The Sun.
London, England, 1841-10-20 00:00:00

S M

AND
ttblir Optutort.

" Who runs may rear!."

FOR=IGII.
We are without any news from Madrid of a later date
than the accounts published in The Sun of yesterday.
The King of the French has succeeded in his infamous
project to the extent of filling Spain with confusion,
anarchy, and bloodshed. Pampeluna, Vittoria, San
Sebastian, Barcelona, Valencia, and Madrid are all in
a state of commotion, occasioned by the wicked attempts
of the Citizen King and Queen Christina Munoz, to
upset the Spanish Government.
• laic Journal des Debats, which is unsparing in its
attacks on the Spanish Government and people, has the
following remarks\:—" Au extraordinary junta, styled
of public safety,' has been formed at Barcelona, and has
already superseded all the legitimate authorities. The
troopsare declared. to be suspected; a list of proscriptions
has been drawn up ; a forced loan has been de-
creed, and, to make sure of it, no more passports
are delivered ; in other words, the town is con-
verted into a vast prison. This new authority has
promulgated only one short law, but it is simple, clear,
and expeditious—it punishes with death all those who
should spread reports favourable to O'Donnell."—
This is no doubt a sad state of things, but it has its
origin in the wicked intrigues of the King of the French.
I Fur the guilt of the crimes now, committed in Spain
Louis Philippe and Christina Munoz are, in the righteous
;udgment of Heaven, responsible.
The Constitueiend, a Barcelona paper, denounces the
King of the French as the real author of all the troubles
in Spain. The following is an extract from an article in
it:—"Though we never doubted that the King of the
Barricades was the infamous protector of the enemies
of our prosperity, we could not have believed that
he would carry his cynical designs so far as to
openly undermine our liberties, and that lie himself would
put arms in the hands of those who wish to drown our
institutions and our hopes in blood, and that he would
dare to do this in the country that has had the misfor-
tune to call him to the throne. how can a King who
picked up his crown amidst the dust of a revolution take
:Toil himself such an anti-liberal ndssion. What does
Louis Philippe mean ? What does he expect to gain by
the resurrection of a civil war in Spain? Is it to spill
blood I Well, be it so—blood shall be spilt in torrents;
Out mark this blood, perhaps, will be fruitful to the
seeds of our prosperity. This blood will be revenged on
those whose hands are unworthy of being inviolate."
The French Government is sending troops to the
Spanish frontier. There was a rumour in Paris on Sun-
day that the King intended to make any rising of the
Sp :aisle Republicans a pretext for an invasion.
We learn that the Count de Liedekerke Beaufort, for-
merly of the household of the King of Holland, died
;ately at the age of 79, at his seat of Noisy, where he
hes lived in retirement since the revolution.
The Session of the Dutch Parliament was closed on
the 15th inst. The Speech delivered on the occasion by
tle‘ Minister of the Interim- will be found in another
column.

PITn'LIC OPINION.

In an article suggested by a letter from a Correspond-
ent
on the subject of the disturbances created at public
meetings by persons calling themselves Chartists, the
lforniug Chronicle observes :—" So long as Chartism
mas, in its nominal ranks, a supply of vendible scoun-
irels who will take Tory cash, or of ruffian slaves, who
‘vill obey Feargus O'Connor, the repetition of the dis-
turbances complained of will not fail to be attempted.
file agents are becoming pretty well known now, and
their infamy follows them. Men who are base enough,
either for sordid gain or in blind obedience, to stand in
he way of justice towards the poor and working classes,
and abet by their clamour the robbery committed by the
;uonopolist upon the food of the industrious, are not
;ikely long to retain any power of disturbance beyond
that which their fellow-conspiraters can exercise. They
are disarmed by exposure. Accordingly we find, by
our Correspondent's own statement, that the parties of
whom he complains were, at the late meeting, a very.
contemptible minority. He estimates them at not
more tan one in fifteen. This is a very different
state of things from that which existed not many
months ago, when actual majorities were got up against
the anti-bread-tax agitation. A. great change in the
feelings of the many is plainly in rapid progress. And no
wonder. They find that they cannot feed upon the hope
of the suffrage. The Charter falls in their market as
• bread ris9.s."—The Chartists can only make themselves
a really influential party by listening to the unerring dic-
tates of common sense. Let them cease to clamour for

the impracticable, and stick to the practicable,
and they may further the cause of improvement
io as to benefit themselves to an extent of which
•it present they seem to hare no conception. But
the political fanaticism which they manifested at the
commencement of their career can be attended with no.
other result than that of bitter disappointment Reason
the banner under which they must enlist, if they desire
to become really efficient Reformers. Let them combine
their efforts with those of the Anti-Corn-law agitators,
and they will at once secure a high vantage ground for
their further operations. We do not desire to see them
tame or lethargic; far otherwise. Let them exhibit the
same vigour they have always exhibited, but let that Vi-
;our be influenced and directed by common sense. In
.as iq roligicai, ill-nagnlated arallu4asun, however
It may succeed for the time, is sure in the long run to
lefeat its own purpose.
The Post is labouring hard to convince the agricul-
ltral labourers that the Corn-laws are kept up in all

their severity expressly for their interests. alf the
landowners alone," says our Contemporary, " were the
persons interested in this limited and graduated mono-
poly of the supply of corn to British consumers, the
question would be greatly changed. In that case we
might venture perhaps upon the experiment of doing
without the monopoly, because the landowners are not
utterly dependent upon the rent of arable land. It
would be, possible to try the experiment without inflict-
ing great physical misery upon any portion of
the people. But that is nut the case as mat-
ters stand, because the agricultural labourers can-
not afford to lose the limited monopoly they
possess. It is the only thing between them and cessa-
tion of demand for their labour—in other words, the
only thing between them and utter ruin. It is, then,
emphatically a labourers' question. The Corn-law is
maintained chiefly because - it is 'the interest of the la-
oourers that it should- be maintained. Other classes
',right bear the ioss of protection, liut they could not.
They ivh.) clamour for Corn-law repeal, clamour for the
immediate degradation and ultimate destruction of the
British labourer."—Not so. They who clamour for
Corn-law repeal, clamour for the destruction of a
grinding impost kept up for the sole benefit of a few
selfish monopolists. Swift's definition of party applies
admirably to this impost—lt is the ruin of many for the
gain of a few.

The Times says :—" The grand hypocrisy of the day
is the pretence continually set up by those who call
themselves Liberals' to be regarded as the only sincere
Friends of the people. The chief amusements- of the
Tories' are generally assumed by these gentlemen to
be the devising means for starving or tormenting the
-)optilation ; while their political opponents are repre-
sented as abounding in the milk of human kindness, and
.k lighting in conttiThq; henehts upon the people. The
wickedness of all this chiefly consists in its being not
merely untrue, but the very reverse of the truth.
There is no fact more unquestionable in modern
history than this—that the political economists, the
grand enemies of the people's comfort and happiness,
have ever been, in the main, a sect of the Whigs."—
'IA refute this observation, nothing more is needed than
to refer to the history of the last ten years, which will
,how that the Tories invariably opposed every measure
brought forward by the Whigs for the benefit of the
pcopie, and increased their opposition in exact propor-
tion to the good expected to be derived from it. Thus
they opposed the plan for cheap and expeditious jus-
tice ; for a system of national education ; for loosening
some of the most oppressive restrictions on trade ; and
indeed every measure that came recommended by reason
and equity. But this, on the Times's showing, they
did out of their excessive affection for the people !
They " chastened" them, because they " loved' them.
We suppose it was this intense love on the part of the
Tories, that induced them to cut down the people by
wholesale at Peterloo, and build new jails and barracks
throughout the country for their accommodation ! The
" milk of human kindness," which our Contemporary de-
scribes as running in the Veins of Toryism, is just equal
in amount and quality to that which runs in the veins of

_
a tiger.
The Herald makes the following remarks on the con-
duct of the Poor-law Commissioners :—" The Somerset
House despots have triumphed over humanity ; they
have driven the poor from the country into unwhole-
some cellars and half-covered garrets in towns ;
they have lightened the rates by demoralising and starv-
ing the population. They have diminished the agricul-
tural population, it is said, more than two per cent. within
six years, and they have proportionably swelled out those
great national wens '—full of corruption and disease—
which deprive the empire of its real strength. They pro-
posed to elevate the morals of the pocr by pinching their
bellies, and depriving them of the enjoyment of the
only solace poverty can have in that holy union between
man and wife; and yet they have produced an emigration
into those sinks of moral depravity and political crime—,
the manufacturing districts, in .ivhich, according to the
Secretary of the Anti-Corn-law Conference, it is difficult
to: restrain the young men' from • pillaging the pro-
vision warehouses around them.' They have drawn
away the people from rural homes, where there was com-
paratively speaking, little or no surplus labour, to towns
where the population was previously overteeming; and
they have thereby greatly augmented the distress pro-
duced
.by over-production. Here then is a clear connec-
tion between the Poor-law and the present distress."