The Sun.
London, England, 1866-01-08 00:00:00

NEWSPAPER

department of life almost as grave,
of moral perplexity, as their religio.
Lord Palmerston was a man of the
raeli thought the world an oyster, the
being how to open it ; Sir Robert P
the world with a certain dramatic _
that was not earnestness; and Lord Russell is a Vhig
nobleman, with convictions certainly, but with no
conviction so strong as the necessity of breaking all
opposition to his own Government. Mr. Gladstone
is the first leader of the House of Commons, who
will look at the obstacles of his Government from a
quite different.point of view than that of mere diffi-
culties to be surmounted. Take the case of Mr.
Bright himself, for instance, who is quite likely to
be one of Mr. Gladstone's difficulties. Lord Palmer-
ston probably regarded Mr. Bright as a providential
instrument intended to render ultra-Radical views
obnoxious to the country, and took no more note of
what he said than just to pick out the points on
which a judicious word or two in due season would
be calculated to aid this beneficent intention of
Providence. But Mr. Gladstone will certainly not
be able to take this calm, external view of powerful
assailants. If Mr. Bright is unpleasant, he will
fret, he will think of ways of convincing his reason,
of arguments likely to persuade him that he is
wrong; he will look at his speeches with a conten-
tious controversial zeal ; lie will measure the weight
of his thought as thought, instead of merely mea-
suring its importance as a political phenomenon.
Even if Lord Palmerston were annoyed by a
vigorous Radical onslaught, he only thought of
his opponent as Mr. Kinglake says that the
Turks think of an Englishman or an Englishman
of a snowstorm, namely, as " a mysterious unac-
countable, uncomfortable work of God which may
have been sent for some good purpose to be re-
vealed hereafter." But that is the point of view of
a statesman who is mainly a man of the world—
who looks not at the intrinsic value of a thought,
but at its political operation—at its influence on the
state of parties, at the move' which will best coun-
teract it as a matter of policy. But Mr. Gladstone
is not mainly a man of the world. He is a man who
broods over his plans and the ideas of his opponents
with a strong desire to arrive at the truth. Diffi-
culties that were mere stumbling-blocks to be
avoided to the old school of statesmen will be thorns
in the flesh to be prayed against, and patiently
used as political crosses, by Mr. Gladstone. Now
this more modern and higher, if sometimes too sen-
sitive, way of looking at political life will un-
doubtedly be a real difficulty to Mr. Gladstone as
leader of the House of Commons. The manage-
ment of the House must always be more or less a
matter of real eavoir-faire. In the House of
Commons it is scarcely true that the forces to be
dealt with are convictions. At a stage further back
no doubt it is so, and one great advantage that
Mr. Gladstone will have over former leaders is this
—that he may exercise if he will a real influence
on the convictions of the country, and even raise
the standard of its political ethics. But, par-
ties once fairly organised in the House of Com-
mons, the majority of members are more or less
pledged, and scarcely at liberty, even if they
were able, to alter their minds, though they may
be induced by politic considerations to alter their
votes. The notion of seriously altering the convic-
tions of members of Parliament, say on Reform, by
argument, however powerful, is like the notion that
you could mould a bust in the marble because you
can mould it in the clay. To address argument to
the member for Birmingham, for instance, on that
subject, in the same sense in which you would ad-
dress argument to minds still confessedly in search
of truth, is a waste of moral and intellectual force.
It might tell powerfully upbn the country, but it
would be sure not to answer the purpose for which
Mr. Gladstone would be in danger of using it,—the
clearing of a Parliamentary obstruction out of his
path. As a set-off against the advantage of having
a Minister at the head of the House of Commons to
whom political conviction means something very
real, something implying a long intellectual and
moral process for every conviction,—we have un-
doubtedly the disadvantage that he will feel intel-
lectual and moral objections to his policy far too
keenly, and desire too much to parry them, not for
the reason for which a swordsman desires to parry a
dangerous blow—because it is dangerous, but for
the reason for which an argumentative man desires
to answer even the feeblest objections,—from a sort
of intellectual resentment of their vexatious imperti-
nence, and from a fascinating sense of being
able to annihilate them completely. Then, again,
Mr. Gladstone will have another great difficulty
as leader of the House of Commons. He will not
only, we fear, look at his duties too much as per-
suasive duties, too little as managing duties, but his
political position will be perplexing and sometimes
unintelligible to his followers. Ile will care too
much to understand them, often when there is very
little to be understood ; they will care too little to
understand him, even when there is much to be un-
derstood, and they will be the harder to manage in
consequence. A leader loses much in power whose
followers cannot pretend to follow him into half his
positions. In Mr. Gladstone they will have such a
leader. Much of the course which he shaped in the
old country—on ecclesiastical questions, for instance
—and which lie promises to shape also in the " coun-
try new," is utterly unintelligible to Liberals in a
great Liberal leader. His mind is indeed made up
of a complex system of intellectual cells communi-
cating with each other by passages intelligible to
himself but not to the mass of mankind. Now the
habit of following, a habit useful to a party, must
be at least seriously weakened when, on a certain
class of subjects, the Liberals have to admit to
themselves that they must "make allowances" for
their leader, and leave him to think and vote apart
from them. None of the mere phalanx-men had
any difficulty in following Lord Palmerston or Lord
Russell. The Conservative Liberal creed of the
one, the Whig creed of the other, was as well known,
as visible an external reality, as easy to rally to,
as the standard in an army. But Mr. Gladstone's
creed to be understood at all must be studied in its
motives. Why is he, for instance, almost one of
the Manchester school on questions of military ex-
penditure, finance, , and peace,—nearly as Liberal
as they are on the extension of the franchise,—and
yet a Southerner in feeling on the American ques-
tion ? Why has he the keenest possible sympathy
with the miserable captives of Naples, and little or
none with the miserable captives of Louisiana or
Mississippi? Why does he trust popular feeling
and free inquiry so implicitly in secular matters
and distrust it in religious,—devote all his power as
a statesman to promote the spiritual principle of a
free press, and yet to sustain the authoritative and
dogmatic principle of a traditional Church ? These
are questions which can of course be answered by
any one who has studied the interior of Mr. Glad-
stone's faith. But few politicians do study interiors
at all. The popular impression is that his politics
are "not of at
hpaite c,e,,aanpdlayinounidaonn'etank,ntofwolwl
ohwe r emtro.
with any consistency, but must set up
thGhalivankidesnthoginmior himself." And this, we take it, will
be one—by no means wholly unfortunate—but
rather disorganising effect of the leadership of this
brilliant man. The multiplicity of seams in his
views will deter men more than ever from pinning
their faith on his. You might be a Palmerstonian
or a Whig, but only Gladstone can be a Glad-
stonian.

USIIESS IN THE DIVORCE COURT.—In addition
to the legal arrears already mentioned, a list of cases for
the approaching term in the Divorce Court has just been
issued. It bears an "improving" appearance." There are
only 81 cases set down for hearing, besides 26 standing
over by consent of the parties.
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