“Hæc didici, hæc vidi, hæc scripta legi, hæc sapientissimis et clarissimis viris, et in hâc republicâ et in aliis civitatibus, monumenta nobis, literæ prodiderunt, non semper easdem sententias ab iisdem, sed, quascumque reipublicæ status, inclinatio temporum, ratio concordiæ postularent, esse defendendas.”—Orat. pro Cn. Plaucio, xxxix.
It had been arranged that a bill for suppressing the Catholic Association should be passed, before the bill for removing Catholic disabilities should be brought forward.
On the 5th of March, the Catholic Association Bill passed the House of Lords, and on the same day the Catholic Disabilities Bill was introduced into the House of Commons—admitting Catholics to Parliament, and to the highest military and civil offices, save those connected with church patronage and with the administration of the Ecclesiastical law, on taking an oath described in the Act; and Mr. Peel, in opening the debate, repeats with earnestness and solemnity his previous declaration:
“On my honour and conscience, I believe that the time is come when less danger is to be apprehended to the general interests of the Empire, and to the spiritual and temporal welfare of the Protestant establishment in attempts to adjust the Catholic question than in allowing it to remain in its present state. I have already stated that such was my deliberate opinion; such the conclusion to which I felt myself forced to come by the irresistible force of circumstances; and I will adhere to it: ay, and I will act on it, unchanged by the scurrility of abuse, by the expression of opposite opinions, however vehement or general; unchanged by the deprivation of political confidence, or by the heavier sacrifice of private friendships and affections.”
He shows the difficulties that had existed since the time of Mr. Pitt, in forming a cabinet united in its views with respect to the Catholics; the state of things that experience had proved to be the consequence of a divided one; the final necessity of some decided course. The authority which those who were hostile to English rule had acquired, and were acquiring amidst the distracted councils of the English Government; the power already granted by previous concessions; and the dangers which could not but follow the exercise of this power for the purpose of counteracting the law, or procuring a change in it.
It had been argued that the elective franchise already gave parliamentary influence to the Catholics. In reply to this it had been suggested that we could withdraw that source of influence. “No; we cannot,” replies Mr. Peel, with some eloquence, “replace the Roman Catholics in the condition in which we found them, when the system of relaxation and indulgence began. We have given them the means of acquiring education, wealth, and power. We have removed with our own hands the seal from a vessel in which a mighty spirit was enclosed; but it will not, like the Genius in the fable, return to its narrow confines and enable us to cast it back to the obscurity from which we evoked it.”
He does not say who is to blame for the state of things he thus describes. He does not seem to care. He describes a situation which it is necessary to deal with, and never stopping to burthen the argument with his own faults or merits, thus continues:
“Perhaps I am not so sanguine as others in my expectations of the future; but I have not the slightest hesitation in saying that I fully believe that the adjustment of this question in the manner proposed will give better and stronger securities to the Protestant interest and the Protestant establishment than any that the present state of things admits of, and will avert dangers impending and immediate. What motive, I ask, can I have for the expression of these opinions but an honest conviction of their truth?”
It was this general impression that he was honest, and that he was making great personal sacrifices, which, no doubt, rendered his task easier; and when, after opening the way to a new election by the resignation of his seat, he was defeated in a contest for the University of Oxford, the eulogy of Sir James Graham spoke the public sentiment: