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    Untitled Article

    cc That I may not be accused of recommending impossibilities , I will shew how the important objects just alluded to may be reconciled . Let the banns of marriage between Dissenters be published in their Parish Church ; let a certificate of such publication be given by the minister ; let the parties be

    married on the strength of such certificate , by their own teacher ; and let them bring a certificate of their marriage to the parish register . This would provide against clandestine marriages , and would give sufficient facility of recording and proving them . I am not aware of any material objection to this plan : of its infinite superiority to that which is now before the House , I cannot think that one individual will doubt . "

    While the subject was yet under consideration , the Marriage Law came generally under the consideration of the Legislature from other causes ; and it was thought that while a Committee of the House of Lords were engaged in considering the whole code , it was peculiarly necessary that no time should be lost in calling their attention to the imperfect basis on which any law

    would proceed , which should provide only for marriages according to the rites and services of the Church . At the same moment appeared statements of a most important character with regard to the Roman Catholics , whose objec tions to conformity with the doctrine and discipline of the Church by joining

    in her worship and services , had , it appeared , carried great numbers of them so far , as to induce them to overlook all consequences of a civil nature , and to contract their marriages solely before their own priests—of course without any legal validity .

    The Report of the Committee of the House of Lords to whom the Dissenters' petitions were referred , apparently admitted the principle that relief of some kind ought to be extended , but left it to the parties to bring their own case distinctly and separately before the Legislature . It was therefore

    determined ( notwithstanding the late period of the Sesssion ) to place a Bill before the House , that at all events discussions might take place , which if they did not end in the approval of the present measure , would point to oijie more likely to be acceptable .

    The Bill 30 introduced forms the subject of the ensuing discussion . A copy of it is subjoined , and its principle and details may therefore be fully examined . It was thought fairest to make the cause a common one , by including all persons separated from the Church of England , whether Catholic or Protestant , in the plan of relief ; and if the Committee who had the

    matter under their management originally on behalf of the Unitarian Dissenters only , have found their progress in any way embarrassed , by their having considered more the general principle than their individual cause of complaint , they hope that they shall be thought to have erred on the best and most liberal bide .

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• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1823, page 6, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1714/page/46/