The Sun.
London, England, 1869-07-06 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

The Times reminds us that when the Report of the
Trades Union Commission was presented, a case of great
importance in its bearing on the existing law was still
pending in the Court of Queen's Bench. Reference is
made to this case—" Farrar v. Close "—in the 78th sec-
tion of the report, as well as in the expository memoran-
dum drawn up by Sir William Erie, and it was hoped that
its adjudication would at least clear up one doubtful point
affecting the legal status of trades unions. On Saturday
last judgment was at last given, but we regret to say that
it leaves the matter in the same uncertainty as before.
The consequence is that the appeal is dismissed, and the
decision of the justices of Bradford, which has been
challenged, remains valid in law. As this decision
was unfavourable to one of the most influential trades
unions in Great Britain, the Amalgamated Society of
Carpenters and Joiners, and it prejudices in some
degree the security of all trades union funds, we
may be sure that it will greatly strengthen the demand
for remedial legislation. The judges, of course, had
nothing to do with policy, and differed not so much upon
the general doctrine of law as on the application of a
recent precedent. The Legislature, on the other hand,
will have to deal with principles, and, if necessary, to
reverse not only precedents, but even general doctrines of
law. Whatever may bo the immediate effect of this case,
it must inevitably pave the way for a settlement of the
law. Whether trades unions have done more harm or
good on the whole, and whether they do not raise one
part of the labouring class at the expense of another, may
admit of much argument. What no one now questions is
that combination is among the rights of labour, and most
thoughtful men perceive that, after all, the rights of
labour are bound up with the rights of property.
The Standard says that Mr. Lowe has not been content
to sit quietly down under the laconic, but on that acooun,
all the more telling, rebuke addressed to him by Mr.
Disraeli, at the Trinity House, for the lamentable want
of taste and tact displayed by him at its recent grand
banquet. It is one of the misfortunes of ill-breeding, that
the people who are offenders on that score can never be
brought to see that they have committed any breach of it.
Could they perceive their natural bad manners doubtless
they would correct them. The man who absorbs
the whole talk at a dinner-table fancies that he is
amusing, and anything rather than ill-bred ;
whilst he who slaps you on the back, or drops
your title of courtesy on a short acquaintance, little sus-
pects that he is being objectionably familiar. His object,
of course, is to be friendly. The Prince of Wales felt no
difficulty in knowing what to say, and made two capital
speeches. Mr. Disraeli also, knew what to say and how
properly to say it, though what he had to say was not
very pleasant. Mr. Lowe and Mr. Bright come in a
different category, and between the one who did not
know what to say, and the other who did not know what
not to say, the genius of good manners would be at a loss
to decide how to award the palm. Mr. Bright, how-
ever, was the more harmless of the two. Mr. Lowe's
behaviour was simply outrageous, and we cannot but
be well pleased that Mr. Disraeli was present to
administer the required correction. Mr. Lowe may rest
assured that the slips in taste and tact publicly committed
on Saturday cannot be set right by bluster anonymously
indulged in on Monday. The public will approve the
golden rule—no new one—recalled by Mr. Disraeli, and
will much desire, if it cannot insist, that if good feeling
should have been annihilated by recent political events,
some effort should be made to preserve to us the boon of
good manners. When they fail the only remedy is casti-
gation. Mr. Lowe would Lave done more wisely to have
taken his quietly, and resolved to try to offend no more.
The Post observes that the Irish papers which an
always exceptionally interesting in the first weeks of
July, tells us that the crimson flag is flying from most of
the steeples in the North of Ireland ; the " loyalists of
Ulster" have been engaged in a fate' affray with the
police ; and Roman Catholics have given expression to
their feelings by firing volleys of musketry and burning
the effigy of Mr. Johnston. This is only a sketch,
or a sort of telegraphic summary, which anybody who
knows Ireland and the Irish can fill up ; but it suggests the
hollowness of mere rhetorical professions of peace and good-
will, and carries doubt far away into the immediate future,
We cannot but ask ourselves what these demands for justice,
which are dinned into ears from opposite platforms, really
signify. Before all, says Mr. Johnston, let us have "com-
plete political and civil freedom." Give us, says Cardinal
Cullen, " Catholic education for Catholics." And, if they
agree in nothing else, Mr. Johnston and the Cardinal
agree in the definition of their requirements. They cla-
mour for justice. Good sense, however, might teach them
that their notions of justice are one thing and justice for
Ireland another. Rightly or wrongly, it has
come to this. There were, and not long ago, two ways
to the end—two ways in which justice could have been
brought home to Ireland. As it is, Protestants and Roman
Catholics must make up their minds to take the voluntary
system for better for worse, and we would submit to them,
not as deprecating demonstrations which the Government
is competent to deal with, nor as apprehending any serious
disturbance of the peace, but on the broad ground of equity
and expediency, that it were well that this which must be
done were done quickly and quietly.
The Daily .News remarks that in his preface to his new
volume Mr. Ruskin has an eloquent passage on what we
may compendiously describe as the vulgarisation of the
Alps, in these latter days of railways, telegraphs, and
excursionists. Is it of tourists or of athletic sportsmen
that Mr. Ruskin is complaining ? It seems not ; but
rather of the houses and hotels, the villas and chalets,
and chimneys, and railway passenger trains. Well, it is
too true, that no work of man's hands can quite escape
vulgarity ; only the inviolate solitudes of nature can be
called the " presence-chamber of God." Nevertheless, hu-
manity also is divine, and the human race, at least, has a
right to plead in its defence when it is accused of vulgaris-
ing Swiss valleys or Egyptian deserts—it faut vivre. To a
traveller who visited Egypt thirty-five years ago, the
present state of that ancient country, with its steamboats
up the Nile, and its British excursionists smoking "short
clays" upon the Pyramids, is not an inspiring spectacle.
What Spanish traveller has not regretted the Benedictine
Monks in the Alhambra? What Italian traveller has not
bestowed a sigh upon the Carmelite Fathers of the Ca-
maldoli? Yet who will pretend that on the whole
humanity, whether in Egypt, in Spain, or in Italy, has
not been the gainer by the steam boats and the tourists
and the dispersion of the picturesque monks, or that the
Swiss people are the worse (except in simplicity of cha-
racter, perhaps) for the popularisation and the cheapening
of their mountains ? The plain truth is that the material
interests of mankind cannot afford to be arrested by the
sentimental fastidiousness of a few delicate shrinking
virtuos;, and it may be (we whisper the doubt with all
possible sympathy and respect) that Mr. Ruskin in his
latest lamentation bas unconsciously exemplified that
"pathetic fallacy" which he once so admirably defined
and condemned.

The Telegraph refers to the close of Dr. Binney's
ministry on Sunday last, and says that after forty years
of preaching he retires to seek the repose he has earned so
well ; and in all parts of the world to which the English
trading class has wandered in search of fortune,
many settlers will receive the news brought out
by the mails that leave England during the
present week as an incident that personally affects them.
The position held by Dr. Binney is that occupied upon a
smaller scale by thousands of Nonconformist ministers in
our English towns. The record of their labours is found
in the congregations that they collect around them, in
the lives of the men and women whom they endeavour
to rear in the doctrines and practice of their peculiar
faith. The narrow isolation, the reluctance to
admit the possibility of godliness beyond the bounds
of their own communion, which used to distinguish the
Dissenting world, have given place of recent years
to larger and more catholic views of life ; and Dr.
Binney has taken an active part in promoting this
growth of charity towards others. Still, by the very reason
of their being, the Dissenting sects remain organisations
apart from the mass of the community. They would cease
to be Dissenting sects if their doctrines, their divines, and
their ministrations ever obtained the same pre-eminence
that is given to the affairs of the National Church. It
could not be otherwise; it is not desirable that it should
be otherwise. Yet, from time to time, when a minister
of Dr. Binney's stamp ceases from his labours, it is well
that the public mind should be turned to the great work
which has been done, and is still prosecuted, by those
teachers of the common faith who "dwell among their
own people."
The Star declares that there is one very lamentable and
very unmistakable error into which excursionists among
the humbler folk in this country unhappily fall. What
it is we need hardly say. We do not say that it is
universal or even general ; but it is far too preva-
lent. It is a poor heart that never rejoices, and a
modest conviviality may heighten the appreciation
of a day's amusement and adventure. But it is a reproach
against the working class, and still more so against the
lower middle classes, that they will not on these occasions
rely suilicAtly upon the healthy inspiration of pure air
and in'eresting or picturesque sights. They are too prone
lu seek a fictitious fuld artificial excitement, which may
lead to mischief, and is almost certain to end in physical
pain and moral remorse. If any comfort could be got by
tetnembe:ing that this proneness is not peculiar to the
poor in their holidays, we rosy take it. The scene after
'inch on Epsoin Downs chews that being well off is no
guarantee for being capable of rational enjoyment. And
the very poor among us have excuses. They are
not taught. They lack that tradition of sobriety and self-
restraint which would be so powerful if we could only by
any means once get it implanted. They toil to excess.
And in our great towns they are obliged to live in swelter-
ing courts and overcrowded streets. Thus you have
every physical condition making self-restraint difficult,
and you have no moral conditions working to make it easy.
All this has very often been said before ; and, alas, it will
he said very often again. It is a grievous thing that one
cannot even think of the merry-making of our hard-worked
people without remembering by how thin a layer of
civilisation we are separated from the profound strata of
barbarism. - -

IMPERIAL TARLI A TENT

HOUSE OF LORDS.— LAST EVENING.
The LORD CHANCELLOR took his seat on the woolsack
at five o'clock.
Ou the motion of the Earl of DEVON the Companies
Act of 1863 was reed a second time.
LEERHOUSE BILL.
On the motion for the third reading of this bill,
Lot d KINNAIRD said ho had an amendment to move,
the effect of which was to prevent the sale of whisky in
bottles labelled as ale in Scotland. The spirit so bottled
was not sold by respectable persons, but by persons known
as shebeeners.
Tho Earl of MELTE thought it wits not at all neces-
sary at this stage of the bill to endanger its passing by in-
troducing a clause of the nature proposed.
Earl K EMBER LE Y thought it very incumbent to intro-
duce a clause in the bill which would be in effect extend-
ing the measere to Scotland on the third reading.
After some further discussion the clause was withdrawn,
and an amendment, suggested by the Marquis of Salis-
bury, was agreed to, and the bill was read a third time.
RIDING IN ROTTEN ROW.
The Earl of WINCHILS EA asked the Government if
anything was contemplated by them to prevent furious
riding in Hyde Park, to the great danger of those fre-
quenting the ride. A case had recently oecurred that
certainly called far something being done in the matter.
Earl GRANVILLE said it was certainly most desirable
that the safety of the people should not be perilled by the
furious ridingof some of the frequenters of Rotten-row.
He would consult his right hon. colleague the Hume
Secretary on the subject, but with respect to the matter
referred to, he was afraid it would turn out that there were
two sides of the question.
IRISH CHURCH BILL.
Their lordships then went into committee on this bill.
Lord LIFFORD moved the insertion of a new clause,
but Earl Granville said it was at variance with that which
had been done on a former evening with respect to the
Regium Donum.
A discussion then ensued on the proposed now clause,
the effect of which was to give manses to the Presby-
terians.
The clause, after a few words from the Earl of KIM-
BERLEY, was withdrawn.
Upon clause 29, which provides that where any real or
personal property, becoming vested in the Commissioners
by virtue of the act, was the produce of moneys given by
private persons out of their own resources since 1660, the
Commissioners should, on the application of the represen-
tive body of the Church, vest such property in the Church
body; but that where no application was made, then the
property should be vested in the representatives of the
person by whom the endowment was given.
The Archbishop.of CANTERBURY moved as an amend-
ment that the date, instead of being 1660, should be " the
second year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth."
Their lordships then divided, when the numbers were
For the amendment
Against it
Majority —5O
The amendihent was accordingly carried, and the clause
as amended was agreed to.
Clauses 30, 31, and 32 wore agreed to without com-
ment.
Upon clause 33,
The Earl of LIMERICK moved the addition of the
words, "less such stun in the pound as such owner shall
be ascertained by the Commissioners to have been, on au
average of five years preceding the passing of this act,
entitled to deduct for poor rates."
Lord NORTIIBROOK opposed the amendment.
The house divided, and the numbers were—
For the amendment
Against it 6l
Majority —27
The clause, as amended, was agreed to, as also were
clauses 42 down to clause 67 inclusive.
The Chairman then reported progress, and the house
adjourned shortly after 12 o'clock.