The Press.
London, England, 1858-10-09 00:00:00

THE PRESS, OCTOBER 9, 1858.

when those ends are gained, itself ends, or only
takes renewed action to attain the same ends again.
Its whole stock in trade consists in a few cant
phrases. Its hereditary watchword is " civil and
religious liberty " ; its principle (so far as it has
any principle) is a crown bestowed by the
people and subject to the will of the people; its
ceaseless object is to separate religion from civil
government, and to convcrt every man into two
persons, according as he is in office or out of
office—out of office he is to have a conscience, in
office he is to have no conscience. This it is that

accounts for the otherwise extraordinary and
unaccountable contradictions that are found in
Whig statesmen. They are at once rigid and lax,
liberal and illiberal. The weakness of the Whigs
is never so thoroughly exposed as when they are
in power ; for when was Whiggism ever found to
be anything but magnificent in promise and
meagre in performance ?
The Whigs are wont to boast of what they
have effected in the way of securing freedom of
opinion, of abolishing religious restrictions, of
establishing the principle of toleration. But K
as we have observed, their " civil and religious
liberty" means only the liberty of having no
religion in civil matters, this is sorry ground for
boasting. If, then, toleration is only the prin-
ciple of leaving others to be as indifferent to the
obligations of Heaven's revealed truth as they
are themselves in public life, on the ground that
it does not matter what a man's opinions are,
there is small merit in it ; while to pride them-
selves on it is as absurd as it would be for a
walrus to pride itself on its insensibility to cold.
The Conservatives are friends to true toleration,
but they are not the advocates of that kind of
toleration which an old writer speaks of as " a
"weed of spontaneous growth in the soil of in-
" difference." The Conservatives are the culti-
vators of the genuine plant, and they will ever
be friends to " civil and religious liberty" be-
cause they are friends to a manly and enlightened
freedom. It is, however, on a different ground
from that on which the Whigs take their stand.
It is on the ground of a moral principle, and not
for a political purpose.
That the nation is indebted to the Whigs of
former days for some useful services we are not
so unfair as to deny. They made a noble stand
for the independence of their country against
Popish domination in the Revolution of 1688.
They have been occasionally supporters of good
measures since. But they have sadly degenerated.
Between the old Whigs and the new there is
almost the widest possible difference. A new
Whig creed has been introduced ; yet it is a
creed still. This shows itself practically. Between
the old Whigs and the modern Conservatives
there are some points of affinity, so that what few
of the old school of Whigs remain may almost be
accounted as Conservatives ; but between them
and the new family of Whigs, none. These have
developed themselves into a new form under the
name of Radicalism, or self-styled Liberalism, or
at least are cousins-german to it. Radicalism is,

in fact, but the bastard child of Whiggism, be-
gotten by Faction out of the womb of Political
Weakness. This new progeny we will now en-
deavour to describe.

Radicalism, viewed in its true tendency, is
progress without preservation. The Radicals have
neither a creed, nor are they guided by a law.
Their motive power is, in point of fact, a diseased
political sentiment. They labour under the poverty
of having but one idea—that idea being included
in the one word, the People. Their principle of
legislation is to place the State on an inclined
plane, and to let it go of itself, as, on this principle,
they maintain it would go ; respecting which there
cannot be a doubt. They rebel at the idea of
government. They think it is not necessary for
any to guide,—all that is wanted is to let go the
rems. They look not at all to consequences.
These they would cover with the " all-atoning "
name of liberty. Their great object is to level.
They would pollard the nation into a frightful
uniformity. King, Church, Peers, everything
that carries about it any distinction, must be
brought down or inverted. They would place
the base of the pyramid uppermost, and make the
People all in all. They cannot conceive how
there can be unity in the midst of diversity ;
rather they are infected with the desire of cen-
tralizing and uniforming everything. Being
most of them men more conversant with material
, mechanism than with moral principles, they are
90 intoxicated with the love of machinery that they

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think mechanical action better than moral in the
science of government, as being surer and more
easily managed. Hence this new race of Political
Reformers, like the Jacobinical Republicans of
France in former days, would cut into sections,
and square and lay out, the whole complex mass
of society after one precise pattern. It must be
universal or manhood suffrage, vote by ballot,
triennial Parliaments, electoral districts, repre-
sentation according to the exact number of heads.
without regard to brains, property, or any other
qualification. Kings, Lords, an Established Church,
national religion, landed gentry—all must go to
make way for perfect civil equality. In a word,
like the fox in the fable that had lost his tail,
they would have Parliament pass an act of self-
mutilating uniformity for the whole nation.
The contrast between these three political
parties may, as regards their principles, perhaps,
be best brought out by a comparison with three
different kinds of country. The Radicals would
reduce everything to one dead flat ; the Whigs
would preserve some mountains and lofty hills on
one side, and make all the rest a broad plain; the
Conservatives are for maintaining the order of
nature in a beautiful intermixture of hills and
plains, and woods and valleys, adorned with
every variety of luxuriant scenery. Which is
preferable, let every man of sense judge.
To resume : Conservatism is, as we have said,
preservation with progress ; Whiggism is preser-
vation without progress ; and Radicalism is pro-
gress without preservation. The first acts by a
law ; the second by a creed ; and the third has
neither creed nor law. We may safely leave it to
our readers to determine in which of these three
systems or parties it is safest to place their
confidence.

AN EX-MLNISTER'S CONTRIBUTIONS
TO REFORM.
AMONG the political ciphers which made up the
rank and file of the Palmerston Administration,
Sir GEORGE CORNEWALL LEWIS is honourably
distinguished as a gentleman of great personal
respectability. If he has not astonished the
world by any brilliant displays of genius, neither
has he acquired the equivocal reputation of
being a clever Parliamentary trickster. IVhile
in harness he held on his way in the even tenor
of official dulness ; and now that he is relieved
from the trammels and responsibilities of office
he sustains his part as a public man by occasion-
ally sedately and heavily descanting upon the
affairs of the nation. In the pursuit of this
harmless occupation he delivered himself at the
Radnorshire Agricultural Meeting of a string of
observations which, if they have no great tendency
to advance political science, are nevertheless not
unworthy of notice as throwing some little light
upon the intentions of the late Administration
on the subject of Parliamentary Reform.
Sir CORNEWALL LEWIS is evidently not
very well pleased with the prospect of seeing
that question dealt with by the men into whose
hands the reins of power have passed. It can
scarcely be the fear of the Reform Bill which is
expected, and as good as announced, to be
brought forward by the present Ministry,
proving too Conservative in its character, that
causes the Right Hon. Baronet thus to contem-
plate with unmistakeable dislike the introduction
of such a measure by his political opponents ; for
he expresses his firm conviction that any attempt
to give it such a character must be signally
defeated. Neither does he appear to be under
any serious alarm as to the success which may
attend the endeavours of her Majesty's advisers
to put the representation of the people upon a
sounder basis; on the contrary, he augurs for
them nothing but failure. Why such anticipa-
tions as these should give so little comfort to the
mind of the late CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER

is not very intelligible.
What is it, then, that disturbs the Right
Hon. Baronet ? Is it that he thinks Parlia-

mentary Reform unnecessary and undesir-
able ? Strange as this supposition may appear,
after the conspicuous position which has
been assigned to this question for years past in
all the political programmes of the Whip, there is
much in the remarks which fell from Sir GEORGE
CORNEWALL LEWIS to justify such a suspicion.
After vindicating the Reform Bill of 1832 on
the ground that, previous to its enactment, "the
" 110119 e of Commons did not accurately and

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" faithfully represent the general opinion of the
" country," the Right Hon. Baronet goes on to
state his deliberate conviction that, although
" it may not always be the faithful exponent of
" the opinions of particular individuals, or even
" of particular districts" (which, by the way, it
never can be or ought to be), the House of Com-
mons " is now, on all great questions, all impor-
" tant subjects, a very faithful exponent of the
" general sentiments of the country." If this be
so, it would seem to follow, according to the logic
of the Right Hon. Baronet, that no change in
our representative system is required. For,
what would you have more ? A " very faithful"
representation of the general sentiments of the
country, and that on all great questions, on all
important subjects, is, with him, surely the
summum bonum of any representative system
whatsoever. Is it unfair to infer from the broad
assertion of the Right Hon. Baronet, that the
Ministry of which he was a member never
had any serious intention of proposing any change
in it?
This inference is not a little strengthened
by the tone in which the late CHANCELLOR
of the EXCHEQUER rates those who have
announced their intention to propose such a
change, for either their rashness or their dis-
honesty. On the hypothesis that " the circum-
" stances of the times demand a systematic plan
"of Parliamentary Reform "—an hypothesis
which he prudently refrains from either adopting
or repudiating, and, still more prudently, from
explaining—Sir GEORGE challenges the sup-
posed authors of such a plan to " state distinctly
" what is the exact evil they profess to remedy,
" and what are the defects in our present system
" which they intend to remove." According to
his own showing there is no evil to remedy,
there are no defects to remove. He himself is
not aware of any ; he evidently does not believe
that any can be specified.
The public in general, and Parliamentary
Reformers in particular, have reason, we think,
to feel grateful to Sir G. CoRNEWALL LEWIS
for the bonhomie and naivete with which he
has let them into the secret of the ideas enter-
tained in esoteric Whig councils on the subject of
Parliamentary Reform. Whether it might,
sooner or later—the later the better,—become
necessary, having regard to " the circumstances
of the times," to bring forward "a systematic plan
of Parliamentary Reform," is a point on which
Sir GEORGE CORNEWALL LEWIS has not troubled
himself to bestow much thought. And in this
we take him to be a " very faithful exponent " of
the mind of his late colleagues. If, from untoward
circumstances, a pressure for Parliamentary Reform
should arise, they left it to their betters to settle
when the time should have arrived for acknow-
ledging and acting upon the inconvenient
necessity. And to them they left it, likewise, to
discover or to invent ostensible reasons for the
proposed change. All they would have to do
would be to take from them the mot dordre, and
to speak and vote accordingly.
That to a mind imbued with these views—in-
different to Parliamentary Reform in the abstract,
but willing to consider it, if necessary, as a useful
party move—the prospect of seeing the
question handled by a Conservative Ministry
should prove singularly distasteful can astonish no
one. It must be extremely provoking. The Whig
hand is not so rich in court cards just now that it
can conveniently spare such a trump as
" Reform in Parliament ;" to see it pass
over into the enemy's hand may well
try the patience of the most phlegmatic of Whigs.
Add to this the annoyance of being called upon to
form a definite opinion on a subject which it was
hoped would long be suffered to remain in the
chiaroscuro of Whig promises and professions, and
the probable loss of the chance of making political
capital out of it for the Whigs, and the
most ill-natured of bystanders must feel that
great credit is due to Sir GEORGE CORXEWALL
Limns for the perfect good-humour with which
he imparted his feelings on the subject to the
agriculturists of Radnorshire. We are not
ashamed to confess that he has our sympathy ;
and that not the less because disappointment and
mortification appear to have wrought in him
their not unusual effect, a perception of moral
truth. " I trust," said the Right Hon. Baronet,
as he wound up with an apology for having
" contributed his small mite" to a sound con-
clusion respecting " the coming Reform Bill,"