The Sun.
London, England, 1870-01-19 00:00:00

1315111 T or THE PUBLT.O ,TODVIALS.

Tlae Times in discussing our naval expenditure, observes
that it is under the head of necessary repairs, and of the
purchase of unnecessary stores, and by the abolition of
many of the thousand and one factories of naval stores
within-the Dockyards, that the saving of a million in the
yearly expenditure, may, with management, be achieved.
It may ie made without risk or danger to the efficiency of
the Naval Service. Unfortunately, it is only too
true that such a necessary retrenchment cannot
be made without a large diminution both in the
upper and the lower ranks of the men in Dock-
yard employment. The late Government abolished
Deptford Dockyard, and the present Government have
abolished Woolwich Dockyard, and, though we feel sure
that every precaution has been taken by both Administra-
tions to soften as much as possible the inevitable suffer-
ings produced, it is only too notorious that dissatisfaction
and complaint have assailed those whose duty it has been
to make the reduction. It is unjust to visit the con-
sequences of the national policy on any particular
Administration. The exposures of Admiralty waste and
mismanagemment culminated a year and a half ago,
and no Government could retain the confidence of
the country which did not at once apply a stringent
remedy. No one can have read the announcements from
day to day in our naval intelligence without observing
that the abolition of the higher offices has fully kept pace
with the diminution of employment in the lower ranks,
that retrenchment has proceeded without favour to one
class or another. It is the duty of every man who prefers
the national welfare to party advantage to support a
Ministry which takes upon itself this odious and thank-
less task. "Services of this sort," as Edmund
Burke declared ninety years ago, " create no attach-
ments. The individual good felt in a public benefit is
comparatively so small, comes round through such an in-
volved labyrinth of intricate and tedious revolutions,
while a present personal detriment is so heavy where it
falls, and so instant in its operation, that the cold com-
mendation of a public advantage never was and never will
be a match for the quick sensibility of a private loss." Itis
the more incumbent on all who do feel and appreciate the
public need of retrenchment to support a Government
which is ready to incur the odium.

The Post comments upon the Discharged Prisoners' Aid
Society at Manchester. In the last three years it has
inquired into the cases cf 418 discharged prisoners, and
has assisted 321, of whom 205 are known to be doing well,
while only thirty have turned out badly. The remaining
80 have left Manchester, and cannot be traced, though
some of them are known to have emigrated, and
are now presumed to be earning an honest living.
We may take it for granted that the success which
has been achieved by the Manchester Society may,
more or less, be achieved by others,- and it is certainly
encouraging to know that the cases of ascertained relapse
Lave been less than a tenth of the cases assisted. It is
also worth observing that this has. been accomplished at
an expenditure almost insignificant. Nothing is clearer

than that the power of laws to preserve the moral tone
of the masses of the population is limited, and that there
lies beyond it a wide field for reform which it cannot touch.
This has been made evident by the two great blots of our
social system—pauperism and crime ; and it is certain
that the moral influence which ought to come into
operation where the legal influence fails must be supplied
by private zeal. To take the case of our criminals, we may
rest assured that as far as capturing them and bringing
them to justice is concerned, the legal agency is sufficient.
Nor is it one of those official duties which are in danger
of being neglected or performed in a perfunctory
manner. Unfortunately, however, it is from the moment
that we catch and convict our criminals that the
difficulty of dealing with them begins. Generally
there comes a time when they have a right V:
expect their release, and if the discipline they have under-
gone while in prison has been calculated to develop their
better inclinations, all that is needed to give them a
chance of practising in the world the virtue they have
been aided to cultivate, is that they should be provided
with employment. It is at this point that the law
oecomes powerless, and that private zeal must stop in and
do the work that cannot be done otherwise.

The Pall Mall Gazette declares that if, in the absence of any
decided action on the part of the Home Secretary, some
private member should make up his mind to bring the
whole question of the storage of gunpowder and combus-
tibles, and the regulations affecting them, under the
notice of the House
,during the forthcoming session, ho
will certainly not want for illustrations of the imperfect
working and insufficiency of the present enactments.
The practice which appears to prevail in the little
town of Brynmawr of keeping three or four
hundred pounds of gunpowder in a warehouse
at the back of a grocer's shop, and of sending a boy
with a lighted candle and a supply of snatches for
gunpowder when required, might suggest some
comments. It appears to follow quite naturally that
there was at least two deaths, and that several per-
sons were hurt, while damage to the amount of about
£3,000 has been sustained. If Mr. Bruce regards this sort
of thing as satisfactory, we trust that the House will take
a different view of it, and will insist upon the appointment
'of an officer charged with the duty of suggesting amend-
ments in the present Act, and of taking steps to ensure the
observance of whatever regulations it may be deemed pro-
per to make. At the rate at which explosions have occurred
during the past six months, the salary of an inspector
would be easily defrayed: We do not know at what price
Mr. Bruce would assess the value of the life of a boy and
a child, and the injuries sustained by half-a-dozen other
persons; but if we leave these items out of the account,
there remains a balance of £3,000 for material damage i►:
this one explosion, and if the inspection only succeeded in
averting one such explosion per annum, the inspector
would have more than earned his salary. So that on eco-
nomical grounds—to say nothing of other considerations—
the proposition is one which even Mr. Ayrton might re-
gard with complacency.

The Telegraph records the death of a divine who,
although not among the foremost minds of the Church,
will long be remembered for his connection with a turning
point in the ecclesiastical history of England. On Tues-
day morning Dr. Rowland Williams died of bronchitis, at
Broadchalke, where he was vicar. It was he who con-
tributed the boldest and most defiant, if not the most
memorable, paper to "Essays and Reviews." After Dr.
Temple's mild sermon on "The Education of the World"
came a review of "Bunsen's Biblical Researches," which ut-
terly cast aside the idea that the Bible was inspired in a ple-
nary sense. Dr. Williams criticised Isaiah with as much free-
dom as he could have reviewed Milton, and absolutely re-
jected the doctrine that the punishment of the wicked was
eternal. For such teaching he and the Rev. Henry
Bristow Wilson, Vicar of Great Stoughton, author of the
"Essay on the National Church," were prosecuted before
the Court of Arches and the Judicial Committee of the
Privy Council. By the highest Court of Ecclesiastical
Appeal the suit was dismissed; and, in a famous judgment,
Lord Westbury pronounced the standards of the English
Church to permit a latitude which amazed even Broad
Churchmen. Since the trial, little has been heard of
Dr. Rowland William's. No other review from his
pen startled the English public ; only once, so far as we
are aware, did he publicly say a word of self-defence, and
that was, more than a year ago, in a remarkable letter to
the Daily Telegraph. To the English people he was known
only as a contributor to " Essays and Review ; " to students
only as a thoughtful scholar. Nothing that he has written
will be redeemed from forgetfulness by its intrinsic merits;
but his name will live as that of the boldest contributor to
a volume which incidentally marks an epoch in the annals
of the English Church.

The Daily News believes it is very important that the
old order of Radicalism, of which Mr. Bright is the =knoll •
/edged chief, should be represehted in the Cabinet. Its
work is by no means done. But it is not less important
that the later type, of which Mr. Forster is among officials
the most prominent representative, should have its
proper position and influence in the Government.
The solutions of the former school are chiefly nega-
tive, and they go only a little way. The solutions
of the latter school are positive, and positi.e solutions
are what the age needs. The era of destructive Radicalism
is passing away, and that of creative liadic.dism is coining.
Possibly it is because Mr. Bright looks with little confi-
dence on the task of construction, that he
seems to plead for delay in the completion of
what is properly his own work. He dallies even with such
queAlons as the Ballot, and thinks that it, to,7ether with the
abolition of ITnivenity Testi, and a scheme of primary ear.-
cation, i.k-sy have to be dealt with, not flcxt SCSSiOD, but next
session but one. Mr. For,-itcr, who is e.tger to proceed t.,
the positive lecislation which, in his vitw, is the special

task of the age, would soak° short work in fact ques-
tions. which are already settled in principle. Ho declares
that time will be saved by settling the University
Tests Dill next session; that it will be easy to
pass both the Irish Land Lill and a measure
of popular education this yeas, and that the Ballot, a
reform of the licensing system, and the measure promised.
by Mr. Bruce on trades unions may be thrown in as make-
weights. Mr. Forster does not speak with the authority
of a Cabinet Minister; but we may hope that his spirit
animates the Cabinet. The attitude which he takes, and
the temper which he exhibits, aro those which the
Government must show if they desire to maintain the
ardour and devotion of their folloirfers in Parliament and
Out of it.