The Sun.
London, England, 1827-06-07 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

We have just been much amused and grati-
fled by reading (what we have not had time to
read sooner) a little pamphlet of Lord Nugent's,
in reply to an abusive one from the pen of a
Rev. Dr. Scobell. The Doctor has on this oc-
casion received, from the hands of the worthy
and clever Nobleman whom he offended, a
memento, which, if he be a teachable subject,
may redound very much to the future advantage
of his Reverence. The cause of his ire—the
avowed cause, we mean—against the Noble
Lord, was simply his publication of an able and
most useful pamphlet in support of the Catholic
Claims, to which our attention, in common with
that of a large proportion of the reading and po-
litical public, was drawn irresistibly a few months
ago. Now, there is a member—a young one
(whether quite arrived at years ofdiscretionwe know
not)—of Lord Nugent's family, and destined, if
he lives, to be some day or other at the head of
it, who has taken upon him to deviate widely—
or bolt, as half-trained cattle do now and then—
from the course of policy which, on that great
question of emancipation, has been pursued with
unerring consistency by all the Grenvilles of the
last generation and the present—by the late accu-
rate and honest Marquis of Buckingham—by
the sound-headed and virtuous Lord Grenville—
by the present Duke, the parent of the young
seceder from his race—and by Lord Nugent, as
upright and respectable an individual as ally
among them. This youthful personage—LordChandos, in short—is a furious enemy oftheCatho-
lies. He bids fair for the rank of Duke of Buck-
ingham hereafter—for the enjoyment also, as part
of his inheritance, of that church patronage which
is to be found in larger or smaller quantities an-
nexed to most of the grandees of Great Britain.
This contingency did not, we suspect, escape the
keen but vulgar contemplation of the Reverend
Pamphleteer. A fling at the Catholic uncle might
propitiate the anti-Catholic and benefice-bestowing
nephew : fling he did; therefore, (the Rev. Doctor)
with both his hands, as much dirt as he thought
would suffice to anoint a circumference even more
ample than Lord Nugent's. His Lordship, however,
proved no recreant in the business. He has addres-
sed a letter to his friend, Sir-George Lee, which it
seems probable that Dr. Scobell is the only man
living who would wish to suppress; though if the
Rev. Gentleman should be anxious on the point, we
assuredly could not blame him. Lord Nugent's
reply is, from first to last, pre-eminently that of a
gentleman and man of breeding. His language to
the pugnacious pedagogue (Dr. Scobell 's vocation is
that of the birchen rod) never sinks below the level
of instinctive and graceful delicacy. He never soils
Iris own fingers with abuse, nor distorts his features
with the slightest emotion of resentment : all is man-
nerly and easy superiority, but mortal in its exhibi-
tion of the angry and unhappy Doctor. In the lat-
ter part of Lord Nugent's pamphlet, he leaves the
Reverend Gentleman's person sprawling where it
felt, and takes up the general argument with the
same force and success as in his Lordship's former
publication.—Times.
We present in this day's Journal the proceed-
ings of the Unitarian Dissenters, on receiving
the Report of the Committee, at their annual
meeting. We are almost loth to make known
that the aspect of the affairs of this sect is ob-
viously not promising, however we may rejoice
in the fact, because we are sure that the zeal of •
our Clergy of the Church of England is kept
most alive and active by competition. There
are other sects, however, . whose temporary pro
gress may excite their most strenuous exertions;
and we have no doubt but that those exertions
have, upon every human principle, the most ra-
tional'eliiisa fa luecess. We stated in Tues-
day's Journal, that the great body of the Dissen-
ters bad agreed to postpone their application to
Parliament for the repeal of the Test and Cor-
poration Acts. In this resolution they have
acted temperately and discreetly. But some, we
hear, have dissented from them, and are most
anxious to prosecute their claims forthwith, and
in haste. And whom do our readers suppose
to be at once their instigators and advocates in
this-course? Why, the friends and advocates of the
poor plundered Greeks !—the very men who
sacked the money" that should have defended
Greece ! ! Has Joseph restored the thirteen hun-
dred pounds, we ask ? And that other person,whom
Joseph 'helped to the first slice out of those sacred
funds, in • order that himself might have a pretext
for taking the second,—has he restored what he so
obtained? We can only say for ourselves, that were
here any cause for the success of which we were
ever so anxious, but of which those men appeared
as ilte -movers and advocates, we must retire with
shame frun the support of that cause, till it were
introduced tinder happier auspices.—/bid.
Dr.-Southey-observed, that a Dissenter was
but half an Englishman. He would not of course,
admit a Catholic to be any fractional part what-
ever of an Englishman. If we apply this High
Church Test to the United Kingdom, and ex-
clude Catholics in Ireland and England, and al-
low the Dissenters of both countries to pass mus-
ter only for half men, it strikes uses not very po-
litic to keep up laws like the Test and Corpora-
tion Acts, which serve only to provoke and in-
sult those who are affected by them, while they
lead to very unpleasant and uncomfortable com-
parisons. It is not wise in the genuine English-
alien, to force the Dissenters to come forward in
the way they now do, and exhibit their strength.
At the time of the breaking out of the Civil
WarS, the chief strength of the Puritans lay in
London and a few of the larger Corporate Towns ;
but London alone now cootaans twice the popu-
lation of all the cities and tow-n.l; in England of
that day. But ilium that time, while the popu-
lation'of mere agricultural districts is in "marry
cases less now than it was at the period in question,
the population living in towns is now very great
indeed. Nov, wherever men are congregated in
large numbers, it will, we suspect, be found, that
those who frequent the Established Church are
greatly out-numbered by those who frequent the
different Dissenting Chapels. In the manufac-
turing districts of Yorkshire, Lancashire, Che-
ehire, Warwickshire, Staffordshire, Sze., the Dis-
senters possess much of the wealth, and they are
out of all proportion more numerous than the
members of the Establishment. But even in the
agricultural districts of the South, go where we
will, ,Dissenting Chapels appear is: every village,
soost of them, too, of recent erection. lf Dis-
seoers are' such bad subjects as Dr. Southey and
other ,High Churchmen represent them to be, in
what a etc to are we at this moment ? And what a
wretched
pohey is that which forces so numerous
and wealthy and persevering a body to come fors
ward in self defence to exhibit the nakedness of
the land ? Those who wieh well to the Estab-
lished Church ought to come voluntarily forward,
and propose the repeal of Acts of no conceiv-
able benefit to it, to prevent the Dissenters- from
having a motive for coming forward in a body. We
remember well the sensation .produced by
.the rising
of the Dissenters against the impolitic attempt of
Lord Sidmouth to restrain religious liberty. No one
had a conception that the number of Dissenting
Con regatiposelp so great. It was said, and justly,
4h- ' 'Sr6 Wth's zeal for the establishment was
r iiAdge. But what will be the
01-llis,senters, now and next Set-
._
t.;\