The Sun.
London, England, 1836-07-04 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF_THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

An attempt will, it is possible, be made, when the
discussion of the Irish 'tithe Bill shall he resumed
this night, to get rid of the appropriation clause. The
mode, of proceeding may be this—to move the remis•
sion of two-fifths of the tithes and tithe composition.
Having thus proVided effectually for the prevention of
a surplus, to hold out for '' appropriation," which
would then, indeed, be but an abstraction, would he
of no use. Should such a proposition emanate from
my quarter, we think we do not trust to our feelings
'too much, or form too sanguine an estimate of the
Character of the Reformers of the Lower House,
When we declare our thorough conviction that it will
be scouted as an insolent outrage upon the House it-
self, and an audacious insult to the country. What
Was it that drove the driver of the Dilly and his pious
friend, the Cumberland• Baronet, into the ranks of
Opposition ? What, above all, hurled Sir Robert
Peel from place, ovcrtuned his usurpation, and restored
the Melbourne Ministry to power ? Was it not the ite-
rated vledge of the representatives of the people to make
the prialciple of surplus appropriation, after the just
wants of the clergy were provided for, a part and
parcel of any measure for the adjustment of the Irish
Tithe question which might originate in the Lower
House, or should come down for its consideration
from the other Legislative Chamber? - It was not
upon a difference of amount of• clerical remuneration
that three changes of Administration took place in
nine months. A great principle it was which anni-
hilated a Tory Cabinet and reinstated a Whig one.
Had the question been one of pounds, shillings, and
pence, the Goulburns, and K
natehbulls, and Stor-
monts would, to this hour, in all priebability, be dis-
pensing the patronage of the Crown, and fingering the
public money. For what is the proposition which, we
hear, there is an intention this night to eubmit to the
judgment of the Commons? That out of every 1001.
of tithe which may now be claimed by the tithe-
owners, 401. shall in future go into the pockets of the
landlords of Ireland; thus reducing the income of the
clergy to 601. per cent. of their present nominal
income. Now the Bill of which Sir Henry
Hardinge gave notice prior to the expulsion of
his party from office, provided prospectively for
easing the ministers of the altar of a larger
amount than this of the burden of filthy
lucre. True—the existing race of Protestant Episco-
palian clergymen were, by that Bill, to be secured 751.
per cent. per annum ; but Time's scythe, as it mowed
these down, was also to cut down the income of their
successors to less considerably than 601. per cent. Yet
the Tory Secretary's promise to introduce, ay, and to
carry—for he counted upon the friendly support of the
factious Lords—such a measure did not shield the
Peel Cabinet from the fatal blow that was aimed at its.
existence on the night of the 30th of March, 1835,
when a majority of 33, in a House of 611 Members,
again decided in favour of the appropriation to na-
tional purposes of a surplus, in order to obtain which,
it became their imperative duty to take the necessary
steps—steps consistent, however, with a due regard to
the temporal interests of the clergy of the Established
Church. In the present House of Commons that de-
cisive resolution was adopted ; and all the circum-
stances considered it must be irrevocable. To swerve
from it would be a fatal abandonment of proper con-
sistency. But this, though a grievous fault, would be
the least mischievous portion of such a proceeding.
What was the object of introducing the appropriation
principle originally into the question? Was it not to as-
suage the natural antipathy of Ireland against the com-
pulsory maintenance of the Established Church, which is
not the Church of the people of that country, nor even of
a respectable minority, but the Church of a mere
handful of the Irish population? To conciliate the
Irish Catholics and Protestant Dissenters to an Estab-
lishment which it is not in human nature that they
should not view in any other than an odious light, to
facilitate the collection of tithes by giving the tithe-
payers an interest in the fund which they at present
have not, and to divert the now ecclesiastical revenue,
in even a small channel, to the mental culture and
moral improvement of the peasantry—the two leading
uses of any ecclesiastical endowment—these were the
objects, the wise and beneficial purposes, for which the
present House of Commons ratified the resolution of
the former, and solemnly repeated the resolution of the
30th of March, in the following more emphatic reso-
lution of April 7 :
" That it is the opinion of this House, that no measure
upon the subject of tithes in Ireland, can lead to a satis-
factory and final adjustment, which does not embody the
principle contained in the foregoing resolution."
And what was that principle ? " That any surplus
which may remain after fully providing for the spiri-
tual instruction of the members of the Established
Church in Ireland, ought to be applied locally to the
general education of all classes of Christians." So
did the House of Commons determine on the 3d
April, by a majority of 25, in a Committee contain-
ing 500 members. These three distinct decisions of
the present House of Commons we hold to be irrevo-
cably binding upon that assembly. It will not do to
say, that indeed a bonus of 401. per cells. is given to
the tithe-payers in lieu of the appropriation. Where
the tenantry have long leases to run, they would
benefit by such an arrangement ; but in countless
instances the advantage would flow into the pockets of
the worst landlords—without a hope of finding their
parallels—in Europe ; and, ultimately, the whole
of the deduction would swell their extortionate
rental. Incomparably better would it Le for the
Irish peasantry if the entire amount of tithes were
collected, and a useful appropriation made of the
40/. per cent. But the Tories, who, if we have not
been misinformed, arc prepared for the remission of
401. per cent. to the landlords, will shout " Sacrilege"
against our /reposition. In the opinion of these hypo-
crites there iit3 nothing adverse to the Church in the
enriching of the landed interest at the expense of the
clergy ; but if the same sum which they wil
lingly fling
into the lay landlords' horde be applied to the culture,
moral or mental, or to the physical improvement
of the poor peasant, then the ears of the nation are
stunned by the factious howl about sacrilegious inter-
ference with, and diversion of, the consecrated trea-
sure of time Church. We cannot think that the friends
• of Reform will play the vile game of these Pharisees.
The empire is bent upon the appropriation of the sur-
plus which must remain after suitable provision is made
for the religious instruction of the Irish Episcopalian
Protestants, and the people will not be balked in their
just expectations.—Morning Chronicle.
The wise provisions made from century' to century,
by the farmers and successive reformers of the Con-
stitution of England, for affixing to that Constitution,
as its most valuable attribute, a power of self-adjust-
ment, are rendered more manifest by the occurrences
of every passieg day. It speaks for itself, that the es-
sence of good and free government consists in its ave-
rage conformity to public opinion. The whole
of internal genius
o policy, and the spirit of our history,
have served to illustrate this one great riding prin-
ciple. No institution, no course of measures, has
ever long prevailed in England, which was not rooted
in, and supported by, the general intelligence of the
land. In correspondence with this characteristic of
our political commonwealth, and indeed coeval with it
and as a portion of it, some test of intelligence was
early sought and established. Property was fixed upon
as the best collective and average test of fitness for in-
fluence over the affairs of the community, and all the
rights, powers, and functions, legislative or magiste-
rial, of British subjects, from the time of Alfred
downwards, have been marked by a close reference to
the possession of property in some shape or other,
varying as to modes and incidents, but never as to the
substance or the end. The great end of all was jus-
tice, synonymous with every political and private good.
But if justice be the right ann of all human
the best key to the attainment of justice he opinion,
and the best general index of sound opinion be the
possession of so much property as may afford means
ofinstruction proportionate to the nature and magnitude
of the duties to be discharged ;'so there are other safe
guards provided by the jurisprudence and constitution
of England, for insuring to opinion that it shall be de-
liberately formed and that it shall be freely exercised.
Impulse is the great antagonist power to opinion. It
is impossible that where impulse, or, in other words,
passion and precipitation remain unchecked, whether
in the jurisprudence of a State, or in its political mea-

sures, the grossest absurdities and the most execrable
injustice Should not disgrace and enfeeble the whole
frame of society. Impulse has been restrained or frus-
trated in the administration of our laws by the nume-
rous provisions made for revising and correcting, through
sundry modes of procedure, the errors of courts and
juries. Nor have we at any time lent ourselves to the
vulgar outcry against those delays and complexities of
practice which, in man; cases, though confess not
always, are but salutary precautions against irretrievable
wrong. With regard to the framing of laws, nume-
rous regulations and methods have been devised for in-
suring that the sentiments of the nation out-of doors
shall be ascertained with all essential accuracy—that
within doors the opinion of Parliament shall be deli-
berately formed and freely exercised, and that each
question 4all, in its most important bearings, be
'thoroughly understood before it be decided on by the
-Legislature. Of such guards against -precipitation,
the chief and moat effectual is the division of the legis-
lative body into two chambers—one representing the
fluctuations of public feeling, though not in all in-
stances governed by the. ; the other representing
more immediately and exclusively a mass of in-
terests of a deeper and more enduring nature—
namely, those connected with the property of
the soil—an assembly into which those individuals
throughout the nation who are most independent in
fortune, and most distinguished by abilities or public
services, are certain sooner or later to find their way—
an assembly which has scarcely, if ever, failed to
adopt _those opinions which after standing the
test of mature consideration, and the tug of con-
flicting interests, have generally prevailed among
the people, but one which, from being less sus-
ceptible of sudden caprices, less prone to crude and
abrupt decisions, and less subservient to designs, for the
success of which a time of turbulent fury was essential
has naturally become the object of fear and hatred to
the authors of such evil schemes, and by reason of the
very guardianship and protection exerted by it over
the Constitution, has been railed against by those pub-
lic enemies of England as a power incompatible with
their own. Another security for due deliberation in
law-making is the number of readings, committals, and
adjournments, which must regularly take place in both
Houses of Parliament, between the first introduction
of a Bill and its ultimate rejection or completion, in
the form of an Act of Parliament. Now, it would
never have occurred to us, as either needful or interest-
ing, to enter upon such elementary notices respecting
the structure and action of the Constitution of this
country, had not the course of the last two sessions
afforded such abundant proof of their justice. Look
at the different light in which the questions which have
mainly occupied the activity of Parliament and the
public attention, are now beheld by the people of this
country, from that in which they appeared at the en-
trance of the present Melbourne Ministry into office.
The Municipal Bills for England and Ireland were
a pair of giants, the Gog and Magog of revolution.
The Irish Tithe Bill was a monster whose jaws were
to devour the whole Church and State. The House
of Lords was threatened with universal vengeance,
should it dare to oppose or question either of those
plans for the new modelling of Corporations and for
the overthrow of the Church, which were announced
by Ministers as being precisely those which the
" people of England " approved ; but which, in fact,
were neither more nor less than such as the selfish in-
terests of the Whig faction demanded. Very well,
the measures were with infinite parade of boast and in-
timidation brought into Parliament ; they were debated,
they were tossed to and fro, they were made the daily
text of clamour without, and of declamatory violence
within. There was hardly one of those measures, not
a single one, which was not employed by his Ma-
jesty's Prime Minister as an occasion for menacing the
House of Lords with denunciations of national re-
sentment, and warnings of the fate which would befall
that assembly, if it should venture to negative the
revolutionary motions of Lord Viscount Melbourne.
No such indecency was ever exhibited by a Mem-
ber of either House of Parliament as by the
King's Prime Minister during the last and the present
session. But what followed ? The English Municipal
Bill was discussed in the House of Lords ; many of
its provisions—the most anti-constitutional and dan-
gerous, in spite of his Lordship's frowns and menaces,
were rejected, and others substituted for them. The
Bill, on being sent down to the Commons was, with an
ill grace, but in a chopfallen spirit, accepted : it passed
into a law ; and the -democratic man of all work in the
Commons (Lord John Russell) has since declared ex-
plicitly that. it was a good Bill, and had been a vast
improvement on our Municipal Institutions. We need
not add that no revolution followed. Then for the
Irish Municipal Bill—it, too, was pressed upon both
Houses of Parliament as a sine qua non of that demo-
cracy which dictates the measures of Lord Viscount
Melbourne. It was debated in both Houses of Par-
liament—in the Commons fiercely—desperately in the
Lords. A " collision" was, as usual, threatened by
the Radicals, and implied by his Majesty's Ministers :
but the House of Lords listened calmly, and reso-
lutely rejected the Revolutionary Bill. What has
happened ?—collision ?—a vote of censure upon the
House of Lords ? a declaration that the Lords were
" a nuisance ?" No such thing ! The man of all
work shrunk quietly into a corner. The Irish Bill,
for creating in the heart of towns and boroughs a
Popish power which never before existed, has been,
by the Upper House of Parliament, contemptuously
set aside. The Irish Corporations (which we much
regret) remain what they have been, but what
the Lords did not wish them to continue, exclu-
sive repositories of local power, because the Ministers
Mused to abolish them ; and as for the House of
Lords, it is exactly what it has been ever—only inure
esteemed and looked up to than at any former pei iod,
for a wisdom which no false pretences could embarrass,
and a courage which no system of bullying .or intimi-
dation could shake. Now, finally, comes the Irish
Tithe Bill. It was hoisted for the flag of the Mel-
bourne Ministers from the moment they entered upon
office. They nailed the appropriation clause to the
mast ; they called it the talisman of all Irish policy,
and the hinge of their Ministerial existence. The
Lords have already rejected that clause, and they are
prepared a second, and a twentieth, time to reject it.
Well, what says public opinion to this expedient ?
Every hour it has lost ground with the community.
The discussions upon it by both houses of Parlia-
ment have thrown upon it a useful light. The con-
duct observed with regard to it by the Popish incendia-
ries, both in and out of Parliament, have made the
fraud still more intelligible. It was declared from the
very first, by this journal, to be a scheme for the an-
nihilation' of the Irish Protestant Church. It was
represented to be a foundation whereon to rest the
machinery of the Papist revolutionary faction, for
the entire plunder of the Protestant Clergy, and for
the transfer of their subsistence to the Popish
priests, under the disguise, amongst others, of estab-
lishing a fund for the education of Roman Catholic
paupers. How stands the question? All, the most
unfavourable of our predictions, have been boldly
avowed. There is no longer the shadow of mystery
about them. Even so lately as Friday night a partisan
of the voluntary principle moved the House of Com-
mons that tithe should, not in name only, but in sub-
stance and reality, be for ever abolished, declaring that
nought less than the " voluntary principle" would ever
satisfy the " people of Ireland ;" and that all persons
not in communion with the Church of Ireland should
be " relieved from all assessment for its support." Mr,
Daniel O'Connell pronounced the motion of Mr.
Sharman Crawford to be founded on " eternal justice,"
and objected to it—not for the wrong it did time Church
—but because the motion invalved a scheme of corn,
pensation from the Consolidated Fund, which he de-
scribed as still subjecting the people generally to the
cost of supporting the Established Clergy ; and 11r,
Finn, another of the partnership, announced that the
appropriation clause was the only part of the Bill of
the smallest value to time " people of foland," for
the plain reason that it loft an indefinite opportL,lo4
for " appropriating" just so much of the Church
revenue as the dominant faction of the State might
at any future time determine. At a subseqnent
period of the same night Mr. Daniel O'Connell
gave notice that his new improvement on the Irish
Church Bill would be an increase of the deduction
from tithe for the relief of the Irish landlords to
421. 10s. per cent., leaving them to their chance of

compensation to the amount of 10 per cent. from the
consolidated fund, if a Radical or Pap►st-ridden House
of Commons should be graciously pleased to assent
Then, are not the eyes of men by thiS time opened ?
—Does this, as Lord Stanley asked with much
good sense—does this savour of "finality ?" The
plot is perspicuous. The Papists will the destruc-
tion of our temporal Church, and the wretched Mi-
nisters are conniving and sneaking accessories. The

Papists boast of their resolution to-annihilate the esta-
blishment. The Ministers brim; forward mea.:iurcs,
professedly for the support of the Church, and
for the extension of Protestantism, which are eagerly
caught up and supported by those who avow their
eagerness for its destruction. Will not this open men's
eyes? The question comes on in the House of
Commons this evening, and for the last time during
the present, or perhaps any other, session. It will
he carried ; but if the Conservatives are honest men
and true, it will be carried by a small majority.
It goes to the House of Lords a measure already
shattered and condemned. It will be there perempto-
rily rejected. What then ? Another collision ? " Bal-
derdash." - The Irish Papists will bellow a little, and
agitate their own black and offensive waters, but Eng-
land will stand by and rejoice. England, and Pro-
testant Ireland, will hail the House of Lords with ac-
clamations of gratitude. England begins to know—
thanks to the opportunities for discussion provided by
our glorious legislative system—she begins to fathom
the genius of Irish Popery. We speak not of its
creed—of its creed we profess to know nothing ; but
of its political action we assert this—that the priestly
power, the overruling power of Popery, is undefined,
is irresponsible to any human law, and pre-eminently
to the law of England—that it coerces men in their
agency as citizens and subjects, and by the means of
an authority over which no magistrate of this realm has
the least particle of controul—that since the dawn of
history the Popish Priest has aimed at arbitrary domi-
nation—and that to aggrandize such a power, as we
are called upon to do, in the name and on behalf of
enlightened liberty, is an impudence and extravagance
beyond all bearing.—Times.
On Friday last we communicated to the public the
intelligence that the long-threatened collision between
the two Houses of Parliament had come and gone.
Ministers, who had most wantonly provoked that col-
lision, whose great exploit of the Session it was to
carry out the plot for placing both Houses in a hostile
position, became evidently alarmed at the consequences
of pushing on their own design to its completion.
Their democratic allies having failed in their attempts
to excite the people against the Lords, and no less
than three elections, in the compass of a few weeks,
having all ended in the signal discomfiture of the Go-
vernment candidates, Ministers became sensible of

their rashness. The instinct of danger, which, to the
dullest animals, supplies the place of wisdom, so far
as is necessary for self-preservation, taught them to
do the only wise thing which they have done during
the whole of this discreditable proceeding, to get rid of

it quickly. Hence the collision which-they- had la-
boured to produce no sooner appeared than they shunned
it as a fatal portent. These conjurors could not bear
the sight of the Frankenstein of their own creation. But
to affect the confidence of eventual victory, amid the
disastrous circumstances of a precipitate retreat, was
a stratagem worthy of one whose whole policy is a
course of crookedness and deception. Yet still to
pretend to court a collision while flying from it could
indeed deceive nobody. If they cannot compel the
Lords note to submit to the degradation of registering
the decrees of the faction, wielded by the Irish Agi-
tator, they know, or ought to know, that they will be
less able to do it the longer they postpone the strug-
gle. The more the people of England see of the
measures of a Government of which O'Connell is the
irresponsible dictator, the less disposed will they be
to support a Government whose policy so obviously
tends to the subversion of their religion and liberties,
and the downfall of that unrivalled Constitution under
which this country became the pre-eminent nation of
the world. No, the Melbourne Ministry may rest assured
that the longer they delay the great effort which is to con-
summate their glory, by prostrating the House of Lords
at the feet of the Irish demagogue, the more reason will
they have to dread the re-action of that effort upon their
own power. The returning sobriety and reflection of
the people is certainly not favourable at present for
the success of the mad attempt of Ministers upon the
independence of the House of Lords, and, through
that, upon our mixed Constitution. In each succeeding
year, the people, schooled by experience, will be still
better able to distinguish between rational reforms and
those destructive designs which are carried on under
false colours of reform. But though we cannot give
Ministers credit for much political sagacity, it is pro-
bable they are quite as well convinced as we are that,
if either at the present or any future time they were
really to strike the threatened blow at the independence
of the House of Lords, the recoil of that wild at-
tempt would shatter their power to atoms. The Lords
being firm in adhering to their decision upon the Irish
Municipal Bill, for the unanswered and unanswerable
reasons which they have given, how could Ministers
compel them to surrender their constitutional indepen-
dence and privileges, and to share with themselves the
humiliation of bowing the knee to the Baal of Irish
agitation ? Is it by inducing the King to abuse his
prerogative ?—or by appealing to the people, and in-
ducing them to return a House of Commons, in which
the Whig-Radical majorities would be so overwhelm-
ing that resistance to their will by the House of Lords,
would look very like resistance to the expressed will of
the nation ? As to the King, we feel assured that he
would as soon take his hereditary crown from his head
as the priest-ridden King John did, and lay it at the
feet of the Pope's representative, as create a hundred
Peers to promote the anti-Protestant and uncon-
stitutional designs of the Whig Ministers, and
gratify' the boundless ambition of Mr. O'Connell.
His Majesty has too good an understanding
not to know that with the degradation of the
Peerage the lustre of the Crown would fade, and the
security of the monarchy itself be gone. An appeal
to time people—will that be tried ? Threats to that
effect were thrown out by Ministers and their scribes
some time ago, but if they ever - seriously entertained
such a design, the result of the elections for Merio-
nethAire, Essex, and South Warwickshire, must
have cured them of their self-delusion. They know it
will not do to appeal from the House of Lords to the
country ; knowing this, they have contrived, as rapidly
as possible, to get rid of the collision which they la-
boured so long and lustily to bring about. The-Lords
having taken up the gauntlet which they threw down,
I at the moment that the lists were prepared, and the
trumpets about to sound the charge, ;hey decline the
battle, but at the same time solemnly declare .that it
is not their courage that fails, but their convenience
that does not suit. This is rather an awkward exhi-
bition of either the courage or the resources of the
challenges of the Lords, for the latter have only acted
on th:defensive. Had they yielded to the fierei and
systematic intimidation which has been directed against
them, they would have fallen without dignity—they'
would have given a moral as well as political triumph
te their enemies. As it is, they have acted in a man-
ner worthy of the successors of the ancient Barons of
England ; they have reet intimidation by manly dc-
iiance ; they have repelled insults with becoming
scorn ; they have, by intrepid and uncompromising
firmness, saved their honour, and, what is more, they
have saved their country,—Morning Herald.
Time intelligence from Jamaica, which appears in
another part of our paper, is of a most interesting
character. Lord Sligo, like other and higher autho-
rities nearer home, hag found that " collision" between
the constituted authorities of the State is not a pru-
dent or profitable game. His Lordship has diseo
vered, like [us superiors at Whitehall, that constitutional
rights, privileges, and durigi are not yet exactlywhat the
Whigs in all climates would mho thom—words ab-
solutely without meaning. The collision at Westrnin-
ster and the collision at Jamaica- have had sub-
stantially the same result, although the Whig dis-
grace in the former instance has been somewhat better
disguised. Thist however, is not the only occasion upon
record in which the worse man has corn 9 off hest: The
Marquis of Sligo has done wrong, He is convicted' of
having done so too clearly for cavil or dispute, He
acknowledges, retracts, begs pardon, and, having
had to do with really generous and liberal people,
he is forgiven. He has been bold, straightforward,

and impetuous, and the people of the torrid zone have
so much sympathy with these qualities that on offering
his confession and apology, the errors into which they
led him have been overlooked. The Marquis of Sligo,
it must be admitted, and especially by those who com-
pare him with Lord John Russell, is a great man.
The latter talks, and keeps his partisans talking, for
six months about a collision that he and his majority
in the House of Commons intend to hazard with the
House of Lords ; and when the time comes to realise
his big threats lie skulks out of the affair as
quietly as a lamb. He is, like his friend and master,
O'Connell, a calculating assailant of the Constitution,
goes no further than the precise point from which lie
thinks lie can safely draw back, is glad of the as-
sistance of the mob, and will take all possible pains to
excite them ; but if the mob do not prepare to take the
lead in any meditated encounter, and place him out
of the reach of danger, is quite resolved, from the be-
ginning, that there shall be no encounter at all.
Lord Sligo is evidently, and that is not saying
much, a far better fellow. Blunderer though he
be, lie has the merit of having thoughts, 'and feel-
ings, and courage of his own. He does not get up
the expectation of a collision to gain a point, de-
termined beforehand that, unless he is well protected,
there shall be no collision whatever ; but, having a
fancy for a collision, lie confronts the responsibility
and danger at once. " The torrid zone for ever l" say
we ; and vet the difference cannot be entirely in the
greater directness at Jamaica of the sun's rays. Lord
John Russell and the men who surround him would
never, we are persuaded, rise to the dignity of a bold,
straightforward, or resolute course upon any subject,
even though they were to live for a hundred years at
the equator. The contrast between the present leader
of the House of Commons and the Governor of Ja-
maica is scarcely greater, however, than that between
the assembled Representatives, as, in courtesy we sup-
pose we must call them, of the people of Great Bri-
tain and Ireland, and the Jamaica Assembly. The
Marquis of Sligo has had the misfortune to affront the
latter, and has been compelled to retract and apologize;
Lord John Russell and his colleagues have laboured
with great assiduity and success to place the former in
a ridiculous position before their constituents, and for
this a hundred venal voices are ready, whenever they
speak, to animate and cheer them with applauding
shouts. As an apologist and a supplicant to the offended
Assembly of Jamaica the erring and atoning Governor is
not spurned, as Lord John Russell and his col-
leagues would certainly be, and by the men who now
most loudly applaud them, if they were reduced to the
necessity of assuming the same attitude before the
House of Commons. The Jamaica representatives
are generous, because they are stroncr. They know
that they enjoy the confidence of their constituents,
and they, can well afford to commiserate and forgive
the occasional offences which the portly Whig gentle-
man whom his Majesty's Ministers have sent among
them may commit. But let not the Whig Ministers
on any account be apologists or suppliants .to that
majority which now vociferates applause when they
speak, and votes submissively as they command.
The charm would then be broken—the spell by
which they controut the House of Commons would
then be dissolved. The dread of a dissolution,
or, what would be the same thing in effect, the
hope of avoiding this greatest of all calamities to a
large proportion of the Ministerial majority, would
then be at an end, and those who now most
delight to extol the Ministers and obey them,
would be the first, and the loudest, and the bitterest
to revile and to denounce. Collision, it will have been

seen, is a disastrous game for the Whigs whether in
America or Europe, whether played with rash impe-
tuosity or with frudulent art. We must not be mis-
taken, however, for the apologists of Lord Sligo merely
because, in comparing his conduct in Jamaica with
that of his Ministerial friends in London, we have
acknowledged our preference for the former. The
Noble Marquis's confession of his own folly and in-
discretion is so full and explicit indeed as to
leave very little for us to add upon the subject.
" Having been informed," says the Noble Mar-
quis, " by authority of more experience than my
own, and to which it is my duty to submit, that
the delivery of my message, relative to the Act
in Aid, involved a breach not contemplated, as I
before assured you, of the privileges of the Assem-
bly, I have only to express my regret at its having
taken place." It might surely have been expected that
the Noble Governor, if sent out to Jamaica, in
pursuance of the Whig principle, of selecting men
to fill the most important offices without a know-
ledge of the privileges of the local legislature,
might have acquired some general notion of
those privileges during his protracted residence in that
valuable colony. His Lordship thought, however,
that he had a right to dictate to the Legislature of Ja-
maica, just as the King's Ministers in this country
imagined that they and their rank majority in the
House of Commons had a right to dictate to the
House of Lords. His defeat has not been more sig-
nal or complete than theirs, although it has been at-
tended by circumstances of deeper mortification. The
" authority of more experience than his own, and to
which it is his duty to submit," must mean, of course,
the Ministers of the Crown ; but if we may judge from
their own conduct, their admonition could have
amounted only this, that " collision" is a thing to
be threatened •in particular circumstances, but never
with any idea of realising the threat, unless " col-
lision" should become decidedly popular, in which
case the most should be made of it. To this it
might, perhaps, be added, that " collision" should
be avoided at all events, whenever there is the least
danger of its interfering with the supplies. The
Marquis of Sligo's plea of inexperience reflects the
greatest discredit upon the Government which sent
him out, the members of which, if they thought fit to
appoint an ignorant and inexperienced man to such an
office as that of Governor of Jamaica (and at such a
time, too), ought unquestionably to have taken care
to supply him with such sufficient instructions as
would have saved the colon ( from any serious injury
from his incapacity. The Noble Marquis confesses
that the greatest inconvenience has arisen from the
premature dissolution of the Assembly, which resulted
from his abortive attempt to dragoon them into obe-
dience to his lawless will. And we think the people of
England will generally be of opinion that injury or
inconvenience front such a cause ought not to have
been blended with the trying and hazardous experi-
ment to which the most important interests of Jamaica
are at this moment exposed in consequence of an Act
of the British Legislature.—Morning Post.
Nortwithstanding that the proposition of appropria-
ting the surplus revenues of the Irish Church to pur-
poses of general education has been so frequently ap-,
proved by large majorities of the House of Commons,
yet the Tories are mustering their forces, as we men-
tioned on Saturday for another division this evening,
when the subject will be again brought under conside•
ration. The question has already been discussed ad
nauseam, and therefore we do not expect that the de-
bate will present any feature of original interest. The
justice and expediency of the proposed appropriation
are so self-evident as to stamp conviction without the
aid of argument, and the motive of the Opposition is
too firmly fixed in bigotry, selfishness, and intolerance,
to be removed by any appeal to reason or sound po-
licy. In fact, though we consider it most important
that the Liberal Members should be in their places
this evening, for the sake of proving to their friends
and enemies that they are vigilant of the national inte-
rest, yet it would be folly to expect any immediate
practical result from the majority which is certain to
sanction the appropriation principle. So surely as it
will be carried by the House of Commons, so surely
will it be rejected by the House of Lords ;—a striking,
illustration a the effect of vesting legislative autho-
rity in an irresponsible body of men—cut off from all
sympathy with the wants and wishes of the nation.
How lung will the people submit to see the whole pro-
ceedings of their representatives defeated by an unjust
and tyrannical oligarchy ? The conduct of the Lords
makes the functions of the House of Commons a mere
farce. Where is the use of assemblina, debatiog,
And
decidiug out subiccts l i one 4110144.1 tbe 'Aber
the questions ate predoonied' to a different result?
Shall the Lords be permitted with impunity to held
the Comiuons of England in such a contemptible
light as that in which they have new placed them ?
Shall we submit to be made the laughing-stock of

our oppressors,—our representatives to be insulted
and treated with derision, and the Lords to exult in
their usurpation, and treasonably assert that they
and not the Commons represent the people ? If
we submit to such outrage, we shall deserve to
be scorned and spat upon by every petty tyrant who
may choose to indulge in such patrician amusement.
We are surprised -that any friend of an Established
Church can be so blind to its interests as to oppose
the appropriation clause, which is in fact the means' of
a temporary reprieve from utter destruction. The
longer the question is left unsettled, the sooner will be
the establishment of the voluntary principle, and thus the
opposition is likely to be attended with at least one good
effect, that of leaving the support of religion to be re-
gulated by the conscience of the individual. The Mi-
nistry are certain to have a large majority this evening,
if their friends, and the friends of the people will only
do their duty ; but never, until the House or Lords be
reformed, need we expect justice to be permitted free
and fair operation in our legislative eeonomy.—Morn-
ing Advertiser.