Bowood, January 7th.—I came here on Tuesday to meet the Duke of Bedford, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Lord Devon, Lord Auckland, &c. Wood talked to me about his scheme of taxation; he has been in great doubt how he should apportion and increase (as he must) the income-tax, whether income or property. After much consideration he appears to have nearly made up his mind to impose three per cent. on Ireland, and to raise it in England to five, or perhaps something less; to announce that the increase is to be temporary, but the three per cent. to be permanent; and then, on the strength of the extension to Ireland, to propose a grant to that country, without which Clarendon cannot get on. Peel will concur in this plan.

Great talk here of George Bentinck's resignation of the leadership of the Opposition. John Russell and his colleagues are very sorry for it; nobody can think of a successor to him, and, bad as he is, he seems the best man they have. It seems they detest Disraeli, the only man of talent, and in fact they have nobody; so much so, that Wood thinks they will be obliged to go back to George Bentinck: a very strange state of things! George Bentinck and Stanley disagree on many points, especially on taxation; nevertheless this party, thus acephalous and feeble, have really been fancying they could come into office, and their notion is that if the dissolution had been delayed they would have had a majority, and would have come in. The Duke of Beaufort told Bessborough so very seriously, and Lady Jersey told me the same thing, and that George Bentinck had promised her son Francis a place at the India Board! These things are hardly credible, but they are nevertheless true.

THE HAMPDEN CONTROVERSY.

The Hampden war has been turning greatly to the advantage of the Doctor; his enemies have exposed themselves in the most flagrant manner, and Archdeacon Hare has written a very able pamphlet also exposing the rascality (for that is the proper word) of his accusers, and affording his own valuable testimony to Hampden's orthodoxy; above all things, Sly Sam of Oxford (my would-be director and confessor) has covered himself with ridicule and disgrace. The disgrace is the greater because everybody sees through his motives: he has got into a scrape at Court and is trying to scramble out of it; there, however, he is found out, and his favour seems to have long been waning. The Duke of Bedford tells me the Queen and Prince are in a state of hot zeal in this matter. The Prince writes to Lord John every day, and urges him to prosecute Dean Merewether, which of course Lord John is too wise to do. That Dean is a very paltry fellow, and has moved heaven and earth to get made a bishop himself; besides memorialising the Queen, he wrote to Lord Lansdowne and suggested to him to put an end to the controversy by making him a bishop now, and Hampden at the next vacancy. The whole proceeding reflects great discredit on the great mass of clergymen who have joined in the clamour against Hampden, and on the Oxonian majority who condemned him, for it is now pretty clear that very few, if any, of them had ever read his writings. Now that they are set forth, and people see his unintelligible jargon about dogmas themselves unintelligible, there must be some dispassionate men who will be disgusted and provoked with the whole thing, and at the ferocity with which these holy disputants assault and vituperate each other about that which none of them understand, and which it is a mere mockery and delusion to say that any of them really believe; it is cant, hypocrisy, and fanaticism from beginning to end. There is that old fawning sinner, the Bishop of Exeter; it appears that a dozen years ago he called on Hampden at Oxford to express to him the pleasure with which he had read his Bampton Lectures, and to compliment him on them. The Archbishop of Dublin was present on this occasion.

January 12th.—From Bowood to Middleton on Saturday, to town on Monday 10th. The morning I left Bowood, Senior showed me the correspondence (not published) between the Bishop of Oxford and Hampden. It is creditable to the latter; the former really very despicable. The Bishop put a parcel of questions to him as to his belief on points of faith and doctrine, some of which were the most ordinary matter of belief, others unintelligible. Hampden said he might have regarded such questions on the most elementary points of doctrine as an insult, but he would accept his assurances that they were put in a friendly spirit (though he must say much of his conduct was at variance with such professions) and would therefore say 'Yes' to all of them. To his last letter announcing his having withdrawn the charges and read his works, Hampden merely sent a dry acknowledgement of having received the letter.

January 17th.—Still this Hampden affair. Kelly got a rule in Queen's Bench, and it will be argued in a few days. Tractarians hope from the known Puseyism of Coleridge and Patteson that the rule may be made absolute; but the lawyers don't expect it and think a strong Court would not have given a rule. However, it shows the anomaly (not to say worse) of the whole ecclesiastical proceeding under the Act of Henry VIII. The High Churchmen, who want a separation of State from Church, though it does not seem clear what it is they contemplate, are all on the qui vive, and fancy their projects are put in a fair train by all these proceedings; but though some of my friends think very seriously of these crotchets, I believe they are very despicable and harmless. This morning I got a letter from the Duke of Bedford enclosing one from William Cowper to him, informing him what took place when Hampden was made Regius Professor. William Cowper had given me some account of it at the time, which I inserted in my journal, and I copied it out for the Duke of Bedford during our discussion. I don't find that this more detailed account varies much from the other, though it contains several more particulars, and one relating to the Archbishop's nominees curious enough. His account of the transaction is this, saying he got it from Lord Melbourne, and by reference to letters which passed at the time: 'The Archbishop of Canterbury came to Lord Melbourne to announce the death of Dr. Burton. In the conversation that ensued my uncle requested the Archbishop to send him the names of the persons that occurred to him as best qualified for the situation, and begged him not to confine the list to a small number. The Archbishop sent a list including Pusey, Newman, and Keble; and if it was, as I believe, the list of the Archbishop which is now before me, it contained the names; but it is possible he may have sent only six, and that the other three were added from another quarter. Lord Melbourne sent the nine names to the Archbishop of Dublin (Whately) without mentioning who had recommended them, and he justified the confidence reposed in him by giving a full and impartial statement of what he conceived to be the qualifications of each. But previous to this he had been consulted by Lord Melbourne, and asked whom he would recommend, and had written, on 22nd January, 1836, a long letter in which he said: "The best fitted for a theological professorship that I have any knowledge of are Dr. Hampden and Dr. Hinds, afterwards Principal of Alban Hall; the qualifications I allude to, and which they both possess in a higher degree than any others I could name, are, first, sound learning; secondly, vigour of mind to wield that learning, without which the other is undigested food; and thirdly, the moral and intellectual character adapted for conveying instruction. Both Hinds and Hampden are what are considered of liberal sentiments, but agree with me in keeping aloof from parties political and ecclesiastical."... Lord Melbourne doubted for some time between Arnold and Hampden, but, thinking the former rather too rash and unsettled in his opinions for so responsible a post, decided in favour of the latter; and it was not till after he had made up his mind that Hampden was the fittest person that he asked Dr. Copleston to give him his opinion of him, which opinion was so favourable that it confirmed him in his choice; he did not send any list to Copleston. You may rely on the accuracy of this statement as far as it goes.' The Duke also told me in his letter that there had been a very curious correspondence between Prince Albert and the Bishop of Oxford.

THE HAMPDEN CASE.

January 18th.—I have this morning received a copy of the Archbishop of Canterbury's letter to Lord John about making Hampden Bishop of Manchester. Lord John wrote to him for his opinion, and here is his reply:—

My dear Lord,—During the ten years which have passed since Dr. Hampden was appointed Regius Professor of Divinity at Oxford, I have no reason to believe that he has taught from the Chair any doctrines at variance with the Articles of our Church; and in justice to him I must say that I have discovered nothing objectionable in the few publications of his which I have seen and which are ably written; of his discretion or talents for business I have no means of judging. These qualifications may be more than ordinarily required in the first Bishop of such a place as Manchester. I have the honour to be, &c.

W. Cantuar.

This is his letter, which certainly warranted Lord John in saying 'he received no discouragement from the Archbishop of Canterbury.' It amounts very nearly to a sanction of the appointment; and nothing but the Archbishop's age, and the timidity, both natural to him and belonging to his age, can excuse his not having taken a more active part in allaying the irritation than he has done. So far as the Archbishop was concerned, Lord John understated his case.