The Sun.
London, England, 1850-07-05 00:00:00

Cfpienina
LONDON, FRIDAY, JULY 5, 1850.

Seldom, if ever, has a Prime Minister occupied a
more enviable and honourable position than did Lord
JOHN RUSSELL when, last evening, in the House of
Commons, he suggested that a public funeral should
be awarded to Sir ROBERT PEEL. Although in
accordance with some expressed wishes of the late
Right Hon. Baronet that suggestion will not be car-
ried into effect, it will be a source of unspeakable
gratification to the whole community that such an
offer on the part of the Government and of the Crown
has been actually and voluntarily made. In follow-
ing out the dictates of his own heart, and in obeying
the wishes of her MAJESTY, Lord JOHN RusseLL'at
the same time, in his proposition of yesterday, only
gave voice to the anxious desires of the people. This
is a fact so obvious that it hardly requires to be again
mentioned, and yet it is too significant to be passed
over in silence. Thus, even. in the House of
Lords, the Marquis of LANSDOWNE could not
omit an allusion to that public expression
of sympathy which, as he so beautifully and truth-
fully observed, " unasked, unsolici-ed, unthought of,
emanating from all classes of society, has been at-
tending—l wish I could say cheering—the dying
moments of the public statesman." Few Ministers
have been so popularly beloved as Sir RoBERT PEEL,
and few, if any, have by such painful sacrifices in the
popular behalf acquired such a right to the consola-
tions of popularity. Fickle as the multitude pro-
verbially are, the people (according to M. TUIERS'
subtle dis-inction) have an almost instinctive appre-
ciation of their true friends, and they cherish an un-
dying love for their actual benefactors. Thus an
universal but evanescent admiration may be excited
by some brilliant and plausible oration, a large
majority may be summed up, or a powerful
faction organised by party measures and
Machievellian ingenuity ; but such triumphs are ne-
cessarily ephemeral, and we defy the most subtle
and sagacious of political charlatans to devise any
means of attracting to his death-bed the simple but
unmistakeable evidences of popularity such as have
so eloquently pronounced the most sublime of pane-
gyrics upon the statesmanship of Sir ROBERT PEEL.
As a popular Minister Sir ROBERT PEEL has been
lamented, and as such he cannot pass away unho•
noured by his contemporaries. The public generally
will regret that clear expression of his wishes which
will in this case frustrate the popular expectation.
Still the wishes of the dead are sacred ; and if Sir
ROBERT'S own family and friends believe that such a
kind of honour would have been repugnant to him,
then far be it from us, as it will be far from the wish
of any one, to infringe in any manner the sad sim-
plicity of that last scene. There are, happily, other
ways of testifying the national feelings, and we cannot
doubt that when the first shock occasioned by the
sudden bereavement has abated, some worthy
memorial will be erected by the people in token
of their lasting gratitude to Sir ROBERT
PEEL. Even now the thought of such an offering)
and its immediate preparation, will be a welcome so-
lace to many a sorrowful heart. True, we are aware,
alas ! that
" No storied urn or animated bust

Can back to its mansion call the fleeting breath;
Nor honour's voice provoke the silent dust,
Nor flattery soothe the dull cold ear of death ;"

yet is it not a sweet and an almost irresistible impulse
with humanity to scatter the tokens of love and sor-
row over the graves of the unresponding dead ? Who
has wept for a friend and not so testified his grief ? Who
has loved and not desired to be so remembered ? As,
therefore, we would religiously encourage all such
evidences of family and friendly affection on the part
of individuals, so in the same way we should
be loath indeed to see a public man—
one who had devoted his energies to the
service of the people—pass away unremembered
by
some evidence of popular regret. We need not
dwell upon the subject now, confident as we are that
it will be immediately and unanimously responded to.
One other
in sad
otherreflection
sesugguetgeedstbiyontsts—is
naotthewme
h:isi;
fruitful
It
sady occasions wandering
tombstones,
of a melancholy nature.hasb been
asaeidtbsa t a cure
for ambition
m ay
be g
and on suchain gained
this among
late
lamented accident many truisms are ndri
as
uttered on the
vanity of human wishes, and the nothingness power
and glory. Admitting the general truth ofsuc of
hr
ernarks,
the sight of a grave or the news of a death, so far from
damping ambition and the desire ofglory, may be and
should be regarded rather as an incentive than other-
wise to the desire for true distinction. While
death,
the sudden death of the great and powerful, too
surely exhibits the impotence of earthly might, does
not the near contemplation of a death-bed enforce
upon us the important significance of life, of that life
whose retrospect will one day furnish the dying
couch with such painful or such soothing meditations ?
Thus we see plainly revealed the wide difference of
real and false, of gold and W
glitter. e can imagine
the recent occupant of that couch of pain,
looking back, let us hole,
with consola-
tion upon the events of his momentous
career. Can we, however, imagine that any consola-
tion which may have cheered those hours of anguish
arose from the remembrance of the high dignities
with which he had been invested, or of the wealth
which bad continually surrounded him ? It was not
the fact that he had held office, and had possessed the
confidence of his SOVEREIGN, but the remembrance
that he had sought, and, as far as in him lay, had
effected the good of the people and the welfare of the
nation—not that be had governed, but that be had