Current:

Leader (1850-1860), 20th June 1857, Edition 2 of 2, Page 16, CLOSE OF THE SESSION AT BRUSSELS. King L...

Page 16
Page 16
16 of 24

On this page

  • Text (4)
  • Transcript

    • 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.

      Equalization Of Poor Rates. The Reply Of...

      with little more than labourers and paupers . These are incidents which prove that the metropolis is really a whole , its classes not mingled in one district but separated into quarters . The Grovernuient is mistaken in leaving , it so . It may be all very well in a time of quiet ; but how dangerous it would be at a period of distress and disorder , if St . George ' s in the East should remember how St . James ' s had distinctly refused to have anything to do with its poverty or its sufferings !

      592 The Ie A Deb. Fno. 378. Saturday

      592 THE IE A DEB . fNo . 378 . Saturday

      Thesiger —Defender Of The Eaith. !Fob Th...

      THESIGER —DEFENDER OF THE EAITH . ! Fob the last time , we hope , the House of Commons has heard a speech from Sir "Fbedebick Thesigeb on Jewish disabilities . It would seem that the learned gentleman can only argue cleverly when he is paid for it . His oratory in Parliament leads generally into depths of dull mystification . On Monday evening last , he proposed to amend the Government Bill by adding to the oath , as framed by Iiord Pailmebston , the words ' on the true faith of a Christian . ' That

      phrase , he said , was the wedding-garment , signifying the right of a person to sit in the Imperial Parliament . Here was the old fallacy about Christianizing the Legislature , which is impossible . The ^ Legislature cannot be , and never has been , Christianized . It is , and always has been , as easy for an atheist to take his seat in the House of Commons by repeating a formula to which he

      attaches no meaning , as it is for a traveller in a Mohammedan country to enter a mosque by taking off his shoesT There are numbers pf men , who , if requested to break saucers ia China to prove their credibility , would do so as readily as Sir Fkej > ebick Thesigeb would swear upon the Christian Scripture . Upon the Christian cross we suppose he would not swear . Nor do we believe that after his

      break-down on Monday evening , Mr . Sa-MUEIj " Wabben will finish up a speech against the Jews by groaning Ichabod to the Speaker , and then saying awfully to the House , * Mene , mene , tekel ! ' For , what did the reporters record ? Not ' loud cheers , ' * laughter , ' and ' renewed laughter . ' But we had in view Thesigeb ' Defensor 3 ? idei , ' and a ludicrous thing he made of it . If he were intelligent we would explain to him that the House of Commons resembles a

      building with a big door and a little door ; you put a chaplain at the little door to keep out the Jews , but through the big door , by which latitudinarians , professors of contempt , and the general gentry who think English oaths not worth Chinese saucers , the Jew may make his way , provided he can gulp down nine insignificant syllables . If a bigoted barrister can imagine a case , let Sir Pbedebick suppose Himself one of those philosophically calm , individuals , who do not care to stumble over your opinions , although they have sincere convictions of their own . He comes to the gate of Parliament , where

      the chaplain asks him to say ' on the true faith of a Christian . ' He replies , " The saying of those words will not make the oath more binding on me , but as it inak . es it more satisfactory to you , I have no objection to utter them . It your Christian oath is made of no effect and brought into derision by this means , the fault is yours , not mine . Language of this kind might fairly be held by a Jew , unless lie were very scrupulous ; but it is the very scrupulous man whom Sir Fbedbbiok TheSigbb would exclude . But

      Lord Derby ' s Attorney-General misunderstands logic as much aa he miaunderatanda hiatory , and it perhaps never occurred to him that the mass of persons in the British Empire are not Christiana at all .

      Mr . J . B . Stanhope , who seconded the amendment of Defensor Fidei , argued quite as sensibly as JDefensor—that is to say , with incredible obliquity . He objected to the omission of the . words ' on the true faith of a Christian , ' upon three grounds . ¦ ' * His first objection was that the Jews had no right or claim to seats in the legislature ; his second , that they ought to be excluded on political reasons , using the term in its widest sense ; and his third , that it was important to maintain the Christian character of Parliament . "

      "We have three reasons quite as good why Mr . J . B . Stanhope should be turned out of the House of Commons . The first is that he has no right or claim to be there ; the second that he ought to be excluded for political reasons , using the term in its widest sense ; and the third that it is important to maintain the political respectability of Parliament . Is Mr . Stanhope satisfied , and will he resign his seat ?

      Close Of The Session At Brussels. King L...

      CLOSE OF THE SESSION AT BRUSSELS . King Leopold has not disappointed the Liberal party in Belgium . Occupying as he did a most difficult position , with a formidable priesthood backed up by a majority of the population pressing upon him aud his Cabinet , he yet felt that to push the Charity Bill to its ultimate stage would be to open an endless series of conflicts , the most bifcter through

      which the kingdom could pass , between the Liberal and reactionist parties . The Church and its illiterate militia in the provinces were for the Bill ; the towns with their intelligent masses were against it ; the King had avowed himself neutral , but the Chambers were giving way to all kinds of untoward influence , and the Government had been swept away with the stream . Belgium stood , so to speak , at the door of a dan gerous crisis when the

      Liberal party , which everywhere else on the continent distrusts monarchy and would destroy its prerogatives , appealed to the King for a safe-conduct out of these religious and political perplexities . Impressed by wise convictions , the King has closed the legislative session , and the obnoxious measure is allowed to sink into the limbo of delayed possibilities . We have yet to learn what will be the vengeance of the violent Catholic party , which at Brussels has been by no means inspired by the

      preachings of any Laoobdaire ; its representatives in that capital are chiefly of alow intellectual class , and although we are sincerely disposed to concede to every party , civil or sacerdotal , a perfect right to create if it can a majority in its own favour , and tomake use of that majority in the interest of its own principles , we cannot but rejoice that Leopold has interfered to check the perilous successes of the hierarchy . The Church has been spared a scandal if the nation has been spared a crisis ; and we do not for a moment doubt which

      party lias most reason to be grateful . " When an institution , already obsolete in spirit , attempts reconquests in an age of mental progress , its victories are its dangers , and for every step the nation is led backwards it will revenge itself the more mercilessly hereafter . The closing of the Belgian session , and adjournment of the Charity Bill , have rescued the Church , aa well aa ita opponents from n situation of difficulty and alarm .

      A Dat's Maiunis Huntino.—I-Ioro, In Ft P...

      A Dat ' s Maiunis Huntino . —I-Ioro , in ft pool , wo find throe curious fish , ono a ribbon-fish , the other two unknown to mo ; and on ruining the atone , behold , n queer eol-lilco fish , with a miniature groyhoumVa head \ it is tho pipe-fish , 8 yng , nathu $ anguimva , ' Pop * him in ; also this bit of rod weed , on which I observe some Polygon clustering . What ia thia ? a tiny Daisy on a frond of wood ? the beauty ! No , now it is in tho bottle , it turns out to be an Eolis , Eolia alba , lovely among the lovolleat . Stay 1 horo are two eoiorioa , and alive ! Tho sheila orery ono has aeon , but few of ua have aoon tho

      animals ; so the capture is very welcome lw » v , "" aching with all this stooping aidSSSe an ?? " * must get home now , content with my day ' s work a " farewell glance in at that pool , and I have S t ™ on my face , and dangling my feet in water T L ying tinizingly for some minutes , and bear off a ' 1 ^^ Actteon , as a reward . Now r u « 7 l turn L « m 8 ? T Another day , in idler mood , we ramble along tsW ^ receipt of windfalls . A bottle is alwaya ^ v faT ^ pocket , and something is certain to turn UD Th V and root of that oar-weed , for example , is worth an In vestigatmg glance , certain as it is of being a coWrf hfe . The tiny annelids , white , green , and red ^ l in and out among the sheltering shadows of these roots the sponges and polyzoa cluster on them ; and « Ji what pink-and-white feathery creature is this chani ™ the weed with a circle of pale pink roots ? By heavens < it is a Comatula ' the romance of the sea ; ' and no w that it feels the grateful sea-water again , how it expands its

      feathers , and reveals itself as an animal fern , marvellous to look upon . Sudden joy leaps in our heart at the sight of this creature , hitherto known only from hazv descriptions and inadequate engravings . There is interest in reading about Crinoidea , fossil and recent , and in learning that the Comatula is one of these , having kindred with star-fishes ; but how that interest is inte nsified by direct inspection of the living animal ! I could not satiate myself with looking at my prhse . All the way home the bottle was constantly being raised to my loving regard , that I might feast myself upon the waving grace of those pink and white feathers ; and I thought of the poetical passage in which Edward Forbes expresses his emotions about these Crinoidea which ' raise

      up a vision of an early world , a world the potentates of wliich were not men , but animals—of seas on whose tranquil surfaces myriads of convoluted Nautili sported , and in whose depths millions of Lily-stars waved wilfully on their slender stems . Now , the Lily-stars and Nautili are almost gone ; a few lovely stragglers of those once abounding tribes remain to evidence the wondrous forms and structures of their comrades . Other beings , not less wonderful , and scarcely less graceful , have replaced them ; While the seas in which they flourished have become lands whereon man in his columned cathedrals and mazy palaces emulates the beauty and symmetry of their fluted stems and chambered cells . 'Blackwood ' s Afaqazine .

      Despotic Socialism . —For the poor , and ttie advocates of the poor , if they desire a despotism , surely signs have been giveri in history as glaring as a sign in heaven . There is the long cry of misery which strikes on the historian ' s ear from Diocletian to the fall of Constantinople . There is the population of Spain , famished and decimated , as well as degraded , by Charles V . and his successors . There are the tuille and corvee , the grasseating serfs and the dragonnades of Bourbon France . There are the bloody vagrancy laws of the Tudors . Aa to game preserving , ' it was under a very civilized despotism and in face of a strong clergy , that the Prince de

      Charolais used to divert himself with shooting , not pheasants , but workmen on the roofs of houses , whose death-throes , as they full , beguiled the sameness of a princely life . His pardon was easily obtained . The most Christian king , who had made incest the fashion , could not be hard on murder . Had tbe Prince de Cnarolaia , however , been an ordinary person of quality , and not of the blood royal , he would probably have been exiled to his country seat . Had he been a peasant suspected of worshipping God in a way not patronised by Louis XV . and the Prince de Charolais , he would have been sent to die bv slow torture in the galleys ; and u

      he had resisted , " he would have been broken on tne wheel . Sociology ( if that is to bo its classical name ) must bo a science of experience : aud what experience shows that tho rich and noble will act more conscientiously towards their dependents when they have maue over their consciences to a czar ; or that a czar amid his courtiers-will think more of thoio who are fcrtheat from , than of those who are nearest to , »»* thron 0 A J ° French freeholds , bo they good things or bad , were tfte gift of a republic and not of an om |>« o . We kpo * tho trick of

      that some despots have learned aPPJ ^ JJ the passions of the masses against intellect , at ih . a « ne time that they appeal to wealth og . un « t ihe , «» wn ° the , masses . But what bus been done for theimaw * except giving them back , in ostontat ou » ^^ little of the money which is ultimately * ' ™» *™ £ Z In unobtrusive taxation , and swooping oil a good mwj of them to Cayenne ? Tho population oT « no scorns , has hitherto diminished under tho ' ™ "g f of the ' Empire ¦ , though diplomatic joi » r . m an rutJgjr hopes for n cessation of this sad eftoot from the con a « Eo of ita beneficent cause On tho other ha . , «* over mav bo tho shortcomings of > ng « h bo « W )>

      may ^' without boasting , and we hold It m = cynicism to deny , that groat and ™» f ^ " ° on J ra « de by tho upper elaMO . to 1 " *™ ° *^ J » of those the education of tho poor ; and tho so ™ ° ° fl efforts ia tho sonso of Individual W" ^^ winoore religion and a froo press . J' » dl \ " * J J „ 8 inllty is what a despotism ia dosirod to supj ™;^ . ' frfl 0 core religion is what a despotism novor yet linu press . is what a despotism novor h « s endured aim can endure . —Fraser ' s Majaaino .

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), June 20, 1857, page 16, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_20061857/page/16/