Influence of Chartism. 
527 
us to understand the sympathy and support which the cause re¬ 
ceived trom a few of the choicest spirits of the age in which it 
occurred. 
INFLUENCE OF CHARTISM. 
When Chartism passed away the Liberal Party fell heir to 
much of its constituency. The effect of this was noticeable in 
the progressive policy soon adopted by that party. It is im¬ 
possible to consider that the influence of Chartism ceased en¬ 
tirely with the year 1848. It fallowed the ground, so to speak, 
for subsequent reforms. One evidence of this is the luxuriant 
growth of newspapers and periodicals and debating clubs of all 
sorts that sprang up for a time advocating every sort of re¬ 
form. Most of these were short-lived, it is true, but they 
evinced the breaking up of traditional lines of thought. There 
was, for example, the penny periodical entitled “ Politics for 
the People ” advocating sanitary reform, extension of parks 
and general municipal reform, education and socialized religion. 
The weekly entitled “ The People ” advertised itself as the ad¬ 
vocate of reform in general, seeking to promote the free and full 
development of the whole human being. To this end it advo¬ 
cated teetotalism, dietetics, and the healing art, phonography, 
phrenology, and reform in theology. As may be seen from such 
an announcement, pretty much every line of thought was shaken 
up at this time. It could scarcely be but that progress would 
result in some of the many directions which inquiry took. 
Those supporters of Chartism who passed into the Liberal 
Party turned the government to the serious consideration of 
economic problems. Another portion aided in the regeneration 
of the English clergy. The Tractarian movement displayed as 
a central thought the yearning to recover for the church its 
leadership and to make it worthy to revive the idea of the 
fatherhood of the church toward its members. The people had 
shown themselves to be like sheep without a shepherd while the 
church primates had, from the seats of the scornful, exercised 
only a negative influence. Another closely allied line of reform, 
the Young England Movement, was toward re-establishing inti¬ 
mate relations between the aristocracy and the common people. 
