not now be appropriated to an object which must be supposed to have been out of the contemplation of the founder. He said this to clear himself from the imputation of having launched a doubt where none could be fairly entertained. What had been said as to Ireland, induced him still more strongly to believe that the principle on which this Bill was put, was to be extended to all Dissenters. He denied the possibility of refusing it to any if it were granted to the Unitarians. But it had been said, that the same was already done in the case of Jews and Quakers. What had they done for Jews and Quakers? Merely exempted them from the operation of Lord Hardwicke's Act. Let them, if they wished, bring in a Bill to place them on the same footing with those people, and the Bill would be considered on its own grounds; but then it would be a very different Bill from the present, and would place the parties on a different footing; for he could not undertake to say distinctly how the law stood

as

to the Jews and Quakers. Their marriages stood upon the law as it existed before Lord Hardwicke's Act; but what that was, or with how many

difficulties it was entangled, he would leave them to judge when he told them he had been engaged fifteen days hearing counsel on the point, on a question of legitimacy. Their Lordships would as soon wish to pass through the Inquisition as to hear all the arguments connected with that investigation; and it seemed clear to him that they must soon be called to make some legislative provision on the subject. To look a little in detail at some parts of this Bill, (for he could tear in pieces almost every sentence of it,) the persons called Unitarians are described as having conscientious scruples to the doctrine of the Trinity. How many persons, he would ask, had the same scruples? Deists, and he knew not what, might rank under so vague a description as this. If he understood any thing of the Church of England, (though, after all he heard, he almost fancied he did not,) it was impossible that there could be a greater repugnance between any sets of doctrines than between those of that Church and the Unitarians, so far so, that they must, to be consistent, hold that Church to be idolatrous. Whom then did they propose to bring together by this Bill? Are

persons to go to an Archbishop and say, "You hold and reverence the doctrine of the Trinity as an essential of Christianity, but I consider you an idolater, therefore give me facilities which no legislature ever gave!" So, he contended, the whole machinery of the Bill went to make the Church subservient to the cause of dissent. If the Jews and Quakers were to be taken as a precedent, let them take the proposition as broadly, and let the Unitarians struggle with the same legal difficulties. To the State's policy as to clandestine marriages, he never would sacrifice the greater policy of maintaining the dignity of the Church. He, for one, would never be accessary to its degradation. In stating what he had, he was influenced only by a wish to discharge his own personal duty; it was far from his wish, even if he had the power, to controul the opinion of others; he had discharged his conscience and relieved himself of his responsibility; if the House chose to pass that bill, he would leave it in their hands; but for himself, he must declare, that a worse Bill than the present had never been submitted to Parliament.

LORD HOLLAND said,

that after the discussion which had taken place before, and the decision to which their Lordships had come in favour of the principle of the Bill, he could hardly have expected to find SO much warmth, anxiety, and opposition, as was now manifested against the question for going into the Committee. So strongly was he impressed with the opinion that no such difficulty could have arisen, that instead of considering this subject, he amused himself, on his way down to the House, with reading a publication of one of the purest and most elegant writers which this country had produced-he meant Mr. Cowper, the poet. In that publication he met with a story, which he little thought, at the time, could admit of any application to the proceedings of their Lordships' House. It appeared that the writer, walking one day in Ramsgate, had met an eminent lawyer whom, in familiar language, he called "Sam Cox," buried in profound meditation on the beach. Being curious to ascertain the subject on which his mind was occupied, he asked what he was thinking of. The lawyer replied, that he was wondering why such an expansive element as the ocean should pro

duce such an insignificant animal as a sprat. In the same way, though reversing the application, he (Lord Holland) was disposed to pause and wonder how such a miserable sprat of a Bill could produce such a commotion in the element of this grave and sedate House. He would say to the Noble and Learned Lord, with all his anxiety for the Church, that it was not the best way either to consult its dignity or to maintain its power, to cry out "Wolf" at every little mouse that made its appearance; he ought not to be so ready "to rin and chase wi' murdrin' battle" such a 66 'wee, sleekit, cowring, tim'rous beastie." How would a stranger be surprised to hear that, after all this rout, the whole question was whether the Unitarians should be allowed to marry here as they did always till the year 1756, and as they did now in Ireland. One Right Reverend Prelate (as to whose conduct he should certainly wonder if he did not look less at 66 ex quo natus then "quibuscum vixit") had taken upon himself to explain away, not his own scruples, but the scruples entertained by other people. He knew no way of ascertaining the scruples of other men but by their own

1

professions; he knew no way of judging of these scruples but as he would wish to be judged. If he said that any doctrine or opinion was contrary to his conscience, no man had a right to say that it was not. It was contended that the words employed in the Church ceremony had been made use of by our Saviour himself. The Unitarians admitted this, but contended that they were used under different circumstances, and in a different sense. Oh! but then it was said, "You

may use them still in your sense, and we'll put ours upon them for ourselves." What could this be but, as the Most Reverend Metropolitan had stated, to recommend equivocation ---to bring a man to the altar of God to use words in an equivocating way? Then came the objection to making the Church, as it had been elegantly expressed, a handmaid to dissent. And the Noble and Learned Lord, in a very eloquent part of his speech, had at least hinted at a great distinction between mere dissent and this Unitarianism.---But surely one would suppose, from all these arguments, that this Bill was totally the reverse of what it was--that it was a Bill to bring these parties, so opposite in religious

state of the law. Singularly indifferent as the Noble and Learned Lord had shewn himself about the state of the law when they were called upon to coerce, all his legal partialites and anxieties revived when they were called upon to extend a little indulgence; and not a step must they stir in the work of charity, till men, nursed in doubt, and cherishing the sinews of their understandings by such doubts, were satisfied, and had resolved all their difficulties. Like the Right Reverend Prelate, the Honourable and Learned Lord had declared, that if a single stone were touched, there was no saying what would become of the whole fabric of the Church. "Coerce and restrain," argued the Noble and Learned Lord, "to what extent you please, if coercion and restriction be prudent, and I care not what the state of the law is; but I will grant nothing in the way of con

cession-I will concede nothing on the score of liberality-I will not stir a single step in the path of indulgence, until every

doubt is removed, every scruple satisfied, and all the possible bearings and consequences of the law are distinctly ascertained." And, after all, what was this concession, what this great a

mount of indulgence, which had excited so much anxiety and alarm in the mind of the Noble and Learned Lord ? He had heard it said by a Right Reverend Prelate, that this concession would be galling to the dignity and high character of the Church. He (Lord H.) was an unlearned man, but if he understood any thing of the character of the Christian Church, or rather, of the character of Christianity, it was lowliness and charity, and not dignity and lofty pride. Did the Right Reverend Prelate mean to say, that it would be an insult to the Church of England if persons out of the pale of that Church were admitted to the civil advantages of marriage? This was all the Unitarians asked; and he (Lord H.) must say, if he might be allowed to give an opinion as an unlearned man, that it would be much more in conformity to the spirit and principles of the gospel to extend than to deny this relief. In his opinion, the Bill was calculated to afford as much relief to the clergy of the Church of England as to Dissenters; for, deeply impressed as the clergy must be with the importance of their religious opinions on the subject of the Trinity, they could not

but feel it he would not say degrading, for there could be no degradation in discharging a duty-but they could not fail to feel it a most painful and irksome duty to hear the name which they never invoked without the greatest awe and solemnity, pronounced by persons who felt far differently. He could not but think, therefore, that the sentiments expressed by the Learned Metropolitan were most consistent both with those feelings of liberality and of true Christain piety, which should distinguish a great Christian church. Where was the pleasure which it seemed to be supposed was to be derived from the haughty and intolerant language of those dignitaries of the Churrch, who were opposed to this slight concession? Where was the delight of being able to say to the Dissenters, "You pretend to have conscientious opinions of your own, but what is the value of your opinions? We hold the only infallible opinions-opinions approved by Parliament, and lauded by princes and kings; you are degraded individuals, who are allowed to pick up the crumbs from our table, and we, in all our lordly and priestly pride, will compel you to use equivocating language, and

pay at least an outward homage to doctrines which we know that in your hearts you revile and despise." This was not true dignity; this was not high character; but it was that encroaching spirit of ecclesiastical intolerance, it was that haughty, uncharitable, overflow of Pharisaical pride, which every man who loved the Church Establishment, every man who really understood the nature of religious duties, must wish to see banished from the Church of England. The Noble and Learned Lord professed an ardent and anxious love for the Church, and was at liberty to do so; but really to talk of such a Bill as this as aiming blows against her interests and dignities, was rather too much. He had just been reading an eloquent invective against exaggeration, which would be well worthy of the Noble Lord's attention On a former night, when a Right Reverend Prelate expressed some anxiety about the tithes and dues, the Noble and Learned Lord said, "Oh, these are all objections of very inferior importance, for if you once allow such a Bill as this to

pass-if you once allow Unitarians to enjoy the same civil privileges with respect to marriage as Jews