row majority, was now defeated by a majority of nearly three to one.1 The further discussion of the test laws was not resumed for nearly forty years; but other questions affect Protesting ing religious liberty were not overlooked. In Catholic Dissenters, 1791. 1791, Mr. Mitford brought in a bill for the relief of "Protesting Catholic Dissenters," a sect of Catholics who protested against the pope's temporal, authority, and his right to excommunicate kings and absolve subjects from their allegiance, as well as the right alleged to be assumed by Roman Catholics of not keeping faith with heretics. It was proposed to relieve this particular sect from the penal statútes, upon their taking an oath to this effect. The proposal was approved by all but Mr. Fox, who, in accepting the measure, contended that the relief should be extended generally to Roman Catholics. Mr. Pitt also avowed his wish that many of the penal statutes against the Catholics should be repealed.2 The bill was open to grave objections. It imputed to the Catholics, as a body, opinions repudiated by the most enlightened professors of their faith. Mr. Pitt received an explicit assurance from several foreign universities that Catholics claimed for the pope no civil jurisdiction in England, nor any power to absolve British subjects from their allegiance; and that there was no tenet by which they were justified in not keeping faith with heretics. Again, this proposed oath required Catholics to renounce doctrines, in no sense affecting 1 294 to 105. Parl Hist., xxviii. 387-452; Lord Sidmouth's Life, i. 73; Tomline's Life of Pitt, iii. 99; Fox's Mem., ii. 361, 362. The subject gave rise, at this time, to much written controversy. Tracts by Bishops Sherlock and Hoadley were republished. One of the best pamphlets on the side of the dissenters was "The Rights of Protestant Dissenters, by a Layman, 1789." The Bishop of Oxford, writing to Mr. Peel in 1828, speaks of fourteen volumes on the subject, written in 1789 and 1790.- Peel's Mem.. i. 65. 2 Parl. Hist., xxviii. 1262, 1364; Tomline's Life of Pitt, iii. 249; Lord Stanhope's Life of Pitt, ii. 100. 8 See his questions and the answers, Plowden's Hist., ii. 199, App. No. 91; Butler's Hist. Mem., iv. 10. the state. In the House of Lords, these objections were forcibly urged by the Archbishop of Canterbury, and Dr. Horsley, bishop of St. David's; and to the credit of the episcopal bench, the latter succeeded in giving to the measure a more liberal and comprehensive character, according to the views of Mr. Fox. An oath was framed, not obnoxious to the general body of Catholics, the taking of which secured. them complete freedom of worship and education; exempted their property from invidious regulations; opened to them the practice of the law in all its branches; and restored to peers their ancient privilege of intercourse with the king.1 Test Act 1791. bly, praying for relief. In the debates upon the Test Act, the peculiarity of the law, as affecting members of the church of Scotland, had often been alluded to; and in 1791, a April 18th, petition was presented from the General AssemOn the 10th of May, Sir Gilbert Elliot, moved for a committee of the whole House upon the subject. To treat the member of an established church as a dissenter, was an anomaly too monstrous to be defended. Mr. Dundas admitted that, in order to qualify himself for office, he had communicated with the church of England, a ceremony to which members of his church had no objection. It would have been whimsical indeed to contend that the Scotch were excluded from office by any law, as their undue share in the patronage of the state had been a popular subject of complaint and satire; but whether they enjoyed office by receiving the most solemn rites of a church of which they were not members, or by the operation of acts of indemnity, their position was equally anomalous. But as their case formed part of the general law affecting dissenters, which Parliament was in no humor to entertain, the motion was defeated by a large majority.2 1 Parl. Hist., xxix. 113-115, 664; 31 Geo. III. c. 32; Butler's Hist. Mem. iv. 44, 52; Quarterly Rev., Oct. 1852, p. 555. Ayes, 62; Noes, 149. Parl. Hist., xxix. 488-510. Episcopalians Penal stat (Unitarians), 1792. In 1792, Scotch Episcopalians were relieved from restraints which had been provoked by the disaffec- Restraints tion of the Episcopalian clergy in the reigns of on Scotch Anne and George II. As they no longer pro- repealed. fessed allegiance to the Stuarts, or refused to pray for the reigning king, there was no pretext for these invidious laws; and they were repealed with the concurrence of all parties.1 In the same year Mr. Fox, despairing, for the present, of any relaxation of the test laws, endeavored to obtain the repeal of certain penal statutes affecting utes respecting religious religious opinions. His bill proposed to repeal opinions several Acts of this nature; 2 but his main object May 11th, was to exempt the Unitarians, who had petitioned for relief, from the penalties specially affecting their particular persuasion. They did not pray for civil enfranchisement, but simply for religious freedom. In deprecating the prejudices excited against this sect, he said, "Dr. South had traced their pedigree from wretch to wretch, back to the devil himself. These descendants of the devil were his clients." He attributed the late riots at Birmingham, and the attack upon Dr. Priestley, to religious bigotry and persecution; and claimed for this unpopular sect, at least the same toleration as other dissenting bodies. Mr. Burke, in opposing the motion, made a fierce onslaught upon the Unitarians. They were hostile to the church, he said, and had combined to effect its ruin: they had adopted the doctrines of Paine, and approved of the revolutionary excesses of the French Jacobins. The Unitarians were boldly defended by Mr. William Smith, a constant advocate of religious liberty, who, growing old and honored in that cause, lived to be the Father of the House of Commons. Mr. Pitt declared his reprobation of the Unitarians, and opposed the motion, which was lost by a majority of seventy-nine. Mr. Pitt and other 1 Parl. Hist., xxix. 1372. 2 Viz. 9 & 10 Will. c. 32 (for suppressing blasphemy and profaneness); 1 Edw. VI. c. 1; 1 Mary, c. 3; 13 Eliz. c. 2. 8 Ayes, 63; Noes, 142. Parl. Hist., xxix. 1372; Tomline's Life of Pitt, iii. 317. statesmen, in withholding civil rights from dissenters, had been careful to admit their title to religious freedom; but this vote unequivocally declared that doctrines and opinions might justly be punished as an offence. Catholic relief, Ireland, 1792. Meanwhile the perilous distractions of Ireland, and a formidable combination of the Catholic body, forced upon the attention of the government the wrongs of Irish Catholics. The great body of the Irish people were denied all the rights of citizens. Their public worship was still proscribed: their property, their social and domestic relations, and their civil liberties, were under interdict they were excluded from all offices civil and military, and even from the professions of law and medicine.1 A ready the penal code affecting the exercise of their religion had been partially relaxed: 2 but they still labored under all the civil disqualifications which the jealousy of ages had imposed. Mr. Pitt not only condemned the injustice of such disabilities; but hoped, by a policy of conciliation, to heal some of the unhappy feuds by which society was divided. Ireland could no longer be safely governed upon the exclu sive principles of Protestant ascendency. Its people must not claim in vain the franchises of British subjects. And accordingly in 1792, some of the most galling disabilities were removed by the Irish Parliament. Catholics were admitted to the legal profession on taking the oath of allegiance, and allowed to become clerks, to attorneys. Restrictions on the education of their children and on their intermarriages with Protestants were also removed.3 In the next year more important privileges were conceded. All remaining restraints on Catholic worship and education, 1 Some restrictions had been added even in this reign. Butler's Hist. Mem., iii. 367, et seq.; 467-477, 484; O'Conor's Hist. of the Irish Catholics; Sydney Smith's Works, i. 269; Goldwin Smith's Irish Hist., &c., 124 2 Viz. in 1774, 1778, and 1782; 13 & 14 Geo. III. c. 35; 17 & 18 Geo III. c. 49; 22 Geo. III. c. 24 (Irish); Parnell's Hist. of the Penal Laws. 84, &c.; Butler's Hist. Mem., iii. 486. 3 32 Geo. III. c. 21 (Irish); Debates (Ireland), xii. 39, &c.; Life of Grattan, ii. 53. and the disposition of property, were removed. Catholics were admitted to vote at elections, on taking the Catholic oaths of allegiance and abjuration; to all but the relief, Ireland, 1793. higher civil and military offices, and to the honors and emoluments of Dublin University. In the law they could not rise to the rank of king's counsel; nor in the army beyond the rank of colonel: nor, in their own counties, could they aspire to the offices of sheriff and sub-sheriff: 1 their highest ambition was still curbed; but they received a wide enfranchisement, beyond their former hopes. In this year tardy justice was also rendered to the Roman Catholics of Scotland. All excitement upon the Catholic subject having passed away, a bill was brought in relief, Scotland, 1793. and passed without opposition, to relieve them, like their English brethren, from many grievous penalties to which they were exposed. In proposing the measure, the lord-advocate stated that the obnoxious statutes were not so obsolete as might be expected. At that very time a Roman Catholic gentleman was in danger of being stripped of his estate, which had been in his family for at least a century and a half, by a relation having no other claim to it, than that which he derived, as a Protestant, from the cruel provisions of the law.2 - The Quakers next appealed to Parliament. for relief. In 1796, they presented a petition describing their Quakers. sufferings on account of religious scruples; and April 21st, Mr. Sergeant Adair brought in a bill to facilitate 1796. the recovery of tithes from members of that sect, without subjecting them to imprisonment; and to allow them to be examined upon affirmation in criminal cases. The remedy proposed for the recovery of tithes had already been pro 1 33 Geo. III. c. 21 (Irish); Debates of Irish Parliament, xiii. 199; Plowden's Hist., ii. 421; Adolphus' Hist., vi. 249-256; Lord Stanhope's Life of Pitt, ii. 277; Butler's Hist. Mem., iv. 62; Life of Grattan, iv. 87; Parnell's Hist. of the Penal Laws, 124. 2 Parl. Hist., xxx. 766; 33 Geo. III. c. 44; Butler's Hist. Mem., iv. |