The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1833-12-13 00:00:00

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Zbt 13ort'0 Corm,

THE SISTER OF CHARITY.

Written after meeting a Sister of Charity in the Hotel Dieu
(From Lyrics of the Heart and other Poems.)
BY ALARIC A. WATTF.

Art thou some spirit from that blissful land
Where fever never burns, nor hearts are riven ?
That soothing smile, those accents ever bland,
Say, were they born of earth, or caught from heaven ?

Art thou some seraph-minister of g,race
Whose glorious mission in the skies bath birth
An angel, sure, in hearing, form, and face :
All but thy tears—and they belong to earth 1
Oh, ne'er did Beauty in her loftiest pride
A splendour boast that may compare with thine;
Thus bending low yon sufferer's bed beside,
Thy graces mortal, but thy cares divine.
A woman, filled with all a woman's fears,
Yet strong to wrestle with despair and woe ;
A thing of softest smiles, and tenderest tears,
That once would tremble did a breeze but blow.

Leaving, perchance, some gay and happy home,
Music's rich tones, the rose's odorous breath,
Throughout the crowded lazar-house to roam.
And pierce the haunts of Pestilence and Death.

For ever flitting with a noiseless tread,
As loth to break the pain-worn slumberer's rest ;
To smooth the pillow, raise the drooping head,
And pour thy balsam on the bleeding breast.
Or,.'mid each calmer interval of pain,
The Christian's hope and promis'd boon to show ;
And when all human anodynes are vain,
To nerve the bosom for its final throe;

To lead the thoughts from harrowing scenes like this,
To that blessed shore where sin and sorrow cease,—
To imp the flagging soul for realms of bliss,
And bid the world-worn wanderer part in peace.

A creature vowed to serve both God and man.
No narrow aims thy cherished cares control;
Thou (lost all faith, love, pity, watching can,
To heal the body and t) save the soul.
No matter who, so he thy service need ;
no matter what the suppliant's claim may be ;
Thou dost not ask his country or his creed ;
To know he suffers is enough for thee.
Not.esEen from guilt dost thou thine aid withhold,
'Whose Master bled a sinful world to save ;
Fearless in faith, in conscious virtue bold,
'Tie thine the sick blasphemer's couch to bravo :
To note the anguish of despairing crime,
Lash the wild scorpions of the soul within ;
Those writhings fierce, those agonies sublime;
That seem from conscience half their force to win ;
Then glide before that dark demoniac's sight,
The cup of healing in thy gentle hand,—
A woman strengthened with an angel's might,
The storm of pain and passion to command.

To calm the throbbings of his fevered brow;
Cool his parched lips, his bursting wounds to bind ;
Then with deep faith before the Cross to bow
For power to still the tumult of his mind.

And it is given : the softliest whispered word
Now falls like oil on that tempestuous sea :
Hard as his heart may seem, there's still a chord
Once touched, his ravings all are stilled by thee.
I see thee stand and mark that wondrous chapge
With more than mortal triumph in thine eye ;
Then blessed and blessing, turn with tears to range
Where other claimants on thy kindness lie.
By many a faint and feeble murmur led,
A willing slave where'er the wretched call ;
I see thee softly flit from bed to bed,
Each wish forestalling, bearing balm to all.
Performing humblest offices of love
For such as know no human love beside,—
Still on thy healing way in mercy move.
Daughter of Pity, thus for ever glide
Not thine the hollow zeal that loves to, climb
When spurious Faith her ensign rears on high ;
That seeks the heathen of some far off clime.
But leaves the wretched of its own to di.

Mercy—" twice blessed," in him Wl'
..-
-.
-0. with all i• -.`-'

pain ;"

ugatre command
edno other chain ;

.aed badge to wear
.olds might dignify a queen,
.ar cup of life to bear,
agels ye have ever been !

,NTEMPORARY PRESS.

man who cannot rule his own house is unfit to

,mpi re, appears to be a truism of no doubtful import.
...c present Viceroy of Ireland appeals to the world in
this predicament; for if the noble marquis possessed that
control over his household which a man, as head of his
family in any state of life, is entitled to assert, public feel-
ing and opinion could not have been outraged as they ap-
pear to have been by the ostentatious display of his lady's
patronage of the religion to which she belongs. We
would treat the conduct of a woman upon such a subject
with every degree of forbearance and reserve. With the
Marchioness of Wellesley's religious tenets (as Marchio-
ness of Wellesley) the world has nothing to do ; but her
husband ought not to forget that he is the Protestant re-
presentative of a Protestant Kin, and thr.t to allow " the
vice-queen" (there being, by the bye, in fact, no such
personage) to make a parade of her attendance at a Ca-
tholic chapel, shows an inability or indisposition to govern
his house, and consequently a kingdom. The very sub-
ject is one on which we are anxious on all accounts to
refrain from any lengthened remarks. It opens one of
those wounds of Ireland—religious difference—which it
should be the study of every one to heal; and if of every
one, surely of no one so much as the person in whose
hands the highest authority of the state is placed. Of the
unfitness of the Marquis of Wellesley, on other grounds,
for the office he has just resumed, we have expressed our
unequivocal opinion—an opinion which, we believe, is
in unison with that of a great majority of persons both in
England and Ireland. Surely the noble marquis need
not increase these objections by suffering such an obtru-
sion as the vaunted spectacle to which we have alluded.
At any rate, let us hear of his excellency doing as much
for the Protestant as her excellency does to promote and
uphold the Roman Catholic church.—Morning Herald.

THE LIBEL PROSECUTIONS.—Never was the press in
such jeopardy as in this the third year of the reform mi-
nistry. Prosecutions are the order of the day, and no
reliance is to be placed on juries. It is the fashion just
now to convict; this will go on for some time, till pro-
ceedings for libel so encouraged exhaust the courts, and
then there will be a turn ; acquittals will be in rope,
and to real grievances redress will be refused. In Eng-
lish justice there are these ebbs and flows, and some-
times the tide rushes in as now with a bore, and happy
are the lawyers whose craft speeds to futune upon this
golden flood. There is Mr. Hunt with his farthing, and
the two attorneys concerned with their costs of a brace
of hundreds at least between them. There are the news-
venders cast in damages of five and ten pounds for libels
which have :.ppeared in papers they have sold, and fixed
with-ecsts to the amount of eighty pounds-and upwards:.
What can these tradesmen know of the contents of jour-
nals they vend ? Is it to be expected that they should
scan every paper before they send it out to ascertain that
there is nothing libellous in it, or that may be pro-
nounced libellous by a stupid or obsequious jury ? As
just it would have been under the old law of forgery to
have hung the unconscious utterer of a forged note.
Some few years ago professor Christian, the commenta-
tor on Blackstone, improving upon this law, held that
grocers, tallow-chandlers, and others, were liable to pro-
secution for any libellous matter which they might send
out as wrappers of their goods. It was their duty, ac-
cording to Mr. Christian, to read their waste paper. A
pennyworth of snuff might be enveloped in high f nason,
a red herring might be clothed in rebellion ! After the
prosecution of the newsvenders we may expect a revival
of this doctrine, so let the gentlemen in retail trade,
who serve on juries, look to their liabilities, and study
the covers of their parcels, or the lawyers will be upon
them before they have contracted their issues of libel.
We see no boundary between their cases and that of the
newsvenders.

The verdict against Mr. Barrett for copying Mr.
O'Connell's letter to the True Sun into the Pilot, is
worthy of worse times.
When Thomas Muir was prosecuted for the seditious
libel of stating that the House of Commons was not the
representative of the people, and that reform was neces-
sary, he addressed the jury in these words:

" The records of this trial will pass down to posterity. And,
gentlemen, when our ashes shall be scattered by the winds of
heaven, the impartial voice of future time will rejudge your
verdict. In the mean time let faction rage—let the spirit of
party in the present hour proudly domineer—the illusion will
soon vanish away. In solitude the power of recollection- will
resume its influence, and then, gentlemen, it will be material to
you to consider whether or not you have acted uprightly, or
sinned againit your own eternal conscience in my acquittal, or
in my condemnation."

The jury found him guilty,—guilty of advocating par-
liamentary reform ? Are juries wiser now ? What was
Muir's offence ? an attack upon a system which he
deemed vicious. He died a martyr, but the cause for
which he underwent sufferings which have few parallels,
has triumphed,. How can such grievous errors in judg-
ment be guarded against, but by allowing boundless
freedom of remark upon laws and institutions ? The de-
cision of the jury in the case of the Pilot was not more
extraordinary than the course of the prosecutors.
The advocates of ministers know not what to say in
defence of the course theft have taken in proceeding
against Mr. Barrett, instead of proceriing against the
True Sun, which originally publishetl..ie letter called a
libel, or the awl= who wrote it.--Examiner.