much, that Mr Mill, as a logician, sees the propriety of giving to every householder, and indeed to every man, the suffrage. We have gone so far that he sees no possibility of our stopping short of this. And, watching the course of political agitation, he anticipates the triumph, sooner or later, of the mob, who will give to every man his vote. But he says that the cure lies in our own hands. We can give every man his logical demand, provided we give no more than logic requires. Let every man have his vote. There is no reason why we should withhold from any man the right of voting. But, on the other hand, there is no reason why every man should have an equal vote. Every man can claim to have a share, but he cannot claim to have an equal share, in the government of the country. We are not surprised that Jones the bricklayer, who pays taxes as we do, wishes to have the privilege of voting for a parliamentary representative; but we are very much astonished if we discover that he regards the votes of thirty bricklayers to be of equal importance with the votes of thirty men who have passed through the university, and who pay, it may be, fifty times the amount of taxes to the State for which our friends the bricklayers are responsible. If it be a principle of our constitution, says Mr Mill, that taxation should go with representation, carry out that principle to its logical conclusion. There is a logic in this principle which ought to sweeten the logic of that other principle so much dreaded. Let us not be logical in one direction only; let us be wholly logical. If the logical consequence of our constitutional theory be, that every man should have a vote, it is also the logical consequence of that theory that his vote should have some adequate relation to the taxes which he pays. Nor is this a mere theory; it is the practice of our constitution to some extent. The rate-payers elect the board of guardians for the poor. In some parts of the country, the rate-payers have votes in proportion to the amounts which they pay in rates, one rate-payer having but one vote, another two, this one three,

that four, or five, or six. And Mr Mill urges, why not apply the same rule to the election of our parliamentary representatives? Even Mr Bright admits that members should represent not mere numbers, but property also; for in mapping out his electoral districts, and allotting delegates to various boroughs, he goes upon a double calculation of wealth and of population. But if the principle be worth anything, it is worthy of being carried out to its legitimate results. If Manchester deserves so many members more than another city because of its extraordinary wealth, then those householders of Manchester who have extraordinary wealth deserve a greater number of votes than those who can only boast of extraordinary poverty. There is very little gained by talking of abstract rights, and pushing partial theories to their extreme limit; but if people will talk of reforming the constitution on the principle of abstract right, then let us carry out that principle fairly, and let us avoid, above all things, a onesided view of the theory. It is not we who demand universal suffrage as a concession to abstract right. We are quite content with the practical liberty which we enjoy, with all its anomalies and all its compromises. But if we are to have universal suffrage because of abstract right, then let us also, by the same law and for the same reason, have proportionate suffrage. The bricklayer says that he ought to have a voice in the election of the House of Commons, because he pays taxes, and contributes to the expenses of the country. Very good; but let the master- builder, who pays fifty or a hundred times the amount of taxes for which the bricklayer is liable, have, we do not say fifty or a hundred times as many votes, but four or five times as many. It is neither fair, nor is it the custom of the constitution, that numbers, irrespective of property, should impose the taxes, and regulate the expenses of the country. The hackneyed answers of Mr Bright and his party to such a conclusion are, that the man of property, paying fifty or a hundred times as much as the poor man, has fifty or

a hundred times as much security for his possessions; and that over and above his individual vote he has an influence on those around him which is equivalent to the enjoyment of several votes. These are transparent fallacies, or rather they are arguments which cut two ways. They are arguments that tell as much against the poor man's claim to the suffrage, as against the rich man's claim to proportionate suffrage. In point of fact, the poor man is denied the franchise on these two amongst other grounds, that he is already virtually represented through the influence which he and his numerous comrades exert upon the society around them; and that, in return for his taxes, he has the benefit of security and law. If the working classes are not content with individual security and virtual representation, why should the wealthier classes be expected to rest satisfied with their social influence and their sense of safety? No, says Mr Mill; turn the question which way we will, we still arrive at the same result. If there is logic in Universal, there is logic also in Proportionate Suffrage; and the one is absolutely required to redress the flagrant injustice of the other. Separate they are wrong; together they are right.

Now, with regard to this view, which has been maintained not only by Mr Mill, but also by the Economist newspaper with great ability, we have no hesitation in saying that logically it is irrefragable, and that practically it would preserve the balance of classes in the poll-books. If we are asked, however, whether we are willing to adopt and advocate the scheme, this is a very different question. To the opinion of no man on any question of politics can we pay more deference than to Sir E. B. Lytton's; but we find that in his great speech on reform he brushed Mr Mill's scheme aside, without even paying it the compliment of stating his objections. Not only so, but hitherto the scheme has been treated very much as Sir E. B. Lytton has treated it-it has not even been discussed. Be its merits or demerits what they may, we are pretty certain that they do not

VOL LXXXVIII.—NO. DXXXVII.

deserve such indifference. If the scheme is not satisfactory, it is at all events the best that has yet been propounded as a remedy for the evils with which we are threatened, and it deserves consideration. Why has it not received that consideration? Partly, we believe, because a great many people in this country are fatalists on the subject of democracy, and imagine that it is as impossible to resist its encroachments as to stop the waves on the shore. It is supposed that there is no use in these expedients for regulating the influence of mobs. Mob-rule is coming certain as the grave, and there is nothing for it but to put off the evil day as long as possible. Let us shut our eyes, and, seeing that we must die, let us die by inches. A more reasonable objection to the scheme of Mr Mill is a sentimental dislike on the part of English gentlemen to raise the question of equality between man and man. It is forgotten, however, that it is not the gentlemen of England who raise the question. We are unequal by nature, and our inequalities are recognised in the constitution as it stands at present. Mr Bright desires not only to do away with these inequalities, but to reverse them; and so far from attempting to create inequalities which do not at present exist, Mr Mill proposes merely to recognise the actual state of things in a new formula. It is to be remembered that here we have but a choice of evils. If proportionate suffrage be an evil, it is simply proposed as an antidote to the still greater evil of universal suffrage. We do not advocate Mr Mill's scheme; we demand for it a fair hearing, because it is the only thoroughgoing attempt that we have seen to grapple with the dangers that beset the constitution of the country. We resist a £6 franchise, but we resist with a sort of despondency, knowing that we are drifting surely, though slowly, to the surrender of the government to the force of numbers. It strikes us as possible that if the principle of proportionate suffrage were once recognised, there would be no occasion to enforce it; that our demagogues would see in the light of it the hopelessness of insist

I

ing on universal suffrage as a basis for their schemes, and that accordingly they would be content to leave matters as they are.

Unfortunately, Conservatives stand at a considerable disadvantage, as compared with Radicals, in the prosecution of their schemes. They abominate agitation; they despise stump oratory; and their strength so lies in deep feeling rather than in noisy shouts, that people are apt at times to mistake the force of the Conservative party. Never was this more clearly seen than at present. The Conservative feeling of the country is expressed in silence and in apathy, while the Liberal birds are chattering very noisily; and were we to judge by mere words, the latter have all the argument and all the wisdom on their side. They get up a meeting, at which young men from the discussion - forum talk by the hour; they have it reported next day in all their papers; and it passes muster as an expression of popular opinion-a most important demonstration. We trust that, whatever be the consequences, the Tory party will never descend to such contemptible arts; but we have sometimes thought that they yield too much in this way to their adversaries. When Mr Disraeli complained that the middle classes in this country have not the habit of organisation for which the lower classes are distinguished, he referred especially to the upper stratum of the middle classes that section of them in which Conservative feeling is strongest. A lawyer and a physician live next door to each other in the same square. They never meet; they do not know each other; they do not even know each other's names, it may be; they certainly do not know that they think alike on political questions, and have strong Conservative sympathies. These men, and men like them, have at present no means of organising themselves into a political federation. They have no public life, because the social life which they cultivate is one of exclusiveness and privacy. But round the corner, in the next street, will be found a middle class of a very different order, who have at their

command an organisation of a rude but powerful character. The grocer stands behind his counter, the publican behind his bar, and gossips with his customers on all the topics of the day. The shop is more than a shop, it is a free-and-easy club. These shopkeepers and publicans lead a public life; have a great number of persons around them who regard them as centres, and who, when a general election takes place, are quite content to see the choice of a candidate practically depend upon their exertions. To a very large extent this influence is perfectly legitimate. The shopkeeper and the publican, as popular characters, are perfectly entitled to whatever influence they can command in consequence of an extended connection. At the same time it is a miserable thing that in so many large towns the elections should be completely in their hands, and that their organisation should be the only organisation at work. We do not blame them in the least. We blame ourselves. Why are we not better organised? Why should not the lawyer and the physician, of whom we have spoken, have a community of effort as well as of opinion? They want the natural system of organisation which the shopkeeper and the bar-keeper enjoy-but why should they not recompense themselves by an artificial system of organisation? Why should they be a series of disconnected units contending at the polling-booths with highly disciplined forces, and thoroughly amalgamated publicans? Not until they acquire this art of organising themselves, can the Conservative feeling, strong as it is in the country, find that full expression in the House of Representatives to which it is fairly entitled.

Taking matters as they stand, however, we think that we may congratulate our friends on the growing strength of their position, as exhibited both in the number of their adherents, and in the currency of their opinions. And we do not doubt that those differences in the Tory camp to which Lord John Russell maliciously alluded, and which he attempted to magnify, may, in the act of being ventilated, lead to greater unity and strength. That Mr Dis

raeli does not command the allegiance of every member of his party, Lord John Russell professes to regard as something very extraordinary, and on the strength of that fact innocently wonders whether the member for Buckinghamshire is to be accepted, after all, as the leader of his party in the House of Commons. We should like to know where is the party in which perfect unanimity is to be found? There has always been a certain amount of disaffection in every political confederation. Canning had to complain of it; Peel had to complain of it; Disraeli has to complain of it also. On the whole, however, the discipline of the Tory party is admirable; is in striking contrast to that of the Whig camp; and we doubt not that Mr Disraeli is perfectly satisfied with the confidence which he enjoys. It should be remembered that his rise to power was peculiar, and would justify an impartial observer in expecting a much stronger dissent from his authority than that which actually exists. He rose into power when the party was at war itself; when sharp words were flung about on every side; when ridicule and recrimination were all too freely used. Who can wonder that, joining in the strife with more than usual spirit, he should have made many enemies-implacable as they are powerful? But over and above this, the very success of his efforts raised him into authority over the heads of men who were gradually working their way upwards, and who looked forward with reason to leading the Tory party sooner later. He has had to endure the implacable jealousy of these men, in addition to the implacable hate of those whom he ridiculed; and the marvel is that, having to contend against such influences, Mr Disraeli has been able to maintain his position at all.

or

In these facts we have quite enough to account for any difference which may exist between Mr Disraeli and some members of his party, without fabricating an explanation by denying to him the possession of fixed principles, and by accusing him of veering about as Peel did. We deny that Mr Disraeli

has ever refused to statesmen the right of changing an opinion. Anything more shameless than the doctrine of the Peelite school, as expressed not long ago by Sir James Graham, when he said that everything is changing-that the wind shifts, that the weather-vane wheels round, and that therefore political opinions must turn about too-we do not know; and Mr Disraeli has certainly refused to sanction such inconsistency. The inconsistency also of Peel, who did not merely change his opinions, but changed them in violation of a pledge coming into office to carry out one line of policy, and remaining there to carry out the very opposite - he reprobated in the strongest terms. But no one can accuse him of such changes. That he has always been consistent with himself we do not say; he would be more than mortal if he were. Only on this question of principle we have two remarks to make, which we commend to the attention of those who are running him down. The first is, that there is not a statesman living who has more laboriously and more continuously than Mr Disraeli striven to arrive at great principles. Any one who will carefully go through Mr Disraeli's works, will be perfectly astonished at his restless anxiety to get at the elemental truths of government and of British politics. He puts forward a thousand suggestions, and speculates on ten thousand facts. Sometimes his suggestions are valuable, sometimes exceedingly crude. With some we agree, at some we smile, some we throw into the fire. But going through volume after volume, we confess to a feeling of profound respect for the industry, for the thought, for the ambition which have led him to probe with intense curiosity all the great truths that lie at the root of British history. Often when he is wrong theoretically, his imaginative sympathies keep him practically right, and all through his life his political instincts have in the main been sound. That immediately after the passing of the Reform Bill, which he regarded as a great revolution, his intellectual being should have been profoundly stirred, and that he

should have groped wildly about for first principles, is scarcely wonderful. That a man who has thought so much, and studied so hard and so incessantly to arrive at the primary dogmas of the constitution, should reject much that at one time seemed to him to be true, is very natural. It has been the grand object of his life to get at first principles, and this, be it remembered, in a period of political infidelity, when statesmen are not celebrated for hav. ing fixed principles on any subject whatever. It is rather hard to say of such a man-of a man who has exhibited all through his career a passionate desire to get at first truths that he has no beliefs and no principles, and simply because he dug out a good deal of dross with his gold, and has had the good sense to see that much of what glittered like the precious metal was utterly to be rejected.

The other remark we proposed to make has reference to Mr Disraeli's style, which, if not properly under stood, may create a false impression of the man. That style has not a few of the excellences and some of the faults, of the Oriental character. It is generally forcible, often brilliant, sometimes perfect, but it is not always exact. Mr Disraeli has not much sympathy with the scholastic mind; and with all his great gifts and acquirements, he has not that peculiar cultivation which comes of study at a university. So long as he is dwelling on facts, he is accurate enough; it is when he comes to the expression of an opinion that we have to remember how far this opinion is limited and modified by other opinions previously expressed. If any one will open Coningsby, it will be found that the author of that brilliant novel insists in the strongest terms on the enormous influence of the personal on human affairs, and on the importance of party; we therefore leap to the conclusion that personal attachments and party ties are supposed by him to deserve the first place in the consideration of a statesman as an element of power. When we read further, we find, however, that he harps on a very different string. His great accusation against Peel is that

he headed a party without principles, and that he hoped to govern by a confederation bound together purely by personal influences. Mr Disraeli talks so strongly on this subject, that we are apt to forget his previous statements, and leap to the conclusion that he regards principles as everything, party as nothing. So all through the novel, he harps now on the wonderful spell exerted by individual character, now on the worthlessness of anything but dogmas, again on the magic of party associations, and yet again on the inexorable necessity of principles above all things. Here we conclude that party ought to override principle; there that principle ought to obliterate party. The uncandid

reader will of course say that these are contradictions. More just criticism will at once admit that each is a half truth exaggerated in the expression, and that if Mr Disraeli contradicts himself in the form of the words, he is perfectly consistent in reality. It is easy to put the two sentiments together and show their perfect consistency, when each occurs about fifty times in the course of the same novel; but when they happen to be expressed in separate speeches, people who are lazy, people who have bad memories, and especially people who are a little prejudiced, only see contradiction, falsehood, and recklessness. In a speech given at a Conservative banquet in honour of the progress which the party had made, Mr Disraeli spoke with great emphasis of the value of party influences. He magnified party at the expense of principle, as it appeared to some. People at once jump to the conclusion-"Here is a man who has no principles- he holds principles as second to party: it is disgusting that the Tories should be led by a statesman who, in the very moment of his party's triumph, can utter such a barefaced statement." Were we to point out other passages to them in which Mr Disraeli magnifies principle at the expense of party, and seems to argue that we ought all to be independent of each other, and stick only to our individual opinions, these very persons would probably say, "What contradictions! He re