The Sun.
London, England, 1831-04-08 00:00:00

PARLIAMENTARY RE FORNI.

[We copy the following clever speech of Mr
Smith from a Taunton Paper. The meeting at
which it was delivered took place some weeks ago,
but we had not room to insert it at the time.]
The Rev. SIDNEY SMITH rose, and addressed the
meeting to the following effect :—" Mr. Bailiff, this
is the greatest measure which has ever been befor,
Parliament in my time, and the most pregnant with
good or evil to the country ; and though I seldom
meddle with political meetings, I could not recon-
cile it to ma' conscience to be absent from this
Every year for this half century the question of Re-
form has been pressing upon us till it has swelled up
at last into this great and awful combination, so that
almost every city and every borough in England are
at this moment assembled for the same purpose, and
are doing, the same thing we are doing. It damps
the ostentation of argument, and mitigates the pain
of doubt to believe, as I believe, that the measure is
inevitable ; the consequences may be good or bad,
but done it must be ; I defy the most determined
enemy of popular influence, either now or a little
time from now, to prevent a Reform in Parliament.
Some years ago, by timely concession, it might have
been prevented. If Members had been granted to
Birmingham, Leeds, and Manchester, and other
great towns as oppor unities occurred, a spirit of
conciliation would have been evinced, and the people
might have been satisfied with a Reform, which
though remote was gradual ; but with the customary
blindness and insolence of human beings, the day of
adversity was forgotten, the rapid improvement of
the people was not noticed, and the object of a cer-
tain class of politicians was to please the Court, and
to gratify their own arrogance, by treating every
attempt to expand the representation and to imrease
the popular influence with every species of contempt
and obloquy, and so the golden opportunity was
lost. Proud lips must swallow bitter potions. The
arguments and the practice (as I remember to have
heard Mr. Huskisson say) which did very well
twenty years ago, will not do now. The people
read too much, think too much, see too many News.
papers, hear too many speeches, have their eyes too
intensely fixed upon political events ; but if it was
possible to put off Parliamentary Reform a week
ago, is it possible now? When a Monarch (whose
amiable and popular manners have, I verily believe,
saved us from a revolution) approves the measure,
—when a Minister of exalted character plans and
fashions it,—when a Cabinet of such varied talent
and disposition protect it,—when such a body of the
aristocracy vote fur it,—when the hundred-horse
power of the Press is labouring for it,—who does
not know after this (whatever be the decision of the
present Parliament) that the measure is virtually
carried,—and that all the struggle between such an-
nunciation of such a plan, and its completion, is tu-
mult, disorder, disaffection—(it may be) political
ruin ? An honourable Member of the honourable
House, much connected with this town, arid once
its representative, seems to be amazingly surprised,
and equally dissatisfied, at this combination of King,
Ministers, Nobles, and people, against his ep'nion—
like the gentleman who came home from serving on
a jury, very much disconcerted, and complaining he
had met with eleven of the most obstinate people
he had ever seen in his life, whom he found it abso-
lutely impossible by the strongest arguments to
tiring over to his way of thinking.—(Applause.)—
They tell you, gentlemen, that you have grown rich
and powerful with these rotten boroughs, and that
it would be madness to part with them, or to alter a
Constitution which had produced such happy effects.
There happens, gentlemen, to live near my parson-
age a labouring man, of very superior character and I
' understanding to his fellow-labourers, and who has I
in ide such good use of that superiority, that he has
saved what is (for his station ire life) a very consi-
derable sum of money, and if his existence is ex-
tended to the common period, be will die rich. It
happens, however, that he is (and long has been)
troubled with violent stomachic pains, for which he
has hitherto obtained no relief; and which really are,
the bane and torment of his life. Now, if my excel-
lent labourer were to send fora physician, and to
consult him respecting this malady, would it not be
very singular language if our doctor were to say to
him, " My good friend, you surely will not be so
rash as to attempt to get rid of these pains in your
stomach ; have you not grown rich with these pains
in your stomach ? have you not risen under them

from poverty to prosperity ? has not your situation
since you were first attacked, been improving every
year ? You surely will not be so foolish and indis-
creet as to part with the pains in your stomach ?"
(Shouts of laughter ) Why, what would he the
answer of the rustic to this nonsensical monition ?

" Monster of Rhubarb," he would say, " I am not
rich in consequence of the pains in my stomach, but
in spite of the pains in my stomach; and I should
have been ten times richer, and fifty times happier,
if I had never had any pains in my s•omaeh at all."
Gentlemen, these rotten boroughs are your pains
in the stomach—and you would have been a much
richer and greater people if you had never had
them at attt Your wealth and yew power
have been 'Owing, not to the debased and cor-
rupted parts of the House of Commons, bat to
the many independent and Honourable Membeis
whom it has always contained within its walls.—
(Applause.)—lf there had been a few more of these
very valuable Members for close boroughs, we
should, I verily bel,eve, have been by this time
about as free as Denmark, Sweden, or the Germa-
nized States of Italy. They tell you of the few
men of name and character who have sat for bo-
roughs; but nothing is said of those mean and me-
nial men who are sent down every day by their
aristocratic ma,sters, to continue unjust and unne-
cessary wars, to prevent inquiring into profligate
expenditure, to take money out of your pockets, or
to do any other bad or base thing which the Mini-
ster of the day may require at their unclean hands.
What is the mischief these boroughs have done ?

I believe there is not a day of your lives in which
yofoulifaerefrormiot
tshue
effaring inccumi ail
iinti the
otioftaxedbad
m d votes,coto
nofdibticatsi
men. But, Mr. Bailiff, if this were otherwise, if it
really were a great political innovation, that cities
of 100,000 men should have no representatives, be-
cause representatives were wanted for political
ditches, political walk, and political parks; that the
people should be bought and sold like any other
commodity ; that a retired merchant should be able
to go into the market and buy ten shares in the go-
vernment of twenty millions of his fellow-subjects;
yet can such asseverations be made openly before
the people? Wise men, men conveis int with hu-
man nrraird, may whisper such theories to each
other in retirement; but can the people ever he
taught that it is right they should be bought and
soki? Can the vehemence of eloquent democrats
be met with such arguments and theories ? Can
the doubts of honest and limited men be met by
such arguments and theories ? The momentuch
Government is looked at by all the people, it is
lost, It is impossible to explain, defend, and re-
commend it to the mass of mankind. And true
enough it is, that as often as misfortune threatens
us at home, er imitation excites us from abroad, po-
litical Reform is clamoured for by the people—
there it stands, and ever will stand, in the appre-
hension of the multitude—Reforrn the cure 01

every evil—corruption, the source of every mis-
fortune—famine, defeat, decayed trade, depressed
agriculture, will all lapse into the question of Re.
form—till that question is set at rest (and it may be
set at rest), all will be disaffection, tumult, and per-
haps (which God avert !) destruction. But demo-
crats and agitators (and democrats and agitators
there are in the woild)will not be contented with
this Reform. Perhaps not, Sir; I never hope to
content men whose game is never to be contented;
but if they aro not contented, I am sure their con-
tent will then comparatively be of little importance.
I am afraid of them now; I have no arguments to
answer them, but I shall not be afraid of them afier
this Bill, and would tell them boldly, in the middle
of their mobs, that there was no longer cause for
agitation and excitement, and that they were in-

trodin;; wickedly to the people. You may depend
upon it such a measure would destroy their trade,
as the repeal of duties would destroy the trade of
the smuggler—their functions would be carried on
faintly, and with little profit—you would soon
feel that your position was stable, solid and
safe. But all would be well if they would but
let the people alone; but what chance is there,
I demand of these wise politicians that the people
will ever be let alone—that the orator will lay down
his craft, and the demagogue forget his cunning ?
If many things were let alone which never will be
let alone, the aspect of human affairs would be a
little varied. If the winds would let the waves
:dour., there would be no storms ; if gentlemen would
but let the ladies alone, there would be no unhappy
marriages, and deserted damsels. If persons who
can reason no better than this would leave speaking
alone, the school of eloquence might be improved.
I have little hopes, however, of witnessing any of
these acts of forbearance, particularly the last, and
so we must (however foolish it may appear) proceed
to make laws for a people whom we are sure will
not be let alone. We might really imagine, from
the objections made to the plan of Reform, that the
gnat mass of Englishmen were madmen, robbers,
and murderers. The kingly power is to be des.royed,
the House of Lords is to be annihilated, the church
is to be ruined, estates are to be confiscated. lam
quite at a loss to find, in these perpetrators of crime,,
in this mass of pillagers and lunatics, the steady and
respectable tradesmen and farmers, who will have
votes to confer, and the steady and respectable
country gentlemen, who will probably have votes to
receive. It may be true of the tradesmen of Mau-
ritania, it may be just of the country gentlemen of
Fez, but it 'is any thing but true of the English people.
The English are a tranquil, phlegmatic, money-
money-getting people, who want to be quiet
—and would be quiet if they were not surrounded
by evils of such magnitude that it would be basene s
and pusillanimity not to oppose to them the strongest
constitutional resisiaace.—(Applause.) Then it is
said that there is to be a lack of talent in the new
Parliament,—it is to be composed of ordinary and
inferior persons, who will bring the Government of
the country into contempt; but the best of all talents,
gentlemen is to conduct our affairs honestly,diligently,
and economically, and this talent will I am sure
abound as much in the new Parliament as many pre-
vious Parliaments. Parliament is not a school for rhe-
toric and declamation, •where a stranger would go
to hear a speech, as he would go to the Opera to hear
a song; but, if it were otherwise, if eloquence be a
necessary ornament of, and an indispensable adjunct
to, popular assemblies, can it ever be absent from
popular assemblies ? I have always found that all
things moral or physical grow in the soil best
suited for them. Show me a deep and tenacious
earth, and 1 am sure the oak will spring up in
it. In a low and damp soil I am equally certain
of the alder end the willow. Gentlemen, the free
Parliament of a free people is the native soil of
eloquence ; and in that soil it will ever flourish and
abound ; there it will produce those intellectual
effects which drive before them whole tribes of

nations of the human race, and settle the destinir s
of man.—(Cheer s.)—And, gentlemen, if a few per-
ons of a less elegant and aristocratic description
were to become Members of the I-louse of Com-
mons, where would be the evil ? They would
probably understand the common people a great
deal better, and in this way the feelings and in-
terests of all classes of people would be better re-
presented. The House of CommoUs thus organized,
will express more faithfully the opinions of the
people. lint the people are sometimes grossly
rn'staken ; but are Kings never mistaken ? Are
the higher orders never misoken ? Never wilfully
corrupted by their own interests ? The people have
at least this superiority, that they always intend to
do what is right. The argument of fear is very
easily disposed of: he who is afraid of a knock on
the head or a cut on the cheek is a coward ; he
who is afraid of entailing greater evils on the
country by refining the remedy than by applying
it, and who acts ia pursuance of that conviction, is
a wise and prudent man : nothing can be more
different than personal and political fear, it is the
artifice of our opponents to confound them toge-
ther. The right of disfranchisement, gentlemen,
must exist somewhere, and where but in Parlia-
ment ? If not, how was the Scotch Union ? How
was the Irish Union effected ? The Duke of Wel-

lington's administration disfranchised at one blow
200,000 Irish voters—for no fault of theirs, and for

no other reason than the best of all reasons, that
public expediency required it. These very same
politicians are now looking in an agony of terror
at the disfranchisement of corporations, containing
20 or 30 person, sold to their representatives, who
are themselves perhaps sold to the Government;
and to put an end to those enormous abuses, it is
called corporation robbery, and there are some per-
sons wild enough to talk of compensation. This
principle of compensation, you will consider perhaps
in the following instance to have been carried as far
perhaps as sound discretion permits. When I was
a young► man, the place in England, I remember, as
most notorious for highwaymen and their exploits
was Finchley, Common, near the metropolis ; but
Finchley Common, gentlemen, in the progress of
Improvement, came to be enclosed, and the high-
waymen lost by these means the opportunity of
exercising their gallant vocation. I remember a
friend of mine proposed to draw up for them a pe-
tition to the House of Commons for compensation,
which ran in this manner--•‘: We, your loyal high-
waymen of Finchley Common and its neighbour-
hood, having at great expense laid in a stock of
blunderbusses, pistols, and other in-truments, for
plundering the public, and finding ourselves im-
peded in the exercise of our calling by the said en-
closure of the said Common of Finchley, humbiv
petition your Honourable House will be pleased to
assign to us such compensation as your Honourable
House in its wisdom and justice may think fit."
Gentlemen, I must leave the application to you.—
(Immense applause and laughter.)—An Hon.
Baronet says, if Parliament is dissolved, I will go
to my borough with the Bill in my hand, and will
say, " I know of no crime you have comnutted,—l
found nothing proved against you,—l voted against
the Bill, and am come to fling myself upon your
kindness, with the hope that my conduct will be ap-
proved, and that you will return me again to Par-
liament." That Hon. Baronet may, perhaps, receive

from his borough an answer he little expects,—" We
are above being bribed by such a childish and un-
worthy artifice,—we do not choose to consult our
own interest at the expense of the general peace
and happiness of the country,—we are thoroughly
convinced a Reform ought to take place,—we are
very willing to sacrifice a privilege we ought never
to have possessed to the good of the community,
and we will return no one to Parliament who is not
deeply impresre I with the same feeling." This I
hope is the answer that gentleman will receive, and
this, I hope, will be the noble and generous feeling
of every borough in England. The greater part of
human improvements, gentlemen, I am sorry to say
are made after war, tumult, bloodshed, and civil
commotion : mankind seem to object to every species
of gratuitous happiness, and to consider every ad-
vantage as too cheap which is not purchased by
some calamity. I shall esteem it as a singular act
of God's providence, if this great nation, guided by
these warnings of history, not waiting till tumult
for Reform, not trusting Reform to the rude hands
of the lowest of the people, shall amend their de-
cayed institutions, at a period when they are ruled
(Fervent
arid continued applause followed the delivery of this
address.)
ibiiystear, poaiiridulabrleAsit v
ot‘iirh
arch,pofund
grtiidoel byp an upright Nii-
eace._

THE NEW NOVEL.—The author of Vivian
Grey will certainly produce the story of The Young
Duke, in the course of the present month. Report
speaks of this work as being, in character, incident, and
plot, of a description which, while it is perfectly true to
nature, is new to fiction. Dm is as it should he ; the
numerous readers of Vivian Grey expect something ori-
ginal from the hands of the author.

LEEDS CORN MARKET.
Wheat, Norfolk and Suf
York. and Lincoln. (lOib.
Barley, Norfolk and Suffolk
Yorkshire and Lincolnshire
Grinding
Beans 63lb.

Oats, Potatoe
—Mealing, Foreign 134. to 14!,A....Eni
Shelling
Rapeseed, English, 301. to 3'2/ Foreii

.—April 5.
ties. to 765.
6os. to 735. 4 ,
435. to 445.
395. to 40s.
28s. to 30s.
335. to 475.
3‘...15. to 345.
glish 14d. to Isd. per st.
365. to 375. per load.
gn, —l. to —l. per last...

LI VERPOOL CORN EXCHANGE—ApriI 5.
WHEAT, English, White, per 701 b.
Red 10 0 10 3 i
-- Scotch, Welch, and Manx
Irish, White 9 6 9 7
---' Red 9 0 9 4
Foreign lO 6 10 10
Gal's, English, Welsh, and Scotch, per 451 b 4 2 4 9
Irish
Foreign
BARLEY, English, Malting, per hop. quarter 43 0 48 0
Scotch and Irish, per 601bs.
Feeding 4 4 4 9
BEANS, English, per Imperial quarter 44 0 50 0
Irish, &c.
Foreign
PEASE, English, per Imperial quarter 5:l 0 54 0
_ Fsireign
FLOUR, English, per 2801 b.
------ Irish
OATMEAL, English and Irish, per 240105. 35 0 37, 6
INDIAN CORN, per 4401 h. ,44 0 47 0
BYE, per Imperial quarter
Nlaur, per Imperial quarter
IMPORT OF GRAIN for the Week ending April 4.
Wheat. Oats. Barley our. Oatmeal.
Fl
Qrs. Ors. Qrs. Foreign, t3rls.llrish, &c. Scks. Loads.
10,004 12,57)3 , 751 1,656 I 785 2,838

BI RTHS.
On the 6th inst. at Kensington, the wife of H. Ronalds, M.D.,
of a son.
On the 6th inst. at Southgate-park, Mrs. Wm. Tewart, of a
daughter.
On the
of. 7th
inai
On the' Ist inst. at Cheltenham, the lady of C. Earle, Esq., of
Major J. Fletcher, of the Hon. East
a daughter.
MARRIED.
M'Lean, Esq., of the island of Carriacou, in the Government of
Grenada, to Margaret Ann, second daughter of A. G. Milne,
BrantfordE s Oc
l
On the 6th inst. at Tottenham, R. T. Fletcher, Esq.,_ 01
inlodsftitoiaeitd.lia'treinity Church, St. Marylebone, George
Company's 2,1 Battalion Old 112th (now Ist) Regiment Bengal
Native Infantry, to Ellen, only dauglder of C. A. 1
A. "homson, Esq.
On the sth inst. at Trinity Church, C. Marylebone, F. J,
Walthew, of Norti,lk-street.' Strand, and Albany-street, Regent's
Park, Esq., to Elizabeth, third daughter of J. Bent, Esq. of Oat_
hall, Lindfield, Sussex.
On the sth inst. at St. Paul's, Covent-garden, T. 130 ~,ditch„
Esq., to Caroline .lane, second daughter of the ,late P. W.
Broughton, Esq. of London.
DIED.
On the sth inst. at Rusper, Sussex, Mr. A. Inman, aged CA
of Crown-street, Finsbury.
On the sth inst. at Andover, Hants, Margaret, the Ylligtst
daughter of the late Wm. Davidson, Esq., of shaftesbury. 011,e,
Kensington-gravel-pits, in her 2tith year. f ,fagdalery h
On the 4th inst. at Bath, J. Wathen, Es (I._„° "0 •NT --all
Oxford, third son of the late S. Wathen, r-;:"'' t - ew_hetis
e,
Gloucestershire. aret Keith A.i,
On the 30th ult. at Edinburgh, Miss Marfinby of Gla,s. Abe
crombv, daughter of the late General Abcrert 44h,
Ban frshire. wan, widow of t,
On the '..!d inst. at Walworth, Mrs Cole " late
Mr. T, Coleman, Waltham-abbey ..-"ex' ----"--"--"`--

Pat,.Tun AND p
B y *m KL)O YOUNAi.
SUN-OFFICE, 1 STNAND. LONDON, THe