and Fector, Nicholl, Bramstone, Bethell, and Pringle I do not know now by sight. It is really amusing to see the joy with which the news of Baring's defeat has been hailed by every member of his own family, and all others who have heard of it. The goodwill of the world (a very inert but rather satisfactory feeling) has been exhibited towards me, and there is mixed up with it in all who are acquainted with the surly reformer who is my adversary a lively pleasure at his being baffled and mortified. July 23rd, 1835 {p.280} [Page Head: IRISH CHURCH BILL.] Dined with Bingham Baring[13] yesterday, and met Whateley, Archbishop of Dublin, a very ordinary man in appearance and conversation, with something of pretension in his talk, and telling stories without point, which smelt of the Common room; nevertheless he is a very able man, and they told me that when he is with such men as Senior, and those with whom he is very intimate, he shines. I was greatly disappointed with what I saw and heard of him. The Church Bill has been in the House of Commons these two nights. Peel introduced his motion for dividing the Bill in a very able speech, well adapted to the purpose, if anything was to be gained in such a House of Commons; but the fact is, both parties look beyond the immediate question: one wants to bolster up the present system, the other to overthrow it, and though I go along with Peel on his _point_, I go along with his opponents on their _principle_. He stated, however, very forcibly the dilemma in which his opponents are placed, and said, 'Why don't you make the Establishment Catholic at once, openly and avowedly, or abstain from doing what has that inevitable tendency?' Melbourne said there was no escape from this, and I replied that I would take him at his word, and that it must come to this, and he might immortalise himself by settling the question. It certainly would be a glorious field for a statesman to enter upon to brush away all the obstacles which deeply rooted prejudices and chimerical fears founded on false reasoning throw in his way, and bend all his energies to a direct and vigorous course of policy, at once firm and determined, looking the real evil in the face, and applying the real remedy to it. If I were Prime Minister I would rather fall in the attempt than work on through a succession of expedients none of which were satisfactory to myself, to hold language at variance with my opinions, and to truckle to difficulties which it is now time boldly to face. I am as satisfied as of my existence that if the heart's core of Peel could be laid open, it would be found that he thinks so himself. His is not the conduct of conviction, and he has been led into contradictions and inconsistencies which must ever beset and entangle those who persist in the attempt to maintain positions which have ceased to be tenable. [13] [Afterwards the second Lord Ashburton.] Goodwood, July 29th, 1835 {p.281}