The Sun.
London, England, 1841-01-07 00:00:00

—by a profusion of compliments and promises
equally hollow and contemptible persuade the
English to abandon Chusan, and to await at Can-
ton the settlement of all differences between the
English and Chinese, the richest fruit of the expe-
dition will be completely lost. Having begun
negotiations sword in hand, it would be madness
on the part of Admiral EL LIOT to return it to
the scabbard before all the demands which he is
authorised by the British Government to
make are complied with. One thing ought
to be constantly kept in mind. Having acquired
a footing in China, it is essential to the maintenance
of our dominion in the East, that we retain it at
any cost. Complaints are made in several letters
of the insalubrity of Chusan, and we find it stated
that a regard for the health of our troops will oblige
us to abandon it. We suspect these complaints
originate in evils not attributable to the climate of
this fine island. After so long a voyage, it is to
be supposed that the men indulged in excesses de-
trimental to health in all parts of the world. The
last accounts from China informed us that on land-
ing they drank to excess of an intoxicating beverage
which they had never before tasted, and which pro-
duced a terrible dysentery among them. Most
likely the wells were poisoned, and deleterious drugs
mixed with the provisions which they found on
shore. These are ways of inflicting injury upon
their enemies which the Chinese, from time imme-
morial, have not scrupled to employ as often as they
have had opportunities.

But if the island of Chusan be really insalubrious,
there are plenty of other islands on the coast upon
which the English could effect a permanent settle-
ment. It is only requisite that the island occupied
have a good harbour, and be not more distant from
Pekin than the one already in possession of our
gallant troops. With a British force constantly on
the coast of China, capable of redressing any wrong
offered us, our merchants would be secured against
insult or oppression, and our commerce would gra-
dually extend from the mouth of the Canton river
to the entrance of the Peiho into the Yellow Sea,
thus opening a direct water communication with

Pekin itself. To trust to the good faith of the
Chinese would be as preposterous as to attempt to
read characters traced with a pen upon the face of
a descending torrent. We would just as soon ac-
cept the offer of a treaty alleged to be written on a
moon-beam, as a mere parchment scroll bearing
the imperial sign-manual, and deriving all its value
from Chinese adherence to the sanctity of written
obligations. We sincerely trust that this is a point
which has not been overlooked by Lards PA LMER.
STON and AUCKLAND.

About seven years ago there was, as there now is,
and has ever since occasionally been, a discussion
carried on in the public papers, as to the propriety
of calling the Church of England the poor man's
Church. It was then objected to the name by a
Liberal Journal, that the rich had their well car-
peted pews, while the poor sat on benches or were
crowded into the aisles, without seats at all. The
curtained and cushioned seat of the squire, was
contrasted with the want of accomodation provided
for the poor, and it was maintained that it was a
mockery to call that the poor man's Church in
which the distinctions of the world were preserved,
and he was treated as if he were not, even in the
temple of the ALMIGHTY, equal to his brother of
the dust. The difference between the Anglican
Church and the Catholic Church, in which there are
no pews, and all persons kneel equally on the same
floor, was pointed out, and the name of a poor
man's Church was shown not be properly applied
to the Anglican Church. At the end of seven
years we are happy to find that the Anglican priest-
hood are taking lessons from the liberal news-
papers, and proposing to restore to the Anglican
Church the equality of a Catholic Cathedral or
a Dissenter's Chapel. A writer in yesterday's
Times, quotes the following passage from a charge
recently published by the Archdeacon of LEWES :
" The first measure which I would recommend would
be to alter the distribution of the seats, by getting rid
of those eyesores and beartsores--pews, and substituting
open benches with backs in their stead. Many advan-
tages would accrue from such a change, over and above
the power of seating a greater number of people.
This increase in capacity would be very considerable
in our country churches, where pews large enough to
hold from 10 to .20 persons, in the best situations in the
church, are often allotted to small families, and may be
seen gaping well-nigh empty : for even they who rarely
come to church themselves are not seldom most rigid in
asserting what they conceive to be their right of
excluding others from their pews. Meanwhile the
poor who, owing to the obtuseness of their senses and
and perceptions, need to be near to the minister, are
thus driven to the outskirts of the church, where only dim
broken sounds reach their ears, the connecting links
of which they are unable to supply, and where, if
they are not altogether out of sight, they can but im-
perfectly discern those accompaniments of manner and
voice and gesture, in which so much of the force of
preaching lies, and which are especially requisite to per-
sons less familiar with the power of words, and less
easily impressed by them. We all know, too, how many
jealousies and heartburnings are perpetually springing
up from disputes about rights of pews, which would thus
be extinguished at once. At the same time, for the
sake of order and regularity, seats might be assigned to
each family, according to its numbers, and one may feel
assured that such an arrangemuent would be generally re-
spected. Besides, do we not all know what facilities and
temptation pews affordfor irreverent belmviour during di-
vine service, what facilities they afford to the somnolent ?
Moreover, the eyes of the congregation are not all turned
the same way, directed towards the same object ; but
people sit face to face, and thus are inevitably led to
look too much at each other, which interrupts the cur-
rent of their devotional feelings. Above all, the ten-
dency of pews is to destroy the character of social wor-
ship. Instead of our kneeling all side by side, rich and
poor, one with another, pews keep up those distinctions
of rank, which in the presence of God we should de-
sire to lay aside, each family penning itself up within
its high wooden walls, and carefully secluding itself
from all contact and communion with its neighbours.
Indeed, when one enters a church on a week-day, and
sees the strange fashion in which the floor is partitioned
out into large shapeless lidless boxes, one is involun-
tarily reminded of one of the ugliest objects on the face
of the eat th—Smithfield• market when empty.'
" I am aware that there are many obstacles which lie
in the way of the change I have been urging, and
which may for a time prevent its being generally adopted,
All our selfish passions will resist it ; pride will resist
it ; indolence will resist it ; the baneful love of ease and
comfort will resist it. But an excellent example has
already been set in the new church of St. John, at
Lewes, where the whole centre of the floor is covered
with open benches, for the poor, and pews on each side
are so low as to be almost inoffensive to the eye. From
various quarters, too, I hear that efforts are making to
throw open the pews in old churches ; and I trust that
ere long it will have been proved in several parishes,
how much more favourable the change is to devotional
behaviour in church, how it brings home to our hearts
that we are all indeed brethren, all members of the same
body, that we are all one before God, all one in Christ."
The same point is also urged by Mr. Wolfinger, of
Lewes, in his consecration sermon. He says, that—
" To call the parish church the church of the poor
man, when the accommodation afforded in it has no re-
ference to the capacity of the hearers, in an insult to the
understanding and the feelings. It is like throwing a
loaf at a hungry man, without thinking whether it will
reach him, or whether he will be able to gather up the
crumbs into which it may break. It is like saying,
Depart
ye; be ye warmed and filled: notwithstanding
ye give Mem not those things that are needful. He
with good reason blessesGoldc,ets forhat hearing,inthoCwh,urreetailuloititeer,e,
he was preaching, the best places
to those ' who ought to have that advantage,' the poor :
and he anticipates an early day, when the laity
and clergy of every town and village in England will
take up this godly work in right earnest ; when every
parish church will be so enlarged, or re-arranged, or
multiplied, as to afford room for all to hear ; and when

_, _......., . .
stoeelfitatci
opnrsout;
ieu,trosoofur
Gpoodo,srer brethren that we arc not
1::1 to their spiritual wants, gifts,bu rather that apsutwae
as little,
t.Talue on
ourgGod's mercies to our own souls, by
self-denial and exertions to communicate them to
others."

•
This passage expressly. proves much that The Sun,
and other Liberal Journals, have urged against the
poor man's Church. While the best places are
preserved for the pews of the rich, " the poor are
driven to the outskirts of the church." l'evfs de-