The Sun.
London, England, 1859-12-06 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

I The Roman or Turkish lath. By William Potter,
of Manchester. Bvo. pp. 48. Simpkin, Marshall,
' and Co.
We only wish, on glancing at the title-page of
this little pamphlet (after turning over its leaves),
that we could read there also that Mr. Potter was
of London as well as of Manchester. Whenever
he himself, or any emulator of his munificent
enterprise in the good city of Manchester, shall
venture at last to open in the metropolis a similar
establishment in every respect to that described in
these pages, we are perfectly well satisfied that a
very little time indeed would be required to elapse
before the speculation in question would prove.itself,
to be singularly remunerative. The only approxi-
mation to these baths in this great capital of ours
that we can call to remembrance was one a very
few years back flourishing in St. James's—admir-
ably salubriOus and delightful baths, opened in that
central part of the West-end by an eminent surgeon,
one of our greatest public benefactors and practical
philanthropists, Mr. George Alfred Walker, who
has the glory and honour (never yet recompensed
by the public) of having, single-handed, destroyed
the detestable and pernicious system of intramural
interment. Since those admirable baths were acci-
dentally destroj ed by fire in St. James's there has
been a distinct opening in London for precisely
such an enterprise as that some time since estab-
lished by. Mr. Potter, and now flourishing it, Clif-
ford-street, Oxford-road, in the city of Manchester.
What this bath is—this original Turkish or Roman
bath—any one :may learn in ten or twenty mi-
nutes, by glancing through the pages of this
agreeable pamphlet—a perusal of which almost
tempts one to take a return ticket to Manchester.
The mere reading of it is so suggestive of ,the
luxury of the operation of the bath itself that it
is almost like swallowing a spoonful of that won-
derful green aromatic hashish devoured at bliss-
ful intervals (as though it were the very am-
brosia of the gods) by Edmund, Comte de Monte
Christ° !

VIE LAM OF BLASPHEMOUS LIBEL.

The discussion upon the question of how far the
law of bltsphemous libel is consistent with freedom
of opinion was yesterday evening resumed, at the
ordinary meeting of the Juridical Society, over
which Dr. Lee presided.
Mr. PHINN, Q.C., in opening the discussion,
observed that when he first heard that the society
was about discuss the question, it occurred to him
that it was taking a wrong course, for he con-
sidered it one of the last sujects which ought to
engage their attention; but as he had since read,
and reflected much upon the matter, he was in-
duced to alter his views, and rejoice that it had
been brotight forward ; for, as we were on the eve
of having a new code established, it was desirable
that the offence of blasphemous libel should receive
in it a clear, an accurate, and a philosophical defi-
nition, and as a means to that end the society, as a
philosophical society, and one that aimed at im-
parting a higher character to the jurisprudence of
the country, was very properly called upon to con-
sider the subject of Mr. Lewis's paper. On many
points he differed from the views propounded by
that gentleman, not so much in regard to his state-
ment of the law, collected from the dicta of the
judges, as with respect to his application of it, and
as to his views of what the law itself ought to be.
He would say nothing in reference to the parti-
cular case' which gave rise to the preparation'of the
paper, beyond remarking that their sentence was
three times as severe as that passed on Mr. Holy-
oake, for his continued contempt and revilement of
the Christian religion, but he would ask Mr. Lewis
to favour the society with a definition of what
blasphemy is ; for, so far as he could gather from
the paper that gentleman had read to the society,
he would punish as a blasphemer not only those
who ever spoke against the being and attributes of
God, but also any person who denied the funda-
mental doctrines of the Church of England, and
therein seemed to confound blasphemy and heresy,
which were two different and distinct offences,
and a wide line ought in the admini-
stration of justice to be drawn between the two.
The law of England in reference to the offence
was taken from the law of the Jews, for it was
stated in Leviticus that whoever cursed the name of
the Lord should be stoned to death ; but then that
was under a theocracy, and the crime amounted to
treason against the invisible ruler of the people;
and coming down to a later period, they found, as
in the trial of Jesus Christ himself, that when the
civil magistrate took cognisance of the offence it in
some degree touched upon treason. The same prin-
ciple was observable in the remarks which Festus
made to Agrippa, when St. Paul was brought before
him for trial. They had the record of three celebrated
trials which took place et Athens, in two of which
the same principle was discernible. 'When Anytus,
Meletus, and Lycon charged Socrates with intro-
ducing new gods and corrupting the youth of the
state, they made the charge of bl2sphemy as a mere
colour to punish him for his political views ; and
the same might be said of the trial of Diagoras
of Milos; but in the case of Andocides, who broke
and knocked down the statues of Hermes, the pro-
secution was a different thing, and was very pro-
perly directed against him for his violent destruc-
tion of the objects of the people's adoration. In the
records of Rome there was, so far as he was aware,
no.instance of any trial for blasphemy at all, as the
Romans gave the widest license to religious worship,
and even permitted the introduction of the gods
of Egpyt into the religion of the country. The
common law of this country, however, did punish
the offence, and as that portion of the juris-
prudence of the country was coeval with the
introduction of Christianity, it was fair to as-
sume that the crime to which the law applied was
blasphemy, as defined by St. Augustine, who said,
" Vulgo blasphemia non accipitur nisi mala de Deo di
sere," and that its application to cases of heresy
wag a gloss introduced from the canonists. Now,
he took a blasphemous libel to mean a denial of the
divinity, in fact, the expression of practical atheism,
and it was worthy of consideration whether it was
desirable that the punishment of it should be re-
tained in the law of this country; and in the next
place should the punishment be extended to eves
beyond the denial of that belief, which was common
to every race of mankind. In France all indecent
and irreverant attacks upon the religion or the
ministers of any sect recognised by the law
were punishable ; but in the code of Louis-
iana, as prepared by Mr. Livingstone, it was
stated that there could be no defamation of a
corporation or religion, or good morals. These
were the extremes. Now, with respect to denying
the sceptic the use of ridicule as a weapon, hasaw
no reason for doing so, as the truth could never
suffer from any attacks ; but whatever the new law
might be, he hoped, that no expression of opinion
bona fide given to elicit fair argument, would ever
be punished as a blasphemous libel, but that the
offence should stand on the same principle as a
nuisance, and imply nothing more than on open in-
jury inflicted upon the common rights of all.
Mr, SYDNEY SMITH argued that a country was
bound to protect the established religion of the
State. He thought the reaction which had set in on
the cessation of intolerance, was going too far, and
that by and by we should be tolerating everything.
Mr. COLLIER, Q.C., complained that Mr. Lewis,
in his paper, as published in the Solicitors' journal,
argued as if atheist and infidel were convertible
terms.: For himself he would apply to blasphem-
ous libel the rule laid down 'by Starkey in regard
to libel in general, and leave to the jury to decide
whether the publication was made bona-fide or
mala fide.
Mr. MONTAGU CHAMBERS, Q.C.,.argued that it
would be an inconsistency in the law if it permitted
the abuse and ridicule of the Deity while it guarded
the meanest subject of the realm from them.
Mr. DANIEL, Q.C., as a Christian and a member
of the Church of England, repudiated all State pro-
tection. He did not dread the attacks of ridicule;
on the contrary, he was prepared to encounter them,
and say in answer to the scoffer—" The foul hath
said in his heart there is no God." With regard to
protecting the young and the ignorantfromtett:
effects of blasphemous writings, he held that
a matter of education to be guarded against by the
parent or even by the state.
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A CHILD KILLED BY A PIG.—On Saturday last
a child belonging to Angus Mackay, Dunn, parish of Wet-
ten, met its death in a very shocking manner. While lying
in the cradle, in the absence of the mother, a pig entered the
room and attacked the infant, tearing its face and hands to
a dreadful extent. The little sufferer died in a few hours
chiefly through loss of blood. Dr. Robertson, Bower, was
sent for, but death ensued before he arrived.---Northern
(Wick) Ensign.

A WIFE KILLED BY HER HUSBAND.—A lament-
able event occurred during the night of Saturday last, at
Bletchingly, a village near Reigate. It appears Mr. Brown,
landlord of the Red Lion Inn, and his wife had frequent
quarrels, the latter being much addicted to drink. On Sa-
turday evening, she ranch annoyed some company in one of
the parlours, by going in when under the influence of liquor.
The company left the house between 11 and 12 o'clock, and
the lodgers went to bed between 12 and 1 o'clock, leaving
the husband and wife alone in the parlour. It would seem
probable a quarrel sprung up between them, the husband
kicking his wife so violently in the abdomen that she shortly
bled to death. Mr. Sargent, surgeon, Bletchingly, was sent
for, but his aid was, of course of no avail. Mr. Bungard,
superintendent of police, Chidstone, proceeded to Bletch-
ingly, and apprehended the prisoner between two and three
o'clock in the morning, and conveyed him to one of the cells
in the police-station' Godstone. Deceased was about 34
years of, age ;prisoner is about 40, The unfortunate ..WOIID 11
leaves five chil.Aren.