The Sun.
London, England, 1844-07-22 00:00:00

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LONDON, MONDAY, JULY 22, 1844.

. At length Ministers seem disposed to confer
something like a substantial boon on Ireland. They
have been a long time making up their mind to this
lainful necessity—for as such we fear they considered
it—but better late than never, and, though we cannot
say we entertain any unbounded gratitude for the
announcement of their intention to consider next
session the great question of Irish education, with
a view to frame some measure whose cordial
anti equitable spirit may render it palatable to
all parties, yet we cheerfully tender them our
thanks, and congratulate them on the novel fact
that they have, at lengh, evinced a disposi-
tion to substitute conciliation for the old Tory
system of coercion, of whose utter inefficiency they
must by this time be fully convinced. In reply to
au excellent speech by Mr. `NYSE, on the subject of
education in Ireland, Sir B. PEEL not only frankly
admitted many of the defects of which the Hon.
Meml,er for Waterford complained; but stated that
`!.. .abject was one which had already occupied the
• ~leration of Ministers, and to which the attention
!'ie new Viceroy, Lord HEYTESBURT, -would be
.mediately directed. The Bight Hon. Baronet .fur-
observed, that at an early period of next session,
• ~(•mment would be able to increase the
academical education, or finding their
unsuccessful, would givean intimation
r. il,at effect to Mr. WYSE, and leave
'urn an opportunity of working out his own views in
his own fashion. He added—and nothing could be
more satisfactory than his language on this occasion

—that " if there should be any failure on the part of
Ministers, it would not be from want of an honest
de-ire to supply the means of instruction to the people
of Ireland; and while on this subject he would take
the opportunity of stating that the attention of Go-
vernment would be directed also to the position of th 2
College of Maynooth, which he felt was not in
an efficient condition as regarded the amount
of the sums granted for it." This announcement
was received by a majority of the House with
marked approbation, Lord J. MANNERS, Mr. SHELL,
and Mr. BELLEW significantly remarking that they
hailed it as an earnest of a more consistent, pros-
perous, and enlightened line of policy towards Ireland
for the future. Of course, however, there were some
dissentients, and foremost among these dissatisfied
gentlemen was Mr. PLUMPTRE, who, true to the
cause of intolerance—a cause which, so long as he
continues a Member, will never want an advocate
in the House of Commons—expressed his discontent
at the Premier's liberal announcement, adding that,
OAs he professed to be a Protestant, he professed
also to consider Protestantism something more than
a name, and he ought not to be called on to favour
and encourage principles which he detested and ab-
jured." No one calls on Mr. PLUMPTRE to favour
principles which he so ostentatiously tells us he " de-
tests and abjures ;" he is neither asked to go to mass,
attend confession, worship the saints, nor kiss the
Pope's great toe, whenever accident or inclination
leads him to Rome ; he is left in. the full and uncon-
trolled enjoyment of his Protestant bigotry, and may
cleave to the Thirty-nine Articles with what tenacity
he pleases; no one—certainly not Sir ROBERT PEEL
—will presume to interfere with his conscientious,
but somewhat stupid, prejudices and predilections;
all he is called on to do, is to assist in giving fair play
to Ireland, and in helping forward the great question of
her social and political improvement by means of such
a system of popular instruction as may be adapted to
the wants of the masses of the Irish population who,
at present, are in the most deplorable state of igno-
rance it is possible to conceive. Surely there is
nothing here irreconcilable with the duties and
convictions of a devout Protestant ! Even CANTUAR
himself, the supreme head of the Establishment, may
congratulate the Premier on his announcement with-
out the slightest impeachment of his orthodoxy. We
are not without our apprehensions, however, that the
High Church party, which is ever jealously
on the watch against any encroachment, or
fancied encroachment on its prerogative, will
take fright at Sir R. PEEL'S public mention of tl e
ardent wish of himself and his colleagues to promote
the important—we might add, the sacred—cause of
Irish education ; and, with that inveterate obstinacy
which seems engrained into its very nature, will take
every opportunity of throwing all sorts of vexatious
obstacles in his way. But the Premier, we hope
and believe, will not allow himself to be scared
from the broad path of duty by the remonstrances
and clamours of bigots. Having voluntarily offered to
do all in his power to promote the question of educa-
tion in Ireland, he will see the absolute necessity of
pressing it forward to a successful issue, and not dis-
appointing the expectations of those whom his an -
nouncement has filled with delight. All enlightened
men will be with him on the question, and every
sincere well-wisher to the interests of the sister-
country will give him full credit for the wisdom—
the liberality—the kind and conciliatory spirit that
have dictated his views on the subject.

The debate on Mr. M. GIBSON'S motion of Friday
night, on the subject of incendiarism in Suffolk,
Norfolk, Essex and Cambridge, afforded another ex
ample of the narrow and contracted spirit which
directs the votes of the House of Commons, under the
leadership of Sir R. PEEL. That House will not

legislate, it seems, on grounds so unparliamentary as
the admitted existence of a fearful system of criminal
outrage, tending to the destruction of property and life
—widely spread—and in active operation over a vast
extent of agricultural district. This is not case enough
for putting in motion those precautionary processes of
inquiry and prevention, which must have resulted
from the appointment by her MAJESTY of a " Com-
mission to inquire into the condition of the agri-
cultural labourers in those counties, and to ascertain
the nature of the grievances under which they
labour." The motion for this Commission—founded
on an allegation " that there is reason to believe
that the incendiarism which has prevailed for
some time in Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, and
Cambridgeshire, is caused by deep discontent
among the labouring population of those coun-
ties"—that motion was lost by a majority
of 89 (there being for it, Ayes 41, Noes 130.) At
the amount of the majority we are not so much sur-
prised, for it is about the average maximum of the
Government's numerical superiority on divisions;
but at the paucity of the supporters which such a
motion could array against the compacter and larger
phalanx of its opponents, we are at once astonished
and ashamed. Liberal Members of all shades of
political opinions were bound to have assembled, in
order to affirm a proposition based on the clearest
principles of humanity and common sense,—in
greater force than an aggregate handful of 41.
The contemplation of their weakness seems to
have emboldened Sir JAMES GRAHAM to indulge
in his favourite propensity of reading lectures
to all who venture to doubt of the wisdom, the effi-
ciency, the benevolence, the paternal character of the
home administration of her MAJESTY'S Government:
Poor Sir JAMES, who has passed this session through
so many phases of Ministerial declension, is becoming
somewhat maudlin in his captiousness. Before the
Post-office exposures he was simply disagreeable. His
obstinacy was constitutional (physically speaking, we
mean). His crafty and insidious way of stealing a
march upon the House whenever it was practicable
to do so, in advancing some unpopular measure a
stage or two, was only the natural development of
his characteristic tendencies. He is a born stra-
tegist ; and, like the " Nature" which was the
presiding Divinity over the worship of " Capability
BROWN,"—that planner of parks and wildernesses,—
he " abhors a straight line." His contrasted affecta-
tion and arrogance of manner, half lisp and half
rudeness, was deplored only by his friends; it was
a source of amusement to his enemies. But
ever since the night on which he was reduced
to the hard necessity of imploring a Committee
—a Secret Committee—of Inquiry into his
own conduct, the bearing of the GRZEME
of Netherby has become strangely altered.
He is querulous, deprecatory, didactic. He
relies for his escape out of perplexing ques-
tions or unwelcome reminiscences, arising out of
the current debate, on appeals of the most grave but
delicate nature, to the prudential consideration of the
old Members ; or he throws himself in his blandest
and most dexterous manner on the "generous cour-
tesy" of the young ones. He is eager to persuade
each of the one hundred and ninety and nine antago-
nists of his scheme for the amendment of the New
Poor-law that he has " prepared a clause " to em-
body the views or remove the objections that form
the ground of the intended opposition. And he talks
so complacently of the implicit deference which he
pays in all things to "his high sense of public duty,''
that one is compelled to suppose he has at last wrought
himself into a delusive conviction of that apo-
cryphal fact.
Let us see what were the cirumstances under which
Mr. GIBSON'S motion was brought forward ; and
what was the alarm-cry so successfully raised by Sir
JAMES GRAHAM and his colleagues as to lead to its
rejection.

Mr. GIBSON relied, very mainly, on this strong
avowal by Sir HENRY BANBURY, a gentleman of
eminent distinction in Suffolk, where his family have
long been settled—" I must avow my conviction that
these incendiary crimes are symptoms of a smoulder-
ing and dangerous discontent"—and in the language
of a letter addressed by the Hon. and Rev. GoDoL-
PIIIN 9SBORNE to the Duke of RICHMOND, Mr. GIB-
SON said—

" The writer stated, that a deputation of landowners
and tenant-farmers had recently waited upon his Grace
to apprise hin of the dangers by which they were threat-
ened ; but that there was not at that meeting a repre-
sentative of the agricultural labourers. The Rev. writer
then proceeded to say, that if the Noble Duke and those
in g Similar position bestowed upon the condition of the
labourer" half the attention they had given to the land-
lord and the tesi.".4lt question, or to the improvement of
their cattle, he beliec.7l--they would arrive at the same
conclusion with himself—that "_'re was no one oreature
belonging to the farmers—there was noi,aal tit,eY
reared for use or for sale—that had been the subjet.
so much neglect as the agricultural labourer.—(llear;
hear.) The Rev. Gentleman requested the Noble Duke
and his fellow-landowners to compare the way in which-