The Licensing Bill passed its second reading in the House
of Lords on Thursday, after a debate of very little importance, though one speech, the Bishop of Peterborough's (Dr. Magee's), was remarkable and courageous. He pleaded for the right of the ratepayers to have some voice in the regulation of the liquor traffic, by giving them representatives on the Licensing Boards, but he said incidentally that he was not only not pleading for the principle of the Permissive Bill; but that he abhorred it : —"If I were given the choice, I should say that it would be much better that England should be free than that England should be sober," "for with freedom we must eventually -obtain sobriety, but on the other hand, we should lose both freedom and sobriety together." For a bishop that was as bold a saying as it was wise, and we confess we wish Dr. Magee would make less scruple of speaking on properly political subjects. If the Bishops are in the House of Lords for any pur- pose at all, it is not so much to express the opinion of their order on ecclesiastical subjects, as to apply the principles of the 'Christian Church to the policy of the half-Christian world ; and when minds as masculine as Dr. Magee's venture upon this, the whole country is the gainer.
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