The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1880-04-27 00:00:00

TORY RESIGNATION.

It is a satisfaction when one can heartily congratu-
late our opponents, and it is impossible to do otherwise
this week, seeing that they have given up their furious
policy of wa- to the knife, have even been shamed out
of clamouring for revenge on petty and helpless wrong-
doers, and have submitted with "resignation." Had
the " resi.mati .n" 10.. en only that of acquiescence,
of a sullen tame less under defeat, only contempt
might have followed ;but it I a. been a far more sensible
" resignation"—of 1.), rice Conservative. The
"sound and fury signifiog r.othing," but which were
meant to belch forth punidiment if not destruction to
all whocriticised the I:mpreseinakeehave disappeared,
the Tory bully has given place to the Conservative
critic, uttering mil I wails and complaints, doubta and
fear,. One can hardy • xrc,ct the organs of what Is
now Her Majesty's Opp ,sition to accept cheerfully the
sentence th:t condemns them to finish up their gorging
of Gave, tiormt money, an-1 that within • reasonable
time, and which hurries the leading Clothes-man to
distribnto during life all the suits he can get
out of the country's wardrobe before he is
politically dead, and the key passes into other
hand,. And co the Liberals must re,:a-.1 with a pity
almost sympathetic the paro ly from the Prayer Book,
by which the country's leading representati, es are
described as "extreme Radicals, ath, 14., political
Dissenters, infidels, and other wlvauce 1 politicians."
Perhaps none are less disposed than moderate Liberals
to the ov. rbah difference between the fin-blue Tory and
the con, cientiouaConvervative ; between the progressive
Liberal and the varioue schools who gloey in the term of
Radic ; but the C. omen, dive c. 'tie blunders
greatly when ho suggests that the differences
are au da nc will irevmt the Liberals en 1 the
more a Iv.inced Radicals from acting together on
questions in which pr egress is imeded. As to the
multiforiene hobbies which it is the fashion t c 'II
"crotchets," they wi:l inspire many earnest men to
oordiolly a-clot the only party that will give ',teener
views a fair hearing, and decide them on their real in-
ableness or otherwis., icstead of contemptuously
snubbing their advocates became their views are new.
Extreme R are often those who have seen
extreme evils erica from the things they a'taek, ao.d
it set tem bps to the same men that they should see
(ho extreme evils of many bad thing., apparently pro-
tected by vested intere.ta. Providence forbid they
should, for the combinati et sights of evil might
drive a wise man mad. For instance, wer, Mr.
Fl msoll to be oppressed by other abominations beeide
those he believed he disc vered in pert of the shipping
trade, that wilds madness which raised him to a hero,
in spite of cruel cynicism, might have been increased
till he was made unfit to legi-late at all. Hal Mr.
Plimsoll witnessed what many members of the Press
have seen of the awful depths into which selfishness,
gratified and increased by excess in intoxicating
drinks, have sunk the brightest of their and other
professiocs, Mr. Plimsoll might despair. How much
more if upon all legislators were heaped experience of
the evils into which our peasantry are drawn by pre-
servation of rabbits, experience of the vileness of the
C. 1). acts, of tyrannies of false teachings by • small
percentage of a noble order, and so on till one cannot
haw the recital. Some are impressed by the evils of
war, and others find it dreadful enough that • Tory
landlord may have nests of tenements with conveni-
ences not fit for decent men, though poor women have
all shame ground out by the shoitcominge of that for
which they pay rent. Yet each of these "crotchets"
has to be dealt with, its extremities and absurdities
knocked off, and what remedies or mitigations are
practicable must be found. The great mistake of
Toryiem—(not to say Conservatism, which fairly may
have a different meaning)—in that all "crotchets" may
be pooh-poohed, crushed out of existence by force, or
smothered by exorbitant demands for compensation to
so-called "vested interests." Liberalism recognises—
widely differing as the crotchets may be—that our
knowledge of truth is iirogressive, that the world
should be progressive, and that "the presence, not to
gay the ascendancy," of the Government of the United
Kingdom will be welcomed at home and abroad in
proportion ma it helps to make things better instead of
worse. It may remind us of such heathen absurdities
as Ovid's to say of chaos :
" Where hot and cold and moist and dry
Strive alike for mastery."
But chaos can only be where the elements lie supine
and motionless. " A more sure word" whose teach-
ings have rather gone out of fashion under Imperialist
rule tells um of motion as the means whereby order
was called out of the formless void. Repletion can
hardly be conceived of in the universe of life, where
the cessation of motion Is regarded as affording rather
strong reason to suspect death. The sequence of hot
and c 'meow, of rainy Aprils, and, if it please
Providence, of dry harvest times, and the alternation
of seasons wherein opposing forces visibly strive, is
but the usual and happy course of life; may we be
blessed with such a well-balanced course of seasons this
year, and Liberals and Conservatives will alike be
joyful at the profitable result. And in the Legisla-
ture also, instead of a continual pouring of cold water,
let us hope that honest efforts to make things better
may be so enoutrazed by the Liberal majority as to
result In a valn ble harvest et good Acts.