The Sun.
London, England, 1847-11-22 00:00:00

JEWISH DISABILITIES.
(From the Times.)
It will very soon be seen what reception will be
given, in the great council of the nation, to the ver-
dict of its greatest city in the last case of religious
liberty. This question would not be worthily settled
if the decision were otherwise than formal and ex-
plicit, given on a clear understanding and by a candid
vote. We lately published a letter in which it was
argued that the test at present supposed to operate
against the admission of the class in question to the
national councils was never devised with any such
end, and might be evaded without any illegality.
Much of such reasoning may be true, but to pro-
ceed on its suggestions would not be more un-
becoming to the country itself than unacceptable to
that portion of its citizens who were to benefit by
the evasion. Least of all people are the Jews given
to breaches of form or law, and it certainly is not
on this particular occasion that they would transgress
their wonted rules. It is not in claiming the rights
of citizenship that they will, for the first time, neglect
its duties. The case was not thrust upon the court
by clamour, and it is not to be decided by shuffling.
An honest and straightforward sentence of the
House upon the continuance of the religious disabi-
lities of the Jews is the judgment by which the Jews
will abide. They will not avail themselves of the
shabby shelter of a quibble. It is " a grave political
question," and it will not "be unconstitutionally
solved." Our own opinions on this subject are already
known, nor are we greatly apprehensive that they
will be found at variance with those of the nation.
The theory of religious tests in civil affairs has been
so long abandoned, that little need be said to convince
any thoughtful advocate of the opposite system that
the removal of Jewish disabilities is but the consistent
and necessary development of a long established prin-
ciple. We say that the disability now affecting a
Jewish candidate for Parliament is the last of a long
series of similar restrictions, differing in no essential
point from any of those which have successively,
yielded to the suggestions of humanity and the dic-
tates of reason. If, indeed, the particular case of the
Jew had been exempted from all those remissions of
penal rigour which testified the growing enlightenment
of the times ; if the gradual indulgence to the varia-
tions of Protestant churches had never been extended
lo such a creed as his; if the idea had never been
abandoned that Christianity could only be becom-
ingly professed by the exclusion of a Jew from the
social community ; if he were still confined to his
Jewry, stigmatised in his costume, oppressed by
special enactments, and proscribed by universal con-
sent, then it could be easily understood that his
opinions should be still held destructive of his civil
rights, even though such a persuasion had been ex-
ploded in all other cases of heterodoxy. Nay, if the
abolition of all these substantial penalties had merely
been a concession to the instincts of humanity—if,
while civilised Britain extinguished such barbarous
badges of Judaism, Christian Britain still shrank
from all social contact with the Jew, then would his
disabilities be consistently supported. But when the
spirit of the age has involuntarily and insensibly
become such that not the smallest repulsion is in-
dicated between the citizens of the two creeds,
—when the followers of the proscribed faith
are employed in all the common duties of citizen-
ship, and confessed to be exemplary in the discharge
of them—when they take not only equal, but ex-
traordinary rank in the social scale—when they are
admitted to acquisitions of influence and offices of
trust, how can they be consistently visited with a
Ctisability based only on assumptions which are thus
practically exploded ? A Jew can only be reason-
ably excluded from Parliament on account of his
misbelief, or on account of opinions dangerous to
the commonwealth. The latter cause will not be
alleged, since the political demeanour of the Jew is
allowed to be beyond exception. If the former
cause holds good in this case it holds good in every
other. If the Jew is to be visited for the sins of
his fathers with any civil incapacity, he should be
visited with all, short of those examples of active
persecution Ilia humanity forbids. It is impossible
that a man who conscientiously votes agai,st the
admission of a Jew to Parliament can conscien-
tiously hold any but necessary dealings with him
in any other transaction. Persecute him he may
not, but avoid him he must. As- regards the re-
ligious bearings of the question, he can only justify a
vote of exclusion on this particular point by a con-
tinuous expre-sion of his convictions in all other
actions of life—by a return, in fact, to that general
deportment towards Jews which has been abolished
by the operation of the surest and most unexception-
able agents. Nature and reason have insensibly de-
cided the point, and their judgment may be read in
the daily events of life. As regards the political
bearings of the question, nothing is even likely to be
urged requiring a reply, though objections against
" aliens" have certainly been suggested, and in those
particular gainers, too, where the system which
enabled a Mussulman nabob to buy his seats in the,
House of Commons found its boldest defenders
The most plausible argument alleged against the
impending decision is, that, inasmuch as it will
amount to a national negation of Christianity, it must
most seriously injure the prospects of national
; that it comes as a conclusive sin upon repeated
errors ; that it finally destroys our character of a
Christian kingdom which we had hitherto retained,
and removes the last barrier which might have been
opposed to national indifference or infidelity. It is
said that the exaction of even a nominal conformity
is something, and can only be dispensed with at a
great cost of credit and consequences. Such argu-
ments are serious indeed. We admit they would
decide the question, if sound, and they demand,
therefore, a careful consideration. It is not disguised
that they apply with more or less force to all the
questions previously raised and decided on cases of
religious liberty. It is admitted that "much has been
lost" by the abolition of other tests of conformity
somewhat less momentous than this. The force of
the argument, therefore, must depend upon the postu-
late, that a remission of such kind of tests entails a
certain peril upon the religion they protected, and
implies a certain indifference in its protectors. A
succession of such acts should consequently have
issued in the degradation of the authority and in-
fluence of the established faith, and in the apostacy or
latitudinarianism of its votaries. Religion should
have flourished nobly while tests abounded, and
should decline when they were removed. Now, take
the testimony of two characteristic periods to the
truth of the proposition. In 1752 the City of London
presented a most vehement petition against such an
emancipation of the Jews as Mr. Pelham proposed to
grant; the whole country was in an uproar against
such an outrage upon their faith ; and the prospect
of little less than a religious insurrection compelled
the Ministry to withdraw their plan. In 1847 the
City of London elect a Jew for their representative,
and the nation remains passive under the instigations
of those who recommend a similar demonstration.
Steadfast faith was, therefore, the characteristic of
1752, and indifference is that of 1847. Now, is
there one among the thousand readers of these
columns, in the smallest degree acquainted with
the history of the country, who does not know that
the very contrary is the fact? As much religious
spirit could not have been then collected from the
province of Canterbury as is now manifested in every
county town. Nor are we speaking of those erratic
or irregular impulses which may lee reputed as in-
volving no great gain. We say that such a spirit as
Hooker illustrated and Andrewes taughris inconceiv-
ably more rife and active now than it was at any of
those former times. While the Church of England
was receiving the presumed support of these protec-
tive tests—while a crushing interdict lay on the most
excusable phases of nonconformity—while the mob
were permitted to burn meeting-houses and harry
priests, the most deplorable abasement of spirit and
practice pervaded every department of her ministry,
and every portion of the people. Cathedrals went to
ruin, while chapters pocketed the funds ; parish
churches were seldom water-tight, and con-
gregations were nominal; the most open in-
fidelity was professed by the upper classes,
Tiling in the Hellfire Club and culminat-
ing at Medenham Abbey ; nor did anything
but a most exemplary Court under George 111. save
.113 frolla worse morality than that of France. And
now, after all the successive concessions have been
made t;?.4,re.e.ligionuesecreedom, what is the result ? Ren-
o-we are"me`"urue
one We will only shortly state what
in. deny,and that
.between the land-
ing of William
there was no iseesaa in the accession of George IV.
degree comparable to the
present for the sinceritayen,xyeertension, and activity of
religious spirit, for tlse
tc-Tess influence, and au-
thority of the church, for Fineral decency of
morals, and the unmistakablemanifestations
moat of faith.
It is matter of history that the
are not incompatible with the grossest° rigorous tests
utmost laxity of discipline, and the most ufittedelihty, the
ness of spirit. It is matter of experience that their
remission is compatible with sincere conviction
awakened energies ; with undiminished faith and
laborious works. And, if this be thecs, may
we
not be justified in concluding that religious
improve-
ment may go hand in hand with enlightened tolera-
tion ?

(From the Observer.)
So much has been said and written on the pro-
priety of admitting the Jews to an equal participa-
tion in the rights of citizenship, that we should
scarcely dwell on the subject, which, though it oc-
cupies a considerable space in the columns of the
Morning IIral(l and the Standard, does not suffi-
ciently attract the notice of the public at large. This
indifference (in the part of the English people is
sufficiently significant of their opinions and feelings
on the subject, and demonstrates that we could no
more
get •up a Lord George Gordon riot at the pre•
sent day than we could an auto da fe at Smithfield.
Persec • ution for conscience sake is no longer possible,
;nor its corrollary, exclusion from public olhces of
trust And honour. Let the opponents to the achnis-