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Nov. 15, 1851.] ffift? n*alter. 1°®?
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SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 1854.
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public Mints.
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ThPre is nothing so revolutionary, becau...
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ENGLAND HAS PRONOUNCED. England has acce...
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ARE WE PROSPEROUS? The Trade and Navigat...
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OUR COLONIES IN THE COMING YEAR. It is n...
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Transcript
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Nov. 15, 1851.] Ffift? N*Alter. 1°®?
Nov . 15 , 1851 . ] ffift ? n * alter . 1 ° ®?
___ — J? , %R Ckd
___ — J ? , % r ckd
Saturday, November 15, 1854.
SATURDAY , NOVEMBER 15 , 1854 .
Public Mints.
public Mints .
Thpre Is Nothing So Revolutionary, Becau...
ThPre is nothing so revolutionary , because there 13 rn \ ni * so unnatural and convulsive , as the strain to P »» n things fixed when all the world is by the very law of K Jre ation . in eternal progress . —Dr . Arnold .
England Has Pronounced. England Has Acce...
ENGLAND HAS PRONOUNCED . England has accepted the position offered by Kossuth to the free states of Europe . Our Go * vernment may wince , shrink , and hesitate ; certain tim id folks , who had fallen into a routine of sleepy politics , may falter ; a stockbroking press may raise up cries as false as the great Cochrane conspiracy ; bat England has stepped out bodily—in Copenha ^ en ^ fields , at Birmingham , at Manchester , at Birmingham again , and again in London , in the personiTof the middle class—England has stepped forth , and accepted nonintervention in its complete and efficacious form .
The Peace Society protests ; but it is well known tliat leading members of the Peace Society are active in promoting " Kossuth demonstrations . " " We have no quarrel with them : let them cover their consistency with protests , and we will grumble not . We can afford to be in good humour with all the world . The Times is almost in alliance with the Peace Society , only the alliance would have been too laughable . The Times can brave public opinion , can dare the sacrifice of its own circulation and
pecuniary interests , can sacrifice itself at the altar of Austrian loans—do we not see daily that noble instance of self-immolation?—but the Leading Journal cannot afford to be laughed at , so it will not be thought to be in alliance with the Peace Society . Only adversity makes one acquainted with strange bedfellows ; and it does happen that the Times and the Peace Society , all the world being against them at this particular moment , are lying down together in one bed , pillowing their heads on Porter ' s Progress of the Nation and other lay sermons , and consoling each other in very touching strains about the expensivencss of war .
Yes , the Times , seeing that it can t write down Kossuth and the English people , who have somehow got face to face , and won't be written downwhich the writer takes very unkindly—cunning Times resorts to a device worthy of Lear's ingenuity in his extreme , and comes upon them with statistics from Porter . Already before the midnight of 1851 , the trumpet of freedom tries the stirring note which is to awake the morning of freedom in 1852 , and the poor Times , seeing that the fit has seized us all , tries its hand at a counterblast of statistics . " Don ' t go to war , " cries Times , " it will cost so much : Porter says so . "
The argument is amusing , not only as an old wife ' s soothing sop tried to lull the wakening spirit of a giant , but as being of such nature that in fact it tells for the war of freedom . Let us not blink the truth : we arc . for a war , and we are going to have one . Our readers will testify to our earnestness in that behalf ; events are testifying to our foresight . Hut the Times would have gone to Nelson , just before the first broadside at Trafalgar , and would , like
: my Peace man , have expatiated on the cost of each ball and pound of powder . Times- would have represented to Washington the expensiveneHS of bandoliers ; and would have asked Lafayette if he bad pro-calculated his bill . Too late , good Leading Journal I If you warn to keep your lead , go buy you a manual of taeticu , and engage a few half-payh to report for you in J 852 . Too late with Porter now 1
1 he argument is magnificent which the Times ' % « up from Porter ' s archaeology of tho British Umpire . We have spent , during the present < - « utury , saith Times , sitting over its Porter , •^ l . ' ^ OOjOoOjOoo , more than half in actual war ; wo # wo subsidies to the tune of £ < l (> , <)<)<> , 0 <)() , and more ; wo spent £ i , 500 , 000 in arniH and supplies 'or our allies . Most true ; we are upending nearly £ : «> , ( ) 00 , 000 yearly as the consequence . Hut why did we- spend all that money ? To act up Austria a >» d Russia . We havo , as the Times says , yielded ll Sicil y to Naples ; ' « Russia , PiUBoia , and Auatria
have to thank us for immense subsidies ; and what is the return ? " " During the war we gave much substantial assistance to Russia . What is there to show for it ? " The Times puts the question , not we . It is engaging to see so much naivete still surviving in the atmosphere of Puddledock . But we must quote more : — " France has twice exercised her natural and inalienable privilege of settling for herself how she shall be governed ; the heir of the man we chained to the rock of St . Helena , now presides at St . Cloud ; and deep in the heart of every frenchman there lurks
the scarcely secret hope that France will one day have the last word with her conquerors . Belgium , which we united to Holland at so much cost and paina , has long thrown off that yoke , and it is no thanks to us that she is not a mere appanage of the crown of France . Holland , whom we endeavoured to aggrandize , has a standing quarrel with us , only unimportant because we have not succeeded in making her even a secondrate power . We are nowhere so unpopular , either with Peoples or with Courts , as in Portugal and Spain , the chief objects of our costly and heroic interference . Nowhere are we so insulted , and
with such impunity . Our interference in behalf of the kingdom of the Two Sicilies has not obtained either a single political right or the performance of one Royal promise in favour of the island we rescued , preserved , and restored . The Pope , whom we were so forward to reinstate in his lost independence , has since used it incessantly to promote disaffection among our own people , and abridge the prerogatives of our Crown . In Greece , if a British subject has his house pulled down over his head , and his property destroyed , so little disagreeable is the occurrence to the Sovereign we created or the people we made free ,
that we must back our bill of damages with five sail of the line . Whether we are on , the best possible terms with Austria , and whether the many millions we have spent in her behalf have been spent to a political advantage , we leave to those who now ask our interference between the house of Hapsburg and the finest provinces of the Austrian empire . Whatever our gains by our countless expenditure in Germany , we cannot flatter ourselves that we have much promoted the cause of constitutional government . It is almost forgotten that during the war we gave much substantial assistance to liussia . What is tftere to
show for it ?" Well said , Times : but what does all this teach us ? That it has been a losing game to set up a few crowned families and their official retainers against the Peoples of Europe . That is true . And it is a losing game , still , to keep up those families . To keep them up , we keep up the system of huge Standing Armies ant ] huge National Debts , at a cost to ourselves of millions sterling . And we have " nothing to show for it "—nothing !
But we are going to change the tune . Yea , for all the trepidation of the Times and the Peace Society , the great demonstrations of London , Birmingham , and Manchester , comprising as they have done all the active men of the working and middle elas- > es , prove that England—not the official England of a bureau , but the real , hearty , substantial England itself , is going to revise its policy . And with what results ? First , as Kossuth said at Manchester , " the oppressed nations will be of good cheer ; " as John Bright said , there is to be " a glorious resurrection of the trampled nations . " " The alliance of despots , " says Kossuth , " is a fact ; " these demonstrations attest the instinctive
sense of the English people , that a turning point has come in the history of the world , when that alliance must consummate itself in the subjugation , not only of France , already ottered to it by mercenary traitors , but of England , unless it be met by an alliance of the Peoples . America perceives the same fact , and the glorious young Republic of the West , forgetting her differences with us as we forget ours , is preparing to join the mighty union from which England will not be excluded . Kossuth has already conferred upon us the inestimable blessing of awaking us out of our slumbers ; lie has pledged himself to promote the union between England and America . (» od speed him .
The English People will not be blinded by the nonsense that would not . deceive children . A howl of delight was raised by the enemies of KoHSiith and national independence when he avowed himself a republican . What then ? In the first place , the English are not , as they once were , to be frightened by names . Our best trust is henceforth to beif our official folks do not spoil and prevent , it . —; m alliance with a Republic , the great Republic of America . Next , what it' Hungary do choose a republic ? Each nation to be independent , und choose ilnS own form of government that is Kossuth ' H proposition ; and it is accepted by London , Birmiiif / luun , and Manchester . Hungary y / ixn
monarchical , and she implored to remain so ; but the perjury of her Kings has worn out her reliance on the whole craft . She had a , succession of Charles Stuarts , and Englishmen will not blame her for cutting off the entail ; But why should it lie with a few crowned families and official servants to keep the nations apart ? That is the true bad oeconomy ,--rthat is the costly war disguised in the semblance of " Peace / ' Manchester is pledged to a truer policy . " Free trade , " said Kossuth , "is not carried . Cheaper bread is carried ; but free trade is not
carried . Free trade will be carried , when the products of England ' s industry shall have a free accession to the markets of Europe , from which , by the Absolutist principle , they are now excluded . " " The liberty of Europe ' s Continent is more than a dispensable complement to the free-trade school . ' That would , indeed , be free trade , that would be peace , that would be a real Holy Alliance . Now , we say , the choice of the English people lies between that free trade , that peace , that alliance of the civilized world , and a progress of despotism which will not cease until the Cossack waters his
horses in the Thames ; the choice lies between fighting the battle of defence here in England , —on our own land , on the very banks of the Thames , or on the distant lands of Hungary and Italy . But the choice has already been made .
Are We Prosperous? The Trade And Navigat...
ARE WE PROSPEROUS ? The Trade and Navigation Returns continue to exhibit a most satisfactory increase in our exports of all kinds of manufactured goods . The coffers of the Bank of England are crammed to repletion . " We have just concluded a harvest , " says the Economist , " which , taken altogether , has perhaps never before been equalled for quantity and quality . " Another reduction has taken place in the price of the four pound loaf , which now ranges from 4 $ d . to 6 d ., and all other commodities are equally plentiful and cheap . And yet the golden age of Saturn comes not . To a large portion of the industrious classes it seems as far off as ever . The streets of
Paisley are said to be " thronged with workmen wandering about" in search of work , and even in thriving Manchester , the trade circulars speak of the mills going on short time , because " several descriptions of our staple fabrics are produced and sold without a margin of profit . " We know very well how Mr . George Frederick Young , or Mr . Chovvler , would explain such a state of things at Paisley and Manchester ; but that is not what we care for . How does Mr . Cobdcri or Mr . Bright ,
account for it on free trade principles ? Has legislation done all that it can do towards improving the condition of the people in their estimation ? If they think it lias not , what must be our next move ?
Our Colonies In The Coming Year. It Is N...
OUR COLONIES IN THE COMING YEAR . It is now some months since the Leader was the first to herald the necessity of a close alliance of England and America in what has since been presaged by official lips as the " coming war of opinion . " This island of ours stands as a breakwater between the decrepit despotisms of the Old World and the boundless destinies of the New . We are the advanced sentinels of freedom ; the land beyond the ocean , her last refuge . John Bull , secure in liberties at home , ia tho constitutional friend of Cossack " order " abroad .
Liberty , if not according to the British conntitutional gospel , is anarchy : better be allied with the right divine of despotism than with , tho right primeval of Democracy-Nevertheless , we had cast our bread upon the waters , and after many days it coineu again to uswith interest ! The idea has been caught up far and wide . With electric rapidity it traversed the Atlantic , and already binds the parent state and her giant offspring by closer bonds than those of interest or blood .
Announced at Southampton by the man who may be future President of the United States , as a Miiro and certain promise ; echoed by diplomacy itself ! escaping for a moment from seereny and shadow in the person of our own Minister uL Washington ; proclaimed unceasingly by Hungary in the pernon of KosHuth , as the earnest of Europe ' s redemption— - the alliance of free England uii < 1 free America against the crowned coalition of European tyrann . es ih no longer a voice cast on tho wind and waiting for an echo—it is an iii . sl . uiit necessity , a living fact . It is u beacon-fire in this night of huropeuii def lation to the ijiinkin-f thrones , to the heart-famished exiles , to the sileni and expectant Peoples . Now what is England ' s condition within and
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 15, 1851, page 11, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_15111851/page/11/
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