The Sun.
London, England, 1856-10-10 00:00:00

TILE PRIIVCEITES AT TAUNTON.

Brother Starkey and Brother Thomas, the shining
lights dale Agapemone, held forth in the Assembly.
rooms on Friday night. The rooms were densely
crowded. After the' usual farrago of blamberny and non.
sense, Mr. HeHard; ironmonger, asked, It the door of
mercy was shut, what was the use of being there ?"
Another person denounced the proceedings as sheer
humbug, to gull the public.
Mr. TIELLARD wished to know whether the door was
shut. Let the gentleman answer that. (Cheers, and a
voice—" He can't.") How long has the door of mercy
been shut—making so bold ?

The scene of confusion at this moment was really ave-
ful, the hisses, oat-calls, screeches, and expressions of
disapprobation being wholly indescribable. It was, in
tact, &perfect Babel of indignant voices. At length,
Mr. THOMAS, who had been going through hie decla-
matory movements on the platform, held up his finger
in a remonstrating attitude, and said :—lf you have any
intention of hearing what I will tell you, I will proceed,
but it not, I call Heaven to witness that on you and you
alone rests the rejection of my warning. In refusing to
bear the message from God through "Brother Prince,"
your blood be upon your own heads. If you will not
listen to the word which I declare to you is sent for your
deliverance from the power and kingdom of the devil,
that is entirely a question between you and your God.
We come here in all honesty and sincerity of heart ; we
ask you not for anything ; all we look for is gentlemanly
conduct. We want nothing of you ; we come to testify
what God has done—what we have seen, and it is for
you to reconcile your refusal to hear it with God aid
your consciences. (Uproar.)
The Rev. W. T. REDFERN, incumbent of Taunton St.
James, rose in the body of the meeting, and said :—Will
you allow me to say one word ? (Cheers.) It would
save the time of the meeting if, sir, instead of giving us
those doctrines which we all liedr in our respective
churches, you would bring us to what I may call the
distinctive character of your teaching. (" Hear, hear,
and cheers.)
Mr. BARNICOTT—WiII the first speaker, Mr. Starkey,
be kind enough to answer the question of Mr., Hellard 7,
We want that question answered before we go any fur-
ther. I mean Mr. Starkey's saying first that the door
of mercy was closed, and then offering salvation to all of
us here. If the question is not answered now we shall
not stand a chance of getting it answered at all. We are
met hero as men. of common sense, and we just want a
common-sense answer to a plain question. We hope
Mr. Starkey i 3 come lore to enlighten our minds—will
he do so by answering the question ? (Cheers.)
Mr. Starkey, though thus appealed to, still continued
sitting in 'abstract mood, and the calls being loudly
continued,
Mr. THOMAS said—lf you really are to bear anything
at all, you will hear what I have to say. (" No, no,"
and great uproar.) •
The speaker here placed his overcoat over his arm,
took up his hat, as it to depart, and said —" Hearken,
hearken, to my words. (Hisses, and cries of" Starkey.")
This is your condernnatioa, if you refuse to hear me--
(" Humbug," and disapprobation)—this is your condem-
nation ; men love darkness rather than light, because
their deeds are evil. (Uproar.)
quAelst-
rioni! EL(l6AhlteDer-s—aWnde onlys want you to answer the
e s
Mr. LEE, the lessee of the assembly-room, then an-
nounced that the meeting was dissolved, and the two
speakers calmly left the platform, amid the shouts of
derision and jeers of the crowd, one of whom, as Messrs.
Starkey and Thomas made their exit, exclaimed, "Pretty
fellows ! I wonder the blush of shame doesn't mantle
your cheeks."
The Bev. W. T. REDFERN was then asked to take the
chair, which he declined, The rev. gentleman, however,
said—l was rather anxious that the last speaker should
have been heard as to what was the distinctive character
of their teaching. The first speaker certainly left us
quite in darkness, and. perhaps the second might have
enlightened us. (" He couldn't.") We have, however,
heard sufficient to show that what these persons call the
Gospel. iu our opinion, diametrically opposed to the
gospel of Jesus Christ.. (Cheers.) They emphatically
bestate that the dispensation of Christ is cloied, and
that Jesus Christ is now coming again to offer a fresh
salvation. I heard him say, in the first place He is
coming to judge the world, and then he said, Jesus
Christ is coining tii offer WI a second salvation through
"Brother Prince." Now I cannot understand or re-
concile that. (Applause.) I should be very sorry, for
the, character of our town, for us to allow this
meeting to cheer without coming to a resolution de-
claring our opinion of the character of the teaching of
these men ; and as such resolutions have bean passed in
other towns, I beg to move—" That the opinions that
I have been expressed here this evening, by the speakers
from the Agapetnone, are, in the 'opinion of this meeting,
blasphemous towards ;Gm}
L teaching of Jesus Christ, and entirely •opposed to the
degrading to humanity.
The resolution was aarriecrainid loud
cheers, and the
•
meeting terminated.—Slierbortto Journal.

TUE MISEULES OF A LIBIZO.

.;" •

oinngerrands, a hero.
In reply to some newspaper strictures, Lieut. lirast.ey
writes :
pein`nSyir.,a•liTneorusdaorrnesott
ykonuorwsetrlsvae
nmtsi saesr
eoyf
gboe
and ask where you were born, where you were brought up,
who was your grandfather, and who was your schoolmas-
ter ; and some day you see a hideous biographical carica-
ture of yourself. A daguerreotypist seizes on you—an
artist, pencil in hand, waylays you—an engraver puts
your identity upon proof—invitations to public banquets
.ccune_inupon you, on cards as large as dinnler-plateS—
young ladies, in prettily-folded notes, solicit your ante-
graph. You receive an overwhelming supply of tracts
from ladies of a graver age—imaginary poets harass you
with cioggrel verses—authors of bad books send you copies
of their tiresome wo:ks—you are stared at in the street—
when your carriage stops, your horse is provokingly patted
on the neck—you are shouted at in the theatres. In fact,
comfort and privacy are at an end. Now, all this is very
well for a strong, able, idle Crimean hero who likes the
thing, and who has health and strength to bear it.
But it is a very different thing, if by chance the unhappy
victim; after six months lying on his back in one position
in a Crimean hut, should return home, and wish to enjoy
quiet, and to have time to nurse a leg some two or three
inches shorter, and much feebler than its fellow—to think
over tbo precautions necessary to preserve weak lungs in
the moist climate of an Irish coming winter, and should
have occasion two or three times a week to endure a very
ugly ceremony—viz., the insertion of a probe some eight
or ten inches into an open wound.
" For my part, I give everybody notice, that I am by no
means the man to make a hero of, and that those that
made me so should at once repent. Much better may
easily be had. The crop is as plentiful as blackberries.
Crimeans are everything now, are everywhere, and though
wild-looking and hirsute animals, are easily caught. Ido
not at all answer the description. I have not a single hair
on any upper or lower lip. I do not wear a Turkish cap
when I travel. I never smoke tobacco. Therefore, where
others may be had for the asking, I beg to be allowed to
abdicate the honours of heroship, and to remain in quiet.
But if there is one thing worse than to be a full-blown
hero, it is to become a doubtful or disputed hero—in fact, to
be Cardiganised ; to have one side swear you are'the won-
der of the age, and the other as stoutly aver that you are
no better than a sham and a deception, both probably
being perfectly wrong. Lest I should go into this miser-
able predicament, once for all, I beg my friends to spare
me. I must be allowed to be the best judge of my own
case ; and now beforehand, and in order to prevent con-
troversy, I give that case against my friends, and declare
their opponents must be perfectly right—not when they
distort my words and acts, but when they say lam no
hero."

lIR SERJEANT SHER, M.P.-AN OPINION ON
" THE HOUSE."

Mr. Serjeant Shee was lately present.sat a local dinner,
given at Buckie (a thriving seaport on the north-esist ooast
of Scotland), on the occasion of laying the coping-stone at
the point of the western pier of the new harbour.

•
Mr. Serjeant Shee who is connected with the district
by marriage, in reply to the toast of his health at the din-
ner, said :—" When I came into the House of Cominons,
I confess that my impression was very different from.
that which has lately been promulgated in Scotland.• I
found it, composed of orators who would have held, if not
the first rank, at least a place amongst the first in the
earlie-t annals of our parliamentary history—of statesinen
not only familiar with the interests of their own country.
but with the power and the resources of all the empires
and countries of the world—of lawyers of the first emi-
nence —of eminent merchants, manufacturers, and.
bankers, whose mere signature would be the key to trea-
sures of wealth in every city in the known world—of a
landed aristocracy who would bear comparison in intelli-
gence, patriotism, and independence with the aristocracy
ofany colintrY9u_the face of the earth. My opinion of
that house, I confess, was very different indeed-from that
which younger men have lately expressed of it. 'I found
that every man who had anything to the purpose to say—
every man who had taken the trouble to prepare himself,
and exhibited that reasonable diffidence which all well-
bred men will exhibit when they address an assembly com-
posed of persons of education, is sure of en attentive audi-
ence, that a fairer assembly does not exist in the known
wuild than the House of Commons. For the presumptu-
ous and self•sulbcient, the loquacious without information
—with nothing to attract attention about them but their
presumption and their ignorance—there is no toleration,
nor ought there to be ; but to every man who has any-
thing to say to the purpose, who knows what he is talking
about, every encouragement is given by the House of Com-
mons. I have observed that the oldest members, and the
most distinguished members of that house, are those who
would be least likely to find fault with the well-meant in-
dustrious efforts of younger members to serve their con-
stituents and do good service to their country. They are
not the men to sneer at persons members who have
hobbies to ride upon ;' they are not the men to talk of
persons in terms of disrespect who do their best for the
service of their country."