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Northern Star (1837-1852), 20th November 1852, Edition 2 of 2, Page 9, M%t ^ JPrttlmWk SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 20,1852.

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    • M%t ^ JPrttlmWk SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 20,1852.
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      Tf Ovember 20.] W\I ¦ S * S=== F ===^^ 2...

      tf OVEMBER 20 . ] w \ i ¦ s ====== ^^ 233

      To The Headers Of The Star Of Freedom. 3...

      TO THE HEADERS OF THE STAR OF FREEDOM . 3 ) EAk rRiENDs ,-It is my unpleasant duty to intimate that it fe m 0 re than probable that with the next week ' s number the publication 0 f the Star oe Freedom must cease , for a time . In resuming tlie Editorship of the once popular « Star " after it had ^ mdi ^ fiur liehnr " paying point . " I was not insensible t 0 the difficulties to be encountered and the t t 0 tu ^ ub i s f

      , oo mar , v n ^ wi ;*^ „« » «~~ - ~ - ~~ _ . u , auu oo many probabilities of failure in the attempt to raise the circulation . Still I ventured to iope that the aforesaid difficuties mi ght be overcome . That hope has not been realized . It wold be as disagreeable as useless to give expression to comp laints regarding popular apathy , & c ,. It is sufficient to say that throug h want of adequate support the Star of Freedom has keen published at a heavy loss and sacrifice—impossible to be continued

      I anticipate the regrets of some friends who will urge that I ought to have afforded them , and the Star readers generally , the opportunity of at least doing something towards providing for the weekly loss on the publication of the paper , by means of a , public weekly subscription . But I have an insuperable objection to the rattle of thebeggingfox . Mendicancy has been the prime shame of popular movements Better extinction than dishonour . If obliged to give up the Stab , of Freedom , myself and friends will have this twofold consolation for loss and failure : —

      1 st . We have done our duty to our principles , our country , and cause ; and our failure is our misfortune rather than our fault . Those who have read this journal from the 24 th of April last are well aware that on no one question has' it hesitated to make the boldest stand in defence of universal Justice and Right . It has been pre-eminently the representative of pure Democracy , unsullied by faction , ambition , imposture , or cant . AVherever the Star of Freedom has been read , and is , consequently known , witnesses will not be wanting to testify to its devotion to the Democratic cause .

      2 nd . jSo shade of pecuniary dishonour can be charged to this journal . "We have not sought any man ' s money under false pretences . $ o taint of debt , no brand of fraud can sully the good name of this paper , Every man has been paid his own . No man can impeach the honour of the Star of Freedom . I shall regret the fall of this journal mainly because it has been the organ of European Democracy—bear witness last Saturday ' s paper ,

      a perfect Gazette of the European Democratic movement . The Times and Daily News of Wednesday last , only , contained the French Republican manifestoes which appeared four days previously in the Star of Freedom . Again no other journal has dared to translate and give publicity to the " Letter to the French People" that bold and brilliant programme of the Future Revolution . No other journal—in spite of discouragements of all kinds—has so faithfully and unfalteringly advocated the claims of our brave bretheren , the Refugees .

      But , come what may , the Star of Freedom shall not perish completely and for ever . There are events slowly hut surely maturing in the womb of Time , which ere long must arouse Public Opinion and rekindle the fire of democratic action . Then will be the hour to try anew the experiment of a democratic journal . Until then it may be prudent to husband resources which may be attainable in presence of better prospects of success . In the meantime means must be adopted to keep , the readers o f this paper still in force , around the old democratic banner . Those means will be explained in next Saturday ' s Star . I remain as ever , Your devoted brother democrat , G-Julian Harney .

      M%T ^ Jprttlmwk Saturday, November 20,1852.

      M % t ^ JPrttlmWk SATURDAY , NOVEMBER 20 , 1852 .

      The Show And Its Moral On Thursday Last ...

      THE SHOW AND ITS MORAL On Thursday last the final pageant was enacted—the mortal remains of Arthur Duke of Wellington were consigned to the tomb . Much preparation had been made , there was a great show , and myriads of the population poured forth to witness it .

      We are not of those who would meanly begrudge the expens of testifying the nations gratitude to the benefactors of the country ¦ nor are we greatly troubled with the fears of that party stvlin-itself the party of Peace , for the nation ' s testifying reso ' ect for one who has served his country if he had served it m the canacitv of a soldier . To these men , armed patriotism is a fearful thin * . To us it is not so . We think that military honours shouidjiave the

      to patriot soldiers who have passed away , exp ess pu pose of inducing others to rival their mighty deeds . The late Duke of WELLINGTON was not a man of the people and he was less the benefactor of the country than of the ruling faction . Therefore it is that we altogether disapprove of the lavish waste of pubic money that has taken place for thefuneral of this dead Duke it is because Wellington was the foe of the people that we are averse to see the people ' s money spent ; in oecorating his

      t 0 But if WELLINGTON had been a soldier of the people instead of beiu " one of the main props of despotism in Europe , we would oem one o proposition to burv him in the presence of have hailed wimjoytnt piupu ? i . i ~ « T , ri amid the people s tears , but it was not so . in ot 1 L rT ' sW " he population for the loss of the "Great Duke , " l &^ « w ^^^& ^ ti ^^ SfSS * - on - the occas ^ of £ but expression

      Duke oTwbliTnGIoN ' S funeral , we expected some uuke ot vvw . b a 3 sembled multitude . We were disappointed , of opinion from the a = ^ o ^ ^ ^ We ^^ 7 P ~ ressed regarding him , his character , life , no opinion whatever expicaoc a & or irt . The multitude had come to see a show , ana mey 1 t f nfhiL more . AVe say this with sorrow , for we had thought . of nothing ^ ^ thing of a national seeming , hoped thatthvs pageaat ^ ^ hrs & rf ^ ^^ ^ ^^ " ^ J ^ ri patr iotism-someth ing of political I * T K ts Ion kerned dormant in the British breast . SSS £ M * *¦ *¦« Ustenedt 0 tto r "

      The Show And Its Moral On Thursday Last ...

      ^ S ^ SZX WatCh 6 d l T count — . None would ceimonv rt * " * T had come to witness a solemn sr ? to th \ - a dead her ° ° f the p * . ^ massof the tpSmf ** ""* * ™ evident , > ' » * * allies iS D hi . t ° \ " tarian ^^ spirit that pervades if 11 h C 0 Un 7 at the P re 3 e t h There board

      Z * our . was - ng for seats ** let on hire at every boose ; but w £ ihos So ^ n th ^ q ; estl <> ned , there seemed no desire to do houses ^ P * ™ m or b y a tasteful adornment of their thrift By ha ? glniapieCe 0 fblack cloth over a portion of their ungainly boarding , they seem to have satisfied their conscience and

      thought that they had accomplished their duty as respectable and loyal men . T * do more - would not pay . " Looking around upon the Wellington multitude , observing their vacant and purposeless features , their eager pursuit of mere animal excitement , hearing their coarse jests and ready laughter their all but universal anxiety about their « wittals »' we asked ourselves-is this , then , the great British people ' ? i n ?' , wecanuotbelieveit . Such is the British people temporanly debased b y mere material prosperity , and by the cursed tower aller philosophy . When we looked at the noble forms erf the soldiers we felt that Englishmen are still capable of being as their fathers in physical powerunited with all the

      , spirit of their ancestors , and having in addition a knowledge and a purpose far superior to any our fathers knew . Let it be the task of Democracy to raise the . masses from their degradation of powerlessness and listlessness , to restore to them physical strength , mental enlightenment , and the high and holy purpose of being free and giving freedom !

      The Probabilities Of The Session. Montai...

      THE PROBABILITIES OF THE SESSION . Montaigne has left it to us an axiom that there is nothing certain . That is a fact most of us have at some time realized . In Jove , law , and life all is contingency ; but of all chances which have happened or may happen / we know of none so eminently defying prediction as the present state of the parties which have met at St . Stephens . Coming events , it is said , cast their shadows before , but a shadow cannot fall in the midst of shadows darker than itself , and in the dark obscurity of the immediate future there is scarcely a ray to guide us .

      As , however , out of a multiplicity of negatives comes an affirmative , as by exhaustion we arrive at a result , so something is to be learned where there is nothing absolute , and from the all but universal chaos we grasp two certainties . The first is that there is to be a fierce faction fight ; the second , that the people will gain from it little or no positive good . That the battle will be a raging one we may gather from the civility with which it has begun . When what is called well-bred people hate one another intensely , and intend to do each other all possible mischief it is

      remarkable how polite they are , and how attentive to the minutiae of courtesy . It almost seems as though the age of chivalry had been revived , when knights killed each other with all possible urbanity , and the commander of an army sent word to the leader of the opposing host of the day on which he he would have the pleasure of fighting a pitched battle . Or to use a modern and more vulgar simile , which after all is perhaps more applicable , we can imagine Parliament a great prize ring , where two pugilists are to contend for stakes , and where they shake hands , and choose referees and umpires before they knock each other into jellv . ' The unanimity of the opening of the session was truly

      wonderful . They agreed on the choice of a speaker as though there never was—never had been , and never could be any such thing as even the phantom of faction . They agreed to the Address in answer to the Royal Speech , although they regarded the said speech as humbug , merely for the sake of peaee and quietness , —and they agreed in eulogizing the man whose shade , if modesty be a quality plentiful in the other world , must blush , if blushes are prevalent there . All was as courtly as though the wordy arena had been a salon of the aneien regime , or a ballroom with a be-wigged speaker for master of the ceremonies . The late Prime-Minister , emulating the stern justice of the Romans , admitted merit even in an enemy , and could find no word to add

      to the eloquence of the present Chancellor of the Exchequer . If after all this too much politeness by half there be not war to the knife , then all we can say is , that we must mend our mode of estimating parliamentary human nature , and begin by admitting that statesmanship is something more than a stage trick—that dissimulation is dead , and hypocrisy has lost its force . The other certainty , that the people have but little to hope for in the present Parliament is so broadly written on the constitution of the legislative body that those who run may read . The

      dimmest political sight cannot confer such obscurity as to hide that , whichever party wins , those who as yet have no party—the people , will gain nothing . If the Derbyites continue to hold power , their announced intention of putting down Democracy is too recent to be forgotten , and too sincere not to be acted upon . If they are overthrown and the Whigs come back we shall have the old family party dawdling on through their hereditary career of blundering nothingness . If Whigs connot hold power , but cling for strength to the alliance of the small band of

      quasiconservatives who waver between them and the present government , we shall be gratified by the usual amount of hair splittings of the Gladstone school , of " philosophy , and Puseyite Church movements , joined to the liberaism and sympathy for the oppressed of Sir James Graham , of post-office and Bandiera betraying memory . If the doubtful Conservative alliance failsthe Russell aud the Manchester school will shake hands , and we shall he blessed with the small economics of the ancient

      Joseph , the utilitarianism aud industrial tyranny of ^ the Cobdenites , and the quaker-like matter offactism of Bright . Really where bad is the best ( and the best it is ) , it is difficult to choose , and for the great mass of the unenfranchised it makes but little difference whether the rulers of to-day be Disraelites who promise nothing—Whig s who do nothing—Pusoyites who wonld make the Church dominant , or political economists who would do much for themselves , ^ and seek for nothing but a middle-class rule , under which society would be Governed entirely from a centre not famous famous either for elevation of sentiment , benevolence of motive , or intellectual

      It is a sad pass for a great nation that m its legislative assembly there is no semblance of a . national party . It is a deop degradation to a civilised people to be ruled by factions for

      The Probabilities Of The Session. Montai...

      factious purposes . It is a destitution of resources almost incredible when it looks for wisdom to guide it to the pungent jibes of a satirist , the platitudes of an aristocratic blundererthe reminiscences of a . historian—or the figures of a trader grown rich on class agitation . —Yet this is the fate of England of to-day . Amidst all the desert of selfishness there is scarcel y an oasis of purity of intention—over all the foaming sea of party strife hardly a beacon light rises to mark its hidden dangers . Along the course of the swift current which is

      drifting to the Maelstrom of commercial greed there is no holding ground where an anchor can bring us up , hardly an anchor to cast overboard if there were . The few men who would serve the people are so few , so lettered , and so powerless that their struggles only serve to demonstrate their own want of ability . We may scoff if we will at our French neighbours for being governed by one tyrant , but it would be as well to remember that here we have , though in a mitigated form , a tyranny with many heads .

      I assing from the certainties to the uncertainties , the first thing which strikes our attontion is the motion which Mr . Villiers has given notice of , for Monday next , on the Free Trade Question . The exact form in which it will be put , is categorical , but it will be as Mr . Disraeli sarcastically termed it an " abstract motion , " and as such it will be treated . Her Majesty ' s opposition thought , among the ifs of the most important paragraph of the speech , they had found a stone which fitted their sling to a nicety . The exact pebble which

      was to bring down the giant Protection , who has been so often been brought down before , and supposed to be quietly buried . On their own vantage ground , they thought they would get up a fight which must end in their triumph . But the best laid schemes of mice and men often fail . In order that there may be a contest , there must be two parties to it . There can be no struggle without opposition , and if rumour be true , ministers will decline thecombat . They will introduce in political strife the doctrines which Brijrht and his co-reliffionists

      hold , with regard to physical war . They will have none of it ; neither will they reject it . The vulgar saying about the possibility of taking a horse to the water , but the impossibility of making him drink represents their feelings . The stream of Free Trade may flow undiluted for them through ; the muddy channel of debate—they will neither obstruct it , nor make it a passage , The motion may come on—its supporters may

      " make a House for it "—they may talk themselves dumb about its proprUtry , its principle , its policy—they may be as unanimous as they have lately been in laudation ; but ' what if Disraeli sits by with a cold sneer—if Christopher listens with stoled apathy—if no taunt , no ¦ provocation , no satire—and Whigs are not great at that—can rouse the ministerial bencher to a reply ? Why then , the result will be that of the old fable of the mountain , in labor , and the mouse of the

      abstract resolution , will be duly born . Such unsatisfactory content as silence gives , the Manchester men must be content with ; for ball-kicking about his own peculiar notions—or Sibthorpe sibillat'ng his disgust—or some lusty country gentleman groaning his disapprobation , or stammering his disapproval can scarcely be taken as articulate expressions of any body ' s policy .

      There is nothing so difficult to meet as impassive , immovable , dead silence . Nothing so puzzling , nothing so irritating . If that be as reported , the policy of Disraeli , his opponents are likely to be outmatched and lose time , breath and temper , without gaining anything , and then the budget will come forth , upon which will begin the real battle of the session . As about that we really know nothing . —Disraeli being as good a secret keeper as Louis Napoleon . —wo must be excused from predicting anj thing , except this—that whether wise or unwise , it will meet with a furious opposition , and the better it is , the more likely it is to be deuouced .

      The Reaction And The Press. The Object O...

      THE REACTION AND THE PRESS . The object of the reaction cannot be doubted , it is not merely , to restore Europe to the state in which it was found by the Revolution of 1848 , but to extinguish human intelligence altogether , to reduce the European peoples to ignorance and barbarism so that they may the more readily be made to submit to Cossack rule .

      The free expression of thought has been suppressed in France , in Germany , in Italy—for scarcely can Piedmont be excepted , and now in Belgium is the press to be placed under the same law . The infamous project of law intended to shackle the press was published in last Saturday ' s Star op Freedom . None can deny that this proposal to destroy the freedom of the Belgian press is a shameful and cowardly concsssion to Louis Bonaparte . If

      the representatives of the Belgian people so far forget their ' mission as to pass the Faider project into a law , Belgium will ! virtually become part and parcel of the dominions of " Napoleonr the third , " and the Belgians will no longer be an independant ; nation , but will be subject to the will of the perjurer and ! assassin Bonaparte , the hero of Strasbourg and Boulogne ,, and of the coup d ' etat of December .

      By the first article of the Faider , law , whoever shall speak : write , distribute , or sell any attack upon the head of a foreign ! government , shall be punished with fine and imprisonment , andl deprivation of civil , civic , and family rights . Thus , whoever shalll dare to say or write in free Belgium that Nicholas of Russia * is a tyrant , that Francis' Joseph is a perjured traitor andd oppressor , that Frederick William of Prussia is a drunkardl and liar , that Bomb a of Naples is an inhuman torturer and executioner , that Pius of Rome is a wholesale murderer , thatt

      Isabella of Spain is a shameless and immoral wretch , thatt Louis Bonaparte of France is tyrant , perjurer , traitor , torturer ; , executioner , wholesale murderer , vicious monster , all combined , ! , —he will subject himself to severe penalties , even to the suspension of his civil rights ! So is it thus , as a Belgian journal trulyy remarks , an encouragement of treason , espionage , and immorality * j for it permits anyone to publicly praise the most . infamouas actions—tyranny , perjury , robbery , and assassination ; while itit forbids everyone to defend Freedom , Truth , and Justice , on paina of 2 , 000 fr . fine , and two years imprisonment !

      And it should be remarked that this law of a toadying govern-iment decrees punishments much more severe for an attack uponn a foreign potentate , than for a similar one upon the head of thae Belgian state . A decree of the National Congress of the 21 st obi July denounced a punishment of fchree months to three yearYs

  • Citation
    • Northern Star (1837-1852), Nov. 20, 1852, page 9, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/ns/issues/ns2_20111852/page/9/