all who wished to court the favour of ministers. He did in his conscience believe that the noble lord and his colleagues were too honourable and too wise to advocate the abominable and foolish measures, the responsibility of which they were now compelled to bear. He believed, as it was generally understood, that in an unfortunate moment they had given a pledge, that if the Queen set foot in England, they would proceed against her, thinking, no doubt, that there was no chance of her ever doing so. By this means they had now become responsible for conduct which they were ashamed to contemplate. He did not know what the noble lord might say upon the subject, but he thought that he (the noble lord) had not advised the prosecution, and that he was now obliged to bear the responsibility of measures entered into against his advice. Of such conduct he could not speak in terms of sufficient reprobation, for it was too much that they were not only to be deprived of the talents (and those not too great) which the ministry possessed, but that the latter were to come forward, and justify measures against which they had themselves advised. Lord A. then concluded with moving that" the Order in Council, &c. appears to have been ill advised and inexpedient."

Mr Ellis here rose for the mere purpose of justifying his friend Mr Canning. That gentleman, in the first discussion of the proceedings, had declared his intention of taking no part in them. During the whole of the proceedings in the other House, he had remained absent, and had only returned upon their termination. The new state in which he had since found affairs, had made it appear to him, that the course which he had hitherto adopted would no longer be compatible either with his duty or his feelings. There appeared no other alter

native than that of surrendering his office. Having done that, and having thus purchased the right of acting con. formably to the resolution which he had originally expressed, he had now determined to remain absent until the final termination of the question relative to her Majesty. He could assure the House, however, that upon all questions of internal and external policy, his honourable friend and his late colleagues were entirely agreed.

Mr Robinson began with declaring, that ministers were ready to take the full responsibility of the proceedings, and most decidely repelled the idea of having acted otherwise than on their own conviction. Neither now, nor at any time, had they any doubt of their proceedings being strictly legal; and numberless instances could be given, in which a similar course had been followed. If then it became a question of discretion merely, he would beg the House to recur to the period when it first became necessary for ministers to direct their attention to the subject of the Queen. They would recollect her Majesty had for some time been living in a state of separation authorized by his late Majesty, and in some measure recognized by Parliament itself. Upon the death of his Majesty, arrangements had been entered into, the effect of which was to induce her Majesty to remain abroad, and to renounce the style and title of Queen of England. When those arrangements had been first proposed, abundant reason existed to believe that they would have been acceded to. To have inserted the name of her Majesty in the Liturgy under those circumstances, would therefore have been inconsistent with the situation in which they stood, if those regulations had been completed. The intention of ministers in that respect being defeated, they were compelled to embrace the other alternative, and

bring the question before the House. Ministers could not have advised his Majesty to place the Queen in the Liturgy, without advising him also to bestow on her every honour that belonged to a queen. If they were guilty of the dreadful charges brought against them by the noble lord, how could he think of compounding for them by such a milk and water motion as the present? He could have no object but to catch a few votes. Yes, to enable the noble lord to gain possession of the loaves and fishes, the King might be insulted with impunity, the Queen might be betrayed without fear of observation-the laws might be violated-the country might become the victim of rebellion or of anarchy-all those horrors might arrive, provided the noble lord and his friends but gained the object of their wishes. If the noble lord wished to do justice to the Queen, why had he not endeavoured to do so, instead of cringing to the gain of a few votes? Why else had the noble lord been satisfied with such a weak, such a futile conclusion as was contained in his motion? Perhaps it was but a feint, to put to the test the feelings of the House; but why did the noble lord anticipate the resolution proposed by him, or rather, why did he not more manfully bring it forward? Mr R. finally moved the adjournment of the House.

Mr Hobhouse strongly supported the motion of Lord A. Hamilton, and conceived that Mr Robinson had evaded entering into any proper justification of his colleagues. In a measure so unprecedented, the onus probandi appeared to him to rest entirely upon ministers. He condemned the discussion relative to Mr Canning, as introducing irrelevant matter into so important a debate.

Mr Wetherell now rose, and began

VOL. XIV. PART I.

with drawing the attention of the House to the extreme importance of the discussion, which interested all future queens, and involved the question, whether the Privy Council could alter the statute law, as well as the practice and usage of the kingdom for three centuries. I say, continued Mr W., that the present is one which relates to the past, to the present, and to the future; it is one which requires this House to say, not whether the present Queen is to be thrown at the feet of ministers, to be spurned, to be degraded, to be dethroned, at their pleasure, but whether the established laws of England are, or can be, abrogated by any power other than by the legislature; and whether any future Queen Consort is, or may become, the victim of any Privy Council. I take the liberty of declaring it to be my opinion, after a full and satisfactory deliberation, that the act of the 12th of February last is grossly illegal. If the right honourable gentleman thought that the motion of the noble lord to-night was one of mere milk and water, he will not have to reproach me with using such language; for I thus openly declare, that the erasure of the name of her Majesty from the Liturgy was grossly illegal and unconstitutional. Mr W. then went through the history of the Liturgy, from the time of Henry VIII., to the Act of Uniformity under Charles II. He had consulted the act, but could not find any position of it, or any clause in it, which could sanction the act, which he had already pronounced illegal. The particular clause which had allowed the alteration or changing of names of those persons of the royal family for whom the act required the subjects of the kingdom to pray, was in substance as follows:-"Be it enacted, that the names of the King,

B

Queen, and royal progeny, be challenged and altered from time to time, and fitted to the present occasion, according to the direction of lawful authority." This might authorize the alteration of the young George for Frederick, or of Anne for Elizabeth, but certainly nothing more. In the Liturgy of the church, the Queens of Henry VIII. James I. and Charles II. had been uniformly introduced, and the Liturgy of that day was precisely the same as that which had existed previous to the Reformation. It was somewhat remarkable, that in the printed copy of the Common Prayer attached to the statute, a blank was left where the name of the Queen had been usually insert ed, because that monarch was not married, and therefore there was no Queen Consort. The established usage, besides, for upwards of three centuries, had, he conceived, given to the Queen a right founded upon prescription. Upon what but custom did the prerogative of the monarch depend? By what but custom did they enjoy these privileges? What but custom protected the rights of the community? What, indeed, could be named, that was possessed by any man, that was not secured by usage? (Cheers by the Opposition.) Was it for the noble lord and his anti-radical coadjutors, after exciting an alarm at innovation, thus to set at defiance usages of three centuries?-they might deny radicalism, and so would he, but yet, whether radicals or antiradicals, he wished men to be consist

ent.

He would not anticipate what the talents of those might be who might undertake to answer him, but he believed he knew the arguments they would adopt. The fact was that of the omission of the Queen of George I. That monarch, it would be recollected, ascended the throne in the

year 1714. At that time the Princess Zell, to whom he had been married, had been a captive at Hanover a considerable time; she was never known in this country as Queen Consort; she had never had any court, nor exercised any privilege. In the addresses presented by that House and by the House of Peers to that monarch, nor indeed in any address, had she been noticed; added to that, she had been divorced upwards of eighteen years. George I. had contracted a bad-handed marriage, as it was termed, with the Duchess of Kendal, who was entitled to the style of Queen Consort in preference to the Princess of Zell. Many experienced clergymen, and many learned gentlemen, with whom he had conversed, were of opinion, that the words of the act, coupled with immemorial usage, were completely decisive against the legality of the measure. He had endeavoured to bring the question to the test of monarchial rights and of monarchial candour,

(Hear, hear,)-whether it would not be most impolitic to leave the Queen to the discretion of popular or unpopular faction to exalt or de grade her.-He had read enough of the history of his country to know that there were factions at court, as well as factions among the people. The Queen, who was now opposed by the Court party, was at one time strenuously supported by them. That fact plainly elucidated his argument, and evinced the dangers that might arise from such a discretionary power being intrusted to any party, by which they might deprive the Queen of her attributes. He could not compare the proceedings of the Privy Council to any thing but the High Court of Commission, and the members he must describe as inquisitorial judges. The learned gen

tleman concluded with strongly reprobating the whole course of the proceedings against her Majesty.

Dr Dodson maintained the right of the King to regulate the Liturgy; and Mr Martin conceived, that, after the resolution of Parliament last session, the Queen ought to have acquiesced.

The Attorney-General began by expressing his surprise, that the noble mover, affected apparently by the speech of Alderman Heygate, had directed his attack merely against the expediency of the measure, thus tacitly admitting its legality. If the act was illegal, why discuss its wisdom? Once show this act to be illegal, and no matter what might be the conduct of the Queen-whether it was such as the whole nation might be proud to approve, or such as it must be compelled to condemn, nothing could justify ministers in having advanced that act; there was litera scripta upon the subject; there was a course laid down for them to pursue; and to recommend any other course would be to recommend the exercise of such a dispensing power on the part of the Crown, as no minister in his senses could venture to advise. Mr Wetherell, after first declaring the measure to be illegal, appeared finally to rest his argument chiefly upon usage. He was prepared, however, to meet the argument upon both points. The honourable member for Westminster told the House, that from the year 1546 to the present period, there was no instance in which a Queen Consort had been omitted in the prayers of the church. It would be seen by the prayer-book used in the time of Philip and Mary, that a Queen, not a Queen Consort, but a Queen Regnant, had been in that situation; for during that reign the King was pray ed for, and the Queen, though Queen

Regnant, was not. (Hear, hear, from the Opposition benches, and cries of "Queen Consort.") Queen Consort, did the honourable members say? That was the case of a Queen Regnant; and that Queen was not prayed for. The book was to be found in the British Museum; and the form stood, "Pro rege et principibus suis." The honourable and learned member for Oxford had ascribed to the Act of Uniformity, that immutable right of the Queen to be prayed for, which no King, it was insisted, had power to take away. He (the AttorneyGeneral) wished to see the enactment; he desired to have the clause laid before him under which the immutable right was to be claimed. So far from the course having been uniform from the Reformation downwards, there had been repeated instances of deviation. In the reign of George II., the name of Frederick Prince of Wales had been struck out of the form of prayer. In the commencement of the late reign, the same measure had been adopted with respect to the Duke of Cumberland. The words of the act were certainly "to alter and change." The framers of that act had not probably the copia verborum of the honourable and learned member for Oxford, and did not think it necessary to employ variety of words where the meaning might be expressed by one; but the advisers of George III., at the period alluded to, men upon whom the honourable and learned member, notwithstanding his aversion to anti-radical and to monarchical administrations, would scarcely pass hasty censure, those advisers had recommended to the King to strike the Duke's name out of the Liturgy, he (the Duke) being still in existence. He would now come to that instance, which he took to be an instance of the highest value, and which had

been described to the House as an instance of no value at all-the measures pursued towards the Queen of George I. Did the honourable and learned member really mean to contend that the divorce mentioned by Cox, was a divorce actually annulling the marriage between the parties? Why, the very same page which spoke of the divorce, stated that the Queen was gazetted as Duchess of Zell, and as Duchess Dowager of Hanover. It was said, that the second marriage, the marriage with the Duchess of Kendal, was a good and valid marriage. Why, then, was it not set up as a legal marriage? It was not his intention to provoke discussion as to the question of guilt or innocence; but ministers had believed they were in possession of satisfactory evidence against her Majesty. When a change in the Liturgy became necessary, while such a charge was hanging over her Majesty, if her name of Queen Consort was inserted, with what face could ministers afterwards come down and say, we have a charge against the Queen, which, as we think, forms a ground, not only for degradation, but for divorce? The answer would immediately be, What! you who advised her name to be inserted in the Liturgy, who placed her in the enjoyment of all the rights and privileges of Queen Consort of these realms!

Sir James Mackintosh declared, that after the most deliberate consideration of the subject, his mind was brought to this conclusion, that the removal of her Majesty's name from the Liturgy was a violation of the common law; that there was nothing in the statute law to countenance such a proceeding; that it was unwise, inexpedient, and a departure from the principles of justice. The arguments used by Mr Robinson and the Attorney-General, were mere charges of

party feeling, not affecting the merits of the question. It seemed a very singular charge, that the motion was too mild and too respectful to his Majesty. He would now tell his learned friend, the Attorney-General, that his argument drawn from the case of Philip and Mary had no force. To prove it, what did his learned friend do? He quoted the mass book in the time of Philip and Mary. He introduced the popish ritual, as if Philip and Mary were supreme heads of the Church of England, a title they would have looked upon as damnable and heretical. The fact was, that the name of the Queen was never found in the ritual before the Reformation. He would now come to the case of the Princess Sophia. His learned friend, the Attorney-General, seemed to think that she could not have been divorced, as she was called in the Gazette by the name of the Duchess of Zell. Did he forget that she inherited this title from her father; that she was the daughter of the Duke of Zell, from whom she inherited large estates? Her being styled Duchess of Zell at her death, appeared to him pregnant proof of her having been divorced. His learned friend contended, that there was no divorce e vinculo matrimonii. He (Sir J. Mackintosh) thought there was. Every person knew, that, in all protestant churches, except that of England, a divorce e vinculo matrimonii might be obtained in a Consistorial Court; and the noble lord himself (Castlereagh) admitted, in alluding to this subject last session, that the record of this divorce was still extant in some of the Consistorial Courts of Hanover. George I. could as easily have obtained a divorce e vinculo matrimonii, as a divorce a mensa et thoro; and therefore the probability was that he obtained it. This case of a woman,