The Sun.
London, England, 1848-04-14 00:00:00

etlenin4

LONDON, FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 1848.

After all, the Monster Petition has burst like the
veriest bubble of suds I The parturient mountain of
Kennington has brought forth the merest mouse of
a grievance. The whole demonstration of Chartism
on Monday morning, turns out to be one of the
grossest delusions ever practised upon the Legislature
by a clique of unprincipled and designing demagogues.
After the revelations and explanations of yesterday
evening in the House of Commons, it is altogether
impossible for us to express ourselves in sufficient
terms of disgust at the vulgar and unpardonable
insolence which has throughout characterised this
transaction. Language is too feeble to express our
contempt for the authors of a movement so derogatory
to the name, and the fame, and the glory, and the
dignity of the working classes of England. Far,
however, be it from us to associate the brutalities,
obscenities, aria
petition the ribaldries of this notorious
We know them
mass of our industrious countrymen.
to
n
any manner Whateverincapable participating
With
aschrne so utterly despi-
cable
writing paper five enormous rolls Of
Preseeti.tedThe Monday evening to Par-
and designated, Par-
liament Ow:lth an intolerable audacity,
" A Petition from the
the fabrication of an odious "s' in fact, merely
tatives of that ignorance andsdminority—the represen-
found amongst the lowest depravity which is always
the moral sediment of a po urlegs' of
a community
compelled to declare our sentimentsPatiun• When we are
terms of abhorrence, we are by n in these resolute
implicate in the deception all tose means
dis Posed
have appeared conspicuously in the courses'se nnrn"
may
agitation. And first of all
We
wouli of the recent
thoroughly exonerate .Ir. FFARGIJS o('CWholly and
any share— the most trivial—in this disgusting from
stupendous humbug. Ilia character, both 1::?; ga"
tleman and a representative, is of itself a sufficient
that any such participation would under
every every circumstance have been impossible. Every one
of the many entertaining incidents which interrupted
yesterday's discussion in the Commons, was a cor-
roboration of this fact and an additional testimony of
the personal respect entertained for the Honour-
able Gentleman, the .Alember for Nottingham.
His positive and reiterated repudiation of all
knowledge of the foul and flagrant trickery
of the petition received, as it deserved to do,

the implicit credence of the House, and his ultimate
resolution—the abandonment of the motion for this
evening—has elevated him, we are bold to say, in
the consideration of every sensible man in the United
Kingdom.

Even the Hon. Representative of Cirencester must
by this time, we imagine, be disposed to sympathise
in the opinion here expressed by ourselves in refer-
ence to the Hon. Member for Nottingham. Now
that the excitement of Mr. CRIPPS has abated under
the assuaging influences of sleep and reflection, we
are satisfied that his conjectures as to the actual con-
nexion existing between the designs of the petitioners
and those of Mr. F. O'CONNOR are altogether different
from the ideas expressed by him yesterday in regard
to that supposed complicity. Not that we view with
any degree of amazement the emotion displayed on
that occasion by the honourable representative of
Cirencester. That emotion was the natural conse-
quence of the indignation with which he had perused
the fictitious signatures and indecent absurdities
mingled together in the petition. We as thoroughly
appreciate the cause of his excitement as we do the
honourable completeness of his apology, and the
laudable cordiality of his explanation. When it was
proved on examination before the Committee on
Public Petitions that the document called the
Chartist Petition was one of the most shame-
faced and disgraceful humbugs ever brought
within the cognizance of Parliament—that in-
stead of containing 5,750,000 signatures, it
contained only 1,975,496; that among those signa-
tures occurred the names of her Most Gracious
Majesty the QuaEs, of his Grace the Duke of WEL-
LINGTON, Of Sir ROBERT PEEL, of Colonel SIBTHoRP,
of Mr. COBDEN, &c. &c. ; that other pretended auto-
graphs were merely phrases from the slang dictionary,
or words that, accumulated together, formed "a
mass of impiety, of blasphemy, and of ribaldry"—.
when all these disgusting particulars revealed them-
selves under the scrutiny of the Committee on Public
Petitions, it is anything but surprising that Mr.
CRIPPS, himself a member of that Committee, should
have commented upon the transaction in language
such as, under other circumstances, might have
been considered intemperate. Insomuch was
this allowance for provocation manifestly neces-
sary that the Right Honourable the Speaker of
the House, in his official capacity, thus alludcd to
the observations of Mr. CRIPPS ;--" The Hon. Mem-
ber for Cirencester certainly contradicted with
warmth the statements of the Hon. Member for Not-
tingham; but I did not conceive at the time that the
Hun. Member had gone beyond the rules warranted
by the usage of this House." Yet, notwithstanding
this decisive exoneration, Mr. CRIPPS subsequently
apologised to Mr. FEARGUS O'Corizioa, and the latter,
in frankly accepting that apology, announced his
determination to abandon the motion on the petition
fixed for this evening !
So terminates this miserable result of dema-
goguism! So ends this parody upon the sublime
achievements of the Parisian Democracy ! If, we
imagined for an instant that THE PEOPLE of Eng-
land were really implicated in an affair so dishonourable
and indecent we should, assuredly, have ample cause
for grief and lamentation. Knowing, however, that
the odium of the proceeding is solely attributable to
a few base and contemptible brawlers—brawlers who
have made Mr. FEARGL'S O'CONNOR their generous
because reliant dupe—we have only reason to regard
the transaction with a scorn the most unmitigable,
and an indignation the most unutterable.

The pacific character of the present European re-
volution receives daily additional corroboration. This
pacific character, in fact, constitutes the main distinc-
tion between the great revolutions of 1789 and 1848.
In the, former war and liberty became synonymous
terms. Every people that dared to as-
sert their rights and throw off the yoke of
their native oppressors, were compelled at the same

time, in self-defence, to unsheath the sword, and re-
sist the attacks of foreign aggressors. They had to
withstand not only the endeavours of coalesced sove-
reigns to preserve the inviolability of the Tights of
kings, but they had also to encounter the subtle at-
tacks of rival jealousy, personal ambition, and internal
discord. The proverb declares, that a kingdom
divided against itself cannot stand, and the truth of
this assertion was abundantly demonstrated by the
evils consequent on the terrible dissensions which
characterised and marred the liberal crusade of former
times. " Never was truth defiled with so much
blood," exclaims LAMARTINE, in enumerating the
terrible and glorious scenes of the first revolution.
Blood, at home streamed from the guillotiae, or stained
the assassin's dagger, abroad was shed in the fields
of carnage and dishonoured the laurels of liberty ;
discord at home and warfare abroad were the distin-
guishing and melancholy traits of the Revolution of
1789. And in this, as we have said, is the great dis-
tinction which exists between the present movement
and its predecessor. Unanimity and peace
are now, happily, the watchwords of Li
beralism. Unanimity knits together each pa-
triotic band labouring to assert their native inde •
pendence; and peace among nations, facilitates the
interchange of those kindly sympathies and the exer-
cise of those moral influences which surpass the most
effective weapons of international alliance. In pur-
suance of this principle it was that the French
Minister of Foreign Affairs ventured to
give . utterance to that most un-Ministerial
declaration—" the old regime had diplomatists and
treaties, our diplomatists are nations, our treaties are
sympathies." This assertion, poetical as it may
appear, is practically correct. Its truth receives
new confirmation by every succeeding depu.
tation from foreign nations that has has-
tened to ratify a treaty with France by
the expression of its cordial sympathies. Deputa-
tions from England, from Ireland, from Poland, from
Hungary, and numbers of others have already testi-
fied their concurrence in the pacific sentiments of
liberal France. Spain and Venice have recently
expressed similar feelings. The Spanish Chargé

d'lffaires has addressed a letter to M. L A 3,IAR-
TINE, in which, in the name of the Spanish
Government, he emphatically disavows all reports
which describe the Spanish Government as enter-
taining hostile feelings towards the Provisional Go-
vernment of France. This letter, amicable though it
be, nevertheless bears a close affinity to a diplomatic
dispatch, but the address of the deputation of the
Venetians must have been as undiplomatic and as
little in accordance with the doings of the
old regime as even M. LIMARTINE could desire. "It
is not in the language of old diplomacy " so begins
the address of the Venetians, " that we shall address
to the French Republic our fraternal acknowledg-
ments. It has pitied our misfortunes, felicitated our
regeneration, promised us a support from which we
have much to hope and nothing to fear."
Then, perhaps, remembering they were
dressing a Poet, the ad-
y proceed with eloquent and
inimitable pathos :—" The unhappy know how to love ;
it is sometimes well to have been oppressed in order
to better feel what real greatness is. We offer up
our prayer for the prosperity and glory of France.
ISre stretch forth the hand to it with a sentiment of
gratitude which time will only render more energetic."
The address of the Venetians is unimportant in itself,
but we are inclined to welcome with interest and
htoweevbneorda of inter-
national
increases h
and further demonstrates that
pacific characterwhich is the greatest glory of the
new Revolution.

Legis-
lature has at length been
which was passed avowedly
95, an Act Victoria, cap.
We rejoice to find that tdhiereaettteedntitoen
theof t9heandlofor the purposef small
f
recovery c
colour of NY 11 i c h
greateroppressionr,thpunder
more monstrous provisions,
.contains
more
adffebotrsd,inbgutgrweahtiecrhfarceilailtliyes
statute thathas bcould r'
readily concede that it is most desirable that. the
dtdays and difficulties which were formerly
be referred
posed in the way of the parties who were entitliendtetrc,
retdhatno. almost
lVe
re:over small a
chew mounts should be removed, and that a
p and expeditious remedy should be provided
against those who had the ability, but not the will,
therefore, of the
to satisfy their just liabilities. The intention,
parties ,
give a complete
to by whom the mea • i
sure was brought forward
code for the recovery of all
debts
was most laudable, and if the abuses that were, per-
not exceeding ')oi.,
haps inadvertently, suffered
to find their way into the

Act itself, and which have also been occasioned by
the manner of its administration, were removed, it
would have been regarded as a boon by the great
body of the people, but those abuses are of such mag-
nitude, and press with such severity on the hard-
working classes, that a general feeling of indignation
has been excited against the law under colour of
which such atrocities could have been sanctioned or
tolerated. These are scarcely the times when there
can be one law for the rich and another for the poor
—when a person owing a few pounds only may be
Punished with the most stringent severity, while
the man who is indebted thousands is treated
with comparative leniency and indulgence. Yet
such is the case under the present system.
The treatment to which Mr. CHARLES POLLETT was
subjected, which so strongly attracted the public
attention, is similar to that which every person com-
mitted for default in the payment of a single instal.
ment is likewise exposed. By an extraordinary
species of refinement, he is told that he is not impri-
soned for debt but fur contempt of court, in not
obeying the order of the judge; he is therefore dealt
with not merely as a debtor, but as a criminal. He
is not merely deprived of his personal liberty until
he makes full satisfaction, but he is associated with
persons who have offended against the laws, and is
bound by the same stringent regulations and the
same discipline as his guilty companions. Even
payment of the amount of the full debt and costs is not
sufficient to liberate him from his confinement. If once
he is taken into custody he cannot be discharged
until a certificate of payment or satisfaction is signed
by the clerk of the court, and the leave of the Judge
by whom the order of imprisonment was made as
been obtained. If he has been unfortunate in his
dealings, and should be obliged to have recourse to
the Bankruptcy or Insolvent Court, and should fully
and fairly surrender up his entire property to be
equitably divided amongst his creditors, and there-
upon obtain the protection of the Court, or even an
order for his discharge, that will not be sufficient, for
it is enacted (by the 102 d section) " that no protec-
tion, order, or certificate granted by any Court of
Bankruptcy, or for the relief of insolvent deb:ors,
shall be available to discharge any defendant from
any commitment under such order." It has
even been held that a person attending his
examination before the Court of Bankruptcy, and
who is protected, eundo raorando et redeundo, from
every other liability may be captured under the order
of the County Court Judge, and incarcerated until
payment, which payment would justly be regarded as
an undue preference and fraud upon his other
creditors. in every other case, if a creditor should
seize the person of his debtor in execution, so that he
should be incarcerated thereon, the debt would be
thereby satisfied if he obtained his discharge from
that custody, but here it is quite different, for "no
imprisonment under this Act shall in anywise ope-
rate as a satisfaction or extinguishment of the debt,
or other cause of acticn, on which a judgment Las
been obtained, or protect the defendant from being
anew summoned or imprisoned for any fresh fraud or
other default, rendering him liable to be imprisoned
under this Act, or deprive the plaintiff of any right
to take out execution against the goods and chattels
of such defendant, in the same manner as if such
imprisonment had not taken place."—(Sect. 108.)
We trust that the Bill, which was last night read
the first time, will fully meet the several defects we
have above enumerated, and others to which we shall
endeavour to direct the public attention on a future
occasion.