The Sun.
London, England, 1864-11-28 00:00:00

the foremost statesman of the country. Where his

habits of thought and convictions are in issue,
been more remarkable for tenacity
no Minister hen
hange which has taken
of purpose. The grew
r modified Lord
place in popular opinion has nes':
.indepen.
e
Palmerston 's determination to uphold te
deuce of Turkey, nor have the remonstrances tn" his
own partisans induced him to withdraw a single
cruiser from the coast of Africa. From his first en-
trance into public life he has supported every pro-
posal for the maintenance and increase of the national
defences. Sir It. Peel also was pliable under the pres-
sure of circumstances, but in his own special depart-
ment he was firm and consistent. Nothing would have
induced him to produce a Budget without an esti-
mated surplus, or to sanction an issue of unsecured
paper currency. If Lord Palmerston has really
consented to become a servile follower of Mr.
Cobden he will have practically admitted that he
has clung too long to office. It would be better to
make way for Mr Gladstone, or even to give Mr
Disraeli the opportunity of abolishing the bloated
armaments which he has denounced in Opposition.
The present Government would only expose itself
to ridicule and contempt by becoming suddenly
convinced that the national armaments are main..
tained, at great cost, for no purpose of practical
utility. The House of Commons itself, having, in
the matter of public defences, come in like a lion,
may perhaps appreciate the absurdity of going out
like a lamb. The experience of twenty years has
proved to demonstration the necessity of maintain-
ing an efficient army and navy. The celebrated
estimates of 1835 were found to be inadequate to
the public wants in the middle of the most peace.
able period of modern times. They had been already
largely exceeded when the Egyptian or Syrian
dispute of 1840 found the country unprepared for
the imminent danger of a war with France ; and
two or three years later, during the angry corres-
pondence with M. Guizot on the business of Ota-
heite, there was scarcely an English ship in the
Channel, or a regiment which could have been sent
to the coast. The Continental revolutions of 1848,
and the re-establishment of absolute monarchy in
France in 1851, created panics in England which
were not the less discreditable because they were
well-founded. In 1854 the Crimean expedition ex-
posed defects of organisation which were but
partially excused by a peace of forty years. At the
end of the war there was a natural demand for a
large reduction of expenditure, and consequently,
at the beginning of 1858, the country was exposed
to painful agitation because the Emperor of the
French allowed some ill...bred officers in his army
to utter insolent menaces to England. The enor-
mous expenditure of the four or five subsequent
years forms the most conclusive argument
against hasty and extravagant reductions.
Periodical panics are as expensive as they are
unbecoming, and they can be effectually prevented
only by a consciousness of strength. There is probably
room for a diminution of expenditure in the navy,
if not in the army; but a Ministry would disgrace
itself by disbanding large numbers of trained sea•
men, at the risk of having hereafter to employ a
rabble of landsmen like the crews of Sir C. Napier's
Baltic fleet. The official caprice which lays up tur-
ret ships in ordinary, and embarks admirals in
wooden three-deckers, has no relation to any ques-
tion of national or financial policy. A government
can scarcely claim the confidence of the country on
the ground that it intends neither to make bonfires
of banksnotes nor to throw heaps of sovereigns into
the sea. It is apparently necessary that a certain
amount of maladministration should be perpetrated,
but even Secretaries of the Admiralty profess to
explain successive blunders. if the War Office and
the Admiralty at any future time become economical
and efficient, the reform will constitute an inestim•
able public service, but it will not be recommended
by the reflection that, because Schleswig has been
conquered, it is inconsistent to go to war on any
other provocation. It costs much less to exhibit
strength than to exert it. If Lord Aberdeen and
Mr Gladstone had spent two or three millions in
arming in 1863, twenty times the amount would
have been saved, because the Emperor Nicholas
would have discovered that the English Govern..
ment were in earnest. Two years ago, after the
Trent outrage, a wiser policy averted, at the mode•
rate expense of a million and a half, an American
war which would otherwise have almost cer-
tainly occurred. There is a certain risk in professed
unwillingness to go to war, but foreign Govern-
ments are aware that popular feeling may change,
and that it is unsafe to presume too far on volun-
tary patience. Obvious inability to fight has a more
direct tendency to invite encroachment. As the
English nation, not withstanding all its pacific ten-
dencies and professions, is not gifted with inexhaus.
tible tolerance, peace and goodwill are most effectu-
ally prompted by a policy which discourages insult
and injury. Tr%e most friendly feelings towards
France are perfectly consistent with the recollection
that, on the other side of the Channel, at least two
hundred thousand men are at all times ready for
immediate service abroad. In less than six
weeks the French army con be raised to
its full number of six hundred thousand men,
and every State on the Continent maintains a force
on nearly an equal scale. The United States of
America, lying beyond the reach of possible in-
vasion, dispensed till five years age with a standing
army—but since the commencement of the war, the
two sections of the former Republic have raised
three millions of men, and spent six or seven hun-
dred millions sterling-Iml the Northern Governs
- merit alone is now speeding more than half a
million a day. It is scarcely the moment for Lord
Palmerston to announce his conversion to a belief
in the universality and perpetuity of peace. 'There
is happily no special reason for apprehending any
European collision, nor are the Americans likely in
the ensuing year to attempt to include Canada in
their area of freedom—but the smallest proportional
army in the world can scarcely afford at present
to be largely reduced. If it should be thought de-
sirable, before the impending dissolution, to bribe
the constituencies by an exceptional remission of
taxes, it will be at least prudent to find some plau-
sible excuse for a total change of policy. Mr Cobden
and Mr Bright are entitled to the copyright of the
old Peace Society fallacies—and Mr Cobden him-
self has repeatedly insisted on, the necessity of
maintaining English supremacy at sea. There is
reason to hope that a considerable balance will he
legitimately available for the relief of taxpayers.
'rhe revenue hes been even more than usually elastic
during the present year, and the heavy charge for
shipbuilding which has lately been incurred ought
to have diminished the necessity for a large addi-
tional outlay. The Miscellaneous Estimates scarcely
admit of reduction. There is no clamour more un-
reasonable than the complaint that a sum not
amounting to a million is spent in modifying, to a
limited extent, the unfair burden which is laid on
the liberal and enlightened part of the community
by the necessity of providing, either at public or
private expense, for popular education. The charge
for the administration of justice, for jails, and for
many other branches of the public service, neces-
sarily increases with the growth of wealth and
population. With continued prosperity, the gra-
dual reduction of the charge on the National Debt
will probably do more than cover the simultaneous
increase of the Miscellaneous Estimates.

" THE SPECTATOR" ON MR COBDEN FOR PREMIER.—
Mr Cobden has been vary frank at Rochdale. Ho has ex-
plained to his constituents how his virtues have stood in
the way of his attaining to the Premiership ; and in spite of
this mortifying result he has had the courage not to regret
his virtues, but on the contrary, to prefer virtue to power.
The obstacle, the only obstacle, is that he will not flatter the
people of England, but tells them the truth about themselves,
and especially that he discourages their interest in foreign
politics, reminds them that foreign affairs aro not their‘own
affairs, and that they would do well not to meddle even by
speech lie matters from which they are bound to hold back
the hands of their Government. " If," ho says, " I would
only flatter you instead of talking these home truths, I be-
lieve I might be Prime Minister. If I would say that you
are the wisest, the best, and the happiest people in the whole
world, I have no doubt that I might be Prime Minister. I
have seen Primo Ministers made by this process. It is not
my custom to court momentary popularity, but I always get
it back afterwards with exorbitant and even luxurious inte-
rest, far more than I deserve." Well, if that be so, and Mr
Cobden has always received his deferred instalments of
popularity with a really satisfactory business interest for
the period over which the discount runs, ho has scarcely
explained perhaps how it is that at the seasons when the
the principal and interest came in ho was not made Prime
Minister. It is precisely statesmen who have given wise
advice when it was unwelcome who are most eagerly called
for by the popular voice when the wisdom of their advice
has become apparent. We feel a sincere admiration for Mr
Cobden's intellectual power and political achievements, but
amongst a few problems which wo are persuaded ho is
incompetent to solve, is a true estimate of the reason why
he has not become Prime Minister. Even many inferior
intellects—and there are very few intellects in England
which aro not Metier to Mr Cobden's in the force with
which they can grasp and the perspicuity with which they
can illus!rate practical principles within a moderate compass
in themselves, but ramifying into distant and complex
consequences—may really assist Mr Cobden in the solu-
tion of this question ; ono of certainly considerable interest
to himself, and not by any means without solid interest for
Englishmen in general, since it is clearly no unimportant
question why a man of integrity, of the highest practical
ability of a certain kind, who has rendered one first-rate
political service to his country, and quite recently supple-
mented it by another lees remarkable, but of no ordinary
merit, should be, as we think Mr Cobden is, quite out of the
list of even possible Prime Ministers. First, it is certainly
not because Mr Cobden is a manufacturer and a middle-class
man—though it is in great measure because Mr Cobden has
never allowed his mind to escape from the strong trammels
of manufacturer and middle-class prejudices. We do not
under-estimate the vast advantage of high birth and high