The Sun.
London, England, 1863-09-28 00:00:00

the Cardinal's essays, whether spoken or written.
They have, many of them, a sleek, flabby, veal-like
texture both of thought and of expression. It is
partly from the recollection of such discourses of the
Cardinal, partly from a general conviction that the
Cardinal's mode of thought must, from the inevit-
able circumstances of his training and position, be
a mode of thought utterly incapable of any whole-
some effect upon the national British mind, that one
is apt to take up any new discourse of his with a
predetermination against it. But one ought not
to let prejudice have its way, even against a cardi-
nal ; and we must say that there were parts of
Cardinal Wiseman's recent lecture which were really
ingenious and good. It is not so much those parts
of the lecture which were generally praised by the
newspapers that have caught our fancy as a certain
troin of abstract disquisition upon which the Car-
dinal entered at the beginning of the lecture, and
the application of which occupied the rest of it.
The Cardinal, indeed, treated his Southampton
audience to a neat little bit of psychology ; and
newspapers cannot be expected to look utter the
bits of psychology that may occur in the lectures
which they report. Indeed they are seldom troubled
with them. There have been a few capital vacation
speeches within the last week or two by various
public men—Earl Russell, Lord Stanley, Mr. Grant
Doff, and others; and, all in all, perhaps the best
vacation speech of the season—that with most of
real thought and perception of the future in it—has
been Mr. Grant Duff's ; but the Cardinal alone, so
far as we have observed, made his speech to consist
in a connected exposition, taken from what Univer-
sity men call the Philosophy of the Human Mind.
SPECTATOR.—The magistrates of Leigh have been
baited into a breach of the unwritten law, which
ordains that Englishmen sitting in judicial capacity
shall never defend themselves. The fact is remark-
able, for the accusation against them amounted only
to one of bigotry. It was said that certain farmers
of Leigh, fearing a thunderstorm, carted their hay
on Sunday, that they were summoned by the police,
that the magistrates fined them, under an obsolete
act, twenty-three shillings apiece, and that, the
yeomen resisting the illegal sentence, their goods
were distrained with many circumstances of insult
and oppression. So strong was the feeling created
by the narrative, that Lord Essex headed a subscrip-
tion in the Times, which speedily reached a most
respectable figure, and the magistrates were censured
so sharply by men to whose opinions they could not
affect indifference, that they have suffered their
clerk to publish a long and formal reply. We are
bound to admit, for we accepted the original story,
that it is on all important points conclusive. There
is a point connected with the amount of the
fines which is not yet cleared up, but on all others
little doubt can remain that the public have been
deceived. The farmers were not doing an occa-
sional work, but carrying out a system which has
already led to increased demoralisation ; they were
not carting their own corn, but hiring labourers
with drink and victuals to do seven days' work in-
stead of six ; the distraint was only carried out in
consequence of a combination to refuse payment ;
and in short, the farmers, and not the magistrates,
were guilty of a breach of the law. If it be true,
as asserted, though not by Mr. Marsh, that the
money subscribed was spent in a savage orgie, of
which races performed by naked men formed the
most conspicuous feature—those who have read
Mr. White's book will understand why we consider
this statement possible—they were guilty of some-
thing worse than excited misrepresentation, of en-
couraging a demoralisation which to men living in
Southern England seems almost beyond the range
of belief. Altogether apart from that statement,
however, the magistrates must stand acquitted, for,
whether the law be evil or good, they only carried
out its provisions, and in no unmerciful spirit. For,
and it is on this point that the gravest misapprehen-
sion exists, it is not the purpose or wish of those
who resist the bigoted Sabbatarians to abolish the
legal restrictions which protect the weekly rest.
Each of the extreme factions who on this question
abuse each other so savagely—the Sabbatarians,
who would make it a crime to " pluck the ears of
corn on the Sabbath day," and the party who would
abolish all restrictions on Sunday work—includes,
we conceive, in England a very small minority.
The great body, we take it, of educated men, while
doubtful as to the religious obligation of rest, the
rule laid down by Christ being clearly intended to
abolish the Jewish Sabbath, and not clearly intended
to establish any new one, still regard the legal en-
forcement of rest on one day in every seven with
the most cordial approval. The argument so com-
mon in Scotland, that the day is a necessity even
for animals is an argument merely, and a poor one
even for men who are reasoning on an ecclesiastical
point. Three-fourths of the world get along ex-
ceedingly well without any observance of the kind,
and it Chinese bullocks or Parisian horses die a
little the sooner they have got all the more work
out of the days of their lives. But no sane man
can doubt that in an age of excessive toil, when
the rush and excitement of life wear out the
nerves and bewilder the brain, one day of
peace in seven is an unmixed and enormous good.
And co man who believes with us, that the impor-
tance of things divine is to that of things earthly as
the infinite is to the finite, will doubt that some
short space of rest, during which the soul has time
to contemplate subjects unconnected with dinner,
worship may be exempt from the interruptions of
daily life, and meditation may be free from the
thought of work left standing, will doubt that the
Sunday's rest is of unspeakable moral value. It is
not a religious necessity any more than water is a
religious necessity to the man who thirsts. it may
not he to many minds a necessity of any kind, any
more than buttresses are necessary to support the
perfect arch. There are even minds to which the
strict observance of Sunday, as of any other rite or
ceremonial whatsoever, has that savour of formalism
which to such minds destroys all possibility of
spiritual life. But to the mass of mankind, and
especially of English mankind—Englishmen having
a tendency to crystallise their habits around their
beliefs,—one day of rest in seven creates un-
doubtedly the opportunity of spiritual, as well as
the fact of physical benefit. To abolish that time
of rest, in an age which is maddening itself with
work, in order to give the competitive strife
a monopoly of all life, or even to suffer avarice .to
steal the little time now exempt from its evil con-
trol, would be a course of procedure only less mad
than that on which Sabbatarians would have all
Englishmen enter. Toil shall halt one day in seven
—that seems to us the clear and the wise decision
of the mass of English opinion, which, while main-
taining that principle, still resents all external in-
terference with the use of the day so secured. If
this be at once a just and predominant opinion, it
only remains so to regulate legislation that the end
sought may be secured without religious oppression.
SATURDAY REVIEW.—No one can wonder that the
famous Woolley insurance case should have pro-
voked some rather strong criticism on the conduct
of the leading offices. In coming to the determina-
tion to resist payment on the ground of fraud and
arson, we have no doubt that the managers of the
companies in which Campden House was insured
acted upon a genuine suspicion that the fire was
wilfully caused. Unfortunately for them, all their
efforts failed to produce a fragment of evidence to
justify a defence which was equivalent in effect to
putting a man on trial for one of the gravest of
criminal offences, without any reasonable cause. It
is not, however, this—the really important aspect
of the matter—which has attracted most attention.
Most persons who insure feel that the precedent of
Mr. Woolley's case is not likely to be followed
against them ; and though the fact of this gen-
tleman having, some twenty or thirty years ago,
occupied an unusual position at au hotel was
rather an insufficient reason for charging him
with crime, there is no doubt that the singularity
of his life had more to do with the,suspicions of the
offices than they would perhaps be willing to allow.
After the result of this famous trial, it is less likely
than ever that ordinary insurers will be exposed to
gratuitous accusations of setting fire to their houses;
but it so happened that there was one little inci-
dent in the history of the affair which touches in-
surers much more nearly. When Campden House
was totally destroyed, and a claim of of £30,000
was made upon the policies, the companies had the
audacity to ask Mr. -Woolley how he made up this
imposing total of damage. The investigation proved
to the satisfaction of a jury that the house was not
I over-insured; but this conclusion was not arrived
at until a great deal of trouble and some expense
had been incurred in making out a priced inven-
tory of the stores of furniture, fittings, and pic-
tures with which this old curiosity-shop was
crammed. It has occurred to sundry correspon-
dents of the Times that what was done in Mr.
Woolley's case might be done in theirs also, and
that, when they call upon au insurance office to
replace the damage which a fire may have
caused, they may be asked in return to point out
what damage they have suffered, and to fur-
nish sufficient details to shoW bow the
amount of their claim is arrived. at. The most
affecting pictures have been drawn of the painful
embarrassments of a burnt-out proprietor when he
attempts to recall from memory the particulars of
his household goods, and to estimate the cost at
which they may be replaced. The difficulty of
making a perfectly accurate claim is no doubt con-
siderable; but as the claimant, however weak his
memory, must know more about the matter than
any one else, the difficulty is much more likely to
press hardly oil the assurers than on the assured.
Still, the trouble of framing such an estimate as was
required from Mr Woolley is a very good grievance
for discussion at this time of the year, and it cannot
be denied that the plan which the 7inies has advo-
cated in a slashing leader would effectually relieve
the sufferers. The proposal is that, if a man in-