The Sun.
London, England, 1844-11-12 00:00:00

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.
FROM THE EVENING PAPERS Or THIS DAY.
STANDARD.—The position of the affairs of
Spain is most melancholy, and presents no immediate
prospect of improvement. The fault is, however, as
much that of the Spanish people as of their law-
givers, for where there is not the strong temptation to
despotism which exists in that miserable country, the
chances are undoubtedly in favour of rational
liberty. For their present degraded condition, the
Spanish people are clearly indebted to themselves
alone. They have created the Frankenstein which
now follows and torments them. Whenever they have
exhibited firmness and decision of purpose they have
invariably selected the wrong time for its display.
They were pretty unanimous in driving Espartero
from his place among them; although they had no
grave accusations to allege against him. His govern-
ment was mild, and in the fullest sense of the term,
constitutional. He gave peace to the country
from the incessant intrigues of the Carlist faction,
and had scarcely had time to settle down in
his government, ere ha discovered the imprac-
ticable elements with which he had to deal. Having
achieved all that military daring and foresight could
be expected to accomplish for Spain, he had hardly
time to turn his attention to the internal condition
of the country ere he was driven from it a fugitive
and an exile. Had he exhibited those qualities
I which have invested Narvaez with almost su-
preme power • had he established a reign of terror,
which forbad' all political discussion, and planned
opportunities of rendering his enemies amenable
to his vengeance by originating, through his
agents, conspiracies for the express purpose of afford-
ing him an excuse for punishing the parties they were
intended to compromise; had he appropriated the
scanty resources of the nation to the conciliation of
the army, or the corruption of the priesthood,
he would have been Regent of Spain at the pre-
sent moment. But he thought proper to despise
those extraneous aids to power of which other
less honourable and far less able aspirants
have made such abundant use. If we except a
single abuse of his power—only more conspi-
cuous, because of the usually moderate character of
his government, an act forced upon him by the vin-
dictive disposition of the ex-Queen—his regency was
characterised, not merely by a just, but by a humane,
regard to the errors of the people over whom he was
called upon to preside. Had he been better ac-
quainted with their character, he might possibly have
acted with more promptitude and decision in his diffi-
culties than he did. But the Spanish people are
rotten to the core. Even the army, which
he had fostered, and which had earned glory
under his command, deserted his cause the instant
it began to fail, almost en masse; and that, too,
under circumstances of meaner infamy than has
characterised the refection of any similar body in the
whole range of modern history. Officers and men
alike sold themselves to the highest bidder. A small
sum down, and promises which have never been re-
deemed, induced soldiers who had fought under his
banners, and achieved on such occasions considerable
military glory, to turn their arms against their bene-
factor, and they were among the first to join the
movement against him. A brave man, and with
ample means at his command, could he have re-
conciled the conduct of his successors to his
conscience, he contented himself with remaining
on the defensive, and thus lost not only the
military advantages which were within his
reach, but disgusted such of his followers as were
unable to appreciate the motives of his forbearance.
His successor, Narvaez, has been far less scrupulous,
and consequently far more successful. He found a
people wearied out with agitation, in the collapse,
physical and moral, which sometimes succeeds
powerful excitement. He took advantage of this
prostration of spirit to place his iron heel upon their
necks, and after innumerable acts of severity, better
suited to the leader of a tribe of sava•es than the
servant of a constitutional monarch, he is about
to consummate the treachery and cruelty which
have marked his entire career by sacrificing the life
of a man who was one of his most zealous coadjutors
against Espartero. By the sheer force of military
despotism, he has contrived to assemble a Chamber of
Deputies, capable of any degree of submisston, how-
ever degrading, he may think proper to propose.
Hence their acceptance of his late audacious articles
for the reform of the Constitution. Hence the Spanish
people are willing to revert to a state of despotism
greater than has existed among them for more than a
century. The trial of General Prim is proceeding with
little chance of an equitable decision in his favour.
The witnesses against him have been suborned ; the
tribunal to which he is committed is evidently one
which will have little scruple in condemning to death
a man who has been guilty of the enormous offence of
disputing unconstitutional mandates. Here, how-
ever, is once more a tolerably striking example of
"poetical justice." General Prim was one of the
most bitter and successful enemies of the Duke
of Victory. He has even been charged with
having endeavoured to assassinate him. His claim
to public sympathy is therefore wholly unte-
nable. In either case he is a traitor and deserves
to be tried as such. If the farciful account given in
the Paris papers of Saturday of the intended scene
between Narvaez and himself be correct, he will, it is
possible, be a traitor again. He is, however, too able
a man to be agreeable to Narvaez, and the great pro-
bability therefore is, that the proposed visit and re-
prieve will arrive too late. The conduct of Narvaez
and that of the wretched victims of his tyranny, of
whom the Chamber of Deputies is composed, are
worthy of each other, and have given rise to the
fullest belief that it would be imprudent in the ex-
treme to interfere with their concerns.
GLOBE.—The selection of Mr. Erle, the eminent
Whig barrister, to supply the vacancy on the Bench
of the Common Pleas, has been the subject of varied
comment by the public journals of this country. By
the Tories it has been regarded with surprise, if not
alarm. Still the acknowledged personal and professional
merits of the new judge have deprived party attacks of
their accustomed virulence. Though the policy which
dictated the selection has been assailed, the unexception-
able qualifications of the gentleman selected, apart from
party considerations, have been admitted. With such
admissions, *the objections against the appointment
are rather creditable than otherwise to the Govern-
ment. Except with the few whom party prejudices
have blinded, or the disappointment of personal ex-
pectations has irritated, nothing is heard but com-
mendations. The best anticipations are cherished
from an act which implies that, wherever else the
claims of party shall be recognised, the judgment-
seat shall be kept free from their presence and influ-
ence. Not so, however, in Ireland. There the Orange
journals are venting the virulence of party on the
Government, whom they assail with renewed fury. The
prospect of one, if not two, early vacancies in the Irish
Courts may have some affect in pointing the earnest ex-
postulations and reproaches with which the Orange
journals are filled on this subject. This " latest in-
stance of the Peel policy," is dilated upon in every*
imaginable form of exaggerated complaint and con-
demnation. The passing over of that staunch Con-
servative, Mr. John Beatty \Vest's claims to a judge-
ship the elevation of Mr. Sergeant Howley, a
Roman Catholic and a Whig—with other instances
of Sir Robert Peel's ingratitude to those to whom he
owed his recal to power—these are recapitulated and
dwelt upon in illustration of the policy of which Mr.
Erie's elevation to the Bench is only one among many
instances.
" It would be affectation in us," says the Dublin Mail,
" to say that we regret that this instance of the Peel
policy has occurred. It is not impossible that it may
have a beneficial effect, by explaining to English capa-
cities somewhat of the nature of the feelings of Irish
Protestants, when they saw a premature grave closing
over Mr. West, and when they witnessed the eleva-
tion of Mr. Sergeant Howley into the number of those
whom the Conservative Sir Robert Peel delighted to
honour."
In yet more indignant phrase the .'Mail proceeds :
" Is is not preposterous that, as the head of a Conser-
vative opposition, he should turn out of office the Whig
administration ; and that succeeding to their places, in
himself and his colleagues, he should, as the head of a
Conservative administration, fill up the vacancies in his
own ranks, and in the several executive departments
under him, by recruits selected from the ranks of his op-
ponents ? If the Whigs, as a whole, should not be al-
lowed to administer the government, why should they be
preferred in detail for those offices, the aggregate of
which finally constitute the administration of the
country. ?"
As though the worst forebodings beclouded the
future, the Mail goes on :—" Conservatism hangs
downirna ltlhe
elevationiwt s hands,ay of
to the
Irish Pig benchot's[the,WonhitgheSnoelxictivtoarc-aGneeyn?ez
' With such retrospects and prospects, no wonder that
the conclusion to which the contemplation of such
th&gsll mencond muctsataht be sensible t
the Orange
journalist
hatc
o prt3can
shoulda. be—
Acon-
tinue to hold together in opposition to strenuous exer-
tions made by its leaders for its dissolution. The Con-
servative party in Ireland is already dissolved into its
elements—the cohesion of the same party in England is
rapidly loosening. It Lecomes wise men to inquire and
consider as to the combinations into which it is probable
the dissolved elements may enter in the one country and
in the other. This is the true moral to be drawn from
the elevation of Mr. Erle, the Whig partisan, to the
honours and emoluments of the Judicial Bench."
Still there are gleams of sunshine, shedding light
on, and administering consolation to, the desponding
spirits of the Irish Conservatives. Mr. Napier has
been honoured with notice by the Government; and,
in the estimation of the extreme section of Irish Con-
servatism, Mr. Napier's claims to the honours and re-
wards of his profession are of no ordinary kind. The
Dublin Monitor places Mr. Napier's merits—for
which the Irish Chancellor doubtless counted him
worthy of the honour he has put upon him—in a
strong point of view :
" We accuse him (Mr. Napier) of rank disloyalty—of
having foully slandered her Majesty the Queen—of
having basely asserted that her youthful mind was