New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1865-08-04
THE LIBERAL MOVEMENT IN EN-.
GLAND-THE LESSON OF MIR.
CLADSTONE,s DEFEAT.

men of great genius and great eccentricity
This Englishmen has shown many Of thu
contrasts of public opinion. BY education
Tory and by instinct a Liberal, bis reason
has been gradually overcoming the prejudice
of early teachings. A friend of freedom il
Italy-he was the friend of Slavery in America
simply because the struggles for each had
certain degree of romance, attractive to th'
impending student of Homer and Sophocles
A friend of goneEal suffrage, he is o warm adj
herent of tho Church establishment, which repre-
sents, We are sorry to think, the worst abuse
of England. A conscientious, sensitive, NOR
bid man, vainy struggling to be right without
sacrificing the expedient, given to generous i'm
pulses in the House of Commons, and elaborate
reservations and explanations in the closet,
hardworking Iegslator-one of England's most
careful scholars, and her most accomplished
orator-Mr. Gladstone has succeeded in com.
handing the universal respect Of men without
attracting any Of tho romantic fondness that
we have seen manifested toward Mr.. O'Connell,
Sir Robert Ped and Lord Palmerston. OF all
Englishmen. he was the one most proper to rep
resent the University of Oxford. Those very
traits of hestaiing md reluctant Toryism which
seem to us like stains upon his character would
be virtues in tie eyes Of the University. His
genius gave him the right to stand up in the
Commons and speak for her scholarship. lie
had been an eloquent and patient champion oil
all those principles which Oxford seems called
upon to defend against the combined sentiment
of liberal Europe. We remember his first ap-
pearance in literature as tho "stern and I'M
bending" advocate of all the rights of the
Church, and tl;at Church has never sought his
advocacy III vain. 1t was proper that Ok
ford should remember his devotion to the An
glican establishment, as well as his scholarship,
and send him rs her representative to the House
Of Commons.
The University of Oxford has defeated Mr..
Gladstone. TIE struggle has been sharp, the
contest earnest the defeat decisive. The eyes
of England wele fixed upon the struggle and
in the minds q every EngliShman the issue
there decided was made up. Because the
scholar and Iurchman saw proper TO think
that English hnhood should represent English
suffrage, OH ID declares that he shall no longer
represent her Yin Parliament; and although he
retracted and modified the declaration so as TO
deprive it Of Is pth, still, the mere fact that
such o thought had crcpt into his heart and
+ =. l.. liz. nh 10
debar him fron Oxford's scat in the Commons.
Any other sin might have been committed with
impunity. H.. might have moved the renewal
of all Catholic tests and penalties-he might
Laws, or the reimbursement Of the rotten bor-
oughs, and Oxford would have honored him
with election after election and crowned him
in her University halls. For the great Univer-
sity is champion ofsloth and tyranny and GUS
tom-of nepoi!sm and bigotry and lazy,
proud priesthood. Every plan of reform that
England has adopted found Oxford bitter
enemy. In those halls, thought was compressed
into narrow channels. Beyond a certain mark,
the tide could not rise. With certain rcstric-
tons and reservations, the Oxford man might
think; but those restrictions and reservations
were like the walls and arches Of the sewer that
converted the gushing brook into sluggish,
masmatic stream. The great law of Oxford is
that there shall be no change. These college
men have grown rich and strong by the law OF
growth and aggregation. They have absorbed
lands aud franchises and privileges like so
much nutriment, and grown luSty upon the
labor OF q people. An establishment which
is great, by reason Of the antiquity that
surrounds it, that represents the learning and
religion of a class, that belongs TO the same
order of Adjournment as dukedoms and baronies,
and is maintained at the expense Of the nation,
will dread change as it would dread death. Its
life is death. Reform is to be feared; for when its
spirit is abroad the hour may come swiftly which
would introduce it into the snuggeIes and rock
cries Of the old halls. These men dread the
day when they will be compelled to 60 abroad
and work for living, leaving fcllowships and
curacies and sinecures behind. They dread the
air of heaven in their musty, moldy tombs.
Their thought is sitting, heavy, enervating;
and so'they cling to Toryism and decay and
bigotry.
Mr.. Gladstone represented all that is good in
Oxford, without doing particular violence to
what is bad. But all that is good has not saved
him from defeat. Oxford hastens to place her
self right in her own eyes. She rejoices in being
permitted to declare that none shall speak for
her but the disciples of decay; that, when her