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Were we to judge by the news of the single week we might almost be afraid that society was 4 f dissolving into its elements . " Such general confusion pervades every party in Parliament , they hardly seem to know what they are at j the public events are of a very incoherent nature ; and our law courts display most anarchical incidents in the body of society . Of course we have no fear that we shall fail to " rub on " through next week , in spite of these portents ; but it is curious to observe how the same confused aspect comes over different classes of society and institutions at the same moment , as if the cause were atmospheric . It is more than the impatience to get rid of the session which causes the disorder in Parliament , more than the common want of legislatorial motives . The Prime Minister , head of the Government and leader of the House of Commons , may be said to have abdicated his functions , and to have voluntarily assumed the inferior position of a private Member for the week . When the citizens of London took the Jew question into their own hands , and sent Baron Lionel de Rothschild to demand that seat which Lord John Russell ' s Bill was to have obtained for him , —the Bill being postponed to a third session , —we foresaw that Lord John Russell would be placed in a very embarrassing position ; but we did not anticipate that he would possess so little inventive tact as to become a mere unit in the discussion , and really not the most important unit . At the head of the Government , as the Member in charge of the Bill for settling the question , he ought to have had a leading voice ; but the same infirmity of purpose which allowed him to defer his Bill prevented his grappling with the subject in its integrity . Left to pick up stray ideas thrown out by others , he came lagging after his own Attorney-General in pursuit of the Baron for whom he was to have opened the door ; exactly as the poor Edinburgh Baillies pursued Queen Victoria about their own city . Brushing Lord John aside , Baron de Rothschild advanced to the table of the House , was permitted to take the oaths on the Old Testament , and did take them , omitting the words , " on the true faith of a Christian . " This he was suffered to do . But then arose a debate on the effect of the position thus attained . On the one side it is contended that he had taken the oath , and was ipso facto Member for the City of London in plenary possession of his seat . On the other side it was maintained that he had refused to take the oath , and that the seat was vacant . The questions at issue , therefore , were—whether he had taken the oath or not ; whether the words omitted I were an essential part of the oath j and whether the House of Commons could dispense with the oath , or any part thereof , in opposition to a specific act of Parliament . We must confess that the mass of the general argument on the subject—as to what [ Town Edition . ]
courts of law might do , what interpretations are to be put on the intentions of the Legislature as manifested in the structure of the oath , and so forth — have no force against the indisputable fact that Parliament has prescribed a particular form of words to be uttered by a new Member on taking his seat ; and , until that act of Parliament be repealed , the admission of a Member without uttering the words would be mere evasion . How does Lord John cut the Gordian knot ? His Attorney-General is to move next Monday , that the House shall resolve to consider the subject—next session ! The compromise to which the Premier consents on the Parliamentary Voters ( Ireland ) Bill was spiritedly rebuked by Mr . Bright . Lord John introduced a measure to restore a county constituency to Ireland ; the Lords so alter the measure as to reduce it in its main purpose almost to nothing ; Lord John proposes to modify the amendments so as to raise the bill again just a little above nothing ; and then he boasts that he is obtaining popular concessions by a constitutional compromise with the Upper House . Mr . Bright hints that unless the leader of the Whigs should do better next session , those who are now his followers might leave him behind . They have been a long while coming to that determination . The little Sunday Trading Bill has been among the measures thrown out , partly through the vigorous onslaught of Mr . Thomas Duncombe , who reappeared in his full vigour . There is no man who proves more than he does the influence which may be attained by boldness , outspeaking , and heartiness ; and the consequence is , that many a more studied statesman might be far better spared . The Vernon Picture Gallery has taken possession of Marlborough House , as predecessor to the Prince of Wales ; trying the house on , as it were , for his Royal Highness . The mansion may do for pictures ; but we doubt whether the Prince , whoever he may be nine years hence , will be content with its confined rooms , old-fashioned make , and bald court-yard . It will , however , be a respectable residence for Whig protegees who are to enjoy the duty of keeping it warm for his Royal Highness . Ths annual feast of " The worshipful Company of Fishmongers , " gave Lord Brougham an opportunity of recalling to that venerable Whig Club the time when he was made a Fishmonger , " because he opposed the Court , its profligacy , and tyranny . " What promotion can the Company accord to their distinguished fellow , now-a days , for opposing everything , except the Duke of Wellington , in the classic dialect of the fish market ? Could they not promote the illustrious Fishmonger to be a graduate of Billingsgate ? The first detachment of Colonists for the Church of England settlement of Canterbury , in New Zealand , have celebrated their departure by a public breakfast , which derived uncommon dignity from the presence of divers Peers and Bishops ,
with the great satirist , Mr . Michael Angelp Titmarsh . Satire might have found plenty of food at that festival on board ship in the East India Docks ; but the union of " distinguished persons" with emigrants undistinguished and the working promoters of colonization , is a hopeful sign of the extent to which sound opinion on the subject of colonization is gaining ground among all classes . There has been some more visiting of Parisians this week . The public buildings have been invaded by sight-seers from , the French capital ; not at all , however , in the numbers which London recollects to have seen in the two previous summers . But this year there has been no revolution to stir up the locomotive gaiety of our neighbours . Conspirators and prophets talk of a reign of terror as necessary to clear the political atmosphere in France , and compel that mercurial race to go through the drudgery of completing its own institutions . If there should be any such stimulating process we may look for a very surprising invasion of holidaymakers immediately afterwards . An assassination plot is said to have been discovered at Rome j but there is some doubt whether it is not a police plot . An assassin has been discovered and captured ; but he is suspiciously made a crown witness , and the police are unmistakably active . They have seized some young gentlemen detected in the fact of making holiday fireworks , and the dreadful traitors have been condemned for twenty years to the galleys ! Among them was the son of a French milliner ; but of course he will be snatched from a fate reserved in Italy onlyfor Italians . There has been a great battle in Schleswig , ending in the total defeat of the Schleswig-Holstein army ; but , as the United Province falls back upon the resources of Germany , the victory of the Danes does not settle the campaign , any more than the protocol recently signed in London . The annals of our law courts teem this week with questions arising out of matrimonial irregularities and domestic crimes . In the House of Lords we see Mr . Paterson resisting the claim for a separation preferred by his virgin wife , whom he took to his bosom with an advance of money from her father . The love-letters of a Mr . Hillborne are circulated for the edification of the world , terminating as they do with the coolest of dismissals to the lady whom he jilted . A Scotch Saint , Benison by name , poisons his wife that he may be free for union with a young lady , who passionately , excites his religious sympathies . The wealthy Bainbrigge , disappointed in his early love , sinks into a combination of hermit and roue * , confounds his illegitimate genealogy with his legitimate relations , finishes off with a variety of incompatible wills , and leaves the law-courts to determine who shall have his property . The case of Chadwick , who conspired with his wife to poison an uncle , scarcely belongs to this category of social irregularities . But the whole casts a strange light on the working of our boasted institutions .
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No . 19 . SATURDAY , AUGUST 3 , 1850 . Price 6 d .
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News op the Wkek— Page Bigamy and Murder 438 Assassins Great and Small 414 Kay ' s Soc » al Condition ol fcngland . Parliament 434 Miscellaneous 439 The Truck System 445 Hearts-in Mortmain 443 The WarinSchh'stvig-Holstein .... 43 » Associative Progress— The Post-office Absurdity 4 Ao Wade b Juntos 4 pu The Treaties of 1815 43 "> Will It End in Monotony 441 Cruelty Legal 44- > Robert Owen ' s Revolution 450 Sanguinary Plots in Rome 433 The Necessity for a Change of Sys- Social Reform 44 <> Thb Arts—An Extraordinary Marriage Case .. 436 tern 441 Open Council— La Juive ............. ....... 4 oL . Breach of Promise 437 The Metropolitan Carpenters 441 Sunday , and the Sunday Question .. 446 1 he Old and Modern Dramatists .. The Canterbury Colonists 437 Friendly Association of London Cos- The Ruling Idea of Society 416 Portfolio—The Saints at the Gold Mines 437 termonsrers 412 Constraints of Communism 447 £ i T " •« * % Scientific Poisoning 437 Elections by the Redemption Society 4 S 3 Extension of the Suffrage 447 1 he Unseen Witness io £ A Madman ' s Will ° . 438 Public Affairs— The Population Question 447 Commercial Affairs—Balloon Exploits 438 Position of Parties 443 Pulls at the Public Purse 4 i 7 Markets , Gazettes , Births , Mar-A Very Indiscreet Young Lady .... 438 The Marlborough House Affair .... 444 Literature— nages , and Deaths , &c 451-ftB ^ . ^^ ^
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— i w "The one Idea which History exhibits as evermore developing itself into greater distinctness is the Idea or Humanity—the noble endeavoizr to throw down all the barriers erected between men by prejudice and one-sided views ; and by setting aside the distinctions of Rehefion , Country , and Colour , to treat the whole Human race as one brotherhood , having one great object—the free development of our spiritual nature . "—Humboldt ' s Cosmos .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 3, 1850, page unpag., in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1849/page/1/
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