Omaha daily bee., 1898-06-01
CLADSTONE'S GREAT CAREER
Justin MCCARTHY Reviews Some Qualities Of
His Life and His Genius.
A CONSISTENT OPPONENT OF WAR
BoundIess Interest In and sympathy
with All that Concerned the We'll
fare OF the Human Rnce-Direc-
tor Of Great Movements.

tOE ot eFtht DNt"eht |
The New York Independent OF May 26
contains the following sketch Of the political
career Of william Ewart Gladstone from the
pen Of Justin Mccarthy, NJ. p:
Most OF us have. at some time or other.
and with a deepening and almost pathetic
interest, watched the sunset that Is some
times to be seen In a country with a warm
climate. The sun, apparently, has done its
course. and yet II fingers and fingers and
sends Its broad and beautiful light all over
the western sky; and even when II seems
10 have sunk altogether 1t still illumines
the horizon again and again, as II It were
striving against nature and unwilling to
leave the scene 1t had enriched and glad
dened so long. The thought Of such a sun
set must have come back to the minds Of
many among us who watched the closing
days of Mr.. Gladstone's great career. Now
we settled ourselves down to the melancholy
conviction that all was over, and yet again
and again the state of the sinking man
seemed to strengthen and to recover, and
our minds were filled with a new hope, and
we fancied that the whole career was not
over yet, and that some months, or even
years, of happy, restful q~uietude remained
= " hlbi WIN iiut = ~ ioN t'e eD
complished such great achievements. In
truth, 1t was hard for those who had followed
Gladstone's career through so many fruitful,
active years to believe that all was really
coming to an end. Few men now living can
remember the beginning of that career.
Most of us had grown accustomed to 1T and
regarded 1t as one of the great moving
forces of the age; and, even after the Parlia-
mentary work was abandoned forever, we
kept looking for some new expression by
pen or tongue of Mr.. Gladstone's unconquer-
able interest in the doings and the welfare
of the human race. 1t was hard. indeed, to
believe that that marvellous activity had
passed from the world at last. 1t is, of
course, too soon as yet to attempt to mark
out Mr.. Gladstone's distinct place in his
tory, but there are, at least, some qualities
of his life and his genius on which the
Judgment of history may with confidence be
anticipated. Gladstone has taken his place
among the greatest of English statesmen;
his name is written down in the list Of
England's greatest orators; as a Parliament
airy orator he ranks with Bolingbroke and
Pitt and Fox. For many years back no
European statesman. except Prince Bis
marck alone, occupied so much Of the atten-
ton of the world, and it must be remem-
DeTeu InaJ FRINGE DlSIldTCh WdS JIG pl lile
mover in events which compelled the at
tention of the world to a degree such as no
career of domestic reform can often hope to
rival. Peace, no doubt, hath her victories
no less renowned than war-that We are
all fond of saying, and it proves itself a
truth in the long run, but the victories of
war attract more of the worlds attention
at the time, and the war trumpet is often
the loudest trumpet of fame.
Mr.. GIndstone's Political Career.
Mr.. Gladstone's political career had little or
nothing to do with war. There was only one
great war during his time in which England
was ever concerned, and Gladstone was not
one of the promoters of that war, and Its
military honors were shared with other
powers, and the whole Crfmean struggles
ended in little or nothing after all. Not
once during the whole Of Gladstone's long
career was England put in anything like the
national peril which BISMARCK had to meet
in Prussia, and Cavour had to risk for Sar-
DINA. Therefore it is something to say that
Gladstone divided among statesmen of the
European continent the attention Of the
world for many years back with Bismarck.
and to say 1t Is but to say the truth,
Gladstone had to do with domestic legisla-
ton and domestic reforms, almost alto
gether; he never had to encounter even such
a. crisis as, that which Canning encountered
when he called in the new world to redress
the balance of the old. Yet, the attention of
Europe, Of America and of all civilized
states followed Mr., Gladstone's movements
with as close and intense an interest as
though he were a man likely at any mo-
ment to surprise the world, as Napoleon III.
did more than once, by a new and unex-
pected policy of war. Every one can UNDER
stand the keen anxiety with which the
movements of Lord Palmerston were at one
time followed by the populations of con-
tinental Europe. Palmerston was but the
foreign secretary or the prime minister of a
constitutional country and he could not, as
Louis Napoleon might, make war of his own
good will and pleasure. Yet he was always
disposed to an utterance that seemed war
like, and people never knew when Palmer
ston might not say something which would
sound like n provocation to war. Gladstone's
whole temperament turned him away from
war, except as an inevitable necessity. The
policy of brag and bluff and buster he al.
ways regarded as merely vulgar, or elst
absolutely criminal. Therefore, when HI
drew on himself the attention of foreign
populations, it was only because ever
strangers felt that the work he was doini
for his own people was such as to be wortl
the interest and the attention of all civilized
beings. Gladstone was often charged by hi
political opponents with having frequentl!
changed his opinion. Gladstone, In fact, wa
not only a statesman, but a man of genius
and he soon found that a priori convictions
are not the best means of dealing with tn
eyerchanging conditions of our social system
A Progressive Statesman.
The admirers of Gladstone are constantl
reminded by their opponents that Mr.. Glad
stone. in his early Parliamentary days, ad