Yesterday week Mr. Osborne Morgan asked the House of Commons
to affirm that Dissenters are entitled to be buried in the national burying-grounds with religious services other than that of the Church of England, and with services conducted by other than Church-of-England clergy. The debate was a spirited one, introduced by an admirable speech from Mr. Osborne Morgan, in which he criticised very ably the assertion that this was a movement intended to end in Disestablishment, and asked whether language like the Bishop of Lincoln's, about the deadly sin of schism, and the sacrilege of robbing God of a foot of ground to give to schismatics, tends to Disestablishment more or less than the policy of comprehension. The Home Secretary, Mr. Cross, made a speech intended to minimise the grievance bygetting rid, as soon as possible, of the burial-places in dispute. The majority of the churchyards should be shut up on sanitary grounds, says Mr. Cross, and if the sanitary laws were what they ought to be, there would soon be hardly any open churchyard left to quarrel about. This, however, was giving the go-by to the question at issue, not answering it, as Mr. Walter showed, who stated the question neatly thus,—Was it, or was it not, fair that, for the interval still remaining during which a great many churchyards must be open, these churchyards should be considered cemeteries for all public purposes ? This question Mr. Walter answered in the affirmative, nor did his very moderate and thoughtful speech receive anything like a refutation.
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