The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1854-02-21 00:00:00

DISFRANCHISEMENT OF FREEMEN

There is yet another feature in the bill, by no
means the least important, and that is th
prospective disfranchisement of the Freemen o
corporate towns. The ostensible ground for this
political suicide, this retrograde step, in the exten-
sion of the franchise is the alleged corruption of
this class of voters, and the influence of bribery
upon their exercise of the franchise. Such a
charge is false and malicious, proved to be false
after the most. searching investigation, and only
reiterated by those who are unscrupulous in their
assertions, and, following the example of one of
their wooden idols, would vote that black is white
in order to keep their party in office. The real
offence is, that the majority of the Freemen are
Conservatives, and are not to be bribed by Radical
money, nor beguiled by Radical promises.
It is not for being bribed, but for being inacces-
sible to it; not for their truckling to party, but for
their steady adtierence to Conservative principles
that the outcry is raised against them ; and Lord
JOHN RUSSELL has the daring effrontery, the
miserable servility to party influence, the most
I Contemptible truckling to the basest spirit of AC-

tion which ever disgraced a legislrtive assembly,
to propose that this, the most independent of all
classes of voters, shall be deprived of the franchise.
This is no privilege granted through favouritism,
or, like a Radical's vote, purchased with money, but
a freedom acquired by seven years' faithful service,
to the satisfaction of the master—a distinction far
more honourable, and a training far more advan-
tageous, than any of the means either of deposits
in savings' banks, payment of taxes, or house occu-
pation, by which the Minister seeks to select the
fittest men for the enjoyment of electoral privileges,
and, therefore, the proposal to curtail the franchise,
in this respect, while it is extended through so
many equivocal channels, at once stamps the bill
as an emanation from the vilest spirit of political
fanaticism such as, without this evidence, we
should hardly have believed even Lord Josx
RUSSELL to be capable. It is the crowning capital
of his column of Radical perfidy, and would justify
the appointment of a Commission of Inquiry into
the state of his intellects, at no time very sound,
but latterly betraying the effect of ath'-ancing age,
after a life of fussiness and trickery.

IT is so rarely we can find an opportunity of
giving the present Ministry credit either for good
intentions or political wisdom, that we gladly seize
the occasion of the proposal made by the Poor-law
Minister to alter the law of settlement. By the
bill which he has introduced into the House of
Commons, it is proposed to equalise the poor-rate
over each union by gradations of ten per cent. each
year during the next ten years, so that the change
shall be felt as slightly as possible. It will, no
doubt, be thought a hardship by those parishes in
which the rates have hitherto been comparatively
light, that they should bear a portion of the bur-
den of other parishes, but a calm consideration of
the subject will serve to demonstrate its justice. it
will be remembered that the maintenance of the
destitute is not only a legal obligation, but a
Christian duty, and that by the present division of
parishes there is much practical inequality, and,
consequently, injustice. One parish has many
wealthy inhabitants, and yet, from having but few
poor, those have the least burden who are the
most able, to bear it. Another parish, with but few
wealthy inhabitants, has many poor, and the bur-
den is heavy on those least able to bear it. An
equal distribution of the rate over a whole Union
would remove much of this inequality, and by the
mode proposed the change would be scarcely felt.
Another advantage will be, an abolition of the
heavy costs attending disputed settlements, which
would be a positive boon to the ratepayers, and
tend materially to abate much of the misery often
experienced by those who are recipients of relief.
The only tangible objection to the proposed change
is, the approach to a sytem of centralisation, which
is repugnant to English notions of local govern-
ment, but this is an objection more apparent than
real ; nor will it be found that the alteration now
contemplated will be less a system of local govern-
ment than the present mode. There are also
several minor advantages attendant upon the pro-
posed change, which, if party differences are not
allowed to interfere with their development, may
operate to place the system of poor relief upon a
more satisfactory basis than it is at present.

PROTESTANTISM AND ROMANISX

WHEN once the human mind has voluntarily wandered
' from the right path, it is difficult to say what extent of
absurdity it may reach, or to what depth of intellectual
prostration it may fall. This was painfully evident in the
display which the apostate der-nil-lan, Mr. ANDERDON,
made on Monday last week, in the Concert-hall. The
subject of his lecture was ostensibly an attack on Protes-
i tautism, of which he was unsparing in his abuse, but it
was evidently intended to apply to the Church of England.
It will be seen that, however his strictures may apply to
some of those extravagant fanatics who falsely assume the
name of Protestants, nothing can be farther from the
' truth when applied to our Church. He characterised Pro-
testantism as an act of intellectual and moral rebellion,
which made an individual or a section rise up against the
authority vested in the great whole, disbelieved its mis-
sion to teach and govern, and so rejected its creeds or its
precepts. This is exactly his own position. He has him-
self rejected the creeds and precepts which he had sworn
to teach, and, in doing so, committed in its most flagrant
enormity the sin of which he accuses all Protestants. He
confounded Protestants with Infidels, as both rejecting
what was really Divine and authentic, and calling it
human and fictitious, which is again an exact reflex of
his own conduct. He has left the Church which founds its
creeds and its articles on the pure authority of Holy Scrip-
ture, and adopted a monster fable, of which the creeds
are human inventions, and the miracles fictitious. He
accused the Protestants of taking only such part of Divine
Revelation as suited their purpose, and denying the
i authority of the rest, whereas the Church which he has
left accepts the Scriptures as a whole, and teaches them
I as a whole, without alteration or addition ; while Rome
notoriously perverts the text to suit her own dogmas, and
denies the perusal of the Scriptures to her dupes, for
the simple reason that they would make palpable
to the plainest understanding her own enormous
falsehoods. The only difference, he asserted, between
the . Protestant and the Romanist was, that the
former was taking a human instead of a Divine
tradition for the rule of his faith,—an assertion so
monstrous, that, if he believed himself; the extent of his
credulity must be unfathomable. There is no fact more
notorious than the repugnance of Protestants to all tradi-
tion, and their exclusive faith iu the Bible, the whole
Bible, and nothing but the Bible. A prominent article
of the Church declares that " Holy Scripture containeth
all things necessary to salvation : so that whatsoever is
not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be
required of any man, that it shOuld be believed as an
1 article of the Faith, or be thought requisite or necessary
to salvation." On the other hand, .the whole teaching of
' Rome is founded upon human tradition, its articles of
, faith in Purgatory, the invocation of saints, the real
presence in the Eucharist, the adoration of the Virgin
Mary, the worship, of images, and other prominent tenets,
being not only not warranted by Scripture, but diametri-
cally opposed to the whole tenour of its doctrine. As a
iman in a state of drunkenness fancies every one so but
himself, Mr. ANDERDON drew a picture of his own me-
lancholy condition, and, with the perverseness which
ordinarily accompanies mental weakness, applied to the
Church he had left the very charges which so aptly suited
the delusion he had adopted. He said that men were
furious because Rome would not change. Such an asser-
tion is amusing from its utter absurdity. It is the ridicu-
lous claim to infallibility, to which Rome never had the
shadow of a title. From the first assumption of supre-
macy, in the sixth or seventh century, down to the present
time, Rome has altered her creeds, adopted and rejected
articles of faith as it suited the paltry views of worldly
expediency, and hai never been consistent in any one
point but her love of gain and temporal power. Her pre-
tence to Divine authority is the will of the reigning Pope,
who is impiously styled the Vicegerent of Heaven, and,
her pretended Christianity is practical Deism, a miserable
imposture, founded upon the grossest superstition, and
maintained through the debasing ignorance in which her
tools have laboured unceasingly to keep her wretched
dupes. They are objects of pity, but far more pitiable
must be the condition of Mr. ANDERDON, who has volun-
tarily embraced a heresy from which every one, who has
once read the Scriptures, must turn with horro
soulC ht
.rdcehbaso of
debasing
negrrlanorsd,ofonnomthee a
t thothere Reformation, h and
_, shho shook k
restoredrOr
her teaching, as far as possible, to that oft primitive, .
Christians, and since that time has endeavoured
pr,e. to main
Preserving the Holy
tain the faith in its pristine parity. '
infallibility thantl that htwousthrw:ishitiwnicehmhsiscr:lr
Scriptures
atyt'allsisteihnehi ea:a tsestfhartetmhoeno.lrefiydeteirre
too f
tranpeenn_nersoxiosioi ignorantly
in their integri
standard by which she may
li. such
ANDERDONANDERDON
has given is
foarnminthstane best
claims her
for teaching,
izo n and
le. in this respect
from truth
It is lamentable
stahLia'tetolecfhis example ' being followed. Let his
faasagrprotestantism and Romauism be weighed in
the balance ittlisedlTP:oterroh
of human conscience, and tested by the book
to which every Christian must appeal, and it will be found
that every shaft which he has levelled against the faith
which he hdeserted inflicts a wound upon himself and
thote with Mom he is associated.