The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1881-11-19 00:00:00

MR. BRIGHT'S PUBLIC CARE:ER.

The Daily Telegraph of Tuesday (15th), anticipating the
celebration at Rochdale on the following day of the
seventieth birthday of Mr. John Bright, says in a leader :

To - morrow the seventieth birthday of John
Bright is to be celebrated by his friends and neigh-
bours at Rochdale. Such a tribute will touch the
'heart of the great tribune, who has ever cherished a
love of home and of the thoroughly English senti-
ment that gives to its surroundings an especial value.
Those who will approach him to-morrow with words
of homage and affection have known him intl.-
matfly all his life. His manly forth has been a
familiar presence in their streets- his simple and
kindly greeting has often echoed in their ears.
In other great cities and towns he has only ap-
peared to charm and thrill an audience with
the thunders of a powerful political eloquence
when he has mounted a platform to denounce
some wrong, to plead some high cause, or to direct
the indignation of the people. He is remembered as
he ',stood with arms outstretched, his fine voice rolling
out magnificent sentences, his eye flashing the fire of
the born orator as he sways the passions of a multi-
tude of men. His friends at Rochdale associate him
with more tranquil and homely scenes. They have
felt the grasp of his hand, have listened to his quiet
social talk, and their children have looked up at his
caressing topch upon their heads. His workmen, too,
respect him as a just and generous i
employer. He was
born near Rochdale; hehas lived in or near t for seventy
years ; he has taken part in the local life of the town for
nearly
oott to become
ha
Free
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crol a e
Trade,
mdee
thea nntdue century.
oaaf
after
rultft was
oorrtoy from
ftcwrooobyd
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naharsi at
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m h
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i s s t
oe
public career he receives a testimony to his worth as
a man, a neighbour, and a fellow-townsman from
those who have been nearest to him from first to last.
there is something especially English in the way our
n'
most national men cling to their homes, the neigh-
, bours, and their immediate duties. Not one of. them
is content without a local habitation and a name in
some village or town or district where they put A
the great man and take their share in the interests,
the occupations, and the pleasures of their neighbour-
hood. After the cares of State and the wide anx-
ieties of politics the change is welcome, and the
words, "I wish to dwell with my own people," were
not only the reply of John Bright to Mr. Gladstone's
first offer of office in 1868, but an abiding desire at the
very heart of his whole career.

Indeed his public life has been in one respect en-
tirely unique, and we know of no parallel to it in the
modern history of this or of any other land. He has
been a powerful public man, a great force in politics,
the fountain and the origin of important changes, the
inspiration and the guide of many acts, of statesman-
ship, and yet from first to last he has never sought
office, and has always accepted it with reluct-
ance. . . .

Taking him as he is, with his virtues and the "de-
fects of his qualities," he has been a great figure in the
latter half of the nineteenth century, and stands out a
splendid specimen of the English citizen. His tem-
perament and genius have been "racy of the soil."
He has displayed occasionally a fierce temper and
a strong pugnacity that are distinctly national, for
an Englishman hits hard when his blood is up,
though he never bears malice long. His style
of oratory has commended itself to every rank
and condition of men. Direct, homely, and simple,
his speeches are like "a well of English pure and un-
defiled," compared with the oratory of many of his
contemporaries; but, while even uneducated men
could understand him, scholars rejoiced at the proofs
read between the lines that the eloquence was built
up on the noblest models of our tongue—the prose of
the Bible and Milton's mighty verse. It has been the
good fortune of the English language that our Scrip-
tures—read and heard by millions for generations—
were moulded centuries ago, when our tongue was
fresh, and that the translation of James, like the
Revised Version of our day, kept mainly to
the old lines. The oratory of John Bright has
sustained this vernacular tradition, and no
finer specimen of purely English speech en-
riches the treasury of our national eloquence.
The sword of his style, however, has greater honour
than the beauty of the hilt or the polish and temper of
the blade. It has victories inscribed on it as noble as
any that shine on the banners of our oldest regiments.
He advocated in his youth the cause of commercial
freedom, and trade is free. For years he toiled to
reform Parliament, and his labours were crowned by
an adversary in 1867. From the earliest period of his
public life he advocated a generous and reparative
policy towards Ireland, andhe has lived to see principles
and sentiments once derided pass into Acts of Parlia,
ment and inspire decrees of State. Almost for a genera,
tion he was denounced because, as a public man, he
had always a friendly feeling and a good word for
the Republic across the seas; but he has lived to see
the generous sentiment of his youth adopted by the
nation, and awarded gracious expression by our
Queen. He contended in 1858 that legislation must
impress "the feelings and condition of the people,"
and the task of the highest statesmanship is to
realise the desire. The ideal he proclaimed in 1854
—"the high example of a Christian nation, cour-
teous and just in its conduct towards all foreign
States, and resting its policy on the unchange-
able foundation of Christian morality "—may be
impracticable as the inspiration of the policy of
an Empire won and protected by the sword,
but it is a lofty standard which statesmen of all
parties must unite to respect. In 1864 John Bright
summed up his principles in the words, "I want our
country to be populous, powerful, and to be happy.
But this can only be done by just laws justly adminis-
tered. I plead only for what I believe to be just ; I
wish to do wrong to no man." He then added, "For
twenty-five years "—and to-morrow he might quote
the sentence, altering the figure to forty-two—" I
have stood before audiences, great meetings of my
countrymen, pleading only for justice." That is thq
summary of his career.