NOTES OF THE MONTH.

Globe, Volume III, Issue 210, 10 February 1875, Page 4

NOTES OF THE MONTH.

(From the Spectator.}

The Government of Germany has given way about the National Bank. It is to be a German, and not a Prussian one. A Bill with that object is to be prepared—after the consent of the separate Parliament of Prussia has been obtained —and laid before the Federal Council, It is suspected from the complete amenity with which Prince Bismarck has borne his apparent defeat by the House, and the absence of any prosecutions of Opposition Members, that he wished his hand to be forced, so as to be able to say to the Federal Council—“ This is the will of the people.” He does not give way like that when he is in earnest.

The Archbishop of Canterbury has been lecturing on the progress of unbelief, but not, if we may judge by the report in the Times, with much force or pertinency. He declared that men ought to expect “a scientific proof of the truth of the Christian religion,” but as far as the Times reports him, Dr Tait appears, if not exactly to have limited himself to remarking on the absence of proof for disbelief, instead of giving the scientific demonstration he had spoken of for beliefat least, to have given nothing beyond the most shadowy sketch oli the reasoning by which he would infer from the free-will and conscience of man the existence of “a will something like his own, above him and beyond him.” For the most part his address seems to have consisted in asking questions like this: —“Who should say that the soul which had existed in him ever since he was a baby, which had passed with him through all the changes of his changeful life, which seemed altogether independent of the outward organisation of his frame, was altogether to go out, like the flame of a caudle, when he had come to that part of his existence which they called death?” Who, indeed? But in the first place, the soul, as we know it, cannot be said by any careful observer to “ seem altogether independent of the organisation of our frame,” or else why do blows on the head, or a few drops of poison in the blood, cause all the appearances of unconsciousness, or sometimes even of insanity? And next, how does dwelling on the openly-professed ignorance of the Agnostics, tend to show that faith is justified! An archbishop who deals with such subjects should bring more force to bear on them than Hr Tait seems to have done at Margate. He excited great hopes, but his performance was barely a dividend of a shilling in the pound. The Liberation Society have been made prematurely hopeful by Mr Gladstone’s attack on the Vatican decrees, and Mr Fawcett’s exhortation to study the true principles of disendowment before disestablishment bursts upon them like a thunderclap in a serene sky. At Bristol the society held a meeting, at which the Bev J. Allanson Picton delivered an eloquent speech. He declared that the discussion of the extreme claims of the Boman Catholics tendered to help the Liberation Society’s movement — but why, and how, he did not explain. As far as we can see, the fear of the Boman Catholic Church is one powerful motive for the support of the establishment. If all churches be placed on a perfect level, the church which claims most authority, and which has the most imposing history, wonld probably gain much more relatively on its competitors than it does now, when one of its rivals has the dignity of a national position and repute. Mr Picton also expressed his belief that Mr Gladstone’s motive for his recent pamphlet was much deeper than appears, and that it was really intended as a sort of prelude to a new deliverance of his mind on the subject of Church and State. Possibly, though we cannot ourselves see it. But even so, is there anything at all in the pamphlet to point to the dissolution of all ties between Church and State as the solution of the problem ? Mr Gladstone carefully refrains from condemning Prussia, and Prussian statesmen think his pamphlet equivalent to a tacit approval of their course —which is certainly, not an anti-State Church course. Seeing that the Boman Catholic Church receives no sort of State support in this country, how any reasonable man can read into an attack on its imSeriousness, an intention to strke a great low at the prestige of its chief rivalpasses our comprehension. Mr Picton’s wish seems to have been father to Mr Picton’s thought. It is stated that Serrano’s Government had a military reason for recalling General Loma and his army from the pursuit of the Carlists. They feared that Don Carlos might destroy or break through the force upon the Ebro, which had been reduced by Loma’s expedition to 25,000 men. It is probable that this is correct, Serrano’s Government being influenced at once by fear, and by a desire not to interrupt a negotiation still going on with the governing juntas of Navarre, Guipuzcoa,; and Biscay. These provinces are almost exhausted by the war, and would abandon it if they could only be guaranteed possession of their fueros. The guarantee they demand, a local army, cannot of course be granted, but if any compromise can be discovered, the Carlist army will, it is said, retire quietly to its homes. Pending that discovery, the North is being exhausted by bombardments, requisitions, and excessive taxation,

Lord Lyons, the British Ambassador in Paris, has returned to his post, and Lord Lytton, who has for a few months been virtual ambassador there, goes as Minister to Lisbon. It is, we suppose, indispensable to maintain some sort of seniority in the Diplomatic Service, or no one without interest could rise in it, but Lord Lytton’s special experience and ability will be rather wasted at Lisbon. While the Boyal family there persistently refuse the throne of Spain a policy from which there is no apparent chance of their deviating, politics in Lisbon can be of little interest to tbe world at large. The only thing to discover is why the sleepy little kingdom gets so rich, and why it feels so little the reflex action of the commotions in Spain.

Lord Emly delivered a speech before the the Irish Statistical Society, in which he produced figures showing that the value of land in Ireland has risen by nearly three years’ since Mr Gladstone’s Land Act came into operation. In the seven years ending 1870, the average number of years’ purchase given for land was 17 2-Brds, while in 1873 it had risen to 20\, the exact difference being, therefore, 2f. The landlord has there fore lost nothing in money, though he has Buffered some diminution in prestige, while it is calculated that the additional value conferred on occupancies throughout Ireland is not less, according to the best statists, than £75,000,000. As to taxation, so far from Ireland being despoiled, she is exempted

from taxes paid in Great Britain to the amount of £3,800,612 a year, and receives also in proportion more than Great Britain from the Treasury in relief of local taxation. The dark spot in Ireland is the decline of the industrial classes, who were less in number in 1871 than in 1861, a decline attributed by Lord Bmly to the want of a proper system of intermediate education. Might he not add, to the want of a proper sense of the fact that a dead employer, or one frightened away by threats, cannot pay wages ?