The Sun.
London, England, 1827-11-02 00:00:00

you at once justify the use of the means
which experience has proved to be the best ;
adapted for giving these qualities. " God .:
forbid," said a Court Preacher, before Louis ;
XIV., K that in recommending the forgive-
ness of injuries, 1 should be thought to
recommend that any gentleman should bear with
what might tarnish his honour." But what is
good for gentlemen is good for all, if all are to
have the :ame object in view. There is nothing
like pusN.w, an argument as far as it will go, if
we wish to try its soundness. If duelling be
good for giving delicacy in one ease, it will be
good in another, According to this principle,
the Yankees, who are constantly rifling each
other, should be the most delicate and decorous
Of human kind. Are they one whit better be.
hayed than other people because all are
duellists ? There is certainly no reason why
Barbers and Cutters of Cabbages should not ;
pistol each other as well as their betters ; but
were they to do so generally, we believe the cir-
cumstance would serve wonderfully to aid the
higher ranks in seeing the futility of the reasons
for the nractiee. If general challenges were to
be recognised, it would be seen, that so far from
the practice contributing to improve behaviour,
it would have the very contrary effect, for the
turbulent, relying on his insensibility, would
often be tempted to encroach on more valuable
men than hhnself. Duelling is not abused at
present, because it is had recourse to chiefly by
persons of consequence, who, by behaving, ill,
would lose the opinion of' those with whom they
associate. It is the influence of this opinion
which secures the good behaviour, and not the du-
elling which has a directly contrary tendency, by
allowing the exhibition of bravery to diminish
the disgust which offensive conduct is calculated
to cause, Thus, for instance, in a Sketch of
the Life of that peculiar character (we cannot
call him savage, because savages are usually
great observers of decorum), Lord Norbury, un-
derstood to be from the pen of Mr. Shiell, in
the New Monthly Magazine for November,
we have a striking proof of the position which
we have endeavoured to enforce. " That emi-
nent • Statesman (Mr. Ponsonby)", says the
writer, " had made a speech, recommending
Catholic Emancipation, and other collateral
measures, as the only means of rescuing Ireland
from the ruin which impended over her. He
was always remarkable for the dignified
urbanity of his manners ; and in the speech
to which Serjeant Toler (Lord Norbury)
replied, scarcely any man but Toler could
have found materials for personal vituperation.
The English reader will be able to form some
idea of the system on which the debates of the
Irish House of Commons were carried on, and
to estimate Lord Norbury's powers of minacious
oratory, from the following extract from the Par-
liamentary Debates What was it come to,
that in the Irish House of Commons they should
listen to one of their own Members degrading
the character of an Irish Gentleman, by language
which was•fitted but for hallooing a mob ? Had
he heard a man uttering out of those doors such
language as that by which the Honourable Gen-
tleman had violated the decorum of Parliament,
he would have seized the ruffian by the throat,
and dragged him to the dust. What were the
House made of, who could listen in patience to
such abominable sentiments ? Sentiments, thank
God ! which were acknowledged by no class of
men in this country, except the execrable and
infamous nest of traitors who were known by the
name of United Irishmen, who sat brooding in
Belfast over their discontents and treasons ; and
from whose publications he. could trace, word for
word, every expression the Honourable Gentle-
man had used. ' Mr. Ponsonby took no notice
of the vituperation, but he was affected by it ;
and if the bullying qualities of his Lordship had
not been hallowed by the factitious notions of
society as meritorious, would not the indignation
of the members have instantly silenced him
Duelling is a remnant of an age when men were
obliged to do themselves justice from being un-
able to obtain it from any other hand. It has
not polished society, but the polish of society
has rendered it less noxious than it was in a
more barbarous age. In France, the feeling of
equality, arising out of the Revolution, has made
duelling universal, and will allow no man to re-'
fuse a challenge from an individual, however low,
without subjecting him to dishonour. This is
the consequence of the little regard formerly paid
to the low; for Smollett remarks that, in his time,
when two persons of the lower orders quarrelled
in the streets, the persons in the houses threw
pailfulls of water on them from the windows.,
Morning Chronicle.
It is an old trick of demagogues when they
wish to inflame the passions of a multitude, and
to tempt their dupes into danger which they do
not intend to share with them, to affect a desire
to sooth and tranquillise the very people whose
feelings they are endeavouring to work into a
state of rabid excitement. This is the artifice
which that'great master of human character and
observer of nature, Shakspeare, gives so ad-
mirable an instance of in the speech of Mark
Antony over the dead body of Cwsar. It was
the object of that wily politician and profligate
man to turn the extraordinary event which had
just occurred to the advantage of his own ambi-
tion. Destitute as he was of the virtues, or per-
sonal dignity, that could command the support
of the respectable class of his fellow-citizens, he
saw that it was posSible, by managing the pre-
sent crisis adroitly, to excite such a commotion
in Rome as might raise, him at once to supreme
power on the shoulders of an infuriated populace.
How did he set about it ? Not by calling on
the people to rise and avenge the death of
Caesar-- not by any direct appeal to their pas-
sions.. He took the safer, and more certain
course of drawing an exaggerated picture of the
virtues and liberality of the Dictator—described,
with the warmest colouring of a rhetorical pen-
cil, the circumstances of his untimely end, and
glanced with prophetic sorrow at its lamentable
consequences. He saw that these topics had
stirred up the feelings which he wished to
arouse—and he threw oil upon the' flame by
' affecting a spirit of peace and moderation which
his heart did not acknowledge.
Good friends ! sweet friends ! let me not stir you up
To any sudden show of mutiny--
Those who have done this deed are honourable,
And will, no doubt, with reason answer you.
Such was his admonition at the moment when
he knew the popular spirit was stung to that de-
gree of excitement which could not be put down
again but by its own ruin, or the overthrow of
those whose destruction would make him—then
a needy and desperate adventurer—the master
of the Roman world. Such is the policy, but
with infinitely less tact and ability, of some of
the Roman Catholic agitators of Ireland. They
have the selfish intention, but neither the shrewd
eloquence nor executive ability of Mark An-
tony.
.Their rhetoric is too blustering and
ostentatipus to be as effective as the unassum-
ing and insinuating harangue of the Roman