3 DECEMBER 1881, Page 7

ARISTOCRATIC VIOLENCE.

THE expression used in Sir Henry James's speech at Bristol which was supposed to apply chiefly to Lord Randolph Churchill,—the "gutter children of politics, —was intended, of course, to describe, as it did describe very happily, the vulgarity and violence of phrase which seem to be borrowed for politics from the coarse language of those who reel about half-sober in the gutter. And when the present writer was a boy, it might have been said justly that such violence of lan- guage was common enough amongst those politicians who, in the misery of their outward life at least, were nearest to the gutter ; the Chartists of 1842, the followers of Feargus O'Connor, or of leaders more violent and furious still. Now, however, if we want to have a model for serious and sober language, we should go to hear Mr. Burt address or confer with his constituents, or enter a Trades-union Congress and heir it discuss the fallacies of Fair-trade. If we want the sort of language that was formerly treated as the opprobrium of working-class' politicians, we must go to hear either the Marquis of Salisbury at Bristol, or the Duke of Marlborough's son at Hull or Manchester. That Lord Randolph Churchill feels the hit of Sir Henry James is evident enough, for in his last speech at Manchester he turns on the Attorney-General with a ferocity so great, that it extinguishes the gleams of in- telligence by which Lord Randolph's oratory is usually relieved, and applies to the Attorney-General, at least at all times when "the occupant of the Woolsack is in a precarious state of health," the Scripture motto, " On thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat." That piece of mud hurled at Sir Henry James certainly shows how angry Lord Randolph is, but it also shows how his anger takes away his wit. The serpent was condemned to go on its belly and eat dust, not as a qualification for promotion to a place of honour, but as a curse for having tempted Eve to sin. It is a quotation which, instead of suggesting mean and flattering professions, as Lord Randolph intended, suggests only the punishment due to a crafty and successful tempter. But we refer to this evidence of Lord Randolph's extreme violence, not because we think that it can be of any measurable importance to any human being what Lord Randolph Churchill, in his scur- rilous moods, may say, but because it is a very curious sign of the times that our aristocracy should be taking up the exces- sive violence of tone which used to be regarded as the dis-

grace of the artisan class of politicians. Our artisans, whether Conservatives or Liberals, are careful, sober, and moderate in their criticism, when compared with such orators as Lord Salisbury or Lord Randolph Churchill. And no doubt, the explanation is easy to find. In 1842, or so, the poorest of the people thought themselves specially oppressed and plundered by the aristocracy. Now, the aristocracy think that they are specially oppressed and plundered by the poorest of the people, and so they have changed tongues with them. The billingsgate, in moral effect at least, is all poured out by titled politicians. The homelier classes, when they talk politics at all, talk them in mild and subdued language,—in the language of reason. Take the case even of Mr. Bradlaugh, a speaker with whom we have as little sympathy in relation to politics as we have in relation to religion. Still, the speeches which he has himself delivered, even on the subject of his recent imprisonment, are speeches of calmness and moderation, compared with those of Lord Salisbury and Lord Randolph Churchill. The man with, a grievance who has really been imprisoned for his conduct in asserting that grievance, talks a dialect as different from the epileptic violence of the Churchill cadet, as the language of respectful controversy is from the shriekings of a scold.

And, no doubt the principal reason is just what we have assigned,'—that the aristocracy really fear for their own privileges and interests, and even fear that they may be denied mere justice ; while the poor no longer fear that they shalt be denied justice, but see that from year to year every- thing tends to secure them better and better guarantees for generosity, as well as justice. That is one cause, no doubt, why the aristocratic orators get more violent, while the plebeian orators get less-so-. The fOrmer are afraid of the future, the

latter are sure of it. But there is another reason as well. The aristocratic orators, in their new appear to the masses, have got a pervading idea that they must paint in strong lights and strong shadows, and make everything they say quite pungent enough to be remembered, if only for its pungency. Doubtless, some idea of the same kind was the secret of the very violent and often indecent invective with which Mr. Disraeli began public life. He thought that to be successful he must reach the democracy, and that the democracy could only be reached effectually by turgid declamation. He understood the democracy somewhat better before he left us, but you can see the same idea, in a milder form, permeating that high-flown letter to the Duke of Marlborough with which he gave the anti-Irish keynote to the electors of 1880. In spite of Mr. Gladstone's much greater success in reaching the ear of the people, and in spite of the fact that Mr. Gladstone's speeches and addresses contain hardly anything that could be called violent or passionate from end to end, the great leaders of a Tory denmeracy persist in be- lieving that it is the language of violence which will best dwell in the hearts of the people, and stir them up to right the balance of parties. Now, in this we believe the leaders of the Tory democracy to be wholly mistaken. Mr. Gladstone understands the people better when he makes fact and reason- ing the basis of all his most popular address -s. Read his Midlothian speeches, and the very fine and terse election address into which be compressed so much of the argument of those speeches, and you hardly discover a trace of anything be- yond that warm sentiment for a cause which is wholly in- separable from the rational appreciation of it. And that is what really reaches the popular ear best,—earnestness first, a strong grasp of the facts of the case next, a consider- able reasoning power in the third place, either wit or fancy to lend colour to speech in the fourth, and the exhibition of a large and genial nature as the basis of the whole. The mis- take which these leaders of the Tory democracy make is, in thinking that the kind of violence which was natural enough in former days to oppressed and miserable men, when speaking out their sense of oppression and misery, seems at all natural to the people now, when they are arbitrating between the opposing statesmen of different parties, and trying to decide which of those two parties really represents the whole people best. The Tories should remember, what they always seem to forget, that the interest of landlords as landlords, the interest of Lords as Lords, the interest of rich men as rich men, is not so great to the masses of the people as to suggest any excuse for the violence of their outbursts. No doubt, the interest of justice as justice, whether it affect in the first instance one class or another, is of the greatest interest to them, and if the Tory orators would set themselves to show that the interests of justice as justice, and not of landlords as landlords, is at stake, they would be much more carefully listened to than they are. But to the people at large there is no violent presumption on the side of a privileged class, simply because the members of that class foam at the mouth when they speak of Acts of Par- liament which have diminished their privileges. Th e people are quite willing to hear argument on the subject, but they are hardly in the state of mind to enjoy vituperation simply as vitupera- tion, only because it is levelled at men who are said, without proof, to be unjust to landlords, lords, and rich people. It is a serious blunder to think that because, when they were them- selves helpless, and groaning under the misery of all sorts of class-legislation, they used very violent language, they will be specially attracted by such language when it is used, not on their behalf, but on behalf of another class to whom the speakers take no pains to prove that it is fairly

applicable. When two great parties are disputing with each other the right to represent the people, it is obvious that the true course is to argue carefully which policy does represent the interests of the people best, and not, having coolly assumed that, to shower down all the vilification at their disposal on their rivals. Lord Randolph Churchill may entertain a Tory audience here and there by the excesses of his tongue ; but he may be assured that the future is to the statesman who can convince the people of the wisdom of his policy, not to him who can express best the passions in which they have no share, and the personal animosities which they regard with wonder, if not even with asuusement.