system at elections, and
during his short Parliamentary career he made the ballot the subject of
an annual motion. Some of us can still well remember George Grote in
his much later days, and can bear testimony to the fact that, to quote
the thrilling words of Schiller, he reverenced in his manhood the
dreams of his youth. We can remember how steady an opponent he was of
slavery, and how his sympathies went with the cause of the North during
the {216} great American civil war. One can hardly suppose that
Grote's style as a speaker was well suited to the ways of the House of
Commons, but it is certain that whenever he spoke he always made a
distinct impression on the House. Some of us who can remember John
Stuart Mill addressing that same assembly at a later day, can probably
form an idea of the influence exercised on the House by the man who
seemed to be thinking his thoughts aloud rather than trying to win over
votes or to catch encouraging applause. Grote's speech on Ward's
motion brought up one view of the Irish Church which especially
deserved consideration. Grote dealt with the alarms and the
convictions of those who were insisting that to acknowledge any right
of Parliament to interfere with the Irish State Church would be to
sound in advance the doom of the English State Church as well. He
pointed out that, whatever difference of opinion there might be as to
the general principle of a State Establishment, the case of the two
Churches, the English and the Irish, must be argued upon grounds which
had nothing in common. Every argument which could be used, and must be
used, for the State Church of England was an argument against the State
Church in Ireland. The State Church of England was the Church to which
the vast majority of the English people belonged. It ministered to
their spiritual needs, it was associated with their ways, their hopes,
their past, and their future. If an overwhelming majority in any
country could claim the right, by virtue of their majority, to set up
and maintain any institution, the Protestant population of England
could claim a right to set up a State Church. But every word that
could be said in support of the English State Church was a word of
condemnation and of sentence on the State Church in Ireland. The Irish
State Church was the Church of so small a minority that, when allowance
had been made for the numbers of dissenting Protestants in Ireland, it
was doubtful whether on