The Press.
London, England, 1858-10-16 00:00:00

THE PRESS, OCTOBER 16, 1858.

those materials there fell the fatal spark,
which lighted up the terrific conflagration.
13y an extraordinary coincidence, the " greased
cartridges"
offered the opportunity for corn-
bluing in the same resistance the hostile races
of Mussulnian and llindoo. Swine's fat was
alike an abomination to the followers of MO-
HAMMED and the votaries of BRAMAII ; the one
had been alienated by our absorption of the
territories of their Nabobs, the other by our
denial of the rights of adoption to their ltajahs
and the dreaded confiscation in Oudc. Would
that we could blot out from memory the horrors
that succeeded ! But let us not be so scared by
those horrors as to draw from them unwarrant-
able conclusions. Let us not be frightened out of our
Christianity into heathen indifference, by placing
on these atrocities a mistaken interpretation. No,
it was not our Christian zeal but our un-Christian
acts which brought down this calamity upon us.
had the British Government adhered to the
principles of the Gospel, had it even obeyed the
eternal laws of justice, the sons and daughters of
England would have escaped this awful visitation.
If we read that visitation aright, we shall,
whilst doing our utmost to give confidence to
the natives of India that no official pressure
shall be put upon them to convert them from
their Faith to ours, not hesitate fearlessly to pro-
claim that we believe our Faith, not their Faith,
to be the best, because it is the true one. But it
will be worse than useless to make any such
proclamation if we are not prepared faithfully to
adhere to the precepts of that Faith which we
thus ought fearlessly and openly to profess. It
is worse than folly to avow ourselves Christians,
and to act as Heathens. We must seek to make
converts to our Faith by showing its superiority
by its working. Professions of neutrality will
avail nothing—no, nor even deeds of neutrality;
both will be alike suspected ; for an llindoo, to
whom his religion is dear, is utterly unable to
comprehend the motive which can induce a
Christian to be neutral with regard to his.
What ! neutral in a matter involving the most
important interests in this life, and everlasting
destiny in the next ! We may do what we please,
we may say what we will, to prove our " religious
neutrality; " but, so far from the Government
thereby gaining the confidence of the natives, it will
only serve to excite their suspicion and distrust.
The past avowal of " religious neutrality," we
affirm, was one of the causes of the mutiny.
It excited distrust—it was quite incompre-
hensible—it was not even desired ; all that was
wished for was security for their own Faith against
official powers and against official wiles. Gene-
rally speaking, neither the ministers of the Church
of England nor the missionaries were distrusted.

We may therefore rest assured that in order to
preserve our Indian dominions, it is quite
unnecessary for this nation to ignore its Chris-
tianity. On the contrary, we believe that the
best means of preserving our sway is to avow our
Christian Faith fearlessly before the natives ; but,
then, woe betide us if we go on, as hitherto, pro-
fessing that we are Christians but acting as if we
were ileathens.

We may safely avow our Faith, if we will only
act up to its precepts.

In the good olden times of Barons, broadcloth,
and beef, there was a custom which was of real
utility under the form of apparent absurdity.
The custom we allude to was that of every great
man keeping a Fool, whose privilege it was, on
all occasions, to tell him the truth without the
fear of taken offence. There would be no small
advantage, who can doubt, in having this sort of
cunt privilegio personage in many a house, and
by many a great man's side, now. But customs,
and habits, and modes of life have strangely
altered. Now, save in ruins, we seldom see
the castellated baronial residence where, in its
huge hall, hung round with axe and halberd, at
yule-time, some two or three hundred retainers,
clad in broadcloth, brown or grey, sat down,
with their Lord at the head of them, to a roasted
ox, and ended the day in feast and song, Nor
do we ever meet now, in any great man's house,
' with the individual who used to supply
amusement in these scenes—the individual
kept to play the part of Fool. Surely it has
not yet become less true than it was in the
days of King Lear, that recognised Fools
cannot arrogate this title exclusively to them-
selves ! When Kent made the remark to
Lear, " This is not altogether fool, my
Lord," it will be remembered the Fool
answered :—" No, faith, lords and great men will
" not let me ; if I had a monopoly out they
" would have part on't : and ladies, too, they will
" not let me have all fool to myself; they'll be
" snatching." Truth, when witty, is the wittiest
of all things, of which this is an instance, as also
when the Fool told King Lear, " Thou hast
" pared thy wit o' both sides, and left nothing
"in the middle." How aptly might this be
applied to many a so-called " prudent man "
now, who shuts himself up in his own opinion,
and never listens to what others say of him, or
think ! In fine, the conclusion we have long
come to ourselves, is, that they are the real fools
who never listen to fools ; for none but a thorough
fool is always right, and his right is usually the
most ridiculous wrong.
What are the habits of men now ? What
is their mode of life ? " Every Englishman,"
NOVALIB once remarked, "is an island." Too
many men live a purely subjective life—segregated
in their inmost hearts altogether from their kind.
Hence it often happens that they make ruinous
mistakes for the want of some one at their elbow
rash enough to tell them the real truth. What
a useful fellow a licensed Fool would be in such
cases !

Excellent for statesmen would be the
harmless aid of this most useful instructor of the
olden times. Bishops require their playful help
even more than Ministers of State. For, as
SYDNEY SMITH says, " Bishops live in high
" places, with high people, or with little people,
" who depend upon them. They hear only one
" sort of conversation, and avoid bold reckless
" men"—(he might have added, very clever
men too)—" as a lady veils herself from rough
" breezes." Living under such conditions, a
new-made Evangelical bishop, of the straitest
sect, may appoint as his examining chaplain,
without at all being aware of it, an out-and-out
Puseyite, because he has no one about him who
dares tell him that he is being misled ; or he may
appoint to a living of his own a man, whom he
thinks to be sound, who, as soon as he gets secure
possession of his living, will proclaim himself a
Broad Churchman of the most thoroughly Ger-
manized type. These are instances in which the
advantage of a man to be called " the Bishop's
Fool" is most obvious. Most persons, in-
deed, in high office, are far more anxious to
have right on their side, than to be on the side
of right; and in order to have the satisfaction of
feeling that they have right on their side, they
take very good care that no one shall show them
to be in the wrong. Oh, that all men knew the
usefulness of a Fool I
For the reasons above assigned, and others
might be added, we are strongly in favour of
reviving the old practice of every great man's
keeping his own Fool. To sundry other cha-
racters they would be most useful : to many an
M.P., for instance, who imagines himself an
eloquent orator, just to hint to him that men
cannot live upon smoke • to many a new-made
knight, just to let him imow by sonic playful
innuendo that his sword should not flesh its
maiden edge among ladies in the drawing-room;
to many a Mr. Justice Shallow upon the bench,

995

just to instruct him that his look of wisdom had
not in it the weight of law ; to many a handsome
lady even, just to acquaint her with the fact that
" there was never yet fair woman, but she made
mouths in a glass." If it were desired, indeed,
that wisdom should enter into it, and folly be
driven out of it, there would be a Fool kept in
every house.

" Fools grow without watering," the proverb
says. It is commonly assumed, indeed, that fools
are as plentiful as blackberries ; but he must be
a fool who thinks so ; for the term " fool " has
become the synonym for an honest man. The
fact is that fools of the kind we have in view
are most scarce, because now-a-days they never
get fed. Even if an advertisement for one were
inserted in the Times, offering high wages, we
doubt if the right sort of one could be found. In
the olden time they appear to have been bred,
fed, and fattened as we fatten bullocks. They
had the honour of sitting at their master's table,
or at all events came in to the dessert to help by
merry quip, the jest and playful allusions, the
process of digestion. En passant, they would be
of no despicable utility in this respect. They
would help to dissipate the ill humours that arise
from inaction of the liver. Many a wrong judg-
ment is owing to a dormant liver. Laughter is
the best friend to sense. Our own dull sense, in
short, is often not half so good, because not half
so much to the purpose, as a fool's nonsense.

Let every Minister of State, then, let every
Bishop, let every man in any dignity or high
position, have his own Fool. Let his office be
twofold,—first, to go about and hear what other
men say of his master—what mistakes he is
accused of making—what mistakes he is in
danger of making—what course it will be wisest,
safest, best for him to adopt ; secondly, to assist
the very necessary process of digestion at dinner,
that he may have an even temper, physical
energy, and a clear judgment.

It has become too much the fashion with a
certain class of public men " to feel by rule and
think by precedeflt"; and so long as they can
support what they do by some wise saw, they are
well satisfied. But this is not wisdom, never-
theless, though it is the course adopted by
reputed wise men. For these men a Fool would
be invaluable. There is often more wisdom
in a fool's finger than in such men's head.
To all kinds of begging in this independent
age men are averse except begging the ques-
tion. They will beg pardon fast enough,
except when there is any serious ground for
doing so, and then they will only beg to tell you
that you are an impertinent fellow. Those who
are always gazing at their own shadows must
walk in the shadows of one fool at least. Ad-
vice is a very excellent thing were not people so
modest sow-a-days that none will presume to
give it, and so vain that, if given, none will follow
it, or they would not question for one moment
the utility of Fools.

THE FOREIGN AFFAIRS COMMITTEES
IN THE NORTH OF ENGLAND.
THERE are few of our readers but must, at inter-
vals, have observed in the newspapers corre-
spondences between the bodies which have
assumed to themselves the above designation, and
the different members of the past and present
Administration. But we rather think that,
nevertheless, the majority of our readers have no
distinct idea of the history of these Committees,
or of their organization, their composition, and
their objects. Notwithstanding, they are by no
means unworthy of attention, for the extent of
their organization forms a rather remarkable fea-
ture in our present social position. When we
tell our readers that in some seventy of the prin-
cipal manufacturing towns in this country these
Committees meet weekly, to consider the state of

our foreign relations—that many of them have
obtained an extensive knowledge of all the
proceedings of our Foreign-office for the last fifty
years, and that they discuss the merits of those
proceedings with a judgment and ability which
would do credit to many a member of the Legis-

996

lature—and further (what is far the most re-
markable circumstance connected with them),
that they are composed only of working men,
obtaining their livelihood by the sweat of their
brow, we think it cannot be denied that it is
worth the while of the public to know something
more about them than is generally known at pre-
sent.

These Committees, then, mainly owe their
existence to the untiring energy and indomitable
perseverance of one single individual, who, if he
had been endowed with a sound judgment and a
power of accurately discerning facts, would, with
such instruments as these at his disposal, have long
ago succeeded in making a deep impression on the
public mind. Unfortunately, however, so much
of eccentricity has pervaded his views, so hastily
has he brought forward statements which would
not bear scrutiny, that he has given to his oppo-
nents the advantage of being able to discredit
those of his principles and his views which are,
in fact, wise and profound, so that truth
has come to be disregarded, because it has been
unfortunately largely mingled with error. Still,
whatever may be his faults, he has contrived to
imbt.e his followers with as right and patriotic
sentiments as ever animated the greatest of our
English statesmen.

Now, we believe that there are at present very
few individuals, who have taken the trouble really
to master the true nature of our dealings, for the
last twenty-eight years, with foreign nations,
whether in Europe or in Asia, but have arrived at
this conclusion—viz.,that most of the wars in which,
since 1830, England has been involved, have been
impolitic and unnecessary, and, what is far worse,
not to be justified in their origin, when tested by
the principles of international law. Where is
the honest man who, having carefully looked
into the alleged causes, will venture to defend
the justice of the Affghan, the Burmese, and the
Chinese wars ? Where is the wise man who,
after having weighed their consequences, will
venture to affirm that they were beneficial and
politic ? Unhappily, the vast majority of the
people of this country have not troubled them-
selves with these matters. They have borne in
ignorant patience the increased taxation which
they have caused, and they have been content
to take for granted that England is as just as she
is glorious, and as unselfish as she is great. They
have assumed without inquiry that such a nation
would never engage in any wars which dire
necessity bad not forced upon her. They have
formed the most false but most magnificent
notions of her disinterested conduct, and have
been able to listen with the utmost complacency
to the declamation of her statesmen against the
grasping aggressions of Russia, without a suspi-
cion crossing their minds that the indignant coin-
mentaries which were directed against the Czar
were even more applicable to her own aggres-
sions.

Now, the up-hill and ungracious task which
these Committees have set themselves has been
to arouse their countrymen to a just sense of these
our national delinquencies, to wake them from
the day-dream of innocence in which they have
too long indulged, and to get them to view the
national policy of this country as it is too surely
viewed by the more impartial optics of neigh-
bouring nations. Their one single cry is—" Let
us procure the re-establishment of law throughout
the world ; let us only behold our country once
more acting as the asserter, and not the violator,
of international law, and we shall be content.
We care comparatively little for Reform, for the
Ballot, for Free Trade, or for any other of the
popular cries which politicians have raised ; but
we do care for the honour and the good faith of
our country, and we can live happy if we can but
see it restored."

Such is the language that for some three or
four years has been heard to issue from the lips
of working men—men with rough hands, and
with rude address—men who once clamoured for
the Charter and the Ballot, but whose language
now reaches the pitch of patriotic eloquence,
and whose honesty of sentiment is worthy of
the noblest legislator that ever addressed the
Parliament of legislator

It may be true that these Committees appear
sometimes to be acting in a sphere for which they
are not fitted ; but it is not to be wondered at
that men in their position of life should some-
times blunder, and should venture on inquiries