The Sun.
London, England, 1833-04-03 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

Lord Althorp last Aght proposed the resolutions
on Irish Church Reform, preliminary to his Bill on
the same important subject. Symptoms of opposi-
tion were soon manifested, but not in a very de-
cided form. We would recommend, however, to
Lord Althorp to put his resisting as well. as con-
ciliatory faculties on the alert. Mr. Hume's motion
for abolishing flogging was supported by several of
the military members. Indeed, it does seem mon-
strous that Parliament should be called upon to
sanction the principle that the discipline of " a
British army" cannot be maintained without this
brutalizing punishment. It is known that the best
regiments and best ships are never degraded by wit-
nessing the infliction of the whip. What is possible
in one regiment or vessel is possible in all; but the
" cat" is an easy substitute for moral vigilance and
personal attention. If men in command would exer-
cise greater care, and insist upon. the faithful dis-
charge of duty among their subordinate officers, the
bad habits of tile soldier would not grow to that
inveterate degree of malignity which is admitted
by the supporters (for their can be no friends) of such
a system to be its only justification. If the officer
whose company is disgraced by what he may call
the necessity of suck.a., punishment be put at once
on his defence on acharge of neglect of discipline,
a tew months will remove from the British army
the foul reproach tnat,'-thqugh it is the bravest body
in the world, it cannot managed except by the
methods only occasionally, applied to the most mis-
chievous portion of the brute creation. Sir F.
Burdett zealously supported Mr. Hume, and the
rational arguments of these .sand other Hon. Gen-
tlemen prevailed so far that the'n'ip ja ority against the
motinm consisted of but eleven Members.—Times.

The report of the poor law commissioners was
brought up last night by Lord Althorp, and the pe-
rusal of the evidence has frightened Mr. O'Connell
to such a degree, that he has again abandoned his
intention of proposing poor laws for Ireland.
" Among all the misfortunes of his unhappy country
(said Mr. O'C.), it had still the consolation of
having hitherto avoided the poor laws." Strange
that a man can pass through England, and witness
the condition of the people, and yet allow himself
to be persuaded by the statements of others, that
there is any comparison between the evils produced
by abuses of the poor laws in England, and the evils
produced by the total abandonment of the poor in
Ireland ! The console, ion, indeed!. It may be a
consolation to a landholderlikethe Earl of Limerick,
a stanch opponent of poor laws, who possesses
20.0001. a year, and has never, we .are informed,
contributed 100/. to the support of the poor.
A consolation to the Earl of Wicklow, an-
other opponent of boor laws, who, according to
the statement of Mr. Henry Grattan, though
Lord Lieutenant of the county of Wicklow, does not
Contribute as much to the_support of the poor, as he
(Mr. G.) does for a few acres he possesses in
Surrey ! But what is it to the great body of the
People compelled to compete for partitions of land ?
4. Whoever," said Mr. H. Grattan, " had witnessed
the frightful state of misery and disease in Ireland
must, if he were possessed of any feelings of huma-
nity, advocate the introduction of poor laws there.
In the great streets of Dublin, the number and condi-
tion of the poor was frightful; so urgent was their
distress, that they were not content with merely ask-
ing casual charity, but they might be seen knocking
with double or treble knocks at the great people's
houses, and when the door is opened thrusting in
and demanding sustenance for themselves and their
starving children." Strange that persons of the
least reflection, with the evidence staring them in the
face of the comparative prosperity of England (for
after all, in physical comforts the mass of the people
of England enjoy a superiority over the people of
any other country in Europe), and knowing that
England .has been two cemnries and a half subject
to the present system of poor laws, should yet attri-
bute to these laws the most ruinous effects ! If poor
laws are ruinons to a country, whence the prosperity
of. England ? But it will be said that England has
prospered in spite of her poor laws. But it is
a contradiction in terms to suppose any system
of a ruinous tendency affecting the great body
of the people, should allow, during two centu-
ries and a half, of the existence of continued prospe-
rity. We are no advocates for the abuses of the
English system, which were introduced with so
many other abuses under the empirical administration
of Mr. Pitt, who entertained opinions with respect to
the poor sufficient to ruin any country. He was
wild enough to talk of giving bounties to encourage
the poor to have large families. But there is no
danger of Irish squires falling into the error of the
Norfolk and other squires, who introduced the al-
lowance system. No man thinks of opening a door
for the English abuses in Ireland. The condition
of the Irish poor in Dublin was described last night
by Mr. Henry Grattan. But the poverty of Dublin
is prosperity compared with what is to be found
elsewhere. The Dublin Evening Post, of Saturday
last, quotes, from an Essay on Malignant Cholera, by
Surgeon M•Coy, in the last number of the Dublin
Medical Journal, a description of the condition
of the people of the North of Ireland, where
he was for some weeks in charge of two dis-
tricts afflicted with cholera, by desire of the
Central Board of Health, which is absolutely
appalling. " I found (he says) a population exist-
ing in a state of poverty hardly to be credited by
those who have not witnessed it. Most of the pea-
santry living in huts, the thatched roofs of marry of
which gave as free entrance to the frequent showers
as their unglazed windows admitted the cold air of
an inclement December—their food but a few po-
tatoes and some salt, for a'scanty morning and even-
ing meal. They were very much alarmed at the
presence of the disease among them. This fear
occasioned me to be sent for in many tiifling stomach
and bowel complaints; and an opinion may be
formed of their wretchedness from the cause as-
signed for most of these occurring on the 25th of
December and two or three following days—namely,
the eating of a little flesh meat on Christmas Day
by those who had not touched animal food for
twelve months before ! Unwholesome straw, damp
earthen Soars, steaming mud walls, stinted fuel,
and uncleanliness, appeared to invite disease," &c.
These, be it remarked, are not insulated cases—the
description applies to • the whole peasantry of the
country. Compare these people—who, according
to Mr. M'Coy, were so weak, that they could not
bear the proper medicines—with the sturdy, bacon-
fed peasantry Of England So long as the peasantry
of Ireland are abandoned in this manner, and the
whole produce is taken by the landlords, there can
be- no improvement. Predial and other agitation
must reign triumphant, and England will be com-
pelled to keep thepeace !—Morning Chronicle.
The Bill for the Suppression of Disturbances in
Ireland received the Royal Assent yesterday, and is
now the law of the land. Will it be sufficient for
its purpose ? or will still leave Ireland in the same
state of subjection to lawless violence and jesuitical
agitation in which it has so long dragged on a fever-
ish and wretched existence ? In the former case
the present Ministers of the Crown will be proved
to have been six weeks .ago tyrants grasping at un-
constitutional powers, for the assumption of which
there existed no necessity. In the latter the more
disgraceful stigma will be fixed upon them of having
acted the part of drivellers, in the rejection of powers
with which the public welfare and safety required
them to be invested, and with which a large majo-
rity of both Houses of the Legislature was ready to
invest them. The practical operation of this mea-
sure will be watched with deep anxiety, on account
of the permanent interests of the empire which it
involves; but it will be watched also with conside-
rable euriosity, as a meant of estimating the character
of the present Administration. The result must
throw much light upon the following interesting
questions ;e-- Were the Kings Ministers actuated by
the spirit of despotism. in the House of. Lords at the
commentement of the session ? Were they the
abject slaves of popularity in- the House of Com-
mons during its progress ? Or were they in the
honourable- predicarnent in both'instances alike of

not\ittilswing what-additional powers, they requi?ed
and not caring what additional poweritshould be put
into their hands? We are willing ton-believe that
this measure of coercion, although much less severe
than Earl Grey and his colleagues desired until they
found r hat extreme coercion would be fatal to their
popularity, and that their friends of the •political
unions, thinking it might be their turn next, had
taken the alarm—we are willing, we say, to believe
that this mitigated measure may be productive, at
least for a time, in Ireland, of comparative peace,
order, and security; and it is a question of the
highest importance how such an occasional, and
temporary, and partial diminution of agitation, and
the crimes of which agitation is the parent,
may be improved to the best advantage—
may be made the occasion of introducing
a spirit of habitual, permanent, and unconstrained
reverence for the laws—may be so employed as to
effect a change in the character, habits, and condi-
tion of the population of Ireland, so complete as to
impart to that country the capacity and the title to
enjoy for the future, without stint or interruption,
the full and entire blessings of the British Consti-
tution. The immediate establishment in Ireland of
a legal provision for the poor out of the produce of
the land is a measure imperiously prescribed by the
most obvious considerations of justice, policy, and
humanity. A people subject to periodical visita-
tions of famine are far beyond the reach of laws and
institutions. It is evidently one of the necessary
results of their situation that among such a people
desperation of character and lawlessness of habits
should be indigenous. For them so long as the es-
sential preliminary of a secure supply of the means
-of life to the great bulk of the population is neg-
lected the wisdom of ten thousand Solons would le-
gislate in vain. The Irish people must be fed and
taught, but first they must be fed; that is,the necessary
food of every man in the land must be made secure.lt is
a fixed and unalterable law of human society that
civilization should descend from the higher classes of
society to the lower. But, by withholding from
Ireland a legal provision for the poor, we effectually
intercept this benign communication. In Ireland,
in consequence of the absence of a poor law, the
class who possess the land have, as a whole, a direct
;interest, not in the comfort, happiness, intelli-
gence, and morality of the class who till it, but
'in their degradation, ignorance, and misery. The
more debased the tenantry, the higher the net rental.
Thus the Irish landlord has nothing to do but to
keep his person out of the reach of the degraded
and wretched beings who cultivate his land; and
so long as their misery, ignorance, and vice are nor,
by means of a poor law, made to re-act upon the
amount of proceeds from his estate, and so long as
the public force of the empire can, by means of
coercive laws be brought to bear npon them when-
ever they become more desperate than usual, the
more miserable, ignorant, and vicious they are, it is
so much the better for him ; he can keep the better
stud at Newmarket, or decorate his favourite dun-
seuse with gems of greater brilliancy and value. a his
lays on the surface; and how many landlords there are,
not of Ireland only, but of every country, who do
not trouble themselves to look deeper. Evident,
however, as it seems, this is no bet ter than a pro-
digal and thoughtless delusion, which it is the duty
of the State to correct by the speediest and most
effectual means. The source of imaginary wealth
which consists of the misery and degradation of a
people may stimulate and does stimulate the cupidity
of individuals, or what is equally pernicious in its
effects, may lull them into indifference ; it yields,
however, no increase to the general riches of the
community, but is, on the contrary,the most power-
ful impediment to their growth and accumulation.
If the poor are not fed by law, they will be fed it,
defiance of law. If the land is not made to yield
food to the whole community in exchange for labour,
it is always made to yield food in exchange for vio-
lence and crime by that part of the community
whose claims and interests have been overlooked
In the latter rase the outlay is greater than
in the former, with the further disadvantage
that it is expended, not to improve the security and
value of the general stock, but to impair both. It is
then plainly the duty of Government to establish
some general and permanent system for the employ-
ment and maintenance of the poor of Ireland. But
all will not then be done which the condition of that
country requires. If the strong measure of coercion
which the Legislature has adapted in order to calm
agitation anti to repress outrage in Ireland he at-
tended with any degree of success, it will afford a
favourable opportunity, which we trust will not be
neglected, for a strenuous endeavour to redeem the
infatuated, ignorant, and wretched people of that
country from the dominion of Popery, to which
more than to any other causes put together—its
vices and its misery are justly to be ascribed. It
were vain to hope that this task will be undertaken
by, or receive the countenance of, Government.
Modern liberality repudiates the duty of converting
nations from errors in religion, however complete
may be the proof that the errors are such as have
always contributed to disturb the peace, derange
the organization, pollute the purity, and poison the
happiness, of civil society. But the Protestants of
Ireland, and-many also, we trust, of the Protestants
of England, are sufficiently conscientious and un-
fashionable to acknowledge that to diffuse true re-
ligion and to eradicate that which is false, to diffuse
that religion which renders men peaceable, indus-
trious, reflecting, and useful members of society,
arid to abolish that which makes men the mere
slaves and tools of a factious and self-interested
priesthood, is an enterprise which they are bound
strenuously to pursue whenever an opportunity is
afforded them. It is an enterprise which the pa-
triotic Protestants of Ireland ought never to desert
for a moment, however they may be discountenanced
by authority. Its complete success is an essential
condition to the permanent welfare of their country.
In the pursuit of such objects persecution even
should be despised. But we do not know that at
present there is much reason to apprehend that
Protestant missionaries faithfully discharging their
duty would be sent to prison under the suspension
of the Habeas Corpus Act; and, as the military
courts under the new Bill are only to administer
the existing law, from them there is evidently no-
thing to fear.—Morning Post.