The Sun.
London, England, 1837-08-26 00:00:00

which attended its acquisition was also Irish. Anm
one who wants a minute description of it may find
the same in the records of certain Coroners' inquests
which have been held in " the sister country" within
the last fortnight. The various police sheets of the
districts where elections took place, anti the books of
the county infirmaries, will furnish additional particu-
!ars of this very peculiar tranquillity. As gems of the
purest lustre are generally dieaorered in the roughest
loih this " tranquil power," of which the Whig-
adleele boesti is found amid the ferocious turmoil of
Irish elections, In short, the " elements" of this
tranquil power are no other than broken heads. It is
not easy to deal seriously with impudence so eetrava-
gent es W,2 find in the Ministerial assumptions regard.
line* the power and the position of the present Govern-
ment.: There arc, however, a set of grave ninnies who
think they ere philosophical when they are only stupid,
and who, by the solemnity of their affectation, have
nut only deceived themselves but some other well-
meaning yet thoughtless people into the idea that
acre is a sort of connection between the calm advance-
ent of general improvement in public affairs and the
xistence of the present Administratioo, or some other
Adininistratioe of similar habits—that is to say, of silly,
solemn, finical habits—in the management or
misma-
nagement of the public business. It is not very easy
to understand how such a- delusion could ever have
obtained even for a short time in such a manly nation
at England is ; but there is, or at all events has been,
a delission about these effeminate chatterers, from which
some harm and an immense quantity of grave imper-
tinence have sprung. If these chatterers would but
put on petticoats and pattens, and provide themselves
with ear-trumpets, like Miss Martineau, they might
form a political sect, with that worshipful lady at
their head, which would afford some amusement, and
lead none astray but such as were equally hopeless in
taste and in judgment. But while they disguise them-
selves in the garments of men, and keep scribbling on
about politics, with the authority too (if such it may
be called), of the Government to back them, there
exists a sort of necessity for exposing and reproving
the lying gabble of which they are guilty. Now,
as to this " tranquil power" of which they chatter,
it is, manifestly, either a ludicrous hallucination
of the most egregious vanity, or a mere un-
truth, for which it is hoped to obtain some credence by
the cool irrefragable manner in which it is stated. The
Whig-Radicals have not, nor ever have had, any such
thing as tranquil power, nor are they likely to have it.
Their power, when they have any, is the result of po-
pular excitement, of which they never scruple to take
advantage. When there is no popular excitement—
that is, when time judgment of the people, and not the
passion of the people, is in the ascendant—the Whig-
Radicals sink into powerless insignificance. At pre-
sent they have office, but they have no political power.
They can make a Bishop or give away a regiment
when there are vacancies, but they cannot prevail on
the Parliament to pass those Bills to which they
are pledged as " vital measures." The present Mi-
nisters hold the executive power because they are
hardy enough, or shameless enough, to bear discom-
fitures or disgraces which, before their time, Minis-
ters always resigned the executive rather than con-
tinue to receive. The possession of place without a
jot of effectual influence in the Legislature cannot be
called political power. If " the elements of tranquil
power" mean the elements of a power which never ac-
complishes anything—which, as to effectual result, is
as though it were dead—there may be some truth in
the phrase as applied to these Ministers. But this is
not the sense in which they who have used the phrase
meant it to be received.. We showed yesterday that
from the time of the popular excitement regarding the
Reform Bill, the Whig-Radicals have been rapidly
losing strewth until the present day. In the first
Parliament after the Reform Bill was passed their
force in the House of Commons was not less than
500. In the second, elected only two years after-
wards, when Sir Robert Peel had been entrusted with
the Government, they could not muster more than
350, and of British Members they had barely a ma-
jority. In the third, which has just now been elected,
while they possess the Government, and have exercised
every influence, fair or unfair, which they could bring
to bear upon the elections, their strength has suf-
fered a further diminution, and has gone down to
230. While the popular excitement lasted they did
with it all that they could, and procured a Bill to be
passed which, according to their calculation, secured
to them for ever the pre-eminence in the direction of
_British politics. Since that excitement has been at an
end, this party, who pretend to have with them " the
elements of tranquil power," have so suffered from
tranquillity that the majority of British Members is
now decidedly hostile to them, and they depend for
their Mioistenal existence solely upon the support of
the most incorrigibly turbulent population upon the
rue of the earth. Is it necessary to go beyond this in
prong the prodigious nonsense of the assumption
that o ;he elements of tranquil power" are with the
party of the Whig Radicals ? No ; the elements of
tranquil power are conspicuously with the other side.
The Conservatives will accomplish improvements if
they can be accomplishqd tranquilly; but they will not
attempt to borrow power :rtoffi public excitement. It
will ever he their pride, as it e'er has been, that their
influence is greatest when the people are most calm.—
Morning Post.
A few days since we had occasion to e,! nsure the
advice injudiciously or insidiously given by some of
our Liberal Contemporaries to Ministers, recommend-
ing them to propitiate the opposition, by submitting to
the next Parliamnnt measures of a more moderate cha.,
ratter than those proposed and approved in the late
House of Commons. Already is the mischievous ten-
dency of this advice manifesting itself in the increased
audacity which the Tories exhibit from so trivial an
encouragement as the craven or treacherous proposi-
tion of some one or two incompetent or designing po-
liticians. If such exultation be displayed by the To-
rem at the mere allusion by an unauthorised writer to
the necessity of Ministers retreating from the position
which they have so liberally taken, and so unflinch-
inele maintained by the side of the people, how bound-
less would be the extacy of the faction if Ministers
were really to pursue a course at one so impolitic and base
as that proposed for their adoption ! Of this, as we have
stated, there are not the slightest grounds for apprehen-
sion, butif it were necessary to adduce evidence of the evil
which such a policy would be calculated to bring upon the
cause of Reform and time Ministry with which it is
identified, we should refer to no stronger proof than
• the delight manifested at the prospect by the 'Tories.
Whatever may he the result of next Session there arc
two things certain, both equally gratifying to the people
of these realms—one is the determination of Ministers
to stand fast by those measures and principles of go-
vernment with which, through times of doubt and
difficulty, through good report and .evil report,
they have been so honourably associated—and the
other is, that under no circumstances, in the bounds
of the most remote probability, can a Tory Ministry
usurp the, government of the State. As a guarantee
of our first position we seek no further warranty than
the manly, dignified, and determined adherence to the
measures of his Administration which, for the last two
Sessions, distinguished our noble and patriotic Premier
—and of the next, the well-known disposition of liFr
Majesty, the sentiments of the majority of the House
of Commons, and above all, the detestation in which
Tory principles are deservedly held by the British
people, furnish abundant confirmation. Little, indeed,
must they know of the present state of intelligence and
feeling throughout the United' Kingdom, who fancy
that a Tory Government, or a Tory adaptation of time
present Government—were such contemplated --could
unpede the progress of the people to time recovery of
their rights. On the contrary, such occurrence would
provoke a more energetic and excited action amongst
the claimants for justice and the advocates of political
ameliorations. To stop or delay the movement of Re-
form, it is necessary to get in advance of it. It is judi-
cious even to exceed popular expectation, if it be desired
to gain such a hold on public confidence as may be,effi-
cieut to restrain the more violent and irregular impulses
of a people ardent in the pursuit of freedom. This
maxim seemed to have guided the preparation of the
Reform Bill as originally proposed by Lord J. Russell ;
and had it been allowed to pass in all its integrity—had
it not been curtailed of itsfair proportions, and disfigured
by spurious ingraftings—and had not the division in the
Grey Cabinet, and its subsequent doubting and timid

policy, iinpaired the public confidence generated by the
first proposition of the Bill, the people would hay(
repwcd with confidence in their Government, and
ears might have passed away before they would have
roused themselves to enforce to their full extent those
rights to whicl► the principles imperfectly embodied ii,
the Reform Act recognised their indisputable claim
A similar policy now would have a similar result. Tt,
disappoint public expectation would only be to excite r
more determined spirit amongst the people, and pro:
yoke them to increase their claims in proportion to
the injustice of which they would feel themselves the
victims. But why discuss the consequences of a con-
tingency of which, as we have already stated, there is
not the slightest ground of apprehension ? The sup •
position is one of those visions with which the Tories
are accustomed to delight themselves—a mir►ge-which.
in their thirst after office, they sec floating in the desert
of their hopes, and which, mocking them as the►
perish, serves only to allure them to more certain de.
struction.—Mormg Advertiser.