The Express.
London, England, 1852-05-22 00:00:00

Vie erortoo.

TO CORRESPONDENTS.
rtoantat Mien of " Tu. Espros.“ eesuasieff ,h• our moires
" tar Gratette," Y publOtted every Tarok, awl Friday sight, la use
past
,dvdriamesdatalatetated fur "The raprow," Leedom Evening paw,
:own be at the LO. Eurrverte-atreet, 57 Two o'ekok oa the
day et pablantlea.

MOB WATER AT LONDON BRIDOR.
Tsui UnT—Mondos, 3h. Ma Altmann, 4h. nro.
To•oseamow—Rorousg. 44. Mks Ahem:loo. 40. 4/la.

LONDON, SATURDAY, MAY 22.

LAST night Lord PALMERSTON called the attention
of the House of Commons to the dangers now threat-
ening the existence of constitutional government in
Spain and elsewhere--dangers exposed some days
ago in the columns of this journal. His lordship
urged the present ministers to give such an expres-
sion of opinion upon the subject that foreign powers
might knew there was still in England a ministry
ready at least to sympathise with the adherents of
constitutional liberty abroad as well as at home. Lord
PALMERSTON made one of his telling epee thee, but with
no better resultthan has followed all previous attempts
to gain an explicit avowal from the present occupants
of office. Mr. DisnAzu is much more cunning,
and far less candid, than the ex-Foreign Se-
cretary, and, as usual, he avoided all satis-
factory reply. Lord PALMERSTON sympathised with
the coup crltat—he now finds nearer home a public
character curiously akin in spirit and policy to the
hero of the I.:lye:v. What strong sympathy can we
now hope to see evinced for constitutionalism by tho
existing governments of England or of France ? In
the one country we have a ministry holding ottlue on
the unconstitutional basis of a minority : in the other
we see a l'resident lording it over a Republic,
forcibly deprived of constitutional rights. Indeed,
the analogy between the actual conditions of
France and England is more close than is quite
agreeable to people who pride themselves upoa
being citizens of a country which has enjoyed parlia-
mentary government for more than a century and a
half, and which generally objects to be eajolea by ad-
venturers. Englund is ruled by Mr. DisnsELl, and
France by M. Louts NAPOLEON. The previous
careers of these—statesmen, shall we call them P—
have been curiously similar.
It is to the published speculations of the French
and English rulers that wo must turn in order to
find the proofs of idiosyncratic resemblance. The
showy, though fantastic revels of Mr. Dtsnszu
have'been_twetty wide)7 circulated; and the lucubra-
tion. of M. Louis NAPOLEON, have been eagerly
published by enterprising booksellers since lie installed
himself dictator. fheac bibliopules have remembered
what hamlet says of people giving high prices for
his uncle's portrait in little after ho became king
who made mouths at him before.

One literary knack is common to both of these dis-
tinguished authors, that is of imparting an adventi-
tious interest to their writings by associating them
with the notorieties and popular topics of the day.
Mr. DisnsELl—who, contrary to the prevailing no-
tions that Englishmen are dull and solid, Frenchmen
airy and vivacious—is the more sparkling and less
wearisome of the two, effects his by taking the plots
of his fictitious novels from blue books, trials which
,reveal the scandalous privacy of men of rank, and
club gossip about party struggles. M. LOUIE NAPO-
LEON, in an humbler way, accomplishes the same
object by prosy dissertations on popular topics, and
letters to individuals eminent in science or literature.

The great aim of both in their ostensibly literary
productions has been to hold themselves out to the
world as men who have devoted much time to retied.
tions on politics, and cultivated practical statesman-
ship. Their theories of politics and policy are
strikingly similar. Mr. DIBRAELI sterns and dis-
parages what he calls the fiction of representative
government, and so does M. Louts NAPOLEON. Mr.
DiattAELl has schemes for social, moral, and political
regeneration, and so has M. Louts NAPOLEON. Mr.
DISRAELI is of opinion that nations prosper most when
they submit to be drilled, disciplined, and acted for
by some hero-prophet; and so is M. LOUIS NAPO-
LEON. Mr. DISRAELI paints fancy anonymous por-
traits of himself as the man who has it in his power
to save and elevate the ago. M. Louts NAPOLEON,
more frankly, puts his own name at the bottom of
the effigies he draws. The novels of the one and
the essays of the other are as obviously advertise-
ments for political employment just as a ltygeisn
treatise is an advertisement for customers for the
publisher's nostrums; and the qualities and princi-
ples which each attributes to himself are remarkably
alike.

The ways in which both have conciliated politi-
cal supporters are as nearly similar as the dissimi-
larities of France and England permit. Mr.
DisitAELt set himself up as the champion of the
I landed interest, and coquets when in power with all
shades of liberalism. M. LOUIS NAPOLEON took the
field, he said, to combat the socialists and red re-
publicans of the proletarian class, but he turned his
cannon and musketry against the bourgeoisie.
The estimation in which the two worthies are
held by all men of common sense is much the same.
Neither gets credit for fixed principles or sincerity ;
neither gets credit for solid judgment ; they owe
their elevation simply and exclusively to the effron-
tery with which they have offered themselves as can-
didates for power, and the dogged pertinacity with
which they persisted in urging their claims. The
moral of their success seems to be that in France and
England any man who has the assurance to aspire to
the highest offices, and perseverance to keep the
field amid universal laughter and ridicule, is tolerably
sure to succeed in the end.

It is a humiliating spectacle to see two great and
intelligent nations like France and England ac-
quiescing, for however short a time, in the usurpa-
tion of the reins of government by two adventurers
whose peculiar talents aro of that kind hitherto
deemed only fitted for the manufacture of a fantastic
melodrama. In both countries we have had dull and
feeble statesmen ere now, but somehow they had
contrived to acquire that reputation for common
sense which is so liberally conferred on mere
common-place. Wo have had brilliant and
eccentric statesmen in both countries ere now,
but then they had evinced comprehensive
and sound views of policy, tact, and sagacity,
in the practical business of life. But the present
Dictator of France and the de facto l'rime Minister
of England combine a showy, superficial glitter
with that propensity to extravagant thcorisms which
lis the infallible indication of ambitious, feeble, and
common-place intellects.
With such men in power in England and in
France the people of Spain and of Sardinia must rely
upon themselves alone for the preservation of their
constitutional liberties. To look to Downing-street
or to the Elysee for sympathy, would, indeed, be
vain. Lord PALMERSTON May speak; reformers
may cheer; newspapers may report ; and journalists
advise—but no sympathy will liberty, abroad obtain
from a tory government in England. Tories are
now as they have ever been—the opponents of pro-
gress. Lord DERBY has denounced orenly " the
noxious influence of the people," and after such a
declaration of his sentiments how can anything be
expected from him but sympathy with despotic re-
action. If Lord PALMERSTON really wishes to sup-
port liberty abroad, he knows quite well what steps
are proper to be taken tor that purpose. They are
to heal the differences that divide the liberals at
home, and so put the tones out of office.

OUR husbandry and husbandmen have now fairly
passed through a period of transition from protection
to free-trade. From monopolists placing their hopes
of profit in artificial scarcity, our farmers have be-
come trader open to competition, who with a fair
stage and no favour have to trust alone to their skill
and activity. That they have passed through this
period of transition without misgiving, that they
have passed it without difficulties, and in many in-
stances distress, we do not assert ; for it is one
amongst the host of evils of such a vicious system as
that founded by the corn laws, that to attain a
sounder and better state of things somebody
must suffer. But that they have, as a body,
passed it unscathed, and with greater cretlit
and energy than their self-styled " friends
thought possible, few will at this time be
found to deny. And more than that, they have come
out of the trial in a condition far more sound, and
with prospects of future well-doing far more satisfito-
tory than even their real friends and customers—the
mass of the community—ventured to anticipate.