The Press. — London, England, 1858-08-14 00:00:00

774 love and admiration for what is lovely and gene- I rous, or of contempt and hatred for what is vile and execrable, should be forgotten or abandoned. And it is a strange mistake to think it ever was the object of the Papacy to make men socially or individually wicked, or that it was ever generally regarded as a necessary means to gain the great end which the Papacy has ever had in view. That end was always and is always simply poli tical ; it was to keep men in helpless and de pendent tutelage. And it is not necessary utterly to demoralize a community in order to make or keep it politically degraded. Virtues can never cease to be venerable and lovely, nor vices to be hateful ; but our admiration and our love of virtues may be modified, and so may our natural abhorrence of vice. Constructive vices may lessen the heinousness of real ones, and virtues may be turned aside from their fair scope and defrauded of all their worth and efficacy. To attend devotedly to one's own private business is on all hands justly held to be a virtue; but, as PLATO tells us, he that breeds his children up only, or even firstly, to look always after his own private business, breeds them up not to be citizens but slaves. The simple distribution of natural virtues into independent, unconnected specialities is degradation : it is like confining a mechanic to makmg the wheels or linking the chains of watches, without ever allowing him to combine them into a useful motive instrument, or even know the final destination and capacity of what he spends his whole life in constructing. These specialities in virtue stop the man from being a complete man, instead of enabling him more perfectly to be one, as the specialities in mechanism prevent the man from being in any true sense a watchmaker. This mimicking of manhood, this making of men into pieces, as it were, of men—a citizen of one, a husband of another—giving one the part of poverty to play, another that of magnificence and wealth—segregating some in solitude and gathering together others into the multitude and discipline and irresponsibility of armies—was the way to do the work of Jesuitry. It was a coun termanding of the whole primeval order of our creation. But it was only a logical prerogative of jus divinum. THE PRESS, AUGUST 14, 1858. sloe, began to rise—trade in all its branches having, after long-continued stagnation, began to revive. The visit in every respect was as admirable as its political effect was great. The weather was splendid, the sight presented by the multitude of ships in the roadstead magnificent, the crowd on land enormous, the enthusiasm excessive, the thundering of cannon tremendous, the Emperor and Empress delighted, the Queen and the English Princes pleased, the English and French, whether nautical, military, or civilian, on the best of terms. lam quite surprised to find that newspapers, private letters, and people who were there, not only agree in saying that every thing went off well without a single mischance, but in abstaining altogether from those sneers at, and illnatured remarks about, the English which were so freely indulged in when the Queen was in Paris in 1855. The very cocked hats of our naval officers, though uncouth in the extreme, escaped criticism ; nor was the self-constituted deputation of the House of Commons, though over•fussy and boisterous, so much quizzed as might have been expected. So smoothly and pleasantly did matters run that not even Janicot of the Gazette de France, as fervent as ever in his determination to destroy the British empire by means of leading articles—a peculiarly hard task this hot weather—not even he has been able to say anything at all smart against the hated English ; his lies even have been failures. I hear that the Emperor has not been so gay for many a day as since his interview with the Queen of England. His Majesty regards it justly not only as a triumph for his policy, which is more than ever an alliance with our country, but as a mark of personal friendship to him; and the personal friendship of the Sovereign of England is of inestimable value to the monarch of revolutionary France, especially when he is, as the Emperor called himself, a parvenu. As to the Empress, she, as I before told you, looks up to the Queen with mingled gratitude, respect, and affection; and her joy at seeing her Majesty again was consequently unbounded. Both the Emperor and Empress kissed the Queen on meeting and on taking leave ; the Prince Consort., the Prince of Wales. and the Duke of Cambridge on those occasions kissed the hand of the Empress, and with marked cordiality grasped that of the Emperor. The Emperor and Empress are pursuing their " progress " through Brittany, and will be engaged in it for nine er ten days to come. At Brest and some other places they were received more warmly than had been hoped for; but they must not expect in that province, dominated as it is by Legitimists and priests, anything like the enthusiasm which has been manifested in their visits to other parts of the empire. The Government, I am informed, has received in telligence that at Constantinople serious agitation prevails amongst the Turkish population, and that a popular rising against the Christians is not at all un likely. The accounts from the Turkish provinces are also extremely grave. They represent that hoatili• ties between Turks and Christians are in some places imminent—in others actually raging. All this has created great uneasiness in our political circles. It shows that the definitive settlement of the " Turkish question " is of urgent importance ; and yet the difficulties of coming to a settlement are so great as to appal the most experienced diplomatists. It is said that at Cherbourg Lord Malmesbury and Count Walewski had a very long conversation on the matter, and that they agreed on certain points on which England and France should act in accord. Since the Cherbourg interview I believe that commu nications have taken place between our Ambassador, Lord Cowley, and the French Cabinet on the same subject. The Emperor was very anxious to have the Con. ference about the Danubian Principalities conclude its labours before the 15th, so as to enable the result to be announced on that day, and thereby give eclat to his fete; but though anxious to please his Majesty, the plenipotentiaries have not thought it prudent to hurry through the matters which are still pending, and so they will have to sit after the 15th. Nevertheless, it is not improbable, from all I hear, that they will agree to sign definitively the resold. tions they have already come to, which resolutions concern all the really eisential points ; and the Emperor, therefore, can, if he think fit, publish then in honour of his fête. I am told, by the way, that some of the plenipotentiaries do not like the idea of matters of grave European importance being treated as an element in the rejoicings of a Parisian holiday. _ _ The Duchess Mathieu de Montmorency, widow of tha Duke Mathieu, a most excellent man, has just died at an advanced age. The family of Montmo rency, one of the most ancient and illustrious of ell Europe, is menaced with extinction in the male hoe. Only four male members of it exist, and three of them are of advanced age and childless; th e youngest is fifty-four years old, and not married, nor likely to he. Sunday is always shamefully desecrated in Paris, but the desecration of next Sunday will be on a tar grander scale than usual. It is the Emperor's fête, and all day long there are to be concerts, halls, mountebank shows, gratuitous theatrical perform ances, and greased poles for young gentlemen to climb up, and at night these things are to be fol lowed by fireworks, illuminations, and other re joicings. All Paris will of course be on foot, and the city will besides be invaded by tens of thousands of provincials brought up by cheap excursion trains. Fast and furious will be the mirth and revelry, and audacious the contempt of one of God's commands. Some agitation has been caused in the (French) Protestant community, by the Consistory of Nantes having dismissed one of its ministers, the Rev. Mr. Robineau, for having declared himself opposed to the doctrine of infant baptism ; and by the Rev. Mr. Mooed, of Paris, and some other distinguished Pro testants, having complained of this act as a violation of the " liberty of conscience " which is one of the fundamental bases of Protestantism. The affair has arisen most unluckily, as it threatens to create a division in the Protestant phalanx of France, at the very time at which the Papists are assailing the Protestants with east 3ssive vehemence. P.S.—The evening journals publish a despateit from Marseilles, which announces the arrival of letters from Constantinople confirming wbat said above as to fears of an outbreak taking place in that capital. This despatch adds, that the Sultan had left with several vessels of war to make an excursion to Smyrna and the Archipelago. His departure at this moment seems singular, and the reason given for it is still more so. "He has gone," says the despatch, "to prove his confidence." The same despatch says that a conspiracy for the assassination of the Chris tians has been discover .d at Smyrna. lam assured on the eve of closing this letter that the Government has to-day received new despatches which paint tho situation in Turkey and at Constantinople in the darkest colours. Marshal Randon has this day notified to his friends his intention of resigning the. Governor• Generalship of Algeria. THE FOLLOWING ANECDOTE ABOUT CHERBOVRO is supplied by the Manchester Examiner :—ln our Ordnance-office there are plans of the works at Cherbourg quite qs accurate and complete as will be that model which it is said the Emperor is to present to our Queen. No thanks for this to the French authorities, for they were obtained by the skill, the patience, and the tact of one of our engi neer officers. Two or three years ago you might have met at one of the hotels of that town an Eng lish gentleman who seemed one of the idlest of mortals, and at the same time one of the most ec centric in his tastes. It was difficult to understand why a man who really seemed to have nothing to do, whose time was passed in strolling in cafes and in lounging, should have selected so dull a place as Cherbourg for the very protracted stay he made. No professional object could, it would seem, have taken him there, for no one ever saw anything in his hands but a walking-stick ; and although it is true that he did occasionally smoke a cigar now on this bastion and now on that ravelin, no one ever saw him take the trouble to make anything like the tour of the enceinte, and among the visitors to the port none were so incurious as to the works going on. And yet all the time that man was making a plan of th e works. His harmless looking walking.stick was a yard measure. As he trailed it listlessly up an d down, it was doing its work. A pocketinstrumen t measured every angle when no one's eye was up on him. And thus, by visiting in succession during many months every portion of the fortifications , and combining his notes, our countryman had at last the satisfaction of p!acing in the hands of the military authorities that complete and accurate survey of the fortifications of Cherbourg which they now possess. So impossible is it to keep anything secret when men of energy, skill, and patience are determined to tin lit out' [lt appears, however, from communi cations addressed to the Times that the above story is, to say the least of it, apocryphal.] jr °reign 6Orrespontenct. PARIS, Thursday. OF all the successes in foreign policy obtained thus far by the Derby Cabinet, the greatest, without ques tion, is the visit of the Queen to Cherbourg. That event is of immense political importance ; it may almost, without exaggeration, be said to rank next to the signing of the treaty between England and France for making war on Russia. It rolls away the clouds of distrust, suspicion, and dislike which recent events and newspaper squabblings caused to exist between the two countries; it places their alli ance on a firmer basis than it over stood on before— ay, even during the war; it baffles for many a day to come the Russian intriguers, and their continental creatures, whose object is, at whatever cost, to bring about a separation between the two nations. To appreciate fully this great event, a man should have been living for some time in the political circles of Paris. He would then see clearly how completely has given way to good feeling, disquietude to confidence, the dread of war to the conviction that peace will be maintained ; be would see that the friends of the Emperor are exultant, because they feel that his Throne has bee►, consolidated ; he would see tbat even the eminent statesmen and politicians of former days are, in spite of their dislike to the Em pire, glad exceedingly, because France has been snatched from the side of despotic Russia, and placed shoulder to shoulder with liberal England —a nobler alliance far. He would see that almost all the conti. nental diplomatists, great and small, appear relieved from a load of anxiety, because the Cherbourg interview was—Peace. And, after a few minutes' conversation with banker and merchant, he would learn that as complete a transformation has taken place in the commercial as in the political world—the rente and all other securities having, after months of depres•