The Sun.
London, England, 1830-03-17 00:00:00

a million of gold exported, making the whole amount
• 26,800,000/. ; now, 2,000,000/. had been since supplied
through the Mint. There were 19,000,000/. of notes
of the Bank of England, and 9,000,0001. of notes
issued
by country bankers ; which made altogether
56,000,000/, of circulating medium, independent of the
silver coinage. Now, there never were fifty millions
of circulating medium before the Bank Restriction Act.
This, therefore, showed him it was not circulating me-
dium, but confidence, that was wanting.—(Hear, hear.)
He had next to observe, in answer to those Hon. Members
who wished for a double standard, that there was much
inconsistency in this. The House was about four years
ago occupied in the simplification of measures: and now
it was proposed to introduce a complication which would
be of all others the worst ; for the price of necessaries
would be suspended, like Mahoinet's coffin, between the
two standards; and would corsform to neither. Others
recommended a silver standard. This, in his mind, could
have no pOwer to relieve the distress ; for they would
have the same difficulties to encounter, and the same sa-
crifices to make in procuring a silver currency, that they
had endured in acquiring a currency of gold. In a word,
he thought they should remain as they were. The dis-
tress appeared to him to have arisen from bad harvests,
and not from low prices. The price of corn four years
ago, in the time of Mr. Canning, averaged 575. 41. a
quarter. It was now higher—therefore, the absence of
corn, and not the lowness of price, was the cause of the
distress. One thing he wished to impress upon the House,
and it was, that whatever might be their situation, they
were under the influence of a price from competition,
which compelled all persons to share alike in the public
burthens. This was what he wished, as ail he asked for
• was a fair proportion.
Mr. SADLER commenced by animadverting on private
communications from individuals, however respectable, be-
ing given to the House in proof of returning prosperity, in
the face of the recorded allegations of numerous petitioners,
and, after some observations on such a communicationlfrom
Leeds, from the distressed stuff-manufacturers, of which he
had, in the early part of the evening, presented a petition
• e.--(llear, hear)—said—Sir, it is most painful to advert to
the situation in which the industrious classes of society, or
in other words, the great mass of the community, have been
Placed for some years past—it is more than painful to re-
flect on the manner in which their just representations and
demands have been treated. Alterations in the policy of
the eountry, that policy by which the nation confessedly
rose to an unexampled state of power and prosperity, have
been recklessly made, and these alterations, Sir, have been
succeeded by a depreciation not only in the nominal, but
in the real value of labour—by a ruinous diminution in
the worth of
though all its products, accompanied by no advan.
tages whatsoever but to one class of the community, who,
a pitiful minority in point of number, have alone
Profited by
this great and ruinous revulsion. I mean the
public creditors, to whom must be added those who, whe-
ther seated on that bench, or allowed to expatiate where-
ever it may please them to expend the sums they
derive from an over-burthened public, are sti-
pendiaries upon the country.—(Hear, hear, hear.)—
Sir, the simple fact is, that every class of society but the
mere capitalist, and the fundholder, the pensioner, and the
foreign broker, to avail myself of a just definition of Locke
applied to certain traders, are either in a state of extreme
suffering or find themselves sinking to it ; and still it can
be proved by these interested parties that the country is all
the while prospering, or, when that assertion can no
longer be ventured upon, that the distress is partial, and
that it will be but temporary.—(Hear, hear.)—But,
we are informed that things are already in a better state
in the country. As compared with the winter months
most certainly. It is the season of spring, and, if we
are still to be fed even partially front our native fields,
now, Sir, is the seed-time of the agriculturist of
England. If we are still to be clothed by native in-
dustry, now, Sir, is the harvest of the manufacturer. As
absurd would it be to suppose a spring without an increased
degree of business asi one without a bud or a flower. But
on the verdure of spring there may be a blight more me-
lancholy to contemplate than the barrenness and desolation
of winter—(Fiear)..—and spring as it is, I fear there is
that blight on the once fair and opening prospects
which this season was wont to open to honest industry.
But, Sir, my fears fer the country under the existing policy
of its present Government would not be much abated were
a temporary gleam of prosperity to shine upon it. On the
contrary, were I utterly hopeless as to the final result, I
should expect such as the consequences of the subsiding
efforts of a great and industrious people. The ebbing tide
may occasionally throw up a bolder wave, and seem to vin-
dicate its former but it is all in vain if the mighty
Lease of waters front Whence it flows is already subsiding and
receding. No country has ever declined at once from its
former superior state. without such fluctuations, and I
confess I see much to apprehend in the issue of these ap-
palling alterations. In the comparatively short period
of five or six years we have had two or three of them ;
and we find ourselves it this moment, notwithstanding the
mighty efforts which, t:he people of this country have made,
with a declining revers tie, diminished wealth, and a uni-

versally dissatisfied people, while even the advocates of the
new system deprecate these apparent returns to a former
state as evidencing over-production and undue speculation.
On all hands, then, these temporary gleams of properity
(and would to God one• awaited us!) are only to be re-
garded as feverish exacerbations of that wasting disorder
which is preying upon the %it'll of the country and pros-
trating its energies and strength. Such, without a figure
of speech, I fear, is the condition of the country now. 1
am sure it has been so during the last few yea's. What,
then, have been the causi!s which in so short a period have
inflicted on this country at lessening intervals such a suc-
cession of sufferings, which have at every repeated visita-
tion inflicted still deeper calamities on the people? An
inquiry into them is at once the most important and the
most imperative dutyrof Parliament. We are, nevertheless,
it
appears, not to enter upon it. There are certain parts
of his rm field of inquiry which we are forbidden to explore,
y
and the are precisely
have those in which the real calamities
Principally originated. (Hear, hear.)—Sir, we can-
not approach such inquiries so well, with
such hopes of a
true and beneficial conclusion, as when we review those
mighty means of prosperity which still remain to us
unimpaired, simply because a ruinous policy cannot
impair them--which remain unchanged because a changeful one cannot alter them.
same country, favoured beyond a We inhabit the
all others in soil
ALind climate, unrivalled in its position, surrounded
n the same ocean, the scene of its brightest glories,
and, till of late, one of the most inexhwastible and cer-
tain elements of its wealth—we possess the same colonies,
pouring into the lap of this country the riches of every
soil and climate under the sun, and which they give to us
in exchange for the products of British skill and industry
--we possess capital equal to feed the commerce of the
world—we have what is the superior, because that which
itt the creator of capital—industry—(Hear, hear)—
wholly unrivalled by any other nation, or even by this in
any preceding age—we have institutions which are sup-
Posed to foster and prot2ct that industry, and to secure
that eapitsl, beyond any other people ; and, Sir, all these
itlealculable advantages (any of which ought to be of itself
t 4 source of prosperity) wis have now enjoyed during a
tag and profound peace- -long, I say, in reference to
aat.which we have often 'before experienced ; profound,
°%vever compared ; and still, Sir, the people are in uni-
‘,"
?1'551 distress—they are at t bat bar assertina. it—they are
'here demanding relief—they are demanding that relief
Whi •
ci ,`-111 believe in my conscie nee we have it in our power
t ?"taw, and which I as ful;ly- believe nothing but an un-
r"!intable pertinacity in adhering- to a novel and absurd
Lreitng Prevents us fom bestowing, and which, itself the
4-"P.4'ing of Change, pand when ev'ery thing else has been
e to be changeable, is, it appears, to be immutable, and
eventhe sacred from inquiry.—(Hear, hear.)—Now, Sir, as
i distre,el can be no longer denied or very successfully
Pa hate' it is really curious to learn what a number of
bees
have been assigned for it. It would. be amusing to
. e their catalogue were it not too appalling to he a sub-
jrneeethof mirth. The Hon. Gentleman who has just preceded
tithe 4.4 enumerated some of the causes which, from time to
1824 have been given for the distress of this country. In
in 186 he fanners were in fault; they produced too much—
blaMe. tiv" little. In 1896 the English bankers were to
production and land
trotters, thecan perceive,
"'my, as far as I
Peasantry there, who do the mischief. Over
harvests, EA under production, do
t. good and too bad
dry seaso baud
alternately been appealed to ; 1627 was a
choice and' 1829
a wet one; in fact, nothing can equal the
the • ' tanversav
of the reas
alri,iet,y of the reasons whicii now apologize for
one of last aistresses 0• the country.—(Hear.)—But
ons for English distress deserves a
moment', attention.
Poor in some Other and It is discovered, I believe, that the
ofcantueadfatuity of the neighbouring countries are in no
prosperous condition. Sir, we want no better proof
present system when its advocates
other', with, till l ''' ' •
countryvtlince n° apology for the distress of their own
a.a. Presentim, the picture of the wretchedness of
in whatever t leir unnappy intermetthung, a tate
ehoi , whether in peace or iu war, so inelan-
a Frenchman is '
y a contrast. ' ''' • fforded,
But these free trailers now hold that if
reason tha • distressed it is an abundantly sufficient
have his Suffering
t an Engliahtnan should be sill more so, and
embitters
d by the change to which lie has
ken submitted-a_
tation in saying to whj.)—nut, Sir, we have no hesi-
of the country. ny
reyeeauses we attribute the distresses
which the nation attain:mg that system of policy by.
to its proud pre-eminerwe of