The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1843-01-03 00:00:00

occurrences of the most trivial nature are seized upon,
as the pivots upon which to turn the national hostility

against us—tl

forbearance, if not encouragement,

with which her Government has recently appeared to
regard these insults and outrages; and we are driven
to the inevitable conclusion, that nothing but exem-
plary prudence, combined with firmness, on the part
of the British Government, can prevent the occurrence,
at no distant period, of an embroilment between France
and the British nation.

Many causes have, doubtless, contributed to the pro-
duction of the spirit to which we have pointed.
Memory of the past has done much to produce it. The
giant effort by which British arms crushed the glit-
tering fabric of the empire, and twice dictated peace
before the gates of Paris, is not forgotten. The arm
which chained its haughty chief—another Prometheus—
upon that barren rock in the midst of ocean, is not
forgiven by the French nation. The very meanness
and treachery which its marshals, its statesmen, and its
philosophers—" unwise in their glory, and base in their
fall"—turned at that eventful period, from the obscured

meteor to worship the new risen sun which victorious
Britain gave them—the bitter consciousness of the
contempt, which they then earned in the eyes of the
world—goad them still, and will goad them, until
wiped from the page of history, or from memory, by a
fresh career of blood and conquest. Th.; contrast,
too, which presents itself in the subsequent career of
the two nations is not one calculated to soothe the
vanity of the French people. Whilst Great Britain

has grown in commercial and colonial greatness—is
greater, at this moment, than when she "strode like
a Colossus" over the fields of France, whilst the
wrecks of " the empire" lay scattered beneath " her
huge legs"—that nation has been progressively de-
clining, in its prestige and its position amongst the
nations of the world. Incontestibly, this is the case.

The name of Great Britain is paramount amongst ci-
vilized nations, whilst France has, more than once,
been " isolated." A revolution, even, has not sufficed
to retard her downward progress ; and—unless some
sudden outburst, like that which, under the auspices
of Napoleon, conferred upon her the dominion of the
world, revive for a time her faded glories, to be fol-
lowed by a new prostration beneath the feet of insulted
Europe—the day appears not far distant when she will
sink into the condition of a second, if not a third-rate,
power.

It is natural to a nation constituted as is the French
nation, and circumstanced as she is, to regard with an
eye of jealousy, if not of hostility, her victorious com-
petitor in arms and in greatness. There was, how-
ever, a time, we remember, when these feelings ap-
peared, as in the natural course of things they might
be expected, to be passing away. Friendship, com-
merce, the intercourse of brotherhood with France,
was then universally talked of. That these expecta-
tions have not been realised, is, we firmly believe, at-
tributable to the insolent and insufferable vanity of
one man, and that man Lord Palmerston. There is
virtue enough, wisdom enough, patriotism enough in
the French nation to have enabled it to resist and re-
strain the turbulent spirit of its canaille : that virtue,
wisdom, and patriotism Lord Palmerston has succeeded
in turning away disgusted from the effort. A noble
spirit can bear to be vanquished, but never to be duped.
Disingenuous intrigue in every foreign court—the
everlasting interference and eternal manoeuvring of
the ex-Foreign Secretary and his officials—have suc-
ceeded in neutralising the healing effect which time
had wrought upon the temper of the French people ;
and we confidently believe that the return to office of
that statesman and his paety would he. Hip -signal for
embroilment between the two countries !
As it is, we repeat, nothing but exemplary prudence
combined with firmness, on the part of the British
Government, can prevent the occurrence, at no distant
period, of a consummation so deplorable.

On Friday next the Collegiate Institution will be,
as announced elsewhere, formally opened by the deli-
very of an inaugural address by Lord Stanley, and
other interesting proceedings. In addition to the dis-
tinguished names which appear in the advertisement,
we understand that Lord Skelmersdale, Lord Lyttleton,
Sir Stephen Glynne, M.P., the Hon. R. B. Wilbraham,
M.P., J. Wilson Patten, Esq. M.P., the Hon. and
Rev, Horace Powys, Rector of Warrington, and other
noblemen and gentlemen are expected to be present.
No doubt a great body of our townsmen will join the
procession. We understand that his Worship the
Mayor has issued cards for a grand entertainment in
the Town-hall, in honour of the occasion.
We rejoice to hear that the number of parents who
intend to avail themselves of the sound scriptural edu-
cation to be disseminated within the walls of this
school, is already very considerable.