The Sun.
London, England, 1859-11-07 00:00:00

THE SUN.

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 1859.

Do British Catholics believe, or do they not, in
the independence of nations ? This is the plain
question we put to them, after reading the resolu-
tions of their Dublin clergy, which appeared in
The Sun of Saturday. If they do not, then let
them give up at once all title to the name of Britons.
Let them openly avow that they wish for the re-
turn of the days of King JOIIN, or of THOMAS
A'BECKET, and that they think it fit and proper
that this kingdom, or any kingdom, should
take for its ruler some one whom it detests
and whom it longs to shake off, at the
bidding of a combination of other na-
tions. Let them avow that they have not the
same love for national independence as the French,
or even the Belgians, who have both got rid of the
monarchs and dynasties given them by the Holy
Alliance. But if they do believe that England did
nobly and well by asserting those liberties in 1688,
in virtue of which Catholics have a home in Eng-
land, and by the expansion of which they stand on
a level with all other British subjects, then let
them blush for their prelates and their clergy
who ask them, in effect, to make a tyrant of their
Pope, and slaves of his subjects.
To Popery, as a religious system, it is not ours to
object. We hold each man's faith sacred. Roman
Catholics are Roman Catholics for exactly the same
reason as Mahommedans are Mahommedans, and
Protestants Protestants ; they were born and
brought up Roman Catholics. It is not with them
in the slightest degree a matter of investigation,
or conviction ; they have been industriously pre-
cluded from that by priests and confessors who had
the absolute command of their mothers' faith,
and they are no more culpable for be-
lieving in what appears to others supersti-
tion, than English Churchmen are for believing
in the Church Catechism, or Scotchmen for
pinning their faith to the Assembly's Catechism.
Nine-tenths of us, at least, account for it how we
will, believe as our mothers did, and for this rea-
son in addition to all the more religious and meta-
physical ones, we think it no merit that our tolera-
tion to religious differences is absolute and com-
plete. But let it remain a religious difference.
Let the difference between us and the Catholic be
that he thinks CHRIST has a Vicar on earth, and
that we acknowledge religiously, no master
at all on earth, but one in Heaven only.
With that difference we can shako hands with
him as cordially as with a Protestant. isno
concern of ours whom or what he believes in ; to
his own Master he standeth or faileth.
But, all is changed if he bring his religion forth
as an instrument of civil oppression. While we
thoroughly believe that no man's religion should
interfere with his own ciell•position, we equally
hold that no man's religion should interfere with
another's eicil position. It is to this converse of
their own demand that Catholic prelate and priests
exhibit an insensibility which rouses the indigna-
tion of every sincere lover of civil and religious 11-
berty, If Roman Catholic soldiers and sailors, felons
and paupers, do not enjoy the same religious advan-
tages at the cost of Protestant taxpnycrs which are
accorded to Protestants, we hear no end of outcry
against religious oppression---against their treat-

ment being worse because they are Catholics. But
when Catholic States forbid Protestants to worship
at all in their dominions, or compel them to do so
under annoying restrictions and supervision, or al-
low no bury ing place or monument for their dead,
or enact laws for kidnapping Jews' children—all
such things are " good Catholicism !" It is
only religious liberty that Catholics in Eng-
land should propagate their views and cele-
brate their worship as they please ; but
it is very wicked and revolutionary, " dam-
nable" we believe is the favourite word, for
Protestants to enjoy the same rights in Spain, or
Italy, or Austria ! The Vicar of CHRIST being the
most perfect exemplar of this intolerance !
If, however, there be one case in which this
unendurable one-sidedness comes out with more
offensiveness to free Britons than another, it is in
the conduct of British Catholics in regard to the sub-
jects of the Pope. So blinded are the former with
the conceit of making the elect of the cardinals and
the religious head of their faith a temporal
prince, that they deny to the unfortunate descen-
dants of the ancient Romans the common rights
of mankind. They onlylof all the nations of Europe
may not govern themselves as they please ! While
all other free Britons assert the right of the Romans
to depose even a good Sovereign if they wish it, and
to instal a better, British Catholics deny their right
to get rid of the worst government in Christendom,
and to arrang-a their temporal affairs to their own sa-
tisfaction. They brand as calumnies the accounts we
have of Papal maladministration from every
source which can be relied on. Not a decent
Government in Europe has yet denied that
the POPE'S government is the worst in this quar-
ter of the globe ; yet British Catholics
profess not to believe it! We have, how-
ever, one broad fact which settles all con-
troversy as to what is the real state of the
case. The Pope cannot keep on his throne without
the aid of foreign bayonets. Let the Catholic clergy
twist and turn that fact as they please, there it is.
French, or Austrians, or Neapolitans, or Swiss, or
some foreign help, is indispensable to the support
of the temporal reign of the Pope. He must hire
foreign dogs to worry his flock, as at •Perugia, or
his flock will not merely run away, it will trample
his temporal power under foot. It is willing to
hare him for its shepherd, but not for its butcher.
Let the French go to-morrow, and his Holiness
must be off, too !

Now, we ask all British Catholics what
right have they to require these Romans
to submit to the will they detest ? Is their religion
one which necessitates the political enslavement of a
nation ? Were there no popes before they had
temporal power, and was their Church less efficient,
less a Church for the first eight centuries than
it is now ? Is the abuse implied in making a priest
into a Sovereign, the better because it is an old
one ? Because it is so old that it has become

utterly rotten and corrupt ?
There is a great deal of nonsense talkel, about
affronting 200,000,000 of Catholics by interfering
with the rights of their Head. We know not how
numerous Catholics are, nor do we care. Truth
and right do not depend on numbers ; and
a very large part, nearly all the educated part of
these Catholics in France, Germany, and Italy, are
infidels, while a very large part of them indeed—
perhaps the larger part—sympathise with the
freedom-loving Romans, and not with their bishop-
despot. But even were not this the fact, as it most
certainly is, what rightwould the 200 millions to be
affronted by our demanding for the " Patrimony of
St. Peter," as they style it, that its inhabitants
should be free men ? Did the superstition of a
r foreign Prince, in giving that territory to an elective
Bishop, deprive its inhabitants of the rights of men
for all time? Did that superstitious dotation really
elevate the position or improve the character of the
Bishops of Rome ? Did it even render them more
independent ? has the Bishop of Rome been more
independent just because he has had a small terri-
tory to be anxious for, for the safety of which he
has had to be by turns dependent, now on a king,
now on an emperor, and at this moment on the ten-
der mercies of the man whose uncle whirled about
his predecessor as he pleased ? But we refuse even
to entertain the question—whether it be for the
advantage of Catholics that the Pope should have
a little kingdom of his own. As free Englishmen,
we assert the right of the Romans, and of all
nations, to have Governors of their own choice.
Whether the Popes have governed well or
ill, whether the people or sovereigns of other na-
tions would like the Popes to have a kingdom or
not, have nothing to do with the matter. The
Romans have the same right to resist the nomina-
tion of a monarch for them by 200 millions of Cstho-
lics,'as they would have to resist the nomination of 200
millions of Protestants. Surely the Catholic Laity of
England and Ireland will have the good sense to
put an extinguisher on these proceedings of their
clerics ; if not they will make half the country re-
pent of emancipating those who use their own
civil liberties to clamour for the enslavement of
their fellow Catholics in a foreign land. Let Catho-
lics in Rome choose their own Sovereign, as well
as Catholics in England Ireland.

There are two wars now upon the eve of vigorous
comencement at opposite extremities of the old or
eastern hemisphere. To the generality they have
the aspect of direct conflicts between barbarism
and civilisation. Yet, among all the various belli-
gerents involved in them, there are nearly trace-
able degrees of civilisation. An Anglo-French war
with China, a Franco-Spanish war with Morocco,
might rather be termed, either of them, a collision
between ancient civilisation, or Pagan civilisation,
and Christian civilisation, or modern civilisation.
It were as preposterous for us to talk of the Chinese
as barbarians as it is for the Chinese to employ
that ridiculous term of darision or deprecia-
tion in regard to ourselvei. And in some
degree also it comes nearly as absurd
for the citizens of the French empire or of the
Spanish monarchy to sneer at the Moors as a race
but one removed from savages. The difference be-
tween them and their African antagonists is no
more than a difference between the degrees of
civilisation. It is not only thus under a purely
historical aspect, under the remembrance, namely,
of those monuments scattered far and wide over
the land of the Cid, attesting the glory and pomp
and the influence of the ancient race of the A ben-
carages. It is visible here, we maintain, in the
actual condition of the Moors in their own country.
Granted that they have long been and still are to a
certain extent notorious and infamous in the eyes
of the nations of Europe as par excellence among
all the robber hordes of the old world, the pirates
of the Mediterranean. Granted that, as a recent
annalist has written upon this subject, " the his-
tory of the throne of Morocco, of the dynastic re-
volutions of Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli, is writtot
with blood"—yet as a people the Moors of this
present day are far, very far indeed, removed from
a state of barbarism. As the same writer has re-
marked, by a significant reminder, at the Great Ex-
hibition in Hyde-park but eight years back, the
Moorish Department, as many may remember,
contained many articles of utility and of luxury,
which were viewed with wondering admiration—
tbe taste and skill of the Moorish artisans

being wo; id famous in dyeing, in the fabri-
cation of 'swords, of saddlery, of earthen- )
ware genera lly, and of gold and silver ornaments.
'We read of ;them upon reliable authority, " They
are tempera' ,e in their diet and simple in their
dress, excep t the richer classes in the principal
towns, where, the ladies literally cover themselves
with silk, gold, and jewels, while the men indulge
to excess the:'r love of fine horses and splendid
arms." It being further related of them as a nation
that while the re are, of course, amongst them many
wandering tribes—" they generally lead a settled
life as merchants, mechanics, or agriculturists."
The civilisation of the Chinese is a fact more noto-
rious in Western Europe, though more remotely
situated, namely, at the opposite extremity of the
eastern hemisphere. Among other illustrations
of the high degree of Chinese civilisation, it
is well known that they have for centuries enjoyed
as a people the advantages accruing to a community
conducted, from the highest to the lowest, upon a
grand and nobly-organised system of—Competitive
Examinations! It is well, we conceive, to have
facts like these in vivid remembrance, when we are
about to embark upon a new contest of any mag-
nitude with a race in all respects alien from our
own, but one that it would be simply folly to re-
gard, for that reason, as little else than semi-bar-
barous. The recurrence of wars like those once
more imminent, there with China, here with Moroc-
co, is in a great measure attributable, we can hardly
help suspecting, to a frivolous depreciation of the pa-
gan wars we are periodically called upon to combat
again and again. For ourselves, at any rate, it
were advisable, now that we are upon the eve of
embarking in another Chinese war ; it were, to say
the least of it, advisable to bear in mind that wise
saying of the Duke of WELLINGTON—that England
should never embark upon a little war. Less than
ever should we embark upon a little war with a
people numbering a vast aggregate of from
300,000,000 to 400,000,000. Now that we are
called upon once more to combat the Chinese, let
us do so at least energetically—for once and for all
—estimating aright the greatness of the enter-
prise upon which we have adventured.

EXTRAORDINARY DISCOVERIES.

(From the Athenmum.)
RUNCORN, CHESHIRE, Oct: 24.

May I be permitted to lay before your geological
readers some account of a phenomenon recently
brought to light in a quarry of red sandstone in
this neighbourhood?
Twelve years ago footprints were discovered on
the surface of a stratum of red argillaceous earth,
about eight inches thick, which, to a considerable
extent, intervened between two nearly horizontal
beds of the sandstone rock. Perhaps it would be
more correct to say that the impressions were in
relief on the under surface of the rock immediately
overlying the stratum of earth.
They attracted some notice at the time, and I
believe the quarry was visited by Dr. Buckland and
other geologists. Since then thousands of feet of
the impressions have been disturbed in working
the quarry, the stone of which has been extensively
used in the construction of public works ; and it is
only recently that attention has again been at-
tracted by the discovery of footprints of a much
larger character than those previously observed.
Learning that impressions "resembling a man's
hand" had been found induced me to visit the
quarry.
I am not sufficiently versed in palsenotology to de-
termine to what animal these footprints should be
attributed. It is said to have been the cheirotha-
rium, an animal whose footmarks have already been
observed in the new red sandstone near Liverpool,
and in other places,
But it is not in reference to these footprints—
important as they are—that I am induced to
trouble you with this communication. My purpose
is, more expressly, to call attention to an object
found among them, which has excited the astonish-
ment of those who have seen it. Lying horizon-
tally in the clayey stratum of earth intervening
between the beds of rock above referred to was dis-
esvered what has every appearance of having
formed part of an ancient Gothic window. It is
composed of stone, but the stone is of a closer grain
than that of the surrounding rock, and consistsb of
a mullion 20 inches long, springing perpendicu-
larly from tracery a foot in length. This, how-
ever, was longer when found, a considerable
portion having been irrecoverably broken. Sur-
mounting the mullion are two arms extending
right and left, in a direction slightly upwards. The
one on the right is 14 inches, the other 21, in length.
These form, at the point where they join the mul-
lion, an obtuse angle, which corresponds with the
angles formed by each limb, severally with the mul-
lion. Again, from the upper surface of these arms
proceed, at right angles to them, two other arms,
dichotomously, one eight, the other nine, inches in
length. The height of the entire fragment is three
feet, and the distance from the extreme points of the
arms two feet seven inches. The mullion and
tracery are quadrilateral. The side to the front, or
the upper side as it lay when found, measures 3
inches across, and this surface has the appearance
of having been rudely " tooled," as by the hand
of some primitive mason—two grooves or fillets,
separated by a nose one inch wide (to use the lan-
guage of the craft), being distinctly and continu-
ously traceable throughout.
Fully aware how inconsistent it is with the
teachings of geology to believe in the possibility of
evidence of the existence of the human species being
discovered in any of the earth's strata of earlier
formation than the diluvial, I feel, in submitting
the above particulars, that anything so startling
as the supposed discovery of a work of human origin
in a locality so extraordinary and unexpected will
be received with doubt, if not with incredulity.
But whatever the result of further investigation,
which I desire, whether it be that we have in this
fragment a human production, or simply the effect
of some freak of nature, there is still the question
to be solved " how came it to be placed in the si-
tuation in which it was found ?" Of the fact of
its having been so found the proofs are unexcep-
tionable. The foreman, or clerk, of the works, Mr.
J. Widders, an intelligent young man, was present
at the time' and superintended the removal—
which, however, was not effected without it; being
unfortunately broken into several pieces. He like-
wise has in his possession apiece of rock, on which
are footprints, which was removed from imme-
diately above—in fact, overlying it, and which
formed part of the under side of a bed of superim-
posed rock from 20 to 30 feet in thickness.
With respect to the nature of this rock, it will
be scarcely necessary to say that it is understood
to be regarded by geologists as of the new red
sandstone formation, being continuous, for many
miles distant, with the E andstone now being quar-
ried in various places, and :associated with the
celebrated salt rock of this county—a characteristic
of the red sandstone system.
HENRY WILSON, F.It.C.S.

ROTAL ENGLISH OPERA, COVENT-GARDEN.—
The following distinguished visitors have lately honoured
the Royal English Opera with their presence :—The
Duchess of Wellington, Countess of Abingdon, Baron and
Baroness Brunow, Marquis and Marchioness of Normanby,
Lady Georgina Grey, Lord and Lady Ernest Bruce, Lady
Lawley, Lady Emily Cathcart, Lady John Somerset, Lady
Mary and Sir Charles Wood, Hon. Colonel Biddulph,
Ponsonby, Lord Arthur Hay, Count Certi, Lady Clara
Cavendish, Lady Molesworth, Lady Stafford, Sir William
and Lady Clay, Lady Shelley, Sir George and Lady Army-
tage, Sir William De Bathe, Bart., Sir Frederick Roe,
Bart., Sir William Curtis, Bart., Earl of Lisburne, Viscount
Exmouth, Lord Carington, Sir John Rennie, Sir Frederick
French, Bart., Sir C. Rowley, Bart., Sir Henry Fletcher,
Bart., the Hon. Mrs. Stanley, Lord Somerset, Colonel
Brownlow Knox, M.P., Admiral Ryder Burton, General
Steele, Lieut.-Colonel Meyrick, Baron Aldenburgh, Capt.
Mildmay, Captain Clayton, Sir H. Duncombe, Sir Geoige
Pocock, Colonel Da Bathe, Captain Macqueen, Captain
Brent, Captain Read, Hon. Otway Toler, Napier Sturt,
Esq., M.P., Captain Giffard, Lady Chantrey, Capt. Cave,
Sir John Liddell, Lady Mcux, A. C. Billing, Esq., Mr.
Ilanbury, Mr. Delafield, Mr. Vansittart, Capt. Goad, &c.

ROYAL ST. JAMES'S THEATILE.—The following
fashionables have hemmed this theatre with their presenc e
during the past week :—Earl of Mountcashel, Sir G. Womb-
w€ll, Lord Clinton, Lady Panmure, Hon. 0. Knox,
Hume, M.P., Colonel Foley, Lady Met's, Baron Greene,
Captain Sinclair, Captain Gough, Sir W. Anstruther, Sir
P. Roe, Mr. and Mrs. Bassett, Hon. Bathurst, Mr.
Scabell, Captain Parke, Lord Lincoln, Captain Carlton, Sir
W. De Bathe, Horace Claggett, Major Lyons, Earl of
Munster, Hon. W. F. Campbell, Mr. Robarts, Lady
Jenkins, Sir Ralph and Lady Howard, Captain Bernard,
Dr. Hastings, T. Baring, Lord Vane Tempest, Hon. Mr.
Toler, Colonel Charlton, 'Hon. T. Stoner, Colonel F. Sey-
mour, Sir B. T. Phillips, Colonel Townsend, Admiral
Courtney, Hon. Mr. Blythe, Mr. Cathcart, &c., &c., &c.

- -
TIIE TEMPLE GARDENS.—The show of chrysan-
themums in the two Temple Gardens is now open to the
public (free) every day from nine till dusk,