386 History of the English Landed Interest. 



whicli should have been amicably distributed between them 

 according to the altering exigences of the times. 



It is not, however, to be supposed that the records of un- 

 published Parliamentary debates will as yet furnish us witi 

 information on this subject. The House of Commons was ir 

 that intermediate stage, when, just having freed itself from 

 Court influences, it was struggling as far as possible to keej 

 independent of popular control. No outside circle of non- 

 voters, like that about the earlier gatherings of the Witena- 

 gemot, sought by noisy approval or dissent to guide its cours( 

 of action. Garbled versions of its debates alone penetrated th( 

 people's ears, and members were seldom called to account 01 

 the few occasions when it was necessary for them to mee' 

 their constituents. For many years, therefore, the controversy 

 between trader and squire was not heard within the precincts 

 of Westminster, but was confined to ominous growls whicl 

 broke out in various congested centres of the counties. 



The origin of the Radical Party is wrapped in obscurity 

 In the contests between the Royalists and the Parliamentarian! 

 of the seventeenth century we find an acute phase of that in 

 evitable collision which occurs from time to time in every com 

 munity between the authority of government and the freedon 

 of the individual. The principles of popular rights swayed th( 

 Roundhead, those of personal power the Royalist ; and th( 

 same sentiments afterwards drove the Whig into one camp 

 and the Tory into the other. Then ensued a very curious 

 period in the history of political strife. The Tory still clun^ 

 to his predilections in favour of divine right, the Whig to thos( 

 in favour of popular right ; but there was a king who trustee 

 for the safety of his crown to the popular party, and { 

 Government which maintained its existence and power b] 

 opposing the worshippers of established authority. The Whig; 

 in order to keep out the Stuarts upheld the prerogative of th( 

 Crown, and the Tories, in order to promote the cause of ai 

 exiled king, posed as popular champions. 



Before even the close of the second George's reign, a sectioi 

 of the Whigs, animated by hatred for their leader Walpole 

 had made overtures for political union with the Tories. A 



