pointed out a few evenings ago by the hon. MR. GOLDNEY said, it appeared to

and learned Member for the Tower Ham-him that if there were six items in a Vote lets (Mr. Ayrton). In the 4th Resolution four of which were unexceptionable, and there were the words "without amend-exceptions were taken to the two remaining ment," which he believed had been in- items, and on a division on the latter items serted after the Resolutions came down the Government gained a narrow majority, from the Select Committee. He would and if afterwards a reduction of the whole propose that those words should be left Vote was moved and carried, it would be out and that this Resolution should be extremely undesirable that the items which adoptedhad not been objected to should have to be reduced, while those to which exception had been taken must necessarily be left in their entirety.

"That after a Question has been proposed from the Chair for a reduction of the whole Vote, no Motion shall be made for omitting or reducing any item."

MR. AYRTON said, that the hon. GenHe hoped there would be an understand. tleman (Mr. Goldney) had misunderstood ing that if a Motion to omit an item had the nature of the proposal, which was that failed, and that subsequently there was a if, for instance, one or two items were reduction of the Vote as a whole, the affirmed and the Vote itself afterwards rehands of the Government would not be tied duced, the whole of the items would be rein respect of the mode in which the re-mitted to the Government for re-consideraduction was to be carried out; but that they would be at liberty to make it on the particular item which had been affirmed in Committee, or on any other portion of the Vote. The right hon. Gentleman concluded by proposing his Amendment and the new Resolution.

tion.

Question put, and agreed to.

1. Resolved, That when it has been proposed to omit or reduce items in a Vote, the Question shall be afterwards put upon the original Vote or upon the reduced Vote, as the case may be.(Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer.)

2. Resolved, That after a Question has been proposed from the Chair for a reduction of the whole Vote, no Motion shall be made for omitting or reducing any item.-(Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer.)

ESTABLISHED CHURCH (IRELAND).
COMMITTEE.

Acts considered in Committee.
(In the Committee.)

1. Question again proposed,

Church of Ireland should cease to exist as an Establishment, due regard being had to all personal interests and to all individual rights of property."

"That it is necessary that the Established

MR. GLADSTONE: If I understand the Resolution, it is likely to place the matter upon a very reasonable footing, so as at once to secure the order of our proceedings, and at the same time to give to all Members of the House the fullest scope. Any proposal for a Vote in Supply must divide itself into two branches-first, the general structure of the Vote, and, secondly, the particular items of which it is composed. In future we shall consider, in the first instance, the particular items of the Vote; and, after that, it will be open to any hon. Member to raise the general question of the structure of the Vote, and its general fitness for the purpose for which it is intended. Now, the right hon. Gen--(Mr. Gladstone.) tleman, on the part of the Government, proposes that in cases where particular To leave out from the first word "That" to items may have been confirmed by Vote the end of the Question, in order to add the words of the Committee, if subsequently there "so long as the Union between Great Britain and should be a reduction of the aggregate amount of Vote, a difficulty might arise in the mind of the Government whether they would be acting in accordance with the intention of the House if they reduced any particular item. Well, Sir, I think it is obvious that if the Committee confirm an item in a Vote it must be understood to do it with reference to the general amount.

I must be understood to mean that the amount put down for this particular item is not unreasonable.

Amendment proposed,

Ireland continues to exist, it is just and consistent
should be maintained in Ireland, and its endow-
that the principle of the Established Church
ment on a scale suitable to the wants of the popu-
lation,”—(Sir Frederick Heygate,)
instead thereof.

Question proposed, That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the proposed Resolution.”

COLONEL BARTTELOT said, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Lancashire had exercised a very wise discretion

when he advised the House to keep as near as they could to the question of the Irish Church. Other Gentlemen, however, on that side of the House had made use of language which, in his opinion, was out of place in a great debate like this; but he trusted he should not fall into a similar error, although in the course of his remarks he should have to advert to the speech delivered last evening by the right hon. Member for Stroud (Mr. Horsman). He should endeavour to establish that it would be an act of gross injustice to the Protestants of Ireland if the Church in that country were wholly disestablished and disendowed. No doubt there were many important measures before the House this Session; but he would ask the Committee whether the question of the disestablishment and disendowment of the Established Church was not the most important of them all? The Opposition and not the Government had brought forward this great question; and if many Gentlemen on the Ministerial side of the House were, not unnaturally, anxious to address the House on the subject, he was surement; but he denied that the mass of the there was no desire on their part to delay the division on the Resolutions proposed by the right hon. Gentleman. The right hon. Member for Stroud distinctly stated that the Committee had to decide between the policy of the Government, which was a policy of upholding the Establishment and levelling upwards, and the policy of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Lancashire, which was a policy of levelling downwards. Now he, in common with many who sat on that side of the House, did not take that view of the matter, but was perfectly willing to raise a straightforward issue on the question whether the connection between Church and State should be maintained both in this country and in Ireland. If the Irish Church were disestablished and disendowed, the attacks on the English Church would come faster than the right hon. Member for South Lancashire seemed to suppose. The right hon. Gentleman had set the ball rolling, and where it would stop he did not know, nor did he perhaps care. The hon. Member for Birmingham (Mr. Bright) had on one occasion compared the Members for Stroud and Calne to a Scotch terrier, so covered with hair that one could not tell the head from the tail; but they were quite distinct enough now, and resembled two dogs of a different kind, who barked at every one, and when at

tacked sought refuge under the skirts of the right hon. Member's (Mr. Gladstone's) coat. The right hon. Member for Stroud, having been Chief Secretary for Ireland, surely ought to have given the House some information about the Irish Church; but in his speech he did not mention a single grievance caused by the existence of that institution. He believed, however, that during the time the right hon. Gentleman was in Ireland he did nothing but amuse himself; and the people, in their generosity, said that "His Honour was a good fellow, for he could ride well across country." For his own part, he believed that the Irish Church had been of great benefit to the country. He had often asked the peasantry, both in the North and South of Ireland, what they thought of the Establishment? and the reply was invariably that they were well treated by the clergy. They professed to have a liking for a gentleman, and he never heard any other remark beyond that in Ireland. He did not say that there were not others who said a great deal against the Establish

people were discontented with the Church. At the time of the famine disturbances he was quartered at Cork, and had consigned to him from England various large sums of money for the relief of the existing distress. The money was distributed among the clergy, and he found that at that time there prevailed the greatest unanimity with regard to the acknowledged disposi tion of England to help them. But were there no other causes that stirred up the people of Ireland against the Irish Church? Had those men who were bound to instruct the people done their duty? He was not going to censure the Irish priests; but he would affirm that if they had instructed the people in that loyalty which it was their bounden duty to inculcate, the result would have been different; but, taught by their priests, they had learnt to keep rankling in their breasts feelings which happily did not possess the peasantry of this country. In the North of Ireland Protestant and Roman Catholic would be found living side by side harmoniously-excepting, perhaps, a fraction, who indulged in Orange displays and other little disturbances occasionally. Otherwise they were perfectly quiet, prosperous, and happy; and he would ask whether the influence of the Protestant Church and people had not had something to do with the state of tranquillity which prevailed in

the North? He would ask whether the | No doubt it was, and this was admitted on Protestant people in the North of Ire- the opposite side when it suited the purpose land had not during the whole of these of the party to say so. He contended that Fenian disturbances, and on every oc- they were going to perpetrate an act of casion, done everything in their power gross injustice, and to offend the feelings to promote between England and Ire- and prejudices of a large portion of Her land that union which was so essential Majesty's subjects; and before taking such to the well-being of both countries? a step would it not be well to pause and Why was there so different a state of well consider it? But was that all? The things in the South of Ireland? Why people of the North of Ireland had been acwas Belfast flourishing and increasing from customed for centuries to pay tithes and reday to day and from year to year? Why ceive all the benefits of an Established was Cork stationary, if not going back- Church without paying more than their ward? Why were there no new buildings tithes. These people would have a right to to be seen there as in Belfast? Why, but complain if that privilege were now taken because that life was safer in the North from them. Was there no other way of than the South; and because no capital getting out of the difficulty than by diswould go there for employment till the establishment and disendowment? He venpeople had learned not to take the law tured to think there was-namely, by the into their own hands. It was said, though removal of anomalies and defects of the he did not altogether endorse it, that Ire- Establishment, which he, for one, was not land laboured under three curses, dema- prepared to deny prevailed in certain porgogues, priests, and poverty. As to dema- tions of Ireland. Supposing Parliament gogues, they had always existed, and still were to reduce the Bishops and deans and existed. As to the priests, history would clergy who had no cure of souls, that would say whether they had or had not done go a certain way, at all events, to reduce the their duty. He had certainly met many grievances complained of, without inflictpriests who were well-educated and well- ing the gross injustice of severing the Esaffected men; but he had met with others tablished Church from the State. Would who were disposed towards everything that it not be possible to allow the proprietors Englishmen considered wrong with re- in Ireland to buy up the tithes at a certain spect to the Union. With regard to amount, and the funds secured by this poverty, he presumed most hon. Gentlemen means might be applied to some useful would admit that poverty was passing purpose, such as the general education of away. Every one acquainted with the the country, which he thought would be country must be familiar with the progress doing no great harm. In conclusion, the it had made since 1843, as exemplified in proposal before the Committee was one of the better cultivation of the land, the im- a ruthless-he would not say dishonestprovement of the houses, and the increased character, and he was glad to know that comfort of the poorer classes. It was ob- Gentlemen on his side of the House would vious that the demagogues had been foster- show, as a body, that they were determined ing the discontent which prevailed. But to stand by that Church which, whatever what was the remedy for the grievance faults she might have, had been a great complained of? He was sure of this, that blessing to this glorious and great country. if the right hon. Gentleman had taken the vote upon the land question, and not upon the Church question, he would have found a hundred who cared for the former for one who cared a single farthing for the latter. But the right hon. Gentleman had taken up the cry of the Church, because it was popular with hon. Gentlemen on the other side. He (Colonel Bartelott) could perfectly understand such a course on the part of the hon. Member for Birmingham, who had all along avowed himself an advocate of disendowment and equality. They were now about to try their hands upon the Irish Church, and the question arose, Was the Church part of the English Church or not?

MR. BUXTON said, nothing had astonished him so much in the debate as the unparallelled weakness of the arguments by which these Resolutions had been encountered. Surely the right hon. Gentleman at the head of Her Majesty's Government must be ashamed to march through Coventry with such a ragged regiment of reasons as those which had been put for ward on his side of the question. First of all, there was what he might call the Lord Plunket argument. They had been deluged with quotations from speeches of Lord Plunket, Lord Ellenborough, and others, as if they at this day were to be deterred from their purpose by the ipse dixit