The Press.
London, England, 1854-08-26 00:00:00

kuousT 26, 1854.

England, where, after a lapse of centuries, and after many
periods of agitation and convulsions, political parties had
settled down into a kind of sage and serene maturity,
where all that was visionary, and all that wss sentimental,
had been long banished from public life ; where every per-
sonal and party rancour, together with the profound differ-
ence of classes, had, whilst continuing antagonism, learned
to combat with blunted arms, and with all the courtesy and
moderation of a regulated arena.

---
The bigotry of the priests formed another
obstacle to the establishment of rational free-
dom ; and a third consisted in the disposition
of extreme parties in France to form a
coalition for the overthrow of any Ministry
-which did not enter into their extreme
views :

The two extremes of aristocracy and demozracy had thus
'only to unite in denouncing every candidate that was a
.tunctionary or connected with Government, in order to leave
the ultras of both sides masters of the field. The Royalists
ven exelamed, " Rather return Jacobins than Ministerial-
ists." This sad and passionate mistake, by which the
ultra• Royalists destroyed the throne and sacrificed the
King iii the first revolution, promoting excesses and the
worst of measures in hopes of ruining whatever Govern-
ment existed, was nowhere more fully exemplified than in
the election of the Isere. At Grenoble, the chief town of
this department, the recollections of l)idier's insurrection,
sad the severity of its repression, rendered the Libe►als vin-
dictive. They selected as their candidate the regicide
Abbe Gregoire, ex-bishop of Blois, his recommendation
being the insult which his election would prove to the
Royalists and even to the King. There was a sufficient
number of liberal electors of moderate views to have placed
the partisans of the Abbe Gregoire in a minority,
hut the rancour of the ultra• Royalists prevented this. It was
fun and vengeance to them to see a regicide elected, and,
accordingly, in despair of returning one of their own
opinions, they gave their votes to Gregoire, who was re-
turned.

-------
This return caused great embarrassment to
both the King and the Chamber, but eventually
the abbe was expelled. In the opinion of
Mr. Crowe, the wise and temperate reign of
Louis XVIII. had been so fur successful as to
root respect for constitutional government
in the mind of the people. Noticing the
close of Villele's Ministry, he writes :

They still, however, reproach his memory and his repu-
tation by alleging that he entered upon the Ministry with
the royal power at its height, and that he left it in a condi-
tion that was past recovery. This reproach is unjust.
Wileslele took power the Bourbons were execrated by
the public ; the entire surface of society was undermined
with secret associations, and filled with combustibles
which exploded from month to month. His long,
successful, regular, and vigorous administration put
down and outlived this dangerous state of things.
Narrowed as liberty was, and defective as was the
sonstitution, people became accustomed and attached
to it and to the monarchy, so that all energies were
turned towards correcting it by legal means. Imperialism
concealed itself, Republicanism was extinct. In the
press and in the Parliament the language of Opposition was
as exemplary as it could be even in England. The Oppo-
sition was certainly more formidable than that which
assailed the Due de Richelieu, for instead of being con-
fined to politicians it counted all classes and grades of the
public, which, during that time, had been instructed in
politics, and took an interest in its progress ; but all this
was improvement. This opposition and even indignation,
although far more formidable to a Minister, was not so to
the Crown; and if Charles X. had had the good sense or the
good fortune to understand and play the part of a consti-
tutional king, wielding the very great powers that a con-
stitution always must leave to a king, he had a people
fashioned, and reconciled, and attached to that form of
government, and fully prepared to respect the dynasty,
if the dynasty remained true to its oaths. Indeed, so
thoroughly constitutional had the French become, to the
utter oblivion of either empire or republic, that, when the
dynasty did disappear, constitutional monarchy survived,
and even a Bourbon prince succeeded without personal
tom petition, or even the form of any other government
being mentioned.
If this be true, it is surprising that the
attachment to constitutional rule should have
been suddenly extinguished 14 ith the revolu-
tion of 1848.
'The characters given by Mr. Crowe of most
of the eminent personages who figure in his
pages are judiciously drawn, and add greatly
to the value of his instructive and impartial
history.

Tlae First Resurrection. By the Rev. Robert Noble,

A.M. Dublin : Curry and Co.
Ax exposition of the fifteenth chapter of St.. Paul's
First Epistle to the Corinthians, designed to show
the incorrectness of the commonly-received view that
the dead immediately join their Lord. In the opi-
nion of Mr. Noble, the "Life of the World to CoMe"
Is subsequent to, and consequent on, a resurrection.
No man can master " the mysteries of the sepulchre ;"
but the pious, reverent. feeling which pervades the
book, and endeavours to render such a subject more
explicit, must be appreciated by all readers.