merits of the case in a clear light, and that the cause of the Dissenters must ultimately triumph. The discussion was closed by the bishop of Exeter, who, in reference to the alleged practical grievance, admitted that the expenses in the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge were great, and he should rejoice to see them much lessened for those who would avail themselves of the advantages of medical education there. But it was the constant practice that the Dissenters availed themselves of the diplomas, and became doctors of the Edinburgh and other universities, and this, too, in a shorter time, and at a less expense, than their object could be elsewhere accomplished. This, he conceived, did away with the alleged grievance in respect to medical degrees to the Dissenters. With respect to the profession of the law, that had been admitted to be a matter, not for the Universities, but for the benchers of the inns of court. Setting this aside, then, what reason was there for interference? It had not been attempted to be denied that the Universities fully discharged the duties imposed upon them by their charters; and if they had not so failed, then parliament had no right to force upon them a different mode of education; for these corporations possessed a clear and distinct right to decide for themselves, in order to carry into effect the objects for which they were founded; and it could only be in the case of a departure from these duties and objects that interference could be justified. What was the grievance complained of? Why, that the Dissenters were not admitted to the benefits of institutions, an interference with which could only be justified by its maladministration. That the Universities now discharged in the best manner, the important duties intrusted to them by charters was, forsooth, the reason why the legislature was called on to interfere. Or was the right of interference to be maintained on the ground of the Universities being national institutions? No doubt they were so in a very high degree; they were the great seminaries for education in the national religion; they were national, inasmuch as they were the source of that high glory for which England was so much honoured in all foreign parts, as the possessor of two such institutions. In these respects the Universities were national institutions, but not so on the ground of being supported by the legislature; very far from it. Not long ago, the present secretary for the colonies had been called on, in his former capacity of secretary to the treasury, to defend elsewhere certain estimates containing payments of salary to the professors of the Universities. An objection had been taken to this branch of the estimates, and that gentleman, in answer to it, expressed a hope that the objection would not be persisted in, as it would take away the very strongest argument for enforcing the Universities' Admission Bill. He asked no further question when he heard of such an argument coming from such a man upon such a question. Was it endurable, that because this great country made some show of libe rality towards two Universities to the paltry amount in question, its legislature acquired a right to break in upon the constitution, and to violate the very principles upon which those Universities were founded? It would be little less than an act of dishonesty to withhold those payments; for how did the matter stand? Those payments did not originate with parliament, but with two of the sovereigns of this realm, George II. and George III., who, anxious to celebrate their respective reigns by the endowment of science in the two Universities, had devoted these sums out of the hereditary revenues of the crown; and when those revenues were applied to public uses, then it was, that parliament came in bound, in common justice, to fulfil the intentions of the sovereign. The Universities paid considerably more in taxes upon degrees and matriculations than the amount paid by the country to their professors. The government would receive the thanks of the Universities, if it would deny the salaries and remit the taxation, and enable the senate and governing bodies to dispose of the difference in the field of science. Neither was there any better foundation for the hopes held out, that the yielding of this demand would produce harmony and peace, much less that it would convert the Dissenters into willing defenders of the church, or, at least, deprive them of all desire to assail it. This was not the language, nor were these the anticipations of the Dissenters themselves. He had taken the trouble to make a selection from the petitions which had been presented from the dissenting portion of the community in reference to that subject. The Unitarians had com plained that they were refused. admission into the Universities, and claimed an equal eligibility with the members of the established church to all offices of distinction and emolument in those Universities. This was the language of the Unitarians of Plymouth. They did not ask for this bill, for it was a mere mockery upon their demands, which went to the extent of claiming a participation in the government of the Universities both of Oxford and Cambridge. The Unitarians of Bradford and of Nottingham went the same length. The Dissenters of Hull, in a petition most numerously signed, stated, that to withhold from them civil rights and religious honours was an injury which no government, ruling over an enlightened people, could perpetuate, and they called upon the legislature immediately to remove the grievance, by granting them the abolition of the monopoly of university honours, and further to abolish the unscriptural union between church and state, having at the same time a due regard to the interests of all parties concerned. This petition, strong as it was, became a little more important from the occurrences which took place at the meeting by which it had been adopted. He alluded to the speech of a dissenting minister of high estimation, and one of the delegates to London on the subject of the claims of the body to which he belonged. That reverend gentleman, on the occasion in question, had said, that there were no less than twenty-two foundations in the colleges of the Universities at the time of the Reformation, and that, therefore, the Dissenters had as much right to a participation in these benefits and emoluments as the churchmen. The reverend gentleman added, that there were those who had contented themselves with forwarding petitions only asking for a redress of grievances and a dissolution of the union between church and state. Such petitions were too weak, contended the reverend gentleman, who may be regarded as the spokesman of the party. There were others, continued he, who went rashly forward and demanded an immediate dissolution of that union. This was an extreme on the other side, and he should recommend the juste milieu between the two extremes. "Hence it was," said the speaker, "that our petition does not pray for immediate dissolution, but looks forward to the accomplishment of that great and glorious object." The Independents and Baptists of Leeds had addressed a memorial to his majesty's government, in which they stated, that they conceived the property and revenues of the Universities to have been transferred at the time of the Reformation, and that the benefits derivable therefrom should be equally accessible to all British youths; and they demanded, not merely admission into the Universities, but also a full participation in all their endowments. Such being the sentiments of Dissenters, this bill, so far from satisfying them, would, in their opinion, be only a perpetuation of oppression and injustice. Those pretensions were by no means new; there was a precedent for them only two centuries ago. In the year 1647 a parliament order, number seventyfour, was passed for the reforma tion of the University of Oxford, whereby it was directed, "that an examination should be had of all oaths required by the statutes of the said University to be taken, in order that such only might be required as might be agreeable to the intended reformation of the said University." This was what the Dissenters now sought. If the majority of the Dissenters of the present day thought their brethren too rash in their demands why did they not endeavour to check them? Would, then, their lordships become their dupes? He must frankly say, that their dupes they could not be, for the Dissenters had spoken out so plainly, that it was impossible for any man of common sense to be now deceived by them. Neither would their lordships become accomplices in perfecting their object; for accomplice implied some communion of interest, and an unity in the end. and aim; but what could their lordships have in common with those individuals who sought to seize upon the Universities and to pull them down? What, then, remained? Would their lordships consent to be the instruments, the tools, the ministers to the sordid hatred which the Dissenters bore to these institutions? Would they betray to them these sanctuaries of British honour? Would they be the corruptersthe poisoners of these wells of religious knowledge and of virtue ? On the division, the amendment to reject the bill was carried by an overwhelming majority; 187 peers voting for it, and only 85 for the second reading. Another grievance of which the Dissenters complained, and one which brought out still more plainly the principle that lay at the foundation of all their demands was, that they were liable to church rates, that is, that they were taxed towards the expenses of the national religious establishment. From this impost they claimed to be relieved, on the broad principle that it was unreasonable and unjust to make them contribute towards the support of a religious system from which they altogether dissented. This is a principle which it is impossible to reconcile with the existence of a national church; for it is equally applicable to stipendiary clergymen paid by the state, or to any payment made by the state towards the expenses of public worship, as to tithe drawn by the clergyman in right of his benence, or to rates levied directly and exclusively to meet the cost of divine service. It was a principle, however, with which ministers were under the necessity of not only dealing, but of dealing favourably; because it was one which they had sanctioned in their Irish Temporalities Bill of the preceding session. During the discussion of that measure, they had been warned, that ere long a similar demand would be made on the part of the English Dissenters, to whom they would have precluded themselves from giving a plausible answer. That demand was now made-made on the same ground, and supported by the same arguments, which had enabled the Catholics of Ireland successfully to insist that they should bear no part of the expense of the Protestant worship. On the 18th of March, Mr. Divett moved a resolution, "that, in the opinion of this house, it is just and expedient that effectual measures should be taken for the abolition of compulsory payments of church rates in England and Wales." The mover stated, that by a return of the local taxation of the country for the year ending 27th of March, 1827, the churchrates appeared to amount to 564,000l.; thus forming a very important item in the general local taxation, which was somewhere about 9,489,000l. The repairs of the churches in one year had cost 248,000l.; the charges for organs and bells 41,000l.; for books and wine 46,000l.; for payments to clerks and sextons 126,000l.; and for other charges 184,000l. Some part of this, indeed, was not now enforced by law; but the rest was enforced, and proved most injurious to the established church by engendering in the Dissenters feelings, not merely of dissatisfaction, but of disgust. The Dissenters raised not less than a million a year for their own religious purposes, and surely the members of the established church might support their own religious edifices, without calling on the aid of those who disclaimed its tenets. The increase of dissenting meeting houses both in England and Wales had been immense. In two parishes in Monmouthshire, having a population of about 16,000, twentythree places of dissenting worship had sprung up within a few years. This showed the infamous nature of the tax in question, and its tendency to injure the best interests of the established church; for in all of these parishes the most bitter hostility was entertained by the Dissenters towards the established church, and was mainly engendered by this impost. Abolish it, and a vast deal of that hostile feeling would vanish, for he knew of no subject which created more heartburnings than the compulsory assessment of church-rates. He utterly disclaimed any intention of interfering with tithes; for though he thought that men who dissented from a religion ought not to be compelled to pay towards its support, he was himself a churchman, and thought he was doing the church good service, by striving to remove what only created enemies against her. Other members enforced the motion by similar statements. According to them, the Dissenters had become so formidable in numbers, that if arrangements which they disliked, because they enforced practical grievances, were not forthwith altered, the established church would be anything but secure. It was to the principle, and not to the amount of these payments, that they objected; and no measure, short of one which would relieve them from such payments in any shape, would satisfy them. They deserved this more especially at the hands of the present ministry, to whom no body of men in England had rendered more essential services. Mr. O'Connell, a catholic legislating in matters touching the welfare and stability of a protestant church, laid it down as the plain principle of justice and common sense, which the house should establish, that no Christian ought to be compelled to pay towards the religious observances of a church from which he dissented; and he advised the Dissenters, if they wished to succeed, to show the ministers how much government depended on them, and what it had to dread from their anger.-Lord Althorp stated, that as he himself had given notice of a motion on this subject, he would not at present enter into it any farther than to declare that the question of church-rates rested on very different foundations from the question of tithes. The measure, which he intended to introduce would be brought forward, not in the shape of a resolution but as, an effective and practical motion. Under these circumstances, he did not think the present a desirable occasion to adopt the principle contained in the resolution, and he should therefore move the previous question.—Mr. Divett, however, expressed himself willing to await the appearance of the government plan, and withdrew his motion. On the 21st of April, lord Althorp brought forward his plan, but in the shape of a resolution, "that, after a fixed time, churchrates should cease and determine, and, in lieu thereof, a sum not exceeding 250,000%. should be granted from the land-tax to be applied to the expenses of the fabrics of churches and chapels in such manner as parliament should direct." His intention, he said, was not merely to relieve Dissenters, but likewise to provide for the fabrics of the church. The Dissenters, indeed, said that it was not so much the amount of the rate that was objected to, as their being compelled to contribute towards the support of a church to which they did not belong. One way of relieving the Dissenters, no doubt, would be to leave the system of church-rates as it was, but to exempt the Dissenters from |