THE REVEREND MR. CUNNINGHAM AND THE NORTHERN CIRCUIT.
A CORRESPONDENCE between the Reverend J. W. Cunningham, of Harrow, and Sir J. Scarlett, on the subject of a toast given on the Northern Circuit, has been the topic of a good deal of remark during the week. The first letter we observe is dated March 25th; and as the year is not added, it is commonly supposed that the singular controversy took place last spring. This is, however, we suspect, a newspaper trick, designed to give the interest of fresh- ness to a really stale affair ; for we heard the substance of the cor- respondence fifteen months ago, when it was much discussed in legal circles. Among people of the world, the merits of the matter do not allow of any very wide difference of opinion. It will be ge- nerally agreed, that the toast of the Northern Circuit is of a dis- gusting grossness • and neither wit nor sentiment can be pleaded in its vindication, grossness; the attempt of Sir J. Scarlett give to it the character of the latter quality, in his ingenious de- fence. Adherence to the obscenity of our ancestors is the justifica- tion that might perhaps be offered most satisfactorily to one, and that the angriest class of objectors. The throwing out a challenge to cant, is the most specious justification presented to a more mo- derate order of persons. It must, however, be extremely ques- tionable, how far it is politic to (rive an offence to cant which places it on the vantage-ground. give should the championship of decency be forced upon hypocrisy? Once again, we repeat, the toast is a gross toast, suited only to the coarse orgies of an alehouse-parlour ; and we much question whether, as Mr. Cun- ningham charitably to the army assumes, it would be heard (cer- tainly not as a custom) in the mess-room of a marching regiment. On the other hand, the interference of Mr. Cunningham was, to say the least, of very doubtful prudence or seemliness. A nasty little corner of smut may have lurked in society, but there appears no imperative reason why the reverend gentleman should thrust himself into acquaintance and intimacy with it ; and he is indeed obliged to justify his meddling by extreme exaggeration of the subject matter. " I could not send," urges he, "a son to the bar without his being compelled to drink a toast which makes it a duty and a pleasure for every man to seduce his neighbour's child, or sleep with his friend's wife, when- ever he has the opportunity !" This is monstrously untrue. The toast were better abandoned, but it is frantic to impute to it such a tendency---a tendency disproved by experience, for though there is sufficient evidence of the grossness cherished on the Northern Circuit, we hear no attempt to show that the individuals of that body are more charge- able with immoral conduct than any others in the country.
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