The Sun.
London, England, 1840-05-08 00:00:00

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LONDON:
FRIDAY, MAY 8, 1840.

In the House of Lords last night Lord SEA-
TON'S Annuity Bill was read a third time and
Passed.

Viscount MELBOURNE, in answer to a question
formerly put to him by Viscount STANGFORD,
saidthat information had reached her MA-
443TY's Government of 500 Negroes having been
shipped in the Senegal for Cayenne, and that her
4AJEETY'S Ambassador at Paris had been di•
reefed
to inquire into the matter, and take such
measures as were proper. In reply to Lord Asti-
iltiftTox the Noble Viscount said that no de-
spatches had been recently received from China.
A number of petitions for and against the aboli-
tion of the Corn-laws, for Church Extension, against
the intrusion of ministers, &c., were presented.
Some Returns were laid on the ;able, and then
their Lordships adjourned.
In the Commons, too, a consider—able number of
Petitions were presented, the bulk of which were
for and against Church Extension. Sir R. INGLis
axed his motion on this subject for the 21st inst.

Mr. HUME postponed his motion relative to
Messrs. BEDARD and PENNET, the Canadian
Judges, for a fortnight.
In reply to Mr. SHAW, Viscount MORPETII
stated that he hoped a final payment to the
Irish clergy, on account of the tithes which the
Irish people refused to pay, and with which
the Legislature burdened the whole empire, would be
speedily made ; with which explanation Mr. Sri w,
who looks after the money of the clergy, appeared
to be contented.

In reply to Sir J. GRAHAM, Mr. Fox MA ULE
Rued that lie could not make any alteration in the
accounts furnished by the corporate towns accord-
'at to law, so as to show whether both the auditors
concurred in vouching for those accounts or not ;
but,he thought it would be proper to have such a
Statement in future, and he would direct the Mayors
to supply it.
Mr. Fox 'VIA tax, in answer to Mr. GrtEnric
and. Sir E. KNATCHBULL, said that he was
"Xious to carry forward the Rural Police Bill, Ili.
Bh°4 as possible, but he could not fix any day for
e purpose. He wished also to propose that the
Police of the borough Should be united with the
police of the counties, where the latter adopted the
rural police, but he was afraid he should encounter
ere opposition. If he succeeded, however, the
4-I°R. Gentleman was understood to say, that it
would be optional with the councils of boroughs to
form the union.

In reply to Captain BOLDERO, Mr. MACAU-
LAY stated that it was the intention of Government
t° Carry into effect the recommendations of the
1411itary Commissioners, but that a vote of money
*as first necessary.
Mr. WARBURTON co.nplained of Alderman
I‘';OPELAND for presenting a petition reflecting on
nltn, Without first mentioning the matter to him.
The. Select Committee on the Grammer School
ill Was appointed.
The House adjourned without transacting any

business of the least importance. When so much
remains to be done, the loss of a week now is a
serious inconvenience.

It may not be without use to take the present
opportunity, when the public is strongly excited by
the late diabolical murder, of remarking, that this
crime is still subjected to capital punishment. The
law in that respect has undergone no change. It
is not from the melioration of our criminal code
that the crime of murder is committed. Whatever
punishment it has been liable to remains ; and as
surely as a man is found guilty of murder, so
surely will he be executed. Those crimes for
which the punishment of death has been abolished
have diminished, and, to prevent doubt and dismay,
and to guard against every wish to return to cruel
laws, we beg to impress it on our readers that it is
impossible to trace the crime of murder to the
meliorations which have taken place in our criminal
code.

We are not so sure that it may not in some
measure be traced to the arrogant, self-sufficient
spirit which opposed those meliorations, and which
persists in acting on its own short-sighted conceit,
after the progress of events has demonstrated that it
is net in accordance vs-ith the habits of the age
When it was found necessary, absolutely necessary,
to put an end to capital punishments for considerable
crimes, such as forgery, stealing horses and sheep,
etc., it became palpable that political opinions
could no longer be enforced, nor political systems
upheld, by penalties, the infliction of which men
would not tolerate to repress crimes. Nevertheless
our Legislators, who seem very slow to learn,,
have not yet comprehended this important fact,
and they insist on enforcing their political opi-
nions, and upholding their political systems, by
terror; and issue their decrees as arrogantly as before
the axe was blunted in their hands, and the people
had set aside their bloody enactments.
Take for example Lord STANLEY'S Registration
Bill. What is that but an arrogant indulgence of
self-will, in this Lord and his Tory followers,
in defiance of the bulk of the population of Ire-
land ? We quote that only as the example of the
indulgence of arrogance in our puffed up lordlings
and legislators, who insist on trampling under foot
all the feelings of other men. They encourage a
similar indulgence in those who can attain their
ends only by the use of physical force, till it hur-
ries them into crimes. We maintain that the ex-
ample of the Legislature, the principles it
acts on, have more influence over the public mind
than its punishments, and that tl:e tyranny it
indulges in, under the direction of such mere pas-
sionate brawlers as my Lord STANLEY, produces
more crimes than its punishments prevent. Our
lawmakers, though they have been compelled to
abrogate several sanguinary laws, have failed to
perceive the connection between the spread of hu-
manity and the decay of arbitrary power ; and by
continuing to act on arbitrary maxims have foa-
tered that headlong self-will which ends in great
criminality.

It should also be remembered that the habit of
caring little for human life, and of being regardless
of bloodshed, was for a long period encouraged
both by the precepts and example of the Legisla-
ture, whilst it has only very recently given its
formal sanction to the growing humanity of the
more enlightened of the people. It cannot be won-
dered at, therefore, that the bad habit of caring
little for human life should continue for some time
amongst certain classes of society. Nor have we
the least reason to despair of the continued progress
of improvement, because we are now and then still
shocked by the commission of atrocious and bar-
barous crimes.

A great meeting of gentlemen favourable to
Lord STANLEY'S Bill, was held at Belfast on
Saturday. Of course, the Tory papers magnify it
to the utmost of their power, in order to counteract
the effect of the Ulster meeting against the Bill.
The Marquis of DOWN3HIRE moved the first re-
solution, and the simple-minded Peer, after many
protests against its being supposed that he wished
to injure or control his Catholic tenantry, vet),
naively let out the whole secret of the Tory at-
tachment to the Bill in the following passage :

" It would, I firmly believe, rescue them (the Roman
Catholics of Ircladn) from an influence very prejudicial to
their character and interests, by which they are guided into
lamentable error. , A power and an influence over the
Roman Catholic population of Ireland is possessed and
exercised by persons whose motives are not pure, and who
have not the real interests of the people at heart, but who
counsel and impel them to designs which are for anything
but the promotion of the general welfare of the country.—
( Hear, and cheers.) This is a notorious fact. It will
not be said that persons, bringing those who have not had
the benefit of education, or have not been taught strictness
in regard to moral principle, to make a false claim to the
exercise of the elective franchise, are actuated by proper
motives.—( Hear. )"
Lord DOWNSIIIRE and his friends, then, . are
envious of the influence which others than them-
selves exercise over the Catholics of Ireland, and as
they cannot win that influence by their good deeds
or by their character, they are de:ermined to de-
prive others of it by law-if they can. That and
that only, is all the Tories care for, and all which
they seek to accomplish. Their talk about perjury
• and immorality is mere hypocrisy.

We understand that Lord PALMERSTON has
sent instructions to Lord PONSONBY, the British
Ambassador at the Porte, and to Colonel HODGES,
British Consul-General at Alexandria, to employ
their influence with the Turkish and Egyptian Go-
vernments, in obtaining some mitigation of the hor-
rible cruelties to which the Hebrews of the East
are at present exposed. Letters from Damascus,
of the sth of March, demonstrate the importance
and the necessity of this proceeding on the part of
the British Government, as it appears that the
Consuls of the Great European Powers have had
no slight share in the persecution of the unhappy
Israelites. From these letters, we learn that the
Apostolical Prefect of the Catholic Missions at
Beyruth sent a Capuchin Monk to Damascus, to
inquire into the alleged guilt of the Jews. The
Monk reported to his Spiritual Superior, that
the Jews had certainly murdered Father THOMAS°
and his servant ; that he had collected the bones
found in the sewers, and after putting them in a
coffin, had them conveyed in procession to the
house of the French Consul, where mass was
celebrated ; that afterwards the coffin was
taken to the church of the Capuchins, followed
' in procession by the French, English, and Austrian
Consuls, and all the Catholic clergy of Damas-
cus, with a crowd of Turks, who vociferated
curses at every step against the Hebrew race.
When this was done the French Consul demanded
from the Jews the blood of Father THOMAS°,
which he affirmed they had kept in a bottle, and
likewise a crucifix made of the wood of the true
cross, which that ecclesiastic was wont to wear
about his neck. What answer the Jews made to
this demand the letters before us do not state ; but
we can safely affirm that they could not comply
with it, as they neither had blood nor crucifix, being
as innocent of the murder of the Priest and his ser-
vant as the Sovereign Pontiff who now fills St.
Peter's chair.

It will be remembered that in all previous ac-
counts the French Consul was represented as the
zealous defender of the innocent Jews. The letters
now r.ceived assure us, that, on the contrary, the
French, English, rind Austrian Consuls abetted the
Egyptian Authorities in their atrocious p:;rsccution
of the Hebrews.
As to the report of the ignorant Monk, it is

enough to say that the bones conveyed to the

Church of the Capuchins are not human bones at
all—an assertion not hazarded slightly, but rest-
ing on the testimony of an eye-witness, who
communicated the fact to the Austrian Observer in
a letter from Damascus, published in that Journal.
The procession, too, with the bones was clearly
intendvd to excite popular vengeance ; possibly to
prompt a wholesale massacre of a devoted people.
The Monk, whose waking dreams were of the In-
quisition and its dark terrors, saw in the rack upon
which the Jews were miserably tortured, the extor-
ter of undoubted truth. Sent to inquire into the
affair, lie was content to know that sufficient pain
had been inflicted to extract from the sufferer an
assent to a dictated confession. The Secretary's
part at such trials is not difficult. He has but to
write on ; for geat must be the miracle if any ob-
jection be made on the part of the agonized victim
to sign the record of his alleged guilt. But of
this the Monk was either ignorant, or he was in-
different to any such consideration. At all events,
he wa; satisfied with what had taken place in the
way of persecution. But, his zeal would not suffer
him to leave the fire as he found it. He cast so
much fresh fuel upon it, that we are surprised that
it did not entirely consume, in one day, the whole
of the Jewish quarter at Damascus.

We have reason to believe that the French
and Austrian Governments have not been he-
hind Elgland in instructing their Represen-
tatives in Turkey and Egypt to afford the.
persecuted Jews all:the protection in their power.
To none of these Governments is it unknown that
the only guilt of the Jews consists in their wealth,
while they must be equally sensible that it is neces-
sary to rescue them from the superstitious preju-
dices of the oriental Christians of the Catholic,
Coptic, and Greek Churches, who are ready to
countenance any plan of Jewish persecution de-
vised by their Moslem rulers. The march of scep-
ticism is rapid enough to affright the conscientious
believer ; but slow—painfully slow—is the progress
of its erroneously presumed concomitant, true tole-
ration, civil and religious. In the East it is yet
hardly known, and the last in that dark land des-
tined to feel its benign influence, are that land's
once bravest and noblest_offspring—the day-spring of
its former civilization and its glory—the deposi-
taries of its wisdom and its sublimest genius—the
living inspired oracles of all that the religion of
the Cross has sanctified to us—the now scattered
and oppressed children of Israel I

When we inform our readers that a clergyman of
the Church of England has fallen under the lash
of the Times, we need not add that he must have
been guilty of some enormous act of charity—that
he must have committed some heinous sin against
the spirit of bigotry and intolerance, to have de-
served so cminent a distinction. In this predica-
ment stands Dr. OLIVER, the Rec►or of Wolver-
hampton.
There are many Dissenters in Wolverhampton,
and the opposition to Church-rates has consequently
been resolute. The Church-rate war has been
accompanied with all the evils usually attendant on,
a disturbed and dislocated state of society—
evils which, judging from the present tem-
per of the Church, must, we fear, be con.
siderably aggravated and extended before an effec-
tual remedy is applied. Dr. OLIVER, seeing the
injury done to the Church by those contests
which bring her into collision with the people in
the odious character of a " nefarious exactor"—
the Times never hit upon a happier definition—
and lamenting the animosity thus excited among
inhabitants of the same locality, who, as neigh-
bours and Christians, ought to live in peace, de-
termined that, as far as he was concerned, there
should be an end of these things. Accordingly, at
a Vestry meeting held some time ago, he addressed
his fellow-parishioners in a speech worthy of a
minister of the gospel of peace and charity, but
on that very account the more calculated to expose
him to the censure of those who hold that peace
and charity are neither part nor parcel of a State
religion, which must be defended with very differ-
ent weapons. The substance of the Reverend
Gentleman's address appeared in our colutns at the
time, but as it was made the subject of an abusive
attack in the Times a day or two ago, we republish
it in juxta-position with the comments of that
paper, that our readers may see how contemptu-
ously the thorough-going supporters of the Apos-
tolical Church discard Christian principle and
Christian feeling from their consideration.

" As to the legality of Church-rates," said the Rev.
Gentleman, " I continue to hold the sentiments I have
heretofore professed ; but when I consider that the grant-
ing of such rates is optional, and that the discussion of the
subject only tends to create feud—to divide the town
against itself—to set father against son, and son against
father—to sever long-standing friendships, and to
dissolve mutual ties—( Loud cries of " Hoar, hear")-
-when I reflect, also, that the agitation of that question
is little less than a scourge on the public peace of the
town, I cannot consent to aim a blow so heavy and a dis-
couragement so great upon what I consider to be the
interests of the Church.—( Expressions of much ap-
probation.) I shall not give my consent, there-
fore, to the agitation of the question of Church-
rates.—( Hear, hear, hear.) My motto is Peace; and
the banner which I this day unfurl is the banner of
Unity—a banner which cannot, as it shall not, be raised to
lead you into contests, in which all is to be lost and nothing
is to be gained.—(Much approbation.) I know I shall be
asked how I purpose, without a rate, to provide for the
congregational expenses of the Church ? My answer is
simple. I have no doubt whatever of the success of the
voluntary system, if it is properly tested. I shall, with the
assistance of my warden and the colleague you may appoint
to act with him, give this plan a fair and a free trial; and
so long as I continue the resident incumbent of this pa-
rish, I pledge myself never to go for a rate if you will sup-
port me, which, I repeat, I have no donbt you will, in de-
fraying the congregational expenses of the Church by your
voluntary contributions.—( Hear, hear.) Having thus ex-
plained my views and sentiments, I shall proceed to name
the gentleman upon whom I have fixed my choice ; and
when I mention his name you will, lam sure, leel that he
combines the qualifications I set out with laying down for
my guidance—he being a consistent and regular Church-
man, agreeing with me on the subject of Church-rates,
and one who will lose sight of no opportunity of promoting
the interests of this ministry and of the congregation."—
( Loud cries of " Ilear," and a general expression of ap-
proval.)

Happy were it for the Church of England if all
her ministers were inspired by the spirit which
breathes in this admirable speech. But what does
the thundering organ of the Establishment say to it ?
Why, that coming from a sworn clergyman of the
Church, it is "very melancholy"—" a mockery of
Scripture, and a defiance of experience—that it
evinces a " contempt for revelation" (Church-
rates being held by orthodox believers to be one of
the main pillars of revelation); that " foretelling the
inevitable tendency of Christian discipline to awa-
ken the wrath of corrupt natures the Son of Man has
himself told us, that he came not to send peace
upon the earth but a sword;' that it is impious to
talk of sacrificing principle to peace ; and more-
over, as experience shows, it is utterly useless !"
We have heard of the Devil quoting Scriptute—
we might defy the Prince of Darkness himself to
pervert it more outrageously, than the writer of the
above passage has done.
We say nothing of the disreputable ignorance
displayed by Dr. OLIvER's assailant, in confound-
ing the imposition of a tax with Church discipline,
because the Times never enters upon such subjects
without displaying its ignorance ; but we were not
prepared, we confess, for the new theory of scrip-
ture interpretation which it has broached. It is
not enough, it seems, that the evils foreseen and
foretold by the SON OF MAN should come to pass.
According to the Ncologist of the Times, it is the
duty of the so-called successors of .JESUS CHRIST
and his Apostles to fulfil the prophecies, by volun-
tarily becoming themselves the doers of evil. They
are not to let the sword slumber in the scabbard,
lest the Scripture should not be fulfilled ; but if
none else will drawit, they must. They must doff
the garments of peace and love, and becotne men
of war and blood, that our faith in the Divine
Oracles may test on a sure foundation ! " Bella,
horrida bella," is in future to be the motto inscribed
on the banner of the Church ; and he that will not
fight under this banner sacrifices principle to
Peace ! Truly the clergy are greatly indebted to the
limes, for its exposition of Scripture, as well as
of their Scriptural principles.

Every day is bringing with it new proofs or the
necessity of doing away
The
with Church rr•
subject now presses itself on public attention in the
form of the question, whether the Church or the