The Sun.
London, England, 1841-08-05 00:00:00

PUBLIC OPINION.

The Chronicle has another article on Sir Robert Peel's
late Tamworth speech :—" We gave him credit," says
our Contemporary, " for the external semblance of a
better morality than it now appears he put on for 'the
occasion. The incautious protest of the Post strips off
this rag of decency. Its rash denial brings out into
bold relief the fact that Sir Robert Peel is a states-
man who withholds what he knows, or professes to
know, will benefit the nation, avert public calamity,
and ensure public prosperity, until he first grasps the
fee' of office." We do not believe that it is the " fee
of office" which causes the Right Hon. Baronet's present
reserve ; but that he withholds his remedy, simply and
solely because he is unprovided with one. Instead of
taking time by the forelock, his policy will be one of
shifting expediency—to do no more than he can help—
to have no settled principle of action—but to trust to
chance for escape from perplexity.
The Herald reads a long lecture on propriety to the
expected Tory Government, exhorting it never to lose
sight of " the straightforward, genuine earnestness of the
British character." From the exceeding earnestness
with which our Contemporary enforces this exhortation,
it is pretty evident that he is somewhat distrustful of
Tory policy, and thinks that the party stand greatly in
need of his refresher.

The Times gives some amusing advice to the British
Association—in default of a more important subject for
discussion—recommending it, inter alia, "to elect an
agreeable philosopher, President—a man of rank, Vice,
to fix the next meeting at Cheltenham, and have plenty
of experiments and eloquence," in which case, we arc
assured, " it will be likely to prove one of the most for-
midable antagonists that horse-racing has encountered in
our days."
The Advertiser justly remarks, " We deem the ques-
tion of the Corn-laws one in which the ministers
of the Gospel, whethar belonging to the Establish-
ment, or ranging themselves under the banners of
Dissent, may not only with propriety take a part, but
in which they ought to take a part. They are bound to do
this by every consideration of humanity and religion.
Were the clergy to follow this advice, they would really,
instead of nominally, be showing themselves Ministers
of the Gospel. But this is almost too much to expect
from well- endowed Pluralists, who have an interest in
maintaining Tory abuses.
The Post contains an article whose object is an ex -
ceedingly novel and edifying one—namely, to prove that
the present Tory leaders in Ireland are " men of un-
usual moderation and sobriety of judgment." If so,
they must be strangely altered from what they were
only six months since.
The Dublin Evening Mail is truly of opinion that
Mr. O'Connell is the sole cause of the disturbed and
criminal state of Ireland. Owing to his machinations
the landlords consolidate their estates, and turn wretches
out to starve or murder. He alone has kept Ireland
from reaping the harvest of peace, union, industry, and
prosperity ; which language, translated into an idiom
which we understand, means that Mr. O'Connell is the
sole cause why the landlords of Ireland have been
checked in the most villainous career that ever a well-
fed set of gentlemen ever pursued towards their half-
starved and over-worked brethren.

The Tyne Mercury says, " Sir Robert Peel admits
that the Queen has the power of choosing her own Mi-
nisters, at the very moment that he is urging in every
possible manner the necessity of the House of Com-
mons acting as the great constitutional power. He plays
into the hand of the Queen, but he will not relinquish
the trump cards of the Commons. He is like the man with
the enormous squint, who was said, in vulgar parlance, to
look two ways for Sunday. He is like the inconsistent boat-
man who looked one way and rowed the other. He
does, indeed, act, or rather say, by and bye, in the same
speech with considerable candour, more than we could
have expected of him, for men's real motives, however
evil and black, are sometimes most beautifully wrapt up—
the most rough and ugly and unsightly determinations,
are not uncommonly very admirably folded in the finest
muslin—as some old phrase about the Archipelago has
it, it's very easy to put a pirate's head in a golden
cloth.' But not so Sir Robert. He is more candid than
usual. He says, 'my advice for the present is, dismiss
those who are at present in office.' This is all he wants."
The Brighton Guardian says :—" The nation consi-
dered as a patient has been placed as much in Sir R.
Peel's hands as a Member of Parliament as in those of
the Ministers. Her disorders are legislative, not admi-
nistrative ; they lie in the digestive organs, in the vital
functions, not in the nerves of the will or the organs
of locomotion. So far from not being admitted
to feel the national pulse, as a legislator he has his
hand continually upon it, and as a legislator he con-
tinually prescribes for the patient. The Corn-law is one
of his pills, the discriminating duty on sugar is another,
the timber duties are a third, Church-rates a fourth,
Ecclesiastical Courts a fifth, a great limitation to the
franchise is a sixth, with a great multitude of powders and
draughts, steel pills, and great depletion by taxation. It
is quite false, therefore, to say that he is n7t admitted
to the patient ; he is a regular attendant, and continu-
ally forces, with ever injurious effects, the most disgusting
nostrums down her throat. England is already dying
of Dr. Peel's attendance and Peel drugs ; and there is no
hope of a cure but by throwing the physic and the doc-
tor out of the window."