The Press. — London, England, 1858-10-02 00:00:00

THE PRESS, OCTOBER 2, 1858. THE WEEK. THE Revenue Returns just published are, we suppose, a further instance of what the Times called Mr. DISRAELI'S " luck." This is a con venient phrase to use when an opponent's calculations turn out to be correct ; but we think that by this time even the bitterest anti-Minis terialists will hold their tongue upon this subject. The increase in the general revenue for the year ending Sept. 30, 1858, as compared with the previous year, is a little under two millions, while for the last quarter alone it appears to be nearly 900,0001. It must be clear now to anybody's apprehension that Mr. DISRAELI's Budget was both safe and satisfactory ; and that while such results as these can be shown, it is idle for persons to indulge in the insinuations they have done against that gentleman's financial abilities. We may now look forward to the winter with a capital harvest, a flourishing revenue, and the most friendly understanding with foreign Powers to inspirit us. And we have very little doubt that for two of these blessings we have to thank a Conservative Government. Among the numerous public " orations" which the columns of our daily contemporaries have this week presented to us, Lord Goomicit's deserves especial notice, and the more so that he has been arraigned by the leading journal on a very groundless charge. There is nothing new, rays the oracle, in Lord GonEnicies observations. His Lordship has conic round to the idea that " a spade is a spade and a cat is a cat," with much more to the same effect. Now, we recollect an idle clever fellow at the University, who before going in for his examination, engaged a private tutor to instruct him in logic. When asked by his friends what he thought of his preceptor's powers, he replied that he seemed well enough, but that he told him " nothing new." This worshipper of novelty was, we need hardly add, hopelessly plucked, and affords an excellent instance of the ease with which any proposition may become familiar to us without in the least degree inducing us to think about it. Not less irrational is this appetite for telling or hearing some new thing on the part of the Times. Let us grant that Lord GODERICH told his audience at Knares borough nothing that had the character of a discovery. But what then ? Like the Oxford tutor, he was enforcing and illustrating laws which are as old as the human mind, but which are very frequently obscured through prejudice, or neglected through ignorance. Mechanics' institutes are the very places of all others where they are in danger of being for gotten. Indeed, it is quite a hopeful sign, and in some sense an actual novelty, to find the audience on such an occasion addressed in the • lan guage used by Lord GODERICH. A few years ago, we heard of nothing but the encyclopedic system. Give a man facts, it was said, and he could always reason about them. " Facts" were the raw material, and he could not have too much of them. Following very slowly in the wake of public opinion, but still following, the University of Oxford became infected by the same delusion, and adopted the principle of extensive knowledge just as the rest of the world was beginning to find out its absurdity. Many new authors were imported into the classical curriculum, modern philo sophers were added on to the ancient, and modern science had its own exclu sive honours reserved for it. University College, London, might have acted as a warning against this error, where the Professors were lamenting its bad effects Just when their brethren at Oxford were priding themselves on their enlightenment in accepting it. But, as it is, we already hear complaints on all sides that the results of an " Oxford educa tion" are no longer what they were, and that the thorough intellectual discipline of the old system has been sacrificed to a visionary standard of literary perfection. It is for exposing and refuting this dangerous error, among persons especially exposed to its influence, that Lord Gonunicii deserves our best thanks. It may be very true that large masses of our population can get nothing more than miscellaneous and superficial knowledge. But let them at least know that it is superficial. For the great mischief that arises from the system is not so much that a man gets crude opinions, as that he believes them to be well digested. Therefore, as Lord GODERICH well pointed out, let it be the first object with all the frequenters of such institutions to single out some one comparatively limited subject of study, and endeavour to make themselves master of that in all its bearings. By so doing, not only will they have strengthened their intellectual powers far more than by ranging at will over wide and various fields of knowledge, but, what is of equal importance, they will have obtained a standard whereby to gauge all their future acquisitions. They will have learnt what knowledge is ; and will have found an addi tional meaning in the proverb that truth lies at the bottom of a well—viz., that it is only by long and incessant labour that it can be pumped up. Now, all these reflections, if not new in themselves, have something of the force of novelty at the present day when delivered before a " literary in stitute." Coming from the lips of Lord GODERICH they assume a peculiar significance ; and we are at a loss to understand how they can have suggested the rambling and pointless article to which we have alluded, which we see from his speech on Thursday last, at Leeds, on a similar occasion, his Lordship treats with perfect good humour and indifference. Next to Lord GODERICH come Lord SHREWSBURY, Lord SANDON, and Mr. Hurr, who have been giving us their views on Cherbourg, the national defences, and the prospects of war with France. Lord SHREWS BURY was till very lately, and Lord SANDON and Mr. Hurr still arc, Members of the House of Commons. So that, when we find them agreeing in their anticipations of the effect produced on that Honourable Assembly by its visit to the great French fortress, we are bound to pay some attention to the fact. Men do not weigh their forms of expression very carefully in an after-dinner speech, and when Lord SIIREWISBURY said "he could tell" the House of Commons so and so, we see no neces sity for charging him with assuming airs of patronage towards the L ower House; while the language both of Lord SANDON and Mr. Hurr pr ove d that his Lordship was not singular in his prediction of a great alarmist movement among its Members in the next session of Parliament. As far as expenditure is concerned we believe that a good Channel fleet afloat and a well-disciplined militia on land is all that the country need charg e itself with. As long as the latter is embodied we have no fears on ic subject of French invasion. As to the possibility of that event we are very much of Mr. Hurr's opinion—that a successful war implies the existence of a successful general, and that a successful general, &C. &c. Nevertheless, w e believe in the good old maxim of always treating an ally as if he might one day be an enemy, and an enemy as if he might one day be an ally. The rule is somewhat selfish and misanthropical, we grant, and one that in a social sense we should not he the first to recommend. But in public affairs the case is different, and the more sincerely we believe in the friend ship and wisdom of our Imperial ally, the less need we be afraid of giving offence by adopting those measures which the experience of mankind forbids us to consider as superfluous. Turning our swords into ploughshares, we pass from war's alarms to the smiling festivities of agriculture : Porto mgricohe pierumque frnuntur, 3lntuaque inter se lseti convivia All the meetings of the past week have been characterized by an air of quiet contentment to which the late capital harvest has, no doubt, prin cipally contributed. At the same time we fancy that, if farmers were in reality so prone to grumble as they have been represented, the extraordi nary dryness of the season would readily have supplied them with a topic. The failure in grass and turnips, in many parts of the country, will cause a considerable falling oft' in the value of live stock, which is not more than compensated by other advantages. But the fact is, that the British farmer rarely grumbles unless he has something to grumble at. It was never pre tended that the repeal of the Corn Laws would ruin British agriculture, but that it would seriously injure, as it did, British agriculturists. What was complained of a dozen years ago was that the change was effected with so short notice that farmers had no time to accommodate themselves to it. This was a real grievance, and amply justified the indignation that was commonly expressed upon the subject. What unforeseen events may have contributed to the more speedy righting of the agricultural interest atter the shock inflicted upon it this is not the place to discuss. But the prospe rity of the farmer now, no more proves that his grievances were groundless then, than the recovery of West India property at the present day proves that the planters had no reason to cry out when reduced from opulence to poverty by the Abolition Act. The exclusion of political topics on these occasions accordingly renders the speeches rather briefer than they used to be. Mr. PuLtEn, indeed, in Hertfordshire broke through the rule, and even seemed as if he were trying to provoke Lord SALISBURY into some Ministerial disclosures. If. that were hie intention, he failed. The Noble Marquis was not to be caught. Curiosity respecting any new Reform Bill that may be in contemplation is, of course, very natural, and in nobody more so than in members of that party who had the good luck to carry the old one. That it will be pleasing to them can perhaps hardly be expected ; and so far, no doubt, Mr. PULLER did misunderstand Mr. HENLEY'S observation that the new measure would be satisfactory to all parties. The address delivered by Lord SHAFTESBURY to his audience of peasantry on Saturday last, and that of Lord STANLEY at Fishmongers% hall, complete the number of these speeches which it has this week been our duty to notice. The speech of the Noble Earl was characterized by sound sense and philanthropy, and we sincerely trust that his hearers took the lesson to heart. Drunkenness in the men and slovenliness in the women are the two great evils of cottage life. The system of allotment grounds, to which Lord SHAFTF.SBURY did not allude, has proved one power ful instrument in checking the former vice, while the excellent wages and constant work spoken of by his Lordship, by putting it into the power of the labourer's wife to pay some little regard to decencies as well as necessaries, will enable his home to wear a more attractive aspect than the public-house. We are glad that his Lordship touched upon this point, because, among all the excelle nt and kindhearted schemes propounded for the amelioration of the labourer, it is too often forgotten that good and permanent wages are the first necessary. To bid a man with eight shillings, or even ten shillings , a week, and as many children to support, to be orderly, respectful, and take a pride in himself and his family, is a sad piece of mockery.-0 to 11 Lord STANLEY'S address we quote the following admirable article from the Daily News , in which the genius of the son of the Prune Minister is characterized in language so well chosen and so apposite that we kel we could not improve upon it. We record with much satisfaction this testi mony both to the abilities of the New Indian Minister and to the purity of the Government to which he belongs from the organ of a party which sits on the Opposition benches, and we trust we may accept it as an earnest of the spirit in which the policy of Government will be met in the ensuing session of Parliament : " Lord STANLEY, at the Fishmongers'-hall banquet, expressed the belief—and we are quite ready to indulge the hope—that the transfer which has taken place of the Indian Government from the East India Company to the Executive of this country, may on the whole be p roduc tive of benefit to India. As our readers are aware, we oppo.sed that change, especially in the form under which it was at first proposed t" the consideration of the Legislature. In the progress of the nieasure . through Parliament it experienced many important modifications; gild we are quite free to admit that, if the time had indeed come when the transfer of power from the hands which had so long wisely and success fully wielded it, could no longer be postponed, that transfer, m the shape it finally assumed, was effected in the manner least liable to serious objet , Lion. Every new scheme of government depends mainly for its success I 956