The Sun.
London, England, 1839-01-04 00:00:00

LONDON :
FRIDAY EVENING JANUARY 4, 1839.

Mr. STEPHENS is committed, and held to bail in
1,0001., and two sureties in 5001. each. His income
has been stated to be 2001. a year ; as a Dissenting
Minister, supported chiefly by the poorest classes, he
cannot have more than 3001. a year. In the one case
the whole bail is equal to ten years of his income, and
in the other to his income for six years and two-thirds
of a year. We consider this bail to be excessive ; con-
trary to the Bill of Rights ; and, being levied by a class
to whom Mr. STEPHENS is opposed, to be most unjust.
The Bishop of CLOGHER, with an income probably
of 5,0001., was held to bail in the tenth part of one
year's income, for an infamous moral offence. Such
contrasts, occurring as they do every day, and on
every Bench, disgust every reasonable man with the
law, which is obviously the mere instrument of party
purposes and class tyranny.
We write this much less with reference to the indi-
vidual than to the general principles which, if violated
in the persons of those who decry the Poor-law, may
be equally violated in the persons of those who decry
the Devil's laws. One country gentleman has already
referred to his company of Yeomanry as a ready means
of putting down those who may be driven by hunger
to seize food ; and now we have other gentlemen send-
ing a man to gaol for speaking against what he also
calls a Devil's law. We mean to make no apology
for the language Mr. STEPHENS is accused of
using ; we abhor violence of all kinds ; but
we know not how the organized and systematic vio-
lence of the law, the cold crafty scheme of putting
down all opposition, and all difference of opinion, by
the bayonet, can be counteracted, and mankind
rescued from the worst kind of slavery, if all vehement
censure of the law, whatever may be its scoundrel
origin and its diabolical design, is also to be stifled as
dangerous within the walls of dungeons.
We have great respect for the lives and properties
of the Lancashire gentlemen, but we do not think they
will be secured by the legal war they have renewed
against the expression of opinion. Though the Scots-
man—the mild, calm, reasonable, thorough Whig
Scotsman—qualifies its general doctrine in the case
'STEPHENS, on the unfair and partial reports which
have been published of that gentleman's speeches, we
hold to its general doctrine, and assert that it will be
as dangerous to violate it in the case of STEPHENS,
and perhaps mOre dangerous than in the case of any
except Mr. O'CorrstELL. The
other man living, if W.,
Scotsman of Wednesday Nst says—
" We are of those who would allow to every man the utmost
license of tongue and pen consistent wit'd the public safety.
The fiery materials imbedded among the people are less likely
to explode when left to burn openly ; and the liberty to say
extravagant things belongs, we think, to a free and advanced
state of society."
The attack on Mr. STEPHENS is a denial of the
liberty of saying what his enemies assert are extrava-
gant things ; it is an attempt to compress the volcano,
instead of allowing it to burn itself out, and it will add,
we dread, very much to the danger. Much evil has al-
ready arisen from the local attempts to distort Mr. STE-
WilENs'S speeches, and prevent the public from acquir-
ing a knowledge of his objects, opinions, and influence.
Of the examination before he was committed we
have nothing to say, for it was little more than swear-
ing the iwo former witnesses to the truth of their de-
positions, ai:d bringing forward another witness, who
deposed, without having taken notes, to some very
strong and unwarrantable expressions used by Mr.
STEPHENS forty-nble days after they were spoken. It
is a rule of law to require the best evidence, but
.the committing Magistrates seem to despise the
lades, when they have a purpose to serve, of their own
grimgribber. At present the art of reporting is al-
most perfect, and the reporter can swear to his notes
and the words he takes down. With this known im-
provement in common use, for giving accurately
what a man says, it is as unjustifiable to com-
mit a man on the evidence of memory, at such an
iin;erval, as to commit him on hearsay. The Magis-
trate.s have not sought for the best evidence, and
taking this in conjunction with their haste to commit,
as said to be avowed on a former day by Mr. KEN-
WORTHY, with the excessive bail they have demanded,
.and with the known feelings of hostility which per-
wade their class, we are bound to say that the whole
100.eeeding looks more like an act of inquisitorial malice
and persecution than of fair and even-handed justice.
" The facts elicited at the examination of Mr. STE-
PHENS," says the Scotsman, " particularly as to the
possession of arms by large bodies cf the operatives—
'when taken in connection with the threats so frequently
offered and the actual outrages committed--Jemand
the most rigorous vigilance on the part of the author
rities." These facts have generated great alarm, and
the alarm colours, if it does not dictate, the decision of
the Magistrates. But in what way is Mr. STEPHENS
responsible for those facts ? Has he ground down the
bulk of the people to the lowest stage of penury and dis-
tress? Is he the author of the Corn-laws ? Has he filled

the hearts of the working classes with a thorough
hatred of those laws and the Poor-laws ? Has he
made the Legislature an object of general mis-
trust and contempt ? No. But he is to be
punished because the mass of the people have
such feelings, and are preparing to act on
them. The real authors of such feelings are
the land-owning law-makers, whose deeds are set forth
by the writers in the Times and the 1-Jerald, in The
Sun and the Scotsman, in the Morning Chronicle
and Manchester Guardian, by Ebenezer Elliott and
Cob 'Thompson ; and they ought to be punished for
these feelings of the people, and for their collecting
arms, as well as Mr. STEPHENS. We are
aware how very difficult it is to distinguish
in the combined emotions of terror and anger
arising in the Magistrates and factory owners
from such disclosures as those alluded to, and
from conceiving that Mr. STEPHENS may have been
the parent of the facts; but at the same time we affirm,
in the name of justice, that the analysis must be made,
and that Mr. STEPHENS must be tried only for his
own acts, and not for the feelings and acts of the con-
gregated masses amidst whom his lot is cast. He must
not fall a victim to the Magistrates' and gentlemen's
terrors.

In the language of warning, the Scotsman says,

speaking of the Corn-laws—but we beg leave to apply
it to the case of Air. STEPHENS and the Chartists—
" Already are the means of violence organized, and the
Pile is ready for the torch. Open insurrection may