The Sun.
London, England, 1832-03-08 00:00:00

would not be resorted to by the Anti-Reform
faction for the maintenance of things as they
are. He must have been, therefore,—what
we arc sure he is not,—the weakest or most
hypocritical of mankind, to introduce an alter-
ation; of such extraordinary magnitude--pro-
voking, as he knew it would, more than com-
mon resistance—if he did not lay his account,
at the same time, with the obligation of en-
forcing it by means of more than usual vigour.
But, as we put the question yesterday, what re-
markable energy has he yet displayed in any single
instance? His Lordship's whole embarrassment
hitherto has arisen from the difficulty of inhaling,
without too severe a pressure on his respiratory or-
gans, the clouds of flattering incense wafted to him
from every corner of the credulous nation. Over
rugged and untrodden wastes a broad and smooth
road of easy ascent has been cut for his Lordship by
the manly people of England. Along this high
way the people have borne Lord Grey and his col-
leagues on their shoulders—all that he has yet
effected has been to promise us a reform of Parlia-
ment. In the only thing like a struggle, where he
had the power to win, he has once already chosen
to be vanquished. Even in his offer of reform,
was it not brought forward—ostentatiously brought
forward—as no less a tribute to his own personal
" consistency," in discharge of a debt of 40 years'
standing, than to the good of the realm ? Well,
then, we must give Lord Grey to understand, that
he has not vindicated his consistency by a barren
promise dressed up and garnished out with
whatever apparatus of King's speeches, dis-
solutions, prorogations, bills, tables, schedules,
debates, divisions, &c. The question is,—
what solid amendment of the old law have we
gained ? Where is the Act of Parliament actually
authorising Reform ? What is there as yet but
smoke from all this fire ? It is a pretty tale for a
nation so justly excited, that if Parliamentary Re-
form could have been carried without the slightest
sacrifice of fastidious taste, or Almacks arrogance, or
feudal jealousy of a sudden accession to " the
order ", Lord Grey would have had no particular
objection to let the thing take its course. It is a
flattering and gracious boon to the British nation,
that when the majority of boroughmonger Lords
shall consent to vote the abolition of their
own boroughs—then, and not one minute sooner,
Lord Grey will fulfil his pledge. For
what means the refusal to create new Peers,
when the majority of those now existing have
positively threatened a second time to throw out the
Bill which they have thrown out already ? What,
we say, is that refusal on the part of the Prime
Minister, but a plain declaration in other words,
that so far as depends on him the country may
go whistle for Reform ? It never can be too
often repeated—it never can be too forcibly im-
pressed on the people of England—that the real
and head opponent to the cause of Reform is not
the Duke of Wellington—is not Lord Harrowby—
who possess no power except that which the all
but treacherous irresolution of others has left in
their hands; but that the author of this infanticide—
the murderer of his own first-born offspring—will
be no other than Lord Grey himself, if he denies the
only means of rescuing it from destruction. And
on what plea is such a political crime to be exte-
nuated ? Why, Lord Grey is understood to " fear
what posterity may think of him if he resorts to
violent measures for carrying the Bill of Reform !"
Good Heaven ! but conceive a man so construing the
term " violence." Imagine a politician boasting at
once of his adour for Reform and his respect for the
Constitution—boasting even of the impossibility of
withholding a Reform of Parliament from the
country, because of the universal determination of
the people to hare it let what will happen, and yet
the same man dreading more the censure of poste•
rity for " violence" by the exercise of a lawful and
royal prerogative, than for the certain, lawless, and
destructive " violence," to which such conduct
tends to drive the people ! But again, what a
paltry and selfish plea is this ! We have heard
Lord Grey laughed at by foreign diplomatists,
for always referring his decision upon the greatest
questions to some consideration involving his
own personal consistency. Some would say
that there must be egregious vanity at the bot-
tom of such a disposition, though of such a prepon-
derant feeling we undoubtedly acquit Lord Grey.
But will his Lordship reflect for one moment, whe-
ther it be possible to respect the generosity of that
man who professedly decides against a measure em-
bracing the welfare of millions of men for ages, on
personal motives merely; or how he can hope to be
thought sincere in his passion for the approval of
after times, by incurring deliberately the contempt
of the existing generation ? And what is the opinion
of posterity respecting ally man but the echo of the
opinion of the best and wisest of his contemporaries ?
Will Lord Grey throw away the present substance
for the future image ? The avowed suggestion of
the Tories, well known for some weeks past to Lord
Grey, is to make small battle on the second reading,
—then to rally for an unrelenting mutilation of the
Bill ;—finally, to take their chance that the people
of England, when wearied and dismayed, will accept
the Bill thus dilapidated. If Lord Grey, according
to the guess of some of his supporters, delays the
new Peers until after such mutilation shall hare
taken place, suspicions will arie on ail sides that he
is himself a partner in the Tory scheme, and that he
wishes the Reform Bill to be ruined. For any seem-
ing harshness in the above observations we make no
apology. It has been called forth after some months
of patient forbearatice4and even credulous acqui.
escence, by a zeal which we disdain to compromise;
and is, in our opinion, fully justified by the facts as
they appear. We shall be most happy to have the
opportunity of finding our forebodings felsified.—
noes.

The Opposition have now taken another Poten-
tate under their compassionate protection— his
Holiness the Pope. It is only when Catholics
happen in Le contending for equal rights, and free-
dom of conscience, that Tories are their enemies
The Pope is an idolator when Irish Catholics are
striving to escape from Protestant Tithes; but the
Pope a legitimate S,vereign, entitled to the
sympathy of all good Tories, when he resists the
just claims of his subjects to the benefits of good
government. That good man the Pope will now
share with the Tories the sympathy now engrossed
by Don Miguel. Sir Richard Vyvyan made a very
good beginning last night. It is about as well
established as anything can be established in history,
that the Popes have been the great cause of the
evils of Italy; that to retain their Sovereignty they
have at all times kept the country divided, and
betrayed it to foreigners; a.;4 it is well known
that at this day the territories of the Pope are the
worst governed of any in the whole Peninsu:a,—
Sir Robert Peel approved of the invasion of
Naples by an Austrian army, though the Neapolitan
dominions were at one extremity of the Peninsula,
and the Austrian possessions at the other; but then
the invasion of Austria had for object to destroy
the Neapolitan Constitution. But a ;:iicpicion flits
across the minds of the Tories, that the small force
sent by the French to Ancona may possibly benefit the
subjects of the Pope, aL.I that is quite another affair.
Sir Richard Vyvyan is all uneasiness—Sir Robert
Peel,who had no doubts in the case of _ustria, is not
without " a degree of apprehension and anxiety,"
with regard to the small French force. Idolators
are to he cherished when they have the means of
making the people miserable. Sir Richard Vyvyan,
with admirable consistency,complained of the French
for now interfering between the Pope and his sube
jects without the consent of the Pope, and without
the justification of contiguity of territory, and for not
having interfered some time ago between the Puke of
Modena and his subjects without the consent •of the
Duke, or the justification of contiguity. " He thought
(he said) the interference of France the more repre-
hensible, because he knew that not long since the sub-
jects of the Duke of Modena, who suffered under a go-
s ernment which he should like to see ameliorated, had
been induced to rebel by the representations of a
party in France, who left them to be put down and
severely punished for the rebellion into which they