20th May.
From French telegrams supplied to "L'Echo de Chine," we learn that M. Waldeck Rousseau has addressed circular to the French prefects on the subject of the interference of the clergy and monks in the elections in numerous departments. From the native paper the "Ssu Pao," we learn that while the other provinces in China raise no factious opposition to the newly-assessed taxes necessary to make up China's indebtedness, only in Shansi, Honan and Pechibli is there trouble, "There must be something wrong up north and we hear that the Tahabitants of large villages which the Reman converts have occupied lave been prevented from returning to their homes on the plea that the indemnities have not been paid." Further, as a comment on both these, we find an 1mperial Edict issued on the head of a report received from ELE. the Viceroy of Chihli to the effect: "That in the district of Tsung-hsien, a mob, after being dispersed by the local forces, went on to the district of Chiilu, where they spread disquieting rumours, and after murdering several soldiers of a recently enlisted regiment, proceeded to attack two district cities, and ended up by destroying churches and plundering native converts, finally murdering a French missionary' named Lo Minhsin."
All these stories, it will be seen, thoroughly explain' and confirm one another. True to its traditions, mixedly religious and political, the Church of Rome has recently been reviving its political propaganda; and would gladly see the time when monarchs trembled under the threat of an interdict from the Vatican. This secular crusade has brought the Vatican into unpleasant contact with the French Government several times during the last three years, and resulted in the passing of an act to expel from France those orders that had been most conspicuously forward in their interferences with the law of the land, unless they should honestly conform to those laws. Nominally the greater number of the orders have done so; but apparently the temptation afforded by the recent elections has been too powerful for the old Adam still existing even in the clergy; and under the pretence of caring for the religious welfare of their flocks, attempts have been made to guide their political views. Had those political aims of the ecclesiastics been confined to their views as Frenchmen and citizens, the churchman in France would have had as good right as his neighbours to ventilate those opinions which were next to his heart; but unfortunately he could not be brought to view affairs in this-reasonable light, and strove to bring into the field the most odious of tyrannies, that of sacerdo-} talism. Worse even than this, it was sacerdotalism inspired not from; France but from without; and pro-/ fossedly undertaken with the object of rendering France subservient to foreign influence. Not from religious grounds, therefore, but because national government was becoming impossible, under these extraneous factors has the French Government found it necessary to interfere in the interests of order, So far so good. The English nation, who for long centuries has rid itself of the like attempts at introducing within the realm the rule of the foreigner, is not likely to complain of the similar steps which are being forced upon its good neighbour of France. But unluckily for herself as well as her neighbours, France, or its Government, is not consistent, and herself' throws considerable doubt on_the reality of her own intentions. In a word, she is encouraging abroad in the hope of advantage at home the very same sacerdotal instinct of asso-clating political with religious aspirations; and what she deprecates a home as fraught with dang-r the State, she in China is actually stimulating in the vain hope of thereby increasing the greatness of the Republic. Now if there be one thing that the French as a nation pride themselves on, it is the logical instinct. No nation has so distinguished itself in the purely induce tional sciences. Astronomy, mathe-maties, chemistry, ete., and in fact all those sciences which depend on the clearness of the reasoning faculties, owe more to this instinct as developed in the French nature almost than to the other nations together. It is curious therefore that the logical Frenchman, who sees the necessary, because logical, effects of Roman sacerdotalism at home, should under the influence of a strange prejudice permit his mental vision to be blinded as to the similar necessary effects of permitting it a free hand abroad. Neither France nor we desire a continuance of the present disorders in China; but the encouragement she is giving to ultramontane pretensions in the East is going a long way towards introducing a yoke at home which neither modern Frenchmen nor their fathers have been able to bear.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.