The Sun.
London, England, 1829-05-23 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF fIIE LONDON JOURNALS.

Dr. Samuel Birch, " late President of Sion Cel-
lege," has written a somewhat intemperate letter in
an Evening Paper, on the subject of the ancient re-
cords appertaining to the Scotch Kirk, now detained
in that College, and, as it appears to us, of no use
to any one. The Doctor has not got a very logical
bad, for he says that " he feels it right to conira-
d-L't thus publicly the misrepresentations which the
Gelter.,l Assembly of the Church of Scotland have
stuitiously set forth to answer their own purpose ;"
whereas the Doctor only argues against their state-
ment, as thus—that if the papers are theirs, they
lave their legal remedy, &c. &c. But to argue
against hypothetically, is rtit to contradict Neither
is it Sc easy a course to adopt a legal remedy us the
Doctor imagines. It was perhaps deemed less
trn,,blesnme to endeavour to shame the Governors
of Sion College out of the farther retention of the
papr,,,- by mentioning the matter in Parliament,
than to prosecute a Chancery suit. We would ad-
vise the people of Sion College, if Dr. Birch be no
longer their President, not to take him as there ad-
viser ; for if they do, they will he-SUre to be led into
:4crape, by one who cannot speak of the property
of these papers without upbraiding the whole Scotch
mat ion wi:h that " love of money which once pre-
vailed to the selling of an unfortunate King."4—'.
Times.

fHE KIRK of SCOTLAND and SION COLLEGE.

(From an Evening Paper.)

Sia,—The General Assembly of the Church of Scot-
land having authorised a statement to be pulkshed relative
to certain ancient records thereof, depoaired in Sion Col-
lege, and having applied to Parliament on the subject, I
f,el it right to contradict, thus publicly, the misrepresenta-
tion which, in both cases, they have studiously set forth,
to answer their own purpose.
They a.surne two thines, both of which remain to be
proved ; first, that these ancient records were the original
property of the kirk ; next, that they came dishonestly
into the possession of Archibald Campbell, the-donor of
them to Sion College. In regard to the first, if theysare
lent on establishing that point, they have their legal re-
medy, without calling on-Parliament preposterously to do
t: at for them which, by means of the law of the land, they
ouzla to do for themselves.

fa regard to the other, it must surely be thought that
the General Assembly of that day recognized Mr. Camp-
right of possession, when they condescended to treat
with him for the purchase of the records, and the nego-
ciation was only broken
.Off by that love of money which
once prevailed to the selling of an unfortunate king, but
would not allow them to buy the records of their own
kirk. II id Mr. Campbell come improperly by them, how
cam• thy to abandon all legal attempt to recover them,
and to suffer him to escape unprosecuted.
It remiins to Le seen whether Parliament will interfere
to determine a right which an ordinary court of law might
settie, and to give away property which the par:ies claim-
int*, onlv found it too dear to purchase.
. . .

-
1 am satisfied of this, that Parliament cannot justly in-
terfere; that the kick have no claim whatever to these
records; that they were not dishonestly obtained nor dis-
honourably withheld, aed that the governors of Sion
(7,olege would not morally be justified in either giving
them up or in allowing copies or collations to be made
with the partial ,blireviates in possessive of the kirk.

SAMUEL BIRCH, D D.,
Late President of Sion Coliege.

The preposition to increase the salaries of the
Scotch Judges was very properly withdrawn by
Mr. Peel on Thursday- evening. We mean to cast
no refh-ction on those eminent persons, trot we argue
generally, from the present state of the country, that
whilst we are endeavouring to accommodate our-
selves to a more solid, bat less abundant circulation,
it would be preposterous to increase the salaries of
any public functionaries whatever. All such ought
rather to look to a diminution than an augmentation,
and to an extension also of the plan of retrenchment ;
so that the nation may be left at ease, though the
illoney for conducting its internal concerns be less in
quantity than was the case before cash payments
were resumed and small notes called in. The refusal
to augment the salaries of the Scotch Judges ought
to draw back those of the English Judges to their
told amount : as the precedent of 1826 cannot be
followed throughout, it ought to be reversed. We
might hope, too, that economy will be practised in
the changes about to be introduced in the Court of
Chancery. Government should look to the nation
as not likely to be able to supply great and numerous
salaries, is e will not say out of exhausted means, but
out of a narrowed circulation. The interest on the
debt we cannot diminish honestly, except is so far
as we reduce the capital ; but we may reduce our
expenditure, and we should keep our eye fixed upon
that state of things which existed in the year 1792.
From thence we came out, and thither we ought to
return. The speech a the old Lord Chancellor on
Lord Lyndhurst's Bill was interesting; yet few will
he cons ineed by his Lordship's argument, that as
there'have always been delays in Chancery, there
always must be such. The proceedings in the other
Courts were once much more dilatory titan at pre-
sent ; but legislative enactments have quickened their
pace.—lbid.
In the House of Lords last night, the Privileges
or the Corporation of the City of London were the
subject of discussion. In the Common Council on
Thursday, high ground was taken ; but there is
nothing like knowing both sides. Lord Durham
observed, the order for the production of Accounts
of the Rereires and Expenditure of the City was
made "in consequence of an application from the
Corporation for funds, because it was incapable of
carrying into execution the engagement it hadC
entered into in 1823, to complete London Bridge
and its approaches, and now it came to Parliament
to ask for one million more. The Bill stated in the
preamble, that the City had no funds to carry into
execution its engagements, and it was, therefore,
right then to move for Accounts to prove the want
of funds The City was not

e,asued before Parliament ; but it can-le before
Rit11,..--lent to ask a favour; it forced itself on
the „„,1„‘-rittion of Parliament, by asking for an
additional rm;,lion of money, to enable it to bnild
London Bridge.- It complained, when it asked this,
of being in a state of bankruptcy, which ought to
he proved betke the grant was sanctioned." Seveml
other Peers considered the prtneedinci°s of the Cor-
poration of the City very unjustifiable. Lord lialmes_
bitry observed, " that the City had come to their
Lordships in forma panperis, and requested permis-
sion from them to tax the public to the extent of
60,000/.a year for a period perhaps of thirty or forty
years ; and it was at the least necessary to show
that they had not funds to answer the expcnue in
any other way than by means of this Nil, which
they nov,- called on the House to pass." Lord
Lonsdaie " considered the proceeding of the City
the most extrath7flinary he had ever heard of." It
strikes us that the Corporation would have acted
more prudently in reserving the assertion of their
right to give no account of the manner in which
they administer their property to a more fitting oc,
casion. The stoutest stickler for Corporation privi-
leges will hardly pretend that Corporations, with
regard to their property, are more. absolute than
private individuals; but when private individuids
alaproach the Legislature for aid, it never occurs to
cleat that they ought not to disclose the state of
t heir affairs.-3forning Chronicle. - . •
•

When we asserted in our number of Thursday,
that the impartiality professed by the Government
on the question of Mr. O'Connell's right to .sit for
Clare was more in semblance than reality, we spoke
advisedly ; and when we asserted that exertions
were made in certain quarters to ensure the presence
of the avowed opponents of the claim, we spoke from
direct personal knowledge of the fact. We admit that
the declaration made by the Secretary for the Home
Deprtmeut, that the usual Ministerial Circulars
( which enjoin and secure the attendance of all offi-
cial and all expectant Members; of all Placemen is
esse, and all Placemen in posse), were not issued, is
perlectly true—that would have been too undis-
guised an avowal of the feeling which it was de-
sirable to conceal—or, to avail ourselves of a hack-
neyed but intelligible expression—such a step would
have been too bad. Bnt we must once more repeat,
that certain skilful and cautious veterans in Parlia-
mentary tactics—nun too sagacious to mistake the

inclinations of the Dii majorum Genlium, and too
wary to act without a moral certainty that their ac-
tion was in conformity with those inclinations—lid;
by word and deed, press the necessity of securing
what they called an overwhelming majority in ev6y
quarter which they thought accessible to their in.- •
fluence or their arguments. We must also repeat,
that we know that to an application made to the
usual quarter, by a Member of a Ducal Family,
havot,r; a seat in the House, for an opportunity of ,
pairing off, a refusal was given, although common
Parliamentary and official courtesy makes a negative ,
in such a case a matter of rare occurrence.--Ibid.
A discussion of more warmth than usual on the
subjtct of the grant to Maynooth College took I
place last night. Lord Mandeville, who is a saint of
the first order, thought " if they persisted in such a
course as voting money for the distiemination of the
principles of a religion which they:declared to be
founded in error, they would Erring down the wrath
of God on themselves and the whole country."—
His
Lordship seems to tte. quite familiar with the
councils of Heaven. \Vlmat an idea his Lot dship has
of the Almighty ! It may or it may not be right to
vote money for._ ;Maynooth College; but because
two or three hundred individuals, possessed of po- !
litical power, choose to vote 8 or 9,009/. a-year
for a particular religion, the Divine vengeance is to
overtake twenty millions of people, who cannot I
prevent the grant except by incniring the guilt of
rebellion ! There is a very happy exposure quoted
by Bale, from St. Ambrose, of the bai reasoning
of a Roman Priest, when Rome was Pagan, who
contended, like Lot d Mandeville, that If any one
listened to the Christian doctrine, this city would
be destroyed by-a judgment of Heaven. - Bigots of
all ages are the same !—lbid.

The Common Council of the City of Landon ap-
pear to be in a dilemma. The House of Lords have
ordered them to produce their accounti—they re-
fuse, and plead,- in bar to the production of the ac-
counts, their privileges: we hope, however, that
the House of Lords will compel them to produce
their accounts; and we hope that the House of
Lords will at the sane time tell the Common,Coun-
cil that it does not care one farthing for the city of
London privileges. 'This Corporation, like all the
Corporations in the country, is a great nuisance and
ought to be abated.. We hope the Parhameet will
get rid of all Corpoiate privileges, as they are called,
in all parts of the country. Let any one, only for a
moment, consider that a man cannot becomes trader
within the City walls, but he is liable to be called
upon to become what is called free of sonic hum-
bug Company, and for that freedom he must pay
from 50/. to 100/. We call this robbery, azd yet
the Common Councilmen, at the Common-hall,
where so much dull trash is continually beii spoken,
talk of the freedom of trade, liberty, &c. The lan-
guage of the Scripture ought to be applied to them,
" o unto ye, hypocrite 4 I" to talk of the' freedom
of trade—of the free importation of corn—of liberty,
&c., and, before you allow a man the freedom of
keeping a shop within the City walls, you rob him
of 50/. or 100/., and nick-name him Pin-maker or a
Fishmonger. We hope that Smithfield Market
will be removed in spite cf Alderman Wood's talk
to the contrary.—ihlorniug Herald.