The Sun.
London, England, 1840-09-12 00:00:00

partially from opposite parties. A coalition at present
would be regarded by the country—and justly
so regarded—as an attempt to restore this mo-
nopoly of the close Corporation of red tapists
and practical statesmen, and thus deprive us of the
greatest benefit that we owe to the Reform Bill."
,
To have got rid of the routine class of statesmen
is an inestimable benefit. It forces those who
would obtain power to ponder deeply over events,
and it compels the people to apply a very different
test to the conduct of statesmen than the catch-
words of party. The substitution is of things for
names. The old routine being at an end, both
statesmen and the public must look to prin-
ciples for their guides. With routine, of course,
prescription is at an end ; and every politician is
obliged now to give a better reason for his conduct
than that he is following the steps of his prede-
cessor.

But what are the principles which are to be sub-
stituted for routine ? The Standard is for cor-
recting every institution by a religious test, and,
according to it, every measure is good or evil as it
bolsters up the dominant Church, or places all:
religions on a complete equality before the law.
Every human affection, every earthly interest,
every political, civil, and natural right is, according
to the Standard, to be trampled under foot to res-
cue the ascendancy of the Law-Church. We need
not inform our readers that on this point we totally
differ from the Standard. It is under this aspect,
too, especially worthy of notice that the routine
red tapists, the practical statesmen of whom the
Standard has now such an abhorrence, acted on
the very principle of the Standard. Their test of
all measures was the security of the Church, and
the illustrious warrior who first and most widely de-
parted from the red tape routine left it to emanci-
pate the Catholics, That single fact is sufficient to
prove that the principle of the Standard cannot now
by any possibility be acted on, and that both politi-
cians and the public must look beyond the Church
for the light that is to guide their steps.
The Standard is ready to adopt the principles
of the Constitution of 1688, which, for a Tory
and a Divine-right journal, is most marvellous.
It is deceived by its own phrases. The Constitu-
tion of 1688 nominally asserted the supremacy of
Protestantism over the Papacy ; really, it asserted
the principle of the supremacy of the people over
the throne, of the public welfare over the esta-
blished institutions of the country. It asserted
the principle of freedom of religion, in opposition
to a would-be dominant sect; and established the
right of private judgment in defiance of the autho-
rity of an infallible Church, and the Divine right
of Kings. It set up the Protestant Church al.ove
the Papal, because the latter was then the tyl- ant,
and the former struggling for freedom. Now the
Protestant Church has changed places with We
Papal Church. It claims an infallibility, e:id
it insists on political regulations being all
framed to secure power and wealth for it. The
Roman Catholics are now treated by it as it
treated the Papists. It is, in fact, a new Papacy,
without the sanction of either tradition or prescrip-
tion. The nominal principle, therefore, of the
Constitution of 1688—the ascendancy of the Pro-
testant Church—will no longer serve the purposes
of statesmen. It was the routine principle of the
red tapists till 1829. Without entering at the end
of an article into an investigation of what principles
statesmen ought to follow, it must suffice at present
to assert, with the Standard, that prescription is at
an end ; and he will be the most successful states-
man who discards the routine of his predecessors,
and frames his policy on the principles of justice
from an enlightened anticipation of the future. The
laws he makes, the poJcy he pursues, are not to in-
fluence the past. which has escaped beyond tire
power of man, but the future ; and he must look
chiefly to that, unknown though it be, to guide his
present conduct.

We give in another part of The Sun, a report
of a meeting, from an Edinburgh paper, for the
purpose of showing the tyrannical conduct of the
modern Pharisees—the Agnewites, towards the
poor, and at the same time to express our delight
at the returning good sense of the Scotch people.
The Church functionaries of the largest parish in
Edinburgh, St. Cuthbert's, or the West Kirk, had
adopted a resolution prohibiting all funerals within
their bounds during Sunday, on the plea, no
doubt, that the burial of the dead was not an act of
necessity, and that the Divine displeasure would be
incurred by returning to our mother earth the body
of a brother or sister on that day. Shame on the
hypocrites ! This extravagance was insufferable
even for the inhabitants of Edinburgh; the Sabbath
men bent the bow till it broke, and a large meeting
assembled, on Tuesday last, to testify by their
resolutions, that, come what may, they will
not be tyrannised over by men more fit for
Beci',lam than a Church Court. The chairman,
Sir JOIN GKAHAM DALYELL, properly de-
scribed th ose pests of society in these words—
There was a strong disposition in certain quar-
ters to trample on the rights of the poor, and to
arrogate an authority which never belonged to an)
set of men." A journeyman mason also dis-
played much good sense on the occasion, and from
the manner in which he was cheered we begin to
entertain hopes that the working classes in Scot-
land are no longer to be led blindfold by Church-
men who, under the pretext of Divine authority,
but in reality for their own selfish purposes, would
impose on them the most grievous burden that
ever oppressed a Christian people. " They did not
;seem," said he, "to have any idea of
tthe manner in which their regulations af-
fected working men. They were quite
an irresponsible body, and tho only way to get rid
,of their withering, pestifercrus influence, was to
:break up the connexion at once.—(Great ap-
'plause.)" Let us hope for the honour of our
country, and above all for the furtherance of the
.Divine truths of the Christian religion, that the con-
-nexion will be broken, and that, while professing to
be Christians, we shall no longer be scoffed at as
the only real Jews in Christendom. The result
of the meeting at Edinburgh only confirms what
we have repeatedly asserted on this subject—that
the oppressed classes will begin to inquire what
authority there is for these absurd observances,
and, finding there is none, will treat the Agnew.
ices, both lay and clerical, as the most arrogant
impostors.

The Times of this morning, alluding to The
Sun and its own wonderful announcement, says,
" Our Contemporary, that at first blustered most
loudly, now, in place of contradicting, lends circu-
lation to our articles, and some who came to mock,
remain to fear." We never ventured to contradict
the Times, for we know nothing whatever of the
invention it writes about. That is exclusively known
to the Times, the " Veteran of 40 years' stand-
ring," and the profound inventor : we only laughed 1
:at the bombastic and absurd inferences of our Con-
temporary. We have given circulation to his
article, as we give circulation, occasionally, to all
the opinions and statements of ourConternuoraries ;
and that the Times should infer approbation of its I
remarks from our having inserted its last article on
the New War Power, without making any corn-
m ents, betrays an eagerness to have a certificate of
,I,prural under our hand, whether it be filched or
0 rged.
After all that the Times has written on the sub.
lec.t., we still disbelieve the wonderful tales it has i