IS86 HOME RULE 



133 



Casalini, W. Bournemouth, March 21, 1886. 



Dear Mr. Grey — I am as much opposed to the Home Rule 

 scheme as any one can possibly be, and if I were a political man 

 I would fight against it as long as I had any breath left in me; 

 but I have carefully kept out of the political field all my life, 

 and it is too late for me now to think of entering it. 



Anxious watching of the course of affairs for many years 

 past has persuaded me that nothing short of some sharp and 

 sweeping national misfortune will convince the majority of our 

 countrymen that government by average opinion is merely a 

 circuitous method of going to the devil ; and that those who 

 profess to lead but in fact slavishly follow this average opinion 

 are simply the fastest runners and the loudest squeakers of the 

 herd which is rushing blindly down to its destruction. 



It is the electorate, and especially the Liberal electorate, 

 which is responsible for the present state of things. It has no 

 political education. It knows well enough that 2 and 2 won't 

 make 5 in a ledger, and that sentimental stealing in private life 

 is not to be tolerated ; but it has not been taught the great lesson 

 in history that there are like verities in national life, and hence 

 it easily falls a prey to any clever and copious fallacy-monger 

 who appeals to its great heart instead of reminding it of its weak 

 head. 



Politicians have gone on flattering and cajoling this chaos 

 of political incompetence until the just penalty of believing 

 their own fictions has befallen them, and the average member of 

 Parliament is conscientiously convinced that it is his duty, not 

 to act for his constituents to the best of his judgment, but to do 

 exactly what they, or rather the small minority which drives 

 them, tells him to do. 



Have we a real statesman? a man of the calibre of Pitt or 

 Burke, to say nothing of Strafford or Pym, who will stand up 

 and tell his countrymen that this disruption of the union is 

 nothing but a cowardly wickedness — an act bad in itself, fraught 

 with immeasurable evil — especially to the people of Ireland; 

 and that if it cost his political existence, or his head, for that 

 matter, he is prepared to take any and every honest means of 

 preventing the mischief? 



I see no sign of any. And if such a man should come to the 

 front what chance is there of his receiving loyal and continuous 

 support from a majority of the House of Commons? I see no 

 sign of any. 



There was a time when the political madness of one party 



