The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-01-12
LORD MAOA ULAY ON THE SEPARA-
TION or LORD AND LADY BYRON.

happy domestic occurrences wh1ch decided
the fate of Byron's life. Yet nothing is,
nothing ever was, positively known to
the public but this-that he qusrrelled
with his lady, and that she refused TO
live with him. There have been hints in
abundance, and shrugs and shakings of
the head and "Well, well, we know" and
1--WE could if we would" and 'If we list to
speak, and ''There be that might an they
list" But we are not aware that there is be-
fore the world, substantiated by credible, or
even by tangible evidence, single fact indi-
eating that Lord Byron was more to blame
than any other man who is on bad terms with
his wife.
The professional men whom Lady Byron
consulted were undoubtedly of opinion
that she ought not to live with her hus
band. But it is to be remembered that
they formed that opinion without hearing
both sides. We do not say, we do not
mean to insinuate, that Lady Byron was
in any respect to blame. We think that those
who condemn her on the evidence which is
now before the public, are as rash as those
who condemn her husband. We will not pro-
nounce any Judgment, we cannot, even in
our own minds, form any judgment on a
transaction which is so imperfectly known to
us. Itwould have been well if, at the time
of the separation, all those who knew as little
about the matter as we know about it now,
had shown forbearance, which, under such
circumstances, is but common justice.
We know no spectacle so ridiculous as the
British public in one of its periodical
fits of morality. In general, elopements,
pass with little notice. We read
the scandal, talk about it for a day, and forget
it. But once in six or seven years our virtue
becomes outrageous. We cannot suffer the
laws of religion and decency to be violated.
We must make stand against vice. We
must teach hbertines that the English people
appreciate the Importance of domestic ties.
Accordingly some unfortunate man, in no re-
spect more depraved than hundreds whose
offenses have been treated with lenity, is
singled out as an expiatory sacrifice. II
he has children, they are to be taken
from him. If he has a profession,
he is to be driven from it, He is cut
by the high orders, and hissed by the
lower He is in truth, a sort of whip
ping-boy, by whose vicarious agonies all
the other transgressors of the same class are,
it is supposed, sufficiently chastised. We re-
fleet very complacently on our own severity,
and compare with great pride the high stan
| dard of morals established in England with
| the Partisan laxity. At length our anger is
satiated. Our victim is ruined and heart
broken, and our virtue goes quietly to sleep
| for seven years more. 1t is clear that those
vices which destroy domestic happiness ought
to be as much as possible repressed 1t is
| equally clear that they cannot be repressed
| by penal Legislation 1t is therefore
right and desirable that public opinion
should be directed against them. But
it should be directed against them uni.
| formly, steadily, and temperately; not
by sudden fits and starts. There should be
one weight and one measure. Defamation is
| always an Objectionable mode of punishment
1t is the resource Of judges too indolent and
hasty to investigate facts and to discriminate
nicely between shades of guilt 1t is an
irrational practice, even when adopted by
military tribunals When adopted by the
tribunal of public opinion, it is infinitely
more irrational. 1t is good that cer-
tain portion of disgrace should constantly
attend on certain bad actions. But it is not
| good that the offenders should merely have
to stand the risks of lottery of infamy
that ninety-nine out of every hundred
/ should escape, and that the hundredth,
perhaps the most innocent of the
hundred, should pay for all. We remember
to have seen mob assembled in Lincolns
Inn to hoot gentleman against whom the
most oppressive proceeding known to the
English law was then in progress. He was
hooted because he had been an unfaithful
husband, as if some of the most popular men
of the age, Lord Nelson for example, had not
been unfaithful husbands We remember
! still stronger case. Will posterity believe
that, in an age in which men whose gallan-
tries were universally known, and had been
legally proved, filed some Of the highest
| offices in the State and In the army,
presided at the meetings of religious
and benevolent institutions, were the
delight of every society, and the
favorites of the multitude, a crowd of moral
i lists went to the theatre, in order to pelt a
f, poor actor for disturbing the conjugal felicity
| of an alderman What there was in the
| circumstances either of the offender or of the
| sufferer to Yindicate the zeal of the audience
| we could never conceive. 1t has never been
supposed that the situation of an actor is
peculiarly favorable to the rigid virtues, or
that an alderman enjoys any special immu-
nifty from injuries such as that which on this
occasion reused the anger of the public. But
such is the justice of mankind. In these
cases the punishment was excessive; but the
| offense was known and proved. The ease of Lord
! Byron was harder. True Jedwood Justice
was dealt out to him. First came the execu-
ton, then the investigation, and last of all,
! or rather not at all, the accusation. The
public, without knowing anything whatever
| about the transactions in his family, few into
| a violent passion with him, and proceeded to
invent stories which might justify its anger.
| Ten or twenty different accounts of the
separation, inconsistent with each other, with
| themselves, and with common sense, circu-
| lated at the same time. What evidence there
might be for any one Of these the virtuous
| people who repeated them neither knew nor
| cared. For in fact, these stories
were not the causes, but the effects
of the public indignation. They re-
| sembled those loathsome ISLANDERS which
| Lewis Goldsmith, and other abject hbellers