The Sun.
London, England, 1829-09-18 00:00:00

The Chronicle of this morning has the to

lowing :—" A private letter from Constanti-
nople, which we have seen, and which is of the
latest received date, repeats a statement which
has already appeared in our columns—namely,
that a direct application had been made to Ge-
neral DIEBITSCII, by the Diplomatic residents at
Constantinople, to suspend his advance upon
that capital. The letter states that the English
and French Ambassadors took a prominent part
in this unusual proceeding, and that their ex-
ample was followed by the other Envoys. We
repeat this intelligence, because doubts have
been thrown upon it ; and further, because it
comes from a person who must possess an un-
usual means of ascertaining the truth of the
statement, and who can have no inducement to
propagate a falsehood."

Now, if the above be true, and if General
DIEBITSCII will not suspend his advance, the
unwelcome secret will be out a little earlier than
was expected—that's all.

It is not a little surprising to observe the per-
tinacity with which opinions, whose absurdity
has been proved over and over again, are reiterated
from time to time, whenever occasion serves to
keep up popular prejudices. As an instance of
this, we cannot help noticing the endeavours of a
Morning Paper to persuade the working classes
to consider improvements in machinery as an
evil ; though from the outrage lately committed
on Mr. GURNEYS steam-carriage, and other
instances in the north, there seems little occasion
for excitement of the anger of mobs against be-
neficial inventions.

Few truths appear plainer than this—that any

machinery by whose aid commodities can be

produced cheaper than before, is a positive ad-
vantage to the consumers of those commodities;
or, in other words, to the nation at large, the
most numerous class of which is always the
labourers. Hence every new invention is, in

this point of view, a benefit, even to those who
complain that they are prevented by it from
earning so much as they could if the obnoxious

.nstrument had never been known.

It is, however, contrary to experience that
machinery causes a diminution of manual labour,
even in the very manufacture to which it is ap-
plied. The number of persons employed in the
cotton manufacture before the invention of spin-
ning-jennies and power-looms, bears no compari-
son with that of the immense population that now
subsist by it. The use of steam vessels has not
diminished the number of seamen to whom our
Foreign and Coasting Trade give bread. Nor
do we believe there is any one branch of industry

[n which human labour has not found its useful•

ness increasing in proportion as production has
been facilitated by mechanical inventions.
If machinery be really an evil, why are dis-
_

tinctions made between different kinds of it ?
Why are not the saw and plane of the carpenter
to be condemned as well as the power-loom of
the weaver ? Why are we thankful for the in-
vention of Printing ? an invention which places
in the strongest light the fallacy of imagining
that machinery abridges human industry, there
being at least five hundred times the number of
people now employed in the various processes
necessary to make books (considering books
merely as a manufacture) than there were when

the world was indebted for knowledge to the
copiers of manuscripts. Yet we have little doubt
that very many worthy transcribers looked with as
suspicious an eye upon the first printing presses,
as their posterity now do upon the power-looms.
The recommendation to the British manufac-

turers to let their enterprise and ingenuity remain
stationary, is peculiarly ridiculous at this time,
when it is notorious that remarkable exertions
arc making in France, the Netherlands, Germany,
and America, to improve their machinery, in the
hope of being one day supplied by their own
fabrics, to the exclusion of ours. However far

these endeavours may eventually prosper, we do
not take upon ourselves to predict, but if any
thing could effectually promote their success, it
would be the relaxation of that spirit of improve-
ment, which has hitherto led our manufacturers
to adopt every amelioration of their machinery
that ingenuity and science have placed within
their power.