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

Why the one should be so easy and the other so
hard in politics is not so obvious as the truth that
it is so. The chief reason, we believe, will be
found in the fluctuating nature of the materials
with which statesmen have to dee!. Others
have to collect facts, to form opinions out
of them, and perhaps to apply those opinions
to new combinations of circumstances. A statesman
has a far more complicated task than this—a task
all the more difficult because each of ia3 processes
appears so simple. Let him be an historian, an
economist, and a man of the world ; let him be
gifted with the imagination to conceive and the
nerve to execute; he will still fail of success unless
he have a profound and sympathetic insight into
the motives and opinions of men and nations. To
him sentiments are facts, causes as well as effects,
means and ends at once. The stumbling-blocks of
co-operation are great, and the sacrifice of indivi-
dual convictions to the necessities of joint action is
trying, but the real and permanent difficulty of
statesmanship is the anticipating, interpreting,
leading, following, and giving practical expression
to, publ:c opinion. The political necessities which
dominate over one generation are often the creation
of the former; their component elements were opi-
nions, and their present force is embodied in opinions
only. So hopeless does it appear to master all these
moral conditions of domestic and foreign policy that
the great majority of public men in power trust en-
tirely to instinct, and are content to take external
pressure as a good rough test of opportuneness and
expediency. This tends to make a Minister little
more than the agent of the public will, and implies
a deep scepticism as to the value of political prin-
ciples. We cannot acquiesce in this as the ultimate
ideal of government, but it is often the nearest ap-
proach to it that we can get, and is at least safer
than the theories of amateurs. If we mistake not,
Mr. Layard has learnt this lesson, and is already
less of an optimist than he once was. How the
Queen's Government can be carried on with safety
and efficienny is not the highest question that an
administrator can ask himself, but it is a vital one,
and while he is engrossed by the solution of it he
must leave to others the suggestion and elaboration

of organic projects of reform.
POST.—There are few offices in the kingdom
more difficult to discharge at the same time with
dignity and efficiency than those which are held by
the occupants of the judicial bench. The model
judge should, in order to come up to the popular
standard, be an individual not only of profound
learning and consummate ability, but of unwearied
patience and unfailing courtesy of demeanour. By
many be is expected to present a living epitome of
all the Christian virtues; by the vulgar he is in-
variably regarded as the incarnation of all that is at
once the most wise, the most majestic, and the most
awful. Stripping, however, from the judicial cha-
racter all that may be regarded as clap-trap, there
remains quite sufficient to make it desirable that
promptitude, precision, and unswerving fidelity
upon the judgment-seat should be tempered by
moderation of language and dignity of demeanour.
We all remember the painful scene which occurred
some years ago at the Guildford Assizes, when a
feud sprang up between the judge and the high
sheriff, in which both parties committed themselves,
the latter perhaps the most unpardonably, and
where a breach, which had been already once
patched up by the intervention of the Chief Justice,
ended in the infliction of a heavy fine upon the
official guardian of the public peace. The scandal
which was thus occasioned has hardly yet been for-
gotten, and remains as a lesson of the extreme cau-
tion which it is requisite to exercise if the,boun-
daries of that reverence and respect which should
surround the judicial bench are never to be trans-
gressed. It is therefore with the more regret that
we have noticed the charge delivered the other day
by Mr. Baron Pigott to the grand Jury at Exeter.
The learned judge is, until a successor to the late
lamented Justice Wightman is appointed, the
junior of his fraternity, and has just en-
tered upon the honourable and onerous duties
of his first circuit in his judicial capacity. After
some sensible remarks upon the demoralising ten-
dency of pugilism, and the utter absence of any
countervailing benefits to lessen the evils of the
unmitigated ruffianism to which it gives rise, his
lordship proceeded to comment upon the arrange-
ments which had been made to receive bim. He com-
plained in strong terms that the business of the
country had been retarded by the negligence of
" some authorities in the town," and that the com-
mission could not be opened from " the stinginess"
of those who declined to light the cathedral for
afternoon service at his request. Of course such a
charge, if founded on fact, would do anything but
redound to the credit of those who had laid them-
selves open to it. Unfortunately for Baron Pigott,
one story proverbially only holds good until another
is told. The Dean, the chief authority in the cathe-
dral, turns out not to have been in the city, having
been summoned to attend the funeral of a near
relative. Both the Canons in Residence, however,
have come forward to give their own version of the
affair, which is substantially as follows. It is quite
true that a notification was received by the autho-
rities of the cathedral that Baron Pigott would pre-
fer attending church on a certain afternoon, instead
of waiting till the following morning. But it is
equally true that this request was coupled with an
intimation of the time at which he would arrive,
which would have rendered it imperative, in order
to comply with it, to change, in the first place, the
hour of the afternoon service, and to fix it, in the
second, at such a time as would have rendered it im-
possible to conclude it during daylight upon a short
llecember's day. From this alternative the Chapter
might well shrink after the outcry which was excited
some time ago at the mere report of an unseemly
deference having been displayed towards Royalty
itself at Peterborough. It involved also the ques-
tion not of the expense, but of the possibility, of
lighting the cathedral. It is true that facilities for
doing so exist in the choir, but the cortege of trum-
peters and javelinmen who accompany the judge
attract a following which is rather numerous than
select, who generally await in the nave the egress
of the judge. This portion of the church has been
recently fitted up for service at the private expense
cf a member of the Chapter, but, from the time
at which the service ordinarily takes place, no pro-
vision has been made for lighting it. It is needless
to point out how unseemly would have been the
spectacle of a rabble composed of the riff-raff of the
town thronging the nave at an hour when the efforts
of the authorities to preserve anything like order
or decorum would have been effectually paralysed.
Such is the counter statement put forth upon the
part of the Chapter by Archdeacon Bartholomew
and Canon Hurington, the Chancellor of the diocese,
men wpose motives and character are alike above
suspicion. We are bound to say that, in our opinion,
the Church has the best of the argument. Baron
Pigott does not deny that arrangements had been
made to receive her Majesty's representative with
all fitting honours on his way to morning service,
nor does he explain why he himself should have se-
lected for his arrival an hour which interfered with
the ordinary services of the day. It is difficult to
imagine that a little consideration upon his part
would not have prevented a collision of any kind,
and still more difficult to justify a hasty accusation
of " stinginess" made from the bench against a body
who, whatever else may have been their shortcom-
ings, have never before been accused of any failures
in this respect. We can quite believe that the new
judge may have been eager to resent a fancied
affront to his newly acquired dignity. But he
would have done well to pause before he accused a
society of loyal and honourable men, in the absence
of their head, of an intentional omission to pay pro-
per respect to the representative of her Majesty.
Had Baron Pigott arrived earlier or later, the ques-
tion could not have arisen. But it is rather too
much, even for a judge, to time his coming at an
hour which would interfere with the usual service,
and then to grumble not only that the time is not
changed to suit his convenience, but that it is not
changed to-an hour which would render the preser-
vation of order and decorum difficult, if not ira-
scible.

YANKEE TOASTS.—The following toasts were
given at a recent dinner of New Jersey Democrats:—
" Blessed are the peacemakers." " The last man and the
last dollar—May the one be an Abolitionist, and the other
a shinplaster, and may they both perish in the last ditch
together." " State rights; may they not be forgotten in
delirious and bloody triumph of state wrongs." " Things
we remember—Habeas corpus and trial by jury." "T°
the first Governor who shall have the virtue and courage to
keep his oath of office, and protect and defend the cosotif;t:
tion, laws, and sovereignty of his State and the rtighwtsore s
citizens. ', The light of other days, when lib:Tr Tie
Demo.
white face and America was not a negro."
shodd
8 " The aboli-
tion' ii
and greenbacks had demoralised its councils."
it
.tre.achery,
cratic party, as it was, before cowardice,y
stay at home." ct may
it, and those who think it is wrong
war for disunion—Let those who think is right go to
shall never have the Union
tahsoseit whowa say
sfollowexample of their brother
traitor Judas Iscariot, who died and went to his
own
place.
„ ,6 The War Democrat—A white man's
we
the
face on the body of a negro." "The only possible remedy
for secession and the only hope of the i
U,.,on—Peace, mu-
tual concession, and compromise."
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