The Sun.
London, England, 1841-10-29 00:00:00

The Corn-laws are obviously a part of that
great system of oppression which the aristocracy
has woven round the democracy. Under the
pretence of preserving what it calls social order,
it has continually laboured to coerce the demo-
cracy into submission, and has sentenced the
people, in spite of their noble and natural desire
to improve their condition, and their strenuous
exertions, to perpetual degradation. To succeed
against such an undying and watchful corpora-
tion, the strictest rectitude and utmost wariness
are necessary. Above all, justice must be fol-
lowed. It is, therefore, especially desirable for
the democracy to distinguish between such laws
as, from their own nature, deserve to be obeyed,
and such as ought to be resisted. To assert that
men are not to exercise their judgment on this
point is to hand them over, bound like a
victim to the stake, for the lawmaker to
torment at his pleasure. Indiscriminate and
blind obedience is not even required of a sol-
dier. "If a sergeant command a private to
shoot his colonel, the soldier would not be
justified in obeying; and, therefore, the soldier
cannot be deprived of the power of judging
whether he will obey or not." The blind
obedience which is not required of soldiers,
cannot be demanded of civilians, and conse-
quently before men can be reasonably asked to
obey laws, they must be convinced that the laws
are such as ought to be obeyed.
We at least shall always feel it our duty, in
spite of the objurgations of the Tory Journals,
to tell our readers that laws to enrich one class
at the expense of another—laws to restrict honest
industry, which political society is constituted to
protect—laws which are cruel or unjust—laws
which unwarrantably interfere with individual
liberty, to secure which ought to be the object of
all law—we shall always avow the doctrine that
laws which, like the Corn-laws, plunder the
many for the sake of the few, are a violation of
the first principles of political society, and ought
not to be obeyed. Force may compel obedience,
but when the society lends itself to that work it
takes the responsibility on itself, and incurs, as
at present, those manifold evils which are ob-
viously a punishment inflicted by nature, and an
admonition for society to alter its course. Far
from adopting the convenient doctrine for its
masters taught by the Post, we wholly repudiate
the assertion that men are bound to obey all the

laws, and limit the duty of obedience to thpse
laws which we know or believe to be honest
and just.

From the remarks of our Contemporary, and
erom the controversy they will engender, it is
plain that this question of the duty of obedience
to law is no longer a mere school question, but

one of practical every-day life. Day after day,
both in metropolitan and provincial Journals, it
is undergoing and will undergo discussion.
People will not be stopped short of any conclu-
sion to which reasoning fairly leads them, by
the vehement assertions of the landlords, whom

they hate as oppressors, or of the priests, whom
they mistrust as deceivers. Interested men will

no more be allowed to settle questions of po-
litics, on an assumption of authority, than ques-
tions of religion ; and if the aristocracy and the
Church cannot defend their position and power
by argument, they will not be suffered long to
enjoy them. We have told them 'long ago, and
repeatedly, that they are provoking a searching
inquiry into the very foundations ''of political
power and political society. That event has
come to pass, and already men have gone to the
very corner-stone of all their power, and discuss
the right and duty of obedience.

We- arc glad to see the Times taking up the
cause of Reform in any shape, though we cannot
admit that the great civil reforms effected by
the Whigs were not of more importance than
'the reforms in the Army proposed by our Con-
temporary. Desiring, too, quite as much as the
Times, a sweeping Reform in the Court of Chan-
cery, we cannot assent to its doctrines, that a
reform in that Court, which dcals in general
only with the property of the opulent, is of infi-
nite importance compared to the abolition of
Church-rates, which interest the conscience of
millions and the peace of half the parishes in
England. We agree «•ith the Times in consider-
ing a reform of the army to be very important,
and we rejoice to see it, on that point, taking the
field against Conservatism. Our Contemporary
said yesterday,—

With some exceptions, so rare as to have no effect
upon the argument, our officers rise in their profession,
not according to their professional merits, but either
upon death vacancies, which are few, er according to
their pecuniary means. The monied man succeeds, as
of course, to each commission, as disposed of by the last
possessor, provided there bo no disqualification in point
of character. Without money or a chance vacancy by
sudden death or dismissal, all the science extant would
not give its possessor a step. " The profession," says
Colonel Mitchell, " bolds out no inducement therefore to
the
acquisition of professional knowledge ; the minds of
military men remain dormant on military affairs." Add
be-
stowed to this, that they generally enter the army at a very
early acre, and with much less of education than is be-
likely to induce most. .men in civil professions, and thus, from
or their in
the very ue-innino. they fall I
of predisposing. ...ey ,aIL into a track very little
themnno a desire of improving their fa-
cultiescultivation, we cannot wonder
and of direct motives to mental
In this total absence both
not more assiduouslyaLurltivated by the officers of the
wonder that military science is
of should marvel that so many
them employ themselves regular army, but r
in intellectual pursuits at all.
The present system, undoubtedly, produces a
great many good officers and estimable gentlemen.
The opinion of society, th
essentiale spirit of the service
itself, have a strong tendencyand to encourage many of
the virtues which are the
most
best men but still,
theso pleonvigerasef
selecting mere
purchase
the be
in a soldier ;
shall be the chief
For the highest commands, it is trUe
se-
lection is retained ; but the highest true, the
is excluded.
power of
ommends are not
command
r of eigahtLi
the only important ones. It is a seriouss responsibility
*hich we assume in placing a body of ix
hun-
dred of our fellow-men under the eu-
tenant-Colonel—or even leaving a company or t
one-tenth of that number at the orders of a Captainrp al
Lieutenant—where such Lieutenant-Colonel, Captain,
or Lieutenant is a person of a violent or vexatiouspteraml
er, or of a dull, or perverse, or uncultivated
') ,
under-
standing, though perhaps a strict disciplinarian and a
studious observer of those minor points which make a,
regiment
•
It is too much that a country like ours shOutl leave it
lo9k well on parade.
wholly fortuitous 'whether the persons who ought to
possess tbi qualities necessary for officer's do actually
possess them or not. It is tou much that the lives of
our soldiers in war, and their regulation and happiness
in peace, should be left the sport of accident—should
depend upon the vague chance whether the party who
has laid out his money in a military step, be a man of
sense, education, and temper, or a headstrong dunce.
After thus adverting to the evil, and pointing

The testimony of the Times to the impro-
priety of the present system is valuable, for it
testifies against the Conservatives but we do
not see how it is to be effectually remedied with-
out a greater infusion of the democratic prin-
ciple both into the Army and into the Govern-
ment. To give the soldiers a share in the elec-
tion of their officers, and to make the GoveruL
ment equally responsible to the whole people,
instead of being the mere instrument of the aris-
tocracy, might, perhaps, secure good officers and
justice to all. Without some changes of that
kind, all other contrivances will be mere pallia-
tives, and the monied and landed aristocracy, in
spite of them, will continue, as at present, to
Make the Army subserve their convenience rather
than be the defence of the country. ,

The Metropolitan Police, in addition. to a
variety of modes already in practice of annoying
respectable publicans, as well as offending public
feeling, have lately hit upon a new system, which,
with the exception of one instance, occurring
in the City, we are happy to say has been
hitherto without effect. Not being allowed,
when on duty, to enter a public-house to take
refreshment, they seem inclined to subject other
persons to the same restrictions, and have lat-
terly been very active in laying informations
against landlords for selling spirits and beer.tO
persons whom they consider of doubtful charac-
ter. They have repeatedly arrested unfortunate
girls in the street, who were giving no annoy-
ance to any human being. In almost every in-
stance within the last month, they have been
reprimanded by the Magistrates for this
officious and cruel interference. Some of them,
convicted of swearing falsely against these poor
creatures, have been reported to the Commis-
sioners without the result being known, and
others, whose conduct was too gross to be over,
looked, have been suspended or allowed to make
their escape. A Correspondent of a Morning,
Contemporary, hitherto favourable to the New
Police regulatims, makes the following coin-

munication, in which we regret to say there is
too much truth :

I have heard, and I believe it to be true, that police-
men often extort money from women under the threat of
taking them to the station-house ; and, if this is per-
mitted, I wish to know what woman is safe ? But I
maintain that the liberty atilt) subject is grossly violated
by any person being taken into custody who has not po,
sitivcly offended in a very decided way. the public de-
corum which it is necessary to maintain in our streets.
It is surely approaching very near to inquisitorial powers
when the subaltern officers of the law are permitted to
inquire into the private characters of persons whom they
may either see frequenting the streets or the taverns.
If this system is permitted to exist, it will not stop here,
and the police will be at last but a corps of spies, and
the tools of an inquisitorial power, which may be carried
to any extent.

The Chief Clerk at the Mansion-house, who has
so long filled the office with credit to himself
and great benefit to the City, and whole opinion,
from long experience, is entitled to 'great weight,
described them astyrannical, the power entrusted
to them, he said, was enormous, and enormously
abused, and something must be donetO prevent
" respectable people from being completely
over ridden." The tyrannical conduct of these
men, supposed to have been abetted by the
Government, returned a Tory for Westinin
ster ; and, had another come forward, would
have achieved what neither money nor influence
ever before accomplished. Two of the Liberal
City candidates, it is firmly believed, lost their
elections for the same reason. But the
dread of this new . body was not con-
fined to London ; . it extended throughout
the whole of England, particularly among a
very influential body of electors, the 'publicans,
and Contributed more than any other cause (ex-
cept the Corn-law question), to turn the balance
against the Government. Yet, notwithstanding
all these proofs of hatred to this inquisitorial
system, manifested by the spontaneous feelings
of free-born Englishmen, an ex-Ministerial
Evening Paper, in a heavy pharisaical article,
more than a column in length, and written, it is
said, by the Member for Lambeth, denounces
those who will not crouch to tyranny, and lauds
this.obnoxious Act to the skies. It is imrnacu-.
late. Daily miracles are performed by it.
Father MATHEW is a mere drone in the great
work of regenerating the . lower classes, coin-
pared with Mr. HAWES. "No restraint," says
the Globe, "is imposed on any one, except those
who require to be restrained jfrom doing themselves
positive injury, and who are prone to insult and
outrage public decorum ;" and thus exultingly
concludes :—" The law improves, as we have
seen, the habits of the people, and conse-
quently .tends to raise their character in
the estimation of other nations." It is
melancholy to see a paper professing Liberal
principles so mischievously influenced 'by party,
prejudices, and so utterly forgetful of a principle
which the Whigs profess to prize above all others
—the liberty of the subject.

The most abject partizans of CHRISTINA MU-
Noz find a difficulty in attempting to advocate
her atrocious defence of the insurrection in
Spain. There is something in the conduct of
this woman so utterly abandoned—so entirely
dead to every sentiment of gratitude and paren-
tal tenderness—so indifferent to the magnitude'
of the crimes committed in her name—so callous
to the sufferings and death of the misguided
dupes of her avarice, ambition, and thirst of re-
venge, that even the unscrupulous champions of
every assumption of despotic power in Princes
shrink- from the obloquy of undertaking her
defence at the bar of public opinion. Destitute
alike of decency and shame,
she, in order to in-
crease the listof the alleged crimes of the Sp—ailigt
G overnment, unblushingly charges the Executive
Government at Madrid with the very acts com-
mitted by herself; while Regent of the kingdom,
in the name of her august daughter. In vainly
attempting to exculpate herself from the guilt
of immediately
agd directly kindling the civil

arrest the downfa. of CHRISTINA MUNOZ. There
was not even a mountain robber in the Penin-
sula, who thought it worth his while to unfurl a
rag at the end of a pole in her name, either as
guardian, of hei children or as Regent of the
kingdom. Even her well-beloved MuNoz fled
without shouldering a musket in her defence, or
once offering to resist the popularly-established
Government of the Spanish FABIUS, ESPARTERO.
As to the third alleged cause, the usurpation
of the Royal authority, we may observe, that in
a constitutional monarchy, where the represen-
tative principle is the basis of law and Govern-
ment, there can be no usurpation where the
whole nation is a consenting party. Now all
Spain promptlyacquiesced in the sentence of the
abandonment of the guardianship of her children
and of the Regency, pronounced by the Cortes
against CHRISTINA MUNOZ. Not a municipality
raised its voice in defence of Madame MuNoz,
who, by her connection with a menial, had vir-
tually resigned the guardianship of her children
by FERDINAND.
The fourth cause embraces two distinct charges.
Of the obseivance of the Treaty of Bergara we
. have said enough above to disconcert the parti-

zansof Madame MUNOZ. As to the hypwritical
babble about the Basque fueros, enough that it
Was by the Government of Madame Muxoz that
they were declared to be for ever abolished.
Her rebellious partizan, MONTES DE OCA, now a
prisoner in Spain, and one of the confreres of the
rebels O'DONNELL and LEON, countersigned as
Minister of the Interior, the very decree by which
CHRISTINA MuNoz, as Regent, abolished the
Basque fueros. So much for CHRISTINA'S veracity.
Respecting the fifth cause, we can only say,
that if CHRISTINA &luNO2 regarded the secret
joy with which all Spain beheld her removal
from the guardianship of wards whom she plun-
dered, as'neither more nor less than a "stupor
of prcifbund grief," she must regard objects
through a very different medium from that of
the rest of the world. The self love must be
'indeed miraculous which discovers in ill-con-
gealed joy and suppressed hatred and contempt
a sorrow too' deep for tears, and a commiserating
indignation too intense for muscular action. But
when in a whole year that sorrow finds neither
a tongue nor a sword, it becomes ahnost amusing
to hear it pleaded as the still existing cause of
national lethargy.
As religicotand the POPE are thrown in by
-warof,lnake-weightsi it is hardly fair to make
more than a:passing allusion to them. Of the
first, the Holy See will hardly accept CHRISTINA
Muzlez as a spotless champion, unless, by way of
making reparation for the past she assist in
tbunding as many convents and monasteries as
she enriched herself by suppressing. And even
:wei:e,she to do thiS, we doubt whether she would
be as acceptable at the Vatican us Don Cantos.
CHRISTINA'S participation in the rebellion in
Spain is now indirectly, but most conclusively,
avowed by herself. She glories in the crimes-
that have been committed—exults in the blood
that,ha4 been shed. Instead of appearing ap-
palled with horror at learning that murder has
been committed under the roof which covered
her children, she applaUds the daring intrepidity
of the murderers. Her rehearsal of the part of a
:distressed mother separated.froni her children is
dlsguiting. Has she not two or three little
MinsozEs to dandle, one of whom engaged her
attention more when REGENT than both the
Royal infants ? At ten years old 'the education
of the youifg - QUEEN was so neglected by her
mother that she could not read or write a word;
while the very money allowed to supply 'the
wants of her wardrobe was unscrupulously/added
to her Royal mother's state perquisites. Yet
this woman makes a parade of her sufferings and
indignities as a Sovereign, and of her agonised
feelings as a widow and a mother ! Not 'Mu-
tented with plundering Spain of her gold, and
robbing her Of her tranquillity, the ex-REGENT
parades a demand upon her sympathy 1 The
Peninsular SEMIRAMIS is an adept in all the con-
triVittices by 'which humility, credulity, vanity,
an unsuspecting singleness of purpose are made
theAnpesofcraft,avarice, andprolligateambition.

The Paris Journals of Wednesday have all
reached us. Their contents arc more than usu-
ally uninteresting.

A letter front Toulon, of the 22d inst., an-
nounces that the sivadron of Rear-Admiral
CASY got under wek;h on the evening of the
21st for Brest.
The Veloce steamer left Toulon on the 20th
for Constantinople, with the Baron DE BOUR-
QUENEY on board.

The pompous impudence of some political writers is
amusing.; For example, a writer in the Post yesterday
says:---,-" There are four different ways of settling the
Government of Spain:-Ist. A soi-disant republic com-
bined with a- dictator. 2113, A marriage betwixt the
young Queen and the son of Don Carlos. idly, An
union betwixt a son of lion Francisco and his _Royal
cousin. 4thly, A marriage between tho same young
Princess and a Prince of the house of Cobourg." To sup-
pose that a Government can be settled by marrying a
young girl to either one of three youths, implies that
the people vire to go for nothing. The Government of
Spain—a country, like our own, in a state of rapid transi-
tion, with a prodigious mass of ecclesiastical and civil
grievances to redress, with ages of usurpation to over-
throw—cannot be settled by any such means, nor in a
short time. Et all the transactions which may take
place heneerorth, the people and the press of Spain, will
have Much to say, and it is the very essence 'of political
quidnunciam to talk of settling the Government by marry-
ing a girl Wa boy.

We leartf that, in addition to the estates of Pen-
heame, Clugsidn, and Dalreagle, Major Stopford receives
300,0001. by the will of the late Mr. Blair, of Penning-
hame, to be laid out in the )urchase of land, which, with
the above estates, is to be put under 'entail.—Galloway
Register.
THE LARGEST PETTICOAT GOVERNMENT
EVER. KNOWN.—TiIe Brtish empire extends over
2,800,000, square miles, Ind contains a population of
179,235,000 souls.--New -,rork Paper.