The Sun.
London, England, 1860-03-29 00:00:00

persons more than three times as numerous as that
of the other party, till the House looked aghast at
the multitudes which still kept coming—
indeed, St. Stephen's Chapel seemed likely to
become a wholesale petition warehouse. So
thorough was the 'victory, so complete the dismay,
that the party which but a few short weeks ago
celebrated its increased minority as a triumph, was
now compelled to retire bodily from the contest.
Poor Mr. PACKE, whom they had selected to head the
last grand charge, and to carry an amendment, that
the bill should be committed that day six months,
was compelled to withdraw it ! The ecclesiastical
Zouaves had thoroughly routed the ecclesiastical
Austrians ; their whole line gave way, and the
Quadrangle of the House of Lords is their only
hope. We are perfectly certain, however, that
there will be no Villafranca armistice. The Quad-
rangle may hold out as long as it can, but it is
certain to be forced. Nu compromise will be tole-
rated. Any capitulations their lordships like, so
that Church-rates be completely abolished ; but
nothing will be endured which leaves a vestige of
the power to coerce the reluctant to pay for the
worship of the willing.
Poor Mr. NEWDEGATE, with his amendments,
followed Mr. PACKE. His own party had in vain
endeavoured to dissuade him from persisting. But
persist he would; he wanted the tax transferred
from persons to property ; to become a charge on
property ; to be levied on the occupier, but deducted
from rent. The house would not hear of this, and
the unfortunate assailant of Maynooth and
" Papists " was left by his fellow Protestants in a
minority of 49 to 222. So much for one notable
recommendation of the pious Marquis of BLAND-
FORD'S committee—that owners of property, not
occupiers, should be saddled with the rate. Mr.
WALTER coolly observed that those who used the
Church ought to pay for the accommodation ; one
of his largest tenants, he said, who would pay
most of all in his parish, neither had, nor could ob-
tain, a pew in the parish church. Surely it was
rather hard that his farm should pay Church-rates
for the fortunate pew-holders.
Sir GEORGE GREY'S proposal came next—the
bill having been committed—that power should be
given to the incumbent and churchwardens to charge
the appropriated pews. Legal and technical diffi-
culties were raised, and it was pretended that such
provisions did not belong to a bill for the abolition
of Church-rates. Sir GEORGE stated that the pro-
posal was his own, and not that of the Government ;
and finding more opposition than he anticipated
withdrew his motion. We certainly think his plan
a perfectly fair one. All the talk about the exclu-
sion of the poor is mere cant. Are the poor ex-
cluded from the chapels of Dissenters, where they
are certainly to be found in far greater numbers
than in churches ? Indeed, the fact is rather the
other way. The poor, infinitely to their credit,
prefer to pay the trifle they can afford, for the ac-
commodation. We were much struck by the evi-
dence of a Wesleyan witness before the Lords' com-
mittee; he told the committee that their
poor, without exception, paid a penny a week
as their contribution. And so strong does the feel-
ing of self-respect seem to be, that "the brethren"
who are better off furnish the very poor with the
means of payment to save their feelings ! There
is the same feeling in Scotland, where weekly
collections at the doors is the practice of all
Churches. The poorest and the youngest will not:
pass the plate. The poor are not the class to object
to a small and reasonable seat rent, while free seats
would, of course, be reserved in every place of
public worship. Nothing seems fairer than, that
as we pay for a seat in a theatre, an omnibus, or a
railway carriage, so we should pay for a seat in a
church ; while no religious sect would, for de-
cency's sake, forget their " third class" worshippers
—we almost blush to mention such an idea in con-
nection with Christian worship.
Lord JOHN MANNERS liked neither Mr. NEWDE-
GATE'S nor Sir GEORGE GREY'S proposals; indeed,
he would like nothing that mitigated the purely
abolition character of Sir Joint TRELAWNY'S bill.
His hope is in the Lords, and we well know they
are hopeful enough in any such cause as this. What
they will do this year, of course, no one can be sure.
The chances in the Lords are always against libera-
lism and common sense, and especially against the
surrender of any privilege, ecclesiastical or politi-
cal, commonly in proportion to its offensiveness.
It exhibits most strikingly the dignity of the
Lords, when they can coolly face repeated divisions
of the House of Commons, and ignore petitions
by the thousand from the ignoble vulgus ; and
hence, as likely as; knot, they will refuse
to abolish Church-rates this year. Reasoning
would be, we fear, wasted upon their Lordships—
not, we wish it to be understood, upon the more
active portion of the Peers, those who take a part
regularly in the business of the country, and who
know something of public life. It is that portion
of the House which has no right to belong to it at
all—the dormant three-fourths or four-fifths, who
never hear a debate, certainly never make a speech
—whose names are only known by reference to lists
and catalogues,—and whom ninety-nine hundredths
of Englishmen know no more of than they do of
the greengrocers of Southwark—it is these Peers
with whom it is hopeless to reason, for they are
utterly incapable of weighing arguments. They ask
no question about a bill, but is it a Tory Bill, or a
Liberal one. If the former, up go their proxies
against it to their noble Tory agent, at Westmin-
ster, and it is by the help of all this antiquated
lumber that the progress of the country is every year
obstructed. How long is the way to be blocked up
by this venerable rubbish ? We talk of reforming
our representation in the House of Commons ; we
surely need quite as much to reform the House
of Lords. If hereditary Peers we must have, we
then must have some means of rendering them
amenable to reason and public opinion. At pre-
sent they are far more despotic than his Majesty of
FRANCE whom they so willingly depreciate ; he
does respect popular opinion. The Rouge of Peers
takes a pleasure in bearding both the people and
their representatives. And this they do from the
dignified seclusion of their ivy-covered castles,
without ever condescending to attend a debate,
and to assign reasons for their votes ! If we must
have Lords,
we are surely not bound to have proxy
Lords.

On the first announcement of the French Ear-
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indignation not only with the selfishness of the
thing—for the whole Treaty is one of pure selfish-
ness on the French side—but at the insult to this
country. We can, therefore, but be gratified to see
that the press of the country, and the loice of
all genuine Englishmen has since fully recog-
nised the justice of our sentiments. Like
a contemporary this morning, we, too, may
say, that we can have no interest in dear paper.
The cheaper we can buy this raw material of our
manufacture, obviously, the better for us. But
we recoil from cheapness at the cost of our honour.
Though viewed commercially, we and the paper-
makers are antagonists—their object being to sell
to us dear, and ours to buy of them cheap; yet we