The Sun.
London, England, 1857-05-04 00:00:00

WATIO, AT LONDON L,T-LIDG'r:.
-Morn. 2 min. aft. 11—Evening 32 min.. aft, 11
ORIIO w'—Morn. 32 min. aft. 11 —Bvening 58 mia.stL.ll

ThXM D. 17-

TELE WEATHER—SUN Onrunt, MAY 3.
THEB,MONZTEII, IN THE SHADE.
55 —highest since noon yesterday.
43 —loweat this morning and during the night.
52 —Cala day at noon.
BAROMETER, 3018.
WEID, W.N.B. —Easterly, moderate, with fair, cold
weather, and cloudy, with occasional sunshine; some slight
rain in the afternoon.

MAY 4.
55—highest since noon yesterday.
42—lowest this morning and during the night.
51—t1,16 day 9 uproll.

aA ROMII',I2, 30.18.
WIND, N.B.—Light, with sunshine, and cloudy, bu'
cool. •

r07:411.)2? •••
1 ; -
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e

LONDON, MONDAY MAY 4, 1857.

en

The absurdity of a " penny-wise And pound-
*foolish policy" has become so notorious, as to have
passed into a proverb. The man who sacrifices
important matters in order to effect a compara-
tively trifling saving is regarded with contempt,
and would be laughed to scorn by any of his more
experienced neighbours ; but, as a nation, we set
aside the many painful lessons so frequently re-
ceived, and fall into the palpable error which in
others we should be the first to condemn. It is
a general misitake, which has been sanctioned by
the "wisdom" (?) of Parliament, and that is quite
sufficient to satisfy the sufferers, and to persuade
them that the evil is beyond remedy, or at least
that it is ziot ascribable to any fault on their part,
and therefore they grumble, but submit ; or,
according to the vulgar but expressive phrase,
make up their minds " to grin and bear it."
Our monetary code furnishes, perhaps, the
most striking illustration of this ridiculous policy.
The internal trade and commerce of the country
are made to depend altogether on the possession
of a Certain quantity of metals—not produced in
this country, and which no degree of active in-
dustry can procure for us at home. Mills are
closed, artizans Paid operatives thrown out of em.
ployraent. Those who should be the creators and
producers of national wealth become unprofitable
consumers, credit is annihilated, and perfectly sol-
vent houses are subjected to serious losses, be-
cause bolo fide securities cease to be convertible,
orders for the manufacturers of the country cannot
be executed—and those previensly sent or about
to b 3 sent, are countermanded or kept back, and
all this is occasioned by the scarcity of a proper
measure and representative of value--the want
of a circulating medium adequate to the wants
and exigencies of the country !
" They manage these things bettor in France."
DY paying a trifling premium for gold, 6 fr. per
mills, which necessarily attracts it to the quarter
where it is most valuable, they supply themselves
with all they require at our expense. There are
frequent arrivals of the precious metals, but we
is abstracted, and we are helpless because there is
are forestalled in our own market. Carrie, after cargo
no one to pay the trifling sum necessary to ensure
ease. Tho Bank of England is bound to sell at a
fixed price to all applicants. It has, therefore,
vo inducement, to buy, is virtually prohibited from
buying at any sum, liQwever trifling, ht,yonc.l the

stipulated rate. The Bank of France, with far
inferior resources, whose entire capital i!!' but
little beyond the " rest," or reserved fund of
" The Old Lady," is enabled to rela the strin-
gency of its rules, merely from being at liberty
to purchase specie at a higher rate than can be
given by its English rival, and hence they can

maintain comparative ease in their country, and
pay more than twice the dividend of the London
establishment.

An intelligent and respected correspondent,
whose letter will be found iu another part of our
impression, has clearly explained the nature of
this anomaly. On the 20th ultimo we ourselves
pointed out the trifling cost by which it was
effected, and the only adequate remedy for the
flagrant grievance. By the payment of 6,0001.
the French Bank can draw gold worth a million
from England, and the withdrawal of that amount
not only occasions great "tightness," as it is
termed in the money market, but -increases the
minimum rate of discount from to 1 per cent.
to the immediate customers of the Bank, and to
at least double the rate, to those who are not
so fortunate as to possess similar facilities
for obtaining discounts. Sixty thousand pounds
thus applied, would produce another commercial
crisis in England, exceeding in interest that of
October, 1847, when the unwise, and we may
add, iniquitous enactment, was suspended, and
virtually abrogated. Now, what is such a sum,
ten times told, when compared to the annoyance
and inconvenience sustained by the industrial
community ? It is notorious that there are always
commercial bills worth from fifty to one
hundred million of pounds sterling in circulation.
We believe, that considering the extraordinary
increase indirected by our enhanced exports, that
the larger amount may he fairly taken as that
discounted. The addition of only 1 per cent.
therein, would amount to One Million Sterling,
and this, he it remembered, from four to six times
in the year. Sixty thousand pounds, spent by
the Bank of France, would quadruple that loss,
42n1 make it at leaSt TWENTY-FOUR MILLIONS
Sterling per annum. This being the amount
sacrificed, by what may be designatod as "the
penny wise and pound foolish" policy of Great
Britain.

The Bank of England, however, favours this
system, inasmuch as it enables it to charge 7 in
place of 3 per cent. for its advances. The Direc-
tors seem to be oblivious of the advantages of the
"nimble shilling" over the sluggish pound,"
and to ignore altogether the devastation occa-
sioned by the system. Trade and manufactures
may struggle on for a time, but they cannot
permanently stand against such repeated
blows. No men will remain satisfied at
the continued transfer of her legitimate
profits to greedy money-lenders. It must, sooner
or later, terminate in the destruction of " the
Goose that lays the golden eggs." A private cor-
poration cannot safely be trusted with the control
and management of the National Currency. The
duty should be transferred to a department of the
Government, and then the Bank of England
might find it convenient to compete with
that of Franco, and to arrest the golden
tide now ebbing from our shores. A really
National Bank, and National Notes of small
and convenient denominations would prevent all
the mischief, and if the industrial community be
wise they will strive to achieve that great deside-
ratum while there-is yet time, and before the
Bank Charter Act has been renewed without
I change or modification for a protracted period.

Concurrently with the meeting of the Secular
Parliament, the Spiritual Parliament has also
made its commencement. Of the two Assemblies
it has the better claim to the name of Parliament,
Since it meets to talk (parler) and to do nothing
else. Nor is the epithet Spiritual, or its nearly
antiquated Saxon equivalent, a/lastly, inappro-
priate, for time was when convocations of the
Clergy were formidable realities, and besides trans-
acting business, could instigate secular powers to
consign to present perdition all who ventured to
dissent.
The Convocationists of the province of Canter-
bury make the most of the two or three days
which of late they have managed to secure for their
conversation ; those of York are still dealt with
after the old fashion, and dismissed as soon as
they appear. If they wish to talk, they must do
so at their hotels, or anywhere but in the Convo-
cation Chamber. The Canterbury represent stives
and Spiritual Peers, by the glace of Lord DERBY,
who dared not venture, in his peculiar position,
in 1852, to offend so powerful a body, have ever
since furnished a column or two of perfectly re-
sultless motions, discussions, and speeches to the
' daily papers. sople of the restless among them
are fain to represent this as a great point gained.
We cannot think so. In fact they injure rather
than aid the cause they have at heart."
The object of the High Church Clerics, and of
some others top, is to get a working and effective
representation of their Church. They demand
power to make laws for her, and to superintend
their administration. They want to be a power
in the Church, not a mere debating club. Now,
as we think, their present attempts are just of
the kind to keep them out of power. They show
us once or twice a year the kind of stuff they are
made of, and hitherto it has appeared as if there
was a tolerable share of the quarrelsome and
quibbling in their composition, a special unaptness
for business, a great faculty of moving resolutions
and anapudinent.s innumerable, but no faculty for
moving on, or for amending where confessedly
there le ample room for it. The plain fact is,
and coaepp4opAiata will find it out, that their
annual threb days' debate just serves to ke,p
awake the attention of their Parliamentary anta-
gonists to their objects, but so as to irritate rather
than conciliate. The attempt to steal power
makes every Liberal in the liouse of CoMmons
only so much the more determined t) bolt the
door against them. The sentiment amongst ho-
nest, businesslike laymen is, if the Church needs
A Synod of some hind for self-government, let her
come openly forward, and seek it by the means
adopted for all other objects : but let her not at-
tempt to worm herself into power underhandedly,
through the ruins of au antiquated institution,
and one whose very cp4stitution is wholly behind
the standard of the day.
The truth is that the Convocationists have
gaine4 nothing beyond the privilege ppi,/yed by
all Englishmen, from the peer to the peasant.
LOO JOHIiT RIISSET.L or Lord DERBY, Mr. FROST
and 440;!ITItitp O'liurEN, have equally the right,
and use it too, of getting their supporters together,
814 freely all that, concerns their re-
si3q4iig objects. Convocation only (1.004 at a dis-
advantage what the others can do with every faci-
lity. Convocation has all the trammels of an
institution fettered by law, but none of the free-
dom and vigour of a: voluntary, or a still living
body. It is obsolete, and does not know it. A
hollow oak, with a few sprigs and leaves and the
outward layers and bark, to indicate he former
strength ; but it is useless now except for those
ecclesiastical emblems, owls and ivy. Convocation,
iu aboaq, is lut bad public Meeting ;it has no
more power thaa one ; it can do uotiliag