The Sun.
London, England, 1840-09-28 00:00:00

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LONDON:
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 1840.

We sometimes ask ourselves, as we read the ac-
counts of the proceedings of Societies to promote
dio:lesian schools, national education in the tenets
of the Church of England, to build new churches,
and such-like crotchets, ti-hat is all this to end in ?
It is quite clear that in the majority of instances a
factitious enthusiasm, or interested motives, stir up
all the bustle. It is equally clear that this factitious
enthusiasm; having its origin in a notion that
the Church can regenerate the nation, which ea-
' petience has proved •tObe"false, Unlit .he as tern
porary .as it is faatitiOus It is equally clear that
those who are so busy from interested motives will
no sooner be placed or provided for than their
motives for strenuous exertions will die away, and
the schools and institutions once endowed will,
in spite of visitors and guardians, soon be
occupied by men who will study only how to ob.
tain and enjoy their income with the least
labour. To keep alive such an agitation
for a long period is plainly impossible, and in a
few months, or a few years at farthest, the people
will be again allowed to pursue their own course,
less interfered with than before, owing to the lassi-
tude and disgust which always follow a dose of
factitious excitement.

In the meantime, however, the people will go
on getting more knowledge, day after day, and
learning better to weigh the motives and weigh the
doctrines of those who are so zealous to obtain
power over them. The discussions which the ex-
traordinary claims, both political and religious, of
the priest party will force en, cannot fail to expose
their doctrines to a searching examination, and
make the people competent to judge of their pre-

1
tensions.
The number of fluent orators who have
lately risen amongst the working classes,
the publication of such works as that of
Messrs. LOVETT and Cow fcs, the extensive
circulation of such a Journal as the Dispatch,
and numberless other similar facts, show that the
clergy will now appeal to an intelligent, well-in-
formed people, who are hostilely rather than favour-
ably inclined to them. They will , not have to
deal with persons wholly ignorant of the wonderful
tidit,gs they bring, like our Saxon ancestors or
the New Zealanders, and may not, like mis-
sionaries instructed in all the arts of civilized
life, hope to obtain influence over the multiqk.
Their exertions are ill-timed. Their system has
no other principle of vitality than the selfishness of
a few men, who, seeking after power and wealth,
on obviously false pretexts, will not be credited.
Their own disbelief, as evinced in their conduct,
lies like a canker at the root of all exertions, and
blights the produce.
• The farmer and the merchant, the banker and the
manufacturer, striving after wealth, make themselves
useful to other men. They either facilitate the
production of commodities which others desire, or
actually produce them, and their exertions lay the
foundation for an ever increasing sum of food,
clothing, and enjoyment. But the begging cr
extorting scheme of the parsons and their friends
begins and ends in taking away wealth from others
,
and putting it into their own pockets. We know
they assert that they bestow instruction, &c., which
is of more than equivalent value, but they assume
to be the exclusive judges of their own wares, and
the very fact that men will not voluntarily buy
them, is an all-suflicient proof that in the fair
market of competition they are already regarded as
valueless. If endowment stifles, perennial begging
and perennial extortion must end in starving the sys-
tem. If endowment will not keep it in health, and
there can be no hope cf keeping up a factitious enthu-
siasin to fill a he box box every year, it is foolish
to vex the public this year by endeavours which
next year, or in the long run, must be abortive.

iThe second Annual Report of the Registrar-
General, made to the Marquis of NORMANBY in
June this year, and recently published, contains
some facts and statements that are worthy of being
noticed.
the Theum b Rrseg registered,trar-Gne inr al
' in his Report,
statesthe year ending
ise
n
June 30, 1839, to have been—of births 480,540,
of deaths 331,007, and of marriages 121,083 ;
being, as compared to the numbers for the pre-
ceding year, an increase of births of 80,828, al
decrease of deaths of 4,949, and an increase of i
marriages of 9,602. The increase in the num- l't

ber of registered births he ascribes to the in-
creasing success of the system, which has made
the registration of births approach much nearer
to a complete record of the whole number
born than was afforded by the registers of baptisms.
At the same time, the decrease in the number of
registered deaths, compared with that of the pre-
ceding year, is not owing to imperfect registration,
but to diminished mortality. This is a favourable
testimony to the year ending June 1839. But Mr.
F 9 RE, in his excellent letter to the Registrar-Ge-
neral, published as an appendix to the Report,
states that " the rate of mortality in IS3B
was higher than in the latter half of the year
1837, whence we must infer that the year 1838
was an unfavourable year. Of course, when the
epidemics, such as the small-pox and typhus, which
prevailed in 1838, had done their work of moving
the weakest out of the way, there was comparatively
fewer to :be r,moved in the next year, and hence
• 'de favourable notice which the Registrar-General
could take of the year 1839.

Same discussion has recently taken place on the
much greater mortality in towns than in the tural
districts, and surprise wias felt and expressed at the
statement, particularly as it was well known that, on
the whole, the rate of mortality in the country is
much less than formerly, while the chief increase of
the people has consisted of a town population. Mr.
FA R R acknowledges the rapid
improvement in the
health of London during the last two centuries ; at
the same time he repeats in the present report, and
confirms the former statement, that the rate of' mor-
tality in cities is much, higher than in a rural
population. It is found by a careful registration
of deaths among a city population, calculated at
3,726,221, and amongst a rural population, calcu-
lated at 3,539,908, that there died of the forrner
101,019, and of the latter 70,410. The mean
duration of life, says Mr. FA RR, in the two sets
of circumstances, would differ nearly in the ratio of 37
years and 50 years. But the Registrar-General tells
us that it is impossible to do more than approximate
to a solution of the important question, what is the
proportion of mortality to the; population ?. In
fact the town and rural population are calculated
from the population returns made in 1821 and
in 1831, and the rates of increase between
those periods. The registration of deaths is a cer-
tain fact. The numbers of the town and rural
population are only supposed or calculated, and the
actual numbers may differ widely more or less from
the numbers set clown. We shall have, therefore,
a much better guide to determine this relative mor-
tality in town and country, after the census for the
present year, than we now possess. Our own im-
pression is that it will not be found so unfavourable
to towns as the calculation makes it out.

It has been sufficiently proved that this increased
mortality is less the consequence of a mere congre-
gation of people, than of their being huddled toge-
ther in a small space—the result of the high value
given to land and of their poverty. In the eastern
districts of the metropolis the mean duration of life
is from 25 to 30 years, while in the western and
northern it is from 40 to 50 years, the difference
being the result of the poverty or wealth of the dif-
ferent classes who dwell adjoining each other. To
give an additional value to land, and thus to compel
people to crowd together, •is one -object of the
Corn-laws. With the whole world open to
us, there is no other reason why land_ should be so
excessively dear here ; but our crazy Legislature
and all classes may be induced to unite to obtain a
repeal of the Corn.laws. by Mr. FARR'S remark,
" that the middle classes are ,exposed to the epide-
mics generated attiongs:he.ii:p?oi*nei'gltbetttsf7l ~:
by want of rooin and want 9"rair. ' :.„;-;::;1.,,,2
The Registrar-General in his-,Report, draws some
deductions as to the education of the people-from
the persons who write their name or make their
masks, on being married, which will be useful. " It
appears that in 15 English Counties, and in North
and South Wales, more than 40 per cent, of the men
were unable to write their names, and in 19 English I
counties, more than half the women are similarly I
deficient." Out of 121,083 couples, married be-
tween June, 1838, and June, 1839, there were
44,587 men and 58,959 women who could not
write." The metropolis, according to this return,
is much superior as to education to any other part
proportions in it of men and of the kingdom—the
women who cannot write, when married, being only
12 and 24 per cent. The north of England foi-
-1 lows the metropolis, and Lancashire, Bedfordshire,
Monmouthshire, and Wal's, are the more deficient.
It is curious to notice, too, that early mar-
riages are fewer in the metropolis and
the northern districts, where the people are
educated, than in Hertford, Bedford, Cambridge,
&c., where they are less instructed. At the same
time, it will not be denied, we believe, that in the
rural districts the people have more clergymen in
proportion to their numbers than in the me-
tropolie, and yet they are not so well edu-
cated. The Londoners are described by their
own Bishop as sunk in heathenism, but they
are better educated than those who are considered
by the Church to be its own peculiar children.
Our impression is, that throughout the kingdom of
Hanover and Prussia not five persons per cent.,
who arc married, are unable to write, and the im-
mense number who cannot write, when married, in
England, while we possess a Church that costs, in
proportion to the population, ten-fold at least as
much as the Church in the north of Germany, is a
disgrace to the well-paid priesthood of England.

inst.amdvo incytersotilsl,feei
eosamtr rivaleiantmislueerrrapetfcortFal
from
insurrection
h o
Lisbon,
itajoemus teongn S
capital
t the
eca tthruaoorda
vfoeptsy of the
21sti
the
received
theve
north had been completely suppressed. Colonel
M. A. DE SOUSA, the rebel leader, was shot by
his own men, who afterwards laid down their arms
on condition that their lives should be spared. The
to officers dreading that an example would be made of
them escaped into Spain.
In the Cortes some important measures for doing
y
itlurseticGol,er
c
foreignne Government. creFdriotomrs
tzerel)ronght forward by
opposition made to
them, and the feeble wa in which they were sup-
ported by Ministers, it is evident that had not the
British Government taken such a
high and menac-
ing position they would not have been entertained
for an instant. Wiih shameless effrontery almost
every item of the foreign debt was denied, or a
quibbling pretext offered for not
paying any part of
it. Even honourable men shrunk from opposing
the clamours of a venal Press and a dishonest mob.
But what England never would have obtained from
Portuguese justice, Lord PALMERSTON extracted
from Portuguese fears. What years
of entreaties
failed to effect was quickly accomplished by a
threat. Now, although it is a matter of indiffe-
rence to the Portuguese creditors to
what circum-
stance is attributable the recovery of their arrears,
we cannot but deeply regret the exhibition of such
a want of principle in an old and respected ally of
this country. There is nothing which so exalts
the glory of a nation as good faith, and very few
things which sink a State so low as the absence
of it.

The following is the text of the law for defraying
British claims, which
passed the Cortes on the
15th instant, under various protests on the part of
unscrupulous Deputies :
,‘ Art. 1. The GovernmeNt is authorised to pay the
quantity of $1,325,150 839 reis, or the sum which,
according to the rate of exchange, may correspond to
309,201/. 17s. 3d., the amount of the claims presented

on the part of the British Government, according to
the agreement as seen by the table A. annexed to the
present law.
" Art. 2. The means necessary to realise this pay-
ment shall be comprehended in the budgets for the
economical years 1840-41, 1841.42, and 1842-43, in
conformity with the division thown by the table B."

A second law for defraying the whole of the
Forei,n debt in instalments to be derived from
certain taxes, was subsequently passed. It was
supposed that the budget would be voted in a lump,
to allow an early dissolution of the Chambers.
'The Court was in hourly expectation of the ap-
pearance of another branch from the Royal stem
of BRAGANZA. The capital was tranquil. One
French vessel of war, the Espoir, remained in the
Taps.

Madrid Journals of the 19th inst. have reached
us. They confirm the account communicvcd by
telegraph of the appointment, by the REGENT, of
ESPA RTERO to the Presidency of the Council.
The following copies of the Royal decree, and the
proclamation of the Junta of Madrid, are from a
supplement to the Madrid Gazette of the 19th
instant