Beacon Lights of History, Volume 10: European Leaders — William Ewart Gladstone, Part 4

The settlement of the Alabama Claims did not add to his popularity.

Everybody knows what these were, and I shall merely allude to them.

During our Civil War, injuries had been inflicted on the commerce of the United States by cruisers built, armed, and manned in Great Britain, not only destroying seventy of our vessels, but by reason of the fear of shippers, resulting in a transfer of trade from American to British ships.

It having been admitted by commissioners sent by Mr. Gladstone to Washington, that Great Britain was to blame for these and other injuries of like character, the amount of damages for which she was justly liable was submitted to arbitration; and the International Court at Geneva decided that England was bound to pay to the United States more than fifteen million dollars in gold.

The English government promptly paid the money, although regarding the award as excessive; but while the judicious rejoiced to see an arbitrament of reason instead of a resort to war, the pugnacious British populace was discontented, and again Gladstone lost popularity.

And here it may be said that the foreign policy of Mr. Gladstone was pacific from first to last.

He opposed the Crimean war; he kept clear of entangling alliances; he maintained a strict neutrality in Eastern complications, and in the Franco-German embroilment; he never stimulated the passion of military glory; he ever maintained that-- "There is a higher than the warrior's excellence."

He was devoted to the development of national resources and the removal of evils which militated against justice as well as domestic prosperity.

His administration, fortunately, was marked by no foreign war.

Under his guidance the nation had steadily advanced in wealth, and was not oppressed by taxation; he had promoted education as wall as material thrift; he had attempted to heal disorders in Ireland by benefiting the tenant class.

But he at last proposed a comprehensive scheme for enlarging higher education in Ireland, which ended his administration.

The Irish University Bill, which as an attempted compromise between Catholic and Protestant demands satisfied neither party, met with such unexpected opposition that a majority of three was obtained against the government.

Mr. Gladstone was, in accordance with custom, compelled to resign or summon a new Parliament.

He accepted the latter alternative;

but he did not seem aware of the great change in public sentiment which had taken place in regard to his reforms.

Not one of them had touched the heart of the great mass, or was of such transcendent importance to the English people as the repeal of the corn laws had been.

They were measures of great utility,--indeed, based on justice,--but were of a kind to alienate powerful classes without affecting universal interests.

They were patriotic rather than politic.

Moreover, he was not supported by lieutenants of first-class ability or reputation.

His immediate coadjutors were most respectable men, great scholars, and men of more experience than genius or eloquence.

Of his cabinet, eight of them it is said were "double-firsts" at Oxford.

There was not one of them sufficiently trained or eminent to take his place.

They were his subordinates rather than his colleagues; and some of them became impatient under his dictation, and witnessed his decline in popularity with secret satisfaction.

No government was ever started on an ambitious course with louder pretensions or brighter promises than Mr. Gladstone's cabinet in 1868. In less than three years their glory was gone.

It was claimed that the bubble of oratory had burst when in contact with fact, and the poor English people had awoke to the dreary conviction that it was but vapor after all; that Mr. Disraeli had pricked that bubble when he said, "Under his influence [Gladstone's] we have legalized confiscation, we have consecrated sacrilege, we have condoned treason, we have destroyed churches, we have shaken property to its foundation, and we have emptied jails."

Everything went against the government.

Russia had torn up the Black Sea treaty, the fruit of the Crimean war; the settlement of the "Alabama" claims was humiliating; "the generous policy which was to have won the Irish heart had exasperated one party without satisfying another.

He had irritated powerful interests on all sides, from the army to the licensed victuallers."

On the appeal to the nation, contrary to Mr. Gladstone's calculations, there was a great majority against him.

He had lost friends and made enemies.

The people seemingly forgot his services,--his efforts to give dignity to honest labor, to stimulate self-denial, to reduce unwise expenditures, to remove crying evils.

They forgot that he had reduced taxation to the extent of twelve millions sterling annually; and all the while the nation had been growing richer, so that the burdens which had once been oppressive were now easy to bear.

It would almost appear that even Gladstone's transcendent eloquence had lost in a measure its charm when Disraeli, in one of his popular addresses, was applauded for saying that he was "a sophistical rhetorician inebriated with the exuberance of his own verbosity, and gifted with an egotistical imagination that can at all times command an interminable and inconsistent series of arguments to malign his opponents and to glorify himself,"--one of the most exaggerated and ridiculous charges that was ever made against a public man of eminence, yet witty and plausible.

On the retirement of the great statesman from office in 1875, in sadness and chagrin, he declined to continue to be the leader of his party in opposition.

His disappointment and disgust must have been immense to prompt a course which seemed to be anything but magnanimous, since he well knew that there was no one capable of taking his place; but he probably had his reasons.

For some time he rarely went to the House of Commons.

He left the leaders of his party to combat an opponent whom he himself had been unable to disarm.

Fortunately no questions came up of sufficient importance to arouse a nation or divert it from its gains or its pleasures.

It was thinking of other things than budgets and the small extension of the suffrage, or even of the Eastern question.

It was thinking more of steamships and stock speculations and great financial operations, of theatres, of operas, of new novels, even of ritualistic observances in the churches, than of the details of government in peaceful times, or the fireworks of the great magician who had by arts and management dethroned a greater and wiser man than himself.

Although Mr. Gladstone was only occasionally seen, after his retirement, in the House of Commons, it must not be supposed that his political influence was dead.

When anything of special interest was to be discussed, he was ready as before with his voice and vote.

Such a measure as the bill to regulate public worship--aimed at suppressing ritualism--aroused his ecclesiastical interest, and he was voluminous upon it, both in and out of Parliament.

Even when he was absent from his seat, his influence remained, and in all probability the new leader of the Liberals, Lord Hartington, took counsel from him.

He was simply taking a rest before he should gird on anew his armor, and resume the government of the country.

Meantime, his great rival Disraeli led his party with consummate skill.

He was a perfect master of tactics, wary, vigilant, courteous, good-natured, seizing every opportunity to gain a party triumph.

He was also judicious in his selection of ministers, nor did he attempt to lord it over them.

He showed extraordinary tact in everything, and in nothing more than in giving a new title to the Queen as Empress of India.

But no measures of engrossing interest were adopted during his administration.

He was content to be a ruler rather than a reformer.

He was careful to nurse his popularity, and make no parliamentary mistakes.

At the end of two years, however, his labors and cares told seriously on his health.

He had been in Parliament since 1837; he was seventy-one years of age, and he found it expedient to accept the gracious favor of his sovereign, and to retire to the House of Lords, with the title of Earl of Beaconsfield, yet retaining the office of prime minister.

During the five years that Mr. Gladstone remained in retirement, he was by no means idle, or a silent spectator of political events.

He was indefatigable with his pen, and ever ready with speeches for the platform and with addresses to public bodies.

During this period three new Reviews were successfuly started,--the "Fortnightly," the "Contemporary," and the "Nineteenth Century,"--to all of which he was a frequent contributor, on a great variety of subjects.

His articles were marked by characteristic learning and ability, and vastly increased his literary reputation.

I doubt, however, if they will be much noticed by posterity.

Nothing is more ephemeral than periodical essays, unless marked by extraordinary power both in style and matter, like the essays of Macaulay and Carlyle.

Gladstone's articles would make the fortune of ordinary writers, but they do not stand out, as we should naturally expect, as brilliant masterpieces, which everybody reads and glows while reading them.

Indeed, most persons find them rather dry, whether from the subject or the style I will not undertake to say.

But a great man cannot be uniformly great or even always interesting.

How few men at seventy will give themselves the trouble to write at all, when there is no necessity, just to relieve their own minds, or to instruct without adequate reward!

Michael Angelo labored till eighty-seven, and Titian till over ninety; but they were artists who worked from the love of art, restless without new creations.

Perhaps it might also be said of Gladstone that he wrote because he could not help writing, since he knew almost everything worth knowing, and was fond of telling what he knew.

At length Mr. Gladstone emerged again from retirement, to assume the helm of State.

When he left office in 1875, he had bequeathed a surplus to the treasury of nearly six millions; but this, besides the accumulation of over five millions more, had been spent in profitless and unnecessary wars.

In 1876 a revolt against Turkish rule broke out in Bulgaria, and was suppressed with truly Turkish bloodthirstiness and outrage.

"The Bulgarian atrocities" became a theme of discussion throughout Europe; and in England, while Disraeli and his government made light of them, Gladstone was aroused to all his old-time vigor by his humanitarian indignation.

Says Russell: "He made the most impassioned speeches, often in the open air; he published pamphlets, which rushed into incredible circulations; he poured letter after letter into the newspapers; he darkened the sky with controversial post-cards;

and, as soon as Parliament met, he was ready with all his unequalled resources of eloquence, argumentation, and inconvenient inquiry, to drive home his great indictment against the Turkish government and its friends and champions in the House of Commons."

Four years of this vigorous bombardment, which included in its objects the whole range of Disraeli's "brilliant foreign policy" of threat and bluster, produced its effect, A popular song of the day gave a nickname to this policy:-- "We don't want to fight, but, by Jingo, if we do, We've got the ships, we've got the men, we've got the money, too."

And _Jingoism_ became in the mouths of the Liberals a keen weapon of satire.

The government gained the applause of aristocrats and populace, but lost that of the plain people.

The ninth Victorian Parliament was dying out, and a new election was at hand.

Mr. Gladstone, now at the age of seventy, went to Edinburgh, the centre of Scottish conservatism, and in several masterly and memorable speeches, showing that his natural vigor of mind and body had not abated, he exposed the mistakes and shortcomings of the existing government and presented the boons which a new Liberal ministry were prepared to give.

And when in 1880 the dissolution of Parliament took place, he again went to Scotland and offered himself for the county of Edinburgh, or Midlothian, making a series of astonishing speeches, and was returned as its representative.

The general elections throughout the kingdom showed that the tide had again turned.

There was an immense Liberal gain.

The Earl of Beaconsfield placed his resignation in the hands of the Queen, and Gladstone was sent for,--once more to be prime minister of England.

And here I bring to a close this imperfect notice of one of the greatest men of modern times,--hardly for lack of sufficient material, but because it is hard to find a proper perspective in viewing matters which are still the subject of heated contest and turmoil.

Once again Gladstone was seated on the summit of power, and with every prospect of a long-continued reign.

Although an old man, his vigor of mind and body had not abated.

He was never stronger, apparently, than when he was past seventy years of age.

At no previous period of his life was his fame so extended or his moral influence so great.

Certainly no man in England was more revered than he or more richly deserved his honors.

He entered upon his second premiership with the veneration of the intelligent and liberal-minded patriots of the realm, and great things were expected from so progressive and lofty a minister.

The welfare of the country it was undoubtedly his desire and ambition to promote.

But his second administration was not successful.

Had the aged premier been content to steer his ship of State in placid waters, nothing would have been wanting to gratify moderate desires.

It was not, however, inglorious repose he sought, but to confer a boon for which all future ages would honor his memory.

That boon was seemingly beyond his power.

The nation was not prepared to follow him in his plans for Irish betterment.

Indeed, he aroused English opposition by his proposed changes of land-tenure in Ireland, and Irish anger by attempted coercion in suppressing crime and disorder.

This, and the unfortunate policy of his government in Egypt, brought him to parliamentary defeat; and he retired in June, 1885, declining at the same time the honor of an earldom proffered by the Queen.

The ministry was wrecked on the rock which has proved so dangerous to all British political navigators for a hundred years.

No human genius seems capable of solving the Irish question.

It is apparently no nearer solution than it was in the days of William Pitt.

In attempts to solve the problem, Mr. Gladstone found himself opposed by the aristocracy, by the Church, by the army, by men of letters, by men of wealth throughout the country.

Lord Salisbury succeeded him; but only for a few months, and in January, 1886, Mr. Gladstone was for the third time called to the premiership.

He now advanced a step, and proposed the startling policy of Home Rule for Ireland in matters distinctly Irish; but his following would not hold together on the issue, and in June he retired again.

From then until 1891 he was not in office, but he was indefatigably working with voice and pen for the Irish cause.

He made in his retirement many converts to his opinions, and was again elevated to power on the Irish question as an issue in 1891. Yet the English on the whole seem to be against him in his Irish policy, which is denounced as unpractical, and which his opponents even declare to be on his part an insincere policy, entered upon and pursued solely as a bid for power.

It is generally felt among the upper classes that no concession and no boons would satisfy the Irish short of virtual independence of British rule.

If political rights could be separated from political power there might be more hope of settling the difficulty, which looks like a conflict between justice and wisdom.

The sympathy of Americans is mostly on the side of the "grand old man" in his Herculean task, even while they admit that self-government in our own large cities is a dismal failure from the balance of power which is held by foreigners,--by the Irish in the East, and by the Germans in the West.

And those who see the rapid growth of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States, especially in those sections of the country where Puritanism once had complete sway, and the immense political power wielded by Roman Catholic priests, can understand why the conservative classes of England are opposed to the recognition of the political rights of a people who might unite with socialists and radicals in overturning the institutions on which the glory and prospects of a great nation are believed to be based.

The Catholics in Ireland constitute about seven-eighths of the population, and English Protestants fear to deliver the thrifty Protestant minority into the hands of the great majority armed with the tyrannical possibilities of Home Rule.

It is indeed a many-sided and difficult problem.

There are instincts in nations, as among individuals, which reason fails to overcome, even as there are some subjects in reference to which experience is a safer guide than genius or logic.

Little by little, however, at each succeeding election the Liberal party gained strength, not only in Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, but even in England also, and their power in Parliament increased; until, in 1893, after a long and memorable contest, the Commons passed Mr. Gladstone's Home Rule bill by a pronounced majority.

Then it was thrown out by the Lords, with very brief consideration.

This, and other overrulings of the Lower House by the Peers, aroused deep feeling throughout the nation.

In March, 1894, the venerable Gladstone, whose impaired hearing and sight warned him that a man of eighty-five--even though a giant--should no longer bear the burdens of empire, retired from the premiership, his last speech being a solemn intimation of the issues that must soon arise if the House of Lords persisted in obstructing the will of the people, as expressed in the acts of their immediate representatives in the House of Commons.

But, whatever the outcome of the Irish question, the claim of William Ewart Gladstone to a high rank among the ruling statesmen of Modern Europe cannot be gainsaid.

Moreover, as his influence has been so forceful a part of the great onward-moving modern current of democratic enlargement,--and in Great Britain one of its most discreet and potent directors,--his fame is secure; it is unalterably a part of the noblest history of the English people.

[5] [Footnote 5: Mr. Gladstone died May 19, 1898. Perhaps at once the most intimate and comprehensive account of him is "The Story of Gladstone's Life," by Justin McCarthy.

] AUTHORITIES.

There is no exhaustive or satisfactory work on Gladstone which has yet been written.

The reader must confine himself at present to the popular sketches, which are called biographies, of Gladstone, of Disraeli, of Palmerston, of Peel, and other English statesmen.

He may consult with profit the Reviews of the last twenty-five years in reference to English political affairs.

For technical facts one must consult the Annual Register.

The time has not yet come for an impartial review of the great actors in this generation on the political stage of either Europe or America.

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