The Sun.
London, England, 1854-06-24 00:00:00

(From the Morning Herald of yesterday.)

Let us earnestly hop e that the speech delivered by
Lord Aberdeen in the House of Lords on Monday night
will not escape the attention of any person who is anxi-
ous for the honour of England. It will be remembered
that the speech upon which we comment is the speech
of the Premier—of the man supposed peculiarly to
possess the confidence of the Crown—of the man whose
advice is supposed to come to the Crown with most
authority and weight ; who has, of all her Ministers,
the readiest access to the Sovereign, and who is the
general medium of communication between the Cabinet
and the Queen. Every man who will read the speech,
and who understands what the interests of England
now demand, will be satisfied that those interests are
not safe while the speaker of this speech retains the po-
sition which he now fills.
We ask the attention of every Englishman to this
subject. It is not one of politics or of party. It is one
coming direct to that which is dear to us all—the honour
and the character of our country. On Monday night
the venerable Lord Lyndhurst called the attention of
the peers of England to the present dangerous position
of the Russian question. In doing so he pointed out,
with a force and power marvellous in any man—in a
man of his years miraculous—the aggressive policy which
had marked the Russian dynasty for a century at least.
For doing this he was rebuked by.the Premier—if it be
right to apply the term rebuke to the silly impertinence
with which, by Lord Aberdeen, this great man was as-
sailed. He was charged by the Queen's first Minister
with pronouncing a philippic against Russia. It was
actually true, that in the British House of Peers a
nobleman, of mature age and sane mind, did snake it a
charge, a matter of accusation, against Lord Lyndhurst,
that he had delivered a " philippic against Russia."
Lord Aberdeen, however, assigned a reason for this
singular accusation. The philippic, said this choice de-
fender of the national honour, was out of place, because
we are at war with Russia ! One would have thought
that this was just the reason why it was an act of pa-
triotism and loyalty in Lord Lyndhurst to employ his
great powers in proving that his own Sovereign was in
the right, and his Sovereign's enemy in the wrong—that
this was just the reason why he did good service in ex-
citing the spirit of the country to vigorous and deter-
mined resistance to. Russia. But Lord Aberdeen thinks
and says that it is improper, after we are at war, to
stimulate the people of this country against Russia. We
must quote the very words of Lord Aberdeen to verify
a statement that is almost incredible. Thus did the
Premier of England comment upon one of the most
powerful arguments ever addressed to any assembly to
establish that the war in which we are engaged is just
and necessary. These are the words of the First Mi-
nister of the Crown :
" I think that the speech of my noble and learned friend
would have boen somewhat more appropriate three months
ago than it is at the present moment. At'that time it
might, perhaps, have been necessary to have stimulated
the antagonism and the martial feelings of the people of
this country against a power with which we were not yet
at war. But having become engaged in a war with Russia,
I think it vvas not requisite to indulge in that eloquent
and protracted philippic which ho addressed to the house
in detailing the policy of the Russian Government for
many years past. My noble and learned friend reminds
me on this occasion of an occurrence which took place some
25 years ago. I had the pleasure of making him known to
the French ambassador of that day—a man of lively ima-
gination and much wit—and that personage afterwards
said to me, in reference to my noble and learned friend,
who had then occuied the woolsack, ' Chancellor, do you
call him ? surely ho must be a colonel of dragoons !' (Hear,
and laughter.) Now, I think that the speech of my noble
and learned friend was calculated to recall that military
ardbur which he was thus formerly supposed to have pos-
sessed. But most happy am Ito see that he still retains
A hie licrour Rd 144 mental energy (IcilfaQd crivri of kora