Mr. Morley's main topic, however, was the increase of taxa-
tion, which, he says, amounts to 232,000,000 a year within the last four years, after deducting the 28,000,000 which Mr. Ritchie is expected to remit. The National Debt has in the same period risen from 2635,000,000 to over 2800,000,000. The mere interest on that increase takes two-thirds of the Tea-duty to discharge. He maintained that in thus in- creasing the Debt we were weakening the credit of the State which in war-time was one of the most important of its sources of power. He quoted the same idea from a speech by Mr. Disraeli, and made the surprising remark that in his time the three men of most original constructive views, "the most seminal ideas," who had influenced Parliament were Mr. Cobden, Mr. Gladstone, and Mr. Disraeli. We should assent as far as finance was concerned ; but we wonder what Mr. Gladstone would have said if he had heard the sentence. 'Your impartiality, Mr. Morley, is carried to the length of indifference to fact,' would, we suspect, have been the substance of his objurgation.
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