The Sun.
London, England, 1841-12-14 00:00:00

PUBLIC OPINION.

The Morning Advertiser, after commenting at some
length on the present distressed state of the country, and
showing that just in proportion to the spread of luxury
among the higher classes, has been that of privation and
destitution among the working classes, goes on to say
that this state of things arises out of no necessity, but is
" the work of man—it is the result of class legislation—
of aristocratic rule—of a national debt created to arrest
the march of liberty—of overwhelming taxation, imposed
to support the poorer branches of the aristocracy—and
of accursed Corn-laws, enacted to augment their rent-
rolls and to multiply their luxuries. When a country is
thus bestridden by an oligarchy—selfish and voracious as
that of Great Britain is—distress, poverty, and wretched-
ness, must be the inevitable result. The higher classes
throw the burthen from their own shoulders, by clutching
portions of the public revenue, in some shape or other,
and by artificially raised rents. The middle classes
struggle on, and are all but crushed. But it is the
working classes—the lowest sacks in the pile—upon
which the weight principally falls. How long it may still
be attempted to uphold a system which produces such
deplorable results, we cannot pretend to say. The aris-
tocracy is blinded, but the people can discern the causes
which produce the poverty and suffering they now endure."
—The evils to which the Advertiser here alludes, will ere
long work their own remedy, and class-legislation be
numbered among the nuisances that once were. Sir
Peel and his aristocratic colleagues are perhaps the only
thinking men in the country who cannot foresee the ine-
vitable results of the suicidal policy they are now pur-
suing. It is not their emigration scheme that will save
them from overthrow ; they must just as soon expect to
triumph over all obstacles by means of their Fine Arts
Committee, and their House-of-Commons ventilation
project

- Times says:—" Amidst the proverbial mutability
of all human affairs, the present vicissitudes of Liberal-
ism are touching in the extreme. Within thelast six
months the Whig party, whose obstinate perseverance
in a long course of degeneracy had brought them into a
state of helpless decrepitude, may truly be said to
have become defunct. Formerly their club coteries,
notwithstanding occasional reverses, were disposed
to be somewhat chatty and cheerful ; but latterly
they have fallen into a moping, melancholy, and
desponding turn. Indeed, by their own confession,
the Whigs, as a political party, are now reduced to
a condition of absolute inanity—a condition from
which, unless the existing Government be so infa-
tuated as to imitate their career and thus dispose the
nation to give them another trial, nothing on earth can
rescue them. A disregard of public opinion, on a few
cardinal questions deeply interesting to the feelings and
habitudes of Englishmen, was the chief cause of the pre-
sent adversity of the Whigs."—lf the Whigs as a body
are defunct, why is it that the Times is so incessantly
wasting its powder and shot on them? Why not reserve
its ammunition for enemies who exhibit a more
formidable vitality? To be perpetually popping at de-
funct Whiggism, seems to us to be a very superfluous
proceeding. But the truth is, the Whigs are not dead;
they are alive and active, far too active ; hence the Times'
attacks on their leaderss, Lord J. Russell and Palmerston.
The Post strives hard to neutralize by shallow logic
the effect produced on the public mind by the late
Derby Conference. "We learn from the leading Whig
Radical journal," says our pert Contemporary, " that a
considerable meeting of manufacturers (nicknamed a
' conference') took place on Thursday last in the town.
of Derby. We are sorry to say that these manufac-
turers do not appear to have come together for any use-
ful or rational purposes, but to add to the public excite-
ment on the subject of the Corn-laws by a great many
violent statements regarding them, which statements
were not supported by one tittle of evidence. A great
deal was said to show that in one part of England the
manufacture of woollen stockings and gloves had con-
siderably fallen off, and that what trade remained was no
longer so profitable as it used to be. But the additional
statement that the decline of business and of prices was
altogether to be attributed to the Corn-laws was a mere
assumption, apparently taken up without consideration,
as it was proclaimed without caution or modesty."—
Had the north-country manufacturers met at Derby for
the purpose of supporting Toryism, instead of showing its
ruinous effects alike on our home trade and on our
foreign commerce, the Post would have pronounced the
meeting "useful and rational" in the highest degree. Not
a speech but would then have been well worth reading •,
not a speaker but would have manifested an exalted
patriotism. As it is, the Post can see nothing but mis-
chief in such meetings as that at Derby ; and our Con-
temporary is right, for the meeting in question—and we
thank God for it—will have a most mischievous effect
on Toryism. It is a broadside launched against the
Monopolist Government, that has given itjust the sort of
rude shock it deserves.
The Chronicle observes, with reference to the recent
Wiltshire meeting :—" Amongst the speakers was a Mr.
Clark, who described himself as a working man, and who
spoke with point and spirit. He and his fellow-workmen
wanted justice, not charity. 'Let the aristocracy repeal,
and cease from passing, those lass that deprived them
of work and of the full fruits of their honest lftbout, and
he would assure them there would be no, need of holding
meetings to dole out charity.' Yet this man, who ut-
tered this manly sentiment, and who spoke, as Lord Rad-
nor said,with ability, had the greatest difficulty in obtaining
leave to address the meeting. Lords Lansdowne and Rad-
nor had to interfere in his favour ; and during his second
speech, in reference to the distress in Bradford, amongst
other unseemly interruptions, he was greeted with the
following choice specimen of squireen brutality—' LAY A
WHIP ACROSS HIS SHOULDERS!' "—This brutal conduct is
very characteristic of Toryism. It smacks of the Castle-
reagh and Sidmouth times, when Manchester massacres

were the sole answers to the people's cry for bread.
"Lay a whip across his shoulders !" Aye, so the Tories I
would, if they dared ; for they are still the same despots
that they ever were—still fond of replying to argument !
by the dungeon, the yeoman's sword, or the squire's whip!
The Herald is evidently endeavouring to get up a
feeling of sympathy for the poverty of Mother Church,
as will be seen by the following passage :—" The means
of the Church, it is alleged, have increased as the people
have multiplied. Again, we der:), the fact ; the means
of the Church have not increased. The value of livings
has of course increased with the value of land, but the
cost of maintenance and support has proportionably been
augmented ; and the present incumbents are merely in
that position relatively to landowners, that their prede-
cessors were in by-gone times. Nay, they are, tempo-
rally speaking, not in so good a position, because the in-
crease of population compels them to have resource to
paid assistance in the performance of their sacred duties."
—lf the Church really desires to make herself an efficient
establishment, she has abundant means for doing so, as
we have more than once observed. But she prefers, it
seems, to draw money from the State and the laity, in
the shape of voluntary contributions, rather than to
spend her own. Verily, she is wise in her generation !
The Aberdeen Herald, in allusion to the persecutions
of the Sabbath worshippers, gives the following advice :
—" The prayer at the end of the Relation of the Cir-
cumcision of E. Curll,9 might be used with reference to
Sir Andrew Agnew and the rest of his Judaizing breth-
ren—' Keep us, we beseech thee, from the hands of such
barbarous and cruel Jews.' And then, again, the prayer
that concludes the Story of Peter the Savage, might be
offered up in behalf of the wild party in the Church,
for truly we have much need, looking to the proceed-
ings of the Commission and at Culsamond, to ask, with
Dean Swift, that such as profess to be Christians, ' may
lay aside their savage and rapacious nature, and return
to the meekness of the Gospel.' "
We quote the following from the Leeds Times :—" The
aristocracy have never failed to put in a claim for com-
pensation when their class interests suffered. They claimed
compensation for the slaves whom the British Govern-
ment compelled them to .liberate ; and they got it.
How many thousands and millions of the labour-
ing poor are now toiling and slaving for the
benefit of the landlord-class, and though starving
and pining themselves, are nevertheless taxed to their
last crust, to keep up in all its pomp the gilded tyranny
which rolls over them ! Why, then, hesitate for a mo-
ment in putting in a ,claim of compensation for the
people ? They, the sufferers, in justice are entitled to
compensation."

The IJuhiin -Evening Post contains the following re-
marks in an article on the state of the country :
" The only interest that flourishes in the Queen's Eu-
ropean dominions, is the Agricultural—in other
words, the Landed Interest. The only people who are
well off, and, as far as money can confer happiness,
who are happy, are the Lords of the Soil. But, be-
tween these Lord-monopolists and the consumers,
there has been, for some time, a fierce strife in progress.
Every hour sharpens the animosity of the contending
parties ; and whim the parties come—as come they must
—in the early part of the next Session of Parliament, to
close quarters, the fundholders then, it is probable, will
become alarmed, and the public securities may recede
seriously in price."
Speaking of Puseyism the Cambrian says :—" What-
ever argument Puseyism alleges against the actual
Church might be urged against itself, if it had been esta-
blished for a hundred years. Does the man live who, at
the present moment, can subscribe the confessions of
Church of Englandism, Presbyterianism, Catholicism,
Methodism, or any other ism, with absolute faith, with-
out a single reservation, as a true plan of the universe
and God's law, upon which he would stake his life and
death ? Subscribe them he may, but as a matter of
form, which the spirit of society well understands."
The Liverpool Chronicle says—" The Tories have been
continually railing against the Whigs for the last two or
three years for not paring down the expenses of the
country so as to bring them within the operation of this
salutary maxim, and, lo and behold, the very
moment they themselves obtain power, they fly
to their old tricks of jobbing. and spending, and wast-
ing, as if the Exchequer were not only full to the brim,
with surplus gold, but actually overflowing. Let Sir
Robert Peel remember that the people cannot do with-
out food, but that they could have done very well with-
out the job perpetrated by Master Scarlett."
In an article on Military Despotism, the Somerset
Gazette observes :—" The sabre and the musket are to
awe the freemen of England into the surrender of their
liberties to the allied powers of Toryism and Church
Popery, and the ball and the bayonet are to be the sub-
stitutes for bread. Sir Robert should have quitted office
rather than have submitted to the dictation of the
monopolists and ultra-Tories in this their design for
military despotism."
The Bolton Free Press thus speaks of the Government
emigration scheme:—" The proposed transportation of the
poor from the soil of Britain, has been very properly de-
scribed as a traffic in human flesh. It is, primarily, a Minis-
terial manoeuvre for propping up a rotten Cabinet; and it is
promoted, from motives of interest, by a host of selfish
stock-jobbers. As a partial and temporary relief from
the horrible pressure of, population against the limits of
subsistence, its obvious tendency is to assist the bread-
taxers to 'rub on.'"