times when the divisions were close and the government was weak, at any moment transfer the purchasing power from the head of the administration to the leader of the opposition. It was in consequence impossible for any minister on dubious occasions to refuse the king a share in the patronage. If he did not concede some of it, he would in all likelihood lose the whole of it.

A third inherent defect in the administrative strength obtained by the use of patronage is its certain unpopularity. Mankind call it corruption. Refined reasoners may prove, or fancy they prove, that it is desirable; they may demonstrate that it is possibly in some degree inevitable; but they will never induce ordinary men to like it. Of all governments, it is the least impressive to the popular imagination. It seems not only to have vice for its adjunct, but vice for its principle. All governments are feeble which cannot appeal with confidence to the moral instincts of their subjects; but it appears almost impudent in this one to attempt to do so. It exists because it has successfully applied bad motives to men susceptible of bad motives. As the secret of its power appears to be base, it loses its hold over the loyalty of mankind. We have seen this exemplified in a conspicuous instance in France. The monarchy of Louis Philippe was weak because it was believed to be maintained by bribery and to be supported from immoral motives. The same cause long weakened, and was at last the chief agent in destroying, the long, prosperous, and able ministry of Sir Robert Walpole. It was to no purpose that he governed well; it was to no purpose that he administered general affairs consummately, or that he regulated the finances wisely, it was to no purpose that he showed that those who opposed him were impelled to do so by very mean motives: no defensive considerations availed him. It was believed that his government was maintained by corruption, and a kind of disgust gradually grew up towards it, long impaired, and at length annihilated it. Every government under the old system of representation that continued long in office was sure to contract this stain; that of Lord Liverpool did not escape it. There were sure to be some instances of misapplied patronage, which inevitably incurred the censure, and irritated the feelings, of thinking men. This unpopularity is a source of more continued weakness to a government than would be at first sight imagined. It might be thought that an administration with plenty of votes would have plenty of courage, but it is not so. A certain timidity belongs to all oligarchies, and to an unpopular oligarchy, to an oligarchy that is believed to rest upon corruption, above all. It is timid at every outcry, and it yields whenever it can. In the

plenitude of power Sir Robert Walpole did not press his excise scheme, though it was a wise one, and though he was sure that it was so; he felt that at a crisis he was weak, that the popular odium was not compensated by parliamentary support. Make what refined devices we may, in every free government any strong opinion that possesses the multitude will be powerful; it will not be least powerful where the government is conscious that it rests upon a basis which is odious to common men, and which therefore shuns a popular scrutiny.

For these reasons, therefore, we think, when the subject is accurately examined, the supposed strength which the administrations of the last century are commonly said to have derived from the employment of patronage was a strength rather seeming than substantial. It added to the strength of administrations otherwise strong, and that did not need it; but it was not in its nature to strengthen those which were weak, or to aid, as it is sometimes believed to have aided, tottering administrations at a fatal division.

But even for this strength, such as it was, the people of the last century paid a very heavy price. They purchased it by the almost total sacrifice of efficiency in administration. We can hardly at the present day conceive how utterly feeble that administration formerly was. Nor have we space to go into the details of the subject. But one test on the subject may be easily used; we mean, the test of success. Our administrative system was subjected in the last century to three of the most searching tests of efficiency. It was tried by a riot, by a rebellion within the island, by the resistance of our greatest colonies. If any events can bring out the latent vigour of an administration, these would probably bring it out. They did not, however, do so. We all know the utter feebleness and miserable inefficiency with which the mobs of 1780 were resisted, if resistance it can be called. We know that London was then almost as much at the mercy of its worst inhabitants as Paris has ever been. But it is not so generally known that similar events nearly as bad, though not quite as bad, had happened before; but they did happen. In Hume's Correspondence there is a curious description of the riots of 1765: “Another very extraordinary event is the riot which the silk-weavers have made for some days past. They got a bill passed in the House of Commons to prevent more effectually the importation of foreign silks, which the Duke of Bedford threw out in the House of Lords. The next day, above ten thousand of these people came down to the House, desiring redress, with drums beating and colours flying. They attacked the Duke of Bedford in his chariot, and threw so large a stone

at him, that if he had not put out his hand, and saved his head by having his thumb cut to the bone, he must have been killed. He behaved with great resolution, and got free of them; since which time he has remained blockaded in his own house, and defended by the troops. Yesterday the same number of weavers assembled again at the House of Lords, where the horse and foot guards were to secure the entry for the Peers. The mob were ranged before the soldiers, and their colours were playing in the faces of his majesty's troops. The degree of security with which these people commit felony seems to me the most formidable circumstance in the whole they carry in their whole deportment so much tranquillity and ease, that they do not seem apprised of the illegality of their proceedings. It is really serious to see the legislature of this country intimidated by such a rabble; and to see the House of Lords send for Justice Fielding, to hear him prove for how many reasons he ought not to do his duty. The Duke of Bedford is still in danger of his life if he goes out of his house; and we expect to see the same number of people assembled every day, till something more vigorous is done than any one has yet chosen to propose. The spirit of robbing has gone forth in this nation to a degree that we have not experienced this century past, and it will not be found so easy a matter to quell it" (pp. 55, 56).

No description can be more graphic of the weakness of a feeble administration, unmoved by evident danger. We need not dwell on the other instances of inefficiency to which we have alluded. In 1745, the administration of the day—a divided and discordant administration, it is true-permitted a small body of half-disciplined Highlanders to advance into the centre of England. So imperfect were their arrangements, that some good judges of evidence have thought that if Charles Edward had pushed on towards London, he might have succeeded in taking it. The war with our North-American Colonies was conducted with as little wisdom and energy; it could not be with less. The whole strength of the empire was never put forth; and historians have often wondered at the series of petty expeditions and inconclusive conflicts, with which so great a country as England endeavoured to reduce so great a country as America. Lord North's government was perhaps somewhat feebler than many of the governments of the last century; but even if so, it is only because it exhibits the characteristic defects belonging to them all in a conspicuous and aggravated form. It was not exceptionally inefficient, but characteristically inefficient.

The explanation of this inefficiency is simple. It was caused by the abuse of patronage; or rather, to speak the language of

the old Tory theory, by the use of it to bribe members of parliament and proprietors of boroughs. George II. is reported to have said to Sir Robert Walpole, "I won't have my army jobbed away for your members: it shan't be." It had been, however; and the state of the English army at the commencement of the long war with France is a conclusive proof of it. Burke, in his speech on economical reform, has explained this point with more humour than is usual with him :

"There was another disaster far more doleful than this. I shall state it, as the cause of that misfortune lies at the bottom of almost all our prodigality. Lord Talbot attempted to reform the kitchen; but such, as he well observed, is the consequence of having duty done by one person, whilst another enjoys the emoluments, that he found himself frustrated in all his designs. On that rock his whole adventure split-his whole scheme of economy was dashed to pieces; his department became more expensive than ever; the Civil-List debt accumulated-why? It was truly from a cause which, though perfectly adequate to the effect, one would not have instantly guessed-it was because the turnspit in the king's kitchen was a member of parliament.* The king's domestic servants were all undone; his tradesmen remained unpaid and became bankrupt-because the turnspit in the king's kitchen was a member of parliament. His majesty's slumbers were interrupted, his pillow was stuffed with thorns, and his peace of mind entirely broken-because the king's turnspit was a member of parliament. The judges were unpaid, the justice of the kingdom bent and gave way, the foreign ministers remained inactive and unprovided; the system of Europe was dissolved; the chain of our alliances was broken; all the wheels of government at home and abroad were stopped-because the king's turnspit was a member of parliament." The efficiency of the public offices was sacrificed, in order that the best posts in them might be better used as parliamentary purchase-money. It would have been a heavy price to pay even for a government that was really strong.

It is curious, that though under our old constitution so heavy a price was paid for parliamentary support, and so little support was at critical moments obtained by that price, the governments of that day did very little with the strength which they so bought, after they had bought it. We nowadays consider that the first use which a prime minister will make of a large majority, is to legislate with it. In the last century men did not think so. Lord John Russell justly said in the House of Commons, that there was no statute, no act of

"Vide Lord Talbot's speech, in Almond's Parliamentary Register, vol. vii. p. 79, of the proceedings of the Lords."

legislation, which we can connect with or can trace to Lord Chatham, who was the most celebrated minister of England during the last century. There have been a greater number of important Acts of Parliament passed in the last twenty years than in the previous hundred and twenty. The people of England, a hundred years ago, and their Parliament also, were habitually satisfied with their existing institutions: they did not care to abolish any of these, or to introduce any new ones. Accordingly, when the minister at that time had bought his majority, he had nothing to do with it except to keep himself minister.

On the whole, therefore, we do not think that our old system of representation is entitled to the credit, which it has often received, for causing and maintaining strong administrations. The ingenious devices which it contained seem to us to have failed whenever they were really wanted; and we conclude, from the entire history of the last century, that governments were then only strong when public opinion was definite and decided, and when that is so they will be strong now.

The only one of our questions as to our old system of representation that is still unanswered is, What was the degree of its suitability for training and developing statesmen? Lord Macaulay has in more than one part of his writings expressed a doubt whether all representative systems are not in this respect defective. They require, he says, that an influential statesman should be an orator, and especially a ready and debating orator; and this he considers is inexpedient. He appears to believe, both that the practice of debating injures the intellect, and that the conviction of its necessity makes a statesman prize and practise qualities which are not essential to his true calling in preference to those which really are so. He believes that the statesman is induced to think more of the House of Commons, and of the effect which his measures would produce there, than is desirable; and also that the habit of defending those measures by very questionable arguments disorganises the intellect of a statesman and renders it much less fit than it would otherwise be for the investigation of important truths. There is doubtless some truth in these ideas; the practical working of a representative government often tends to produce these hurtful effects upon the minds of the statesmen who are eminent under it. And not only so.. All free governments are to some extent unfavourable to much originality of mind in their influential statesmen. They necessitate an appeal to the people; and the mind of the people is almost by definition ordinary and commonplace. The opinions of the majority of mankind almost necessarily partake of these qualities; and those who have to please