The Sun.
London, England, 1837-02-03 00:00:00

We are glad to find Lord rouffiam -stsain 4114%4, 14
in the House of Lords, and directing hs attention to those
subjects which may be said to be peculiarly his own—as
his exertions with respect to them far exceed those of any
public man, either in our times or in any former period of
our history—we mean education and charity. The c .un-
try will never forget its deep obligation to his Lordship :Or
his unwearied labours to diffuse education among the peo,:!e
of England, and to wrest from the bands of a corrupt wis-
tocracy the funds left by pious individuals for charities, and
more particularly for education. The Church of England
is so mixed up with the aristocracy, and the Clergy %sr( re in
so many instances the instruments of the fraudulent misap.
propriation of charities for education, that, so far from
watching over the interests of the people, and endeavouring
to prevent the diversion of the funds left for instructing
them to other purposes, they long discouraged all at-
tempts to remove that ignorance which depresseS man
to the level of the brutes that perish. In consequence,how.
ever, of the persevering exertions of Lord Brougham, the
clergy were shamed out of their opposition to education,
and in many instances became zealous promoters of it. His
Lordship last night reproduced his Bill for placing the
the funds left for education and other charities under the
controul of a board, to watch over their proper application.
This is a first step ; but we trust the time is not distant
when public men will be convinced that so important a mat-
ter as the development of the mental faculties of the people
should not be left to accident. An educated people have
the means of being religious in their power, while no church
establishment can communicate religion to the ignorant. If
it were necessary, therefore, to choose between an establish-
ment for religion and an establishment for education, the
latter would deserve the preference, for this especial reason,
that instruction is the key to religion. An ignorant man
does not know his wants ; but a properly-trained individual
must always be anxious respecting a future state of exis-
tence.—Morning Chronicle.
Mr. Horsham has given notice of a motion for this day
fur a Select Committee to inquire into the practice Of creat-
ing fictitious votes in Scotland, by which the suffrage has,
in many cases, become a mere mockery. We alluded in
yesterday's Chronicle to this as one of the means by which
a Tory was returned for Renfrewshire. Various plans have
been adopted by our ingenious neighbours (whose skill in
manufacturing is not confined to cottons, and linens, and
iron, but extends also to paper) for defeating the purposes
of the Reform Bill ; but all have the same oject in view,
the centralizing in the persons of a few individuals the
whole political influence of the respective counties within
which their estates are situated. But of these plans the
most flagrant is that which is accomplished through the crea-
tion of what are called life-rent votes. By the Scotch law,
property may be held either by the owner himself or by a
life-renter, whose right is created by marriage, mar-
riage contract, deed of settlement, or by appointment to
an office. The modus operandi is this :—Where a great
landholder is desirous of increasing his political influence,
he grants, in favour of a number of individuals on whose
political fidelity and subserviency he can rely, a • deed or
deeds, by which he conveys to them, jointly, on life-rent, so
much of his estate as will yield to each of them a free yearly
rent of 101. On the other hand, these individuals either
give him a promissory note at one day's date, or a sum of
money corresponding to the value of an annuity of 101. for
h .ir respective lives. Every one is familiar with the mode
in which qualifications are granted to Members of Parlia
ment in England, and the deeds before the Reform Bill,
giving burgess holdings for a special occasion.. The extent
of the fraud of the ScotCh landholder!, and the rapidity with
which the machinery has been perfected, challenge for it an
admiration which it cannot fail to obtain, and we hope that
it will equally obtain the attention of the Legislature.
To give an idea of the extent of this political fraud, we
may observe, that in the small county of Selkirk;..out of
.552 voters, no fewer than 112 have fictitious qualifica-
tions, and 105 do not even reside in the county, but have
obtained their qualifications for the mere purpose of vot-
ing. In the neighbouring county of Peebles, out of a con-
stituency of 576, there ate 133 fictitious qualifications, 123
held by non-resident individuals. All these voters have
been created by four or five landholders. We have singled
out two counties, but in Scotland any invention spreads
with} the rapidity of lightning, and the system of swamping
the real constituency by voters possessed of fictitious quali-
fications has taken deep root in most of the counties, and
will soon make the county representation of Scotland a -mere
.farce. The Housil of Lords may object to the removal of
this.abusc ; but the Commons may easily render it impera-
tive for election committees to allow no votes on fictitious
qualifications. Only conceive what. an individual like the
Duke of Buccleuch, with a rental of 230,000/. it year,
could do in the way of creating fictitious votes.-.—Morning
Chronicle.

Four Hundred Dekgates from England, Scotland, and
Ireland, assembled yesterday at the London Tavern, to de-
vise the best means of procuring the total and unqualified
abolition of Church-rates. The stoppage which, in the
last Session, was put by the Peers on the progress of legis-
lation, seems to have forced the nation to the necessity of
making an extraordinary exertion, and having recourse to
means, certainly not adverse to those recognised by the
Constitution, hut such as an extreme necessity like the
present could alone call into operation, in order to effect
those objects which have now become essential to the pros-
perity and peace of the natton. Had the British Parlia-
meat done that justice to Ireland which the Ministry
called for in the last Session, the National Associa-
tion could never have been called into existence ;; and
had the same Parliament made a similarly just conces-
sion to the claims of the Dissenters, the people of
the United Empire would not have been forced to the
necessity of sending 400 delegates to the London Tavern,
to petition for that justice which 605 nominal represen-
tatives were unable to accomplish for them in St.• Ste-
phen's. As was forcibly urged by different speakers at
the meeting to which we refer—as will be seen by our re-
port—the cause of the Catholics of Ireland, and that of the
Dissenters of England and Scotland, is based on the same
principle—that principle to which it is impossible for the
utmost endeavour of a depraved ingenuity to furnish a te-
nable objection—the principle of every man worshipping his
Creator, and contributing to that worship ,in the manner
and to the extent which his own conscience. dictates. It is
an outrage on Christianity itself; to compel men to contribute
to the maintenance of a sect or doctrine which is adverse to
their individual opinions. If it were desirable that the Estab-
lished Church, should be upheld by force, it would not now
need the protection of Acts of Parliament. It was not by
the sword that Christianity was propagated ; and had
any influence but the force of individual conviction been
essential to the promulgation of the tenets of the Gos-
pel, or the opinions which individual sects form of them,
these tenets and these opinions would have been sustained
by a spirit beyond that of any human authority. It was by
self-denia and martyrdom that original Christianity ap-
pealed to mankind ; but the modern Christians, or at least
a class of modern Christians, rest their confidencie on the
support of the Legislature, and not on the reaiity and effi-
ciency of its ministers. , These gentleme7i deny the right
of thought,. and would make the mii.;.ntenance of a sect an
essential to the general salvation., They. reject the volun-
tary principle, as if they felt conscious of the weakness of
their cause, and despair of their establishment, when it
should be brought to the test of conscientious examination.
On yesterday the debate at the London Tavern completely
supersedes in interest that in the House of Commons. From

the city and hamlet, the mountain and glen, the popular
delegates assembled, and showed themselves ready to urge
on the consummation of those principles which Parliament
either hesitated to carry into effect, or altogether rejected
from its consideration.-411orning Advertiser.
The British colonists on the eastern frontier of the Cape
of Good Hope, if we may judge from the language of the
local journals which have just reached us, are suffering
severely, and manifesting correspondent,- feelings of indig-
nation towards the British Government, in consequence of
what. is unceremoniously termed " the disgraceful and un-
justifiable dispatch of Lord Glenelg" to his Excellency the
Governor. The Colonial Secretary, it seems, expressed
in that dispatch the opinion that the Caffre war and all the
horrors which attended.it were justifiable acts on the part
of the savages, and fully warranted by the aggressions
first committed upon them by the colonists. His Lordship
insists also, we are told, with an emphasis which the colo-
nists, whose lives and homes are at stake, deem cruel and
absurd, upon the expense incurred by the Colonial
Government during the progress of these hostilities.
The despatch of Lord Glenelg to Sir Benjamin
D'Urban is further accused, or we ought rather to
say convicted, of direct falsehood ; inasmuch as it supports
the imputation cast upon the colonists by testimony which
it alleges to have been .given by the missionaries of the
London and Glasgow Societies ; whereas two of the most
active and influential missionaries of the Glasgow Society,
Messrs. Laing and Chalmers, had fully corroborated the
declaration of the general body of Wesleyan missioraaries,
" that the Caifres were themselves the aggressors ; that
they most wantonly, crtielly, and ungratefully commenced
the war with a people who sought and desired their wel-
fare and prosperity ; and that, so far as the Colonial Go-
vernment is concerned, the war had been conducted in
accordance with the principles of justice and mercy." We
shall on the first open day publish extracts from the jour-
nals, of the contents of which, in relation to the subject of
Lord GleneUs injudicious and -offensive despatch, the
above is a brief and imperfect summary.— Morning Post.

The following distinguished foreigners arc expected
to visit England during the ensuing spring :—The- Crowzi
Prince of Denmark, the Elector of Hesse Cassel, the Grand
Duke Michael, and the Landgrave of Hesse Homburg. Mast
of the principal Hotels at the west end are already full. The
approaching season will commence much sooner han usual,
owing to Easter falling so early this year. • •