much to prepare those gifted ones for their peculiar trials? Yet you would not have all women educated as if they were women of genius, and who is to decide fitly on the plan to be pursued? For, if every man is not a hero to his valet-de-chambre, most children appear to their parents singularly gifted."

"Of course,-like all mothers, I suppose," replied Mrs. Verner. "I have my own theories of education, and one of these days we will talk them over together. Our great aim,

it seems to me, should be, to put young people in the way of educating themselves; for, until they feel the necessity for self-culture, we can do little for them. But we are interrupted in good time," she continued, as her laughing children bounded into the room, followed by her husband; and the grave discussion gave way to lighter sallies, in which, if there was little wit, there was no lack of good-humour, or of the spirit of love which bound together the members of that happy household.

CONTEMPORARY ORATORS,

No. IX.

EARL GREY AND LORD MORPETH.

1.-EARL GREY.

THE Whigs recognise the principle of an hereditary succession even in party leadership: an office under government and ultimately a seat in the cabinet, with occasionally an advance in the peerage, are as certainly secured by a kind of law of entail to the Whig lordling who turns his attention to politics, as is his paternal estate. Public honours and power, under the favouring forms of the constitution, have become, to a few families, almost a private property. We do not say that they inherit these things without deserving them; far from it: the sons of the great Whig families have often developed into statesmen, becoming by the force of their talents entitled to fresh honours; and in their turn founding new families, all with the like claims on their party. But they certainly have had a preference in the first start into life which has not been enjoyed by commoners generally, nor even by the scions of other noble families professing, perhaps, liberal politics, but not being within the charmed circle. An exclusiveness in the distribution of offices, and the initiation into the service of the state, has characterised the Whig party since it first became possessed of power under the consti

tutional form of government; nor, until the bold offer of Lord John Russell to Mr. Cobden, of an office under government, when that noble lord was forming an administration on the resignation of Sir Robert Peel, before introducing his free-trade plan, has there been any material symptom of a relaxation of that rigid rule of almost family preference. Mr. Macaulay's elevation to the cabinet is a brilliant exception; but the ground of his promotion has been, as we have shewn, exceptional also.

On the other hand it is a singular fact, that the party in the state whose principles are generally declared to be as exclusive as those of the Whigs are asserted to be liberal; a party which numbers in its ranks more of the aristocracy of the country, and a less proportion of the commercial and the democratic interests; has always been remarkable for throwing open its arms to talent wherever it was to be found, and for bestowing the most valuable offices in the state upon distinguished persons, more on account of their intellectual merit than of their noble blood.

Earl Grey and Lord Viscount Morpeth, the eldest son of the Earl of Carlisle, are, at the present time,

next to Lord John Russell, the two most prominent inheritors of the political heirloom of Whig influence. The career of each has in several respects run parallel to that of the other: their claims on their party are as nearly as possible equal: their talents, allowing for certain differences of character, about which more hereafter, are as nearly as possible equal also: their public services, although in different spheres of action, have borne the same proportion: they were born in the same year: they entered parliament in the same year, each for a nomination borough, and, within a very few months of each other, they severally secured the representation of a great county: each has shewn a marked independence of individual character, while in the main paying due homage to the claims of party; each has earned a reputation, both for oratorical skill and official capability, in the House of Commons; so that they are qualified, not by their hereditary rank merely, but also by their talents and standing, to take a leading part in the House of Peers. In fact, these two noblemen present themselves in marked and almost natural contrast.

The practice of sending the eldest sons of peers, who hold by courtesy titles of nobility, into the House of Commons as representatives of the people, is one of the most singular of those compromises which are the very essence of political and social life in England. Of the advantage derived by the public from this arrangement there cannot be the slightest doubt. A senate composed of men inexperienced in public affairs, from their very station comparatively ignorant of public wants, and who would legislate more by their will than their reason, without being subjected to restraint or responsibility,--such a body of privileged dictators would be almost as dangerous as a purely democratic assembly. Their laws would have no moral sanction. However the constitution might assert or strive to enforce their claim to hereditary wisdom, certain it is that the merest crudities of a purely popular representative would find more willing support from the people than the most elaborate productions of such king-made oracles. But when they have previously served and under

gone training in the House of Commons, they have secured a personal as well as a legal claim on the respect of the nation. They are then recognised by their deeds, not by their titles only. The history of the chief party contests of their time is a record of their speeches and votes: they are identified in the minds of the people, of whatever classes, -Tory, Whig, or Radical, it is all the same-with the triumph of some favourite principle; or it may be only with its defeats, yet defeats which are not the less cherished, for they are looked upon as the precursors of future victories. Long before the time comes at which in the order of nature they are elevated to the peerage, their intellectual and political standing becomes ascertained, and they take a position at once. Their claim comes backed by the suffrage of the public; and it is yielded to at once. The most active among the peers, those most entitled by rank and experience in the Upper House to hold permanently the lead on either side, at once give way when one of these chosen men of the House of Commons comes up with his certificate of superiority.

Besides the education in practical statesmanship which young noblemen so situated receive during a few years' campaigning in the House of Commons, a moral influence is exercised over them which is also of the highest advantage to the nation. They learn both by precept and example the value of public opinion, that indefinite but omnipotent and omnipresent agent in the political affairs of free countries. Few greater calamities can befall a nation than a necessary separation and antagonism, both of feeling and of interest, between the privileged and the unprivileged classes. If a nobility so situated be high-spirited, powerful, and deeply imbued with a sense of hereditary right, they will restlessly strive at an oligarchical tyranny. Revolution, in states so situated, is always more than a possibility, and democracy lours in the distance. On the other hand, if this privileged and isolated nobility be not animated by the higher range of ambitious motives, they will, from combining too much leisure with too much wealth, become depraved in their moral habits, spreading the poison of a vicious ex

ample through the whole social system. Of each evil, history, past and present, affords too many fatal instances. There must be a safetyvalve for the passions, whether political or personal. In our system it is provided. The young noble, by the law and the constitution a commoner, can only obtain his right to sit and speak in the representative assembly by an appeal, more or less real and sincere, to the free suffrages of the people. Coriolanus must sue for votes in the market-place, or his ambition will chafe, and his talents rust, while meaner men sway. Therefore (the simile is rude) his nose must come to the grindstone. Once in parliament, emulation quells the baser passions in the soul, and the whole of the intellectual and moral powers of the young aristocrat, according to his degree of talent and intelligence, are devoted to the one great object-distinction. That distinction can only be obtained by commanding public opinion; first, that of the House, then that of the country at large. Fortunately the steady character and practical genius of the British people render appeals to political passions comparatively useless. In the House they are a sham-oratorical flourishes, pretences to turn a period, laughed at for what they mean, admired for how they are expressed. In the country, they evaporate with the excitement of the

election; disappear, like the fleeting glories of the travelling theatre, with the removal of the last plank of the hustings. It is turn-and-turn with such people: I am beaten to-day; it

will be yours to-morrow: so they

laugh at each other, for the defeat that has been or is to be. Something real is wanted, then, to give the young peer in masquerade influence in this the largest, greatest, highest permanent assembly of his fellowmen that is in the country. He must

be well read in the laws of the past and the facts of the present. He must not only be more philosophical than the lawyers, but also more practical than the practical men, or neither will submit to be led by him. He finds, too, that here, where all men are equal, certain principles of freedom are held in common. His mind becomes imbued with them. If he began in play, he ends in earnest.

Men fresh from the factory or the desk are, he finds, as well versed in affairs as he nay, some of them almost equal him in his school learning and his oratory. There is no patent, no privilege, in talent. If he would be a great man, he must work, too,-work with the head and heart. He, too, competes in the noble strife, tasks his intellect, trains his powers, to rise to the height of statesmanship and eloquence-to make his personal warrant his social superiority. His heart, too, warms in the contest; insensibly he becomes more national, less exclusive. Nay, by the time he enters the exclusive walls, the privileged assembly, he almost wishes he could dispense with his rights. Acted upon thus by public feeling in the Lower House, he reacts upon it. By his example of liberalism (not political but social) he makes them love the aristocratic. And how can democracy shew itself where the future nobles of the land are to be found stretching the most free of all free constitutions almost to its extreme point of tension?

But, if the country gains by this system of political training, it is attended with some disadvantages to the individual statesman or orator who is thus removed to the Upper House. Men who have made a great figure in the House of Commons often fail in the House of Lords. The habits, the tone of thinking, the style of eloquence, that are adapted

to the one do not suit the other. What wonder, if a man, who has laboriously trained himself up to one standard, should be at fault when

suddenly required to adapt himself to another quite different? Lord Brougham has in this respect succeeded admirably in effecting the transformation from the commoner into the peer. At first, he was not sufficiently aware of this necessity of strange scenes occurred; but now he his new position, and some very is quite another man. It is not every one, however, that has the same plasticity of mind: and hence that very usual question, when a popular leader becomes elevated to the peerage, "How will he do in the Lords?"

Earl Grey has of late been very often made the subject of this question; partly because, by the death of his celebrated parent, he has been so

recently raised to the Upper House, and partly because it is generally understood that an attempt will be made to elevate him to the position of leader of the Whigs in the House of Peers, on the Marquis of Lansdowne hereafter resigning in his favour that sometimes most arduous post. There is reason to believe, also, that Earl Grey conceives himself to be, as a debater, a match for Lord Stanley,-in short, a sort of natural antagonist (of course, in a parliamentary sense) of that distinguished speaker; so that when causes now existing shall have ceased to operate, and when Lord Stanley shall have assumed that position in the House of Lords which, in a reorganisation of parties, will become at once a right and a sphere of duty, Earl Grey will be enabled to stand up as the assertor of principles materially differing from those which Lord Stanley is known to entertain, and thus once more realise those old ideas of party opposition which recent events have so much tended to postpone, if not to neutralise. If these assumptions be true, if Lord Lansdowne be really disposed to yield to Earl Grey the management of what is certainly at the present time the most compactly organised party in the country, it is a step peculiarly interesting to the people of England, from the great influence which the acknowledged head of a party, whatever may or may not be his talents, has upon the course of legislation. It becomes important to inquire, Whether the probable elevation of Earl Grey to this high-priesthood of Whig principles be justifiable or desirable on the score of his possession of commanding talents, or superior political wisdom, or whether it is only a new instance of that hereditary succession of the Whig families to power and honours, the prevalence of which has already been noticed?

There is one other ground on which the promotion of Lord Grey might be justified, that there is no Whig in the Upper House with so many claims. Mere rank alone, without oratorical powers, or some commanding qualities to which deference would instinctively be yielded, will not in these days justify a man's being placed at the head of a party. The Marquis of Lansdowne's claims

are not founded on his rank alone.

Although his stilted and somewhat pompous style of oratory is now rather out of date, yet there was a period when he was looked upon as one of the foremost men of his time. If he has scarcely fulfilled that promise of future excellence which led his contemporaries to compare Lord Henry Petty with William Pitt, still his past successes are not forgotten; and he has also that kind of personal weight, derived from his age and political experience, which inspires respect among those who have grown up around him, and who have for so many years stood towards him almost in the relation of pupils. Setting him for the moment on one side, who is there to take his place? Lord Melbourne, of course, must be looked upon as having virtually given up the contest; his name is only associated with an administration whose

political history was, in spite of some good intentions, little more than a series of defeats. The Marquis of Clanricarde, though at times he displays great vigour and considerable tact, fails to inspire that personal respect which is necessary in a leader. Lord Normanby, although he has filled high official posts, has no weight in the House of Peers. The Earl of Clarendon is in every way superior, as a thinker and as a debater; there is the stamp of sterling talent in all he says and does. But he is to all appearance either an indolent or an unambitious man, or his ambition is confined in its objects; he has done too much to be altogether passed over, yet not enough to secure our admiration, and induce us to fix on him as even a probable person to be the future head of his party. With these names, we have exhausted the list of Whig leaders in the House of Peers, who in any degree are prominent for their talents. The oratorical strength of the Whigs lies in the House of Commons; nor is it likely that those who there exercise so much influence over the public mind, would be in any hurry to leave it. Lord Morpeth will, in the course of things, be obliged to do so; but wherever there is a choice, it is not probable that it will lie in the direction of what a popular phrase terms being "pitchforked." If, then, Earl Grey's personal ambition being

seconded by the suffrages of his own party, he shall aim to take and (what would be more difficult) to keep the lead of the Whigs in the House of Lords, it is obvious that the difficulties of his task will be very much diminished by the comparative mediocrity of those with whom he will be placed in immediate competition.

With the political mantle of his father, the present Earl Grey would by no means inherit his responsibilities. The conditions of eminence are not what they were twenty or thirty years ago. Then, to be a party leader -of the chosen few, at least, whom history deigns to notice-implied the possession of an absolute mastery over the elements of political warfare. He to whom his compeers yielded precedence was distinguishable from them not merely by his talent, but also by the degree of his talent. There was in him a marked individuality of character; his intellect was of such towering proportions, that like the stature of a giant it was confessed at once; and all men gave way, by an instinct of deference, to one in whom they recognised a superior. He had not to work his way to the command by slow and laborious efforts and shifting tactics, carrying with him the traces and the disgraces of many defeats, of many yieldings, of many compromises, such

as men must suffer who seek to attain the height by the tortuous path. He took the initiative in government, stamped the impress of his mind upon that of his countrymen. He laid down principles-principles which, if they were not the creation of his own mind, were at least taken at first-hand from the well-stored armoury of the constitution; and never ceased his efforts, or swerved from the course he had marked out, till he had brought his fellow-subjects either to acknowledge them as true, or, at all events, to array themselves against him, and trust the issue to a combat in which he was himself at the head of his own following, and where he also secured the glory of the victory. Then, the political history of an age was written in the movements of parliamentary leaders: office gave power, and the real head of a party was at once the medium of its principles, the source

of all its minutest movements. There was dignity in his high station.

Statesmen then were the pupils of statesmen till they attained their full vigour, till they were politically of age, and fit to begin the world for themselves. They had not yet become the full-grown puppets of agitators out of doors-the glittering tools of more hard-handed and determined men than themselves. Things, and, to say truth, men also, have vastly changed since then. A party leader is now an anomaly; the very name itself a perversion of language. The initiative in legislation is assumed, not in the cabinet, but in the market-place, or at the hustings. The loudest voice, the longest purse, the most selfdenying demagoguism, the most cautious audacity, the most calculating treason, these are now the quali fications for that mastership of the nation, which used till recent times to be the certain property of those men alone who possessed the loftiest intellect, the most far-seeing views, the most prominent integrity of character, the most determined spirit in asserting and maintaining the principles in the truth of which they be lieved, the most commanding or the most persuasive oratory; who rallied round them the sympathies of their politically-hereditary followers, and were elevated to power alike by the affection of the people and the confidence of the crown. Whatever their politics, they were to be depended upon as men; if they could not be relied on and followed for their wisdom, their consistency could be calculated on, and their principles counteracted.

But it is the perverse practice of party leaders in the present dayforced on them, perhaps, by an unhappy necessity of carrying measures by new uses of constitutional powers -to abandon the highest privileges of the statesman, to destroy the noble and exalted ideal which history leaves us, and of which even memory recalls living examples. And this is as true (though, perhaps, in a modified degree) of the Whig as of the Conservative leaders,-of the Lord Melbournes and the Lord John Russells, as of the Sir Robert Peels and the of its arguments, and the regulator mislead. Their principle of political Lord Lyndhursts. They lead but to