The Sun.
London, England, 1832-11-26 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

The protracted riego.ititions upon Belgium have
been malignantly turned against the dearest inte-
rests of Great Britain, by a faction British only in
name. It ought to be deeply impressed upon the
people of England, so deeply as never, during this
or the succeeding generation of our statesmen, to be
obliterated, that the Dutch Court has been crammed
for many months past with counsels and injunctions,
issuing from certain quarters here, of which the di-
rect and only object was to defeat the efforts of the
King's Government for a pacific adjustment of the
Dutch and Belgic quarrel. England, and not Eng-
land alone, but every one of the mediating Powers,
had declared by numberless, and on that point con-
sistent state papers, that Antwerp and its dependen-
cies belonged of right to Belgium, and ought of
right to be restored by Holland. This, we repeat,
was not merely Belgic law, or French law, or Eng-
lish law—it was the formal decision of Austria,
Prussia, and Russia, of Holy Alliance Europe. It
was no longer, therefore, open to the Conservatives
here to question that which had been admitted
by their brethren the absolute Monarchs of the con-
tinent. It was not within the limits of justice, honour;
or decency to urge the King of Holland to the retention
of Antwerp, the fruits of his wholesale pi-
racy. Yet we charge these men, these hounds
of faction—we charge their chief and his core
science will inform him whom we mean under
that title, with having positively encoutaged the
King of Holland to stand out against the earnest
and solemn adjurations of this Government for the
pE aceable surrender of the great Flemish city, as the
most certain guarantee of repose for Europe. The
Dutch King has rejected the friendly appeals of our
Sovereign. He has acted under the advice of a
predominant English Tory. Under that counsel,
he has spurned at peace ; he has defied the Allied
Powers, or any of them, to execute their own de-
crees—decrees in which they all concurred—and the
result of that vile selfish counsel, offered by a fac-
tious hater of liberty, who still anticipates a death-
blow to practical reform from his own hand—the re-
sult, we say, of that atrocious counsel, is the war
which now threatens to embrace and desolate all
the habitable world. On the head, then, of this
dealer in human blood, and on his only, be the sin ;
on his, alas ! cannot fall exclusively the suffering.
But the war is a treasonable war, for the
wretched end of expelling a liberal Adminis-
tration and restoring the Duke of Wellington
and his Tory myrmidons to office. Every guinea
spent, every habitation levelled, every family
ruined, every drop of blood spilled, and all the
anguish of spirit and body to be endured, rests,
therefore, we say emphatically, on the English Con-
servative faction, and on it alone. The meeting,
called by Tories all over England, to force war un-
der the cloak of a clamour against it, have ended
invariably in the defeat and mortification of the re-
qnisitionists. That at Leeds, on Thursday last, had
a local as well as general aim—to give a fillip to the
flagging hopes of Mr.-Newcastle Sadler, in his can-
vass for the borough, aed to help the grand Con-
servative project of encouraging the Dutch to op-
po-e the King of England in his pacific policy. The
naivete of the worshipful Mayor, on that occasion,
was delectable when he professed his belief that
" commercial, and not political, motives (!) had any
share in producing the requisition." His Worship
tacked to this avowal of easy faith a declaration that
" he was opposed to any policy which was likely to
involve this country in a general war." Then, if
commtrcial motives were at the bottom of the meet-
ing, let us have leave to ask what class of commer-
cial Englishmen have an interest in closing the
Scheldt against the mei chandize of England ? There
are, we are well aware, men wearing the British
garb who have active partnerships at Amster-
dam, and whose profits as merchants are de-
rived from Dutch monopoly ; but, with that
exception, it seems to us hardly conceivable what
sort of " commercial" motive can induce an Eng-
lishman to clap Holland on the back in her wicked
appropriation of a Flemish city, which she retains
confessedly but as part of a system of opposition to
all attempts of the Powers of Europe at releasing
the commerce carried on between them, Great Bri-
tain, and Belgium, from the tyrannical shackles
which she has for centuries imposed upon the navi-
gation of the Scheldt. However, the unhappy
Mayor and his Conservatives when ogee they yen-
tared to encounter the Leeds public were swamped
and no more seen. The coercion of Holland had
commenced many days before the requisition was
heard of. 'I he pretext, therefore, of prevailing on
his Majesty to retrace a step already and irrevo-
cably taken, was a gross insult to the understanding
of the country : the true purpose was seen through
in a moment by the meeting,—that it was to impose
upon the Dutch a belief of their having powerful
friends among the commercial interests and poli-
tical parties of Great Britain,—that the war
might, therefore, with safety be persisted in by
Holland, because, if it should be general, the
people of England would become dissatisfied,—
the old Tory gang once more be Ministers,—
the Holy Alliance politics abroad be trium-
phant,—and that, through some fortunate hocus-
pocus of the cards, the reform principle, worked by
anti-reform wires, might bring things back again to
that blessed state when corporations were Parlia-
ments, and boroughmongers Kings. The flight of
the Mayor and his Sadler partisans before the col-
lective public opinion of Leeds, and the unanimous
adoption of resolutions in support of the King's po-
licy, and that of his Ministers, will be taken through-
out England for proof sufficient of the real insigni-
ficance of an unprincipled and fallen faction. At
Huddersfield, the outline of the project was the
same, and its discomfiture no less complete and
signal. A meeting was called, professedly to pre-
vent a measure which had been already executed.
Ttie artifice and the genuine object were contrasted
without mercy; the purpose of bringing back the
Tory faction to power was treated as its iniquity and
folly. deserved ; the Duke of W'ellington's com-
mencement of the plan of interposing in the affairs
of Belgium was recorded,—his pledges to enforce
_the execution of the treaty of 1815 (which sub-
jected Belgium to Dutch supremacy), and those
other provisions (from which he did not even except
the dominion of the Charles X. dynasty over
France), " by which the political system of Europe
had been established," and to recognise Don
Miguel as King of Portugal, were all read
as part of the Kieg's speech in November,
1830, and made a deep and just impression
upon the audience. The mildness, forbearance,
and reluctance to intermeddle in foreign affairs, on
the part of Lord Grey's Ministry, even when the
temptations of Poland and Portugal had presented
themselves, and were diligently pressed upon its
attention by the national voice, were brought to the
remembrance of the meeting, and the result was an
all but unanimous rejection of the factious motion
for giving effect to which it had been called, and
the substitution of one in support of the King, his
Government, and its pacific policy. Two such
thrashings, administered to Toryism on the same
day, and in spite of every advantage which previous
concert and long preparation could have afforded it,
smay
.erve, if its partisans have not lost all use of
reason they ever exercised, to show them
the little .
bow desperate is the hope on which they are act-
ing. Unhappily, they have resorted to other means,
which exhibit an insaDity almost beyond the chance
of cure. Th,:t the revolutionary party which. exists
amongst us shouiJ make A abQW of
.cualescing with
Conservatives, i; not at all surpsing,—such. a
scheme bespeaks at once edroitness and depravity,
and so far is in character with ;its authors.—Pww.
The Prussian journalists, while 4enouncing the.
French invasion of the Netherlands as :.1;) unprin-
cipled trick of State, for the purpose of rendering
the existing Government popular, take occasion to
draw, from the policy of the Cabinet of Louis
Philip, inferences unfavourable to the operation of
civil liberty in France. They artfully take it for
granted that it is the position which the King of the
French occupies, as Chief of a liberal system, which

makes it in some measure compulsory ou him to re-
sort
periodically to theatrical displays of military
heroism to obtain the popularity of the multitude or
Preserve the support of the Chambers. The infe-
rence is that the existence of civil liberty in France
is necessarily dangerous to the repose of Europe, and
:might to be suppressed. In an article from Berlin,
quoted in the Frankfort Papers, the writer says,
It is melancholy and disgusting to see how events
ond enterprizes, on which the welfare of whole coun-
tries and nations depends, should be got up for stage
effect in the theatre of the representative system.'
Here it is evident that all the vices and errors of
the Government of Louis Philip are charged upon
the representative system. The King is likened to a
melodramatic actor, all whose performances have a
studied reference to stage effect in the theatre of the
representative system, where the Deputies enact
scarcely a more important part than a Greek chorus,
Ind the peole of la belle France are the ap-
plauding spectators. Now the real state of
the case is that Louis Philip is obliged to have
constant recourse to stage tricks of policy,
because he has no taste for the honest arts of
crood government, and, having falsified the promises
which he gave when the nation raised him to a
throne which the crimes of his predecessor forfeited,
cannot keep himself there but by those meretricious
expedients which give power a hollow and uncertain
support by the influence of sudden and startling il-
lusions upon public opinion. But the most fertile
tivention for such expedients and political clap-traps
will wear out in course of time; nor is the ex-
citement of the public so exhaustless as to supply
for ever the feeling of surprise which is necessary to
insure the success of those fantastic exhibitions.
Even children may become so familiar with the
ricks of a pontomime by repetition as to lose that
.wondering credulity which was the source of all the
delight it at first inspired. There is also the danger
of such political coup: de theatre being carried so
tar as to alarm those Powers whom the Government

France would rather not just now alarm. The
melodramatic production of the " flags of Ulm" and
the expedition to Ancona were near producing a war
with Austria, and, in fact, the French Government
was obliged to make the most abject explanations to
soothe the despotic pride which it had offended, and
ro appease the ambitious jealousy which it had pro-
voked. For any thing which the French expe-
lition to Ancona effected it might as well have re-
mained at home; but it served to give a dash of
popularity at the moment to Casimir Perier's Admi-
nistration ; and that being done the tri-coloured flag
was allowed to repose ever since over the wrongs
of Italy in inglorious inaction. With regard to the
eventual consequences of the expedition against
Antwerp the Prussian writer says, " It were much
to be wished that the French Government would
consider what it is about. It may, by its impru-
dence, kindle a conflagration which no human hand
will be able to extinguish, and which may in the
,nd prove most fatal to France itself. It is the
French policy which, after all the vain attempts to
consolidate its new Government at home at the
expense of foreign countries, now makes a new one
to maintain, by arrogant conduct, a system which
was already out of joint at its birth. It has met
with encouragement in London from Lord Palmers-
ton, and thinks itself now strong enough to throw
the sword into the balance, and violently to decide
a quarrel with which it has no concern, though the
common sense of justice protests against it, and
even prudence seems to forbid it; for the taking of
the citadel of Antwerp will neither cool the military
ardour of the French party of the Mourement, as
they are called, nor so far lull asleep the Cabinet of
the Hague as to induce it to depart from what it be-
lieves to be its right, and to subscribe to conditions
which it believes would lead to the ruin of the com-
merce of Holland." From the same quarter we are
old that " nothing will have been done to pacify the
Opposition, or to terminate the differences between
Holland and Belgium, if the French campaign is to
terminate under the walls of Antwerp. On the con-
trary, the Opposition (in France) would only be
turnished with the more dangerous weapons, and
the Belgian question become more complex." Thus,
as we stated the other day, the general peace of
Europe is endangered to effect an object which,
when achieved, if the French army should imme-
diately withdraw, would not in the least facilitate
the settlement of the Belgic question. On the
contrary, it will, by rousing all the national pride
and angry feelings of the Dutch, make it more dif-
ficult than ever to settle in a peaceful way the great
question of the free navigation of the Scheldt, and
other matters in dispute, such as the navigation of
the internal waters of Holland, and the question of
the debt, which have yet to be adjusted. It is hu-
miliating to see the Government of this country
made the tool of the immoral and selfish policy of
Louis Philip's Cabinet. When we objected to the
interference of the Tory Government in the Belgic
question, the Whigs did the same, and a notice of
motion given by the present Secretary at War, to
prevent the Duke of Wellington proceeding with
such interference, had their warm support. Before
the motion came on for discussion, the Duke was
out of office, and the Whigs, succeeding to his
power, became enamoured of his policy. The ex-
ample of sitting in Conference with the despotic
Powers is his—the blunders of the protocols and
the warlike measures against Holland, are their own.
—Morning Herald.
Since writing the above we have received the
Paris papers of Thursday and Friday, and later ac-
counts from Berlin to the date of the 20th instant.
The contents of these journals are still speculative
and inconclusive as to the results, which alone the
curious world has now in view—namely, the strength
and stability of the present Ministry in France, or
the real intentions of Prussia with respect to pass-
ing events, and their consequences in the Nether-
:ands. As these several matters belong essentially
fo the province of opinion; which changes its phase
from day to day, we are, of course, not unprepared
for the report of one day presenting a complexion
very materially differing from that of its predece,Nor ;
and accordingly our present presumptions from read-
ing these papers would be, that the views of the
King of Prussia were much more pacific than they
have hitherto been represented—that all his arrange-
ments, threatening though they looked, were still
but precautionary, and contingent only upon the
French army remaining in Belgium after the reduc-
tion of Antwerp—and that the Ministerial party in
France was so strongly established as to be now in
a condition to defy all the opposition which has
been threatened in the Chambers to it. It certainly
does appear that the Ministry has obtained a victory
of no small importance by the election, and by a
large majority too, of M. Dupin aine, whose un-
doubted adhesion we announced on Saturday, to the
Presidency of the Chamber of Deputies. The trial,
judging of the number and popularity of the other
candidates, seems to have been a severe one, arid it
would be uncandid to withhold from the Govern-
ment the concession of all the advantages which
they may fairly anticipate from its issue. Thiselection
has been long looked to as the test of the relative
strength of the parties. The candidates were six
M. Laflitte, the idol of the revolutionary party, and
lately Prime Minister ; M. Dupin aide; another
M. Dupin ; M. Dupont de l'Eure ; Gaillard
Kebertin: and Beranger; but the real contest lay
between Dupin and Laffitte, the Representatives
severally of the juste-milieu (which is some shades
more liberal than the doctrinnaire or Ministerial) and
the revolutionary party. The whole number of
voters was 376, of which 234 gave their suffrages
for Dupin, and 136 for Laffitte, leaving the former an
undoubtedly triumphant majority of 98—the other
candidates receiving only nominal support. The
election,, therefore, fell upon M. Dupin aine, who
was proclairile.d president, and which election is
likely to exercise a cooeiderable influence upon the
Chamber during the important ensuing Session.
The strength of the ;Ministry is said to have been
considerably increased by the late attack upon the
King—to which, by the way, no further clue, ex-
cept a suspicion that it was the young woman her-
self who boasted of her friendly interference who