The Sun.
London, England, 1830-02-17 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

There are some things about the East India Com-
mittee which we do not like. Directors of the
Company have no business to be members of the
Committee, as is by this time, we believe, pretty
sensibly felt by those who have the fortune to be
their colleagues. The Committee ought to have
been so constituted as to ensure a majority in favour
of the renewal of some of the most odious provi-
sions of the Charter, and this by a Minister who
professed for himself and his fellows that they had
not made up their minds upon the question, pro
or con. Neither ought the friends of free trade, by
what we can learn, to be over-delighted with the
Chairman of the new Committee, if it be true, as is
roundly asserted, that the Hon. Gentleman had pre-
viously declared himself an advocate for the East
India Company. This sort of management does un-
questionably put forth an awful Bohea flavour.
There is a third point to which we request the
most immediate and active attention on the
part of all those commercial and manufac-
turing interests throughout Great Britain,
which have pronounced the Indian monopoly
to be a serious grievance, but which seem—
whether from lack of diligence or from a superabun-
dant confidence—to have confined their efforts to
harangues and resolutions in the country, neglecting
to appear, at least by representatives,here in London,
where the battle must be fought, if it be not already
more than half decided. But the point we would
advert to is this—that the great question of the
China trade and tea monopoly, where the pith and
marrow of the whole contest lies, will come on in
the House of Commons Committee so early as to-
morrow, when two supercargoes of the Company's
factory at Canton are to be examined. This all-
important branch of the subject comes ou, we are
assured, most unexpectedly early to those who, in
the different parts of England, are bound to oppose
the pretensions of the Leadenliall-street mono-
polists ; so that few or none of the deputies
from the outports are now in or near to
town. We do not suppose that a part of the ques-
tion so voluminous as the China trade can be
finished, with whatever eagerness it may be pushed
on, before the great towns of the kingdom have
time to witness at least some share of the proceed-
ings; but it is too much that the inquiry should be
launched and in motion in the absence of those
whose interests it so vitally affects,—that the Com-
pany and its well-instructed supercargoes should have
the vantage ground thus conceded to them, and an
ex-parte impression made, which cannot, perhaps,
by any subsequent effort be obliterated. We ad-
monish the out-port delegates to hasten to the scene,
and to act with vigour, good will, and harmony, or
the same inexorable incubus which has fixed itself
so long upon the sinews of British commerce will be
fastened on us again for a period of which none liv-
ing may hope to see the termination. It were to
be wished, we must repeat, that a Committee, osten-
sibly chosen to " inquire," should have been con-
stituted in a manner less exposed to even an unjust
suspicion that their business was really to decide.—
Times.

The pastoral letter, which will be found its
another column, addressed by the Roman Catholic
Archbishops and Bishops of Ireland to the Clergy
and Laity of the Church over which they preside, will
be read, we doubt not, with the attention which it
merits, and by all reasonable and well-disposed men,
with the same satisfaction which we have ourselves
received from it. The cry of Anti-Catholics has been
from the beginning, that the Iri,h Priests could not
be conciliated by emancipation, and would never cease
to be political incendiaries, employing an influence
over the laity which nothing could impair, to ends
destructive of the public peace and safety. Our
answer was, that the Irish priests, in so far as they
were citizens, would, like other citizens, be gratified
by the redress of their wrongs; that the same bad
spell of injustice and oppression which had dis-
turbed the laity, and bound them in one confe-
s deracy with the priests, would, by its dissolu-
tion, extinguish that confederacy, and not merely se-
parate, for all political objects, the laity from the
priesthood, but the members of the priesthood from
each other. The recent Limerick election fulfilled
the latter and most unpromising branch of the above
prophecy, when the Catholic clergy took opposite
sides, the larger portion of them voting for Mr.
Dawson, the least popular candidate. But a de-
monstration, altogether irresistible, of the healing
power of the Duke of Wellington's Bill, stands on
the face of the pastoral letter, which gave rise to
these observations. It is a document which breathes
in every line the most edifying spirit of loyalty,

of the interference in temporal politics, exhibited
by the Catholic Bishops before the grant of
Emancipation, are fairly stated in this production
under their signatures, and tl:c tluly of henceforth
confining their activity to the spiritual and pastoral
functions of their callings is distinctly recognised on
their own behilf, and earnestly enforced upon the
whole body of the Irish Church. After this, we
shall be told, perhaps, that nothing has been gained
by Emancipation. Much, doubtless, would it profit
the country—more, indeed, than we expect from
such a source—if the learned Drs. Magee and El-
rington were to follow the charitable precedent now
established for them by the prelates of " a Church"
which we are told is " without a religion," and to
exhibit some better proofs of their own religious
spirit than those derivable from bitterness of lan-
guage against the professors of the creed which they
condemn.—Thid.

Sir Francis Burdett declared last night, that " he
. - -
was aumpus to remove an impression that he did not
sufficiently appreciate the motion of the Honourable

Member for Aberdeen, and he was always ready to
say that he had a full value of the great and merito-

rious efforts of the Honourable Gentleman." We

certainly do not wonder that Sir Francis, on reflec-
tion, should have been anxious to remove such an
impression ; for in his fervour he spoke of retrench-
ment in a way which it would not be easy to justify.

" Nothing (he observed) which the Honourable
Member for Aberdeen could propose—and he pro-

posed twice as much as any man in the House—(A
laugh)—could relieve them. It was the grossest
folly to believe, indeed, that any relief could come
from such sources." Now, although it is not, per-
haps, quite fair to tie a speaker down to the
literal meaning of every word he utters, yet
there runs throughout the whole of Sir Francis's

speech a magnificent contempt of economy, quite
in accordance with the above passage. But

the Honourable Baronet is at issue with himsel

when he runs down economy and cries up de

preciation. lie cannot suppose that changing- the
value of the denomination would make the nation one

whit richer. We are unwilling to suppose him de-
sirous of inflicting an injury on creditors, even
though the class to which he belongs (landowners)

usually rank among debtors, and conceive that he
peaches the striking at creditors generally because

he cannot otherwise reach the public creditors and
the different servants of the State. But the lower-

ing salaries, reducing establishments, &c. is one great
object which Sir Francis must aim at accomplishing
by a depreciation. Whatever lowers the burdens

n;ust, therefore, be a relief, even on his own show•

ing, although not so great a relief as some people
might desire. This was clearly put by Mr. Peel.
" Certainly (said the Right Hon. Gentleman), he
inferred from the speech of the Hon. Baronet that
he meant to vote against the motion.—(Hear,
hear.)—Undeceived as to his error, he should say
that he could not agree with those gentlemen who
contended that no relief could be given to the people
by a reduction of taxation. The remission of every
tax was, undoubtedly, a relief to the people.—
(Hear, hear.)—He never did suppose, that when a
tax was not necessary it ought to be diverted
from the natural application of industry ; for
he was sure it would fructify more in the
hands of the people than in those of the State; and
if taxation were not necessary, he should not wish
to levy taxes." Of all the wild and incoherent
speches ever delivered in the House, that of the
Hon. Baronet was perhaps the most wild and the
most incoherent. At one time he talked of a
"well-regulated paper currency"—meaning of course
a paper currency convertible into gold, and conse-
quently an undepreciated currency. " Whatever
grievances (he said) could be sustained from it had
been got over at the time it was abandoned, and
now none were felt which could not be compensated
for by its superior cheapness and convenience."
The next moment he spoke as if he contemplated a
depreciated currency ; for he talked of affecting, by
a departure from gold, " the interests of persons,
for whom God forbid he should not feel all respect,
and whose comforts and happiness demanded
every attention." If we were to have a con-
vertible paper currency, those who had the issuing
of it would be forced to take care that the in-
terests of the persons in question were not sacri-
ficed. Are the prices higher in Scotland under a
convertible paper currency, than in England with a
gold currency ? It has sometimes been supposed
that a paper currency led to panics, but the ex-
changes prevent depreciation. But Sir Francis's
paper currency is a wonderful currency ; for it is to
be good and bad at the same time—to be well regu-
lated and ill regulated—to be convertible, and yet
to depreciate. Mr. Peel did as much as could be
done with such a speech in the way of refutation.
" He could not (he said) understand the Hon. Ba-
ronet's doctrine—that reducing the currency five
millions in amount, necessarily reduced the income
of the country fifty millions. I-k could not see
why the reduction of the currency should reduce
the income to a ten times greater amount. By rais-
ing the value of money, those who possessed it could
obtain a greater command over commodities. He
admitted that there was a certain class whose pro-
perty was inc-ambered, and who were obliged to dis-
charged their incumbrances at a fixed sum; and he
would admit that raising the value of money was a
hardship on them ; but to those destitute of in-
cumbrance it was no hardship." The change
of the measure leaves the nation, as a whole, pre-
cisely where it was, though it distributes the pro-
perty differently. But when Mr. Peel talks so
reasonably respecting the benefit of reducing taxes,
and the mischief of diverting the produce of the
industry of the country from its natural application,
except where necessary—are we to conclude that
we are, in reality, to reduce our expenditure to what
is strictly necessary ? We have more than once
observed, that the people of this country are obliged
to pay, in addition to what is levied by Government,
for what, in other countries, constitutes the chief
expenditure of Government. We, in fact, govern
ourselves at our own expense.—Morning Chronicle.
In the House of Commons last night Sir C.
Wetherell gave notice that " on Wednesday, the
3d of March, he should move for a return for copies
of the ex-officio informations which had been re-
cently filed against the Morning Journal newspaper
—for copies of the minutes of the Judge before
whom the trials took place—for the names of the
Jurymen who were sworn upon each trial—and for
the words which one of the Juries had made use of
in recommending the defendants to mercy." Upon
this notice, although it concerns us so nearly, we
shall for the present offer no remarks. We are in
good hands.—ln extracting yesterday from the Irish
newspapers some passages of a more than ordinarily
gratifying nature to ourselves we accidentally omitted
one, which, in common gratitude, we feel bound to
insert in our Journal of to-day. It is from the
Warder—a paper of whose good opinion we have
always been proud, and whose support we look
upon as a matter of high value and importance. As
this observation will be read by the Warder—but
twenty-four hours before we are enabled to speak in
mote positive and explicit terms upon the subject to

" It now rests with those persons who have still re-
maining any regard for the liberties of their country, and
who would maintain that most effectual of ban iers against
tyranny—a free press—to testify their feeling toward this
martyr in the cause of national honour. If Ain Alexander
must suffer in his person, in order to gratify the, liberal
feelings of Sir James Scarlett and his hopeful employers,
let him at least be borne harmless in his purse. Let sub-
scriptions be forthwith commenced to remunerate him for
his losses; and thus will the spirit of despotism be taught
how fruitless the attempt to crusts the honest expression of
public opinion. The Protestants of Ireland owe much to
their constant and efficient advonte, the editor of the
Morning .Journal ; and we trust tha' they will not be
slow to evince their gratitude."—.2llornipg Journal.
The treatment which we have received at. the
hands of a Whig Attorney-General it might have
been expected would have induced us to comment
severely upon his masters, but their actions have in
710 unequivocal manner proved the truth of many of
our positions; and we think the forbearance and
generosity of the Duke of Wellington are placed in
too clear a light to need any eulogium from us. If,
however, any individual is still sceptical upon the
subject we Would refer him to his Grace's replies to
the representations of county Magistrates, and ()thew
gentlemen of weight who dared to tell the truth.
We would beg him to re-consider the answers given
to the starving weavers—to reflect over again upon
that precious document called the King's Speech—
and if he should still doubt the fact of the First
Lord of the Treasury being the most pro-
found staicsrnan and most disinterested patriot
—the most humane Christian, and most in-
telligent legislator—:-we really fear that his
mental blindness is incurable. If unparalleled
effrontery in asserting that distress is merely partial
and temporary—if an inflexible determination to
persist in ruinous measures—if narrow-minded pre-
judice in favour of a particular theory—if an ill-
digested and destructive commercial policy—if, in
a word, a reckless career of political blundering
argue the great man—then must we unlearn all that
has hitherto been deemed proofs of greatness, and a
dictionary be constructed adapted to the modern
acceptation of the political vocabulary. lire this,
however, can take place, we sincerely hope the men
who have produced such an unnatural confusion in
our language will have ceased to be in power, and
that purity, both of language and principle,
will have resumed their proper places. The
weak point of the Administration is clearly
the question of supply. Here every member
attached to the real interests of the community
ought to make a stand. Not a shilling out to be
voted for either army or navy ; for what have a
pacific Cabinet to do with men of war ?—not a
shilling for Ministers, who have repeatedly declared
themselves incapable of doing any thing for the
country, and therefore have no claim—not a sous for
the parasites and Dagon-worshippers—no secret-
service money, to be expended in strengthening the
influence of party, no matter how—not a penny, in
fact, ought to be granted to our stewards until they
have given an account of their stewardships. We
know such a course will be deprecated by the apos-
tates, but that is alone a ground for persevering in
it. We are aware such an opposition will be called
factious, but when applied in such a sense
we glory in the epithet. The opposition of
the, Marquis of Blandford and Colonel Sib-
thorp has immortalized them in the eyes of the
discerning portion of the community, and will, no
doubt, stimulate others to pursue the glorious path
of honour and patriotism. The seed has fallen upon
good ground, and we confidently look to a harvest
of principle, which will precede the final subversion
and destruction of the Cabinet of incapables.—
Soon may that day dawn upon our political hemis-
phere, and dispel the mists and fogs which have
too long obscured its brightness ! Soon may the
Whigs and Judases go to their proper places—and
then, and not till then, the boast of the Duke of
Wellington of the vast resources of this country,
and her capabilities to sustain a distinguished part
in any hostile collision of the Continental Powers,
may be realized. But the Field-Marshal must him-
self be aware, from the conduct of the Whigs during
the Peninsular war, how little support he can ever
expect from his present friends and associates, how-
ever pressing and urgent the necessity of the State
may be.—lbid.
Sir Charles Wetherell gave notice last night of an
important motion, which we have no doubt will give
rise to an equally important discussion, oa a topic
in which we confess not only a strong general, but
individual interest, prevails—the late prosecution of
the Morning Journal, and the imprisonment of its
Editor and principal proprietor. Sir Charles is dis-
tinguished by his legal knowledge ; and yet the
terms of his motion include a return of the names of
the jurors upon the trial, the publication of which
list of jurors, be it observed, Sir James Scarlett not
only declared to be a libel, but which he also
threatened to punish as such ! We shall see how
he will answer for such proceedings to the late
Attorney-General, who is at least his equal in legal
attainments, as well as in political honesty. Sir
James will no doubt be supported by his colleagues
in office, and, according to present appearances, he
will need all the relief that they can afford him.—
Morning Advertiser.
The speech of Mr. Flume on Monday last on the
great question of reducing the taxes, and the public
expenditure, was as able in fact and in argument as
it was most feebly and inefficiently opposed by the
Ministerial side of the House ; and we think it im-
possible for any one to have perused the brief, but
luminous, report of its main features which appeared
in our Paper, without being convinced that there
has since the peace been not only great and unwar-
rantable extravagance in all our public departments,
but, that even now—numerous as are the reductions
which have been made in different ways—there is
still great room for practicable retrenchment and
economy. The object of Mr. Hume was two-fold ;
first, to convince the House of the practicability of
great reductions in the army, the navy, and othergreat
establisffments; and, secondly, to induce it toagree to
a reduction of taxes to such an amount as the di-
minished means of the country would bear, and
then to square the public expenditure with it, in-
stead of, as heretofore, first voting away the amount
estimated, and then casting about for the means of
procuring it. This plan of proceeding he justified
on the ground that faith had not been kept with the
public in the often promised reductions of expendi-
ture—and that unless Parliament kept back the sup-
plies by first reducing the taxes, the Government ne-
ver would be induced to practise economy to
the extent required by the necessities of the
country. In these views he was powerfully sup-
ported by an independent body of Members from
all parts of the House, and of all parties ; and,
as we have already observed, as feebly opposed
by the Ministers. They had no argument, in
fact, to oppose to the statements of Mr.
Hume, except the hackneyed one that the time was
not convenient—that Ministers bad pledged them-
selves to every possible reduction—and that if the
House agreed to the motion of the Hon. Member, it
would show that it had no confidence in his Ma-
juHersgut
reductionmey
d'
es
asgas
ron Minis.efsettschtiheet r,vpea
pubs
lic
cont point—ieetxhdpe;e nntnidoiert
ruer
to:
ad
Iseosfeaedcrttt
aoenn
yi,an thatthingmou
nt
recommended, was impracticable. Of want of con-
fidence in the economical resolutions of the present

ported our views on the currency with more
than his usual ability, and declared, that hcm-
ever taxation might be reduced, there was no
hope of the incomes, and profits, and wages, of the
productive classes returning to their former standard
while gold formed the currency of the country. " To
look at the country, it was the land of abundance,
and it ought to be the land of happiness, instead of
which it was covered with distress.—(Hear, hear.)

—What had produced this alteration ? The climate
was not altered—the energies of the people were
not altered—their industry was not altered—one
thing was altered, and only one; and was it not a
perversion of understatoling to attribute the distress
of the country to every thing that had not altered,
and entirely overlook that which had altered"—the
Currency !—lbid.

We rejoice, and the country generally will rejoice
with us, that the small division of the Tory party
who were expected at the commencement or the
Session to take part in the factious employment or
harrassing his Majesty's Government, have, with
some very inconsiderable exceptions, repudiated,
.or at least receded from a task and,a position iii
which it was evident they Could rreitber_acquire any

honour to themselves nor confer any advantage upon

the country. On Monday night Mr. Wodehorise,
on the part of his Honourable Friend the Member
for Shaftesbury, withdrew a notice of motion which
stood for the following day (yesterday), on the
express ground that it was not the intention of a
most respectable list of Tories whom lie named,
and who have hitherto been supposed to form part
of the Tory Opposition, any longer to emba►ras4
his Majesty's Ministers. By this speedy retreat
from a position inconsiderately taken, and in which
as honourable men and patriotic senators, they could
not for a single moment have felt themselves at
home, they at once redeem their own characters and
offer a timely and acceptable atonement to a dis,
cerning nation, which perseverance in a factious
course would have offended and alienated once and
for ever. To what humiliation and inconsistency
the Tories—or the men, we should rather say, still

usurping the name after having renounced the prin-
ciples of Toryism—are reduced, who persevere in
opposition to the King's Government, may be seen,
when we find the Earl of Stanhope, who seems,
with more valour certainly than discretion, to have
volunteered as leader of the forlorn hope in the

house of Lords, adopting the opinions andrepeating
the very language of such Statesmen as Mr. Hume
and Mr. Cobbett. The latter of these gentlemen,
chiefly, we believe, for the purpose of discrediting
the wisdom of Parliament—for we think too highly

of his acuteness to suspect him of believing what
he said—has every week for the last twenty years
been telling the country that it was impossible to
restore the ancient standard of the currency with-
out repealing many millions of taxes. This is the
full amount of what Lord Stanhope tells us now.
Is it not then, we ask, truly deplorable that a
Nobleman like Lord Stanhope, assuming a new elle,

racter and a new position in the eye of the country,
should at the same sime be so entirely destitute of
a single novel idea, as to be compelled to re-
echo, without improvement or variation of anv
kind, the hackneyed and exploded errors of such
a man as Mr. Cobbett ? It will be recollected
also, that once at least in every day, of every
Session, since Mr. Hume has had the honour
of a seat in the House of Commons, he has not
failed to exhort that Assembly to abolish what he
conceived the proper amount of taxes, never a very
small one, without troubling itself with any previ-
ous inquiry into the amount of expenditure neces•
sary for the safety of the State, or the discharge of
its solemn obligations. Innumerable votes of the
House of Commons—the proper guardian of the
public purse—votes in which not only every Tory,
but every honest and rational man, did in fact and
of necessity concur, have pronounced the course re-
commended by Mr. Hume to be dangerous, un-
constitutional, and absurd. And now we have
Lord Stanhope, still calling himself a Tory—stand-
ing in the front of a party which calls itself a Tory
party,l borrowing the notions and very language of
Mr. Hume, pronouncing in effect that Parlia-
ment has all along been wrong, and Mr. Hume
only right, and calling upon the Legislature
to act in conformity with the repeated admonitions
of that gentleman, unless the King's Government
can be brought to adopt the principles of Mr. Cob-
bett with respect to the currency, and in deference
to those principles, to defraud the creditor of the
State, and violate every subsisting engagement be-
tween individuals. It can scarcely be pretended
surely that any thing but inconsistency and des
gradation could have brought Lord Stanhope
and those who follow him into conjunction with
Mr. Cobbett and Mr. Hume, for the latter re-
main precisely what they have always been in
their principles, characters, objects, and lan-
guage. Having in the above remarks alluded to
the observations which fell from Earl Stanhope on
Monday night in the House of Peers, it may be
as well to notice at the same time a singular mistake
into which the Noble Lord appears to have fallen,
with respect to the statement of the amount of cur-
rency in circulation made by the Duke of Welling-
ton on the first night of the Session. The Noble
Premier did not think it necessary to qualify his
statement by observing in so many words that it
was the result of calculation, and not the specific
contents of any existing official document or record;
and for this very obvious reason, that he supposed
naturally enough, although it now appears some-
what rashly, every Member of the Upper House
of Parliament to know, that the existence of any
such official document or record was impossible.
Statistical writers have estimated, and it is gene-
rally supposed with sufficient accuracy, the amount,
of currency in circulation at different epochs, by
combining upon certain principles the information
to be derived from returns of coinage at the Mint,
the number of stamps issued to country Bankers,
the probable extent of exportation of gold and
slyer coin, as indicated by the Custom-house en-
tries, and induced or discouraged by the fluctuations
of the course of exchange within definite periods.—
Such a calculation the Duke of Wellington had
made or caused to be made, and he read its results
to the House from a small memorandum which
he held in his hand. This, however, is very
unsatisfactory and imperfect information in the
opinion of the Noble Leader of Opposition in the
House of Lords. He will be satisfied with nothing
short of a precise and accurate official document, to
obtain which it is at least necessary that the agents
of Government should be enabled to peep into, and
count the contents of, every iron chest, every till,
every money bag, nay, even into every man's
pocket, and every woman's card-purse, throughout
the United Kingdom. Such information as is at-
tainable—such information as Statesmen in all ages
have been content, and if not content, have been
compelled to rely upon, the Noble Duke possessed,
and gave it faithfully to the House. Loci' Lord
Stanhope think the Noble Duke should have done
less or more than this ? That the result does not
accord with a favourite theory of the Noble Lord, is a
tittle unfortunate; but for this the Duke of
on surely is not to be held responsible.s—siliorn.Post.

FitoAl THE GAZETTE OF LAST NIGHT.

Lord Chamberlain's- Office, Feb. 15, IS3O.

The king has been pleased to appoint the Honourable
Cecil Forestei., one of the Grooms of His Majesty's Bed-
chamber, in the room of the Honourable Major-General
Henry King.

Crown-Office, Feb. 16.
MEMBERS RETURNED TO SERVE IN THIS PRESENT PAR-

LIAMENT.

ROROUGH LEOSIINSTER.

John Ward, of liolwood, in the parish of Keston, in the
comity of Kent, in the room of Rowland Stephenson, Esq.
whose seat has become vacated under the provisions (A-
the Act 52, Geo. 111. c. 144.