Early in 1850, when the friends of Church Education met at Willis's Rooms to discuss and protest against the Government's Education Bill, he declared himself a decided opponent of "National Education upon strictly Church principles," which, as interpreted by some of the speakers, were "indistinguishable from those of the heretic-burners of the Inquisition." The cleavage between the various schools, and the narrow bigotry of all, moved him to an impassioned appeal in which the Gorham case, and the secession of Newman, are brought in to reinforce his plea for toleration:--
O Gentlemen! O Servants of the poor dear Church of England, while you are boxing and brawling within the sanctuary, why send forth these absurd emissaries to curse the people outside? They don't mind your comminations, they are only jeering at your battles.... The people in this country _will_ learn to read and write; they will not let the parsons set their sums and point out their lessons, or meddle in all their business of life. And as for your outcries about infidelity and atheism, they will laugh at you (as long as they keep their temper) and mind you no more than Mumbo Jumbo.
Sound doctrine this, but it was all forgotten in the frenzy of the "No Popery" movement a few months later. _Punch_, in a poem on "Consolation amid Controversy," gives thanks that the days of persecution are past:--
We've now some sharpish mutual slanging, But, Heaven be thanked, there is no hanging! No axe, no chopping-block, no drawing, But only just a little jawing.
There's no Jack Ketch his business plying, People beheading, throttling, frying. _Punch_, and he says it without boasting, Does all the cutting up and roasting.
As a matter of fact, the whole of Volume xix. is dominated by the one subject. The "cutting up and roasting" of the Pope and Cardinal Wiseman, of Passionists and Puseyites, is conducted on every other page. The Pope's message was "the greatest bull ever known." In "Pontifical News" we have a series of imaginary appointments, including a Papal Lord Chancellor, miracles and conversions, winding up with the announcement that the Palace of Bedlam will be proposed as the residence of the new Primate of England. Simultaneously, burlesque rival claims are put forward on behalf of other creeds--Mohammedan, Buddhist and Brahmin.