Mr. Abercrombie, M. P., Mr. Denman, Mr. Hume, M. P., Mr. Warburton, M. P. Mr. Marshall, M. P., Mr. Brougham, M. P., and Mr. J. Brougham, M. P.; Mr. Tooke, Doctor Birkbeck, Mr. Mill, with a number of other Noblemen and Gentlemen, Clergymen, and Dissenting Ministers. Upwards of 420 persons sat down to dinner, and we believe the room was never more crowded. All the galleries were filled with ladies, who seemed to take great interest in the scene.

Our limits will not permit us to follow the routine of the business of the evening, but we shall select those parts which struck us to be most important.

The Duke of NORFOLK proposed the health of his Royal Highness the Duke of Sussex, who, he said, had added to the illustrious title which he inherited by birth, that of the friend of the arts, and the patron of every liberal institution in the metropolis.

The Duke of SUSSEX, in rising to return thanks to the company for the manner in which the toast given by his Noble Friend had been received, would only say, that he thanked the company cordially and heartily. The compliment paid to him by the Noble Duke he felt sincerely, but at the same time, he must say, that he differed from his Noble Friend, in thinking that he had any merit in entertaining the sentiments for which his Noble Friend had complimented him. He was proud to cherish every thing which brought to his recollection what he was sure he should never forget, that those principles brought his family to the Throne of these realms [great cheering]. Under all circumstances, he was always glad to refresh his recollection of those great objects, which proved the sincerity of his professions [hear, hear!]. He wished always to be judged by facts rather than by professions, and he would not say any more, because he wished not to make professions, but show what his opinions were by his acts. He had been much interested, from the earliest period, in the object for which they had then met--he should rather say, that from the earliest period he had heard of the University, it had excited his liveliest interest for its success. He would be at all times ready to support it; and should his exertions be called for in any way that he could exert himself, they would always find him ready to put his shoulder to the wheel, honestly, sincerely, and going straight forward, neither turning to the right nor the left. His excellent friend, Dr. Lushington, in his address that morning, had explained--and this would be further explained by some gentlemen he then saw near him--the object, and defined the limits of the establishment, which shewed that it was not intended to injure

He

or interfere with the two Universities of England. It would ill become him, as a Prince of the Blood, to further any object which might injure the two Universities; but it was thought that they had not gone with their instruction to that extent which was proposed by the establishment in London [cheers]. They must be, as his Learned Friend had said, lost in gratitude to those by whom they were educated at our two Universities; but they took a different view, and wished to march with events, while the discipline and regulations of the other Universities did not allow them to make those changes which the circumstances of the times required [cheering]. They meant to assist in the improvement of education, and augment the number of those who aspired to obtain a good education, and reduce the expense of obtaining it, which had been much augmented in the last 20 or 30 years. He would not go further back, for if he did, he might be thought to be casting reflections, which he had no wish to do. only wished to do good to mankind, and preserve those feelings which ought to belong to those engaged in the same pursuits. He was satisfied, that if the principles laid down were acted on, and the University were well conducted, the other two Universities would not be opposed to the London University, but they would be helps to each other. For his own part, the professions of support which he had made he meant to adhere to, for he did not suppose it possible that the London University could in any manner injure the others [cheers]. He only gave his own opinion, but he would not trespass longer on the Meeting, as there were several distinguished individuals waiting to address them, and especially as there was one who would explain at greater length, than had been done in the morning, the objects of the Institution. He would only, therefore, return the company his thanks for the honour they had done him, and assure them that he regarded this day as one of the proudest of his existence. He then proposed "Prosperity to the University of London," which was drunk with loud applause.

Mr. BROUGHAM rose, amid enthusiastic cheering, which prevented the learned Gentleman from proceeding for some minutes. He then observed, that it became his duty, in execution of the commands imposed on him by the Council, to return, on their behalf, the thanks of the Institution to his Royal Highness their illustrious Chairman, who had been just now pleased, in such terms of cordial friendship and kind feeling, to make mention of their views and objects. It was also incumbent on him to return thanks to those individuals now present, and who

might not belong to their body, for the like cordial reception which they had given the undertaking. This task had been imposed on him from (God knew) no peculiar fitness which he possessed for the office, but from the recollection of the fact, that he was one of the earliest, and most zealous (albeit, by no means the ablest) of the promoters of the good work which they were then met to celebrate. Two years had not yet elapsed, since he met, peradventure, a great part of the persons now present, in the midst of the city of London; in that cradle of civil and religious liberty-near to that spot where freedom had been nurtured and watered by the blood of the noblest of her citizens, and there had arisen an institution, which, if he did not deceive himself, would, under the blessings of Divine Providence, render the principles which had there been cradled and nurtured, perpetual and eternal, in England, and would enable them to spread the lights of knowledge and of freedom over the whole world [applause]. On that day he had risen to perform a duty under very different circumstances from those in which they were at present placed. Under the sneers of some--the more open taunts and gibes of others, accompanied by the faint hopes of some friends, the ardent good wishes of many others, while the project was heard with deep execrations by the enemies of human improvement, who were the enemies of light and liberty [hear, hear]. But, now these early clouds and mists were dispelled, two anxious years had scarcely passed over their heads, and, amid the varied fortunes of the empire, with much to dishearten and drive all, but them, to despair, they had surmounted their difficulties--they had triumphed over secret cavillers--they had defeated more open enemies--and they had lived to see their walls arise amidst the plaudits of thousands of their fellow-citizens, and the good wishes of all who wished well to their kind in every corner of the world [cheers]. These were works of wisdom as well as of beneficence, and they who lent their hands to them, built a fabric on no quicksand of human policy--on a foundation, where no winds of popular opinion could dissipate their labours, or no slipperiness of human parties cause the fabric to fall; but they engraved on an eternal pillar their names, to be handed down to a grateful and admiring posterity [loud cheering]. He decried the occupation of no man, he contemned no man's vocation, but he could not help contrasting that day's work with the works of others, which held but a passing interest, and glorying with a mighty exultation at the gratification of the purest ambition which could gild the course of any man--the erection of monuments to the genius, the knowledge, and the happiness of mankind. He who pressed

Volvitur, et plani raptim petit æquora campi.” [Cheers.] Little now remained to complete the work which had been begun. He should state the intentions of the Council with respect to the great task which they had undertaken. One of their principal cares must be in the choice of teachers, that they should be men in every way qualified--full of rich and varied learning; and it was a unanimous resolution of the Council--a fixed resolution to which, as a body, and as individuals, they had solemnly pledged themselves never to allow such a phrase as a candidate for votes to be mentioned in their presence. They were resolved to prefer the worthiest, even though he should happen to be the least known; and to select a Candidate whose merits were greater, rather than the better recommended, but less meritorious, competitor, if his merits were only so much superior as the dust in the balance. Instead of devoting only four or six months of the year to the education of youth, as other establishments did in this country, it was their intention that the lectures should be delivered during a space of nine months; and instead of the lecturer giving a single lecture of an hour on each day, and after such a manner, that the pupils might attend to it or not as they listed; in the new University, each lecture was first to last an hour for instruction, and then another hour, during which the Professor was to examine the pupils, to see whether he had been understood by them. A third hour was proposed to be allotted three times a week, to such pupils as chose, from a greater zeal for knowledge, to frequent the private levee of the Professor, where he could dispense rewards and titles of honour-where he could help their difficulties-open up to them matters which the instruction in the class had failed to expose, and thus encourage persons not only to learn what was known, but to dash into untrodden paths and become discoverers in their turn. He thought it needful to say a word, and but a word, in reference to another subject, because he had been accused, unjustly accused, of enmity to those other seats of learning, where science had been preserved in the dark ages, till it burst forth with a power to dispel the darkness--he meant Oxford and Cambridge, those two lights of learning and science. Why he should

be supposed to be their enemy, he was at a loss to imagine. Was it because be had the misfortune not to receive his education at either of them-not to have studied in the sacred haunts of the Muses, on the classic banks of the Cam or the Isis? That might be a reason for envy, but not for enmity. But he trusted he should not be compared to that short-sighted animal, which pronounced the fruit to be sour because he could not taste it. With respect to Cambridge, should be malign a place whence that science had been spread over the whole of Europe, in which he had himself delighted in his earliest years, and from which the business of life had with difficulty withdrawn him?

"Me verò primùm dulces ante omnia Musæ Quarum sacra fero ingenti perculsus amore Accipiant

Was he the man to condemn that place which had produced a Newton, who had been succeeded in the same society by a Wodehouse and a Babbage? Could he malign Oxford, that seat of classical learning, which of all men none more revered than he? Could be despise the University which had trained the Coplestones, the Wheatleys, and many others, whom it would only bewilder the assembly in a maze of conflicting admiration were he to enumerate. He must be shortsighted indeed, who could not see the claims of Oxford in this our day-of Oxford, which almost rivalled Cambridge in science, at the moment when Cambridge was overtaking Oxford in classical literature. The meeting would suffer him to express the unmeasured joy and not indecorous exultation with which he looked at this day's work, which had been performed by the illustrious Chairman, with this instrument (the trowel) which he (Mr. Brougham) now held in his hand. Contrasting this serene height with that more foggy level which they occupied when he last addressed them, he felt there was much matter for congratulation. He would now repeat historically, what he had then said prophetically, when describing their Institution, in the words of the sweetest of our minstrels, he told them it would be

"As some tall cliff that lifts its awful form,

Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm,

Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread,

Eternal sunshine settles on its head."

"Prosperity to the two Universities," having been drank,

The Marquis of LANSDOWN on rising was received with loud cheers. When they had subsided the Noble Marquis went on to say, that his name having been coupled by their Illustrious Chairman with one of those venerable bodies whose extended existence in the country, with the instrumentality of their privileges, had

The

made them the repositories of literature and religion, he felt himself called on to say a few words, and express the respect he felt for the Institutions alluded to, which he was sure was in no respect or degree at variance with the warm wishes he entertained for the prosperity of the Lon don University [cheers]. He could never believe that the extension of science in one spot would check its growth in another; on the contrary, he believed that it would every where make a more rapid progress in proportion as it was diffused. It was his ardent hope, that the sciences which constituted his proudest recollections of the University of Cambridge would be respected and studied by the opulent classes of this country--that they would apply themselves to the higher branches of knowledge, so that in this age of inquiry they would not be left behind. University, the foundation of which they were then met to celebrate, he must, however, remark, extended to the interests of all the country; it was, perbaps, the largest instrument of the kind ever called into operation, and would continue, he hoped, to grow with the growth and prosperity of the great city in which it was established, and be eternal like it. He hoped also, it would grow with its commerce, which could not continue to thrive separated from science, and which was inseparably connected with principles of freedom [cheers]. He was sure, when the project for the University was first developed in London, that, so far from being a rival of the other Universities, it would contribute to the progress of science, and at the same time that it brought forth new views, it would open the minds of all, and be a great means of securing the best interests of morality and religion [cheers]. He was at a loss to discover how teaching science to young men, who would return home daily, and there receive the benefit of religious instruction, could disqualify them to appreciate correctly the truths of the one or the consolations of the other. Not only this generation, but the next, and all succeeding generations, would be benefited by the Institution, of which they were met to celebrate the foundation, and he wished it prosperity and honour [cheers].

66

The Royal President then gave Henry Brougham, Esq. Chairman of the Society for the Diffusion of useful Know. ledge."

Mr. BROUGHAM was extremely overpowered with the great kindness with which he had been received on more than one occasion in the course of the evening. He returned his heartfelt thanks for the favours done him. His Royal Highness could not have connected his name with any subject which he had more at heart than the diffusion of useful knowledge :-not even the University of London, which was only

one of the great engines for the diffusion of information, so many of which they now saw put in motion--all actuated, without any rivalry, in pursuing the same glorious race. He congratulated the assembly on the progress which had been made, and that they had lived to see their opinions not only not opposed, but hardly even laughed at So ridiculous had the conduct of the deriders become, that their jest had ceased to be a jest among the jesters, and the joke was now turned against the josters themselves. A man who might have run his little career twenty years ago, and indulged in jokes against the diffusion of knowledge, would now be stared at as if he were a person of doubtful sanity, and might chance to come under the protection of the Keeper of the Great Seal for the time being. At best he was more the cause of wit in others than witty in his own person. To have lived to see their enemies silenced, and the press no longer spending its gall against its own parent and nursing mother, the diffusion of knowledge, whereof the press was the grand instrument; to have lived to see knowledge raise her head, perhaps he might have said her mitred head, even in courts and palaces; to have lived to see no chance of parliamentary opposition; to have lived to see the pulpit utterly silenced, if not converted to be a creature of the spread of information; to have lived to see the ministers of that religion which in its outset was preached to the poor, the poor being preachers as well as objects of preaching; to have lived to see them acknowledge that religion never strikes its roots deeper than in a heart which is watered with knowledge from the foundation of true learning; for all these benefits he, for one, must express his gratitude to the Great Disposer of Events, and, under Providence, to the co-adjutors with whom he (Mr. Brougham) had been favoured-men neither to be deterred by the frowns of power, nor chilled by the sneers of railers, nor frozen by the interests of self-love, nor scared by the fear of offending, not so much those in high stations, as those who, in honest nature, have strong, though, perhaps, not unamiable prejudices, which last was a great bar.--To have lived to see himself surrounded by men of this stamp, actuated by such motives-under the guidance of so great a discretion-making effective that zeal which, while it reached its object, disarmed its antagonist, this was the happiness which he, in common with his coadjutors, enjoyed. When the friends of knowledge wished for improvement they could not disconnect from their minds that country which had been recently created by that illustrious individual, the Liberator of South America. He was more glorious N. S. No. 30.

in that title, than in the name of Emperor, which he declined for the good of his countrymen, lest the possession of imperial power should damage their safety, to conquer and fix the possession of which, had alone made power grateful to him. He (Mr. B.) therefore invited the assembly to express their sentiments, under the conviction that the proceedings of that night would reach across the ocean, and animate the Liberator of South America in the performance of a patriot's most sacred duty-retirement from power, when retaining it would be dangerous to the safety or happiness of his country.

"The health of General Bolivar, and prosperity to the advancement of knowledge in South America, was then drunk with applause.

Many other toasts were given, which introduced the Dukes of Norfolk and Leinster; Lords Caernarvon, Nugent, and Ebrington; Doctors Maltby, F. A. Cox, Gilchrist; Messrs. Hume, Hobhouse, Venables, &c. to address the company, but whose speeches our limits will not permit us to report.

PROCEEDINGS AND RESOLUTIONS OF THE COMMON COUNCIL OF LONDON.

A Court of Common Council was held on Wednesday, May 9, at Guildhall, in pursuance of a requisition to the Lord Mayor, for the purpose of considering the propriety of petitioning both houses of Parliament for the repeal of the Corporation and Test Acts; and to take such other measures as might be deemed expedient for the same purpose.

Mr. Favell rose and spoke to the following effect:-With the exception of the Criminal Law, I rise with more anxiety on the present subject than on any other, not for want of confidence in the cause which I have the honour to plead--not because I feel that I am not addressing an independent and enlightened audience, but lest that great cause of religious liberty should suffer in my hands-a cause which is not sectarian, but one deeply interesting to more than two millions of his Majesty's loyal subjects among Dissenters in England and Scotland; and, as I humbly think, to the whole body of the clergy and members of the Established Church. But I take courage in recollecting the indulgence of my fellow-citizens, for nearly half a century, in my endeavours, however feeble, to uphold the cause of civil liberty, which I made, in an early period of my political career, at the hazard of my life; and that I have lived to see those sentiments which I then maintained, triumphant in public opinion and in this Court. I am especially encouraged when I can state that this question among Protestant Dissenters has been kept in abeyance for nearly 40 years, least, 2 U

during the late war, it should embarrass the Government, and because Dissenters were expecting that the justice of the country would concede it without their public efforts. And here I beg most distinctly to avow that the question is now agitated with no view to serve or to injure any other body of his Majesty's subjects, and least of all could it have any thing to do with the Ministers of the Crown, to whom, as far as I know, the Dissenters in London are generally favourable. Again, I rejoice that I have the satisfaction to plead this cause in an enlightened period, when the influence of Great Britain has taken the wings of the morning to carry education and Bible principles, and to abolish slavery throughout the world; and when Bishops are sent to preach the gospel to the Hindoos, and to annihilate their cruelties towards their widows and children--when a London University is just rising to educate our youthful citizens, founded, not to oppose, but to co-operate with, our ancient seats of learning, unshackled by their monastic rules. I know that this Court cannot uphold persecution for conscience sake. No! bigotry and superstition can no more prevent the effects of general knowledge and liberal principles than they can arrest the planets in their celestial orbits, or extinguish the light of heaven. The Test and Corporation Acts, my Lord, are persecuting acts. What is persecution if incapacity to serve in all offices of trust in his Majesty's navy and army, and in corporate bodies, in all chartered companies, without violating the conscience, be not persecution? Surely, this is not merely a theoretical evil to tender consciences. I shall now show the penalties of these acts, and then their absurdities, and make some allusions to the prejudices which I suppose have so long maintained them. They inflict on persons, who do not qualify under them, a fine of £500. and such persons are rendered incapable of prosecuting any action in law, or suit in equity, from being guardian to any child, or acting as executor or administrator of any person, or from receiving any legacy or deed of gift, or holding any office within the realm of England. First, you forfeit to the informer £500. and if you cannot pay it the penalty is imprisonment, and with many brave officers, who have been fighting the battles of their country, this would be imprisonment for life. In the second place, Does any man owe you money-have you intrusted him with your whole fortunehe can cancel the debt by annulling your means of recovering, and for this act of fraud and treachery he is assigned the reward of £500. In the third place, you are made outlaws. In the fourth place, you are incapable of receiving any legacy, even if bequeathed by your parents. In

Surely (I speak with reverence), surely the angels who announced the birth of Christ with peace on earth and good will to men, must weep indeed (if there could be weeping in heaven) that the holy ordinance of the Lord's Supper should occasion discord and strife amongst mankind, and that it must be prostituted to the purpose of qualifying an exciseman. It is very remarkable how slow society has been in its progress to the knowledge of religious liberty, notwithstanding that civil liberty has been so long enjoyed. The Corporation and Test Acts were passed soon after the days of Coke, and Prynn, and the constitutional lawyers who passed the Petition of Right, and about the same time and by the same Parliament that passed the Habeas Corpus Act, that bulwark of British freedom. The reason, I suppose, arose from an opinion, that every man's creed was Jure Divino.

Allow me to quote the words of Mr. Fox, in 1790. He said-" Indisposed, however, as he was to allow merit or demerit any weight in the discussion of the present question, yet he must say, the conduct of the dissenters had been not only unexceptionable, but also highly meritorious. They had deserved well of the country. When plots had been concerted, combinations formed, and insurrections raised against the State,-when the whole country was in a state of alarm, distraction, and trouble-when the Constitution, both ecclesiastical and civil, was in immediate danger of subversion-when the Monarch trembled for the safety of the throne, crown, and dignity, the Dissenters, instead of being concerned in the dangerous machinations formed against the Government, proved themselves, in the hour of peril and emergency, the firmest support of the State. During the rebellions of 1715 and 1745 they cheerfully had exposed their persons, lives, and property in defence of their King and country; and by their noble exertions our enemies were defeated, our Constitution preserved, and the Brunswick family continued in possession of the throne. They were then, as they are now, incapacitated from holding commissions, civil or military, in the service of their country. Did they plead their incapacity, and the penalties to which they were subject? No: they freely drew their swords: they nobly transgressed the laws which proscribed