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    January 20,1855.] THE LEADER. 61

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    STATESMANSHIP AND JOURNALISM. Habt the w...

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    WHAT IS HERESY ? What is heresy? It cons...

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    War And'the Press. Since The Press Becam...

    to state facts , certainly ; but facts that had been accomplished , not preparations and incomplete arrangements . Things done it was their business to relate ; they should have exercised discretion in reporting upon things in progress . The defects in the administration of the medical and commissariat department were subjects for manly exposure ,

    with a view to getting them remedied . But nothing could be more prejudicial to the cause of the country , nothing more calculated to give encouragement to the enemy , than the continual wail which has saddened the papers , —the complaining refrain of some officers who think themselves entitled to more comforts , and who have made the welfare of the men the stalking-horse of their

    own grievances . "Whatever the consequences , that we must make war in the full blaze of publicity , is an inevitable condition of our political and social system . The sound rule of discretion would seem to be that journalists should abstain from publishing all manner of knowledge that relates to military operations in progress , to the strength and weakness of which

    positions , the numbers by they are manned , the position of batteries and the number of guns they mount , and to the effective strength of the army . Surely if not only the safety of our troops but the success of their operations depends upon a prudent silence on these points , the press of England will know how to do its duty , and the public how to bear the privation .

    January 20,1855.] The Leader. 61

    January 20 , 1855 . ] THE LEADER . 61

    Statesmanship And Journalism. Habt The W...

    STATESMANSHIP AND JOURNALISM . Habt the world lives without knowing what the other half is doing ; or , rather , we may say that we do but know an infinitesimal fraction of what is going on -in the world even close round about us . In politics , as well as in private life , we constantly reverse the rule—Trust not to appearances . Half the journals of the day are conducting the discussion of national and public affairs on the sole ground of appearances , and statesmen slavishly copy the journals . But the journals themselves are to a great extent ignorant of journalism . The " gentleman connected with the Press , " who is the nexus between Parliament and thepaper , knows but little of what passes in the editor ' s room ; the editor knows not whither his writers wander ; and if he has so incomplete a knowledge of his own establishment , what can he know of others ? His very knowledge may mislead him . But if he is misled respecting a contemporary , what can outsiders know , save that journals

    are printed having more or less reference to the passing events of the day . We have heard of a discovery which Lord Melbourne made comparatively lafce in life : he asked some " gentlemen connected , & c , " to dinner , passed a very pleasant evening , and in bidding them good-bye , convivially confessed his having had " no conception that they were such d d pleasant fellows . " Yet he had been under the same roof with them , or some of them , every night for a considerable part of the year ; at all events , he was an Englishman . Other statesmen , who have survived

    to our own day , know the Press perhaps through its members ; but it must be very difficult for a stranger to classify . How can he bring into ono category the well-informed , independent , unobtrusive , high-minded gentleman—independent in every sense of the word , conventional aa well aa moral—whose opinion on public affairs is sought by acting statesmen ; the not less independent or genial , but more frequently-seen member of the Press , a historian and a man of taste , who sustains the traditions of an old Badiqal paper ; the working lawyer , who is the

    animus of a great journal , little seen or known to the public , save as a kind of election agent or party advocate , faithful to his employment ; the dashing " gentleman connected , & c , " who thrusts his eyes and his voice into every place , from a royal palace to a pauper ' s death-bed ; the speculating , pushing originator of papers for sale ; the hired mercenary , who can be employed , by parties out of doors for a fee to palm off reports or leading articles upon journals as genuine statements of fact or honest expressions of

    opinion . There are three classes of these people . First , the hired tools for pay , and will accompany that branch of political trade with trade in private scandal , for the purpose of extorting hush-money . But those banditti of the Press , since the great London journal of scandal went down , have occupied but a precarious and detested position , and they seldom did more than transitory evil . Another class consists of political spies , who are by turns scouts , couriers , instigators of conspiracies to be discovered , actors of plots to

    drag the plotters into the net , arrangers of newspaper on-dits , purveyors of material for leading articles to serve the purpose of this or that Minister , domestic or foreign . These men are seldom really connected with the Press ; they come to it on occasion ; they are more or less trusted , more or less 7 « z $ trusted . Sometimes they succeed , sometimes fail . They contribute to the errors of the journals , but do not stamp any peculiar mark upon its general character , They really belong to the establishment of the statesman , and not

    to that of the journalist . Their delusions contribute more to the blunders of statesmanship and of parliamentary eloquence , than to the faults of leading articles . The third class finds a type in a person who has latel y been dragged before the public by the Editor of the Examiner , with his own assistance . He is what the Morning Advertiser calls " a Chevalier " Wikoff , not < Nlchoff : "

    " That this strange individual has played the part of agent to the dancing woman , Fanny Elssler , shone forth the American of small wit , had many unfortunate adventures , been private friend and secret agent of Lord Palmerston , to the astonishment of Americans better acquainted with him , enjoyed the friendship of Count d ' Orsay , sought pertinaciously the hand and goldof aladyfor whose . namewe . entertain too much respect to insert here , been imprisoned for laying a despicable plot to extort marriage and money , while minister in general to the English Foreign Office , — and , a 9 a last act in his hopeful adventures , written a work of scandal , entitled My Courtship and Its Consequences , by which he hoped to still from the

    further extort , for its suppression , money lady whose name he so ungallantly drags before a scandal-loving public , is but too true . But instead of his being an agent of Russia , and the writer of certain articles in the New York Herald favourable to the Czar , he has always been held up by that journal as only a fit object of ridicule or commiseration . Knowing these facts , we give them here in justice to that journal . Nor , indeed , would the fooleries of this singular individual , whose highest ambition on one side was to imitate his friend , Count d'Orsay ( through whom he became known to Lord Paltnerston ) , and , on the other , to possess himself of a fortune and a lady , have become notorious but for the London press . "

    According to this person , he fulfilled some kind of employment under the English Government— Lord Palmehston- being the Minister ; and the nature of that employment is indicated in the subjoined extract of a letter which he publishes , from our Foreign Office to himself : — " Foreign Office , November 24 , 1851 .

    . * ' Sir , —In reply to the letter which you addressed to Viscount Palmerston on the 21 st of October , I am directed to observe to you , that the solo object of the arrangement which his Lordship made with you in the autumn of last year was to make known clearly , through the medium of the French and the . United States press , the liberal , and especially the pacific character of the policy of her Majeaty's Government , & c . ... I am therefore directed to state to you that Lord Palmorston considers the engagement

    taken with you would properly cease with the close of this year , but , in order that you may have a full twelvemonth ' s notice of its cessation , he will continue until the end of June next , 1852 , the rate of payment which you have already received , and on the 30 th of June that allowance will accordingly cease altogether . "I am , Sir , your obedient humble servant , ¦ " H . U . Aihmngton . " Not long since we found the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland convicted of a juvenile indiscretion in employing a gentleman , whose services could be bought , to express certain statesman-like views to the Irish people . Lord Pai / mebston selects a " Chevalier ~

    Wikofp . " It is an approach on the part of these distinguished Cabinet Ministers towards the functions of editing , and we cannot congratulate them on their success or their felicity in the selection of writers . It only shows what a totally inadequate conception , certain public men may have of the qualities required for reaching the conviction of the public . It shows that public men are content with a lower standard of intellectual morality than the editors of any esteemed journal would be . A statesman who professes to have a practical knowledge of life , imagines that the Press is composed of men like these ! The story has

    many morals : it teaches us to what instruments statesmen will condescend ; it teaches us upon what ignorance statesmen will presume to act ; and if they do so in matters connected with journalism , how do we know that they are not equally mean , equally ignorant in matters of strict statesmanship ? Possibly they may adapt the principles to the treatment of foreign countries — gambling away the independence of a Sicily and betraying the rights of a Venice . They may " make things pleasant" in Ireland , until nobody * knows what is genuine and what is got up . How can we tell what passes in diplomacy ? that profession more secret than freemasonry ,

    because its members are fewer , and yet are men exhibiting this strange ignorance of things nearest to them , this strange laxity of morals .

    What Is Heresy ? What Is Heresy? It Cons...

    WHAT IS HERESY ? What is heresy ? It consists , says Pope Pius the Ninth , who is not yet canonised , in believing that the Virgin Maei partook of sinful humanity . And in that opinion he is sustained by King JFeuj > Jlsasd otNapleSj and Queen Isabella of Spain . It consists , says Saint Bebnabd , in supposing that the Vibgin did not partake of the original sin of

    humanity ; and the Roman Church , tacitly at least , rather agreed with Saint Bebnabd than otherwise , until the opposite doctrine was enunciated by Pope Pius , with the support of King Febdinand and Queen Isabella . HereBy consists , says the Boman Church , in not believing that the wafer is " really" omnipotence : it consists , says the Protestant Church , in believing that reality :

    it consists , says Protestant Dissent , in using the wafer at " ; but High Church thinks that it consists in disbelieving the reality , although the reality must not be affirmed . Heresy , says Mr . G-obham , lies in believiug that the priest has any share in imparting a subvenient grace to the infant baptised ; no , says H . Exeteb , it consists in denying that the priest has any part in the transaction , and in thinking that it is only a prevenient grace which is transmitted at the time when the priest operates . On the contrary , heresy , contends ono able Low Churchman , consiata in everything ; and he finds a splendid example for condemnation : .

    " The fact that Miss Nightingale is so variously represented—by some as a ' Roman Catholic , by 17 , Unitarian , ' and by Mr * Herbert aa ? r W Church ' -is a pretty good proofthat her creed ia not very distinct . Tho creed of the modern High Churchman is likewise of a nonde-JSSchwSoter . ^ woul d not be difficult to show

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Jan. 20, 1855, page 13, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_20011855/page/13/