to me
that he saw no alternative but the compromise, but that he did
not know whether his party would be brought to consent to it. I
told him that they could not help themselves, and must consent;
besides that, if the Tithe Bill is passed they will have got the
security for the Church which they require, and the ground of
objection to the Corporation Bill would be cut from under their
feet. It is remarkable, and rather amusing to a neutral like me,
to hear what each party says of the concessions of the other. I
see in the 'Examiner' this day that 'the Lords cannot now pass
the Bill if they would, without disgracing their party in the
House of Commons,' and Wharncliffe said that 'the Government
could not give up the appropriation clause in the Tithe Bill
without covering themselves with disgrace.' In my opinion the
disgrace is not in making concessions which reason and expediency
demand, and which are indispensable to the peace and tranquillity
of the country, but in ever having pledged themselves to measures
for party purposes, or to accomplish particular ends, without
calculating the consequences of such pledges, or estimating the
degree of power that they would possess of giving effect to the
principles they avowed. This applies more strongly a great deal
to the Whigs about the Tithe Bill than to the Tories about the
Corporations; but it does apply to both, and it is a national
misfortune when two great parties so commit themselves that no
adjustment of the question at issue between them is possible
without some detriment to the credit and character of both.

[5] [He was entirely an Englishman, for he was born at
Boston before America was separated from England, and
his whole family came to this country when the war
broke out.]

March 18th, 1837 {p.391}

[Page Head: THE BISHOPS IN A FERMENT.]

Three weeks, and nothing written. The dejection of the Tories at
the division on the Corporation Bill has been since relieved by
that on the Church-rates, which they consider equivalent to a
victory; and so it is, for the probability is that the Bill will
not pass the House of Commons. The debates have been good upon
both these matters. Just before the question came on, the Bishops
made a grand _flare-up_ in the House of Lords. The Archbishop of
Canterbury (Howley), with as much venom as so mild a man can
muster, attacked the Bill. Melbourne replied with some asperity,
and the Bisho