The Sun.
London, England, 1840-09-23 00:00:00

Zrln -nia.x.

LONDON:
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 1810.

DEATH

OF THE

PRINCESS AUGUSTA

The Princess Augusta expired at seventeet,
minutes past nine o'clock last night, at Clarence
House, St. James's, after a long and very trying
illness, which her Royal Highness bore with the
utmost patience and meekness. .

Throughout the progress of her painful malady,
her Royal Highness exhibited the greatest resig-
nation, fulfilling, in the intervals of freedom from
(suffering, her religious and devotional duties. With
the exception of a few hours previous to her decease,
the Princess retained her consciousness to the last,
or at least, was easily roused to a state of con-
sciousness, and during this painful trial, her Royal
Highness constantly maintained that amiability of
'temper which always characterised her.

The last moments of the Princess were attended
by all the Royal Family in town, viz., tha Queen
Dowager, the Duchess of Gloucester, the Princess
Sophia, the Duke of Sussex, and the Duke of
ICambridge ; and also by her Royal Highness's
medical attendants, Sir Henry Halford and Mr.
Moore, together with the Rev. J.R.Wood, Chap-
lain to her Majesty the Queen Dowager.
All the Royal Family had been in anxious at-1
kendance on their relation from an early hour yes-
terday morning, remaining to the last by the bed-
side of her Royal Highness.
Immediately after the melancholy event, the
Duke of Sussex despatched one of his Equerries,,
Colonel Sir A. Macdonald, to Windsor Castle, to:
convey the melancholy tidings to her Majesty
Infoimation was also forwarded to the Princess
Sophia Matilda at Broadstairs.
Her Majesty the Queen Dowager, and the other
members of the Royal Family, took their depar-
ture from Clarerce House at half-past ten o'clock.

Among the Nobility and Gentry who called yes-
terday to learn the state of her Royal Highness,
were the Hanoverian Minister, the Danish Charge
!d'Affaires and Countess Bille Brahe, the Brazilian
(Charge d'Affaires and Madame Marques Lisboa,
the Duchess of Inverness, Marchioness of West-
minster, Marchioness of Westmeath, Countess of
Mountnorris, Earl Brownlow, Lord and Lady Col-
chester, Lord Augustus Fitzclarence, Lady Agnes
Buller, Lord and Lady Cowley, Lady Catherine
Bucle!cy, Lord and Lady Mahon, Lord and Lady
Braybrooke, Lady Matilda Wynyard, the Solicitor-
General, Sit R. S. and Lady Adair, Sir Edmond
Stanley, Col. Couper, Col. C. Fox, Capt. Frederick
Pelham, Rev. Dr. Kuper, and Mr. Fortescue.

Another vehement leader against Alderman
HARMER, yesterday in the Times, a cackling
Mutation of its leader of the day before in yes-
terday's Post,
a falling echo of the abuse in the
Cow-kr, a loud blast oa the same trumpet from the
Standard, and the publication in the Ho ald of the
denunciation of the worthy A 'dermal), show distinctly
that his exclusion from the civic chair is to be
made a party question. He is vehemently assailed
by the Tories. As usual those hypocrites fight
under the banner of religion, and boast of having
already obtained the co-operation of some Whigs
and Dissenters. If that be so, the unanimous yell
of the Tory Journals must awaken them to the
truth, and convince them that the Tories are using
them to stab political and religious liberty to the
heart.
The Times yesterday halloed before it was out

EVENING 141,Diff'ION.

of the wood. While it was boasting '1 that not one
Liberal Daily Journal had offered a single word
in the Alderman's defence," The Sun had

risen on him, and was dispersing the thunder cloud
which the Times had gathered over his head. It

may receive, perhaps, no assistance; a narrow-
minded, jealous rivalry, in the other so-called
Liberal Journals, or a contemptible fear, maY
make them sacrifice the public interest to their
presumed private advantage ; but, arined tvith a
good cause, The Sun fears not the issue, though
it shine alone. The subject, however, grows
into a somewhat startling magnitude, when the
whole Tory press unites to pull Mr. Ilmot
ER
away from the civic chair, and only one of the
Liberal Journals comes to his aid.

It is also of startling magnitude, from the vast
interests involved. Let no man suppose that they
are confined to the question of who shall be
Mayor ? The principles at issue lie at the founda-
tion of all our moral science, and as truth or false-
hood prevails there will be years of happiness or

misery in the country.
The Address of the Liverymen, quoted by the •
1
Times; says of the Dispatch, " a greater moral
pest or public nuisance it is impossible to on'
ceive." The Times itself says—
The general course of the Dispatch has been t°
inculcate everything demoralizing, anarchical, aed
christianizing. That Mr. Harmer would have so Writ
ten, had he held the pen, we do not assert ; but we u° '4l--
assert, that he has looked on and permitted all this lej
wickedness; and for it he, above all others, is
elcarly is
and justly responsible. doe
And it gives this illustration :
if for instance, we found the Alderman in a rriereso-4
tile concern in the city, as " Messrs. Harmer "a) ,10
Smith," and if that firm were detected in some ,canclalous.,ife
misdemeanour, would any man in the city listen for p
instant to the plea that " Alderman Harmer has a.
partner, and cannot be responsible for the frauds or the
larcenies committed by the firm ?" Would not every
man of business require, before he acquitted the knowl
head of the house, to know when and how he had Purged
himself of all guilty knowledge of the fraudulent trill's.
actions ?
Here, then, we find the Times and the authilrg

of the Address to the Livery, distinctly embracing
the old papal principle that certain opinions are :11
criminal, and enforcing their opinions that they ars,'l9/1'
criminal by imposing on Alderman HARM".
a civic disability. They wish to make the LiYerl
the instruments of inflicting the punishment' '4
This is retrograding to the dark ages. lhis
is re-opening those frightful dungeons we had
hoped had been closed for ever, in which so reallY
human victims were entombed for opinions which
some men arrogantly pronounced to be false. Thera
is great danger in this. The mass of society are 1,11
f
a state of great suffering, and if they are practically
taught, that the erring systems by which they suffer
are the offspring, not of well meant, though mis-
taken benevolence, but of wickedness, who can
foresee, or who can answer for the mighty excesses'
when their wrath is roused, they may think the"'.
selves justified in committing.
Wickedness I What is wickedness ? •T° eom.
mit murder is wickedness. From that heinous
crime, we say, the Corn-law is not exempt. II°b,
bery is wickedness. The clergy, who have take
all from the poor, who have clinched tbea,
selves at the expense of charitable and other
institutions, are openly accused, and by documents
convicted of that offence. Lying is wiekedneis:
•
y
Those who habitually take oaths which
ne
never keep—who preach a morality which they
hose
ver practice—are guilty of this offence.
tie of
I who put abroad opinions, with all the fervour
1 which they do not believe, are guiltY,
'of lying. All these offences are wickedness, a°°
have been wickedness at all times and places ; bat ~.);!
the Decalogue does not class as wickedness being,„,,o
the rival of the Times, or differing in opitii-on from
the priests and the Tories. For a public and-pope',,i
lar Journal to class a difference of opinion, on.
whatever subject, as wickedness, is to confound all
human language and all distinction between right

and wrong.
These remarks show the total inapplicability 0f

the illustration we have quoted from the Tirne,
There is no fraud, there is nothing akin to filo'
in the opinions of the Dispatch. On the contrary;
they arc distinguished by openness, plainness, ants
an absence of all rnystificatian. What is guiltles:
might be known by Alderman HARMER with°.
any guilt on his part. The whole of the laboured
article in the Times rests on the assumption o f the:
French damsel, " I never find anybody right b°

myself."
t of
We take up this question because the rig—
:
free discussion is assailed in the person Of
,ilViri
HA RNIER ; and, standing on the high grotto" °t
principle, we shall fearlessly point out the track
enables us to trace. The Times and the priesth°"l
and those members of the Livery who have
lend'
themselves to be the tools of the trading sPite -,
the former, and the angry dread of the latter, te,
rain certain opinions as to Monarchical Gov'!"
went, as to the union between Church and State'
the writera
and as to the truth of Christianity ; • ions
land
the Dispalch entertain different °P" by
on those subjects : they think, perhaps, Inclre.oo
not so good as republicanism ; that - relligfi at
will flourish more if not degraded into a P—rke
I instiument ;
Ino inconsiderable number of clever men ill we
and they may, perchance, thiOk' like
'ages, that there never has been a revelation.
the
are not discussing the truth or falsehood' but
utility or the mischief, of these opinions' are
we assert that the writers in the Die/aalc"
as '.
as free to form them, and ought t• 11°- '
iterg .
leomplete liberty to express them, as thereljuab.
!in the Times to form and express opposite op
Llt is very natural for the Times and its friends t:
i
*
'believe that they are right and other men are retng
the ,
but it is equally natural for other men to have
: rioi.
same belief as to the Times. There is no ente-sod
of the truth or correctness of opinion but till' re.
experience. To that the Times and its
theirfrienus
fuse to appeal, and insist on power adoptintg 1.
!)ctty conceits as an unerring and eternal stancl.ar",
• itair

It is not asserted of the writers in the DisPa't,°at
O
whatever may be said of those of the Times' t
they believe one thing, and state another. f that
crime they are not accused. They are accused 0t
differing from the Times. To inflict punishtuenc
for that difference is to assume infallibility. That
there can be any wickedness in any opinion Carr
fully formed, honestly entertained, and correctly
expressed, we deny ; but arrogantly to assume in-
and thereupon to inflict pain and de"
privation on our fellow-creatures, is afrn
eq uen arelitci/
e
'which the Author of Christianity
denounced. We agree, with Mr. Alderman
HARMER, that this is not a personal (I°s'
tion—it concerns the rights of the Livery, the
rights of the Corporation, the more inestinable right
of free discussion, and the distinctions between doh`
and wrong. All these arc endangered by the
trines of the Times, that certain opinions are wicked
and that punishment must be inflicted on them':
if they were infringements of the Decalogue,
robbery 01 murder.
What the Livery may do on this important 9°lrat
tion we cannot judge. We hope, however, (
they will defend their own rights, and the rights c'
the whole human race. They must have sunk fat
below their predecessors if they suffer the frtliesi;
under a hypocritical love for Minion and truth?.hPt
tet r
which their conduct perpetually outrages; to itr.
a severe blow on their liberties by excluding
HARMER from the Mayoralty because the Po