The Life of William Ewart Gladstone Volume II Part 43

(M158) He found specific reasons for withdrawal in the state of the party (Feb. 12):-

1. The absence of any great positive aim (the late plan [budget]

having failed) for which to co-operate. 2. The difficulty of establis.h.i.+ng united and vigorous action in the liberal party for the purposes of economy. 3. The unlikelihood of arriving at any present agreement respecting education.

In another fragment of the same date, he says:-

I do not forget that I am in debt to the party generally for kindness, indulgence, and confidence, much beyond what I have deserved. Deeming myself unable to hold it together from my present position in a manner worthy of it, I see how unlikely it is that I should hereafter be able to give any material aid in the adjustment of its difficulties. Yet if such aid should at any time be generally desired with a view to arresting some great evil or procuring for the nation some great good, my willingness to enter into counsel for the occasion would follow from all I have said.

But always with the understanding that as between section and section I could not become a partisan, and that such interference even in the case of its proving useful would entail no obligation whatever on those accepting it, and carry with it no disturbance of any arrangement subsisting at the time.

The situation proved, as Lowe had foreseen, an anarchic experiment. Mr.

Gladstone went up to London for the session, and followed his ordinary social course:-

_March 9, 1874._-Off at 4.45 to Windsor for the fete. We dined at St. George's Hall. I was presented to the d.u.c.h.ess of C. by the Queen, and had a few kind words from H.M. 11.-Archbishop Manning, 9-11. It is kind in him to come, but most of it is rather hollow work, limited as we are. 16.-Dined at Marlborough House. A civil talk with Disraeli. 20.-Finished _Vivian Grey_. The first quarter extremely clever, the rest trash.

_May 15._-Emperor of Russia's reception at 3.15. He thanked me for my conduct to Russia while I was minister. I a.s.sured his Majesty I had watched with profound interest the transactions of his reign, and the great benefits he had conferred upon his people. He hoped the relations of the two countries would always be good.... Dined at Marlborough House. Stafford House ball afterwards. The emperor complained of the burden and late hours of evening entertainments.

Princess of Wales so nice about her picture. D[israeli] complained of my absence, said they could not get on without me. 20.-Dined at the F.O. to meet the emperor. It was very kind of Derby. Much work at Hawarden in arranging books and papers.

The House of Commons is hardly attractive to an irregular and perfunctory attendant; and Mr. Gladstone's thoughts all turned to other fields. To Mrs. Gladstone he wrote early in April:-

The anti-parliamentary reaction has been stronger with me even than I antic.i.p.ated. I am as far as possible from feeling the want of the House of Commons. I could cheerfully go there to do a work; but I hope and pray to be as little there as possible, except for such an aim. In London I think we were too much hustled to speak leisurely or effectually of the future. It will open for us by degrees. I shall be glad when the matter of money, after all a secondary one, is disentangled, but chiefly because it seems to put pressure upon you. I spoke to Stephen about these matters on Sat.u.r.day; he was kind, reasonable, and in all ways as satisfactory as possible. There is one thing I should like you to understand clearly as to my view of things, for it is an essential part of that view. I am convinced that the welfare of mankind does not now depend on the state or the world of politics; the real battle is being fought in the world of thought, where a deadly attack is made with great tenacity of purpose and over a wide field, upon the greatest treasure of mankind, the belief in G.o.d and the gospel of Christ.

In June Sir Stephen Glynne died,-"a dark, dark day." "My brother-in-law,"

wrote Mr. Gladstone at a later date, "was a man of singular refinement and as remarkable modesty. His culture was high and his character one of deep interest. His memory was on the whole decidedly the most remarkable known to me of the generation and country. His life, however, was retired and un.o.btrusive; but he sat in parliament, I think, for about fifteen years, and was lord-lieutenant of his county."

I thank you much-Mr. Gladstone said to the Duke of Argyll-for your kind note. Your sympathy and that of the d.u.c.h.ess are ever ready.

But even you can hardly tell how it is on this occasion needed and warranted. My wife has lost the last member of a family united by bonds of the rarest tenderness, the last representative of his line, the best of brothers, who had ever drawn closer to her as the little rank was thinned. As for me, no one can know what our personal relations were, without knowing the interior details of a long family history, and efforts and struggles in common carried on through a long series of years, which riveted into the closest union our original affection. He was a very rare man, but we grieve not for him; he sleeps the sleep of the just. The event is a great one also to the outward frame of our life here.(310)

(M159) In the same letter he says it is most painful to him to be dragged into ecclesiastical turmoil, as for example by the Scotch patronage bill, which he considers precipitate, unwise, and daring, or the bill directed against the endowed schools commissioners, of whom his brother-in-law, Lord Lyttelton, was one. In the last case he acted as a leader of an organised party, but in the more important instance of a bill devised, as Mr. Disraeli said, to put down ritualism, his dissent from most of those around him fulfilled all the antic.i.p.ations that had pointed to retirement.

The House was heartily in favour of the bill, and what is called the country earnestly supported it, though in the cabinet itself at least four ministers were strenuously hostile. Mr. Gladstone writes to his wife a trenchant account of his vigorous dealing with a prominent colleague who had rashly ventured to mark him for a.s.sault. He sent word to the two archbishops that if they carried a certain amendment he should hold himself "altogether discharged from maintaining any longer the establishment of the church." He wrote to Lord Harrowby when the recess came:-

I think, or rather I am convinced, that the effect _either_ of one or two more ecclesiastical sessions of parliament such as the last, or of any prolonged series of contentious proceedings under the recent Act, upon subjects of widespread interest, will be to disestablish the church. I do not feel the dread of disestablishment which you may probably entertain: but I desire and seek so long as standing ground remains, to avert, not to precipitate it.

To another correspondent-

Individually I have serious doubts whether the whole of the penal proceedings taken in this country with respect to church matters from the day of Dr. Hampden downwards, have not done considerably more harm than good. There is no doubt at all that all the evils, of whatever kind, at which they were aimed, exist at this moment among us in a far more aggravated shape than when they began....

My object and desire has ever been and still is, to keep the church of England together, both as a church and as an establishment. As a church, I believe she is strong enough, by virtue of the prayer-book, to hold together under all circ.u.mstances; but as an establishment, in my opinion, she is not strong enough to bear either serious secession or prolonged parliamentary agitation.

Finally, in a letter dated from Whittinghame (Nov. 17)-

There are already too many causes of demoralisation operating upon the House of Commons. If it is also to become a debased copy of an ecclesiastical council, all the worst men and worst qualities of the worst men will come to the front, and the place will become intolerable.

Even any member of parliament who shares none of Mr. Gladstone's theology, may sympathise to the full with his deep disgust at theologic and ecclesiastical discussions as conducted in that secular air. We can easily understand how detestable he found it, and how those discussions fortified his sense of estrangement from the ruling sentiments of the parliamentary party of which he was still the t.i.tular leader.

Of course the whigs, always for keeping a parliamentary church in its proper place, disliked his line. Liberals like Thirlwall read his speeches "with great pain and suspicion," and declared their confidence to be shaken. Hardly any section was completely satisfied. His mind in the autumn and winter of 1874 was absorbed, as we shall see within a few pages, in an a.s.sault upon the decrees of the Vatican Council of 1870. This a.s.sault, as he told Lord Granville (Dec. 7, 1874), while tending "to hearten" the party generally, was against his resumption of formal leaders.h.i.+p, because it widened the breach with the Irishmen in the House of Commons. Apart from this there were many questions, each with a group of adherents to a special view, but incapable of being pursued by common and united action. He ran through the list in writing to Lord Granville.

It has historic interest:-

1. Extension of the suffrage, with redistribution of seats abreast or in the rear. 2. Disestablishment in Scotland, England. 3. Land laws. 4. Retrenchment. 5. Colonial policy, territorial extension of the empire. 6. Reform of local government taxation. 7. Secular education. 8. Undenominational education. 9. Irish affairs. On no one of these is there known to exist a plan desired by the entire party, or by any clear and decisive majority of it.

On the whole, he was persuaded that neither the party generally nor the country desired another period of active reforms, even if he were fit to conduct them. Besides this he confessed his "apprehension that differences would spring up, and great shrinking from any breach with the party, and a determination, often expressed, never, if he could help it, to lead one branch of it against another." In many forms he carried Lord Granville with him round the circle of his arguments. He once sent his points on half-a-dozen sc.r.a.ps of paper. Granville playfully replied, "I should like to treat them as old Lord Bessborough used to treat his playing-cards when luck was adverse-tear them up into small bits and toss them in the fire."

Nothing shook him, not even Mrs. Gladstone's misgivings. To her he wrote from Carlton House Terrace on the eve of the session of 1875:-

Now for the grave matter about the leaders.h.i.+p. I have had much conversation with Granville and Cardwell, and I am going to see Hartington, also Goschen, to-morrow. My letter is rewritten and improved, but I am obliged to stand to my conclusion, for many reasons. Among them the church reason is one of the most serious, and the other the undefined and prolonged character of the service if now undertaken. This, while arguing and deprecating, they admit I think to a great extent. Our old colleagues are inclined to come up on Thursday if they can, and this will be rather to hear than to debate. Hartington will succeed. I am indeed sorry that you and I have not been able to take the same view of this important subject, but you know that I am acting on convictions very long entertained, and will I am sure believe that I have probed myself deeply, and used all the means in my power to get at a right conclusion. Nay, I think you will be more reconciled, when I tell you that Granville did not really see his way either to a nominal leaders.h.i.+p, or to making any arrangement by which I could after a short time with some certainty have escaped. I saw Clark last night and this morning; he gives an excellent account of me and makes it impossible for me to plead health as my reason.

The drama went rapidly forward:-

_Jan. 12._-I find that the agreement made yesterday that I should meet my former colleagues on Monday will require me to remain until this day, though after a pretty busy morning the pressure is less. I have, however, to preside in the evening at the meeting of the Metaphysical Society, and to listen, though I hope nothing more, to a tough discussion. Manning, I am sorry to say, will be there. His pamphlet is at length going to press, and will extend he says to 150 pages. Newman is not out yet.

_11 Carlton House Terrace, Jan. 14, '75._-This great affair is nearly arranged. My old colleagues all submit under protest; and I shall be free. An article in the _Times_ this morning is undisguisedly aimed at getting rid of me; but it does not express any of their feelings. We have had a morning at Granville's; Halifax, Granville, Cardwell, Hartington, Aberdare, Forster, Carlingford, Stansfeld, Selborne, Goschen, Lowe, Kimberley,-in short all, I think, except Argyll and Bright. There was argument and exhortation, and much kindness. My letter to Granville will be accompanied by a short reply from him expressing difference of opinion and regret. They are afraid of being blamed by the party if they seem to show indifference.

The Queen thanked Mr. Gladstone for communicating to her his resolution of retiring from the more active duties of parliamentary life. She was not entirely unprepared for it after what he told her himself last year. "She knows that his zeal and untiring energy have always been exerted with the desire of advancing the welfare of the nation and maintaining the honour of the crown, and she thanks him for his loyal a.s.surances of support on all occasions when it may become necessary."

(M160) The Duke of Argyll wrote "sincerely to congratulate" him upon his withdrawal. Bright on the other hand (Jan. 17) said he could not applaud, yet he would not blame: Mr. Gladstone's course seemed so unfortunate if not disastrous to the great public interests committed to him:-

For myself, says Bright, if I could have foreseen either the result of the election of last year, or your retirement from the conduct of the party, I should certainly have withdrawn from parliament, where now I seem to have quite as little of duty or of a mission as you have. The front opposition bench is full of discord, and when you are not there full of jealousy, and I find myself without any particular attraction to any particular part of the House. However, I will not complain; some door of escape may open for me, and I can become a spectator as you are proposing to be.

I hope on some occasion I may have the chance of seeing you when you come to town. I have had so much pleasure in your friends.h.i.+p, and have gained so much from it, that I would fain hope it need not cease now, when our a.s.sociation will necessarily be less frequent than it has been of late years. Whether you come back to the political field or turn wholly to study and to literature, I am sure you will be usefully employed, and I hope that nothing but blessing may rest upon all your labours.

The feeling among liberals in the country was of deep dismay. Some of the whigs doubtless found solace in the antic.i.p.ation that a new middle party might be formed, with "a recovery of the old liberal position demolished for the time by John Mill, Gladstone, and Cobden."(311) But this was limited to a narrow circle. "All suns.h.i.+ne is gone out of politics," was a general phrase. The news was compared by one correspondent to Gelon's message to the Greeks, that the spring was taken out of their year.(312)

An organ of the stiff nonconformists said,(313) "Against his government we felt that we had a great grievance; for himself, the nonconformists of this country have long cherished a loyalty more fervent, we are inclined to imagine, than that with which he has been regarded by any other section of the community. He, beyond all other modern statesmen, with perhaps here and there a doubtful exception, gave us the impression of a man who regarded politics as a part of Christian duty." And the same writers most truly added, "We do not know what the English people have done for Mr.

Gladstone that can be compared for a moment with what Mr. Gladstone has done for them. Claims on him we have none. He has far more than discharged any debt that he could have owed to the nation." These words are a just remonstrance against the somewhat tyrannical conventions of English public life.

When the session began, he wrote to Mrs. Gladstone (Feb. 15): "I came down to the House and took my seat nearly in the same spot as last year, finding Bright my neighbour, with which I was very well pleased. Granville and Hartington both much preferred my continuing _on_ the front bench to my going elsewhere." Lord Hartington, strongly encouraged against his own inclinations by Mr. Gladstone, accepted a thankless and unpromising post, and held it with honour and credit for five difficult years to come.