The Sun.
London, England, 1851-11-12 00:00:00

TIEE

StrN

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.

FROM MORNING rereas OF THIS DIY.
UERALD.—Tae enthusiasm that has marked the
reception of Kossuth iu this country is an indication of
national feeling not lightly to be esteemed. The trium-
phal procession of the outlawed Hungarian through the
streets of" the metropolis of the world," to the building
where he was formally to receive the congratulations of
its constituted authorities, was a scene of equal intetest
and instruction. Foreigners cannot understand this. In
England the exile is received with the acclamations of
the populace, and honoured by the municipalities of our
chief cities. With this popular demonstration our Go-
vernment has nothing to do. The Sovereign of England
has no right and no power to intercept or repress this
exhibition of the feelings of her people. All the power
of the Court, were it exerted for the purpose, could not
prevent the municipality of the metropolitan city from
honouring the man whom the ally of our Sovereign would
gibbet if ne could catch him. Whatever men may think
of Kossuth or his cause, every Englishman ought to feel
proud at this practical proof of the freedom of our insti-
tutions. The Austrian Cabinet complained a year ago
that our Government did not execute summary punish-
ment upon those who insulted Ilaynau. They could not
understand the explanation that Englishmen could only
be punished by regular process of law. Were they to
complain of the sympathy which this country has shown
for the " rebel," they probably could as little under-
stand the reply that if Englishmen choose to exhibit that
sympathy there is no law and no power on earth that
can prevent them. It were to mistake the nature of the
popular feeling in favour of the Hungarian chief to
suppose that it is merely an expression of sympathy
with the cause of the Hungarians. So far, indeed, as
that cause is understood, we believe the verdict of the
people of England is on the side of the Magyars. But
the popular feeling that has welcomed the champion of
Hungarian independence has not waited to examine the
provisions of charters, or determine the privileges
granted by constitutions. It were an utter libel upon
those manifestations to attribute to them any sympathy
with the cause of revolution. It was the misfortune of
the events of 1848 that they tended to confound a
struggle like that of the Magyars with the revolutionary
spirit which then shook the nations of Europe. With
the enemies of social order the people of England have '
no sympathy. The very men that cheered the Magyar
chieftain in our streets were the special constables of the
memorable I Oth of April, 1848. Feargus O'Connor
could not gain even a momentary popularity by pressing
to Koseuth's side. The Hungarian proved that he tho-
roughly understood the nature of the feeling that
welcomed him when he asked the first crowd that
cheered him at Southampton to testify their loyalty
and affection for the Queen. Had he come as the cham-
pion of democracy or republicanism to our shores, he
would have been probably as unnoticed, certainly as un-
honoured, as Mazaini or Louis Blanc. The spontaneous
outburst of enthusiasm that has greeted him is the voice
of the English nation giving utterance to its hatred of
arbitrary power. By whatever disgoises the truth may
be concealed, under whatever varying forms the contest
may appear, the people of this country believe that there
is now an organised conspiracy to crush the liberties of
Europe. Of that conspiracy Jesuits are the contrivers,
bigots the instruments, and despotic Sovereigns the
tools. Terrified from his brief attempt to ally the
Church with the cause of democracy and revolution, the
Pope has been driven back to a confederacy with tyranny.
Different as are the instruments and apparently oppo-
site the policy, the end that is aimed at is the same.
Ancient privileges, whether of kings, or churches, or
peoples, are the strongest barriers against the encroach-
meats of the Papacy, which it is the one object of the
Jesuist faction to carry out. No constitution, or sem-
blance of a constitution in Christendom made room for
the absolute power of the Pope. All ancient customs
protested against it—all old privileges resist it. To
clear the way for the establishment of Papal despot-
ism all old constitutions must be broken down.
Thu reign of Pope Pies commenced by an attempt to
effect this by placing the Church at the head of a popular
and revolutionary movement. The game was, fortunately
for the peace of the world, weakly and feebly played.
Nevertheless it was persevered in until the very exist-
ence of the Papal Government was perilled. That which
the Jesuits failed to do by directing the rebellion of sub-
jects against their Kings they are now setting themselves
to accomplish by controlling the treason of Kings against
their subjects. They are now the advocates in every
Court of Europe of reaction. They want but Govern-
ment uncontrolled by laws or constitutions, in which
nothing can claim the authority of prescription but the
power cf the Church; and this they are now essaying
to effect by reducing all the Governments of Europe
to pure absolutism. The abrogation of constitations is
now become the favourite amusement of the despotic Cabi-
Lets of Europe; and, as none are given in room of those
abrogated, constitutional government is no longer to
exist. Tho people of England have instinctively per-
ceived the workings of that absolutist alliance which
is to divide the civil and religious liberties of Christen-
dom between the despots of Europe and the Pope. It
is their hatred of that conspiracy which has given its
fervour to their welcome of Kossuth. We do nut desire
to detract from the sympathy that may abstractedly be
felt for the cause of the Hungarian nation ; neither do
we take anything from the admiration that may be en-
tertained personally for the Magyar chief ; but yet we
del not believe that either of these sentiments would
have found so universal or so enthusiastic an expres-
sion, if Englishmen had not the conviction that the de-
sign has been formed to crush before :arbitrary power
whatever is left of European privilege arid freedom.
The shouts with which they hail the.man who comes to
them as the defender of the ancient Hungarian constitu-
tion, proclaim in truth their hatred and defiance of that
absolutist re-action which wages mortal warfare against
all constitutions, and the civil and religious liberty which
only constitutions can protect.
DAILY NEWS.—The reception given to Kossuth in
our great cities and in the. districts of England most
replete with intelligence, wealth, and population, gives to
the universal sentiment in his favour the character of a
national adhesion. No man and no cause have awakened
the admiring voices of so many millions. We know not
when Englishmen were so unanimous. They have been
tried of late years on many a domestic question, on some
connected with religion, or with taxation, with reform,
or cheap victuals, yet the pure and disinterested feelings
evoked by the coming of Kossuth are more enthusiastic,
more overpowering than either the political or material
interests of the most household questions could produce
in Englishmen. It is seldom that contemporaneous his-
tory presents in action, in events, in cause, and in cha-
racters, a spectacle of such noble dramatic interest as the
Hungarian struggle. Shaltspeare never drew a picture
of greater perfidy, meanness, and tyranny than Austria
displayed, or of more generosity of sentiment and noble-
ness of courage than Hungary evinced. In the develop-
ment we have seen two campaigns, the injured and me-
naced country gallantly resisting and defeating
Austria, and then making a noble fight against
Austria and Russia combined, and only succumb-
ing to an ascendancy, bought even then morn
by :gold and treachery than by manly fighting
in the open field. The great features of this epic, for it
is the great epic of the age, have been placed before the
popular view, with the characters who figure in it all
brought out in the boldest relief. Windischgrate, the
bombarder of Vienna, the slaughterer of Blum, driven
ignominiously out of Hungary, and disgraced in conse-
quence by his Court—opposed to him the dauntless
courage and cool defensive policy of Kossuth. Haynau,
and his women-flogging, Schwaraenberg and his edict
for the hanging of Louis Bathyani, with the tragical
circumstances of that execution, the struggle round Co-
morn, the flight of Gorgoy, and his simulated defence,
tee heroic battle of Temesvar fought by the rash but in-
domitable Bern, and that occasion seized as a pretext
by the traitor Gorgey to deliver up his soldiers to the
Russian general, and his officers to the Austrian hang-
man :—all these are events that have penetrated into
every English worshop and every English cottage, until,
as wo have said, they have become the great popular
emp
nf
ioty7
ttoiales.trivWe haagtaivnasitnthfoisllygreat,tt, this egenerous,
and honest expression of national sentiment, by ex-
amining, as some of our journals do, with critical
scalpel, into the exact shade of political opinions pro-
fessei by the great chief of the Hungarian struggle, by
Kossuth himself. What. on earth cares the English
public in its devotion, that Kossuth be a little more or a
little less republican? What care they whether he has
thought with Washing,ton or with Jefferson, with Ed.
ward Hyde or with Algernon Sydney? If in these days
the English people have learned to be profoundly indif-
eerent to shades of religious difference, they have also
learned .to be so in respect of political theory. By a
singular mistake, it is assumed that Englishmen award
their praise and mete out their enthusiastic attachments
according to the political opinions of their
.hero. And
they are told what a great error they make
in worship-
P re-establishmentl) n g luis
Bla
n Blanc,
thhee-
op nogs
eKhoostshu thha, v
ea ndespairedin
t wofo rt shhei
royal races in their respective countries. But the poli-
tical theories of these moil have nothing to do
with
th the
different degrees of popular appreciation which y
meet in this country. The struggles in Hungary and
the struggles in France have both been phurtrayed before
the British public. It has locked with interest and ad-
miration upon the one, but turned with disgust and
aversion from the other. Need we say why? Need we
spend words and employ arguments to show how the
nroad, common sense of the English public at once
discerns the difference betwo2nthe honest struggle forth)
rightful:and traditional claims of Hungary and the inexpli-
cable and aimless Parisian revolution of 1848? It may
be,
e, a t is however,enthusiasmthat our
for Kossuth,urCo as
Conservatives and their organs
d h
likely to ultra-
liberalise the English public; and therefore that it is but
prudent to abate the fever even by the antidote 01
slander and sophtsm. We see nothing dangerous in this
Kossuth enthusiasm, except the fact of the industrious
I and frankly thinking classes nll joining it, whilst the
idle and the gentle hold aloof. On this latter group of
persona the Conservative press no doubt has effect. I
warns them to beware of Kossuth as a mad dog that is
.o infect them with some deadly poison. It beseeches
them not to be vulgar, or Jacobin, or to allow their na-
tural sentiment to Hungary to escape their lips, lest
rpe
become complicated.
might
eiteeesti
na, 9
g whilst
these
deet
oabuleltipnogurl
beneathii sntgens
offwenethochdafeeitmo bygi s
the
et the Rff
resulta i
or
fs s
uocfh Ep I
iu:roi
generous
rtohu
indulge
a upperndt
thebcelra
as
Ise of
natural
meet? The result will be, that
gentry
people of this country
will learn to mistrust the
but false lovers of liberty, hesitating and lukewarm
too
selfishly
alive
admirers of patriotism, and as class
prejudices to join
in the manly and honest enthusiasm
if the people. We have before signalised ofthe great body
these deep di
o their own interests and their Own
visions between the classes of society
a
sym-
bol of that fatal malady which underminess the worst
ta and destroys
. France. Should a similar schism
,hatifest here, when such masses of the industriousPa c e and becomep opu
.
I: Welfare gathered together as those which thronged round
,
KoSauth in Birmingham and Manchester, we shudder
for the onseqvuces. The, greatest enemies of the