The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1845-08-19 00:00:00

for the purpose of speculat
obt-' • and mo

wining them ;

s, finding their concern is rising in the
market, allot none to the public (however high the refer-
- ) but keep the shares all them-
_ next day at a premium."—Times.
OUR MERCANTILE DIPLOMACY.—Mr. Chapman gives

rally the direct

ence a party may gi.

it as his opinion, and the opinion it is of a very exre-
tbmced merchant, that we have been always overreached

in our foreign mercantile diplomacy ; and we fear some
instances adduced of the dexterity of our commercial ri-
vals, or of the re❑►issness of our own Foreign Office or
Consular Depa:tments, will rather tend to confirm him ;
—that from the day of the date of the Riciprocity Treaty
with Prussia, of the article salt, the only bulky article
which this country can export to that ally, not a single
n carried there in a British ship, the reser:

pound has bee

_ . .
won of that state, under which salt, being a royal
government does not buy any imported,
)t it arrive in a Prussian ship ;—that owing to restrict-

3opoly, the

ing duties. British ships are driven from the Havannah
whither Liverpool formerly carried on a large and profit-
able trade ;—that the same tonnage measurement does not
even iu our own ports apply to our own and foreign ves-

sels, the foreigners having the best of the discrepancy ;
that there would be an almost utter impossibility of ob-
taining any Russian trade unless the shipowner belongs,
and pays, to the Russian company; that British ships
trading even to Archangel are subjected to the vexatious
expense of paying to an English Church at St. Peters-
burgh and Moscow ;—that in Russian, Prussian, and
French ports a duty is levied on the provisions and on the
stores that the ship carries of necessity for her own use ;

possible to

. .
obtain any vouchers for the port payments exacted in
great sums on all British ships entering Baltic harbours;
—that, for three years after they are built, Russian ships,
which only live six years, by an exemption from their go-
vernment port duties, have pro lotto a decided advantage
over ours,—all these, and an infinity more of little items
of charge, of delay, and of annoyance, of which the com-
mittee received ample proof, do surprise us, and will be a
subject of fair coxlplaint and reproach by the shipping in-
terest till they cease to exist ; and certainly no opportu-
nity which the progressive, extension of commerce, on the
generally acknowledged sound principles, offers, of giving
employ and increase to our mercantile navy, should be
lost. The removal of the duty on coals has lately been one
occasion, and advantage of it has been taken.—New
Quarterly Review.

LITERARY CHARACTERISTICS OF THE HOLY SCRIP-
TURES.—T:;ere is no more decisive mark of a great writer
than this, that his thoughts are pregnant thoughts—that
they germinate in the mind of the. reader, and suggest a
. .

multitude of ideas beyond what is written. Tried by this
criterion, how plainly does the Bible stand at the head of
a!! literature ! What other book has been so suggestive
of thought in its readers ? What other book has furnished
the seed from which so many productions of genius have
sprung ? It has been noted as the highest proof of Sir
Isaac Newton's divining genius, that most of the great
discoveries of later philosophers are hut the developments
of hints and principles thrown out of his writings. With
equal truth may it be affirmed, that to the Bible belongs
the glory of having originated nearly all that is sublime
and pure in the literature of Christendom for the last
eighteen hundred years. WI sc are the countless treatises
which illustrate ,he Christian doctrine; what the count-
less sermons and essays which enforce moral and Chris-
tian duties ; what the innumerable controversial works
which discuss articles of faith and modes of worship and
government ; what the noblest conceptions and finest
images of our Christian poets and orators—what are all
these but a ma's of evidence illustrative of the germinant,
p olific, exhaustless quality of the thoughts and sentiments
of the Bible? Nay, were all other proof wanting, the sin-
gular richness of Scripture-thought would be sufficiently
evinced by the undiminished profit and unflagging inte-
rest with which pious readers peruse the sacred books
from the beginning to the close of life. In numberless
pa: sages, there is a fulness of meaning which repeated pe-
rusal fails to exhaust. There is, indeed, for the most part,
a plain and obvious sense which any one may perceive ;
but there is usually also a deep and recondite sense which
patient examination alone can detect. There is a wine
which flows at the first gentle treading of the grape; but
there is also a wine, stronger and more exhilarating, which
flows out only after the crush of the winepress. Most
literary works will hardly bear a second reading; the best
become flat and uninteresting after you have gone three or
four times through them ; you have gained all their ideas
—you have exhausted their beauties—you no longer delight
in them. But it is not thus with the Bible. There are
countless passages which you may have read hundreds of
times, and which you may yet read over again to-morrow
with fresh relish. As often as you peruse them with at-
tention, you discover something new ; and the more at-
tlntively you peruse them, you discover the more. "The
fairest productions of human art" says Bishop Horne,
" after a few perusals, like gathered flowers, wither in our
hands and lose their fragrancy ; but these unfading plants
of paradise become, as we are accustomed to them, still
more and more beautiful; their bloom appears to be daily
heightened, fresh odours are emitted, and new sweets are
extracted from them. He who bath once tasted their ex-
cellencies, will desire to taste them yet again ; and be who
tastes them oftenest, will relish them best."—Hogg's
Weekly Instructor.