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    1152 THE LEADER. [No. 297, Saturday,

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    LORD P.AJUMERSTON AND THE MAP OF EUROPE....

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    VIRTUE'S MISPRISIO1F OF VICE. Do not let...

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    Has Afforded Matter For Contemplation Be...

    « ^ bour and as to the particular condition of the Silk Trade , that we are not without hope of being able to extract , from a careful and dispassionate investigation , something that may be permanently useful .

    1152 The Leader. [No. 297, Saturday,

    1152 THE LEADER . [ No . 297 , Saturday ,

    Lord P.Ajumerston And The Map Of Europe....

    LORD P . AJUMERSTON AND THE MAP OF EUROPE . JSTo one , we hope , ¦ will give Lord Palmerston the credit of the idea attributed to him by certain Kadical and Conservative prints . The former think as they hope—the latter , without hoping or thinking anything , only wish to damage . But the error is an old one—and should , by this time , have been exploded . It is this : —that Lord Palmerston designs to carry on the conflict , not only until Russia is disarmed , but until the political system of Europe has been destroyed , lord Palsierston is doubtless willing , as long

    as the war is popular , to beat the war-drum for the sake of being popular himself . He may also have little schemes of his own affecting some of the territorial dispositions of the Continent ; but it is pure infatuation on the part of Liberals , and pure malevolence on the part of Tories , to assign to him any plan for extinguishing Russia , and re-arranging Europe . A plain proof that he is misunderstood consists in the fact , that , there being two sets of politicians interested in vilifying him ; one describes him as the fanatical enemy , the other as the purchased friend of Russia .

    We believe him to be neither . We believe Mm to be as incapable of baseness , in the ordinary sense of the word , as of fanaticism . He would laugh at a bribe as he would laugh at a . heroic principle . Having become popular , less by his liberality than by the spirit and dash of his manner , he is expert enough to remain a diplomatist in the attitude of a patriot .

    The liberties of Europe will not be aided by Lord Palmerston , unless aeci dentally . From liis first entrance into the Foreign Office , he lias never rendered one real service to the Liberal cause . He has meddled abundantly ; he has made some dupes and some victims . Perhaps lie has , at times , interfered with enthusiasm ; if so , his impulses are irregular , and always in the end subordinated to the dominant law of

    diplomacy . Neither against Russia nor against Austria has he exerted that systematic resistance ascribed to him by the wild lampooners who parody old songs and " divulge" state secrets in the interest of Mr . Disraeli . On small occasions , when a " cry" has been -wanted , he has exercised in all the attitudes of "bravado , as when he chained up the com / merce of Greece—but Russia has never been

    intercepted in the pursuit of any . important object that did not interfere , directly , with the policy of Great Britain . Lord Palmerston excused , and even defended , the violation of Polish independence . With regard to Austria , he excited a vague enthusiasm by declaring that he desired to see the extinction of power in . Italy ; but against this incontinent declaration must be set his recantation of a hundred conventional utterances of sympathy , -when he said that Austria ruled Hungary by indefeasible right , and that he should regard as a misfortune the separation of Hungary from Austria . It is to be remembered that he maintained an

    expectant attitude while the Hungarian contest wavered;—he was the judicious bottleholder then—but when Russia had quelled the insurgent nation , Lord Palmerston conceived that Europe had been saved from a disaster . His policy throughout the revolutionary period showed that he felt no deep sympathy with the rising liboralism of Europe , He and his colleagues stood aloof from the Republican Government of France , which inaugurated the alliance attributed to the good-will of Louis jSTajpgijeon . When the . Okleans throne had

    been" subverted , the Republic that took its place had one chance of success . That chance was—a war of intervention in Europe , to give Italy her desire , and form a moving military nucleus of the insurrectionary nations . This plan the British Government vehemently opposed , and the French Republic sacrificed itself upon the altar of the alliance . Instead of sending its legions across the Alps or the Mediterranean , to rescue Venice , Rome , and

    Milan , it sent its National Guard to visit London , and invite an amicable understanding ; between the nations . How coldly the citizens of Paris were received by our aristocracy , and by our municipalities , and how they were ignored by our Court , should be remembered by those who praise Lord Palmerston for compHmenting the coup d'etat , and thus " laying the foundation of an invaluable alliance . " The alliance was the suggestion of the Government of 1848 . The principle to which the Republic sacrificed its chance of existence was that of Nonintervention . In the history of the last and of the present century , it is a singular feature that , excepting the Great French Republic , no Continental power has ever intervened in behalf of an honest cause . Against the promulgation of revolutionary ideas the Kings of Europe formed a League . Against the idea of a free Poland , Russia , Austria , and Prussia combined , and the other Powers consented . The

    independence of Hungary was resisted by Austria , m concert with Russia—that of Italy by Austria , in concert with France . The result of Lord Palmerston ' s foreign policy has been to foster revolution and to disappoint it . He has meddled , and has gained some reputation among unthinking Liberals by meddling indiscreetly . But , by birth , education , interest , he is associated with the class of statesmen and diplomatists who , almost throughout Europe , are supported by supporting despotic thrones . If Europe were generally Constitutional , we

    believe he would uphold its Constitutionalism , Upon the whole , though with a propensity to interfere , he has been prudent enough to avoid compromising himself too far . He would make a sacrifice of opinion , of honesty , of personal feeling , to avoid an embroilment . Before he attacked Don Miguel , or Mohammed Ali , or showed the English fleet in the Dardanelles to defend the right of refuge , he summed up the probable consequences , and found that they did not amoxmt to war . The governments of the Continent are too wise in their generation

    to go to Avar upon minor questions . Lord Palmerston , upon the same principle , knows better than to commit the nation to a dynastic struggle , the issue of which would leave his name the most hated in Europe . Any other struggle it is impossible that he should propose . Leaving his own antecedents out of view , his connexions , his foreign coadjutors , excepting the King of Sardinia , are despotic in their tendencies , and the King of Sardinia ' s

    dynastic ambition is opposed by the family interests of the French Emperor . Instead of cultivating Liberalism , Lord Palmerston countenances the lawless expulsion of refugees from Jersey , as he formerly approved the denial to the expelled patriots of Italy of an asylum in Malta . His traditions , therefore , no less than the relations of the British G ovcrnment with Continental Powers , render the idea of a war conducted under his auspices for the dismemborment of Russia and tho reconstruction of

    Europe simply absurd . It is , however , a part of tho " exclusive intelligence" by which Young Toryism has lately made itself ridiculous . Will these high-minded journalists , who live by squeezing scurrility into rhymo , believe us if we assure them that they can tell us nothing that passes either in or between the

    French and British Cabinets ? Among the disjecta membra of Conservative Logic , we find that Lord Palmerston is necessarily bent on promoting a war of extremity , because he refuses to take as the text of peace the settlements of 1815 . It would , probably , cost as long a war to restore the-settlements of 3815 , as it did to establish them . The independence of Belgium and Greece exist , the Constitutions of Poland and Hungary have been violated , in defiance of them . In defiance of them , a Bonaparte sits on the French throne . We have reached a point at which the Constitution of the Holy Alliance is as impossible as the programme of Liberalism ( at present ) . But it is as incredible that Lord Palmerston

    should voluntarily undertake a war for tha emancipation of Europe , as that Louis Napoleon should consent to one that would fix on him the outlawry of 1815 . If Europe be convulsed by either of the Western powers , it must be , as matters stand , by France ^ -with Bonapartist schemes in view . Would England be dragged into that adventure also ? Lord Palmerston may be trusted as a

    eleafsighted , selfish statesman , ready to do the expedient thing at' \ th « convenient moment , too English at heart to injure or disgrace his country , disposed ttf favour steady constitutionalism on the Continent , but not unwilling to palter with the party of freedom by deceiving it with inuendos of unmeant sympathy . He is the worst enemy of liberty ,- because he hasf been its falsest friend .

    Virtue's Misprisio1f Of Vice. Do Not Let...

    VIRTUE'S MISPRISIO 1 F OF VICE . Do not let us deceive ourselves ! - Imixrofality is not practised alone by those who a *^ denounced as reprobates . Mischief " is don « ' by respectable people , and of the very same & fetd with the immoral . It is partly done in igr noranGe , partly by a wilful perversion that ' makes them refuse to look at the facts , and anxious only to' see preconceived conclusions , which they will ael « et the facts to svspport . The philanthropists who endeavour to allsriate the condition of the working classes without changing it , perfosm exactly the same office that is undertaken by vultures and other ??/ nclean birds that follow in the march of armies ,.

    and , by eating up the ear-rioM , prevent the contagion that would otherwise attfend upon carnage . We- have never' heard ) that tbe most industrious- vulture ever attempted to preventthe carnage whose consequences- k « mitigates . Nor do those who are now-Imaging : upon the rear of the working classes ^ , wxtll . institutes , and lectures , and " homes , ?? and otlfccr benevolent alleviations of their lot ,, make any attempt that . we perceive radically t © ' change the conditions that create , naultitud'tes- vf children consigned to ignorance—raultitm-iles of stunted men and depraved women .

    Lord Stanley , . indeed ,-. boasts of the ' grand discovery that we have begun education at the wrong end , because wo have no books-that the working classes care to read * - Yob we have educational books , and . admirable oi' their kind . We have , for example ; . " Crmmbers- ' s Educational Course ; " and we havo- the- whole series adopted by the Irish Board of Education .- We might stock popular libraries * with work * fohat in comparatively moderate time- could load with the

    the simplest reader up to a . levol average of the educated el asset ) . But the worst of it is ,, that , however individuals amongst tho working -classes can possess the knowledge or the ambition to plunge rhto tho study , the mass will not do it . Tho didactic books eagerly sought by the intelligent low , are neglected by , the multitude ;• , vrliilo tho multitude will run after another style . of literature . " The nonny . litorntwre . of tho hy k" . saya tho 2 V » Mr " iB absolutely d » vqurod bythus ^ nsn os of . our . & P »"

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Dec. 1, 1855, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_01121855/page/12/