I

LORD ASHBURTON then rose, but the noble Lord was nearly inaudible. He was understood to express an opinion favourable to the experiment on a large scale of immigration of free labour. In the mean time, however, in the depressed condition of colonial enterprise, much further loss would accrue (pending such an experiment) if the Government did not resort to other modes of relief. If it was admitted to be a national necessity that slave-labour sugar should not be altogether excluded from our markets, then, as we exposed our colonists at such odds to such competition, we were, as it appeared to him, in justice bound to assist them through the transition stage in which they were now passing. He anticipated some benefit from the loans which the Government proposed to tender to the

rality and honour; they will dash at once | with neighbouring States an insulting and from their lips the chalice you offer to degrading mockery. them, tinged as it is with the blood of fellow-creatures sacrificed to economy. am convinced that the people have been misled, and that they are ignorant of the inevitable truth that if they violate their most sacred duties and the holiest feelings, and become abettors in the guilt of others, they will be condemned, in some way or other, to be partakers in the punishment; for, as the noble Lord has eloquently remarked, it is impossible that any nation can continue long to set at defiance the plainest laws of God, without some corresponding suffering accruing to the sinners. You cannot share the Cuba profit without incurring your share of the Cuba guilt; and you cannot incur the Cuba guilt without having recorded against you the Cuba chastisement. Let, then, this question, in all its forcible simplicity, be stated in Eng-West Indians; but as to the demand which land, and I doubt not of the result. It may was made for the abolition of the navigabe a little sooner or a little later; but I tion laws, he thought the discussion on that hope, as ruin to the West Indians is im- point might with propriety be postponed. pending, and we may shortly be called The noble Lord laid several petitions on upon to abandon ourselves to new treaties the table, one from the standing committee with other States, the present moment will of the merchants and planters connected be made available to our purpose. Our with the West Indies resident in the city of colonists confessedly tremble on the verge London; and another from the planters of destruction-let us not forget the proof and other inhabitants of Mauritius, the which the history of the world furnishes, concurring prayer of which was for the apthat, the moment lost, we cannot recall the plication of some immediate remedy or prosperity we might have preserved. This remedies to the position in which the peti remark will apply especially to the conditioners had been placed by recent legislation of society in the West Indies; and it may be that if the ruin which threatens arrives, no efforts we may make, and no exercise of our power, will be able to restore the position we ought to have maintained, I have ventured to press this matter upon your Lordships once again, because I feel that it is a question of the deepest national morality, as well as of the deepest national prosperity. I have endeavoured to state the argument fairly; and I cannot believe, if the subject be but viewed in a clear light, that after all our anti-slavery labours we will now consent thus palpably to frustrate our own designs, and contradict our own principles. I, for one at least, do declare, if we barefacedly admit this produce of slave labour, on the single ground that sugar will be 1d. per pound dearer if we do not admit it—that is, in point of fact, to make our abolition struggle a deep and indelible disgrace to this country; to convert our cordon of ships on the coast of Africa into a glaring piece of hypocrisy; and to render our treaties

tion.

The petitions laid on the table.
House adjourned.

—mmmmm

HOUSE OF COMMONS,

Monday, February 7, 1848.

MINUTES.] NEW MEMBER SWORN. - For Sunderland,

Sir Hedworth Williamson, Bart. PETITIONS PRESENTED. By several hon. Members, from an immense number of places, for and against the Jewish Disabilities Bill.-By Mr. Beresford, from Suffolk, and Viscount Emlyn, from Pembroke, complaining of the Conduct of the Roman Catholic Clergy (Ireland); and from Essex, against the Roman Catholic Relief Bill.-By Sir J. Y. Buller, from Axminster and Devon, for Repeal of Duty on Attorneys' Certificates.-By Viscount Palmerston, from Southampton, for Repeal of Property Tax Act.- By Mr. C. Buller, from Norfolk and Cambridge, for Rating Owners in Lieu of Occupiers of Tenements. By Viscount Morpeth, from Independent Order of Odd Fellows, Manchester Unity, for Extension of the Benefit Societies Act.-By Captain Berkeley, from City of Gloucester, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, from Halifax, for Sanitary Regulations.-By Mr. Milnes, from Pontefract, for Retrenchment of Naval and Military Expenditure.-By Sir J. Y. Buller, from Torbay, against Repeal of Navigation Laws.-By several hon. Members, from Officers connected with the Administration of the Poor Laws, for a Superannuation Fund.

RELIEF OF THE POOR (IRELAND), appears that the Commissioners decided, on the MR. SCULLY, in the absence of the 29th of October, that such assistance should be hon. Member for Limerick (Mr. John issued a circular letter to the inspectors of twentygiven.' On the 6th of November the agency O'Connell), asked the following question, five unions, acquainting them with the intentions which had been put upon the paper by the of the association, and soliciting their co-operalatter hon. Member: Whether, consid- tion. All the inspectors responded to the appeal, ering the enormous and every-day growing relief into operation. and set out, without delay, to bring the intended The returns of the first increase of destitution in many parts of week, ending the 28th of November, showed Ireland; the nearly total want of means eighteen schools, with 2,136 children daily attendamong her small farmers and agricultural ing them. The returns of the last week, ending labourers to purchase food and maintain the 23rd of January, showed above 44,000 chiltheir families; and the inability of the dren, to whom relief was afforded by 655,229 weekly rations. The increase during the interpoor-law to support the overwhelming vening eight weeks was gradual. The total num pauperism of the country-the Government ber of rations issued since the beginning was have not some measure ready for the pro- food to children becomes a great auxiliary to that 2,111,513. The assistance which is given in viding of relief by means of food or em- given for the out-door relief and otherwise, and ployment, and thus far preventing the meets a case of the utmost exigency which had wholesale wasting and destruction of human sadly needed the charitable interference of the life among the poorer classes of Ireland." committee. The reports of the inspectors upon SIR G. GREY complained of the incon- this subject, and which I have laid at different venient form in which the question was times before the committee, concur in this. They also bear testimony to the visible and daily imframed, involving as it did a series of as- proving condition of the poor unhappy children, sumptions, the disproving of which, if he to the cheering and beneficial reaction which this were to undertake that task, which, how-provision has had upon the parents, and to the ever, he did not intend, would necessarily faithful appropriation and distribution of the lead to a long debate. It was unfair in any Member to avail himself of his privilege to insert upon the paper, contrary to the rule of the House, late at night, a question like that which had been read by the hon. Member. On the present occasion he could only repeat what he had already stated on a former occasion, namely, that the Government was not prepared to submit to Parliament a proposition for the resumption of public works, or the system which superseded the public works; that was to say, the system of feeding all the destitute poor of Ireland by means of advances of public money. He would take that opportunity of reading to the House some papers, which would show the manner in which relief had been afforded in Ireland under the Poor Law Act:

bounty by those intrusted with it."

"Extract from Poor Law Inspector's report at Skibbereen, Jan. 30, 1848: Many lives (I may say, hundreds) have been saved by the plan adopted of giving food to the children at the

schools.'

The House would also, he was sure, excuse him for reading an account of the amount of the poor-rates collected in Ireland in 1847 as compared with 1846, which, he was happy to say, furnished most satisfactory indications of the ultimate success of the Poor Law Act:

" Amount of poor-rates collected in Ireland in the last quarters of the years 1846 and 1847 :

October
November
December

1847.

1846. £26,805

£121,255

36,639

151,684

...

46,440

168,860

£109,884

£441,799

"By a statement furnished to the Committee Total amount collected in the twelve months :of the British Relief Association by their agent in Ireland, dated the 31st of January, it appears that assistance has been afforded out of the funds at his disposal to those unions in which either a temporary pressure arose from the inefficient action of the board of guardians, or the extent of the distress really exceeded all the power of legal relief duly and fully exerted by them. The selection of the proper cases for the interference of the association was made by the Poor Law Commissioners; and the expenditure of the relief afforded at their recommendation was superintended by the temporary poor-law inspectors, and accounted for according to the provisions of the Irish Poor Relief Acts.' But the chief mode of

would now, with the permission of the their political disfranchisement" the last House, proceed at once to the more diffi- remnant of religious persecution;" and the cult and onerous task which he had under-right hon. Gentleman the Member for taken, that of moving that the Bill be Oxford protested against any particular read a second time that day six months; period of our history being chosen as the and it must be conceded by all hon. Mem- date of our constitution, both agreeing in bers who were conversant with the de- thus much, namely, that the whole of our bates of the House, whatever might be the history had been consistent with itself as opinions which they might entertain on the to the maintenance of a policy whose last measure now submitted for their consider- remnant we were now called on to remove. ation, that any one who rose to address He agreed in the main with both these the House on the subject laboured under opinions; but he thought that to narrow two of the greatest disadvantages that this question within the limits of this isever constituted a claim upon its indul- land, or to date back no earlier than from gence. In the first place, the subject was Magna Charta downwards, was to underone on which the arguments were so very rate its importance, and to deny it a just few, and the ground so very limited and so amplitude of discussion. If he ventured, frequently traversed, that no novelty of therefore, to assign to that system, whose treatment could be reasonably expected; last remnant they were called on to reand in the next place, the arguments them- move, a far wider field than England, and selves were of so sacred a nature, that if a far earlier date than Magna Charta, and they were not interwoven with the charac- if in support of such a view he was obliged ter of the Bill itself, he should most reluc- to touch upon sacred and awful subjects, tantly approach them in the course of the they would believe that he was not actudiscussion. Although the House had seen ated by any feelings of irreverence, far a number of petitions presented on this less by any Pharisaic arrogance, which subject, yet those who recollected the not only would there be miserably misnumber of petitions presented when other placed, but which was, he trusted, abhorsimilar religious questions were involved, rent to his nature. As soon as Christianity would not fail to remark that the petitions emerged from her dens and hiding places, presented that night were comparatively and was called to embrace nations within few when considered with reference to the her pale, it was believed that the new number of petitions presented about May- principles upon which she based her moralnooth and other similar subjects. In pro- ity must be thoroughly incorporated with portion, then, as the pressure from with- legislation, must be completely interwoven out was small, the House must consider with all the customs and usages of life, the question as one of abstract principle. with all the edicts which restrained the It would be necessary for him to travel bad, with all the covenants that bound over again the ground which had already society together, with all the punishments been traversed, lest it might be said that that awaited the guilty, and with all the he and those with whom he acted had seen rewards that consecrated ambition; so that the unsoundness of their arguments, and whether in its ministers or its mysteries, its had yielded to conviction. The question ceremonies, its martyrs, its saints, or its before the House was not one of religious truths, the question was never within how persecution, and was not even one of reli- narrow limits they could draw up their religious toleration. These two questions were gion, but how far, how wide, they could difdecided when the Legislature determined fuse its salutary waters. As all law, therethat everybody, of whatever religious per- fore, and all usage, did theoretically rest, not suasion he might be, should be at liberty merely on religious but on Christian sancto attend religious worship and hold reli- tions, any difference of opinion as to those gious opinions without let or hindrance by sanctions was considered not merely as a the State. The question for present de- sin against their great Teacher, but also cision was, whether the House should as a treason against society. True it was continue to hold that the possession that great crimes were committed in this of certain religious opinions, or of no zeal for religious truth; true it was that religious opinions, ought to operate as a in its exaggeration it depressed the enerpolitical disqualification. The noble Lord gies of the human mind; that the wicked (Lord J. Russell) had placed the case of traded on it, and that the frivolous trifled the Jews on what he called the broad with it; but still he was not ashamed to debasis of religious liberty, and he called clare that, in the early struggles of Chris

tianity with the last forms of heathenism | may have entered into this discussion, it and through rough and unlettered ages, never did enter in such a manner as to they owed to it far more than they were affect his present arguments. Till now, either willing to acknowledge, or even to they had, ever since the conversion of this appreciate; and, even as it was said that island to Christianity, recognised the phithe rival vices were each other's pre-losophy, the morality, the ethics, of the sent foes, so he believed that zeal was a far better extreme, if extreme there must be, than than to which this age was tending; and he agreed with that French writer who, in the beginning of his Essay on Indifference, said

The age which is most to be pitied is not the age which is fanatic for error, but the age which neglects or despises the truth."

66

New Testament as the basis of all our legislation; and whether they had deposed their monarchs, changed their forms of government, or separated themselves from Popes, still they had declared that the teaching of Him who taught on the Mount

of Him who corrected and contradicted so much of what was "said by them of old time "of Him who " spoke with auWe were now come to such a state that thority, and not as the Scribes, was the the last of three questions with reference teaching they were prepared to follow. to those who disagreed with us in religion This was the great acknowledgment and must be answered by the House. The profession they made, as a nation, when first question which they had to ask was, they, as a nation, abandoned idolatry, and Shall we persecute them?" that is, before sects and differences arose among "Shall we imprison them? shall we tor- them. This had been the great acknowture them? shall we execute them?" ledgment and profession which had surThat question would, at least in every vived all their differences, and which, in Protestant, and he trusted in every Chris- the whole history of this country, was never tian, country, be answered in the negative. contravened till the question was brought The next question which would arise forward. It was remarkable that it was was, "Shall we, having ceased to per- now proposed to divest our Legislature of secute them, and having granted them its Christianity, for a nation whose polity tolerance, connivance, and sufferance, per- was eminently theocratic. It was conmit them to exercise the administration | tended that there was no harm in this, of the laws enacted by ourselves?" He because the numbers in whose favour the could see no reason why there should be any distinction between these two descriptions of civil privileges; and therefore the question came to this-" Shall we admit them, not only to administer, but to assist us in the enactment of laws?" Till now that question had been answered in the negative. It was no answer to the opponents of this measure to say that Parliament had been a Church of England Parliament, next a Protestant Parliament, and was now a Christian Parliament. The question, when the circumstances incidental to those changes were discussed, had always been, whether the differences between ourselves and either Protestant or Romanist Dissenters were deep enough to go to the very root of legislature, to affect its whole character, to change its elementary ideas; not whether we should become, or, at all events, proclaim, ourselves indifferent to Christian ethics, but whether or no Christian ethics did not include those brother Christians whom we excluded; and however, with regard to Romanists, the question of foreign allegiance, or, with regard to Dissenters, the security of the Established Church,

change was proposed to be made were but few. This appeared to him to be but little better than an insult to those respecting whom such an argument was held. But it was said that this was the last remnant of religious persecution. Now, on looking over the notices for the day after to-morrow, he found the hon. Member for Limerick intended to move that the Lord Chancellorship of Ireland should be open to Roman Catholics. He did not wish to anticipate the discussion which would follow that Motion; but he would venture to predict that that also would be called the last remnant of religious persecution. It must be remembered that, in the eye of the law, the Lord Chancellor was the keeper of the conscience of the Sovereign; and if it were admitted that the Lord Chancellor might be a Roman Catholic, on what ground could any one maintain the exclusion from the throne of these realms of any person professing the Roman Catholic religion also? The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Oxford (Mr. Gladstone) had said that he should deeply regret that the pious and good custom of opening the proceedings of that House with prayer should be