The Sun.
London, England, 1841-07-16 00:00:00

would be inexcusable if it had recourse to other
means.

But those who have not the power of making
laws as a means of gaining their ends, are driven
have recourse to violent and illegal means,
which in the others would be objectionable. It
is certainly very bad of the Catholic priests to
threaten the people with spiritual penalties if
they do not vote as the said Catholic priests
would have them ; but does nothing of the kind
take place under Protestant priests ?
The Established_ clergy hold many of the peo-
ple in the rural districts in such a state of pecu-
niary and mental bondage, that they never dare
to think, even on any public matter, without
asking leave of the squire and the parson, who
are generally leagued together. The organiza-
tion of the Church by law, as the servant of the
aristocracy, is so complete, that it works in the
rural districts unfelt and unseen. Having such
a power, which it quietly uses to the same ends
as the Roman Catholic priesthood use their
power, it would be mere silliness in them were
they to threaten men with spiritual punishment
on any special occasion, in order to obtain a vote.
They know better; they have that power by law
which the Roman Catholics have in spite of the
law, and hence there is a difference in their
mode of action, but the nature of their power is
the same, and so are the ends it is employed to
attain.

We have no faint recollection, too, that not many
months ago, Mr. HETHERINGTON was sentenced to
three months' imprisonment for merely publishing
a book which expressed opinions not relished by
the Protestant priests. It is true that the law
was the instrument of punishment, but the law
was framed and set in motion by the Protestant
priests. There was in Mr. HETIIERINGTON'S
case no vague threat, it was the positive infliction
of punishment. Other cases of the like kind might
be enumerated, but of severer punishment. Per-
sons have been imprisoned eighteen months and
two years, not because they did not vote as the
English priests told them, but because they pre-
sumed even to think differently from those
priests. We dislike and condemn the tyranny
of the priests in Ireland, but we hate and re-
probate, to the whole extent of our strength,
the greater tyranny of the priests in England,
which is exercised in the name of the law, and,
by Protestants, in the name of resistance to
ecclesiastical tyranny.
Some persons may suppose that there is a
great difference in the cases, inasmuch as the
law is on the side of the English priests and
against the Roman Catholic priests in Ireland.
We cannot see any difference unfavourable to
the Catholics. They have not the law to work
with, and therefore they act spontaneously
on their• own authority. The English priests
shelter themselves behind the law. They add hypo-
crisy to arrogance. Having made the law their in-
strument, they have no reason to act personally ;
but it is because the law in Ireland is not the in-
strument of the Catholic priests that they are
obliged to act personally. This is all the differ-
ence between the two parties. The law maxim is,
who acts by another, acts for himself; and while
the Protestant priests cowardly slink behind an
enactment, the Roman Catholic priests boldly
exercise their power in their own way. We say
this on the supposition that every thing reported
of the Roman Catholic priests is true ; but we
must not omit to observe that the testimony
agai':ist them, on which the Tories rest their abuse,
is that of opponents and enemies, heated and
chagrined by electioneering defeats.
Were some of our Contemporaries, who are
very forward in abusing the Catholic priests, not
because they desire different objects from the
Protestant priests, but because they use diffe-
rent means to obtain them, only to reflect that
the Protestant priests have in the law an instru-
ment to gratify their lust of power or wealth,
while the Catholics have no such instrument,
they would not, we think, expend all their anger
on the Catholic priests; at least, they ought not,
and ought to reserve some of it for the Anglican
priests. But one set of priests may, according
to the proverb, steal a horse, while another, de-
siring the horse equally with his fellows, must
not look over a hedge. One is our own priest,
and we honour him as a divine, the other is the
priest of some other man, and we treat him as
• the patron of superstition.

To show how general is the disdain and contempt
which the Tories entertain of the manufacturing
population, we must mention that the Morning
Herald yesterday, like the Quarterly Review,
the Standard, and the Morning Post, spoke of the
millions of the manufacturing districts as hav-
ing no right to exist, because they alarmed
and endangered the Government. Instead of
the Government being the servant of the indus-
trious classes, existing only to protect that pro-
perty which has no other source than industry,
it has become their absolute master, entitled, ac-
cording to the showing of the Herald, to starve the
manufacturers out of existence, or prevent them
ever coming into being, lest they should en-
danger the Government. Unconsciously the Tory
scribe betrayed the whole secret of his party's
policy. The multitude are to be sacrificed to
the convenience of the few, and Government
and law are the subtle instruments the Tories
are to employ to obtain their ends.

It now stands confessed on all hands that the
Corn-laws are maintained to keep down the ma-
nufacturing population. Lord ASHBURTON—
poor sentimentalist—does not like to see the land
covered with tall chimneys, and the rest of the
Tories do not like to sec the increase of a manu-
facturing population, it is so different from the
scared and obedient serfs they are accustomed
to command. The quiet happiness of the work-
ing millions in their own way, the peaceful en-
joyments of their own comforts with their wives
and families, their domestic bliss and their do-
mestic sorrows, are all to be put down by the
Tories to secure the Constitution and the Govern-
ment. The Corn-law, we repeat, is one of the
instruments by which they hope to secure the
success of their horrible and even hellish system.

We invite special attention to the subject
which has for two days engrossed the attention
s o
of the Proprietor- East India Stock and the
Directors of the Company
; we refer to the inte-
resting case of the dethroned and exiled RAJA of
SATTA.P.A a u
Prince of ancient and high
lineage,
who
has
oboeei deprived of his power, his
dignity, and his
private
trial, and upon testimony,
property, without a
which we think every
candid mind, who exanmY?
mes the debate, will
pronounce in the highest degree unsatisfactory.
It is, however, most gratifying to perceive
that the debate has had the Yng
effectiof bringing
b announced
out one of the oldest and most
den
influential of the
Directors, "Mr. TUCKER, who
yesterday
that in his opinion the RAJA had not
to be guilty of any act warranting his e shown
dethrone-
ment, ment, and that he was prepared to do all e
tth
jus-
tice which the circumstances of the casel e ad-
mitted. He proposed that the RAJA'S character
should be cleared; that his jewels, money, and
other property should be restored ; and that he
should be invested with the power of nominating
a successor to the throne, on the demise of its
present occupant. Should this be done, although
we think full justice would not be awarded to the
ex-RAJA, yet his friends, who have so boldly
laboured on his behalf', may be considered as
triumphant, and to have read a lesson, both to
the Governments abroad, and the authorities at
home, by which they are likely very greatly to
profit in time to come. The debate is resumed
to-day. We shall report the proceedings and
the result to-morrow.

Lord STANLEY—as will be seen by reference to
another column—has had a lesson read to him by Mr.
SYDNEY SMITH, which he will do well to take to heart.
But, indeed, he can scarcely fail to do so, for the sarcasm
is such as must cut clean through the thick coatings of
even his self-conceit and vanity. Never was a pert,
shallow Lordling so woefully bemauled ! He is exposed
in all his littleness and charlatanism—stripped fairly to
the skin, with not a rag left to cover his nakedness. j