A pungent and stimulating article on the subject of the
Dissenting thin's for equal justice, " for liberty, true and absolute libeety," ap- peared in the Morning Chronicle of yesterday. The shuffling conduct of Ministers Was very ably exposed. " Moderation," it was said, " will no longer prevail ; " and our contemporary predicted, . • • • • " That uuless Ministers adopt prompt and dm isim steps—unless they distinctly and immediately pledge themselves to the full ri dress of the practical grievanc.'s originally propottaded—a new public question will arise of fearful 'Airport, aml the Church and State will be severed, as certainly as all other great questions of politico! agitation have been successively achieved."
Nothirtg, we believe, can be more certain than this. But what wre true yesterday is true to-day ; for what has happened within twenty-four hours to alter the relative positions of the 1W hies and the Dissenters ? Yet, this morning, a leading article in a totally different spirit appears in the Chronicle. The Dissenters are recommended to be calm and patient—to remember all that their friends in the Ministry have done for them—not "to close the door of conciliatioe," &c. &e. Why, what is all this about ? what would our contemporary be at ? Does he ima- gine that he has to do with men who are to he whistled on and
whistled off like well-bred hounds ? Ile treats the Dissenters as if he thought so—us if they were easily cajoled, meamspilited, and any thing but formidable.
The Morning Chronicle may think it extremely knowing and astute policy, one day to urge forward a party, the next to curb it in, according to the quarter the Downing Street weathercock points to : but the men he addresses net upon principle, and know full well that no great question ever was carried—no principle of civil or religious liberty ever was maintained successfully—except by determined and persever- ing consistency. This blowing hot one day, and cold the next, is vexatious to all those who would gladly find a steady advocate of the rights of conscience in the Morning Chronicle.
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