11(> PUBLIC OPINION. 



where popular interference must assume the place of deliberative 

 wisdom ; and it requires no slight amount of political sagacity to in- 

 dicate where prerogative shall step in, and say to popular ex- 

 pectation, " Here shalt thou go, and no farther." Are we far from 

 the time when authority and public opinion will come into collision, 

 if the language of party is to represent its actual state of feeling? 

 and has this party considered well the means then to be adopted ? 

 We fear not and therefore we urge them to be cautious. 



It is here we are at issue with several members of the Melbourne 

 Cabinet : these gentlemen would have shown their wisdom by re- 

 peating simply the statement made by their political chief. In place 

 of doing so, they have gone about making the most extravagant pro- 

 fessions and boasting, not so much of what they have done, as of 

 what they intended doing and winding up their rhodomontade by 

 hinting at obstacles and impediments in high quarters. Are men fit 

 to be the ministers of an hereditary king, who in one breath disclaim 

 all idea of disputing the monarch's prerogative, and in the next de- 

 clare that such prerogative was given by the people, and ought to 

 be exercised in the way that any particular section of the people may 

 think proper ? We say not and were they in power, they would 

 again, as they have before done, lose public confidence. 



It is vexatious to hear men who ought to know better talk as they 

 do they are echoing each other, with people prerogative men 

 and measures measures, not men; and what are these but mere 

 cuckoo cries? How is it that at this particular juncture neither 

 party takes its stand on the high ground of political expediency and, 

 in place of making themselves hoarse by bellowing to their followers 

 Church and King the people and Reform inquire into the pro- 

 bable course of events, and from this form a judgment ? Tory, 

 Whig, and Radical, fill the mouths of all the political wranglers ot 

 the day, and act as complete extinguishers upon common sense. 



Public attention is thus withdrawn from the vital measures at 

 issue ; and it is amused with high-sounding phrases of real Reform 

 and sham Reform of Reform from the hands of true or old Re- 

 formers and Reform from the. bands of new or false Reformers. In 

 point of fact, and in so far as the interests of society are concerned, 

 it does not signify which of these parties gives Reforms, provided 

 they are Reforms but neither extreme party can give them. They 

 are now placed in such a position with regard to each other, that 



