The Sun.
London, England, 1841-01-20 00:00:00

SUPPLY OF WATER-LONDON
AND WESTMINSTER WATER COMPANY.

civilly. If the delegates had rambled to the King's Head,
or 500 other houses, or committed any acts of violence, his
clients could not be conpide.red—responsible beyond the
authority they had given.
The prisoners were finally ordered to find bail, them-
selves in 1001., and two sureties in 501. each, to answer
an indictment at the next assizes for illegal conspiracy.

TO THE EDITOR OF ,Tia_ SUA.
- - Office of West Middlesex Water Works,
New-road, Jan. 19, 1841.
Sir,—My letter of the Bth instant has been miscon-
strued—the object of the concluding paragraph was to
state that, notwithstanding the West Middlesex Coin-
pany had incurred a very great expenditure' to reader
the water supplied bright and pure at all seasons, noin-
crease in the rates had been made on account of that
outlay.

By order of the Board of Directors,
M. K. KNIGHT, Secretary.

'lO THE EDITOR OF THE SUN.

SlR,—Allow me to correct an error in the Grtiele in
your Journal of Saturday last, relative to Manchester
becoming a port, wherein it is stated that the project
for cutting a ship canal from here to the River Dee was
submitted to the public !about sixteen years ago by the
" fate Mr. W. W. Tait."

As this gentleman is alive, and iu good health, the
mistake your Correspondent has unintentionally fallen
into, may inflict unnecessary pain to absent conaectioos
and friends, have the goodness, therefore, to -give
an early insertion.—l am, Sir, your obedient serv.snt,
Manchester, Jan. 19, 1841. E. M. JONES.

SEIZURE FOR CHURCH-BATES.

The Church has fallen foul of the Dissenting minis-
ters at Harlestone, the adjoining market town to Bun-
gay. The following letter from a Dissenting clergy that
of that town explains the case. It has been widely cir-
culated and made, no doubt, some impression on those
who conscientiously refuse to pay for the support of a
Church which is the richest in the world :

TO JOHN GEDNEY, ESQ., ONE OF THE CHURCHWARDENS OF
REDENHALL WITH HARLESTON, NORFOLK.

SlR,—The Church..rate war has commenced in our
quiet little town. On the 12th inst., the Rector's War-
den, with a constable, entered the house of. my brothe:
minister, the Rev. S. Laidler, and took therefrom one
table and seven chairs for the rate of Is. OA.

On this disgraceful proceeding I address you, Sir, rather
than your brother in office, because you are the Parishioners'
Warden, supposed to be the guardian of our interests;
and because you are capable of being reasoned with. I
hare long admired your eff•,rts to break the trammels of
agricultural prejudices; and you have done much to add
to the stock of the farmer's practical knowledge.
Let me then call your attention to the injustice and im
piety of compelling Dissenters to support your Church.
You take the Bible to be the authoritative test of what the
Creator requires of his creatures, and you profess to de-
rive your views of religion from the Word of God ; and
thus far we agree : but here the agreement ceases. lam
punished for taking the Word of God as my rule, and you
are rewarded with my chairs and tables for your interpre-
tation of the same rule. The law of man comes between
me and the law of God, and requires me to support your
form of religion, which I reject as being opposed to the
Bible. Do you approve of this? Let us change posi
dons. Suppose the Catholic religion once more estab-
lished, yourself a Dissenting Protestant, and Mr. Aldous
taking your chairs and tables to pay for his high mass.
Could you then approve his proceeding, or recognise his
moral right? It does not a whit alter the case, whether
you are the Dissenter or I. The reasons which would
justify your resistance in the case supposed, are the wry
reasons which justify Dissenters in their line of conduct.
But Church-rates are the law of the land I No.
There is no law to compel the parishioners to make a
rate ; and until a rate is carried in the vestry, there is no
law upon the subject. Suppose a bad law authorised you
and your fellow Churchmen to repair your own private
houses, and charge the expense upon your Dissenting
neighbours, would it not be simple robbery to take advan
tage of such a law ? No, Sir, it is your own voluntary
act, and not the law, which makes the Church-rate
But I take higher ground. A thing may be legally
right and morally wrong. A rate may be legally made,
but, with my convictions of what the Bible requires of ►ne,
I may be compelled to resist the payment of it. In all
civil affairs, I acknowledge the supremacy of " the powers
that be," but in the province of religion I uwrly deny
their authority. The.question is simply this, whether
right, to obey God or man ? I cannot obey both in the
matter of Church-rates—to which I shall do homage,
judge ye.

But to return to our particular case. Never was a
grosser act of injustice perpetrated. I say advisedly, th-t
the rate, for the payment of which Mr. Laidler's goods
have been seized is a nullity, and the Churchwardens know
it to be such. The vestry-book, produced before the Ma-
gistrates, proved that the rate was, by a blunder, made at
a vestry meeting a fortnight before the Churchwardens
were themselves appointed : and I am competently ad-
vised that the distraining Magistrates, the Rev. Mr. Spen-
cer, Rector of Starston, and J. flavors, Esq., a Roman.
Catholic, have subjected themselves to an action in trespass.
This, Sir, is the case I have to bring before you. `rise
rate in question is confessedly illegal—yet you have ven-
tured to distrain the goods of a respectable parishioner for
not paying it. What is this? Is it not theft ? If you
had acted legally, the case would have been one of opores-
sion ; but as you have acted in opposition to the law it is
theft, and nothing else. You shrink from this conclusion.
But remember, that as you are one of the Churchwardens,
you are responsible for all that the other officially does. I
call upon you then, as a conscientious man, to wipe your
hands of this foul deed of injustice and impiety. Put an
end, as you have the power of doing, to the injury thus
done to the principles and feelings of your Dissenting
neighbours.
Allow me, Sir, through this medium to address a word
to my fellow Dissenters. You, my friends, cannot, with-
disgust and execration, witness the outrage committed
by the harpies of the Law-church on Mr. Laidler's domestic
comfort. M-my of you attend upon his ministry, and look
up to him as your spiritual instructor. You will now flock
around him to tender him your sympathy, and to manifest
your approval of his principles. A cleaving disgrace will
rest upon the head of that Dissenter who now shrinks from
his duty. I have heard that there is not an auctioneer in
Harleston who will undertake the job; I am sure none who
makes any pretensions to respectability will do so. And
if the thing be so disgraceful that no auctioneer will sell,
who will be base enough to buy ?
I now, Sir, commend this matter to your serious atten.
tention. You and the liberal members of your Church
have a duty to discharge both to your own characters and
to us, namely, to discountenance by word and deed the
persecuting conduct of the Rector's Churchwarden. (The
Rector is the Archdeacon Oldershaw. It is observable,
the Incumbents of Bungay and Braintree are elk. Arch-
deacons, the venerable men Glover and Oakely.) Until 3 o_
do this, you violate the golden rule of Christianity, " As
ye would that men should do unto you, do ye also unto
them." Come out, then, and take a stand against the High
Church bigotry which frowns upon us on every side. f Show
your attachment to your principles by supporting your own.
forms of worship, but let us Dissenters alone. This is ail
we aek of you, let us alone; and until you do this we shall
never rest. Your's respectfully,

DAVID LLOYD.

Harleston, Jan. 13, 1841.

THE ASHTON MURDER.

TUE SUN, LONDON, WEDNESDAY. JANUARY 20, 1841.

GERMA. N

' ~FRANKFORT, JAN. 7.—The military preparations are
continued with unabated industry, notwithstanding the
small chance which seems to exist of the need of a warlike
demonstration. The Bavarian Government has sent the
General Von Bauer, the Quartermaster-General at Munich,
to the conferences which arc still continued at Carlsrhue.
In the mean time a great victory has been achieved over
the popular cause in Germany by the suppression of the
Deutsche National Zeitung , published by Vieweg of Brurs-
nick, a measure not less significative of the state of things
here than the proclamation of the Elector of Cassel, which
1 noticed in my last. The editors were obliged to discon-
tinue publishing from the beginning of the year, by an
order from the Ducal Government, acting of course under
higher impulse. The crime which has been thus severely
viAts d was the attempt to take a decided line in the dis-
cutsion of political subjects, and in the dangerous example
which this paper set of giving leading articles—a practice
which has hitherto only obtained in thi comparatively ob-
scure regions of Stuttgard and Freiburg. Nor is the
announcement of a new Liberal paper in the Grand Duch.)
of Baden, to be conducted by M. Giehne, who wrote
clever answer to the Pentarchic some time back, eonsi-
d,,sed as an indemnification, as his wings are sure to he
clipped if he takes adventurous flights.
to Hungary the question of mixed marriages has been
again brought before the public under a novel form. The
last Diet had passed a resolution, by a great majority, in.
sisting upon the right of all Christian members of the com-
munity to the free exercise of their consciences, and de-
ci.ring it to be contrary to the law for any clergyman to
demand a written engagement respecting the education of
children from parties desiring to be married.
The Comitat of Pesth, in its last local legislative meet-
ing, reduced this principle to practice, by imposing a fine
of 600 florins on any priest of any confession who should
so act against this resolution. The Primate of Hungary,
M. Kopaozy, has publicly protested, in a long letter, in
which he openly assumes that the Legislature has no right
to dictate to the clergy what functions they have to per-
form, or in what manner they are to perform them.
In Berlin there seems to be some anxiety respecting the
difficulty of keeping a strict control upon the international
distinctions in the duties levied under the Customs league.
People who have been taught that this league had abo-
lished all check upon internal commerce in Germany,
will be surprised to learn that wine and spirits pay an ad-
ditional duty when imported into Prussia from the south-
ern States of the league, while beer and some other ar-
ticles pay a higher duty on entering Bavaria. Salt, which
is a Government monopoly, cannot be introduced from
any one State into another. These discriminating duties
like passports and all other restraints upon mental and
bodily exertion, worked well enough as long as people
moved slowly, but now that railroads arc getting the fas-
hion, and seem to have their advantages, the official heads
arc growing afraid that the nations will get on too fast
for them. t am, however, happy to add, that the prepara-
tions for commencing the railroad between Berlin and Frank.
fort suffer no delay in consequence of these petty objec-
tions. The works are expected to be commenced in the
spring.