Page images
PDF
EPUB

4

enough out of his plot of ground to live upon, and to get drunk as many days in the year as possible. With such a base to the pyramid as is constituted by the peasant proprietors of Russia, aided by the enormous army, recruited almost to any extent from among their ranks, whose chief religion is a superstitious reverence for the 'great father,' the Czar is safe in refusing all concessions, all improvements; and the hopeless nature of Russian reform hitherto, mainly hangs upon the conviction of the Government that nothing external can possibly act upon this inert mass. "Great is stupidity, and shall prevail.' But surely not for ever!

F. P. VERNEY.

4 'When God created the world He made different nations, and gave them all sorts of good things-land, corn, fruit. Then He asked them if they were satisfied, and they all said "Yes," except the Russian, who had got as much as the rest, but simpered, "Please, Lord, some vodki."-Russian Popular Tale.

The same word Batushka is used for Father, the head of the Mir, the serf-owner, and the Czar,' says Haxthausen; the sun and moon appear under the same word in the songs.

THE ZENITH OF CONSERVATISM.

THERE was a favourite saying of Ptolemy the astronomer, which Lord Bacon quotes in its Latin version thus: Quum fini appropinquas, bonum cum augmento operare- As you draw near to your latter end, redouble your efforts to do good.' From time to time I have ventured to criticise the action of our great political parties. The professional politicians are always apt to be impatient of the intervention in politics of a candid outsider, and he must expect to provoke contempt and resentment in a good many of them. Still the action of the regular politicians continues to be, for the most part, so very far from successful, that the outsider is perpetually tempted to brave their anger and to offer his observations, with the hope of possibly doing some little good by saying what many quiet people are thinking and wishing outside of the strife, phrases, and routine of professional politics. Declining years supply a motive, Ptolemy tells us, to an aged outsider for more than ever trying to do this, and so, at the present moment of crisis, I find myself drawn back to politics. Before the defeat of the Liberals I criticised the performance and situation of the Liberal party under Mr. Gladstone, and said that this great party seemed to have at that moment pretty well reached its nadir, or lowest. The other great political party, the party of the Conservatives, might on the contrary before the recent sudden surprise of Lord Randolph Churchill's resignation have been said to stand at its zenith, or highest. Before Parliament meets, and it is decided whether the fortunes of Conservatism shall remain prosperous or shall take a turn to decline and fall, I want to inquire how things look to plain people outside of the rivalry of parties, and on what the standing or falling of the Conservative fortunes seems to depend.

When one thinks of the weakness of the Conservatives in the last Parliament, of the confidence of Mr. Gladstone and his followers that in the elections for the present Parliament they would sweep the Conservatives from the field, and how this confidence proved false and the Conservatives from very weak in Parliament became very strong; when one thinks, next, of the prophesying of the Liberals that the alliance between the Conservatives and the Liberal Unionists would instantly dissolve, and how false, too, this prophesying proved; when one considers, finally, how the Conservatives in their resistance

to Mr. Gladstone had and have the mind of the country with them, or at least the mind of England, of the far greatest, most civilised, and most influential part of the country, the part, too, where the mere trade or game of politics least absorbs men, where there is to be found the largest number of people who think coolly and independently—when one considers all this, one must surely own that the Conservatives might until just now have been said to be at their zenith.

Certainly there have been appearances of danger.

We heard at one time that Mr. Chamberlain was consenting to an attack on the Home Secretary's seat at Birmingham, at another that Sir George Trevelyan was going himself to contest a Conservative seat at Brighton. Then, too, there was Mr. Gladstone's friendly proposal that the Liberal Unionists should join with him to force the hand of the Conservative leaders at the beginning of this coming session, and to make them at once produce their plans for dealing with Ireland. But these former appearances of danger passed off. Mr. Chamberlain was staunch, Sir George Trevelyan was staunch. Mr. Gladstone's friendly call to co-operation was received by Lord Hartington with a coldness which reminds one irresistibly of the attitude of the prince in Rasselas His old instructor officiously sought opportunities of conference, which the prince, having long considered him as one whose intellects were exhausted, was not very willing to afford.'

Now, however, has come the startling surprise of Lord Randolph Churchill's resignation. Of course, that resignation is a grave event, throwing a very serious responsibility upon Lord Randolph Churchill, a very serious responsibility upon Lord Salisbury. So long, however, as the Liberal Unionists continue staunch, and the majority remains unimpaired, the gravity of the event is ministerial and parliamentary, rather than national. But the attitude of Mr. Chamberlain, agitated by Lord Randolph Churchill's resignation, has become equivocal. More than ever is it important that the mind of the country, the great power of quiet reasonable opinion in England, should make its force felt. Parliaments, parties, and politicians, are more or less discredited; that force is at bottom sound, and affords our best guarantee of national strength and safety. It placed the Conservatives in office, and, if not alienated, it will for the present keep them there. Questions of persons sink into insignificance beside the paramount question, whether Ministers will, by their policy on two or three matters, now of main concern, carry the mind of the country with them. It is favourable to them at present, in spite of Lord Randolph Churchill's defection and of Mr. Chamberlain's signallings to the enemy. It is favourable to them at present, and shows no signs of withdrawing from them its goodwill. But how are they to keep it favourable? How are they to retain the goodwill of that great body of quiet reasonable people, who thought the course attempted by Mr.

Gladstone and his Liberals a false and dangerous one, and rejoiced at the success of the Conservatives in stopping it?

Well, what the Conservatives, having been themselves successful, have now above all to do, is to make their country too, in its turn, succeed. There can be no doubt that for this good while past our country has not been, in the judgment of any cool-headed person, succeeding; that it has seemed somehow, as has been said, to flounder and to beat the air; to be finding itself stopped on this line and on that, and to be threatened with a sort of standstill. People carried away by party spirit will say anything; they will say that Mr. Gladstone succeeded in Egypt, that he was successful with his Land Act, successful with procedure. But that great body of plain reasonable people, whose goodwill at present makes, I say, the strength of the Conservative Government, know better. Perhaps party writers on the Tory side will say that Lord Salisbury's Government, since it has been in power, has already been succeeding; but dispassionate observers will hardly agree to that either. The Conservatives have done little or nothing hitherto, since they came into power, to make their country succeed, to make things go happily for us, any more than the Liberals did. I do not say that the Conservatives are to be blamed for this; perhaps they have not had time, perhaps they have been reserving themselves for the meeting of Parliament. But the fact remains; they have not yet made their country visibly recover itself and succeed, and to make it do this is what is wanted of them. If they are to remain at the zenith, they must do it; and both for their own sake and for the sake of the country it is most important for them, and now since Lord Randolph Churchill's defection more important than ever, to consider by what sort of proceedings when Parliament meets, since they seem to be waiting for the meeting of Parliament, they are likely to do it.

Soon enough will the occasions come to the Conservative Government, the occasions for standing or falling; and in what fashion soever they may meet them they will have plenty of party foes sure to tell them that they do ill, and plenty of party friends to tell them that they do well. But the verdict which will decide whether they and the great Conservative party led by them shall really stand or fall is, I repeat, the great force of fair and reasonable English opinion independent of party. This force is what they must keep in view and seek to satisfy. It will go with them in not permitting questions to be raised which ought to be postponed to matters more urgently pressing now. But with three matters of urgent present importance the Government will, as every one knows, have to deal: procedure, the state of Ireland, local government. It is probable also that some branch or other of the question of Church disestablishment will force itself under the notice of Parliament and compel discussion.

On

perhaps four matters, therefore, the Government will, we may expect, have to declare itself: procedure, the state of Ireland, local government, Church disestablishment. On these it will have to carry with it, if it is to stand and not to fall, the great body of independent reasonable opinion in England.

Let us take procedure first. Probably no member of Parliament quite knows how scandalous and intolerable the present state of the House of Commons appears to the great body of quiet reasonable people throughout the country. Party men may find their account, one way or another, in that state of things; the excitement of it, and selfimportance, may make many members of Parliament blind to the actual truth. But the actual truth is that plain reasonable people outside the House of Commons regard the confusion into which it has fallen, and its apparent helplessness to extricate itself, with ever deepening disgust and shame; it is a relief to them when Parliament is not sitting; they are uneasy and apprehensive as soon as it meets again, for they know that the time for humiliation has returned. A Minister said solemnly, after a scandalous scene: The country will judge;' the Times sounded its eternal warning: If this sort of thing continues, it will become necessary to apply some very stringent remedy.' The country has judged, judged and condemned. It has judged that the stringent remedy ought to have been long before now applied, and has condemned the House of Commons of impotence for not applying it. Factious men in the House of Commons may from party interest oppose a stringent reform of procedure, vain men may oppose it in the interest of their own importance; pedants, both inside and outside the House of Commons, may oppose it on the strength of stock phrases which perhaps had force and truth once but which have them no longer. But the body of quiet reasonable opinion throughout the country is in favour of a most stringent reform; and this opinion will heartily approve the Government if it undertakes such a reform and carries it through, will be displeased and alienated if it does not. Plain people will not be impracticable and insist on having closure by a bare majority, if the Government finds that time and labour are saved through accepting closure by a majority of three-fifths, or of two-thirds; but the more stringent a closure the Government can carry, the better will plain people be pleased. I presume it will hardly now be Lord Randolph Churchill who will propose closure; but to imagine that we should have been so stiff as not to accept closure from Lord Randolph Churchill because he of old intemperately inveighed against it, is to think us foolish indeed. The Saturday Review objects to my quoting Bishop Wilson, but really I have a maxim of his which fits Lord Randolph Churchill's duty in this matter exactly: 'Let us not afflict ourselves with our failings; our perfection consists in opposing them.'

The subject of Ireland I will leave to the last, because it requires

« PreviousContinue »