as the declaration of the Cabinet, that they are resolved to
maintain the neutrality and independence of Belgium, I accept
it as a wise and spirited policy, and a policy, in my opinion,
not the less wise because it is spirited.
Gladstone then replied, saying that the reason the Government had not
made a general declaration of its intentions regarding Belgium was that
much danger might arise from such a declaration and that inadvertently
they might have given utterance to words
that might be held to import obligations almost unlimited and
almost irrespectively of circumstances.
We had made up our minds, he continued, that we had a duty to perform,
and we thought a specific declaration of what we thought the obligations
of this country better than any general declaration. Referring to the
two treaties in process of ratification, he concluded:
We thought that by contracting a joint engagement we might
remove the difficulty and prevent Belgium from being
sacrificed.
The policy of the Government continued, however, to be criticised,
mainly on the ground that the Treaty of 1839 amply covered the case. On
Aug. 10 Gladstone defended his policy in the House of Commons in a
speech pitched on a high moral plane, in which he dilated upon Belgium's
historic past and splendid present and on Great Britain's duty to this
little nation irrespective of all questions of its own self-interest.
With genuine fervor, he exclaimed:
If, in order to satisfy a greedy appetite for aggrandisement,
coming whence it may, Belgium were absorbed, the day that
witnessed that absorption would hear the knell of public right
and public law in Europe.... We have an interest in the
independence of Belgium which is wider than that which we may
have in the literal operation of the guarantee. It is found in
answer to the question whether under the circumstance of the
case this country, endowed as it is with influence and power,
would quietly stand by and witness the perpetration of the
direst crime that ever stained the pages of history, and thus
become participators in the sin.
What Gladstone Had in Mind.
What Gladstone had in mind was the scheme of 1866-7, by which France was
to absorb Belgium, with Prussia's consent and aid. He distinctly stated
that the Treaties of 1870 were devised to meet the new state of affairs
disclosed by the publication of this incomplete treaty. It was in order
to prevent the revival of such a conspiracy that Gladstone made separate
and identical treaties in 1870 with France and Prussia. They were a
practical device to secure an effectual enforcement of the Treaty of
1839 under unforeseen and difficult circumstances. The agreement of 1870
was, as Gladstone said, a cumulative treaty added to that of 1839, and
the latter treaty
loses nothing of its force, even during the existence of this
present treaty.
During the course of this speech defending the Government's action
against those critics who claimed that the Treaty of 1839 adequately met
the situation, Gladstone made some general remarks about the extent of
the obligation incurred by the signatories to the Treaty of 1839:
It is not necessary, nor would time permit me, to enter into
the complicated question of the nature of the obligations of
that treaty, but I am not able to subscribe to the doctrine of
those who have held in this House what plainly amounts to an
assertion that the simple fact of the existence of a guarantee
is binding on every party to it, irrespectively altogether of
the particular position in which it may find itself at the
time when the occasion for acting on the guarantee arises.
It is, of course, impossible to state precisely what were those
unuttered thoughts that passed through Gladstone's mind as he spoke
these characteristically cautious words, but what in general they were
can be satisfactorily gleaned from a letter that he had written six days
before this to John Bright:
That we should simply declare _we_ will defend the neutrality
of Belgium by arms in case it should be attacked. Now, the
sole or single-handed defense of Belgium would be an
enterprise which we incline to think quixotic; if these two
great military powers [France and Prussia] combined against
it--that combination is the only serious danger; and this it
is which by our proposed engagements we should, I hope, render
improbable to the very last degree. I add for myself this
confession of faith: If the Belgian people desire, on their
own account, to join France or any other country, I for one
will be no party to taking up arms to prevent it. But that the
Belgians, whether they would or not, should go "plump" down
the maw of another country to satisfy dynastic greed is
another matter. The accomplishment of such a crime as this
implies would come near to an extinction of public right in
Europe, and I do not think we could look on while the
sacrifice of freedom and independence was in course of
consummation.