The Sun.
London, England, 1859-07-14 00:00:00

Mr. Du CANE had certainly in future better rely

on " native county wit" than on quotations.
But Lord ROBERT MONTAGU (for the lead in
the Church-rate battle seems to be now intrusted to
the county members) was the great gun of the -
evening on the Opposition side. His artillery was
very heavy indeed. It was carefully placed in
position, but it seemed to tell very•little ; indeed
we could hardly perceive its effects on succeeding
speakers, or on the division. It furnished for those
who have a taste for such topics, nearly two
columns of semi-theological arguments. The
old Nonconformists were duly quoted and
pitted against their degenerate Anti-State
Church successors, and the speeches of
Anti-State Churchmen, and. the writings of the
Liberation of Religion Society, were quoted at full
length. We have no doubt the society is deeply
obliged to Lord MONTAGU for publishing their
writings for them, set too in all the graces of his
oratory. Nothing probably do they desire more
than to get their clearest and strongest statements
noticed. They think them true, and avow them-

selves content to let them make their own impres

sion. They, we must do them the justice
to say, never even pretended that church-
rates were an alternate object with them ;
on the contrary, their speakers have, again and
again, declared that the Church-rates were a grand
help to their object. They keep up, they say, an
establishment blister on the sides of thousands of
parishes ; get a hearing at vestry meetings when we
could not get up a lecture on our chief object; they
irritate people into the adoption of our views; they
are a text for us everywhere ; if they are abolished
we shall lose, at a stroke, thousands of platforms
from which we:now; proclaim our doctrine—these
have been the frequent statements of the Libera-
tion Society, and we doubt not, therefore, it feels
heartily obliged to Lord ROBERT MONTAGU.
But the definite conversion of the Whigs to
Abolition is the great feature of the night's debate.
Lord JOHN RUSSELL indeed indicated at the close
of last session that his trepidation for the safety of
the Throne and the House of Lords, as well as the
Church of England, in the event of abolition, had
given way to better hopes. An election was near,
and large majorities had taught him wisdom. Sir
Sir G. C. LEWIS now went into an elaborate argu-
ment to prove that as things are the Church can
not only do without rates, but do better without
them. The voluntary funds raised for Church-rate
purposes were larger in amount than the rates
themselves, and while the sum raised by rates had
been every year decreasing, that raised voluntarily
had been every year augmenting. And now Lord
PALMERSTON himself says—" I am. a convert—l
have changed my opinion—that is, my statesman's
opinion ; individually I prefer Church-rates in some
form, but who am I that I should oppose public
opinion expressed again again in this House by
large majorities, and by public opinion in every
shape out of doors." The fact which has satisfied
Lord PALMERSTON of the safety of abolition, is the
ease with which such numerous district churches
have been built and maintained for so many years.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer also strongly felt
the weight of the fact, that for the last 20 years
with diminished rates churches have largely in-
creased in number, and been kept in better repair
than ever.

Thus yielded the Whigs ! A notable lesson for
the advocates of every honest popular demand.
Thus, and sooner than they yet may think, must
they yield on the Ballot. Thus will they at last
discover that the House of Commons can really be
an " Honourable House," and the House of Lords
and the Throne be safe, though the people should
vote for themselves, and not at the bidding of
bribery in the boroughs and intimidation in the
counties. Thus will they discover that public opinion
is master on the great questions of political as well
as of religious liberty. That liberty, in fact, in
this country, though too slowly, has advanced, is
advancing, and will continue to advance, and that
if Whigs stand in its course, they, as well
as Tories, must be carried away by the stream.
We congratulate the friends of religious liberty
on their victory. The day of their complete
triumph cannot be far distant, and that
that of Parliamentary Reform—of the greatest of
all reforms—independent voting is, we may be
assured, not very distant also. Whigs have long
lived on the cry of civil and religious liberty,
they must now be content to see the cry con
verted into a reality.

Whether we have or have not lost a year in
legislation must be pretty obvious, we should ima-
gine, by this time. Here is July running out
rapidly towards August, when grouse-shooting
comes into season—leading the way on to the
autumnal deer-stalking, and the partridges of
September. And all that the new Parliament can
contrive to do is just to struggle as rapidly and
carelessly as may be, through the estimates.
Everything—except the inevitable paying is
postponed until next year. Next year ! a sort of
political To-morrow, that never comes. Parlia-
mentary Reform is put aside—until next year !
The very purification of the great river reeking
with pestilential vapours through the heart of our
capital, under the very walls of the Legislative
Palace at Westminster, under the very noses of the
national representatives, even that flagrant abo-
mination is to be taken into account—next year. A
reformer in this country, according to the new-
fangled system of the Whigs, " never is but always
to be blessed," in the realisation of his aspirations.
We are always, according to the GREYS,
ELLIOTTS, and RUSSELLS, just one session only
from the attainment of all our hopes of
all kinds of Parliamentary improvement. Next
session—everything is to come to us, if we are to
believe these great constitutional authorities. Every
most desirable boon is to come to us—well, next
session ! We don't very much wonder at this par-
tiality of the Whigs for postponement. It has
answered hitherto so admirably in their regard, as
a politcal contrivance. It keeps the Reformers en
permanence upon the tenter-hooks, or as Mr.
BUMBLE 110 less graphically terms it, in a moment
of failing memory, upon " the broken bottles" of ex-
pectation. The arrangement in this p Articular
really bears some resemblance to that ingenious
device hit upon by the hero of a very humor-
ous caricature. If we remember rightly the gentle-
man referred to was represented as one having
far more
individualcelebratedtioursrteemseadnitdatfiavreilyes_sirritability than the
to himselrfes
and thenillliNfryolnuhaficici.tnlatl
wallop him, oh, no,.
yldoanakdesy_what would'nt go,
Whereas in the grotesque limning erne° 'ceferred to,
the more amiable charioteer is conquering the ob-
stinacy or sluggishness of the animal in harness by
means not of an ash stick or ayard of whipcord, but
of a succulent bunch of carrots suspended enticingly
within a few inches of the nose of the unfortunate
and tantalised quadruped. It is precisely by this
kind of device that the Whigs for years past have
contrived to be dragged on at a rattling pace in
triumph by that deluded animal the British lion
hungering for Reform and racing after it under their
guidance with the tempting lure " dangling" porpe_
tually—all but within reach of immediate attain-