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0^9 The Leader and Saturday Analyst. [Ap...
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, THE PROFESSED POLITIC:!AX., AFTER a sh...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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\ : Sill C11a.Elks Wood's Lvesl'otlrim. ...
end , the greatest social disasters , They may ns many of them do approve of it bceause they are : vinacquainted with .-the history of rnrer money . They may rely on the regulations , very , stringent in rip > earance , to restrict the issue , but such regulation s have never stood the test of trial .,. Even in England , now , where all sorts of precautions are taken , our State paper money , at one time -M-eatlv in excess , ami at another greatly in deficiency -of he want * of the coim-uunity , inflicts continual injury on the public . It has occasionally caused such injuries . through the two hundred . ' year * at least from the first establishment of . the Bank monopoly , that it has been growing to its present condition . Here , the public have been educated , as it was slowly and successively tampered with to use it . Hero , all the transactions of commerce being adapted to it , reduce the evils of State paper currency to a innunuun . Ileve , the lolly of the Legislature in imitating the Governments of France and Itussia in establishing paper promises to pay as a legal tender , or actual payment , . has been neutralised by he ¦ habits of the comnmnity . It has-used with advantage the ptomiscs to i-av of individuals ,. and has counteracted and kept in click a kte paper currency , India is to have a -fit -blown * H < -ni of such currency at-once imposed on u , Neither tie intelligent voice of . Mr ! Newmarch lifted against it , nor the numerous other intelligent voices that will be lilted , aginiist ^ whenever its nature is fully known , can now be hcedec . I will be ( breed into circulation , and there will be neither a knowledge of its nature nor the habit o ; f using . it to keep a cheek on the " ¦ "Iv ' iuav admit that Sir Ciiaiu . es ^ Yood and Mr . ^ YiLSON mean well , though wemay suspect they -hardly take cognizance , of their-own motives ; bvtf the French and' Kussian authorities ¦ also- meant well , and vet they Brought innumerable ^ evils on Uxe people who coniided in their state paper money . l » c the systeni practicable or otherwise , likely to be beneficial or not , the-heaght of wisdom or the depth of fully , it is equally despotic to sot . about establishing it without iirst consulting the people and Parliament of England . The same despotic power which establishes the restrictions mny sweep them away , and then . Sir Cit vim . es Wood ' s stale paper currency will be no hotter than the assignats of revolutionary Frnncc . Independently ot all consideration of consequences , we call attention to tho proceeding , because it is by no-. means , a solitary example ot lnghhanded despotism by officials , who ought to . be , hut m no sense are , practically responsible for their acts . .
0^9 The Leader And Saturday Analyst. [Ap...
0 ^ 9 The Leader and Saturday Analyst . [ April 21 , 1800 . « 3 / & ¦ ¦ . ,. .. - - . - . ¦ . . - . . . . ¦ ^_____ .- - .- — ' , .- - —— . , - t . —__
, The Professed Politic:!Ax., After A Sh...
, THE PROFESSED POLITIC : ! AX ., AFTER a short holiday we arc going to have another hatch of Parliamentary debates , and it is somewhat melancholy to think that the country , as a whole , cares little or nothing lor the forthcoming performnnqc . Particular interests are alive to what is o-oing on , nrid anxious to turn legislation to a good profit . Papcrmakers desire to protect their trade ; wme nuirrbants look to the details of the new propositions for assessing their commodity ; coal-owners , iron-masters , and cotton-spinners have also on eye to business ;—but in each case it is the proht ot the individual " shop or mill or counting-house that commands attention , and public interests arc little thought ot by M . I . s , or even by the public themselves . Dissenters support bir Joux TketaW y rather from habit than from zeal ; and those who have , called themselves « Reformers , " or " Liberals / and find the nickname useful for electioneering purposes , affect a little interest in . Lord John Russhm / s puny measure for electoral olinngc . People hro tired of the " ¦ designs of "France ; " even Cardinal V \ isema « can' get up no interest about a Pot ' K who can do no better than carry out Mr . Sii \ npy ' s theory of the purely derivative and second-hand nature of the profane swearing of modern times ; the Savoy question , like the savoy cabbage , ia passing out ot senson ; Mr . Bryan Kino and his chuich-nulitnnt are censing to draw attention , and things in general hro as flat as it the " last man" were his own last " public , " and had the felicity ot making his last spueoli entirely to himself . Scokmg ior some objoct of interest , wo come upon " Mr . Bbhnal Osbounb on Public Allah's , " rind rend his ovation to see whnt a gcntlomnn well up in electioneering rhetoric would have to say to his enlightened constituents of Liskenrd , which has a population not quito big enough to form a congregation ior Mr . bL'UitOEON nt the Surrey Hall . „ , Mr . ' OsnoRNJS does not spenk with tho powoi' ot spinning jennies , nor doea ho nttor tho voice ' of winds . Ho is neither a concentration of railway , nn oxtrnct of wntor , nor nn essence of irns . No " intoroat" looks up to him , and ho excites no moro ilimn a passing- sinilo . Ho is ono of the very small class who make polities u profession , and lie doos nothing to rniso tha olmmolrr or tho influence of tho occupation in which ho lias embarked his cnpitul of brains . Omitting tlw noblo persons
' . who are born to do us the honour of ruling us , we have remark-. 1 ably few men who adopt the business of Professors of Public ! A flairs , and aspire to be ranked as statesmen from the range of their information , the accuracy of their reasoning , or the value of ( heir suggestions lor social progress and benelieent change . Mr . Osboune has treated politics as a jaunty trade , and , "in his small way , done something to lower confidence in Liberals not spe' -, daily attached to a great interest , and speaking-according to its ! behests . While Mr . Qsboknk calls . himself : a Liberal , and remains a member of parliament , he will sit on one side of the .. House of Commons , and his oratorical . - peas will occasionally be ' heard rattling against the other .. Were he to change . his views and positioiCthc aforesaid peas would have a new incidence ,, nncl . \ L ijlltlie earnest affairs of society go on just the same . Having .. . . . been Secretary to the Admiralty , Mr . Osjsoune had ' . opportunities of learning something of its management , and . might have put himself in " a position to indicate reforms , and have something better to say than that the . " estimates were , enormous , '' and ; that such ' expenditure ¦ ' ¦ ought not to exist . " . His constituents ; we . re benevolent enough to cheer these sentiments , as if such vague-! generalities were net " part of the stock in trade of every jrolitioalpedlar who goes forth-into , the world-with his pack of deceptions : wares . Upon the . Reform c-n . it-stion the honourable gentleman . ¦ was equally unsatisfactory ; Ik : called ' it . an ¦¦ ¦ ' awkward ( jncsi tiou , " and ' so it is in other , places ' besides Liskrard . H has \ become so because it has been traded upon too long ; u ^ - ^ i like : tlie sore l (\ f > - that will never get well , as . a fraudulent means of ' attracting sympathy and obtaining political relief . ' When Mr . OsBOiiNE tells us that " tin :: Conservatives having come to the level , ol" the AVhigSj the Whigs are obliged to be i something more , " he niis-states historical facts , inasmuch ¦' as . i Lord Joil . v 1 \ USS 1 M , l ' s earlier bills were further-going measurr .-j than that which he at present puts forth . We have no olyccMou ¦ to his eomparihg Mr . JiujGUT to the " Jk'nic-ia Boy , "' and have ! always felt that gentleman ' s . denunciations of aristocracy wriv . I basecl . upon a desire to inake eottoiiocracy supronie ; but wliat i can be more silly than , to say that " -every man might elevate ' hiuiself , and become a meniher of that aristocracy . " ' The army and the bar open I lie doors of the peerage to a few ; but no . man . -. - . uueonnecied -with . the Court or the aristocracy gct-j a fair chance in the ' military profession , and subserviency to a ] : arty will do j more than legal acquirements to obtain a woolsack for a chair . Were a mail to distinguish himself as a great lrgal reformer , like i Jeremy IhixxiiAM , he would be more likely to be . elected , . kingof the Cannibal Islands than to lind his genius and labours rewarded by a British coronet . Science conducts no oiic be-vond . the boundaries that separate the commoner from t lie ' peer . Art never leads to precincts too sacivd for genius to profane . Literature was tho pretext for a single ( .-luvaunu lo the ii ]) pcr ranks ; but everybody knew the reward was to the Whig I i ) artisan , and that : Macai ; i . av would have waited long enough for a peerage if he had written in the bolder and iVcer spirit ot ¦ Cahlyle . Tlie hig-lit-st exercise of human faculties for tin . general good is not tho way to the House of Lords ; but money can get its owner thcivv if he was lusver known to employ tho power of the millionaire in favour- of anything wiser or bettor than the ruling classes find it their interest to desire . No philosophical thinker can desire to witness the exclusiw predominance of tho commercial and manufacturing eluss , hur . the peers might as well consider whether their objection lo take into their ranks tho intellectual leaders of tin : country , who- arc , after all , its real aristocracy , is likely to win ior their institution permanent regard . To Mr . Osbous ' k it may bo all that is desirable , but politicians who neither represent interests nor ideas can throw little weight into any scale . Mr . Osuoknk characterised Lord John JIussnm / h Reform Hill ns " clumsy / ' nnd complained that it was not in reality a reform bill at nfl , ns it did not deal with tlie evils of the pivssenl system ; but l » c did not tell his constituents what ho hud done to remedy its defects . IVy n few smart sentences he sought to buy tlics advantage of being- supposed anxious for sonn thing better , and when the time for notion comes ho can avoid all combinations' that might bring about a more satislinctory ^ vsult . One of tho chief faults of our electoral system is that it represents nothing but interests , imd entirely fails to give prominence to ideas . If every interest were represented , this might not matter very nuioh , as ideas can get tjecess to , and ultimately oonmituid , tho world , outside tho legislative doors 5 hut the fact , is , only very rich interests havo-a clumco of being heard , and'there i * dmigcr tliat the workmg-chissoa will bo taught to consider the House ot Commons as simply a representation of tho feelings , opinions , nnd profits of other rmiks in tho sociul sonic . AVo want , u now nud popular order of men , who will grow into statesmen from 11 lovo of whnt should bo a nqble profession . Tho existing system gives us hiudornncG instead of Jiolp . The Whigs nro willing to
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), April 21, 1860, page 8, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_21041860/page/8/
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