The Sun.
London, England, 1861-03-18 00:00:00

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THE SUN.

LONDON, MONDAY, MARCH 18, 1881.

Mr. LINCOLN has now spoken officially. The
views he expresses do not differ, except in a-slighter
degree of precision, from what he has already given
ue in his various speeches. Indeed on one impor-
tant point he quoted at length, from one of his
speeches as a candidate, to show thathis sentiments
in regard to the slave states and their rights had
undergone no change. 'We have now, however,
his formally expressed opinions in full ; those on
which he must act to maintain his character for
consistency, and we can but note them with some
solicitude.
Mr. LINCOLN enters on office under circumstances
but too notoriously perplexing. Seven of the
provinces of his kingdom had seceded from it,
elected another King, one Davis, and taken pos-

session of all but one or two of his fortresses

arsenals, and customs houses, before he took the oath
as elective monarch of the whole confederation,
seceders included. His first important declaration
is that he knows nothing, as President, of all this .
He does not intend to prosecute individuals or
states for high treason ; he does not mean to levy
war on the rebels, indeed he treats their acts as
nullities. The Union was arranged for perpetuity,
no state has power to withdraw from it, he will,
therefore, treat as null and void, ab initio, all that
the seceding states have done.
The immediate corollary from all this is, that

he will act in regard to the collection of customs,

and the United States forts and arsenals in the
seceding districts, just as if they had done nothing.
In doing this he says :—" There shall be no blood-
shed nor violence unless forced upon national
authority. The power confided in me shall be used
to hold, occupy, and to possess property and places
belonging to the Government, and to collect the
duties imposed. Beyond what is necessary for these
objects there will be no invasion or force. Where
the hostility to the United States is so great and
universal as to prevent citizens from holding offices
there will be no attempt to force obnoxious strangers
among people that object. The mails, unless re-
pelled, will continue to be furnished to all parts of
the Union."

We cannot doubt that Mr. LINCOLN shrinks as
much as any of us would do from bloodshed ; he
also ought to know far better than we can pretend
to do, whether what he proposes to do would
lead to bloody resistance or not; but cer-
tainly all accounts we have been accustomed to
receive of the Southerns are that they are
men of the revolver and the bowie knife, men
ready to kill each other on the slightest provoca-
tion, and who therefore would be not less likely to
dill the Northerns for what they deem a great
one ; that though there may be plenty of bullies
amongst them, there are yet also plenty of men
who are ready to fight duels armed with half a
dozen formidable weapons, from the rifle and revol-
ver to the dagger; and in this country we should
expect, therefore, a resistance as fierce, merciless,
and deadly as from the least civilised mountain
tribes of Asia.

Alongside the resolution of Mr. LINCOLN just men-
tioned,lof what avail will it be to repeat his declara-
tions that the Republican party never thought of
"Y invasion of the domestic institutions of any
°I. the States, or that they recognise the
obligation of that clause in the constitution
to
which every member of Congress has sworn
respecting the rendition of fugitives from slavery ?
The acts of the, tsouthern States are not an ebulli-
tion of a mere 'ephemeral feeling. They have
hitherto been the ruling power, and they are
resolved rather to rule in separation than to be
subordinate ir a Union. The fugitive slave business
they have themselves declared to be merely a
pretext--the runaways are not worth to them
the cost of their recovery. But the two great and
sore pointe,
in addition to that of loss of anpre-
macy as Par •
tv' have been the exclusion of
eL
slavery fro m the territories, and the hostile tariffs
of the North. With these three grounds (f
antac,onisn I left untouched, it is vain to think of
If political ascendancy
restoring a real union.

were given up, the struggle for increased area of
slave territory would be considered a life and
death one. And as to the tariff, the South has
the best reason to complain of the insane attempts
of the North, since their members seceded, to
augment the protective to restrictive duties. How
can the South, whose interest is free trade, re-
unite with the North, which is selfishly and
blindly set upon protection ?
On the whole, we cannot but regret that Mr.
LINCOLN did not act upon patent facts rather than
on legal fictions. He may have special informa-
tion which dictates to him the course he has chosen,
but if not, it seems to us that he had better have
left the seceders to go on with their scheme,
and form, if they please, a feeble Slave Confedera-
tion. lie cannot conquer and hold the vast terri-
tory of the South if it resists, for he has next to no
army ; he cannot efficiently blockade the Southern
ports, for his whole navy is insufficient, and most of
it far away. The wisdom of his plan all depends
on whether he has better reasons than we yet
know of to think that the seven States will return
o the Union. Time only can tell us this.

It will be a grievous thing indeed if we don'
after all have some changes for the better at the
Admiralty secured to us before the close of the
present session of Parliament. An immediate and
comprehensive reconstruction of the whole depart-
ment may be a prospect in many respects altogether
too grand and too good to be true—but at any rate we
cannot but insist that it will be absolutely grevious
if we don't contrive to have some changes for the
better brought about under the shadow of the
sea-horses at Whitehall, before —at the first
crack of the autumnal grouse-shooting—the Lords
and Commons shall have been prorogued.
There is the Select Committee to begin with. There
are the various returns that are being moved for just
now very opportunely. There are the revised
Navy Estimates submitted to the House in Com-
mittee of Supply by the noble and gallant Secretary
of the Admiralty, in a spirit evidencing, at least,
a willingness to retrench, so far as may be
rationally practicable in this department—a willing-
ness, in this way, to economise reasonably, not
only manifested by the Board of Admiralty
themselves, bat more or less by the whole six-
teen responsible members of her MAJESTY'S Go-
♦ernment. Then there are the occasional reso-
lutions interspersed, while these Naval Estimates
are passing, item by item, through Committees of
Supply—resolutions emanating from independent
members, from whose practical knowledge many
valuable hints may be not injudiciously derived,
even by the most skilled of the professional
administrators in our maritime department.
If nothing comes of it, after all these strenu-
ous efforts to insure improvement, it will be
really and truly something lamentable, and some-
thing also, as the Americans say—cautionary.
That such will be, in this direction, the anticlimax
to the session, we cannot, for an instant, believe.
On the contrary, without being so extravagantly
sanguine as to anticipate anything like a complete
reconstruction of the Admiralty, within the present
twelvemonth, we do, nevertheless, look forward
with confidence to the inauguration of a series
of improvements and modifications in
that department such as may (and will, we believe)
eventually lead to the desired work of total re-
construction. Mr. LINDSAY'S intended resolutions
we have already commented upon ; but, as they
are down upon the notice paper for to-night, we can
hardly do better than remind those who are the most
interested in the prospects, visible more or less
clearly here and there, of changes for the
better down at the Admiralty, that the
following are the precise terms in which
these resolutions are expressed by the hon. member
for Sunderland :—" I. That it is inexpedient to
sanction any further expenditure for the construc-
tion or conversion of wooden line-of-battle ships.
2. That it is inexpedient to incur, during the

present year, the expenditure requisite for the
completion of the line-of-battle ships now on the
stocks ; and, that during the present year, it is not
expedient to commence the construction of any
wooden vessels which carry guns on more than
one deck. -3. That it is inexpedient, without
further experience, to sanction the expenditure
of any money for the purpose of adapting her
Majesty's dockyards for the construction of iron
vessels." And we have the less hesitation in recalling
these three important resolutions of Mr. LINDSAY'S
to recollection upon the very day upon which
they are announced to be brought before the House

in Committee of Supply—because it affords us the
opportunity of remarking that the hon. gentleman
the member for Sunderland has himself explained
away the unwelcome construction originally placed
upon the third and last of these same resolutions.

It is not by any means his wish, he has now

remarked, to put any impediment whatever in the
way of our constructing iron vessels—it is only
that he deems it inexpedient that money should be
precipitately expended, as yet, in adapting her MA•
JESTY'S dockyards to their reconstruction ! Already
also we have directed particular attention to the
important and suggestive returns which are about
to be moved for by Sir MORTON PETO. Yet
nere also, for the self-same reason—because of
their intrinsic importance, and because like-
wise of their being down upon the notice
paper for this evening—we are impelled to re-
call to remembrance the precise wording of Sir
MORTON PETO'S notice of motion, a notice couched
in the pithy terms now following—" Return of
the number of departments in the Admiralty at
Somerset House and Whitehall ; the number of
persons employed in each department, and their
designations and salaries, together with the hours
of attendance; the number of rooms occupied by
each department; the number of rooms occupied
for records ; the number of rooms occupied by
messengers ; the number of messengers employed ;
and the amount of the yearly disbursement for
messengers." Returns like these are surely well
calculated to flutter the occupants of all the
numerous and comfortable pigeon-holes in those
amiable civil service dovecotes of the Admiralty at
Somerset House and at Whitehall. The mere
motion for the returns will certainly be like the
apparition of CORIOLANUS among the Voscians at
Corioli. And it is worthy of consideration that in
regard to mere" num bers,"as surely, in a Parliamen-
tary sense, as the Registrar-General's returns have
long since proved it to be in a sanitary sense, these
is something especially wholesome, beneficial, and
salubrious in—ventilation. Happily,the overcrowd-
ing in these densely-packed offices of Somerset
House and of the Admiralty at Whitehall, is about to
be very decidedly ventilated by Sir MORTON
PETO. Another return moreover—a return of a very
different character—is down upon the paper of the
House for to-night, under the name of
.Sir
JAMES ELPHINSTONE—that honourable and gal-
lant member having there announced his intention
to move for a " return of the names of all captains,
commanders, and lieutenants commanding, names
and complements of ships commanded, present pay,
proposed pay, proposed reduction of pay, proposed
command money, proposed pay and command money
combined, and consequent gain or loss." There are
besides other returns, resolutions, and amendments,

besides these already here particularised, which,
upon the House going into Committee of Supply
upon the Navy Estimates, will be duly forthcoming.
So that altogether we cannot but believe that the
House in Committee of Supply has for once its
weather eye fairly open, and keenly fixed upon
those Estimates.

Our sympathies are few indeed with what has'come
to be denominated Puseyism, and we have enjoyed
the truth as well as the humour of SYDNEY SMITH'S
pun that it was " a thing of position and imposi-
tion ;" and, if clerical vagaries in worship were ever
a topic we thought appropriate for frequent notice
in our columns, we could find as much to amuse as
to censure in the performances of the St. Barnabas
Knightsbridge School. Still, however opposed
may be the creed and worship of any section of
clergy, Dissenting or Established, to our unprofes-
sional notions of Christianity, we are ever ready to
do justice to Religious manliness, earnestness, and
consistency, find them where we may. We must
say, then, that one of the great leaders of the priests
of St. Barnabas has just published a pamphlet on
church rates which does him, as a churchman, as a
Christian minister, and as an Englishman of the
latter half of the 19th century, the highest credit.
While perverse lack-a-daisical young lords, while
old political leaders, while bishops and some High
Churchmen, while country rectors, vicars, and
churchwardens are pitifully whining for some COM-
promise which shall spare them a little of the dear
old rate, and while Low Churchmen are contending
for the whole rate in their section of the -press,
and in. public with their usual Calvauistic
bitterness—here we have a St. Barnabas Church-
man, vicar now of Froome in Somersetshire, man-
fully publishing to the world his reasons why
church rates should be abolished.*

It is a pamphlet really worth reading, and
that is saying a great deal for a pamphlet on church
rates now. The subject has been so long discussed
that even to freshen up the old matter is no easy
task. Mr. BENNETT has done more than that. He
has surveyed the whole subject anew from his
position as a church clergyman, adducing church-
men's testimony, lay and clerical, in favour
of his own view ; and we can at least say, in a
manner and style which induced us, much as we
have ourselves written on the subject, to read
every page. If any of our readers desire to see
the subject of church rates handled in a manner
worthy of a Christian minister in England at the
present day, we can with confidence recommend
him to Mr. BENNETT'S pamphlet. He will there
find the matter treated of from the commencement
of Christianity itself, through the Reformation and
the times following it, down to the present time.
We trust that most readers beginning to read, with
different views to himself, would be convinced by
his arguments, but if not, all would acknowledge
that they were worthy of a sincere believer in
the power of Christianity as taught by himself.
He first examines the " Laws of Ancient Custom
concerning the Church," and beginning with the
Apostles, and citing authorities downward to the
time of HENRY VIII. he substantiates the conclu-
sion of ATLIFFE respecting the repair of the Church,
that " of common right the laity are not compellable
thereto." The Bishop was responsible for doing it
out of his " fourth part" of the oblations. Thus he
sums up this section—

" From all this it clearly follows that the whole question
of repairing churches and supplying what is necessary for
the offices of divine worship is one of religion, and not of
state authority. Springing from the Bishop, as the foun-
tain head, it flows backs to him in his spiritual court. By
common right it is his affair as the chief director of things
ecclesiastical. If a common custom has thrown it upon the
parishioners in this country, yet it has only so thrown it, on
the understanding that the paliehionere, the yeeple, and
the State, are one with the Bishop in religion; that they
recognise his spiritual power, and that a punishment in-
flicted on them in a spiritual character would be felt and

recognised by them as one affecting their soul salvation."
He then turns to " Modern Laws of the State
concerning Dissenters." We wish we had room to
quote from his fair and impartial account of the
intolerance of all dynasties, and all parties
of Protestants till the time of WILLIAM 111. He
thus describes how things were left then :

" After WILLIAM 111. we do not find much advance in
Dissenters' legislation until quite close to our own times.
The free opening of conventicles and license for Dissenting
ministers to preach was certainly a boon. Yet there was
very much still left undone. The Test and Corporation
Acts still remained. Men might worship, pray, and preach
as Dissenting Protestants, but that was all. Marriages
were still withheld. Burial of the dead was still with-
held. To enter any corporation, or serve the State
in the army and navy, without the Sacramental Test,
was still impossible without violating the law. All through
the reigns of the GEORGES men looked on, and though not
satisfied submitted, and it was not in effect till the close of
the great revolutionary wars of France that any further at-
tempt to relax the bonds of religious exclusiveness was at-
tempted. Then indeed things took a sudden start afresh,
and Roman Catholic emancipation became a great political
watchword under cover of which the Dissenters' privileges
took a wide range."

A glowing account of the new equality of all sects
with the Established Church follows :

" But what is the case now between the Church and
the Dissenters ? There is no one rite, form of wor •

ship, ceremony, or sacrament of the Church to which

any person having a conscientious scruple is compelled
for a legal object to witness or receive. Not one.
Year by year, and one by one, as seen by the laws
above recited,' every impediment has been removed,
which acted as a bar to perfect religious freedom. Neither
tender nor malicious consciences have any longer the com-
pulsion or the opportunity of desecrating holy things by
Act of Parliament. In every religious community, from the
Jow down to the lowest Ranter, holy things are separated
from legal things, and true religion is relieved at least from
the open violations of decency which the last generation
witnessed. Dissenters of every shade, and Non-Confor-
mists of every degree are now recognised as religious com-
munities equally with the Church."

He next considers the " position of the Church
at the present time." He shows that the history
of toleration proves that we are in the midst of a
stream of liberal ecclesiastical legislation, which it
is vain to think of resisting ; that Non-Confer-
mists of all classes have a grievance for which they
will obtain redress from the spirit of modern legis-
lation. He shows that church rates are substan-
tially a personal charge, and thus concludes:—
" But we must view the question in its deeper aspect, we
must recur to the first principles from which it has arisen.
These principles are religious toleration, and freedom of
private judgment. If we please to accept these principles,
realise them, legislate towards them, believe them to be
God's will, then we must not be surprised by the results.
These results are accidently mischievous, but not essentially
so. The refusal on the part of the people to pay church rates
is simply the unavoidable result of religious toleration."

Lastly, he asks, " What is the remedy." Here
he discusses all the usual schemes; 1. Registration
of Dissenters; 2. Pew Rents; 3. A Commutation
by way of Rent Charge ; 4. Transferring the
charge to the National Exchequer; and of each of
all of these he shows the utter impracticability and
the mischief's which would result, supposing any
of them to be adopted as law. We must here re-
mark that, in propounding his owu remedy he
speaks from having put it to the test. For nine
years, at his wish, church rates have been given
up in Froome, and he has, by the means he sug-
gests for universal adoption, found supplies for the
public worship of the church, schools, parish chari-
ties, and choir, and other incidental things.
Here, then, is the Froome remedy—

" We have then yet to find the real remedy. It is neither
in the registration of dissent, nor in pew-rents, nor in a
commutation for a rent charge, nor in an appeal to the Go-
vernment. It is simply to be found by having recourse to
the first principles of Christianity; to disown legal inter•

* Why Church. Rates should be Abolished. By William
J. E. Bennett, M.A., Vicar of Froomc-Selvood, Somerset.
London : Whittaker and Co., 13, Avo Maria lane,