The Sun.
London, England, 1831-03-07 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

The people are everywhere meeting. t express
their gratitude to Ministers, and tletermination to
support them. The Livery of London meet this
day. There is also a nreseting of the parish of Maryle-
bone. Several other parishes are moving. In slicer,
the movement in the metropolis is universal, and ex-
tends to all classes of the population. A petition'
from the law students will be presented this evert-
ing. Gosport has already met, and the address
from that place will be presented this day. It is ex-
pected that the example will be followed* without de-
lay in Portsmouth. We learn from Birmieglaaan
that all parties—Tories, Whigs, and Usaiee. members
—are cordially uniting to convene R meeting of the
town and its vicinity, " for the purpose of expres-
sing their cordial and eteteful satisfaction at 'int
measures proposed by 'llia Majesty's
The requisition is already signed by I'M lteading in-
habitants, bankers, merchants, &ce, :sea the meeting
will probably be held on Wednesday. Bilston,
Wolverhampton, Dudley, &c. are also movines to
Yorkshire the feeling is the same. The Leeds
Mercury, of Saturday, says—" 'The Reformers
in this part of the ICingdont are both surprised
and delighted with the plan—it meets Ostia
most cordial approbation—and they will imp-
port, by every constitutional exercise of their
influence, both the measure itself arid the Ad-
ministration by whom it is brought forward,"
The same paper adds," We trust that the Reformers
will, as one man, support the only reforming Ad-
ministration that England has ever had." We may
confidently nssert that tto measure ever united so
extensively the suffrages of all classes of the eopule.
tion as the Ministerial plan of Reform. That among
Reformers there are some who think that the
Reform ought to be more extensive, cars sur-
prise no one; for it was knoevn, before this
measure was proposed, that Reformers, how-
ever much they agreed in disapproving of the ex-
isting state of the representation, were by no means
agreed as to the extent to which Reform ottght to
be carried. But we conscientiously believe that the
Reformers, with few exceptions, are quite satisfied
with the present measure. It was well observed by
the Lord Advocate on Friday night, that " renatair-
able Reform will not satisfy the unreasonable, but
it will satisfy the reasonable. And tithe will deny, I
that if you satisfy the reasonable, and induce them
to unite with you, you will not be better able to deal
with the unreasonable ?" Ministers have onle to
be true to themselves, and the measure must besic-
ceasful. A hand will not be raised against the mea-
sure throughout the country. Even Sir Robert
Peel, though he carps at the plan, and rantingly
laments the disfranchisement of future generations
of potwallopers, cautiously keeps aloof lleim the
anti-reformers, who are loud in their execrations
against him. In the present disposition of the
nation, no Ministry hostile to Reform could stand
their ground a single day. The attempt even to
carry on the affairs of the country with such a 'Mi-
nistry, would necessarily lead to consequences, to
prevent which every lover of peace and order, every
good citizen interested in his country's welfare,
ought strenuously to exert himself, by making
such a demonstration in favour of Ministers, as
shall not allow their opponents to entertain the
slightest hope of success in their schemes. While
we hold as ridiculous in the extreme the pre-
tended alarm of those who make the declaration of
some Reformers, that they will make the present
measure the stepping-stone for obtaining more, we
cannot at the same time too much caution all Ain-
eere Reformers against the use of language like this.
The Ministerial plan of Reform, if it become law,
will either ensure to us the benefit of good govern-
ment, or it will not. If it ensure to us good govern-
ment, it will continue to satisfy us for ever as it ma-
defies us now. If it do not ensure to us good go-
vernment, if the favourable anticipations which lead
men at present to be so generally contented with it,
ate not realised, who is there who in such a case
would wish every person to remain satisfied with it
any lo,nger? The reason why the plan has been so
generally well received is, that it promises to remedy
the defects which prevent our present institutions
from allowing Ili to enjoy the benefit of good go-
vernment. The measure deserves, therefore, the
acceptance of the nation simpliciter as conservative,
and indispensable for the preservation of all that is
not noxious in our old institutions. If the plan,
therefore, work well, as it is believed it will, the at-
tachment of the nation will ensure its continuance.
The institutions of a country cannot be altered with-
out the consent of the inhabitants. It is because all
classes of the people are disettiafied with the present
state of the representation, that Ministers have been
obliged to propose a Reform. If they had been sa-
tisfied, Ministers would not have proposed an altera-
tion, and if they had, the nation would not have sup-
ported them. If the nation remain satisfied with
this plan, it will not be in the power of the dissen-
tients to make it dissatisfied. We hold, therefore,
the apprehensions that the present plan will 'eel to
further demands, as entitled to little attention. It
does not follow, that because all men are willing
to go as fir as Ministers propose to go, all men will
go as far as some people wish to go. Had Ministers
proposed to go farther, they would not have been
able to go so far as they have done. All agree that
the present plan is an improvement ; the most ex-
tensive Reformer takes it, and the moderate Re-
former takes it : but the latter wculd not have taken
what would have gratified the formere—ellorn.Chron.
During four days of the week just expired, the
public has watched with the deepest interest, and
without any symptom of chagrin or disappointment,
the progress of those discussions in the House of
Commons which have followed the announcement
of the great measure of Reform on the part of his
Majesty's Ministers. Speaking of the absence of
uneasiness or disappointment (we might improve
the phrase by substituting gradual disappearance,
for entire absence), as the debate proceeded, we
draw our impression from all that has met our eyes,
or been communicated to us in conversation, or by
writing—in town, and from the country—by rich
and poor—by individuals and through the press—
from unanimous resolutions of public meetings
already held,—from the cordial eagerness with which
snore in all quarters are summoned,—that the pro-
gress of the debate, as well as the admirable wisdom
and virtue of that proposed Bill which is the subject
of it, has quieted every fear, excusable at the outset,
in a people distrustful of all solid redress for inveterate
grievances, that the measure would not be in itself
complete, or that its passage through an unreformed
Parliament might be successfully impeded. If any
honest doubts had been entertained as to the neces-
sity and value of such a Reform, we would turn
for the solution of them, not so much to the argu-
ments of those who support the Bill, as to the
speeches of their adversaries, and to the description
of places which they represent. To begin with the
latter circumstance, as being the least important,
and the most speedily disposed of, we may remark.
that about 21 young lords and gentlemen have got
up in the House of Conemona to oppose the Reform
Bill; and that of these not less than 16 are mem-
bers for that very class of boroughs which the Bill is
about to disfranchise. Of the five remaining cham-
pions of the present system, one is Lord Lerman
Gower, a Member of the last anti-Reform Admi-
nistration, who returns himself for his •wn Scotch
county of Sutherland, to be opened by the present
plait ;—a second is the renowned Sir R. Inglis ;—the third is his friend Mr. Hart of Bristol, as
well known during the last war as he Davis,s
now ; —nex.
comes Mr. William Duncombe, returned fur York-
shire at the late election, only because there was a
general inclination in that great county to avoid a
contest, but a personage who perfectly understands
that he will be returned no mote;—and, filially, Mr.
Wynn, who had been a Cabinet Minister under a
former Government, and whose sole argument against
the Bill—that is, against the only part of it which he
did disapprove of, namely, the disfranchisement of
so many close boroughs—was his belief that in that
, respect it went " too far ; but for that belief the
Right Hon. Gentleman did not assign a reason. So

much for' 'the Parliamentary mulhorilies which have
appeared in opposition to this vast and enlightened
measure of national relief, security and advance-,
ment. When we consider the alleged rottnds
such opposition, it is not too much t o decla'ie, as we
do moat consciention'Sly, atr ernaiement at their fal-
lacy, and their almost ludicrous weakness, at least in
so far as linty regard the principle of the propoSed
Reform. It gives one no sthall comfrirt to obnel ye,
that the broad objection to 'the Biil—so broad, in-
deed, as to surpass tl:r. i.tounds offdistinet and accu-
•
rate comprea....sion—is its" revolutionary tendency."
tMs point we, in the main, agree with Mr. Jef-
frey, Lord Advocate of Scotland; 1:n 'nis view of
the progress of those so.:itl'Aanges through which
an advancing ficriitle at length out-grow their insti-
tution'. Vi'e agree that as intelligence is diffused,
'must political power; and that as a Cnrztittttibti
well fitted to the age of Elin.the ir, Might not fully
embrace the wants of !Gtiti, !neither can the provi-
sions for pt.d.lic, liberty, secured to the subject
at thtt latter celebrated period, be rronottnseed,
On the mere dictum of a tnemi;er of our ex-
isting Aristocracy, a sufficient satisfaction of the
just desire! en',:e'rtained by the bulk of the people
of psf,t_and in 1830, or an adequate protection of
their more complex interes's. The te_'.th is, that a
real revolution has fur 40 ytte.l-s 'oeen pervading and
exciting tine v•lY:ki.*- Mans of society in Great Britain.
The eo..:ntry has meditated its own wrongs until it
v/iii no longer endure them. It will not be en-
slaved, whatever the Duke of Wellington tooy fancy,
by a class, or rather a few individualn of a class,
having views and objetts separate from those of the
nation, anti hostile to them : it will not suffer these
selfish and domineering grandees to dragoon it first,
that they tnav afterwards plunder it, and to perpe-
toate the tyranny, that they may accumulate more
plunder. The inward revolution in coOiplete, it con-
sists in the vast spread or knowledge, and conse-
quent multipl!tnttiOn among the people, of tastes,
and enjoyments, and nee, slities, unknown to their
ancestors : the indulgence of these they insist on
having secured to themselves, and not henceforth
cucroached upon, or endangered by the wealthier
classes. Whet has for many years been abstract-
edly right, Las now become politically unavoidable.
They demand that the subs:antial and internal
I revolution shall have its outward and visible
type. This it is which constitutes the present
emergency—and which will, as sure as spring
follows winter—crush all opposition to a reform
of Parliament. Mr. Stanley, in his able aid prompt re-
ply to an abrupt question of Sir R. Peel, as to the com-
parison between the revolutionary settlement of 1608 and
the measure now contemplated, well characterised the
difference between them by stating that the revolution of
1088 was the work of a convention, not of a Parliament,
" brought about by the assistance of foreign troops, and
perfected without the consent of one estate of the realm,"
whereas this, when carried, will have had the formal sanc-
tion of all the authorities recognized by the existing Con-
stitution. The Duke of Wellington asks the King's Mi-
nisters to inform him " how they are to carry on the Go-
vernment of this monarchical country, after the passing of
such a law." His Grace unquestionably points to the
disfranchisement of the close boroughs, as being that fea-
ture of the new Reform which may be incompatible with
the conduct of a monarchical Government. How then
do the close boroughs act? Are the patrons of these
boroughs men of such generous and elevated loyalty as to
become, in their own persons, or command their nomi-
ne,s to become, gratuitous champions in all cases of the pre-
rogative of the Crown—volunteer supporters at all times of
the executive government—without reward or stipulation ?
This, no doubt, his Grace, has had too longexperienceof the
domestic administration of England to affirm. It need
not be brought to the Duke of Wellington's recollection,
that borough patrons are as apt as other people to require
a quid pro quo—that they are too conscious of their own
weight and value to make a present of their services or of
the votes which they can influence ;rand therefore that
their const:nt language to the Minister is—" There are
three, four, or five, of us, hanging together like one ma.
You will therefore be pleased to intimate what price you
will pay for our support to your Cabinet measures." The
Noble Lord, or whoever happens to he at the head of the
Government, answers, of course, in the usual manner, by
agreeing to liberal terms with the patriotic boroughmonger,
and promises that, on condition of a full and unflinching
support, certain places, ponsi,ns, contracts, or other gra-
tifications, at borne or in the colonies, shall be at his
service to distribute among his relatives or dependents.
'lbis is the whole craft and mystery of the support
derived by " monarchical Government" from the borough
system. What then, in plain English is that system ?
It is one which upholds the power of governing the
nation through a force not acknowledged by them, nor
known to the law of England,—an army of political mer-
cenaries, paid by the Crown with money extorted from
the people. The bayonet would be a better instrument
than this. There would be more honesty in it : there
would he less extravagance. The principle of government
disclosed by the Duke of Wellington is neither more nor
less than that of a monarchy, mixed in its name, but in
its nature and operation absolute : its secret movement
screened by the forms of a representative legislature, but
rendering the evils of practical despotism more burdensome
by the multiplication of bribes,—more odious by the mask
of hypocrisy,—and more ruinous to public spirit by an
admixture of gross and degrading corruption. By those
who take a less stern and intractable position than this
military chief, it is asserted that many men of ability are
introduced into Parliament by the patrons of close bo-
roughs, u ho might otherwise be left in obseurity. This
assertion has been a thousand times repeated, and must not
be wholly overlooked. Why do men of ability become
Members for close boroughs? Is it that they may benefit
the nation? Is it the purpose of a borough patron to bring
in men who will in all cases give independent votes ?—men
who will in all cases—nay, or in any case—vote against
the inclinations of the patron who returns them ? No-
toriously- he does not. The borough patron either sells his
seat to a rich man for his 4,000/., 5,000/., or 6,000/., as
the case may be, or to the poor man for his personal ser-
vices, nr puts in a relative for whom he wishes to provide.
Does the rich man who buys a eeat munificently fling
away 5,0001. for the good of the nation ? No; in nine-
teen instances out of twenty he jobs his vote, and being
pro tempera his own patron, he bargains with a Minister
on the sanie principle as a wholesale boroughmonger
would for his half dozen seats. He is in no degree re-
sponsible to the people, for whom, or frequently against
whom, he legislates. After a couple of sessions he is ap-
pointed to a place, accepts the Chiltern Hundreds, and
makes way for some similar successor, from whom the bo-
rough patron pockets a second 4,0001. or 5,0001. Then
the men of talent,—the adventurer gifted with the power of
Parliament iry speaking,—what becomes of him'' Does he
employ his abilities for the public good? Is he a free agent ?
Ask Sir T.Dertmen, who drew such a picture on Wednesday
evening of the thraldom in which a borough nominee, if
brought in as a man of talent (that is, without paying money '
for the seat), is held, and the intolerable burden inflicted
by such conscious humiliation on any man of spirit and
sensibility. But the fact is, that if half-a-dozen indivi-
duals are made
.Members for close bon oughs in the course of
twenty years (and the proportion is little more), because
of their reputation for ability, and if they afterwards prove
that the reputation was not unmerited, how many lion-
,fred dandy blockheads are thrust in by their noble rela-
tives or patrons who possess borough interest, with no ob-
ject under Heaven, but to establish for them certain claims
upon the Government to advancement in their profes-
sions, or to vacant offices---diplomatic, financial, or colo-
nial—in the several departments through which the busi-
ness of the country is mismansged, and at an enormous
cost ! Of men of this description there are at least forty,
for each of those vaunted men of talent, whose admission
to Parliament through the dirty back door of a close bo-
rough is regarded as a purification of the whole vile sys-
tem from its foulness. Now, of the above two classes, we
maintain, in defence of the projected measure of Reform,
that the bulk of men of ability will find various other
means of acquiring reputation, and recommending
themselves to the suffrages of their countrymen,—more
honourable and useful methods, too, than by scraping
acquaintance with some borough Lord ; while it is
equally certain and consoling, that from the disgrace en-
tailed upon us by the preaenee in Parliament of the noo-
dles and puppies, the raff arid scum of fashionable families,
who have 710 talent, no intellect, no capacity of being
useful, no moral or political efficiency about them,—who
are at this moment void of all pretence to be Legislators
but the countenance of some horoughmongering parent or
connexion,—from the nuisance, we repeat, of Laving such
animals to make laws for us, we shall he everlastingly re-
lieved. Persons of so useless a quality could never force
their way into any assembly, the right of entrance to which
(""t be ,established by the public voice, electing them in
ifire them
to other candidates. The incorrigible portion
,
f ham will retreat to drawing-rooms, gaming-houses, or
gables, scenes more adopted to their acquirements and
tastes. Representatives of the people they never were, nor
atilt they hereafter pretend to be. In the destruction of the

close borough system, therefore, we say, as a reply to the
Duke of Wellington, that the people of England, who
have a respect for monarchy aitd who love their King,
oil! be s'ecfire of shell a controtil over the AdminiStratibn
as must greatly improve, and therefore strengthen, their
" monarchical goverihnent ;" and, in ansiver to the
borough, ailvo .aces in the House of Commons, we assert,—
~ .1.. :That I;nct4 of siirth 7ind ability will be sought after by, the
•o h'. to b:tiicircounsellors and the protectors of their rights
.1 Parliament, with as much diligence and success as they now
are by patron-lords; for purposes far less respectable.
tt. That imbecile and insignificant coxcombs, who have hi-
therto been accustomed to fall asleep ott the baosbenches, or
employed to cough and tsrottly tio,rn men of such eminence as the
Lord of Scotland, for speaking wisdom, which they
ttyrl.':(l not comprehend, will be extinct for ever.
3. That the steerage standard of ability and character, as well
as independence, in the House of Commons, will be raised be-
yond all comparison with preceding times.
4. That the highest Aristocracy themselves be diiVen to a
more uniform and manly eultivatiohiff their inteilcatial powers;
and to a morc ett,t't Wstv%-ance of those severer laws of decency
ann Pa tae \althea's:lt a becoMing regard to which it IS happily
piASible for any man in an enlightened rontmunity to enjoy re--
spect or confidence. The breaking up of the Aristocratic mono-
poly will thus hate the ordinary good effect of intprsoving the
article -which its Members deal, as a political portion of the
coinmonwealtff
We have next to consider a few of the leading prin-
ciples of that representative system which is to be substi-
tuted for the corrupt and oppressive dominion of the
boroughs, and to see how far it me, its the 'aide of " revo.
lutionary," in. the. twits'twits''in which that term has been ap-
pliSa: 16 it by those who, for lack of argument, betake
themselves to nicknames. The country has for years com-
plained, not merely that places without inhabitants—that
stone walls and green sods—had the privilege of sending
Nleinbers to Parliament, but that great towns containing
hundreds of thousands, of the most industrious, affluent,
and instructed population of the empire, had no means of
access to the House of Commons except through peti-
tions, brought, perhaps, under the notice of the House by
the compassion of Hon. Gentlemen who sat for some of
the former class of places ;—that, in fact, these vast em-
poria of wealth and greatness had no representatives,
while many individuals in different parts of England, had
each of them from one to five or six representatives of
their own persons, no less empowered under the existing
law to legislate for the whole United Kingdom
than are the Members for Yorkshire or .Middlesex.
We have heard the above grievance frequently and
publicly termed an unconstitutional grievance—odious,
dangerous—tending to the subversions of the monarchy,
from which it estranged such an immense portion of the
most valuable class of Englishmen, as well by depriving
them of the benefits of a free and representative Govern-
ment, as, by permitting others, few and insignificant, as
compared with the inhabitants of even one large town, to
usurp those rights from which the great masses of corn-
mercial population were unjustly, but pertinaciously, ex-
cluded. On the other hand, we never yet heard it insi-
nuated, that they who murmured at the monopoly of re-
presentation enjoyed by the paltry rotten boroughs, or at
the exclusion from every share of it, inflicted on the
powerful manufacturing and trading communities, had
betrayed a revolutionary spirit. So much otherwise,
that the real revolutionary change was that which debarred
the people of England of the ritht of watching over their
own interests, and returning their own Members to Par-
liament, while it transferred that vital power to indivi-
duals who had none but selfish objects to promote, and
who did, in truth, promote such objects, by compelling the
Minister of the day to rob the people for their benefit. There
never was effrontery like that of vilifying a return to the
wholesome principles of the Constitution as if it were a step
towards revolution. The men who sound this parrot-note
must agree with the Duke of Wellington, that there is no
property in England worth preferring but borough pro-
perty, and nothing in the Constitution but Ministerial
power. And what sort of ‘• revolution" is it that they
charge upon the present Bill? A Jacobin one, of course,
—a sans-culotte revolution ! From a set of men who
may, for aught the public or any one but the parties con-
cerned can tell, be composed, in a large proportion of fo-
reign Jews, or Frenchmen, Portuguese, Russians, Nabobs
of the Carnatic, or what you please,—of any people, black,
white, or mulatto, who can muster 50,000/. a piece for
the purchase of places like Gatton or Old Sarum,—from
such strangers to England, or possible enemies, the pro-
posed measure takes away the monstrous privilege of lilting
into high authority over the people of this country 168 le-
gislators : that is to say, it releases us from the gripe of
that number of domestic tyrants, not responsible to the
nation, but to a power having no sympathy with the na-
tion, for the mode in which their enormous prerogatives
may be exercised. Is that a revolution which Englishmen
have just reason to dread ? What next ? The same measure
which strips the unallowed plunderer of his_ spoils, restores
them to the rightful owner. It gives to the people that
which they ought long since to have enjoyed,—the power of
choosing their own representatives, instead of being preyed
upon soil tormented by those whom they never would
hare chosen. And to what orders or bodies of the popu-
lation dots this jacebinical Reform extend the right
of electing their own Members ? To their paupers ? the
day labourers? frame-breakers? barn-burners? No such
thing—the substantial yeomanry throughout England
the copyholders of 101. per annum and upwards, hitherto
excluded by a contemptible fiction from the same benefits
which 40s. freeholders and pot-wollopers, not worth
O. in the world had already possessed for ages ; the
leaseholders for 21 years, paying 501. per annum rent
and upwards,—such are the sans culottes about to trample
on church and state, and lass' and liberty, and to realize iu
slang gibberish " the horrors of a French revolution !"
Why, if ever there was devised by statesman a measure con-
serrative and protective,—a measure by which property iu
its most wholesome, extensive, legitimate, and least invidious
forms, could be said to have the reins of government placed
in its own grasp ;—if ever there existed a scheme of
policy, by which whatever is most fixed And stable in so-
ciety was trebly armed against all that is irregular and
loose, that scheme has been exhihited ha the present Bill
of Reform. What ! when 500,000 men of property, en-
titlirg them to all the rights and respect of citizens, have
been heretofore outcasts from the Constitution, and are
now drawn within its more hospitable precincts, are we
to be told that the law which works this all-hut-miracle of
beneficence, is one rather of risk than of preservation ?
Is there no comfort in the assurance that we have half a
million more of brave, intelligent, and high-spirited bre-
thren, co-operating with us for the common security and
la pose ? The towns, including the eight new votes fir
the immediate vicinage of the metropolis, obtain an addi-
tion of 42 representatives. The counties balance it by an
augmentation of 55. But the landed interest, thus re-
inforced in the counties, has lost, in a yet wider proportion
by the extinction of the 168 borough votes, of which per-
haps three-fourths, at least, may be considered as apper-
taining to the same landed interest. And here a fair
reply suggests itself to the dexterous imputations of Mr.
Croker as to the apparently unequal manner in which the
elective right has been distributed by the plan of Lord
John Russell. " Halifax, Huddersfield, and some other
places," says the Right Hon. Gentleman, " are not to have
more than one representative allowed them, while towns
of inferior population are to retain both their Members."
True; boroughs of certain population having Members
are still permitted to retain them, because the Government
does not meddle with rights of any description beyond the
necessity of the case. If the question lay between Halifax
and Tavistock, which should for the first time ob-
tain two representatives, Mr. Croker's rule might then
be not unreasonably applied. On the same principle it is
that potwallopers are suffered every where to enjoy during
life their present franchises, although of a class of men the
least qualified to discharge a public trust with judgment,
integrity, or advantage. For ourselves we heartily re-
joice to have seen this day, wherein a Government selected
under the old vicious system has had courage and wisdom
to prepare for the country a redress so absolute, of so many
grievances, and a vigorous restorative and renovative for such
a mass of diversified decay. When Mr. Pitt proposed his
plans of Reform, he, too, was called a revolutionist ; when
Mr. Burke proposed his economical Reform, there were
those who charged him with a design to obstruct the move-
ments of " this Monarchical Government." When the
Test Act was repeatedly sought to be repealed, " it was a
step towards revolution." The relief of Catholics from
their civil disabilities was an overthrow of our invaluable
Constitution." The Test Act repealed, is no longer
thought of but with ridicule, and Catholic emancipation
has already saved Ireland front the clutches of real revolts
tionists. Yet shall we never cease to hear amendments
the most obvious to common sense, thus turned into bug-
bears by hypocrites or fools. Our cry is,—Concede !
Reform ! while the people are still disposed to receive con-
evasions with good-will and appreciate their advantages
with reason and temper. Wsit till the passions are excited
by obstinate inattention to their petitions and contemp-
tuous disregard of their claims, and then concession, how-
ever liberal, Reform, however extensive, will, alas, be toe
Isle ! Those who deny justice are the real authors of all
revolutions.—Times.

The course of each night's debate convinces us
that the cause of Reform is advancing, and must
finally triumph. All those Members who are not
prepared to encounter the shame of useless and con-
victed selfishness, or who do not aspire to the
honours of stultification for conscience sake, admit
the necessity of moderate Reform. In which class
will the Ex-Secretary of the Admiralty choose that
we should place him ? Truth and courtesy to the
Right HON. Gentleman compel us to include him

in the first : he is cunning, rather than wise, in his
genetation ; he perfectly know, the value of the
cuttom of 80 at Aldebutgh," and of the general
pi oprietary borough interests of his patron ; he is
most critical, arithmetical, and personal. No one can
say that he deals unfairly by others, fur he judges of
thein by hithself. Had it been his tusk, as the
Member of a Government that had pledged itself to
Reform, to contrive the plan, and to adopt the prin-
ciple, he would at once have said, before he gave
his assent, or lent his ingenious hand to the comple-
tion, " It is all rely well, but how will this plan
affect the patron of Aldeburgh ?" It is not am-
Pr.sing, the refore, lit! should firmly ktlieve that the
applictition of the two great principles of population
and property, upon Which the plats of liefolin now
under di•cuSsion rest, was fettered and regulated
by consideration for the inter. stn of the Marquis
of Lansdowne and Lord Fitz\villitm, but so does not
any sensible and impartial person in England. The
objections made by Mr. Croktr to the arithmetic
of the Bill are of no weight. It was quite necessary when
rinr:e the principles of property and population had been
assumed as the basis of qualification for electors, that
some sum should be taken to regulate the one, and some
number to detertnine the other ; but certainly it seas im-
possible to fix either the one or the other with equal fit-
ness for all localities. There are, unquestionably, many
honest friends to Reform who would have preferred a
higher qualification, but the practice of large bodies of
electors already inherent in representation for counties,
and in some populous places, would have made a less ex-
tended right of voting unpalatable to the middling classes,
in compliance with whose petitions, and on whose just
demand, it is proposed to reform the abuses in our present
system of representation. It is somewhat singular th
the opponents of Parliamentary Reform, who proclaim
themselves to be the household troops of the Monarchy,
should treat Monarchy as if it began and ended in the
House of Commons. This plan of Reform, they say, is a
change in the Constitution ; i. c. the Constitution does
not consist of King, Lords, and Commons, but of the great
varieties of franchises and rights of election, under
which the Members now sit in the House of Commons.
Touch any of these franchises or rights, and away go
the King and the House of Lards. This is the dictum
of the ex-Secretary to the Admiralty. Wo will yield to
no one in love for the Constitutional Monarchy of England,
but we do not believe that the beautiful system of social
compensations, by which the isterests of the several orders
are maintained is regular and accordant movement, de-
pends upon the obstinate maintenance of the abuses of cor-
porations, or of burgege, tenures. As soon could we be-
lieve that the true adtneasurement of time by one of Bar-
ratters best chronometers was cause I by an accidental flaw
on the dial plate. In our opinion the English Constitu-
tion owes its pre-eminence to the due distribution of po-
litical power among the orders of the State. The King
has prerogative ample to render the Executive authority
efficient for all good, but powerless for all evil. The
House of Lords possess property enough to make their he-
reditary privileges, as Members of the Legislature, almost
a necessary consequence of their property ; and no circutn-
stance can shake the general confidence and respect to-
wards their body, except an obstinate adherence to an
illegal and direct interference, however ancient the prac-
tised abuse, with. the rights of the people to choose their
own representatives. Wealth, when united to hereditary
rank and knowledge, will not fail to bestow influence in
England. We are a monarchical and an aristocratical
people, but we are not to he talked out of our rights, or
into an adoration of abuses, benefitting a few individuals, at
the sacrifice of our national reputation for good sense, by
the well-turned common-places of dexterous debater:, or
the arithmetical sophistry of the most ingenious poli-
tical partisan. This is not the first time that fault has
been found with the system of representation in Parlia-
ment; this year is not the first time fault has been found
with the delays and expenees of the Court of Chancery ;
it was not for the first time, some three years since, tint
a Reform was called for in our Crimiud Law ; it was not
for the first time, in the year 1529, that Catholic exclu••
sion had been complained of;—no ; all these had been of
long standing, but they never could be remedied unless by
the King's Government. We indeed feel that it required
no ordinary energy, no ordinary disinterestedness, to un-
dertake the great work of Parliamentary Reform. Par-
liamentary support was certain in the Reforms proposed in
other branches of the Administration ; few Parliamentary
interests were affected by those plans of emendation ; but
in the present measure the Minister of the Crown knew
that every step they incurred the risk of alienating per-
sonal friends ; that therefore they had nothing to do but
to go straightforward to their great object, the satisfaction
of the people of England. Let time be given, and we are
certain that the opponents of Reform will be driven from
resistance—not by the clamours nor the threats of physical
force, but the unanimous and resolute expression of the
national wish—an expression that we predict will net fail
to carry conviction to the mind of Sir Robert Peel, and of
all others whose abilities call them to direct and watch
over the public weal.—Morning Herald.

SECOND EDITION.

SUN OFFICE, Seven a' Clock.

DI PERI A I'A It LI All ENT

THIS EVENING.

HOUSE OF COMMONS.

The SPEAKEK took the Chair precisely at Three o'clock,
at which time the gallery was more crowded, if possible,
than on any former night during the debate on the mea-
sure of Heforin. Indeed so great was the crush that it
was found necessary to lock all the doors leading to the
gallery, and it was with the greatest difficulty that
gentlemen connected with the Press could obtain ingress
or egress. The seats in the body of the House were as on
the former evenings all labelled with the names of the
Members.