believe, never out of it, to depreciate the character of the clergymen
of the Established Church in Ireland. I think no religious ministers are
placed in a more unfortunate position, and I am satisfied that many of
them feel it to be so. I have not the least doubt, when this transaction
is once accomplished, that they will breathe more freely. I believe they
will be more potent in their ministrations, and that their influence,
which must, or ought to be, considerable, will be far more extensive
than it has been, and far more beneficial in the districts in which they
live. But being so great a question, as the Home Secretary described it,
it can only be settled by mutual and reasonable concession. The main
principle being secured, that State Church supremacy is abolished in
Ireland, and that the Irish Churches are henceforth to be free Churches
upon the voluntary principle, then I should be willing, and I would
recommend every person in the country whom my voice may reach, to make
any reasonable concession that can be suggested in the case. So anxious
am I that it should be done, that I should be delighted to co-operate
with the right hon. Gentleman, and with hon. Members on the opposite
side of the House, in support of any just measure for settling this
great question. But I say, if it ever does come to be dealt with by a
great and powerful Minister, let it be dealt with in a great and
generous spirit. I would counsel to all men moderation and justice. It
is as necessary to Protestants as to Catholics and to Nonconformists
that they should endeavour to get rid of passion in discussing this
question.
We are, after all, of one religion. I imagine that there will come a
time in the history of the world when men will be astonished that
Catholics and Protestants have had so much animosity against and
suspicion of each other. I accept the belief in a grand passage, which I
once met with in the writings of the illustrious founder of the colony
of Pennsylvania. He says that 'The humble, meek, merciful, just, pious,
and devout souls are everywhere of one religion, and when death has
taken off the mask they will know one another, though the diverse
liveries they wear here make them strangers.' Now, may I ask the House
to act in this spirit, and then our work will be easy. The noble Lord,
towards the conclusion of his speech, spoke of the cloud which rests at
present over Ireland. It is a dark and heavy cloud, and its darkness
extends over the feelings of men in all parts of the British Empire. But
there is a consolation which we may all take to ourselves. An inspired
king and bard and prophet has left us words which are not only the
expression of a fact, but which we may take as the utterance of a
prophecy. He says, 'To the upright there ariseth light in the darkness.'
Let us try in this matter to be upright. Let us try to be just. That
cloud will be dispelled. The dangers which surround us will vanish, and
we may yet have the happiness of leaving to our children the heritage of
an honourable citizenship in a united and prosperous Empire.
* * * * *
IRELAND.
IX.
HOUSE OF COMMONS, APRIL 1, 1868.
[This speech was made in the debate on Mr. Gladstone's resolutions for
disestablishing the Irish Church.]
The House will not expect me to follow the legal argument of the hon.
and learned Member who has just sat down. I entertain a firm belief that
those legal cobwebs which are spread, and which are supposed to, and do
in the minds of many Gentlemen, interpose between the completion of a
great act of justice, will be swept away before long by the almost
unanimous opinion of the people of the three kingdoms.
During this debate, which has yet lasted only two nights, there has
been, if not a remarkable change of opinion, a remarkable change of
expression. Last night we had an interesting speech from the noble Lord
who generally sits opposite me, the noble Lord the Member for Stamford.
I refer only to the beginning of his speech, in which he spoke of his
affection for the principle of a Church Establishment. There was a
hesitation in his manner; he had a strong love for his principle, but it
appeared to me that he thought the time was come when even that
cherished principle would have to be surrendered. From the Treasury
bench we had a speech from the noble Lord the Secretary for Foreign
Affairs, and when he sat down it is difficult to say what was the
precise impression made upon the House; but I think, on the whole, the
impression made on the other side of the House--his own side--was by no
means a comfortable one. Now to me it is, and I think to the House it
is, a misfortune that we have a Government that speaks with a different
voice from night to night. We had it last year, and I presume, from the
example of the debate which lately took place on the motion of the hon.
Member for Cork, and from the debate on this motion, we are about to see
a repetition of it.
The fact is, that the position of the Government is one of great
difficulty and perplexity; to speak plainly, it is one which I should
call, in our Constitutional system, altogether unnatural. They are the
Ministers, the leaders of a minority of the House, and whilst they sat
as leaders of the minority in opposition they defended the principles of
their party, and they apparently regarded all their past career with
satisfaction; but the moment they are transferred to the Treasury bench
they find themselves in this difficulty, that although their party may
still wish to cling to their past opinions, there is something in the
very air, there is something throughout the mind of the whole kingdom,
which teaches them that their past opinions are impossible in their new
position.
The noble Lord the Member for King's Lynn made a speech not long ago at
Bristol, and in that speech he expressed what I am quite sure were his
honest opinions with regard to the condition of Ireland. He stated that
the condition of Ireland was one painful and dangerous, and to us, in
appearance at least, discreditable. He said we had a strange and
perplexing problem to solve; that in Ireland there was a miserable state
of things. Then he said, 'If we look for a remedy, who can give us an
intelligible answer? Ireland is the question of the hour.' And that is
not altogether at variance--in fact, I should say not at all at
variance--with the speech of the Chief Secretary for Ireland, who told
us, as far as he knew, the facts about his country. But immediately
afterwards we had the description of the right hon. Gentleman at the
head of the Government, to the effect that there was no crisis at all--
that, in point of fact, the condition of Ireland was a normal condition,
and that there was no necessity for anything remarkable or unusual in
the legislation that was required. Now, to-night we have had a speech
from the Home Secretary. I may say that every speaker on that side of
the House has admitted that his speech is entirely in opposition, in its
tone, its purpose, and its principle, to the speech of the noble Lord
the Member for King's Lynn. It seems to me that the Home Secretary to-
night answered the Foreign Secretary of last night--and I suppose if the
debate goes on until Thursday, probably the right hon. Gentleman at the
head of the Government, or perhaps the Secretary of State for India,
will answer the speech of the Secretary of State for the Home
Department.
But all this shows us that the House is in a wrong position. We have a
minority in office which cannot assert its own views with safety, nor
can it with any more safety directly adopt our views; and thus, when, on
that side of the House, a Minister gets up and makes what is called a
liberal speech on this question to us who are in opposition, that
creates discontent; and then another Minister rises and makes a speech
of an exactly opposite character, to reconcile that discontent. There
is, in fact, confusion and chaos in the House. We have a Government
which is not a Government--and we have an Opposition which is not an
Opposition, because really we do not oppose anything that you propose.
Your propositions are not based upon your own principles, which you held
when you sat on this side of the House, but on our principles, and
therefore we are not in opposition at all, but we help you as much as
possible to enforce, not your own principles, but ours. Whatever
compensation it may be to right hon. Gentlemen who sit on that bench and
enjoy the dignities and emoluments of office, I think there are many
honourable men on whom I am looking at this moment who do not observe
the course of these proceedings with entire satisfaction.
But now, notwithstanding these difficulties, there remains this great
question which we must discuss, and which, if possible, we must settle.
I say, notwithstanding some observations to the contrary, that the
people of the three kingdoms are looking with anxious suspense at the
course which Parliament may take on this question. The right hon.
Gentleman the Home Secretary on one occasion spoke of this question, of
this proposition, as being something in the nature of a revolution. But,
if it be a revolution, after all it is not so great a one as we might
suppose from the force and energy of the speech which he has delivered
to-night--a speech which, although I differ from his views, was, I must
say, a very good speech--in which he brought into the House a good deal
of the energy of the people of that great county (Yorkshire) from which
he comes. But we are now about to deal with a question which only
affects, according to the census, something under 700,000 people. I
observe hon. Gentlemen talk of the Protestants of Ireland as being one-
fourth of the whole population--of being a million and a half. All that
is fanciful exaggeration. According to the census the Episcopalians are
not more than 700,000, and let hon. Gentlemen bear this in mind--when
the census enumerators go round, if a man is not a Catholic or a
Presbyterian, he is put down, unless he can state he is of some other
sect, as an Episcopalian. And judging from what we know, there must be
out of the 700,000 a considerable number who never go to church, and,
politically or religiously, have no interest in it. Therefore, I
believe, speaking correctly, it would not be possible to show that there
are Episcopalians in Ireland in intimate connection with the Established
Church to the amount of more than from half a million to 600,000.
Now, this will not come to more than 100,000 families, that is, will not
be very much more than the population of Liverpool, or Manchester, or
Glasgow; so that, in point of fact, this question, which is held to be a
revolution,--this great question affects only a population equal to that
of the city of Glasgow, or of Liverpool, or of Manchester. And it is for
a population so small as this, I am told--for I am not versed in
computations of this kind--you have no less than twelve bishops and
archbishops, and that you have devoted for their services--for their
religious services--not less than the annual income arising from a
capital sum estimated to be, at least, ten or twelve millions sterling.
Now, if their system of teaching is really very good, I must say there
ought to be in Ireland a more perfectly moral and religious population
among the Church Protestants than there is in any other country in the
world.
What, then, are we about to do? What is the House about to do if we
adopt the resolutions of the right hon. Member for South Lancashire? If
the House accept the advice of the majority sitting on this side, what
will be done? We are not going to commit any vital wrong upon that one
city population of 500,000 or 600,000. When we have done everything that
I have suggested should be done, we shall leave them in as comfortable a
position as the majority of the people of Scotland are in at this
moment. We shall leave them as well off as eight or nine-tenths of the
population of Wales are; we shall leave them as well off as half, and
not the least religious half, of the people of England are; we shall
leave them as well off as the English, Scotch, Welsh, and Irish people
who form the population in our colonies, whether in North America or
Australia. And what can be more monstrous than for Gentlemen to come
here from Ireland--and there may he some from England--and tell us we
are bringing about a revolution, that we are committing an enormous
oppression, that we are hazarding the loyalty of the people of the North
of Ireland, when, after all, the most and worst which any of us proposes
to do is that the Church population of Ireland will be left at least as
well off as any of the various populations of the Empire I have just
described? I hope hon. Gentlemen opposite will be convinced that it is
not a bottomless abyss we are going to plunge their friends into.
Although it is a very small question for the Church in Ireland and for
the Church people, I hold it is an infinitely larger question for the
Catholic population. The hon. and learned Gentleman who spoke last
relies much upon law. I suppose it will be admitted that there are only
two pretences on which this State Church--the Protestant Church--can
exist in Ireland. The one is religious--the other is political. Now, has
anybody been able to show that, as a religious institution, it has not
been a deplorable failure? because clearly, the original intention, the
original hope was, that the people of Ireland would be drawn from the
Church of Rome and brought into harmony with the Church of England. I
undertake to say, from the time of its first establishment until now,
reckoning up all the Catholics on the one side and the Protestants on
the other, that it could not be shown, and is not to be believed, that
it has ever added really one person in every hundred persons to the
actual number of Protestants in the kingdom of Ireland. It has been an
entire failure--a failure deplorable, and almost ludicrous, as an engine
for converting the Catholic population. But it has not only not made
Catholics into Protestants, but it has made Catholics in Ireland more
intensely Roman than the members of that Church are found to be in any
other country in Europe or in America. And what is more than that, I
think it can be demonstrated that the existence of the Protestant Church
in Ireland, whether missionary or not in pretence, has not only not
converted the Catholics themselves, but has made it absolutely
impossible that anybody else, or any other Church, should convert them.
Because, if you look how the Church has been connected with the State,
and with the politics of the country, with the supremacy of the landed
proprietors, with the supremacy of the Protestant party, with all the
dark records of the past, you will see the effect has been to make
Catholicism in Ireland not only a faith, but absolutely a patriotism.
I think I might appeal to every Member of the House who now hears me
whether, if he had been placed in Ireland with his father before him
among the Catholic population--I might ask him whether he would not have
felt that if he threw off his allegiance to his Church, and if he
entered the portals of this garrison Church, that it would have been to
him not only a change of faith, but a denial as it were of his birth and
of his country. I have felt always in considering this question--and I
have considered it much for twenty-five years past--that all the
circumstances of that Church in Ireland have been such as to stimulate
the heart of every Catholic to a stronger adherence to his own faith,
and to a determined and unchangeable rejection of the faith and of the
Church which were offered to him by the hands of conquest. There is one
point on this, too, which is important, that the more you have produced
dissatisfaction with Imperial rule in Ireland, the more you have thrown
the population into the hands of Rome. Now, I hope I shall offend no
Catholic Member in this House when I say that I consider it one of the
greatest calamities of the world that there are in many countries
millions of Catholic population who are liable to be directed in much of
their conduct, and often in their political conduct, through their
bishops and clergy from the centre of the city of Rome. I think that is
a misfortune--I think it is a misfortune to the freedom of the world.
And I think, moreover, that it is a misfortune to every Catholic Church
in every country, for it tends to prevent it from being wholly national,
and it prevents also such changes and such reformations as, I believe,
are necessary in the progress of every Church. We see some result of
this in other countries of Europe. Notably, at this moment, in Austria,
even in that country which we lately thought was the very last in the
race of freedom, there is a contest going on with Rome. But there
probably is no country in Europe at this moment in which the Catholic
Church and population are more entirely subject than in Ireland to the
direct influence of a certain number of persons, of whom most of us know
nothing, who pull the strings of the Catholic world in the city of Rome.
I attribute much of this, which I think a great evil, to the existence
of the Protestant Church in Ireland. You know perfectly well that the
great discontent of Ireland is chiefly entertained by the Catholic
population, and you know that this population is even at this moment,
more than it was some years ago, subject directly to political
influences from Rome. But I am satisfied that it is for the interest of
the Catholic population, and that it is for the interest of this great
nation and of this Imperial Government, that whatsoever be the tie
between the Catholic population of Ireland and the Government in
Ireland, we ought at least to take away every obstacle that can lessen
in the smallest degree the loyalty of that people to the Imperial Crown.
And if this Church has failed as a religious institution, how stands it
as a political institution? It was intended not only to convert the
Catholics, but to secure the Union. An hon. Gentleman, with a courage
that I should not like to imitate, said that if the 5th Article of the
Act of Union should be altered, then in point of fact the Union is as
good as abolished. I see the hon. Gentleman up there, and I think he is
not the only one who has said it in the course of this discussion. It is
a very old and not a very strange device to expect the people to be made
loyal through the instrumentality of the clergy. I know that many
centuries ago a monk of some celebrity at the Court of Louis of Bavaria
told that monarch, 'You defend me with the sword, and I will defend you
with the pen.' We have been during all this time defending this Church
with the sword. The sword has scarcely ever been out of the hand of the
governing power in Ireland. And if a fair, simple, and unadorned
narrative were given of the transactions of this Parliament with
Ireland, with regard to its different enactments, coercive restrictions,
suspensions of the Habeas Corpus Act, and so forth, it would form a
narrative which would astonish the world and would discredit us. Sir, I
am afraid it is not too much to say that, in support of this supremacy,
many victims have perished on the scaffold in Ireland, and that the
fields of Ireland have been more than once drenched with the blood of
her people. But, after all this is done, we are not a bit more secure.
It is no matter what Government sits on the bench opposite. The right
hon. Gentleman the Member for South Lancashire was there two years ago,
and on that occasion, by the consent of his Colleagues, the then Home
Secretary had to introduce the Bill for the suspension of the Habeas
Corpus Act. Now you are on that side of the House, and you have to do
the same. Nobody says it is not necessary. I am not prepared to say it
has not been necessary at other times. But surely if this be necessary--
and if there is this painful duty to perform at various times--it shows
that the Union is not very secure in Ireland. In fact, Sir, it is the
most painful thing that we have witnessed lately, that the suspension of
the Habeas Corpus Act has become so common that it causes almost no
remark. The measure is introduced into the House. An Irish Member makes
a feeble protest against it, and it is passed, and we suspend the
liberties of one of the three kingdoms from year to year. And the Prime
Minister has the courage--I might almost use another word--he has the
courage to say there is no crisis, and that things are going on very
much as usual, and that the House of Commons is not required to do much
or care much for that country.
What you have in Ireland is this. There is anarchy, which is subdued by
force, and after centuries of rule--not our rule, but that of our
forefathers--we have got no farther. We have not reconciled Ireland to
us, we have done none of those things which the world says we ought to
have done; and at this moment--in the year 1868--we are discussing the
question whether it is possible to make any change with reference to the
Established Church in Ireland which will bring about a better state of
feeling between the people and the Imperial Government. Sir, I am afraid
there has been very little statesmanship and very much neglect, and I
think we ought to take shame to ourselves, and try to get rid of some of
our antiquated prejudices on this matter, and look at it as men would
look at it from a distance, as men whose vision is not impaired by the
passionate feelings which have so often prevailed in this country with
regard to this question. What, then, is the remedy that is now offered?
What do people say of it? Now, I challenge any hon. Gentleman on the
other side to deny this, that out of half a million Episcopalians in
Ireland there are many--there are some in the Irish nobility, some
landed proprietors, some magistrates, even some of the clergy, a great
many Irishmen--who believe at this moment that it is of the very first
importance that the proposition of the right hon. Gentleman the Member
for South Lancashire should be carried.
I am not going to overstate my case. I do not say that all of them are
of that opinion. Of that half-million, say that one-fourth--I will state
no number--but of this I am quite certain, that there is an influential,
a considerable, and, as I believe, a wise minority, who are in favour of
distinct and decided action on the part of Parliament with regard to
this question. But if you ask the whole Roman Catholic population of
Ireland, be they nobles, or landed proprietors, or merchants, or
farmers, or labourers,--the whole number of the Catholic population in
Ireland being, I suppose, eight or nine times the number of
Episcopalians--these are probably, without exception, of opinion that it
would be greatly advantageous and just to their country if the
proposition submitted on this side of the House should receive the
sanction of Parliament. Now, if some Protestants and all Catholics are
agreed that we should remove this Church, what would happen if Ireland
was 1,000 miles away, and we were discussing it as we might discuss the
same state of affairs in Canada? If we were to have in Canada and in
Australia all this disloyalty among the Roman Catholic population, owing
to the existence of a State Church there, the House would be unanimous
that the State Church in those colonies should be abolished, and that
perfect freedom in religion should be given.
But there is a fear in the mind of the right hon. Gentleman the Home
Secretary that the malady which would exist in Ireland might cross the
Channel and appear in England; that in fact the disorder of
Voluntaryism, as he deems it, in Ireland, like any other contagious
disorder, might cross the Channel, by force of the west wind, lodging
first in Scotland, and then crossing the Tweed and coming south to
England. I think the right hon. Gentleman went so far as to say that he
was so much in favour of religious equality, that if you went so far as
to disestablish the Church in Ireland, he would recommend the same
policy for England. Now, with regard to that, I will give you an
anecdote which has reference to Scotland. Some years ago I had the
pleasure of spending some days in Scotland at the house of the late Lord
Aberdeen, after he had ceased to be Prime Minister. He was talking of
the disruption of the Church of Scotland, and he said that nothing in
the course of his public life had given him so much pain as the
disruption, and the establishment of the Free Church in that country;
but he said he had lived long enough to discover that it was one of the
greatest blessings that had ever come to Scotland. He said that they had
a vast increase in the number of churches, a corresponding increase in
the number of manses or ministers' houses, and that schools had
increased, also, to an extraordinary extent; that there had been
imparted to the Established Church a vitality and energy which it had
not known for a long period; and that education, morality, and religion
had received a great advancement in Scotland in consequence of that
change. Therefore, after all, it is not the most dreadful thing in the
world--not so bad as a great earthquake--or as many other things that
have happened. I am not quite sure that the Scottish people themselves
may not some day ask you--if you do not yourselves introduce and pass it
without their asking--to allow their State Church to be disestablished.