8 THE NEW TORY REFORM GOVERNMENT. 



will consent to correct an abuse and what reality of grievance must 

 be made apparent before he will undertake to redress it ? 



Shakspeare tells us of one who would not smile " though Nestor 

 swore the jest were laughable." There are some men, likewise, 

 proof against proof; who would not see an old abuse any more than 

 they would recognize an old friend who would not redress a real 

 grievance lest they might encourage imposition. This scepticism 

 comes of making people beggars of justice, which they should de- 

 mand as a right. The pressure from without will abate when its 

 cause is removed, and not till then. It is useless to complain that 

 the people will insist on having a voice in their own government. It 

 is a hard case, perhaps, but it will be so. The men of Middlesex, 

 we are told by the Standard, are " animals :" and we suppose 

 the same may be said of the men of all other counties ; but they are 

 ruminating animals; and sometimes, while they chew the cud of 

 politics, they cannot be made to understand why John Bull should 

 not be the best judge of what is good for himself. The estimation in 

 which the Tories, through their organs, hold the people of England 

 is the best clue to the perfect understanding of their policy and prac- 

 tice in governing them. 



It might have been expected from a prime minister of the crown, 

 taking office, as he himself confesses, tc in a crisis of great difficulty," 

 (there was a crisis, after all, it seems), chat we should have been 

 favoured with something more than a mere exposition of general 

 principles, " necessarily vague ;" it was the more desirable, since, in 

 that case, we should have been saved the trouble of shewing that de- 

 clarations of general principles are by no means the best guarantees 

 that particular measures will arise out of them. The most reckless 

 profligate may subscribe to the truth and justice of a moral axiom ; 

 but it is not thence to be inferred that he purposes forthwith to 

 " purge, live cleanly, and like a gentleman." Sir Robert Peel, in 

 this difficult crisis, was bound to have furnished us with some not 

 necessarily vague but intelligibly precise pledges of specific mea- 

 sures now loudly called for by the country measures, without which 

 the country will not rest satisfied, measures that must not be post- 

 poned, and cannot be evaded. Let us see with what success Sir Ro- 

 bert Peel has endeavoured to apply his declaration of general prin- 

 ciples, " practically to some of those questions which, of late, at- 

 tracted the greatest share of public interest and attention." 



