The Sun.
London, England, 1857-08-05 00:00:00

UNION OF TIE PRINCIPALITIES.

(From the Daily News.)
The crisis in Turkish and Danubian politics,
which we have long foreseen and foret• V, has oc-
curred. We have repeatedly said that the obstinacy
of the British Ambassador in himself supporting,
and making Reschid Pacba support, those func-
tionaries who were determined to put down the
cause of the Union in the Principalities, not by fair
means, but by the most gross violence and tyranny,
would lead to the nullification of the iTreaty of
Pari., by giving France cause for backing out of it.
Had the Union been fairly and honestly opposed,
France could have recurred to no such extreme
measure. It is the continual boast of the antago-
nists of the Union, that the Moldavians are averse
to it. Why not, then, have left to the Moldavians
the free expression of their opinions ? Instead of
this, Prince Vogorides was made ruler of the coun-
try, for the sake of using every violance and trick
in order to carry the anti-unionist vote. The proofs
of his having done so are too patent to be denied.
By supporting Vogorides in these practices, Lord
Redcliffe has put it in the power of the French am-
bassador to charge the Potts with a breach of the
conditions of the Treaty of Paris. And the French
ambassador is unfortunately right. M. Thouvenel
accordingly threatens to withdraw from Constanti-
nople, which means neither more nor le s than a
threat to withdraw altogether from the Treaty of
Par!s.

The Sultan could not of course abide by such an
alternative, which would deprive him for the pre-
sent and the future of the support of that army
which so mainly contributed to the capture of
Sebastopol, and to the destruction of Russian power
in the Black Sea. Lord Redcliffe has been for the
last month pushing the Porte to this extremity.
He has been combating the Union of the Principa-
lities per fas et nefas ; and he has been doing this
under the plea that he wanted to strengthen the
Porte. We long ago pointed out that no strength
which Turkey could derive from preventing the
Linton of the Principalities—supposing that pos-
sible—was at all comparable to the -danger of
alienating France from the Sultan. This lat-
ter result has, however, been recklessly braved and
provoked by Lord Redcliffe and Rescbid Pacha,
until at the ultimate threat of France to withdraw,
the ground fails beneath both, the Sultan perceives
his danger, and the Grand Vizier, who lias been
acting under English advice, is overthrown, and is
compelled to leave the place to his rival.
The whole of this business is as disgraceful as it
is untoward to the British Government. Our Mi-
nisters, in their support of Vogorides were illiberal,
irop,,litie, and insincere. It is all very well to twit
the Emperor of the French with being such a stick-
ler for freedom of election in Moldavia, and with
setting the letter of it at nought at home. But
surely England ought not to screen its own dupli—
city under that of a despotic powei, compelled by
the folic course upon which it has entered to dire
and extreme expedients. The words of Lord Cla-
rendon, and the promis-s of the Treaty, were that
the Principalities shibuld be fairly consulted. If
it was imprudent to consult them,. the promise
should not have been made ; but if made, it ought
to have b: en honestly kept, especially by such a
country as England. Here in the West, we may
understand and perhaps excuse the falsification of
elections, but people in the East are simple. And
when they see England promising a boon one day,
and then striving to cheat the Danubian out of it
the next, they cannot but settle down into the be-
lief that England is that base and Machiavelic
country which continentals have so long taken the
pains to depict us.
We do all this wrong, we commit all this illibe-
rality, we break with all that is patriotic , and
Christian and enlightened in the Levant—for what
purpose ? To strengthen the hands of the Porte,
and to wield influence through the Turkish Divan.
And what is the very first result of our efforts, but
to overthrow our own friends, destroy our own in-
fluence in the Divan, and hand over all influence
and authority in Turkey to our inveterate enemies.
Policy so shortsighted is scarcely to be conceived.
The dominant idol with Lord Redcliffe and
Lord Palmerston has been not really to strengthen
the Turkish empire, but to concentrate all power at
Constantinople—as if that were strength. The true
strength of the empire would be to attach the out-
lying provinces to the Government—not sacrifice
them thereto, and thereby render them disaffected
and weak. Gratify the fair demands of the Principa-
lities, and they will be bulwarks for the defence of
Turkey. Disappoint, trick, despoil, and discontent
them, and you have provinces which, like Lom-
bardy in Austrian possession, require an army to
keep them.
And for what purpose do we labour to concen-
trate all power at Constantinople ? On what does
power there depend ? On a corrupt Minister, or a
capricious concubine. If England lords it one day
in the Bosphoru., France is sure to do so the next,
and Russia, we may be sure, will haveits turn. No
one can be sure for twenty-four hours of the colour
or policy of a Turkish Government. It was most
important at the present moment, in the face of
an Indian mutiny, and with the probable resuscita-
tion of the Persian war, to keep a Turkish Minister
in power who was the friend of England. Instead
•f keeping this in view, we stir heaven and earth
against the Union of Moldavia and Wallachia—as
if that were a question of either- vital or secondary
importance. Yet to it have been sacrificed the
vizierate of Reschid and the influence of our Am-
bassador. Never, surely, was there so complete an
exemplification of the sacrifice of the grande poli-
tique to the petite.

THE DIVORCE AND MATRIMONIAL
CAUSES BILL.

At this season (Fromof fh hyeei:aalbraiem:
apt
oeirsari
eas). hi
nbc
dal perishable articles, c eeasn,ndaisf
Such
and
is the
Matrimo-
nial present
kept rather too long, are apt to become not only
stale, but actually offensive.DivSeurce
exceedinglyrrt..hGeleVarren took it up la3t
nfpaihgcaltiistoec:oaas fentsahe
sew eßoppositionialil.ve mtmo
joy of the treatment their cause received at the
hands of the ingenious novelist. This gentleman,
like Mr. Melins, starts with demanding a who'e
Session and the restoration of his youthful
powers
for the proper examination of this bill. He has,
nevertheless, had time and strength enough to
arrive at some conclu-ions. Marriage, he says, is
indissoluble. This, he says, is the law of Eng-
land. Our hundreds of Divorce Acts have been
cc a barbarous usage," imported into this country,
we presume, wi 11 that other barbarous system,
Constitutional Government. Notwithstanding
the "wage,"
which Mr. Warren admits,
these Divorce Acts have been national sins, and
caonlevaesne betrayalienceo
f a
comparatively few rich pers :ns. of truth and religion to the
Mr. Warren takes his stand on the New Tes'ament.
To a corrupted age, six generations deep in foul
national sins, be proclaims that he is a consistent
Christian, and that be recognises no moral prin-
ciple which is not founded on the Gospel. Mr.
Warren' declares himself not only a moralist and a
Christian, but a divine and a scholar. As he will
do nothing that he does not find in the New Tes-
tament, he very properly devotes himself to the
study and undentanding of that volume. The re-
sult of his piety and single-mindedness, his Darning
and diligence, is that marriage is indissoluble ; that
laws profess;ng to absolve it are inoperat've and
sacrilegious ; that Queen Victoria, the Lord, and
the Commons, about half-a-dozen times a year
perfoim a blasphemous and sacrilegious farce, pre-
tending to disunite those who must ever be one,
contrary to the law ai England, in the face of the
Bible, in contempt of the Almighty, and in dis-
regard of Mr. Samuel Warren.
Ve would not, however, do an injustice even to
Mr. Samuel Warren. He does not place such ab-
solute confidence in his own knowledge of the law,
his own scholarship, his own moral sense and theo-
logical acumen, but that he is ready to appeal to
"the Teachers of our Church." The learned and
subtle Doctors of the Anglican Communion to
whom this title is given are the nine thousand
clergy who, by means of railways and the penny
post, by circulars and central agitations, by much
use of horseflesh and shoeleather, and no doubt at a
great cost of other animal substances in this very
hot weather, have been induced to sign a Declara-
tion composed by some ingenious politician
for the express purpose of mystifying and
committing them out of their depth. Mr. Warren
quotes the document in, extenso to prove th it
these nine thousand Teachers of the Church all
hold marriage to be indissoluble, and appe ils
to us whether it is possible to fight against such a
cloud of authorities. It so happens,
however, that
the reverend Secretary of the Declaration, the man
employed by its framers to push it about, receive
signatures, explain it, and mediate between the
higher and lower intelligences
employed upon it,
has written to us most indignantly repudiating the
Airr• Warren
very construction put upon it by • $ the
,
very doctrine for which he cites the nine thousand.
This gentleman says that the " Declaration " does
not declare marria
Mr. Warren mast settle that matter between them,
for " Who shall decide when doctors disagree 1"
We confess ourselves um:
ble to fathom
mpy po
of a document which we be:
much of a piece with
y
tical demonstration, and ver •
• -.Titles to Dr. Phil-
the opinion which Mr. Warren as, .tight to be the
litnore--viz., that "he thought it
thel roguery
a
ieve to be si
principle of the law that marriage was in- t for our
If this means anything at all, it means tha.
worldly convenience we ought, to declare ttiAl,, to be