Nothing, it will be conceded on all hands, has occurred during the last two years, to justify such an extraordinary change of sentiment. We have had in the interim a general election, the result of which has been that a Coalition Ministry, numbering Lord John Russell among its members, is presently in power. Trade, we are told, is in the highest degree flourishing; and the prosperity of the country has been made a topic of distinct congratulation. Search as closely as you please, you will find no external reason to account for so prodigious a change of opinion. The potato-rot and famine were the visible reasons assigned for Sir Robert Peel’s change of opinion on the subject of protective duties—but what reasons can Lord John Russell propound for this prodigious wrench at the constitution? He cannot say that the proposals in _both_ his bills are sound, safe, and judicious. The one belies and utterly condemns the other. If his last idea of disfranchising and reducing sixty-six English borough constituencies is a just one, he must have erred grievously in 1852 when he proposed to retain them. So with the other provisions. If he intends to maintain that he has now hit upon the true remedy, he must perforce admit that he has acquired more wisdom in 1853 than was vouchsafed him during the twenty previous years of his political career. He must admit that he was totally and egregiously wrong in 1852; and he has no loophole for apology on the ground of intervening circumstances. Really we do not believe that there is a parallel instance of a British minister having voluntarily placed himself in such a predicament. How is it possible that he can expect his friends, independent of the mere official staff, to support, in 1854, a measure diametrically opposite to that which was propounded in 1852? No wonder that Earl Grey and other influential Whigs are most desirous to have the measure withdrawn without provoking a regular discussion. Some of them may not have approved of the former bill; but those who did so, or who were at all events willing to have let it pass, can hardly, if they wish to be consistent, give their sanction to the present one. It is not Lord John Russell alone who is compromised; he is compromising the whole of his party. If they thought him right in 1852, they must think him wrong in 1854; for he cannot point to the smallest intervening fact to justify his change of principle. And if they think him wrong, how can they possibly support him? We do not believe that he can reckon on the support of the high-minded Whigs of England. They have principle and honour and character to maintain; and we think it exceedingly improbable that they will allow themselves to be swept into the howling Maëlstrom of Radicalism. Rather than that, we venture to predict that they will toss the rash little pilot, whose incapacity and want of knowledge are now self-confessed, overboard, and trust to the direction of an abler