The Express.
London, England, 1851-12-10 00:00:00

FRENCH PUBLIC OPINION.

We have been favoured with the following letter,
addressed to his London correspondents, by a mem-
ber of the old Chamber of Deputies, known for the
moderation of his political opinions, who is still the
head of a great mercantile establishment in an im-
portant centre of French commerce. It was received
unsigned, and de tribes the general feelings of
French society on recent events :

PARIS, S Vrt7110.14.
The su=pension of the greatest part of the remelt news-
papers ; the state of restraint in which those are whose
puhlication is allowed, under the watch of an agent of
without whose permission no article can appear, can-
not allow you to learn the truth as to events here. I think,
tlicrefore, that you will receive with some interest internia-
tMn both sincere and drawn from the best sources.

On the day of the decree dissolving the National Amore-
bly, the population appeared indiderent ; all that was at
fir.t seen was the restoration of universal suffrage, which
had been taken away contrary to the spirit of the constitu-
tion. For some time the legislature had been con-
sidered to be in the wrong ; and, without going
so far as to approve its expulsion, people at least
were resigned to it. Paris was therefore perfectly tranquil at
first; but the next day, when it was known that snore than
200 representatives, that many distinguished generals, had
been arbitrarily arrested, that several of the last had been
the objects of personal brutality, public feeling, so calm the
day before, changed in a moment completely ; and strong
indignation broke out against those violent measures.
Public feeling, alienated from the Assembly, returned to it
when its persecution was known ; an agitation extended on
all sides through all ranks of sock ty, among rich and poor;
all flocked to the Boulevards, and from the Bastille to the
Madeleine the troops, as they paraded, were received with
cries of " Vice la Il.publiitte • Vire la Constitution; 1 ice
to (Ai; a bas k dicealear." I traversed all the di-dance
named on foot ; I mixed with all the groups; and I pledge
my honour to you that I did not hear a single voice in
favour of Bonaparte.
It was easy to sec that things would not stop where they
and that idler - '

were,

r such

gette would soon tollow.
Accordingly, barricades arose in all points of the capital,
and everywhere a combat began. It was, however, evident
that no serious struggle was possible ; for the President had
got together 100,00.) men at Paris, carefully selecting the
regiments most devoted to him ; but the object of the oppo-
nents was to gain time, to weary the soldiers by continual
marches and alarms, and to ascertain the feeling of the
corps at a distance from the capital. This plan was con-
' tinued even yesterday (Friday), and whatever the govern-
ment may say as to the complete repression of the insurrec-
tion, it is certain that fighting continued in the more distant ,
faubourgs.
I do not believe that these tactics can succeed ; but it
seems to me probable, that without shedding uselessly blood,
it will be suffteient to oppose a moral resistance, a force of
inertia that will prevent the new order of things from
establishing itself. The President is only surrounded by
mediocre men, by people sunk in debt and debauchery;
everybody of any value has abandoned him with contempt.
How can he torm a respectable government with such
elements ?

Besides, one step taken in the way of illegality and
violence, one is inevitably led each day to go farther, and,
for self support, to resort to means so disgraceful that no
nation can long support their ignominy.
On the first day inviting citizens to remain peaceful was
enough ; next day, groups and cries were forbidden ; the
third day the right to fire on crowds without previous sum-
mons, and even to shoot on the spot any person found work-
ing at a barricade, or with a gun in his hand in the street,
was assumed and practised ; to-day, further progress has
been made ; tyranny attacks intelligence, and those who
repeat false news arc brought before the council of war.
IN hat more could be done—unless to prohibit our con-
versing of these matters at home, by our tire4ide, or to for-
bid our corresponding
You must see that no good man can submit to such an
abominable state of thinzs, and that if brute brae suc-
ceeds in restraining the explosion for a short time, it must
be but the more violent and irresistible.

Let me now give you some d, tails as to es I..et
National Assembly. You may Once iniiiheit fait,. Militia.
for I have them from:ever:el of ti ach.r., in these sae:iv,_
choly transactions.
Two hundred and thirty representatives met at h u ;„
morning nt the Mairie of the 111th anondissendot,
organised themselves under the two vice-presidents,
the usual secretaries and short-hand writers. To 2jvt.• T„
authenticity to their acts, they opened the &so, 'ho
public; and, in conformity with the text of the c!,n.a.;!„
tion, they unanimously declnred the President u! :ie.
public de,graeled from his functions and aucweil le! •!;
treason. This decree passed, M. Lupin, Pr :cureur4l.
la Cour (le Cessation, bore it himself to that (sour, esi
gave him a formal acknowledgment of its ret,ript, ;wpm,
the accusation, and instructed the high Court .4 •
proceed to trial. Then the police interfered seal li•;•:r.
the magistrates. At the same instant ;,.:
followed by soldiers went to the 10th arroi.,l.- .eahrit, .a.f
proceeded to arrest the repre-sentatives us th,
their functions; they were, carried elk ay l•• :••• •
barrack, and left there for seven or agia :..or.. ;
eAlular carriages—those while transport con% ;,
hulks—were brought, and some were take:. o, Vinc,:;;;,,,
some to the cellular prison fur criminals, and r•t t,
casemates of Fort Valerien. Them taken t s the Let • r
place were crammed into a room without fire ; t!. y w „
brought boards, bad mattresses, coarse blank,:. an,: •4
that hnd been already wed by the soldier.. Th.:„
themselves to make up their beds.
These disgraceful proceedings soon ai
Paris, awl made so much noise there, that i.te
day the governmeat determined to release i.s • ;
but as this measure did not apply to all, mot ,1,•;i:, •
were prude, the representatives declared Oa.. ; y ei• ! ;
leave tog, tier or not at till. To overcome ! •• „
the police resorted to force ; each deputy w..•
soldier.s and led out bef.re a file ef
Extreme irritation in all classes of 1.36.; . .
pression, which inspires only hatred e.i • . •
plunder of the finances--praetorian damii.ati it.
violation of the laws and of Om most : •
society and of humanity ; such is the evict 4 u of
It is impossible that it can last long.

THIS DAY'S I'AIIIS NEWS.

(BY BUBNIABINI: IBLECiILIPII.)

PARIS, NVEDNEADAY, TLN ~.CLO4
Tho department of Dames Apes is in a ste.
siege.

LOUIS NAPOLEON AN 1) THE PANTII!

Our contemporaries, bewildered apparel:. iy 1..- ;!.3
rapid succession of l'arisian hattidierit: ...a.! d, •
alternating with volleys of musketry, th, • • .
which came thick and thick from that e.,•••med I:t
dragooned capital, have b.:stowed little not', e
ukase or amen of the new Czar or Sultan. c.
lug that national property known as the I'; inr
into a church. This " dodge" neverthc . •
a whole world of meaning, and being act;
'meted in its proper sense by the " wide •
the Unicers, plainly indicates that t' ro :
attempt to marshal.' those functionor'...
late John Sterling called the " ,
and enrol them under the new dictator ,•••
r, verve to the mailed Cuira,siers and 01,
Vincenr,es, of Roman each' ity, who Li%
their allotted job in such an oil-hand st:.. •
manship.
The Irish ultramontane prints, the
Cork F..raminer, and minor satellites
dutiful orbits round the centre of
potism, have, in ignorance of the nod,
pact, and in absence of instructions ft I
given utterance to abusive denum •-I
" usurper." They will soon be tau;,::.: •
ners; and we expect to hear she
" nephew "of an excommunicated un,•l, i•
of fact, the eldest son of mother e!ltis,
second to King Bombe in the personal
of the Pope.
Magnin sees ahem Roma.:
This is the old game of political sinn• IVi,
the Norman built Battle :I.bbev oil the I Ind:
of }lasting* where the independence of the
Saxon ram, and the laws of Edwin(' the t
fessor were cloven down under a war
chct blessed by the Roman bisl••••0.
Ireland's subsequent subjugation, in %nue
Adrian's Bull, was paid for by :the, awn
known, grant of tithes to the clergy at -.11.• Sr,
Cashel. These arc merely domestic
took place in every case of European n.arpa•
plunder, robbery, and violation of law, the ;nit
of the culprit or occupant of questionable auth.
being to make matters pleasant with the priest',•
It was ever deemed advisable to purchase alisola
by liberal largesse, and thus secure n vener
accomplice in the seizure and the rapine. To
that any reluctance was felt on the part of the
ceisces m this comfortable arrangement were
wrong the memory of those holy men, and the
peril:need small eompunctuous visitings in the
secretion of every accomplished violence.
The principal writer in the trairers, Mr. Ji
Gordon, has adopted, in the name of his Fie'
readers, to its fullest extent, the Lunen; Nelipli
"Catechism° Filosotico," and in a mmllllllo.
translated into English by the sympathising Ifolir
of Bond-street, declares himself at a loss to Sec':
thing "lase" or "abominable" in the e!...etrin
oaths to maintain a sworn constitution ought Iva
be kept, or that such grave engagements arc an
but a solemn farce (page 97).
'ibis casuistry, when first put forward by a Greek
tragic poet, us xpn auras. et 1.6” Topavoidot Was
scouted even by Pagan integrity, and Cicero, alto
took the trouble to translate the scandalous propos
sition,
Nam si vinlandurn est jus regnandi gr nil,
Violandum est. Cmtcris rebus pistaton cola,: •

n

of V.'ll

any
I:at
,t to

stamped it in the name of Roman honesty with his
emphatic abhorrence. Yet we have the janissaries of
the Latin church, in the furtherance of what they
call Christianity, cheering on the stunt Fenlitiand
in his brutal downtreading of every fmneltis.. civil,
political, or intellectual, in the Two Sicilit A ; an
now see a repetition of the same blaspha mon- :ink-
ing of the cause of the Gosptl with the lue o;
drunken soldiery, in the ease of the lloulogau and
Strasburg adventurer's third exhibition.
The decree professes to carry out " the pious in-
tentions of the founder," in this matter of tit, Paris
Pantheon. That pious person was the keeper of tho
pare HUE cerfs, and the paramour of Bubarr; , who,
in 1757, thought tit to build a shrine to St.
Genevieve, as some atonement for the pub-
lic infamy of his life, and court, the truo
causes of the subsequent revolution. The pub-
lic money was lavished on the monument which
he lived not to see finished, and the architect
Soufflot died of a broken heart because the dome Will
found too ponderous for the pillars which he hoped
would bear it up. It was found necessary to mar
the beauty of his design by the substitution of
pilasters and massive masonry. But it was not con-
secrated as a Christian church when the first Na-
tional Assembly was convoked by monarchy in its
decrepitude. The public building was changed by
public enactment into a mausoleum for illustrious
eitiz( ns, and, though desecrated by the ashes of such
a wretch as Marat, it received the mortal remains
of Jean Jacques Rousseau and of Voltaire; and when
the statesman and orator Mirnbcau died, "carrying
with him tho last hopes of monarchical rule in
France," his funeral in the Pantheon was one of the
grandest scenes in modern history. By a decree of
1800, the Emperor ;Napoleon, who had been just
crowned by a pope, did not sofas forget the national
dignity as to sacrifice this building to the Itomisb
clergy, who had neither right to, nor indeed any ra-
tional use for it, as the neighbouring church of St.
Etienne du Mont gives more than sufficient church
accommodation to the vicinity—Napoleon ordered
its destination as a sepulchre fur his senators
and marshals. It was reserved for the year
1820, when the Restoration began its down-
ward course, to hand this monument over
to the priests, and a Jesuit preached on the occasion,
attributing the defect in the dome to a miraculous
anticipation on the part of the structure to the inters
meat of Rousseau under its cupolm'which " for very
shame it shuddered to tolerate.' But the fir-t act of
the popular dynasty of Orleans was to resume tho
edifice, and inscribe its walls in golden letters with
the names of the "men of July." Truly the giant
spirit of Mirabeau seems yet to agitate the superia-
cumbent mass, and to awake from time to time, SC'
cording to the destinies of this gorgeous temple.
}lama est Eucelsaisemiwitum fulmice corpus

ti rgen mole hoc ingentemque insuper ..Ertaam.
Et quotics foawn mutat tutus intremere mum=
Murmur° Trinacriam.
At any rate, with every successive chango this:
Pantheon seems in a remarkable matter to testifj tts

DEATLI or PROFESSOR DosnAn.—iiro have to
announce to-day the death of Mr. George Dunbar, Pro.
fessor of Greek Literature is the University of Ediabligh;
The melancholy event took place o t Saturday mormog
his residuum, lloso-park, Trinity.—Catedoiliart ihrturi