The New Zealand Herald. AUCKLAND, SATURDAY, DEC. 9, 1865.

New Zealand Herald, Volume III, Issue 648, 9 December 1865, Page 4

The New Zealand Herald.

AUCKLAND, SATURDAY, DEC. 9, 1865.

SL'ECTBJIUR AGENDO. " Give every m:m thine ear, but few thy vnico : Tnke ench nun's censuro, but reserve Miy judgment. This übove all,—To thine own self be true ; Anil it must follow, as the nitflit the day. Thou ciinst not then lie falso to any m.in.

The intelligence that tlie members of the Council of the Northern Association have unanimously decided in favour of the continuance of the Council after the 20th inst., (when the annual meeting of the members of the Northern Association will take place, and the present Couucil will lapse by effluxion of time,) will be received with a Yery general

feeling of satisfaction by the inhabitants o* this city and. Province. It ia much, to bo regretted that the carpings of a miserable few should have weighed for one instant in the minds of some members of the Council to have led them to entertain the question of discontinuance at all. "Whatever may have been said by the small and insignificant party who have attacked the Council of the Association, it can never be said of the | Council itself that " it died and left no sign." The evidences of its usefulness are even now before us in the return of our present Superintendent, and, in a great measure, in tho tone of unanimity infused into tho minds and feelings of the electors generally, which led to the return of a Council composed in great part of men chosen lor their individual ability and fitness for the office. To the Council of the Northern Association we owe the great Separation meeting held in Mr. Buckland's yards, the moral effect of which was felt in the Assembly itself. To it we owo the late banquet given to our members of A ssembly, and to it we shall have to look, every ten months out of twelve, for the motive power to set on foot any special and extraordinary political movement, and for the guiding power to direct that movement into the best and most desirable course of action.

Tho Annual Public Meeting of the Association will take place on tho 20th instant, when it will be in tho power of members of tho Association, that is, of the electors generally, to re-elect the present members of the Council or such of them as they may think advisable, or to add to their number by the introduction of new blood. Either, or all of these courses may be advisable, but it certainly is not advisable—and those who read the report of the speeches of Mr. Eusscll and others delivered at the meet ing of yes terday, will agree with us in saying so —it is not advisable to breakup an institution which, during its brief career of one twelvemouths, lias been of such public service in tho cause of Separation, and which may still bo of even greater service in the future. How much more so will those who listened yesterday to tho reasons given by more than one speaker, after the reporters withdrew, agree with us when we say that the existence of the Northern Association is an essential element in the Separation movement! "What the head is to the body, the Council of the Association is to. the political public of the Province.