English Extracts.

Lyttelton Times, Volume VI, Issue 387, 19 July 1856, Page 4

English Extracts.

THE CONFERENCE AND FREE-TRADE.

(From the " Spectator," Feb. 23.)

Should peace be concluded in Paris by the instrumentality of the Conference wnose members are now assembled there, the deliberation will mark a di cided change in the policy of Europe, not only with reference to questions of territorial encroachment, but even with reference to any political and economical principles in the government of states. An impulse will be given to benefit* la! measures, although they may not directly be discussed, and ought not to be. Mr. Gladstone is quite right in repudiating for the Conference the business of agitating and making proselytes for Free-trade; and his rep'y on the subject to the Manchester Chamber ol Commerce is marked b}^ his keen sense and his just appreciation o( policy. Mr Gladstone went to the Board of Trade when Peel entered office for the purpose of carrying out Free-trade; he most efficiently aided his leader in reforming our tariff, and in the endeavour to negotiate a reciprocal reduction of duties with the principal states of the civilized world. But, as he says, the whole operation placed us in a false position : for it made ourselves and our doctrine equally an object of jealousy. England was thought to aim at entrapping other States into a field where she could beat them. The very orations of our Freetraders, in surmounting the prejudices of the protectionists, instigated that fear. " Heciprocity' thus proved an unverauneraiive course ; and England struck out alone in the course of commercial freedom, trusting to the effect of her example for the sequel. The consequence has been, that our own wealth has increased to an enormous extent: we have had the means of sustaining one of

the most expensive wars in which we ever engaged without oppressive encroachment upon our resources : and what is more, we have rendered England the emporium for the converging trade of other countries. When there has been dearth in corn elsewhere, we have commanded the first of the market, and we have had abundance in our ports even "when there was not abundance in the hum nor abundance in the neiirh- I bearing states. We have seen lhe effect of this example in other countries, but we have evidences that it has not been 1. stupon those countries which are more perfectly represented at the Conference assembled to decide in tire case of Free-trade in Turkey on the law of Europe. We could scarcely take a more dramatic personification of rising or declining principles than that meeting. Who i£ the enemy whom we admit to make terms ; Ir. is Russia, the most exclusive country in the world, out of MonsfJia —if Russia is anthropologically quite out of Mongolia. It is a country which has sought to make a trade for it.-it-lf in a way to prevent any other country from having a trade in it, and lias miniiniz-.'il its commerce to an outgoing traffic, it is that country which, relying for its greatness upon the principle of territorial encroachment ab.-oad and mil'iiary slavery at home, now comes to accept a peace as the alternative of degradation. To whom docs she come? We are not vaunting when we say that France could not have stood i:> thisyreat European contest without England. For although it is frue that France has succeeded on most occasions in taking the van. England could belter have done without h<±i than she without England. W« need nut recapitulate the reasons. The obvious fact has In-en exemplified by the feeling that even if France were to abandon us, we rniiijii find it expedient to continue the con test single- handed. But what is Enirhiiiri. wlose powerfbus stands contrasted with the beaten enemy ? it is the country whose absolute freedom of trade makes our

island the centre of the ship traffic of the whole world, and carries our own shipping to extend its school of navigation likewise around the whole world. The consequence is, that although we must acknowledge a parallel capacity in the great Republic across the Atlantic, we know well enough that there is no navy on this side of the ocean that can withstand ours; and we, relying upon our own resources, our wealth and our marine, have been enabled to shut up our enemy in his ports, to annihilate his seagoing trade, and to terrify him into sinking his military ships. Kven Russians have an eye to business, and they will be able to compare the circumstances that give us this naval strength with the circumstance that Peter the Great, for all his Grave^end pilrimage, left Russia possessed of ships, but not of commerce nor shipping- power.

France, whose military genius has not inclined her to trade, has of late been tentatively commencing an imitation of our free trade in a relaxation of her exclusive tariff. Her material means have been enlarged more than correspondingly. The power that she has obtained by alliance with us has been shown by the manner in which our marine was able to serve as the complement to her own when she required transport to the Euxine ; and she stands with us as prosecutress, almost arbitress, in the war question.

One great power has sought admission and has obtained it, but under terms which are re iiarkably modified. Austria lias been compelled to accept the dictates of necessity, and to take her place upon an equality vvitii a state whom she has regarded as her inferior, her natural enemy, perhaps her destined victim. It is rather remarkable that Austria is that power in Europe which has most copied Russia in sacrificing- the benefit of trade to an exclusive system as the accompaniment of an arbitrary power; for, let us say in passing, that Ireedom of trade, like all other freedoms, is, in practice if not in theory, nearly incompatible wiih despotic ruls." Stern lessons of finance have taught Austria that no country can isolate itself commercially, and that she must look for her loans, her railways, her colonization of Hungary, her material growth, to reciprocal exchanges with other countries. iShe has only begun the iesson ; she cons it imperfectly, but^she has beg-un it; and her position'is better thar that of Russia in almost a direct proportion with her homage to the regime of commercial freedom.

Prussia, that attempted a commercial combination with other countries in order 'o create not. freedom but. monopoly, carrying out tiiat spirit in politics, stands excluded and impotent.

The one other country which is admitted to the Conference is Sardiuia—that slate which in less than a decade lias copied our country as a model in constitutional freedom, ecclesiastical freedom, and now in commercial freedom: for the next task which avowedly and hy common consent awaits the statesmen of Sardinia, is to carry out those principles of free trade which she has already recognized and applied. We have here strung together nothing but facts most familiar to the ordinary reader, and although the moral is new, it is distinctly suggested by the facts of the day. We have no proselytizing either for political or commercial freedom, as in 18-18; yet unquestionably the spirit of irresponsible arbitary srovernment has been in conflict with the spirit of responsible government and. peaceful co-operation amongst the nations. The barbarous spirit, has been rebuked and is in the decline ; the opposite spirit is in the ascendant. A few years back, Austria would have proudly refused to sit on an equality in the same assembly with Sardinia. Sardinia was identified

herself with the most civilized countries on the Continent; she exercises an influence largely exceeding her territorial magnitude or her military power; she belongs to the regime of the future, as her great antagonist has belonged to the regime of the past. And unless the Conference be juggled away by the most extraordinary incapacity or treachery on the side of the West, it must have a material influence on tlie commercial and social progress of the Continent, as well as on the narrower political question of the independence of states