The Express.
London, England, 1849-07-16 00:00:00

NIGH ',ATM,. AT L0.1.f1/91111TD011.

Till rDATZIGIIII2--- Ir.!! M. 11.,
To Miaow —llornlnd, 22 AIL put II; Atternos, 51 W. pia 11.

LONDON, MONDAY, JULY 16.

WE doubt the policy of resting the defence of the
garrison church in Ireland on the pretext that its
existence is no longer looked on as a grievance by the
great majority of the people. It is unquestionably
true, that during the disastrous years of physical pri-
vation through which they have passeklittle leashe:n
said in popular assenahlies.'or in the organs of popular
opinion, on the subject. Food or work was the de-
mand made almost universally and to the exclusion of
every other. There was no time for thought or
speech regard;ng permanent and prospective changes;
the wants of the day were too pressing and impera-
tive, and all ordinary feelings and convictions were,
consequen.ly, left without expression.
But is it wise or seemly in a minister of the crown,
or in the diurnal expositor of ministerial sentiments,
to affect to conider the temporary silence on the
question, prescribed by an overwhelming calamity,
as an indication of a change of national opinion ?
The absence of recent protestation against the
maintenance of the Anglican establishment, in
a country nine-tenths of whose inhabitants are
aliens from its communion, proves in reality
nothing. No man whose days aro not spent
either in the Home-office or the Times office can
seriously believe that it does, or that there exists the
slightest ground for believing that the hatred
of the Irish people towards that ill-omened
institirion is not as lasting as the love of justice is
inherent in the bulk of every community.
Tee enormity of its pecuniary disproportion to the
spiritual wants whose supply is its pretence, grows in
fact more glaring and offensive in the eyes of the
struggling classes every day. As they grow poorer,
and as they find it harder to pay rents, rates, and
local taxes, the obvious thought daily returns with
more irresistible force,—why should we not seek an
alleviation of our burthens to the extent of some
700,0001. a year out of the tithe rent charge?
Can any unofficial being believe that such an allevia-
tion of the actual weight which now presses heavily
on the infirm industry of the country, would not be
gratefully and joyfully received? Will any honest
or candid man assert that the non-appropriation of so
much national property to local purposes of general
utility, and i s continued application to the payment
of several hundred gentlemen whose services the
mass cf the population will not accept, can be mat-
ter of satisfaction or cause for contentment to the
latter ?

But even were it otherwise, were it pcssi-
bic to conceive that from any combination of
I circumstances a less vivid sense of national in-
justice had really begun to prevail, and were
it in truth or cand.nr permis..ible to infer the
growth of such a state of feeling from the silence
lately observable on the subject,—can any course be
imsgmed less likely to foster its growth, or less cal-
culated to induce a continuance in mute long-suffer-
ing, than that which we have seen pursued by cer-
tain members and certain organs of the government.
We are b. and in fairness to restrict our observations
to exceptional sections and instances. To hie credit
be it said, Lord PALMERSTON refused to form one of
the late tory majority against inquiry into the tempi-
larities of the Irish church. He had neither forgotten
the principles on which he came into power, nor with
all his proficiency in diplomatic art did he attempt to
explain them away. As a member of the cabinet, in
the absence of its chief, he could hardly with pro-
priety have voted contrary to his colleague in com-
mand on the occasion ' • but his absence from the divi-
sion was a manly and honourable declaration that
disapproved of the course adopted, and that he was
not prepared to retract or abindon the pledgee he
had an often given of fidelity to religions freedom.

Amongst our contemporaries, in like manner, we
cheerfully recognise and ackno wl edge a widely -diffused
spirit of resistance to the retrograde and ruinous i ropoliey
to which we refer. The principles of the liberal party
in this country have not changed since 1835; and
neither the cool hardihood of journalists or nt;nisters,
be they who or what they may, will succeed in per-
verting the public mind on great and 'astir g ques-
tions. Clever evasions and dexterous mystilications
may rave a temporary turn on subjects for whose
consideration men are unprepared ; but " the good
old cause " is not to be made away with by mere
slight of hand. If certain whig gentlemen are
ashamed of their party, or of the principles they
have hitherto held, let them betake themselves
to the society of ()ISRAELI and STANLEY. The
latter can furnish them doubtless with ample sugges-
tions as to the best mode of cutting their friends and
changing their colours in the most approved manner ;
for both have had some experience in that line. But
let them not fall into the grave mistake of supposing
that they will succeed in drawing any section of de-
serters with them—the division upon Tuesday night
!wt ought to be a warning.

Meanwhile we shall look with no little interest
and curiosity to the response which Ireland will
make to the charge of having grown indiffer-
ent on the church question. In a certain sense,
a denial of the contemptuous imputation is forced
upon her. Toe unfairness of the use made of her
silence, and the untimeliness of the taunt, are indeed
sufficiently plain. Still we should be sorry that
room were any longer left for the disreputable accu-
sation. If we could believe tte Irish people fallen so
low as to be contented tacitly to acquiesce in the
monstrous injusti:e of the present ecclesiastical sys-
tem—we should not perhaps insult their fate by
sounding. the depths of such social and political
degradation, but we should indeed, and for the first
time, turn our face in despair from the west, and
pray that a like prostration of all moral worth
and national vigour might never be again exhibited
to the world.
But we have ro such fears for the honour of our
sorely-stricken, but still courageous and elastic-
spirited brethren. We are much mistaken if the
cruel mockery of their greatest grievance in which
the Times has of late indulged, will not by its very
pungency help to renal the dormant sense of political
duty to its accustomed action. If renewed and
reiterated denunciations of sectarian ascendancy
be all that is wanting—wanting they are not
very long likely to be. The bubble project of
exporting protestant congregations from this country
at the cost of the livery of London, is, we believe
upon the eve of vanishing into thin air. The;
vaunted estates in Ulster are found out to be neither
so prosperous nor so profitable, after sll, as they were
rhetorically said to be. Petitions from rack-rented
tenants at Dunbor, and memorials full of bitter com-
plaints of the tyranny and extortion of the Irt-h
Society at Coleraine, have come most inopportunely to
light. And the absurd mistakes as to the
extent and nature of the corporate plantation
of Londonderry which have recently been per-
petrated in high places, are no longer capable
of concealment. Bat were it not so, there is one
little circumstance that would no doubt prove conc'u-
sive in the matter. The corporation of London have
no money to spare, and the citizens are not quite such
fools as to mortgage their credit and liability to rates
for payment of tens of thousands a year in interest of
money to be sunk in land speculation. Congrega-
tions cannot be conjured over to Connaught in this
way. Catholics will continue to form there and else-
where the immense majority of the population • and
they must cease to be men ere they cease to regard
any other sentiments than those of aversion and re-
sentment the forcible maintenance amongst them
and at their expense, of a lavish endowment exclu-
sively devoted to a clergy whose tenets they hold to
be errors.

Now that Mr. HOME has obtained an inquiry
(though by whom it is to be conducted does not u yet
apputr) u to the revenues of St. Cross and their ap-
propriation, and as to the duties and emoluments of

the marcr of the hospital, " with a view of ng
parliament t) place the hospital, en the determination
of this presint man erehip, on such a footir g as wig
secure the get West amount of benefit to the inthl;e,
coca-tent with Pe original design;" now ti,ut Mr.
HOME has by this inquiry arrested the enntinua-,te of
this lioslital in its pre:,et.t cor.dition of prfit to noon°
but its masters ; it is very much to be wished that the
honourable number for Montrose would turn his
attention to another greit charity to which also we
have from time to time directed public observation,
the Crewe Charity. And as we were the first to
expose the aborts of St. Cross, we make this appeal
to the veteran re former on behalf of the coutAtes of
Northumberland and Durham with some confi icnce.

The case of the Crewe charity, which we have
stated in detail on a former occasion, is, in brief aim.
ply this, Bishon CREWE left his Northern
and Durham estates to five trulteel, men,
with the power for them and their successors w elect
other four ece.lesiastical trustees, on certain speci6o
trusts. At the period of his death those spccitio
trusts consumed nearly the whole income of the pro.
perty so devised ; and the bishop's intention a-
vec:mil: was that his trustees should have very small
discretion as to the expenditure of the prop-rty so
devisel to them. But by the growth of seea'th and
the improvements in agriculture, the amount of the
specific trusts now bears no proportion to the bihnee
or the income, over which the trustees have almost
complete control ; and it is probable that thty have
not leas than nearly 8,0001. a year to appropti t very
much as they please. In the proper application of
this great annu sum, the counties of Northumber-
land and Dorham, which ought to be its beneficiaries
have a deep interest ; but how it is applied, the in-
habitants of those two counties are quite ignorant;
and their ignorance does not arise from any Want of
curiosity, but from the absence ef means to gratify
their curiosity. Now, the first point we sug-
gest to Mr. Hume is to ascertain how the
surplus revenues of the Crewe estates, atter pay-
ment of the specific trusts of the t.mtator's will
is provided for, are spent. That fact ascertained, the
next point for consideration will be, wheler the sur-
plus cannot be applied so as "to secure a greater
amount of benefit to the public consistent with the
original design" of Bishop CREWE.

There is still time for Mr. HUME to move in the
presert session fur the returns from the trustees
requisite to furnish this information ; and, it ob-
tained, there will be ample time in the re' ess to give
the subject that mature consideration which the pecu-
liar circumstances of this great, but almost unkirown,
charity require. The principle on which such infor-
mation can be required, has been repeatedly asserted
by parliament. In the case of the Charity Commis-.
Motors, the inquiry was fortified t y stunts; in the
present session, a motion of Mr. Ilatuter's ter similar
returns has been agreed to in the case of a Lama-
' shire ecclesiastiell charity • and Mr. lit-mrsi recent
success in the instance et St. Cross ought to render
the proposal to apply the same principle to the Crewe
charity irresistible.

The proper mode of putting the case of the
CREWE charity is, the ignorance of ate communities
fir whose benefit it was founded. There is a surplus
of 8,000/. a year ahieh the esuntit s of Northumber-
land and Durham l ace a right to know thc applica-
tion of; that knowledge they cannot obtain except
by the assistance of parliament, or through the costly
instrumentality of the Court of Chancery: and for
parliament to deny them such assistance is practically
t
o refuse them the information.

It ought not to be necessary to make out a cam of
misappropriation against the trustees to induce parlia-
ment to interfere; fir inasmuch as the appropiation
of the surplus income is confined to the trustee+, the
public interested are not in a position to assert either
its proper or its mal•appropriation. All that they are
aware of is their want of derailed knowledge in that
in which they are interested. But from the little
whi M is known respecting the munagement of the
trust, no great confidence can be reposed in proper
management. Not, indeed, that there is any buspi-
e,oo of p.eulat:on, of wholesale jobbing, or of scanda-
lous mist pprorriation. But that the m wage-
rnent involves much domestic conveaience
to the trustees, many snug family advantages,
a magnificent marine residence and toe produce of a
home farm and of extensive gardens fer themselves,
comfortable shooting quarters for their sine and
frie:ide, the opportunity of advancing the university
education of their proteso, very considerable political
influence, the power of bestowing at pleasure a east
amount of charity and benevolence, and many other
agreeable advantages—that the trusteeship conveys
these little, snug, quiet, comfortable power-giving ad-
vantages to the reverend gentlemen who occupy that
post, is quite notorious. But the principles on which
they act in the distribution of these their favour!, the
rules which govern their bestowal of them, the per-
sons and the cbjects who can claim them, and ell
those particulars in which the district is interested,
aro quite unknown. Great is the power cf the
Reverend WILLIAM NICHOLAS DARNELL, rector of
Stanhope, with its 5,0001. a year, and of that eminent
pluralist, the Venerable CHARLES THORPE, in these
ma.ters ; but small the knowledge of the community
us to their cxerciso of that large and annually harm-
ing power.

lts exercise may be irreproachable ; but so long as
:t is secret and cor crated, it is obnoxious to suspicion.
The power they have of doing great good may not be
jobbed and frittered away by eliquerie, by favour-
idsm, and by intolerance; but until they let the
world know how the power is used, it is not in human
nature to give them credit for much purity. Nor
have the dignified clergy of Durham ever been very
remarkable for scrupulosity in the administration of
the many good things entrusted by the piety of our
ancestors to their rate ; co the trustees, who are of
that class have not therefore the prestige of good
name and high reputation in their favour. And the
pressure of publicity in their conduct of the charity
will, at all events, do them to harm if it be honestly
and fairly managed; and it will do the public much
goad by enlarging the area of its application, if not
by ex coding the objects and purposes of its appli-
cation.

Therefore, Messrs. DARNELL and Tuonre (the
House of Commons directing), we will have the pub-
lication of your amounts for tho last 10 or 15 years.
We shall then ste how the 8,0004 a year has been
applied by yeti ; and whether it cannot be much more
usefully applied hereafter.
'I here is, too, another reason for giving publicity to
there accounts. Ere the lapse of many year the
character and station of the ecclesiastics occupying
the past of trustees of this charity, must be consider-
ably changed and modified. At pri sent and fir many
years they have bten chosen front amongst the pre-
bendaries and the pluralists of Durham. but hence-
forth the number and the value of stalls in Durham
cathedral will be greatly reduced; and, in all human
probability, the Venerable CHARLES TIIORPE will be
the last, presbyter of that diocese who will hive the
opportunity—or let it be hoped tho inclination—of
being at once the rector of a large parish, the warden
of a large university, the archdeacon of a largo arch-
deaconrate, and the occupant of a wilder, stall. Stan-
hope can hardly endure in its present state throughout
another incumbency; nor Durham eh rgy in another
age have the means of aping the expe iditure and the
habits of the territorial aristocracy. This change
will, of course, afftct the future character of the
crown trust : whether for the better or the worse
time can irly show. But a more intimate ic!,owt., dge
of the trust and of the system on which it is
mune d,
be an excellent preparation for its in-
troduction.
On the grounds, then, that tima has cmfided to the
trustees a much larger discretion as to expenditure
than Bishop CREWE ever intended they should have;
that in this expenditure the counties of Northumber-
land and Durham have an interest ; that at present
they are in ignorance as to how the surplus income is
spent ; that the little knowledge the public possess
show a Imre amount of small jobbing by the trus-
tees; and that a great change is impending ovcr the
composition of the trust—on these grounds we sub-
mit to Mr. HcME there is a strong cue for the inter-
ference of the House of Commons ; and by such inter-
ference, he may depend upon it, will be secured to
the public a mach larger amount of benefit than the
Crewe Charity now bestows on it.

IMPROVEMENTS IN THE ClTY.—Workmen have
been engaged for some time pest in removing the houses
lying between Queen street, St. I homy, the Arstle, Cloak-
lane, and Budge. row. These oper e, ions are ptvpsrstwy to
the formation if a broad and con, inuons thoroughfare, ex-
tending from Earl-street, Blackfriars, to Linclon-bridge.
The formation of this line of street will materially reliever
Cheapside, Ludgate-hill, and St. P.,ul's churchyard from
their present inconvenient amount of traffic.