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    &mpton . The petition was signed'both by Protestant Dissenters and Catholics , and it stated that the imposition of civil disabilities upon people on account of their religious opinions , partook of the character of persecution , and would not be the means of making sincere converts to the Established Church , but that it would have a contrary effect . The

    Noble Earl stated , that upon a subject of such great importance , he had no wish to promote a discussion at present , but he must say that the general principle advanced by the petitioners was one in which he agreed . He did not mean to say that in no case it would be

    justifiable to impose civil disabilities on account of religious opinions , but he contended that their imposition must be justified clearly and unanswerably , on the ground that the religious opinions of the people who suffered from such disabilities were dangerous to the safety of Church and State . He said Church

    and State , because he thought that the interests of the Established Church and the interests of the State ought to be indissolubly united ; and it Was upon that principle that he should ever maintain the extreme expediency—nay , the necessity , of removing the restrictions placed upon the Catholics and Dissenters ; for he thought the opinions they professed were not calculated to endanger the safety of the . Established Church .

    Lord Clifden sincerely rejoiced that there was a prospect of the Dissenters and Catholics uniting , in order to get rid of the disabilities under which both of those classes laboured . Whenever that union should take place , he thought that the Catholic question would find a different reception to that with which it had lately been met . He hoped and

    trusted that the day would soon come , when the word toleration would be erased from the statute-book , —when every man might pray to God according to the dictates of his own conscience . He never knew any thing more unwise or insane than the continuing of those unjustifiable and exclusive laws , which the whole of Europe had got rid of , with the exception of Spain , and which

    were a disgrace to the statute-book . If the Catholics and Dissenters had one grain of sense , every man of them would unite in one common cause . He believed , that if the Church had supported a measure to give a liberal provision to the Catholic clergy of Ireland , there would have been ten times more security to the Church in that coyntry than there was at present .

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    Lord Holland had to present two or three petitions to their Lordships , praying for a repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts . In presenting these petitions , he meant to confine himself to moving that they be read , and laid Upon the table ; and it was not his intention to institute , or to call Upon their Lordships to institute , any thing upon those

    petitions during the present session . But though such was his intention , he thought it necessary to call their Lordships' attention to the character and merits of the petitions , as well as to the motives which had induced the petitioners to approach their Lordships ' bar . The first petition came from the ministers of the three united

    denominations of Dissenters in and about the metropolis . These respectable persons were the successors and representatives of those who many years ago were excluded from the Church by the Act of Uniformity , which , whatever their Lordships might think of it now , was at that time passed in breach of the promises which had been made , and

    which was followed by all the cruel consequences with which their Lordships were acquainted . The petitioners were also the successors of those persons who had been consulted by Government at the time of framing that great Act called the Toleration Act . Since that period , the House knew that some of the clauses of that Act had been

    most beneficially and wisely altered . By that alteration , adopted by a decision of this House after having heard the admirable speech of Lord Mansfield , — a speech which it was impossible for any man to read , without feeling impressed with the great wisdom , justice , and love

    of toleration which distinguished that eminent man , —by the effect of that alteration and that speech , those persons became not only acknowledged by law , but he might even say , were established by law . On the merits of the individuals it would be invidious in him to

    dwell , but with respect to the merits of the body , no man could read the history of this country , at those periods when its liberty and constitution were endangered , and at the time when the House of Hanover was called to the throne of this country , without finding these

    persons among the foremost defenders of the constitution of the kingdom . The petitioners complained of the stigma cast upon them by those rigorous , unjust laws , which was entirely undeserved , by any act of theirs , but cast upou them merely on account of the religious opinions which they conscientiously held . He did not

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    5 $ 0 Intelligence *—* Corporation andTest AcU

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), July 2, 1827, page 550, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1798/page/78/