CONVENTUAL AND MONASTIC

INSTITUTIONS.

MOTION FOR APPOINTMENT OF SELECT

COMMITTEE.

MR. MATTHEWS said, he wished to correct a misunderstanding which had arisen in regard to the Instructions to the Committee which he intended to move. Every member of a monastic taken was, under the existing laws of order in England in which vows were the country, guilty of misdemeanour, ment for life. Further, every trust under and liable, as a consequence, to banishwhich property was held for the maintenance of such orders was, in law, void,

MR. HIBBERT took exception to the word "Anglican." It was rather hard upon the Anglican denomination to be named in this particular manner, and he suggested that the word be omitted. The Instruction would include all such institutions, whether named or not.

MR. EYKYN said, he could not accede to this proposal.

MR. COGAN said, that as he did not think the wrong and insult that would by the proposed inquiry be put upon the Church to which he belonged could be at all lessened by extending the inquiry to other religious bodies, he was not prepared to adopt the proposition of the hon. Member for Windsor.

MR. J. G. TALBOT said, he thought the wording of the proposition rather vague. The hon. Member for Windsor proposed that it be an Instruction to the Committee to include within the scope of their inquiry all Anglican and other socalled religious institutions.

MR. SPEAKER said, that the Instruction of the hon. Member for Windsor, as amended, referred to "other religious institutions in Great Britain of a Conventual or Monastic character."

vows forbidden by the law. This being so, any person who felt so inclined might, by application to the Court of Chancery, have the trusts set aside, and cause the property to revert to the heirsat-law of the donors, or to be applied to such purposes as the Crown might appoint. Therefore, he wished that the Committee should be so instructed as that no member of an order who might be called upon for evidence should be compelled or called upon to make minute statements that could lead to the property of his monastery being forfeited by its being shown to be held under a title that was bad in law. He had no intention to re-open the discussion on the broad question of the appointment or non-appointment of the Committee, but simply to guard against the inquiry being turned into a mere inquisition. To effect this object he, therefore, moved

"That it be an Instruction to the Committee

not to inquire into matters which would involve a criminal charge against any person, or the forfeiture of any legal or equitable interest in property."

He had placed upon the Paper a second Instruction, to the effect that the Committee should

"Inquire and report, in the first instance, on the state of the Law respecting Conventual and Monastic Institutions or Societies in Great Britain, before proceeding with the other subjects of inquiry referred to them.

This he had done because he found that authorities like the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate), the hon. and learned Member for Marylebone (Mr. T. Chambers), and the Solicitor General held different views on the legal aspects of the question. At present, however, he moved the first of

the two Instructions.

SIR JOHN GRAY seconded the Mo

tion.

66

Motion made, and Question proposed, That it be an Instruction to the Committee not to inquire into matters which would involve a criminal charge against any person, or the forfeiture of any legal or equitable interest in property "—(Mr. Matthews,)

MR. NEWDEGATE said, the hon. and learned Member for Dungarvan (Mr. Matthews) had referred to him, probably because he anticipated that he (Mr. Newdegate) would object to any further limitation of the scope of the inquiry, and was suspected of being able to put an interpretation on the Motion of the First Lord of the Treasury which would involve danger to the tenure of property now held by monastic orders in this country. With regard to these questions he wished to explain. | In a previous debate on this question he adverted to the monastery of Mount St. Bernard, in Leicestershire, and to the leniency which the Legislature had manifested in matters connected with that monastery, and its property. His having done this had led to a correspondence between himself and Mr. Harper, a gentleman connected with the management of a reformatory school which the Government had at one time placed under the control of the monks of Mount St. Bernard, who received the usual allowance for each of the boys placed in the school, the condition being that they should be employed upon a farm, of some 450 acres in extent, belonging to the monastery. In 1863, in consequence of the unsatisfactory state of the school and of certain evils connected with it being brought before the House, the Home Secretary made an arrangement, under which a certain number of persons, including Mr. Harper -all being Roman Catholics, and the chaplain of a school, a member of the monastic order, hired 100 of the 450 acres from the monks and continued to employ the boys upon it. Now, he put it to the House whether, if the danger of legal annoyances as to the possession of land by these monks which the hon. and learned Member seemed to apprehend from the proposed inquiry were likely to result, pending the inquiry the House had directed, it would not be clear that, prior to 1863, at any rate, there was already in the Library of the House, contained in a Parliamentary Return presented by the Home Office in 1864, direct evidence of the property

having been, and being, in the possession of the monks inhabiting the monastery of Mount St. Bernard? That was a case directly in point, and if the danger which the hon. and learned Gentleman anticipated, should accrue, it could be no greater than that which had existed for the last eight or nine years. The apprehensions of the hon Gentleman, therefore, were quite groundless. The second Instruction related to the laws with regard to conventual property. Undoubtedly this subject was contemplated in 1860 in the debates on the Charitable Trusts Act; and one of the great arguments then used was that conventual property ought to be brought within the compass of the law, and the Act contained provisions for legalizing it on certain conditions. It was desirable that the House should know how far the provisions of this statute had been complied with or evaded. He perfectly admitted that that Act revived the clauses of the Catholic Relief Act of 1829 against the establishment of the male Orders of the Church of Rome in this country. But he had shown that there was no danger to the property in question pending the inquiries of the Committee, because in his own district property of this very kind had been exposed by a process as public as the inquiry of the Committee, and the hon. Member would find in the Library a Parliamentary Paper which had been there for the last six years, giving all the details with respect to it. He could not look upon the Instruction as anything else than an attempt to limit still further the inquiry of the Committee and to that he was decidedly opposed.

MR. GLADSTONE: Having made the Motion to which the House has agreed, and which effected a great limitation to the field of inquiry originally propounded, I feel it my duty to give an opinion upon the Motion of the hon. Member. I think it a most unfortunate Motion, and I am extremely sorry that it has been made. The hon. and learned Member (Mr. Matthews) indicated that he had found in private conversation a great objection to this Motion, and I do not think the remarks he made tended in the least to diminish it. As the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate) said, there is no ground for apprehension about property. That is not the spirit in which the inquiry of the

Committee will be conducted; and if any persons were inclined to conduct it in that spirit the hon. and learned Member and others will be there to prevent it. But the Motion is unfortunate, because it seems to show a disposition to check the Committee in a field of inquiry which the House has marked out by a very large majority, and I, having had something to do in limiting the inquiry as at first proposed, do not feel myself at liberty to introduce further limitations when there appears to me to be an absence of any practical object. The proper guards and limits of inquiry must be judged of by the discretion of the Committee and by the privilege of the witnesses. If a witness is asked questions which it would be injurious to him to answer, let him claim his privilege. If any course of examination is likely to lead to matter that would be inconvenient, the discre-. tion of the Committee-which can be invoked by any Member at any time, at any point of the examination, is the only manner in which the difficulty can be met. I am very sorry, indeed, that the Motion has been made, because I think the very refusal of the House-and in my opinion they can have no hesitation in refusing it-will leave the Committee in a less advantageous position than they would otherwise be in.

MR. HEADLAM said, it was his lot some years ago to preside over a Select Committee of that House to which was intrusted an inquiry of the very same description-he meant the Select Committee on the Law of Mortmain. Upon that occasion he had the good fortune not to meet with any opposition from any Roman Catholic Gentlemen who were Members of that House. On the contrary, a noble Lord, the late Duke of Norfolk, then Earl of Arundell and Surrey, and also the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Limerick (Mr. Monsell) were Members of the Committee. On that occasion he was careful to make everything general, so that there should be nothing in the form of reference, and nothing in the inquiry or Report which could be said to be directed against any particular portion of the community. There was no limitation whatever to the discretion of the Committee, and, of course, in the progress of the inquiry they had some delicate questions to determine. The late Cardinal Wiseman appeared before it. But he was

happy to think that the whole inquiry was conducted in such a form that no Roman Catholic gentleman ever complained that anything harsh or illegal was done. The House could perfectly trust his right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton (Mr. C. P. Villiers) to conduct the present inquiry in the most unexceptional manner.

MR. CHARLEY said, the hon. and learned Member for Dungarvan (Mr. Matthews) was fighting a shadow, for it appeared from Sir Erskine May's Parliamentary Practice that witnesses, petitioners, and others were protected by privilege from the consequences of any statement they might make to either House, and that any molestation to which they might be subjected in consequence of such statement would be treated as a breach of privilege.

MR. SHERLOCK said, that a witness might refuse to answer any questions tending to criminate himself, and if questions were put to him involving the title of his property he might respectfully decline to answer. Lord St. Leonards last year, in a Court of Justice, had declined to state what his title was, and he recovered notwithstanding his refusal. The case referred to by the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate) as to the number of acres held by a particular monastery was one on which the hon. Gentleman himself could give the information required. The Motion, to say the least of it, was unnecessary.

MR. SYNAN said, he could not see what possible objection there was to the Motion; but, at the same time, he did not recommend that the hon. and learned Gentleman should go to a Division on it. It would, however, prove to the House and the Committee that the inquiry ought to be two-fold—first, into the law as to its exempting persons and property from the penalties of confiscation, and afterwards, an inquiry into the other part of the order of reference.

MR. MATTHEWS begged leave to withdraw his Motion.

Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
MR. WHALLEY rose to move-

"That it be an Instruction to the Committee

also to inquire into the existence, character, and increase of Conventual and Monastic Institutions

or Societies in Great Britain."

MR. SPEAKER ruled that the Motion was irregular.

House adjourned at a quarter before Two o'clock.

Order for Second Reading read. MR. ASSHETON CROSS, in rising to move that the Bill be now read a second time, said that he had purposely deferred this stage of the Bill in order that persons in the country might have the opportunity of becoming acquainted with it; and he had sincere pleasure in stating that out of the very large numbers of letters he had received from clergymen in every part of the country hardly one expressed the slightest objection, whereas the great majority warmly praised its provisions. That being so, it was not his intention now to make any lengthened statement, not having heard that any opposition was to be offered to the progress of the Bill. He might state at the outset that nothing was further from his wish than in any way to interfere with the right of patronage as vested in the hands of laymen. It was, he thought, of essential use to the Church. In the first place, it interested a large number of people in the welfare of the Church who were likely to make good appointments to their livings; while the fact of so much patronage being in the hands of the laity throughout the country tended to produce a variety of tone and thought among clergymen, and prevented them sinking into that monotonous character which would prevail if all patronage were in the hands of the Church or Crown. The origin of Church patronage in lay hands dated from early times. Many owners of estates offered to build and endow a church, on condition of having the patronage placed in their

hands; and the Bishops, jealous as they were with regard to ecclesiastical appointments, consented to place the patronage in the hands of laymen, in consideration of the advantages which the Church and people received from the endowment of churches. No one could doubt, that in consequence of the action thus taken, a vast number of livings were created both in this country and abroad, which would not otherwise have been founded at all. But it was obvious that one evil was likely to attend patronage in the hands of laymen-and he was sorry to say it showed itself also in the case of those who were not laymen. That was that in corrupt times a vast amount of it was sold and bought just like any other marketable commodity; and we read in the ecclesiastical historian Mosheim—

"The kings, princes, and nobles either con. ferred the sacred offices on their friends and ministers for whom they had partiality, or sold them to the highest bidder. And hence frequently men the most unfit and flagitious-sometimes soldiers, civil magistrates, and counts-were invested with spiritual offices of the highest dignity and influence.

There seems to be nothing appertaining to the Church which is not put upon sale-namely, bishoprics, presbyteries, deaconries, and the other lower orders; archdeaconries also, deaneries, superintendencies, treasurers' offices, baptisteries. . . All ecclesiastical offices were at that time as much accounted things ven

In

dible as merchandize in a common market.” In order to put an end to that state of things Gregory VII. took vigorous measures, and did for a time put an end to it. In England the early history of our advowsons was much the same. early times persons who had manors, in consideration of assigning lands for the endowment of the parish church were allowed the patronage of the living, and the patronage always passed with the manor; but in later times they became separated, and the advowson became what was called in gross.

"This practice, which was originally a mere indulgence, became in process of time a right, and all those who had either founded or endowed a church claimed and exercised the exclusive privilege of presenting a clerk to the Bishop whenever the church became vacant."―[Cripps, 552.] And again, although the law did not consider the exercise of the right of presentation as of any pecuniary value, or a thing for which a price or compensation ought to be accepted, yet the general right to present was considered valuable. As the right of presentation became pro