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Houfe; he could not, therefore, agree to the motion. There was a mode established by law for colleéting the average prices of corn for Ireland; and if the honourable gentleman pleated, he might move for copies of thofe averages for any period he thought proper.

Mr. Mr. Powys contended that the bill, if not to alter, was to Powys. confolidate, and make permanent the former corn laws; à measure surely of fo much importan e, as to render every poffible degree of information neceffary. In the reprefentation from the Privy Council, many points were flated as facts which required proof, and the Houfe ought at least to have before them all the information of which the Privy Council was in poffeffion.

Mr.

The motion was negatived.

Mr. Sheridan prefented a petition from the Trades House Sheridan. of Glasgow, praying to be heard by co nfel against the claufes that refpect Scotland. He wished to be informed, whether it was meant to alter the claufes complained of; becaufe he understood fuch an intimation had been given to the petitioners by the promoters of the bill. If thofe claims were not altered, he fhould have to prefent a petition against them, figned by more than twenty thousand perfons.

Mr.

The petition was ordered to be referred to the Committee on the bill, with an inftruction that the petitioners be heard by counfel.

The Earl of Carysfort, from the Select Committee, who were appointed to try and determine the merits of the petition of Sir James Johnftone, Bart. complaining of an undue election and return for the district of boroughs in Scotland of Dumfries, Kirkcudbright, Annen, Lochmabon, and Sanquhar, informed the Houfe, that the faid Select Committee have determined,

That Patrick Millar, junior, Efq, is duly elected a Commiffioner to ferve in this prefent Parliament for the faid boroughs.

And alfo, That the petition of the faid Sir James Johnftone, Bart. did not appear to the faid Select Committee to be frivolous or vexatious.

The Houfe having refolved themselves into a Committee on the Catholic Diffenters bill, Lord Beauchamp took the chair; and immediately after the reading of the fourth claufe,

Mr. Mitford obferved, that having a variety of new Mitford. claufes to move, which could not be conveniently debated till they were before the Houfe in a connected form, he fhould, therefore, propofe to adopt them in the Committee, without debate, and to order the bill to be reprinted with the amendments, and re-committed on a future day.

The

The Master of the Rolls was of opinion, that if any other Mafter of gentleman had amendments to propofe, it would be proper to the Rolls, move and adopt them on the prefent occafion, as far as that could be done without debate, that the Houfe, on the recommitment, might have as much of the whole before them as poffible.

Mr. Fox faid, that he had an alteration to propofe in the Mr. Fox. oath, and that he wished to know whether it would be better to introduce it immediately, or to wait for the re-commitment of the bill.

Mr. Mitford answered, that the oath had been agreed to as it now food, by the perfons whom the bill was intended to relieve, and that he had no authority to make any alte

ration.

Mr.

Mitford,

Mr. Fox rejoined, that the alteration was fuggefted to him Mr. Fox. by fome of the perfons interefted in the bill, and related to that part of the oath which difavows the authority of ordinances or decrees of Councils, to abfolve from any allegiance to the King and Government, and from the obligations of an oath. He next read the propofed amendment, the fpirit of which was univerfally approved; and after fome obfervations on the mode of wording it, by Mr. Pitt, the Mafter of the Rolls, Mr. Mitford, and Mr. J. H. Browne, Mr. Fox obferved, the words were not of his chufing, neither did he think them the most proper, but they were the words of those who were to take the oath; and as the obligation of them was admitted to be complete, he fhould prefer them, on that account, to any other.

The amendment was adopted.

Mr. Chancellor Pitt, adverting to that part of the oath Mr. Pitt. which declares, "That no perfon can be abfolved from arty "fin, nor any fin whatever be forgiven, without forrow for "paft offences, and refolution to avoid future guilt," here remarked, that the Houfe, as a legiflative Affembly, might very properly exact a declaration, that no man can be abfolved from moral obligation and obedience to the law; but it was totally beyond their province to require a declaration concerning points of do&rine which included the forgiveness

of fins.

The propriety of this amendment was alfo admitted.

Mr. Mitford's claufes were feverally brought up, and agreed to, pro forma.

Mr. Fox next remarked, that there were feveral alterations Mr. Foxe either made, or intended to be made, in the bill, to which he now gave notice that he could not agree, and which he fhould certainly oppofe, although not perhaps to the extent of taking the fenfe of the Houfe upon them. It was meant, he understood, to change the name, by which perfons taking

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the benefit of the bill, were to be diftinguished. Why any objection fhould be made against perfons calling themselves Catholic Diffenters, who thought that the name was appli cable to their fituation, he could not comprehend. They had long been called by the name of Papifts in this country; but we had also been in the habit of calling them traitors and murderers, with perhaps as much juftice. Papift was an invidious name; and he need hardly fay, in an affembly of well-informed men, by no means applicable, in its strict fenfe, to the English Roman Catholics: as fuch, it ought not to be continued. It was alfo intended to prevent perfons taking the benefit of the act, from exercising any patronage, which, in right of their property, they might poffefs, or prefent to any livings in the church. This he thought not only invidious and unjust, but abfurd, inasmuch as that which was thought a fufficient fecurity to the Government, ought to be deemed a fufficient fecurity to the Church. The claufe in the bill, which denied the benefit of it to any perfon who shall speak or write against the doctrine of the Trinity, was such as ought never to have been admitted into any bill; and the admiffion of it into this was peculiarly improper, fince it was never imagined, but that Roman Catholics were fufficiently Trinitarian to fatisfy the most orthodox Divine of the Church of England.

Mr. Martin remarked, that it would give him concern if Martin. the clause were retained in the bill. He should feel himself humbled in his opinion of the Houfe of which he was a Member, and of the times in which he lived, unless it were rejected.

Mr.

Mr. Mitford answered, that he could affure the honourable Mitford. gentleman, that the change of name was introduced by the defire of the perfons for whofe relief the bill was intended. The article refpecting the doctrine of the Trinity was preferved, because it was found in the Act of Toleration, and he intended to have left it out, for the fake of avoiding difcuffion.

Mr. Fox.

Mr. Pitt.

Mr. Fox faid, that as far as that argument went, he rejoiced that the clause had been introduced, because he thought it a fubject which ought to be difcuffed.

Mr. Chancellor Pitt acknowledged, that to allow perfons taking the benefit of the bill to exercise Church patronage, was a point to which he was not prepared to give his affent.

Mafter of The Mafter of the Rolls obferved, not for the fake of imthe Rolls. mediate debate, but of future confideration, that to declare that perfons taking the oath, contained in the bill, fhould not be confidered as Papifts, would go a much greater length than it was meant by the bill to go.

The Chairman left the chair, the report was brought up, ordered to be printed, and farther confidered on the enfuing Friday.

The Houfe adjourned.

Monday, 4th April.

The Speaker acquainted the House, that pursuant to their order to him on the 25th day of March, he had, on Thurfday the 31st of March laft, fignified by writing to the United Company of Merchants of England trading to the Eaft Indies, the refolution of the Houfe of the faid 25th of March.

Mr. Henry Hobart reported from the Committee who were appointed to examine the lifts of nine perfons' names to be the Select Committee, to whom it is referred to examine and flate the feveral accounts, and other papers prefented to the House in this feffion of Parliament, relating to the public income and expenditure, and to report to the House what has been the whole amount of the public income and expenditure during the last five years, and what may be expected to be the annual amount thereof in future, and also what alteration has taken place in the amount of the public debt fince the 5th day of January, 1786, and to report to the House upon which nine perfons the majority fell; that the Committee had examined the lifts accordingly, and found, that the majority had fallen upon the following perfous, viz. William Huffey, Efq., William Pulteney, Efq., Sir Thomas Charles Bunbury, Bart., Samuel Thornton, Efq., the right honourable Dudley Ryder, Daniel Parker Coke, Esq., Andrew Stuart, Efq., John Sargent, Efq., and Matthew Montagu, Efq.; and he read the report in his place, and afterwards delivered it in at the table, where the fame was read.

Mr. Henry Hobart, from the Select Committee, who were appointed to try and determine the merits of the petition of George Tierney, Efq., complaining of an undue election and return for the borough of Colchester, in the county of Effex, informed the Houfe, that the faid Select Committee have determined,

That George Jackfon, Efq. is duly elected a Burgess to ferve in this prefent Parliament for the faid borough of Colchefster.

That Robert Thornton, Efq. is duly eleted a Burgess to ferve in this prefent Parliament for the faid borough of Colchefter;

And that the petition of the faid George Tierney, Esq., fo far as refpects the faid George Jackfon, Efq., did appear to the faid Select Committee to be frivolcus and vexatious;

And also, that the petition of the faid George Tierney, Efq., fo far as refpects the faid Robert Thornton, Efq., did

appear

appear to the faid Select Committee to be frivolous, and vexatious.

The following accounts were, upon motion, ordered to be laid before the Houfe:

66 I. An account of the number of veffels, with their ton66 nage, which have arrived from Ruffia in the feveral ports "of Great Britain; and alfo of the veffels, with their ton66 nage, which have cleared out from Great Britain to Ruf"fia during the laft ten years, diftinguishing the British from "the foreign."

2. An account of the feveral articles imported from "Ruffia into Great Britain, from the 5th of January, 1789, "to the 5th of January, 1790."

3. "An account of the export to Ruffia from Great Bri"tain, from the 5th of January, 1789, to the 5th of Ja"nuary, 1790, diftinguishing British from foreign goods.'

4. "An account of the value of the imports, into Great Britain from Ruffia, during the last five years, and the "exports from Great Britain to Ruffia during the fame pe"riod."

Mr.Burke Mr. Burke obferved that, probably, the Houfe would be furprised not to difcover, when he informed them that he muit beg leave to prefent a paper to them concerning an East-India subject, that, ftrange to tell, it was not an impeachment, but, what was ftill more ftrange, a petition from a perfon who had been long in the fervice of the Eaft-India Company, and yet was miferably poor. It was the petition of Jofeph Fowke, who held, during 56 years, an employment under the Company in India, which, added to the length of his father's fervices, made up no less than one hundred and fix years, and, at the age of 72 years, he found himfelf in great indigence. According to a refolution folemnly entered into fome years ago by the Court of Directors, it had been formally fignified to the Company's fervants in India, that if any of them, after a certain period of fervices in India, fhould defire to return home, they might be permitted to do fo, and in cafe, upon oath made of the fortunes they returned with, it fhould appear that they were not worth ten thousand pounds, the Company agreed to make their income up according to the rate of 400l. as an annuity. Mr. Fowke, by the permiffion of Lord Cornwallis, had returned home from his flation of Senior Private Merchant, about fourteen months fince; he had made the requifite oath as to his fortune, and fworn, that fo far from being in poffeffion of ten thousand pounds, his circumftances were fo ftraitened, that he had not much more than forty pounds a year to live upon. cafe had been regularly laid before the Court of Directors, who had, nevertheless, refufed to grant him any relief; un

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