The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1843-01-17 00:00:00

pon to provide

country

cation of those duties, infinitely more satisfactory to
the public than the Whig scheme, has already taken
place. The sugar question, too, there is every reason
to believe, is in course of settlement by Sir Robert
Peel's government. There remains, therefore, only
the unmeaning and indefinite cry of " FREE TRADE—
free trade in corn—free trade in every thing." But,
unfortunately for the potency of this shibboleth, it has
about as many different meanings as make up the
numbers of the entire opposition party who use it.
One section of the party, for instance, associates with
the term "free trade in corn" a fixed duty, varying in
amount, according to their particular opinion, as to the
power of the landed interest to sustain foreign com-
petition; varying from 10s. per quarter downwards to
about 6s. Another section view it as a question of
revenue altogether. The Cobdenite party throws
aside the question of revenue; prates of the injustice
of " taxing the food of the people," and cries out for
total and immediate repeal. Then there are not want-
ing those who would totally change our existing com-
mercial system ; who maintain that the tariff of Sir
Robert Peel does not go far enough, and who would
at once admit the produce and the manufactured com-
modities of the foreigner to come, untaxed, into the
British market, stipulating, however, at the same time,
for an exemption in favour of the particular commodity
in which themselves or their constituents may be in-
terested ! And then would comethe question how the
national revenue is to be collected; but such a con-
sideration scarcely enters into the reflections of such
profound philosophers.

What a career of ruin and misery would be before
this once great and happy country, if its destinies were
consigned to their tender mercies and consummate
wischm ! We are spared, however, we trust, from
such a calamity. Thank heaven, the Whig faction, at
the present moment, is too contemptible even to be
feared.

When the League men, the other day, promised
PLACE AND PAY to the first great party which en-
rolled itself under their banners, we did not think that
there was one second, or even third, rate statesman in
the British House of Commons likely to be gulled by
a pretension of power so absurd. We were in error,
it seems. Mr. Fox Maule is, we presume, a very
respectable third-rate Whig statesman,—for he was a
member of the Melbourne Administration ;—and the

same gentleman, we find, at an anti-corn-law display,
held in the enlightened city of Glasgow during the
past week, publicly professed his conversion to the
opinions held by the great cotton confederacy. "He
had certainly," he explained, " held different opinions
upon the subject of free trade, whilst in office under
her Majesty's late government ; but he had since
examined the question more deeply ! and the result
was his entire coincidence with the objects of the
League party."

" Straws thrown up serve," they say, "to show
which way the wind sets." Mr. Fox Maule, more-
over, is one of that "canny," cautious race who hold,
with the old song, that

" 'Tis best to be off wi' the'auld love
Before you are on with the new."

Mr. Fox Maule, we are therefore in every respect
justified in concluding, has taken no unadvised step;
and we must suspect that his course will he that of not
a few of his late colleagues. We are confirmed in this
suspicion by the somewhat sly manner in which be
continued, on the occasion, to srnoothe the path for the
return of the entire Whig party into the good graces
and confidence of the Repealers.

" It is urged against the late government," he re-
marked, " that they did not take up the question of
free trade when they were in a majority in the House
of Commons. But their having taken it up at the
last hour WHEN ALL OTHERS HAD FAILED, is the
GREATEST COMPLIMENT which can be paid by them
to that great question !!" A very left-handed compli-
ment, we think ; but of course the Leaguers must take
all they can get in the shape of compliment, and be
thankful. The public, meanwhile, will not lose sight
of the admission, perfectly true, with which Mr. Fox
Maule—gull would be the more appropriate prcenomen
—has so kindly favoured them. When a Whig, hence-
forward, prates of his ardour in behalf of the "great"
principles of " free trade," let him be reminded that
it was only AT THE LAST HOUR, and when ALL
OTHERS HAD FAILED, in the promotion of the
object dear to the ear of \Vhiggery—the retention of
place and pay—that his party were moved to stir a
step in its behalf! Mr. Fox Maule, most candid of
Whig statesmen, we salute you, and bow low as our
shoe-tie.

We heartily congratulate Mr. Birkett on having at-
tracted the vulgar abuse of the schismatic priest Wil-
kinson of the Edmund-street mass-house. It is praise
in disguise, a tribute unconsciously rendered to his
honesty, and a confession wrung unintentionally that
the truth has given offence.

Everybody has been convinced long ago that the ag-
gressions of popery have been made systematically with
a view to political ascendency. We were not, how-
ever, in this country prepared so soon for those aggres-
sions to be followed by priestly anathemas, and open
incitements to personal violence. Listen to the follow-
ing passage from the letter of this " humble minister
of the ancient faith :"

" I would respectfully suggest to you that the better part
of valour is discretion,' and that from other hands you may
receive a castigation which it would be unbecoming in me to
inflict."

You are quite right, Mr. Wilkinson. The better
part of valour is discretion. So true (lo we hold that
saying to be. that we cannot help suspecting that divers
other reasons weighed with you than regard for your
office for declining to administer the castigation your-
self. It would be more convenient that some ignorant
member of your flock should be a victim to the law
than yourself. But, we take leave to remind you that
you are not in Ireland; and that in this country there
are several modes of punishing the impertinence of an
arrogant Jesuit.

Our good neighbour of the Mercury, after publish-
ing the correspondence, (which appears in another
column,) says he leaves the public to form their own
judgment on the matter. So do we.