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t October 23, 1852.] THE LEADER. 1015 -—...
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MMIIS NAl'OLKON, MM ITOROIt. 'ouis Nai'o...
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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.
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The Meeting Of Convocation "For The Desp...
who claim to represent the majority of the clergy fear the issue ; have no faith m their principles ; i we will not say what reflections such a fear and lack of faith must call forth in the public ¦ ^ jfot perhaps the most astonishing result of the week ' s controversy is the portrait painted by the journals of the Protestant clergymen . If we desired to compass the destruction of the Church i destroying the character of her clergy , we should not wish for surer means than those loyed by the lay advocates of a stationary , dividedand a submissive Church . One says
, that tlie clergy cannot deal with " even the interests of the Church in a spirit of discretion , wisdom , and decorum ; " that Convocation would gerve no imaginable purpose but the " disgraceful exhibition of the dissensions" of its members , whom it respectfully alludes to as a " swarm of theological hornets . " Another at first mildly denies them the " good temper and common sense required to conduct the debates of Convocation , " and rising , as the polemic grows warmer , into a higher strain of invective , speaks of the " disgusting brawls at Plymouth , " carried on " with a defiance of ordinary
restraints and decency , happily unknown among societies of laymen , " and conducted with a ¦ " personal bitterness amd coarse vindictiveness " distinguishing the " whole batch of these Plymouth clergymen . " " Bound the whole horizon , " says the same writer , " there is not a single sign to show that divines are becoming more tractable to reason or more willing to think and act gently by their spiritual antagonists . " A third , after great profession of respect and anxiety for the welfare of the Church , calls Convocation " an amphitheatre wherein to hold an ecclesiastical bull-fight . "
Now , we must -be understood as neither adopting nor rejecting these descriptions of the pastors ofthose who write them , —of the men from whom they receive the most awful sacraments , and at whoso feet they are supposed to sit to hear the sacred and saving doctrines of religion . What is the value of this wholesale depreciation of the clergy P How can the writers believe and denounce ? Does it not make manifest the truth for which we
arc contending—namely , that profound and vital hostilities are at work in the Church of England , wliicli , nevertheless , presents itself to us , officially , as one united , harmonious , divine institution . What a startling discrepancy between the pretension and the facts ! What a tremendous deficit on the side of truth and conscience I In point of fact , these are confessions , all the more valuable , because so spontaneously made ,
Hint the Church of England , composed not only of its lay myriads , but of ten thousand educated clergymen , in the possession of enormous wealth , with the prestiqc of ages ,, cannot improve its present position . If persevered in , wo must accept this cry of the great journals as an indication that the Church of England is a gi ^ inf ic wham , and if so , woe unto thepooplo who tolerate it ; , and consent to bo its dupes .
^ It remains for the clergy and laity of the t'lmrcli to disprove the representations of their cham pions ; to win freedom or dare- defeat ; to niake l , lie Church what she professes to be , to ' ¦ " ¦ ny on !; her doctrines , to adhere toiler dogmas , 1 ° insist on her rights ; to do this for conscience ' ilce , and to stand or fall in doing it , this is tho '" " ¦ d but , noble task imposed on churchmen ; and whatever may bo its result , we lire , if they are , prepared to take the consequences , confident Unit u'h ; it is truest , will bo also mightiest in tin ; end , ; l "d that we shall never live to repent of having ^ '"itteii faithfully up to our creed of freedom of lll () iiglit , of speech , and of writing for all ranks " » sorts , and races of men .
T October 23, 1852.] The Leader. 1015 -—...
t October 23 , 1852 . ] THE LEADER . 1015 - — • • - —— - — - - - """' '
Mmiis Nal'olkon, Mm Itoroit. 'Ouis Nai'o...
MMIIS NAl'OLKON , MM ITOROIt . 'ouis Nai'oi . kon has conquered . However ¦'' iiiHpareiil , hjs devices may have been at first , "never hoi low the pageant , however sullen tho ^ "ll nuiee of | , | ,,, spectators , there is no doubt ¦ ' -Hi IJio pertinacious continuance of his parade ; i ' ' 0 ll ^ 'out I'Yanco has bad 'its ex pected ellcct , < Ul ( l thiil , by the time ho made his triumphal '' ' . ' jy '" to Paris , on Saturday last , large closes o | . ' ' . < ' population had really fallen info the ranks hls Nnpportei-H . Whatever may be the ne-|| '' "llH : iM to the feeling in this or that district , 11 , ^ . , !> ' ' ; l ( 'tn before the world prove that the j ' ¦ 'I t"ic-a , l display is on much too large a scale 1 (| ve been got , up |> y his means only , by a
single purse , or any surreptitious machinery . Numbers of those who make spontaneous offerings to him must represent volunteers newly added to his adherents ; and there is a reason for this , not very deep below the surface , and yet often unrecognized by statesmen . When Louis Napoleon started for his tour in the South , met chiefly , perhaps only , by his friends , the multitude standing by in sullen silence , he was but beginning the process which he accomplished on Saturday . At that time the semblance of a popular movement was got up by his own instruments , and was aided only by those timeservers who are willingto speculate on the chances of any new success . The feelings , both of the
middle and working classes , towards him are well known . The working classes were prepared to tolerate him so long as they should see under his regime a prospect of employment ; and they were the more impelled to that course by the rancour with which they remembered the grape-, shot of the " Moderate" Republic . " The Bepublic , " they said , " filled our bellies against our appetites ; and Louis Napoleon could not give us harder fare . " The trading classes , whom he treats with a marked contempt , whom he is grinding with taxation and with all the oppressions of hard rule , who form , in fact , the fulcrum by which he is moving other classes , sustain , the whole weight , and are mere endurers of the chains . These classes he has well selected for
the . purpose . Their main desire is to let trade go on . To that desire they will sacrifice everything ; and as the maintenance of quiet does let trade go on , they are content to suffer morally , while they prosper materially . He places the greatest pressure on the class whose spirit is most prone to endure that pressure . The army he has diligently courted ; and the army , it may be remembered , although now much demoralized and alienated from the mass of the citizens ,
especially in the capital , is drawn-from the heart of the people , and is the very life-blood of the country . The army in ¦ France is a class , and that army at present sees its old prospects in the open career of the new Empire . It may , indeed , have an enterprise or two beyond that which he may calculate , but , of course , such ideas are vague and conditional . At present it is pleased through him , and it is prepared to elevate him on the shield , of election . Add to these facts .
that there is sprinkled about the provinces , and especially in the South , a large element of Bonapartism , and tho raw material on which he has worked is before us . The pageant which he has created throughout , his route has revealed to the uneducated mind the image of the old empire under the most vivid aspect of a theatrical representation . Moving amongst such elements , ho has done something more , however , than simply perform a pageant . 3 n the South he has drawn out , the population , by the aid of administrative machinery , and lias induced it to stand before . France in presence with himself . Tie did so at Toulon , at Marseilles , at Bordeaux , and at every place of any note in the intervals . In other words , for the
day , lie made France to see herself , and paraded before society the actual strength of tho nation . Coming back to Paris , he prances into that city , ever sensitive of ear and eye lo the pomp of battle , at the head of an imposing and devoted army . As troop after troop marched glistening through the streets , the fluttering easements had leisure to count the power which France possesses , and which had been intrusted , whether by . 1 ' rovulence , or by fortune , or by chance , into the hands of the one man , who rode ; triumphant .
rnuico saw there , in her quivering capital , concentrated at one survey , an engine capable of moving Slates , and with her own eyes saw thai , engine in the hands of the bold unflinching fatalist , whose ; fixed tenacity of purpose lias raised him from being the idle lounger of Leicestersquarn , to the lord of the . Imperial throne , and arbiter of the destinies <> f Kuropo . Tenacity of purpose—converse Duw to face with l Ya , nce
display of the strength of l < Yanco , and of her military power in one grasp—these are tho apiteals by which Louis Napoleon has addressed himself to tho mind , the fear , the pride of Kranee . The nation has calculated that her submission to thai , power for the nonce would be belter than resistance . l < Ya . nce has trembled under the display of her < mn power , held over her own bead . I'Yanco has fell , pride in the engine by which the man who speaU in her name can make nationw
tremble . Many a class , therefore , which had looked upon him as an adventurer , an alien , is now prepared to fall into the ranks of the veritable Emperor of France . Louis Napoleon has stolen a march upon the statesmen who have been before him . Factions speak to particular convictions , but mostly they address interests which are sectional , or convictions that can only be entertained by particular classes of minds . The Legitimists entertain peculiar notions of a very abstract kind , as to the duty of subjects , the rights of sovereigns , and the particular merits of a gentleman with a feeble
constitution , who writes abstract letters to his personal friends in the metropolis . But the especial crotchet which that party entertain is one which can have no sort of interest for the people at large . The Socialists entertain notions which , to us appear based upon a very sound principle , respecting the future development of political economy in any State ; but they have shaped their conclusions in forms so remote from any immediate practicability , that they have never yet enabled the people to handle any specimen or result of the promised fruits . Louis Blanc might have done so ; but his colleagues suffered Marie to outwit him . Tho association of
workmen remains , and it may prove to be quite as possible under tlic Empire as under any more strictly Socialistic regime . The Republicans also put forth abstract theories , but lost themselves in conflict , and perpetrated the hideous mistake of firing grape-shot into the stomachs of the people , in whose right they professed to speak ! They immolated the citizens , as a sacrifice to the name of the Eepublic , —immolated
more especially the most republican of those citizens . But all these parties had neglected to make a direct appeal to the passions of France , as France ; Lad neglected to set forth that appeal iu forms that particularly strike the collective mind of any community ; and thus they left that appeal to a man much their inferior in many respects , but instinctively appreciating the particular art . He has used his art .
He lias elevated France into being a very dangerous neighbour to this country . We mistrusted France in 1840 , under the citizen-king , the Napoleon of Peace , and his Minister , Thiers , historian of the Revolution . We mistrusted France again in 1818 , when Paris was the scene of conflict . We have regarded France with an increasing mistrust , and now , although amongst us there are many disposed to consider her a , guardian of tranquillity , simply because her Government is to be called royal , she has acquired a power and a posture more hazardous to this country tliau she ever before possessed , even
under Napoleon himself , who met the power of : England at Waterloo . Franco was far less ahlo thru than she- ' is now to damage- England : she Ls not yet in conflict with all the world ; she possesses a , power of naval transport which she never before possessed , certainly not in the days of tho Boulogne flotilla . Her enormous army is for tho most part at home ; she has had the recruiting ; interval of a long jiea . ee , yet with warlike practice in Algeria ; and she lias lent herself for all purposes to I he inscrutable . Adventurer . Never ¦\ v ; is France before so able to injure England , . so little diverted by oilier occupations , or so removed from the calculations of political science .
But these facts do not really constitute tho f » reafest danger which I ' ranee has for our own country . That danger lie ' s precisely in tho neglect of our statesmen who copy the defeated statesmen of France rather than Louis Napoleon . The middle class , whom Louis Napoleon has made the fulcrum , but not i \ ir , ruler , of his course , in I . lie dominant clans in this country , and is giving to our sla , lenma . nship ils purely nrgal ive and passive character . The whole conduct of England as a Stale is a practical lime-serving , ready for submission to any event , but unprepared for action . The concentration which I'Yanco has
acquired through the eleval ion of the Linpcror in wholly wanting-in this country . Wo doubt whether there has ever before been in I he history of t lie world a , great State so totally broken iij > into small fractional parties as ICngland is at this moment . We have , it is true , an army ; but tho largest proportion of it is spread abroad , to tho nuts I , remole parts of the empire : which it in the practice of our central governiuonl to keep in a slale of di ; i . ulinl ; i ( -lion if i" » t disaJlection , as if purposely to provide ( hat our soldiery may have work at the most distant , frontiers , Sonic por-
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 23, 1852, page 11, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_23101852/page/11/
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