The Sun. — London, England, 1865-11-02 00:00:00

Mr. Gladstone in Scotland. GLASGOW, Wednesday. The proceedings in connection with the visit of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to this city com menced this morning with the presentation of an address from the Parliamentary Reform Union, in the Trades'-hall. Mr. Graham, M.P., occupied the chair, supported by Mr. Dalglish, Mr. Lamont, the Lord Provost, Admiral Erskine, Mr. Moir, and Mr. Crum-Ewing, M.P. The CHAIRMAN introduced the deputation of the Reform Union, one of whom, Mr. Moir, read the address:— "To THE RIGHT 110 N. WILLIAM EWART • GLADSTONE, M.P., CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER. " The members of the Glasgow Reform Union desire to join in the welcome given to you on the occasion of your visit to this city.. They remember with pride your Scottish descent, the connection of your ancestry with the shire of Lanark, and that your high and honourable public career contributes to the honour of Scotland, whose honour is identified with that of all her sons. We also profoundly appreciate the many happy results to the whole Empire which have followed your financial and other measures, liberating commerce from many restrictions, and pray that you may be long spared to confer further benefits on your fellow -countrymen by the same liberal and enlightened statesmanship. " We look forward with much hope to your wise policy still further lightening the burden of taxation which yet presses heavily upon the people, whose physical and moral condition would become proportionally improved, and the mass of pauperism which yet disgraces our country thus be largely diminished. " The members of this Union rejoice in your hearty ex pressions of trust in the people ; that your sympathies are entirely with them ; and that your desire is to see a great number who are at present debarred from citizenship ad mitted within the pale of the Constitution.! " We rejoice that you have declared that' If forty-nine fiftieths of the working-classes are to be excluded from the franchise it is upon those who maintain that exclusion that it rests to show its necessity.' Holding the maxim of Sid ney, ' That the liberties of nations are from God and nature, not from kings,' we regard the exclusion of the working classes from political liberty to be a national injustice, and its continuance therefore unsafe for the nation; that this disfranchisement by those who are in power is in violation of the law of Christ, who said, ' Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them. "We deeply regret that it should be necessary for Bri tish workmen to emigrate before they can obtain the status of citizens, " We believe that not until the interests of the working classes are directly attended to by representatives in whose election they share, will your noble effort for financial re form be duly supported to a legitimate extent, their ideas of economy, acquired in the school of necessity, being very different from the ideas of those who at present control the public expenditure. " We therefore hope that in the approaching session of Parliament a comprehensive measure of reform, extending the franchise both in counties and borough; and providing for a redistribution of seats, may be introduced and success fully carried through by the Government of which you are so influential a member. We believe that no other legisla tive measure will tend so much to the general elevation of our fellow-countrymen ; that no other measure will so effec tually promote a truly national system of education for the entire people: that no other measure will tend so much to sweeten the breath of society, and beget contentment, peace, and the mutual reconciliation of all classes of the community. "We pray, honoured sir, that your life's work may be crowned by seeing the great mass of your fellow-country men enjoying the dignified and ennobling position of citi zenship, their children having free access to all the means of the highest Christian civilisation, and Britain maintain ing her precedence of teaching nations how to live." MR. GLADSTONE, who was received with enthu siastic cheers, said—Although the straits of restricted time are hard upon me, although I feel it my duty chiefly to endeavour to pay honour to the commu nity of Glasgow in that place where I am after a few minutes to meet that community as a whole, and as it is represented by those whom it has chosen to high office, yet I could not reconcile it to my feelings to quit this room without begging you to accept my very cordial acknowledgments for the address which you have been so good as to present to me in a manner so gratifying to my feelings— (cheers)—and while I feel myself bound to eschew detail—even to request indulgence on account of the necessity of the occasion—l must thank you, and thank you very particularly, for reminding me upon such an opportunity of my connection, not only with Scotland at large, but I must even pre sume to say with the city of Glasgow, through the medium of the shire of Lanark. (Cheers.) I think, gentlemen, there are .very few of those who can claim a connection with Scotland who are indis posed to make that claim wherever they may find themselves. If Scotland is not ashamed of her sons, her sons are not ashamed of Scotland, and the memory of the parents to whom I owe my being combines with various other considerations to make me glad and thankful to remember that the blood which runs in my veins is exclusively Scottish. (Cheers.) Gentlemen, you have touched in this address on questions of the greatest importance which I must not here endeavour to open, but, again appealing to your indulgence, I will simply my one word upon them taken in the mass. In the first place, I am glad that you have expressed with manly, outspoken plainness and distinctness the sentiments which you entertain upon subjects of great public interest and importance. It is by this plain outspeaking of sentiments, by reserving no thing, by keeping in your breasts no silent grudges, by bringing out into the light alike our subjects of satisfaction, our wishes for improvement, and, if there be such, our causes for complaint, that we in this happy country make common stock, as it were, of the whole of our public ideas and feelings, and lay a foundation upon which those who represent you and those who advise the Crown may pro coed with some confide nce i n th e i r en d eavours to I suggest measures for the benefit of the country. (Loud cheers.) And, gentlemen, you are well aware that as the proposition which I have just ventured to state applies to every question, so it applies with even still greater force to those that are of the most difficult character in themselves, and to those upon which, although not very difficult in themselves, an extensive variation may prevail, although it may be foreign to the merits of the question itself. With regard to the great subject which gives its title to your association, I simply beg you to put faith not so much in a man, not so much in a set of men, not so much in the chosen representatives of the people at any given moment, as in the institutions and habits of the country-. (Cheers.) Whatever wants are deeply felt, whatever convictions are widely and profoundly entertained, we may be assured, for we know it from a long and extensive experience, these wants and these conditions will mike their way to the surface, they will do themselves justice, and the results of that free bearin g and free discussion which every opinion from every quarter maintains among us is sure to be, not perhaps as quickly as the more eager among us could desire, but yet, if slowly, on that account all the more securely, a settlement conformable upon the whole to public justice. Without in the slightest degree attempting at the present moment to foreshadow or to forecast any method of proceedings—nay, even admitting the discouragement that may have arisen from former events with regard to the particular subject of the franchise, with unbounded confidence I am per suaded that whenever Parliament shall find the opportunity of addressing itself to the consideration of that question, and will approach it in a spirit on the one hand of prudence, and on the other hand of manliness and courage, the end which they will pro pose to themselves will be public justice, and they will seek, by any provisions they may incorporate in the law, neither to continue, nor to set up, nor in a ny manne r t o f avour dominion, or the undue in fiuence of one class as compared with another, but in a fair adjustment of common rights and common interests to make Provision fo r th e h app i ness an d for the strength and prosperity of the country. (Loud cheers.) The proceedings terminated in cheers for Mr. Gladstone, the chairman, and Mr. Dalglish. Leaving the Trades -hall at half - ast one 'cloc Mr. Gladstone drove to th e CentralPCookin og Dep k ot in Irongate, having inspected which he proceeded to the City-hall, where the ceremony of presenting him with the freedom of the city was to take place, and every part of the hall was crowded. Mrs and the Misses Gladstone, Ladyßlantyre, and the Mar quis of Lorn occupied seats in the front gallery. On the platform were the magistrates and members of the Council, Mr. Dalglish, M.P., Mr. Graham, M.e., Sir E. Colebrooke, Mr. Crum-Ewing, M.P., Mr. Merry, M.P., Capt. Spiers, M.P., the Dean of Faculty, &C. At two o'clock, Mr. Gladstone, ac- companied by the Lord Provost, appeared on the platform, and was received with loud and con- tinuous cheering. The LORD PROVOST, in presenting the freedom of the city to the right hon. gentleman, referred to the distinguished services which Mr. G 1 Ldstone had ren dered to the country, and the important changes which he had effected in our financial system for the relief of our home trade and manufactures. An address having been read by the Town Clerk, the freedom of the city, inclosed in a massive gold box, was presented by the Lord Provost to the right hon. gentleman, who, on receiving it, warmly shook hands with the chief magistrate, and then turned to address the.meeting, by whom he was received with loud and long continued cheering. The audience rose to greet him, and for some moments there was a complete:ovation, the ladies in: the gallery waving their handkerchiefs, and the gentlemen their hats. Silence having at length been restored, Mr. GLADSTONE said—l need hardly tell you that it is with the liveliest and deepest feelings of satisfaction that I accept from your hands, my lord, the gift you have been pleased to present to me, to be preserved, I hope, for many long years among the records and the treasures of myfamily. (Cheers.) I have no doubt, indeed I feel too well assured that a critical judgment might find ample scope for re mark upon the too flattering terms in which you have been pleased to advert to my public conduct, but still I presume to say that such acknowledg ments as you are pleased to make on occasions like the present of the feeble and humble efforts of any individual to render services to his country are the choicest rewards that we can receive for the past, and are the greatest encouragements and incentives, the greatest and most powerful aids for the future. (Cheers.) But such occasions lead us to review the position in which we stand, and to reflect upon that which has been and that which is to be ; and per haps it might at first sight appear strange if upon an occasion so joyous, when I have received at your hands an honour so deeply valued, I confess to you that a powerful, perhaps a predominant feeling in my mind at the present juncture is a feeling of solitariness in the struggles and in the career of public life. (Hear, hear.) The Provost has alluded briefly, but touchingly and justly alluded to the loss we have just sustained, and has intimated to you that the covenant which brings me before you was a covenant concluded before that loss had taken place; but indeed the retrospect of the last five years is in this regard a touching and melancholy retrospect. Sad, numerous, and wide have been the blanks which death has made in the ranks of our public men, and not alone of our official public men, for many in this country is the public man, many is the statesman who renders true and vital service to the land, but who has never touched a public salary. (Cheers.) Within these five years we have lost him whom I must name as the most illustrious in his position and his office—the beloved husband of our Queen, revered, admired, loved by all classes of the community, and one whose departure from this mortal home has inflicted on the Sovereign so dear to our hearts a loss that never on this side the grave can be repaired. (Hear, hear.) I pass from the Prince Consort to another name, widely, indeed, separated from him in social rank, but yet a name which is great at this moment in the esteem of the country, and which will be for ever great in its annals—l mean the name of Richard Cobden (loud cheers)—so simple, so true, so brave, and so far seeing a man, who knew how to associate him self at their very root with the deep interests of the community in which he lived, and to whom it was given to achieve, through the moral force of reason and persuasion, numerous triumphs that have made his name immortal. (Cheers.) But if I look to the ranks of official life, perhaps it may cause even sur prise, though we know that our losses have been heavy, when I say that my own recolle,ction supplies me with the names of no less than 17 persons who have died within the last five years, and whose duty and privilege it was to advise the Sovereign as mem bers of the Government of this country. (Hear, hear.) As to the last of these mon, the distinguished man whose loss at this moment the whole community in every class and in every corner of the land deeply and sincerely deplores, we have this consolation—that it had pleased the Almighty to afford him strength and courage which carried him to a ripe old age in the active service of his coun try. (Hear, hear.) It has not been so with all. It has been my lot to follow to the grave several of those distinguished men who have been called away from the scene of their honourable labours—not, indeed, before they had acquired the esteem and confidence of the country, but still at a period when the minds and expectations of their fellow-country men were fondly fixed upon the thought of what they might yet achieve for the public good. Two of your own countrymen, Lord Elgin and Lord Dalhousie, Lord Canning, Lord Herbert, Sir Geo. Cornewall Lewis, and the Duke of Newcastle, by some singular dispensation of Providence, have been swept away in the full maturity of their faculties and in the early stages of middle life—a body of men strong enough of themselves in all the gifts of wisdom and of knowledge, of experience and of elo quence, to have equipped a Cabinet for the service of the country. (Cheers.) And therefore, my lord, when I look back upon the years that have passed, though they have been joyful years in many re spects, because they have been years in which the Parliament of this country has earned fresh and numerous titles to the augmented confidence of its citizens, they are also mournful in that I seem to see the long procession of the figures of the dead, and I feel that those who are left behind are in one sense solitary upon the stage of public life. (Cheers.) But, my Lord Provost, it is characteristic of this country that her people have been formed for many generations in those habits of thought and action which belong to regulated freedom, and one happy and blessed result of that description of public edu cation is that the country ceases to be dependent for its welfare upon this man or upon that. There never has yet been in the history of the world a nation truly free—l mean a nation that is free not only in laws and institutions but in thoughts and acts—there has never been a nation in this sense possessed of freedom, and which has likewise had large and spreading and valuable interests, which has found a want of men to defend them. Nor, my Lord Pro vost, I am thankful to say, have we yet been reduced to this extremity, and I trust that I am not going beyond the liberty of an occasion such as this when, standing before you at a moment of such public in terest, I venture to express my confidence personally in the state of the Government and the country. Her Majesty, well aware of the heavy loss which we have sustained, and wisely exercising her high pre rogative, has chosen from among the statesmen of the country Earl Russell to fill the place of Prime Minister. (Loud cheers.) I know well the inclina tion of those whom I am addressing, and also of the whole community, to trust more to the evidence of ee L ) Latta than t o t h at of words, which may be idle and y de o l u us t i h v a e t — t 1 ( 1 1 l e name (hear, a lia of r --ordanßd presumeßussell Issell is in itsli toosaay pledge and a promise to a people. (Cheers.) A man who fought for British liberty, for our institutions, and for our laws, but with a view to the of those laws, who has fou g ht on a hundred fields for their improvement, is not_ likely now, when in his 73d honourable year, to unlearn the lesson of his whole life, to change the direction of his career, and to forfeit the inheritance which he has secured in the hearts and memories of his countrymen. (Cheers.) Therefore, my Lord Provost, I venture to think that the country has reasonable assurance in the name of the person who has for the second time assumed the responsibility of guiding the councils of a Crown, with the aid of many experienced and distinguished persons whom I am happy to call my colleagues—l therefore hope that the country has reasonable as surance that the same wise and enlightened spirit which has for the last 30 or 35 years distinguished in the main the policy of British legislation and the conduct of the Executive Government will still con tinue to be exhibited by those who will have the re sponsibility and direction of public affairs. My Lord Provost, if we look to the acts of the period through which we have been passing, they are in deed too numerous to allow of fre erence in detail. The acts of legislation and of government in which my share has been, if earnest, yet secondary-- those acts of legisla t i on and government have embraced almost every subject that can be of inte rest to a free and civilised community. In the period which our own recollection comprehends we have seen the popular franchise wisely and temperately, yet boldly, enlarged ; we have seen the education of the people immensely extended, with, at the same time, all due regard to the sanctity and integrity of religion on the one hand, and to the feelings of pri vate conscience on the other—(hear, hear)—we have seen religious disabilities, for the most part, swept away ; we have seen questions of social policy deeply interesting and deeply momentous asserting from year to year greater and still greater importance ; we have seen, as I have said, the principle on which and the method by which taxes are taken from the people largely reconsidered and revised ; and we have seen all these changes made with a view to the promotion of one great end—the freedom of inter course not only among the various members of our own community, but also among the various mem bers of the great human family, the nations of the world. (Cheers.) Well, my Lord Provost, in my prime I have taken part in the struggles of political parties, and it may be my lot to continue to bear a share in them, and I will not disavow nor under value the use of party combinations. It is by means of party combinations as a general rule, and by those means alone, that the matured convictions of expe rience can find the final and distinctive expression in the form of laws and institutions ; but yet party is only an instrument ; it is an instrument for ends higher than itself, and those ends are the strength, the welfare, and the prosperity of our country. (Cheers.) We may now presume to say that it is the peculiar felicity of our time that the good of each to the country is not now to be regarded as it was in old times, as something distinct from the good of the rest of mankind ; but, on the contrary, when we la bour for the advancement of our countrymen we la bour likewise for the advantage of the whole world. (Cheers.) Therefore, my Lord Provost, when I look back on the numberless changes in these various chapters of legislative and constitutional improve ment, I confess that the most fertile result of all— although I have no desire to disparage the others, for they are intimately woven together, as it were, with a silver cord—the most fertile result probably is that which I may describe in the well-known familiar and beloved words—the promotion of free trade. (Cheers.) It is quite unnecessary before this audience—l may venture to say, it is unneces sary before any audience of my countrymen—to dwell at this period of our experience upon the material benefits that have resulted from free trade, upon the enormous augmentation of national power which it has produced, or even upon the increased concord which it has tended so strongly to promote throughout the various sections of the community. But it is the characteristic of the system which we so denominate, that while it comes forward with homely pretensions and professes, in the first in stance, to address itself mainly to questions of material and financial interests, yet, in point of fact, it is fraught and charged throughout with im mense masses of moral, social, and political results. (Cheers.) I will not now speak to the very large measure of those results which are domestic, but I would ask you to consider with me for a few moments the effect of the system of unrestricted intercourse upon the happiness of the human family at large. Now, as far as that happiness is connected with the movements of nations, war has been its great implement. And what have been the great causes of wars ? They do not come upon the world by an inevitable necessity or through a providential visitation. They are not to be compared with pes tilences and famines, even ; in that respect, though we have learnt, and justly learnt, that much of what we have been accustomed to call Providential visitation is owing to our neglect of the wise and prudent means which man ought to find in the just exercise of his faculties for the avoidance of cala mity ; but with respect to wars, they are the direct and universal consequence of the unrestricted, too commonly of the unbridled, passions and lusts of men. If we go back to a very early period of society we find a state of things in which, as be tween one individual and another, no law obtained —a state of things in which the first idea almost of those who desired to better their condition was simply to better it by the abstraction of their neigh bour's property. (Laughter.) In the early periods of society piracy and unrestrained freebooters among individuals were what wars, for the most part, have been in the more advanced periods of human his tory. Why, what is the case with a war ? It is a case in which both cannot be right, but in which both may be wrong. (Laughter and applause.) I believe if the impartiality of the historian surveys a very large proportion of the wars that have deso lated the world—some, indeed, there may be, and undoubtedly there have been, in which the arm of valour has been raised simply for the cause of free dom and justice—that the most of them will be found to belong to that less satisfactory category in which folly, passion, greediness, on both sides, have led to effects which afterwards, when too late, have been so much deplored. We have had in the history of the world religious wars. The period of these wars I trust we have now outlived. lam not at all sure that there was not quite as much to be said for them as for a great many other wars which have been recorded in the page of history. The same folly which led to the one led in another form to the other. We have had dynastic wars, wars of succession, in which for long periods of years the heads of rival families have fought over the bleeding persons of their people to deter mine who should govern them. I trust we have outlived one period of wars of that class. Another class of wars, of a more dangerous and yet a more extensive description, have been territorial war. No doubt it is a very natural, though it is a very dangerous and a very culpable sentiment,which leads nations to desire their neighbours' property, and I am sorry to think that we have had examples —perhaps we have an example even at this moment before our eyes—to show that even in the most civilised parts of the world, even in the midst of the oldest civilisation upon the continent of Europe, that thirst for territorial acquisition is not yet ex tinct. (Cheers.) But I wish to call your attention to a peculiar form in which during the latter part of human history this thirst for territorial acqui sition became an extensive cause of bloodshed. It was when the colonising power took possession of the European nations. It seems that the world was not wide enough for them. One would have thought, upon overlooking the broad places of the earth, and thinking how small a portion of them is even now profitably occupied, and how much smaller a portion of them a century or two centuries ago— one would have thought there would have been ample space for all to go and help themselves ; but, notwithstanding this, we found it necessary, in the business of planting colonies, to make those colonies the cause of bloody conflicts with our neighbours ; and there was at the bottom of that policy this old lust of territorial aggrandisement. When the state cf things in Europe had become so far settled that that lust could not be as freely indulged in as it might in barbarous times, we then carried our ar maments and our passions across the Atlantic, and we fought upon American and other distant soilsfor the extension of our territory. That was one of the most dangerous and plausible, in my opinion, of all human errors ; it was one to which a great portion of the wars of the last century was due; but had our forefathers then known, as we now know, the bless ings of free commercial intercourse, all that blood shed would have been spared. (Cheers.) For what was the dominant idea that governed this policy ? It was this, that colonising, indeed, was a great function of European nations, but the purpose of that colonisation was to reap the profits of extensive trade with the colonies which were founded (hear), and consequently it was not the error of one nation or of another—it was the error of all nations alike. It was the error of Spain in Mexico, it was the error of Portugal in Brazil, it was the error of France in Canada and Louisiana, it was the error of England in her colonies in the West Indies and her posses sions in the East ; and the whole idea of colonisa tion, all the benefits of colonisation, were summed up in this, that when you had planted a colony on the other side of the ocean, you were to allow that colony to trade exclusively and solely with your selves. (Hear.) But from that doctrine flowed im mediately all those miserable wars, because if people believed, as they then believed, that the trade with colonies must, in order to be beneficial, necessarily be exclusive, it followed that at once there arose in the mind of each country a desire to be possessed of the colonies of other countries in order to secure the extension of this exclusive trade. In fact, my Lord Provost, I may say such was the perversity of the misguided ingenuity of man that during the period to which I refer he made commerce itself, which ought to be the bond and link of the human race, the cause of war and bloodshed, and wars were jus tified both here and elsewhere—justified when they were begun, and gloried in when they had ended— upon the ground that their object and effect had been to obtain from some other nation a colony which previously had been theirs, but which now was ours, and which in our folly we regarded as the sole means of extending the intercourse and the in dustry of our countrymen. (Hear, hear.) Well, now my Lord Provost, that was a most dangerous form of error, and for the very reason that it seemed to abandon the old doctrine of the unrestricted devas tation of the world, and to contemplate a peaceful end ; but I am thankful to say that we have entirely escaped from that delusion. It may be that we do not wisely when we boast ourselves over our fa thers. The probability is that as their errors crept in unperceived upon them they did not know their full responsibility ; so other errors in directions as yet undetected may be creeping upon us. Mo desty bids us in our comparison, whether with other ages or with other countries, to be thankful—atleast we ought to be—for the downfall of every form of error, and determined we ought to be that nothing shall be done by us to give countenance to its re vival, but that we will endeavour to assist those less fortunate than ourselves in emancipating themselves from the like delusions. I need not say that as re spects our colonies they have ceased to be, I would almost venture to say a possible—at any rate they have ceased to be a probable —cause of war, for now we believe that the greatness of our country is best promoted in its relations with our colonies by allow ing them freely and largely to enjoy every privilege that we possess ourselves ; and so far from grudging it, if we find that there are plenty of American ships trading with Calcutta, we rejoice in it, because it contributes to the wealth and prosperity of our Indian empire, and we are perfeetly assured that the more that wealth and prosperity are promoted the larger will be the share of it accruing to ourselves through the legitimate operation of the principles of trade. (Cheers.) But the beneficial influence of free trading intercourse is far wider than this. You stated that a treaty had been made with France, and cer tainly a treaty with France is even in itself a mea sure of no small consequence ; but that which gives to a measure of the kind its highest value is its ten. dency to produce beneficial imitations in other quar ters ; it is the influence which is given to the cause of freedom of trade by the example held out by the two most powerful nations of Europe ; it is the fact that in concluding that treaty we did not give to one a privilege which was withheld from another, and that our treaty with France was, in effect, a treaty with the world. (Cheers.) And what are the moral consequences which engagements of this kind carry in their train ? I know there is no part of the pro vidential government of the world which tends more deeply to impress the mind with a sense of the profound wisdom and boundless benevolence of the Almighty than when we observe how truly and how universally great effects spring from smalkcauses, and high effects from causes which appear to have been mean. Now, we have said that, with respect to freedom of commercial intercourse, reduction of tariffs, abolition of duties, and readjustment of com mercial laws, that these are things which in the first instance touch material interests, and there are some men so widely mistaken as to suppose that they touch material interests alone. There are some men, aye, and high-minded men, too, who would bid you beware of such things lest they should lead simply to the worship of Mammon. Now, the worship of Mammon is dangerous to us all, but, as far as regards the great masses—the more numer ous masses of every community—that portion of the human family which at present has not much to spare in respect to the e,ssentialslof raiment, of food, and of lodging—that portion of the human family has hardly yet reached the province in which the worship of Mammon is wont to be dreaded—(laugh ter and cheers)—but that is a subject for the private conscience and a subject of the greatest importance. There is no doubt that an infinity of moral danger surrounds a state of things in which multitudes of men find themselves rapidly possessed of great for tunes and entirely changing their social position. I do not deny that at the proper time and in the pro per place it is a subject for the most solemn con sideration ; but I don't think it the duty of Parli ment to withhold laws which are good from any fear of their leading to the worship of Mammon. That is an argument which if good in one case would be argued with equal force against all bless ings of Providence, for what is more dangerous to the human soul than those blessings of Providence when their great Author is forgotten ? ,(Cheers.) But, I say it is marvellous to see how the Almighty makes provision through the satisfaction of our lower wants and appetites for the attainment of higher aims, and the relations of business are doubtless founded upon pecuniary profits, as are also the relations of the tradesmen and custo mers ; yet what is their immediate aim ? The customer wants to be supplied wherever those supplies are best and cheapest, while the trades man seeks to dispose of them wherever they are dearest. What are the relations between the employer and employed ? The master wishes to produce as cheaply as he can, and the workman wishes to get the best wages he can. The landlord obtains the highest rent he can safely ask, and the tenant obtains his farm as cheaply as he can; and such is the rule that runs through all these pecuniary relations of life. Human beings on the two sides of the water are com ing to know one another better, and to esteem one another more ; they are beginning to be acquainted with one another's common interest and feeling, and to unlearn the prejudices which make us refuse to give to other nations and peoples in distant lands credit for being governed by the same motives and principle as ourselves. We may say that labelled on all those parcels of goods there is a spark of kindly feeling from one country to the other, and the ship revolving between those lands is like the shuttle upon a loom weaving the web of concord between the na tions of the earth. (Loud cheers.) Therefore I feel that that which may be in its first and in its outer aspect a merely secular work, is in point of fact a work full of moral purpose, and those who havegiven themselves to it, either in times when the system of free trade has become prosperous or in earlier times before those principles were accepted as they now are, could easily afford to bear the reproach that they were promoting the worship of Mammon, or that they were conversant only with the exterior and in ferior interests of men. In all cases it is the quiet, unassuming prosecution of daily duty by which we best fulfil the purpose to which the Almighty has appointed us, and the humble task, as it may appear, of industry and of commerce, contemplating in the first instance little more than the necessities and the augmentation of our comforts, has in it nothing that prevents its being pursued in a spirit of devo tion to higher interests ; and if it is honestly and well pursued I believe that it tends with a power quiet and silent, indeed, like the power of your vast machines, but at the same time manifold and resistless, to the mitigation of the woes and sor rows that afflict humanity, and to the accelera tion of better times for the children of our race. (Cheers.) Wars, my Lord Provost, are not to be put thwn by philosophical nor, I believe, even exclusively religious argument. The deepest pre judices of man, and the greatest social evils are only supplanted and undermined by causes of silent operation ; and I must say that, for my own part, I am given to dwell upon the thought that the silent and tranquil operations of these causes in connexion with the vast industry of this country constitute for us not only a promise of stability and material power, but likewise a mission that has been placed in our hands, that in being benefactors to ourselves we may also hope to be benefactors to the world. (Cheers.) And, Sir, I trust and I may say I feel well convinced that the ideas upon which the whole of these movements depend are well rooted in this country. Such prejudices as may remain adverse to freedom of trade in any of the multiform develop ments arc, I hope and believe, gradually fading away. It is noteasy to part with them, because we must admit, and especially we must admit so far as the working classes are concerned, that the first re organization of the principles may involve, or may appear to involve, something of a personal sacrifice ; but the whole mind in this community is perfectly, I believe, fixed in the conviction that these princi ples are the only principles upon which a country can be justly governed, nor need I say that which, is so well known, that this, at least, is a country in which the conviction of the countrymust be the regu lator of the State. (Cheers.) My Lord Provost, I once more thank you for the honour that you have been pleased to do me. I think that, so far as the prospects of our politics are concerned, the refer ence that I have made to the name of the distin guished person who has succeeded to the head of the Government is, perhaps, more becoming, and islike wise of a character to carry greater weight than any mere professions that I could lay down before you of a desire to serve my country. (Cheers.) It is an arduous task to which we are called. I do not hesi tate to say that the most painful, the most fre quently-recurring sentiments of public life must, I think, be a sense of the inadequacy of resources, inadequacy of physical strength, inadequacy of mental strength, to meet its innumerable obliga tions ; at the same time that pain is not aggravated by a sense that our shortcomings are severely judged. We serve a Sovereign whose confidence has ever been largely given for the counsellors who are charged with public responsibility, and we act for a people ever ready to overlook shortcomings, to pardon errors, to construe intentions favourably, and to recognise with a warmth and generosity be yond measure any amount of real service that may have been conferred. (Cheers.) We ought, there fore, to be cheerful; we ought, above all, to be grateful in the position in which we stand ; and these are not mere idle words, but they are what the situation evidently demands and exacts from us all, when we assure you that it is a rich reward to come among great great masses of our most culti vated and intelligent fellow-citizens to find our selves cheered onward in our course by acknow ledgments such as that which you have given me to-day. We have little to complain of ; we have much, indeed, to acknowledge with thankfulness, and most of all we have to delight in the recollec tion that the politics of this world are perhaps very slowly, with many hindrances, many checks, many reverses, yet that upon the whole they are gradually assuming a character which promises to be less and less one of aggression and offence ; less and less one of violence and bloodshed ; more and more one of general union and friendliness ; more and more one connecting the common reciprocal advantages and the common interests pervading the world, and uniting together the whole of the human family in a manner which befits rational and immortal beings, owing their existence to one Creator, and having but one hope either for this world or the next. Mr. Gladstone resumed his seat amid great cheer ing. He subsequently visited theExchange,where he was received enthusiastically by an immense throng within and without the walls of the building. In tho evening Mr. Gladstone was entertained at a priv.te banquet by the Lord Provost, after which the right hon. gentleman, escorted by his host and guests, repaired to the Scotia Hall, for the purpose of receiving an address from the working men of Glasgow. Mr. Daiglish, M.P., presided. The right hon. gentleman, on entering the hall, with Mrs. and Misses Gladstone and Lady Blantyre, were most enthusiastically cheered. The CHAIRMAN briefly opened the proceedings, and said that the working men of Glasgow having two years ago ' presented an address to the great and popular Minister whose death they were deploring, they were now anxious to pay a similar compliment to the working men of the late Cabi net. He reviewed the valuable measures which Mr. Gladstone had been instrumental in passing, which were doubly valuable for the benefits they would confer on the working classes, and expressed his belief that if he had been the son of a duke instead of a Liverpool merchant there could be ho doubt that at this moment he would have been at the head of the Government ; but as Mr. Gladstone had consented to retain office as Chancellor of the Exchequer, he could only congratulate them on still retaining his most valuable services in that most important post. (Cheers.) Mr. WILKINSON then read and presented the address. Mr. GLADSTONE on coming forward was received with th e warmest enthusiasm, the audience rising en masse and greeting him with vociferous cheering and the waving of hats. He said, Mr. Dalglish, Mr. Wilkinson, and Gentle men—Be assured that 1 do not underrate the value of this address, neither, I hope, do I overrate the position which 1 myself occupy in respect to it. This address contains much, gentlemen, and I have heard much in the :speeches that have accompanied it, which I could not with a good con science appropriate to myself. I am conscious that I am in a condition at the present moment the very reverse of that which sometimes is held by an unfortunate individual who, when he happens to be detected in a particular fault, forth with has laid upon him all the blame that is duo to all the faults of that particular kind that have ever been committed in the country. (Laughter and cheers.) That, gentlemen, is what is called being made a scapegoat, and I have been made a scapegoat in a very opposite sense, because it ap pears to me that the good deeds of men who have preceded me, and men who have greatly exceeded me, appear to bo so regarded in your minds as if I wore myself to reap at this happy moment their undivided credit. Gentle men, I ask for myself no such undivided credit. I pre sume to draw no distinction, and I could honestly draw no distinction, between myself and many more who have laboured as sincerely and more effectually in the same good cause. (Cheers.) I must even say a word—and it is the only word of criticism that I feel called upon to utter—l must even say a word after the speech of my hon. friend, your able, tri e d, and trusted representative—(cheers)—on behalf of the heads of departments; and I beg to assure those who now hear me that without the valuable assistance received from the experienced civil servants of the State it would be im possible for the political advisers of the Crown to have car ried into effect those improvements which have been of so much advantage to the country. (Cheers.) I am a follow labourer, gentlemen, with many more ; yet I do thank my honourable friend, and I do appropriate to myself, if I may do it without undue pride, that one expression which he has used when he has described me in an assembly of working mon, as myself a working man. (Cheers.) I hope, gentlemen, that I may be allowed to address you in that capacity. There is very little use in my coming among you to use the words of mere compliment or flattery; but this I do feel, that there is use in having personal contact between the public men of this country and the masses of the popu lation, if they meet together in that spirit of earnestness and sincerity which ought to characterise all our proceedings. And we live at a time when it is more than ever advisable, so far as it may be practicable, that a course of this kind take place; because the 19th century, whatever it is, is un doubtedly in a new and peculiar sense the century of the working man. It is the century which has seen his position raised, his circumstances improved, new means organised for his benefit, new prospects opened for the future, and he has before him—l mean not the individual, but the class— he has before him a prospect which, as Itrust, nothing can mar, of increased weight, increased consideration, increased usefulness, increased happiness in the generations to come. As by the law of Providence the working man and his family do constitute, probably must ever constitute, the great majority of the community, the circumstances attach ing to their condition must bo circumstances of the deepest interest to every man who carries a heart in his bosom. We have arrived at a time when it is for us to consider that which has taken place, and that which is yet to come. We have seen groat changes; the majority of those whom I am addressing are younger than myself, but many of them will recollect—and more particularly so for they have felt the nature and character of those changes— much has been done, happily done, to improve the general condition of the people. I do not mean to say that it is to be treated as a favour conferred on them. It has simply been the performance of a duty, as a matter of right and justice, aided by the progress of political economy, of social knowledge, and the favouring circumstances of the time. (Loud cheers.) I will endeavour, with your permission, to run rapidly over some of the particulars in which the posi tion of the working classes has been so greatly changed for the better, also as to what there are which may yet re main. Thirty years ago this country, like all other coun tries in the world, was overspread with a network of what was called the protective system ; and I cannot describe that protective system more truly and more concisely in any other words than by saying, that it appears to be an elaborate contrivance by means of which, under the mask and notion of doing good, a nation devises a most ingenious instrument for robbing, plundering, and impoverishing itself. (Cheers.) There was hardly a trade, with the ex ception of the cotton industry, that did not suppose itself to be more or less interested in this pretended protective system that is now like an evil dream passed away as a thing of the past ; and all that remains to bo done, with certain exceptions which I hope will soon disappear, and that we shall be thankful for the escape which we have had, is to endeavour to induce the other countries of the world to confer on themselves the same advantages which we have been happy enough to secure. Well, now, at the time I speak of what was the condition of the labouring man in regard to that which must over occupy a very largo share of his legitimate cares—anxieties, I mean, in regard to his access to the means of subsistence ? Almost every neces sary upon which he depended was taxed and enhanced in price, sometimes by the comparatively legitimate mode of the payment duo to the Exchequer, and applied to meeting the necessities of the State ; more frequently and mor e mks chievously in that unhappy and altogether illegitimate mode of artificially enhancing the price of articles raised at home by taxes imposed upon foreign imports, not for the purpose of feeding the public Exchequer, but for the purpose of adding to the price to be paid to the home producer, while at that time, gentlemen, there was hardly any single article of importance to the labouring man which was not sub jected to an enhancement of price ; but with great enhance ment by the operation of that system the importation of meat from abroad was prohibited, each was subjected to. a very high duty; foreign fruits were subjected to very high duties ; the elements of clothing, in some important con stituents, were subjected to duty; all the materials of house dwellings were subjected to duty—l do not speak of stone, in which Scotland happily abounds—but I believe that no philosopher ever has been ingenious enough, or bold enough, to tax the stones of which your houses are con structed ; but the Englishman who owes his dwelling to the useful and homely material of brick, had a very diffe rent story to tell, and the bricks could not be put into the wall of his house without having first paid a high duty to the excise. Tho wood, however, which, next to stone and brick, was the most important constituent of dwellings, was subjected to an immense duty, imposed more for the pur peso of protection than revenue, though partly for that, too ; even iron, the production of which is so eminently characteristic of this country, and even foreign iron was not allowed to come into the country without a protective duty imposed to enhance its price, though I do not believe or know that it was effectual for the purpose of enhancing its price. On glass, that essential condition of cleanliness, neatness, and comfort in the dwelling of any man—glass was enormously enhanced in price ; not so much, however, by protective duty, though partially also by that, but also in a groat degree by the operation of the system of excise. Well, now the protective duties are gone, and the duties, on what may strictly be called the necessaries of life, with few exceptions, are gone also; there is no duty upon bricks, and there is now no duty upon glass. There is no duty upon iron; the constituents of your dwellings are free, the constituents of clothing are absolutely free, and not a shilling in any form is levied upon them for the purpose of augmenting the revenues of the State; the broad which you consume is free, the meat which you eat is entirely and absolutely free, and you have a command of the markets of the world ; the cheese, butter, eggs, fresh fruit, all those articles which can fairly be de scribed as necessaries of life, are free from taxation, and of the tax-gatherer in any form or shape whatever. (Cheers.) If we pass on from necessaries of life to the comforts of life, then, at any rate, a considerable progress has been made; the duty on sugar—one of the most essential and valuable comforts—may now be stated at ld. per lb. Twenty years ago the duty in its direct operation on the revenue was not loss than 2jd. or 3d per lb., and the price was further en hanced by the operation of a protective system—so that, perhaps, I would not be far wrong if I were to say that, on the whole, the tax upon the sugar which you consume, and consume, I hope, pretty largely— (cheers)—for that is my interest—(laughter and cheers)—has been diminished from probably not less than 3d. to 4d. per lb. to a rate of about Id. per lb. That is a great progress made. (Cheers.) The other great and capital article, which may be said to con stitute a comfort all but essential for the masses of the community, is the article of tea. (Cheers.) Five and thirty years ago, I think, the average duty paid on tea in this country was about 4s. per lb. ; it is now reduced to 6d. (Cheers.) That also indicates considerable progress. There are, gentlemen, those who are so sanguine as to believe that the whole of those duties may be removed, and that all the comforts as well as the necessaries of life may be quite absolutely free. (Hear, hear.) I have no doubt at all that consummation would be extremely desirable (laughter)— but I do not come here to flatter or mislead—(hear, hear) —and I am bound to say that whether my great grandchild may or may not live to see that consummation arrive, I have not the smallest expectation of seeing it myself. (Hear, hear.) There is another description of taxation, gentlemen, which has undergone, on the whole, no reduc tion, and in some cases even an i ncrease , an d th a t ii the tax upon what I may call stimulants. (Laughter and cheers.) Under the description of stimulants I include spirits, beer, wine, and tobacco ; and, gentlemen, with re spect to that class of article, it certainly is not, I think, my own business, who do not deny to myself the use of them, to come here and preach among you a high and as cetic doctrine. (Hear.) And I will venture to say, particu larly in respect to tobacco, that as regards the mass of the community there is no sort of evil or mischief of a serious kind, at least so far as my experience and knowledge goes, to be traced to its use—(cheers and laughter)—but I do not venture to say that the exigencies of the country will per mit us to look forward to a very great diminution in that class of taxation which is laid upon what I have termed stimulants ; and I think that so long as these exigencies continue to be what they aro, and so long as we have not found any more satisfactory method of getting by direct process at the pockets of the taxpayers, it will be necessary for us to continue to raise money, I doubt, upon the stimu lants that are used by the population at large. However, gentlemen, on the whole this review, which is perhaps of a homely character, presents to us satisfactory features; it shows that at all events we get our fee from the poverty of the country as well as the magnificence of the State—it shows that the first wants of the human being, that are ne cessary for existence, that are necessary for decency, go free untaxed. (Hear.) It shows that the first comforts of the people, though they are not untaxed, are subject to taxes far more moderate than any that have been levied in former times, and likewise, I trust, that we may venture to believe that beneficial process which has operated those diminu tions in the burdens of the country have not yet reached the farthest point to which they may be carried. (Cheers.) About 50 or 55 years ago the taxation of the country amounted to £3 10s. per head. Immediately after the ter mination of the great war it fell considerably, and was brought down perhaps as low as £2 103 ; it is now very little over £2. But it would not be a fair statement of the case wore that 10s. looked upon as the whole advantage reaped by the community, because an increase, a just and necessary increase, has taken place in the expenditure of the country. (Cheers.) You know perfectly well, and I re joice that it is known perfectly well, that the wages of al most all kinds of labour have particularly increased. (Applause.) If the value of labour has increased to the in dividual employer it follows that it has rendered an in crease of pay to the Government officials necessary, and that therefore the soldier, the civil servant of all descrip tions, is much better paid _now and much better treated now than in former times. (Hear, hear, and applause.) That increase has increased the amount of taxation; but it is an increase, so long as the rate of pay to the civil servant, the soldier, and to the sailor is raised, and supposing justice with economy is practised, which no man in this vast assem blage will for one moment grudge. (Cheers.) That there is another way,a far more effective way, of judging how we now stand compared with the manner we stood forty or fifty years ago, is to consider what had been at the re spective periods the aggregate income of the country, and to consider how much of it has been taken away by the Government for the purpose of meeting the wants of the public service. Now, as well as I can venture to make a computation upon this subject, I will say that fifty years ago, out of every £6 of private income or assets of all classes taken together, £1 was taken aw a y b y G overnment for the purposes of the Exchequer, and that now, on the contrary, instead of taking £1 in every £6, which cannot be said to bo required for attaining the same purposes, but in a more extended and efficient manner, £1 in every £9 in the country is taken. Well, gentlemen, in that same period we have seen an extension of the political franchise of the community in England ; indeed, it does not appear to be very clear whether the proportion of working men who are now in possession of the suffrage is or is not greatly larger, or even, indeed, whether it is larger at all, than it was forty years ago, before the time of the Reform Bill. (Hear, hear.) But in Scotland, at any rate, no such com parison has been drawn. That proportion of the working classes which has been enfranchised has been a sheer addition to the constituency; for before the Reform Bill I apprehend there was no such thing as working men in Scotland who had the capacity, either in town or country, of giving a vote for their representatives in Parliament. (Cheers.) And, gen tlemen, without attempting to enter into the details, I will venture also to express the hope which I have expressed with regard to taxation, that on this point also we have not arrived at the final term of possible improvement; but on the contrary that the day may not be far distant when we may be per mitted to indulge the expectation of witnessing a further progress in the direction of an extension of the suffrage. (Cheers.) Another change, gentlemen, has taken place, of which I for one scarcely know how to state the importance. I mean the change that has been effected with regard to the conveying into the houses of the community what may be termed political information by the emancipation of the Press. (Cheers.) The omanicipation and cheapening of the periodical Press have constituted in themselves a new era in the existence of the working men of this country. I do not think it is necessary for us to find fault or pass a severe judgment on the more restricted system that pre vailed before. The truth is that this method of conveying information periodically upon public affairs to the various classes of the community is one of the advances, one of the real advances, effected by modern civilisation. (Cheers.) The newspapers altogether in the history of the human race are but as a thing of yesterday. When they began, their circulation was and long continued to be limited. Gradually it spread from class to class; they were the luxury of the very rich, then they became the enjoy ment of the middle class, and now, continually widening the circle of their benefits, they have become the privilege and accessible enjoyment, if one may venture to say so, of every member of the community. (Cheers.) No change, I believe, of a more beneficial character has been carried out for many years—nothing that has on the one side done more to convey satisfactorily to the public a large amount of political information, together with all other in formation of general and public interest now constantly supplied at the lowest charge, has done more by its reci procal action to strengthen the institutions of the country, by the promotion of contentment and by generating a strong sense of union and mutual goodwill in the various classes of the community. (Applause.) Well, gentlemen, I need not remind you how much has been done of late years for the promotion of public education. Reference may indeed still be made to that subject as one in which much remains to be done. Of that lam fully aware : it must continue to bo the subject of most serious anxiety to the public men of gnsiand to consider how a houotcial MOYeraent ill that direction can be continued and extended until we are able to say that, as now the necessaries of life for the purposes of bodily sustenance are supplied, so the necessaries of life for the primary purpose of mental cultivation shall be at the command of every member of the community. (Cheers) Groat progress, however, has already been made, and m ore may be hoped for. Well, gentlemen, another importenti most important department of modern legislation, has bol l beneficent and prudent—the limited and guarded interfer ence which the legislature has attempted with reference to_ protecting against undue and exhausting labour the feeble and the young. (Cheers.) There was at one t ime chance that by a narrow and one-sided view of the prin ciples of political economy we might have overlooked what was justly due to the principles of a higher kind, those of humanity, philanthropy, and justice ; or rather there was a danger that we might have forgotten for I ‘ .. moment that there wore in the subject two sets of prin?l, pies, which, though they appeared to be at variance carte each other, are essentially in accordance one with the other. We have seen, however, beneficial restraints . posed without use of capital, and in the application of labour as regards the feeble portion of the community andir, the young ; and this likewise may be regarded, I t hle d as no unimportant chapter in th e history of a true en solid social progress. I confess lam one of those °_ believe that a very small part of what Government can au for the people is to be done by positive and coercive raga" lation. By far the largest portion of the beneficial act?: of the State is to be found in the removal of ut l W l restraints, and in offering opportunities of which the fre e will of the citizen may or may not avail itself as 14e 11: 1 sea te think proper. We have, the re f ore , a tt em pted to do thing in that direction, and m y h on . f r i en d has allude to two measures in which it h as b een m y h a ppy fortun e , take an interest and to be ar a s h are —th e organisation of the Post-office savings banks, and the bill for facilitat il f i o g r the sale of annuities and th e gran ti ng o f lif e a,ssuratle ee to small sums. (Cheers.) These are measures which apps' me to be sound in principle. Th e y d o no t i n an y via,' int : t r y fere with the labouring man's liberty of choice, orihellb e ' - d o of choice enjoyed by any one else. If ho thinks he c an n t better with his money than to carr y it t o th e Goverlizet, savings bank, by all means let him do better with it. 7 1 that is done is done with a very mod era t e , nay a Yer/L o „d rate of interest ; a perfect security is offered, cornono with the greatest possible convenience. The attempt on is to give him information so f u ll an d so c l ear that he caa ll „: u ;possibly be ignorant of the precise t erm s on which the vernmenik holds his money, and likewise to put hire position in which he can reclaim that money whenever pleases, and wherever he pl eases . N ow th a t i s the wh c ' to bo secret of Post Office saving banks, and nothing can more remarkable than the manner in which they 113 ,f answered a real public exigency. I ca nn o t reckon tP ro, ' they have been in full work for much more than three Ye e o f and yet besides having transacted an immense amour business, business, and having returned to depositors some n'''": ,„,a of money, we have got I think in that short period of t o between six and seven millions of the earnings of therc'r to in our hands—(cheers)—and that in sums beginning fr or is. upwards, and averaging I believe not more than 0' £l2 in the whole for each depositor. Now, genderaeeii that is an imp or t an t p i ece o f mo d ern legislation, bec alib i b e 0 represents in the fi rs t pl ace a very great grow th provident habits of th e p eop l e, an d t h at i s t h e m ost eee'C t tial and the gre a t es t a d vantage that can possibly be br °lz about by any act of l eg i s l at i on i n such a prov i nce ; , o presents also, let me a dd, an d add with satisfaction a n with joy, an increasing con fid ence on the part of the PeZi in the Government ; there i s no more marked proo f of confidence than when the hard ea rn i ngs o f t h e i n dustit the poor are carried for deposit to th e h an d s o f the offic e ' of the State ; and if anything could r en d er the el te t w i r sive action of these banks more signal and satisfaetori e it is this, that that money has been tendered to the St° ts ~. a permanent, indeed, but alow rate of interest, during lied when, upon the whole, from the action of a varle t) ; y t causes the 'rate of interest ruling in the money-nler i T, v „b, large has been extraordinarily and exc e ptionally '"° (Cheers.) The other act is founded exactly upon the l er principle respecting the freedo m o f c h o i ce o f eve ry rea m of of the community, holdi ng ou t no fi c titi ous allureine°,. 1 0 inducements, not pretending in the s li g ht es t degree W to the labouring man the benefit of one farthing at the of anybody else—for it i s essen ti a l an d v i tal to thisnlep*T he that it should contain no o l eemosynary element— b u tetl- same time offering that kind of security, that kind of e er f venience which in case they are disposed to the e xercis e ; providence, and always in c ase th ey can find no bettoron, of investing that whi c h th e y w i s h to save, will a ff or dthe7. the occasion they wi s h f or . (Ch eers. ) The e ff ec t of thes e changes has been as marked as it has been beneficial; it increased loyalty to the throne, respect for the ILI o f union, confidence and conco r db e t ween th e severa l clasee S o the community; and I know not on w h a t point those WV Providence has blessed with larger means are now entittlehe to make any complaint as to th e genera l con duct of working classes. (Hear.) As to the struggle which i 5 0 .1 volved between capital and labour, as l ong as it is nion n b e by each party with a full sense o f th e rights of each °ther, by fair and above-board mea ns , an d a f u ll a ll owanc e to ot be people of the liberty which they claim for themselvesoo have no apprehension myself of this kind of compet iti between the capitalist and the labourer. (Cheers.) have said, speaking in all characters, though unwortlw d ? as a Minister o f St a t e an d a repro sentetive of law an d 6 i : thority, I know nothing of which we have to comPl'is to you ; but the labouring classes have the great lessen learn respecting the rights of minorities. That i g lesson of infinite difficulty; it is a lesson which Y e a men of Glasgow have learned perfectly. (Cheer's th e laughter.) You are accustom e d t o see i n opera tion all t 'i t energy which goes to increase production with the utre ° , t freedom ; but altho ug h y ou h ave l earnt t hi s l es son, I ri " different portions of the wo r ki ng p opu l a ti on o f the coue t no are in different circumstances, an d h ave l earn t this les s 0 differently. I will tell you honestly what I consid er involved in this lesson of respect i ng the r i g ht s ef ,be minority. I understand, in the first place, that machitterit is to be introduced whe rever manu f actures can be bettne produced by machinery than by h uman labour. Tlio or natives of Glasgow and of Lancashire would ridicule "j.. man who should att em pt t o t e ll them that the stearo-t. gine and the power-loom, by doing certain operations o'.l. ter and quicker th an h uman l a b our, are hostile to the it interests. But this lesson is not so learnt by every Pc irt re l o of the community, as t o re li eve t h ose who feel an Weg.:fi in the welfare of th e wor ki ng c l asses from the neca.,„-lie• of reminding them from time to time that it is a o f take to look on machinery as hostile to the i n terest e b o labour; but, on the contrary, it is not only benoficiall aa , tends to raise the condition of the working popill s .4o . l.- But if you are to proscribe ell machinery, tho same e j° went which leads you to proscribe the steam-engine 11 2:0 lead you to pros cr ib e s t eam ploughs ; and if the 6,,y1 plough, the horse plough, nay, even the spade, and O f ; ) 1 " leave you to grub the ground with y our hands. Pet-0i I aver that at this m omen t t h ere are some trades in ~-„,3 the labour of wom en an d b oys i s more or less either lire-60 or proscribed by regulations enforced by men who are short-sighted as to believe that they are benefiting t he/ selves by cutting off sources of employment from the o e ; bers of their families. (Hear, hear.) That is what it core to. Well, gentlemen, there i s anot h er point, andl'ebai again, I would appeal to y ou w ith some confidence, an d ; t ip is the labour of stra ngers. I believe there are trad e s ~ 0 which it is very dis agreea b le to the workmen of one P; if the workmen of ano th er place are brought in by the 31' be tor. The people of a certain district were not thought t ia ti o f very clever at th e process of boring coal. What did t' do ? They introduced some Scotchmen. But the natfa so to call them, were not altogether pleased with the arri of these Scotchmen ; and even in some cases e,nonylo e c, letters were written, calling on th e Scotchmen to vr it , o draw, and to the employers, desiring them to dismiss t f h t e l l e Scotchmen. Thes e s h ort - sighted people forgot that it tee Scotchmen, who were the more competent labourers, :tee withdrawn, probably the r esu lt would have been th at y et district would not have been improved at a ll. Wilit t i e wal l be the regulation am ong workmen that may tend to the freedom of the i n di v id ua l' s choice, that may teo_",„/ interfere with the moral right that every man has to 01- 1 h es his own labour individually into what he thinks the : 40 market—l ventu re t o say those regulations are all in P no r: ciple unsound ; and I confid en tly p re di c t th a t in PrNeo tion as the working c o mm un ity o f thi s country containo to advance in every attainment that tends to dignify 1111 4, nature, and to raise the people above th e con dition " more tool or instrument to that of an intellectual, rst leli t f i e and immortal being, so will all attempts to interfere on o f part of one man with the liberty of another fall more e t o more into disrepute. I admit th at i t i s a much harder le6:10 for the working man to apply these principles fairlf . ,,op fully than for per sons i n c i rcumstances of abunc l ' - iD Immense progress has been made, and is being no cie ' v ot these respects, and all those interferences, if they ar tea dead, are about to die ; and the reason why I enw - 00 upon such a subject was, that what I desire to see ! f all mecontinual advance of th e wor ki ng commun it y, n ot "or in their material circumstances, but likewise in tll :bete spect and confid ence o f t h e i r f ellow-c iii zentt i ftr be an apprehension that you cherish separat e terests, disarm that jealousy by your conduct. Iva doubtedly some portion of the proceedings of the le bo p tS ing classes are still open to criticism, namely, the att 4re l be on the part of majorities to interfere with minorities' l e' right hon. gentleman, after a few further observati on°, sumed his seat amidst great cheering. l igl ley [ADVERTISEMENT. - Holloway's Pills. „ fitDe Advice.--To all persons who suffer from bilious hesu B pill disordered stomach, biliousness, or flatulency, tlass e are most strongly recommended as the safest, b es ot it quickest mode of obtaining ease without weakening e apo,; ritating the nervous system. H o ll oway ' s pills a re ,,,blc; cially useful in clearing away any excess of bile, dop te7 usually produces fever unl ess reme di a l maasure s a t i o n without delay. In asthma, bronchitis, and cong e !, ti oge" the lungs they may b e re li e d upon f or remov i n g all " e ffec" and by purifying and regulating the circulation thsY fait tually prevent relapses. By rousing the liver t", bo a secretion of bile and quickly carrying it off from tboo" tern, these pills ward off low spirits, listlessness, 311 distressing feelings often called nervous. P .. London : Printed and P u blished by WILLIA M Ai` m io , 1)1 of No. 112, Strand, Punter, at Tnz Sox Officer i „ o utf ° Strand, in the Precinct of the Savoy. in the v v MiddlefiC l 47-Thtliddairt NcVenlber 2,18 A IrBE SUN, LONDON, THUBSDAY EVENING, NOVEMBER 2, 1865. Fit It i aoi th e A Otn Kin --___ 1' leeue `ha beit The i alto be The 811 a The The The Th e JAAr Art JAW Jame W.llll MCA Mea IdeE Bes th e pc fund and h th e at th e p f 4s. 9d Th, to £3l !landi hu g i fund Xl,OO t on th /Joi e £1 .£7_l( On the gi m et 41 Ini charp instal tient; r4 l So th £5 cf tiers tniun sente ahoy valu( that in Se APril Shan lucre T o t