The Sun.
London, England, 1834-12-13 00:00:00

PIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS,

What is true of individuals is, we presume, true of
the great plurals, the editors of newspapers. In pro-
portion as a man finds himself in the wrong, he works
himself into a passion. The Times, a great master
of the vulgar tongue, was yesterday peculiarly foul-
mouthed : " vulgar impertinence," " jackanapes,"
" simpleton" " conjuror," conceited prig," " the
scribe," " small-minded pedant," " calumniator ;"
these, together with the more usual elegancies of
" abominable falsehood," " impudent liar," are a few
of the flowers presented to us, in yesterday's
nosegay, out of the rhetorical hotbed of Print
ing-house-square. The truth is, that not a '
of the former success of the leading j
has arisen from the pleasure which the grea
mass of readers feel in the exposure of their ene-
mies ; yes, and of their friends too. There is a
satisfaction in seeing such terms as " knaves,"
" boobie," " poor creatures," " insane wretches,"
" zanies," " incurable blockheads," &c., applied to
anybody and everybody ; and it is impossible not to
smile when a scavenger, all bemired himself, tosses his
mud and filth by shovels-ful about him ; and is always
the most vigorous and active in his dirty vocation, when
the best-dressed and most decent-looking man crosses
his path. There is scarce a public character which
the Blackfriars nightman has not bespattered in
his turn. Every honest man must make up his
mind to the abuse of the Times once at least
in his life ;—it is like what the wise Frenchman
said of marriage---" Il Taut
.passer par la." But
our snappish contemporary is never so truly rabid
and hard-bitten as when he is angry with himself :
that is the case just now. He has made a wrong
cast, and has a long, miry, roundabout way to
run, before lie can get upon the right scent, and join
the old popular pack again. 'Tis a savage mongrel,
it must be confessed ; and one of his tricks is, after
giving a suspicious growl or two at the heels of his
master, to bark when he stumbles, and fly upon him
the moment he is down. The Times begins to suspect
the experiment will not succeed. According to him
the very formation of the new Government is doubtful.
His phrase is, " We hope this will be a hint to the
new Administration, if it should be formed." If—if :
" talk'st thou to me of ifs ?" Is it come to this ? Why,
it was only a day or two ago that, according to the
same sagacious authority, the great mass, indeed the
whole of the wealth and sense of the community,
were pressed to support the Duke and Sir Robert,
and it was only the vile mob who raised the voice
of clamour and discontent. If so, what does the man
mean by his " ifs ?" Has Lord Stanley's refusal, or
the coyness of dear James, done this ? He had better
tell the truth at once ; but if he will not, we will for
him. The Conservatives have no chance—that is the
fact. The constituencies are not to be betrayed into
self-destruction. The people feel that the late Govern-
ment have been treated with less ceremony and decent
pretext for dismissal, than the confidential servants of
any British Sovereign have a right to demand at
his hands. The people know that the real cause of
that dismissal was the determination of the Govern-
ment to give to them the full results of the Reform
Act. The people regard the late Ministers, there-
fore, as martyrs to the cause. The people look upon
the means resorted to in order to displace these
Ministers, with disF,ust and abhorrence. They see in
the immediate appointment of the Duke of Welling-
ton a bold contempt of public opinion, which they are
resolved to meet with equal scorn. They see in the
audacious usurpation of all the powers of State by
this one hateful man, a token of what the friends of
liberty in this country might expect from the domina-
tion of the Duke, if his power were equal to his will.
They see, at the same time, in the base and nefarious
attempt to reconcile this man and his deputy to them
as converts to all the reforms which they opposed
up to the last vote of the last Session of Parlia-
ment, a specimen of the morality of those very
mean politicians by whom the dirty work of the
new Government must be done, if it is done at all.
To the amazement caused by the coup d'etat at
Brighton, and the interregnum of the Duke, has
succeeded a deep determined feeling of disgust
and resentment, at the impudent experiment now
making of forcing back upon us the children and the
champions of the old abominable system—the Goul-
burns, the Herrieses, the Granville Somersets, the
Billies Lowther and Holmes, the Dawsons, the
Hardinges, and Horace Twisses—the quarter-day
apostate patriots, and all the offensive half-forgotten,
who lorded it over us in the old boroughmongering
days, which we fully thought were never to return.
The people, we say, will not suffer these men to be
their masters again. They will not bear them
under their old master the Duke, and his colours ;
nor will they allow themselves to be cheated by
them, under the false pretences of his demure de•
puty. The elections will soon decide the question,
at once and for ever. Neither force nor fraud
can give these impudent adventurers an increase
to their present force of more than thirty or
forty votes ; and what will that strength be ?
not a fourth of the total number of the House I All
the counties put together, in England, Ireland, and
Scotland, return only 254 Members ; and if these so-
called Conservatives had them all—what then ? But
some of these deluded men say they have 280 or 300
secure. It is not true ; but suppose it were—what
then ?In the one case, the smooth-faced gentleman
on the Treasury Bench meets Parliament with a ma-
jority of 98 ; in the other, of 58 against him. Did
ever Minister dare to do this before, after a dissolu-
tion? Has any man a right, with suc'h prospects, to
make such an experiment ? Has he a right to throw
the country into confusion by the dissolution of a two-
years Parliament ? Where is the precedent for such
conduct ? We hope and we believe that the first day
of the next session will not pass over without a motion
of inquiry as to who dared to advise his Majesty to
dismiss his late Government—who dared to advise him
to dismiss his late Parliament, without cause of com-
plaint against either the Government or the Parlia-
ment, and without any chance of administering the
affairs of the country by other men, or with other
measures.--Morning Chronicle.
From various quarters we learn that the Tories are
at their old work of intimidating electors. It is a
bitter mockery to giv'e the franchise to men, without
allowing them to exercise it according to their own
judgment. Before the Reform Bill, when representa-
tion was virtual, not real, and boroughs were private
property, corruption in one shape or other was the
rule, and independent voting the exception ; but the
Reform Bill had for object to put an end to this state
of things ; and care was taken to exclude from the
franchise those who, from proverty and other circum-
stances, were presumed to be incapable of enlightened
exercise of it. It was intended by the Reform Bill
that the vote should be really and truly that of the
individual who possesses the suffrage, and no other
person's. But if intimidation and corruption be to-
lerated, the vote is not that of the individual
intimidated or corrupted, but that of the inti-
midator or corruptor. It is of immense conse-
quence that the spirit of the Reform Bill, as re-
gards independent voting, should not be departed
from. We trust that in all places the Reformers will
carefully note down every instance of attempts to
influence electors by intimidation, giving all the par-
ticulars connected with them, as it is intended to
bring every case of intimidation before a Com-
mittee of the House of Commons, with a view
to proceedings against the offending parties, and
measures for the protection of voters in time to
come. Reformers will see, therefore, that it is
of the utmost consequence to exert themselves
with diligence, to procure the most ample informa-
tion with respect to all attempts to influence voters
by threatening them with pecuniary loss, either by
the withdrawal of custom, or in any other way, in
consequence of the conscientious exercise of their
suffrages. The various indirect means artfully re-
sorted to, with a view to avoid liability to a charge
of distinct intimidation, ought also to be noticed.
The of is, the biassing by undue means the
voters ; and, therefore, whatever is intended to
influence them otherwise than by argument and
persuasion, ought to be carefully registered. We trust
that country papers in the liberal interest will take care
to give every publicity to these suggestions, and return
o the subject from time to time, that electors may be

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