THE CURSE OF PARTY.

As every naked man that comes into time world is shuffled into clothing of some kind—rags or robes according to destiny—so every born truth has its particular lie "made to measure in six hours," in which its lot is to be stitched up and as fitst as possible disguised, that its real scope and meaning may thenceforth go un- remarked by common eyes. Something of this sort appears to have happened, as we shall have occasion to show, to the book we noticed last week entitled Chart/see—a book which we hold not only to contain truth, but to be itself a truth—that is, to be an holiest, conscientious inquiry into the matter in hand, and not a sneaking, timeserving pretence of an inquiry, undertaken, pro- fessedly, to lay it open—really to conceal it. Indeed, if we value highly this production of' CAR LyLE's pen, it is even less on account of the power it manitbsts than for those qualities—rarer than power, nay, of all qualities in laditical writ it :g rown rarest— sincerity and truth-speaking in contempt of party objects. For what literofw man, challenging like rank and name, ever in these days opens his mouth on politics but you find him sticking stupidly in one or the other of the old lines of declamation, and, violently Whig or violently Tory, imagining that he is accomplishing some- thing new and particular, while he is only showing what a dupe of habit, party connexion, or fittnily circumstances, he is. Mr. WALTER SAVAGE LA NDOR, for instance—whose genius in its own walks we duly honour—has, unfortunately, a call to politics of' this kind. Incre- dible is his lust of aggression on all witahnilla ; one has in him the Most irresistible router of time routed, the keenest killer of dead Notspurs ; also for publishing " the sun at noonday" one knows not his equal. In a word, full of originality, even the pride of ori- ginality, in whatever else he does, here alone—in politics—he can- not see Ow if he could he would rend his hair) that he plays no better than the part of a parrot and a puppet. But give us the man whose opinions on public affairs are his own, and not another person's, or collection of persons,—who is not related to politics "by the father's side" or " by the mother's side," or by the side of a faction, but simply by a certain thing—reason ; who reasons, too, ab mitio, and not from any point of common convenience. Give us the man whose literary talents, whatever they may be, are not the mere ornamental furniture of a political party, hired out to give elegance to malignity and a smart appearance to dirty things, but Powers held in subservience to a serious estimate of public duty— to a deep sympathy with the mute masses of human life, to be whose guide and interpreter must ever be his truest glory. Give us such a man, _and we will hail him as a true prophet of the people, and cease not to cheer him on to the accomplishment of what fur- ther good works his genius may prompt him to attempt. Y. Chartism is, as we think, a spechnen of manly and ingenuous Wilting, the way in which it has been noticed and unnoticed by the Ministerial press, equally exemplifies the characteristic absence of

this and such other hot e rut C.Aar.r.t.n is a " a philosopher, however, IL

indeed—to IISOW :,CedS," We aye t(, iaaiI1.1,1 that is eVell now

getting ready for him, and, what i lore, under tlie direction or the very husbandmen he leer. I l I I ly maligning. Yes, the public must be L'. . • repe;f1 of the ('orn- laws and a thorough 1.c:et:Ilk:alien wetive System are at least two thitlgs at length ■.,Ii.(1. and coming about—by the grace of a Memee :aid a RUSSELL 0)

Ministry.* After that, the ground I ..le.;r for such seeds of public truth and goo ,1 SMr. C u sLY i. i lilt'y (Alter meditative philosopher May liat•C to sow thcreili." Poor Mr. CARLYLE! he will 1111VC timale perilapS to write i counterpart to the excel-

lent comic song. Nyhich relates all the things Guy Faux " would have done" but for thy. mums of their execution being un-

happily not developed " till arter Mat" Till then, however,

your philosophers are to be patient, merely getting their seeds ready ; but then, behold, there is H1,1111(1;114 eonsolation for them,

for " Tin then tie re is blISInt'SS /We' le, In' M:Lril'eted." Oh, important men (,f tminess, inighty a:He:actors of our national affitirs, not lightly to be approached le.-1i 111(1' creatures. awful in power tuul wisdom, whose sum of " busine.e. in hand" MON es only ribald " philosophers" to mirth, hut all proper people to reve- rence—what a pity if the country should n. t Im able to wait ''tilt then!"

Such specimens of public itn.truction excite, v:e confess, less of ridicule in our minds tient of disgust. It surely a high insult to the common SOaisf• or the enuilif■ hold out allay longer in con- nexion with the present Government mat the present House of Con1111011S tlicso cct al ions of hepirtailit public relief. The very

measures aboyc 1.roposed es standing- in Out first rank of prac- ticable legislative &ejects, till' centen:eorer;,' list know as well as ourselves, could only pass into law elfin r by virtue of a state of

things posterior to a dissolution of the yesent Cabinet, or by an

abandonment 01'1)61141e on the part or its vital members, so flagi- tious as their enemies can hardly ill reason exia,ct or their friends

ia conscience desire to witness. Suppose that the Corn-law re-

peal would avert the oil now threatening us, (it would do nothing of the sort, observe,) N\ hat t!len ? Will any olle look us in the thee and tell us he believe, 11:;.t that -•ei• will pass this session ?

But the next ?—the next but one t!: ! -limps the next after

that? Ney, when will this bill, in • as, payable, that is to relieve the starvation and ill 1:1 not but of 1840 ? If

a wretch is dying of inanition I a he streets, oite does not generally give long-dated bills.—But what of' entistnehising a few more

people and granting the priN ef secret voting? Suppose this

would avert the evils in question, (it weuld restore Lord .Mee- 11011RNE to yOlitli as likely,) then does anybody seriously maintain that his Lordship or any I ltlier of their Finality" for instance) are thinking of conceding the Rallot i r extending the basis of the Reilmn I lulh ? Is thi:, really the " business in band ? " But an amiable confiding political fileiel may simply intend to express his belief', or knowledge, that amongst various obvious sources of popular relief llini-terA at least have it in contemplation

to open smite; mid nnentwhile he, their political friend, may natu- rally harp on those which he 0. ems most important, and which he

himself certainly means to pre!- on their atteution. If so then,

once for all—what measures have 'Alinisterg in store for the na- tional pacification ? To Darrow the question--have Ministers any one measure in store with that object ':' it' no answer can be given * We won't insult the reader by reciting, the oft-repeated statements made by these two pillars of our Givernment, in glarbig incompatibility with our Ministerial contemporary's professions of hope. both those qualities; and on that account alone will perhaps repay a little attention. We have seen much significance attached to the circumstance of the author's having contiibuted essays to Fraser's 211kzazine (we could name politicians of all shades who have done that.) From this circumstance, however, the inference is left to be drawn that bad company and evil example have alone brought about that insensibility to the beauties of Whig Government, which nothing else in nature could account for. The argument is—no deep-thinking writer like Mr. CARLYLE could ever come to entertain light and disrespectful th.lught s ofa ATELEor RN!: Ministry, such as he unhappily expreSSe, IC it \wt.:: not for some aceidental vitiation of the natural taste, ever to he lamented ; that such thoughts do never arise in a real hu; fil ,lidc course of' thinking; that only love and affectionate attachment arise in that course ; but that it' such a num, instead of publishing esays in a Con.:ervative periodical, (fine Radical ones, by the way,) did bet shut himself up in his study, be " not at home " l' e:ksint and Co. a week's space,

and there and then carliestly communing with lid ask of it

" what evil it knew °fa Whig Ministry " ,uit must be swift

remorse and iestant penitential return t., ts • 1„ eoill of Whiggery,

where, according to the promise of th,, r; for stray children, " every thing," no doubt, " oblivion." the advertisement would. come w ;1 • : the author of Chorti..“.., we take to have no r: ace. and. moreover

no Whiggism—even extraetible t -.4-communion and severest c:atrusion of A sER and Co.

One who coulo1 so well (1,-;eriLe the ruling political party, as " 'nen who discern in the misery of the toilim.;., omplaining mil- lions, not misery, but only a raw Ili;alcrial which can be wrought upon and traded in for one's own law hidebound theories and.

cgoisms," could expect no very affectionate greeting from that party or from any of its orleal,:. lo order to take the sting out of

, it remarked that Mr. a ii ci rcumstance)—

, ibr verv soon

to this question, the humiliation is awful indeed! We must have facts—the country will have them : the country cares not a rush for the hopes of a writer, his wishes or expectations ; how sanguine somebody is, never was its question ; what it sees it believes, and no more. Your draft then, if you please, of the bill or bills to be brought into Parliament this session for pacification of England and prevention of starvation and anarchy. We have said that the Corn-law repeal would now be insufficient to stem the tide of evils that has set in upon us. That what it now will not suffice to cure, a little while ago it would have suf- ficed to prevent, we think equally certain. A great measure of justice, granted at the right moment, is a genuine political medi- cine that never failed of its due operation ; but even a great mea- sure of justice may become comparatively null and inoperative when withheld too long. Corn-law Repeal (let us not be misun- derstood) is at this moment not less, but many times more essen- tial than it has been at any previous point of time ; but it is now, at least, no panacea—it is only one of varkui measures, now, on the prompt application of which the saflAy of the state depends. If it was our object in this paper to enter into the subject of re- medial measures, we should feel bound to inquire with what truth ft can be asserted that the " Condition-of-England question" is " continually before the Legislature," when it is obvious to our minds that the very limitation which follows—" in some or other of its great branches"—describes that evil (the evil of hashed le- gislation) which for over prevents the public from seizing the whole subject in its true bearings, and bringing it to a focus of observation. But of this another time. We should also be obliged in that case to enter upon some poiats of difference with Mr. CARLYLE, who, particularly in his remedial propositions, is far from satisfactory. It is not immaterial to remark here, that the word " Chartism" is likely to become instrumental to some delusion and quibbling. Though properly descriptive only of the " five-point " men, there is already a disposition to apply the term generally to all that po- pular discontent and violence of which the literal Chartism is the most conspicuous symbol. It is in this sense, we conceive, that Mr. CAELrui speaks of it as follows. "Chartism means the bitter discontent grown fierce and mad—the wrong condition there- fore, or the wrong disposition, of the working classes of England." This definition has been laid hold of in a journal which indeed seems strangely disposed to make the least of the character and extent of the present discontents, wisely (?) aiming to restore the apathy of the middle classes. Our contemporary finds the defi- nttion "much too sweeping." Now it is too sweeping .if merely applied to Five-point Chartism, which (though far deeper sunk than our contemporary will admit) is certainly, as we have every reason to know, not an universal creed : but the definition, intended with the latitude we have supposed, is correct and forcible; and the attempt to sneer away the bitter truths it impresses on the mind, by reverting to the "miserable failure in Palace Yard," the Convention's "dying agonies," &c. is—to drop all mention of its wisdom or justice—simply in the worst imaginable taste. Whatever else Chartism is, it is a serious, a most serious thing; it has no sort of connexion with any thing hu- morous or pleasant—nothing ever had less. Neither is Chartism a "political fanaticism." Call it an error if you will—and even errors, according to our showing last week, may grow into truths, in the revolution of time, if you leave them long enough. The means we use to ends are to be judged by those ends. If a man, in order to raise a stone out of the ground, should fetch you se- veral thousand pounds of gunpowder, with miners and sappers and an armed host at his back, you might fairly guess he was mad, or "a fanatic." But what if all were not told about that stone? sup- pose other atones lie over it—suppose it is a foundation-stone, say of a Basalt', and to raise it from the earth is, in fact, to leave no other stone standing ? In this case the pickaxe might become inadequate ; and the declining to use it and the preferring to try a gunpowder plan might become—very ludicrous, no doubt, and "a miserable failure," but at least not a proof of "fanaticism." We could more easily illustrate what, under such circumstances, we consider are proofs of fanaticism ; and it would not require us to go out of the liberties of Westminster to indicate our ex- amples. It will astonish no reader to learn that an article which com- ments on the present deplorable state of social disorganization in the tone and temper we have described concludes with the follow- ing, for its total, final solution of the great question of the day- " Chartism is the natural reaction of Toryism, with which for the moment it is in a most unnatural alliance, induced by that feebleness in a Liberal Go •

sernment which can only be removed by removing the remaining defects of the representative system. The position of Toryism is an element in the condi- tion of England which is most unphilosopbically disregarded by the author of

Chartism. Here is the great block to all working-class relief, and to all na-

tions/ improvement. A faction, 'tea chiefly by cupidity for the emoluments derivable from the possession of the Government, [winch faction ?] strengthens

itself by appealing to every prejudice, [which thction ?] courts the coopera- tion of every sinister interest, [which faction?] traffics in falsehood and cor-

ruption, [which faction ?) combines the most heterogeneous forms of ambition and rapacity, and avails itself of every anomaly in the representative system, to bring all wholesome legislation and beneficent administration to a stand- still. [which faction ?] here is the solution of the useless 'palaver '—useless as to the public, of which the philosopher and the philanthropist complain. Here is the secret of that imperfect grappling with whatever is wrong and wretched in the state of society, which makes the satirist vent his jeers and gibes at Reform Ministry.' For the people, the masses, for the stimulus of struggling industry, for the avoidance of distress and starvation, for the con- sOlation of discontent, for the security of equal justice, for the education of the rising race, nothing adequate in magnitude or in spirit can be accomplished instil Toryism be crushed. It, or England, must be crippled. It interposes

between society and Government. It divides wrong from remedy.. It stands between God's fruitful earth and God's famishing creatures. It stops the tide of time, which in the nature of things is that of improvement, and creates destructive floods and pestilential marshes. Chattism is only one of its myriad spawn of mischiefs, and not the worst."

One is to wait, then, till the Tories arc all annihilated before any_ thing can be done. We see no alternative—it seems that as long as the Tory body has life in it the Tory soul will inhabit there. To get rid of French Aristocracy they were obliged to get rid of the French Aristocrats. English Toryism must exist as long as English Tories exist. Away with them, then. What ! their wives and all—" all the little chickens ?" Horrible ! This then is the "business in hand!" Mr. CARLYLE and the other philosophers, who are to be so welcome and so happy "after that," must go on fumbling their "seeds of public truth" and keep getting ready "till then " Then" is getting defined with a vengeance. All the Tories are to be " crushed " first. How is it to be done—by simultaneous assassination ? with aid of a million or two of O'Cox- NELL'S lisithmful BCpC111C1'St lent for the occasion P How long will it take doing? Are Tories tough of dying, or do they take to it kindly ? Will ten years do ? Troy was taken in ten years. Tory and Troy—there is an odd sort of' similitude between the words; some meaning must be in it—discoverable perhaps in the "mimics of G erman mysticism," which we perceive Mr. CARLYLE gets credit for inhabiting. Will the walls of' Tou fall, however, in twenty years ? in forty years? Because if it is 11111C11 " arter Mat "—which of us will be left behind to sow these " seeds ?" In a word, can England wait " till then?"

Our contemporary is of opinion it can and must-

" If the philosopher wants to serve his country, let him analyze this monster's power, and do battle with it; but let no speculations divert from its existence and its malignity till it is fairly prostrate, and for ever."

We are to keep writing elaborate essays on " the monster's power," analyzing it with keen scholastic logic-probe—and this will save England from civil war.

But enough. The reader will regret to know that we have been quoting from a journal which, scarce six months gone, received from us the hearty meed of praise for a series of ably-written articles, apparently the opening of' a manly independent course of political action—now how fulfilled ! Our object in this paper was chiefly to exemplify some of the pestilent deceptions practised by the Ministerial press, the effect of which is to muddle and lays- tify the public intellect—to envelop it in a thick fog of fatuity, while Fate leads the way to the edge of a precipice : but we never expected to take our illustrations from the pages of the Morning Chronicle.