The Sun.
London, England, 1833-11-30 00:00:00

must acknowledge its obligations to those whom
it raised to power. We recollect when the
Whigs fiercely contested Lord Castlereagh's law
Of libel—one of the Six Acts—relative to
bringing either House of Parliament into con-
tempt ; but he did not go the length of including,
in his definition of libel the bringing into con-
tempt any Act of the Legislature. Suppose
Lord Castlereagh had at that time, in the ple-
nitude of his power, brought in a Bill, decla-
ratory of his view of the law of libel, beginning
in such terms as the following Whereas
certain political writers are in the habit of ex-
oressing their opinions of severe and unconsti-
tutional Acts of Parliament in such a manner
is has a tendency to bring them into contempt,
and it is necessary for preserving the dignity of
Parliament, which passes such laws, and its re-
putation for wisdom and virtue, that such writers
should be punished by fine and imprisonment ;"
if, we say, a declaratory Bill of Lord Castle-
reagh contained such words, the indignation
of the Whigs, whose patriotism shines brightest
in opposition, would have known no bounds.
Vehement would have been the eloquence,
hitter the sarcasms, that would have assailed
the monstrous doctrine of the Tory Mi-
nister of the Crown. We have lived to see that
doctrine realized by the proceedings of a Whig
orosecution, if the trial be correctly reported.
The journalists who defend this doctrine to-
day, to please the present Government, are esta-
blishing a law against themselves, under the
effects of which they may writhe to-morrow
The intimidation which was directed not very
long ago against the House of Lords we depre
cated at the time, because we would not have
even bad laws abolished, and good ones carried
by other than moral force, the force of argument
and reason. Positive law, the express words of
an Act of Parliament, protected the House of
Lords against such efforts as were then made to
bring it into odium and contempt. But that
law was not executed, it was not the interest of
those who held power that it should. We are
glad it was not, because we think that no man,
or body of men, who cannot claim the respect
of their fellow-citizens on any higher and better
ground than the terrors of the law of libel, are
destined to a very exalted or spotless fame in
impartial history. A wise and virtuous ruler
can safely leave his reputation to protect itself.—
Morning Herald.
It is, perhaps, rather unreasonable to upbraid
t!-;,-.• Government Press with not being in the
secrets of its employers, when the latter them-
selves probably do not know their own minds.
Such is, probably, the case with regard to the
rumoured retirement of Earl Grey from office,
an event which is spoken of with certainty by
one part of the Press which has generally been
presumed to speak from good Whig authority ;
and which is, on the other hand, as flatly con-
tradicted upon authority which is considered
quite as good. This discrepancy, probably,
arises from the cause above alluded to, viz., that
the parties in question do not know their own
minds. Of course, we do not ourselves profess
to have access to any authority which can at all
compete with that of which the papers in question
are the acknowledged organs ; but, upon the
principle that " the looker-on sometimes sees
more of the game than the player," we should
infer, from all we hear and see, that Lord Grey
is desirous himself of retiring from office before
the effects of age become more apparent and
debilitating, but that his colleagues cannot agree
among themselves in finding a suecessor, and that
the N oble Preatier's retirement, without this
preliminary, might seriou-ly hazard an ultimate, if
lot an immediate, breaking up of the Mtn;

Towards Earl Grey personally
,ere is, we believe, throughout the country,
great confidence and attachment. There is, on
all hands, but o►►e drawback on his fair fame,
that the excessive nepotism which has marked
his every step in the di,tribution of his official
patronage. Had Earl Grey avoided this tempt-
ing but fatal error, his pre.ent fame would have
been greater, and his name would have gone
down to posterity unmixed with any alloy. In
reference to Earl Grey's retirement from office,

stration.

we may remark, that it was said of his friend
Lord Erskine, that it would have been well for

fame had his public life ended the day on which
he became Lord Chancellor ; of Earl Grey,
perhaps, it may with equal truth be said, that
his reputation as a statesman reached its climax
on the day on which the Reform Bill received
the royal assent. At all events, the solve seize-
scentenz of the Roman poet ought never to be
absent from the mind of a wise man. That
there is a point at which the strongest energies
break down, is a fact too trite and obvious to
call for any elucidation ; and we trust the time
will never come when it may be said of such an
ornament and benefactor of his country as Earl
Grey—

Precet etextremum, ridentem, et ilia ducat."

—Morning Herald.
We have given, greatly condensed, a report
of a trial which has occupied two days at Dub-
lin, of Mr. Barrett, proprietor of the Dublin
Pilot, who repunli,hed a celebrated letter of
Mr. O'Connell, which originally appeared in the
True Sun. Mr. Barrett has been found guilty,
hut the jury recommended him to mercy. Ou
,his occasion Mr. O'Connell is said to have
surpassed himself, and that is saying a great
deal, for of all the men who ever addressed a
jury, not excepting Er,kine, he possesses, perhaps
in the highest perfection, the sort of eloquence

calculated to carry them along with him. A
full report of his speech has not yet appeared ;
for that of the Morning Register of kVednes-
day, which extends to four columns and a ball,
is incomplete, that journal having been obliged,
for want of space, to postpone the remainder to
the following day. What we have seen fully
bears out the character given of it by the Dublin
papers. Full of vehement invective against the
Whigs, he never loses sight of his Dublin Protes-
tant jurors ; he dwells with all the bitterness of an
Orangeman on the injustice shown to Col. Blacker,
enumerates the advantages which Ireland, and
Dublin in particular, would derive from a resi-
dent gentry; and endeavours to rouse the na-
tional pride by reminding them that Irishmen '
had been described as an inferior race, as not fiL

to govern themselves, as men who ought to bow
heir heads before the people of every other
nation. He dwelt on the tre,itment Mr. Lefroy,
one of the members for Trinity College, had
received from an English House of Commons.
" Good God," said Mr. O'Connell," " why

should Mr. Lefroy be thus received—they were
legislating for the Protestant Church—this gen.
tleman was the represents ive of the Protestant
Church—his feelings were deeply interested in
the question ; his duty was involved in it, and he
must have felt it to be an awful duty ; for if there
be a man who is sincere in his religion, he is the
man who will be believed to be so. And yet be
was put down by loud cries of Oh, oh !
when he attempted to spake on this, a most
awfully important question to him." At the