795 as confirming the principle of it; and great reliance has been placed upon the fact that Maynooth Col-though from various causes, in representlege has been supported through half a century by successive Parliaments and the most distinguished statesmen that have adorned the page of history; and that in this number are to be classed the name of Pitt, as the Minister under whom it originated, and that of Perceval, by whom it was subsequently continued. I cannot, my Lords, admit that any weight of human authority can justify an act inca

ing it to be; yet the power of State control still existed, and Parliament might and ought, since the year 1820, to have insisted upon the College being placed under proper regulation, or to have abolished the institution altogether. But it cannot be said with truth, that those who acquiesced in the support of an institution wholly under the power of the State control, laid down any precedent for an Act

by which such control is wholly sur- encouragement to the spread of the Roman rendered into the hands of Roman Catho- Catholic religion in Ireland, and that the lic ecclesiastics. It is also stated in justi- increased number of young men for whose fication of this Bill by the noble Earl be- education at Maynooth this Bill provides, hind me (Lord Hardwicke), that it is a ne- are to be trained in absolute subjection to cessary consequence of another Act already the discipline of the Church of Rome; upon the Statute Book, I mean the Chari- and that the object of their education is, table Bequests Act of last Session, by that they should afterwards go forth as which the titles, orders, and pastoral func- the authorized teachers of the population tions of the Roman Catholic clergy in to disseminate through the length and Ireland have been legally recognised, and breadth of the land, those principles a corporate character conferred upon them, in which they themselves have been for holding in perpetual succession the educated; and, among others, the docendowments bequeathed to them. I do trine of the Pope's rightful supremacy not, my Lords, feel myself called on to over Her Majesty's realm. [The Earl of undertake the defence of that Act, which Mornington: No, no.] Yes, I say, that has undoubtedly laid the foundation of an such is the Ultramontane doctrine, as ecclesiastical establishment in Ireland, not taught at present at Maynooth College; of a mission, as stated by the noble Duke, and if the House does not grant the Combut of a Church, subject to no other au- mittee of Inquiry asked for by my noble thority than that of the Pope; and so fully Friend (the Earl of Roden), the course of impressed am I with the belief that it education must remain the same as now. belies what is affirmed in the Oath of No one surely will stand up and say that Supremacy, viz., that no Foreign State or it is consistent to vote for such a measure, Prelate hath jurisdiction ecclesiastical and yet to call God to witness your sowithin this realm, that, feeling the impos- lemn declaration that this ought not to sibility under these circumstances of taking be. The expediency of the measure-if the oath, I was lately compelled to forego indeed any sound principle of expediency the privilege and pleasure of voting for can be urged in favour of it, cannot in my my noble Friend, the last elected Repre- opinion outweigh the religious obligation sentative of the Irish Peerage. It is for that opposes it. Let the oaths, or at least those to vindicate the Bequests Act who the Oath of Supremacy, be repealed, and brought it in, and would now found upon a new Parliament summoned to carry out, it a still more flagrant violation of princi- if the nation be so disposed, the recently ple. I was not in the House last Session announced policy of Her Majesty's Goto take any part in the debates upon the vernment; but let Parliament be henceBill; otherwise-although as a relaxation forth unembarrassed by tests and obligaof the Statute of Mortmain, it contained tions of no practical value, originally demany excellent and salutary enactments signed to maintain a policy which has long -I should have felt it my duty to have ceased to be the policy of the country; voted against it, on account of the princi- and affirmative of a principle of Protestant ple involved in it. The Act, nevertheless, so ascendancy which every Act for the last far differs from the present measure, that fifteen years has belied, and which Her by many it might be viewed-and by Par- Majesty's Secretary of State for the Home liament I believe it has been viewed-only Department has upon a late occasion, as an Act of more extended toleration; and in reference to this Bill, declared whereas the present Bill is one of direct must be henceforth wholly at an end. favour and encouragement to the propaga- While oaths continue to be taken as at tion of Roman Catholic doctrines. It present, they will be considered by many may be perfectly true, in the restricted as involving corresponding obligations, sense of the oath, to deny any personal the disregard of any of which (though subjection to papal authority; but fur- perhaps but apparent and capable of exther to declare, on oath, that no such au- planation), will not fail to impair the conthority ought to exist within the realm, fidence and respect with which it is so surely implies, if words can do so, an ob- desirable that every Act of the Legislature ligation to resist the enactment of any should be viewed. Entertaining the opinlaws calculated to uphold or extend such ions I have expressed of my obligation as authority. No noble Lord will, I am sure, a Member of Parliament, and not undeny that the object of this Bill is to give mindful of what is due to my Roman