MONTHLY COMMENTARY. Quicquid agunt homines, votum, timor, ira, voluptas, THE LORD CHANCELLOR and SIR EDWARD SUGDEN.-The Court of Chancery has become a place of public amusement since Lord Brougham has presided in it. First, there is the entertainment of seeing how the Chancellor looks, which the members of the Mechanics' Institute, who consider his Lordship as belonging to themselves, enjoy daily; for these honest people drop into the Court to gaze at the Judge with much the same feeling that a girl opeus a drawer and looks at her doll to gratify the complacency of possession, and to be assured of its safety. The second entertainment is derived from the scenes which are now of frequent occurrence in that once grave place. Lord Brougham carries something of the vivacity of debate into the Court, and a leading practitioner carries a considerable portion of the irritability of disappointment into it; the result is, some smart altercation, with much petulance on the one hand, and a remorseless dry sarcasm on the other. To employ a trite but expressive phrase, Sir E. Sugden has never been "right in his mind" since Lord Brougham ascended the Woolsack. Loss of place, together with that circumstance, seems to have utterly spoiled the learned gentleman's temper, and he bears himself as one crossed in love of office. When Mr. Brougham took leave of the Bar, it was remarked that Sir E. Sugden alone neglected to rise and acknowledge his parting salutes, as though he would express, "I will not rise to you, whose rise has stopped my rising." The spleen has not confined itself to dumb show, it has broken out in words, as spleen will do, on a very slight occasion. While delivering a speech, Sir E. Sugden observed that the Chancellor was writing, and he stopped. "The Lord Chancellor desired Sir Edward to proceed. "Sir E. Sugden replied that he could not, unless he were in possession of the attention of the Court. "His Lordship said he was giving his full attention to every thing that was stated, and of that he alone was competent to judge; he was taking a note of something said by the Learned Counsel, and he should choose his own time for making his note; papers might be put before him for signature, but signing his name was merely mechanical, and did not at all withdraw his attention. If a Judge were not at liberty to do any thing merely mechanical whilst Counsel were addressing him, the business of the Court must be suspended every time he blew his nose, or took a pinch of snuff. If one of his predecessors had given such intense attention as was expected, he would not now appear with so smiling a countenance. "Sir E. Sugden sat down. "The Lord Chancellor inquired if he had any thing more to state in reply? "Sir Edward Sugden declined to say any thing further. The Chancellor's illustrations of snuff-taking and nose-blowing were, perhaps, too farcical for his place, and for the respect which a Judge should show for a member of the Bar, even when he is in error; but the conduct of Sir Edward was provokingly captious, and obviously proceeded from a settled purpose to take and make offence. It is notorious that Lord Eldon was in the habit of carrying on all the correspondence of State intrigue when presiding in the Court of Chancery, and purporting to be hearing the statements and arguments of counsel; and Mr. Sugden never found any fault with the practice in those days, or stopped till his Lordship's attention should be disengaged. After barristers had been addressing the Court for hours, without making any impression on Lord Eldon's mind or ears, he would declare he must take home the papers to look into the case, without which proceeding, indeed, it was physically certain he could know nothing about it. The large full-bottomed wigs worn by the Judges would seem as if they had been devised for the protection of their organs of hearing on these occasions. Why Sir E. Sugden should, in the long time of Eldon, have been patient of scribbling, and letter-reading, and note-dispatching on the Bench, and so impatient of any employment of the pen by Chancellor Brougham, is only to be explained by the supposition that disappointment nduces displeasure in the one instance, as expectation caused content in the other. The Whig journals have teemed with zealous vindications of the Lord Chancellor (for the zealous vindication of a Lord Chancellor is always a sweet and promising office, and nothing can more agreeably fill up the time of an unemployed barrister), and fierce attacks on Sir E. Sugden, whom, according to liberal practice, they have not failed to reproach with the humbleness of his origin, or "meanness of birth," as it is, on such occasions, termed by the railers against prejudices. What the vocation of Sir E. Sugden's father had to do with the affair, it is not easy to see. Lord Eldon did not come of high degree, and yet he was the very pink of temper and courtesy. If it were clear that humble birth was the cause of splenetic conduct, it would not be unreasonable to advert to a man's descent when he gives way to ill-temper, or even to call legitimacy in question when the faults of low-breeding were manifested by a person of rank or family; but the fact, that men unhonoured with ancestry cannot behave themselves decently, is not yet established as a certain truth. The burliest of patriots, the great town-bull of Reformers, the bruin Radical of the day, the "Radical" of the "Times," who rages and roars against the aristocracy by the hour or the column, concluded some charges against the Marchioness of C— with a moral reflection, referring her alleged meanness of conduct to her ungentle blood! And this is liberality, ay, and consistency too! In one column it is proved that the aristocracy are all greediness, and it is asserted in another that rapacity is attributable to plebeian descent! Thus it is that the professed foes of illiberal prejudices are ready to turn those very prejudices against persons they desire to wound. Oh that people who take the name of liberal would wear it with more credit! A better name there is not in the vocabulary; in the Latin, it implied more than the word gentleman, and it should comprehend every good quality belonging to education and accomplishment. MR. O'CONNELL and the RATIONALE of DIGNITY. It would puzzle Jeremy Bentham himself to expound the rationale of dignity. The "John Bull" lately remarked, that honour, in a priestly sense, means salary; and that when double honour is scripturally said to be due to the spiritual pastor, the proper interpretation is double income, or two livings. Had Falstaff been instructed by a pluralist, he would have seen that there was one sort of honour which was of some sterling value. When we rise above honour to dignity, we find the charges of it steadily increasing with station. Thus the dignity of the Crown is the most expensive quality in England; why it should be the only quality of the Crown supported by a revenue, I do not exactly understand-for instance, why should not the truth of the Crown, or the wisdom of the Crown, or the knowledge of the Crown, be maintained at high charges also? As Bel's godhead was proved by his eating much meat, so the dignity of the Crown is referred to its costing much money. Dignity, it seems, can never stand on its own legs; it must be supported, and by gold; and the more exalted the person invested with the dignity is, the longer and the more solid must be his pedestal. A tabular scale of dignities might be formed from a prebendary to a king, running up at an angle of forty-five degrees, to a perpendicular of half a million a year. In these arrangements I can clearly trace a ruling principle, and a plan; but when I come to the dignities of unofficed individuals, and the means of upholding them, all attempts to develope the rationale are fruitless. The occasion of these words is the conduct of Mr. O'Connell upon his arrest. When the informations against the Learned Gentleman were about to be read,— "Mr. O'Connell put on his hat, and, addressing the Magistrates, said he meant them no disrespect in doing so, but that, as a Member of the British House of Commons, he I marvel that the lovers of coincidences have never remarked that liber, the book, comes from liber, the tree; as malum the fruit, and evil, came from the tree of knowledge; and that libertas, liberty, proceeds from the book which is now every where disseminating its spirit. There are those who would push the remark to Liber Bacchus, and make a bad point on the intoxication of knowledge. was in no way inferior to Lord Anglesey himself, and he was determined to assert the dignity of that House, which was outraged in his person. The Magistrates remarked, that that was quite a matter of taste, and Mr. O'Connell was at liberty to act in that respect as he pleased. Mr. O'Connell said, that having asserted his dignity, he should, out of respect to the Magistrates, remain uncovered." Here was a dignity of the O'Connell crown, supported simply and solely by its supporting a beaver! A king could not have supported his dignity at a less rate than half a million sterling, but an O'Connell puts on a hat, value (prime cost) thirty shillings, and supports not only his little, private, personal dignity, and the dignity of all the line of the O'Connells, but also the dignity of the Imperial Parliament into the bargain. At the same time, it must be perfectly obvious, that had not Mr. O'Connell clapped his hat on his head when he did, and for such time as he did, the dignity of the House of Commons, to say nothing of his own, would have suffered a grievous shock, sensible to every member in every part of the world. Nothing but Mr. O'Connell's hat could have saved the dignity of the Honourable House. The cheapness of that mode of asserting a dignity wins upon the affections. There is so much cost associated with the idea of keeping up a dignity, that it charms one to see that the dignity of the third estate can be upheld on the easy terms of putting a hat on head, which is nearly or quite as cheap as hanging it on a peg. Fielding, in his "Jonathan Wild," has a learned chapter on hats, in which, however, he has overlooked the uses of them for the maintenance of the dignity of Parliament. He hastily says, indeed, "What is the use of a hat, farther than to keep the head warm, or to hide a bald crown from the public?" Now, in Ireland, there is no occasion for hats to keep heads warm, which are as constitutionally hot as roasted potatoes; and, as we see in the example of Mr. O'Connell, they are the only conservators of dignity, public and private. It is odd that Fielding should have hazarded the hasty proposition I have quoted, as, in another passage of the same book, he shows a perception of what is necessary to the dignity of the crowns of men, where he describes Jonathan Wild in the boat adrift at sea, cocking his hat and looking fierce, until he reflected that there was nobody by to observe him. Jonathan, in cocking his hat, was asserting his dignity. The best example of asserted dignity I have ever seen is that of Reeves, in the part of Magog the Beadle, at the Adelphi Theatre. As I did not witness the effect of Mr. O'Connell's putting the dignity of Parliament ou his head, I cannot form a comparison between the two, but I would venture to back Reeves against the Counsellor; and when Mr. O'Connell visits London again, I strongly recommend him to go and see the Beadle's manner of vindicating the insulted dignity of Beadles. It may afford a lesson, or hints at least. MILTON and SIR HUMPHREY DAVY.-In Dr. Paris's Life of Davy, a work of great knowledge, and full of instruction, I observe this passage : A great poetic genius has said, If Davy had not been the first chemist, he would have been the first poet of his age.' Upon this question I do not feel myself a competent judge but where is the modern Esau who would exchange his Bakerian lecture for a poem, though it should equal in design and execution the Paradise Lost?"—p. 30. I believe that if this choice were proposed, the number of Esaus would be very considerable indeed; not because there are many who really enjoy and prize the poetry of Milton, but because most persons think it necessary and proper to profess an admiration for his Paradise Lost, while few know any thing whatever of the Bakerian Lecture. The vast majority of Dr. Paris's readers will, I am confident, be startled by seeing the two performances mentioned in the same sentence. The national admiration for Milton is of a very general, and also of a very distantly respectful kind; it is commonly quite clear of intimacy, for people venerate without troubling themselves to know his writings. Speak of Milton, and you hear of Satan's Address to the Sun, and such other passages as have become familiar through Entick's Speaker, the Elegant Extracts, and, perhaps, Addison's Critical Notices. But though the admiration of Milton is an ignorant admiration, though it is an admiration of a name supposed to imply all poetic excellences of the noblest kind, yet it is not certain that the preference which this blind respect would dictate would not be the preference accordant with reason. The choice may be right, though the motives are insufficient. The Esau who, knowing nothing whatever of the Bakerian Lecture, and little of Milton but the common honour in which his name is held, should prefer the Paradise Lost, may make the proper choice, though moved to it only by an adopted admiration. As we happen to be blest both with Paradise Lost and the Bakerian Lecture, it is not now very profitable to consider which might have been dispensed with for the possession of the other; but supposing the necessity of foregoing one, I am far from satisfied that the choice of wisdom would have been that which seems to Dr. Paris (a name certainly of great authority in judgments) the necessary preference. The discoveries of science are discoveries of truths, always existing, and which every hour of experience is tending to lay bare at some period or other they are sure to be made, and the forward or fortunate genius of any one man only accelerates the discovery by some short time. The inventions of poetry are in the mind of the poet only, and if they are lost in him they are found in no other brain. Had Milton not written his Paradise Lost, we may be quite sure that to the end of time no other author would, in the same words, and with the same thoughts, have supplied the omission, and our language would have wanted the grandest manifestation of its power; but had a Davy not existed to propound the Bakerian Lecture, another philosopher would, in all human probability, ere this have developed the identically same doctrines. Imagination is a personalty, science depends on a reality; the first is lost with the man-the truths of the latter are co-existent with the scheme of Nature, and ever waiting discovery. PUBLIC ECONOMY.-" How are we ruined?" asks Quidnunc in the farce. It would not be difficult to show him, if the following statement may be taken as a specimen of our public economy: "It is said that Buckingham Palace is about to be given to the Duke of Northumberland in exchange for Northumberland House, which is to be taken down in order to complete the improvements in the Strand."-Morning Herald. This is, indeed, buying and selling, and living by the loss. The whole affair may best be set forth in a sort of equation £800,000-Buckingham Palace. Buckingham Palace=Northumberland House. Nash Northumberland House minus Northumberland House=0. All the building-up of Buckingham Palace; the dome; the archway; the finuy wings; the monstrous charges, and jobs, and misappropriation of the French fund, are to end in a clear space, at the site of Northumberland House! Thus in the chain of causation, the New Palace was raised for the pulling-down of an old mansion, and all its multitudinous jobs have turned to rubbish, and the clearing away for improvements-in State morals as well as Charing Cross, I trust. Whenever that Buckingham Palace writes its life, what odd stories it will tell of its birth, parentage, and rearing! SMUGGLED NEWSPAPERS.-The high Stamp Duties have had the effect of producing a smuggling trade in newspapers. Men without character or capital publish journals unstamped, which circulate extensively among the lowest classes of people, for whose worst tastes and narrow means they are intended, and return immense profits to the adventurers. The price of these papers is fourpence, which gives a larger profit to the smuggler than is obtained by the fair dealer from the sale of any stamped sheet. The expense of getting up the contraband articles is small, as they deal in declamations and inventions, which cost nothing more than the ink and paper. The spirit of them, like all smuggled spirit, is furiously ardent, and three times above proof. One of them recommends the hanging of a hundred and sixty-two Boroughmongers, and is obliging enough to name the persons whom it will be pleasant to the nation to see hung by the neck until dead. Among these, Lord Berkeley is, I observe, named. As the Berkeley title is in abeyance-the Colonel claiming it without success, and his fourth brother, the Hon. Moreton Berkeley, disclaiming it, and refusing to take his seat in the House of Peers-it would be necessary, in order to give effect to the wish of the smuggler journalist, to make out at the same time the claim to the title and the title to the gallows. To the parties this would be an interesting suit to have to press, or to have adjudicated. It may be asked, what is done with the smuggled prints to which I have alluded? Prosecutions are commenced against them, and in due course of procrastination; and, supposing all legal exactness in the proceedings, and no flaws, technical errors, or quibbles, a conviction may be obtained in three months, or so, by which time the chief adventurer has cleared three or four thousand pounds, out of which, a man of straw, who suffers the penalties, has a share that supports him comfortably and cheerfully in gaol. There is only one way of dealing with this or any other smuggling trade, and that is, by the reduction of duties. The RECORDER of NORWICH.-A teacher has appeared at Norwich, known by the style and addition of Mr. Sergeant Freere, the Recorder of that town. This learned Gentleman has a short and easy way of disposing of all persons whose opinions displease him. "Are we," says he, " to despise the wisdom of our ancestors, and scoff at the experience of ages, because certain theorists and speculators choose to put forth their absurdities?" This is a sensible question. As well might it be asked"Are we to cut off our legs, because certain boobies attempt to stand on their heads?" Decide that arguments are "absurdities," and it requires no ghost, or Sergeant Freere, to suggest to people that the nonsenses should have no force; but to some persons, not of the worshipful station of the Recorder of Norwich, it might seem necessary to prove the absurdities before proposing the question, whether weight should be permitted to them. On Trial by Jury, the Sergeant held forth thus luminously: "In criminal cases it worked well; in civil cases, it did not, because if in the latter an individual brought into Court a just cause and lost it, it was no satisfaction to him that his neighbour won his; but in criminal cases it was a sufficient satisfaction to the public that, if in one instance an offender was acquitted, in another an offender was convicted, and an example was made to satisfy the justice of the country." That is to say, provided there be a hanging or a transportation, the public is content; and without one of these two good things there is no complete satisfaction. Mr. Sergeant Freere has, however, overlooked the fact, that in criminal cases there is often one party as much dissatisfied with the verdict as is the losing suitor in the civil proceeding-namely, the man to be hanged. The Sergeant is in great wrath with persons who have derived the notion from Blackstone, that originally one-third of tithes was appropriated to the repair of the church, one-third to the support of the poor, and the remaining third to the maintenance of the parson. This the temperate judge describes as "One of the falsehoods, the wicked and malicious falsehoods, which have been put abroad by periodical publications, by itinerant lecturers, and by newspapers.” He proceeds to state : "The real history of the tithes, and that on which these theorists have founded their false and unfounded assertions is this; ever since this country has been divided into parishes, the rector has been entitled to the whole, and this statement about the tithes, which has caused so much excitement, existed more than one thousand years ago-when no distinction of parishes existed-when this country was first converted-when there was scarcely more than one church within a Bishoprick, and then, indeed, one-third went to the buildings and repair of the cathedral, and one-third to the poor converts of Christianity; all that time the clergy were not planted about happily, as they are now -that time was some three hundred years before the conquest of this country; but since then the clergy have become the owners of the whole of the tithes, and such owners, whether lay or clerical, are possessed of a title to be traced back many hundred years before the title to our estates." The same power that entitled the rector to the whole of the tithes can surely disentitle him now, should such a course be consistent with public policy. The legislature which has regulated tithes may regulate them again. By what |