The Sun.
London, England, 1836-10-29 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

There are, as Mr. Gisborne happily observed, few
disinterested Tories. They who produce the wealth
of this great and powerful community are, with few
exceptions, Reformers ; while they who seek to obtain
a disproportionate share of the wealth so produced, by
access to the public purse, are, with equally few ex-
ceptions, Tories. In this country, and the immense
colonies belonging to it, the amount of public pro-
perty—that is, property withdrawn from the producers,
and et the disposal of those who possess political
power—is enormous ; and the great struggle of the
Tories is to prevent the diminution of abusive .expen-
diture, that they may draw from the producing classes
an undue proportion of their savings. The Church,
in the Tory vocabulary, does not mean the assembly of
the faithful, nor even the men who celebrate religious
worship, but the holders of all that is not appropriated
towards the maintenance of the working clergy. The
tithe is a proportion of the produce of the soil. The
Tory would willingly contribute his own tenth, to
obtain, in the shape of a rich Church prize for his son
or other relative, the tenth of the produce of all the
rest of the parish. The poor working clergy are intimi-
dated by the rich pluralists and sinecurists ; and hence,
from 1830 down to this day, nine-tenths of the clergy
have been oppose 4 to the reform of the representa-
tion, and to the reform of all abuses in Church and
State. Hence the connection between Church-blood
and Toryism, so ingeniously pointed out by Mr. Gis-
borne. The Reform constituency, as was truly ob-
served by that Hon. Gentleman, " contained the edu-
cated and the intelligent, the active and the enterpris-
ing, the wealthy and the thriving—every man who was
exerting himself to rise above his station and to in-
crease his means." The Tories are the drones of so-
ciety. Unfortunate:lc the Reform Bill has left open-
ings to them in the tenoutry-at-will voters and the free-
men, and of those openings they have availed them-
selves—they have ploughed with the heifer of the
people. But still, with all their intimidation and cor-
ruption—with all the influence they derive from the
establishment of a clerical canvasser and advocate,
keenly alive to their interests in each parish, the
wealth and intelligence and industry of the country
are more than a match for them. In all places where
public opinion can display itself the Tories have lost
ground. It is p•erfectly well understood that the
Tories are eager te return to power, but are de•
terred by their knowle3ge that they have•everywhere
been beat in the Registra:ion Courts. Every addition
to popular privileges has redounded to their detriment.
The Municipal Corporation Reform added to the
power of Reformers. The opening charitable trusts
has also given great additional power to the Reformers.
They know that a general election, even with Sir Ro-
bert again in power, would deteriorate their condition.
They have made the most of every little circumstaneo,
such as the discontent of the small shop-keepers, in
consequence of the removal of the poor to union work-
houses ; but still the public voice throughout the na-
tion is against them. The Times has with shameless
effrontery poisoned the stream of information in order
to frighten the timid, and mislead and perplex the
weak ; but in spite of all the truth will out, that the
Reformers are everywhere triumphant. A distinguished
correspondent, who pays a compliment to the Times
which that paper will know how to appreciate, because
,it must enhance the value of its services in the eyes of
its patrons, observes, with regard to " the deliberate
system and uniformity of nus- statement which now
pervades the whole of that journal," that the
" Misrepresentation is not confined to any single portion
of the paper. From the leading article to the police re-
ports, it reigns throughout. By an ingenious consistency
in slander, facts reported in one part are made to corres-
pond with assertions advanced in another. Reports of
public meetings are not only partially stated, they are so
perverted as to seem to confirm the calumnies uttered in
the leading article. This system of supporting slander by
forging facts is probably adopted for two purposes ; first,
to mislead the Crown ; secondly, to mislead a number of
indifferent politicians who read the Times from habit, or for
convenience, rather than from inclination. A single false-
hood might not succeed. It is hoped that masses of them
will."

But great as the merit of the Times may have been
in the contrivance and execution of this iniquitous sys-
tem of misrepresentation, the people see through the
arts by which it is attempted to hoodwink them ; and
the sagacity of the higher quarter, equally aimed at,
will. it is hoped, be equally proof against the attempts
to mislead. The Tories, we know, are fully aware of
the strength derived by the people from their exclusion
from power, and fain would they again have their
fingers in the public purse. But the people are not
less aware of the complete victory which a little longer
perseverance will give them. The foundation of Tory
domination is undermined.—Morning Chronicle.
We recur to the subject of the difficulties with
wk eli IVlinisters are surrounded. We cannot too
earnestly impress on the people of England, that the
perilous position in which the Government of Lord
Melbourne is at present placed, chiefly arises from the
extraordinary apathy with which the friends of his
Lordship regard that Government. Let us not be
misunderstood. We do not mean apathy as respects
attachment to his Lordship's Administration—the
people of England are in heart most devotedly attached
to that Administration. But the apathy we speak of
has reference to the inactivity which the country is
manifesting at a time when their enemies, and the ene-
mies of the existing Government, are combining their
forces in all quarters, previous to one grand endeavour
to scatter that Government to the winds of heaven.
The apathy which the people of England are, in ap-
pearance, just now evincing towards the fate of the
Melbourne Ministry, is surprising in the highest de-
gree. It is, indeed, unaccountable. Experience has
taught the nation that Lord Melbourne's Govern-
ment is the-best which has ruled the destinies of the
empire for a long series of years. Nor is it possible
that the least reflecting portion of our countrymen can
be ignorant of the fact, that the overthrow of the exist-
ing Administration will, should such an event unhap-
pily occur, inevitably be accompanied by the return of
the Tories to power. The consequences of a repos-
session of the reins of Government by that faction, at
such a crisis as the present, it were frightful to con-
template. It is in the apparent indifference—for it is,
we repeat, apparent, not real—of the people, to the
circumstances in which the Ministry of Lord Mel-
bourne are just now placed, that the Tories ground
their hopes of ejecting that Ministry from office, and
stepping themselves into their vacant places. The
Tcries make no secret of this—they boast of it at all
their country dinners, for their usual prudence then
forsakes them—thus verifying the old adage, that
I, when the wine's in the wit's out." They taunt us
with it on every such occasion that presents itself.
It is deeply to be regretted they can do so with so much
justice. We reproach Lord Melbourne with not pro-
ceeding farther and faster. The censure is unjust. He is'
not to blame for the slowness with which his Govern-
ment pursues an onward course. The people themselves
—we must tell the truth, however unpalatable it may be—
the people themselves are his greatest impediments. It
is true, they interpose no positive obstacles to those
great reforms which are essential to the well-being awl
.i.fety of the empire—that is the peculiar vocationof
the Conservative Peers—but they, to wit, the people
of England, act as a drag-chain on the wheels of Lord
Melbourne's Government, by the practical apathy they
evin;..e in its fortunes. His Lordship has, in fact,
more ca7lse of complaint against his ownr friends than
lie has agajnst the Tories themselves. They are his
open enemies--their hostility is as undisguised as it
is inveterate. go far, therefore, he is not taken by sur-
prise. The indifference of his friends, however, does
take him by surprise, and must, of necessity, do much
;nore to dishearten him, and to paralyse his exer-
tions for the public good, than the bitter and unre -
Mtting enmity of his sworn foes, the Tories. Be
had a right to expect that the people would have
allied round him, and manifested an increasing
• c for ids Administration in proportion to the
.rowing hostility of the Tories to it. So far from
this,` he is left to fight the people's battles single-
handed, and then, when discomfited, is reproached for
his defeat. This ought not to be. Not only are we,
by our supineness, putting weapons into the hands of
our enemies to be used against ourselves, but we are
acting unjustly and ungenerously towards Lord Mel-
bourne personally. Who put him into office ? Who
raised him to the high station he fills in the councils of

the King ? The people. Then it is clear as the me-
ridian splendour of a summer sun, that we ought to do
everything in our power to keep him there. To stand
silently and inactively by while we see the most stre-
nuous efforts making by the Tory faction to hurl him
from his.high eminence, is unworthy of a great nation.
We are bound, no less by considerations of justice to
him than by a regard to our own best interests, to
make common cause with the Noble. Lord against the
common foe. If he is to fall let him have the satis-
faction of reflecting that be fails with the people of
England. What it behoves the Reformers at this
moment to do is, boldly and unequivocally to express
their opinions as to the measures which are called for
in the existing circumstances of the country. Let this
be done by public meetings and strongly worded reso-
lutions in all parts of the kingdom, and not only will
Lord Melbourne be continued in office, but he will
bring forward measures which will meet the views of
the most liberal Reformers. He will do even more than
this : he will carry those measures triumphantly through
Parliament, for the Conservative Peers, with such a
demonstration of public feeling, would no longer dare
to strangle them in their transit through the Upper
House..—Morning Advertiser.