The Sun.
London, England, 1863-10-09 00:00:00

THERMOMETER.

This clay at Two o'clock 58

Barometer-29.61.

Wind—North-Eaaterly ; moderate, and cloudy,

f-igeb.47
eyzoxti„. 4.4.

LONDON, FRIDAY, ocr. 9, 1863.

Bit by bit the Tory majority is increasing. Of
this, there can no longer be any reasonable
doubt. The present Ministers, on their acces-
sion to power four years ago, by means of what
Sir HuGlr CAIRNS called in exceedingly plain Rog
lisp " a dodge"—began their political speculation,
as one may say, with a very small capital,
indeed, in the way of votes. The division that
actually landed them in power only just turned
the balance of that political plank on which party is
ever playing the game of see-saw between Govern-
ment and Opposition. The balance, even then at
that turning point, was little more than just nomi-
nal. The clear majority was so very juvenile in poiut
of fact, that one might say it was only just in its
teens. It was a majority, in truth, so small
that it was only a trifle better than no majority what-
ever. The minority confronting it, if not furnish-
ing quite six to every half-dczen opposed to it,
was really and truly so very nearly upon a
level with its victors, numerically, that it might
the most fairly have been designated at the outset
merely the second bast. Gradually, however, even
the small clear majority appertaining to the
in-coming Government began to dwindle and fade
away, until the point of equilibrium was eventually
reached. The Conservative Reaction has unmis-
takably since then gone on steadily—slowly it may
bs—but steadily, increasing. A laugh at first was
raised by the apologists of her Majesty's present
Ministers, when people began to whisper about the
phrase of—Conservative Reaction. The fact that
there was any Reaction of the kind was confidently
and indignantly denied. All the while the Reaction,
really in progress, while Ministerialists were
laughing at it, went on increasing until it even-
tually compelled them, as the phrase is, to laugh
on the other side of their mouths; and, so
laughing, to recognise it ; and, so laughing, to ac-
knowledge frankly that, in spite of themselves, they
did recognise it. A Liberal member dies, and
into his place slips adroitly enough a new
tooth-and.nail Conservative. A supporter of
the Government resigns for one reason or an-
other—his constituency is bagged immediately
by the vigilant promoters of the interests of the
Opposition. A partisan of the Cabinet—or of one
of the most conspicuous members of the Cabinet,
probably its veteran leader —is re warded for
his long years of faithful adherence to the
Liberal cause by his promotion to a coronet and
ermine, in other words to a seat in the Upper House
_forthwith, into his seat in the Lower House, glides
as alarmingly as the Ghost of BANQUO to the won•
Bering eyes of MACBETH, not a Liberal, not a
Ninisterialist, no Whig, no new adherent of the
prime Minister, but one diametrically the reverse, an
opponent to Lord PALMERsTON, and to all around
Lord J) MERSTON. Thus, pushing from their stools
Liberal after Liberal, Conservative after Conser-
vative has
mustered on the benches behind
Mr. DISRAELI.
The time has long passed by
could pretend, far a moment,
when anyone
that, with a pal ty question of any decided kind
brought forward in the House of Commons, the
present Ministers could by any chance whatever
muster a majority, a clear maJ )ritY of one ! The
Opposition has been to
dif4"lltY with the
question in the regular
c''rne across any such
course
things. To drag
in by ,e_a party question
head and shoulder., would only,
could Only bear the flagrant construction
„of being
another
infallibly in rah'eat
coanse "'bee" part, and must, quite
.
dubbed thenceforth that
most dubious Politica'l triumph, a triumph won
by mere factious
opposition. The guiding policy
of the Opposition, for Borne time past, therefore,
has manifestly been to
atilt patiently, as patiently
as men might wait who
a
already in the palm of their they covet
the priz
ands, so that they have
ounollyicytoweiloth msetthheeir,
words,
grasp it. The
fingers,itiottie inorder
r word
as
until the opportunity should been to tarry
naturally present it .
self—not be dragged forward, not
be
actually
P
made by them, but, in the regular course of
political
events, as we have said, present itself for theirtc4l
acceptance. The longer this policy is continued,
the more certain it is of proving successful in the
end, The opportunity is sure to arise sooner or
later And meanwhile, by merely waiting, the
Tory Opposition is winning for itself not simply, as
it is really still doing from time to time, new votes,
as in this recent instance of the election down at
Coventry, but—what ie better than votes to them,

with the community at large, an increasing reputa-
tion for prudence, and almost, we might go the
length of saying, for magnanimity.

A specimen of American eloquence has just been
afforded us in the address of the Rev. H. WARD
BEECHER, in the Cobden Hotel, Glasgow. This
gentleman is well known on both sides of the
Atlantic for his earnest, uncompromising advocacy
of temperance and abolition, and accordingly some
of the sriecipal temperance men of the Scottish
City took the occasion of his visit to improvise an
assembly in his honour. It was of course expected
that Mr. BEECIIER S. hould address the meeting,
and although it was expressly declartehe general
declared that no
political feeling called them together,
destoi r
thee w
ta g
os
pi
cr,a toicfied
cup,
yfionrg t haenv ism iitno plunged boldly
drandae
know
in
s
bold
ne aornte de
tpobe outspokenhis
va
onmud
riaaenbnnleyee r..
O' eh
df
a gtt
he c deo mh ms
speech Ta
ni edwei ieenl tf aweaebstoc
It was illogical, rash, and one-sided. Its argu-
ments were unsound, its assertions preposterous,
and its religious allusions, to say the least of it,
decidedly irreverent, even allowing for the freedom
of American discourse. Mr. BEECIIER began, as
was natural, by complimenting the Scotch, and
commenting on the many points of resemblance
between them and the New Englanders. But
when we come to the instances of similarity which
he gives, we are almost inclined to think he is
speaking satirically. " That union of moral senti-
ment, that intellectual progress, together with that
mild and yielding disposition tohich characterise
both sides, convince me that I am here at home."
It is the first time that we have heard either North
Britons or New Englanders celebrated for their
mild and yielding qualities, and certainly present
events do not show much of them in our transat-
lantic friends, at all events. Where a little further
on Mr. BEECIIER declares that the Federals will
rather give " the last child they have and the last
penny they possess" than relinquish a war already
hopeless, he does not give a very striking proof either
of their amiability or their readiness to yield to
conviction l The religious declamation of Mr.
BEECHER, though doubtless earnest and sincere,
seems sadly oat of place to English taste when it
precedes such declarations as those we have just
quoted. We are not slow to appreciate the grand
and lofty spirit of patriots dying for their country,
or the heroism which strives to the last to defend
its hearths and homes from the invader, but there
is nothing in the American war to inspire such sen-
timents. It is one of the darkest and most melan-
choly passages in modern history; fought by a
people who have always boasted of their practical
and matter-of-fact tendencies, it carries out that
view by being utterly divested of lofty idea or good
and noble purpose. We may sympathise with the
determined resistance of the South, and its unflinch-
ing courage, but the Southerners were not forced
into war by the oppression of a King BOMBA or
the atrocities sanctioned by a GORTSCHAKOFF. On
the part of the North it is a struggle for supremacy,
actuated by mercenary motives; a lavish expendi-
ture of men and money, a reckless sacrifice of the
peace and welfare and progress of the State to sel-
fish ends. The great question of slavery, which
some enthusiasts would have us believe lies at the
root of this strife, has been worked for their own
ends by both combatants. The North talk loudly
of its iniquity—just discovered since the tide of
fortune turned against them—the South uphold it
hardily. The North would gladly retract the
famous Abolition Emancipation on condition of the
re-establishment of the Union, the South are bent
on preserving their "domestic institution." And
in the midst of this struggle constitutional liberty
and civil right go down; free speech brings the
speaker into trouble, opposition to the Govern-
ment entails imprisonment or exile. A forced
conscription carries a whole train of evils with it.
Conscripts refuse to serve, or find substitutes who
enlist for the sake of the bounty, desert, are re-
captured, and shot. Murmurs, not loud but deep,
are heard, until the popular discontent is silenced
by exaggerated accounts of victory or infinitessimal
pictures of defeats. And in the face of all this,
Mr. BEECHER talks to us of " GOD sending his
angel of war," of a feeling in the North "as ex-
tensive as the atmosphere, as deep as the ocean,
as immoveable as the mountains," against the divi-
sion of the Union. He says, "We all feel
this is not man's work, but GOD'S ; and we
feel that we shall follow His footsteps to the
end.'' Truly, if this is his idea of supplying the
needs of want, sorrow, or suffering which he tells
us is his mission ; if this is his mode of displaying
that religion of universal love which he declares
to be burning in his soul, his intentions are better
than his practice. He has upheld the cause of
abolition, he tells us, when to do so was to incur
exclusion from society, and to peril life and limb,
and he merits our applause for so doing, but such
Abolitionists hinder rather than further their cause
at the present crisis. They refuse to acknowledge
facts which are patent to the eyes of all unpreju-
diced men, and persist in talking as if the rights of
the negro, instead of the mercantile interests of the
Northern States, were the true origin of the war.
Let the South offer to rejoin the Union to-morrow,
on condition that the maintenance of slavery is
guaranteed to them, and we shall soon see the value
of the Federal fervour on behalf of humanity, end
the rights of man. Mr. BEECHER himself was fain
to admit that the immortal proc'amation was not
altogether disinterested, and that it was only be-
cause " the rebels became so potent, and their aims
se alarming" that the PRESIDENT had recourse to it.
This he considers especially the work of Providence,
and the language in which he describes it, after
c‘ms‘aw.v
vnuosdrthi
ddebsnl y
be
destroyed,
t admittingafiberesect rai
nom yteehdeii
their
s origin, is worth quoting,--
with
hta
hands, they
hands
hrooeusteGa
ltrirkeeat Dr
agon
must
outstretched
and
man,
Letreverberated a
l l itsthroughout
theand wholewith a
world,Te voice
c rwi ehdi, h "
This is aa iheot
considering
dhorrors,
rho go
real te helstla." te of too strong,att e n
nor in which Hhe e
eaven is dragged in to b© thers monashil
e
ble for the iniquities of man is
still worse. Whenp
we remember the total absence of humanity and
good faith which has characterised
tohf
eB actsUTLER, the
Northern Government, the tyranny of the
submersion of the lands round Vickeburg, the shells
falling under the protecting yellow flag, the Greek
fire poured into Charleston, we can but feel indig-
nant astonishment that the most fervent enthusiasm
should carry Mr. BEECHER 60 far as to express the
feelings of the Northern people in the most sacred
of prayers, and to compare their present self-in-
flicted trial to the euffei ings of Gethsemane, Such
language may suit the exaggerated taste of Mr.
BEECHER'S co-en thusiaste, but it will not favourably
public.
impress the English

The speeches at the Manchester Southern Jude.
pendent Association are well worthy of perusal,and
will be aura to interest our readers. Lard WHARN-
CLIFFE took the chair, and delivered a very sensible
discourse on the important subject before them. He
stated that some erroneous reports had been circu-
ated relat
take that oivpe to their proceedinfo, and he must
had Portunity to contradict them. They
sever
those attributed interested motives to
_ opposed to them. All ho Ns iONd was to