Star.
London, England, 1830-08-05 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF TIIE JOURNALS.

CIIRONICLE.-If the King of the Netherlands have any sincere
friends, they would do well to warn him of the danger to which he
will expose himself by reminding his Belgian subjects of the benefits
'they formerly enjoyed when connected with France. It would,
perhaps, be good policy to retrace his steps with regard to the Press,
and to recall M. Pottier, and the other illu►.trious exiles, the fecal..
lection of whose fate may not prepossess his subjects in his favour.
There are times for persecution and times for leniency.

Cnaostictr.—We have never believed that any British Stater
man was& party to the designs of Charles the Tenth, or in any way
countenanced hint in the undertaking. It is unfortunate that the
idea should have been entertained by the French, that they not only
were indebted to the Duke of Wellington for the Polignac Cabinet,
but for the policy of that Cabinet. While we admit this, we can.
nut help believing that very strong opinions must have been ex-
pressed by men in power in this country against the French Institu-
tions. The article in The Quarterly Review, to which our Cur-
respondent Publicala alluded yesterday, indicated all that has been
attempted by Charles the Tenth. That article is understood to be
the production of the well-known Captain Basil Ball, who had no
doubt his own ends to serve by writing it. Captain B. Hall
is a tolerably good weather-gauge. his account of South America,
full as it is of the benefits resulting from liberty and independence,
was calculated for one state of things. But Mr. Canning, the
great patron of South American independence, being no more,
Capt. Ilall was thrown on another tack, and he produced a work on
North America, calculated to atone in a certain quarter for the injury
done by him in the South. Are we to suppose that the Captain,
when recommending a crusade against the French institutions, was
indifferent to the opinions of great men at home, or unacquainted
with them ? A good deal of speculation existed some few weeks
ago, with respect to the departure of Prince Esterhazy from Lon-
don, and Count Appony from Paris, and the meeting of these
great men with Prince Metternich, at Johannisberg. There are
people who will have it that the ordinances which followed so soon
the meeting in question was not altogether unconnected with it.
Time will, perhaps, throw some light on this.

'l.'i s.—We seize with avidity the circumstance of M. being I
transmitted to us " for the relief of the families of those who have
fallen or suffered in the late glorious struggle for liberty in Paris,"
of recommending a general subscription for the same noble purpose.
We do not suppose that our gallant neighbours are deficient in gra-
titude to their defenders ; but they will permit us to say, that the
cause is a common one ; for if the liberty of the press,.—if the free
election of representatives may be suppressed in one country bylloval
ordinance, though we are far from entertaining any apprehen-
sions under the open-hearted and gallant Prince who now rules Eng-
land, yet the precedent might be injurious at some future period. De-
sides, our King loves his subjects, and loves them better because
they are free, and would therefore wish that freedom which is
the pride of his own country to be diffused over the world:
he will himself sympathize with the suffering victims in the cause
of public rights. We strongly recommend a general and liberal
subscription, and shall ourselves not be backward in contributing
our humble aid. Public meetings have also been recommended in
this country, to testify the admiration which the people of England
feel at the conduct of the citizens of Paris. The suggestion has our
perfect approbation. And now we turn to the victims of another
cause—the Charles Capets, the Polignats, and the rest of them.
The that of those wretched persons, the late King, is, no doubt, on
his way to England—perhaps, ere this, arrived. fret the country
receive hint ; there is vice and villany enough in it already,
wonatrous as his offences are, he cannot add much to the
general stock ; and we hope there is virtue also, and in-
tegrity, and patriotiism enough, to redeem the had, even
when his crimes, and absurdities, and follies, are added to the
stock. There is not a parish workhouse in England, a penitentiary,

or a bridewell, that would not be disgraced by such an inmate. Let '
hint live upon his own resources, whatever they may be : otte shil-
ling for support farther than to proctect him against the cravings of
hunger, will not be allowed him here. But how noble in the
French people to dismiss the wretch, even before the streets of Paris
have ceased to reek with the blood of the thousands whom he and
his councils have murdered ! Perhaps we would wish the people to
abstain from any mark of disgust at the sight of him ; yet we are
reminded of the Devil's return from his more successful attempt to
injure our common parents
having said, awhile he stood expecting
Their universal shout and high applause
To fill his ear, when contrary he hears
On all sides from innumerable tongue*
A dismal universal hiss, the sound
Of public scum."
As to the Alinisters, they ought, if it were passible, to be ex-
cepted :from the general rule, and to be given up, if they escape
hither, and ate claimed by the French Government ; fur certainly
greater criminals never landed on the British coast. They are respon-
sible persons by the constitution of France; and though Charles
X. might view his own rights with the prejudices and infatuation
of absolute Royalty, they were in no such situation. They were
criminal to, no other purpose than that of simply destroying their
country in order to please a wicked and stupid master, whom they
should either have restrained or quitted. The ordinance of the
25th of July bears on the face of it the impress of their having
counselled it to, and demanded it of, the King : and the innocent
and unoffending citizens of Paris, slaughtered by thousands in the
streets, are not to be the only people who are to reap the fruits of
such counsels and demands. We hope to see the French ministers
brought to justice.

-..-
Post.—The first scene of the great drama acting in France has
closed ; Charles X. has contended for his throne ; front that throne
he has been driven, and the enemies of himself, of his family,
and of Monarchy, have triumphed. Success is all in this life, and
we are therefore little surprised to hear the terms " perjurer,"
" wretch," " tyrant," " vagabond," heaped upon the head of a
fallen Monarch. He is taunted with these and similar opprobrious
exprer,sions—he is accused of having violated his cath, and
broken faith with his people; we arc, nevertheless, firmly and
conscientiously of opinion, that in die late lamentable events
the ex-Sovereign of France was the aggrieved party, and
that in the contest upon which he ventured he had right
upon his side. The origin of the commotion' which have so sud-
denly shaken Charles X. from his throne, are not to be looked for
in die Ordinances of the 26th of July, nor in the nomination of the
late Ministry. It lies far deeper; it is to be found in the temper of
the. French people, and in the ill-omened concession of a repre-
sentative system and free Institutions to a Nation not ripe for
their enjoyment. No person who has set foot within the French
territory could have tailed to observe the strong feeling pervading
nearly every class of the people against the actual Sovereign,
against the Bourbon name, and even against Monarchy in
the abstract. The Charter afforded the means of giving
effect to this almost universal bias, and the nation, though posses-
sing every conceivable advantage that the most perfect form
of liberty and the best system of Government could confer, did not
scruple to employ those means to overthrow the existing Constitu-
tion, and recklessly hazard a change which could not improve,
though it might, and we fear will, greatly deteriorate their moral
and political situation. Are we not justified, therefore, in
deducing that die French people were unfit for Institutions
which they turned to so evil an account? 111-omened was the
day which granted them the Charter ! The struggle between the
crown and the people was at hand ; it could not have been lung
delayed. Charles the Tenth, in deciding upon the course he
adopted, did not create, as it is asserted, the dreadful ca-
tastrophe—he hastened it only by a few months, we might perhaps
more justly say, a few weeks. The existence of a fixed resolve to
circumscribe the prerogatives of the King, and finally to abolish
his authority, cannot be doubted by any candid and attentive ob-
server of events as they have occurred. The pertinacity which the
Liberals displayed in opposing that most important and essential
breach of the King's prerogative, the selection of his ministers, with-
out the smallest assignable cause, and before the policyof those minis-
ters had been in any way developed, is in itself ample evidence of the
charge we have brought forward. The King was thus reduced to then,-
cessity either of resolute resistance or calm submission. The single
error he committed was in the selection between the altesnatir:s. His
single error was one of miscalculation or of rashness in deciding
upon resistance without duly estimating his own power, or the
suite of opinion and principles of action among his people. The
sense of the Nation, though wrongfully, being against him, he
would ,have acted nobly, and with greater wisdom, in relin-
quishing a Crown which he could no longer wear with honour;
therein adopting the magnificent example of our George 111.
who, under circumstances somewhat similar, had resolved
to descend from his Throne, and to banish himself from
his country, rather than, on the one hand, surrender those
rights which he deemed essential to the welfare of the State,
or, on the other, expose his Kingdom to the horrors of civil war.—
Charles X. unfortunately attempted remedial measures without
ascertaining his means of enforcing them. Of these he was most
strangely and fatally ignorant, while among his enemies the result
of the trial was at once clearly and precisely foreseen ; the Liberals
appear, from the first, to have had no misgivings whatever ; their
course was at once taken, and the event has wonderfully confirmed
the accuracy of their views. That they may use well the supremacy
they have acquired is out ardent hope, though we regret that it can-
not be our expectation.