LYING ON A LARGE SCALE.

NOTWITHSTANDING Lord BROUGHAM'S virulent abuse of the Press, he keeps up a constant illicit intercourse with the worst portion of it. As libertines are apt to judge of the female

tax from what they have observed among abandoned women, se Lord BROUGHAM, who has recently been much in contact with newspaper-writers of easy virtue, has imputed the want of rinciple, which he has witnessed among his peculiar associates, to the Press in general. Among all classes and professions venal men are to be found. Lord BROUGHAM has discovered that some members of the Press are to be bribed by Government advertise- ments; others by promises, hints, and expectations of preferment; many more, perhaps, by the contemptible desire of being supposed to be hand and glove with a "great man "—to be in confidential communication with a Lord Chancellor, and a participator in state secrets! We see tools of one or other of these descriptions at work for Lord BROUGHAM in many quarters: they are easily discover- able, for the "mark of the beast" is broad and deep on their fore- heads • and among the most servile of this lackey-genus, the Edinburgh Review now stands preeminent. It was formerly a Whig, then a Ministerial, now it is simply a BROUGHAM journal : it represents the BROUGHAM section of the Cabinet—that section being composed of its patron alone. The October Number con- tains an article on " The Last Session of Parliament," which passes as the authentic production of the Chancellor; • who, we tare little doubt, penned or dictated every line of it. No better proof of the subservient state to which the Edinburgh Review is degraded, could well be adduced than the fact of its having ad- mitted this article into its pages. That every sentence proves its Broughanty origin—that it is the genuine manifesto of the Chan- cellor—does not relieve the Review from the stigma of having sanctioned a mass of twaddle, spite, calumny, and downright false- hood. These are the characteristics of the article; as a brief ex- amination of its contents, and scrutiny of the motives for its com- position, which appear on the face of it, will prove.

The honour and glory of Lord BROUGHAM is the thought up- Permost in the mind of the writer. Hence his achievements in Law Reform, the everlasting Bankruptcy Court, and Central Cri- minal Courts Bill, are again pressed into the service. The mighty deeds of Lord BROUGHAM, the bills he carried, and the bills he threw out, his extensive popularity, and triumphant progress through Scotland, are dwelt upon with parental partiality. Next In order of importance to self-laudation, the envious desire to de- preciate Lord DURHAM ietransparent throughout the article. This part of it is a mass of clumsy spite and ill-concealed mortifica- tion. To uphold the House of Peers, and to lower the House of Commons—that House which resisted the attempt to bully it in the Warwick, the Bribery, and Poor-Law Bills—is another main object of the article. The writer insists that the House of Peers is more likely to legislate wisely than the Commons,—because the

latter comprises " a very numerous assembly of persons repre- senting others, and representing large bodies of their constituents ;" whereas the House of Peers is " a much smaller assembly of men, who being accountable to no one, and only controlled by pub- lic opinion, are better fitted to discharge the functions of a deli- berative and correcting tribunal." So, one grand qualification in a legislator is irresponsibility : they are more likely to make wise laws who cannot be called to account for making bad ones ! It is difficult to imagine how any human being, who is aware of what passed in the Rotten Borough Parliaments, and more recently in the House of Peers, could give utterance to such stuff: the insult to the understandings of men is too gross and impudent. The defence of the Do-little System is also undertaken by the author of this article ; who sports the hundred-times-refuted fal- lacy, that because measures are de/eyed, they are improved—that procrastination and cowardice are caution and deliberation. We are told that men who under the old system were called " Radicals, innovators, and Benthamites, and what not, have since the passing of the Reform Bill adopted precisely the views " of the Reviewer, or Lord BROUGHAM ; but the names of these converts are not given—we should like to know where they are to be found.

The article contains some overtures to the Anti-Reformers, which, with all our experience of Lord BROUGHAM'S trickery and indiscretion, we should not have supposed him so exceedingly foolish as to put forth at the present time. The " manly can- dour " and " excellent understanding " of the Duke of WEL- LINGTON are bepraised ; and, in spite of his declaration against Reform in the abstract—his particular opposition to the Reform Bill, to the Local Courts Bill, the Irish Tithe Bill, and a host of other excellent measures—in spite of his firm adherence to the exclusive principles of his party—we are told that, "on great questions of public interest," this manly candour and excellent understanding "always guide his decisions." Again, says Lord BROUGHAM in the Review- " When we speak of Tories, we use the name for shortness, and to express the Ultra principles of that party which acknowledges the Cumberlands, and Kenyons, and Rodeos for its head. We are far indeed from holding that the liberal Tories and their views are in the same disrepute among us. On the contrary, though the season may not yet have come, and though it has been put off by the bad policy of some impatient spirits, whom the Duke of Welling- ton and Sir Robert Peel cannot control, we do not think it out of the question that there may arrire a day whtn, if a STRONG GOVERNMENT be required to save us from anarchy on the one hand or Orange domination on the other, some favour may be shown to the better parts of the Oppoon, from whom great practical good has in former times flowed to the policy of the State."

There is no mistaking this language : it is a lure to the • Anti- Reformers : it is meant to apprize the Duke of WELLINGTON—the leader of the opponents of Reform, and who in power ought to strive to repeal the Reform Bill—that Lord BROUGHAM is willing, when he loses his present colleagues, or is expelled by • them, to join the Duke and form a Coalition Ministry. In the process of working out the unworthy objects for which the article was compiled, the writer, as we have already indicated, has been guilty of gross unfairness, and in some instances of direct untruth. In his endeavour to depreciate Lord DURHAM by insinuation, he goes so far as to divulge a Cabinet secret that

never transpired till now : lie states that the Sub-Conamittee of Ministers who prepared the Reform Bill reported in favour of a 20/. qualification for voters, instead of the 10/., which the Cabinet afterwards adopted. If this be true, we are warned by the tex- ture of the article against believing that it is the whole truth

part, we have no doubt, has been kept back, so as to render what is communicated substantially untrue. Lord DURHAM, we think, is now called upon to acquaint the public with the conditions that accompanied this particular proposition, and the reasons. We can imagine a more effective Reform Bill than the bill of 1831,

though apparently a less liberal one. Lord BROUGHAM must know what the accompanying conditions were ; but he will only divulge just as much of a Cabinet secret (sanctioned by an oath, we believe), as answers his own purpose, and serves to give a false gloss to the transaction.

The Reform Bill was mutilated in its progress through Parlia- ment, and yet Lord DURHAM voted for it with all its imperfec- tions: therefore, says Lord BROUGHAM, as you have accepted a clipped measure of Reform, I have a right to clip other measures, without being subject to reproof. But Lord DURHAM took all he

could get, and would gladly have had more. He did not volun- teer to clip : he did not spout through the country, that too much had been done in the way of Reform, and that less would be done

in future. Even if he had, that would be no defence ef a bad principle, any more than Lord RADNOR'S vote on the Warwick Bill justified Lord BROUGHAM'S active hostility to it. Lord DUR- HAM is now desirous to forward the cause of Reform ; he took all he could at the time, but is still impatient of the existence of recognized abuses, and would proceed steadily and deliberately to their removal. Here is the diffigence between Lord DURII AM and the Chancellor : there is no analogy between his clipping and paring and procrastinating of good measures, and Lord DUILH AM'S acceptance of the hest measure that could be curried, evee though it was mutilated by open fees and false friends. One of the most outrageous misstatements of fact is to be found in the assertion contained in the following passage relative to the Bribery Bill. After mentioning the alterations made in the bill by the Lords, it is said-

" Lord John Russell, and the other authors and friends of the measure sent up from the Cormnons, heartily approved of the amendments, and strongly re- commended the House to adept them."—(Edinburgh Reriew, page ) Now, upon turning to the records of the debates,* we find that Lord JOHN RUSSELL, and the other friends of the measure, strongly disapproved of many parts of the Lords amendments. Lord JOHN RUSSELL objected to a Judge being appointed the president of the new court ; to his having a vote in its decision ; and to the refusal of their costs to parties who have established cases of bribery. He stated that he felt " great difficulties in agreeing to the extensive alterations" made by the Lords, and only agreed to them on the ground that the evils the bill proposed to remedy were exceedingly pressing. Mr. WARBURTON, Mr. 0.CONNELL, and Mr. HARDY, the only other Members who spoke, strongly opposed the amendments. So that, instead of heartily ap- proving of them, Lord Jon Is RUSSELL gave them a reluctant assent ; and the other friends and authors of the original measure scouted the handywork of the Peers. In another part of the artie7s: ,::a provisions of the original bill are misrepresented- " Its provisions went to enable both Houses by an address, passed, of course, on a single vote in each, to disfranchise any city or borough in the three king- rionis."—( Review, p. 83.) Now from this it would be inferred, that on a motion being made to disfranchise a borough, a vote would at once be taken, and if agreed to, there would be an end to the matter : the previous in- quiry is altogether kept out of view. But Lord JOHN RUSSELL shall explain his own measure- " Our proposal was, when a prima fide etv,e of bribery had been establisho; to choose, in a particular manner, a second Committee of this House; which should have the power to take evidence upon oath ; minutes of which evidence should afterwards be sent up to the house of Lords," &c.—(Mirror rf Parlia- ment, No. LI X. p. 3272.)

• So that, instead of a single vote, the house would have had to agree to the appointment of two Commitees, to the report of the second Committee, and then to an address to the Crown. All this is kept back by the tricky Chancellor.

The Warwick Bill, concerning which Lord BROUGHAM did not dare to open his lips when confronted with Lord DeituAst at Edinburgh, figures largely in the Review. It is no longer termed a disfranchisement bill, but a bill to punish twelve hundred eke- tors against whom no evidence had been offered. How to punish them? Were the electors of Westminster punished by the bestowal of the franchise on the ten-pound voters ? Is any honest man punished by the extension of the franchise to men equally disposed as himself to exercise it honestly ?—No ; the bril,ed and the profli- gate only were punished by the bill—punished only by the ex- changeable value of their future votes being reduced to nothing : it would no longer have been worth while for Lord WARWICK to purchase their votes by the expenditure of thousands, because, buy all he could, the unpurchaseable would have been a majority against him. With respect to the mode in which the evidence was dealt with by the Lords, and the assent given to the rejection of the bill by Lord RADNOR, it is said- " The greatest care was taken to strain the rules of evidence to the uttermost in order to admit all the evidence that could be tendered ; and none was re- jected, which was not plainly, and beyond possibility of dispute, inadmissible. Lord Radnor distinctly stated, that he agreed in every word the Lord Chancellor had said, and that nobody could think of carrying such a bill in such a case."—(Ileciere, p. =9.) But the Lords refused to admit evidence as to false rating and rioting, which the Commons received: was this straining the rules ofevidence to the uttermost infavour of the bill ? As to the speech of Lord RAntson, in order once for all to put a stop to these re- peated false assertions (for the same thing appeared in the Scotsman, and in two or three London papers, we believe in the same words), we will quote from the Mirror the brief speech that Lord RADNOR actually did deliver.

"I do not think it necessary to trouble your Lordships at any length, because I am far from disagreeing in many of the propositions laid down by my noble and learned friend. My noble and learned friend has alluded to we as being the mover of the second reading ; but I beg to state, that I had nothing more to do with this bill thin any other noble Lord iii this House. There is one point, however, in which I cannot agree with my noble and learned friend. I think the auspicion to which he has referred, is much stronger than he is disposql to admit; and r think the petitioners hare laboured under considerable dis- advantages in proving their case, and which I consider to have broken down in consequence of those disadvantages. At the same time, having attended pretty closely to the examinations at your Lordship's bar, I cannot in my eon- science say that we ought to put the other parties on their defence. stated my opinion, I can only observe, that I submit to what appears to be the sense of the House, and am ready to give my vote, if necessary."—(Mirror of Parliament, p. 2:3.) Here we find, that Lord RADNOR very reluctantly acceded to the rejection of the bill : he said nothing about agreeing to every word that fell from the Chancellor ; and expressly declared that the evidence had broken down from the disadvantages the peti- tioners laboured under in proving their case. There are other points in this article which invite animadver- sion; but enough has been said to prove how utterly reckless of truth, and decency, and sound political principle, that man must 16..) who could have penned or sanctioned such a farrago.

• Mirror of Parliament No. LIN.