The Sun.
London, England, 1844-08-16 00:00:00

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.

FROM THE EVENING PAPERS OF YESTERDAY.
GLOBE.—The Times of this morning contributes
a rather large instalment towards balancing its ac-
count on the Otaheitian question. For some days the
entries in its columns were principally on the other
side; and a large amount of sound argument, inter-
spersed with wholesome invective, were introduced to
show the unprovoked and indefensible character of the
outrages perpetrated by the French authorities at Ota-
' cite ; and also to impress upon our Government the
bligations by which it is bound to demand and
enforce indemity and reparation for the indignity
offered to the British flag in the person of Mr.
Pritchard, the Consul of this country, and for the
abuse of the powers assumed by the French officers
under the " Protectorate " they had set up. No
longer than yesterday an article of this cha-
racter, of no ordinary excellence, enforcing these
views, appeared in the columns of the Times.
" A change has this morning come o'er the spirit"
of our Contemporary. As if scared by.the sounds
itself had made: apparently fearful of having assisted
to rouse the spirit of the nation ; or, possibly, of hav-
ing " roared" too loudly in the ears of Lord Aber-
deen, and disturbed the dreamy repose which con-
stitutes his delight; the Times suddenly becomes
mild as a sucking dove ! Recently so big with rage
against French aggression and outrage, for which re-
paration must be demanded, and atonement made, our
Contemporary—in the spirit of Shakspere's popinjay,
now " talks like a waiting gentlewoman of " the
pity, so it was—"
" That villanous salt-petre should be digg'd
Out of the bowels of the harmless earth,
Which many a good tall fellow had destroy'd
So cowardly."
The occasion of this marked change—at once both
sudden and complete—is not very obvious. The
meeting at Exeter Hall yesterday, convened for the
purpose of enabling the Directors and members of the
London Missionary Society to make a public demon-
stration of their views and sympathies upon the state
of things at Otaheite, is made the peg upon which the
Times hangs its new opinions on this question. We
neither adopt the whole of the views put forth by the
speakers at the meeting referred to, nor undertake to
defend the language in which some of them gave
utterance to their opinions. There are, however,
strong provocations to regret and indignation in
the ministers and gentlemen on whom the Times
pours out the vials of concentrated contempt
and wrath for their interference. The argument
of our Contemporary will induce an opinion
that the Society which met yesterday on this matter
had obtruded itself into a dispute with which it had
no peculiar concern—that, in fact, their interference
is impertinent, and their agitation mischievous. Has
the Times forgot, or did it never know, that by the
patient, persevering, and devoted labours of the agents
of this Society—not composed exclusively of Dissenters,
but of clergymen and members of the Establishment,
uniting with Dissenters in this noble enterprise—
Otaheite and the other islands in the Georgian
groupe were civilised and Christianised ? Had the
South Sea Islanders continued in their state of bar-
barism, they would not have attracted the regards of
the French, nor would the subordinate authorities of
that nation have forced their " protection" upon them.
They were reclaimed from barbarism by the agents
of the Society which met yesterday to express
its sympathy with the islanders whom they had
raised from the debasement of senseless idolatry, and
the vices and cruelties which follow in its train.
Those shores, once unsafe for any vessel to touch at,
were rendered approachable and hospitable through
the heroic courage and indomitable energies of the
missionaries who were sent forth to, and supported
by the contributions of, the Society which is upbraided
by the Times, in one of the fitful changes for which
it is remarkable, with exceeding their vocation by
expressing their views on such a subject. If
the Times did " not know what particular call"
the meeting of yesterday had to " involve itself in
such matters," it is now informed ; and will doubt-
less admit the ignorance which induced the reflections
upon the meeting and its proceedings, and apologize
for the discourtesy and injustice of which it has un-
wittingly been guilty. The marked discrepancy of our
Contemporary's present opinions on the main question,
with those it has recently put forth, may be less easily
reconciled. But as we are not the " protectors" of our
versatile fellow-journalist, we refrain from dwelling
upon what we cannot explain, and are not called upon to
defend. The Times thinks Otaheite too insignificant, in a
commercial sense, to deserve the attention of the British
nation. Would you provoke a war between the two
Governments about " a row in Otaheite ?" This ques-
tion is, however one of those which cuts two ways.
If Otaheite be of little value to England, it is of far
less importance to France. Yet France has deemed
it worth putting forth its best acts of circumvention
to secure it I France has juggled Lord Aberdeen into
conceding the " Protectorate" of Otaheite to itself.
And now, when outrage and havoc have grown out
of the " Protectorate ;" and indignity and outrage to
the British Consul have followed the deposition and
banishment of the Queen, the question is gravely
asked, whether this had not better be hushed
up ? Who would think of disturbing the pacific
relations existing between two great nations, because
" a row has taken place at Otaheite ?" Otaheite
is not altogether so contemptible, even in a commer-
cial point of view, as some persons suppose. The
following return of the average yearly number of
vessels of commerce, belonging to different nations,
which touch at Otaheite, is from a quarter on which
implicit reliance as to its accuracy may be placed : it
will also show that France has less interest of a com-
mercial kind in Otaheite that any other civilized
State

Yearly.
English Merchant Vessels
American ditto
French 2O
Queen Pomare and her people have a strong claim
on the British Government itself. This must be ad-
mitted, if the promises of protection they have re-
ceived from successive Administrations be regarded
as of any worth.
STANDARD.—If we were not well aware that
the first, nay, the only consideration with particular
classes of persons is to keep themselves constantly be-
fore the public, we should be at a loss to guess the
purpose of the gentlemen who collected to make
speeches at Exeter-hall yesterday. These gentlemen,
one and all, deprecated the suspicion of a wish to
involve the country in war ; but we defy the
most sagacious to suggest any purpose consist-
ent with the preservation of peace their meeting
and their speeches can serve ; taking them
upon their own representation, they adopted a pro-
ceeding which can do no good, but which it is
obvious to every one may be productive of evil.
Let us not be misunderstood ; we are very far
indeed from undervaluing the beneficial effect of
missionary labours, but we protest against the
interference of missionaries and missionary so-
cieties in the direction of the Government
of the country. The useful missionary is in-
spired by one and one only feeling, zeal for
the propogation of true religion ; but zeal
is passion, and government, like law, ought to be
" mind without passion." If, in the administration of
the complicated affairs of a great empire feelings, even
the most noble and exalted, are allowed to take the
command of calm reason, there must be an end of con-
sistency and systematic government. Without even
departing from the subject immediately before us, we
can see a striking example of the danger of this inver-
sion of the proper order of influences, in the prevail-
ing temper of a considerable portion of the French
people, acting so powerfully upon the Government of
the country as to threaten it with an overthrow, if it do
not persevere in a course which every unprejudiced
human being must see to be both imprudent and
unjust. We do not wish to say it offensively,
but we certainly anticipate the judgment of
posterity when we assert, that each successive step
taken by the French officers in Otaheite has been
-wrong. We have it, indeed, upon the acknowledge-
ment of the best and wisest men in France, that the
principal step thus taken is indefensible, and such as
ought to be retracted. Nevertheless, by a misappli-
cation of one of the most honourable feelings of
our nature, patriotism, our neighbours insist
upon maintaining as just and right the
unauthorised wrong-doing of the officers of
France with all its
its
injurious consequences.. This
maybe unjust unwise,of and so it is, but it is,
nevertheless, the effect of an honourable
.passion. The
French people are, they ought to be, jealous of the
rank and honour of thealgar-inustntz, amndusttheir,jealotusy
is naturally directed
sminenin
power mad in reputation of the rival natione France
can afford to submit to a wrong from Naples or Bel-
gium, because submission in either case could be
ascribed only to the magnanimity of the
more powerful state ; but it is hard for human
passion to yield, even to right, in a dispute with an
equal, because such submission may be misconstrued.
This state of things, of which we have the evidence
before our eyes, demonstrates the danger of permit-
ting passion to interpose in the higher concerns
of Government. Yet, if not to excite a passionate
feeling of resentment against the French people,
though not, perhaps, against the French Govern-
ment, what can be the effect of a meeting and
speeches like those of yesterday at Exeter-hall ?It
is true that the effect in this country will be incon-
siderable, because the speakers and their general prac-
tices are pretty well known here. The speakers all
with the exception of Mr. Baptist Noel (if it is right to
except him), Dissenters from the Established Church,
and as much separated by political opinions (in this
Mr. B. Noel is no exception) as in religious profes-
sion, from tha vast majority of the people. The Mis-
sionary Society is a society wholly unconnected with
the
Grovern.nent, the Church, and all the other insti-
tutions of the country, to which it is pretty generally
hostile, as our own colonies have experienced in more

than one instance. The people of England, indeed, I
rejoice at the success of its members in the conversion
of the heathen, as they rejoice in the success of
American missionaries in the same glorious work,
and the people would anxiously support them in
protecting their converts from the errors of Roman-
ism—but we are too well acquainted with the habits
of some of the missionaries to hold ourselves respon-
sible for all their proceedings, or to wish that they be
allowed to claim from the Government more than
the protection to which they are entitled as
British subjects. Nor have they any right to
claim more : as Dissenters they renounce the au-
thority of the State to govern their movements,
and it is too much for them to expect that the
state shall support a line of conduct which it is not
permitted to influence. It certainly was an un-
fortunate choice which selected a Dissenter as the
British Consul at Otaheite ; for that gentleman, how
just and honourable soever his disposition, could
not help considering himself more as the represen-
tative of the Missionary Society than of the Sove-
reign of the United Kingdom. So far, there-
fore, as regards the effect upon the mind of
this country, we apprehend no evil from the
demonstration yesterday, which, indeed, shows how
very slight has been the political connexion be-
tween this country and Otaheite, and so slight,
chiefly because of the care of the Dissenters to keep
the Queen and her people in their own hands, to the
exclusion of the British in common with every other
Government. It is in France—where the absence of
rank and total want of political importance of the
speakers at Exeter-hall must be less known, and
where the interior politics of our Dissenting sects
can hardly be appreciated—that the mischief (if
any) of the display to which we refer will ope-
rate. It becomes, therefore, our duty to set forth
the truth as plainly as we can, and we surely say no
more than truth in asserting that the meeting at
Exeter-hall does not speak the sense of the
people of this country, but the sense of a
class which hardly ever concurs in sentiment with
the great majority of the nation, and certainly
will not bring the people to concur with it
by coming forward in its Dissenting character
to dictate to the Government upon a mo-
mentous and most delicate question of foreign policy.
We have not disguised our opinion that th French
officers at Otaheite have been in the wrong from first
to last. The first error was, however, the parent of
all that followed, by a very natural transition, and
the gradual advance from the imposition of the
original paltry fine, upon grounds which no pub-
lic law can justify, to the last act of extreme violence—
the seizure of the sovereignty—is, after 11, perhaps
the best excuse for what appears at a hasty view so
shocking. It seems to us, however, that the proper
course to be pursued by England in such circum-
stances is, while she takes care to protect her sub-
jects, and to assert the honour of her flag, to refer
all besides to the native justice and generosity of the
French people. A few incendiaries and Jesuits
may deny justice to poor Queen Pomare, but it is
impossible to suppose that an intelligent, a high-
minded, and gallant people, like the French,
will permanently, and after all motive for
national jealousy shall have ceased, pursue a
course of unjust aggression, such as every man must
consider that, which has hitherto been pursued towards
the Queen of Otaheite. We have spoken with many
Frenchmen upon the subject, but we have not met
with one who does not acknowledge that the justice of
the case is wholly against his country, and acknow-
ledge also that the judgment of posterity will be as
unfavourable to France in this affair, as all admit the
public opinion of Europe to be at present.
FROM THE MORNING PAPERS OF THIS DAY.
TlMES.—Since the Emperor Charles V. retired to
the monastery of St. Just, the world has scarcely
witnessed so singular and unexpected an act of volun-
tary abdication as that of Mehemet Ali, which has
just been announced by the French telegraph. Al-
though the retirement of the Pasha of Egypt from
public affairs to the precincts of the Holy Cities can-
not be compared, in political importance, to the seclu-
sion of the august head of the House of Austria in
the 16th century, yet as an instance of individual
force of character it is not less remarkable ; and it
would seem as if the most signal renunciations of
political greatness were to crown the lives of those
men who had been must eager in the pursuit of it.
Mehemet Ali will occupy a conspicuous position in
the history of Oriental nations, as one of the greatest,
and probably the last, of those men who rose by the
sole energy of their natures and the capricious in-
fluences of Asiatic manners from the lowest orders of
society to all but the supreme dignity of Mussulman
empire. Like Hyder Ali, or the low-born heroes
who, in past ages and in various countries, disputed
the ascendancy of the cross over the crescent, Mehe-
met Ali found within himself resources equal to the
pressure of the most eventful times, and superior to the
declining tendencies of his race and of his creed.mßut,
unlike any of the other heroes of Mahommedan history,
he was resolute without fanaticism ; and he combined
to a remarkable degree the habitual exercise of arbitrary
and absolute power with a true respect for more
civilized countries and a practical tolerance of other
forms of religion. If we attempted to sum up his
character in one word, it would be in that of " self-
possession." The most cruel and violent acts of his
life, such as the destruction of the Mamelukes, were
performed with a coolness and design quite distinct
from the ordinary excesses of Oriental vengeance.
The administration of Egypt was conducted with the
same stern indifference to all but the steady growth
of that power which the Pasha was labouring to esta-
blish. During the events of 1840, when a less pru-
dent or a more timorous man might have compro-
mised his existence by an act either of defiance or of
submission, he kept his temper, and therefore he kept
his pashalik. To his immortal honour,he forwarded
the British mails to India whilst our fleet was attack-
ing Syria and menacing Alexandria; and on no sub-
sequent occasion has he betrayed the smallest resent-
ment for conduct which, on the part of certain high
servants of the Crown of England, was harsh, impo-
litic, and unjust. Indeed, we may here allude with
peculiar satisfaction to the very marked reception
given by the Pasha to the present Governor-General
of India when he passed through Egypt a few weeks
ago ; and we trust that the treaty which was rapidly
negotiated at that interview will afford a permanent
and effectual protection to our overland communica-
tions with India. Lastly, as if even death itself was
not to find him unprepared, or as one who is anxious
to witness at least the commencement of his own pos-
terity, the old man retires from the shores of the Nile,
which he has once more opened to life and to a second
greatness, and betakes himself in meditation, if not in
devotion, to the consecrated City of the Prophet. It
is, however, premature to assume that his career is
already closed. His life is probably even now better
than that of Ibrahim ; and in the vicissitudes which
are now crowded on the surviving members of the
Ottoman empire, it is impossible to foresee any.secure
repose but in the grave. Some uncertainty, indeed,
still hangs about the actual fulfilment of this great
and sudden determination. Within a few weeks,
and by the last accounts from Egypt, the Pasha
was in all his usual vigour of body and mind
—full of projects and active designs which seem
calculated rather to prolong the duration of his
life and power, than to forestal the close of
them ; and at no time was the abrupt cessa-
tion of his interest in public affairs more unforeseen.
The personal remarks arising out of this singular
event are not unconnected with other and more ge-
neral considerations. It is impossible for any one
who takes an enlarged view of the condition of
the countries contiguous to Europe, whether in
the south or in the east, not to perceive the same
universal symptoms of decrepitude, wherever
the Mussulman rule and Mahommedan institu-
tions still maintain their ground. From Persia to
Morocco, and throughout the whole expanse of the
Turkish dominions, the same results obtrude them-
selves on our notice ; the causes are probably
different—sometimes foreign. egression, as in Al-
geria, or foreign intrigue, as at Constantinople—
more frequently a bad internal policy, and a
corrupt and depraved class of public servants, most
unfit to be the organs of absolute power ; but the
results are the same. Every part of these Mahome-
tan countries is more or less insecure ; none of them
are in a condition to defend their independence, if it
were seriously attacked; and since they owe their
present political existence to the protection or for-
bearance of the Christian Powers, they are little more
than tenants at the will of those whom they still per-
secute and contemn. The inevitable consequence is,
that rights so ill-defended are peculiarly liable to
encroachment; and that the resistance to such en-
croachment proceeds, not from the power directly
affected by it, but from the indirect consequences it
might produce on the European states. The Govern-
ment of Mehemet Ali has furnished a solitary in-
stance in our time of a Mahometan state sufficiently
enlightened as to its true position, and invested with
a sufficient control over its own resources, to will
what it thought expedient, and to accomplish what it
willed. The use of absolute power in the hands of
the Pasha has doubtless created anew the land of
Egypt, and restored the valley of the Nile to the im-
portance which it justly held in the ancient world :
but he leaves behind him no tradition of his system
of government; that system has called into existence
no other
men capable of fulfilling his designs; and as
far
as the descendants of his own house are concerned,
tithemvaiycesbeofapthparethfeantadlesdytsht at thfey relapseill
which
int o all
he either entirely shook oeff orm o
a misgovernment
adapted to the objects
of a wiser administration. The retirement of the
Pasha of Egypt cannot but be regarded as an event
of the more importance, since it will show what ex-
pectations or apprehensions we may entertain of the
fate of that country under his successor ; and the per-
manent establishment of the overland route to India
has rendered this subject one of the greatest interest
to the British possessions both in Europe and in Asia.
ADVERTISER.—Data are now furnished from