new colonial secretary, that the new advisers of Her Majesty were not
"inclined to give their consent and support to any arrangement the
result of which would too probably be the diversion to other purposes
of the only public fund ... which now exists for the support of divine
worship and religious instruction in the colony." It was also
intimated by the secretary of state that the new government was quite
ready to entertain a proposal for reconsidering the mode of
distributing the proceeds of the sales of the reserves, while not
ready to agree to any proposal that might "divert forever from its
sacred object the fund arising from that portion of the public lands
of Canada which, almost from the period of the British conquest of
that province, has been set apart for the religious instruction of the
people." Hincks, who was at that time in England, at once wrote to Sir
John Pakington, in very emphatic terms, that he viewed "with grave
apprehension the prospect of collision between Her Majesty's
government and the parliament of Canada, on a question regarding which
such strong feelings prevailed among the great mass of the
population." The people of Canada were convinced that they were
"better judges than any parties in England of what measures would best
conduce to the peace and welfare of the province." As respects the
proposal "for reconsidering the mode of distributing the income of the
clergy reserves," Hincks had no hesitation in saying that "it would be
received as one for the violation of the most sacred constitutional
rights of the people."

As soon as the Canadian legislature met in 1852, Hincks carried an
address to the Crown, in which it was urged that the question of the
reserves was "one so exclusively affecting the people of Canada that
its decision ought not to be withdrawn from the provincial
legislature, to which it properly belongs to regulate all matters