DILEMMAS AND CONFESSIONS OF THE WAR FACTION.
IT would be a miserable waste of time to follow the War-faction into all their pettifogging quibbles about the terms of Lord ASH BURTON'S treaty. There is a very short process by which their present conduct may be brought to the test—Do they mean to oppose the ratification of the treaty ? Will the leaders in Parliament move an address to the Queen to withhold the ratification? If they attempt such a course, we guess their mortification will be considerable when they come to count the number of Liberals, of whatsoever shade or complexion, who will be found to follow them to the vote. If they contemplate no such course, what intelllgible object can they aim at in the series of abusive railings against the terms of pacification, which have furnished daily employment for their chief mouthpiece during the last three weeks ? They can have no object, but the wicked one of rekindling feelings of animosity between America and England, or the contemptible one of exciting prejudice and ill-will against their successful political rivals.
A correspondent of the Morning Chronicle forced the Corypbreus of the War-faction to suspend his small debating-club sophisms on the minutiEe of the boundary for one day, and meet the charge of pandering to mischievous and quarrelsome propensities calculated to involve the civilized world in war. The sentiments of the anonymous writer to whom we refer were so just, and so well put, that they deserve to be quoted
" Until within these few years, it was not only the doctrine of the Liberal party, but a sort of commonplace among writers in general, that war is the game of kings, not the pleasure of their subjects. We were accustomed to contend, that in proportion as the affairs of nations are withdrawn from the control of individual ambition, vanity, or animosity, and placed under the power of those who pay the taxes and smart by the commercial losses which war engenders, in the same proportion would that ancient and barbarous mode of terminating the disputes between governments fall into disuse. For some years past, however, that which has called itself the Popular party in each of the three most powerful countries of the earth—England, America, and France—has, whether in or out of power, been sedulously engaged in blowing Up war between those countries, if not by direct instigation, yet by that blustering tone and that bitter and insulting language which are much more likely provocatives of quarrel than even real injuries ; and now, it seems, this course is to be persevered in. As in France, so here, the Liberal party, if some who seek to be its leaders are suffered to have their way, will stand openly before mankind in the disgraceful character of a War party, and will labour to discredit and frustrate the apparently sincere and hitherto successful exertions of the Governments of the three countries to keep the world at peace ;—an attempt of which you, Sir, [the Morning Chronicled are making yourself in our own country the main instrument, but in which I trust you are destined to he speedily, signally, and shamefully defeated. The complaint which I make extends to the principles and tone of nearly every article on foreign policy which has appeared in your paper for the last three years ; and I select as the most recent, and one of the most striking examples, your strictures on the late treaty with America." It is indeed a disheartening reflection for those who cherish the wish of a better future for mankind, that the progress of popular Power seems to strengthen rather than diminish the propensity to war. "War is a game which, were their subjects wise, kings should not play at." It was the want of wisdom not the want of Power in the subjects, that rendered hostilities so frequent in times past ; and their attainment of greater power, unaccompanied by the acquisition of greater wisdom' could not diminish the occasions of war. The only change it has operated is, by rendering wars the consequence of the nation's instead of the sovereign's wish, to make them more inveterate and destructive. It is less, however, to this general view of the phEenomenon, than to its practical bearing upon the concerns of Great Britain, that it is desirable at present to direct attention. As yet, the Reformers of Great Britain are less tainted with the war-spirit than the Republicans of France or the Democrats (Locofocos) of the United States : their selfish and unprincipled leaders have not yet persuaded them to cast to the winds all those professions of humanity taught by the common founders of the Movement party in Europe and America.
To the accusation of having been for three years a strenuous advocate of warlike policy, the mouthpiece of the War-faction replies, that Lord ASHBURTON'S treaty is one of which even the most peaceably-disposed cannot approve. This is to evade, not meet the charge. Let the treaty just concluded with the United States be what it may, it forms no excuse for the war in support of opium-smuggling in China—for the war undertaken to change by foreign bayonets the dynasty of the Afghans—for the intermeddling in the domestic concerns of Turkey, which cost us a little war with the Pasha of Egypt and had almost involved us in a great war with France. The blustering tone adopted towards the United States is no isolated feature of the PALMERSTON policy, but a consistent and necessary expression of the meddling and domineering spirit which is its animating principle. Lord PArAtERErros, or the understrapper who held the pen for him on the occasion, says of the views expressed in the letter from which we quoted above—" To say that the opinions put forward in this letter are the opinions of the 'Liberal party,' is to betray utter ignorance of the principles upon which that party is constituted, and upon which our correspondent must give us leave to tell him that party can be held together." It is well that this avowal has been made, in order that the public may know what it has to expect from the party which Lord PALMERSTON is attempting to rally under the specious name of "Liberal." It takes its stand upon the blundering, bullying, and spendthrift system of foreign policy, developed more unequivocally than before in the course of the last three years. It repudiates the principles of peace and non-intervention which were the boast of Lord GREY'S Government ; the profession of which did more than any thing else, except the introduction of the Reform Bill, to gain for it the general and enthusiastic support it at first obtained. The PALMERSTON "Liberal party" is pledged to assert in the name of this country a right to make and unmake kings in foreign states—to treat with all other nations on the footing that its will shall be law—and to enforce these revolting pretensions on all occasions by arms. And this it stands pledged to do, not on the hypocritical pretext that thereby the interests or the "glory" of Great Britain will be promoted, but for the plain unvarnished reason that these are "the principles upon which that party is constituted "—and that only "upon them that party can be held together." It has often been said that " partyis the madness of many for the gain of a few," i but the present s the first example of party-leaders making the confession to the very "many" they are in the act of courting. Old fabulists have told how the ostrich when it buried its head in the sand fancied its whole body was hid: the would-be leader of the new sort of "Liberals" improves upon the model, and thinks by fixing his great goggle-eyes upon the observers, to stare them into a belief that they do not see him or his manoeuvres. And the frank avowal of his selfish objects is followed up by one of his equally futile and favourite inuendoes. "That such opinions [as those advocated by the letter-writer in the Chronicle] do not belong to the Tory party, we shall have no difficulty in demonstrating." This hit is thought extremely clever as tending to withdraw the support of the old Tories from Sir ROBERT PEEL if he persist in a liberal, rational, and pacific foreign policy. Unfortunately for the writer's object, however, it cannot produce this effect without at the same time showing the public that the principles of Sir ROBERT PEEL'S Government are, on this point at least, not those of the old Tories, and convincing even these antiquated politicians that their opinions belong to an age which is past and cannot be acted upon in the present.
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