The Sun.
London, England, 1853-05-04 00:00:00

a ludicrous than an imposing appearance. In the

House of Lords, however, there is still remaining
a specimen of the species now extinct in the
other hemisphere of Legislation ; one, more-

over, of such sterling worth, that we much
regret the unworthy purposes for which his aid has
been invoked. As the patron saint of Sabbatarian
movements, Protestant Alliances, Stafford-house
Addresses, baths and washhouses, model lodging-
houses, ragged schools, and of everything indeed
which bears the stamp of benevolence or anti-
Popery, the Earl of SHAFTESBURY has enjoyed the
long and just admiration of all the Protestant
MACHALES and LUCASES, and of all who delight
in benefiting the humbler classes of society by
direct charity. The sincerity of his charity, more-
over, has never been called in question. The
most rabid curs on the other side of St. George's
Channel would not venture to denounce him as
guilty of " soup-ticket proselytism." His Lord-
ship is, however, but one of too many instances
in which the narrowest interpretation of a meek
and expansive faith is combined with a high de-
gree of religious and social excellence. This, no
doubt, was the reason why he was selected as the
standard-bearer of mediaeval bigotry and intoler-
ance on Friday night. Had Lord DERBY been
put forward, it would have been held all pretty
fair as a political opposition in his peculiar
position, but it would have been accounted
a purely political opposition. Had the Bishop
of EXETER moved the amendment, all his
resistance would, by worldly and malicious
minds, have beef ascribed to views and habits so
uncourteously described the other night by Sir
WM. MOLESWORTH. But, if Lord SHAFTESBURY,
whose motives none ever ventured to impugn—
Lord SHAFTESBURY, who has such a constituency
of the benevolent on his right hand, and the zeal-
ous Protestants on his left—if he will but head
the ill-omened phalanx of civil and religious des-
potism, his name would be an answer at once to
many a taunt, and an authority with thousands
of followers. Nothing harsh could come from
the noble patron of factory operatives and ragged
schools ; nothing contemptuous to the Jews from

One who vies with BENJAMIN DISRAELI in extolling
" the Hebrew mind," as destined to make them
" the future sovereigns of the earth." Lord SHAF-
TESBURY'S name is sufficient to prove that it is both
Christian and benevolent to do to the Jews as we
would not that they should do unto us—to prove
that it must unchristianise the kingdom since he
thinks it would. Lords who, at bottom, chiefly
desired to give Lord JOHN RUSSELL a well-deserved
snubbing, since he chose to try his hand at " lead-
ing" their Lordship; as well as the House of Com-

mono, where he ought to have settled the whole
business ; Lords who wished to tantalise the Coalition
a little; Lords who wanted to take breath after such
a mighty liberal effort as passing the Canada Clergy
Reserves Bill ; Lords who really believed that
there was such a thing as unchristianising a Legis-
lature by permitting Christian electors to choose
a Jewish Representative—and there really are a
few such Lords—chiefly those, no doubt, who
_ _ _

have personally retired from public life and coma
mated themselves to the care of their wife and
the chaplain ; but chiefly the far greater number
of Lords who delight, in any safe contest, to nail
the good old Tory colours to the mast, and show
that they are Tory Lords still, and not the foot-
ball of a Reformed (?) House of Commons—all
these various classes of Lords could play their
part in this annual sham-fight to the very best
advantage under a leader far too good a man to
be a party politician. " I voted with the Earl of
SHAFTESBURY." That's answer enough to all the
gentler sex assuredly, and more than answer
enough to all who care for " our Protestant insti-
tutions." His Lordship performed the office of a
legislative CALCRAFT, of course, with his wonted
blandness. He strangled the last offspring of
Religious Liberty with a silken cord, but it was
strangling of the noblest kind of freedom still, an(
gave a Bishop the opportunity to remind the
House of the " grievous wrong they had done the
Church in admitting Catholics and Dissenters into
the Legislature, and that admitting the Jews
would be but to perpetuate a greater wrong." Lord
SHAFTEsnußvhimself partly adopted the same argu-
ment, and ought, logically, to have adopted the
whole when he urged that a Christian Church
ought only to be legislated for by Christians.
Lord SHAFTESBURY and the Bishops, however, must
take care. They may find that the sentiment of
Religious Liberty is becoming hourly much stronger,
and the policy of State Endowments and State
Churches more and more extensively questioned.
We regard it as perfectly certain that if the two
should come of necessity into conflict, Religious
Liberty would gain the victory, and speedily too.
If the greater part of our politicians at all believed
that a system of exclusions from civil privileges
and offices were necessary to the preservation of
English Episcopacy, they would neither dare, nor
probably wish, to take their stand on the ground
of exclusiveness. On the debate generally we
have already expressed our opinion. We suppose it
is hopeless to expect the House of Commons under
a Coalition to assert the rights of Electors, or Lord
JOHN RUSSELL to kick at the House which snubs
him at pleasure. To us the People's Representa-
tives appear unendurably degraded when they
suffer the Upper House to hold the keys of the
Lower ohe—when, year after year, they invite
Baron ROTHSCHILD to take his seat among them.
But the Lords see fit to bar the door, not of their
own, but of the People's House, in his face.
Surely the day must be at hand when the good
old motto, that " Every Englishman's house is
his castle," will be adopted in good earnest by the
Englishmen who compose the House of Commons.
We want a " House of Commons Reserves Bill,"
of which the first clause should enact " that the
settlement of qualifications for a Representative
of the People should be determined by the Repre-
sentatives of the People ; and a second, that all
matters pertaining to the right of suffrage, the
mode of collecting votes, and the arrangement of
electoral divisions, should also belong exclusively
to the People's House."