Mr. Byron Reed devoted a speech which would have been
still more effective if he had not depended on others for his Welsh translations, to exposing the extraordinary violence,. falsehood, and scurrility of the Welsh vernacular papers against the Church ; but the chief interest of the debate was that, while Mr. Bryce argued for Welsh Disestablishment as likely to prolong the existence of the National Establishment in England, Sir William Harcourt took up his parable against all Establishments, and maintained that every Established Church loses popularity by its Establishment, and especially that the unpopularity of the Established Church in the rural districts of England is due to its Establishment. In fact, he made his speech a speech against the National Establishment as a whole. The division showed a majority of 47 against the motion (267 to 220).
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