The Sun.
London, England, 1842-04-21 00:00:00

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LONDON':
THURSDAY MORNING, APRIL 21, 1842.

It would not be worth while noticing the Earl of
RIPON'S self-contradictions, were it not that we trace
w ith more certainty the principles of a system, when
their consequences are brunted out by a weak, than
witen they are carefully elaborated, guarded, and
mystified by a cunning man. The Cabinet are about
to perpetrate a series of new and mischievous enact-
mint:,, and they have assigned, to justify these
enactments, a great variety of contradictory
reasons. Neither in Parliament, nor in the press,
is there that homogenity of argument which dis-
tinguishes a sincere conviction, and even their own
supporters acknowledge themselves, by the variety
of contradictory reasons, to be stunned and be-
wildered.

Of the general contradictions which perrade the
Tory r.rguments, we shall quote the Earl of IhroN's
observations, which would otherwise be wholly un-
worthy of notice, as a specinlen. He began his
speech on Monday evening by admitting that the
system of free trade was " kiwi, considerate, and
charitable ;" but he objected -to, this system that
it would make England dependent for corn on foreign
countries. He then went on to show at considerable
lenth, and with -much statistical information, that
there were no foreign countries from which we could
get any great supply of corn. He would not have a
free trade in corn, therefOre, because that would
reduce us to a state of dependence on foreign
nations for corn, and next, because we could
not • get any great quantity from them. If we
could- get no great quantity of corn from them
'WC 001411 not possibly become dependent on them for
a large quantity, and the Noble Earl, therefore, com-
pletely answered the only objection he made to adopt-
ing a system which he called " kind, considerate, and
charitable," and which has the higher recommenda-
tion of being just. If any man in common life had,
with this sort of Irish dexterity, sawed off the head of
his own argument, and let himself flop down in the
mire, he would have been laughed at as an egregious
ass ; but Lord RIPON'S contradictions passed in the
House of Peers for wisdom.

The Duke of WELLINGTON, to take a far higher
example, began his speech on Tuesday evening by
declaring that " there could be no doubt, as an abstract
proposition, that no duty ought to be laid on the food
of the people. Now an abstract proposition means a
proposition divested of all party and factious colouring
of either time or place. It is the essence of truth,
deduced from all experience and purified from all
passion ; vet the Duke of WELLINGTON cannot act
on such a solemn principle, because Viscount MEL-
uoURNE thought that there should be some protec-
tion to agriculture. He avowedly prefers his own
imaginings to deductions of long experience as the
basis of law. For him this proposition is true, and
it is not true. He says it is undoubtedly true, but
at the same time ha shows, from a variety of supposi-
tions, that it cannot be true, and he concludes that
by his law the truth must be overruled.
Turning from the Lords to the Commons, we find
Lord STANLEY, in the early part of Tuesday even-
ing, recommenaling all " emigrants to place them-
selves under the Government agents," and be guided
by them; and we find Sir ROBERT PEEL, in the lat-
ter part of the evening, recommending all people to
rely on their better discretion. He delivered this very
important, but, to the whole Tory scheme, most con-
tradictory truth :
I have not the slightest doubt that there are frauds
committed in manufactures—l have not the least doubt
of it ; and so long as the world exists, there will be
fraud, there will be dishonesty, and no laws which you
can pass will be sufficient to prevent it.—(Hear, hear.)
The security you have against fraud is in free compe-
tition, and in the preference which, in the long run, the
honest dealer -sill have over the fraudulent. Precautions
of this kind, when taken against fraud, very often defeat
themselves. The party who buys the article relaxes in
that natural vigilance and circumspection which he ought
always to exercise.--(Hear, hear.) When I first went
to Ireland I found that there had been frauds in the
butter trade. A butter-taster was then appointed • not
a firkin was allowed to o out until it ba.l first 'been

tasted, and there was then a stamp placed upon it to show
that it was genuine.—(Laughter.) People then bought I
the butter, taking its quality for granted, because it had
been submitted to the butter-taster. The consequence
was, that frauds were practised to a greater extent than
they had ever been practised before. because there was a
general absence of that caution and vigilance which had
been previously exercised.—(Hear, hear.) Depend upon
it the natural interest of the purchaser is the great secu-
rity against fraud, and another security is that integrity
and honesty all in the long run, both with respect to the
home consumer and the foreign consumer, ultimately sell
the cheapest article, and secure the greatest profit.
There is enough in that paragraph to upset not
only Tory policy, but all Government. If the laws
of the most skilful legislator cannot prevent fraud, why
make laws at all, seeing that they are not good, but
evil per se, and only defensible because they do pre-
vent frauds. It is no benefit' to society to hang or
imprison a man if it do not prevent crimes. Sir
ROBERT PEEL has a better mode of preventing
fraud than laws—" free competition," but at fnis
time he is framing and forcing through Parlia-
ment laws to prevent free competition in grain,
and, therefore, to encourage fraud. Theu he gives an
admirable example, and illustrates it very happily by
his own knowledge—not by a theory—of the vast in-
jury which is done to the people by substituting pro-
tecting laws for their own edscretion and for general
competition, yet, he acts in the teeth of his own prin-
ciple. Lord STANLEY would have the people rely on
the Government. Sir R. PEEL, with a true Radical
spirit, tells them to rely on themselves. The:inan
who would not substitute a butter-taster fo: individual
caution, who tells the House of Com:;nons to rely on
the " natural interest of the purchaser," is not the
man to carry out, with sincerity and consistency, the
protecting and restrictive system he has taken in hand.

After Sir R. PEEL had dP:iivered this true and im-
portant sentence he said i:—
Now I cannot conce;_ve anything so bad as the conduct
of the master, who, -in violation of the law, abuses the
power which he tas over his workmen, by compelling
those workmen. to buy of him inferior articles at the full
price. I 13.,;ieve you will find that that practice exists ;
and I F.st say that I cannot conceive a more unwar-
rantai'de abuse of power.
);tre differ from Sir R. PEEL, in being able to con-
I ceive something worse than this conduct. The truck-
master only commits a petty, however detestable
fraud, in common with many thousands; but the
Minister of a great nation, who derceives all classes,
who is double-tongued, who cheats the public
both by his silence and his words, who sacri-
fices mankind to his party purposes, who
invents fallacies to disguise the oppression of
which he is only the instrument, whose acts are con-
trary to his own convictions, who, in support of the
in,ustice which places him a its head, denies in Par-
-1 liament the dictates of his head and the feelings of his
heart, who, knowing better, consents to be the
means, for the poor bribe of office, of inflicting
injury and degradation on the people, who
while he expatiates on the advantages of competition,
makes himself the tool of monopolists, is a far worse
wan than the truck-master.

And now let us conclude by a remark on the
system which is upheld by such men and such con-
tradictions. That a great system of delusion should
be maintained for years when its foundations are laid
in the spiritual hopes and fears of man, when it is
shrouded in mystery and carefully guarded from in-
quiry, when an immense army of men have an in-
terest in maintaining it, and have vast funds at stake,
which they use for the purpose of promoting delusion,
and which they will lose when the delusion is at an
end, is consonant to experience in every age of the
world ; but that a system of delusion should be long
maintained, which refers wholly and exclusively to the
gross interests of this world, which courts inquiry, and
cannot escape investigation, which is surrounded by
sharp critics, eager to detect and exaggerate all its
vices, which is daily felt in the business and pockets
of men,—that such a system should be long
maintained after its admirers have lifted its
foundations, and loosened all its holdfasts,
is not consonant to experience, and should it take
place will be a new and memorable lesson for man-
kind. Prophecies of revolution realise themselves.
The conception and the utterance of such a thought,
bhows that the reverence is at an end on which
alone human institutions repose in safety. When
we find such language in common use—when we
see that the system, as now carried on, is a great mass
of falsehood and delusion, and when we see it daily
exposed to a fierce investigation, we join with others
in saying that its end cannot be far off. In the midst
of life we are in death, and the Tories will find that
in the midst of victory they will be everlastingly
crushed by their own errors and contradictions.

It will be seen by our extract from the Manchester
Guardian that the increased activity in the Cotton
Market of Liverpool, which was obviously mere spe-
culation, and perhaps diseased speculation, has had no
influence on the Manchester Markets. Our advises
from that quarter, we regret to say, come more and
more gloomy. Trade, far from improving, becomes
worse, and less and less wages are paid, we are told,
from week to week.

Sir ROBERT PEEL'S tariff, whatever good it may
ultimately do, and we hope but little from it, has
hitherto, by adding uncertainty to stagnation, only in-
creased distress. It has unsettled those trades which
were doing something, and has not put into activity
those which were before lying still.
The Income-tax, however advantageous or even
necessary to the Government, cann et, it is quite clear,
relieve the people ; and it may, perhaps, by pressing
heavily on the struggling traders, be that straw which
breaks the overburdened camel's back. Let them
receive relief, therefore, before they have to bear
additional pressure.

If. Sir RO!IERT PEEL, and his great majority, have
a spark cf patriotism left in ther whole composition,
if they be not the selfish incarnation of party spirit,
they should forego, for the present, their plan of in-
creasing the revenue of the Government and the bur-
dens of the people, and bend their exertions to relieve
the public distress. He says, the tariff will have that
effect. His Corn-law is nearly through the House
of Lords. The Income-tax, though a part of his whole
scheme, is not so closely connected with the Corn-
law as the tariff, and it would seem better for the
public, therefore, and more consistent with principle,
that he should hasten to pass the tariff, setting at rest
commercial inquietude, than that he should hasten to
hurry on the Income-tax.

His majority is commanding, and he can have no
fear that his Income-tax Bill should fail. In fact, to
pass the tariff would soften the opposition to the In-
come-tax, and ultimately hasten its success. More-
over, as the tax is to be levied from April, it will be of
no consequence, now that the public is adver-
tised of the fact, whether the Bill receive the
Royal Assent on the 20th of June or the
20th of May, while it is, on Sir ROBERT PEEL'S
showing, and the showing of his friends, the city
merchants, of much consequence, that the tariff should
be, as soon as possible, carried through Parliament.
For these reasons, we trust that the Members of the
House of Commons will press on Sir R. PEEL the
propriety of proceeding first and immediately with
the tariff; and we trust that he—leaving the discus-
sions on the Income-tax Bill in Committee till after the
tariff has been finally disposed of—will proceed at once
to re-fasten the trade he has universally cast adrift.

The Corsican bandit Orsini was taken on the Ist
instant. He was met near Campile by a voltigeur, who seized
him. Orsini defended himself and made a desperate resistance,
but, seeing four men coming up, he relinquished the contest,
and fled. He was, however, so exhausted by the struggle, that
he was overtaken, and secured at the moment he was on the
point of plunging int" a ravine, where it would have almost
been hopeless to follow him.

A RUNAWAY ENGINE.—A circumstance occurred
at the Yatton station on the Bristol and Exeter Railway, on
Saturday last, which fortunately ended without any serious
consequences. The first morning dovrn-train, which is both a
passengers' and goods' train, having stopped at the above sta-
tion, was detached from the engine for the purpose of placing
on another luggage waggon, when, no doubt very imprudently,
the engineers left their situations, and by some unforeseen
cause the steam got up, and off the engine started without
control. As may be imagined, the greatest consternation pre-
vailed down the line at seeing the engine passing at a most
furious rate, without ary one on it ; but fortunately, about a
mile before it reached Bridgewater, the steam was exhausted,
and there it stopped. Immediately on its being known at the
Bristol station, an express engine, with a number of hands, was
sent off, but happily their services were not required. —lfeene's
Bath Journal.

While an itinerant company were, a few clays ago,
performing the Tour de Able at Sermaize, in the Marne, at
the point when Buridan in his dungeon inquires of Margaret
of Burgundy what she had done w►th his two children, the
actress who appeared in the character of the Princess sud-
denly seated herself on the bed of the prisoner, and uttered
piercing cries, having been taken in labour of her seventh
child. Buridan received her in his arms ; Orsini :et down the
curtain, and dismissed the audience, entreating their indulgence.
A midwife, who was one of the audience, hurried round to
render her asistance to the distressed Margaret, who was
noon lately delivered of a fine boy.