The Sun.
London, England, 1829-08-24 00:00:00

SPIILIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

A letter which appeared in our paper of
Friday having assigned as a reason for the recent
change in the French Ministry a misunderstand-
ing between the Court and the late Cabinet, re-
specting the publication in France of the Pope's
bull of jubilee, or his " encyclic letter," we have
thought proper to insert in another column the.
most remarkable passages 'of the latter document.
At the same time we are bound to say, that we
do not agree with our correspondent in ascrib,
ing, either to the bull of the Pope, or to the
bigotry of the Bourbons, such a sudden and
complete revolution in the councils of France.
The Pope may be allowed to have had just about
the same influence in this affair as the Grand
Turk or Prince Metternich ; but though the
Liberals represent the change as a " jubilee" to
all three, we do not believe that any of them
could claim the merit of bringing it about. Had
the clergy of France, acted upon by Rome, pos-
sessed the power of turning out a Ministry, they
would have exercised it on the occasion of the
famous ordinances of last year for suppressing
the Jesuits, and regulating ecclesiastical semi-
twits. A great part of the French prelacy, with
two Cardinals at their head, protested against
these measures, and several Bishops even re-
fused to be instrumental in carrying one of
thn regulations into effect; yet the Court
was not terrified into submission, nor induced
in a panic to throw its obnoxious councillors
overboard. The late bull and encyclic !cur—
proceeding as they do from a Pope selected by
the French Court, and addressed in such strains
of panegyric by its liberal representative M. de
Chateaubriand—could not have the effect of
turning out a Police Magistrate. The ;titer in
question, though high in words in proportion as
its author's power has declined, could have oc-
casioned no difficulty whatever. It is addressed
to the prelates of the Catholic church indivi-
dually, and deals only in general recommenda-
tions of which the Government may prevent the
publication, or interrupt the execution, as it
pleases. Neither do we believe that the resolu-
tion of Charles X. was so sudden—whatever
was its motive—as our correspondent represent-
ed That a change was intended befbre or at
the toncluSion of the Session, was evident by
the repeated visits of Prince Po!ignac to Paris,
and his presence in the French capital when that
event occurred. The Royal decree for closing
the sittings of the Chamber is dated the 31st of
July ; the Royal ordinance for appointing the
new Ministry appeared in the Moniteur on the
9th of August. The Pope had nothing to do
with these dates.—Times.

A contemporary (the Examiner), with re-
ference to a recent case between a clergyman
and a. Nobleman, observes, " That there is not
ik civilized country in the wodd, in which so
much security is owing to the goodness of hu-
man nature, and so little to the wisdom of social
polity, as in England. The power to oppress
is immense, and possessed by a vast number o.
hands; but the abuse is held in check by a
knowledge of the activity of men's sympathies,
and the consequent apprehension of public opi-
nion. Government with us has so far wan-
dered from its end that it has become, for the
most part, merely a piece of machinery, for the
maintenance of the Oligarchy. It taxes the
people, supports the Aristocracy, under various
false pretences, and leaves the masa of the com-
munity to provide for their own security in
their own way. To afford justice, to protect
men against the rapine or malignity of men, is
the grand object of Government ; but it is
only accomplished to a partial degree, and
most benefits those who need it least. The
strong are sufficiently armed against the strong,
and still more so against the weak ; and
for the weak, they are left absolutely without
remedy or hope, save in the forbearance of
humanity." We remember reading in the agree-
able and ingenious book on Italy, by the Presi-
dent Dupaty, an enumeration of the advantages
derived by the modern Romans from the utter
woahlessness of the administrators of the law.
The law, said this Judge, has in every country,
been made by the rich, with the view of adding
to their superiority over the poor. When the
poor man goes to law with the rich man, he is
sure to be a sufferer. But in Rome the law is
so bad that the poor man is not so stupid as to
appea' to it ; he takes justice into his own hands ;
and the rich man being more afraid of a knife
than the law, is cautious how far he provokes an
appeal to the lex talionis. He endeavours in
this way to account for the great, comparative in-
dependence, of the low Romans and Italians in
general. If the reasoning of this Judge he any-
thing near the mark, the lower orders of English
ought to be peculiarly independent, for they are
( except in a few districts and tile great towns, where
there are courts of conscience) utterly without the
pale of the law. We have heard from gentlemen
constantly resident in the country statements
which go some Way to show that the opinion of
the President, paradoxical as it may seem, is not
without colour. What they say is, the great
mass of the pecyle in the country cannot be
reached by the law. A labourer is a pauper in
the first place, and, consequently, he cannot be
touched in his purse, a powerful means of actin,'
on the lower orders when they possess a little"
property. Then there is no punishtnent, ex-
cept in capital cases, which is not a luxury to
them. Having thus nothing to lose, and being
beyond the reach of suffering, they are, to a
certain extent, independent.. A very intelligent
gentleman, who resides constantly in the coun-
try, assured us that a feeling among those of
his class that their property is at the mercy
of the poor, and that their best protection
is the good feeling between them and the
poor, naturally prompts them to be on good
terms with their neighbours. When a rich
man commits a labourer for some offence, lie
returns to the neighbourhood, after an imprison-
ment in the county gaol of a quarter or half-a-year
disposed to make his prosecutor sufkr, which
inclination he has many opportunities of gratify-
ing with impunity. So mach for the rich and
poor in England. It has been often remarked
that extremes beget extremes. From the bosom
of corruption, appears new life. Oppression too
carries with it its remedy. It is fortunate that
there is thus some limit in the nature of things to
the dominion of evil. The instance alluded to
by our contemporary, as a proof of what a rich
man can do in this country by means of law, when
lie chooses to set opinion at deflance, may enable
those whose imaginations are not active to form
some idea of what those who displease our Aris-
tocratical Governors of Colonies, who trust for
impunity to their family influence at home, have
to suffer from these beings when they happen to
takeLk:l4;la 111 tormenting. their victims. • We

could tell some well-authenticated cases of an
ingenuity in tormenting, almost super-human, of
one who was at the head of a Colony, which
would startle our readers.—Morning Cbron.
It has become very much the practice, of late
years, for landlords at their audits, to return so
much per cent. to their tenants—sometimes 10,
sometimes 15, and not unfrequently even 25 per
cent; Nothing can prove more forcibly than
this practice that the rents of farms arc too high,
and that the landlords admit them to be beyond
the cabability of the tenant to pay. Rent should
bear an equitable proportion to the prices of
agricultural produce. In the war, when those
prices were high, the landlords raised the rents,
and now that the prices are low they refuse to
make a proportionate reduction. They prefer
taking off so much per cent. from an excessive
and impracticable rent, to receiving the whole of
a fair and moderate one. What rational object
this serves we cannot clearly perceive. It may
be that the landlord still expects such a rise in
prices must take place as will allow the farmer, •
without ruin to himself, to pay the war rent for
his farm. But this is not likely to occur with-
out the artificial stimulus of another war—a mode
of renovating the " national prosperity" which
only those politicians who arc under the peculiar
influence of lunar inspiration would recommend
England to adopt. We are convinced that the
farmers would be in a more thriving condition
than they are if it were not for the exorbitant
rents which they are under, at a time when agri-
cultural produce is low, and taxation, caused by
the Debt, excessive.—Morning Herald.
The tariff' or scale of import duties lately
adopted by the Colombian government, and of
which we gave in this paper a slight sketch some
weeks ago, is as likely, we suspect, to disappoint
those who have passed it, as to prove injurious
to the trade of foreigners with the Republic.
The declared object of the new tariff is to pro-
cure for the service of the government a larger
revenue than it has hitherto been able to collect
from the duties on imports ; and with this view
it has increased the rate of the latter ; and, no
doubt, hopes to meet with a corresponding
increase in their total amount. This
is the usual plan adopted by statesmen
who are ignorant of the truths of political
economy. Their legislation in matters of
finance proceeds upon the principle that
the people will consume to the same extent
whatever may be the price of the article of con-
sumption, and then to draw the inference that
by doubling the duty on imports they will doable
the amount received from that source. No rea-
soning, however, can be more truly fallacious,
nor any principle more thoroughly opposed to
fact and experience. Two and two do not make
four in political arithmetic. Duties and taxes
may be doubled or trebled, but it by no means
follows that the revenue mill exhibit a similar in-
crease. The amount of consumption depends
not so much on the necessities of a people as on
their ability to consume, or, in other words, their
means of purchase ; and in a country where the po-
verty of the population forbids it to indulge
in superfluities, and limits its consumption to ar-
ticles of primary necessity, the inevitable and un-
varying consequence of an increase of duties, is
not only a great declension of consumption, but
not unfrequently also a decrease in the amount
of revenue collected. Such results have taken
place even in this country, and are much more
likely to ensue in Colombia, where the augment-
ed duties cannot operate as a stimulus to domes-
tic industry, and where the supply of foreign
goods is already, from the poverty of the people,
limited to little more than actual wants. We
should not, therefore, be surprised were the mew
tariff to be speedily abandoned, as it has been
rashly and unwisely adopted.—Morning Adv.