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Leader (1850-1860), 26th February 1853, Edition 1 of 1, Page 209, Untitled Article

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      Untitled Article

      Da Lushington , in the case of Dr . Hampden , in 1836 . Bat , as we have intimated , the controversy is meaningless . The Charter of the University is bound np With the observance of these statutes , and has lapsed to the Crown by their violation . It matters nothing whether they are binding with or without the assent of Convocation . The . Tatter is manifestly the fact ; but , were it . otherwise , as Convocation has never formally sanctioned the measures of the Hebdomadal Board , the violation of the statutes bars the university of all power of complaint against visitations , commissions ,

      or whatsoever else the Crown may decree . The " eternal laws" which Convocation , in servile deference to Laud , declared to be destined to endure , in " annum Platonicum , " have , as we shall see , long ceased to operate in points most essential to the welfare of the University . As we write , our glance falls on these strange words of the letter to Laud , sealed in Congregation , Sept . 1 , 1623 , " Ultro cbmpegimus jugutri quod pronis cervicibus annectas ; " fit introduction to the perpetual bondage imposed by the letters from the Chancellor and the King , dated June , 1635 , by which the statutes are ratified and declared in all essentials

      inviolable for ever . The " eternal laws" stand unrevoked , but vigorous only for evil ; a moral plague , tainting Oxford through all its members . We pity as much as we censure . Duty and conscience have failed , when matched against irreversible decrees and the corporate spirit which substitutes verbiage for duty , and which knows no conscience . But the sum of all is , that Oxford has forfeited its charter , and lies at the mercy of the State .

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      Untitled Article

      WANTED AN " UNCLE TOM * ' FOR BETHNAL GREEN , ( To the Editor of the Leader . ) SIB > —jn last week ' s Leader is quoted a " Letter to the limes , " from the incumbent of St . Philip ' s , Bethnalgreen . The tale told is most distressing , not the less so from being a common one , even in richer neighbonrhoods than Bethnal . A poor woman loses her child" Oh , such a fine child , sir , —three years old , died nearly a fortnight ago . " Her husband is in the hospital , sick of rheumatic fever—she wants to bury her baby—the undertaker will do it for 15 s . She sets to work to beg and to borrow . The clergyman remonstrates , " My good woman , it is very wrong . The parish , will do this for you . " " Yes , sir , they would bury it , but he told me , sir ( bursting into tears ) , that he must take it out of itu little coffin , and put it in a shell , and / could not follow it , and the prayers would wot be said over it ; " and she rocked herself , and covered her face , and was almost choked with her sobs and her agony . It would be worse than waste to apend words upon the pathos of this scene j when the genius of Scott drew Mucklebackit moaning for his Steenie , he wrung tears from the eyes of half Christendom , yet the fisherman ' s agony , as imagined by the illustrious novelist , goes no straighter to the heart than the cry of this poor mother for her child , " taken out of its little coffin , " to be buried " without prayers , " in a grave to which she must not follow it . " And my husband , it would break his heart ; and the man spoke go ' gruff , ' and I had not been used to it , and I could not , sir , oh ! I could not . "

      But , good God ! Mr . Editor , what material for national reflection is suggested by all this ; what n theme for Mrs . Tyler , ' and the slave-states , that in our land , with its Christian code and its Christian church , wo should only bury poverty on condition of " no praying " and " no tnourniny , " no , not even the mourning of a mother ! What must foreigners think when they reud such tales as these in our daily annals ! Their first impression is to pronounce the Christianity of England a fiction , and they only pause at such conclusion on being reminded tliat England alono pays more for the administration of religious ritos to her people than all

      the nations , Papal and Protestant , of collected Christendom . That something like eight millions n year should be devoted to the maintenance- of an evangelical establishment , and yet that Christian burial should be denied to English subjects without money in their purse , ia an anomaly that strangers to our social system can scarcely be expected to understand . It is really enough to puzzle the very natives . The incumbent of St . Philip ' s seems to think that the political economist *) are in some * way responsible- ; ho says , " I looked , sir ; at Adam Smith and Harriot Martineau , they were on the- shelf close by , and lit Mill in two thick volumes , but it Was of no use . Mill thus himself would have

      given in . " Now , with unfeigned reajiecfc for the character nnd labours of the incumbent , it does appear rather hard upon these distinguished writers , to charge them with the accumulation of sorrows heaped upon the heart of this poor woman und thousands of similar BuflTererri . What , for instance , have Smith , Mill , nnd Mnrt . incnu to do wiijli , the jfact that ai richly-endowed church charges fees for burial , and will not bury without fees ; feeH for the clergyman and fees for the clerk , fbfla for tho boll and foes for the spade . Fees from the poor in tho nmno of a Mnittir who , whop , on earth

      But this letter is long enough , and what I was going to say , is too obvious to need expression . There can be no doubt of the minister of St . Philip ' s being a most worthy Christian gentleman , but lie would surely do well to ponder the working of the tithe-and-rate system to which he belongs , before indulging in sary casm at the expense of such thinkers as Smith , Mill , and Martineau . —I am , Sir , With respect , your's faithfully , w . Oxford , Feb . 24 .

      Untitled Article

      FRIENDS OF ITALY . ( To the Editor of the Leader . ) Sib , —Your correspondent , Mr . Golding Penrose , gives some excellent advice as to the necessity of avoiding small tricks in obtaining unwilling signatures to petitions in favour of Italian Freedom . Those who are at nil aware of the ease with which signatures to petitions for almost any object whatever , may be , and arr , manufactured , always look upon all petitions of that description with considerable suspicion . In consequence of this , I have long ceased to sign any petition in an individual capacity . The most proper and

      constitutional mode of petitioning Parliament is by the Chairman of a Public Meeting , in pursuance of a resolution thereof . Petitions signed by the officers of a society are also of the same description . These cannot be falsified or sneered down in any way . We have sent four petitions from Sheffield in favour of Italy . They were similar to the one adopted by the St . Pancras Public Meeting last week , over which the talented , excellent , and amiable Professor Newman presided . One was from our Town Council ; another from the National Society ; another from the Nether Hallam Wardmote ; and another from a meeting of friends of European freedom . These petitions were signed by the Mayor , or by the respective chairmen of the other

      bodies . They were presented , in December last , by out- member , Mr . Hadfield ; and one of them was printed in extenso with the Votes of the House . I am quite aware that this is nothing to boast of , but if all towns had done as much , the Italian cause would now stand in a better position . One earnest man in every town , district , village , or hamlet , is all that is necessary . Inhisessay on Representative Government , Gn \ zot truly Bays that the right to govern is proved by the capacity to do so , and that all who have the capacity , do govern , whether they have the vote or not . If the friends of progresa wish to govern , they must show their capacity . The truth is on their side , but the actual fact is against them , and their supineness is the sole cause .

      The excuse generally made for neglect and nonattention is , that it is troublesome and expensive to mo in these matters . Of course it is . " No noble task was ever easy , " says Carlyle . Those who think freedom can be won or maintained without trouble aro mistaken , and are also altogether unworthy of having it . The objection on the ground of expense is far too common . It is the accursed spirit of mammon eating like a canker into the heart of everything good . Our international relations are regulated by no higher principles than those of the shop . Wo are Continually verifying the truth of Napoleon ' s remark , that we aro

      a nation of shopkeepers . Tho police court is tho assault shop , where the magistrate nets as shopkeeper , nnd disposes of assaults at so much each . But really the expense of a public petition in favour of Italy need not be much . Let those who are poor , and yet have the cause at heart , endeavour to interest the wealthy in their neighbourhoods , and foiling that , let them employ tho bellman of their district to call a public meeting in some club room , if no other place can bo obtained . Appoint a chairman , and propose a petition for adoption , in short , reasonable speeches . It should he signed by the chuirman on behalf of the meeting ' , and sent to the Member of Parliament who represents

      the place or district for presentation . Thorn is nothing to prevent this being done in every town , village , hamlet , pariah , or township in the country . An earnest man in each placo ia the ono thing needful . The friends of progress would prove their capacity for governing , by adopting this constitutional plan of petitioning , not only in tho cuuso of Italy , but on all subjects in which they take an interest . Yours faithfully , ISAAC IltONHIlXK . Rhefflold , !<>!> . 14 lh , 1853 .

      i > u n w i > niiriiMiruiif , and errutifvintr sicrn of tliA P . S .- It in a significant and gratifying sign of the times , ilmt tho St . Pancras Public Meeting was held m tho Vestry Hull . Whenever the ratepayers throughout tho country think proper , they may have their respective vestry rooms used in a similar manner .

      Untitled Article

      NOTICES TO CORRESPONDENTS . U . ~ The poom referred to nover . aame under our eye . Wo ahull bo haypy to hoc the communication he Bu ^ cuta .

      Untitled Article

      February 26 , 1853 . ] THE LEAD E R . 209

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      THE DISCUSSION OIC SECTTLABIBM . Dtjeittg the past six weeks a public discussion has been held in the Cowper-street School-rooms , between the Rev . Brewin Grant , B . A ., of Birmingham , and Mr . G . J . Holy oake , Editor of the Reasoner , on the comparative merits of " Secularism and Christianity . " Thronged doorways , an hour or more before the commencement of the proceedings each night , attested the metropolitan interest in the issue , and { he interest , we believe , has extended to every town in the empire . The four principal Dissenting journals , the Nonconformist , British Banner , Christian Times , and Patriot , have given copious reports of the

      proceedings ; and what ia noteworthy and creditable , on the whole , impartial reports . Unqualified approval , credit , and success , are awarded by the British Banner to Mr . Grant ; but the same paper "feels , in justice , bound to confess that Mr . Holyoake exhibited sobriety of deportment , habitual solemnity—that bis whole air and mien are strongly marked by that modest gentleness and those conciliatory qualities which command re-Bpect , and beget something like affection . " For rapid utterance the Banner concedes to Mr . Grant an excellence which , it says , exceeds the analogies of Nature to parallel ; and thinks " his lingual , labial , and intellectual apparatus

      so perfectly adapted to each other , that they assume the appearance of a special creation . " Tho oratorical powers of Mr . Holyoake are described aa " very superior : his voice , though thin , is well heard , and his speaking often distinguished by splendid strokes of powor and pathos . " So much for tho personnel of tho disputants . As respects the matter of tho contest : Mr . Grant ' s speeches were personal—Mr . Holyoake ' s expository . To tho secular advocate the debate was simply a trial of temper rather than of reason . Wo

      do not say that thorn was any lack of such reasons as the Secularists doom vnlid , but tho demand made by Mr . Grant in that direction wns not groat ; and tho personalities Mr . Jlolyoako studiously ignored . By this means Mr . Grant ' s sallies retained piquancy , whereas , had hia opponent stooped to retort , tho pleasant aspect of tho discussion would have been changed . Tho Secularist expositor seemed to labour not only to develop his own posilion 8 but also to balanco tho tone of tho controversy itself , bo that tho reputation of free discussion should not fluflbr . 'DniihtleHH other dismissions will follow . Defenders of

      Christianity of another order of mind will no doubt put upon record what may bo said for its principles . For ourhoIvoh , we are unwilling to beliovo that Christianity is only to bo defended by personalities , imputations and bitterness . Wo hoar its most attractive expounders say of Christianity : — Thou art all mildnoHS , pationeo , power to o « po , And pilynlg heart in ( Kino : ( living them charity and faith and liopo , Thou link ' nl , thy ohildren with A love ( livino .

      Wo nhall probably say moro on thin subject . Of its relevancy , the public ; will bo able to judge ore long , an ablo roportort ) were engaged , and we understand a vorbatim volume will noon appear . Tho chairman for Mr . Holy oake was Mr . Kbonozer Symo , late Unitarian minister ; for Mr . < lrant , Mr . Samuol Morloy . Tho umpire wan tho Itev . Howard Hinton ; and , under the auspices of those gontlomen , tho public may expect a trustworthy roport . Tomorrow , north and aoutli of the Thames , thirty-eight ministers simultaneously preach on tho " Secular Aaptocti of Christianity . "

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      There is no learned man but will confess he hath much profited by reading controversies , his senses awakened , and nis judgment sharpened . If , then , it be profitable for hun rx > read , why should it not , at least , be tolerable for hia adversary to write . —Mii / ton .

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      [ IK ISIS DBPABTHENT , AS AIX OPINIONS , HOWEVBB EXTREME ABB AXLOWED AN EXPBESSIO 1 T , THB EDITOB NBCBSSABILT HOLDS HIMSBLIF EBSPONSIBLE FOB NONE . ]

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  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Feb. 26, 1853, page 209, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1975/page/17/