The Sun.
London, England, 1869-12-18 00:00:00

OPIITIT OP Tllll PUBLIC .1071INAL13,

The Saturday Review cannot doubt that the situation in
Ireland is growing every day more dangerous. The
language of all the advanced Irish is that England 11mA
restore the Irish land to the Irish, under the threat cf
-king made to do it if she declines to do it peaceably; and
that when she has done this service, she will be invited,
under a similar threat, to clear out of Ireland altogether
leave the Irish to themselves. The only question is
wheil,eE the moreimpatient spirits will be content to make
two bites a;" a cherry. Why, they ask, if England is going
to leave Ireland should it not begin at once ? The
Irish could pass an admirable land bill for themselves,
without troubling the English Parliament to waste its time
in discussing a measure it does not understand. We
observe that at a Poor-law Board in Dublin, the Guardians
almost unanimously passed a resolution that nothing but
a national parliament would do for Ireland; that absen-
teeism was the great curse of the country, and that an
Irish parliament would soon cure the mischief by taxing
absentees until they could not afford to hold their land.
The mover and seconder of the resolution were Conser-
vatives, and thus we have the curious feature of Dublin
Conservatives of a most respectable typo actually going
in for a Repeal cf the Union as the only remedy for the
miseries of Ireland. Men like the Duke of Abercorn of
course take a wholly different line. They say that resis-
tance to Irish clamour must cease some time, and that
it will be wisest to commence at once. That they should
say it was only what was to be expected ; but what is now
is that they are beginning to stand alone, and that the
Orange population, the Conservatives of the middle class,
the popular leaders who are still loyal, the priests and the
Fenians, are all working towards the same end, that end is
independence of the English Parliament. .All this may be,
and we trust is, a mere momentary fit of pique, excite-
ment and vapouring. But the embarrassment which it
will create as long as it lasts is very serious. The present
Ministry came into office announcing that it was going to
govern Ireland according to Irish ideas. Ireland is now
thing the trouble to inform us what Irish ideas are, and
to explain that the chief of these ideas is to have a national
Legislature. It will be difficult, if all except the great
landowners, many of whom are absentee Englishmen, join
in saying that this is the chief Irish idea, to reply that it
is not. If the Irish try to push it further than it wishes
to go, it will employ the military strength of England. Mr.
Gladstone, who started as their one great friend, will have
to make the Irish understand that if they do not take
what he gives them, and keep quiet, he will, how-
ever reluctantly, have to shoot them. This is
what he will practically have to say, in whatever
fair and courteous language he may try to say it.
The romance of the Irish system of Government will be
gone. Mr. Gladstone will no longer be able to talk of
messages of pence. The land bill is sure to be a message,
not of peace, but of bitter disappointment to many
thousands of Irishmen. What is justice in so complicated
a matter is hard to say, and so many arguments may be
used against every proposal, that a weak Government
would inevitably succumb before the criticism which the
Irish Land Bill will provoke. This is exactly the kind of
rock on which second-rate Liberal Governments have in-
variably split. Mr. Gladstone approaches his hour of
trial with advantages which no Minister, previously pos-
sessed, and, with tact and firmness, there is every hope
of his succeeding. But probably no one is so well aware
as he is of the grave nature of the obstacles that stand in
hig way.

The Spectate/. thinks there is something not entirely
intelligible about the heat with which our Protestant
journals take side with the Bishop of Orleans and his
party in relation to the great controversy which is now
raging at Rome. Every correspondence to the English
papers with which we are acquainted reports with mani-
fest eagerness and favour every sign of the weakness of the
Vatican, and with manifest displeasure every sign of its
power and every omen of its success. Yet we can hardly
see the justification of all this party feeling with relation
to a discussion entirely external to ourselves—unless it be
a sort of political jealousy of the Pope's claims as distinct
altogether from any theological disagreement with him.
In some sense, we suppose, the Council may be regarded
as a representative body—though a representative body
claiming infallibility as a representative body is a very
bizarre conception—and the Pope as a sort of king, and
no doubt it is the tradition of England to sympathise with
all representative bodies which repel the assaults of the
royal prerogative. Yet, look at the matter from another
point of view, and we think it will be seen that
Protestant sympathies may very well turn the other way.
We cannot but hold, therefore, that the Pope, in as-
suming at once, most logically on his theological ground--
that he has already an infallible veto on the discussions of
the infallible Council, that, indeed, it is ono of the chief
securities of the infallibility that he can prevent even the
utterance of a proposal-which he deems unsound, and so
arrest heresy at its very source, has not encroached upon
the liberties of the Church, but solely on the privileges of
an oligarchy which at present assumes to rule it as despo-
tically, but less definitely and clearly, than be would him-
self do. The bull regulating the procedure of the Council
cannot be accepted by the Gallican party without acquies-
cing in a sure omen of defeat—the admission of the Pope's
separate infallibility as organ of the Church ; and though
it is absurd to talk of degrees of infallibility, yet the
admission even of the greater and clearer evidence of his
infallibility than that of the Council itself, will have been
virtually granted before it is actually announced.
The John Bull says it is most earnestly to be hoped that
the four bishops to whom it is said that a commission ha.;
been issued to consecrate Dr. Temple do not labour under
a misapprehension which prevails in some quarters.
It is by some persons supposed, but erroneously
so, that the above-mentioned bishops would incur
the penalty of prcemunire if they withheld consecra-
tion till Dr. Temple had purged himself from all com-
plicity with any matter contained in " Essays and
Reviews" except that which he had himself written—and
that they are statutably compellable to consecrate. But
this is not so. As the four bishops are neither statutably
compellable, nor canonically bound to proceed, it is most
earnestly to be hoped that they will withhold consecra-
tion until some disavowal in complicity with the general
teaching of " Essays and Reviews " has been made by Dr.
Temple, and until he has purged himself from offence in
the face of the Church. If legal or canonical compulsion
could be exercised over the bishops, their lot would
indeed be a hard one, and they would be the
objects of the deepest sympathy and commisera-
tion, not only to all Churchmen, but to all
honest men, as being forced to consecrate to the holy office
of a bishop one who was a joint author of a book under
condemnation of their own Synod, and, by consequence, of
themselves. But if, on the other hand, unconstrained by
legal or canonical compulsion, they should proceed to con-
secrati9n, then, indeed, it must be taken to be a voluntary
and willing act on their part. And under such circum-
stances, on the loss of confidence or influence within their
respective dioceses, we are restrained by many reasons
"from enlarging ; although the Bishop of London's letter
itself shows that, though he has satisfied his own con-
science, his being chief consecrator will grieve many.
The Economist is of opinion that much good might bo
done by compelling the publication not only of the pro-
spectnses of joint stock companies, but of their articles of
association and the documents referred to in them. In actual
business there is a great difference between having the in-
formation at hand and having to look for it. At the best
it can hardly be said that examining a long deed in an
office is the same thing as having a printed copy which
may be freely used. It is not every one who could pick up
the sense of a legal document in that way. More than
this, you cannot submit the documents which only lie at
an office for inspection to a friend whose opinion you
would like; and you are not likely to hear comments
upon them by friends or acquaintances who would
form, an opinion if the matter was conveniently
before them, though, having no intention to subscribe
tteemselves, they will not take the trouble of
spending an hour or two of the business day in a solicitor's
office to satisfy mere curiosity. This disadvantage of not
being able to procure extraneous comments is really very
.great. There is at least one friend of the general public—
the Press—which would be sure to make its comments in
all important cases, if it only had the information. But,
for the comments of the Press, it is above all things
necessary that nothing should be written about but what
is printed and in everybody's hands. It would be
enormously difficult and most unsafe to publish remarks
in a journal, under heavy responsibility, relying only on
impressions from the perusal of documents which were not
in one's possession. Possibly the companies concerned
ns,ght furnish copies if asked for; but the practical incon-
venience of getting these things as a favour, if they are
got at all, is insuperahle. The false ',within in which a
journal wenhl l r put by ilia favour of documents
froia peuolo ,n whose proccc ilia.:,; it rci:lt 11,5 ^ to ciim-
meld unfavourably, ni e.l not Le pi in kilt out.

According to the Tablet the question or Civil Mar-
,iage is likely to occupy the early al Mention of the Congre-
gation of Discipliw, at its settlement in Germany, Italy,
and Denmark, has become indispensable, and the cases
sent to Rome for consideration are continually inereasinfr,-
in number.

The funeral of Mr. W. 11. Barber took place on
Friday at Kensal-grecn Cemctery, and was attended by
Mr. E. G. Dixon, Mr. E. Jr. Thomas, Captain Stocker, and
Mr. Johnson, M. D., as mourners. There were also present
Messrs. Bernard C. Molly, Turn Hood, Sutherland Edwards,
Savile Clarke, Moy Thomas, Thomas Price, John Hollings.
head, and other gentleman.