The Sun.
London, England, 1844-10-18 00:00:00

SPIRIT of tb. PUBLIC JOURNALS.
FROM THE EVENING PAPERS OF THIS DAY.
GLOBE.—Louis Philippe has left the shores of
England amidst storm and tempest, but bearing with
him the cordial good wishes of the English nation.
Several reflections naturally arise out of this visit
to our shores of, indisputably, the most remarkable
amongst the Sovereigns of Europe. The advan-
tages of peace between the two nations is a point
hardly susceptible of additional demonstration, yet
this moral is pointed in an emphatic manner,
when a powerful and intelligent Monarch not
only proclaims such to be his personal con-
viction, but practically enforces it by his visit to our
Sovereign, and the abstraction of a week from his
multifarious avocations in his own country. It
could never be doubted that such an event would call
forth the bitter hostility of the Opposition press at
Paris, and causes would be at work to produce this
result. The King's presence here as the apostle
of conciliation and good-will between France
and England, provokes, naturally, the antago-
nism of a faction which trades on the excite-
ment of hostile feeling between these countries ;
and this is doubled by the leading member of the
Cabinet being the associate and witness of the Mo-
narch's polite attention to English deputations and
English topics of interest. This blind rage has made
the journals in question lose their accustomed bril-
liancy and point. Never have heavier articles been
penned than those which have appeared in the Op-
position journals of Paris, relative to the King's vi-
sit to this country; and we are bound, in fairness,
to admit that this quality is not usual. We feel
no respect for, or sympathy with, the journals in
question, yet it is idle to deny that their articles are
often ingenious, and sometimes brilliant ; there is
abundant talent perverted to faction for its object, and
using calumny and falsehood as its means. The King
conducted himself, while in this country, just as might
be expected from a knowledge of his character. Full,
no doubt, of bonhommie and unaffected kindness in
the domestic circle of our amiable Sovereign, on all
occasions in which he was brought into the presence
of representatives of English feeling, he expressed
with dignity and cordiality, yet not without a certain
appeal to effect inseparable from kingship, his wish
for the preservation of peace and good-will between
the two countries. Much has been said, by a weekly
Contemporary, on the good effects to Sovereigns them-
selves of such friendly intercourse. We are far from
dissenting from this, but we would rather dwell at
present on its influence on national feeling here and
in France. As to the first, no great change has
been wrought, because the English people were
prepared to honour and respect the guest of
their Queen, as an able and intelligent ruler
of the first continental' monarchy, and a firm
friend to peace; yet, still, a visit like that which has
just taken place, revives and concentrates these pre-
viously existing sentiments. We shall not easily
forget that a Monarch whose reputation is so essen-
tially European has been amongst us, declaring in
emphatic terms, his good-will towards our Sovereign
and nation. And to the numberless private circles,
of all ranks and degrees, which converge into the
large mass we call society, either by personal view
or the recitals of our journals, the King of
the French, from a distant abstraction, has be-
come a familiar idea. As to our neighbours them-
selves, if the visit of their Sovereign has roused in a
section (and we believe a great minority) of that
nation still deeper towards us, may we not
hope it will have the counterbalancing influence
of exciting amongst the more intelligent and libe-
ral, a wish to co-operate more zealously than
before in seconding the desire of their Monarch
to preserve the peace of Europe—a desire em-
bodying the common interests of both countries ?
And surely the interchange of courtesy that
has so cordially taken place between brave and dis-
tinguished officers in the naval service of both coun-
tries, cannot but aid this consummation. Now that
this distinguished Monarch has left our shores, and
the mind dwells more minutely on the peculiarities
of his individual career, the sight of this vigorous
man of 72, so full of energy of body and mind,
brings home to each one the great moral of the em-
ployment of time. How much work, in every sense
of the word, does the King of the French personally
go through! Even his night journeys, his replies
to deputations, the ground he has traversed, the num-
ber of persons he has seen, remind us that he is in con-
stant training for any demand on his energies. We
may, indeed, reflect, not without a feeling of pride,
that no nation is more capable of steady and even in-
tense application than our own. From the highest
grades of professional existence to the lowest of mecha-
nical labour, the English people are ready to do their
work, and do it right AI ell. Even these who have no
professional avocation display an energy, even in their
amusements, which astonishes foreigners. But no
where can be found an existence more ceaselessly
occupied about great interests than that of Louis
Philippe, and in this light he has the strongest claim
on the sympathies and tastes of our nation. No
where, indeed, can now be found the dilettanti Kings
and Queens that of old slumbered on the throne,
like an eastern idol in its temple. War, revolution,
the irresistible tide of public opinion, have replaced
them by a widely different race—and the world has
gained not a little by the change ; for instead of war
being the only vent for the misplaced energies of
royalty, they are now exerted in diffusing the bless-
ings of peace, by the development of industry and
commerce. The quietest monarchs now look about
them, and do their work ; and foremost in this rank,
foremost in age, and perhaps in the necessity imposed
by his position of unceasing application to business, is
he who received on Tuesday the adieus of the English
people at Dover.
STANDARD.—There is, we believe, no longer
any question of the fact that the Whigs are at this
moment engaged in negotiating the terms of a new
coalition with Mr. O'Connell, of which their adhe-
sion to Federalism is to form the basis. The- Irish
Whigs, Sharman Crawford and Lord Charlemont
included, are said to be taking the initiative in
the matter ; and a formal announcement of
their second compact with the repeal con-
vict, will, it is understood, make its appear-
ance in a few days. It cannot be doubted
that the intriguers of Lichfield House will, with a few
exceptions, become parties to an arrangement, be its
terms what they may, which may seem to offer them
the remotest prospect of a return to office. We are
assured, indeed, that the English Whigs had pro-
posed to throw themselves on Mr. O'Connell's mercy,
and accept whatever conditions he might be disposed
to offer them, even before the reversal of his judgment,
and we are induced to believe that the objects and
progress of the negotiation were well known to Lords
Denman, Cottenham, and Campbell, several months
ago. It cannot be denied that the condition of the
poor Whigs at the present moment is pitiable beyond
all comparison with any previous stage of their de-
cadence. The finances of the country are improving
with a rapidity which has exceeded the most san-
guine anticipattons of their successors; the chance
of a war with France is either wholly extinguished
or rendered so remote as to offer them no hope
of relief from such a contingency; trade and com-
merce have recovered from the depression into which
Whig measures had plunged them ; and even the
Anti-Corn-Law League, that ultima apes of their
cankered and deeply mortified faction, is all but
extinct. In addition to these calamities, Ireland
is more tranquil than it has been at any single
period during the last ten years ; and the
chief conspirator having . had his claws trimmed
and his incisors drawn, is reduced to the painful
necessity of adopting a comparative decency of
manner and language, as foreign as it must be
repugnant to his nature. 'What alternative, there-
fore, under such a complication of misfortunes, have
the Whigs left to them ? Beside, has not their patron
taken off the brand of " base, bloody, and brutal,"
which he hal affixed to their names, and declared
his gratitude to them for their indirect exertions in
his behalf during the last session of Parliament ?
Does lie not owe them his present "moral triumph ?"
Are they not his gaol deliverers ? Finally, have
they not sunk to the lowest stage of destitution, whe-
ther of character or influence—to that condition which
renders them fitting objects for the eleemosynary
aid they now seek at his hands—for the sake
of earning his patronage ? Let no man condemn
this last and most desperate expedient for keeping
their heads above water who has not maturely
considered the extenuating circumstances of
their case. Like begging-letter impostors who
having exhausted the charity of every name
upon their lists save one, that one the property
of a knave who has invaded their trade
and anticipated them in their impostures, have
nothing for it but to receive the rogue into their firm
upon his own terms, and practice their future
chicaneries in his company; content with such
hard fare (and hungry dogs, says the proverb, will
eat dirty pudding) as he may cast among them
from his wallet. This is no imaginative picture
of the present condition of this once formida-
ble body who, after having been accustomed to carry
on their " thimble rigs" on their own account, are
reduced to the painful extremity of having to divide
the profits of their ingenuity with a sharper who is
pretty sure to appropriate to himself the lion's
share. Bankrupts alike in character and influence,
hunted from expedient to expedient, and beaten
on their own arena by a swindler incomparably
more expert than themselves, what prospect had
they of being able to earn an honest living ?
When such dexterous knaves as Mr. O'Connell and his
Whig friends combine, the nuisance is no doubt a
formidable one ; but such alliances are rarely
entered into without imposing the necessity for in-
creased vigilance on the honester portion of the com-
munity. In the letter destined, ofcourse,
in question;
and a s the pr e-
face to the announcement of the coalition
and in which the Battle of Waterloo is described
as " the mere triumph of physical force, com-
bined with military organisation—a bloody