Beacon Lights of History, Volume 10: European Leaders — William Ewart Gladstone, Part 3

Mr. Gladstone had now swung away from the Conservative party.

In 1864 he had vigorously supported a bill for enlarging the parliamentary franchise by reducing the limit of required rental from £10 to £6, declaring that the burden of proof rested on those who would exclude forty-nine-fiftieths of the working-classes from the franchise.

He also, as chancellor of the exchequer, caused great excitement by admitting the unsatisfactory condition of the Irish Church,--that is, the Church of England among the Irish people; sustained by their taxes, but ministering to only one-eighth or one-ninth of the population.

These and other similar evidences of his liberal tendencies alienated his Oxford constituency, the last people in the realm to adopt liberal measures;

and on the proroguement of Parliament in 1865, and the new election which followed, he was defeated as member for the University, although he was a High Churchman and the pride of the University, devoted to its interests heart and soul.

It is a proof of the exceeding bitterness of political parties that such ingratitude should have been shown to one of the greatest scholars that Oxford has produced for a century.

It was in this year also that on completing his term as Rector of the University of Edinburgh he retired with a notable address on the "Place of Ancient Greece in the Providential Order;" thus anew emphasizing his scholarly equipment as a son of Oxford.

The Liberal party, however, were generally glad of Gladstone's defeat, since it would detach him from the University.

He now belonged more emphatically to the country, and was more free and unshackled to pursue his great career, as Sir Robert Peel had been before him in similar circumstances.

Instead of representing a narrow-minded and bigoted set of clergymen and scholars, he was chosen at once to represent quite a different body,--even the liberal voters of South Lancashire, a manufacturing district.

The death of Lord Palmerston at the age of eighty, October 17, 1865, made Earl Russell prime minister, while Gladstone resumed under the new government his post as chancellor of the exchequer, and now became formally the leader of the Liberals in the House of Commons.

Irish questions in 1866 came prominently to the front, for the condition of Ireland at that time was as alarming as it was deplorable, with combined Fenianism and poverty and disaffection in every quarter.

So grave was the state of this unhappy country that the government felt obliged to bring in a bill suspending the habeas corpus act, which the chancellor of the exchequer eloquently supported.

His conversion to Liberal views was during this session seen in bringing in a measure for the abolition of compulsory church-rates, in aid of Dissenters; but before it could be carried through its various stages a change of ministry had taken place on another issue, and the Conservatives again came into power, with Lord Derby for prime minister and Disraeli for chancellor of the exchequer and leader of his party in the House of Commons.

This fall of the Liberal ministry was brought about by the Reform Bill, which Lord Russell had prepared, and which was introduced by the chancellor of the exchequer amid unparalleled excitement.

Finance measures lost their interest in the fierceness of the political combat.

It was not so important a measure as that of the reform of 1832 in its political consequences, but it was of importance enough to enlist absorbing interest throughout the kingdom; it would have added four hundred thousand new voters.

While it satisfied the Liberals, it was regarded by the Conservatives as a dangerous concession, opening the doors too widely to the people.

Its most brilliant and effective opponent was Mr. Lowe, whose oratory raised him at once to fame and influence.

Seldom has such eloquence been heard in the House of Commons, and from all the leading debaters on both sides.

Mr. Gladstone outdid himself, but perhaps was a little too profuse with his Latin quotations.

The debate was continued for eight successive nights.

The final division was the largest ever known: the government found itself in a minority of eleven, and consequently resigned.

Lord Derby, as has been said, was again prime minister.

The memorable rivalry between Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Disraeli was now continued in deeper earnest, and never ceased so long as the latter statesman was a member of the House of Commons, They were recognized to be the heads of their respective parties,--two giants in debate; two great parliamentary gladiators, on whom the eyes of the nation rested.

Mr. Gladstone was the more earnest, the more learned, and the more solid in his blows.

Mr. Disraeli was the more adroit, the more witty, and the more brilliant in his thrusts.

Both were equally experienced.

The one appealed to justice and truth; the other to the prejudices of the House and the pride of a nation of classes.

One was armed with a heavy dragoon sword; the other with a light rapier, which he used with extraordinary skill.

Mr. G.

W.

E.

Russell, in his recent "Life of Gladstone," quotes the following passage from a letter of Lord Houghton, May, 1867:-- "I met Gladstone at breakfast.

He seems quite awed with the diabolical cleverness of Dizzy, 'who,' he says, 'is gradually driving all ideas of political honor out of the House, and accustoming it to the most revolting cynicism,' There is no doubt that a sense of humor has always been conspicuously absent from Mr. Gladstone's character."

Sometimes one of these rival leaders was on the verge of victory and sometimes the other, and both equally gained the applause of the spectators.

Two such combatants had not been seen since the days of Pitt and Fox,--one, the champion of the people; the other, of the aristocracy.

What each said was read the next day by every family in the land.

Both were probably greatest in opposition, since more unconstrained.

Of the two, Disraeli was superior in the control of his temper and in geniality of disposition, making members roar with laughter by his off-hand vituperation and ingenuity in inventing nicknames.

Gladstone was superior in sustained reasoning, in lofty sentiments, and in the music of his voice, accompanied by that solemnity of manner which usually passes for profundity and the index of deep convictions.

As for rhetorical power, it would be difficult to say which was the superior,--though the sentences of both were too long.

It would also be difficult to tell which of the two was the more ambitious and more tenacious of office.

Both, it is said, bade for popularity in the measures they proposed.

Both were politicians.

There is, indeed, a great difference between politicians and statesmen; but a man may be politic without ceasing to be a lover of his country, like Lord Palmerston himself; and a man may advocate large and comprehensive views of statesmanship which are neither popular nor appreciated.

The new Conservative ministry was a short one.

Coming into power on the defeat of the Liberal reform bill introduced by Mr. Gladstone, the Tory government recognized the popular demand on which that bill had been based; and though Mr. Disraeli coolly introduced a reform bill of their own which was really more radical than the Liberal bill had been, and although at the hands of the opposition it was so modified that the Duke of Buccleuch declared that the only word unaltered was the initial "whereas," its passage was claimed as a great Conservative victory.

Shortly after this, the Earl of Derby retired on account of ill-health, and was succeeded by Mr. Disraeli as premier; but the current of Liberalism set in so strongly in the ensuing elections that he was forced to resign in 1868, and Mr. Gladstone now for the first time became prime minister.

This was the golden period of Gladstone's public services.

During Disraeli's short lease of power, Gladstone had carried the abolition of compulsory church-rates, and had moved, with great eloquence, the disestablishment of the English Church in Ireland.

On the latter question Parliament was dissolved, and an appeal made to the country;

and the triumphant success of the Liberals brought Mr. Gladstone into power with the brightest prospects for the cause to which he was now committed.

He was fifty-nine years old before he reached the supreme object of his ambition,--to rule England; but in accordance with law, and in the interest of truth and justice.

In England the strongest man can usually, by persevering energy, reach the highest position to which a subject may aspire.

In the United States, political ambition is defeated by rivalries and animosities.

Practically the President reigns, like absolute kings, "by the grace of God,"--as it would seem when so many ordinary men, and even obscure, are elevated to the highest place, and when these comparatively unknown men often develop when elected the virtues and abilities of a Saul or a David, as in the cases of Lincoln and Garfield.

So great was the popularity of Mr. Gladstone at this time, so profound was the respect he inspired for his lofty character, his abilities, his vast and varied learning, his unimpeachable integrity and conscientious discharge of his duties, that for five years he was virtually dictator, wielding more power than any premier since Pitt, if we except Sir Robert Peel in his glory.

He was not a dictator in the sense that Metternich or Bismarck was,--not a grand vizier, the vicegerent of an absolute monarch, controlling the foreign policy, the army, the police, and the national expenditures.

He could not send men to prison without a trial, or interfere with the peaceful pursuits of obnoxious citizens; but he could carry out any public measure he proposed affecting the general interests, for Parliament was supreme, and his influence ruled the Parliament.

He was liable to disagreeable attacks from members of the opposition, and could not silence them; he might fall before their attacks; but while he had a great majority of members to back him, ready to do his bidding, he stood on a proud pedestal and undoubtedly enjoyed the sweets of power.

He would not have been human if he had not.

Yet Mr. Gladstone carried his honors with dignity and discretion.

He was accessible to all who had claims upon his time; he was never rude or insolent; he was gracious and polite to delegations; he was too kind-hearted to snub anybody.

No cares of office could keep him from attending public worship; no popular amusements diverted him from his duties; he was feared only as a father is feared.

I can conceive that he was sometimes intolerant of human infirmities; that no one dared to obtrude familiarities or make unseemly jokes in his presence; that few felt quite at ease in his company,--oppressed by his bearing, and awed by his prodigious respectability and grave solemnity.

Not that he was arrogant and haughty, like a Roman cardinal or an Oxford Don; he was simply dignified and undemonstrative, like a man absorbed with weighty responsibilities.

I doubt if he could unbend at the dinner-table like Disraeli and Palmerston, or tell stories like Sydney Smith, or drink too much wine with jolly companions, or forget for a moment the proper and the conventional.

I can see him sporting with children, or taking long walks, or cutting down trees for exercise, or given to deep draughts of old October when thirsty; but to see him with a long pipe, or dallying with ladies, or giving vent to unseemly expletives, or retailing scandals,--these and other disreputable follies are utterly inconceivable of Mr. Gladstone.

A very serious man may be an object of veneration; but he is a constant rebuke to the weaknesses of our common humanity,--a wet blanket upon frivolous festivities.

Let us now briefly glance at the work done by Gladstone during the five years when in his first premiership he directed the public affairs of England,--impatient of opposition, and sensitive to unjust aspersions, yet too powerful to be resisted in the supreme confidence of his party.

The first thing of note he did was to complete the disestablishment of the Irish Church,--an arduous task to any one lacking Mr. Gladstone's extraordinary influence.

Here he was at war with his former friends, and with a large section of the Conservative party,--especially with ecclesiastical dignitaries, who saw in this measure hostility to the Church as well as a national sin.

It was a dissolution of the union between the Churches of England and Ireland; a divestment of the temporalities which the Irish clergy had enjoyed; the abolition of all ecclesiastical corporations and laws and courts in Ireland,--in short, the sweeping away of the annuities which the beneficed clergy had hitherto received out of the property of the Established Church, which annuities were of the nature of freeholds.

It was not proposed to deprive the clergy of their income, so long as they discharged their clerical duties; but that the title to their tithes should be vested in commissioners, so that these church freeholds could not be bought and sold by non-residents, and churches in decadence should be taken from incumbents.

The peerage rights of Irish bishops were also taken away.

It was not proposed to touch private endowments; and glebe-houses which had become generally dilapidated were handed over to incumbents by their paying a fair valuation.

Not only did the measure sweep away the abuses of the Establishment which had existed for centuries,--such as endowments held by those who performed no duties, which they could dispose of like other property,--but the _regium donum_ given to Presbyterian ministers and the Maynooth Catholic College grant, which together amounted to £70,000, were also withdrawn, although compensated on the same principles as those which granted a settled stipend to the actual incumbents of the disestablished churches.

By this measure, the withdrawal of tithes and land rents and other properties amounted to sixteen millions; and after paying ministers and actual incumbents their stipends of between seven or eight millions, there would remain a surplus of seven or eight millions, with which Mr. Gladstone proposed to endow lunatic and idiot asylums, schools for the deaf, dumb, and blind, institutions for the training of nurses, for infirmaries, and hospitals for the needy people of Ireland.

There can be no rational doubt that this reform was beneficent, and it met the approval of the Liberal party, being supported with a grand eloquence by John Bright, who had under this ministry for the first time taken office,--as President of the Board of Trade; but it gave umbrage to the Irish clergy as a matter of course, to the Presbyterians of Ulster, to the Catholics as affecting Maynooth, and to the conservatives of Oxford and Cambridge on general principles.

It was a reform not unlike that of Thomas Cromwell in the time of Henry VIII.

, when he dissolved the monasteries, though not quite so violent as the secularization of church property in France in the time of the Revolution.

It was a spoliation, in one sense, as well as a needed reform,--a daring and bold measure, which such statesmen as Lords Liverpool, Aberdeen, and Palmerston would have been slow to make, and the weak points of which Disraeli was not slow to assail.

To the radical Dissenters, as led by Mr. Miall, it was a grateful measure, which would open the door for future discussions on the disestablishment of the English Church itself,--a logical contingency which the premier did not seem to appreciate; for if the State had a right to take away the temporalities of the Irish Church when they were abused, the State would have an equal right to take away those of the English Church should they hereafter turn out to be unnecessary, or become a scandal in the eyes of the nation.

One would think that this disestablishment of the Irish Church would have been the last reform which a strict churchman like Gladstone would have made; certainly it was the last for a politic statesman to make, for it brought forth fruit in the next general election.

It is true that the Irish Establishment had failed in every way, as Mr. Bright showed in one of his eloquent speeches, and to remove it was patriotic.

If Mr. Gladstone had his eyes open, however, to its natural results as affecting his own popularity, he deserves the credit of being the most unselfish and lofty statesman that ever adorned British annals.

Having thus in 1869 removed one important grievance in the affairs of Ireland, Mr. Gladstone soon proceeded to another, and in February, 1870, brought forward, in a crowded House, his Irish Land Bill.

The evil which he had in view to cure was the insecurity of tenure, which resulted in discouraging and paralyzing the industry of tenants, especially in the matter of evictions for non-payment of rent, and the raising of rents on land which had been improved by them.

As they were liable at any time to be turned out of their miserable huts, the rents had only doubled in value in ninety years; whereas in England and Scotland, where there was more security of tenure, rents had quadrupled.

This insecurity and uncertainty had resulted in a great increase of pauperism in Ireland, and prevented any rise in wages, although there was increased expense of living.

The remedy proposed to alleviate in some respect the condition of the Irish tenants was the extension of their leases to thirty-three years, and the granting national assistance to such as desired to purchase the lands they had previously cultivated, according to a scale of prices to be determined by commissioners,--thus making improvements the property of the tenants who had made them rather than of the landlord, and encouraging the tenants by longer leases to make such improvements.

Mr. Gladstone's bill also extended to twelve months the time for notices to quit, bearing a stamp duty of half-a-crown.

This measure on the part of the government was certainly a relief, as far as it went, to the poor people of Ireland.

It became law on August 1, 1870. The next important measure of Mr. Gladstone was to abolish the custom of buying and selling commissions in the army, which provoked bitter opposition from the aristocracy.

It was maintained by the government that the whole system of purchase was unjust, and tended to destroy the efficiency of the army by preventing the advancement of officers according to merit.

In no other country was such a mistake committed.

It is true that the Prussian and Austrian armies were commanded by officers from the nobility; but these officers had not the unfair privilege of jumping over one another's heads by buying promotion.

The bill, though it passed the Commons, was thrown out by the Lords, who wished to keep up the aristocratic quality of army officers, among whom their younger sons were enrolled.

Mr. Gladstone cut the knot by advising her Majesty to take the decisive step of cancelling the royal warrant under which--and not by law--purchase had existed.

This calling on the Queen to do by virtue of her royal prerogative what could not be done by ordinary legislation, though not unconstitutional, was unusual.

True, a privilege which royalty had granted, royalty could revoke; but in removing this evil Mr. Gladstone still further alienated the army and the aristocracy.

Among other measures which the premier carried for the public good, but against bitter opposition, were the secret ballot, and the removal of University Tests, by which all lay students of whatever religious creed were admitted to the universities on equal terms.

The establishment of national and compulsory elementary education, although not emanating from Mr. Gladstone, was also accomplished during his government.

It now began to be apparent that the policy of the prime minister was reform wherever reform was needed.

There was no telling what he would do next.

Had he been the prime minister of an absolute monarch he would have been unfettered, and could have carried out any reform which his royal master approved.

But the English are conservative and slow to change, no matter what party they belong to.

It seemed to many that the premier was iconoclastic, and was bent on demolishing anything and everything which he disliked.

Consequently a reaction set in, and Mr. Gladstone's popularity, by which he had ruled almost as dictator, began to wane.