MASK AND ANTI-MASK.

THE TWO PROCLAMATIONS OF SIMLA.

(From the Revue des deux Mondes.)

THE Proclamation of Lord Ellenborough is the exact counterpart and the most bitter satire on Lord Auckland's Proclamation, at the same place (Simla) in 1838.

Lord Auckland announced that he would enthrone at Cabul, a king, protected by England.

Lord Ellenborough declared that it was contrary to the principles of the British Government to impose a king on an unwilling people.

Lord Auckland pretended that the Prince he protected was the favourite of the people.

Lord Ellenborough replied that he had lost by the hand of an assassin the throne he only held in the midst of revolt.

England, said Lord Auckland, will extend her influence in Central Asia, and will raise a permanent barrier against foreign intrigue.

England, replies Lord Ellenborough, will content herself with the limits which nature has assigned to India. The Indus, the mountains, and the tribes of barbarians will serve as barriers against an enemy, should one appear.

There is one more striking contrast; Lord Auckland said, in 1838:-"The Governor-General rejoices to be the means of establishing the union and the prosperity of the Affghan nation."

Lord Ellenborough said, in 1842:-"The GovernorGeneral will leave to the Affghans themselves the task of creating a government out of the midst of the anarchy which is a consequence of their crimes."

It may well be asked by what right the Governor of India charges on the Affghans the anarchy to which their country

was a prey.

"If Lord Ellenborough," says an English journal," has been just in condemning the policy which commenced this war, he should not speak to us of the crimes of the Affghans, but of our own."

Thus the English Government accuses the vanquished of the crimes of which its own infatuation and ambition were the original cause, and withdraws in silence from the desolated country, on which it had let loose a torrent of savage passions which it was unable to restrain.

66

MILITARY CONSCIENCES.

ANECDOTE OF THE LATE DUKE OF YORK.

"At the table of the Commander-in-Chief, not many years since, "a young Officer entered into a Dispute with Lieutenant-Colonel , upon the Point to which Military Obedience ought to "be carried. If the Commander-in-Chief,' said the young Officer, "like a second Seid, should command me to do a Thing which I "knew to be civilly illegal, I should not scruple to obey him, and "consider myself as relieved from all Responsibility, by the Com"mands of my Military Superior.' 'So would not I;' returned the "gallant and intelligent Officer, who maintained the opposite side "of the question. I should rather prefer the Risk of being shot "for Disobedience, by my commanding Officer, than hanged for "transgressingthe Laws, and violating the Liberties of my Country. "You have answered like yourself;' said His Royal Highness, "whose attention had been attracted by the Vivacity of the Debate; "and the Officer would deserve both to be shot and hanged that "should act otherwise. I trust all British Officers would be as

unwilling to execute an illegal Command, as I trust the Com"mander-in-Chief would be incapable of issuing one.""-Sir W. Scott's Memoir of the Duke of York in the Edinburgh Weekly Journal.

THE THREE RELIGIO-POLITICAL

SYSTEMS OF EUROPE.*

THE Political Government of a State grows out of the dispositions of the people. These spring from religious instruction. Evil can be done by a Government, only when the people gives way to passion, or is heedless of right. No Government can do evil where a people has been instructed to know right from wrong-to cling to the one, and to abhor the other. Religion perverted to teach error, or indifference to the acts of rulers, gives to these the charter of oppression and of crimes. Therefore, the Church, standing by the civil authority, acts upon it in one of two modes, counteracting its vices-or subserving them.

The denunciations of the Church are of necessity called forth by the crimes of rulers against their people, or of nations against other nations; for to these, if it resist them not, it becomes a party. Religion, when it deserves the name, acts upon the State, not to influence its ordinary missions, but to prevent its excesses and its delinquencies; acts upon the State corporately, as upon man separately, to make him dutiful, obedient, observant of the law, well-wishing and doing to his fellow man. The Religion that subserves a political Government, is

* See "Erastianism of the Church of England."-Port. Vol. I, p. 556, and "Effect of Words, &c." Vol. I. p. 525.

one that has not taught men to discriminate between crime and duty. Such a religion is only hypocrisy and superstition, and the tree is to be known by the fruit. A people that is factious within, and murderous without, is not a religious people, and is not worthy of the name of Pagans, far less of Christians. Where there is Religion, it must controul and command the Governmentin other words, prevent it from breaking the commandments of God-which being obeyed, the State is free.

We have seen that in our own country and in France, there has been divorce between Religion and Politics. There is neither the knowledge of right and wrong that gives to the consciences of men the power of controlling the Government; nor is there an intensity o fs uperstition, which enables the Church to subserve by active co-operation the temporal rulers. The Church, in both countries, has lost all positive action on the affairs, life, and morals, of the community. It is only, therefore, after an effort to ascend out of ourselves, that it can be possible for us to judge of a Government, where the religious and political authorities are active, positive, and united. There we must expect either a better condition of the mind of man, or a more dangerous character of its Government. We must expect

* In England, for instance, so called Christians deem themselves innocent, by not knowing what it is that constitutes a lawful war-if such men are religious-what is their religion?

something morally above us in the simplicity of the people, or intellectually beyond us in the designs of the Government.

There are three great Governments in Europe, in which the religious and political systems are united- that of Rome, of Constantinople, and of St. Petersburg. The Pope, temporal sovereign of a small state, is the religious head of the great body of European Christians. The Sultan, head of the Ottoman Empire, is Caliph of the Orthodox Mussulmans. The Autocrat of all the Russias, is religious head of the larger portion of the community of Eastern Christians. The spiritual influence of these Potentates is not confined to their own subjects, nor circumscribed within the limits of their own territories, but acts, or is capable of acting, on other people and nations, and on the very nations to the Governments of which they may severally be opposed.

The flock of the Pope is composed of an Emperor, eight or nine Sovereigns of the Ministers, G oernors, chief men of these various kingdoms, and of the whole or the great majority of the people that compose them. This flock comprises a most important portion of Protestant England; it constitutes in Prussia the only section of the people possessed of independent rights; it amounts to twelve millions of the subjects of Russia. As compared with the Protestant communion, with which it stands in balance, it is possessed of these two