The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1842-11-15 00:00:00

PRIVATE LESSONS-

Evenings

Pupils in Ladies

r. HARWOOD'S Rooms without j,
November, 1842.

STATENIE

iT TO THE PUBLIC
SIXTH YEAR OF VICTORIA THE FIRST.
ALL those who wish to obtain superior PROFILE
LIKENESSES, will please to apply to Mr. NEVILLE'S
ESTABLISHMENT, at the corner of North John-street, in
Lord-street, as early as possible, as he will leave Liverpool
very shortly.

Ir, to style and finish.
Open from Eleven till Si 3

A. CASE OF DISTRESS

SARAH EVAl\§l5ll, WidosT of the late Mr. W. B.
Evanson, of Bootle, has ben left with a large Family of
Five Children, wholly unprovided for, and is, in consequence,
driven to the painful necessity of thus making known her
case to a kind and humane public, hoping that sympathy with
"the widow and the fatherless" will constrain the affluent
to give a trifle of their abundance for the relief of the
distressed.

The smallest Donation will be received, at the Office of
this Paper.
The following Donations have been received :

The Rev. Dr. Tattershall
R. Bickersteth, E5q.....

£1 0 0
1 0 0

REVERSE OF FORTUNE.—One of those strange turns of
the fickle maid, fortune, of which we hear tell sometimes, has
occurred during the past week, in this town, to William
Sewell, a water-hawker, well known under the cognomen of
" Water Bill." On Thursday morning a letter from Bath
arrived, per post, announcing to him that a rich aunt who had
resided in that town was dead, and had left to him the large
sum of £lO,OOO. To render assurance doubly sure, the same
evening a gentlemen arrived from Bath, to take proceedings
in the matter; and with him Sewell set off next morning to
Bath, where arrangements were made, and the property se-
cured to him. He then returned to Bradford " quite a gen-
tleman," as the phrase goes.—Bradford Observer.
The Paris journals of Monday are occupied with notices
of the several meetings upon the subject of the Belgian
customs union, and with dissertations upon the British cam-
paigns in China and Affghanistan. Bordeaux and Lyons
have declared in favour of the union, presenting an exception
to the general expression of the towns and districts of France.
The declaration of Bordeaux can be easily accounted for, by

remembering that the union would be favourable to the wine
trade; but it is not so easy to explain the part taken by
Lyons; though as Belgium has no manufacture to rival that
of silk, Lyons might be indifferent. The use which the
Journal des Debate makes of the declarations in question
proves a disposition on the part of the court to return if
possible to the abdicated project.
THE CASE OF CAPTAIN DOUGLAS.—A. writ of habeas

was, on Taesday morning, moved for in the Bail Court to
bring up this gentleman, who was committed, on Friday week
as a deserter from the East India Company's service. The
writ was moved for by Mr. Chambers, and was granted by
Justice Patteson, and it was expected that Capt. Douglas
would have been brought up before the full court. It had

)een understood, that he would not be removed from Tothill-
ields before half after two o'clock. On the messenger ar-

riving at the prison, at a quarter before two o'clock, for the
purpose of serving the habeas, he was informed that Captain
Douglas had been removed from the Bridewell about a quar-
ter of an hour before for Chatham in custody. Messengers
were instantly dispatched with the writ, in order, if possible,
to overtake the prisoner before he should he removed out of
the jurisdiction of the Court. The writ was served, and the
return to it made in the court of Queen's Bench on Thursday,
The arguments on it will be heard this week.

RAILWAYS IN FRANCE.—The Siecle states, that Messrs.
Mackenzie and Brassey, contractors for the Paris and Rouen
Railway proposed to execute the first portion of the Paris
and Belgian line. Their offers were rejected ; but now it
seems the Minister has thought better of it, and accepted
the proposals of these gentlemen. The contractors are,
Mackenzie, Brassey, Locke, C. Laffitte, Thibau-
and an Englishman of the Jewist

Messrs
deau,

persuati(ll

t the lin

Ile 'Journal des Debats states that " the
works of the railway from Paris to Belgium, contracted for
on Monday, will cost 1,122,000 f., of which 400,000 f. will be
expended on embankments, the remainder on works of art.
Messrs. Sherwood, who constructed the line from London
to Croydon, under the direction of Mr. Gibbs, the Engineer
are the contractors. The Moniteur announces that the
adjudication of the works of the first section of the projected
railway from Paris to the Belgian frontier, was made at the
Prefecture of the Seine on Monday last.

CONFESSIONS TO CLERGYMEN.—The Standard of last
night contains the following remarks as to whether con-
fessions made in contemplation of death to clergymen ought
to be;privileged. The question is of great practical import-
ance in reference to a fearful confession which has been made
by a female in the Forest of Dean :—" The doctrine of the
Scripture is clear, that a public confession before all his
brethren (' one to another ) is the- only confession upon
which the sinner can place any dependence as a means of
grace, and thus in the Scripture view a private confession is
no confession at all. But if the law once comes to sanction
private confessions by its protection, the public confession
will rarely, if ever, be made. Of this the practice of Roman
catholics affords painfully frequent proof. As regards the
clergy, we do not understand bow a minister of religion can
be justified in receiving a confession, involving proof of
wrongs offered to the state or to individuals, without jun_
pressing upon the penitent the awful consequences of with-
holding these proofs. For ourselves, we should very much
dislike to be the depositaries of secrets of the kind ; for we
cannot help thinking that he who conceals the evidence by
which a crime may be punished or prevented, or a just right
asserted against a wrong-doer, is very much in the condition
of a partaker of other men's sins. The Church of England
has gone on very well for three centuries without auricular
confession; but let the law privilege such confessions, and
we must naturally expect that the system of compulsory
periodical confessions made in private will creep into our
church, as it crept into the Church of Rome. After all,
what evil is said to result from the actual state of the law ?
A criminal withholds from the clergyman who attends him
some piece of evidence (for it is about evidence only we are
concerned) necessary for the administration of justice: is
the disposition which permits the desire to withhold this
piece of evidence that truly religious disposition which the
laws ought to respect? or. is it the disposition in which a
clergyman can safely leave a penitent ? We think not ; and,
therefore, upon every ground we maintain the advantage of
that state of the law which gives the clergyman a motive to
urge his penitent to a proper frame of mind."