We rejoice to see that the Protestant feeling of the empire is awake; and that ministers will not be suffered to perpetrate their atrocities in the cabinet, without provoking the reclamation of an indignant people. Manchester has nobly done its duty. Liverpool has nobly done its duty. The good men and true, in these great marts of commerce and manufactures, have assembled, in thousands, to listen to the spirit-stirring eloquence of the great champions of pure religious truth and Sound Conservative principles, which were never in more perilous danger; and they have not separated without bearing their testimony against changes and promotions, which bear upon them the stamp of profligate incapacity, or reckless daring, hitherto altogether unexampled.

That a man who stood at the bar of the House of Lords as a culprit, accused of malversation of office in his conduct in the administration of the Irish Government, such as, in the better times of the constitution, would have brought down upon him pains and penalties; and, in the mind of every reflecting and impartial man, convicted, even by the showing of his own witnesses, of the weightiest of the charges upon which he was arraigned, should, as soon as parliament ceased to sit, be promoted to the most influential office in the empire, an office which gives him a sweeping controul over the church, the magistracy, and the administration of justice, is, surely, an experiment upon public forbearance, the boldest and the most audacious that ever was made; and indicates, fully, the degree to which ministers calculate upon the backwardness and timidity of Conservatives to call them to account for their misdeeds, and the increased earnestness of the popish and radical party, to sustain them in the threatening attitude which they have assumed against all that is sacred or valuable in the empire.

The appointment of Mr. Shiel to the office of privy councillor, and Mr. Wyse to that of lord of the treasury, is a pledge respecting their designs against the church, which must be altogether satisfactory to those who are leagued for its overthrow, and who have hitherto moved heaven and earth

for its destruction; nor will any thing which the popish and infidel party in this country can do be wanting to sustain in office the abandoned men, who have thus, literally, for the emoluments of office, sold themselves to work both political and moral evil; and by whose continuance in power the ruin of England is more sure to be accomplished, than by the immediate ascendancy of more ostensibly desperate men, who would be more direct in their aims, but less plausible in their pretensions.

Well then, is it, for the weal of England, that that supineness and indif ference upon which ministers calculated, is, at present, no where to be found; and that the sentiments of the speakers, at the meetings to which we have above adverted, have met with a response in the bosom of every Conservative in the empire? Nor is the indignation less deep, because it is not loud, which swells at the prospect of the ruin and misery which must be brought upon this great nation if the present guilty and contemptible holders of office, though not possessors of power, should be much longer inflicted upon

us.

There is a sentiment of loyalty which animates the bosom of every true hearted Conservative, which forbids the utterance of any strong remonstrance which might wound the feelings of our youthful Queen. We so habitually reverence the sovereign, that we can, with difficulty, be brought to speak or to act strongly against views or principles towards which she is represented to entertain fond though pernicious predilections; and thus, while the enemies of the monarchy, or the desperate men who must act as the enemies of the monarchy in order to retain their ill-gotten power, feel no scruple in abusing the mind of the sovereign for their own purposes, and to her undoing, the friends of the monarchy so venerate the sacredness of that majesty "that doth hedge a king," that they can with difficulty be induced even to murmur their discontent, when, by the contrivance of evil councillors, the monarchy itself is endangered.

We are, therefore, not to estimate the determination of the Conservatives to resist the designs of evil doers, by

the loudness or vehemence of their denunciations. The greatest depth of feeling, and the utmost steadfastness of principle, is yet compatible with a tone of mildness, with "a modest stillness and humility," of which the lovers of peace and order will find it difficult to divest themselves, even under circumstances the most alarming. Their opinions and sentiments will, as they ought, be shown more by acts than by words. They well know that by improving the representation in the House of Commons alone, can they, avert the coming dangers. And as this is only to be done by attention to the registries, all true-hearted friends of the monarchy will be up and doing in the preliminary contest, which must, in its results, either confirm the power, or seal the doom of an unprincipled administration. Already, the feeling and the determination of the people have been felt by ministers in quarters where it was least expected. Cambridge, we may be well assured, would not have been vacated by Lord Mounteagle, could government have seriously apprehended that he would have found a successor in Mr. Manners Sutton; nor would Poulet Thomson have been sent to play his "fantastic tricks" in the Canadas had ministers entertained a notion of the narrow escape of their seat for that place being taken forcible possession of by Sir George Murray. They were saved there by a rally extraordinary of the Quakers. That peaceful body had determined to remain neutral, until they saw the Conservative candidate at the head of the poll, when they changed their mind, and came forward in a body to support the destructive Socinian. But it is satisfactory to know that they will not be able to enact such a part again with the same result, and that nothing but a most culpable supineness, (which the recent meeting gives us no reason to apprehend,) can prevent the triumphant success of the good cause at the next election.

These are but a few of the significant hints which have taught the government that their only hope of safety lies in courses that are allied to desperation. Office they are determined to hold; and how could they calculate upon the tenure of it for one single hour, if they were cast off by the Radical faction. Therefore it is that they are wise in their generation, in conciliating "by all appliances and means to boot" the power of O'Connell and

the priests in this country, and that of Joseph Hume, and the Radicals, infidels, and political dissenters, in the other. Without them, they could not stand for a single moment; and they had, in truth, no option but to relinquish office, or to cast off all shame, and proclaim themselves identified in principle with the fomenters of colonial rebellion, and the thorough-going advocates of a repeal of the union. Upon the utter want of principle manifested by many of their old Whig supporters, they, no doubt, still calculate; and hope that their alliance with them will not be dissolved even by their open confederacy with men of such extreme opinions that they can be scarcely designated as other than Covert traitors. How far a judicious dispensation of the good things at their disposal may act as flappers to the consciences of these men, and cause them still to slumber on in blind security, oblivious of the perils, both foreign and domestic, by which we are on every side besct, remains to be seen. We would fain hope better things of them. We would fain hope that the great majority of them will now see that the time has come, when they must no longer halt between two opinions. No fatuity can prevent them seeing that there now remains but one hope for England; and that, if the vessel of state be not anchored, firmly, in sound Conservative principles, it must be drifted, by the rising surges of an infidel Radicalism, over the precipice of revolution. What then, are they disposed to do? Will they take council from their own corruption, and accept the bribe, or be deluded by the representations, of government, to be aiding and assisting in measures utterly at variance with their recorded convictions? Or, will they act upon those better instincts, of which we would fain believe many of them conscious, and, flinging party feeling to the winds, become like old Burdett, as distinguished for their resistance to popular tyranny, as they might have been, in former times, to what they fancied to be, on the part of the crown, unconstitutional encroachment? It is for them to decide between disgrace and honour, as concerns themselves; and between safety and ruin, as concerns their country. But no. believe that the destinies of the country are, even in the present nearly ballanced state of parties, altogether in their hands. Upon the Conservatives

themselves, we would again and again impress it, our salvation as a nation must depend; and if they but do their duty like men, we care not who may prove knaves or traitors. Let, therefore, the old Whigs, if so they are minded, take their places in the rear of Hume, O'Connell, and the Radicals, and aid in the movement which has for its object a more extensive predominance of republican institutions. We fear them not, as long as the enlightened Protestantism of the empire is wide awake, and, with a full view of their perils and difficulties, the battlecry of the Conservatives is, “England expects every man to do his duty." But let the Conservatives be remiss at this important crisis, and all, indeed, is lost. The combination of infidels, profligates, destructives, and papists, must prevail, and the downfall of the formost nation in the world be the consequence of their unhallowed machinations.

right in itself and what is personally agreeable. And when wrong courses are pursued, it is much more frequently from error of judgment than from perversity of disposition, or depravity of heart. We therefore never yet met an honest man who had been perverted to radicalism, of whom we did not entertain good hope, that, sooner or later, he would be led to see his errors; and innumerable are the instances in which our anticipations have, in the amplest manner, been realised. Time, favouring opportunities, a somewhat better knowledge of the leaders of their own party, a freer intercourse with ours, have contributed, gradually, to the softening of prejudice, and the implanting of better convictions; until, in process of time, the virulent partizan of democracy and revolution has been changed into the strenuous defender of social order; and some of the very staunchest adherents of sound conservative policy have been thus won over from the ranks of its bitterest enemies.

To the scornful and contumelious tone, therefore, which is too frequently used towards the masses who differ from us, we are utterly opposed. Their leaders, indeed, in most instances, deserve the very worst which can be said of them. They are, for the most part, needy adventurers, or desperate traders upon the unsuspecting credulity of those who are their dupes. But not so the masses who are so often influenced by them to act to their own undoing. These, however mistaken, are actuated by honest intentions. They do not pursue what is wrong, in defiance of what they know to be right; but it is from a fixed belief in the rectitude of

Nor let it be supposed that we regard the whole of the party, or of the combination of parties, to whom we are opposed, as wickedly and irreclaimably bent upon evil courses. No such thing. We believe them, for by far the greater part, to consist of honest, though mistaken, men. As applied to merely human concerns, we are no maintainers of the corruption of human nature. In divine, and spiritual concerns it is, undoubtedly, true, that man has departed very far from his original righteousness, and that the lowest depth of self-abasement is the only proper ground upon which he can take his stand, when he becomes a supplicant for pardon to the throne of grace. As a spiritual and immortal creature, there is a natural repuguance to the self-renounce ing courses which he is called upon to enter, if he would copy the example of his Lord and Master. There is a conflict between the flesh and the spirit. The things which he would, those he does not; the things which he would not, those he does. All this is true of man, in relation to his eternal interests; as was, indeed, to a considerable extent, recognised by the enlightened heathen, when he said, " video meliora, proboque; deteriora sequor."

But no

such truth is predicable of man, in his relation to the present world, with respect to the things of which he has been emphatically pronounced to be "wise in his generation." In mere political matters it often happens that there is no natural opposition between what is VOL. XIV.

their opinions, that they are induced to persevere in what are destructive courses. Let us, therefore, only illuminate their judgments, and we do a great deal to correct the obliquity of their conduct. It is not, as in the case of moral evil, where there is an instinct in opposition to the rule of right; a law in our members at variance with the law in our minds. There is nothing which leads the generality of men to prefer bad government to good government, knowing them to be such; but much the contrary. And when, therefore, we convince the understandings of the radicals that conduct which they have been encouraged to adopt is that which must lead to results the very opposite of those which they were taught to expect, our

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readers may rely upon it that there will be a falling off from their cause precisely in proportion to the extent of such convictions.

If we looked for an instance illustrative of the truth of the position here advanced, we could not find one more to the purpose than the great Protestant meeting which was held at Brighton in (we believe) 1885. That town was then the very focus of radicalism; and it was determined by the radical leaders, by a bold stroke, to defeat the intentions of the Protestants, and to convert the meeting to a purpose the very opposite of that for which it was convened. With this view, by means of forged tickets, they, in great numbers, pre-occupied the place of meeting; and when the Protestant chairman, Lord Teignmouth, made his appearance, he was with great violence set aside, and a strong partizan on the other side placed in the chair. Every thing seemed to have succeeded according to their wishes, when Doctor O'Sullivan presented himself to the notice of the assembly, and claimed, as an accused individual, in common justice, to be heard. He was heard, although with many interruptions, for nearly three hours; and such was the effect which his able and honest statement produced on this hostile audience, that many who went to the meeting with feelings of bitterest prejudice against him and his cause, were convinced of their errors; and it was with no small difficulty the managers of the radicals were enabled to pass some feeble deprecatory resolutions, by which the object of those who called the meeting was, at the moment, defeated. But what was the effect of this day's proceedings, when the statements which were then put forth had time to work in the minds of the people? Let the ensuing election of town councillors tell, when the Conservative party so signally triumphed, and when the very individual who had been thrust into the chair, to the exclusion of Lord Teignmouth, was ignominiously rejected.

Why do we allude to this? Is it for the purpose of magnifying the prodigious effort of reasoning and eloquence by which the reverend speaker was on that occasion distinguished? No. But for the purpose of pointing out the honesty which was at the bottom of the most desperate radicalism; and proving, by indisputable facts, that we have only to treat men as rational

creatures, when their political interests are concerned, in order, in a great majority of instances, to make them good subjects.

We freely acknowledge that there is a certain amount of unredeemed scoundrelism, which cannot be turned to good by any reclaiming or humanizing process with which we are acquainted. The wretches who trade upon popular delusion, and who, if deprived of their present occupation of misleading the public mind by a system of " enormous lying," must hang or starve, cannot be easily induced, by any presentation of virtuous or honourable motives, to desist from their pernicious endeavours to make proselytes to infidelity and sedition. Upon such, therefore, we well know that it is altogether useless to expend argument. They are literally given over to a reprobate mind. But they bear, happily, but a small proportion to the masses whom they are permitted to leaven with their pernicious counsel, and amongst whom they have, hitherto, with too much impunity, been suffered to disseminate their pernicious misrepresentations. They are not more in number, as compared with the population, than the felons who adorn our gibbets or tenant our jails. And we ascribe it altogether to Conservative remissness, that they have been permitted, hitherto, to work so much unmixed evil. Had we fully done our duty, their occupation would have, long ago, been gone. But, owing partly to the persuasion that lies will always refute themselves; and partly, to that timidity and backwardness which has always characterised the defenders, as contrasted with the assailants, of our institutions, they have been suffered to go about in the political world like the roaring lion of whom we read in Scripture, when it only required a vigorous determination, and a word of power, to consign them to their own place. This must no longer be. A mendacious press must no longer be permitted to drug the minds and to debauch the consciences of the people. The conservative ability of the country must be alert and indefatigable, not only for the instruction of those who are numbered in its ranks, but of the myriads who are only not numbered in its ranks, because of the manner in which they have been abandoned to the misdirection of miscreants who can only live in the atmosphere of fraud and delusion. The people, we repeat it, whatever they may be led to think