The Sun.
London, England, 1841-12-18 00:00:00

_ .
SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS'
..FROAt THE EVENING PAPERS OF YESTRIWAY.,
GLOBE.—The constant express or tacit as-
sumption of the Starve-all Interest is, that if they
deprive us of foreign customers, it is all for the
benefit of the Home Market, and that, the Home
Market being incomparably the most important
of all markets, and being dependent on the gen-
try ofB,oool. a year (see Lord Stanley) we can't go
wrong in legislating to secure that their rents shall
never be less, and that the nation never shall
have to mourn a reduction in their number of
domestic servants. That a Minister of State
could utter such stuff as this is something me
morable ; and that even a rustic audience could
swallow it, somewhat incredible. The facts
stated at the Leeds Meeting, and the facts notori-
ous even in the rural districts, dispose of all this
vaunting about our happy dependence on squire-
archal .demand and genteel consumption, and
our happy security of a home-market. The
most direct and demonstrable effect of the Corn-
laws is the ruin of the home-market l—the
most important portion of the demand in that
market is the demand of the middle and lower
classes•--impoverished by the Corn-laws! Let
not the spoiled children of opulence imagine
that their demand for luxuries, and domestic
attendance, are the items of most importance
in home-consumption. If Lord Stanley is ig-
norant enough to suppose it (and we believe
him extremely ignorant of those realities of the
work-day world which a statesman ought chiefly
to know), the present state of things should un-
deceive him, or the state of the revenue soon
will.
.The gentlemen of 8,0001. a year get their
rents paid punctually, out of famine prices. We
dare say they are liberal and considerate in their
expenditure. But what is it after all more than
a drop in the bucket towards national .well-
being ? What becomes of the boast that the
great majority of the nation are dependent upon
them? If so, we may well feel it a sorry de-
pendence.
STAN DARD.—The Morning Chronicle is
this morning kind enough to bestow a very
long article of advice upon the Conservative
journals as to the line which they ought to
take. The gist of this advice is to persuade
us to resign the consideration of things we
know, in order to occupy ourselves with mat-
ters of which we are necessarily ignorant ;
that is to say, we are to give rest to the
mischiefs and dangers from which Sir
Robert Peel's Government has rescued the
--empire,,and enter at once upon the measures
which the Right Hon. Baronet may have deter-
mined upon bringing forward some two months
hence. There can be no doubt that such a
course on our part would be extremely conve-
nient to our adversaries, but it would be the re-
verse of convenient to ourselves and our friend,
were it even possible, which happens not to
be the case. It was but yesterday the
Morning Chronicle told of Sir Robert
Peel's agents running all over the Continent
in search of information upon which to frame,
or at least toperfect, his financial and commercial
arrangements—proof that the measures to be
proposed are not yet in a finished state, or, in
fact, im a state such as that they can be advan-
tageously or justly canvassed. What, then,
is there for us to do, but to treat of the
principles upon winch the Government is
pledged to act; and how can we better
trey of those principles than by exposing
tit Tallaciousness of their contradictories, as
illustrated in the practice of the late Oovernment :
" Insuevit pater optimus hoc me,
fugerum exemplis vitiorum qtmque notando."
"We have pretty good assurance that upon
financial and commercial matters the present
Government will pursue a line exactly opposite
to that attempted by its predecessors, and we are
therefore doing our best to make way for the
new measures in exposing the impolicy of the
late attempt and the dishonesty of its authors.
If we succeed, we may not do what is most agree-
able to the authors of that attempt, but what will
certainly be for the public good.
COURIER.—We have just learned that in the
matter of the Scotch Church question, Govern-
ment has at length come to something like a
definite measure to be proposed to Parliament.
The nature of the measure, which; on the same
authority, has been explained to us, leads us to
pause before we yield our belief to the other-
wise pleasing intelligence, that peace and
order are about to be restored in the
Kirk. To one of its provisions we have
no doubt that the good feeling and loyalty of
Scotland will at once .respond, namely, the re-
poning •of -the ministers of Strathbogie in their
ecclesiastical status. The rescinding, of all the
iniquitous proceedings adopted against these
worthy and excellent men, is a tribute due at
once to the authority of the law of time land, and
the peace and piety of the country; and it is
only characteristic of the sterling good sense of
Scotehrnen, that' uninfluenced by the clamours of
a wild fanaticism, this tribute should be paid. But,
that a legislative sanction is hencetbrth to be given
to what is called the liberum arhitrium, or power
to the Church Courts to act in the settlement of
vacant benefices, and, of course, in all other
matters resulting from it, according to any rules
which they may choose to adopt, however much
even civil interests may be involved, we neither
can nor will believe. At the same time, the chan-
nels by which our information has been conveyed,
that this is really the intention of Sir R. Peel, are
such as to render us far from easy under the ru-
mours that are abroad. If Government has been
led to believe, that such a boon to the Church
of Scotland will be acceptable to any por-
tion of thatybody, worthy of its consideration
in a merely political point of view, we can only
say that Government has been grossly deceived.
The moderate and Constitutional party in the
Church muster above four hundred clergy-
men, and all of them, with the exception
perhaps Of half a dozen, endowed Ministers
of the Establishment; and this body, to a man,
is opposed to the liherum arbitrium, to which,
it is reported, Sir Robert Peel and Sir James
Graham have consented to accede. And by
whom has this consent been obtained? Not by
Dr. Candlish and Mr. Cunningham, or Mr. Dun-
lop, the acknowledged leaders of the other
great party in the Kirk; for to this abso-
lute pOwer of the Church Courts, alike over
the people as over the patrons, they are as
much opposed as Dr. Cook and his friends. But
it has been conceded, if conceded at all, to a
small, uninfluential, and—just because they can-
not grapple, one way or another, with the great
principles now contended for—a lightly esteemed
section of the clergy and elders of the Kirk.
That there are athong these, and at their
head, most excellent and pious men, no
man doubts ; but our fear is that these
men have, by some means or another, found
tile opportunity of satisfying Sir Robert Peel
that they possess an influence in the councils of
the Kirk and over the minds of her members,
scattered in all parts of the country, which does
not belong Ito them, and that in demanding the
liberum arbitrimm, which it is said to be
granted, they have " all the mouths of Rome to
second them. Sir Robert pert will be put
right on the point bye-and-by and will learn,
that if he is to make such a concession of abso-
lute power to meCohfulas
i C as is reported,
the great principle
intended
healing mea-
sure, he will raise a greater storm than ever over
the Kirk and country.

MONEY MARKET and CITY NEWS.

FROM THE MORNING PAPERS OF YESTERDAY.
prohibitive
TIM ES.—T he questiorliti
titthe
whetherStpate o
are " bills of credit," y
clause of the Constitution, referred to yesterday,
is again revived in the American journals, and
legal authorities are cited on the subject, from
which a result may be gathered not unfavourable
o the holders, though we would still warn them,
as we did yesterday, to look on the very exist-
ence of the question as a sign that their position
is- -not perfectly secure. The decisions of the
Supreme Court tend to show, that those only are
the bills of credit designated in the clause re-
ferred to, which are issued by the State Govern-
Merits on the credit of the Government, and de-
signed to circulate as money.
These decisions would preclude the notion
that the Stocks are " bills of credit," but it
Would always be as well to look into the exact
Wording of the instruments, and distinctly to as-
certain whether there be or not anything to
bring them within the meaning of the clause.
It appears'that though the benefits of the im-
proved communications with India arc tolerably
Complete as regards the three presidencies,
much yet remains to be done for other places,
and especially for Singapore, Ceylon, and China,
to enable them to share that advantage. A cor-
respondent, who directs our attention to the
subject, states that there is no certain and direct
post from those places for England, and thae even
,though sent by ship to Bombay, and marked in
the usual vvay by "Overland mail via Marseilles,"
they will be fol-wdrded by ship, unless the party
has some agent or friend at Bombay to pay the
overland postage for him. This may not often
be practicable, and hence the appointment of
Post-office agents at those places out of the re-
gular course of the India mail would appear to
be called for by the merchants; and as the rates
are nigh by this mode of conveyance, there can I
be little doubt of its being worthy of the atten-
-don of the Post-office, even in a pecuniary point
of view, though that ought to be a secondary
consideration in all new arrangements, the utility-
of which is clearly established.