The Sun.
London, England, 1853-09-13 00:00:00

LONDON, TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 1853

England is now awaiting with exemplary pa-
tience, not to say with timidity or solicitude, the
decision of the Russian AUTOCRAT, as to the mo-
difications required in the Vienna proposal by the
members of the Turkish Government. It is a
deplorable change in the relative position of the
great Powers of Christendom. Formerly, we
were not so ready to consent that decrees as to
the fate of Europe should emanate from the Im-
perial Councils of St. Petersburg. It is now ar-
ranged otherwise. The Czar NICHOLAS is formally
recognised as the arbiter of the destinies of the
Continent. Henceforth, according to this, we
ought to regard the descendant of PETER the
GREAT as the Lord Paramount of the Eastern
Hemisphere. And for this elevation of Russia
and degradation of England we have to thank the
Earl of ABERDEEN'S Government ! As if yet more
painfully and unmistakeably to indicate the de-
cline of our authority in consequence of our late
diplomatic negotiations, we receive intelligence, by
the latest despatches from Southern Italy, that
the irresolute conduct of the British Cabinet
towards Turkey is being held up to scorn through-
out that portion of the Roman peninsula. The
circumstance was notified yesterday even by the
recognised organ of the Noble Lord the Secretary
of State for the Home Department. Yes—so
flagrantly has the honour of Great Britain been
compromised by the recent subserviency of its
Minsters to the Russian Government, that the
foreign policy of our Cabinet is held up at this
moment to popular disdain and ridicule among
the Neapolitans ! Yes—so disgracefully have we
abandoned our position as one among the principal
of the great Powers of the Earth, that we
are even now dependent upon the will of the CzAR,
in the balance of Peace or War, that most for-
midable of political alternatives. It is a melan-
choly acknowledgment, but one not less true than
it is melancholy. It is the ignominious conse-
quence of that despicable compromise by which
consistency was violated—by which principles
were abandoned—by which so many eminent re-
putations were tarnished, for the sake of con-
structing out of the debris of parties the bizarre
and incongruous edifice of a Coalition Govern-
ment.

France has, at any rate, the satisfaction of re-
membering that from first to last her rulers have
spoken out with a boldness befitting the dignity of
a powerful and independent population. Not so
with ourselves. The despatches of M. DRouYN
DE L'Huys have appeared betimes in the
official columns of the Moniteur, so that,
in as brief a time as possible, they might
go the round of the capitals of Christendom. In-
stead
Ministeref thisbu the correspondence of our Foreign
public scrutiny, been timorously withheld from
or, if at last given to the
world, it has onlyce crept forth in instalments, two
months after
te through the columns of an
unofficial weekly con
thersaeP°rarY.
fact, through all Everything, in
keeping transactions,
has been so far in 1,11.1
kill
egasas
delays
be marked at
once by hesitation,
and pusilla-
at ordering of our
nimity. Everything—frozytheelay,
°cc: time.. when it
fleet to the Dardanelles,
was too late to prevent the
Danubian Principalities, to the inPoaptiori of the
dis-
closure of a letter from Lord 11,Irtune
to the British Ambassador at St. Peter4ll:Tr
a letter written in July, and published inulk—
tember I Contrast with all this the conduct epur-
sued under the same emergency by the Turkish
Government. Nothing on that side could have
evinced from the outset up to the present juncture
more admirable prompitude, or more chivalrous
resolution. Witness this, the recal of a patriotic
statesman like RESCHID PACHA to the guidance
of the Councils of the Divan as Leader in
the Foreign Department. Witness it also, the
placing of the Turkish army at once upon
a war footing—the speedy concentration of the
Turkish fleet in the Bosphorus—the hasty sum-
mons of the Egyptian contingent. Let it be re-
membered, in addition to allthis, that England was
timidandirresolute where Turkey was brave and de-
termin.ed—England with all her vast resources, and
Turkey with wealth and strength, comparatively
speaking, quite insignificant—England far re-
moved from the reach of the great Northern
Despotism
colossal
and Tury
key close upon the frontiers,
and within the red grasp, so to speak, of her
ambitious and
ain neighbours. The contrast
presented,
negotiations—the short, throughout the whole of
these prolonged contrast visi-
ble at a glance between England and Turkey,
coniity lobn of
during this critical
entadmitted on
matists—must, unhapp the diplo-
all hands to be wonderfully epainfui
sensitiveness of the amour pr opre to the
of .
men. For all which, again and again-Einglh-
be it
said, we have to thank the shuffling poikv
and confused councils of the Coalition Govern-ment-
Quousque tandem abutere—it is the old, agonised
cry of the Ciceronean. How long is the national

patience in that manner to be abused 7 How long
are we to tolerate this subordination of our own
wishes to those of the Russian AUTOCRAT ? How
long are our interests, how long are our hopes,
how long is our dignity to be compromised by
the conflicting sentiments of a Coalition, by the
weakness of an ABERDEEN, the delays of a CLA-
RENDON, and the hesitations of a RUSSELL ?
when the solution of all these problems may at
once be arrived at through the energy, the skill,
and the promptitude of a patriotic statesman
like Viscount PALMERSTON.

Lord STANLEY, when he penned his statesman-
like and candid pamphlet on church rates, could
hardly have expected that his almost successful
appeal would so soon prove to be as well-timed as
it was just. The Lords' decision on the Braintree
case, we suppose he expected to be adverse to the
opponents of the rate, since he took it for granted
that it would be " carried again into the Court of
Arches, and finally up to the Judicial Committee
of Privy Council." The same course was, we re-
member, expected by Sir H. J. FusT himself, and
by Dr. LIISHINGTON. The majority of the Judges
having been in favour of the validity of the rate
when Lord STANLEY wrote, most of us looked for
a similar result. The Lords, however, to their
honour in this, as in the other great constitutional
case of the Bridgewater will, which came before
them nearly at the same time, decided indepen-
dently ; and did themselves the lasting honour
of saving in one case the constitutional rights of
majorities, and in the other of saving the con-
stitutional principles on which alone a peer-
age nominated by the Crown in a free
country can be defended. The rights of
majorities in levying taxes must have be-
come " a mockery, a delusion, and a snare " if
the technicalities of " relative " or " constructive "
majorities could have been applied to them. The
Lords have now, however, finally decided that a
prohibition must issue from the Court of Queen's
Bench to stay all proceedings in the Ecclesiastical
Courts to enforce rates laid by Churchwardens
and a minority. A rate negatived by a majority
of the ratepayers, therefore, can no longer be
enforced.

Lord TRURO, indeed, in his lengthy and some-
what verbose judgment, expressed an opinion that
British subjects were generally too enlightened to
evade or defy the law by voting against rates,
and that the Braintree example would not be ex-
tensively followed. Probably his Lordship used
this language for decorum's sake merely ; if not,
Lord STANLEY, though so much his junior, knows
men and things much better. In his pamphlet he
shows from numerous facts, as well as from the
general conclusion, that men will avail them-
selves of any means, not involving penalties,
to defeat an unjust law, that nothing but
ceaseless battles can be expected from the
attempt to tax Dissenters from the Established
Church for the maintenance of its worship.
His prophecy, in which we fully concurred, is
being fulfilled to the letter. Not a month
has passed away since the decision, and not less
than five or six such battles have occurred, each
one ending in a refusal of the rate.
Kettering led the van. As secretly as possi-
ble the probate officials arranged their plans. Dis-
senters had not heard of the notice till three days
before the vestry meeting. Luckily, the Lords' de-
cision occurred on the second of those days. To
work they set, almost as rapidly as the telegraph
which brought the news, and a crowded vestry
the next day, and a negative of the rate carried by
a large majority and confirmed by a subsequent
poll, was the result of their energy. Immedi-
ately after followed the greater and severer battle
at Maidstone. "It was understood by the in-
habitants (says the local journal) that the conflict
was to be a test of the sense of the inhabitants
concerning the justice or injustice of compulsory
payments in support of the Church by members of
a different communion ;" the precise thing which
Lord STANLEY and his father so unsparingly de-
nounce as unjust. The majority of the Maidstone
ratepayers, including a large proportion of Church-
men, agree with them. The perpetual curate, indeed,
the Rev. \V. VALLANCE, was too testy to put a reso-
lution testing the opinion of the meeting on this
point ; they expressed their opinion, therefore,
by negativing the rate by a majority of 4 to 1,
at the meeting, and by majorities of 98 votes,
and 360 persons in a poll of 2,160 votes ; the
pro-rate party withdrawing in despair on the
fourth day of the poll from the contest. The
parish of St. Anne's, Westminster, next refused
a rate by a large majority, and even the diocese
of Exeter dares to show a rebellious temper ; the
parish of St. Mary Arches having caught the in-
fection, and refused a rate. We are bound in
justice, however, to acknowledge that Trac-
tarianism is, to a large extent, honourably dis-
tinguished by its readiness to relinquish objection-
able rates and dues. Bridgewater also defeated
the rate by an immense majority, the Mayor
taking the chair at the Vestry Meeting ; and not
only did the Churchwardens not venture to de-
mand a poll, but they did not even venture to
show their faces at the meeting.
To crown all, we come to Braintree itself—
Braintree, which for eleven years, at least, has
been busy in litigation, while neglecting to repair
its church. Here the battle has been of another
and a more Christian kind. A popular and excel-
lent Vicar, the Rev. J. D. BROWNE, M.A., has
been presented to the living. The congregation,
two years ago reduced to 80, is now upwards of
1,000. A voluntary subscription has been com-
menced, with confident hopes of raising the 1,500/.
at which the repairs are estimated, and here the
Church-rate battle has issued in a contest of
Christian liberality. The patron of the living,
himself a Dissenter, has generously given 100/.
towards the object. If Braintree has been a
model of vexatious litigation, if it has fought hard
for a revolting and un-English principle, it has at
least been prompt in setting the example of re-
pentance, and of " works meet for repentance "
too.

It can hardly be expected that such contests
as we have narrated will cease speedily. The
success of some will embolden others. Liberal
Churchmen and Dissenters will, of course, be
vanquished in some places, especially when they
hazard conflicts in country parishes. Victory,
however, or defeat, will be almost equally fatal to
Church rates. Statesmen will number the con-
tests, rather than the successes of either party.
They cannot quietly look on, and see almost
every large town positively refusing the
rate, smaller towns engaged in annual battles,
and only the priest-and-squire-ridden parishes
quiet through fear. Even amidst the din of the
Reform Bill battle (should Lord JoHN produce
anything worthier of a battle than the last), the
I demand for Church Rate Reform will be heard
also. Anti-Church-Rate men, held down for so
131, allY Years by the supposed power of the minority,
comparatively little stir • they arise
tithaevernor made e vehemently now by a natural' reaction.
Their views have
also spread considerably while
their vestry action was repressed, and they re-
commence thetege
dsntruggle with augmented num-
bers and
in a
; nothing
ir from
remainin remains for them but
-rate martyrdoms" they
Petitions and
" Chele;ch Who
can blame them ?
have tried in vain
h i s felt, since the
be
lag
ltaowusie)latch resistance which the
places in
in
their
hand grand means of
Catholic times, though it
introduction of Dissent and the passing of
Toleration Act, to have become an unjust law. thlet
is most righteous, therefore, to bring to bear
on
its abolition the thoroughly English and
constitu-
tional principle that every tax must be imposed
by a clear majority of the taxpayers.

What is the use of a pawnbroker's license?
Why should persons submit to pay no less than
151. per annum for permission to carry on a trade
and subject themselves to many stringent regula-
tions as to the mode of conducting thei the shours
iness,
the rate of interest to be charged—
during which they may receive pledges, &e.—if
all the restrictions can be violated with impunity
by any unprivileged person who pleases to open
what is termed a marine store shop, and advance
moneytwaetutaynfoledxotrhbaittanctharragteed of
by interest,(hiiy
l morensed
traders, and can do so under the licensed
traders, than
pretextof buying