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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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believe the aggressive tendencies of St . Vla doiik ; but we do not see the advantage o meeting such aggression by counter-aggressidh Nor is Dublin the only place where thi Protestant enters into a damaging competitioi with the Catholic Church . There is a nev Church of a very peculiar kind rising ii Turkey . The Society for the Propagation o the Gospel in Foreign Parts , with the sanctior of " J . B . Cantuar , " is carrying out the request of the Reverend John E . Sabin , senio ] chaplain at Scutari , by sending out two chaplains to Pera . The first object of these mei is modest enough : it is , to supply spiritual ministrations for the " English sailors , shipping agents , store keepers ^ and other temporary residents near Constantinople ; " but besides supplying divine service and religious consolation for store keepers and sailors who may be in want thereof , the mission has an eye to business in another line . The Roman Catholics have three Churches in Constantinople , and they will not certainly be behind-hand in endeavouring to convert the Turks ; and " Now that no Turk on the Bosphorus could be put to death for accepting the religion of Jesus Christ , if he claimed the protection of Prance or England , " the Society for the Propagation seizes the opportunity . " Turkey being under obligations to us , she cannot slay her sons for listening to the voice of the charmer . The Roman Catholics , says Mr . Sabin , " will doubtless have great successes , with the French army to back them ; " can the English expect less , when they have the British army to back them ? Such is the calculation avowed by the Reverend John E . Sabin , and the Society for the Propagation , > with the sanction of J . B . Cantuak . The Protestant aggression is more temperate than the Catholic , but it is still aggression . We calculate on being able to disobey the laws of the Sultan , because the Sultan is down in the world , and so we can force a contraband trade in doctrine , with armies to back us in overruling the spiritual Custom House of Turkey . The independent papers of this country are reiterating the story of the re-marriage at Greywell . Mr . Lush , the Curate of that place , found that two members of the Church had been married before the Registrar , and he encouraged their doubt , whether , although they were married legally , they had been married spiritually , lie re-marries them ; whereupon great public indignation . But Lush is only carrying amongst the Dissenters of Greywell , the same spirit that the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel is carrying at Pern , and that the Pori ; , with more arrogance , is carrying into Austria . Mr . Lush is more temperate than the Society or the Pon : ; for he docs not calculate upon mi army to back him , and he does not attempt to disturb the civil relations of his parishioners . If propagating societies and Popes would limit themselves entirely to spiritual questions ? , they might perhaps be suffered to marry any number of people once a year , since the re-married must be volunteers in that sell-disparngiug process , and " Volenti noil Jit m /' uria . " One curious confession in all these cases of aggressive policy is , the want of confidence which the aggressive ministers feel in thoir own doctrine . The Irish Attoknhy GENEJtAMhinkstlrat Protestantism cannot maintain its ground in Ireland against the antics of a St . ViiAPiMiit , unless a grave quarrel be made with that , temporary representative of the Irish mob on the relative value of the authorised and the Dot . 'AY versions of the Scriptures , with a , competition between the bonfire and the Criminal Court in judicial miracles . The Propagandist Society colints upon the abject condition of Turkey and the occupying army , and the Porn requires material backing
: - to enforce his views of matrimony , education : f &c . Lush stands free from these intempe-. ranees . e Now , in all these cases , the aggression really 1 consists , not in the promulgation of the docv trine , but in the collateral forces . prostituted to 1 the purpose of conversion . If J . B . Cantuarj f the Propagating Society , and Mr . Sabin would 1 simply lay their arguments before the Turk , - that silent person would exercise a really inde-[• pendent judgment . . If the Pope and Ltjtiieu - were to plead their respective causes before l Italian , Hungarian , or Bohemian , probably the I popular judge would show favour to neither f . of the missionaries ; but would perceive that r the sectai'ian dogmas urged by either with so i much acrimony against the rest are not essential to the religion of Jesus Christ . These : temporal appeals , in fact , whether for offence i or defence , only disturb the mind from its free judgment . How can we trust the conversion of the Turk , backed by an army ? How can avo win the Irish to Protestantism through the Attorney-General ? The true function of the civil power is , not to enforce the de-? mands of any sect whatever , or in any degree , but rather to protect the citizen in the free exercise of his will , as well as his limbs , against the compulsory claims of any sect . If , in this country , we could set an example of absolute freedom in that way , leaving every man who behaves himself with decency to walk , talk , and worship as he pleases , defending him against the obstruction or coercion of any priest or prophet , we should teach the "world Iioav to rule in matters of religion , and should no doubt open the way for the propagation of 7 * e « # y powerful doctrines . It is free discussion which , in our day , has abolished Atheism , and done much to drive out other anti-religious " isms . " As doctrine will force its way by its own vital energy , it needs no protection : the citizen alone needs to be protected against the presumptuous aggression of human sectaries , affecting to serve a writ in the name of Divine Power . ¦ ¦
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December IV 1855 . ] THE LEABEIt lAsi
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THE SPITAT . F 1 ELDS WEAVERS . What a keen eye we have for distant affairs ; and how blind arc we to that Avhich is going on under our very noses ! Hero is the whole London press in a turmoil about the strike ut Manchester , while seemingly unconscious that a deadly strife between capital and labour is actually waging in Spital fields . The leading journal busies itself with the Lancashire matter , and gives whole columns of speeches and manifestos spoken and written on either side of ( he question , but the Spital / ields dispute has been hitherto altogether ignored by it—us indeed by all those organs of the daily press which circulate among the thoughtful chisses . There is something in the history <> f these Spitnlttekls weavers which separates them from all other operatives , and invests them with peculiar intere . it . In 1 ( 185 , when the ( Jkkat MoNAitcii , Loi . 'is the FoL ' iriT . K . NTii , wickedly repealed the edict of Nantes , and persecuted all the Protestants out of France , a large body of silk weavers , staunch Pro 1 cfiliinl . su 11 , eiuuo and settled themselves in ttpilaliii- 'lds , where they continued to pursue their calling . This was a hundred and seventy years ago , bill the trade still holds to the locality , and tin ; traditions of the operatives , and the" number of foreign names yet among ; them indicate that ( lie original stock has been equally constant . The inhabitant of western and fashionable London may nut be familiar with these facts , but to those , of eastern experience that colony of workers , so industrious and generally so patient , ( though : \ . \> t occasionall y to betray the hot blood of Lyons and Marseilles by boiling up indignantly against oppression and wrong )
' has afforded matter for contemplation before to-day . To see poverty making clothes few the poor is a spectacle sufficiently affecting but a starving man seated at his loom anc weaving bright and delicate tissues , to cove ] the limbs of the rich , the lusty and the heedless , is a far sadder and more terrible picture . From time to time the Spitalnelds weavers have been heard complaining of a hard lot , —* scanty wages in a dear food market , and occasionally their voices have readied St . Stephen ' s . In Mr . Pitt's time , it was under contemplation to give the Spitalfield weavers a minimum rate of prices , aiid to enforce that by legislative enactment ; but somehow or other the thing was not managed , the crisis blew over , and so did Mr . Put ' s scheme . Not that sucn a rate would have permanently settled tlie question ; for it has since been shown that tlie minimum rate then prepared ( which was at tlie time rejected by the operatives themselves ) exceeds the maximum rate now granted . So futile are all legislative attempts to fetter tlie freedom of trade . The Spitalfield weavers have now turned out , because their masters have lowered theii wages upon the plea of bad trade . They use precisely the same arguments as their Manchester brethren , and say that when food is dear and work scarce , it is a bad time to lo . wei wages ; they also meet their employers upon economical grounds , and attempt to show that there is no good reason ivhy they should be mulcted of theii pay . They are holding " shop meetings , " and deputations of delegates are waiting upon the employers , some of whom receive them kindly , others contumeliously . The whole affair is proceeding with all tlie I regularity of a Lancashire strike , and he that j wishes to study the details of one of these ter-! rible battles need not go to Manchester , but [ betake himself to that populous and povertystricken district which lies about WhitechapcJ , Shoreditch , and Bethnal Gieen . In the course of one of th <> discussions which have been already hold between the workpcoyjle and their employers , one of the latter observed that when machine-makers were badly o ( T , they were glad to sell their machines at a very low figure , and he did not see why capitalists should not have the same advantage ; in purchasing human labour . This was stating the , question boldly and honestly , and here we have the whole creed of tlie " hard-fact , " capitalists . "What , is the operative , after all , but a se . U-aeting machine of ilesh , bone , ami sinew ? Is be not to be bought and sold like his brethren of brass and stud ? What have we to clo ¦ with any . other consideration but his market , price ? Softly , good sirs ! Your machines of brass and steel may be laid by for a time , if your trade- will not permit you to employ them ; only wrap them up warmly aud oil them well , ami they will take little harm from years of inaction . lint your human machine is quite another sort , of thing . The unfed operative pines , starves , becomes desperate , forgets how to work , learns how to beg , drink , rob , riot , and destroy . "You may imprison him , you may . sboot him down with musketry in the streets ; but you can no more make u good workman of him again than you ean restore putrid meat , to its original fresh new . '" a word ( to bring tin- matter , gentlemen , to your unulumis un
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Dec. 1, 1855, page 1151, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2117/page/11/
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