Sir John Newport rose and said, that if the question had been left to the consideration of the House, under the circumstances, and in the form in which it had undergone the discussion of last year, he certainly should not have felt himself then called upon to trespass on their patience, but would have rested the cause of the Roman Catholics on the statement so ably made by his right hon. friend who open

concession has already reached its utmost limits, and that it would be utterly unsafe to admit, into the councils of the state, those who hold tenets at variance with a Protestant creed, and subversive of a Protestant ascendancy. I cannot consent to go into a committee from which I expect no satisfactory result-I am sure the House cannot come, with any prospect of a final and conciliating adjustment of rival interests. I owe it to the Catholics them-ed the debate; and on the eloquent appeal selves, not to excite hopes, which I believe, will terminate in the bitterness of disappointment: I owe it to the Protestant community of this country not to turn my back upon the petitions they have presented to this House, praying against the concession of the Catholic claims. In every view of the subject, I feel myself compelled to vote against the proposition of the right hon. gentleman for going into a committee.

Sir John Newport rose amidst loud cries of Question! The right hon. baronet observed, that as there were very many members who were anxious to speak on the question, he should move an adjourn ment of its consideration to Monday.

Lord Castlereagh remarked, that as it would be quite impossible to come to a conclusion on this important question that night, it appeared to him, that the only point of consideration was, whether the House would then adjourn, or at a later hour. The motion for deferring the further consideration of the question to Monday, was then put and carried.-Adjourned at two o'clock on Saturday morning.

HOUSE OF COMMONS.

Monday, March 1.

MR. GRATTAN'S MOTION FOR A COMMITTEE ON THE CLAIMS OF THE ROMAN CATHOLICS ADJOURNED Debate.] The order of the day being moved, for resuming the adjourned debate on the motion, "That this House will resolve itself into a Committee of the whole House, to take into its most serious consideration the state of the laws affecting his Majesty's Roman Catholic subjects in Great Britain and Ireland, with a view to such a final and conciliatory adjustment as may be conducive to the peace and strength of the united kingdom, to the stability of the Protestant establishment, and to the general satisfaction and concord of all classes of his Majesty's subjects," the House resumed the said adjourned debate.

of another hon. gentleman (Mr. Plunket) whose speech was heard by the House with so much attention, and which had been honoured with so much well-merited applause.

But there were circumstances attendant, on the discussion of the subject this year, which did not exist when it was last submitted to the consideration of the House. Some of those who were inimical to the cause had gone as far as they possibly could, by recurring to the basest arts to prevent the subject receiving a calm and deliberate investigation. They had endeavoured to persuade the Protestant population, that this was a question vitally affecting their religion, and that it was to be judged on that principle alone, divested of those various and important political considerations, by which the legislature ought to be actuated in their examination and their decision, and which he was sure were more fit to guide the judgment of parliament, than any of those topics which seemed to be principally relied upon at several meetings,-meetings which he was in some respects obliged to characterise, as calculated to produce, and absolutely producing ill-will and dissention amongst the great body of the people.

In the course of his speech, it was his intention to examine some of the statements which had been publicly made, with a view, as he conceived, to prejudice and inflame the minds of the people against the claims of their Catholic brethren. Under the circumstances in which they were placed-when they were called on to legislate, in order to restore tranquillity to a large portion of the empire-when they were called on to legislate, for the purpose of producing that strength and energy throughout the empire at large, which must result from conciliation and harmony-by uniting the great body of the people in the participation, and, consequently in the defence of those rights, which were common to them all-under these circumstances, it must appear evi

is usurping an office that belongs to another profession, and to men of another character; and I should account it every whit as indecent in a clergyman to take upon him to deal in these points, as it would be for him to determine titles of land in the pulpit, which are in dispute in Westminster-ball."* Such was the opinion of archbishop Sharpe, preaching before the House of Lords, on the 30th of January, 1700. He felt where the duty of a clergyman ceased, and where the province of a legislator began. He did not doubt, but, in the proper place, the House of Peers, that reverend prelate would have delivered his sentiments on any subject which called for them; but he very justly conceived, that the pulpit was not a place exactly suited to the discussion of politics.

the noble lord opposite (Castlereagh) | deed, a practising in state matters; and would not sanction such an imputation. Over and over again it had been declared, that it was not a Catholic rebellion. And this would be clearly seen by looking to the persons by whom it was fomented and organized. Such an examination would shew, that, of the whole Directory, but one was a Roman Catholic. For the truth of this statement, he would appeal to the declarations of the legislature. They had never designated it as a Catholic rebellion and, surely, if they had believed it was, they would not have gone on, from year to year, making provision for the Catholic college at Maynooth. (Hear!) He was aware that many Roman Catholics were engaged in that melancholy business. But it could not be otherwise, it must always be the case where a rebellion existed in any country, the great mass of whose inhabitants was of a particular religion, that some of the members of that religion must be connected with it; but, in the first French expedition, to Bantry Bay, so far from having any idea of assisting the invaders, every support was given by the Roman Catholics to his Majesty's troops. While at that time, in the north, an organized system prevailed, in the south, the inhabitants were perfectly peaceable and loyal, and, with heart and hand, united in defending the country against the French.

Was it right, then, that dignified clergymen should come forward and make such attacks? Was it right that such statements should pass unrefuted? To those mitred prelates who had been the means of procuring several of the adverse Petitions then lying on the table, he would strongly recommend the perusal of a passage, which struck his eye that morning, in a sermon preached by archbishop Sharpe, before the House of Lords, in 1700. That learned divine there observ. ed, "If a preacher in the pulpit should presume to give his judgment about the management of public affairs, or to lay down doctrines as from Christ, about the forms and models of kingdoms and commonwealths, or to adjust the limits of the prerogative of the prince, or of the liberties of the subject in our present government, I say, if a divine should meddle with such matters as these in his sermons, I do not know how he can be excused from the just censure of meddling with things that nothing concerns him. This is, in

It was something extraordinary, that, in several of the charges lately delivered to the clergy, as well as in that to which he had particularly referred, and in some of the petitions against the Catholics, the belief in certain tenets of religion was alleged as a cause for excluding that body from the enjoyment of the privileges of the constitution, which very tenets, those who made the accusation either did themselves hold, or they were not members of the Church of England. For instance, the doctrine of exclusive salvation was insisted on as incapacitating and unfitting the Catholic for a participation in constitutional rights; and these who made this assertion, stated, that no such doctrine was to be found in the Scriptures. He would ask of those persons, how long it was since they had read St. Athanasius's Creed ?—It was really something extraordinary that they should in direct terms declare that doctrine, which they preached, and were bound to preach, was no where to be found in the Scriptures. Yet such was the statement contained in the Petition from the archdeacon and clergy of Buckinghamshire, now lying on the table. For these tenets held by particular churches, from the speculative doctrines of religion, and from the dogmas laid down in books, he thought the legislature, on considering this question, would do much more wisely to make their appeal to the practical doctrines of the Catholic church, as actually carried into effect, and as operating on the conduct of states professing that faith. There

fore, instead of examining what was de- ing from the privileges of the constitution, creed in the council of Lateran or of Con- that great body composed of those two stance, it was far better to see what, insects, the Lutherans and Calvinists. The the present day, was the practice of Ro- result was, that during the whole peman Catholic countries-and to investigate, riod to which he had alluded, the country whether they could perceive, in the con- was in a constant state of convulsion; so duct of great Roman Catholic governments, much so, that the Lutherans and Cilvanists a recognition of those obnoxious princi- called in the Turks to their assistance; and ples which were represented as rendering more than once the country was divided men unfit to enjoy what were considered between the Turks and the Austrians. Są privileges, by some persons, but which he the state remained for a considerable time. contemplated as rights-rights, which, if At length, at a late period, it was in some at all narrowed or restricted, should be degree tranquillized. How was that effect thus dealt with only where danger to the produced? By the conciliatory measures state was plainly proved. They were all of Maria Theresa-but, till 1791, it was agreed, that the communication of any not completely tranquillized. Tranquilright, must, in the first instance, be guid- lity was then restored, by an extension of ed by the great principle of safety to the civil rights and civil privileges to all the state. But, if it could be proved that no inhabitants of the kingdom, without any danger would arise to the state from its reference to religious opinions-peace and exercise-if it appeared that the danger security were obtained, by recurring to apprehended, existed only in the idea of that very measure, which the advocates of individuals-if it were evident that there the Roman Catholics now called on the was no solid ground for dreading any ill ef- legislature to carry into effect. So comfects from granting the rights demanded pletely were the people of Hungary satisthen they were not justified in continuing fied, that, in the triumphant progress of to narrow and restrict those rights, which Buonaparté, by that country only was his every man was entitled to claim. In tak- march arrested. When he was in possesing this view of the subject, it would be sion of Vienna, the nation, with an necessary to enquire, whether in Europe united voice, exclaimed-"There shall such a state of things could not be pointed thy proud career be stayed." It was out as fully supported the position he had not possible to conceive a case, more laid down. In doing this, the attention directly in point; and it should be was at once arrested by the case of Hun- observed, that the predominant religion of gary, to which his right hon. friend had the state was the Roman Catholic, which alluded on the first night of the debate; they had been told admitted no toleration, and which he had himself noticed, in the-which they had been informed never debate on the Catholic Claims, in 1809. granted any thing like the freedom allowThat case exactly corresponded, both as ed in this country: which the petitioners to previous situation, and the tranquilliz- against the Catholic Claims asserted to be so ing effect which the liberal conduct pur- complete, that no other nation ever grantsued had on the nation in general, with the ed so much. Yet, in Hungary, a Catholic question now under consideration. On state, every privilege was thrown open to former occasions, when instances, had been the Protestant tranquillity, and peace and adduced from the states of Switzerland, it concord followed. The same rights were was observed, that the system of admitt- now demanded for the Roman Catholics; ing the members of every religion to a par- and sure he was, the same beneficial efticipation in civil rights, might do very well fects, in the common course of things, in a small, diminutive republic, but would must flow from the concession. If it was not answer as a rule for a great population argued, that those concessions ought not in a country like this. That objection, how-to be made, because, for centuries, conever, could not be urged against Hungary, which contained 7 millions of people. That country was for many years divided into contending sects the Lutherans and Calvinists being almost equal to the members of the predominant religion, which was the Roman Catholic. During several centuries, the experiment was made in Hungary, of what might be done by exclud

tentions had existed between the opposite sects of Protestants and Catholics, the an swer was, “the same might be said, with more propriety, of Hungary, where one of the parties called in the Mahometan to their assistance; yet every right was ultimately granted, in common, to all religions; not by an arbitrary monarch, but in a diet, consisting of 400 persons, with a