The Sun.
London, England, 1869-08-05 00:00:00

BrLEUT Ok' TILE I'UiLLIU J UURN AL B.

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The Times thinks that the result of the debate on
Tuesday on the conduct of the police in the late case at
MarlborouglA3treet will be felt by the public to be very
unsatisfactory. Certain police-constables stand accused
by a magisterial decision of combining in a false charge
against three young men, and neither the Government
nor the Commissioner of Police will make any formal
inquiry into the truth of the accusation. Even if there
were nothing more to be said about the affair, the public
would have cause for considerable uneasiness and
dissatisfaction. If deliberate condemnation by a
police magistrate does not render a policeman liable
to be placed on his defence, what is the degree of
conspiracy, short of flagrant perjury, which will bring hint
under suspicion? Of course the police would but rarely
trump up a charge the falsehood of which would
be at once evident cn inquiry. They are far too well
acquainted with the practice of evidence to expose their
statements to such easy refutation. The danger of the
public and the temptation of the force are to be appre-
hended in doubtful cases, where possibilities ne.. ‘; evenly
balanced. We are all liable to be placed in positions open
to misconstruction, and it is in such circumstances as these
that we must rely on the integrity of policemen, or, in
the last resort, on the weight attached to the experienced
judgment of magistrates. If, as in this instance, both
these resources are capable of failing us, we shall be
obliged to regard the police as being nearly as great a
terror to honest men as to evildoers. It is not, indeed, to
be expected that errors, or even occasional misconduct,
can be avoided in so large a force. But what we du ex-
pect is that, whenever there is ground, as there un-
doubtedly is in this instance, to suspect such conduct, the
charge should be rigidly investigated by those who are re-
sponsible for the force. As the case now stands, the
police are on their trial, and it is their duty to defeu'
themselves.

The Post says that the Prelates of the Anglican Churc&
in Ireland are now taking counsel how best to adapt
themselves to the altered circumstances which result from
the recent Act of Parliament. It is impossible not to wish
them well in their arduous undertaking. When Mr.
Gladstone bade the Church `‘ God-speed " on her new
career he only spoke the good wishes of tens Of thousands
on this side of the Channel. The disestablishment of that
Church was not a penal measure inflicted fur past mis
doings or shortcomings. It was simply remedial—undoing
that which, in the opinion of the present Parliament,
ought never to have been done. The Church is not dis-
graced, and none will exult over her inevitable difficulties
as if they implied dishonour or a deserved downfall.
The troubles which she has now to face let it be
carefully noted—axe simply pecuniary. That is all.
She has lost all but a nominal part- of her property;
nothing • else. She has lost nothing vital, nothing neces-
sary to her as a Church ; while she has gained a liberty
that is past all price. One immediate consequence of her
disestablishment will be poverty. But surely poverty is
no new thing in the Church of the Apostles. Humanly
speaking, every thing turns upon the wisdom and courage
of the bishops at this supreme moment. If they are wise
to trace ont the ancient foundations, and bold enough to
build upon them, the Irish Church may yet live to be
thankful for its disestablishment; but a halting fear of a
complete and independent polity, an incapability of recog-
nising and embracing the greatness of the opportunity, a
feeble clinging to old traditions of Church and State will
ruin all, and the Church will then suffer more from her
weak friends than from the strongest of her foes. While
our best wishes go with the Church and follow her into a
prosperous fixture, we cannot help feeling a nervous mis-
giving lest her rulers should not prove equal to the present
occasion.

The Daily News states that the late Bishop of Salisbury
did not signify any wishes whatever as to his successor in
the see. It is most natural that the Moderate and Low
Churchmen in the diocese of Salisbury should wish to have
a bishop of their own way of thinking and feeling, and it
would be a misfortune if, through the appointment of
oishops too much resembling their predecessors in their
sees, dioceses were to acquire a stereotyped character ; one
being understood to be permanently high, another perma-
nently low, and so on. We trust the Churchmen of the
diocese of Salisbury will enjoy before long the superin-
tendence of a chief pastor wise to discern the signs of the
times, and able to unite all parties among his clergy and
people. They will not, however, have a truer Churchman or a
more devout and loving Christian for their Bishop than
the one they have just lost. Throughout the trials and
controversies which preceded Dr. Hamilton's last illness,
it was easy to perceive even from the language of his
opponents in how great esteem be was held. The Guardian
of Wednesday states that "in many a Nonconformist chapel
prayers were offered up for him during his last illness."
This would not be very surprising. Character, when
deep and clear, will inevitably assert the superiority of
its i&.fluencc over mere views, and Dr. Hamilton was loved
fur what he was known to Le, notwithstanding what he
was known conscientiously to believe respectirg the case
of those who were outside of u hat he held to be the true
Church. We shall need more of this robust and
magnanimous Christian charity in the times that are at
hand.

The Star, in referring to the Habitual Criminals Bill,
observes that such stated sriminals are the special enemies
of society. 'I heir very exiieLee, FO long as they reso-
lutely adhere to crime as a resource, is an offence and a
warfare against tl.e community. The liberty of the sub-
ject.is pfecious ; but such subjects as these can have ns
claim to it. Mr. Bruce sheaved a fitting courage in the
phraseology which he on Wednesday used in speaking of
this class. He sail they must be hunted down.
If the Habitual Criminals Bill is to be applied,
it is as well we should all know that its object
is expressed in these blunt and terrible words :
The habitual criminal is to be hunted down.
He is to be under the constant inspection of the
police for a certain term after his second conviction. He
is to be imprisoned if, being suspected, he fails to prove
that be is getting his living honestly. And in the event
of his incurring a second conviction for a grave offence, be
is to be subject to this police supervision for life, and will
always be liable to imprisonment for no other offence than
being without ostensible means of livelihood. In fact, it
is to be a trial between society and the habitual criminal,
whether the latter cannot be tired out of his aversion te
labour and his predilection for robbery. We can only
hope that, in the exercise of the greatly increased strength
now placed at their disposal, the authorities will
recognise the necessity of using it with the strictest
reference to the one object of the bill. It is not an
object of the bill to put convicted persons, who are anxious
to live honestly, at the mercy of ma'icious policemen.
The law will defeat itself if it works thus. Society will
decline all part in such atrocities, and they must be guarded
against from the first. A policeman who gets a quondam
thief turned away from a place where be is honestly at
work, ought to be hunted down as unmercifully as an
obstinate habitual criminal. Carried out in this spirit the
experiment may prosper ; but it is one which can only be
exercised by a terrible necessity, and without the very
wisest administration it will inevitably break down.
The Standard finds it hard to say whether, in their
management of the Scotch Education Bill, the Govern-
ment treats the I louse of Lords or the I louse of Commons
with the greater contempt. Certainly there is no Tres-
' thin on which the Government itself has shewn greater
And feebleness of purpose. A measure
which was tlititight teortby of mention in the
Queen's Speech at the otiehibe bf the session has ever
since been made the sport of accident, has been altered
and realtered, printed and reprinted, till five separate
bills have been laid before the two Houses, and at this
moment, on the most important and vital questions of the
bill, the Government have not made up their minds. The
question will, no doubt, be asked what induces Ministers
to urge or the bill with such hot haste now, after having
trifled with it all the session through. The answer
is, a compact with the Roman Catholics. The members
of that body are naturally, and we must say properly,
anxious that their children should run norisk of proselytism
in the Scotch national schools. But instead of openly
demanding that an exception should be made in their
favour, they have made a secret compact with the
Minister, by which it is provided that denominational—
that is to say, Roman Catholic—schoolsshall continue to be
aided by the State under this professedly • national
system ; and they fear that in case of delay the same indul
genee might not be so readily accorded them. The know-
ledge of this compact does not render the bill more
palatable to those Scotch members who are in the secret.
We need not say that it is not on such grounds we are
opposed to the bill. We refer to it as the reason for the
indecent haste with which the Ministers now urge on the
measure, but object to it because of this indecent haste;
hecau-se neither the Lords nor the Commons, nor the
country at large, have had time to consider the measure.
The Telegraph remarks that had the life of Lord Byron,
the great poet, been prolonged to the not extravagant
limit of fourscore years, he would have still been among
ns four or five years ago. fie belonged to a later genera-
tion than the Lyndhursts, Romillys, Broughams, and
Lnshingtons. Arthur Duke of Wellington had been
before him in the world by many years—yet it was only
in isso that the great duke died. Lord Byron
friend Samuel Rogers was a far older man—yet scores
of people now Icing have enjoyed Mr. Rogers's
Sunday breakfasts. It was not to be. in the year
1893 Byron breathed his last at Missolonghi. Forty
and a few more years have clone their work. Byron
is not forgotten - -bow can such a man be forgotten while
the Eirslish ;am rage lasts? -but at least other poets have
arisen whale verse appears to have that hold aeons the
pablic which Byron's once possessed. Those of an older
generation may think that Tennyson, Browning, Swill.
'mine, and others must write with different pens ere they
can be named as rivals to the author of " Childe Harold,"
but younger men seem to be of another way of thinking.
It is not, however, oor wish to-day to rush into mere lite-
rary criticism, lout rather to note it as a curious fact that
the old ontroversy about the Byron family quarrel, which
more than fifty years ago raged so hotly in London, has
been revived. The actors and partisans in that great
scandal case have all gone to their account. Lord Byron
died in IS'23; Lady Byron not so very long since. " Ada,"
whose " future happittess " might have been gravely pre-
judiced• by the discussion, is gone too ; for her there is no
snore pain or happa,ess in this world. The names of
Romilly, Moore, Rogers, Hobhause, John Murray, and a
host of others who took share in this dispute, have been
blotted out of the book of life. Trelawny, in a green old
age, and the Guiccioli, now oonVerted into a very elderly
Yreach countess, are,- perkkskthe- valy guryjx9ol_l4
I'iats9Yektql,