The Sun.
London, England, 1860-11-13 00:00:00

jority of cases, be to their mutual injury. "They
are shut out from the political world ; they
are told that they ought to have, and shall
have, no opinion and no voice in the direc-
tion of public affairs; that they are an igno-
rant and a dangerous class; and that what
are called the institutions of their country would
not be safe if they were permitted to take any part
in them. The inevitable result is that these men,
growing every day in information, and in restless-
ness and discontent, rather it may be with their
social than their political condition, and growing
also in numbers and in the means of organisation,
maintain a contest with the only authority they see
and feel, namely, with their employers, who are to
them almost all they know and comprehend of
superior power and of governmental control."
This is, assuredly, clever hitting ; and it is as
cleverly argued out in what follows. He seems also
to ask the suffrage of the Right Hon. BENJAMIN
DISRAELI himself; for, tacitly, he appeals to his
description of " the two nations," and we should
not be surprised if the Right Hon. Member for
Bucks did not really suggest this argument
to Mr. BRIGHT. " The fact is,"—he says—
" our system of political exclusion has this
effect; it makes of the working classes a nation,
separated by a gulf passable only by few of them,
from that other nation to which the existing Con-
stitution pretends to give, though it does not honestly
give, political power. There is thus no real amal-
gamation of classes. The class receiving wages is
shut out from the questions and the interests which
occupy the minds and engage the energies of the em-
ploying class. Its members are limited to the
consideration of their own individual, and local, and
class interests ; and their mental activity is devoted
to something like a servile war, because everything
that is broader and greater is excluded from their
view." His hopes do not seem to be very sanguine
as to any early adoption of his views ; but he States
well what he conceives the result would be.
He sees a direct connection between an
equal civil and political position for all classes,
and the cessation of strikes. "I do not," he re-
marks, " expect in our time that these deplorable
transactions will come to an end, but I am per-
suaded that they would occur much more rarely,
and be attended with less of bitterness and of that
obstinate folly which now so often distinguishes
them, if the wall of partition between classes were
broken down by the admission of the great
labour interest' into the rights of citizenship.
Then the same questions would interest us all ;
the same grievances, where grievances exist, would
be seen to affect us all ; the same great public ob-
jects would stimulate us all; and instead of being,
as we now are, two nations in one country, having
different ends and adverse sympathies, we should
have objects and parposes in common, to the incal-
culable and permanent gain of the whole people."
It will not be denied that there is weight as well
as ingenuity in these observations. It would be
easy, of course, to picture quite another side ; but
it is not easy to deny that full political rights, pro-
tected too by the ballot, must do much to enlarge
the minds and thoughts of many who now have no
direct interest in anything but work and wages.

The Parliament of Victoria, after a protracted
session of eleven months, has at last come to a
definite settlement of the Land Question. The
Legiaative Assembly, with great good sense and
moderation, having waived two minor points on
which a short time back they seemed resolved to
make a stand, viz., the settling of competing appli•
cations for the same allotment of land by " lot,"
instead of limited auction, and the extension of
deferred payments to three-fourths instead or
one-half of each allotment. But the members of
the Council proving obstinate, and, in fact, want-
ing some concession to be made to 'give them
an excuse to pass the bill, the Legisla-
tive Assembly having in reality gained
the victory could afford to be generous,
so that this long-vexed question is at length settled,
and on the 18th September Sir HENRY BARKLY
affixed his signature to the death• warrant of Land
Jobbery and Squatter monopoly. Henceforward land
will lose its fictitious value, and bona fide pur-
chasers will be enabled to buy land at the upset
price of one pound sterling per acre ; or, better
still, to take it on lease at a rent of:one shilling per
acre per annum, with the right to purchase within
the time specified in the lease. Three million
acres of public land are to be thrown open for
selection by the Ist of November, 1861, at the
uniform price of £1 per acre, and the contracts
have already been taken for the survey of more
than a third of that quantity, besides a considerable
tract of country already surveyed and open for
selection. We take the following summary of the
Land Act from the Melbourne _Herald of Sept. 25 :
" The first 11 clauses deal with lauds reserved for
public purposes, and other preliminary details. AU