But they relied upon the support of men who saw more clearly whither their principles inevitably led. The tale of its consequences is not yet complete. But in the enactment of household suffrage and a fresh disfranchisement of boroughs, enough has happened to show that the extreme followers were right, and the moderate leaders were deceived. The same lesson is repeated in the legislation concerning Dissenters. They were admitted into Parliament by the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, and the opponents of the measure were assured that no danger to the Church was to be feared from their Parliamentary votes. The Dissenters themselves knew better. Since that date their action has been one long and successful campaign against the Church. Similarly, in 1854, the Universities were opened to Dissent, with the assurance that no intention was entertained of severing them from the Church. But in 1871 the latter process was effected, and by the same men, on the distinct ground that such a severance was a necessary consequence of the Act of 1854. We must again repeat, to avoid misapprehension, that in this enumeration we have not the slightest intention of discussing how far these various measures were in themselves good or evil. Our present concern with them is their relation to the theory of political progress their value in answering the question, Whither are we going? And the point which they fairly prove is, that in discussing our future advance in any political direction, the guides whose predictions we are to believe, are not the leaders, but the extremer followers. The leader may sincerely speak his own sentiments, or he may find it convenient to make the promises most likely to disarm opposition and pass the particular measure he has in hand; but he can neither bind his followers in the future, nor are his opinions a sample of what they are likely to hold. It is in its extremes that the fruitful germs of the party of movement reside. There lie the embryo forms and the generating forces of its future life. This has been so in the past, and there is no reason why it should not be so in time to come. The extreme left of yesterday is the hesitating centre of to-day; does it not follow, on the theory of 'progress,' that the extreme left of to-day will be the centre of to-morrow? At all events, if the past is to be trusted, no disclaimers on the part of leaders can in the slightest degree affect the probabilities of the future. If we wish to know the future, for instance, in respect to property, we must enquire-not what they think, for they have to consult the expediency of the moment, but what is thought by the more hardy and independent politicians, who can afford both to think out and to speak out. Now that the old controversies are nearly played out, and malcontents of a new class are bringing into prominence new

topics of dispute, it is of no use trying to forecast our fate by examining the pledges or past opinions of existing leaders. We must rather scrutinise the declarations of those who occupy towards the question of property the same position that was occupied by O'Connell towards the claims of the Irish Catholics, or by Cobbett towards the claims of the English Democrats. By their attitude and their views we may conjecture the true significance and practical import of the 'bit-by-bit' attacks which the present Government occasionally makes upon property. There was very much to be said for the proposals of Sir Robert Peel in 1829, and Lord Grey in 1831: so much, that in this day we are puzzled to understand why those proposals were so stoutly resisted as they were. But, nevertheless, they were steps to the results of 1869 and 1867-results which both Sir Robert Peel and Lord Grey would have regarded with indignation and alarm. Mr. Gladstone may look with similar feelings upon the schemes of the Internationale. But that fact will be small consolation to us if his present little instalments of Socialism lead towards that consummation. To ascertain the likelihood of that contingency we must examine, not his speeches (though they give us some hints), but the declarations of the extremer and bolder theorists on whose support he relies, such as Mr. Mill, and Mr. Odger, and Mr. Harrison.

Writers of this class leave us in no doubt as to their sentiments. The tendency of their proposals varies according to the special antipathies they entertain. Mr. Mill and Mr. Odger are chiefly opposed to the landlord: Mr. Harrison, with his Parisian sympathies, occupies himself mainly with the capitalist. But their conclusion is much the same-that the free possession of individual property is to cease. They arrive at the same end by somewhat different roads. Mr. Odger proposes that all real property-land, houses, and mines-in the country, should be forcibly purchased and held by the State. Mr. Mill's proposal is apparently, but only apparently, more moderate. He would only insist upon the compulsory purchase where the landowner declined to surrender all interest in the future increase of the value of his land. But as the price of land is, and for a long time back has been, regulated, not by its immediate return (which is small), but by the prospect of its growth in value, it is obvious that any one surrendering the prospect of future growth would be surrendering a large part of the price of his land. The two schemes, therefore, are in truth precisely identical in effect. It is needless to dwell on the preposterous character of these propositions from a practical point of view. The State could not find the five thousand million pounds sterling that would be required for such a purchase; and unless its thrift and administrative capacity

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capacity were very marvellously increased (qualities for which republics have not hitherto been remarkable), the financial result of an attempt to manage such an estate would simply be national bankruptcy. Our object in quoting these schemes is, not to refute them, but merely to show that the direction, in which the party of movement,' or 'progress," is advancing, is towards an attack upon individual property. It is the same tendency as that which is so strongly marked in the doctrines of the Internationale. Mr. Harrison's language, though its violence deprives it of precision, points in the same direction. He denounces the selfish, antisocial independence of wealth,' the claim of capital to spend wealth how and where it pleases,' and declares that 'individual property can no longer exist on prevalent conditions.' Similar language is heard from other Liberals not perhaps quite so advanced. Professor Seeley, a divine much honoured by the head of the present Government, speaks, even under the restraints imposed by the neutrality required in a lecture at the Royal Institution, of

'That great monopoly, which the age does not attack but steadfastly maintains, but which none the less helps to increase the mass of discontent and to hasten change-the right of private property itself.'

We have not referred to election addresses; for they can hardly be assumed to represent the deliberate opinions of those who issue them. It is a matter of course that opinions of this kind, endorsed by known political writers, should appear at any hustings where they are likely to be of use. It is satisfactory to find that, so far, the denunciations of the landlords,' which have become a commonplace with the small but savage school of Academical Radicals, have hitherto done more harm than good to the candidates that have employed them. But there is one address, in the nature of an election address, which, on account of the position of its author, may be cited as a sign of the times. Mr. Gladstone's Whitby speech is a very remarkable production. It makes an epoch,' as the French say It has never before happened in the history of this country that a Prime Minister has sought political strength by setting himself and his Government forth, in a speech to a public meeting, as the champions of the poor against the rich. How far he is prepared to go, it would be hazardous to predict. It may be that the tale of his conversions is not yet complete. It may be, that in using that perilous language, he was merely speaking heedlessly under the influence of irritation at recent electoral and parliamentary defeats. Whatever his motives, his words will be remembered and used by those whose trade it is to mislead the English workmen.

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The unstable character of Mr. Gladstone's convictions is not, however,

however, more than an incidental source of danger. The probability that the extreme Radicals will take the principle of individual property as their next subject of attack does not depend on any intentional encouragement they are likely to get from the present Government. The Ministry would repel with energy the accusation of Socialist proclivities. Probably, if they could be brought to discuss seriously an imputation which they would laugh at as ridiculous, they would maintain that their teaching, on the whole, was in direct antagonism to the Socialist philosophy. As far as logical sequence is concerned, the plea would be perfectly sound. They are apostles of political economy in the eyes of the Socialist political economy is a science devised by the capitalist to help him in plundering the workman. They are sticklers for individual liberty, while the Socialists bluntly lay down that individual liberty is a false point of departure, and is inconsistent with the solidarity' they preach. Many other points of opposition could be established between the orthodox Liberal creed as it exists now, and that which the Internationale is organised to proclaim. There is very little in common between the two; and, as far as abstract logic is concerned, the development of the one into the other would be impossible. But it is the actual, not the logical sequence, that interests us. Consistency of opinion has not been the historical attribute of either of our English parties. What deductions may be logically drawn from the existing views of the Liberal party may be an interesting inquiry for a speculative philosopher. To the service of what views their party machinery is in practice likely to be devoted, must be gathered from a consideration of the forces that drive it, and the laws by which its movements have been governed in past time.

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It is obvious that as the party of resistance rests upon the satisfaction which the nation feels, or is presumed to feel, with its present institutions, the party of movement, on the other hand, lives upon discontent. If there could be a state of things in which there was no discontent, its reason of existence would be gone, and its organisation must fall to pieces. And as each successive cause of discontent is removed, by the complete triumph of the discontented class or section, the party of movement, in order to sustain its existence, must find some new subject of complaint. It by no means follows that the individuals who have sincerely and successfully advocated one change will, when it is secured, immediately set themselves to advocate another. If they are honest, they will often shrink from doing so, and at such a juncture will part company with their former comrades. That men who were Radicals when young should frequently become

Conservatives

Conservatives in old age is due quite as much to the constant 'progress' of Radicalism as to the torpor of advancing years; but, though they may stand still, the organisation to which they belonged goes on. Gaps made by the personal consistency of older men are filled up by younger and unpledged recruits. The party of change is bound to no specific line of change. The one thing that is necessary to its existence is a discontent; and if no other is strong enough for its purposes, it will tend to fall back on that ancient and perennial source of animosity which, unhappily, has never ceased, and never will cease, to flow in every civilised community-the quarrel of the poor against the rich.

If political conflict is really to take this form, we are approaching a crisis of terrible moment: for within the scope of historical record no community has yet been robust enough to surmount uninjured the outbreak of this antagonism. We know that it terminated the existence of Rome, not as a military power, but as a free and law-abiding state. We know that, in more than one instance, it paralysed the vitality and prepared the doom of the Italian Republics. Our own generation has witnessed the gradual working of its poisonous influence upon the freedom, the public spirit, the national cohesion of France. It cannot be without painful forebodings that we see the earlier symptoms of this fatal malady breaking out among ourselves. It has not yet taken its acuter form; for the animosity is at present exhibited more by those whose vocation it is to stir up the poorest class than by the poorest class themselves. But the success of similar appeals in France hardly leaves us the hope that they will meet with no response here, especially if, as seems likely, they are to be reckoned for the future among the ordinary missiles of party warfare. But, indeed, it was idle to expect that such an instrument of agitation should not be employed here, when its great potency has been so fully demonstrated a few miles off. So long as we have government by party, the very notion of repose must be foreign to English politics. Agitation is, so to speak, endowed in this country. There is a standing machinery for producing it. There are rewards which can only be obtained by men who excite the public mind, and devise means of persuading one set of persons that they are deeply injured by another. The production of cries is encouraged by a heavy bounty. The invention and exasperation of controversies lead those who are successful in such arts to place, and honour, and power. Therefore, politicians will always select the most irritating cries, and will raise the most exasperating controversies that circumstances will permit. That English workmen would of themselves learn to share the fanaticism of the Parisian Socialists is exceedingly improbable; but it would be too much

to