turn the great mass of English Liberals away from the bright hopes which have been glowing before them since the Chesterfield speech, and draw them back into that slough of impotent negations and embittered personal faction in which they have unhappily so long been struggling, to their own serious hurt and, as I believe, to that of our country also. WEMYSS REID.

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Gentlemen, a new factor has entered into the politics of this country; in future you will have to take account of the opinions of your Colonists.-Mr. Chamberlain, 12th of January 1902.

THERE was one omission in the King's Speech at the opening of Parliament that probably disappointed a great many people besides Lord Rosebery. Lord Rosebery, it will be remembered, in the Debate on the Address, drew attention to the fact that the King's Speech did not make any allusion in any form' to the Royal Declaration which occupied so much of the time of the House of Lords last Session, and with an approach to disappointment' he declared himself convinced that the subject would not again be brought before the House.

VOL. LI-No. 302

M M

Judging by recent events, this conclusion was, to say the least, premature. And it is by no means the only premature conclusion that has been come to on the subject. But so surprising have been its vicissitudes; politicians and statesmen have been so strangely out in their reckonings about it; there has been so much loose talk concerning it and such a lack of accurate information upon it, that it has been difficult to keep count of its progress and to estimate truly the import of the events that have happened directly and indirectly in connection with it. And this, under existing circumstances, it is important to do. For since Mr. Balfour, twelve months ago, lightly dismissed the question as no longer a practical one before the country, and the Prime Minister refused with considerable emphasis to give any encouragement to the hope that the Government would deal with it, the question has made great progress. How great only a review of the past twelve months can show. And this I propose briefly to make.

Immediately after the opening of the first Parliament of Edward the Seventh, at which the King was forced' to inaugurate his reign with a statutory oath that in the grossest language repudiates and misrepresents the religious beliefs of twelve millions of his most loyal subjects, the Catholic Peers addressed an earnest and dignified protest to the Lord Chancellor, urging how difficult and painful the expressions in the declaration made it for Catholic Peers to attend in the House of Lords in order to discharge their official and public duties; and that these expressions could not but cause the deepest pain to millions of subjects of his Majesty in all parts of the Empire who are so loyal and devoted to his Crown and person as any others in his dominions.' 'Those,' wrote the Times, to cite but one example of the many concurrent opinions of the press on the matter, 'who read the declaration will not be surprised at this protest on the part of Roman Catholics, whose loyalty cannot be called in question.'1

The protest was followed quickly by a question in the House of Commons asking whether the Government intended to take any steps to eliminate that portion of the Royal Declaration which describes the religion of his Majesty's Catholic subjects as idolatrous and superstitious. Mr. Balfour brushed aside the question with the answer that the practical question had passed, and he hoped it would not be a practical question for many long years to come.

It is noteworthy that it was on precisely such like pleas that the question was not taken in hand and settled once for all some years before the death of our late beloved Sovereign, when her surprising activity and vigour did not allow a suspicion of any near change in the succession of the Throne, and when her broad mind and tact and judgment would unquestionably have smoothed the way to legislation on the subject. Whoever recalls her memorable action at the

time of the Ecclesiastical Titles Act will understand what an irreparable loss this was.

Then the whole country was in a state of agitation. Men of all classes lost their heads, and thought the royal supremacy was threatened. Addresses from men of all denominations poured in upon the Crown. The Universities of Oxford and Cambridge and the Corporation of London sent their representatives by hundreds with similar addresses to Windsor Castle, where they were received by the Queen, who replied to each in person. And her answer to the Duchess of Gloucester (congratulating her on the result and expressing admiration of the Queen's replies) shows with what a calm and temperate judgment the Queen had viewed the incidents that had thrown England into a frenzy.

I would never [she wrote] have consented to say anything which breathed a spirit of intolerance. Sincerely Protestant as I always have been, and always shall be, and indignant as I am at those who call themselves Protestants while they are in fact quite the contrary, I much regret the unchristian and intolerant spirit exhibited by many people at the public meetings. I cannot bear to hear the violent abuse of the Catholic religion, which is so painful and so cruel towards the many good and innocent Roman Catholics. However, we must hope and trust this excitement will cease, and that the wholesome effect of it upon our own Church will be lasting.2

And justice was done, and the heavens did not fall.

Then again, had it not been for the tact and sagacity of her counsels and her Constitutional grasp of the situation shown at the time of the Disestablishment of the Irish Church, who could have stayed a conflict between the two Houses of Parliament and prevented another year of agitation embittered by the promptings of sectarian animosity? So here again we have a great historical event that clearly indicates how the Queen's influence would have been firmly and soundly exercised with all the requisite foresight to forestall the needs and difficulties of her Imperial successor and for the maintenance of the integrity and unity of the Empire. But I digress.

3

Four days after Mr. Balfour's curt dismissal of the Royal Declaration in the House of Commons, the Prime Minister, when the question of repeal was raised in the House of Lords, though he treated the matter gravely and courteously, nevertheless tried to shelve it. His speech was full of fear and dread of lighting up in the country the sleeping passions, feelings, and sensibilities represented by such an enactment. From beginning to end there was not a trace of the Imperial spirit that now possesses the country: it was simply a question of home policy. Whilst his estimate of the non-Catholics of the country outside the House of Lords was scarcely complimentary in this age and home of religious toleration even if it were just. And in refusing to give any encouragement to the hope 2 Theodore Martin, The Life of the Prince Consort, vol. ii. pp. 338, 339. 3 Davidson and Benham, Life of Archbishop Tait, vol. ii. p. 43.

that the Government would speedily introduce a measure to abolish the Declaration, he emphatically said that though he was very anxious to give a satisfactory answer to Lord raye and his coreligionists, he did not wish to leave on his mind an impression that there was any doubt in the matter.'

In less than a month after this a distinct advance was shown by the Government in its view of the question. Lord Herries moved for a joint committee of both Houses to consider and report upon the Declaration. He was quickly followed by the Prime Minister, who not only condemned the 'language of such indecent violence . . . placed by statute in an oath which is required to be taken by the Sovereign of the realm,' but explicitly faced the likelihood of repeal.

From what we have heard to-night and what we have heard elsewhere we know very well that if the House did. . . . come to a decision to modify or repeal the Act in question, there would be a great many people perfectly sincere, though not very wise, who would say that you were giving some support to the doctrine of Transubstantiation. Therefore you have to move cautiously in this

matter.

But even here it is strange to observe how the misdirected zeal of ill-informed and not very wise people' obscured the claims of Imperial unity and the right to equal justice of millions in the United Kingdom and our dominions beyond the seas.

Nevertheless, it must be carefully borne in mind that one short month before nothing seemed further from the Prime Minister's thoughts than the possibility of the House coming to a decision in favour of repeal.

Then, as regards the Committee, though he still saw very great difficulties in the way, he acknowledged that one of the most effective ways of dealing with them was to inquire into them, and therefore he had, he said, at once assented to Lord Herries's wish. Furthermore, when Lord Herries moved for the Committee, he proposed-if Lord Herries would withdraw his motion and leave the matter in the hands of the Government-to move it himself, with an addition for the security of the Protestant Succession,' which he said was no doubt the object of the Declaration. Lord Herries accepted the Premier's proposal, withdrew his motion, and two days thence Lord Salisbury moved:

That it is desirable that a joint committee of both Houses be appointed to consider the Declaration required of the Sovereign on his accession by the Bill of Rights (1 Will. III. cap. 2, sec. 1), and to report whether its language can be modified advantageously without diminishing its efficacy as a security for the maintenanceof the Protestant Succession.

Last August, when the Session drew to its close after all the long debates in the House of Lords on the Declaration, Lord Spencer alluded to the seriously mischievous effects resulting from the still prevalent ignorance on this oath.