The Sun.
London, England, 1834-05-08 00:00:00

*AM

LONDON,
THURSDAY EVENING, MAY 8, 1834.

The treatment to which the Irish Catholic
clergy have been long subj ected is a great stain
on the character of the Tories. They even
treated them as a race of outcasts—as a people
who had no claims on their justice or Their
mercy, and seemed to think that by continued
insult and persecution they might break their
spirit, and drive them and their flocks into the
bosom of the protestant church. Had the
failure of such a vain attempt been the only
consequence, the result would not have been of
such paramount importance. They have not
only failed, however, but excited a feeling
of hostility against England, in the minds
both of priests and people, to which may
be attributed most of the insurrections
and the endless resistance to almost every
legislative act of a Protestant Government.
What other result could be expected ? What
inducement had they to inculcate obedience to
a government that treated them with the most
barefaced injustice and the most relentless se-
verity, that not only robbed them of what they
considered their just rights, but at one time
forbade the use of their religious cere-
monies, and commanded their agents to subject
them to every species of persecution, nay, to
hunt them like wild beasts, and treat them
with more savage cruelty than the Covenanters
were treated under the reign of the dissolute and
unprincipled CHARLES H. ? These cruelties
are not yet forgotten in the west of Scotland—
they have been religiously handed down from
father to son, and even now impress the minds
of the people with an abhorrence of episcopacy,
and a detestation of the party that inflicted
them ? And is it to be wondered at that in
Ireland, where these wrongs of the people are
still fresh, and many of their grievances still
unredressed, discontent and misrule should still
prevail ? It is only astonishing that the priests
have behaved with such forbearance. We be-
lieve that their condition is quite anomalous in
the history of the Church, and that there is not
another instance, where there is an established
religion, of a people amounting to so many
millions, being compelled to maintain their
clergy, while all the ecclesiastical funds have
gone to support the religion of not a tithe of the
population. The Romans, in the true spirit of
toleration, respected the altars and gods of those
they conquered, knowing well that no force can
subdue religious prejudices, but the Government s
of this country, with all the history of the Chris-
tian church before them—with the example of
an intelligent and high-minded people, and the
most powerful known in the history of the world,
have, till lately pursued a different course, and,
in place, of producing uniformity in religion,
or creating proselytes, have only excited hos-
tility, and caused more suffering and more
bloodshed than the Romans inflicted on any
people at the first conquest of the country.'
Though that wicked and absurd spirit is now
much abated, enough still remains to thwart
every measure intended as a boon to the Irish
people. Let any one of the high church party
try for a moment to act as an impartial specta-
tor, or place himself in the condition of one of
the Catholic priesthood, and we fear not the
decision to which he would come. Here are a
body of men, amounting to some 3,000 or 4,000,
who have been deprived of the incomes which
once belonged to their class—who see these
incomes handed over to a clergy, that, with a ;
few exceptions, do absolutely nothing—who
have to attend to the religious instruction of
nearly the whole population, and while there

'Are foricts out of provisiou might be
'made for thein, they are forced 'to raise a sub-
sistence out of ihe miserable earnings even of
the tgy poorest of their flocks. However
strong the influence of religion may be,
human nature cannot submit patiently to
such glaring injustice. These men never
have beeit reconciled to this country, and
never will be till they are placed on a more
just and more equal footing. Their poverty
and their very dependence endear them only the
more to the people, and render them the most
dangerous instruments on every critical occasion.
They may well exclaim, " What is this govern-
ment that we should serve them, and what profit
should we have if we obey them ?" A brighter
prospect, however, now begins to open—both the
government and the leaders of the catholics seem
aware of the hardships to which they are sub-
jected, and we confidently trust that when
sufficient provision shall be made out of the
Irish tithes for the protestant church, the
Catholic priests shall have that remuneration
to which they are justly entitled.

One main ground upon which the Corn
Laws are rested by their advocates is the heavy
taxes paid in Great Britain. But here we ask,
how does this apply to Ireland, which is the
most lightly taxed country in Europe ? Next
we ask, what taxes are there in grain-growing
countries that do not fall entirely upon the
land ? In Prussia, for example, from whence
we derive our chief supply of corn, how few are
the taxes that are not borne by the land ; and
will she not find out, as we ought to have been
long ago aware, how much relief may be af-
forded to the landed interest from duties of
Customs, which the new and wise commercial
policy of that country is calculated to increase ?
Lastly, we ask, what taxes are paid by the
growers of corn or receivers of rent in Great
Britain qua growers or receivers ? Excepting
the land tax, we are not aware of any tax which
they pay excepting as consumers, and to raise
the price of corn, or to increase the amount of
rent, on this account, would be to make other
consumers pay double the tax paid by them as
consumers to the extent of the duty so imposed.
The imposition of such a duty is in truth in
the nature of an immunity from taxes, conferred
upon a favoured class, which has beggared
Spain and Portugal, and was a leading cause
of the first revolution in France.

Tithe, though a practical hindrance to the
improvement of the soil, is not
.a tax. It ope-
rates in the way of rent, and when commuted,
as it is about to be, will clearly so appear.
Moreover, there is hardly a grain-growing
country from whence we obtain a supply of
corn, where tithe does not exist. The poor
rate, in so far as it regards able-bodied labour-
ers, is a bad way of paying labour, and in so
far as it regards the helpless poor, there is no
country which has not helpless poor to support.
County rate is a local charge for local purposes,
and there is no country without such local
charges. There remains only the land tax,
which does not fall upon the grower of corn,
but upon the receiver of rent, which is progres-
sively increased (at least ought to be, and
would be, but for the operation of the present
law) by the increasing demand of our increasing
population, more particularly our manufactur-
ing population, for food.
Nevertheless, notwithstanding the increasing
demand of such increasing population, the
home growth of grain is diminishing, and rents
are falling. Rents as well as wages, and every-
thing else, must no doubt come down with this
continuing rise in the exchangeable value of
money. But the increasing demand of an in-
creasing population for food ought to increase
the price of corn more than the rise in the ex-
changeable value of money brings it down, and
would do so, but for the operation of the present
corn laws.

Considerations of very serious importance
are thus presented to the agricultural interest.
It is in evidence before the Agricultural Com-
mittee of 1833 (who indeed state in their re-
port), that the heavy clay lands on which wheat
has been grown in England beyond the memory
of man, are going out of cultivation, and that
farmers, having lost their capital, are enabled to
hold these lands only by scourging and ex-
hausting the soil. Must not these lands then
ere long return upon the hands of the owner
incapable of yielding rent ? And what is rent ?
It is the surplus produce which remains after
defraying the cost of production. If then we
continue to go on as we have done for the last
eighteen years, increasing cost of production and
diminishing produce, there will in process of
time be no surplus produce at all ; in other
words, there will be no rent, and the owners of
the soil must either become cultivators them-
selves or their land will remain uncultivated.

Thus the present Corn Laws, after bringing
infliction upon the consumers and growers of
corn, are about to fall most heavily upon the
owners of the soil, who will, therefore, do well
to look to themselves before such consequences
come upon them.

The Dissenting Deputies held a meeting
this morning, at the London Tavern, at which,
we understand, a number of delegates from the
country were present. The meeting having
been announced as a private one, we are unable
to furnish a report of the discussion and its re-
sults. It would seem that it is not a meeting
of the Congregationalists alone, for some gentle-
men from the Secession Church of Scotland,
and Mr. HOWITT, the Quaker from Notting-
ham, are amongst the delegates. We cannot
understand the motive of those who have con-
vened the meeting for announcing it as a pri-
vate one, because the people of England,
and the Dissenters in particular, have
always manifested great dislike of what
has been commonly called hole and corner
meetings ; and since the grave and important
matter of the severance of church and state is
to be made the great subject of discussion, it is
by no means creditable to the parties to carry
on such deliberations with closed doors. It

must have the effect of lessening the respect
which would otherwise be felt for the decision
to which the meeting May come.
There was an tipen meeting of dissenters last
night in Finsbury Chapel, at which many very
energetic speeches were made by Mr. HAD-
FIELD, Mr. HOWITT, Dr. BROWN, and
others, against the measures of the govern-
' ment, and in favour of a severance of
the church and the state. None of the
speakers, however, condescended to show
how the dissolution is to be brought
about ; what it is intended to do with the
church property ; and who is to be the Prime
Minister by whom the contemplated measures
are to be proposed to the KING, and catried
through parliament. The parties seemed to be
exceedingly angry with the present government,
and to be firmly resolved upon separating
church and state ; but by what means, or when,
it was impossible to gather from their speeches.
One gentleman, a Mr. STOVELL, was exces-
sively zealous and determined, and if loud
talking and violent stamping could influence
the KING, the Lords, or the Commons, this
reverend' gentleman might accomplish the
work without any aid. We are curious to
know how, if the State has no right to interfere
with the affairs of the Church, Parliament can
legislate at all on this subject. Is the property
now deemed national to be left in the possession
of the clergy, and to be eventually given to
whom they will, and subject to no control, by the
patrons ? How is the right of presentation to
livings to be taken away from the Crown ?
Perhaps these matters will be explained by the
dissenters at their meeting to day, but the public
needs infonnation which they cannot have so
long as the meetings are held in private.

The Registration Bills, introduced by Mr.
W. BROUGHAM and Mr. CAYLEY, were both
thrown out of the House of Commons last
night by considerable majorities. We are sorry
for it. The lawyers and such of the landowners
as have encumbered their estates have combined
to defeat this improvement.

It was in the year 1814 that Lord JOHN
RUSSELL obtained a committee to inquire into
the abuses of the poor laws by the farmers,
who were tolerated bv the country magistrates
in paying their labourers, directly or indirectly,
out of the poor's rates. The report of the
committee stated, as one of the greatest evils of
the practice, the degradation of the labourers
in the following words :

" There are but two motives by which men are
induced to work : the one, the hope of improving the
condition of themselves and their families ; the other,
the fear of punishment. The one is the principle of
free labour, the other the principle of slave labour.
The one produces industry, frugality, sobriety, family
affection, and puts the labouring class in a friendly re-
lation with the rest of the community ; the other
causes, as certainly, idleness, imprudence, vice, dis-
sension, and places the master and the labourer in a
perpetual state of jealousy and mistrust. Unfortu-
nately, it is the tendency of the system of which we
speak, to supersede the former of these principles,
and introduce the latter. Subsistence is secured to
all ; to the idle as well as the industrious ; to the
profligate as well as the sober ; and, as far as human
interests are concerned, all inducement to obtain a
good character is taken away. The effects have
corresponded with the cause. Able-bodied men are
found slovenly at their work, and dissolute in their
hours of relaxation ; a father is negligent of his chil-
dren ; the children do not think it necessary to con-
tribute to the support of their parents; the employers
and the employed are engaged in perpetual quarrels,
and the pauper, always relieved, is always discon-
tented ; crime advances with increasing boldness, and
the parts of the country where this system prevails
are, in spite of our gaols and our laws, filled with
poachers and thieves.",

The whole report, and the evidence, are well
worthy of attentive perusal.
Why did not those who now object to an
alteration of the law take advantage of the
recommendations of the committee ? Why
have they allowed the system to go on, until it
has altogether changed the character of the
peasantry, and rendered the interference of the
government, in some way or other, absolutely
necessary to the preservation of property, no
less than to a restoration of comfort to the
poor ? Surely ten years' warning was
enough. The overseer was not ignorant of his
duty. The vestries were constantly reminded
of it, and the magistrates have been in the
yearly habit of giving the overseers, on their
appointment, a printed paper, describing their
duties. None can plead ignorance. They
knew the law, and have acted in defiance of it.
Will they now obey the law ? Will the in-
habitants of every parish meet instantly, and
provide work for the poor in their own parishes,
as the statute of ELIZABETH directs and en-
joins? If so, perhaps the best plan will be to
repeal all the laws that have been passed since
the 43d ELIZABETH. But what security is
there that they will do so, unless a power be
lodged somewhere to enforce it ? The recom-
mendations of the Legislature have been disre-
garded by vestries in large towns, as well as in
the country. They have been as blind to their
interest as to their duty. Will they now amend
their ways ? We wish we could recommend the
Government to trust them another year, on the
assurance that they would instantly correct for
themselves the evils which their negligence has
introduced, and seemed likely to perpetuate,
until the Commission was appointed. Let
any man read the, report and the evidence,
and say if something ought not to be
done ; and if the Government plan is not the
right one, what shall be substituted for it ? Are
the lean kine to eat up the fat and well-fed ?
Are we to have not pensioners by the dozen
but by tens of thousands ; not to the amount
of thousands but millions—daily, aye, hourly
increasing ?

The Brussels and German papers are with-
out any intelligence of moment. The following
are extracts :

The Tournay Journal says that it is intended to fix
the Catholic University in that city, and that the site
is already chosen. Lists of subscription for this esta-
blishment are in circulation in the town.

The Count de Montfort, with his son and suite, ar-
rived at Ostend on the 3d of May. On the same day
M. Cabet embarked for London. While at Ostend
he received numerous marks of esteem from several
distinguished inhabitants of the town.
A letter from Ghent, of the sth May, says, that
several eminent advocates have just signed a con-

saltation to prove that the law of Vendemiaire wa
more applicable_ to strangers settled. in Belgium.
In the Chsrfil)el• of Itepresentativei yesterday the
iaw relative to foundling and abandoned children was
passed by a majority of 36 to 21.
According to the tables laid before the Chamber,
and published in the Moniteur, the number of found-
lings and of forsaken children in all Belgium in 1833
was 9,305. The total of the expenses for all Bel-
gium was 580,526 francs.
The Senate has passed the law relative tO the
Counsel of State by a majority of 15 to 10. The
Chamber of Representatives, in its sitting of to-day,
the 6th of May, commenced the discussion of the pro-
ject of law on the provisional organisation.
BRUSSELS, MAY 6.—Actual Debt, 24 per Cent.,
51; Rothschild Loan, 5 per Cent., 98-.} ; Loan of the
city, 1832, 94.—Brussels Papers, May 7.
NASSAU, APRIL 15.—At Dellenburg, and probably
in the neighbourhood, a placard to his Highness the
Duke of Nassau, is in circulation, referring to, a pre-
vious one addressed to the ministry, and discussing the
concession of the Duchy to the Prussian commercial
union. It, however, attacks some manufacturers who
are accused of selfishness, and whose objections are
therefore declared to be undeserving of attention.
Allgemeine Zeitung, May 2.

The following are extracts from Dutch
papers of the 7th inst., received this afternoon :

THE HAGUE, MAY 4. —His Majesty has sanctioned
the law by which it is enacted that the unredeemed
bonds at 6 per cent. interest, of the year 1831, to the
amount of 5,900,000, shall be paid off with the surplus
of the loan of 1833.

The Prince of Orange and his eldest son arrived
here this morning early from his head-quarters.
His excellency Baron Verstolk Von Soelen, is ex-
pected to return to this place towards the end of this
month; as the ministerial congress will, it is said, have
concluded its labours by the 15th May.
The gentlemen who have the direction of the mea-
sures for the iron rail-road from Amsterdam to Co-
logne are very actively engaged in drawing up the
statutes of the company, which is to be called by the
name of " The Netherlands Rail Ro4d Company."
AMSTERDAM, MAY 6.—We have Java journals of a
later date by a week than those we received a few days
ago, but they contain no news except a few nominations
by the Governor General.
AMSTERDAM, MAY 6.—According to intelligence
from Frankfort, dated May 3, which we have received
to day, some disturbances took place there on the
night of the 2d. Some students, confined in the
guard. house, broke out ; the soldiers fired on them,
and, the report having caused a great multitude to
collect, many citizens fell victims to the fury of the
soldiers. Ten innocent persons, it is said, were killed
in this manner. Three students lost their lives, and
two escaped. We cannot give the particulars.till to-
morrow. All was quiet on the 3d, in the morning,
and no effect was produced by this event on the funds.
—Dutch Papers, May 7.
DUTCH FUNDS—AMSTERDAM, MAY 7.
Actual Debt, 2% per Cent.
Amort Syndic, 4% per cent. 89% to 90
Ditto, ditto, 3% per cent. 72% to 73
Loan of 1831, 6 per cent
Ditto, 1832 and 1833, 5 per Cent c64 to 97%
Exchange on London
Ditto, two months l2 07 ;4
—Dutch Papers, May 7.

PRUSSIAN FUNDS-BERLIN, MAY 2.
St. Schuld. Sch. 4 per cent 99 : 95%
Prussian English Loan, 1818, 5 per cent.... 103% --
Ditto ..... ... 1'42.2, 5 per cent.... --
Ditto Bonds lB3O, 4 per,cont.... 94 93%
Exchange on London 3 m ._ ... 6 25%
—Prussian State Gazette. May 3.

The French papers of the sth contain little
information.

It appears that if the Poles who were engaged
in the expedition against Savoy, are not ex-
pelled, an extraordinary meeting of the Diet
will be called.

It is reported in Paris that the new Spanish
Loan has been taken, but there does not ap-
pear to be any positive information from Spain
that such is the fact.

FRENCH FUNDS.—PAats, MAY 6.
Five per Cents., 105 f. 20c. 30c. 20c.
Four per Cents., 93f.
Three per Cents., 79f. sc. 20c. Isc.
National Loan, 105 f. lOc.
Bank Actions, 1,793 f.
Bente de Naples, 95f. 90c. 9'7f.
Roman Five per Cents., 955. a.
Bente Five per Cent., 31 O.
Itcnte d'Espagne, Three per cents., 411 i%.
Royal Spanish Loan, 80;%.
Rcnte l'erpet. d'Espague, rive per Cents., 7334%.
Belgian Loan, 1831, Five per Cent., 98%
Haytiau Loan, '27of.
EXCHANGE ON LONDON.
(Hie month, paper, —c. ; money, 251. 35c.
Three months, paper, —f. —c• ; • money, 25f. 25e.
—t 'okrs Authentique.

THE POLITICAL FLIRTATION.

A DIALOGUE BETWEEN LORD A LTHORP AND SIR R. PEEL.

" No chicks ever seemed more anxious to get under the
hen's wing, than Ministers were to get under the wing of
Sir Robert Peel; constantly were they on the watch to
catch the leer of his doubtful eye; to enlist his support in
their cause; nor was their anxiety often disappointed, for
the Right Hon. Baronet had too great a sympathy in all
their views to withhold his support."— Vide Mr. D. W.
Harvey's speech on the Pension List.

Lord ALTHORP, beckoning Sir B. Peel from the Opposi-
tion Benches :
Come, and sit by my side, for I'm sure that the air
From yon Benches is far too malign,
Too bleak in its essence, too subtle and rare
For a delicate frame such as thine.