24 APRIL 1852, Page 1

a disheartening revival of peevish and unreasoning bigotry. The didates

adapt their professions to the tastes of constituencies. As need requires, they are Protectionists, Free-traders, Ultra-Pro- further Democratic concession; but they are all implicit believers in Lord Derby, and ready to waive any policy or any principle at' his bidding. cate the state of popular sentiment and opinion, they go to betray tinues to be the unscrupulous manner in which the Derbyite can-

At Edinburgh and Glasiieow, a piedge to support the repeal of the endowment has en made the indiSpensable, apparently the only indispensable test of a candidate's fitness. When the practical unimportance of the grant is considered, and so many great and' vital questions are at issue, thid infinite littleness combined with'

ner of annotincing the Wisempu hierarchy, justified, as it provoked, prominence, in some constituencies the almost exclusive preference given to the topic of the Maynooth endowment, is astounding.

deep malevolence is pitiable. Unquestionably, the insulting man- a considerable - burst -ofAnglish resentment against the Romish - Court; there is no doubt that the tactics of the Ultramontane fac- tion in the Romish Church in Italy, France, and Ireland, warrant the keeping a vigilant watch over its machinations. But its pro- pagandist intrigues and its political manoeuvres are not to be counteracted by manifestations of personal antipathy to the whole Roman Catholic body. The influence of the Mtramontanists over the educated laity of their flocks is less now than it ever was ; but to brand them as dangerous and disloyal subjects, by withdrawing at this moment from their theological seminary that State support which is so much more liberally extended to the theological semi- naries of the Anglican and Scottish Churches, can scarcely fail to touch their esprit de corps, and throw them into the scale of priestly agitators. Even this, however, is a lesser evil than the swerving from clear views and generous sentiments of religions toluenes which have prevailed since Catholic Emancipation. The Anti- Maynooth agitation world revive the policy of making certain religionists a less favoured class of citizens. It is no excuse for

this to say that the Catholics have been ungrateful for emancipa- tion : they owed no gratitude for a tardy and reluctant conces- sion of undoubted civil rights ; their emancipation was not granted on the condition of their continuing to be Catholics in name only. Free tolerance means tolerance of every opinion, however absurd, so long as it is only maintained by-argument and persuasion, or the lawful exercise of constitutional privileges. To abandon this high ground, is to relapse into the persecuting tenets of darker ages.