The Sun.
London, England, 1868-03-30 00:00:00

SPIRIT' OP TIIB PUBLIC JOURNALS,

The Times, calling attention to the motion made by
Lord Russell in the House of Commons in 1835, points out
that Mr. Gladstone's resolution is almost identical with
that of the Whig peer. Lord Russell moved, precisely
thirty-three years ago, "That this House resolve itself into a
committee of the whole House to consider the temporalities of
the Church of Ireland ;" and a little before three o'clock
in the morning of the following Satnrday,the motion was
carried by 322 against 289 votes. On Monday, the 30th
March, 1868, after more than the lifetime of a generation,
Mr. Gladitone will rise to propose his motion. Once more
the Irish Church will be made the subject of assault, and
it is not a little remarkable that the leader of the attack
on this occasion both voted and spoke against Lord
Russell's earlier motion. Is there any reason, the Times
asks, why Mr. Gladstone's proposal to go into committee
on the Irish Church in 1868 should be less warmly supported
than Lord John Russell's in 1835? 'There is one consider-
able reason, and, as it is the only one which appears to us
of any force, it is right that it should be brought at once
to the front and examined. If on examination it prove
insuperable, the proposal to go into committee must fail.,
If it prove insufficient, the opposition fails, for no other
reason can be adduced capable of successful advocacy.
The single argument against Mr. Gladstone's proposal it
that the success of 1835 led to nothing. Sir Robert"Peet
quitted office, and the Melbourne Administration assumee
the direction of affairs. But the promised reform of the
Irish Establishment was never effected, and from that time
to this its essential condition had remained unchanged. 14
may be remarked, however, that the failure in 1835 was,
due to the action of the Upper House. The temper of
the peers has now changed, and there is every reason to
believe that they would consider this motion in a different
spirit from their predecessors. The objection raised, there-
.fore, is untenable.

The Post observes that the method adopted by the
Government is extremely unusual. Whilst opposing the
first step for bringing Mr. Gladstone's resolutions under
the notice of the House, they do not ignore their tenour by
simply meeting the motion thatthe Speaker leave the chair
with a formal negative. Instead of doing so, they suggest
the affirmation by the House of something in the nature
of a resolution bearing a faint resemblance to those which
they refuse to entertain. This, to say the least, is
rather disingenuous. What possible object can be
gained by asking the House solemnly to declare
that under some possible circumstances, which are
neither known nor defined, some particular legis-
lation equally unascertained may become expedient?
As to the form, the Post is of opinion that Mr. Gladstone
will move that the House do resolve itself into a committee
for the parpose of considering the resolutions of which he
has given notice, and Lord Stanley will thereupon move
his amendment. On the issue thus raised a debate will
follow, which will last the week, and in which the entire
question of disestablishment will be thoroughly ventilateo.
If the Government are victorious, the matter will then end.
If, however, they are beaten, the discussion of the resolu-
tions in committee will take place after the recess.

The Daily News declares that no language could be
worse chosen than that of Lord Stanley's motion. What
the House is called on to do is not, like a defaulting bank.
rupt anxious to conceal the truth of his delinquencies, to
admit somethim buk to express an opinion : not to make
an admission which, when made. wilt amount to /*thing
but idle words, bat tc declare its opinion a. to the con-
tinuance of tlie Irish Church.

No doubt, says the Standard, Mr. Gladstone would
lave been exceedingly gratified if the Government had
elected to meet him with " a manly negative," which
might have been construed as implying that it absolutely
declined to recognise the necessity for instituting reforms
in the Irish Church ; but that would have exposed
Ministers to an unfair interpretation, seeing that they
sedulously abstained from committing themselves to that
extent. They are ready to proceed to legislate, when they
have the warrant of the Royal Commission for doing
so, and pending this they ask the House to declare
that the violent action proposed by Mr. Gladstone is
premature. It is the conviction that this amendment
bits the blot in the programme of the Opposition chief‘
and that it indicates a policy on the part of the Govern•
meat which may fairly be expected to receive the support
of moderate men of all parties, which dictates this out-
burst of Liberal spleen and vituperation. The Cave is
being re-established, and the Tea-room party enlarged, and
there is a fair prospect that by the co-operation of those
Liberals who can afford to be independent, the chances of
Mr. Gladstone and the office-seekers may be foiled, and
the grand work of the session carried to a successful con-
summation. The party of faction is nervous, apprehensive:
almost despairing. One can readily pardon the angry ill
temper bred of disappointment and envenomed by the sense
of coming defeat.

THE NONCONFORMISTS AND MR.
GLADSTONE'S MOTION.

The English Independent contains a leader in which it
says the blast has at length been sounded which summonses
the Liberal party to assault the citadel of intolerance ;
public opinion has decided that we inflict wrongs upon our
countrymen across the channel which we would not
petiently brook at home. Liberals who deserve the appel-
lation are united in the belief that the Irish Church
must fall, and Mr. Gladstone could not have resisted
giving effect to this conclusion without abdicating his
position as leader of the party. The same paper goes on
to say that the Government will no doubt be sorely
pimled how to act ; there can be no threat of dissolution,
for the nation would be indignant at the Minister who, for
the sake of a few months' power, would compel the
country to rush into the turmoil of a general election, and
the threat of resignation would affect nobody. The
Government must either stand at bay or lay down their
arms, and either alternative is a desperate one,
as in ' the former case the Government would
go before the country with the battle - cry of
Church and State, and the upholding of the
Irish Church, or, in the latter case, to accept the
orders of their adversaries would be the list humiliation.
Mr. Disraeli would-swallow it easily and comfortably,, but
the Independent does not think his party would. There
only remains one course open, and that is, to refuse an
opinion on the subject ; but that is impossible, except by
the treachery of some Liberal members, and that cannot
for a moment be anticipated.

THE SCHOOLS INQUIRY COMMISSION.

Yesterday was published Volumes 2 to 6 of the Report
of the Schools Inquiry Commission. The first volume, as
our readers know, has already been published. In the
second a copy is given of the circular sent to certain gen-
tlemen, asking them to give their opinion on
various matters referred to the commission. There
are answers from the Right Hon. C. B. Adderley,
M.P., the Right Hon. T. Sotheron-Estcourt,
the Rev. Dr. Angus, Mr. Montague Bernard (the Pro-
fessor of International Law at Oxford), the Rev.
J. W. Blakely, the Rev. Derwent Coleridge, the
Right Hon. Sir J. T. Coleridge, and from the Deans
of Hereford, Norwich, and Salisbury, Mr. Beresford
Hope, M.P., and others. The same volume contains the
intructions given to the Assistant Commissidiers, the ques-
tions addressed to each school, a report of the committee
of the British Association, and a valuable digest of the
'evidence given before the commissioners. The third
volume contains the reports relating respectively to Christ's
Hospital ; St. Olave, .Southwark ; Dulwich College ;
Birmingham, Manchester, Bedford, Tonbridge, and
Monmouth Schools. The fourth and fifth volumes
contain the evidence taken before the commis-
sioners from February 28, 1865, to April 24, 1866.
The 6th volume consists of a report on certain
burgh schools, and other schools of secondary education in
Scotland, by Mr. D. R. Fearon, M.A., one of her
Majesty's Inspectors of Schools ; a report on the system
of education for the middle and upper classes in France,
Italy, Germany, and Switzerland, by Mr. Matthew
Arnold, M.A. ; and a communication on the condition of
secondary education in the Netherlands, by Baron D.
Mackay.

The text of a bill has been published, the object
of which is to relieve certain officers employed in the
collection and management of her Majesty's revenues
from any legal disability to vote at the election of mem-
bers to serve in Parliament. The bill has been prepared
by Mr. Monk, Sir IL Verney, and Mr. Otway, who
simply propose to effect the object in view by the repeal
of existing enactments which disfranchise revenue officers.

The late dispute between the colliery owners
and their men in the West Yorkshire district has at last
come to a termination by the whole of the colliers resuming
work, some at the 10 per cent. reduction, but the majority
having their wages reduced only 7i per cent. The men
and their employers came to an amicable agreement with-
out the former being necessitated to give up their tools ;
and the masters promised that when trade revived, and
the demand for coal was greater, the miners' wages should
be increased proportionately.
FATAL OCCURRENCE AT ERITH. —The body of
Mr. Edmund Bignell, coal merchant, Eritb, has been
found by the railway crossing near Erith Church, with his
neck dislocated. The deceased was last seen alive in a
vehicle at the crossing, and when the body was found the
horse and vehicle were proceeding unattended in the direc-
tion of Lessness•heath. Nothing certain can at present be
positively stated as to how he came by his death.

ROMAN AFFAIRS.

,From the Roman Correspondent of the Westminster Gazette)
ROME, March 21.

The ceremonials connected with the creation
of the new cardinals have overflowed into this
week. The public consistory was held on
Monday, in which the hats were conferred and
the titles assigned ; they are, I think, identical
with the list I sent yon before with one error,
that instead of taking his title from the Pace,
Cardinal Bonaparte snoceeds Cardinal Wise-
man at Sta. Pudenziana.

The telegrams will doubtless have super-
seded the necessity of sending you, now so
many days after, the names of the new bishops
and new dioceses appointed; it suffices to allude
to them to recall the fecundity of the present
pontificate in spreading and multiplying the
agency of the Church.
In the afternoon the new proporati met at
the Gesii, and, attended by an escort of dra-
goons went in state to visit the shrine of the
apostles together. In the evening the hats
were carried round to each in state, serving-
men with torches walking by the side of the
carriage, and Mgr. Ricci, who delivered them,
had to make an address at each presentation.
To do honour to its reception the grandest of
the three ricevimenti is always that given on
this evening, and those of Monday were bril-
liant reunions, although the regulation of
attending in court dress made them less
crowded than when that restriction has not
existed. Those at the Spanish and French
Embassies were, from the fact of their being
at ambassadors' palaces, of course, the most
brilliant. Sefior de Castro, who received for
Cardinal Moreno in his absence, displayed a
truly Castilian state. That Cardinal Bona-
parte's was held at the palace of the Emperor's
representation instead of at his own can only
be ascribed to his modest and retiring habits,
and his disinclination for the pomp his im-
perial cousin may have considered befitting the
occasion.

dread and final call whenever it might come,
so that this token of a dignity he had so little
merited might at least not have to rest upon
the feretrum of a castaway.
His language and his attitude have been
scarcely less the subject of discussion than the
words with which the Pope accompanied the
conferring his cardinalitial berretta. Speaking
of the high dignity newly bestowed, and the
responsibilities it entailed in the influence ex-
ercised on other men, for good or evil, accord-
ing to the example set to those who wear it,
he would borrow, he said, a comparison from
a matter of modern industry. It was like a
train borne along the rails by steam power. If
there was an obstruction on the metals the
whole system was thrown out of its course
with the most disastrous results. And then
he alluded to some who troubled him thus ;
and it has been thought he meant to imply
that Cardinal d'Andrea is kept away from all
the cappellas and cardinalitial functions by
something more under his own control than
the indisposition he alleges as the impediment;
and to give the Emperor to understand that
he was not likely to yield in the matter of
making a cardinal of a certain favourite, and
thus, perhaps, avoid further importunity in
the matter.

I was shown yesterday the Golden Rose
which the Pope will bless on Sunday, the
fourth of Lent. As one was sent lately to the
Queen of Spain, that for this year is a new one,
as, though the ceremony is always performed
on Mid-Lent Sunday, it is not given away
every year. There have been four given by
the present Pope. One, made in the reign of
Gregory XVI., to Maria Pia, daughter of Victor
Emmanuel, at her baptism in 1847. One in
1849 to the late Queen of Naples, Maria
Theresa, daughter of Archduke Charles of
Austria, on the occasion of the baptism of her
daughter, Maria delle Grazie Pia. The third
to the Empress of the French at the baptism
of the Prince Imperial ; and the fourth, this
year, to her Catholic Majesty.
That now about to be blessed represents
a flowering shrub, seventeen or eighteen inches
high, bearing on thorny stems many leaves, and
thirteen blossoms and buds. The rose which
surmounts the rest is made to open, and con-
tains scent inserted at the time of its bene-
diction. It is of twenty-two carat gold, and
the workmanship is good, but it is made after
a long-prevailing pattern of no very striking
merit. Its value is about £l,OOO.

The vase in which it will be inserted admits
of greater variety of design. For to-morrow's
ceremony it stands in one belonging perma-
nently to the Sacristy of St. Peter's ; but that
in which it will ultimately be placed, before
it is regalato, is designed by Vespiniani, and
will be a very beautiful piece of work ; the
stand will be adorned with lapis lazuli and
other precious pietre dure. The body of the
vase bears in relief two subjects treated with
great care and, success—the Presentation of
our Lady in the Temple and the Birth of our
Lord.

It is a labour of time, and it may well be a
year before it is ready, though it may be longer
still before it is wanted for use.

THE SUN, LONDON, MONDAY EVENING, mARca 30, 1868,

writing on the subject of the Royal Army of
France, says :—" It is not impossible that it
was from this circumstance that the King
adopted a banner powdered with flowers ; for
the name of rose is typical of all flowers ; the
lily was called by the ancients the rose of
Juno, and I have seen the so-called golden rose
of the Pope's bearing a form quite unlike that
of a common rose, so that what Alexander
gave to Louis the Young may very well have
been that of the iris or present fleur-de-luce
of France, and the Pope himself simply calls it
fiorem aureum.' " In 1177 the same Pope,
having appointed to meet and conclude terms
of peace with Frederic I. at Venice, had occa-
sion thus to spend LaetareSunday of 1177 in
that city. He performed the rite of blessing
the golden rose in St. Mark's, and presented
it afterwards to the Doge Sessano Ziani. It
was preserved in the treasury of St. Mark's,
with others subsequently received. Several
perished in a fire. That which one now sees
there is of much later date.

Henry VIII. of England received three, the
first from Julius 11., the second from Leo X.,
and the third, in 1524, from Clement VII.
Paul 111. gave it to Queen Mary. After this
time it would seem to have been more often
given to women than previously. Urban
VIII. sent it to Henrietta Maria, Queen of
Charles I.

The following is the form of conferring it
on those to whom, on account of their absence
from Rome, it has to be sent by proxy :
" Receive this rose from our hand, who con-
sign it to thee under special commission, given
us for this purpose by our Most Holy Father
in Christ and Lord Pius IX., Pope by the pro-
vidence of God. It symbolizes to thee the joy
of both the Jerusalems, that is the Church tri-
umphant and the Church militant, for which
reason this flower is seen to be beautiful by
all faithful Christian men, for it is the joy and
the crown of the saints. Receive it, beloved
daughter, who art, according to the measure of
this world, powerful and noble, and adorned
with many virtues, but that these be rather
ennobled by every virtue in Christ, like unto
a rose planted beside a fountain of running
water. The Lord grant thee of His overflowing
mercy, who is Three and One, world without
end. Amen."

The allusion made to the typical Jerusalem
arose from the ceremony of the Pope bearing
the rose in the public office of the Church,
being in early times performed at the Basilica
of Sta. Croce in Gerusalemme, in Rome. The
present custom of blessing it within the Palace,
as well as that of celebrating many other
sacred functions in the Chapel of the Apos-
tolic Palace, arises from the sojourn of the
Holy See at Avignon.
St. Sisto, one of the stational churches this
week, is remarkable for being that where St.
Dominic commenced his labours of preaching,
NVI-rence his' order derived its subsidiary title,
and where be instituted the devotion of the
Rosary ; also, as the resting-place of no less
than seven canonized Popes—St. Sixtus,
Secundus, Felix, Zephirinus, Auterus, Lucius,
and Lucian-as.