The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1853-08-02 00:00:00

rhave promises be-en more faithfull

The activity displayed in these immense

,a one reflects that formerly
. _
in the same Louvre and in the same Tuileries, under

.en pro,

powerful monarchs, in times of prosperity and calm, the
foundations often lay open for a quarter of a century, and
the constructions were more often suspended ' • that it
required years to clear a court, repair afacade, discuss a
plan a hundred times resumed and abandoned—one can-
not too much admire the firmness and the promptitude

with which the new works are conducted, Not a day
passes in which the administration to which is confided
the direction of the works of the Louvre does not confer
with M. Visconti, either to discuss the conditions of a
new adjudication, or to settle some difficulty of detail, or
to examine the accounts of the numerous contractors who,
in accordance with the recommendation of the Commis-
sion of Control, immediately receive payment for the
works executed. Under this energetic direction, the
enlightened zeal, the experience, and the talent of the
architect, and the ardour of the workmen, frequently
encouraged by the presence and the gracious marks of
interest of the Emperor, triumph over all obstacles. Let
people judge from a rapid glance at the state of the con-
structions. Immense excavations have had to be made,
foundations to be laid, and cellars to be constructed ; and
yet already the wing facing the Rue de Rivoli is on the
average six yards above the soil, while the arcades facing
the Rue de Rohan are covered. 2,000 workmen are
employed, and in a short time the first °cachet can be
delivered to the public and facilitate the circulation which
at present is often embarrased. The excavations of the
left wing, which is to face the Place du Carrousel and the
Place Napoleon 111., are equally terminated. The same
is the case with the foundations and basements of the
Place Napoleon III„ and of the buildings parallel to
the gallery of the Louvre. Orders are made for all the
ironwork that will be required, and everything causes it
to be believed that, at the end of the first season, the
buildings in the Rue de Rivoli will be raised above the first
story, and the part which faces the Rue de Rohan will be
raised to the roof. The right wing will be level with the
ground, and the left wing with the basement of the Place
Napoleon 111. To give an idea of the importance of the
works accomplished in the first year, it may suffice to say
that there have been employed 20,030 yards of concrete,
30,540 cubic yards of stone of all kinds, and that the
number of the days of the workmen is 187,812. The total
expense up to this moment does not reach 4,000,000 f.
There are anniversaries which cannot be forgotten with-
out ingratitude. Such is that of the laying of the first
stone of the works of the Louvre ; it marks a new date
of prosperity and glory in the life of a great people."

THE IRISH EXODUS.

(FROM THE JOURNAL DES DEBATS.)

le all looks are fixed on the East. while the
crowded and feverish populations of old Europe are pre-
paring to dispute the finest country under the sun, there
is on the other side a profound current, silent and irre-
sistible, which carries millions of men—a whole nation
—towards the west, and towards the unoccupied and
unlimited soil of the New World. When thrones fall,
when royal families wrest the sceptre from each other,
when dynasties emigrate, we call such changes revolu-
tions. By what name should we then call this emigration
en masse of a whole nation, this simultaneous transpor-
tation of an entire race, this sudden disappearance of a
whole society, which shifts all at once like the scene of
a theatre ? A name for this mysterious and providential
movement has been sought for in the Bible—it is called
the Exodus.' It is now customary to say ' the Irish
Exodus,' or ' the Celtic Exodus'—the going forth of
the Irish and the Celts, as the Old Testament says the
going forth of the Jews. And it is, in fact, a migration
like that of the Hebrew people, with women, children.
and chariots ; it is a journey in pursuit of the promised
land, of the land of abundance and plenty; it is one of
those impulses which seize the popular mind, and which
nothing can checli. in a few years the Irishman will
have disappeared from the land of Ireland ; and yet that
land is not to him what Egypt formerly was to the
Israelite; it is the country, the native soil, the paternal
inheritance. It was a country as beautiful and as fertile
as any in the world ' • gifted with all natural riches, with
the most beautiful waters, the finest ports, and the
greenest mountains ; it was the island called the Green
Isle,' a brilliant emerald which God let fall from his
celestial diadem, and which poets lovingly called the
first flower of the earth, the first gem of the sea.' And
on this privileged soil there was a people as happily
gifted by nature—brilliant, amiable, witty, full of ima-
gination and eloquence—a people of artists. But with all
these presents, all these largesses of Providence, Ireland
has only succeeded in representing in modern history
the most complete type of human misery. For cen-
turies she has been an object of pity, of scandal, and of
terror for the whole world ; she has floated on her ocean
as a wrecked vessel, with the black flag hoisted. 'When-
ever it is desired to signalize popular misery, Ireland is
named ; even out of his own country the Irishman car-
ries with him this fatal inheritance; and in the great
towns of England there is always a separate quarter,
called Little Ireland,' which is the chosen kingdom of
poverty, famine, and death. But nevertheless, however
abandoned, famished, and wretched they were, the Irish-
man and Ireland always adored each other. A veritable
love existed between the man and the soil ; they so
strongly resembled each other—they were so well adap-
ted for one another ! Both of them were, so to speak,
lying fallow—both lived from hand to mouth. and warmed
themselves in the sun, doing nothing, and without care for
the morrow ! But now this old alliance is broken ; and
what specially characterizes the great movement of which
we speak is the sort of enthusiasm with which the emi-
grant bids an eternal adieu to his country. Formerly
the Irishman only tore himself with tears from his native
soil ; and now he flies from it as if it were poisoned, and
shakes its dust from his feet. How has this chance been
accomplished ? How has this great divorce been effected ?
To understand it, it is necessary to know that within the
last five or six years a veritable agrarian revolution and a
new division of territorial property, almost as complete as
that effected in France by the Revolution, have been
slowly and silently accomplished in Ireland. We will not
go back to the time of the Celtic Kings, nor even of
Cromwell ; we will content ourselves with going back to
the year of the famine and of typhus—that is to say, 1847.
This date is one of the most sinister for Ireland ; about
2,000,000 of persons died of famine and pestilence. We re-
member having visited Dublin at that time—it was only a
great hospital and a great cemetery. And even these ex-
pressions are somewhat ambiguous, for the people died in
the street and in the gutter, and at the doors of the crowded
hospitals •, and the survivors buried them when and how
they could. The siege of Jerusalem must be called to
mind to give an idea of the ravages which famine made
among that wretched population. The English, who, as
is known, are great amateurs of statistics, calculated
that 2,000,000 persons, in two months, gave 5,479 a day,
228 an hour, and rather more than four a minute.
Thus, in the midst of the 19th century, in the midst
of established society, and in full European equilibrium,
there was a country in which four persons per mi-
nute died of hunger—literally of hunger. It would
have been difficult to long preserve this state of
civilisation, and besides England ruined herself in
maintaining it. After every crisis of this nature, Eng-
land regularly found herself with some millions of Irish
on her hands, and she could not abandon them, for they
were of her family. The Irishman was always for Eng-
land a poor relation ; and Balzac might have found in
him the subject of one of his most painful novels. The
great mendicant, the man eternally famished, came con-
stantly to knock at the door of the rich. Millions were
given, but the thing had always to be recommenced.
Thus, in 1847, the English government caused soup to be
distributed in Ireland every day to upwards of 3,000,000
of persons, and employed nearly 600,000 men in the profit-
able occupation of breaking stones on the highway. But
with the Irish alms had only one effect—that of keeping
up and perpetuating pauperism. The greater the quan-
tity of soup distributed, the more were the poor multi-
plied—nay more; seeing that soup was given to them
at home, the Irish remained there, instead of going, as
before, to seek work in England. They had little social
ambition—soup was stdficient for them. Content with
their pittance, the workmen seated themselves by the
roadside with their arms folded : the fishermen
abandoned their nets and their boats, and lay down
on the shore like true lazzaroni. A man who knows
the country well, the Archbishop of Dublin, said
on this subject—' The Irishman is always on the
brink of ruin, and contents himself purely and simply
with the quantity necessary to live on. Give that to
him, and he will not work at all.' The same Arch-
bishop offered to fishermen to equip them and give
them provisions, but he was obliged to abandon his de-
sign. If,' said he, provisions be given to them, they
would eat them on shore ; even if they were sent to sea
with their boats stored, they would return ashore the
first night, would bring back their provisions to their
families, and, counting on public charity, would remain
with their' arms folded. One cannot confide a piece of
bread to such people.' In reading this portrait of the
Irishman drawn by Archbishop Whately, would not one
believe that he was talking of Neapolitans ? Another
writer said, also, in speaking of his countrymen
(Letters from Ireland, by Aubrey de Vere)—" What
can be done with a people who are so savage and
so devout that, if you were to give them a pipe
to smoke, they would have they imprudence to con-
sider themselves unhappy, and would digest the
easier from not having the stomach laden—who, at
the same time, have a perfectly Oriental belief that what
must happen will happen, and who to all that join a sort
of Epicurean Platonism, mixed with a little cynicism,
which makes them find comfort in the damp straw on
which they spread themselves in the sun, abandoning
themselves to visions of a future world, which resembles
neither England nor Ireland. and which floats before
their half-closed eyes Here, again, we find the
true lazzaroni. We have seen that Irishman on the
port and quays of Naples, lying at full length in the
sun, living on a halfpenny a day, without caring for
the morrow, and leaving providence to act with thorough
Musaulman indifference. We should find him again,
without any doubt, on the quays of Constantinople,
looking, half asleep, at the ascending smoke of his pipe,
and dreaming. The Neapolitan and the Turk, however,
have always sunshine, and never require spirituous
drinks, while the Irishman is often cold and hungry,
and when imagination dees not feed him England must
do so. The reader sees, then, that England turned in a
vicious circle. The more money she gave, the more de-
mand increased. It was the cask of the Danaides, the
stone of Sisyphus—it was anything we please borrowed
from the symbolism of mythology. The English had a
poor law for themselves ; the Irish had none ; so that in
rlrelandipua rbsi
hls
het
were
Treasury.se
r aeh n e
exemptd indigent, f l
landowners
Tn
fdhr ooe
wmi
Ennsneit etra,slai dof b
sahnwdhera
yede eitaa tnttaghtxhe at t
they
n co
ccoi
charge
r charge
g e
o f t
hoef
antrheess,
State
:elr, 000fi
finances, England
mEonngtiahn;danf after
odund a
herselfye oe fhgllabour
tyoand
achoern
a-
ifmeo
loan
nrrc peroiss,pooo7:ooory,ishi ntgoawfpehienidcgh,
cslohtehe,nearndeticall
lodge
trestoredhree
n
katehn ed
off'i trhte
aenviyl cnanuatseadhathme
moat
rveisnsiioennuoyf
shake
orat
The excess of
Englandever
ever-increasing
burden which became accumulated on her, and which
would have ended by crushing her. It was then
that the British Parliament voted measures which legis-
latively and peaceably effected a radical revolution in the
territorial property of Ireland, and changed the situation
of the country from top to bottom.

il_ll k.

as a guarantee of g,

; this is indis

.ement of fac

sabiy equisite

The Editor wishes it to be understood that he does not bold

himself responsible for the opinions or statements of his

1-dents

THE GREEK CHURCH

EDITOR of the LIVERPOOL STANDARD.
—As the all-prevailing topic of conversation appears at

the present time to turn upon the probability of a rut
Ru

sin, and as there

,tune with

n to be events

about transpiring

tich cast their shadows before, some information upon the

rise, progress, and tenets of the Greek Church may be not
unacceptable to many readers of your widely-circulated paper.
In the year 324, Constantine the Great founded the new capital
of his dominions; and the rise of that city invested the bishops of
Constantinople with an independent, and, ultimately, a superior
influence. The five cities which were the strongholds of
Christianity were Jerusalem, Antioch, Alexandria, Rome, and

Constantinople, the spiritual government of which was invested
in five bishops. Not content with the pure precepts taught by
our Lord, worldly ambition and the promptings of a self-
aggrandising spirit marked their actions. Questions of prece.
dence were hotly contested, Alexandria yielded her claim to
the primacy of the East, and Constantinople, the youngest of
the patriarchites, ranked second only to Rome. Space will not
allow to enter into the various disputes which considerably
widened the breach between the Eastern and Roman churches.
A long interval of time frequently occurred ; and, at one time,

68 years elapsed without any communion between the two
churches. Another separation occurred in the year 451, after
the Council of Chalcedon, which was convened for the condem-
nation of those who held unsound opinions concerning the per-
son of Christ. In the seventh and eighth centuries the question
of image worship arose, and, during the agitation of this point,
another controversy was raised, concerning the procession of
the Holy Spirit. In the ninth century the deposition of Igna-
tius, and the elevation of Photus, a layman, to the episcopal
dignity, through the influence of Michael 111, produced another
quarrel between the Roman See and that of Constanti-
nople; but the most important dispute—a dispute that entirely
separated the Greek Church from that of Rome—was that of
Romanists (1053) making use of unleavened bread in the cele-
bration of the Eucharist. The negotiations from Rome failing
in producing a reconciliation, the Roman legates placed on
the great altar of Sophia the written deed of anathema cutting
off Michael and all his adherents from fellowship with Rome.
This act of excommunication proved a lasting separation of the
Eastern from the Roman Church. Frequent attempts were
made for a reconciliation between the two churches during the
space of SOO years which have since elapsed, but all attempts
have been perfectly useless. In the fifteenth century the fearful
inroads of the Turks induced John Palmologus, on account of
the imminent danger of his empire, to endeavour to form a
re-alliance with the Latins, but the Greeks, indignant at the
concessions made by their brethren to the Romans, returned
with increased pertinacity to their own faith. At the close of
the following century a more prolonged union was established.
The annexation of Lithuania to Poland in the year 1386
introduced into the latter a considerable leaven of
Popish influence ;—a jesuit college was established at Wilna,
and renewed efforts were put forth to bring the Polish Greeks
under the sway of Rome. In the year 1596, under the auspices
of Sigismund 3rd, and headed by their hierarch, the metropo-
litan of Kieff, great numbers of the Greeks in Galicia, Hungary.
Poland, and Little or Red Russia, agreed to all the terms pro-
posed by the Council of Florence, excepting that which referred
to the " Filiogue." The Itomanists are still desirous to win
over the Greeks, and leave nothing undone to effect that object ;
and though they have gained a few, still they are repulsed by
the many. The last official communication on record between
the Eastern and Western Churches took place soon after the
accession of Pio Nino, who, in January, 1848, forwarded a letter
to the Christians of the East, in :which he exhorted them to
return to the unity of the Church, repeating the usual argu-
ments in favour of the Papal sys'em. The Greek Church
answered the above epistle from Pio Nino, and brought forward
their reasons for protesting against the Western doctrine of the
double procession and the Western innovations respecting
baptism, holy orders, and the communion of the laity in one
kind only. At the present time the rancour and un-
abated antagonism of the Greek Church against the Romish
still exists. The Greeks have a firm belief in the present day
of the ultimate overthrow and downfall of Papal power,—and
now the struggle appears to be, on the part of Russia, religious
domination and the extension of their faith. How this may be
accomplished is known only to Him who has the disposal of all
things. Turkey may be conquered .by the grasping power of
Russia or their internal dissensions. Already it appears that
the fanatical zeal of the Mussulman has been :the means d
raising a conspiracy against the Sultan. There are, certainly'
political events about taking place in the horizon which are
well worthy the attention of the thoughtful and serious, and it
may be that the crescent of the Turk may ultimately give place
to the cross. G.B.H.

Birkenhead, July 28th, 1353.
P.S.—I purpose next week to give the tenets of the Greek

Church

00.

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