The Sun.
London, England, 1828-01-11 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

submitting to the people of this country a few
remarks upon the present unexampled state of the
Government, we are actuated by no feelings of a
factious, far less of a personal, kind, i,Ve entertain
The most profound respect for the Duke of Welling-
ton ; of whose high reputatione---the property of his
country—we are as tender as of any ',elle thing, ex-
sept only the charactc and the interests of that
country itself. It is a mater e of public notoriety to
every man in London std Westminster, and in four-
and-twenty bows it 'rein be known to every man in
England, that his Majesty has commanded the Duke
to offer him his unbiassed opinion upon the manner
in which the Ministry should be re-constructed. A
more important and a more delicate office never
was 'committed to any subject of the realm ; and
eve entertain a confident expectation that it will be
executed with the discretion and the magnanimity
becoming so 'extraordinary a situation. The Con-
stitution vests in the King the undoubted right to
choose his own Ministers ; and for this, as for all the
acts of his reign, the Savoreign is irresponsible ex-
cept to the tribunal of public opinion, which has ju-
risdiction equally undoubted over the conduct of
Princes and of subjects. But when an individual is
called upon to advise hoer that high prerogative
shall be exercised, he is responsible, in every seen
of the word, to his country as well as to its Mo-
narch. Nor is he to be the less nereewly watched
in the exercise of his duty, because he happens also
to be the Commander-in-Chief of its armies. The
first and the principal matter which he has to con-
sider, is the strange difference that has arisen in the
Cabinet, and has more immediately given occasion
to the demand for his counsel; we allude to the
disagreement 'netweemi Mr. Huskisson and Mr. Her-
ries. The Former is understood to have proposed
the foruration of a Committee, in redemption of Mr.
Canniseg's memorable pledge of effeetuai and syste-
matic retrenchment—a pledge en which the House
of Commons acted last Session, postponing, in con-
sideration of it, the inquiries otherwise inevitable
into the expenditure of our revenue; and reforms
unanimously demanded by all the people except a
few persons in place, to whom it must always prove
most formidable. He is understood to have pro-
posed a Committee, which, from its construction,
must prove competent to the task—_the absolutely
necessary task—of tit length satisfying the just
expectations of the country; and, above all,
which should act under a Chairman whose
character, whose weight, and whose capacity
for affairs, may afford a security that the inquiry
will prove real and effectual, not Colourable and de-
lusive. Mr. Berries is stated to have taken an op-
posite view of the matter, and peremptorily objected
to his colleague's proposition. Upon this great
question—of all others the most interesting to the
nation—those two Ministers are understood to be
at issue; and it is plain that men at variance on
such a point as this cannot possibly act together.
Now the practical question being, whether Mr.
Huskisson or Mr. Berries is to give way ; which of
the two is to prevail, and which the country is to
part with—upon this plain and intellieib!e ground it
neturally occurs to every one to ask the question—
(but, we will venture to say, a hundred thousand
times at the least during the last 21 hours, and not,
we will also affirm, answered once in aey part of
this great city)—_ ho, and what is Mr. Berries,
that his wishes should be consulted? who, and
what is Mr. Berrie% that all of a sudden he should
have started into such a strange importance, and
have proved, twice within five months, the great
subject of political discussion—the pivot on which
the greatest arrangements of the State have hinged ?
To common observation he is only known as an
industrious clerk for many years—private Secretary
of successive Secretaries of the Treasury—then
in the Commissariat, and raising himself, at
ieagth, to the useful . and laborious, but
slot very distinguished place of a Secretary to the
Treasury. . In-point of talents for Parliamentary ac-
Late, he may fairly be said, and without the .leest
exaggeration, to rank much lower than any one man
who ever took upon him the duties of such an of-
fice as be holds, and we have once or twice seen it
filled be men singularly deficient in such accom-
Plishmentss With the country, he has no kind of
estimation for good or for evil, because to the eoun-
ley he is utterly unknown. Why, then, the ques-
tion recurs, is smch a person to be forced upon the
King, and the nation, even if there were no reason
for rejecting him,. :except the bare comparison with
Mr. Huskisson personally ? But when we find
the balance to be, Mr. Huskisson and effectual re- I,
trenchment in.theone scale, and Mr. Berries its oppo-
pent in the other, that which it was difficult to answer
before, becomes utterly and hopelessly unanswerable.
That the Duke of Wellington will duly weigh this
preliminary question, and not proced in his task
until he can either cut the knot or untie it satisfac-
torily, no one who respects his Grace can doubt for
e moment. Sonic there are, who affect to say, that
the Duke will recommend a Government of Ultra-
Tories,—enemies of the Catholic question, and
of all retrenchment and all improvement ; and
they think he will propound the re-uniting of
the old Ministry displaced last spring. This is
wholly absurd. That Government never can re-
unite ; and if it could, it never would be able
to carry on the affairs of the State for a month.
Suppose no change kad happened, and that no dis-
sensions bad sprung up among the former Ministers,
the loss of Lord Liverpool and Mr. Canning would
have rendered their continuing in power almost hope-
less. But the question is, whether or not a Ministry
could now exist for cne month composed of the for-
mer Cabinet, with the loss of Lord Liverpool and
Mr. Canning, and also of Lord Goderich and Mr.
Huskisson, Mr. Grant, Lord Harrowhy, and Mr.
Wynn ; in short, whether a Government could be
formed of the Duke himseif,(who said in the House
of Lords that it was absurd to think he could ever
pretend to be Prime Minister), and Mr. Peel and
Lord Eldon, and .Lords Bathurst and Westmorland
and Melville. Suppose they could obtain Lord
Lyndhurst and Lord Bexley's assistance, and should
then gain all the strength to be derived from asso-
ciating with themselves Messrs. Dawson and Gaul-
burn, Sir T. Lethbridge, Lord Londonderry, and
Lord Ellenborough—does any man of common sense
believe that such a Ministry could stand a month ?
The Duke of Wellington has a very different mea-
sure of judgment and discretion from what his ultra-
admirers give him credit for; and we doubt not he
has well considered this, though they have not.
That he will do his duty, far be it from our minds
to doubt ; but the first question to be answered—and
the question everywhere echoed through the country,
again meets us—Who, or what is Mr. Berries, that
all this importance should be attached to his preju-
dices against effectual retrenchment? The country
will persist in putting this question, until it obtains
an answer ; and we trust its representatives will
also speedily and freely put ite it is of course un-
necessary to add, that we have no new facts to corn-
munieate on the subject of the Ministry, because
none such have taken place. Tile existing state of
things is entirely and accurately repeated in the pre-
ceding observations.—Tinzes.
We, as somewhat older statesmen, would advise
our
,juvenile friend, the Standard, not wantonly and
lightly to sully its pages by untruths, conveyed to
it by people of no principle, and not, we trust, in-
vented by itself. In its number of yesterday even-
ing we observe it to be twice asserted that Mr.
Brougham " had avowed himself the author of our
article in the morning." Now, supposing this Were
true, it were rather " too bad" in a brotherjour-
nalist to expose our inability to write a leading ar-
ticle. To how many people have our leading articles
been attributed. We recollect that Cobbett
claimed them all wholesale to himself upon some
subject, and actually published it so in his paper;
but added, that he sent them anonymously, because
he knew we would not take them from him. What
we must say is, that if Mr. Brougham avowed him-
self as the author of our yesterday's article,. he
avowed what was untrue, and therefore, as he is
rather a different Man from Mr. Gobbett, we are

sure that he made no such avowal; and the Standard
may be sure of the same. And to put a' end, so far
as in us lies, to these falsehoods altogether, we can
assure the &Standard, and the public at larg'e, that we
write the leading articles ourselves, and no one for
us ; and that the creatures who are picking up a
dishonest and precarious livelihood by copying our
title, are little less culpable than those who would
rob us of whatever fame we may have earned by
these our labours ; the former having the dread of
want and hunger as motives to impel them.—the
latter, nothing but wantonness or inconsideration.—

The stateglents that appeared in the 112.0/wing
CltrOnicle of yesterday must have sufficiently pre-
pared the public for the breaking up of the existing
Administrati,3t: which is now taking place, and in-
duoett- them to suspect that causes in abundance
were not wanting to account for such a catastrophe ;
most of them being already too notorious, to those
who arc acquainted with the general aspect of pub-
lic affairs, to render much explanation or inquiry
into the more immediate circumstances either neces-
sary or useful. Those circumstances which have
been adverted to in a Morning Paper of yesterday
are but of slight importance when compared with
the gravbr symptoms of approaching dissolution,
strongly exhibited during the last few weeks
in the conduct of the Premier. To the plans
of finance and economical regulations, which are
there stated to have given rise to the dissensions
in the Cabinet, we are not disposed to attach
much credit, and much doubt whether any of such
a nature as to justify disunion have ever been agi-
tated. Questions of a more immediate and urgent
stamp, relating to the present critical state of our
foreign policy—questions of peace or war—may,
with more probability, have brought on a dif-
ference of opinion. But whatever may have been
the questions, if any, which have divided the Mi-
nisters, we are satisfied that the hands by which the
balance of power was held, were too feeble for the
task ; and that the true cause of the termination of
this Government must be found in the weakness of
its Chief. It is not, however, the cause which has
destroyed the old, but the manner in which the new
Government is to be formed, that will become the
most important and pressing subject of public interest
Upon this point we are enabled to state, that up to
a late hour yesterday no positive information could
possibly be obtained, because no decided step had
actually been taken. The Duke of Wellington is
understood to have received directions on the sub-
ject when he was with the King on Wednesday.—
llis Grace may be supposed to be taking some steps
in consequence of these directions. What they are
can only be the subjects of conjecture at present ;
but some persons \veil informed, and who have the
interest of the country truly at heart, are of opinion
that his Grace's endeavours will be employed to con-
struct a liberal rather than an exclusively Tory Go-
verlitnent.—Morning Chronicle.

The desire for retrenchment has been so generally
expressed throughout the country, and the present
state of our finances pleads so powerfully for the
strictest economy, that, without good evidence, we
should be unwilling to believe any Minister—not
altogether lost to a regard for character with the
nation—could be so deficient in judgment as to
entertain for one moment the idea of baulking its
well-founded expectations. When, therefore, we
saw the statement in The Times of yesterday, res-
pecting the difference between Mr. Huskisson and
Mr. Metrics, we were almost certain that the true
cause of that difference was not assigned. Passing
over much in that statement, as the period has not
yet arrived for laying the subject fully before the
public, we believe we may say that the alleged
dif-
ference between Mr. Herries and Mr. Huskisson on
measures of finance has no exigence. A difference,
we are ready to admit, has. taken place with respect
to the formation of the Finance Committee; but a
difference on this point does not necessarily involve
on either side a wish to throw any impediment in
the way of retrenchment. It is, indeed, ex-
tremely to be regretted that any disagreement
should have arisen, even on an abstract point,
between men who have uniformly agreed on
the most essential matters. When the period
for the disclosure of particulars arrives, we shall
endeavour to obtain them. In the meantime
we cannot pass over the whole of the statement
in silence. The Times asks, " Has Mr. Berries a
plan of finance to propose in lieu of Mr. Huskis-
son's ?" Our answer to this is, Mr. Huskisson has
none, and consequently Mr. Metrics can offer none
in opposition. Anuther question is asked, " Can
Mr. Herries carry on the concerns of the country
without retrenchment ?" Our belief is, that he had
no intention of trying even the experiment, and that
he would have recommended as the Committee of
Finance those gentlemen who had most turned their
attention to the subject of finance, of the most in-
fluential character and belonging to all parties, the
character of the individuals composing the Commit-
tee serving as a guarantee to the public of its honest
intentions. It is further asked, " Has he any plan
which will expose, and render useless in future any
trickery practised in making up the public accounts,
Rze.?" Let us be just to individuals. Mr. Huskisson
has a high reputation with the country for firmness
and integrity, and be deserves it. But no man knows
better than Mr. Huskisson the merits of Mr.
Herries, as a clear-headed man of business. He
has never been accused of advocating or practising
trickery; and we will do him the justice to say, that
we believe he is not suspected by any of his col-
leagues of a disposition to commence it. We be-
lieve he is not only disposed, but determined to carry
on the work of retrenchment quite as far as the most
liberal of his present colleagues are disposed to go
with him. There can, we believe, be but one opi-
nion with regard to Lord Althorp. No man has a
better claim to the confidence of his fellow-citizens,
as an honest and determined asserter of their
rights—he merits and possesses the respect of men
of all parties. But it is possible that a wish for
the very success of the labours of the Committee
may have led Mr. Harries to wish to have in the
Chair one less likely to excite any jealousy arising
out of party feelings, which might have provoked
unnecessary opposition. A difference of views on
a point of this nature, is not to be taken as a con-
clusive proof of indisposition to the object of the
Committee. But, es we have already observed,
the time for entering on this subject is not yet ar-
rived.—lbid.

We stated yesterday the fact, which the country
has learned with much regret, that Viscount Gode-
rich had tendered his resignation to his Majesty.
We stated it in a plain unornamented manner. Like
some of our Contemporaries, we might have sur-
rounded it with particulars to excite public curiosity,
with this difference, however, that ours would have
been correct, whilst theirs, when not wholly un-
founded, are most miserably disfigured and pervert-
ed. We did not sec the necessity, however, of add-
ing to the difficulties of the period by a premature
disclosure of reasons and circumstances, which will
conic out more advantageously for the public when
the interests of the country shall have been secured
by the establishment of a firm and effective Admi-
stration. To further that object we do not hesitate
to sacrifice the gratification of personal van ity. There
are times in the political [life of a State when
the duties of a Journalist assume a more than
usually important character, and when the
Pros, in the momentary abeyance of the Mini-
sterial portion of the Executive, becomes in
some measure a substitute for its suspended
power. At such epochs, to yield to the petty
ambition of being the first to communicatein-
telligence, the revelation of which may increase ex-
isting embarrassments, or create some that do not
pre-exist, is not only a want of patriotism, but of
common honesty to the country. We shall, there-
fore, continue to pursue; for the present, the course
which we adopted yesterday; only premising, that
whenever it may cease to be required for the advan-
tage, not of parties, but of the State, we shall be
found neither unwilling nor unable to lay open the
mysteries of political transactions. With respect to

what is passing at the present time, we shall frankly
say, that nothing has yet reached. a sufficient state of
maturity to assume any:definite forni or character,
even in the eyes of the parties engaged in the recon-
struction of the Ministry. :fhe Duke of Welling-ton,
by whom the first steps are to be taken, is known to
have expressed his approbation of a system in
which different interests and opinions are blended,
so that, instead of pursuing separate objects, they
may all unite and lose themselves in the service
of the country. It is not probable, therefore, with
such sentiments, exemplified by his own conduct in
rejoining, after the death of Mr. Canning, the
friends from whom he had seceded, that he should
propose to his Majesty a Ministry formed of one
exclusive opinion. It is at the same time equally
probable that he may think it necessary to strengthen
some parts of the political union, which he may con-
ceive to have been left injuriously weak in the late
Cabinet. He may wish that the balance should be
more equably poised. The difference between the
Liberals and the Whigs had grown so small that
those two parties no, longer counterbalanced each
other in the King's. Councils, but acted with an
unanimity of purpose which threw undivided power
into their hands, and left the principles of ancient
Toryism no strength, and scarcely any representa-
tion in the Cabinet. Here then is a deficiency to
be filled up ; and if his Grace should propose to re-
move the imperfection, and to vivify the neglected
branch, by recalling. Mr. Peel to the service of
the State, there is not a man in the country who
would not rejoice at the return of an active and
talented Minister, who, though the champion of a
distinct political interest, unites to that character an
expansive mind, a sound judgment, and the most
enlightened views. It is not unlikely that, satisfied
with this infusion of strength into the Tory branch
of a combined Administration, his Grace would
make no change in its leading principle, and would
entrust the guidance of affairs to the able and expe-
experienced hands of his illustrious brother, the
Marquis -Wellesley. In this case, very few altera-
tions, if any, would become necessary; for the
Noble Marquis not only shared the friendship, but
the political sentiments of our departed Minister.—
It was in conjunction with Mr. Canning, that in
1812 he made overtures to the Whigs, and endea-
voured to form that very coalition of parties, which
he now finds ready existing teihis hands. He could
not, therefore, object to act with men whom he
had once thought entitled to his confidence, and
whom his friend had tried and proved to be
so, in' the short but eventful career which they
had run together. Neither, we have reason to be-
lieve, would there be any reluctance on the part of
the Whigs, to co-operate with a Statesman whose
accession would secure the permanence of the
system and policy of Mr. Canning, which they
have adopted as their own. This mutual approxi-
mation would render the arrangements easy and
prompt, two very great advantages on the eve of a
Session of Parliament, whilst the presence of Mr.
Peel in the Cabinet would satisfy the Tories that
their principles, and the integrity of the Constitution
in Church and State, were not in any danger. We
do not say that all these probabilities will be realized,
but it appears to us that if they should come to
pass, all the hostility of parties throughout the land
would cease, and the country would at length pos-
sess a strong, sound, and well-balanced Administra-
tion.---. ew Times.

After the breaking up of the Cabinet Council on
Wednesday evening, messengers were despatched
to the Marquis of Lansdowne, at the Noble Mar-
quis's seat at Bowood, in Wiltshire, with the result
of the deliberations of the Cabinet Council ; also
to Mr. Spring Rice, one of the Under-Secretaries
of State for the Home Department, at the scat of
the Duke of Gloucester, at Bagshot, to bring the
Hon. Gentleman to London. After the Lord
Chancellor and the Duke of Wellington had left the
King on Wednesday afternoon an express was sent
to Mr. Peel, at Maresfield, in Sussex, which arrived
at the Right Hen. Gentleman's tempor,Ary residence
between twelve and one o'clock yesterday morning.
The Right Hon. Gentleman arrived in London yes-
terday, in consequence, between nine and ten o'clock,
at his house in Privy-gardens. In the course of the
day Mr. Peel had interviews with the Lord Chan-
cellor and the Duke of Wellington. We are not
prepared to say which of those distinguishet Noble-
men sent for Mr. Peel, but it is understood that the
communication was sent by command of the King.
Yesterday afternoon, about half-past two o'clock,
the Marquis Wellesley left town in his travelling
carriage, with outriders, for the purpose, it was un-
derstood, of attending the King at the Royal Lodge.
It was yesterday reported that the Earl of Harrowby
had been sent for express, to his country seat in
Staffordshire, offering the Noble Earl the situation
of Lord President of the Council, from which the
Noble Earl had retired a short time since, in conse-
quence of family afflictions.--Morning Herald.

HAPPY CHANGE OF MINISTRY.—It is with the
most joyful and triumphant feelings that we congra-
tulate the country on the complete dissolution of an
Administration, which, during its brief career has
been productive of nothing but mischief, and which
threatened to inflict upon the Nation a fatal succes-
sion of disgraces and calamities. Amid the sneer
of friends, the pity even of enemies, and the deri-
sion of all, the late Government has expired. To
escape the Executioner, it has committed Suicide.
Peace to its ashes. The reasons assigned for this
catastrophe are various. Mr. Huskisson and Finance,
says one ; Lord Althorp and the Finance Commit- j
tee, says another; Mr. Tierney and intrigue, says a
third. The statement in the leading Journal of the
defunct Ministry, in regard to Mr. Huskisson's
financial plans, is a downright falsehood ; and if the
writer of it were even in a remote degree acquainted
with the'suhject, he must have known it to be so.
It is palpably untrue, and carries absurdity on the
face of it. It may be true, and doubtless is true,
that Lord Althorp was spoken to by l'fr. Tierney
and Mr. Huskisson, unknown to Mr. Herries, and
considered by them as the future Chairman of the
Finance Committee. It may be true, that Mr.
Herries with his wonted energy and decision of
character, refused to acquiesce in that nomination,
upon sound public principles. It may he true that
Lord Goderich was as weak and irresolute as a writu•
in another Paper (the Chronicle) says Lord
Lansdowne is, end tossed about like a ship in a
storm, amid conflicting elements. Without dwelling
upon these secondary causes, we know that reasons
existed of a far more influential and pressing cha-
racter—reasons which must have broken up the
Ministry, had the Finance Committee never been
thought or spoken of. The great question of war
or peace decided the Cabinet; and the time had
come when a weak inefficient Minister could no
longer hold the balance between contending, prin-
ciples. The time had come, when it was to he de-
cided whether Whig influence should predominate,
by Lord Holland's admission into the Cabinet, or
whether the Whig party should be themselves ejected
in disgrace. Day after day, week after week, the Minis-
try tottered on, until its weakness and state of disor-
ganization became such, that it crumbled to pieces
almost of its own accord. If causes so trifling as
those brought forward by its surviving friends could
make it fall, its foundation must have been, if pos-
Sible, still weaker than its noble head. Thanks to
the wisdom of our gracious Monarch, and to his
firmness in the maintenance of the principles which
seated his Illustrious Family on the Throne of these
Realms, the triumph of true Tory Principles is now
complete. The Duke of 'Wellington hat beau com-
missioned to form an Administration, round which the
lovers of Constitutional Principles may rally
confidence. In him all hopes are now concentrated;
and ere long we shall have to announce the forma-
lion of a Ministry, not less strong in the esteem of
the Monarch and the affections of his People, than
worthy of triumphant' Parliamentary support.—
_Horning Post. with

FATAL ACCIDENT.—EarIy on Thursday
morning, a boat belonging to Burntisland Went out to
weigh an anchor, and by some accident or other it swamp-
ed, and four of the men perished..--Edinburvit Ackertiser.