We observe with pleasure,...
'Ve observe with pleasure, that thc liberal piinciples of commerciaI policy announced an)d enforced by NIr. Hus- KISsoN, in the debate on the silk trade, have been echoed and recommended by a very influential part of the French press. The following quotation from the reported speech of the Right Hon. Gentleman has been translated into most of the journals, and eulogized by many of them:- " If for advocatingsucl principles he should be u-cused of lean- ing gtrongly to a liberal policy, he should at once plead guilty to the charge :but they were principles founded on experience, and sane. tioned by the best authorities. In his opinion, to be liberal in mat- ters of commercial policy was to remove the jealousies which had hitherto prevented a free intercourse between different nations-was to cxtend to each the advantages and enjoyrments of the other_ was to promote arts, science, and cihilization ; and, in a *rord, was to advance those salutary, beneficial, and enlightened views which were best calculated to increase the wealth, opulence, and power of the country. In short, he was liberal to other countries, because by being bo he felt that he best consulted the interest of his own." The Constitutionnel, which is most extensively read amon)g those powerful classes of French soeiety de- voted to commerce and manufactures, and which, as their organ, has frequently expressed an illiberal jealousy of the progress of English trade and industry, lias been the first to give to the above sentiments all the advantage of its circulation, and all the weight of its authority. It even goes farther; and, as MIr. Hussissov professed that he would be hberal to the corrnnerce of other countries, be- cause in being so be best consulted the interests of his own, the French journalist recommends the abolition of certain restrictions on the importatiou of foreign manufactures into France,because they provoked reprisals "iinjurious toFrench "agriculture and industry." By frequently reciprocating such sentiments between the enlightened orders ofliffierent nations,prejudices must bc graduhally removed,and jealousies allayed, among thosepersons who aremost liabletotakethe alarm at every proposed improvement, who consider every relkxation of monoply as a boon granted to foreigners at their expense., and who unhap:pily act too powerfully on the ignorance or timidity of their rulers to allow the imme- diate adoption of better principles. By a free cormmerce of liberal ideas, we shall soon have a free commerce of commodities.