On this page
-
Text (1)
-
Untitled Article
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
-
-
Transcript
-
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Untitled Article
your inconsequential mind , and gentlemen cannot tolerate your consequential manner ; party leaders despise , even while they seek , the egotistical trimmer ; the people loathe the insolent aristocrat ; and the Court has its natural grudge towards one of the authors of the Reform Bill , notwithstanding- his forwardness as a
champion of Church and King . It is well that your lordship sees little attractiveness in public life , and thinks it likely that that little will be less . There is probably but one man whom every friend of his country would not rather see in office than yourself . We would take even you to save us from the deep debasement of being ruled by an ignorant , self-willed , haughty , military dictator ; but in any contingency short of that alternative , your return to power would call forth from thepopulation groans as
loud as were the cheers which hailed , in the House of Commons , the announcement of your secession from the Grey and Althorp Administration . There is riot much danger ; but meanwhile we have not sufficient faith in your avowal of an indifference , which does not exactly accord with your position and movements , to concede your moral claim , barring the intellectual , to be a Sir Oracle on the subject either of Reform or Conservative associations .
Your lordship is probably correct in anticipating that , should the present tendency to form societies lead to the organization of the whole country in e two rival sets of political associations , engaged in a deadly struggle with each other for the maintenance of extreme principles , ' you would yourself ' be part of the lumber thrown overboard in the first process of clearing the deck for the general action . ' Each would dread the danger of your support
quite as much as that of your hostility . You have been the * evil genius' of a Whig administration ; in your present capacity of counsellor to Conservative clubs , your advice is that of an Achitophel . You warn the Tories against the only chance which remains to them for the recovery of their position . I trust they have lost it for ever . They certainly have , should they follow
your guidance . By their own determination they will at least die game ; your letter recommends them to die dunghill . They will spurn the advice ; and the Reformers must prepare for them that fatal and final reaction with which you threaten them , and which you deprecate far more than this last united and desperate onset of the Conservatives .
Toryism lived and fattened upon the corruption of the House of Commons . The legislature was the machine for screwing out the ' heart ' s blood of the nation , that it mi ^ ht nourish a fac tion . The Reform Act , ( thanks to your lordship for all your share of its useful portions ) stopped this process . How is it to be revived ? Direct action upon Parliament is at an end . The sanctuary of borough property is desecrated . The electors must be subjected to corruption and intimidation . A seven years ' Parliament would repay to the party the purchase-money of a
Untitled Article
440 A Letter to Lord Stanley
-
-
Citation
-
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), July 1, 1835, page 440, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2647/page/4/
-