Brethren votes against it in this House, and nearly every one works against it in his diocese.
They have been unusually active during the past year.
, in moving that the Bill be now read a second time, said: My Lords, I need detain your Lordships but a very few moments.
This Bill has already been brought forward three times during the last four years; and it is barely a year since it was last before the House.
He disclaimed not merely the Levitical argument, but the entire Scriptural and theological argument, and, as your Lordships will remember, confined himself to an eloquent protest against what he termed the eviction of sisters-in-law and their re-admission as caretakers. Prelate is by no means singular in his belief that marriage with a deceased wife's sister is not forbidden in Scripture.
No less than 1,300 of the English clergy, including nearly 30 Bishops and Archbishops, and 300 of the Scotch clergy, have, at one time or another, made a similar declaration.
Bench is to point out that in two respects it is very misleading—first, because people, seeing how large a majority of right rev. Coplestone, the Bishop of Llandaff, Bishop Lonsdale, Dr.
Prelates oppose this Bill, are apt to conclude that therefore the Bill must contain something very shocking to religion and morality; and, secondly, because they naturally suppose that all good Churchmen, as a matter of course, have always been, and ought of necessity to be, hostile to this measure. Vaughan, and the present Bishops of Ripon and Worcester, and of many other distinguished men, are sufficient proof to the contrary, and ought besides to be some guarantee that neither religion nor morality is in danger.
As regards the United Kingdom, this is, perhaps, not quite accurate, for the law in Scotland is doubtful.
The Act of 1835 did not apply to Scotland; and the highest living authority, Lord Fraser, is of opinion that if a case were now tried in Scotland, it would probably be found that marriage with a deceased wife's sister is at this moment legal there.
But, unfortunately, the great majority of the right rev.