The Sun.
London, England, 1828-03-12 00:00:00

the controul of a middle class, is the greatest pesti-
lence with which the earth can be afflicted. In
all times, and in every quarter of the world,
it will be found- that a territorial Aristocracy,
unawed -by a numerous middle .class, has been
an enemy to good order, and a scourge to our
species. In contrasting France and England at this
moment, it is impossible not to perceive in the le-
velling of properties produced by the Revolution, a
source of hope for the former country from which
our own unfortunately is excluded. Money is not
all-powerful in France. Look to the last election in
that country—look to the virtuous opposition of the
Peers; In the French Papers received yesterday,
there is the report of a speech of M. Charles Dupin,
in the Secret Sitting of the Chamber of Deputies,
of the 7th of March, which would be almost unin-
telligible in this country :—" I am about to speak
(he says) of the outrages, the mutilations, the ruins,
-which the preceding Ministry has produced in all
the institutions which are the honour of France, and
which place her in the first rank of the nations
friendly to science, letters, and the arts. 1 shall de-
scribe the system of destruction followed by the an-
cient Ministry respecting the grand objects of honour
and national interest." He then proceeds to dwell
with the proud indignation which a man of science
may feel in a country, in which art and science have
no superiors, on the attempts of the late Mini-
stry to degrade them. The distinguished men,
" proud of their consciences as of the talents,"
to use the language of M. Dupin, and unable to
support the , loss of their own self-respect, re-
fused to become subservient to unworthy purposes,
and the example, while it called forth the warm
sympathies of their countrymen, served to nourish in
them the same elevated feelings. The subject was
one of interest in 'a country where equality of fortune
disposes men to bestow attention on other matters
than those which would engross the attention
of an Aristocratical Legislature. In Mr. Mills's
Elements of Political Economy, there is a pas-
sage on the circumstances in a state of society
most favourable for the enjoyment of happiness and
for the highest intellectual and moral attainments,
which we shall here quote as very much in point :
—" All the blessings (he says) which flow from
that grand and distinguishing attribute of our nature,
its progressiveness, the power of advancing conti-
nually from one degree of knowledge, one degree of
command over the means of happiness toanother, seem
in a great measure to depend upon the existence of a
class of men who have their time at their command;
that is, who are rich enough to be freed from all
solicitude with respect to the means of living in a
certain state of enjoyment. It is by this class of
men that knowledge is cultivated and enlarged; it
is also by this class that it is diffused; it is this class
of men whose children receive the best education,
and are prepared for all the higher and more deli-
cate functions of society, as legislators, judges, ad-
ministrators, teachers, inventors in all the arts, and
superintendents in all the more important works,
by which the dominion of the human species is ex-
tended over the powers of nature. "It is also in a
peculiar manner the business of those, whose object
it is to ascertain the means of raising human happi-
ness to its greatest height, to consider what is that
class of men by whom the greatest happiness is enjoy-
ed. It will not, probably, be disputed, that they who
are raised above solicitude for the means of subsistence
and respectability, without being exposed to the
vices and follies of great riches—the men of mid-
dling fortunes in short—the men to whom society is
generally indebted for its greatest improvements, are
the men who, having their time at their owndis-
posal-.--freed from the necessity of manual labour—
subject to'no man's authority, and engaged in the
most delightful occupations, obtain as a class the
greatest sum of human enjoyment. For the happi-
ness, therefore, as well as the ornament of our nature,
it is peculiarly desirable that a class of this descrip-
tion should form as large a proportion of each com-
munity as possible. For this purpose it is absolutely
necessary that population should not, by a forced
accumulation of capital, be made to go on till the
return to capital from the land is very small.—
To enable a considerable portion of the com-
munity to enjoy the advantages of leisure, the
return to capital must evidently he large. There
is a certain density of population, which is con-
venient both for social intercourse and for that
combination of powers by which, the produce of
labour is increased. When these advantages, how-
ever, are attained, there seems little reason to wish
4hat population should proceed any farther." By
way of contrast to these views of Mr. Mills, we may
instance a passage in one of the'valuable notes which
Mr. M'Culloch has appended to the new edition of
The Wealth of Nations. Mr. M'Culloch, instancing
the beneficial effects of primogeniture, observes of the
younger children, "the sense that they must feel of
their inferiority in point of wealth, as compared with
the head of their family, will be a motive for them
to make extraordinary exertions, which could not
have had any existence had their patrimonies been
equal to his. If you would have a man display all
the native resources of his mind, if you would bring
all his faculties and powers into full activity, you
must render him sensible of his inferiority as com-
pared with others, and inspire him with a desire to
rise to the same or a higher level. . . . . Our,
great landed proprietors are at the head of society.
They give the tone in all matters of fashion and
expence; and the state and magnificence in which
they live, act as powerful incentives to the indus-
try and enterprise of the mercantile and manufac-
turing classes, who never think they have accumu-
lated sufficient wealth until they are able' to emulate
the splendour of the richest landlords." Mr. M'Cul-
loch accounts here satisfactorily enough for the
phenomena observable in the society of this country;
but we differ toto ofe/o from him in thinking that ex-
treme wealth is either advantageous to its possessor,
or that the stimulent which the spectacle of it gives
to the rest of society, impelling 'them to be ever-
lastingly on the stretch, to be everlastingly in-
flamed with cupidity, to chase and cheat each
other in order to possess that which is the god of
idolatary, is at all desirable in a country. We, on
the contrary, consider that state of the law, which,
by keeping together such masses of property, in-
flames the bulk of the people with an inordinate de-
sire of wealth, as a great curse to a country. Pro-
perty is only a means for an end, and that end is
happineis. Men will always be sufficiently desirous
of obtaining enough of it; and we do not see the
advantage of giving any factitious strength to that
desire, at the hazard of destroying all reverence for
what- is just, and elevated, and honourable, what
confers dignity-on our species, and renders man a
worthy image of the Divinity on earth.—Morning
Chronicle.

A severe contest is going on at &heater for
a Coroner of the county of Somerset; the candidates are
Mr, BARNARD, of Crewkerne, and Mr. As;maxi, of

Castle Cary.

On Saturday night the fog was so extremely
dense in the country, particularly between Dunstable and
Daventry, that coachmen, driving the night coaches, had
to use the utmost precaution for fear of accidents, so much
so, that many of them were under the necessity of employ-
ing men with torches to precede the leaders, which, of
course, occasioned considerable delay.

TUNNEL UNDER THE VISTULA,--We hear
from Warsaw that a project has been formed for the con-
struction of a Tunnel under the Vistula; this mode of
communication will be of the utmost utility, especiallyat
the times of the breaking up of the frosts, when all inter-
course is interrupted. The architect is a foreigner, and
has engaged to complete the work in the space of three
years.—Paris Paper.

TIIE•. LATE CA TASTROPII E: AT THE BRUNS-
wicK THEATRE.-The Committee appointed to assist in
the distributio❑ of the funds for the relief of the unfortunate
survivors, are indefatigable in their efforts to make an equi-
table distribution amongst the claimants. It has been
found, that it was the intention of the proprietors of the
theatre to discharge several of the workmen in the course
of the week after that on which the theatre fell. The
Committee accordingly put into effect this intention, after
having given the workmen a fortnight's salary each.