The Sun.
London, England, 1849-01-12 00:00:00

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.

FROM THE MORNING PAPERS OF THIS DAY.
TIMES.—Mr. Cobden has given us one of his best
speeches. It is superfluous to praise what everybody
will read with pleasure, and with the agreeable convic-
tion that he is learning a good deal of truth in a very
lucid form. We will not, therefore, repeat what we
have often said before as to the masterly way in which
Mr. Cobden manages his subject when he is once
mounted on the box with the reins in his hands. What
we have to say refers rather to the matter than to the
man. The seven years' agitation which Mr. Cobden, aided
by the elements and Sir Robert Peel, brought to so
triumphant an issue was against an Act of Parliament.
It was rather a siege than a campaign. It all pointed to
a vote once for all in the Legislature. The corn-laws
having been repealed, the field•marshal laid down his
baton. In the present instance it is not a statute, or a
vote, but the mind of the nation that is to be changed.
The British people are to be made not only peace-
able, but determined to prefer peace to glory, influ-
ence, and power; and they are also to learn the policy
which will keep them out of quarrels; they are to be-
come humble and meek, disposed to put up with trifling
affronts, and not quick to avenge an injured neighbour;
they are to select and prefer the particular statesmen
likely to carry out their pacific intentions; they are to
forego some other important considerations out of re-
gard to this special point. Such, and more, is the alte-
, ration to be effected in the national habits. A work of
this extensive and ethical character is not to be accom-
plished by Ayes and Noes, and "La .Reine le vent." It
is a matter of time, anl requires other agency than
meetings and a league. We do not for a moment deny
that Mr. Cobden appreciates the peculiar difficulties of
his task. On the contrary, he has gone very largely into
the question of national interventions, and the mischievous
itch for meddling and mixing with our neighbours' affairs.
He has also laboured very hard to give the subject that
concentration which existed of itself in the last financial
contest, by referring us to the particular votes which
determine the number of our soldiers and sailors,
and thus, as he says, govern all the other military
and naval expenditure. With the masses in his favour
Mr. Cobden prefers a pitched battle to a war of ma-
noeuvres or a guerilla campaign. So he sets about
settling the day and the occasion on which he will force
the enemy to give battle. " Let it be on the vote for the
numerical strength of the army. We will fall back on
1835. Take the number which was then found sufficient.
All the rest will follow." We admire the bold and sim-
ple strategy of this course, which is quite of a piece with
Mr. Cobden's character; and if he succeed, we believe we
have pointed out the secret of his success. But we must
express a misgiving that the victory will not be perfect
and final. It is easier to destroy than to construct—to
rase a city to the ground than to reform its inhabitants.
Let us suppose that Mr. Cobden-makes such good use of
his time between this and 1850 as to carry the
budget of 1835. There'will then be a great disbanding
of regiments, reducing of complements, putting ships
out of commission, and officers on half-pay, shutting up
of dockyards, selling of stores, emigration of ship-
wrights, decay of Devonport and Portsmouth, remon-
strances of the United Service Gazette, dis-
affection at Cheltenham and Bath, and widely received
prophecies of national ruin. In the midst of the general
wreck there will be economical banquets in free-trade
halls, a pacific tea party in our own Exeter-hall, and a
testimonial to Mr. Robertson Gladstone, for want of a
better. In the course of the ensuing twelvemonth, the
Foreign Secretary of the day, encouraged by numerous
precedents of comparative immunity, interferes in the
private arrangements of some King or Queen so far as
not merely to get his Ambassador kicked out, or his
Minister told by a gentleman from St. Petersburgh to
mind what he is about, but goes a step further, or re-
ceives even more brusque or contemptuous treatment.
In fine, let a shot be fired—let an Englishman be
killed, by some despotic hand. Immediately the
tire will break forth. In a few weeks or a few days
there will be a collision ;—either a brilliant vie-
tory, or a stinging defeat. It cannot be forgotten
how often a long war has been entered upon with a
very short notice. In case of such an event, the people
of this country will give themselves little concern about
the rights of the question. They will at once decide to
refuse amends or to demand reprisals, accordingly as we
have acted on the aggressive or defensive. There will
be war till we are tired out; and if so, we need not say
that there will also be soldiers and sailors, to any num-
ber required, and at any expense. There are, however,
the exciting as well as the predisposing causes to
be taken into account. If there is such a magazine of
passion in this country, as the experience of many ages
would lead us to expect, the probability of war depends
on the chance of provocation. On this we differ from
Mr. Cobden Coto ceelo. He says there is revolution in
Europe, but not war. We reply that there have been
two wars—the invasion of Schleswig-Holstein by
the Prussians and their German allies, and the
invasion of the Austrian empire by the King of
Sardinia and his Italian allies. But there has also
been a war of nationalities, not less contagious,
between the Magyars and the Sclayonians, as well as
between Naples and Sicily. Every one of these incidents
has threatened what remains of the European settlements
of 1814 and 1815, which one at least of the contracting
parties professes itself bound to maintain. It will un

Cloubtedly do so with a very good he;;t.- Mr. Cobden
views all these events with a political bias, and ignores
their tendency to disturb the tranquillity of Europe.
We are sorry to say that we cannot trust either the as-
pect of Europe or the condition of France, or the good
sense or good temper of our own people at home. In
the abstract, of course, all people wish for peace; but
they do not pursue it with perseverance or preserve it
with care. When Canning sent 5,000 men to establish
a constitutional sovereign at Lisbon, when some thousand
men and half a million of money were sent to Spain to
back up Christina and her daughter against Don Carlos,
when Codrington, to the annoyance and perplexity
of his Government, destroyed the Turko-Egyptian
fleet at Navarino, when a British fleet hovered
on the coast of Holland to compel its King to
renounce halt his kingdom, when Napier blew up Acre
and transferred Syria from Mehemet Ali to the Turks,
when Affghanistan was invaded and subsequently chas-
tised, the British public left the rights of the several
questions alone, and indulged in all the pleasurable
emotions of power and success which such feats were
likely to inspire. It would be so again to-morrow. But
what is still more important, even in cold blood the Bri-
tish people are not so devoted to peace as to prepare for
it beforehand. They choose their representatives and
their Governments for other reasons; and when a Par-
liament is once assembled, and a Cabinet once installed,
the question is taken out of the hands of the people.
Mr. Cobden himself would not vote for a pacific Protec-
tionist to the exclusion of a bellicose Free-trader.
Mr Bright would not vote for a warm Churchman
known fur his peaceful and economical inclinations, if
the rival candidate was a Liberal Dissenter. In fact, the
British people do not care for peace more than for any-
thing else. They desire triumph and glory, commercial
ascendancy, and undisputed possession, even more than
peace ; and till Mr. Cobden effects a change in their
natures, he must leave them the means of carrying on war.
HERALD.—Mr. Cobden deserves infinite credit. His
coolness is not to be surpassed. Free trade, as the thing
is called, has proved a dead failure; prophecies of plenty
have degenerated into the merest moonshine; employ-
ment has not been easier to find, and more profitable
when secured; exports have by no means kept on a level
with imports; the West Indian colonies rejoice in no-
thing but stagnation, idleness, and want; quartern loaves
have not been procured for the asking; disaster, in fine,
' has accompanied every step taken in the direction re-
commended by the Member for the West Riding ; yet
the Honourable Gentleman once more presents himself
on the platform, takes off his great coat, and proceeds
to harangue the discriminating multitude with all the
audacity of success, and without thinking it in the slight-
est degree necessary to refer to his doings in the past,
by way of securing confidence and respect for the future.
Mr. Cobden is modest. He evidently wishes bygones
to be bygones. Ile would rather talk of reducing our
expenditure in the time to come than of the reduction
which had taken place in our income in time past. He
prefers applause for his magnificent promises to groans for
his miserable performances. It is far more agreeable to
animate the hopes of an auditory than to confront its
despair. He is aware of the national pride, and knowing
how painful and humiliating it is to the best of us to
retrace a false step, he is eternally for going on.
Hence, whilst in 1846 he was for simply repealing the
corn-laws, which he told us would amount to a national
redemption from all anxiety and trouble, he is now for
striking off at once, and without inquiry, say
10,000,0001. in our army and navy estimates, with
the best disposition to go striking off more and
more as often as it may be found necessary to
push ahead in order to prevent his victims from ever
Looking back. Mr. Cobden confessed as much on Wed-
nesday night.: He would never be quiet, he said, until
he had got rid of this 10,000,0001. " Ile did not say he
would stop there.—(Cheers.) That was the least they
intended to do, and it was something worth the struggle;
but he repeated he would not stop there."—(Cheers.)
The more Mr. Cobden won't stop the more he is cheered.
How significant is the applause! What a key it affords
to the whole secret of the demagogue's influence and
strength! The gentlemen who followed the Member for
the West Riding " did not say they would stop there"
either. Mr. Milner Gibson, for instance, is not content
with cutting off the 10,000,0001. to begin with. Mr.
Bright, with a very keen eye to the main
chance—peculiar, perhaps, to his cloth—heartily
approved of all the propositions of his
friends, and in the form of
_a resolution