The remarks which in our ...
The Times, 1824-05-13T00:00:00

The remarks which in our paper of Tuesday we made upon the state of Ireland, being the subject matterof4Lqrd ALTHOXr'S motion, and the hints thatwethrewontasto the manner in lhich fh* motion had been pepared for by the Irish Secretary, received a full confiriation from the proceedings -which took plee within a few bours after, wards. Lord ALTRORL'S motion for a grave #nd exteji. sive inquiry into the whole condition of Ireland, was actually met on the part of Mr. GOULIURN, by the expt. dient we had in the morning referred to,-for a partial in, quiry, confined in its geography to those districts through- out the South of Ireland whi&shave been visited by the scouTge of the Insurrection Act; ana, in its politic., to, the simple question, whetlher grounds existed for the con. tinuance of that miserable andfutile measure. This, then, is the essential difference between the counsels of the noble' Lord and of the Irish Secretary. Lord ALTHOXP would examine the general nature of the evil. to ascertain wh.F species of remedy ought tobe suggested; the other gentle. man would inquire only whether as much turbulence (in itself rather aX symnptoni than a malady) shows itself among the people, as when he before applied to thera his favourite panacea of the Insurrection Act; tur. bulence being the sole mischief that strikes the s@nSeS of your half-b6red statesman, and violence' the single nostrm by which he ever }lopes to subdue it. Every one must see that if the Committee to be appointed by Ministers should receive instructions to confine itself to the "aked fact-of the existence or non-existence of a dispo. sition to outrage among the inhabitants of MumstVby way of furnishing ground for the revival or for the esrra- tion of the Insurrection Act, a few pounds laid out in 'Irish newspapers would answer such a purpose quite as well as the assembling of a committee of the House of Common% here, 400 miles 'from the nearest point of Munster. Less delusion, indeed,might accompany the former experiment- which to others, if not to Ministers, would be some advan- tage; and the renewed application of a remedy, the failure of which stands already demonstrated by the -ery proposal to examine whether it ought to be repeated, would leave so the Cabinet'the sole credit of that policy of which it seems they are now generous enough to share the reputationx with Parliament. The 'debate of Tuesday Iast was the best set-to which has been exhibited during the present session. The question was of transcendent im. portance; the merits, of it, as between the original proposition and the amendment, by no means diffi- cult to settle; the speakers were conspicuous in their se- veral classes; the speeches cbaracteristic, and the division against Ministers formidable in the extreme. The noble. mover made a powerful appeal to the common sense and good feelings of his hearers, and concluded with an apostrophe not esa forcible to the ambition and personal consistency of 'Mr. CA-Nm.G. The Secretary for Ireland, in attempting to answer Lord ALTMORr, and to gloss oYer the partial distribution af patronage which was imputed to him, stopped short,from losing what he called the " thread. " of his argument"-a substance hardly, we suspect, visi- ble to any eye bat his own. Mr. NORTTH far out- Heroded every specimen of Irish taste and logic that an English Parlientary audience has yet had the fortune to endure. For the first quarter of an hour he was well attended to; his language, though in- flated, elaborately prepared, and trimNed and embvoi- dered like a school-boy's exercise, was the medium oesome strong description, *nd of truths so favourable to that im- I FP*iXiheFabtwsipsil not to anti_. cipate in Mr. NORTH, a voter against the amendment; but it is plain, that in the getting up of the speech, the several parts of it,'however highly wroughtin themaelvsshadnot been compared with each other; nor thoughtabout eren,in relation to the purpose of justifying a vote upon a practical question. The secondhalf of theoration was a complete contrast to the first; the It cycle" of misery which was threatened by the orator in the outset, waas afterwards doomed never to be completed. The Irishmau, hopeless, indolent, and desponding in one passage,was a few minutes afterwards pronounced to be the most restless, enterprising, and locomotive of men-the fittest possible subject for experiments in emigration: the Country-Gentlemen, who had been ruling and ruining Ireland for centuries,were the only instruments through whom it would be safe to effect any extensive reforms in the condition of their coun- try ; and that condition, painted by the eloquent gentleman as one of such complex, inveterate, and frightful suffiermg' was one, at least, which though necessary to be explained he would on no account permit to be examined! Sir ' BURnETT'S mode of handling the above production of Irish " genius" was among the most amusing exaupls. or English sense and antipathy to humbng which, we have ever heard: it was equal to that inflicted upola a Right Hononrable Gentleman, who at a later period, andi wth no better fortune than his learned protcge', got up to, vindicate his own " consistency ;" but received from Tr. IEPRNSY a castigationsuch asfew besideshimselfcould Ave- administered,and for which few undoubtedly could lveaft forded morecopious materialsthan Mr.LCANNING. Onq,ues-. tion with regard to the Catholic question we shall juwtput ou record. In Mr. TiERNEY'slanguage, Does not Mr. CAN- NING know that the men who asked him to become their colleague, would not have asked him if they could havea done withoWt hi7n"-and tlhat he, being necessary to keepj them in office, might have made whatever terms for tku Catholics he pleased ? Irish matters are ripening, it appears, towards, a crisis for which the political monopolists of Irelaud are>ifr from having prepared their expentations. Mr. D)oxn z2 sx; BRow Nsi has given notice of a motion for Thursdays the 3d of June, the awowed purpose of which i to establish a Chatho]c Church in Ireland, connected with the gst?lt