The Sun.
London, England, 1869-01-29 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALJEc 1 CONSERVATISM IN TILE MIDLANDS.

The Times observes that the Chancellor of the Exchequer
may be said to have broken the silence of Ministerial pre-,
paration at the Gloucester meeting. The course of
retrenchment indicated is a necessity which Time may be
said to have created. It is Time, however, not in the
sense of development, progress, and improvement, nor yet
as the parent of perpetual novelties and increasing oppor-
tunities. We may be thankful that we have the
opportunity of withdrawing from some points what
we want at others. What we have to do is to
change our front, so to speak, as Time, with his
inexhaustible budget of change, encounters us, taking
always his own ground and choosing his own
occasions. But, as late philosopher used to say, the
decay of one system is the generation of another. We
must be always reconstructing and renewing our esta-
blishments, and for this purpose clearing away the old
materials. It is always easy and pluvant to do that
which is new ; always difficult and disagreeable to get
clear of the old or to settle it satisfactorily. But that is
the work entailed upon Government by the enterprises
and the neg-7ects of its predecessors. It has duties to the
living and to the dead. It has to wind up and to execute,
as bankruptcies are settled and estates are administered.
A Government that comes into office with but a few
months' lease of power will select work more suited to
the transient sunshine ; but when the policy of
a whole generation is to be inaugurated it must be
on wiser, though perhaps sadder principles. The
very figures of national revenue and expenditure before
us, the ugly comparison with previous years, warn us that
our expenditure has to be measured in the scales of pru-
dence and truth. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has
not to take his financial principles from the commercial
spirit of the age, whatever it may happen to be. He has
not to traffic with the national credit, as others have with
credit once believed hardly less solid and enduring, He
has to set the commercial tone of the age, to teach rather
than wait to be taught, and to set that example the place
of which is ill supplied by results full of the most signifi-
cant warning and instruction.

The Post takes a survey of the recent inquiry at Guild-
hall, and believes that the examination that will take
place in the Queen's Bench will enable the public to under-
stand the affair better than they can at present. One im-
portant phase, however, of the history of the house of
Gurney stands out already with sufficient clearness. It is
evident that it is to the extravagant extent to which,
under the stimulus of the Limited Liability Act, the
deposit system was carried, that Gurney and Co. owed
their first false steps and their ultimate downfall.
If a banking establishment accepts from the public
deposits to any amount, with an undertaking to
pay interest at rates varying from two to three-and-a-half
per cent., or even a fraction more, it is manifest that they
must employ it themselves in such a mode as to realise a
rate considerably in excess of that which they give, and
that, moreover, they must keep their deposits in continual
movement. They cannot afford to let them lie idle even
for an hour. Under the pressure which this necessity
imposes, a pressure which increases in a geome-
trical ratio as the deposits increase, a very large pro-
portion of our banking firms involved themselves by
advances at high interest in speculative enterprises, which
legitimately they had no business to so much as touch
with a pitchfork. In the development of this great
mischief, as exhibited by the history of the Gurneys, the
public and the Legislature ought to find a lesson capable
of teaching them how the law that has been the means of
bringing it about should be amended, and the system
created by it modified.

The Daily News comments upon the speech of Mr.
Lowe at Gloucester, and thinks that the right hon. gen-
tleman is adding übiquity to his other accomplishments.
It is with him as with the versatile barber of Seville,
Figaro qui, Figaro lti--a phrase which we may translate,
"Lowe here, and Lowe there." The Chancellor of the
Exchequer is in Gloucestershire to-day, in Surrey to-morrow,
and elsewhere the day after. He is the political diner-
out, or rather he is a sort of travelling bachelor of the
Cabinet, sent abroad to complete his education by seeing
the world. Mr. Lowe may profit by the opportunities
of information which are thus presented to him.
His one great defect as a statesman up to the
present moment has been that he knows too little of
his countrymen, and they reciprocate the ignorance.
Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Bright are sufficiently well
acquainted with the people of England, who know them
in return. They do not need, as Mr. Lowe does, to be
brought into harmony with the popular feeling and intel-
ligence. If the Liberal symposia in which he is the chief
guest help to dispel the mutual ignorance and distrust
which have hitherto prevailed, that great institution, the
political dinner, will justify itself anew. The personal
confidence and liking of the country are great helps to a
Minister ; and in Mr. Lowe's case it is not sufficient that
he should possess this advantage vicariously through the
mediation of Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Bright. Their sur-
plus of popular goodwill cannot be transferred, like works
of supererogation or over-abounding merits, to make up
for his moral deficit.

The Telegraph makes some remarks upon the pecu-
liar position of those members of the new Cabinet
who found themselves without a seat when they assumed
the responsibilities of office, and observes that though the
letter of the Constitution does not bind the Queen to
select the members of her Government from either legisla-
tive House, the business of the country could not be
carried on for a single week unless the members of the
Government were present in the Lords or the Commons
to answer questions, offer explanations, vindicate official
acts, and take the foremost part in debate. To
an English Minister debating power is almost as
important as administrative capacity. Since the
full formation of our parliamentary system, the
chief political rank has been held by no English
statesman who did not possess oratorical as well as
governing skill. Chatham was a consummate orator. Fox
was the prince of British debaters. The younger Pitt has
never been excelled as an official declaimer. Canning's
brilliant eloquence still lingers on the ear of those who
heard it. Peel was a master of that matter-of-fact oratory
which acts more powerfully on practical Englishmen
than bursts of Ciceronian fervour. Palmerston;though not
an orator in the scholastic sense, had a power of suggestive
talk which placed him in the first rank of debaters;
and his wonderful speech on the Don Pacifico case
shewed that, under the influence of strong conviction,
he could equal the efforts of the chief Parliamen-
tary rhetoricians. Not the least cogent reason
for deeming the present Cabinet one of the most powerful
which has been formed in recent times is, that, in Mr.
Gladstone, Mr. Bright, and Mr. Lowe, it contains the
three foremost orators of the Lower House. Since the
power of debate is so essential to an English Government,
it is all-important that Ministers should be present in the
Lords or the Commons Chamber to defend the acts for
which they are responsible, and to explain the schemes
with which they are entrusted. But, if they belong to the
Lower House, no political rank can save them from the
risks of the great election battles.
The Star, in paying a well-deserved tribute to the
valuable reforms effected in the administration of our
criminal law by the late lamented member for Dumfries,
remarks that Mr. Ewart's earliest as well as his latest
labours are associated with the reform of our penal
code. When he took this question in hand our criminal
law was still hugely disfigured by some of the worst
relics of barbarous times. It was he who, in 1832—
only four years after his entrance into the House of
Commons—succeeded in passing a series of measures
which abolished capital punishment for the crimes of
horse-stealing, sheep-stealing, cattle-stealing, and stealing
in a dwelling-house. It was he who, a year or two later,
removed the death penalty from the offences of returning
from transportation, stealing letters from the Post Offise,
and sacrilege. But his crowning achievement in the
cause of criminal reform was his Prisoners' Counsel Act.
Incredible as it may now appear, it is nevertheless true
that, until Mr. Ewart's bill passed into law, prisoners
who were charged with felony were not permitted to be
heard by counsel in their own defence. Counsel
might examine and cross-examine witnesses—he
might split legal hairs on any technical points
which either his judgment or his imagination might raise—
but his mouth was closed against making a speech on the
evidence which had been submitted to the jury, and how-
ever valuable the arguments or suggestions on behalf of
his client which he felt himself able to offer, the law
sternly imposed upon him the cruelty of silence. Mr.
Ewart's Act remedied this great evil ; and it is impossible
to conjecture how many innocent men owe their safety to
the humane exertions which were successfully put forth by
this enlightened philanthropist.

Arrangements are in progress for entertaining
Mr. Reverdy Johnson at a public banquet on the occasion
of his approaching visit to Glasgow. It is intended that
the banquet shall take place on Wednesday, the 10th of
February, in the Corporation Galleries, which have been
kindly given up for that day by the directors of the Insti-
tute of the Fine Arts, and the Lord Provost will preside
on the occasion.

MEMORIAL CHURCH AT OXFORD TO ARCHBISHOP
LONGLEY.—The promoters of this movement have issued
a circular in which they say Cowley was the first scene of
Archbishop Longley's pastoral labours. It is proposed to
erect in this district, within a few paces of Magdalen
Bridge, a church which shall be worthy to be a memorial
to the late Archbishop, and an ornament to the University
of which he was so distinguished a member. Accommo-
dation will be provided for at leastl,ooo persons. Probable
cost £15,000 to £20,000. Archbishop Tait, his successor,
and the Bishop of Oxford have both promised their sup-
port. The eubscriptiona promised already .o,lncupt to

A Conservative association has been inaugurated ai
West Bromwich. The chair was taken by the Earl of
Dartmouth, who delivered a long address. He did not
believe that the course they had taken would impede legis•
lative progress, or further the cause of intolerance and
oppression ; but he thought that every man had a right
to entertain his own political opinions, and to express.
them at every legitimate opportunity. He would call
attention to the fact that all those who put themselves
forward in the cause of the disestablishment of the Irish
Church were considered to act in a legitimate manner,
while the actions of those opposed to the measure were Called
into question. He considered the policy about to be pursued
towards the clergy of the Irish Church to be most unfair,
and it was bard to impose sacrifices on them when they
had done their duty to the Crown and the Constitution,
Justice to Ireland ought not to be confined to one form of
religion, but all men should receive equal toleration. The
noble earl concluded by saying that the Conservative
party ought to prevent, so far as they could, any spasmodic
legislation. He vindicated Mr. Disraeli from the
various charges that had been brought against him, and
declared that lie had faithfully served the interests of the
country and benefited his party.—Mr. S. Lloyd pro-
posed one of the resolutions, and rejoiced at the spread of
the principles of Conservatism. These aimed at securing
the greatest good to the greatest possible number of man-
kind ; but the 4treme Radical theory was that the Creator
had created men with equal rights to govern each other.
He concluded his remarks by observing that in all well-
governed countries there must be two parties, and the
benefits that had accrued from a good Conservative
Opposition were considerable.

The Conservative members for West Stafford have been
entertained at a banquet at Brierley-hill. Sir Smith
Child, in returrang thanks, said that their meeting on that
occasion bore more reference to the triumph of the prin-
ciples of their pitrty than to the personal success they had
met with. By the term Conservatism he did not mean an
opposition to tht amendment of abuses, and he considered
that there was no aristocracy in the world so demo-
cratic, and no democracy so aristocratic as were those of
England. Mr. Meynell Ingram said that though their party
was now in a minority the wealth and intelligence of the
country were on the Conservative side. He was decidedly
opposed to Lord -Russell's propositions with respect to the
revenues of the Irish Church. Among the other questions
for Parliament to deal with he might mention the poor
laws and the treatment of professional criminals.