The Sun.
London, England, 1832-08-14 00:00:00

servicncy to Russia, both France and England
must witness a kcal prostration of the liberties of
the Continent to military power, or repel aggres-
sion tinder greater disadvantages than they would
have had to encounter before the subjugalion of
Italy, the enslavement of Germany, and the utter
annihilation of Poland. We deprecate war as long
as it can be avoided without the sacrifice of the
interests and the honour of the country ; but
we should be sorry to see the genius of Great
Britain, the arbiter of the destinies of Europe, at
no very distant period, only endeavour to avert
war, by raising in her defence the " sacred
shield of cowardice." To be peaceable, and to be
dastardly, are two very different qualities, whether
in an individual or a nation. The one is con-
sistent with a character that may make its owner
both feared and respected—the other is sure to
provoke worse insults, and worse acts of aggres-
sion, than those which make the first experi-
ments on its coward submission. It is because
we think England could have averted war, by
taking a manly and energetic tone in support of
the faith of treaties, when Russia was about to
invade Poland, that we think our Ministers as
deficient in wisdom on that occasion, as they
were in spirit ; and most fully do we concur in
the sentiments expressed by Sir Francis Burdett,
the other night, in the House of Commons,
upon the weakness and the folly which the con-
duct of our Ministry betrayed. To have
threatened to send a fleet to the Baltic would
have saved Poland, without the necessity of
having recourse to arms, and, instead of provoking
war in Europe, would have averted it. The fact
is, that the Russian Government felt its way
with the Government of this country, and the
more passive it was found to be, the more active
Russia became in pushing on her vast designs
for the " subjugation of European liberty, and
the advancement of her own barbarous supre-
macy." The jusle-milieu Government of Louis
Philip has, through a contemptible obsequious-
ness to the wishes and demands of the autocrat,
betrayed the interests of France perhaps beyond
redemption. England having tried submission
only to be made to feel her inferiority, now tries
remonstrance, or, at least, expostulation. A
special Ambassador is sent for the purpose, and
the autocrat receives him with great personal
civility, for he would not begin by insulting,
when he meant to cajole. He knows how easily
our statesmen are deceived by shallow arts, and
he continues the practice.—Morning Herald.
We shall never cease to urge upon our readers
the necessity of grappling with their political
enemies on whatever ground those enemies may
select for their field. It is not only from the
throne of the Sovereign; or from the chair of the
Speaker, that we would banish evil counsellors ;
it is not only the Ministerof State that we would
denounce, or the Member of Parliament that we
would refute. Whenever or however it may ap-
pear, falsehood must be contradicted, calumny
must be exposed, robbery must be resisted,
treason must be unmasked. A person is making
a tour through the western counties for the pur-
pose of delivering, in their cities and villages,
what he calls a " Lecture on the Origin of
Tithes." This " Lecturer" is an Irishman, of
apparently little or no education, but possessed
of the usual Irish stock in trade, the volubility of
a Shiel, the veracity of an O'Connell, the dis-
interestedness of a Plunket, and the piety of
a Doyle. His lecture is composed of the
common materials, old jokes and new lies, anec-
dotes of fox-hunting parsons, and wine-fibbing
parsons, and card-playing parsons; curses ful-
minated against cassocks, laughter levelled at
lawn sleeves, mis-statements of whatever has been
done, misquotations of whatever has been writ-
ten. " Leave him to himself," says an aristo-
cratic Tory, "he is beneath the notice of an

educated man ; at present he is obscure and
harmless ; answer him, and he becomes noto-
rious and formidable." We dissent, as we have
ever dissented, from this doctrine. While there
is wickedness to excite, and weakness to •be
excited, we must watch the machinations of the
one and correct the unguardedness of the other.
How shall we be in security on the house. top
when, in the cellar, there is a barrel of gun-
powder with a red-hot poker beside it ? If this
man, and agents of a similar description, the
tools of various Associations, whose designs are
daily becoming more and more manifest, had
power only to unsettle the minds, and disturb

the happin'ess, and awaken the bad passions of
the miserable audience whom their ribaldry and
mendacity collect, it would yet be a charitable
office to remove the delusions by which they
augment a hundredfold the distresses of the
humble and poor. But this is not all. The
venom is one of wide and rapid spread. To-day
a drop of water may wash it from the wound ;
to-morrow excision and cautery may be applied

in vain. We know, for we have seen, by what
an easy gradation the dream of a crazy Radical is
transmuted into the will of an enlightened people.
It must not be taken for grainntseudpetrlaiabtleamongst
the lower classes of our countrymen there is any
y
discontent,
tnrht
there
etir,)
el foouirlgat
plough,
,ebraeei
rietas.ols
of right.
otherte.t fo
st‘Tvh
sroehueigpsirpeeia,
csiiaasonnt
t
d is
eceit.
abhor-
renceciastctue;
en
d
to the workman at the loom, truth is more at-
tractive than falsehood, if they compete for the
preference upon equal terms ; and we possess the
means, because our leisure is more abundant,
and our advocates more able, of giving to truth
additional attraction such as her rival cannot
command. We have the better discipline, the
keener weapons, the right cause. It were sheer
imbecility to shrink from the contest, or doubt
the result. One of the lectures of the itinerant
teacher to whom we have alluded was attended
the other day from motives of curiosity by two
Gentlemen. The rest of the audience consisted
of about two hundred of the poorer farmers of
the surrounding country, and the small shop-,
keepers of the little towns in the vicinity. When
the Lecturer had completed his task, and sat
down amid the cheers of his congregation, one
of the Gentlemen rose, and, having remarked
that the Lecturer had challenged contradic-
tion to his statements, begged leave to say a
few words:—
" The Lecturer has told you of a division of tithes into
four parts, made by direction of Pope Gregory in a letter
to St. Augustine. Has th:! Lecturer re ul that letter ?"
The Lecturer owned he hid not. " When the Lec-
turer reads the letter he will find that instead of directing
the division of the tithes, it suggests that the tithes should
not be so divided."

" Again, the Lecturer has told you that the amount of
the tithes collected annu illy is six millions. Has the
Lecturer looked at the returns of the amount of tithes
Printed by order of Parliament?"
The Lecturer owned he had not. " When the L,c-
turer has looked at the returns he will Snd that the tithes,
which he states at six millions, amounted, when corn bore

its highest price, to two milliuna and a half; and amount
now to little more than one million and a half."
The admission to this lecture was "free."
But the Lecturer, although instructing gratui-
tously upon principle, pleaded poverty as his
excuse for the receipt of voluntary contributions.
The two Gentlemen contributed each half a
crown to the necessities of the ragged apostle :