Mr. Lowe made a very vivacious speech at Swindon this
day week on the prospects of the Liberal party, of one thread of opinion in which we have spoken elsewhere. He declared that the creed of the Tory was to stick to what is and of the Liberal to stick to what ought to be, and maintained that while the Liberal acted on his own creed in power as well as in Opposition, the Tory didn't. He recalled the forty years when the Liberals " wandered in the wilderness where there was no way," at the end of the last and the beginning of the present century, when Lord Byron wrote,— " There's nothing permanent about the human race
Except the Whigs not getting into place,"
and declared that what they advocated out of office they began to do directly they got into office. But the Tories have not acted in like manner. When they are out of office they stick to what is; but when they come into office they are obliged to do what ought to be, and in the case of Catholic Emancipation, Free Trade, the Emancipation of the Jews, and the last Reform Act, they did it. Mr. Lowe also attacked Lord Salisbury for saying " it appears the Government has now determined to split up landed property into the smallest possible portions." Mr. Lowe denied that such a scheme had ever been thought of, and saying " it appears that it does not appear," begged Lord Salisbury to be more careful in future.
