The Sun.
London, England, 1834-11-04 00:00:00

No small portion of our distress arises from
taxes continuing at their former amount, while the
price of the articles upon which they are levied has
fallen one-half. It is peculiarly necessary that this
consequence of the alteration of prices should be re-
moved in the case of our duties of import. It is not
merely that a number of the articles imported into this
country furnish the raw material of many of our manu-
factures, but many other articles of our import are
absolutely necessary to the carrying on of others of our
manufactures. Whatever may be the result of a
proper apportionment of import duties, the measure is
one of pressing necessity. But the result cannot fail
to be beneficial, because in proportion to the amount
of duty taken off every article of import, its consump-
tion will be increased in the same proportion, and not
only so, but the general industry of the country will
be increased in the same proportion ; inasmuch as for
every article of foreign industry that. comes in, some
article of home industry must go out, for the exchange
of commodities between different countries is an ex-
change of equivalents, and though different countries,
in exchanging their commodities with each other, esti-
mate them in gold or silver, yet very little of gold or
silver passes in making the exchanges, and the little
that does pass has been purchased in the commodities
in exchange for which any quantity of gold or silver
which any country requires can always be procured.
In each of the two last Sessions of Parliament, reduc-
tions have been made of the duties levied upon a few
of our articles of import, at the suggestion of the pre-
sent President of the Board of Trade, and we trust that
such reductions will be continued until the whole of
our Import Duties shall be properly apportioned. We
shall then come to find that our Revenue from Cus-
toms will be increased, in place of being diminished,
by such reductions, and that we may raise a much
larger portion of our public income by well-appor-
tioned duties on import than we now do, and may
thereby be enabled to repeal or reduce duties of Ex-
cise ; that is, duties on home manufacture, by which
the home industry is deranged and repressed, and the
improvement as well as the increase is prevented of
the home manufacture, upon which the duty is laid ;
whereas duties on import promote home industry, by
increasing the demand for its products, to give in ex-
change for foreign products, and our public revenue

then will increase with the increase of the numbers
and prosperity of our population. Our capacity to
pay duties on import is manifest from the fact, that
previous to 1775, the gross amount of our duties of
customs was then under two millions and a half per
annum, and it now approaches eighteen millions.

We are under some apprehension, that in returning
to the speech of the Marquis of LONDONDERRY, at
the Downshire Orange Meeting, we shall be thought
to attach an importance to the language of that No-
bleman, which would argue us utterly ignorant of the
country's appreciation of his principles, and his abili-
ties as a Statesman. We must guard as well as we can
against misconception in this respect. We know the
strength of the Ultra-Tories. We know the point
beyond which even desperation would not drive them.
They dare not hazard a conflict with the Govern-
ment, which they are sensible would end in a trial
of strength with the people ; of the consequences of
which they require no seer to inform them. And as
to Lord LONDONDERRY, few well-informed Tories care
for what he says as a politician ; indeed we are
very certain that the Duke of WELLINGTON would
never miss him in the House of Lords, were his Grace
armed with his Lordship's proxy, as often as he might
think proper to enter the lists with the LORD CHAN-
CELLOR. But the part of Lord LONDONDERRY'S
speech of which we took notice yesterday, deserves
attention, because more than one Noble Lord as-
sisted at the concocting of it ; and because, in tho
opinion of the most distinguished among the Down-
shire Orange gathering, it included the whole of the
charges which that body had to prefer' against the Go-
vernment. Having considered five of these charges
yesterday we now begin with the sixth. His Lord-
ships says :

" 6. The only protection of the Irish Protestants—their only
safeguard, and the only supporters of the British connection—
those on whom alone they rely for help in the many pressing
dangers by which they are surrounded, are the Protestants of
Ulster—( Hear, hear, hear)—and these, by stripping the
yeomanry of their arms and disbanding them, they have left at
the mercy of their implacable enemies."
The disarming of the Orange Yeomanry of the North
of Ireland has happily had the effect of stripping the ce-
lebration of the Boyne Water victory of its most repulsive
terrors. No doubt" Lord LONDONDERRY and his
confreres at Hillsborough could reconcile to their con-
sciences the justice of continuing arms in the hands
of the Protestants of the North, while the Catholics
were amenable to the heaviest penalties, did they not
strip themselves of every weapon, offensive and defen-
sive. The abuse of arms was only possible in the
hands of the Papists ; whilst among, and by the Protes-
tants, the firing of a musket at a defenceless peasant,
was a deed sanctified by the gospel faith of the ag-
gressor. Like Ralph° in " Hudibras," Lord Lox-
DONDERRY believes that what would be wicked in a
sinner, may be the perfection of virtue in a saint • for
)
that—

" 'Tis the temptation of the Devil,
That makes all human actions evil;"
and consequently that Orangemen beirtg sealed with
the Lodge signet of election, might shoot Catholics
when most under the influence of the Holy Spirit.
But, thank Heaven, the days are gone by when such
detestable doctrines were swallowed by either the Go-
vernment or the people of this, country. We no
longer confess ourselves so weak, or so savage in our
policy, as to say to any faction in the State, " Here
arc arms ; pray defend yourselves from all whom your
tyranny may force to unite against you as enemies,"
The present Government acted wisely and well in the
case of the Yeomanry of Ireland, who were in truth
a curse to the country. By disarming them,
the Ministers asserted the just and legi-
timate power of the British Parliament and people, and
gave the Irish of every party to understand, that the
peace of that country should no longer depend on the
discretion of either Orangemen or Ribbonmen, or any'
other faction. It is the duty of the Government to
afford equal rights and protection to all classes of sub-
jects, without regard to creeds or other religious dis-
tinctions, and that duty the present Ministry will per-
form fearlessly so long as they are in office. This com-
plaint, therefore, of the Orange Peer, we look upon as
one of the highest encomiums that could be passed on
the present administration. Now for the next :-
7. The ministers our religion basely and barbarously mur-
dered with impunity—the single Protestant families dispersed
over the country, separately cut off, and those that escape kept
in perpetual alarm, not knowing the moment they may be as-
sassinated by day or burned in their beds by night, until at
length such a state becomes intolerable, and they desert their
homes, their native land, and emigrate to some foreign clime."
The impunity in the above charge refers to the
conduct of the Government. There is no necessity
for defending that, as it happens that there is not a