The Express.
London, England, 1850-03-27 00:00:00

LIGHT DUES.

Mr. MOFFATT prTsenc;ciapitltiOn from the steam-ship
owners of Dustin, complaining of the light dues chargeable
at that port
PAVING RATE. _

On the motion of Lord D. STUART, an address was
ordered for return from each of the several paving boards, or
separate paving districts, in the parish of St. Pancras, in the
county of Middlesex, showing, for each of the years 1847,
1848, and 1849, the rateable value of property assessed; the
date and amount in the pound of each rate, distinguishing
the rates made for any special objects, with other partien•
bars : also stating the length of roads and streets included in
each district; the number of lamps, the Dauber of public
pumps; aad the number of gates or barriers erected amass
say streets or roads.
The house adjourned at three o'clock, until Monday the
Bth of April.

BANK Or ENGLAllo.—Yeaterday a ballot com-
muned at eleven o'cloca in the morniap, for the yawn of
taking the determination by vote, in print or writing, on
the resolution relined at the court of proprietors but
Thursday, vie .• That a dividend be made et 4 per cent.
interest and moats, for the half.year wading the 28th of
PO:every last, without any deduction on account of the
inns, tax " At four o'clock the ballot closed, and it
appeared datum resolution was unanimously *imbued.

- -
MERCHANT BIAMIN'S CORPORATlON.—licethrdey
thoraces • quarterly court of the governors of the Corpora-
tion for the BstEef of Merchant Seamen, their Widows, and
Cnildren, waa held at 26. Bireltin-lane,CornhEl. G. Lindsay,
Eq., in the chair. The adaainof the last court were read and
warmed, after whisk aa sommant of the receipts and capon.
dime for 1849 was rend, showing th•Jormer to be 28,9391.,
and the latter to be 16,1 W. The income includes 10,4641.
duty frets London mends. 62131. from outputs under the
management of the earipmesties, and throduce by the sale
of 6,0001. Rata Aaraltivis. The eapeaditare includes
12,8401. for Leaden pewelettere. 8,1061. for out-port pension-
ers, and 2,1231. dietribereed in temporary ',diet at London
and the ea TM bill now in the Mouse of Commons
for ey. at a the Merebant fisimaa's fund having ben
leid barn the meetiwg, the emit egjonra d, and the coat-
mitts, premeded to mweider and award pensions and tem
peruy relief to IiaNYWINIS applicants. Since th• quarterly
smut at Christmas then have been 282 applications tur ;elle
from disabled ream ea, sad their widows end children.
UNITIFASITY EXTRAVAOANCS.—The author of a
Leaamplalet OR Ms eabiset. entitled " A Few Plain Furs,"
t published, suerts the following:—" 1 bring fumed •
t of Mama saws which have comae t. my knowledge of
shameful extravegratee at the nattenities. The first we
was that of a youth who spent 2001. beyond his &Bowsaw
daring the period La which he was in college ; the smog
Teeth spud the suns tau daring his midget* also beyondhis *nowise.; the third, 1,6001. ; tb. fourth, 2.0004.
fifth, 1,0001. ; th• sizth, 2001. ; the seventh, 1,0001. ; the
eighth, 2,0001.; the ninth. 2001.; the tenth, 2001. ; the
eleventh, 2001 ; the twelfth. 1,0001.; th- thirteenth, 1,6001;
the fourteenth, 8001.; the firtuath, 8001.: thus, upon an
average, seek of them fifteen youths .pent 8501., dining their
slime mazes, beyond their memo; and it fifteen gush ours
could them my owe knowledge, what must now be the total
excess through the different hells and our gree?"
WHALE Foever—Some importatioes have recently
taken place at the port of Liverpool of an article called whale
1001 s, from the limited States 01 AMIIIIII. The article is
considered to come ander the mud term of grew, sad
thereon edesheibk, wider that head, daty tree.

'G, MARCH 27, 1850.

eke erpreofs.

OUTGOING MAIL&
Tim West Lila Mail. fasleilep Baraiuda, Nweasnall;
lilairen, Rerierne, New Wefts, eel Meelaikied raiding
obese Me II"Odra, Si. dwau4e-Niaaragna, New Goer*
ChM, aid Po% will be made up ea April 2.
The siup es dle air M die
•I Deadis, sad Baena Arm; will
be Rade die April 4.
The anti ~4
DAM • *Awls& aid the United
States ME be made up in *. mass of April 6.
The rib ibe Li*" Spas, sod Gibraltar will be nada
ap ea Apen
Tie mai wid Marla* it' the Mediterraaean, Egypt,
Coyle% llSHontioag, de., will be mile up es tle
el
wrealag 11.
The male Gibraltar, Malta, Greta, the lonien Woad%
ligypt, Goyim, ladle, sad Chios, .is Southampton. will
be made ap en April 20.

MOH WATER AT WIDOW 12IIXIL
!1 DAt—lldnlAA 1L MA Aftinews. IL WA
To-seassw—lbseiss. A 17.. AlawaraL.kis

LONDON, WEDNESDAY; MARCH 27.

INTO the theological controversy which is now
raging, the readers of this jrtrnal will not, of course,
be led. The property of infant baptism; on what
its efficacy may depend; the standard of evidence by
which the character and effect. of that sacrament are
to be decided ; whether the Holy Scriptures have to
control the Prayer-book, or the Prayer-book has to
interpret the Bible—are questions we shall leave to be
decided by the angry polemics who are now, some in
rebellion, all in arms; if, indeed, divines so intempe-
rate, angry, and intolerant, can come to any com-
mon decision on points which nothing but indiscretion
the most mischievous has brought into serious dis-
cussion.

The inconveniences, the troubles, and the discords
of our present eeelselaitical condition almost create
regret at the loss of the High and Dry party in the
church, who, in the old times of political bigotry aNd.
religious indifference, acted like ballast in the bailie
of mother church, and kept the cumbrous old ship
steady. Good souls, they had their faults; but, in
despite of their toryism, their horror of the Pope, their
hatred of dissent, their dislike of BCONAPARTE, their
love of pluralism, and their ignoracce of anything but
the form of religion, they were too gentlemanly,
too jolly a set, and had too much affection for
the church, to disturb either their own, or our, or her
peace, as their successors are now doing. They were
content with a text from Paul and a sermon from
EPICTESIIS, and solved all dogmatic scruples over that
good old port which has disappeared with them.
The rise of the evangelical party disturbed the cld
gentlemen sadly in their latter days; they never
ciuld exactly comprehend what Mr. WILBERFORCE'S
" Vital Christianity" meant; it wu something, they
were sure, not much to the old King's mind, and that
was enough for them; they opposed its progress and
threw in their hostility to abolition of the slave trade
to mark more strongly their dislike of the Clapham
s.ct. The full of NAPOLEON roused them for a while ;
but tho decline of their loved VANSITTART, and the
duke's " treachery," were blo we from which they
never recovered.

Gradually u they disappeared, the evangelical
party came to the surface. Its growth was, perhaps,
a natural rendition from the indifference of High
and Dry party, assisted a little by the rising spirit of
political liberalism with which it had liaisons. One ex-
treme promced the otter. But, though the great
body of the clergy yielded for a short time to even-
gelicism, they never took kindly or heavily to it.
Its leaning was shallow, its habits were not cmirtly,
its doctrines were puritanical, and its views of the
church were loose and indefinite. It left • huge
want in the mind' emlesiaatical onsupplied. So, dis-
gusted with Exeter Hall, and taking advantage of
its senseless tirades against Irish popery, Oxford took
another tarn, and brought forth the Poseyites. For
a while they carried everything before them ; until,
carrying themselves in their enthusiasm to Rome, their
followers became alarmed, and their opponents
triumphant. Slowly, however, the high church people
has regained its own confidence, until, at last, in the
GoitnaM case, it has fairly measured arms with the
Evangelicals.
. . . . . . -

No; the great merit of the judgment of the Judi-
cial Committee is, that it re-establishes the compre-
hensive character of the Articles of the Church of
England, and gives both parties the opportunity of
living peaceably, if not unitedly, in its fold. This
opportunity, to do the low church party justice, it
teems willing enough to avail itself of—very much,
perhaps, because undoubtedly in the judgment it had
a very narrow escape ; the balance of argument from
the Prayer Book inclining somewhat strongly against
it. The other party reject the peace thus offered, and
appeal to the letter of the law.
Without following them into these arguments, we
must, however, point to our readers a practical
ccne-
gzence of their success, which would very seriously
affect the relative positions of clergy and laity. Re-
generation, says Mr. GORHAM, precedes infant
baptism, where rightly received ; that is, regenera-
tion is a supernatural act independent of a religious
form. " Regeneration," stye Bishop PHlLrorrs, is is
conveyed by and in the sacrament of baptism ; in other
words, the priest administering that rite, necessarily
conveys regeneration." This distinction, it will be atonce
perceived, alters the whole character of the priest-
hood. Adopt Mr. Goatiam's view, and the priest is a
mere administering functionary; assent to the Bishop's,
and the priest becomes a being endowed with super-
natural powers. One of the main differences between
the Rom& and the Protestant faiths, with all its
immense practical consequences, is thus involved in
the question.
It is indispensable that this consequence of the
controversy should not be lost right of; because all
the measures advocated by the Bishop of Exuma
and his followers have the elevation of priestly power
for their end. They do not seek to destroy the com-
prehension of the Church of England merely to settle
a doctrinal difference ; but to found upon the destruc-
tion such a superstructure of priestly power as will
be applicable to the practical affairs of the world. All
their schemes are, therefore, to be watched, because of

this their great design.
Nor is there such absolute folly in it as may at
first appear. For it is impossible to trace and ex-
amine the growth of the modern high church party,
without coming to the conclusion that even in this
country—in protestant England—the priesthood has
of late years, by the solemnity of its pretensions, very
greatly augmented its power over the laity.
Let as see what are its present pretensions. The
following are the resolutions passed at the high church
meetings. They declare that the church of England
unless
It shall openly and express) reject the erroneous doctrine
sin, toned by the decision of the Judicial Committee, forfeits
the office and authority to whams and teach as a member of
the univenal church, becomes formally separate from the
catholic body, and can no longer astute to its members the
grace of the sacrament and the remission of stilt
In the next place they recommend that

License should be prayed for that the church in convoca-
tion may declare the true doctriae ; or that an act of parlia-
ment should be obtained to give legal effect to the decisions
of the °oat otive episcopate on this and all other matters
purely spiritual ; or, finally, that all efforts should be made
to obtain from the episcopate a re-affirmation of the doctrine
of holy baptism impugned by the sentence.

It is not our business to decide whether or not the
church is heretical ; but, with respect to the invoked
decision of the convocation as at present constituted,
all must protest. The most rabid tractarian would
scarcely deny that the laity are a portion of the
church, and yet the laity are not represented : there
are no curates in convocation, no incumbents
of district churches ; neither have they, the
last, any vote in the election of representatives.
The el( ctions themselves are " hole-and-corner "
elections. The permission to convocation to settle
the matter would, therefore, involve, in common jus-
tice tv all parties, a complete re-construction
of that body. An act of parliament to give legal
effeet to the decisions of the collective episcopate
would involve a denial of the QUEEN'S supremacy,
and could never be obtained while the church is in
union with the state. Finally, an effort to obtain
from the episcopate a re-affirmation of the true
doctrine would, if it produced Any fruits at all, end in
holding up the bench of bishops as a debating soci-
ety, one portion of the prelates excommunicating the
other. Whatever succcu might be achieved by the
Bishop of EXETER be would be at least doomed to
see the archbishops of the two provinces in the
minority opposed to him.
In fact and in floe the controversialists should not
be encouraged by any new legal machinery; by
altering the constitution of the court, which now
decides in such questions—by giving the ecclesiastical
power any share in the mart, this and similar

disputes would homages. In a society so commituted
as that of Ragland, with an opisoopaey so influential
by it! wealth, patronage, andpelitisal pow.er amongst
the higher dame, with an aristocracy which has, by
mesas of patronage, a deep yeenniary interest in the
church, and whisk regards its maintenance and inte-
grity as a bulwark that protects itself; with a paro-
chial system which provides an organisation such as
_to lay institution possesses ; with a clergy, one divi-
sion of which charges that/that with heresy, an aeon-
@mica which it repels by imputation, of papiatical
tendencies; with a middle class micas:ly split, there
is eddy in what our friends over the Tweed call
Brostianion only which *insists in the state riding
the church with tight rein.

Tams has not been for many :ears so tmvir a
iprisg-iinte throughout ovary part. of Ireland. the
long aontinuanas of the rainy seuoe, u in that por-
tion of the realm is frequently the cue, retarded till
the second week of March the sower's occupation.
Since then, however, sedulous and universal efforts
have be node by all classes to plant every species
of crop. Greater care in the selection of seed, and in
the preparation of the ground for its reception, are
observable.

The conviction has practically come home to the
mind, of all who are connected with the cultivation
of the soil, that there is nothing worth working for
but a large crop and • prolific yield. Price will no
longer pay. Quality and quantity are the sole re-
sults worth the husbandman's hope and labour. The
gambling chances between scarcity profits and " good-
luck sales," are at an end. The probabilities of a
steady continuance of low markets grow every day
more strong. There is nothing for it left but in-
creased and improved produce.
What is this but another way of expressing—better
farming ? In argument all thinking men were long
ago persuaded that to such a result the working of
free trade would inevitably tend. It is of far more
moment to perceive the gradual working of the prob-
lem among the laborious and imperilled claws, w ith
whom error on matters of the kind is no affair of
intellectual discomfiture, bat of physical and so-
cial ruin. Had the majority of farmers in
Ireland been duped last autumn by the pro-
tectionist cry into the expectation that par-
liament would undertake to guarantee them a
pricefor their corn, we sLould now behold wide-spread
disappointment instead of popular hope, and general
despondency instead of universal energy, perseve-
rance, and industrial resolution. Happily for them-
selves, and fortunately for the country, the shrewd
occupiers of the Celtic soil were not to be gulled by
the DOWNSIIIRES and (ILENGALLS. They knew by ex-
perience what landlord professions of sympathy, and
landlord promises of service meant. They
discerted the signs of the times, and wisely
judged that no longer would their safety or
prosperity be built on aristocratic legislation or aria•
tocratic sufferance. They saw that for the tenant-
farmer there could henceforth be but one road, to
wealth, comfort, or independence—and that that road
lay through permanent and never ceasing improve-
ments of the soil.
We rejoice in being able to recognise the first pal-
pable proofs that have been afforded of this awakening
energy in our:neighbours beyond the channel. Sooth to
say, it needed no ordinary amount of moral courage to
recommence, under existing circumstances, the vigo-
rous culture of that blighted land—blighted tempora-
rily by the inscrutable decrees of providence, but far
more fatally blighted by the too intelligible iniquity
of landlord law. Without farm buildings, adequate
fences, or thorough drainage done by the pro-
prietor, as in Scotland is common and in
England not unusual, the Irish tenant has
no alternative generally speaking, but to make
what he can out of so macy acres of land little re-
moved from their primary state, or to risk the outlay
of hie time and toil in works of lasting utility, subject
to their legal confiscation by the landlord, whenever'
he might choose to seize and appropriate them. The
laud law of Ireland, as made and administered by
the landlords of Ireland, by and with the
help of their brethren in Britain, is nothing
more nor less than the law of feudal rtpire.
The only measure of privileged extortion is that sup,
plied by considerations of privileged forbearance,
cunning, or caprice. By force of statute and inter-
pretation, all the improved value which a tenant, by
his own labour and at his own charge, imparts to the
holding—in the jargon of law, " attaches to the free-
hold," in plain English becomes the property of him
who did nut make it, and did nut pay for
it, at his covetous and unrighteous option.
The Irish tenant has no security of tenure during
which he may enjoy the first-fruits of his improve-
ments, and no security for compensation for having
made them, when he is deprived of the opportunity
of enjoying them. We repeat, therefore, what we
have already slid, that to set about improved tillage
under circumstances so disadvantageous, is infinitely

to the credit of the Irish farmers-as a'claas, and en-
titles them in an eminent degree to the respect and
sympathy of all who are more favourably circum-
stanced.

But sympathy and respect are hollow and hypo-
critical phrases if they bespeak nothing beyond the
involuntary emotions which the sight of "civil
courage " excites within men's minds. The Irish agri-
cultural middle class have other claims.
They are fighting an unequal battle against
their hereditary oppressors for the abro-
gation of the statatable privilege of plunder
which we have above indicated. " Tenant right" and
" tenant compensation " where the former does not
by usage and custom prevail, are terms of very differ-
ent signification in Ireland from that which they
peas for here. They are, in truth, nothing more than
a simple assertion of the rights of industry as against
the frauds systematically committed in the name of
property. Without waitirg for their assertion
and vindication, the occupiers of the soil
are willing once more to deal with it as
if that vindication and assertion were at hand.
It is for all who value worth above birth, and labour
more than exaction, to see justice done; to see that
these legitimate expectations be not disappointed. II
they be, what can we expect, save the renewal, in
new and probably unexampled forms, of those detri-
mental and dangerous collisions between classes which
distracted Ireland and disgraced the empire ?
Already symptoms of a feverish state of feeling
grow daily more apparent in many portions of the
sister country. TYpperaryient has for a time slum-
bered, but its accursed causes are unhappily not
extinct. On the contrary, there is bat too much
reason to fear ibat the proprietary encouraged by the
rash and fanatical promptings of certain empirics
in this country, have flattered themselves with
the nation this the social consequences of the
potato blight would reduce the occupying tenantry
more completely into subserviency to their over-
reaching desires, and enable them more completely
than ever " to do what they will with their own.
They had better waken from their dream of prodigal
tyranny, ere it be too late. The people are changing,
and with them the proprietary must for their own
sakes change. Hard fortune has disciplined the
many, and taught them courage out of the depths of
suffering. If property is to be made safe among
such a people, their right to toil in safety must be
made secure.

CONSIDERABLE agitationhm been occasioned in India
by a legislative project of the local authorities at Cal-
cutta, to which some of the residents have given the
name of" the black sote,"others a name redolent of still
dmraft&ore
.unsaThveoutirytlessossoof
theiagetiondrafts—s". twhheichthtrheee
Abolgaelo.k
Indian public are expected to swallow, are re.pec-
Only :—i. An act for declaring the law as to the
privilege of her Majesty's European subjects. 2. An
act for abolishing exemption from the jurisdiction of
East India Company's criminal courts. 3. An act for
the protection of judicial officers.
A very brief explanation will serve to show the
nature and tendency of these proposed enactments.
At each of the three residencies there is a court of law
presided over by English judges, and in whi.h
all Englishmen accused of crimes are tried according
to the laws of England, and by a jury of their
peers. Beyond the confines of throe cities—in
what is called the Morussil—penal law is admi-
nistered by the East India Company's civil ser-
vants. Native-born Englishmen and persons de-
scended of English parents have hitherto been ex-
empted from the jurisdiction of the Mofussil courts;
and the only systems of law administered in these
courts have been tho Mahometan or Hindoo codes, by
which the natives subjected to their jurisdiction have
been accustomed to be judged. The object of " the
black acts" is to introduce one uniform system of

weal law for all residents in Indie, and *ct
Englishmen to the jurisdiction of the Mofussil courts.
Now, Englishmen have at all times and in all
places evinced a strop; predilection for being judged
by their own law', and by tribunals organised like
those with which they are familiar at home. They re.
getable the &etch arohers of Louts XL, who insisted
iwn being hanged by their own Provosc-Marshal,
11U Anglo-Indians, therefore, are decidedly avenues to
being deprived of the privilege of being judged only by
English laws and tribunals. They say in addition
that they have no confidence in the equity or intelli-
gence of the Mofussil courts, and that they protest
against being rendered amenable to the semi-barba.
rolls laws of the Koran and the Shutters.
For this reluctance no man can blame them. The
constitution of the Mothesil courts is certaialy not of
a kind to invite at; man to seek justice in them who
can keep out of them. The men appointed to preside
in them are frequently raw and inexperie need young
men. They have none of them had a legal education.
Of the laws of England they are profoundly ignorant;
and in applying the Mahometan and Hinnoo laws
they are at the mercy of their Bailee assistants, a
class of men distinguished even among the little ecru.
Fuloas natives of Hindostan for reckless corruption.
inally, the Company's servants presiding over these
courts have rarely more than a very imperfect know.
ledge of the language in which the business in con.
ducted in them, and not nnfrequently are entirely
unacquainted with it.
The first reflection that these facts suggest is the
culpable neglect to provide the natives with good
laws and trustworthy tribunals, of which they eon.
vitt the English in India. So long as English.
men were left to enjoy their privileged jurirdiclon
in peace, we heard not a word against tne laws for
the natives. But the moment it is propcsed to extend
the laws and judicial system, which have been deemed
"good enough for Indians," to Englishmen an immense
majority of the Company's own servants recoil from
the proposal in fear and disgust. The badue.a of the
Indian code, and the corruptness of its administration,
may be inferred from the alarm with V( ich even the
Company's officials protest against being brought
within its meshes.
Another reflection suggested by the incident to
which we are adverting is the perverse manner in
which the Company's government set about 'he task
of law reform. They have two systems of laws and
law courts in their dominions—one for Eri;:lialtmen,
the other for natives—one tolerably good, the other
intolerably bad. They have discovers d that it
is unjust to give the one race a prefer. nee ever the
other; and the way in which they set about removing
the invidious distincti in is by reducing mere
favoured race to the level of the other.