TORY LAMENTATION AND FOREBODINGS.
1V1resr we stated a fortnight ago in this journal, that some of the more sagacious Tories considered that the " game was up" with their party, we by no means spoke at random, but asserted what we knew to be a fact. How far this spirit of dejection prevailed among them, was more than we could say ; but the tone adopted by the Tory Review and Magazines of the month induces the belief that it is entertained by many—we suspect by all but the ignorant and hot-headed dupes of the KENYON and WINCIIILSEA faction.
Fraser's Magazine eschews politics altogether—a tolerably sure sign that a good case could not be made out for its party. The Quarterly Review likewise abstains from any but indirect allu- sions to the politics of the day, not having a word to say on the • proceedings of the last session. The Quarterly has doubtless good reasons for its sullen silence. It is understood that the Tory Peers themselves are at loggerheads together ; some con- demning, others defending the tactics of the party in reference to the Irish Church and Corporation Bills. Not knowing which side to take, and sure of giving offence to one or the other, the Quarterly, instead of a rousing and vigorous address to the Tories, such as might inspirit them in the pending struggle in the Registration Courts, contents itself with a ri/iicciauwnto of the old horrors of the French Revolution, and a dissertation on the atrocities of DANTON and ROBESPIERRE. This cry of " wolf," raised for the hundredth time in the Quarterly, frightens but few. The Reformers lauoli at the stale trick, or pity the hard case of the Tory writers, who are driven to find likenesses be- tween HUME and MARAT, GLIOTE and ROBESPIERRE. The attempt to insinuate a resemblance between the dispositions of the British Reformers of 1835 and the infuriate populace of France in 1794, is equally absurd and unsuccessful. CAsrLeaelson and his colleagues did their best by massacreing the people at Man- chester, and by transporting them on the evidence of their own hired spies and instigators to treason in Scotland, to di lye the Reformers of those days into a savage rebellion, and to pro- duce that feeling of intense hatred to the privileged classes which a long series of infernal misrule and oppression had generated in France ; but they did not succeed. They were stopped in their mad career by the growing power and intelligence of the People, who saw the fully of violent measures, and perceived that by peaceful combination they should be able to work out their political salva- tion. This quiet but determined mode of proceeding is charac- teristic of the British People—luckily for their Tory rulers. It is foreign to the habits of the French, who gain their political vic- tories from behind barricades; and then it is not surprising that they demand the punishment of their oppressors by the guillotine. Again, where is the need of violence ? The Reform Act, defec- tive as it is, has put into the hands of the People the sure means of a bloodless victory—the power to obtain political amelioration. It must be extreme necessity which at any time rouses English- men to arms against their rulers; and at present there is not the least occasion, not the slightest temptation, to recur to the use of physical force. The immense masses of the people who assem- bled to welcome O'CONNELL in different places during his tour, though their feelings were stimulated by his eloquence, were quite orderly. Moreover, such is the confidence justly placed by men of all parties in the disposition of the people to obey the laws and preserve quiet, that we did not hear even from the Tories a single intimation of danger to be apprehended from the meeting of hundreds of thousands of the working classes. In short, the state of parties and of public feeling in England at the present time is such as to render the dire forebodings and solemn warnings of the Quarterly as inapplicable as they are old- fashioned, worn-out, and prosy. Blackwood has produced what the Standard calls the hest article that ever appeared in the best of magazines. But this praise is hyperbolical. The author of the article in question has endeavoured to keep up the spirits of his party, under admitted defeat, by virulent abuse of the victorious Liberals. He blus- ters, rails, and calls hard names with volubility; but he shows the white feather, nevertheless. He says that the Liberal party is made up of Dissenters, Infidels, and penniless raga- muffins, who, by the aid of the ten-pounders, have forced the present Ministry into power, after turning out PEEL. The King, the Peers, the Church, all the men of property, and all the reli- gious community have been prostrated before this formidable combination of Destructives. The Dukes of SUSSEX, BEDFORD, NORFOLK, SUTHERLAND, CLEVELAND, ARGYLL, and LEINSTER, the Marquis of WESTMINSTER, the Marquis of LastsnowNE, Earl F1TZWILLIAM, the Earl of DERBY, Mr. BERKELEY PORTMAN, Mr. BEAUMONT, the Governorof the Bank of England, and Mr. LEWIS LLoYn, all count for nothing in the calculation of this hot- headed Tory : they are all confounded with the mass of needy ruffians and low-burn Dissenters.
It is admitted, however, that the last elections have proved the utter hopelessness of Tory resistance to this vagabond combhia-
tion. There is a glimmering of common sense in this admission. It is, indeed, next to impossible that the Tories should ever again have so favourable an opportunity of gaining a majority in the House of Commons. It is also allowed that the Movement gained prodigiously by the passing of the Municipal Bill. There is something like honesty in this confession. The Municipal Bill, as we have before remarked, will create a cluster of little republics in every part of the country ; and the writer iii Black- wood allows as much. Moreover, it is not denied that the Irish Corporation Bill must be carried, and that speedily. Here, too, we agree with Blackwood. It is undeniable that the same power which carried the English, can force the Lords to gulp down the Irish Bill of Corporation Reform.
Such, then, according to their on admission, has been the re- sult of the experiment of the Tories in November last. It has demonstrated the inability of the Tory party, when backed by the whole force of Government and aided by the supineness of the Liberals, to contend with the force opposed to them.
But the writer in Blackwood bestows great laudation on the conduct of the Peers during the last session ; and, of course, ad- vises them to pursue the same course next year. And yet he bemoans the progress of the Movement, and the meditated attacks on the constitution. Why, what has occasioned these attacks ? What has precipitated the movement ? Let him ask sonic of the more knowing, better-informed, and less-bigoted members of his party, and they will tell him that the NEWCASTLES and W IN- C HI LSE AS, acting with a majority in spite of WELLINGTON, PEEL, Lord GRANVILLE SOMERSET, and Other men who are blessed with common sagacity, have provoked a spirit of hostility to the existing constitution of the house of Peers which must produce a thorough reform of that House. Perhaps the best that can happen to the Liberals would be the adoption by the Peers of the advice tendered by the writer in Blackwood. As the House of Lords must be reformed, it were well if it were done quickly ; and a repetition next session cf the proceedings of the last will insure a speedy consummation of that good work.
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