Mr. Gladstone's career will be the wonder of other generations, as it
has been the astonishment of this. Mr. Morley's monumental "Life" of
him will long be remembered as the greatest of all contributions to the
education of the British politician. It is a life of Parliament as well
as of a person. Those who remember how Carpenter's "Political Text Book"
was welcomed will know how much more this will be valued.
Never before was a biography founded on material so colossal. Only
one man was thought capable of dealing with a subject so vast and
complicated. Great expectations were entertained, and were fulfilled in
a measure which exceeded every anticipation. The task demanded a vaster
range of knowledge than was ever before required of a biographer.
Classic passages, not capable of being construed by the general reader,
are translated, so that interest is never diverted nor baffled by
flashes of learned darkness. When cardinal and unusual terms are used,
which might be dubiously interpreted, definitions are given which have
both delight and instruction. He who collects them from Mr. Morley's
pages would possess a little dictionary of priceless guidance. A noble
action or a just idea is recognised, whoever may manifest it Some
persons, as Mr. Gladstone said of Kinglake's famous book, "were too
bad to live and too good to die." Nevertheless, their excellence, where
discernible, has its place in this biographical mosaic Thus unexpected
pieces of human thought emerge in the careers of the historic figures
who pass before the reader, by which he becomes richer as he proceeds
from page to page. Illuminating similes abound which do not leave
the memory--such fitness is there in them. Historic questions which
interested those who lived through them, are made clear, by facts
unknown or unregarded then. Men whom many readers detested in their day
are discovered to have some noble feature of character, unrevealed to
the public before. Mr. Morley is a master of character--a creator of
fame by his discernment, discrimination, impartiality, and generosity to
adversaries, from which the reader learns charity and wisdom as he goes
along. Knowledge of public life, law, and government, come as part of
the charm of the incidents related. Memorable phrases, unexpected terms
of expression, like flashes of radium, gleam in every chapter. The
narrative is as interesting as the adventures of Gil Bias--so full is
it of wisdom, wonder, and variety. From all the highways, byways, and
broadways of the great subject, the reader never loses sight of Mr.
Gladstone. All paths lead to him. Like Bunyan's Pilgrim, the biographer
goes on his shining way, guiding the reader to the shrine of the hero of
the marvellous story. Mr. Gladstone moves through Mr. Morley's pages as
a king--as he did among men. He sometimes fell into errors, as noble men
have done in every age, but there was never any error in his purpose. He
always meant justly, and did not hesitate to give us new and ennobling
estimates of hated men. His sense of justice diffused, as it were, a
halo around him. Mr. Morley's pages give us the natural history of a
political mind of unusual range and power which was without a compeer.
As Mr. Gladstone began, he advanced, listening to everybody, to use one
of Mr. Morley's commanding lines: "He was flexible, persistent, clear,
practical, fervid, unconquerable."
In "Vivian Grey," Disraeli foreshadowed his bright and vengeful career.
In the same way, Mr. Gladstone wrote the whole spirit of his life in
his first address to the electors of Newark. His career is in that
manifesto, which has never been reprinted. The reader will be interested
in seeing it Here it is:--
To the Worthy and Independent Electors of the Borough of Newark.
"Gentlemen,--Having now completed my canvass, I think it my duty as well
to remind you of the principles on which I have solicited your votes as
freely to assure my friends that its result has placed my success beyond
a doubt. I have not requested your favour on the ground of adherence
to the opinions of any man or party, further than such adherence can be
fairly understood from the conviction that I have not hesitated to avow
that we must watch and resist that uninquiring and un-discriminating
desire for change amongst us, which threatens to produce, along with
partial good, a melancholy preponderance of mischief, which I am
persuaded would aggravate beyond computation the deep-seated evils of
our social state, and the heavy burthens of our industrial classes;
which, by disturbing our peace, destroys confidence and strikes at
the root of prosperity. This it has done already, and this we must,
therefore, believe it will do.
"For a mitigation of these evils we must, I think, look not only
to particular measures, but to the restoration of sounder general
principles--I mean especially that principle on which alone the
incorporation of Religion with the State in our constitution can be
defended; that the duties of governors are strictly and peculiarly
religious, and that legislatures, like individuals, are bound to
carry throughout their acts the spirit of the high truths they have
acknowledged. Principles are now arrayed against our institutions, and
not by truckling nor by temporising, not by oppression nor corruption,
but by principles they must be met. Among their first results should be
sedulous and especial attention to the interests of the poor, founded
upon the rule that those who are the least able to take care of
themselves ought to be most regarded by others. Particularly it is
a duty to endeavour by every means that labour may receive adequate
remuneration, which unhappily, among several classes of our
fellow-countrymen, is not now the case. Whatever measures, therefore,
whether by the correction of the Poor Laws, allotment of cottage
grounds, or otherwise, tend to promote this object, I deem entitled to
the warmest support, with all such as are calculated to secure sound
moral conduct in any class of society.
"I proceed to the momentous question of slavery, which I have found
entertained among you in that candid and temperate spirit which alone
befits its nature, or promises to remove its difficulties. If I have not
recognised the right of an irresponsible Society to interpose between
me and the electors, it has not been from any disrespect to its members,
nor from any unwillingness to answer their or any other questions
on which the electors may desire to know my views. To the esteemed
secretary of the Society I submitted my reasons for silence, and I made
a point of stating those views to him in his character of a voter.
"As regards the abstract lawfulness of slavery, I acknowledge it simply
as importing the right of one man to the labour of another; and I rest
upon the fact that Scripture--paramount authority on such a point--gives
directions to persons standing in the relation of master to slave for
their conduct in that relation; whereas, were the matter absolutely and
necessarily sinful, it would not regulate the manner. Assuming sin is
the cause of degradation, it strives, and strives most effectually, to
cure the latter by extirpating the former. We are agreed that both
the physical and moral bondage of the slave are to be abolished. The
question is as to the order and the order only; now Scripture attacks
the moral evil before the temporal one, and the temporal through
the moral one, and I am content with the order which Scripture has
established.
"To this end I desire to see immediately set on foot, by impartial and
sovereign authority, an universal and efficient system of Christian
instruction, not intended to resist designs of individual piety
and wisdom for the religious improvement of the negroes, but to do
thoroughly what they can only do partially. As regards immediate
emancipation, whether with or without compensation, there are several
minor reasons against it, but that which weighs most with me is, that
it would, I much fear, exchange the evils now affecting the negro for
others which are weightier--for a relapse into deeper debasement, if not
for bloodshed and internal war.* Let fitness be made the condition of
emancipation, and let us strive to bring him to that fitness by the
shortest possible course. Let him enjoy the means of earning his freedom
through honest and industrious habits, thus the same instruments which
attain his liberty shall likewise render him competent to use it; and
thus, I earnestly trust, without risk of blood, without violation of
property, with unimpaired benefit to the negro and with the utmost speed
which prudence will admit, we shall arrive at the exceedingly desirable
consummation, the utter extinction of slavery.
* Isaiah could not have prophesied more definitely. Friends
of the slaves stoutly denied that the Scriptures sanctioned
their bondage. They were afraid the fact would go against
Christianity. It was true nevertheless, and the American
preachers pleaded this for their opposition and supineness
towards abolition.
"And now, gentlemen, as regards the enthusiasm with which you have
rallied round your ancient flag, and welcomed the humble representative
of those principles whose emblem it is, I trust that neither the lapse
of time nor the seductions of prosperity can ever efface it from my
memory. To my opponents my acknowledgments are due for the good humour
and kindness with which they have received me, and while I would thank
my friends for their zealous and unwearied exertions in my favour, I
briefly but emphatically assure them that if promises be an adequate
foundation of confidence, or experience a reasonable ground of
calculation, our victory is sure. I have the honour to be, gentlemen,
your obliged and obedient servant,
"W. E. Gladstone.
"Clinton Arms, Newark, Tuesday, Oct, 9, 1832."
The sincerity, the intrepidity, the sympathy with those who labour, the
candour of statement, the openness of mind, the sentiments of piety
and freedom (so rarely combined) of his life, are all there. His whole
career is but a magnificent enlargement of that address. I have lingered
before the hotel in the market-place, where he stayed and from which he
made speeches to the electors. There is no one living in Newark now who
heard them. Byron lived in the same hotel when he came to Newark with
his early poems, which he had printed at a shop still standing in the
market-place. The township is enlarged, but otherwise unchanged as the
Conservatism he then represented. I have thrice walked through all
the streets along which he passed, for he visited the house of every
elector. What a splendid canvasser he must have been, with his handsome
face, his courtesy, his deference, his charm of speech, and infinite
readiness of explanation!
I first saw him in the old House of Commons in 1842. Mr. Roebuck had
presented a petition from me that sitting, and I remained to witness
subsequent proceedings. I only remember one figure, seemingly a
young-looking man, tall, pallid-faced, with dark hair, who stood well
out in the mid-space between the Ministerial benches and the table, and
spoke with the fluency and freedom of a master of his subject Every one
appeared to pay him attention. I was told the speaker was Mr. Gladstone.
When he visited the Tyne in 1862, I did not need to be told his name. At
that time I was connected with the _Newcastle Chronicle_, and it fell
to me to write the leaders on Mr. Gladstone. The miners were told, when
they came up from the pits on that day, they would see a sight new
in England, which they might not soon see again--a Chancellor of the
Exchequer who was known to have a conscience. Other holders of the same
office may have had that commodity about them, but not employing it in
public affairs, its existence had not been observed. The penny paper
which gave the miners that information, we told them would not exist but
for Mr. Gladstone. Thousands of miners came up from the pits of Durham
and Northumberland, and great numbers succeeded in shaking hands with
Mr. Gladstone as he approached the _Harry Clasper_, named after the
well-known oarsman of the Tyne, who was on the river with Bob Chambers,
who had won a hundred contests. Clasper and Chambers were always
named together. Men swam before Mr. Gladstone's vessel a considerable
distance, as though they were the water gods of the Tyne, preparing the
way for their distinguished and unwonted visitor. And what a journey
it was! Twenty-two miles of banks, counting both sides, were lined with
people. The works upon the Tyneside, with their grim piles high in
the air, crowned with clouds of blackest smoke, out of which forks of
sulphurous flames darted, revealing hundreds of persons surmounting
roofs and pinnacles, cheering in ringing tones, above, while cannon
boomed at their feet below. Amid it all you could see everywhere women
holding up their children to see the great Chancellor of the Exchequer
go by. The Tyne has seen no other sight like this.
It was of this visit that I first wrote to Mr. Gladstone. The
arrangements for his wonderful reception were the work of Mr. Joseph
Cowen, jun. His father was Chief Commissioner for the Tyne--in person
taller than Mr. Gladstone, with a gift of speech which sincerity made
eloquent. His son, who had organised the reception, never came in sight
of Mr. Gladstone from first to last. As I knew Mr. Gladstone liked
to know what was below the surface as well as upon it, I sent him two
informing notes.
"Going to and fro in the land "--not with inquisitive malice as a
certain sojourner mentioned in Job is reputed to have done--on lecturing
purpose bent, sometimes on political missions, I knew the state and
nature of opinion in many places. The soul and Liberalism of the country
was Nonconformist and religious. Many in Parliament thought that London
newspapers, published mainly for sale, and which furnished ideas for
music-hall politicians--represented English opinion at large. At times
I wrote to members of Parliament that this was not so. Mr. Walter James
(since Lord Northbourne) was one who showed my reports to Mr. Gladstone.
One day in 1877 Mr. Gladstone sent me a postcard, inviting me to
breakfast with him. He was as open in his friendship as in his politics.
In all things he was prepared to dare the judgment of adversaries.
Incidentally I mentioned the invitation to two persons only, but next
day a passage appeared in a newspaper--much read in the House of Commons
at that time--to the effect that Mr. Gladstone was inviting unusual
persons to his house, who might be useful to him in his campaign on the
Eastern question, so anxious was he to obtain partisan support in the
agitation in which he was engaged. There was no truth whatever in this,
as Mr. Gladstone never referred to the subject, nor any of his guests.
But I took care at that time not to mention again an invitation lest it
should occasion inconvenience to my host. The visit to the Tyne had some
picturesque incidents. By happy accident, or it might be from thoughtful
design, Mrs. Gladstone wore an Indian shawl having a circle in the
centre, by which she was distinguishable. Every person whom thousands
come out to see, should have some individual mark of dress, and should
never be surrounded by friends, when recognition is impossible and
disappointing to the crowd.
At Middlesboro', Mrs. Gladstone was taken to see molten metal poured
into moulds. I knew the ways of a foundry, and that if the mould
happened to be damp, a shower of the liquid iron would fall upon those
near. The gentlemen around her seemed to think it an act of freedom to
warn her of her danger, so I stepped up to her and told her of the risk
she ran. She said in after years, that if I did not save her life, I
saved her from great possible discomfort.
Middlesboro* was then in a state of volcanic chaos. Mr. Gladstone
predicted that it would become what it is now, a splendid town. It was
in the grey of a murky evening, when blast furnaces were flaming
around him, that Mr. Gladstone began in a small office--the only place
available--a wonderful comparison between Oxford and the scene outside.
Alas! the dull-minded town clerk stopped him, saying that they wished
him to make his speech in the evening--not knowing that Mr. Gladstone
had twenty speeches in him at any time. The evening came, but the great
inspiration returned no more.
The night before he had spoken in Newcastle, when he made the
long-remembered declaration on the war then raging in America, the
reporter of the Electric Telegraph Company had fallen ill, and Mr.
Cowen asked me to take his place. It is easier to report Mr. Gladstone
verbatim than to summarise his speech as he proceeded on his rapid,
animated, and unhesitating way. So I condensed the famous passage in
these words: "Jefferson Davis had not only made a navy, he had made a
nation (Sensation)." The word was too strong. There was no "sensation;"
there was only a general movement as of unexpectedness, and "surprise"
would have been a more appropriate word; but it did not come to me at
the moment, and there was no time to wait for it, and the "sensational"
sentence was all over London before the speech was ended. The next night
he recurred to the subject at Middlesboro' with qualifications, but the
Press took no notice of them. The "sensation" appended to the sentence
had set political commentators on fire.
A notable speech was made by the Mayor of Middlesboro'. In presenting
addresses to Mr. Gladstone, local magnates complimented him upon his
distinction in Greek, which none of them were competent to appraise. The
Mayor of Middlesboro', an honest, stalwart gentleman, said simply, "Mr.
Gladstone, if I could speak as well as you can speak, I should be able
to tell you how proud we are to have you among us." No speech made to
him was more effective or relevant, or pleased him more.
By the courtesy of Mr. Bright, who procured me a seat in the Speaker's
gallery when there was only one to be had, I heard Mr. Gladstone
deliver, at midnight, his famous peroration, when, with uplifted hand,
he said, "Time is on our side."
I remember the night well. The Duke of Argyll came into the gallery,
where he stood four or five hours. I would gladly have given him my
seat, but if I did so I must relinquish hearing the debate, as I must
have left the gallery, as no stranger is permitted to stand. So I
thought it prudent to respect the privileges of the peerage--and keep my
seat.
In the years when I was constantly in the House of Commons, I was one
day walking through the tunnel-like passage which leads from Downing
Street into the Park, I saw a pair of gleaming eyes approaching me. The
passage was so dark I saw nothing else. As the figure passed me I saw
it was Mr. Gladstone. On returning to "The House," as Parliament is
familiarly called, I mentioned what I had seen to Mr. Vargus, who had
sat at the Treasury door for fifty years. "Yes," he answered, "there
have been no eyes enter this House like Mr. Gladstone's since the days
of Canning."
Yet those eyes of meteoric intensity so lacked quick perception that he
would pass by members of his party in the Lobby of Parliament without
accosting them, fearing to do so when he desired it, lest he should
mistake their identity and set up party misconceptions. Mr. Gladstone
ignored persons because he did not see them. It should not have been
left to Sir E. Hamilton to make this known after Mr. Gladstone's death.
The fact should have been disclosed fifty years before.
To disappointed members with whom I came in contact, I used to explain
that Mr. Gladstones apparent slightingness was owing to preoccupation.
He would often enter the House absorbed by an impending speech--which
was true--and thought more of serving his country than of conciliating
partisans. Lord Palmerston was wiser in his generation, who knew his
followers would forgive him betraying public interest, if he paid
attention to them.