The Sun.
London, England, 1837-05-03 00:00:00

DUBLIN MAW.

IRISH MARKETS.
.ET NOTE for the WEEK E

" Expire a driveller and rr show ;"
but he has made his choice, and between him and the
Reformers there is now a broad gulf. Reformers
should lay aside all their little differences, and -bear in
mind that the contest is between Toryism and Reform.
The Tory papers are bepraising Mr. De Vear because
he refuses to support Mr. Leader. We trust that this
is calumny. The Times informs us, " that though he
has latterly exhibited a somewhat unfriendly attitude
towards the Hon. Baronet, he has too much good
feeling about him to join the ranks of his declared ene-
mies ; and the Standard assigns as a reason for his
not interfering, " the manner in which he has been
treated by the friends and supporters of General
Evans." We have no doubt that Mr. De Vear will
not prove himself so bad a Reformer as to be actuated
by motives like those imputed to him. He may rest
assured that the praise of the Times and the Standard
is only bestowed to lead him astray. The praise of The
Tories is the strongest censure that can be passed on
a Reformer, and our consolation is, that we believe
Mr. be Vear quite undeserving of it. One spirit ani-
mated the meeting last night. After several electors
had spoken in strong terms of reprobation of the epos-
tacy of Sir Francis Burdett, and of the necessity of
supporting a candidate true to the principles of Re-
form, Mr. Hume made his appearance, and expressed
his gratification that " his friend, his young, able,
honest, patriotic, and radical friend, had been hailed
by them as the object of their choice." He called
their attention to the efficient support he had received
on several important occasions in the House of Com-
mons from Mr. Leader. When Mr. Leader himself
proceeded to address the meeting he was received with
the most enthusiastic cheering. He spoke of Sir
Francis Burdett without animosity, but as truth de-
manded, and stated the principles on which he claimed
the support of the electors. He put the question fairly
to the meeting—" Sir Francis Burdett had been guilty
of a gross relinquishment of his duties ; he had aban-
doned all his old principles and gone over to the
Tories ; but were the people of Westminster, were
the people of England, to be beaten by the
Tories ?" And this is the question. The people
of England have their eyes now fixed on the elec-
tors of Westminster, who are fighting their battle.
Westminster will not now forfeit its old reputation and
deceive the hopes and expectations of the country. In
times when the cause of freedom was elsewhere aban-
doned Westminter set a cheering example to the na-
tion, and it will now teach Sir Francis Burdett and his
Tory allies that his abandonment of his principles will
only incite them to mark in a more determined manner
that they do not participate in his backsliding. The
Poor-law question was introduced, and Mr. Leader did
not shrink from stating both his general approbation
of the new law, and his readiness to support any
amendment of its provisions which might be found ne-
cessary. We perceive, by an advertisement in this
day's Chronicle, that the district committee-rooms are
all fixed, and that a meeting will be held this evening,
at eight o'clock, at the Belgrave Hotel, Ebury-street,
Pimlico, Mr. Grote in the chair, which is to be at-
tended by Mr. Leader. This is going to work in good
earnest. The electors of Westminster will never dis-
grace themselves by sufferine. Westminster to become
a Tory borough.—MorniniChronicle.
The organs of Ministers have begun to make bat-
tle, as they are bound to do, for the new Irish Church
Spoliation Bill, brought in by Viscount Morpeth.
With droll notions of consistency they declare : first,
that it is a more " conciliatory" Bill than the last ;
second, that it maintains the " appropriation" prin-
ciple, like the last ; third, that it is " a better Bill
than the last." Why ? Because it brings the spolia-
tion principle more immediately into practice. It
hence appears that the defence of the Anti-Protestant
Bill has not been shaped with much care, or been cal-
culated for resisting serious opposition. The fact is, that
the Bill exhibits no one character besides the inordinate
effrontery of its framers. They begin the Session by
assuring us that " no Ministry ought to remain in
office which cannot conduct through Parliament
those measures which it deems important to the
public interest." Yet, foreknowing, as Lord Mel-
bourne and his Colleagues must have done, that
the Irish Municipal Bill would be inevitably re-
jected by the House of Lords, if it should be found
to contain the same provisions, or similar ones, to those
which were thrown out last year, for transferring a
corporate monopoly from the hands of a Protestant
laity to those of a Roman Catholic Priesthood, these
faithless and shameless tricksters have actually brought
in a measure embodying the whole principle of a trans-
ferred monopoly, which had caused the rejection of
the last year's Bill, accompanied by clauses of a na-
ture more objectionable than any that had stigmatised
the former Corporation Bill. So, with the Irish Church
Bill. It was thrown out last year by reason of its con-
taining a principle of encroachment, systematic and
indefinite, on the property of the Church of Ireland
to all future time ; and this under the name of aclausc
which sanctioned, after a distant day (viz. the year
1879), the application of what it termed a " surplus"
of Church revenue, after satisfying all the equitable
demands of the *clergy towards the object of edu-
cating the children of " the poor," which
means the poor Papists—the bulk of the Prows-
tants—(in the south of Ireland at least)—not be-
ing in want of gratuitous education for their off-
sPrimg• What does the present Bill, however ? Does
it, with any fair or reasonable view of being "passed
through Parliament," abandon the obnoxious and de-

sti uctive principle' of alienating a portion of the Church
revenue to the service of those who arc not members of
the Church ? No such thing. It reasserts the very
same general principle ; it reasserts the legitimacy of
the very same object—namely, robbing the Protestant
clergy, for the benefit of the Popish laity ; and while
it reasserts both, it aggravates the action of both, by
expediting the pro-cess of depredation and increasing
the quantum of the spoil. The future education of
the Romish poor was provided for, or seemed to be
provided for, in the former' Bill, without exacting
from the Church a larger sacrifice than 30 per
cent. from the incomes of the.parochial clergy. This
'Bill rifles them of no less than 40 per cent., and
without the least reference to the amount of the
living, or the least allowance for the possible—nay,
frequent fact, that the living at the highest may
scarcely be adequate to the support of a clergyman and
his family. Suppose A. (a married man) to have at
this moment a living in Ireland of 3001. per annum.
We will take for granted that the tithe is paid, and
that with the rank and wants of an educated gentle-
man he is not, .in truth, a pauper. Is that annual
sum, we ask, a sufficient support for a gentleman with
a family ? Yet is it not above the average value of
Irish livings ? Then sec what is the value of
the same living after its exposure to the process in-