The Sun.
London, England, 1858-12-23 00:00:00

luments, we had the dignities, we were the rulers'
of the country, but the people were in favour of
war, and we had little to do with it. (Applause.)
It is a striking thing to observe the wonderful de-
lusions which nations live under in almost all ages
of the world, and the submissive spirit with which
they yield to them. I have often compared in my
mind the people of England with the people of
Egypt, and the Foreign-office of this country with
the temples of the Egyptians. lam told that those
who pass up and down the Nile—and we know
something of it from the beautiful artistic repre-
sentations that have been laid before us—that you
have, as you approach these temples, massive and
lofty columns, towering obelisks, and gigantic
statues, each one of which would appear almost to
have exhausted a quarry. You have those vast
chambers and gloomy passages, and some enormous
recess, some holy of holies, in which when you ar-
rive you find, perhaps, some crawling reptile,
almost loathsome to the unaccustomed eye, to
which a nation had knelt in adoration, and to
which it had offered the countless treasures of its
wealth. In our Foreign-office we have none of
these columns, no obelisks, none of these statues,
nor have we these vast chambers, but we have
mystery as profound, we have a deception as com-
plete, we have a superstition as contemptible; for in
the enormous recess we find some miserable in-
trigue, in the pretended defence of which your fleets
are traversing every ocean, your armies are marching
and perishing in every clime, your toil-worn artisans
and labourers are sweating at every pore, and the
blood of our countrymen's children is squandered
as though it was water, and had no price at all.
(Loud applause.) I hope that an improved repre-
sentation will change all this, that that great por-
tion of our public expenditure which is connected
with the doings, the secret and irresponsible doings,
of our Foreign-office, will be placed directly under
the firm control of a Parliament elected by the
good sense and virtue of the great body of the
people of the United Kingdom, and then, and not
till then, will your industry be secure from that
gigantic confiscation to which it has been subjected
during the last 150 years. (Applause.) There is
much in this country, notwithstanding all this, that
we might be proud of. We can write freely, we
can meet in public as we are met to-night, we can
speak freely all our political wishes and our politi-
cal grievances. The ruling class, with a wise
sagacity, have yielded this of late years without
further struggle. But we are so delighted with our
personal freedom—that we have no passports, that
we have practically no censorship of the press, that
we can move, speak, write, and act as freely as
men require to do in a free country—we are so de-
lighted with all these that we appear to be almost
altogether unconscious of the fact that our rulers
extract from the industry of the people, and have
dene it for half a century past, a far larger amount
than any Government on the face of the earth in
any age of the world, has ever extracted for pur-
poses of government, or for pretences of government,
from an equal number of people. Dr. Livingstone,
the African traveller, if I am not mistaken, is a na-
tive of this city, or, at least, of the neighbourhood
of this city, and you identify his reputation in some
degree with yours. (Cheers.) He gives in his most
charming work many anecdotes of the various crea-
tures, not human creatures, which he saw and heard
of during his troubles. His describes in one place I
recollect, a bird which he calls a dull, stupid bird,
a kind of pelican, I believe, which occupies itself
with its own affairs by a river side in catching the
unsuspecting fish which are gliding by. The peli-
can seizes a fish and puts it into a purse or pouch
which he has, instead of the ordinary accommoda-
tion which anglers in Scotland have, a fish basket.
Dr. Livingstone says there is anotherbird in that
country which is neither dull nor stupid, and it is
called a fish-hawk. He says that this fish-hawk
hovers over the fishing pelican, and by and by
comes down, not quickly but with a gentle poise of
wing, the pelican looks up, becomes a little alarmed,
opens its mouth. The hawk comes down, takes the
fish, and away he goes. (Laughter.) The pelican,
delighted that the hawk did not take himself away,
immediately sets to work with the greatest possible
diligence and endeavours to catch another fish.
Now, I ask whether you can apply this anecdote.
(Laughter and applause.) You are delighted that
your Government is a Government that allows you
to meet in vast assemblies like this—that it allows
every man, at least in times of ordinary tranquillity,
to say anything short of absolute treason, that
your leading article writers can denounce every mem-
ber of the Government, and still walk the streets in
perfect security; you are delighted that your ruling
class makes no objection to the possession of all
this freedom ; and, like that pelican, you are so
delighted that you are not absolutely eaten up,
that you allow them to extract from your pockets
every week of your lives, every year of your lives,
an incredible portion of your industry, and you go
to work again just as the pelican did—producing,
labouring, making wealth, and this great Govern-
ment sponge comes down again upon you. (Cheers.)
Now, what I want is that all the people should
examine this question thoroughly, for rely upon
it their present and future welfare as a nation
is greatly wound up with it. Many persons
suppose that if a working man himself pays
very little taxes—though we know that he
pays a great deal, if he consumes coffee, tea, tobacco,
spirits, or ale—it matters nothing to him what
taxes the Government collects and expends. But
there is no greater delusion than that. Everything
which the Government expends, suppose it were all
collected from the employers of the people, and
none from the operative class, would be by so much
a diminution of that great fund and capital out of
which employment is found, and out of which alone

wages can be paid. And any man, whether he pay
taxes or not, who is not content to be a mere liver
upon the taxes, has the strongest and most direct
interest in establishing that, kind of representation
of the people which shall give us a firm control
over the expenditure of the public money. (Ap-
plause.) I have spent some years of my life in
labouring for freed.oM of industry, and I hope to
live to see in this country a complete freedom of
the soil. I believe that to the landed proprietors,
to those great nobles who are the possessors of so
much of the soil, it would work a change to the
full as beneficent as that which has been produced
by the abolition of the corn laws. I think that
freedom to the land, and greater economy in the
expenditure of the public money, with the growing
intelligence which we all see around us, and which

has made a revolution in the people of this country
within the last twenty years, with the increase of
habits of temperance among the people—l say all
these things together fill me often with the hope
that whatsoever we may have in our annals in the
past of which we may boast, there is yet even a
brighter future for this country, and a more pros-
perous and happy time for its people. (Applause.)
I come among you not to stir up animosities be-
tween class and class. That is the charge of men
who wish that one class should permanently rule
the other classes of the country. I come among
you rather that we may all deliberate in a friendly
and open council on this great question, on which
our individual success and our natural prosperity
so much depend. You know it, at least if you do
not know, I can tell you, that I am no frequenter
of Courts • I have never been a seeker for office,
or for the emoluments of office ; I have no
craving for popularity, I think I have but little
of that which may be called a lust of fame ; I
am a citizen of a free country, as you also are
citizens. I love my country ; I love its freedom,
but I believe that that freedom can only be ex-
teoded on a fair and honest representation of the
people, and it is because I believe that I am here
to-night to ask you, in the power of your numbers
and of your intelligence, to step into the harvest
that is before you, and obtain possession of that
harvest.

Mr. Bright concluded amid a burst of tremen-
dous, cheering, having spoken an hour and fifty
minutes.

The following resolutions were then carried

" That this meeting of the citizens of Glasgow presents
to John Bright, Esq., M.P its warm congratulations on
his happy restoration to health, and most respectfully
assures him of its cordial and energetic support in promot-
ing the great cause of Parliamentary Reform which he so
ably advocates.
" That the committee promoting this meeting be re-
quested to adopt measures to advance its object, and that
they have power to add to their number, and to take steps
to secure extended co-operation."
The proceedings of the meeting terminated with
three loud cheers for Mr. Bright.

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