

574 The New Ministry. [JUNE, 



arrangements, as to which side the Whigs ought to take, Mr. Peel's own 

 speech, on the first night when the House assembled, must have put an 

 end to it." The confidence in Mr. Canning's " liberal" intentions, which 

 compels you the Tories to go out, must make it our duty the Whigs 

 to come in. Why have you Mr. Peel and Lord Eldon according to 

 your own account, resigned ? Why, but because you think the very mea- 

 sures certain to be carried under the new government upon which I Sir 

 Francis Burdett have built my faith ? Why, then, what contemptible 

 apologists would the Whigs be for legislators ! what claim could they ever 

 set up again to the character even of sane and reasonable men, far less of 

 statesmen ! if, for the sake of a form, a manner, a ceremony, a degree 

 for the sake of the words in which they have urged their principles they 

 were to abandon those principles themselves ! 



To rest the case entirely upon this last point which is, perhaps, the 

 real one. What asses must men be to say, " Because we cannot get twenty 

 shillings in the pound for the debt (as we consider it) due to the country, 

 therefore we will give up our claim entirely." " We cannot get the whole 

 amount at once ; and therefore we will not take fifteen shillings in cash 

 which is tendered to us without prejudice to our recovery (whenever we 

 can get them) of the other five." No ! as we cannot get all, we will have 

 nothing. As we cannot get " Parliamentary Reform," we will give up 

 " Catholic Emancipation." We will suffer the administration of Mr. Can- 

 ning to break down, because he does not agree with us quite in every 

 thing; in order to let in that of Lord Eldon, who coincides with us in 

 nothing! 



This is precisely the condition in which the Whig members who have 

 joined government were placed ; and upon that state of things we are con- 

 tent to take our stand for their entire justification. It is mere nonsense to 

 talk of compelling any set of men, by a reference to words and to words, 

 too, taken in their literal signification and interpretation, which is very 

 often the most unfair mode of reading them that can be adopted to do 

 acts, which would stamp them as ideots, or compromise their trust to the 

 community. If we did put forth an exaggerated or impracticable opinion 

 yesterday why, let it be our offence ; we will not act upon it to-day. 

 The question is not what has any body said but what should be done 

 now for the general advantage. The Whig party, not being able to get 

 the whole of their measures supported, have embraced an opportunity which 

 seems to promise the carrying of the most pressing of them ; and the 

 new government refuses to deal with the cause which it particularly desires 

 to promote in that manner which would be quite certain to ensure its 

 destruction; this is the whole story of the " abandonment of pledge and 

 principle." 



The new administration is not, it is said, to make Catholic Eman- 

 cipation a cabinet question. Why, grant the fact : the other par- 

 ties (as Lord Althorpe very truly observes) did make it a cabinet question 

 " the wrong way." The new ministers are not disposed to bring on the 

 Catholic Question immediately. Surely not; they must be mad if they 

 were : for they know that the policy of the old ministers, aided by the impa- 

 tience and absurdity of the Catholics themselves, has made it utterly impos- 

 sible that the question should be carried immediately. There exists no 

 difference between the opinions which Mr. Canning professed as to the 

 iit mode of treating the Catholic Question three years ago and that which he 



