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Untitled Article
peerage , there would be no longer any refuge but in revolution . The next session must decide ; for the last leaves it a moot point . If the present Parliament shall follow the course of former Parliaments , and grow worse and worse from the first session till within a near prospect of dissolution , we shall have subsided far towards the ' point from which a great popular struggle raised us ,
and the necessity will be induced of a yet more formidable exertion to prevent a further retrocession into a state which can never again be endurable , or be endured , in this country . In that case , we must continue to slide backwards , until , with strength which has been growing under pressure , and by a mighty bound , the nation springs onward to an eminence where neither force nor fraud can arrest its future course .
But v it is premature yet , utterly to despair of the new Parliament ; not that it can ever be such an assembly as shall worthily represent Great Britain , but it may nevertheless redeem many of its errors , and make that provision for succeeding Parliaments which should have been its first work . It may yet repeal the Septennial Act ,, extend the Suffrage , and establish the Ballot . If only the last , it will be enough . The free suffrage of the present electors , with the means which must and will be
employed to inform their judgment , when the success of the candidate will rest upon their opinions and not their interests , will suffice for ensuring the continuance of reform . The disposal of these questions , in the last Sessions , is any thing but final . The discussion of them has only commenced . Their reception , when
next brought forward , will be a better test . It may be that many new members , placed in very unforeseen circumstances , were plunged in a species of bewilderment from which they are recovering . They were returned in order that they might support the ' Reform Ministry . ' Unbounded confidence in the authors of c the Bill' was the order of the day . The
terror of a resignation was continually before their eyes . They were in the ranks ; and though often puzzled by the uniform of the allies at their side , and at that of the enemy in their front , they yet fired away at the word-of command . In truth , their position did require something more than simple honesty , and what is called practical common sense , and the habit of supporting a party . It demanded great clearness of thought and
firmness of principle . Some were found equal to the emergency . But the impartial intellect and moral courage of such men as William Clay , of the Tower Hamlets , and JDaniel Gaskell , of Wakefield , are not common qualities . Honour to those who have them ; and a little patience with those who have them not , or only in an inferior degree . ' Try again , ' as Harriet Martineau Bays of the Poor House . The country can afford to wait , for if not helped , the ability is ever growing to help ourselves , and that yery peacefully and surely .
Untitled Article
4 Forwards or Backwards ?
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Jan. 2, 1834, page 4, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2629/page/4/
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