Bygones Worth Remembering Volume Ii Part 11

A BILL

To secure the Extension of Civil and Religious Liberty.

(Prepared and brought in by

Mr. Manfield, Sir Henry Boscoe,

Sir Geo. B. Sitwell, Mr. Picton,

Mr. Illingworth, Mr. W. McLaren,

Mr. H. P. Cobb, Mr. Howell,

Mr. Chas. Feiiwick, Mr. Benn,

Mr. Storey, and Mr. Hunter.)

Ordered, by The House of Commons, to be Printed, 7 November 1893.

PRINTED BY EYRE AND SPOTTISWOODE,

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[Price 1d.]

[Bill 464.]

Memorandum.

This Bill comprises but a small extension of religious equality.

Its object is to enable a man "to do what he likes with his own" for admittedly lawful purposes. It is affirmed by legal decisions that any man may believe what he pleases, speak what he pleases, publish his honest conviction, provided he does it in a temperate and considerate manner; and he may, while living, give money to maintain his views. All this Bill seeks is that he may, at his death, bequeath money for such purpose. This Bill merely proposes to extend a right which Christians of every denomination enjoy, but which hitherto has been denied to those who may conscientiously object to prevailing opinions.

BILL TO

Secure the Extension of Civil and Religions Liberty.

WHEREAS

1 it is expedient to remove the Disabilities under which persons suffer desirous of endowing, creating, and maintaining charitable and other Trusts for religious and ethical inquiry, so as to further extend civil and religious liberty:

2 Nothing contained in this Act shall affect or be deemed to repeal or contravene in any way such parts of the Act 9 George II., cap. 36, relating to Mortmain as remain unrepealed, or any other Act amending or altering such Act; and the provisions of all such Acts now in force shall apply to all Trusts created under this Act.

3 After the pa.s.sing of this Act, notwithstanding any Act, Rule of Common Law, Rule of Equity, or Rule of Practice of any Court of Justice now in force to the contrary, it shall be lawful for any person to create and endow, or create or endow, any Trust for inquiry into the foundations and tendency of religious and ethical beliefs which from time to time prevail, or for the maintenance and propagation of the results of such inquiry. And the method of application of Bequests made for the purposes aforesaid shall be, on the part of those responsible for their administration, subject to revision at intervals of thirty years.

4 Such Trust, whether created by Deed or Will, or by other instrument, shall be deemed a charitable Trust, and shall be administered and given effect to in all respects in as full and complete a manner as in the case of religious and charitable Trusts now recognised by Law; and the doctrine of _Cy-pres_ shall be applied to it when circ.u.mstances shall arise requiring the application of such doctrine.

This Bill was not proceeded with. It required a member like Samuel Morley, of known Christianity and a conscience, to carry it through the House.

A theory has been started that by registering an a.s.sociation, under the Friendly Societies Act, it would legalise its proceedings and virtually repeal all the laws confiscating bequests. No case of this kind has come before the higher courts. To do the Government justice, I know no case in which the Crown has interfered to confiscate a bequest on the ground of heresy in its use. Members of families, legally ent.i.tled to the property of a testator, may claim the money and get it. If the family enters no claim the bequest takes effect. In the meantime the state of the law prevents testators leaving property for the maintenance of their opinions, and Christians bring charges against philosophical thinkers for lack of generosity in building halls as Christians do chapels.

The Christian reproaches the philosopher for not giving, when he has confiscated the bequest of the philosopher and the power of giving.

Priests often mourn at the disinclination to listen to the tenets they proclaim, and advertise in the newspapers the melancholy fact that only one person in five is found on Sunday in a place of worship, and do not remember how many persons remain away, not so much from dislike of the tenets preached, as from dislike of the injustice which they would have to share if they belonged to any Christian communion.

CHAPTER x.x.xIX. TWO SUNDAYS

None of our Sunday Societies or Sunday Leagues seem ever to have thought of the advantages of advocating as I have long done--two Sundays--a Devotional Sunday and a Secular Sunday.

The advocacy of two Sundays would put an end to the fear or pretence that anybody wants to destroy the one we have.

The Policy of a Second Sunday is a necessity.

It would put an end to the belief that the working cla.s.ses are mad, and not content with working six days want to work on the seventh.

It would preserve the present Sunday as a day of real rest and devotion.

The one Sunday we now have is neither one thing nor the other. Its insufficiency for rest prevents it being an honest day of devotion.

Proper recreation is out of the question. There is too little time for excursions out of town on the Sat.u.r.day half-day holiday. Imprisonment in town irritates rather than refreshes--mere rest is not recreation.

"A want of occupation gives no rest A mind quite vacant is a mind distressed."

Those who would provide recreation in the country find it not worth while for the precarious chance of half-day visitors. On a Secular Sunday recreation would be organised and be more self-respecting than it now can be.

1. It would conduce to the public health. The manufacturing towns of England are mostly pandemoniums of smoke or blast-furnace fumes. The winds of heaven cannot clear them away in one day--less than forty-eight hours of cessation of fire and fume would not render the air breathable.

2. With two Sundays one would be left undisturbed, devoted to repose, to piety, contemplation and improvement of the mind.

3. It would give the preacher intelligent, fresh-minded and fruitful-minded hearers, instead of the listless, wearied, barren-headed auditors, who lower the standard of his own mind by forcing upon him the endeavour to speak to the level of theirs.

4. A second Sunday would give the people real rest when n.o.body would frown upon them, nor preach against them, nor pray against them.

5. It would be cheaper to millowners to stop their works two clear days than run them on short days; and there need not be fears of claims of further reduction of forty-eight hours a week on the part of workpeople, who would have a real sense of freedom from unending toil with two days'

rest and peace. Manufacturing towns would no longer be, as now, penal settlements of industry. Holiness would no longer be felt to be wearisomeness.

But for Moses, the changes here sought would have existed long ago. One day's rest in the week was enough for Jews who were doing nothing when one Sunday was prescribed to them. Had Moses foreseen the manufacturing system, instead of saying "six days," he would have said, "Five days shalt thou labour."

If he deserves well of mankind who makes two blades of wheat grow where only one grew before; he deserves better who causes two Sundays to exist where only one existed before--for corn merely feeds the body, whereas reasonable leisure feeds the mind.

CHAPTER XL. BYWAYS OF LIBERTY