The Sun.
London, England, 1835-10-07 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

A meeting has been held at Edinburgh, for the
purpose of passing resolutions declaratory of destesta-
tion of Popery, and the determination to use every
exertion to prevent the spreading of Roman Catholic
doctrines. To illustrate the decency and prudence of
this sort of proceeding, let us for a moment suppose
that a meeting were held in some part of Ireland,
for the purpose of passing resolutions declaratory of
detestation of the Established Church, and the determi-
nation to use every exertion to prevent the spreading of
the Protestant religion. We ask, what would be the state
of the empire, if the Catholics were to retaliate upon
their assailants, and meet them with counter-mani-
festations of hatred ? What would be the condition
of our country, if every religious sect were to raise
its standard (for that is the favourite martial term),
and declare its abhorrence of other faiths ? Surely
an obervance of the divine rule, to do as we would be
done by, would have forbidden the zealots in the north
from meeting to express their detestation of the reli-
gion of nearly one-third of the people of the United
Kingdom. We say, that such conduct was the con-
duct neither of sincere Christians nor of good subjects.
If such an example were followed, religion would be
manifested, not in peace and holiness, but in hate of
other creeds, and society would be distracted by raging
sects. Is there, we ask, no better—no more suitable
—no more Scriptural way for men to set forth their
attachment to their faith, than by declaring an exter-
minating war—hoisting the black flag, as it were,
against the faith of others ? Did Christianity
make its progress by any such practice? Do
we find in thGospel any example or authority for
detesting, branding, and exterminating ? The Scotch
are eminently an orderly, a moral, and a religious pe6-
ple, and they must feel that one of their Churches was
desecrated in the worst way—desecrated by the foulest
spirit--by the spirit-most alien to Christianity—when
an assembly was held in it for the express purpose of
manifesting detestation of the faith of many millions of
people. The council of an inquisition was the suitable
place for this sentiment, and an inquisition, once the
reproach of the Catholics, would seem to be the instru-
ment best adapted to the objects which the " No
Popery" brawlers have in view. At the degrading
exhibition of bigotry in Edinburgh, the Rev. Mr.
Cunningham expressed himself as follows :
"We are told that we are raising the No Popery' cry,
which is said to he unworthy of men of sense. We are not
ashan.ed to say that we are raising the ' No Popery' cry, be.
cause it is the cry that resounds through the whole word of
God, especially through the whole book of the Revelation of
John, and it is thn.same cry which was raised and persevered
in by Luther and knox, and it must be the cry of all sincere
and zealous Christians. It is the cry of the murdered saints
for revenge on their Popish murderers. In consequence of
the course of conduct which we mean to pursue, it is not un-
likely that I may have future opportunities of addressing my
fellow-townsmen in regard to this subject. We have now re-
solved to raise a-protest against Popery, and that protest shall
be urged over the whole empire. We have uVurled the ban-
ner of Protestantism, and we are determined to elevate it on
high until Popery, mith its ten thousand curses, and plagues,
and abominations, has been expelled from our land, and we
will not cease urging forward this cry until it has ascended
.rom every corner of the kingdom."
This language. is plain enough. There is no mis-
taking the import of the words, or the spirit clothed
in them. The Rev. Mr.Cunninghain is a clear inter-
preter, and the cry of " No popery" is, as he expldinr,
a cry for revenge—and this cry, " the cry for re-
venge,' was raised in a Chi istain Church, in the se-
cond quarter of the nineteenth century ! " The inur-
cle;ed saints," says Mr. Cunningham, " cry for re-
venge on their Popish murderers." "Where, we would
fain know, does this Reverend Gentleman learn that
revenge is saintly—nay, more, where does he find that
it is Christain ? It may perfectly consist with the No
Popery zealotry—but it certainly cannot be reconciled to
Christianity. Again, we ask, what would be the
state of society, if the Catholics, meriting the
charge of intolerance which our most intolerant agi-
tators -prefer against them, were to meet this war-
whoop with the same savage strain ? How abhorred
'would be the spirit of anv Catholic in Ireland, who,
substituting Catholicism -for Protestantism, were to
Teak the language uttered without shame by the Rev.
Mr. Cunningham, in a church dedicated to the religion
-which inculcates peace and good-will among. men ?
let us present the words with such alteration, and
imagine what the effect of them would be—
We ;lave unfurled the banner of Catholicism, and we are
determined to elevate it on high, until Protestantism, with its
ten thousand curses and plagues and abominations, has been
expelled from our land, and we will not cease urging forward
this cry, midi it -has ascended from every corner of the
kingdom."

How justly exasperated would the people of Great
Britain be by a declaration so fiercely intolerant, and
how dangerous would the spirit which received it with
cheers be deemed ? We have then only to make the
case of the Catholics our own, for one instant, and to
ask whether the peace of society can be preserved if
these atrocious provocations are not rebuked in the
most marked way by the temperate and the reasonable,
who happily constitute the great bulk of the commu-
nity ? As for the bigot agitators at Edinburgh, headed
by Mr. O'Sullivan, the itinerant firebrand, they only
want a Lord George Gordon, which, fortunately, even
the Peerage cannot afford them. In the last century
they might, in the blaze of the capital, and the destruc-
tion of Catholic property, have worked the "revenge"
-which they believe to be desired by murdered saints.--
Morning Chronicle.
We have not, for a long time past, observed any-
thivg so shocking as the exhibitions of Mr. Coke of
Norfolk is allowed to make of himself in public. At
an age when few even of the strongest minded men
(and Mr. Coke never belonged to that class) continue
in the possession of their faculties, he is' permitted to
go abroad unattended, or at least unrestrained, and to
indulge at public assemblies in the expression of lan-
guage and of sentiments which can have no other
effect than to deprive him of all-character as a politi-
cian, and to detract considerably from his reputation
as a gentleman. It is most melancholy that so rich
a man, throughout the whole of- so protracted a life,
should have failed, whatever may be the number of
his dependents, to attach to him one single friend
who has honesty and affection enough to caution
him against such breaches of good manners and
such outrages upon common sense as appear to be
the chief characteristics of his latter days—the freaks
and follies of his dotage. Old age, and its concomi-
tant imbecility, happen often enough to mortals, but
so cruel an affliction as to be left without a guide or
counsellor in second childhood is a calamity with which
we have seldom seen wealthy old men visited. A re-
cent display of this much ill-used and neglected old
gentleman at Yarmouth has given rise to these reflec-
tions, and we declare most seriously and unaffectedly
that we have read what is reported to have fallen from
" more in sorrow than in anger," so far as re-
gards him, but with unmitigated contempt for the taste
and the intellect of those friends of his who failed
to see that they were degrading and disgracing him
in the ,eyes of the world by committing it to print.
Mr. Coke has always moved in the society of gen-
tlemen, an 3 his great boast for many years past has
been, and is, that he is a pure old Whig. How age
and " agitation" have worn off the polish to which
such society must :‘tave rubbed the roughest rustic that
and how his declining and failing
ter sheared a sheep,
...enses have grown to,o weak to perceive the shiftings
of position which his party, and with his party he
himself, has made, and is' still daily making, one or
wo passages of his speech at Yarniouth will very suffi-
ciently demonstrate. Speaking of the Z.-rouse o Lords,
:.e says, " Is it not a fact that for 60 67 70 years
- ere has hardly been an independent man plae,"d in the
House of Lords ?" We should say that it is not oi4Y not
rfact, but directly the reverse, whether the old gei.ltie-
_Jan alludes to his own friends, the Whigs, who havz_,,
been placed in the House of Lords during the period he
mentions, or to Tories. We hardly know which to admire 1
;most, the good manners of this imputation or its good
sense. " The truth is," he continues, "that the House
wax Its sifting, and a reform in the Lords is become as

neceisary as ever it was in the Commons : for in their
.opposition to all good measures they have only shown
them ignorance." Shades of Momus and of Midas
fear this! Mr. Coke, of Norfolk, talks about the
-4‘ ignorance" of such a body of men as constitute the
}louse of Lords ! This surely cannot be true. Mr.
Coke could hardly have hit upon this. The reporter
'wit° had heard, but forgotten, that it formed one of

ADwers or Daniel's harangues in the north, must