The Sun.
London, England, 1867-09-05 00:00:00

LONDON, THURSDAY, SEPT. 5, 1867.

We have news which appears almost too good to
be true—the Abyssinian captives are said to be
liberated. It is said that telegraphic intelligence
has been received by the British Embassy in Con-
stantinople, announcing that the Emperor THEO-
DORE has liberated the Abyssinian captives at the
intercession of an Armenian Bishop This
news created great excitement in Liverpool ; but
little faith is put in the report, it being thought
improbable that THEopoRE would consent to
the release of teese unfortunate men. Unless
actual force be employed, and at least some mani-
festation of it be wheeled. It is difficult to decide

under such circumstances what to believe, and the
only thing to do is to wait for confirmation or refu-
tation of the intelligence with as much patience as
we can. It is, of course, needless to say what de-
light will be felt in all directions should this news
prove to be correct ; and, at any rate, it seems
likely that nothing of an untoward nature has
occurred respecting the condition of these captives, or
we should hardly hear such cheering reports of their
condition. Perhaps the worst part of the burden
that must be borne by those whose relatives and
friends are in dangers and difficulties abroad is the
uncertainty that prevails respecting the truth or
falsity of the various reports that reach them. In
this instance of the Abyssinian captives all
nearly or remotely connected with them may
feel well assured that their anxiety is
shared in a great measure by the nation
at large ; and that if, happily, the certain intel-
ligence of their liberation ever reaches England,
universal rejoicing will be felt by all who have
taken interest in their welfare and deeply deplored
their sad condition through the length of their tedi-
ous captivity, so full of suffering and so fraught
with peril.

Mr. HENLEY is always worth listening to, for he
possesses in no ordinary degree the valuable and
certainly uncommon quality of common sense. He
says iu a straightforward manner what he means,
and although he is often too liberal in his views
for his own party, and always too Conservative
for advanced Liberals, he is listened to with
respect by all, and often exercises considerable in-
fluence. After long argument and impassioned
declamation pour et centre, Mr. HENLEY comes
in with a few plain words, and puts matters
in a new light. Though not a member of
Lord DERBY'S present Administration, he has
given a cordial support to the Government through-
out the difficulties of the past session, and in his
speech in Oxfordshire, yesterday, Reform was the
subject on which he principally dwelt. The elo-
quence of Mr. HENLEY was cut short by rain,
lightning, and thunder, a form of applause which
was not encouraging to the speaker ; but he made
a few observations very much to the point. He
was one of those, he said, who, having seen suc-
cessive Prime Ministers promise the people, through
the QUEEN, an extension of the franchise, " chose
no longer to play the humbug, and thought it
necessary honestly to settle the question,
if it were possible to do so." Mr. HENLEY expressed
his hope and confidence that the people would use
fairly and properly the trust placed in their hands,
and remarked that those who had lived as long as
he had done could not fail to have witnessed many
changes for the better. Not only had they seen a
material and mental development, but they had also
witnessed a great diminution in the amount of
crime and drunkenness and immorality. "In the
face of enormous temptations, in the face of an in-
crease of wealth which was an enormous tempta-
tion to abuse, in the face of all dis-
couraging circumstances, those who looked
back forty or fifty years must do so with
great confidence in the people of this country."
It is not very often that we find men who can
carry their retrospect so far back so willing to enter
into the spirit of the present day, to acknowledge
its events, and be willing to grant its wishes. Mr.
HENLEY has a characteristic aversion to what he
bluntly styles " playing the humbug," a part which
some of our most able politicians occasionally fill to
admiration, and in consequence when wavering
members ask, as they sometimes do, " Which way
does Mr. HENLEY go ?" they are sure of finding a
guide who, whatever his mistakes or his prejudices,
will be certain to adopt the course which appears to
him at the moment the most manly, just, and
patriotic.

On Tuesday the Bishop of Bangor presided at a
meeting held at Penmaennowr, for the Propagation
of the Gospel in Foreign Parts. Mr. GLADSTONE
proposed a resolution, to the effect that the success
which has already attended the efforts of the Society
for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts
is a " call and an encouragement for increased
liberality on the part of Christians in aiding the
support and extension of its missions." The
right hon. gentleman made a very interesting
speech on the occasion, and informed the meet-
ing that at one period he had himself been
an active agent in promoting and assisting
the Council and the operations of this society in
London. Since then, however, now a period of
thirty years, " other and ruder demands" have
encroached upon his time, and rendered it impos
sible for him to continue those efforts ; but he
assured them that he still takes an interest in the
matter, and recognised its growing usefulness from
year to year. There seems great reason in what
Mr. GLADSTONE said concerning the particular mis-
sion that seems to have fallen to England in
this respect. Our little island is inferior in popu-
lation and inferior in size to many countries,
but it excels them all in two particulars, namely,
in the extent of its colonial settlements and in the
extent of its commercial operations. "By your
labour, skill, and energy—by the invincible and
resistless tendency to expansion, which seems to be
a property planted in this race beyond all other
races in the world, you are continually putting forth
in foreign lands agencies which are the source of
great wealth and power to this country, but which
likewise have another aspect." This other aspect, he
went on to say, was the obligation entailed upon
those who set out for foreign lands. Not alone do
they take material treasures, but better possessions
with them, and of these it is their duty to impart
to others.

We live, as the right hon. gentleman said, in a
" period of crisis" for the Christian religion, but at
the same time the conviction remains in our minds
that Christianity "continues to be that which ithas
been heretofore—the great medicine for the diseases
of human nature—the great consolation for its sor-
rows—the great stay to its weakness—the main and
only sufficient guide in the wilderness of the world."
It is most encouraging to find this vindication of
the true meaning and real spirit of Christianity
from one so well able to express an opinion alike
from his ability and knowledge, as well as from his
proved devotion to the interests of religion and the
interests and welfare and prosperity of the Church.
Let us abide the issue, says Mr. GLADSTONE, and
not suppose that the trial which has come upon this
age is either new or unheard of, because in former
times the revival of Pagan learning threatened to
" seduce and draw away the whole Christian intellect
from the light of the Gospel and the worship of the
SAvrotm." No conscientious person can reconcile it
to himself that our countrymen should proceed to
the uttermost parts of the earth and dispense their
wealth, their prudence, and their learni❑g without
imparting that better knowledge, without which all
else is valueless and insignificant. In the
unchristian States with which we have to do,
and in those waste places of the earth
which our colonies are now gradually filling
up, there is enough, and more than enough,
for the most able, enterprising, and elevated to ac-
complish and strive for. At a meeting held under
the auspices of Dr. HOWLEY, Archbishop of Can-
terbury, thirty years ago, a speech was made by
Dr. M4KNINO concerning this sab;ect, and Mr.

GLADSTONE alludes' l to it as one of great eloquence
and power. He I ,ointed out the responsibility that
rested upon this o )untry in its intercourse with foreign
parts, and declar ed that " England had to choose,
in her vast transak -tions abroad, whether she would be
a mere beast of by urden or whether she wouli be the
evangelist of the ;world." It is worthy of record, as
Mr. GLADSTONE said, that of all those men who form
the pith and sinews of colonial communities, there
is scarcely one who bag not made sacrifices in vari-
ous ways, and especially in having to remove him-
self from the power crl ordinary circumstances to
the ordinances of religion. The right hon. gentle-
man concluded by declaring that during the last
thirty or forty years there had been a great im-
provement in the condition of the Church with re-
gard to the action of the clergy, and expressing his
earnest trust, from year to year, that those engaged
in prosecuting the work of this society may be en-
abled to witness " increasing acceptance among
their fellow-Christians, and the richer and ever
richer blessing of the ALMIGHTY upon their work.'

The proceedings of the Manchester Trades Union
Inquiry, so far as they have as yet gone, fully con-
firm the impression made on the public mind by the
startling revelations of Sheffield. We are far from
supposing that every trades' union would sanction
the iniquities of a BROADHEAD, but it is quite evi-
dent that under the mistaken system they have
adopted they have become instruments of oppres-
sion instead of protection to the working man. The
unionist has much more to fear from the union than
from his employer. No individual employer can do
him much harm. The most he can do is to dismiss
him from his employment, and dissuade any one
he knows from employing him. The master will
not certainly shoot him in the street or blow up his
house. It is very well for the defendants of the
trades unions as they are at present to argue as if
the Sheffield outrages were exceptional cases. It is
evident that the doctrine of ruling by force is ad-
mitted among their fundamental rules. Neither
Manchester nor Sheffield are such remote or insigni-
ficant places that we should decline to accept them
as representatives of the principles of these associa-
tions. Manchester at least has long claimed an
intellectual pre-eminence over other cities. Yet we
find the same thing going on there as at Shef-
field, and the very man who is convicted of
a savage assault, and sentenced to twenty years'
penal servitude, now president of his Union. If
such men are fairly and freely elected to such posi-
tions, it proves the morality of the Unionists to be
at a very low ebb. If they are not freely elected,
but obtain their positions through influence or inti-
midation, it shows that the members of the Union
are not free agents. In either case the inference is
unfavourable. The pernicious influence which
these Unions exercise in checking industry and en-
terprise, and the extent to which they carry
their vengeance for what might appear to
the uninitiated a slight infraction of their
rules, is strongly exemplified in the evidence
given yesterday at the opening of the in-
quiry. THOMAS MEADOWS, a master brickmaker
at Stockport, made an alteration in his bricks by
which a saving of 10d. per thousand would be
effected. Some of the Union men came to see how
it worked, and said they might make the alteration
if the men might have the benefit of the 10d. The
master—not unnaturally—did not agree to this, but
said they might have 6d. of it. The result was that
the union men struck work. Three of them, how-
ever, soon after came back and accepted the 6d.
The others then offered to return on condition these
were dismissed. The master refused, and
subsequently the whole came back, but after
WILD, one of the three men, was attacked
when he was at the kiln at night, his right arm
broken and other injuries inflicted, which kept him
for six months in the Stockport Infirmary. For
this assault two of the Unionists were tried, con-
victed, and sentenced, but a petition was got up
for the commutation of their sentence, which the
injured man was induced to sign for fear, as he
himself said, "of getting into a hobble." Fear, in
fact, lies s.t the bottom of most of these proceed-
itnogtsh,easntdrotnhge.Uinniniodnesdaaffondrdunasncernxpcenllloennst
toopptyorratunnniitsye
over their weak or timorous fellows under the pre-
tence of preserving the " rights of labour."