The Sun.
London, England, 1863-12-15 00:00:00

104-.... i...,, S 1 1 iit•
44,4 lb
W

__
LONDON, 'TUESD
. AY, DEC. 15, 1863.

Hitherto Mr. Col:;;.--4 a
enjoyed a very large
share
of public respect
and
admiration.
admiration. He has
certainly had ours—whatever
. value he might set
upon them. It is at this moment a matter to our-
selves, therefore, of very sincere and unaffected
regret that one whom we have , ,
long learnt thus
to r espect and to admire should, 1,
"Y his own extra-
ordimary proceedings, at once and entirely forfeit
all 'claim to either of those sentiraent,,.
It can
alone almost be accounted for, this sudden
and most
Lnseemly explosion of wrath on the put
of
in ....r.
COBDEN, by attributing it to what he himself
ante
called sarcastically—and not so very many months
back either—a craze. Ono is nearly tempted to
believe, witnessing what we all of 119 just now have
been witnessing within the interval of these last
Idly days—one is really almost tempted to believe
that there actually are those peculiar dares, to be
picked out or to be avoided, of which ZAD-
KIEJ's fifty thousand purchasers annually read
in his Prophetic Almanac. And among the
entries of the redoubtable Tao Sze for 1863,
wo might, now, almost look to find a warn-
ing addressed to all persona noted for their
sound common sense, not to write letters on Wed-
neseiay, the 9th of Deumber ! For it was on that
day *specially that the " craze" we have spoken of
e`PP'a•ars to have been very strong indeed upon Mr.
c °ImEN. Under date " Midhurst, 9th December,"
we'd him •
writing in the most offensive manner
ima ~; ~
k-4Lule,personall to the Editor tthe
y, o Times.
Lik !=.vi„, _n
date; `Feltticluh!r that same, for Mr. COBDEN, fatal
ltn writing, also in the most offensive
miroler, also per,onall
_
3, it should be said very per-
eonaoy, to a W holl .
LEI h. 0 i
Y dlfferent ree; i ' t f
win.,e, to Wit, the NI I) s arro-
atquess of HARTINGTON. Ad-
dresging the latterpel.Bo,m_'e
more after the manner
of the late Mr. ConnEr, than
of what we have been
heretofore accustomed to regard
as the manner of Mr.
COr.D ES—the member for Ntidhurst
Opens his com-
munication to Lord HARTINGTON
thus Curtly—
"My lord, you will perhaps 'oe
good enough e
to
your
tike an early opportunity of correcting pall'.l
recent—l had almost said reckless 37
And upon that 5
Perver-
sion of my remarks, 8:o.' amt fatal
Wednesday, the 9;1 it.st., Mr. COBDEN penned
those astounding personalities, which will b 9 found
elsewhere in another part of our impression of
as in extenso
this evening, transferred to our colum

from: those of our chief morning contemporary.
The grossness of these singular personalities,
addressed as they are by name to the prin-
cipal Editor of the 7imes, are happily
we believe unparalleled on the part of any public
man of eminence in the whole history of British
journalism. And the effect already produced
throughout the country by Mr. COBDEN'S excep-
tional indulgence in them, is manifestly such that
we may now pretty confidently conjecture no other
public man will be speedily tempted into the enjoy-
ment of any similar luxury, in the way of unmea-
sured vituperation. Anything more outrageous in
the way of vituperation we may safely assert has
never been 'witnessed in the instance of
any man elected by his countrymen to the
honour of a seat in the House of Commons. Mr.
COBDEN speaks, it will be seen, of the arrogance of
the 7imes—without the faintest consciousness of
Lis own s talks about " what," he says, "I will
call an inordinate display of Times' egotism": and
at the very same moment he is naïvely making such
an exceedingly amusing evidence of Mr. COBDEN'S !
The old fable about the bird of the desert hiding
his head in the sand, is illustrated anew very funnily
in thievery instance by the member for Midharst. He
intimates with overwhelming hauteur that the Times
aidyepheirsvleertttienrg, inhipsrmooefanthinagt
)weheartehhereeruepnoont
is denied access to his own house, and he thereupon
argues
in any
argues that the Times has a very limited, almost, as
one might say, obscure circulation. It is quite a
companion incident, this, to the threatened with-
drawal of the young cadet's custom from HCBY, the
bootmaker, a threat suggestive to the latter of the
immediate putting up of his shutters. More
signally expressive, however, of the darkening in-
fluence exercised by passion over the hitherto clear,
'411; luminous judgment of Mr, COBDEN, more
distinctly indicative of this than the grossly
abusive language in which this painful letter of his
is couched—is the false logic of which it is composed
throughout. Mr. COBDEN avows his systematic
and perverse avoidance of the Times, and yet,
while he acknowledges his ignorance of its con-
tents, an ignorance in which he actually glories,
he coolly presumes to characterize the precise
nature of its contents, and this simply to the
end that he may villify it. Oar contempo-
rary has cruelly, only this 'very morning,
recalled to Mr. COBDEN'S remembrance, his
enthusiastic remark years ago to quite a
contrary effect, namely, that he preferred a
copy of the 7imes to all the books of THUCYDIDES.
Our contemporary does not remark, however, there-
upon that probably Mr. COBDEN knew about as
much then of THUCYDIDES as he confesses to know
now of the Limes. An ill-mannered sneer has been
directed by Mr. COBDEN at what be vulgarly called
the testimonials to character quoted into the 'limes
from the columns of its contemporaries. The times
having probably, we should conjecture, less experi•
ence, perhaps, of anything in the way of honeyed
words than any of the daily journals of Europe. At
the head of which, nevertheless, it is no extravagance
to assert—it is simply the plain truth to state—it
stands, as it has stood now for some years, facile
princeps in reputation. Mr. COBDEN used in his
better days to appreciate the value of facts beyond
almost any man of his time. There are a few, now
that we at least may here venture to obtrude
upon his attention with a trifle more grace,
perhaps, than would be possible in the instance
of the limes itself. And these facts, let us say,
we would now thus briefly enumerate in regard to
the Times, purely out of an honest love of fair
play towards our great contemporary. Before Mr.
COBDEN's favourite organs of nowadays had sprung
into existence, the Times was one of the principal
mediums through which, in spite of itself, his argu-
ments went forth to the world at large, gaining him
his cause and winning him his reputation. His taunts
now, therefore, are tainted with the meanness of in-
gratitude. Again—after the memorable tribute paid
by the late Sir ROBERT PEEL to the " unadorned
eloquence" of Mr. COBDEN, after the equally
memorable tribute paid by the limes to " the
great fact" of the Anti-Corn Law League, we
should have presumed that alike in both instances
Mr. COBDEN might have abstained from flouting
either the memory of Sir ROBERT or the judgment
of the Times with having formerly been foremost
among the advocates of the principles of Protection.
Another of those famous phrases uttered at rare
intervals by Sir ROBERT PEEL, will long be borne
in recollection as applied to the now veteran Prime
Minister of England, Lord PALMERSTON—" We
are all proud of him." And so now may we also
in the name and in the interests of journalism,
apply that very same phrase to the chief among our
contemporaries—" We are all proud of it."
Diametrically opposed to its views, we are, no doubt,
repeatedly—yet we bear in none the less vivid
remembrance many noble incidents recorded in its
history. Incidents, for example, like the discovery
of that gigantic Fraud, the timely exposure of
which, through its agency, elicited at the time the
grateful acknowledgment of the whole mercantile
world of England ! Incidents like the breaking
up to its own vast pecuniary loss of that
Railway Bubble, the bursting of which later
on, after a yet wider expansion, might have had
far more disastrous consequences ! Incidents like
the foundation of the Times' Charitable Fund for
our suffering soldiers in the Crimea during
the first disasters of the Great Russian War !
Incidents like these will still be borne in remem-
brance in regard to the 7imes when Mr. COBDEN'S

'cm/gar abuse of it has been utterly forgotten. They
will be remembered then as vividly as they are
remembered now : and with them that happy
and in no way extravagant remark once made,
a"le years back, in the House of Commons,
by Sir EDWARD BULWER LYTTON to the effect
thatif he were asked for an illustration of the
civilisation
of the age we live in, he would adduce
88.! perhaps,
the aptest exemplar of it, a file of
the
.7 tines newspaper_

The latest •,,,,,B from Denmark and Germany
leave the course tc,
oe followed by the respective
disputants in considerable
doubt. It would seem,
from various rumours, that the Danish authorities
are shrinking from t 4
he not,,.et,
and are anxious to
avoid any
collision with thev
Tederal troops. Accord-
ing 1
to the Parisiane
journal ta Fre,..
aunce, it has been
resolved by th
Cabinet of
Lonenhag©n that the
hall evacuate those t
Danish troops atowns in Hol-
stein which the German troops design to occupy.
News also comes from Alton' that it i,
currently
reported there that th© Danish Govern', cut has
n deral execution, e
determined not to oppose F
--. and
that a friendly arrangement is likely to be made
with the great German Powers. A pacific solution
is of course to be greatly desired, and it would b©
worth many sacrifices to prevent the outbreak of an
European war; but it is to be hoped that the Danish
Government will not be induced by any fear of con
sequences to imperil the independence of their coun-
try, or to surrender its recognised and well-esta-
blished rights. The strong hand of King
FREDERICK
no longer guides the helm ; but his successor will
do well to take pattern from his courage and firm-
ness, however advisable it may be to attempt
conciliation before proceeding to extremities. P.
the Federal Diet can be induced to abandon their
Purpose by any means consistent with reason and
right, the change will be a subject f ~.- general con-