The Sun.
London, England, 1864-04-07 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUELIC JOURNALS.

POST.—To be able to hope in spite of discourage-
meets destructive of hope is to possess a quality
which has on great authority received a high place
among the Christian virtues. We are not, there-
fore, at liberty to scoff at those who solace them-
selves with the expectation that great good will
come of the Conference to be held in London on the
affairs of Denmark. We will try to imitate those
excellent persons who hope the best under all cir-
cumstances and despair of nothing. We will not
suffer ourselves to dwell upon the interference with
anything like calm discussion and judicial equani-
mity which must result from the effects upon dif-
ferent parties of each day's telegrams from the seat
of war. We will recount no more the chances
against a peaceful solution which lie in the fact that
both the assailants and the assailed are possessed
by foregone conclusions. Nor will we spoil any
possibility of a successful issue by throwing
into the arena a single apple of discord out of the
many that lie about on every side. We will be con-
tent to watch and wait, giving the Conference, in
the meantime, our good wishes. It will do a good
work if it succeed in terminating the war and
placing the long vexed question of Schleswig-Hol-
stein upon a footing of permanent rest. It may do
this, and we shall be glad to see it. But some things
it can never do. It can never justify in the eyes of
Europe the barbarity with which the war has been
conducted. It can never wipe out the stains of
blood needlessly shed which will long disgrace
the policy of Austria and Prussia; nor can it
allay the indignation with which the people of
this country regard the proceedings of Germany.
From various causes—not the least among which
must be counted the family alliances which of late
years have been contracted—there was till re-
cently a strong sympathy between the people of
England and the Germans. That feeling has
gone, and no Conference can resuscitate it. The
feeling uppermost in almost every Englishman's
mind is that two powerful States have combined to
deal out the hardest possible measure to a weak one.
That in doing so they have gone out of their way
to be unsparing. Not only would they grant no
terms, no armistice, no cessation from the daily
stretch and struggle of almost hopeless self-defence,
but they have done what they resolved to do with
a ferocity that was needless, and a self-glorification
that was inhuman. The bombastic orders of the
day by Prince Charles would lead one to suppose
that his soldiers had performed prodigies of valour
in the face of a superior enemy, and had won glory
through perils that had no precedent. Whereas
the only credit to which they are entitled is
that which two able-bodied men might claim
for pounding a small boy within an inch of his
life, or for attacking a defenceless woman. Talk
of glory ! Has the military glory of Germany
come to this that it must be freed from the better
instincts of humanity before it can achieve con-
quest ? Is it any glory to swarm over a small ter-
ritory like rats, and then boast of the havoc which
the many have wrought among the few ? Is it
glory to shower fire and shot amongst women and
children, and to slaughter brave men by the brute
force of ten to one ? Let those who can glory in
such deeds; let the two great Powers of Central
Europe perform their prodigies of power over weak-
ness ; and let their princes proudly proclaim the
heroic actions of superior numbers. These may be
glory in the eyes of Germany, but in England the
triumphs count for tyranny, the achievements for
monstrous cruelty, and the proclamations for mere
swagger. The heart of the nation is with Denmark
as the heart of one man, Not one in ten, perheps
not one in a hundred, can give.a rational account of
the quarrel, or state the bearings of the Holstein
question. But ninety-nine out of every hundred
know that, be the question what it may, Austria
and Prussia have adopted a tyrannous mode of solv-
ing it. They may know little of Danish or German
treaties, but they know right from wrong, glory
from rapine, fair fight from foul, reason from passion,
and the necessary evils of war from its needless bru-
talties. The conduct of Germany is regarded in this
country with downright abhorrence—so much so,
that it requires the utmost prudence en the part of
our statesmen to keep the popular enthusiasm from
shouting aloud for Denmark at every opportunity and
goading the Government into war. No doubt, neu-
trality is the wise and right course for this country,
but the reasons are prudential rather than popular.
There is scarcely a dinner-table amongst the highest
classes where the wantonness of Austria and Prussia
is not spoken of in terms of severe reprehension. In
the less reserved circles of the Diddle and working
classes the utterances are louder and deeper; and
whether it be the unreasoning obstinacy of the
Court of Berlin, or the overweening los'e of power
at Vienna, or the paltry politics of Frankfort, or the
intrigues of tho score or so of petty Sovereigns of
even more petty principalities which make up the
federation, the theme need only be German to draw
forth at once expressions which imply the reverse
of compliment and affection. We are not saying
that this is right; still less that it is wise ; but it is
a fact. The German policy and its attendant
cruelties—for they deserve no better name—hove
scandalised the English mind. If counsels, long
trained to rise superior to passion, did not at once
control the impetuosity, while they command the
confidence, of the whole country, the Channel fleet
would leave for the Baltic in four and twenty
hours, and Europe would blaze up with war.
It remains to be seen what the Conference will
do. We have seen what it cannot do. At the same
time it is certain that something must be done.
This terrible assault on Denmark must be stayed
somehow. There is a point at which the neutral
Powers of Europe must reconsider their attitude.
Not the most pacific of European politicians is pre-
pared to see Denmark spunged out of the map. Yet
the Germans show no signs of holding their hand ;
and the heroic Danes still sell their lives at the
dearest price known to inherent bravery and aggra-
vated sense of ill treatment. Welcome, then, the
Conference, hopeless as its prospects are I Welcome
anything that will but make an effort to stop the
waste of blood, to secure that necessary fighting
shall at least be fair, and that judicial wisdom shall
undertake the problem which passion fails to solve.
HERALD.—The bare suggestion that France had
accepted the project of a Conference to arrange the
Dano-German difficulty, with the popular will as a
basis, or, in other words, that the Duchies should
decide according to the views of those possessing
most power and influence among them, has very
naturally drawn attention to a subject of the
greatest importance to the present and future
well.-being of States and dynasties during times
when some, at least, of these are considered not
to be firmly established. If the dangerous prin-
ciple that the supposed will of the people is to
supersede treaties regularly and solemnly ratified be
conceded, then there is not a power in Europe
which may not well tremble for some part of its
possessions. There is no kingdom so blessed with
peace or united in its people which might not be
disturbed with the prospect of independence held
out to any of its sections. What has happened in
Italy may well happen in Germany, in Russia, and
elsewhere. When Earl Russell produced his famous
. `^ to Turin, counselling the doctrine of na-
thsPs"--. e member of the House of Commons rose
tionalit4- on that principle our tenure of
and declared thaw -afe for a day, for that nni-
Ireland would not be e.
since for a severance of
versal suffrage would pron. Extreme and most
the connection with England. e
en uttered in
unlikely as this'statement appears eve action
a time of internal union and peace, on retie
ti rely
! and
guided by experience, it will not seem so ea
absurd and without foundation. If the men of lute.'
ligence and property in Ireland had alone to deter-''
mine the matter there could be but little doubt of
their loyal conclusion. But the decision would fall
to numbers, that is, to prejudice, hatred, and igno-
rance, and to unscrupulous ambition acting on these.
The momentous question would thus be left to the
most incompetent and corrupt of judges. This must
be the result of an appeal to the popular will every-
where.
There may, of course, arise exceptional exi-
gencies where even the choice of numbers, the vox
populi, if that could in some measure be obtained,
would be preferable to any other arbitrament to de-
cide the vital problem of the government of a nation.
But that the great Powers of Europe should allow
a principle so purely revolutionary to enter the field
of diplomacy is to believe that they would delibee
rately propose the sentence of their own disinheri-
tance and condemnation. Our French correspon-
dent calls attention to the emphatic opinion of M.
Guizot on the question of universal suffrage, deli-
vered before it had strength to found the Second
Empire, and to combine various sections of the Ita-
lian governments into one kingdom. "No doubt,"
says the statesman and philosopher, " it should be
the object, and it is the natural result, of good social
institutions to raise progressively a greater number
of men to that degree of intelligence and indepen-
dence which qualifies them to participate in the
wielding of political power; but bet wean that prin-
ciple of free government and universal suffrage held
up as the first and fundamental law of human so-
ciety, what a gulf ! What utter oblivion of an infi-
nite number of facts, rights, and truths which justly
claim their rank and their share in soc:.alorganisa-
lion." Now, this forgetfulness of facts, rights, and
truths is just the difficulty that Conservatives have
always to contend against when opposing the popu-
lar views on the suffrage of which Mr. Bright, Mr.
Baines, Mr. Locke King, and other prominent men
of the extreme Radical school are the champions. It
is very easy to talk of the rights of the working
classes to a free voice in the election of members of
Parliament, but in reality there is no right at all.
The power to choose representatives in the Legis-
lature is the very highest in the kingdom—the
and permance of all caw instautione
rest upon this. It is preposterous to assert that

this supreme authority is Lodged in the ignoran
masses of the community alone; for this is the sole
force and only result of universal suffrage, manhood
suffrage, or such a low qualification as mu st amount
to this or lead to it inevitably and soma. If the
overwhelming working classes had any such natural
right it would be most wise to abolioh it. But they
have not ; for the State is held together by mutual
sacrifices and concessions as the price of protection
and peace. Political privileges, like All others
existing in a nation, must result from labour, must
be the price of toil, mast be the fruits of thrift and,
saving, giving a man e:eclusive property, and
therefore a firm stake is the well-being of the cowl-
munity and kingdom. He on'at hold this property
either as the immediate recosapense of hie own
exertions, or inherit it from pera °l3B having
a right
to confer it upon him. There ma y, it is true, be an
amount of intelligence unallied to property, which
ought to entitle a man to the french, ise, but this can
never be as sound and incorruptible 0 basis for the
suffrage as the qualification of prop erty, for the
man who has most to lose will most dread needless
and perilous change and revolution. The repetition
of some very obvious political truths is not allege.
ther an unnecessary duty now, when even oux Go-
vernment are not very chary of how the questios off
the suffrage is to be treated so long as a tenure off
office is still secured to them. We do not enspeet
Lord Palmerston himself of any extreme opinions,
but there are membrs of his Cabinet who eagerly
desire to see the franchise lowered to the accession
of numbers, or who, in other words, would place
the real Government of this country in the bands
of a wavering, unpropertied multitude. The six-
pound borough vote, the ten-pound county vote,
without any sets-off or counterpoise, must lead ts
this democratic conclusion. The upper and middle
class votes would be swart.,ped by the swarming.
working classes, who would obey their
leaders and study what they considered to be
their own immediate and special interests, no
matter how ruinous to the per manent welfare of
the kingdom. The adoption of the ballot involves
this question of universal suffrage; for where you
destroy the open vote you exclrids the) non-electors
from their sole right in the represental'ion, and thus
you make it only just that every one should enjoy
the same electoral privilege. We do not fear that
the proposal to adopt the popular wiLl as a new
feature in, diplomacy will be acceptable to the
crowned beads of Europe, although it should prove
to be the facetious suggestion of an Emperor, if
indeed the suggestion has been made ; but the dis-
cussion of this novel idea is in itself a ground for
exposing its danger, not only to international con-
cord and peace. but to the stability of domestic
institutions. When universal suffrage is named in
connection with the Dino-German question, it is in
some measure recommended for adoption as the rule
of adjustment everywhere. It ought, therefore, to
meet with no manner of entertainment. We all
know what it means. It argues the will of the
most influential, the most powerful, the most able
in the state to corrupt or compel all the .others. It
does not imply the real voice of the people or their
independence or freedom. It it the open auction
mart of slavery. Nor is it singular that our own
English Radicals should be on the same monopolist
track. When they contend for a wide extension of
the suffrage and disregard the claims of the middle
classes, they are on the rapid line which has led to
the restriction of liberty and the ultimate control of
the popular will by a dictatorship. But it is re-
markable that members of the British Government
should fearlessly entertain and avow opinions
proved by all history, and by recent experience in
particular, to 133 incompatible with any form of free
and liberal government.