The Express.
London, England, 1848-12-25 00:00:00

THE IMPRESS. MONDAY EIWONG,

ehureh's dean he be the eels erideatir of the eatisa.
W. miotOmem the thee& would be divided
ardastin that
ell tipon this ail impalas; questions. 'The
events pens the eorrestuene et Mar reasonhea. laa a
Ctdasmeelhig et the frahaestry of Chichester Mt
lists tonessed i* the purpose of ofiglidat
the gemenesent is the mailer et education, Ankles.
esm
thenAMO (this= r. esidede
dished up aid en theme beet
edeoation a new &Apt ale=s rimmed the meet-
ing by the quad meaty of the aixtere, that it agreed
nee& son. to a whale series of intolerant propo-
sitions. Now it so happens that in a very
resent charge of Arsideneem Haan (the protwe
tent eye), ttee same question between the
National Society and the government committee of
council is considered at great kerb, end all those
arguments and assertions so pompously beouiht for-
ward by Archdeacon WINNOW are set cep in anticipa-
tion only to be most et mpletely knocked down, out.
reasoned, and oontisdieted, with a completeness
worthy of the protoandeM reasoner and the most
learned theologian in the church. It is not our busi-
ness to occupy our readers' time with a collocation of
all the propositions in the speech of Archdeacon
Matitritio, which are contradicted in the charge of
Archdeacon Haas; • few only will suffice tor our I
purpose.
P•rsone, (says Archdeacon ][analog) who spoke of
separatism; mauler mid religious cdaeaties evidently talked
of what they did not animated. So far as the state de-
parted owe hair's breadth hem the priaciple of the church
is education, so far it departed from its ewe benefit, ins
much as it introduced a lower standard of edesation than
the church maintained. So that when they saw sayi eloilFer-
mess between the ehereit and the state they ht be
; assured that the Wadi.* betweea pod and evil wee • ut to
eestmenee I
Now, it in to be remarked that the system alluded
to by the speaker has been ones tried ; its effects are
thus described by Archdeacon Ham :
The emalt. in= the whole system were no other than
wine a ergartous men would have anticipated. Oa the one
heel tbe lane, beteg almost preeieded from taking part la
dill 811.7 works ef the church, grew to deem teat tear v e
mesa mas altogether secular, and es it is sesraly passible far
peels es preserve a lively istenet is that la which they end
semen for action, many, is/wanly el the Dumb tuailigat
mans the higher classes, lapsed late die repine of pennies)
V set of speculative i..adelity, the evil of which woe rather
hiereseed ass diminished by itsoombientioa with a nomisal
outward oratormity. Oa the other hand the clergy them-
selves, from occupying this false position, became outwardly
weak, and, in a grievous number of ewe, iswardly hollow
weak from the want of that help whisk they ought to have
sought, bat which they hat rather repelled—hollow, as we
are apt to grow when we are destitute of the inter-
Asap, and reciprocation of our feelings, and when we are
mate emotions of our rights thins of oar duties. The task
is so immense, tte difficulties so enetnints, tuat we must
needs feel perpetually how utterly inadequate we ere to it;
sad what urgent need we have of help, prtaterily indeed a
divine help, but also of human.
Now, we ask again, is there not &prim; fade case
against the claim of the church to be the sole educator
when two of its high authorities, representing two
large parties into which the church is divided,
express opiaions on the subject thus diametrically
opposite : and when this op, osition of opinion ts
not confined to this one subjee, but extends
to every important doctrine of the church P Is
the government justified in giving the money of
the state unconditionally to a body which is thus
divided in essentials? This money. is collected from
all the subjects of the state indiscriminately; unless re-
presentation, then,is afarce,is money to be parted with
except the grantors exact conditions to ensure its due
appropriation ? Why should the government be de-
barred the right possessed by every other body of
having some security for the accomplishment of the
object for which it supplies funds? The church has
never yet been able to educate the people. It not
able now, or why does she ask for assist-
ance P Why, then, should the state which has
recognised the right of the people to be
educated, be required to give up the money
it has set apart for the purpose of education to a body
which rejects all interference ? The concessions made
by the government committee are acknowledged in
the resolutions peened at Chichester to be neither few
nor unimportant: what ground can be shown that
more should be made, unless it can be shown that all
conditions are unrighteous? The two remaining
claims of the dissentients are, that the clergyman of
tee parish shall have control not only over the
religious Pieta uction of the scholars, but over the
school itself in its moral and religious discipline—
and that an ultimate appeal shall lie to the
bishop of the diocese. Alter what we have said
above as to the utter uncertainty of doctrine or
discipline in the present church, is it to be imagined
that the state can grant money to a school which is to
be under the uncontrolled authority of the clergyman
fur the time being ? Is there again any reason in the
world why an appeal should tie from the local com-
mittee, who are acquainted with the fame, to a bishop
who is acquainted with none? The claims them-
selves are as absurd as the claimants are intolerant;
and we trust that there are still enough enlightened
and liberal clergymen left in the church to form at
least • respectable oppo-ition to an agitation instituted
by • bigot party to serve its own purposes.

WISHING a merry Christmas to our readers all and
sundry, and sending an affectionate greeting to our
friends in every clime, there is no contemporary with
whom we more cordially reciprocate the compliments
of the season than our old and respected friend, the
Almanac! de Gotha. His eighty-sixth annual volume
is now on our table. Such is the venerable age the
high-priest of royal and diplomatic privilege is entitled
to bout. But

Age Newt wither It, or etu.toat stale
The infloste

sameness of the information which he collects
with a seal and precision, long appreciated in
every part of E rope, and winch has made the publi-
cation net only the cherished manual of kings and
courtiers, but a necessary book of reference fur the
statesman, the journalist, and the historian.
Almanaclu of every kind possess indeed a strange
vitality. They have as many lives as a cat, and often
survive for generations, not only the individuals who
projected them, but the social and political bonsai-
ties which they were at first intended to supply.
It is a hundred and forty years since SWIFT amused
the town, and drove the then prince of almanaok-
makers half-distracted, by first foretelling his death •
and then in due time announcing the fulfilment of the;
prediction with that particularity of incident and
command of countenance in which no man could
equal him. At Christmas in the year 1709, people
were consulting their new almanacks to see if PAR-
TRIDGE could prove himself to be alive, in spite of
Squire Biekerstar a overwhelming evidence that he
we. dead and buried. And now that we are on the
threshold of 1849, " Jahn Partridge's Almaxack" is
still printed by the Company of Stationers, and sold
at their Hall. Francisifoore's Almanack is still
published at the same place, and the lineal descen-
dants of " LILLY" and " CADBURY" might still, we
believe, be traced by a diligent bibliographer.
air diplomatic contemporary, though Nestorian
enough, and a elpering
Esemplera WWI a OOTIlle• seclude,

cannot boast a pedigree so ancient or an sauterne so
protracted. The first appearance of the Almartoeh
de Gotha was in 1763, coincident with the peace of
Versailles. Two revolutions, the American sad the
French, has this favoured annalist of royalty beheld
and survived; and now its pages record the opening
incidents of a third, which will probably be known to
future generation. as the European revolution.
It was, therefore, notwithstandmg all testimonies
se to the vitality inherent in the race, with some
anxiety that we looked oat for the reappearance at
our ancient guide through the labyrinths of royal
genealogies, and the mightier and more marvellous
maze of the governmental and diplomatic entities and
nonentities who keep up the farce of managing the
affairs of this world ; and whose exits and entrances,
under the influence of either royal or popular
caprice, are woot at times to be so inconveniently
rapid. We greatly dreaded lest the sudden shock
of so unforeseen a chaos bad proved too mach for
our old friend,Ulyeseantbough his experience has been
of the ups and downs of life, and countless the kingly
vicissitudes which his pages have already recorded.
Why should an alnaanack-maker be made of sterner
stuff than a historian? And if the revolution of 1830
killed the great hilletrlia, with intolerable forebod-
ings of the events which bare but recentle come to
pass, why should not the revnluhon of 1848,
menacing as it has been to monarchs, have proved
equally fatal to the historiographer of the elite
of the human race; the Faubourg St. Germain, not
of Paris, but of the entire oiniised world
the powers, princedoms, and po eposities, who never
dine without music, and who pass their lives in semi-
duous and most successful demonstrations of the truth
of thmorrisares maxims? If a false, or at least a

25. 1848.

premature, alarm killed tie wino filasona, why
might sot a tens alarm peg Of loyal horror at
the disasters he would have to mimed, and the
ermines be wield be called ca to make—have proved
too vouch for the shamrock-maker P
The mere sddltlosal labour imposed oa the editor
of the Atirsaisech d. Gotha might, apart from
all his sympathy far his superiors, have proved
tee mach for any but German industry. We
have often figured him to Gunshots, boiling
pitman conference with his pabliaher, and
addressing him somewhat in the terms of the old
play—" Hazy weather, Muter Noah r as the deluge
of revolution roes higher, and the splatter of submerg-
leg royalties was heard on every side. To be sure the
Oacipal galleons, rotten though their timbers were,
sad incapable their crews, have wonderfully weep
tiered the storm. But this, though a vast consolation
la isms respects, is but a signal tar fresh toil on the
pest of the conscientious compiler of the Almanach de
Goaa cabinets and councils of state. Caere'se. and
irpu.ations succeed each other with the rapidity and
laeoberency of a dream. A man might as well at-
tempt to daguerreotype the as in a storm, or perform
simultaneously on three pianos, as attempt to chro-
nicle in one pocket volume the perpetual shifting. of
the revolutionary scene, together with the struggles
and catastrophes of the multitudinous seeneshiftenn
And then the perplexing thought, what to do with
your outcasts and exiles, your desdiehados and des-
perados, ex-kings, and ex-ministers, too, if they be-
loig to princely houses. Where to put them, in
what closet or niche, or at what aide-table, in the
Valhalla of legitimacy, where their pride will not be
wounded by the transference? We were especially
curious to see what was done with the House of OR-
LEANS, on account of their connexion by three
intermarriages with the fortunate House of
Saxa-Conowto and Gyros, under the shadow
of whose wing the almanack maker wrote.
France has not only repudiated them,
bat abolished their titles for ever. We searched, and
we find them and their titles; all the dethroned
BOURBONS—the branehe coddle, as well as the
branche sine—pitehterked in as an appendage to
tits seassat of the royal family of Spain. There the
Quito de CDADIRORD and the Comte de NECILLT,
With all their respective kith and kin, lie perdu and
patient, like MONTERINOS in his cave, awaiting
soother restoration.
The nest and well-packed little volume—which is
a marvel in its combination of smallness, copiousness,
sad cheapness, and goes nearer than any we have
seen to solve that bibliopolic problem, which may be
Benthamically stated as, "the go ...est quantity of
matter in the smallest possible space —oontains many
another si.;nificant token of the times, if we had
Weave or inclination to compare it with come of its
predecessor.. The frontispiece, for instance, is a por-
trait of the Reieltwersneser, the imitablee but sturdy
old Archduke Jolts, so long the ntauetris so jet of the
house of 11A11111URO-I,OItRAINE. We should have
liked to see the face with which Herr Peonies, the
publisher, and Dr. EWALD, the editor, would, twelve
months ago, have listened to a proposal to give the
place of honour to a liken use of the liberal
archduke, who was so popular in the Styrian hills,
and so unpopular with the Cr/me of Ger-
, man aristocracy everywhere, the especial patrons
of the Almanarh. To ally himself morganatically with
a countess or a baroness, is rather a feather in tt.e cap
of a German potentate, if he be of the right sort. It
shows he haa a will of his own. But a ausallianre
with a simple postmaster's daughter! all the blood of
Germany, that boasted 32 quarters and upwards,
boiled with indignation at the thought. And now
the Archduke is head of the German empire, and his
priestlike visage bedecks the Abounoch de Gotha
itself. But
Tampons atelonter et nos erenteter in this.
Next year probably the frontispiece will be LOUIS-
NAroLtox, and had fortune decided in favour of
LAYARTINE or CAVAIONAC, they, too, wuuld, we sup-
pone, eventually have been exhibited cheek by jowl
with the tenth transmitters of foolish fares, whose
likenesses the Alauntach delights ti collect for the
worship and consolation of the numerous tourtiers,
the missal of whose devotions it was, before it com-
menced supplying that statistical information, which
now not hse than the accuracy of its diplomatic de
tails and its comprehensive diary of events, recom-
mends it to political and general readers.
But enough, for once, of an almanack. The mania
for pictorial illustrations, and the vast improvements
effected in decorative printing, are making this by
pre-eminence the age of Christmas books. But from
none of the multifarious publications of the kind could
we draw so pregnant a moral, or find material fur
so impressive a homily, as in the turns of human fate,
registered without note or comment in the pages of
the Almanac's de Gotha.