The Sun.
London, England, 1868-04-15 00:00:00

THE DANGERS OF DEMOCRACI.

The Spring field Republican is severe on an article
in the TV estminster Review for January, entitled
" The Dangers of Democracy," which it says " is the
wickedest article we ever read :"—" We have seen
some articles in the Round Table of late upon the
same subject, with a great deal more that was
false, and a great deal less that was true ; but the
extravagant eagerness of the Round Table to pro-
duce a sensation, by any means, must be taken as
lessening, in some degree, its moral accountability.
Of this effort to be strange and offensive, in some
way, there is no trace whatever in the English ar-
ticle. Besides, the possession of larger gifts brings
greater responsibility, and one cannot hesitate to
pronounce the Westminster writer far the more
guilty." Is the following passage from the article
in the Westminster Review 1--" It is not to be pre-
tended that the large body of new electors are
pugnaciously malicious, crafty, designing, or trai-
torous. It is merely alleged that they are ignorant,
selfish, and destitute of all senseof moral obligation."
The Republican thus replies :—" The heart of the
common people everywhere is simple and honest and
loving. Ignorant they may be, easily excited and
easily deceived, the prey of faction, the tools of de-
magogues, but whoever says they are not to the best
of their knowledge and of their advantages true
and loyal, slanders his God. It takes man's work,
his wretched fiction of a superior class, his denial of
original and perfect human rights, his structure of
legal inequalties and commercial fraud, to pervert
the gracious instincts of our nature, and turn to
gall and poison the sweet and wholesome juices of
the human heart." The Republican-desires to kill
two birds with one stone, and has a right to accom-
plish this if possible. But so has the Round Table
to enunciate its views on the dangers of Democracy,
however opposed they may be to the feelings gene-
rally prevailing. It is a good thing to have free dis-
cussion, and there is no position in this world so
secure that it cannot be assailed. We believe Demo-
cracy in the United States to be the great hope
of mankind for self-government. If it fails it
will be no less than the heaviest disaster that has
befallen the human race since Adam sinned. But
we hold that this is made all the more apparent by
a full discussion of the subject, for truth requires
no deception, nor silence, nor disguise. The chief
danger of Republican institutions lies in coups d'etat,
wherein men find themselves thrust into a position
before they have time to ascertain what that posi-
tion is, and the after struggle is to get out of it.
They cannot be thus caught if everything has been
fully argued and weighed beforehand, and this is
the advantage of free discussion. The rocks on which
Democracy may split are those on which beacons
should be built, and we think that the Round Table
does more good than harm in freely calling atten-
tion to the perils, and none the less, because it may
shock the prejudices the nation.' Our opinions
coincidewithtnnseof
of
the
Republican; we are strong
believers in the-vices of an oligarchy ; have little
less faith in the virtues of what are called the lower
classes; but we consider that the advocates of the
oligarchy have as much right to expose the short-
comings of the masses as the masses have to denounce
the " bloated ariatocrata.,, We cannot, therefore,
agree with the Republican in the following passage :
" When a citizen proposed a law among the
Locrians, he stood forth in the assembly, with a
rope around his neck. If the law passed, well and
good. If not, the innovator suffered the penalty
of his rashness. And in the same spirit, all true,
men will agree that; the writer who dares to stig-
matize his countrymen in such terms should be
required to substantiate his charges, or expiate
hanging, drawing
Nor does the
, drawing and quartering
othienithebymaostrelentless
: Republican consider itself in any way barred from
making very strong charges against the one class
moral ha
while alleging that the man who makes these charges
against the other "slanders his God." "An aristo-
cracy," it says, " is always and everywhere selfish,
grasping, unscrupulous. From the_ days of Sparta
down, the rule of the few has been characterised
by meanness, jealousy, and greed. The most odi-
ous of all the features of humanity are those
which are certain to appear under an oligarchy."
It is singular to observe how unconsciously we are
betrayed into the very sin we may at the moment
be denouncing in others—if it be a crime, as the
Republican alleges. We call it free discussion, with a
strong spice of truth on each side. The real thing
to do is to keep your temper, and endeavour to be
as fair as human nature will permit.
Since the above was written the Round Table of
March 28 has reached us, and it comes down with
its lash on the Springfield Republican. It declares
that the article in the Westminster Review was
written by the purest and most conscientious of
living thinkers, and in reply to the accusation that
its own articles were published for sensational pur-
poses, it very truthfully states that they running
counter to the popular feelings obtained for the Round
Table mach and perhaps actual loss. The re-
ply:of the Round Table is, however, based on the same
principle as that for which we contend; that is, a
fair and free discussion. The Springfield Repub-
lican," it says, " does not take up the arguments
and refute them; but denounces them as wicked,
and issued from sinister motives." " Out !" cries
the Round Thble, ,6 upon such canting, illiberal
rubbish." "We very much doubt whether all the
good that New England and New England ideas
have ever done the country at large can counter-
balance/the mischief that the detestable spirit., of
which this is an instance, has occasioned."—Angle-
American Times.

At the sheriff's sale of steamers of the New York
Mail Company, recently, the Guiding Star was sold for
$177,000 to H. Webb, for his California line; the Morning
Star for $25,000 to C. K. Garrison; the Monterey, with
coal on board, for $62,000 to C. K. Garrison ; the Mari-
posa for $50,000 to & B. Oromwell.

AMERICAN MARKET S.

(From Beldiny,'Keith, and Co.'s Circular.)

Our New York advices are to March 28. The Journal of
Commerce reports on money market as follows :—" There
will probably be no return to an easy money market until
after the next quarterly statement of the banks has been
completed. The older of our mercantile readers will recal
the trouble which in former years grew out of the require-
ment of an exhibit of the condition of each bank on a given
day. There was a periodical spasm in the market in prepa-
ration for that day of account ; and conservative banks,
which carried a large amount of specie right through the
year, found themselves always tricked into an appearance
of poverty every quarter-day by the action of banks
which were rich on no other day of the year. A sys-
tem was ultimately adopted under which a past day was
designated by the Comptroller for the date of the return,
and the quarterly scramble in a great measure avoided.
Something of this kind will have to be adopted for the
National Bank system, as the well-known quarter-days
are becoming with each return more and more urgent in
their call for special preparation, and the effect on the
market is only evil: After the Ist of April there will be a
surplus of capital at the money centres, whore it has been
drawn by the high rates of interest, and the prevalent
stringency."
The Financial Chronicle, ou Stock Exchange and Money
Market, has the following summary :—" The week has
been one of unusual excitement and activity in money.
The city banks havo been losing heavily, in the line of
their cash balances, especially in the deposit and Legal-
Tender forms. Their last weekly exhibit showed a
further falling off of nearly ten millions in deposits, the
aggregate of which is now only $191,191,526, against
$217,844,518 six weeks ago, making a loss of $26,653,022
since the Bth. of February. Their legal tender reserve
last week decreased nearly 2i millions, standing at
$52,261,086 against $67,154,161 on the 25th of January,
making a loss of nearly 15 millions in eight weeks. Their
loans were last reported at $261,416,900 against
$271,015,970 on the 15th February, when they were most
expanded in this line. Their specie reserve is now down
to 18 millions against over 25 millions eight weeks ago.

UNITED STATES SECURITIES.—GOVerIIMeIIt Securities
have sympathized closely with the course of the money
market. On Monday the price of Seven-Thirties advanced
to 106 j to 106/, the rest of the market sympathizing, upon
the supposition that the banks would require a few
millions of the notes for exchange for Clearing-House
Certificates, under the programme proposed to the banks.
But upon the banks refusing to accept that measure, the
notes fell to 1054 to 1051 and have since remained at 1054
to 105 t. The *3-overnment has been a buyer of Seven-
Thirties during the week, to the extent of about $1,000,000 ;
which, as no other securities have been issued, has relieved
the market, and helped to sustain prizes. The severe
stringency in money has had a depressing effect upon
securities generally ; but there has been no panicky effort
to realize upon them. At the close, prices range ato
per cent. below our last quotations.

The great importance of the subject of the payment of
the United States Bonds to all interested in that country,
is our excuse for producing in full the following:—Letter
of Mr. Jay Cooke on the payment in gold of the United
States Five-Twenty Bonds; for, irrespective of his opi-
nion, his relation to the Government as agent for the loan,
renders him a high authority :
Editor Philadelphia Inquirer,—Sir, I have been fre-
quently asked of late, by my former agents and the public
press, for a full and circumstantial explanation of the
grounds upon which the promise to pay the interest and
principal of the 5-20 loan in gold was based and the ex-
tent to which the faith of the nation was plighted. I con-
sider the agitation of this subject, viz., the payment of our
5-20 bonds in anything but gold, as an unnecessary and inju-
rious attack upon the public credit. No possible good can
come from it. Much injury to the credit not only of the
nation, but
_the whole business community must ensue
from the bare discussion of such a question. It is useless,
because unless we are prepared to expand the greenback
currency, the Treasury is not in funds to avail of its
option if it were right to do so. It is suicidal and foolish to
thus damage our credit by attempting to force a construc-
tion of the loan laws never contemplated by those who
framed them, by those who executed them, nor by those
who invested under their provisions. •