The Sun.
London, England, 1865-09-20 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

TIM:S.—Mr. Bright has very wisely refused the
invitation of a meeting at Glasgo Z 7 to address it on
the subject of Reform. We say this, not from our
own point of view, nor yet in the spirit of political
opponents sneeringly attributing to another that dis-
cretion which is the better part of valour, but simply
with reference to the prospects of the question, and
the part that Mr. Bright has taken and is likely to
take in its consideration. There is force in the ar-
gument which he uses—that if he consents to speak
at one place he must speak at another, and that he
will thus, whether he will or not, be involved in the
turmoil and excitement of a great agitation. We
regret to learn that such turmoil and excitement
would be injurious to Mr. Bright in his present state
of health. Clearing the matter from personal con-
sideraions, there is no doubt that Mr. Bright judges
as wisely in this instance for the cause of Reform
as he does for his personal comfort and well-being
in declining to enter on such a course. There is a
period in which a cause gains by agitation ; there is
a period in which it can do nothing but lose by it.
When a truth has been demonstrated with some-
thing very nearly approaching to the cogency of
abstract science, and yet that truth is denied in
theory and repudiated in practice by great and
powerful politieal interests impervious to argument
and to reason, resting only on the strong conviction
that they have got a good thing and mean to keep
it, there seems to be no remedy but a steady and
well-sustained political agitation. Those who will
not hear reason invite an appeal to their fears, and
if there be any risk of a change more violent and
revolutionary than that which the agitators them-
selves contemplate, the responsibility rests, very rea-
sonably, not so much on those who make it as on
the privileged interests which have set themselves
in direct opposirion to the public good. The
most perverted mind, however, cannot assert that
this is at present the state of the question of
Reform. No private, local, or personal interest is
formally set up against the general interest of the
public. Reform is not resisted on the ground that
the vested interests of existing constituencies are
opposed to the interests of the public. Such an
argument would not in these days be listened to for
a moment, and to put it forward or rely upon it
would imply the certain ruin of the cause which it
was brought forward to support. There needs to
do that for Reform which was so effectually done for
Free Trade. The argument for Free Trade was
concluded before the agitation for Free Trade began.
It was the fact that all thinking men, whose minds
were free candidly to consider the arguments laid
before them, had come to a perfect unanimity on the
subject which gave an irresistible weight to the
cheers of crowded meetings and the denunciations
of popular orators. The first thing Mr. Bright and
his friends have to do before they commence an agi-
tation is to do for Reform what was done so effi-
ciently for Free Trade. Let them create a science
of politics, reasoning logically from acknowledged
principles, so as to form a fair counterpart of the
science of political economy ; or, if such a science
does already exist, let them refer us to the works in
which it is contained. When the educated part of
mankind have given a general assent to the doc-
trines of that science, and when it has been shown
that the Reform solicited comes fairly within its
principles, Mr. Bright and his friends will be in a
condition to commence agitation with very fair pro-
spects of success. We are justified in saying that
this is not at the present moment the situation of the
Reform question. It has, indeed, been assumed that
the rights of mankind on this subject are so clear
and incontestable that no one, unless he is actuated
by narrow selfishness and clam prejudice, can fail to
admit them, and this, indeed, has been the staple of
all the debates on Reform up to the present time.
Now, however, Reform has been challenged to show
its credentials, the very basis of the argument of its
supporters has been questioned, and, to say the
least of it, the force of argument is not at present
on the ultra-democratic side. The controversy is
by no means over, but Mr. Bright and his friends
have undoubtedly all their work to do. It is con-
tended that the qUestion is one not of abstract
right, but of expediency, and the Reformers are
challenged to show wherein that expediency con-
sists. When this work has been done it will be
time to talk of agitation ; till it has been done, any
attempt at agitation is obviously premature. While
agreeing, however, with Mr. Bright in the wisdom
of postponing any agitation on this subject, we
cannot equally acquiesce in the personal comments
with which he accompanies the statement of his
views. Mr. Bright expresses faith in the triumph
of Reform, but says it should be postponed till the
close of the official life .of Lord Palmerston, " the
only men in the Liberal party able and willing to
betray it. One sentence from Lord Palmerston in
1860 would have passed the Bill, but Lord Pal-
merston refused to utter it." Hardly one of these
statements is ti ue ; but, without disputing any one
of them, we may remark that the state of things
they purport to disclose is absolutely inconceivable.
If Mr. Bright has_ faith .in the future success of

Reform, as he understands the word, it must be
because he thinks there is in the classes already
possessing the franchise so strong a conviction in its
favour as to overpower all pessibilitST of opposition.
If the triumph of Reform is sure, it is because
Reform—always speaking in Mr. Bright's sense--
is, or at any rate is rapidly becoming, the faith of
the intelligence and property of England, by which
she is at present governed. If this be so, how does
it come to pass that England permits her councils
to be swayed with aktost unexampled authority by
a Minister willing to betray a question on which
she is so much in earnest ? Whence does Lord
Palmerston obtain the power to thwart the inclina-
tions of a nation by whose will alone he occupies
the foremost place in her councils? How comes it
that, after what Mr. Bright considers his treason in
1860, Lord Palmerston has been permitted to
retain office for five years, and has recently gained
an accession of support by the result of a General
Election ? If the Liberal party are so enamoured
of Reform, how can they tolerate such a leader ? If
they have chosen for themselves, and adhered to such
a leader, how can they, on Mr. Bright's own
showing, be zealous in the cause of Reform ?
But is Mr. Bright justified in accusing Lord
Palmerston of betraying the cause of Reform ?
We have no reason suppose that he is a
zealous partisan of any large organic change in
the Constitution, but Lord Palmerston acted
with perfect fairness when he introduced a Reform
Bill in accordance with the pledges under which he

took office. That bill was probably no more agree-
able to Lord Palmerston than to the rest of the

Liberal poi 4 ; had he heartily approved it hewould
have stood alonein the Houseof Commons. Nothing
is more certain than that the bill was defeatedrather

by the exertions of the Liberals than of the Conser-
vatives, that its defeat was received by the great
mass of the country with indifference, if not satis-
faction, and that no petitions were sent up and no
meetings were held in its favour. There is no
reason to believe that Lord Palmerston would have

thrown any obstacle in the way of his bill had it
been acceptable either to the House or to the coun-
try. Nor do we think that had he attempted to do
so it would have been in Lord Palmerston's power

to offer to the bill any efficient resistance. To assert
that he holds in his hands the means of defeating a

measure which the great mass of the people are re-
solved to pass is to over-estimate the power of any
Minister. He is powerful so long only as the coun-
try is willing to follow him, and the country will
only follow him so long as his will is the exponent
of its own, or so long as he is ready to bring his
sentiments into accordance with those of the coun-

try. When the mind of the country is once made
up it will not lack Ministers ready to give effect to
its decision ; till it is made up the peculiar opinions
of any individual Minister matter very little. Let
us look the thing in the face. The Reform Bill of
1860 did not pass, because Mr. Bright and his
friends had failed to persuade the country that it
would conduce to the public good. This is what
they have got to do. When they have done this it
will not be in the power either of Lord Palmerston
or of any other Minister to prevent the passing of
the bill ; till they have done this they are doomed
to perpetually renewed disappointment ; they will
be " betrayed" successively by every Minister who
happens to be at the head of affairs, and will look in
vain to the close of one official career after another.
The work of persuasion and conviction has yet to be
done ; till that is accomplished nothing is accom-
plished. That once over, everything else will be
smooth and easy.
HERALD.—The closet observers of mankind have
been quick to discover that infirmity of purpose is
not unfrequently associated in the same individual
with an intemperate demeanour which stimulates
force of character. The author of Philip Van
Artevelde sketches one of his historic personages in
three words, as " a weak, inconstant, violent man."
It is an unfortunate thing for any country when its
leading statesmen, those charged with the conduct
of its affairs, and with the maintenance of its posi-
tion and influence with the outer world, are men
who cannot be looked to for any vigorous action in
support of its state and dignity, for any consistency
in their attitude towards foreign nations, who are
only eminent in denunciation, in prophecy, in mere
word warfare. It is a doubly unfortunate thing
when that country happens to be great, proud, and
sensitive, when it has a position which it does not
wish to lower, a history which it would not sully.
Alexander kept a slave at his bedside to remind
him every morning that he was mortal. Our legis-lators keep Lord Russell in the Foreign Office to
remind us every now and then that even England
can be made ridiculous, else perchance we should
be puffed up with overweening vanity. We write
on the reasonable presumption that the document
which has oozed out in the lndependance Beige,
purporting to be a circular on the subject of the
Gastein Convention, is the genuine production of
Lord Russell. If not his, it is an admirable imita-
tion of his style. It is likely enough that it was
intended to be kept secret, that its publication is
most unwelcome to its author. It cuts away the
ground from under Lord Russell's feet ; it leaves
him naked and exposed to all the shafts of his
enemies. it is an admission from first to last of
the justice of the vote of censure proposed by the
Opposition in the British Parliament. It tells our
Ministers abroad that the Treaty of 1815 has
been broken ; that the Convention of 1852, which
settled the Danish succession has been ruthlessly
set at nought by two of the' Powers who were
parties to it, and who promised us, even in 1864,
that they would remain true to it ; that the wish of
the populations of Schleswig-Holstein has been dis-
regarded, and the vote of the Germanic Diet openly
defied ; that violence and conquest are the only
basis on which the dividing powers have established
their convention. It tells them that all this has
been done in despite of England, and to her deep
discontent. And then comes the sequel—an extra-
ordinary climax, indeed, to such a fierce harangue.
Will England even now go to war on behalf of the
despoiled King, whose bereaved Schleswigers are
approaching his throne with tears ? Will she not
at least encer a public protest in behalf of the out-
raged populations of the three Duchies ? Nothing
of the sort. These querulous lamentations, these
indignant utterances, are meant simply for the
sympathising ear of the British representative, to
whom only they are addressed. Some irritation
might be occasioned, some risk incurred, were Lord
Russell to tell Bismarck or Mensdorff all that he
feels on a topic which makes his sensitive heart
swell almost to bursting. " The present despatch,"
he writes " does not authorise you to address ob-
servations upon this subject to the Court to which
you are accredited." Lord Russell on a former oc-
casion was compared to a little boy who having
scrawled " No Popery" on the wall, ran away with-
out looking behind bim for fear of the police. This
despatch is another notable sample of that singular
humour of his—that peculiarity attributed by
Coffins to the most ignoble of the passions which
" Baek recoiled it knew not why,
E'en at the sound itself had made."

Such being the opinions of an English Foreign
Minister, and such the manner in which he is pre -
pared to assert them, who can say that that
sentence was too severe which, in consideration of
the conduct of the Government in the Danish
question, pronounced that "the just influence of
England" had been "lowered in the councils of
Europe ?" There was a time when we took the
lead in those councils, but that time is past. We
are reduced to whispering in the ante-chamber, to
muttering terrible things on the backstairs. While
condemning, as we do most unreservedly, the writ-
ing of despatches which, if Prussia were more acces-
sible to us or we to Prussia, would amount to an
actual declaration of war, we do not wish to com-
mit ourselves to so positive a verdict on the justice
or injustice of Lord Russell's criticisms on the tenor
of the convention between Prussia and Austria at
Gastein. It is one thing to think a man a cheat and
a rogue ; to tell him so, or to tell another so, is to
invite him to knock you down. There are some who
are privileged to give their opinions on political
events without fear for the consequences. A writer
lin a newspaper may condemn a foreign Government
in terms just as strong as he thinks it right to em-
ploy, it being well understood that no threat is im-
plied in what he writes ; that he stands on the
neutral ground of one who has nothing to gain
and 'nothing to lose, and occupies, in a manner, the
position of public arbitrator. The same may be said
of orators and statesmen who do not occupy a posi-
tion of responsibility. But an opinion from a
Minister of the Crown should not be lightly given.
It being well understood that it is not only in his
power to use stronger arguments, it is absolutely his
duty to do his best to carry out his views ; his deci-
sion on any foreign question, if adverse, amounts
to a threat. This being so, we hold it among the
most obvious and tritest of axioms that no threat
should be used, without some intention of following
up words by deeds. Lord Russell, in habitually
disregarding this precept, has brought his country
to such a pass, that this, which is still actually the
greatest and most powerful of nations, is spoken of
contemptuously in every other country in Europe.
In the eyes of most reasonable men the great
fault of the German Powers consisted in their
violent rending of 'Schleswig-Holstein from Den-
mark, in despite of their obligations to the
treaty of 1852. England would not interfere
to prevent this wrong, and, having suffered the
Duchies to lapse to Prussia and Austria, it is per-
haps the more becoming part to observe a dignified
silence as to the manner of their further disposal.
The German Diet, with which Lord Russell sympa-
thises, as its only power consists in its immense
capacity of talk, had little or ncthing to do with the
Conquest, and has no more right to concern, itself
in the matter than England or France, who looked

on with folded arms. It is doubtful whether it
would be a gain to us or to any one that a petty in-
pendent dukedom should be established in the
Baltic under an Augustenburg or an Oldenburg.
We have no cause to fear the development of
Prussia ; on many grounds we might even think it
desirable. The inhabitants of Schleswig-Holstein,
united to Prussia, would have something like a
future before them. We may presume that Count
Bismarck is steadily aiming at the annexation of
these countries. When Savoy and Nice were an-
nexed to France Lord Russell declared petulantly
that the French alliance was at an end. It took
years to heal the breach occasioned by these thought-
less words. The absorption of Savoy and Nice is
now accepted as a fact. Why does not Lord Rus-
sell admit now what seems to be inevitable, particu-
larly as he has no intention of interfering with the
progress of events ?