THE LEADERSHIP OF OPPOSITION.
PERIIAPS the most delicious drop in the cup of Mr.. Disraeli's exultation is due to the condition in which his great triumph finds the leadership of Opposition. Mr. Gladstone is generally believed to be retiring, certainly for a time, possibly finally, from the leadership. No one who heard his speech on the night of the Irish University reverses, who noted what he said to the electors of Greenwich in his recent address, or who has been cognisant of his frequently and earnestly expreased wish for rest, will ascribe this deter- mination to a fit - of unworthy mortification at his defeat. Still his retirement, even if it be only temporary, is unques- tionably a heavy blow to the Liberal party, and worth in mere party value more than the gain of some ten or twenty additional seats to the Conservative leader. No doubt as a mere party politician Mr. Gladstone was not always cool and prudent. He had less presence of mind and de- tachment' than his opponent, and understood less clearly the personal gifts and defects of his various lieutenants. But his marvellous powers of debate, his extraordinary grasp of the questions which have always been the most critical questions in the House of Commons, the respect and enthusiasm with which he has so often inspired the left wing of his party, even when he differed from them most, and his unrivalled parliamentary experience, have more than made up for these deficiencies, and the loss of them will involve a very considerable loss of spring and confidence in the Liberal ranks. Moreover, his leadership being withdrawn, there was but one man in his Cabinet, Mr. Cardwell, who could, under the unfortunate circum- stances of the day, in anyway, however imperfect, have brought the prestige requisite to supply his place. And he, too, as if to play the more effectually into Mr. Disraeli's hands, and leave the Liberal party with a divided front before his majority, is to take his seat in the Upper House, where neither his con- ciliatory sagacity nor his great administrative abilities are likely to have much field for their display. It seems as if Mr. Disraeli's good star had crowned his triumph with a most expressive symbolic incident to popularise to the apprehension of the whole nation the disastrous division in the Liberal ranks. It is hardly possible to overrate the party significance of such an incident. It will carry with it an amount of prestige for the Tory party that may very likely enable Mr. Disraeli to overcome the lingering disaffection in his own ranks. An imperfectly united front soon solidifies in the presence of visible disunion on the part of the foe. Yet there is one Liberal leader left in the House of Commons with more general power than Mr. Cardwell, and far more of that statesmanlike grasp and manner of thought which go so far with the House of Commons and the British people. If Mr. Forster is for the present impossible as the Liberal leader, it •is not from any want of the statesman in him, but rather from the fact that he has shown himself to be the statesman of the whole nation on a question of the most critical party feeling, at a time when he was welcome to a particular section of the Liberal party precisely because it was thought that he would be the special exponent of its ideas. That Mr. Forster forgot the superior disposable wealth of the Established Church, when, purely from a desire to save the British ratepayer, he gave the denominations some months' grace within which their voluntary efforts to build denominational schools would be assisted by Govern- ment building grants, and that by so doing he gave an unfor- tunate advantage to a Church which had but too much ad- vantage already, we are aware. We suspect that no one regrets that error more than Mr. Forster, though when it was made, the Dissenters themselves were by no means alive to its magnitude. But the result has irritated the sec- tarian passions of a small but very active section of Liberals, till we find Mr. Forster charged by one vin- dictive Dissenting minister, who certainly does not make any pretence of carrying the spirit of his religion into political controversy, with being the Judas Iscariot of his party, and with deserving at the hands of the Tories the thirty pieces of silver he had earned. While such monstrous language can still be used and received, though only at an electioneering meet- ing, with applause, it is obvious enough that any attempt to constitute Mr. Forster the leader of the Liberals in the House of Commons would be premature, not to say mischievous. It is true that the party of Mr. Mall and Mr. Mingworth has a very thin representation in the new House of Commons. Mr. Richard and Mr. E. A. Leatham are, we fancy, the only dis- tinguished members of it who are ready to go all lengths against Mr. Forster, and perhaps even that is quite too much to say of Mr. Leatham. But the Liberal party must look, in some measure, to its allies out of the House as well as its allies in it, and no doubt the premature choice of Mr. Forster as leader would neutralise the whole Dissenting vote, even if it did not turn the Dissenters into provisional Tories. The Dissenting minister who thinks Mr. Forster a Judas Iscariot, would probably not himself hesitate at betraying the Liberal party for the sake of that sweet revenge against which he has, in all probability, so often preached. But this we will at least say to the few fanatics who speak and think thus of Mr. Forster. It is that very depth and tenacity of respect for religion which Mr. Forster shares with the religious, as distinguished from the political, Dissenters, which has made him oppose so firmly the Secularist policy. Amongst Liberal statesmen, moderate Churchmen who have always been Churchmen will seldom be found to I make so firm a stand for religious principles, as those who have derived something at least of their tenacity on this head from Dissenting traditions. Conservative statesmen support religious education partly because they feel that it has a con- servative influence, and partly because many Conservatives are High-Churchmen with an ecclesiastical as well as a religious zeal. But amongst Liberal statesmen you will generally find a feeling that religious subjects are just those on which it is easiest and safest to make compromises, and even, after the adjustment, to throw in "a blessing" to the opposite scale in order to have things comfortable. It is the religious fibre in Mr. Forster which the Dissenters put there, that has made him stand so firm against compulsory secularism.
There is but one class of subjects on which we should in some respects prefer another leader to Mr.Forster,—we mean Foreign Affairs,—and on these we confess that we should be more likely to find an exponent in Mr. Goschen than in the late Vice-President of the Council. Mr. Goschen's speeches on national and international questions have always had a singu- larly firm ring in them, while Mr. Forster, especially in his Alabama speeches, has sometimes seemed to us unduly willing to concede, for the sake of peace, what would never promote peace, the dignity, if not the interest or honour of the Empire. On foreign affairs we would sooner trust Mr. Goschen's judgment than that of any other member of the late Cabinet. He has the true instinct for national dignity, and gives that impression of a nervous imagination in international affairs which goes a great way in preventing misunderstandings as well as in righting them. Mr. Goschen, however, has nothing like the general grasp and strength of Mr. Forster, nor that happy skill of explain- ing his mind weightily to the House of Commons which rests ultimately, we suppose, upon sympathy with the representative character of the British nation. Of the Marquis of Hartington, who is said to be the third candidate for the post of leader, we can only say that his very sound sense and his high rank are his sole qualifications. He has not in any degree acquired the art of throwing personal character into his speeches, to say nothing of his lame and wooden delivery. It would be simply impossible for a leader to lead at all with an air so devoid of political impressiveness as the Marquis of Hart- ington's. Leadership is a question in large degree of moral influence. Lord Palmerston had to wait for the moral influence requisite for such a position till a very full experience had in some degree given weight and strength to his character. And so it must be with the Marquis of Hartington, if he is ever to take up such a position. At present, in spite of exceedingly sound sense and administrative ability, he has not much more power to carry the House with him than if he were still a popular lad in training for a statesman.
We have not as yet mentioned two men with, in some respects, more claim on the party than any of the three whose position we have discussed,—Mr. Bright and Mr. Lowe. Mr. Bright's state of health makes the position of leader, with all the vigilance and effort it involves, clearly impossible for him, even if his somewhat peculiar views on war, international policy, and the Church, rendered it possible for the more moderate Liberals to accept him as their leader. And Mr. Lowe, though his intellect is of the acutest kind, and though few men could rival him in the force of that desultory criticism so useful to a leader of Opposition, has made far too many enemies, and given far too much offence at different times, both to the Radicals and to the Conservatives,—is, indeed, far too destitute of statesmanlike reticence,—for such a part. We take it that, for a time at least, the leadership of Opposition must be put into commission ; in other words, that each of the leaders will criticise in turn what lies most in his own line. Even in recent years such a state of things is not without parallel. After Lord Palmerston's defeat on the Conspiracy Bill in 1858, it was never clearly defined whether he or Lord John Russell was leader of the Opposition ; and even after the failure of the Conservative Reform Bill in the following year, and the unsuccessful dissolution, no one was certain whether the Queen would send for Lord Palmerston or for Lord John. We must now look forward to an interregnum of the same kind, during which the various possible leaders will be sifted by " natural selection," and—should Mr. Gladstone not return to the head of the party,—the true leader will be made clear to us. In the meantime, Mr. Disraeli has much cause for exul- tation over this unexpected access of good fortune, which yields him, besides a compact majority, a disorganised foe.
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