The Sun.
London, England, 1869-03-19 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS,

The Times affirms that flimsiness relieved with spangles
—the difinition of a Columbine's skirt—is a too apt
description of Mr. Disraeli's speech on Thursday night.
It was a great occasion. He began by reminding the
House of Commons that the First Minister of the Crown
had himself declared, in introducing the Irish Church Bill,
that no more gigantic issue had ever been presented to the
deliberation of a free Parliament. But how did Mr.
Disraeli rise to the altitude of the occasion? He
diverged at the outset into philosophy ; and while
we freely acknowledge that Mr. Disraeli's fun is
exquisite, his philosophy is simply detestable. English
Tory members, and still more the excellent Protestants
of Ireland, were simply puzzled and indignant at the
use of arguments Which appeared to them to abandon
all their strong positions, and to rest the case they rely
upon as sacred upon pleas which they themselves feel tc
be merely fantastical. What they wanted were good
rousing denunciations of Papists and the Ministry, oppor•
tunities for outbursts of Kentish fire ; and what did they
get? Mr. Disraeli was laboriously civil to the Roman
Catholics. He was deferential to the forthcoming
(Ecumenical Council. In a word, he was, though some-
what dull and laboured on the whole, yet to a perfectly
unconcerned auditor occasionally vivacious ; but to the
men at his back, whose life and soul were in the matter in
hand, wholly incomprehensible and disappointing.
Mr. Disraeli's speech was entirely consistent with the
avoidance of a division on a second reading. Of some of
his most prominent friends and allies it may be said that
they cannot with any consistency support a direct negative
to the bill. They have acknowledged the necessity of
change. They have confessed that the change must
divest the Irish • .stablishment of a sensible portion of its
property. In +vord, they have admitted the principle
of the Ministerial bill. It is to little purpose to discuss
minutely a course of action which must be fully determined
on Tuesday, but one thing might be deduced with toler-
able certainty from the argument of Mr. Disraeli on Thurs-
day, that in his opinion the issue is already decided.
The Daily News declares that Mr. Disraeli's speech on
Thursday evening was made under very dispiriting cir-
cumstances, and was itself practically a confession of
defeat. Like Falstaff, the leader of the Opposition has
"led his r Igamnffins where they will be peppered," and
he is conscious that he and they are, intellectually, only
food for powder. The spectacle of a good man strut
gling with adversity is said to have been the sight of all
others most grateful to the gods. The spectacle pre-
sented on Thursday night of a party leader contending
gallantly against overwhelming numbers and yet more
overwhelming arguments has an interest and a
pathos of its own which makes the beholder forget for the
moment that Mr. Disraeli has with his own hands dug the
pit in which he is now floundering, and has himself woven
the net in which he is immeshed. The leader of the Oppo-
sition commenced his speech on Thursday evening with a
dignified moderation of tone which suited the situation.
He appealed to the House of Commons to display the
self-control and the forbearance which fitted the gigantic

issue which was brought before it. The reference he made
to the other gigantic issue, which was decided in a different

temper two centuries ago, was, perhaps, conceived in that
vein of exaggeration and of strained historic analogy to
which he is prone, and of which his allusion a year ago to
the Dutch conquest of England was an example. Mr.
Disraeli was, however, in the main, true to his word ; and
he creditably abstained from those coarse incentives tc

'ectarian fanaticism to which, twelve months ago, he
made a frantic, but Happily a vain, appeal. As to Mr.
Disraeli's alarms for the Church Established in England,
and for the security of pri, ate property, if the present bill
should become law, they are the commonplaces of alarmist
eloquence. No one would be more amused than he at the
simplicity which should take his rhetoric for logic.
The Standard considers that Mr. Disraeli's speech on
Thursday night is likely to exercise an important influent,
on the future course of the debates on the Church Spolia•
tion Bill. Its studied moderation will do much to avert
what we have always considered as one of the most serious
of the incidental dangers attending the discussion of a
measure appealing so forcibly to the worst passions of one
part of the community, and involving so deeply the
strongest feelings and highest interests of all. No
one questions Mr. Disraeli's possession of all the
qualities of a great orator; and no great orator
could fail to discern the opportunities which the
occasion afforded for those bursts of fervid eloquence
and concentrated passion which the subject appeared
almost to demand. If he abstained from these, it was
because the responsibilities of the statesman outweighed
the instincts of the orator, and warned him to sacrifice to
permanent and public interests the opportunity of a great
personal and party triumph. If, hereafter, the discus.
sion be restrained within the bounds of parliamentary
decorum and constitutional safety, the restraint will
be chiefly due to the self-denial of the Conservative
leader. No speech yet made has contributed more to
the clear and distinct apprehension of the nature and
merits of the issue or of the character and conse-
quences of the bill.

The Post observes that a debate has commenced in tht.

House of Commons which, considering the magnitude of
the issue involved, will be second in importance to none
that have taken place in Parliament for many years past.

- -
The result may possibly be predicted with no little cer-

tainty, but this, which under- ordinary circumstances
diminishes the interest felt in a contest, rather enhances
that which attaches to the pending contest over the Irish
Church. Party feeling, however intense it may be, seldom
equals the feeling of antagonism between two rival sects
of Christians, and in the issue now raised it so happens
that there are at present all the elementsboth of political and
religious strife. Pursuant to notice, the leader of the Oppo-
sition moved what, according to the rules of parliamentary
procedure, amounted to the rejection of the bill. The task
was one which by right devolved on him, and perhaps it
is needless to say that it was discharged with ability.
But, having said this, we fear we can add nothing more
in praise of Mr. Disraeli's speech against the second
reading of the Irish Church Bill. In his exordium he
recognised the magnitude of the issue, and he deprecated
iany censure at the hands of those who differed from him
creed if, in the heat of debate, he should say anything
to wound their religious susceptibilities. A good many
years ago Mr. Disraeli addressed to the House of Commons,
on an analogous subject, a speech which will be recollected
and quoted years after that of Thursday night is forgotten,
and as we listened to him we could not help thinking that
he was looking back with regret on that happier time
when, unfettered by official trammels or party bonds, lie
was enabled 1., give free utterance to his thoughts on the
grievances of the Irish people.
The Star thinks that Mr. Disraeli deserves credit
for sticking to his text, and his fidelity is the more
honourable to him because his text is so empty and
absurd. On Thursday night the House of Commons lis-
tened with great attention while the leader of the Opposi-
tion once again expatiated on the beauties of his State
Church theory, and perhaps the occasion gained in general
interest because many heard for the first time some of
those wonderful utterances which in the solemn guise of
type are apt to seem nearly incredible. The old common-
places were solemnly trotted out. The House was told
how the State derived its highest sanctions from
religion, and how the Church undertook some of
the highest functions of the State. The country was
invited to enjoy a retrospect in which our forefathers won
regulated freedom and set the fashion of temperate reli-
gion. Complete political liberty combined with order,
complete religious liberty united with a national faith—
these are the myths of Mr. Disraeli's worship. TI e
familiar State-Church argument may be said to have cow
posed the solid pudding of Mr. Disraeli's discourse ; but
there were several plums in it, and, on the whole, his
,rookery was much more successful and appetising than on
some recent oecas:ons of like importance. Amongst these
we must reckon the delicate distinction which this acute
critic of vituperative diction established between spoliation
and confiscation. It is reassuring to hear Mr. Gladstone
acquitted an such authority of spoliation.
The Herald asserts that Mr. Disraeli's speech, which
created in Mr. Chichester Fortescue's bosom a mingled
feeling of admiration and regret, was not merely one of
the finest oratorical performances upon that noblest of
all theatres the English House of Commons, it was a
great argument for English liberties, and a keen, and, as
we venture to think, an unanswerable criticism of the pro-
visions of the Government measure. The perfect art of
the speech, looked at apart from the question of agreement
or opposition to the right hon. gentleman's views, will
be universally admitted. The attention of the House
never flagged as the leader of the Opposition passed from
passages of vigorous eloquence to the most laughter-pro-
voking sallies and the closest argument. The composition
of the speech was admirable. There was no slovenliness
about the work, everything was done ad 'unguent. The
balance of each sentence, the happiness of each epigram,
the rich humour of each stroke of satire—every one c.
them, it must be noted, most carefully divested of any-
thing like personal or more party feeling, and the
loftiness and Force of the peroration, make it one of
the very fine!.i. orations ever addressed to the House of
Commons.
The Tdcgraph says that Mr. Disraeli, defending the
Irish Church, was in a position essentially dramatic.
It is now a quarter of a century—the phrase smacks Of
the stage—since the not then distinguished gentleman
addressed the House of Commons on the same question.
It was in the year 1811, and the speaker was still a member
of the Conservative party, still a nominal follower of S.r
Robert Peel. lle has since that elate referred to his speec
as containing im pasts some " heedless rhetoric -" but " we
would not hear his enemy say so, nor shall we do our
ears such violence to make them trusters of his ows
report against himself." The speech was not heedless
it was statesmanlike and unimpassioned, pointing out the
evils of Irish society in phrases fitting, forcible and
just. Not that we mean to underrate the ability o?.
Mr. Disraeli's work. Whatever we may say of the argu-
ments themselves, their arrangement and delivery vver•
distinguished by an amount of
courag
vigour, tact ad e
which will render the speech remarkable even,n among the
most successful essays of the right honourable gentleman.
It put some of his peculiar views on Church and State
with great felicity and force, and there were touches of
humour that would have redeemed even a dull oratory.
But we fancy that any true Churchman who was present
must have exclaimed " Save us from our friends !" as he
heard the Protestant leader declare that the future danger
was lest " religion " should be too "strong ;" for, if the
State and religh al came hereafter into con Ilia, religion was
likely to be " wrong." Therefore the sphere of religion in
to be " contracted ;" therefore the clergy are to be kept in
relation to the State, otherwise they will be a band of
agitators let loose.