The Commons peremptorily rejected on Tuesday all the more important
amendments engrafted by Lord Salisbury on the University Tests Abolition Bill ; the new test for tutors, the engagement "not to teach anything contrary to the divine authority of the Holy Scriptures," was rejected without a division. The amendment exempting the Heads of Colleges from the operation of the Bill was rejected by a majority of 106 (255 to 149). The amendment preventing the governing bodies of Colleges from making any alteration in the statutes re- stricting fellowships in certain cases to persons in holy orders was disagreed with without a division. With relation to the amend- ment inserted by the Lords requiring religious instruction to be provided by the Colleges for students who are members of the Church of England, Mr. Gladstone proposed to limit it to Colleges now in existence, as it is quite possible that Colleges or Halls intended expressly for Roman Catholics or Dissenters might come into existence. Even as so altered,—though Mr. Gladstone supported this concession to the pride of the Lords,—the clause was carried only by a majority of 32 (165 voting against and 197 for it). On the clause providing for the use of morning and evening prayers (in shortened and adapted forms) in the College chapels,—i.e., in the chapels of now existing Colleges, as Mr. Gladstone amended the clause,—there was again a division in which 99 of the Nonconformists and other Liberals voted against 229 who supported it. The Bill as thus amended is now certain to pass, as the Lords cannot possibly insist on amendments carried by themselves by so very narrow a majority, and abandoned by the Conservatives of the House of Commons. All but divinity degrees, and all but
the clerical fellowships of Oxford and Cambridge, are, therefore, at last really opened to Roman Catholics and Dissenters. The clerical fellowships must be looked to next.
