The National Register. — London, England, 1820-05-08 00:00:00

I It - - ; THE PRESENT SENS7WI OP PARLIAMENT. Tor subject which first attracts our attention on the opening of a new Parliament, and of a new re i g n, is what is termed " The King's Speech," tit:lough we both (of course) constitutionally, and some measure personally, consider the same as the speeelt of the Ministers. We are glad to oh. serve some notice there taken, at last, of the dis tresses of the people, and some expressions of commiseration for them; but we are sorry to learn that all the comfort offered to us is, the old song of Castlereagh and Co., that they are but temporary. Now if they are temporary (which we have been told these five years, during which things have got worse and worse), they must be temporary from one of these two reasons:-1. Either the fugitive nature of the malady ; or, 2. From some radical measures likely to be soon adopted, with every fair prospect of alleviations to the thing complained of. And yet we find the wisdom and firm:less of the late Parliament panegyrized ; a Parliament which contri buted, by the wisdom of their Counsels, not one individual measure to fill the hungry mouth, or com fort and aid the empty belly. To frighten and deter they au " pewit quad vivida virttts," all they could! But whether wisdom and firmness, amid rublic distress, be simply shewn by measures of coercion alone, we shall readily leave Lord Castle reagh's friend, " Posterity," (to whom he has left I.is treaties of peace as a kind and benevolent legacy -ss" with all assurances of his high and continue csisideration)," to decide. What supple kind of a thing posterity may he, *romped and hood-winked, as the animal will be, %Altered into the world under the midwifery of that astonishing accoucheur, Doctor Sidmouth Sangrado, and dandled by Lord Castlereagh, we cannot bno gine; but we must own this ministerial manifesto and panegyric, under a new reign, does not augur any thing very good. Thu answer of the Commons and Lords is, as usual, an echo of the Speech; and while totems of civility and respect, the expression of great truths is to be sacrificed, we cannot much wonder that Princes who live at a distance from the bulk of mankind, and have only a bird's eye view of things below, are continually misled.' We are sorry to observe, that it is not Parliament alone, but public meetings called, upon the accession of his present Majesty to the throne, which have abstained from addressing the throne in that language which the times imperiously require. It is the• misfortune of the age, and the peculiar disgrace of our opponents in public matters, that the cause of humanity and truth, if advocated by an oppositionist, is stigmatized with the imputa tion of party motive, and we know that an unwil lingness to do any thing which could be imputed to so narrow a spirit, and which, from such imputation, might have lost its practical effect, alone hindered some individuals from making comments upon many of the complimentary addresses lately presented to the throne. Perpetual opposition looks like ob stinacy too often, instead of what it ought to be deemed, against error, manly perseverance. In some such language as the following we should wish the throne to have been addressed : " Sire,—We approach the throne, not to flatter, and much less to insult you, but as addressing a Sovereign who ought to consider himself as having no rights and no interests separate from his people, hut whose political existence ought to be identified, as our father and our friend, with the interests anal happiness of the community, over which, with regal you are cv.ll4ollfteside. Coo not deceive yourself, Sire, you have sue cteded under trying circumstances to the throne of ycuiatat•stors! ond as new situations have actually st.tne effect in modifying our proteeding., we derive h :pes ua that score to the public councils of the ct—ntry. Hut, Sire, we cannot conceal from you th.tt, in Gar judgment, the true spirit of that free itnr, NATIONAL /IF-GISTEA Constitution, of which you are the executive head, has been under your predecessor's reign, from one cause or another, much impaired. Not that we would blame your predecessor, who has paid what Kings like subjects must pay, the debt of nature, and with whose reign we join the recollection of some particular acts grateful to us as freemen, and the remembrance of distinguished private virtues, but that we lament the general tenor of the public cour sels to which it was not surprising your prede cessor should be favourable, when he saw them sanctioned by those Parliaments, which were sup posed to represent the feelings and the judgment of the British people, but which appear to have been too compliant to the feelings of sycophants or mis. taken men, who either to flatter power, or through some fatal error in judgment, contributed to give both to their Sovereign and the Parliament erro neous views of public affairs; and who, in particu lar, have dared to avow, and act upon a notion, that the interests of a comtnunity arc chiefly cobfined to the existence and welt-being of particular classes, and not in the feelings, interests, sod happiness of that multitude of reasonable beings, with the shape and intellect of man, who are those subject* which 'the King, as the great executive bend, is designed to govern. " What is the consequence of such counsels? You have great chew, in certain classes of society, of riches and prosperity, but amid these appearances, those classes of the community, whose industry maintains us all, arc oppressed, and a large portion of them utterly deprived of those comforts to which even the humblest walk of honest industry is en. titled; while thousands, beyond those who belong to professions, Or who follow salaried employments naturally growing out of a civilized state, fatten on the labour of their fellow-creatures, amid opulence which has accrued to them out of public pedlary and extravagant Aissipetion of the public burthens— burthens intended in their nature merely to supply the necessary wants of Government, and not to op press the people; we are told that these incon veniences resulted from wars which have saved us from revolutim, of which, if there ever has been really any just apprehension, that apprehension might have been much more easily removed 'by timely congestions to the wishes of the people in political mattes, and which ultimately, we are per suaded, will be made, when the necessity of those concessions Ara us in the face, amid general ruin. " Sire I These great truths have not been au& eiently prase upon your predecessor! and instead of measures of public relief; the attention of Govern ment seems ',holly to have been directed towards suppressing be force the effects, and not relieving the causes, of public uneasiness. " The legislative bodies, and especially the repre sentatives of the people, were intended to establish that communication between the people and the Government, which should hinder such a stale of things. Exercise, then, we beseech you, the con stitutional power which you possess, by calling around you men who shall take every step to identify those bodies (which were intended to attach and link the people to the throne), with the feelings and the interests of the community, and which, by modifica tions and changes no way endangering their exist ence, it is both possible and easy yet to accomplish before an entire distrust of those who govern, arises in the hearts of those who obey." Such is the language which we think ought, under present circumstances, to be addre‘sed to the throne, and we shall pursue, in our next number, the thread of our ideas. We have little to add at present but to look back with pity (while we acknowledge the necessary jus tice of their fate) upon those unhappy men who, goaded in their minds by a sort of insane despera tion, would have snatched the rap of vengeance from the hands of God and their country, against Owe whom they deemed objects of their vengeance.— Thank heaven! bad as things are, there is no reason yet to despair, that public delinquency will, wherein it really merits, sooner or later meet with punish ment, without invoking the hand of the assassin to supply its place. But what must be the feelings, if any feelings they pwsess, of those who have been, and who still persist, the supporters of the Pitt system, when, as now, they view the effect of their measures, in having reduced Englishmen to such a state of poverty and distress, phrenry and eespair, afforded such fi.ad for discontent to brood upon, that thirty or forty individuals (if first accounts be true) Englishmen, could be found worked upon, by a sense, however shamefully directed, of public injury, so as to handle the dagger of the assassin ! We shall drop the .subject, content with remind ing Pittites, wherever they remain unshaken by the remonstrances of truth. of this aphorism, " Oppres sion and misery are the parents of crime;" because, though they can never drive a good man to bad deeds, yet they drive the evil to acts of wicked desperation. One more topic solicits our attention this week, and it is " the Civil List ;" upon which %ye shall briefly say, that we are greatly surprised (heedless of public opinion as Ministers appear), that they have not, in ;he name of their Royal Master, offered some diminution of the public burthens connected with this article, rather than put into his mouth that he will be content with what was settled in the year 1816, when it is by no means clear that the mine grounds exist for the different items, and when, if they do exist, the hourly craving necessity of the times cries out, that great sacrifices must be made somewhere, and where can they begin so well as at Court? -.. FROM SATURDAY NIGHT'S GAZETTE. Tbis Gazette notifies the appointment of Charles Woodcock. • ofCorentry. in the county of Warwick. Gent. to be a Master Extraordinary in the Court of Chancery. BANKRUPTCIES SUPERSEDED. W. Matthews. Birm ingh am. Warwick. upholsterer. R. Kay, Bury, Lana.Aire. cotton winner. BAN knurrs. J. Newill, Cbcapaide, stationer. Solicitor, Mr. Abbott, Mark Lena aglicPc. Liverpool, porter merchant. Sol. Mr. James, Ely Holborn. T• MAW. grocer. Sol. Mr. Hindmiush, Soria, Street, C A. Fry, &pare, linen draper. Sol. Mr. Chipchase Bow Lane. 3. E. Cellim9Vll=Clingeide. cloth factor. Sol. Mr. Mayo. Lutinlion. fa;ari e re, dealer. Sols. Messrs.. ileimmisr. and Holes. Now Ina. J. Mies. Titeldeld, Inathampons. draper. Soh. Messes. Alemnder and Holm. New Inn. H. lialhawalavegroole printer. Bob. Meism. Adlington and Gregsry. Row. J. lomat. Boot Doellion, Norfolk, innkeeper. Sol. Mr. Testes, Tanis. J. Featherstone. WINOWAr. victualler. Sol. Mr. Bette. De netlike Sweet, Queen Swam, T. Creasy. Chohnehed, Seem draper. Sol. Mr. Bond. Ware. Huts. J. Beck, Sweeting's Alley. Cornhill. watchmaker. Soh • Mesas. Mayhew and Co., Chancery Lane. J. and J. Silver. and A. Bee son, Size Lane, merchants. Sols. Mobs. Keeney and Spurr. Bubopsgate Street. DIVIDE DS. May 30. B. Wells. Gratechurch Street. hosier—V. E.Sourne. Austinfriars. merchant-27, J. Blake, Parente.) Green, brewer— y. W. Hodge, Great Hermitage Sueet. ship owner-16, W. Parker. Whiteclutpel, oilman-27, M. Bucklabtl. Bayswater. victualler-27. J. and J. Coombe*. Sitadaeli. coopers-30, G. Brown. Broad Street, Westminster. upholsterer-30. J. I itman . Sun Street. Ilishopsgate. tallow chandler-20, W. and 11. Munro. Upper Thames Street, merchantst-30, W. Cross. Lom bard Street. banker-31, W. Nicholls, Huntingdon. sack and ro pe maker-27. W. Davis, Newbury, Berk*. upholsterev—E 4 G. Upton, Queen Street, oil and colour merchant-21, J. Cut bush. Aylesford, Kent, barge bnikler-30. W. E. Browne. Stock Exchange. stock broker—in, J. Day and J. Spratswell. Tayis tick Street, Covent Garden, drapers-27. R. Crombie. Chelsea, victualler_ 30. G. Ridge, Reading. Beats, millwright—l I, J. S. Manfredi, T. Litif, and H. Henshull, Norton Falgate. silk dyers—June 6, T. A. Minchin, W. G. Carter, and A. Kelly, Portsmouth, bankers. CERTIFICATES to be granted May 27. D. Chettleburgh. jun. Norwich, wine merchant—S. llould. Laytonstone, Essex, butcher—H. Feadierstonlisugh, Bishop Wearmot silt. Durham, coal fitter—J. Bone, Time, Cornwall, linen draper—T. Salisbury, Preston, Lancashire, grocer—lt. Ayers and T. llolmes, Newcastle upon Tyne, limn drapers-- A. Shaw. East Smithfield, victualler—W. liissix, Blistol. piye maker—G. Rudd. Norwood. miller—J. Macintosh, Kingston, Surrey, nialturr—W. Flear, Turnagain Lane. Fltet Market, painter—N. Parker, Comptos Street, Brumwirk Square, met , . chant—S. Neville, Leeds, tour seller-3. Wells. N ev.purt, Mot.- mouth. boat builder—T. thigin. Trentham. Hatind, dealer-- ' IL and J. Ilo,king, South Brent, Devonshire, 3 ion mokers—T leutlitter. Newcastle upon Tync. liren draver—D. Lakeman Liverpool, merchant—S. George and U. Ilri4tol, sugar r.finers. PRIVATE PETITIONS.-It will he seen by our report of the proceedings in the House of Commons on Thursday night last, that the time for receiving private petitions, which was originally limited to the sth of May, has been extended on the mot ion of the Speaker to the 12th instant.