more yielding or less scrupulous than his competitors, will discover that the demand is founded on justice and sound policy--will concede all that is asked of him, and finally will turn round complacently and claim the gratitude of his country for having saved it from a revolution. Our view, then, of this vindication of abolition, on the ground that it has averted a social convulsion, is briefly this. The discontent which then prevailed was not, as it pretended to be, the consequence of scarcity and dearness of provisions, or of any real grievance, but was in truth produced and fostered by artificial influences, which may at any time be again called into action. The spirit of agitation which then found a convenient pretext in the corn duties, will not fail to find an equally fit handle to lay hold of on the next favourable opportunity; and it is vain, therefore, to hope that we have purchased by our concessions a lasting immunity from disturbance, or any enduring guarantee for the safety of property on its present basis. It is on grounds of justice, and not of mere statecraft, that so great a question must be argued. Had the corn-laws been founded on injustice and partiality, that surely was in itself an ample and all-sufficient reason for sweeping them away. But if, on the contrary, they were productive of no such injustice to the people at large--if equity, as well as the implied guarantee of a long succession of laws, demanded an adherence to their principle as a partial compensation for the disproportionate burdens we have imposed on the land--then the allegation that their maintenance might have produced a popular outbreak, is, after all, but a feeble and ambiguous defence for the Ministry who so readily surrendered them. The _coup d'état_ which we are now asked to applaud as the crowning act of Conservative wisdom, sinks into a mere wily evasion of a difficulty by giving over the interests of the weaker party as a peace-offering to the more clamorous--a sacrifice of established rights to the "civium ardor prava jubentium."