The Sun.
London, England, 1825-01-06 00:00:00

[THE PtIDLIC LEDGER.]

We have received the Paris Papers of Monday
and the Etoile of Tuesday. The latter contains
three projects of law, which were presented to
the Chamber of Deputies on Monday last. The
first of these concerns the Civil List and the Ap-
panage to the Princes and Princesses of the Royal
Family, by which it is proposed to fix the former
at 25 millions of francs annually for the King's
lifetime, and the latter at seven millions. The se-
cond relates to the long expected Indemnity to the
Emigrants, which it estimated at thirty millions
of rentes, to be inscribed in five years, at the rate
of six millions yearly—the first inscription to
take place on the 22d of next June. The third
project proposes to provide the means, by which
the plan of indemnity is to be carried into effect,
without the necessity of imposing new burdens
on the nation. By one of the provisions, the
Sinking Fund is to be resorted to for a certain
number of years ; and the other is the old scheme
for converting the rentes, with this difference,
however, that it is to be optional on the part of
the holders. We suspect that this part of the Mi-
nister's plan is more showy than solid, and that he
must have recourse at last to new taxes, or
(what would be more unpalatable), to economy,
in order to meet this new source of expence.—
However, this and other schemes of a similar
description, in which the French Ministers are
no vulgar adepts, will prose as favourable to
public liberty, as they are vexatious in a pecu-
niary point of view, by co►npelling the Govern-
ment to make sacrifices of another description,
in return for those increasing demands which it
is in the habit of making on the pockets of the
nation. It is true M. de Villele holds out a
prospect of considerable reductions, instead of
the augmentation that we have alluded to ;
but such Ministerial pledges are estimated at
their proper value. An increase of expenditure
to the amount of thirty millions is an incontro- ,
vertible fact; whilst the plan of relieving the
public from the weight is of a very doubtful cha-
racter. As the French are heavily taxed already,
in fact to the full extent of their means, the Mi-
nister, to prevent the effects of over taxation,
must remove some of those absurd restrictions on
foreign and domestic trade, by which industry
and enterprize are so much cramped at present.
This will be one good result of the extravagance
which characterises that Government; and an-
other of its good effects will be to introduce a
greater spirit of justice into its foreign relations.
The costly machinery of its domestic administra-
tion
.has a wonderful tendency to repress the
wild impulses of an immoral ambition ; and as
the friendship of England is indispensable to the
success of those colossal operations in finance
which are become absolutely the order of the
day in France, we may expect, on the part of the
latter, a relaxation of her commercial jealousy.—
If the French Government were so mad as to en-
tertain despotic designs, it would correct its pro-
pensity through its extravagant spirit of expellee.
It has cut a terrible rod for its back in the vast
. loans which it has raised, unless it honestly exerts
itself to conciliate public affection. To be
wasteful of the public resources, and, at the
same time, indifferent to public feeling, would, in
the end, produce a frightful catastrophe, which
can only be averted by the adoption of.a liberal
system at home, and of a moderate policy abroad.
The same cause which keeps the French Govern-
ment in salutary check, has contributed more than
is generally imagined to defeat the unpopular
designs of the other great Continental Powers ;
and if they could command money as easily as
the personal service of their subjects, we should
tremble for the liberties of mankind. But their
poverty, which is the penalty of the war they
wage against the happiness of the world, tends to
disappoint all their schemes ; and the final result
will be the complete triumph of liberty over des-
potism.- In a few. years more, the credit of despotic
Governments will be entirely ruined; whilst that of

free States will be consolidated in the same ratio ;
and in the war which is now waging between them,
money will be found to be the chief sinew.
France must soon make her selection as to the
part she shall take in this grand contest ; and
whatever may be the inclinations of her Govern-
ment, the pecuniary necessities of the latter will
eventually compel that Power to throw itself
into the ranks of freedom.

[MORNING HERALD.]
The Irish Attorney-General has failed in his
indictment of Mr. O'Connell ; and this wordy
leader of the Catholic Association has only to
withdraw his recognizances to become once more
a free agent. If we are to judge from the formi-
dable array of brother Barristers, who were en-
gaged in his defence (and who appeared in Court
ready wigged and briefed before even the bill was
preferred), we must suppose that he did not him-
self calculate upon so easy a deliverance, but that
the danger appeared more imminent to him and

his associates than it did to disinterested and im-
partial lookers on. To he sure, when Counsel are
to he paid out of a public subscription, it ‘s ould be
absurd to starve the cause : and it seems but
reasonable that those for whose use the Catholic
Rent is raised, should take a good slice of it at
once. It seems like blooding young hounds, who
will, of course, become more staunch and eager
for their prey in proportion as the briefs and the
fees flow in upon them. Whether, like skilful
Generals, they will learn caution from victory
as well as from defeat, remains to be seen. The
wisest thing they could do, if they value the
peace and welfare of Ireland, would be to dis-
solve themselves. They, and their proceedings,
are at this moment the greatest enemies to their
country's welfare; and are ruining, quite in a Hi•
bernian way, the cause which they profess to sup-
port. We fear, however, that they will not
have the sense to do this. The rent is too good
a thing to be easily parted with. The trade of
litigation is too profitable to be willingly
abandoned. We suspect, however, that they
will become a little more cautious, and that the
proceedings against their Chief, though in them-
selves inoperative, will have the effect of restrain-
ing a good deal of that intemperance in which
they have hitherto indulged. Wishing well, as
we do, to the fair claims of the Catholics, we
shall regret if they continue to be thwarted by
these unwise advocates. We trust to the good
sense of the Catholics as a body to disclaim the
services of these injudicious leaders ; and that
they will rather be induced to confide (as they

much more safely may) in the conciliatory dispo-
sition of the Governmuut and the dispassionate
part of the community.

MORNING POST.]

We can easily foresee that the rejection of
the Bills of Indictment against Mr. O'Connell
will be construed by the Factious Press of Ire-
land into a public approval of the Catholic As-
sociation. Such an inference is most unfair.—
The existence and general ostensible conduct
of that body may cheat the letter, while they
violate the spirit of the law ; and still its objects
and the tendency of its proceedings be such
as we have declared and believe them, and also
such as no wise Governwent ought to tolerate.
Though Mr. O'Connell had never uttered the
words for which he was indicted, should we,
or any of his Majesty's loyal subjects, have al-
tered our opinion respecting the Catholic Asso-
ciation ? Before that " slip of the tongue," the
intentions of the speaker, and the designs of the
fanatic Insurgents he leads, were the same as
they are now. We then denounced both—we
called aloud to the Legislature to kill the
monster in its infancy, and we repeat the de-
nunciation and the call at present, with re-
doubled vigour. The failure of the prosecution
against Mr. O'Connell is itself the strongest ar-
gument for resorting to specific measures for the
overthrow of the Association. It is certainly
manifest, that notwithstanding the liberal charge
of Mr. Justice Moore to the Grand Jury, the
latter long hesitated, and experienced great diffi-
culty in justifying themselves not to find the Bills.
But still it must be admitted that the fact of the
existing law being unable to reach such a case as
the one in question, renders an amendment of the
law necessary. By instituting the prosecution
against Mr. O'Connell, the Irish Administration
and the Irish Law Officers of the Crown have ac-
knowledge and publicly set forth their conviction,
that the very organ and soul of the Association
has openly dared, at one of its meetings, to pro-
mulgate sedition deserving condign punishment.
Of the criminality of the act, or of the Body
which sanctioned it, Mr. Plunkett, at least,
can affect no doubt. Neither can he one mo-
ment, after the meeting of Parliament, with
any regard to consistency or public duty,
delay supplying the defects of the present
law, which he has himself proved to exist,
and also proved ought to be remedied. We
accordingly rather rejoice than lament at the
failure of the late indictment. Had that experi-
ment been successful, we should probably be told
that the statutes now in force were sufficient to
restrain the conduct of the Association within
due limits. We should be asked where lay the
necessity for further checks upon the rising
spirit of rebellion in Ireland, when the moment
it broke beyond decent bounds, the Irish
Attorney-General pounced on Mr. O'Connell,
and punished him proportionately to his of-
fence. Now, 1 lowever, it is plain that Mr.
Plunkett's powers are inadequate to preserve the
peace and protect the interests of the country.—
Ile has proclaimed that Mr. O'Connell ought to
be punished, but cannot ; and that when he at-
tempted to catch and hold the Catholic Associa-
tion in his roughest and best sanded grasp, that
eely junto not only escaped, but, in so doing,
stung him with impunity. We repeat, that we
are rather pleased than disappointed at this re-
sult. IVe wish to see the Association abolished
—put down—not to see its nefarious practices
pared just to fit the widest construction of the
Statute Book, and its existence thus brought
within the pale of the Constitution.

[MORNING CHRONICLE.]
Though we are not, God knows, admirers of
that prver to inflict corporal punishment, whiCh

an English Magistrate Can order at discretion,
for what he considers a violation of propriety,
and are acquainted with more than one case in
which the Country Justice that ordered flogging
at a cart's tail, would have richly merited him-
self the punishment he causelessly inflicted, and
would wish that Englishmen were distinguished
from other nations more advantageously than
by being what Sir Francis Burdett called a
flogged nation, we could almost be satisfied
to see every person in those vile and brutal
mobs in Scotland, which have been allowed by
the authorities of that country to commit the
most daring outrages on persons and property,
under the pretence of discovering dead bodies,—
flogged to within an iuch of their lives. We
really cannot understand what the authorities in
Scotland mean by allowing the mob to exercise
with impunity acts of tyrannical violence, which
put one in mind of the goings on in Madrid m
Burgos. Every Scotch Paper brings us fresh
accounts of these outrages. One of th• latest
was the destruction of the carriage of a medical
gentleman, in Edinburgh, which had been stopped
under the pretext of searching for dead bodies,
although nothing was found to justify the suspi-
cion. This is quite abominable, and in a city too
boasting of its excellent police ! We are far from
wishing to repress all indication of popular feel-
ing, and know that the Scotch are indebted for
some of their best qualities to the fear in which
they stand of one another ; and can even con-
ceive, that in such a case as that which lately
occurred, where none of the members of a
family who by ill usage of a young man who
married into it, was supposed to have been
one cause of his committing the crime for
which he was sentenced to die, durst make their
appearance in the streets, may not be without its
good effects. But to allow an insolent mob to
give the law to a community on every occasion,
to allow every ruffian to consider the professors
of science as fair prey, is what ought not to be
borne. Surely in a country which lays such
high claims to science, and which owes so much
to its Medical Schools, there is a sufficiency
of good sense remaining to teach those who
possess influence and authority, the necessity
of encouraging rather than proscribing the
study of anatomy—The Scotch Medical Schools
will soon be without reputation. Already they
are decried, and in a short time, so far from Eng-,
lishmen and foreigners flocking to Scotland, every
Scotchman who can afford it will repair to Ger-
many and France, where a milder people and a
better police allow medical science to be culti-
vated. There are a School of Arts in Edinburgh
and two in Glasgow, well attended. Many
thousands of mechanics must have received, more
Or less, instruction in these schools. Surely it
might be expected of these men that gratitude to
science would lead them to exert themselves to
overcome that ferocious repugnance to the study
of anatomy which seems to be as much the
distinguishing characteristic of Scotchmen of
the persent day, as wild fanaticism was
of that of those of a former age. Dead bo-
dies must be procured, or there must be an end
of all medical science. Even in England, where
the mob are more kept down, and where the
people when roused are less ferocious, the late
outcry encouraged by vulgar Coroners and equally
vulgar Newspapers, has had the effect of fairly
shutting up s..veral of the schools of dissection,
and it consists with our knowledge that several
young men of promise have been fairly driven to
the Continent to prosecute their studies. But
Scotland is by far the most faulty, and having the
most to lose, better things might have been ex-
pected from it. When a Scotchman ceases to
know his interest, we shall look out for the con-
version of the Jews. If the citizens of Edinburgh
are not interested, and deeply interested, in the
success of their Medical School, we know not
what interest means. We are aware that ever
since the Reformation the rabble has been
in Scotland, a sort of fourth estate. Indeed,
if the rabble had not acted so energeti-
cally in Church matters at the Revolution,
we questLu if the Presbyterians would have ob-
tained possession of their Churches. " I have
done as good service (says Lord Whigridden in
tilts Satirical Play of The Assembly), to this ho-
nourable Judicatory as any man living, by ruin-
ing and rabbling the Curates. I have managed
the whole civil interests with much wisdom."—
But in those days the mob was ancillary to some
intelligible purpose. But what man in his sober
senses, and with enough of intellect to compre-
hend the text that a living dog is better than
a dead lion, would wish to destroy an act,
to which most of us are indebted for some life
which we hold dear ? Out of the 101 English
who first landed on the Coast of New England
in November, 1620, there were only 50 alive
in the following March, and the living were
scarce able to bury the dead. IV e will venture
to say that, in the present state of Medical
Science, disease would not have carried off the
tenth part of that number. But if all nations
were to be equally barbarous with the Scotch,
we should soon see disease displaying itself with
its former destructiveness.

AWFUL MORTALITY IN ONE FAMILY.—Lately
died at Ely, in the 70th year of his age, of a brain fever, Mr.
William Orr, many years a serjeant of the Cambridgeshire
militia, but latterly a dealer in earthenware. He left a wife
and three children to lament his loss—the former in a declining
state of health, and, according to human calculation, the next in
the family that would follow him. But this poor creature was
destined to receive another shock before she left this vale of
tears. On the day three weeks following that on which her
husband died, her youngest child, a fine healthy boy about 8
years old, took a box of opium pills, unobserved by his mother,
from a table standing by her bedside, and went to school with
them in his pocket. It afterwards appeared he offered one to a
little boy of his own age, who, not liking the taste of it, put it
away from his mouth. How many the little unfortunate swal-
lowed has not been ascertained, but he was discovered in the
school-room, an hour after the other children had left, cold and
stiff; and nearly dead : every means to recover him was used,
but without effect, as he died a few hours after. The shock to
the poor invalid mother may. be conceived, but cannot be des-
cribed. The only ejaculation she uttered afterwards, and
which was frequently repeated, was, "My poor John." On the
same day three weeks following, in the 4bth year of her age, her
earthly sorrows ceased, and she was conveyed to that bourn
whence there is no return. " Insatiate Archer ! thrice thy shaft
has sped," and yet not satisfied ! Within a little month from
his mother's death (on Christmas Day last), her eldest son,
'William, aged nineteen years, a pious, dutiful, and industrious
youth, followed father, brother, and mother to the silent
grave ! What a havoc has death made in one family ! In the
short space of ten weeks four are snatched hence ; and the only
survivor is a poor friendless girl, seventeen years of age.—
(Essex Herald.)