The Sun.
London, England, 1856-08-09 00:00:00

!"iTON.

There is one lesson, however, which his Lord-
ship may learn from the citizens, and to which in
all seriousness wo call his attention. He will find

them getting their new patterns and fabrics ready
for " the season." All the printers will be rack-
ing their brains to have something ready then,
which shall " take." It will not do for them to
be devising and manufacturing when the article
should be in the shop windows of their customers
41 the country over. Now we really do want a
little of this common sense proceeding in our
Governments. However busy they may be with
administration dining the six months of irrespon -
sibility, tbo session is their season, and they are
bound to prepare for it. By :the House of Com-
mons they are put into office and put out of it ;
and by their success with the House of Commons
they are chiefly judged. They are expected to have
a reasonable degree of influence with the Lords,
but their influence there is chiefly dependent on
their success in the Lower House. Commandiag
majorities in the Commons are never long resisted
by the Upper House. Next session, if the Go-
vernment intends to survive, it must be prepared
for it in a very different style to what it was the
last one—there will be no excuse for being engaged
in winding up a war, and settling the terms of a
peace ; and the reputation of the Government
must depend entirely on being well prepared to
meet Parliament. A Limited Liability Bill, and
a Bishops' Retirement Bill, will not again be
thought a sufficient result of six months' legisla-
tive labour.

There is, in truth, little excuse for a Govern- I
nient failing, as Lord PALMERSTON'S did this year,
chiefly by the imperfection of its measures„ or.
occasionally by its want of heartiness in pressing
them. A Government has at his command the
best possible information. It has its innu-
merablo officials always bound to answer
any question it can put to them ; it has
ready access to men of standing and know-
ledge in every department ; to them it can always
resort when fearing to rely on the routine know-
ledge or contracted views of its own servants.
Every gentleman in England worth being con-
sulted is but too proud to place his knowledge at
the service of his country. A. Government which
would take the pains, could present its bills to
Parliameni; founded upon such ample and correct
informatima that it would be nest to impossible
for even the Opposition to reject them without
discrediting themselves. We refer, of course, to
measures o f practical reform, such as the princi-
pal ones withdrawn last session. Seven or Eight
of these wE:re of great importance to the better
working o F our laws and institution; and they
were lost, i ye believe, entirely through carelessness,
oversight, or through neglect of accurate inquiry,
as in the et tse of the Local Dues on Shipping, to
which, indt )ed, the Opposition was purely factious
and interested, and could not have been main-
taimed for a moment had Ministers but secured
more preciE ;e information at first, or been more
decided to go into committee and make the
re( luisito a 'terationa there.

We tak 3 the prime cause of all these 'nig-
ca::riages, however, to be, not commencing pre-
pa ration 'in time. We question whether
G )vernmetitt, like manufacturers, begins to pre-
pa re for another season as soon as the last one
is over. They ought to do it. They are law
m mufacturers ; the House meets to canvass their
m easures, and accept them if good, and is desirous
fo r its own credit's sako to pass as many as it
fa irly can. It is obviously no easy thing to have
c, aisidered all the bearings of a measure, and to
b 3 prepared to show that they have been taken
a, ;count of, and that the balance of good largely
pi !edonaina';es over any evils incidental to change ;
or to show that every danger
which can be met
duly provided for. Sir ROBERT PEEL,
w. ten he did get hold of a sound principle, was
an example of what may be done in elaborating a
Ito et of details with such care as to make it no
P that respectnea was
a.
m
ash
his adopting wholesale old
cUnery of the previous Income Tax, with hardly
n• modification. This, however, was not like him,
and probably, had he lived, he would have brought
tt into a much more perfect form as a permanent
t lie was to o well aware of the danger of results