The Sun.
London, England, 1845-08-18 00:00:00

hung with ;bite linen, on which were arrangoci with taste
garlands of flowers and green wreaths. At the end of the hall
was placed the King's bust, surmounted with tricoloured fl igs.
Covers were laid for 261) persons, and the Mayors of St. Pierre
and Mezidon occupied the chairs of honour. At the right of
M. Legrand sat M. Guizot, and at the left the Prefect of the
department. At the dessert the health of " The King" was
drunk with great enthusiasm; after which M. Legrand, in a
complimentary address, in the course of which he alluded in
strong terms to the illiberal attacks made upon M. Guizot
both in the Chamber and in the press, proposed " The Health
of M. Guizot." This toast was received with a triple salvo, of
acclamations, and when silence was restored M. Guist rose,
and spoke as follows :
" Gentlemen,—l am deeply affected with the kind sentiments
which your Honourable Chairman has just expressed towards
me. He was pleased to say that you had ardently desired to
see me amongst you, and I can truly affirm that I also was
anxious for the same event. Circumstances independent of
my will have alone retarded the period of our meeting, and I
congratulate myself on seeing it. at last arrive I. I thank Sou
for your most affectionate reception, and for the lively interest
which your chairman has expressed to me in your name, for my
success in the struggles which lam called on to sustain. Let
me, however, be permitted to use a different language from
that of the Hon. Gentleman. These struggles, so warm, and
sometimes so rude, have never drawn from me a complaint,
and never shall ; it is the condition of public life in a free
country. Men whom the world venerates, and by whose side
I should hold it the greatest honour to have my name one (lay
placed, have been attacked. abused, and calumniated in precisely
the same way. They not the less continued to serv, their country ;
they not the less are honoured with its regret. We have no right
to pretend to a less difficult task, and the end towards which we
tend is well worth the trials which we sustain on the road,
which it is necessary to pass over in order to again it. Besides,
gentlemen, if I am attacked I am supitorted. This
meeting, which I see around me ; the feeling which pervades
it; the sentiments manifested towards ntc—is not all this a
great, a strong support? That in the midst of you, gentle.
men, that I c.nild think of uttering any complaint, or ma-
nifesting any appearance of fatigue ? And, in the very centre of
political life, in the great assemblies which have the honour of
representing the country, that adhesion which the policy that I
uphold has met with, the fidelity, the firmness with which, even
quite recently, and in moments of the utmost ditEculty, the
Conservative party has maintained this policy, do not permit a
man of courage to feel the slightest discouragement, or utter the
faintest murmur. Certainly there is in all this the means of
supporting and of overcoming many and many an attack.--
( Loud applause.) Shall I say it, gentlemen ? I consider
that, towards the Opposition, the press, and the jour-
nals, there are manifested at the same time an inclinati n to
exact toe much, and too much timidity. From them are de-
manded an impartiality, a moderation, a justice, which are
scarcely compatible with our reciprocal situations and the
nature of our government. They have their passions, and
we ours. Let us accept and tolerate our mutual liberty,
in place of complaining of it. The more I have mixed in
public life, and practised the constitutional regime, the more

I have become convinced that the liberty of discussion and the
liberty of the press had certain outbreaks in to great measure
inseparable from their very existence. Ido not believe these
to be more excessive amongst us, and in our day, than they
have been elsewhere, and in other times ; and if it is just, if it
is indispensable, to repress them when they meddle with sacred
matters, which ought to be above the reach of all attack, let
us ourselves endure them without emotion, and with good
grace, in the customary course of our labours and our com-
bats. This is a portion of the movement, of the activity of
public life, and, all matters considered, the result is pro.
ductive of more benefit than mischief. But, at the same time
that I accept frankly and without complaint the liberty of
the political press, its wild flights, and its acts of injustice
and severity, I most assuredly regard as a necessity and
a duty to preserve with respect to it the most complete inde-
pendence—not to allow myself to be icflueimg either by its
advice, or by a desire to have its praise, or Ity left fear of its
attacks. I endeavour on all occasions to pay attention only
to things themselves—to the true interests of my country,
such as my reason sees and judges them, and I pay no atten-
tion to what the journals may say of me. There is no digni-
fied and sensible policy but on this condition.—( Applause.)
Permit me, gentlemen, to recommead you to do the same.
Let me beseech you, who approve of my principles and share
my convictions—you, my political friers, to accept frankly
the liberty of the press, to read the journals v.ithout bring
annoyed at them, and-without complaining of their coarseness
and their violence. But guard with rev, ct to oem the full in-
dependence of your opinions; judge political men not according
to what is said of them, but from your personal knowledge of
their character and their previous conduct. Estimate political
acts, not from the picture drawn of them by the press, but
after their results in the country, and for the country. Indulge
in no feeling of anger or ill humour against all the movement,
all the noise, which the press raises constantly about us ;
but place confidence only in facts—in your own judg-
ment. In that way alone you will be neither the dupes
nor playthings of any one ; and you will succeed, "ilk a
little coolness and patience, in beholding men and things as
they really are. Let us at the present moment make trial
of this method. Let us forget all the polemics of which the
policy that I have the honour of mooning has been, and still
is, every day the object. Let us consistsr that policy not in the
points of view that may be taken to attack or defend it, but in
the facts already accomplished by it, in its general, acquired,
and evident results. What was the wish of ail of you, the wish
of France in 1830? To repulse an unjust and senseless aggres-
sion on our;laws and our liberties ; to assure the just share of the
country in the government, and its dignity in the world; to
render our constitutional regime at home and our honour abroad
perfectly independent; to make by necessity, end not by ca.
price, an obliged and decisive act of rovereign,y at home, and
of national independence abroad, and at the same time not to
return to the path of domestic revolutions and foreign war;
to maintain order by securing liberty, and to preserve
peace by disposing ourselves by ourselves alone and
completely for our government and for our count's. Was
net that, gentlemen, I ask you, in 1830, I will not say
the well-considered and closely- reasoned intention, but
the spontaneous desire, the general feeling, the true
instinct of all present at this meeting of our department, of the
whole of France ?—( Loud applause.) Weil, then, Gentlemen,
fifteen years have passed over sir.ce these great days We are
not mere men of yesterday ; we have a right to speak from ac-
quired experience and from accomplished facts. What has
come to pass? What has been done since 1830? At home,
representative government and the constitutional regim:.• are
displayed, arid continue every day to display themselves freely
and extensively. The country takes part regularly aid effica-
ciously in its own affairs, with the concurrence of the great
powers instituted by the charter. This is truly constitutional
government; this is monarchy according to the charter._
(Applause.) Public liberty is every day practised, proved,
and developed. You attend the sittings of the Chambers ;
do you think that there is anything wanting there as to
the freedom of speech ? You read the journals ; does the
liberty of the press appear to you to be shackled ? You
have frequent elections ; do you perceive that they are
the work of corruption and violence ? Because I have
sometimes assisted you in the repairs of your churches
in the construction of your parsonages and your schools, in as-
suring a career to your children, have you, therefore, ceased to
vote freely and conscientiously? Do you feel that you are cor-
rupted men ? Have you not, on the contrary, the conviction,
the certainty, that you profit by, and enjoy with entire security,
all your liberties and all their fruits? And, abroad, do you
not see clearly and positively that the great end of the Act of
1830 has been attained, that the Government of our country is
not only perfectly independent in Europe, but that Europe—
both the governments and the nations show us great respect,
and, under all circumstances, treat with us seriously and pro-
perly? Have not the great nuestions that have been brought
forward, and ;the way in which they have been resolved, fur-
nished a convincing proof of the just influence that we exercise,
and of the just respect that is paid to our interests and our
views ? And those constitutional states which have been formed
around us, which Europe has respected like ourselves,
which have established themselves, and are gaining strength
daily under favour of the movement communicated, and
the order maintained by us, which, in founding or modifying
their institutions, study to resemble ours, Belgium, Spain,
Greece, are they not so many living proofs of the action, the
influence, and, I think I may add with legitimate pride, the
merited ascendancy which France and her Government
exercise abroad, to the profit of a liberal and modest policy.
which can appreciate at once the new wants of mankind, and
the internal conditions 'of social order ? All this has taken
place, and is taking place every day, without violence and
without war. We have succeeded in consummating a revo•
lotion, and in founding a flew government based on lase
within and peace without, and to the grandeur of such
results are added the moderation and legitimacy of her
means. Such, gentlemen, in their ensemble and in their
essential features are the work of the Conservative policy
which we practise. Such are the facts as they would
appear to a new spectator, who should be called upon
to regard them for the first time. I do not hesitate to
say, and I say it with a just and allowable"pride, for it is of our
country itselt and of our entire Government that. I speak.
results—splendid and
there is ground of proud satisfaction in this policy. y,a.
gentlemen,
in these
themselves, useful grand
fruitful for our children as
honourable grand fatty,
and
which have produced
o y:ntiriby
ef for the
d,
and
pdirtseps erconostpit
rirmint
ye:ea:l%ldt,, for ourselves,
ttedutrhe,ean'ovdormmkuocvohifnsgt he
tceougrcei the r on the regular path of our
ififteohrrsemtstilethyuetuairofneutiis. It is to the King, gentlemen, it is to his
wisdom, to his enlightened and inexhaustible devotedness,
ttrilarta
va
ore due.and the
,11 e firs t
!rice
fe homagei
i°i o f
~)
Tphuebli
wisdomgra t taundde.
devotedness(C r i gratitude.---(Cries o f
of the King are the more precious from his inculcating them
daily into that noble Royal Family, into the minds of those
Princes who have already sought for and found glory in the
service of France. Let our own devotedness and attachment
gentlemen, be the just reward of the devotedness of the Roy*
Family ; let the royal wisdom be aided and facilitated by our
firm support ; let us persevere, in concert with it, in one
policy of peace and Conservatism. The principle of
tency and perseverance is the first necessity of all governments
and the greatest; difficulty of free states. Let the Consersa-
five party set the example, and our most simple as well as our
most important interests, every family in its widest existence,
as well as the statei n its glorious destinies, will reap the same
fruits and the same honour."

This speech was followed by three rounds of applause. 111.
Guizot was accompanied bock to the house of the Mayor 11 the
whole of the electors. 11e' subsequently visited the church 14
St. Pierre-sur-Dives, and returned to Val-Richer at seven
o'clock.

The King of Denmark has just erPated a new
order, consisting of a medal with the King's effigy en one side,_:
with the inscription " Christian VIII.," and on the reverse
the words,
_" For Merit," sutrounded with an oaken wreath. .
The name of the recipient is to be enaraved on the edge.