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- ' „ ' nIIZ ^ a ? Vion was have g such there for railwaysJ ^ n « *» s $ ™\ but proper that C " rciai m ^ ffntereVd ^ the subject should express thSroSo ^ on it . He thought they were bound in interest and in honour to do what they could to see that this man who had done so much for them should not be iru 8 hed-- (^ ^) -that they ought to give him what moral support they could ; and whatever jealousy other Sries mig ht have , it might be hoped that Great Bn-Sin had not fallen so low as not to defend interests which were identified with her own . ( Cheers . ) Mr . Larking , who has resided sixteen years in Eevpt seconded the resolution . He explained still further the dispute between the Porte and Egypt as regarded the tanzimat .
" Now , according to a condition in the firman of investiture , the laws of Turkey were to have equal force in Eeypt but might be modified to adapt them to the local circumstances and social condition of the Egyptians . The Porte , however , had lately put forth a pretension that these laws should be carried into effect in Egypt without reference to the modifying power granted by the firman , and also claimed a right to interfere in their administration . Now , this interference would be a direct violation of the rights ceded to the family of Mehemet Ali , and , if admitted , would nullify the firman . This was certainly not the intention of those who framed and guaranteed the treaty between the Sultan and Mehemet AH for , in granting the government of Egypt to the Pacha , it was never intended to take from him the power to govern . ( Hear , hear . )
The following resolutions were also moved by Mr-Foster , member of the Council at Port Philip , and Mr . John M'Gregor , M . P ., and adopted . " That a committee , to consist of the following gentlemen , with power to add to their number , viz . ;—Mr . Samuel Gregson , Mr . Arthur Anderson , M . P . ; Mr . Samuel Briggs , Mr . H . Lindsay , Mr . T . Larking , Mr . Alexander Matheson , M . P .: Mr . Raikes Currie , M . P . ;
Mr . J . M'Gregor , M . P . ; Mr . J . F . Foster , and Mr . G . G . Barton be appointed , and be requested to act , to procure signatures to the memorial , and to present it when signed ; to communicate personally , or otherwise , with her Majesty ' s Government relative to the subject of it ; to invite and promote the cooperation of parties in other parts of the kingdom in the object of it ; and that they be requested to convene another public meeting , in order to lay before it a report of their proceedings . " to his
" That this meeting desire to convey Highness Abbas Pasha , Viceroy of Egypt , the assurance of their sympathy and of their support , by every legitimate means , in the present position of his affairs ; a sympathy and support which they consider he has fully earned by the liberal , active , and judicious manner in which he has devoted , and proposes to devote , his resources , to the improvement and security of the transit of the mails , travellers , and property , to and from the East . That a copy of this resolution be transmitted or presented to his Highness , in such manner as the committee before named may think proper . "
Mr . M'Gregor said he had been a member of the Board of Trade , when the treaty of 1841 was negotiated , and it was then distinctly understood that the Porte had no right to interfere in the internal affairs of Egypt . Chancing to say that he believed the movement did not emanate from the Porte , but from " a source not friendly to British commerce and navigation , " a lugubrious voice called out ' The Greek and Catholic Church has done it" ! a remark
followed by loud laughter . General Briggs and Mr . Aglionby afterwards spoke , and the meeting dispersed . It did not appear that any of these gentlemen doubted for one moment but that they would get the railway were the Porte properly coerced . As to how far the railway question may be a pretext for embroiling the Porte with Egypt for the sake of Russia , not a man seemed to think it at all necessary to inquire .
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EMMA MARTIN . In the current discussions on reformations affecting women , the public will learn with regret the decease of one able to have made valuable contributions to Huch a question . Mrs . Emma Martin , the author of various Essays , lteligious , Morul , and Medical , died on Wednesday , October the 8 th , at her residence , Finchley Common , in her thirtyninth year . The funeral took place on Tuesday , at the Highgate Cemetery , in the presence of a private assemblage of friends and relatives . The following words , spoken ut the grave by Mr . (> . J . Ilolyoake , convey a part of her Htrungo history ; and it will be ncwH to many classes that such things are thought and said in this Metropolis . Mr . Ilolyoake spoke as follows : —
The few words to be spoken here can add nothing to that known and felt by those who stand around . iUtt sometimes relief comes in sorrow , by telling that to each other which we ourselves do know . IJesides , the nature of this occasion lends authenticity to what «» ay be repeated to others caring to know our thoughts at this hour . The btory we have to tell is brief and Bad . A lift ; no useful , elosed at thirty-nine , is sad—yet the mid-«
chequered , and the end a tragedy ; but the end was an example , and carried with it a noble moral . Such is the history of her from whom we part this day . A childhood of religious training and secular neglect , alternately distracted and confined a spirit it could not guide , and Emma Martin , endowed with fine powers and with the capacity of free thought , was taught to accept this world as a transitory state , where there awaits each inhabitant a Providenceapportioned human lot—to which "is annexed the inexorable condition of a dogmatic and unchangeable creed . Her early writings present the suggestive spectacle common among the higher order of minds , of one theoretically eulogistic of her own captivity , and impulsively escaping from it with unconscious gladness . But her lot no less than her creed was destined to be renounced by her .
Allied to a husband ( found in the religious circle in which she was reared in Bristol ) whose company it was a humiliation to endure , she ultimately , even when she was the mother of three children , refused to continue to submit to it . This , though afterwards made a reproach to her , was so justifiable , that even her religious friends found no fault -with it . Her " Remembrances " of this period are best expressed in her own words at the time : — " But hours of agony , and years of pain , Have been my portion in this weary life . Tis well the past may ne ' er return again , Whatever be my future care or strife . " After such struggling ( such as a mother only can maintain ) to support her children unaided , she was united to another husband ( Mr . Joshua Hopkins ) ,
her former one yet living . Though no marriage ceremony wa 9 performed , or could be performed ( such is the moral state of our law , which denies divorce to all who are wronged , if they happen to be also indigent ) , yet no affection was ever purer , no union ever more honourable to both parties , and the whole range of priest-made marriages never included one to which happiness belonged more surely , and upon which respect could dwell more truly .
Our first knowledge of Mrs . Martin was as an opponent of Socialism , against which she delivered public lectures . But as soon as she saw intellectual truth in it , she paused in her opposition to it . Long and serious was the conflict the change in her convictions caused her ; but her native love of truth prevailed , and she came over to the advocacy of that she had so resolutely and ably assailed . And none who ever offered us alliance , rendered us greater service , or did it at greater cost . Beautiful in expression , quick in -wit , strong in will , eloquent in speech , coherent in conviction , and of stainless character , she was incomparable among public women .
She was one of the few among the early advocates of English Socialism who saw that the conflict against religion could not be confined to an attack on forms of faith—to a mere comparison of creeds ; and she attached only secondary importance to the abuses of Christianity , where she saw that ' the whole was an abuse of history , of reason , and" of morality . Thus she wa 8 cut from all hope or sympathy from her former connections , and she met with but limited friendships among her new allies . She saw further than any around her what the new Communism would end in . She saw that it would establish the
healthy despotism of the affections , in lieu of the factitious tyrannies of custom and Parliament . She embraced the Communist theory , because she saw no licentiousness was included in it ; and she drew an austere line between liberty and licence , which made her repulsive to all the vague ( a rather large class in all new parties ) . But what was thoroughly innocent , Mrs . Martin wished to have frankly avowed , and lived out modestly . And here , again , she was almost alono . For those who were unable to see clearly where the line of demarcation lay , were afraid of being drawn too far ; for , not understanding themselves , they were naturally alarmed lest they should be misunderstood by others ; and Mrs . Martin presented all her life the unusual paradox of being at oneo the terror of the timid and the bold .
Only thone understood her character who came witbin the sphere of her influence , or discerned it by insight . Over the whole country there are many who will hoar of her death as a public calamity , and she had some cherished friendships among those who are only attracted by genius or won by worth ; but they were of such persons us could not well be near her , and she died at Finchley Common , comparatively alone , in that retreat which she hud nought in her energy and her pride—disdaining that opponents should witness that suffering which they had no wish to alleviate . Able to die in the prineipleH in which she lived , she Hunk ( just as the iirst rayn of prosperity begun to break on her life ) —too wiso to murmur , and too brave to fear .
The nature of her opinions , which arose in conviction und not in antagonism , will best bo hcch in two passages from her writings , at two remarkable periods of her life . In 1886 ahe wrote in the Bristol Literary Magazine , which , elxo edited : —
" Infidelity is the effusion of weak minds , and the resource of guilty ones . Like the desolating Simoon of the desert , it withers everything within its reach ; and as soon as it has prostrated the morality of the individual , it invades the civil rights of society . " In 1844 , in the Seventh of her Weekly Addresses to the Inhabitants of London , of which it was the the thirty-sixth thousand issued , she said : — " When Christianity arose , it gathered to its standard the polished Greek , the restless Roman , the barbarous Saxon ; but it was suited only to the age in which it
grew . It had anathemas for the bitter hearted to hurl at those they chose to designate God ' s enemies . It had promises for the hopeful , cautions for the prudent , charity for the good . It was all things to all men . It became the grand leader of the ascetic to the convent—of the chivalrous to the crusade—of the cruel to the Star Chamber—of the scholar to the secret midnight cell , there to feed on knowledge , but not to impart it . But at length its contentional doctrines bade men look elsewhere for peace—for some less equivocal morality , some clearer doctrines , some surer truth . "
In this belief she lived , worked , taught , and in this belief she died . And in passing to the kingdom of the inscrutable future , whose credentials could she better take than those she had won by her courage and truthfulness ? Could she take Pagan , Buddhist , Mahommedan , Christian , or some morose sectarian shade ? credentials soiled with age , torn in strifes , stained with blood . On the threshold of the undefined Future , where all who have gone before are afar off and out of sight—where none can accompany us to counsel or inform—where each enters a stranger and alonewhat passport can be so authentic as a love of humanity , undarkened by hate — a passion for truth , always pure — the tribute of labour that never rested , and a conscience which cherished no guile ?
Will any who calumniate the last hours of Freethinkers utter the pious fraud over this narrow bed , and the memory of Emma Martin be distorted ,- as have been those of Voltaire and our own Paine ? Does the apparition of these outrages glare upon this grave—outrages too ignoble to notice , too painful to recognize ? Heed them not—believe them not . Let not the Christian insult her whom only the grave has vanquished . Let him not utter the word of triumph over the dead , before whom living his coward tongue would falter . Let his manliness teach him truth if his creed has failed to teach him courtesy .
As a worker for human improvement , Mrs . Martin was as indefatigable as efficient . From the time when she published her Exiles of Piedmont , to the issue of her essay on God ' s Gifts and Man ' s Duties , and later still , she wrote with ardour , always manifesting force of personal thought , and what is more unusual in the writings of women—strength and brevity of expression . Her Lectures were always distinguished by the instruction they conveyed , and the earnestness with which they were delivered . In courage of
advocacy and thoroughness of view , no woman except Frances Wright is to be compared with her ; and only one whose name is an . affectionate household word in our land ( greater , indeed , in order of power ) , resembles Mrs . Martin in largeness and sameness of speculation , and the capacity to treat womanly and social questions . Mrs . Martin had a strength of will which rules in all spheres , but ever chastened by womanly feeling . Her affectionate nature as much astonished those who knew her in
private , aa her resolution often astonished those who knew her in public . Indeed , she was the most womanly woman of all the advocates of " Woman's llights . " Her assertion of her claim to interfere in public affairs was but a means of winning security from outrage for the domestic affections . She would send the mother into the world—not in the desertion of motherly duties , but to learn there what motherly duties are—not to submit in ignorance to suckle slaves , but to learn how to rear free men and intelligent and pure women .
To some our words may sound like the words of eulogy , which admiration utt < rn and friendship believes ; but they will be found to bear investigation . Deeming the profession of an uecoueheur was properly one for woman , she qualified herself for it witli that intellectual conscientiousness which distinguished her . She attended lectures , npent days and nights in the hospitals for months together , and went through a long and patient practice . In all pursuits she united the scholar ' s conscience with the reformer ' s emulation .
To her own party she was an inspiration ; and had more leisure ) and means been allotted her , her resources and invention would have added largely to its influence . She would huve been our Madame ltolund , whom she greatly loved , "'»
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Oct . 18 , 1851 . ] «»« ****** 985
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Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 18, 1851, page 985, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1905/page/5/
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