The Sun.
London, England, 1868-12-14 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC jOURNAI3.

ThQle3 observes that the Adrainlstration now enter-
ieg upon its career is a nerfectiy new Government—new
not only in the sensefathat it came into being as into as last
Week',-but new also because there has never been anything
like.it. This assertion may seem strange, and, tried by
some obvious arithmetical tests, may be condemned as
erroneous. It is, for instance, perfectly true that out of
the fifteen members of the new Cabinet nine were in the
last Liberal Ministry, and it may be stoutly contended
that an Administration three-fifths of whose memers have
been already Cabinet Ministers cannot be accounted
new. The fact, however, is,' that the character of
an Administration does not depend upon the majority of
the persons in it. Two or three men determine—sometimes
one man determines'—(the complexion of a Ministry ;
the rest take their colour from their chief or chiefs. Mr.
Gladstone's Ministry is new because it is the first of which
he has had the command. It is new because
Mr. Lowe holds in it an office only second to the
highest. It is new because Mr. Bright has now,
for the first time, been induced to assume official
duties and the responsibilities of Council. The Times thinks
the old watchwords—Peace, Retrenchment, and Reform—
will be carried out. Our contemporary comments upon
the difficulty of the distribution of the endowments of the
Irish Church. It is possible that three, including the
Lord Chancellor, would have produced some sort of plan,
and it would be a matter of cusiosity to compare the ideas
of the three. The sketches of the rest would doubtless
shew more or less proficiency of design, and, it can
scarcely be doubted, the widest variety of conception.
But the disestablishment and disendowment of the
Irish Church form a policy which the Ministry is bound
to carry through, and we have no doubt, difficult as we
know it must be in execution, they will carry it through.
The extreme intricacy and extent of the labour it involves
justity us, however, in being content to answer the ques-
tion as to the achievements of the Ministry in the way
of Reform by saying they will abolish the Irish Esta-
blishment. When that is done they will be ready to do
much more, but until that is done their exploits in other
fields must be few.
The Daily News says The promptitude with which Mr.
Gladstone has discharged the task committed to him by
her Majesty is proof of his own energy and of the cordial
union subsisting between the leading members and
various sections of the party. From beginning to end,
though there may have been now and then hesitation
and demur, there has been no hitch or misunder-
standing. Claims to high office which might without
impropriety have been pressed, have been generously
waived in order to secure to the Government the greatest
possible amount of administrative and parliamentary
strength. The general sentiment is, perhaps not without
ground, that Mr. Gladstone might, without disparage-
ment to any just influence of rank or service, have
brought together a Cabinet representing more completely
the Liberal party as a whole than that which he has
formed. His Administration would have been stronger
for an ampler recognition of that popular feeling
which, rather than the nomination of the old
Whig chiefs, has given him the victory. The people have
chosen him, the Whig aristocracy have accepted him ; and
the prizes have been awarded rather to those who have
known how to yield than to those who have known how
.to
conquer. 'She appointments to places lying outside the
Cabinet have been made with judgment. The chief
toblection to some of them is that their occupants might
with propriety and advantage have been admitted into
the inner chamber.
That the Conservatives clung to office in order to work
the diggings, or that they employed their patronage to
further the interests of the party, is, according to the
Herald, untrue. A contemporary threatens that the ques-
tion of the distribution of patronage by Mr. Disraeli will be
raised when Parliament meets. The Herald does not think so.
. The Liberal leaders will never allow a subject so damaging
to themselves to be raised, Mr. Disraeli used his patronage
for the good of the public service, and not to keep his party
alive or to help his personal friends. This is not merely
our statement. A remarkable testimony to Mr. Disraeli's
merits in this respect has been given in a Liberal news-
paper, whose authority the Times will not contest. The
Economist of Saturday says : "On the whole, we must
recognise in his (Mr. Disraeli's) use of patronage a very
dispassionate and in some sense elevated judgment."
And again : "In his choice of officials, Mr. Disraeli's
Administration was in some sense even a distinguished
success." The Economist speaks the opinion of every
candid man, to whatever party he may belong,
in this recognition of the judgment and fairness
with which Mr. Disraeli distributed the patronage that
fell to him ; and the new Government will certainly take
,care not to challenge a comparison between the appoint-
rnents made by Mr. Disraeli, out of regard to the in.
terests of the public service, and the appointments they
have already made, and will continue to make, to promote
their private and political ends, upon the principle now
proclaimed by the Times, of keeping up their party at the
cost of the public.
The Post thinks Mr. Gladstone is to he congratnlatea on
having secured the services of Lord Spencer. Personally
affable, a keen sportsman—no mean qualification in the
eyes of our Hibernian friends—and possessed of an ample
private fortune, he can hardly fail to make a favourable
impression upon a high. spirited and impulsive nation.
In one respect Lord Spencer will be at a disad-
vantage in starting. He succeeds a nobleman who
has admittedly filled the Viceroyalty of Ireland in a
brilliant and effective manner. The Duke of Abercorn
fully earned the popularity which intimate knowledge
of the country, princely magnificence, and genuine
courtesy might be expected to attain ; and perhaps since
the time of the late Lord Eglinton no more admired and
popular Lord-Lieutenant has ruled over Ireland.
Following such a successful Viceroy, Lord Spencer will
be compared with a high standard, which he may
equal, but will find it difficult to surpass. A Lord-
J‘ientenant of Ireland ought to have peculiar facili-
ties for ascertaining the true feeling of the people, the
grievances— real, imaginary, or sentimental—of which they
complain, and the feasibility of the various schemes pro-
posed for their benefit. If Lord Spencer prove equal to
this, the present Ministry should be in a position to grapple
as successfully as is possible with Irish questions ; for they
have, besides, no less than two ex-Lord-Lieutenants in the
persons of Lord Kimberley and Lord Clarendon, who are
statesmen of the first rank. But, what is still more, Lord
Spencer's appointment is one which, if regarded from a
high national point of view, will recommend itself to all
. parties.
The Standard, in noticing the controversy upon the
character of the Church, remarks that it is quite clear
that, in the great majority of minds, the most complete
ignorance and confusion respecting the whole matter pre.
vails ; that there is a total uncertainty regarding the
legal position and corporate character of the Church, and
an inability to determine whether she has any, and, if so,
what existence apart from her status as an Establish-
ment, which permits those who are united in a
common policy to defend it upon the most dis-
cordant and mutually destructive grounds ; and
that this uncertainty is likely to lead to blunders and in.
consistencies in the forthcoming scheme of disestablish-
ment, unparalleled even in the long list of errors and
absurdities which constitutes the history of Liberal legis-
lation during the last forty years. Is the Church, as Mr.
Bonamy Price asserted in a letter published a day or two
ago, a mere department of the State, which has no exist-
ence apart from the State, and which would be absolutely
dissolved by disestablishment? Such certainly is not our
opinion. The Crown is the head of the Church as well
of the State. But this no more necessarily makes
the Archbishop of Canterbury a servant of the State
than it makes the President of the Board of Trade a
• servant of the Church. It is true that Parliament has;
Step by step, sometimes by its direct action, sometimes by
the influence it has exercised over the Crown, gradually
deprived the Church of all powers of self-government, of
independent legislation, and of practical jurisdiction.
But it does not follow that Parliament has deprived the
Church of its corporate existence. It is true that Parlia-
ment has the power to deprive the Church of her endow-
ments, but larliament has equally the power to con-
fiscate the endowments of Roman Catholic institutions
or Dissenting colleges. It has the same power tc
do both ; it has no sort of right to do either.
In brief, the Church is not a State department ; it has
a life, a reality, a body wholly independent of the State'
but the State has paralysed it, has severed its nerves of
motion and sensation, and deprived it of all powers' of
separate and independent life, undertaking to perform all
necessary functions for it. And therefore, while Mr.
Gladstone's view of the de jure character of the Church,
and (we presume) of the consequent status of her
clergy, is the true one, Mr. Prize and the Pall lllall
Gazette are much more nearly right as to the practical
consequences of disestablishment. If Alt-. Gladstone dis-
establishes the Church he will have to recorganise it; and
it is simply astonishing that he should not yet have realised
a fact which any lawyer could have told him.
The Telegraph has a leader upon the wonders of legis-
lative changes. To back the triple event of household
suffrage as the electoral law, Mr. Bright as a d
on th conspe wool-
icuous
Cabinet Minister, and Sir William Page Woo
sack, all to come off in the same year, would have been an
offer against which the sporting squires would have
laid their estates to sixpence, and thown their
brains in for a bonus. Yet the threefold
event has occurred, and ninny a vaticination equally
audacious now—equally certain of accomplishment in
principle, if not so curiously exact as to phraseology and
detail—might be named to-day. As a rule only the un-
wise prophesy; but n.ay !oast, in all honest exulta-
tioni at the recent triumph t f Liberal progress, hazard
a havole33 joke, and sly that another seventeen years
will probably make Churchmen ardent advocates of
disestabli,liment, 'Tories fervent supporters of female
.v.iffrage, squires intense opponents of game laws,
the " stupid party frantic advocates of education
• by • local rates, Mr. Darby Grath amusing and
instructive, and Mr. 'Whalley tolerant anti witty.
In a dozen points, the futile and innocent " Party of
Hindrance" is now banking back the rivulets of change—
chuckling over a strearulet stopped here, or a mountain
torrent diverted there. In our English p JUtics there are
no such things as impassable barriers ; there is no
" finality," no declaration of " Thus far and no farther."
The point of arrival from antiquated measures is always
the point of departure for new reforms. Nor can tire
process be resisted. The " silent forces of the time" strike
down the obstructives, and build the banks of the channel
of Chao 4,2 914 pfoe_pypy 0,4 Altd_2(s Tory. Dati pad