fcw-
 
 /^ 
 
 SPEECHES 
 
 OF THE 
 
 MOST NOBLE 
 
 THE MAEQUIS OF SALISBURY, KG. 
 
 DELIVERED AT EDINBURGH ON THE 
 23d, 24th, and 25th NOY. 1882 
 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 
 THE NATIONAL UNION OF CONSERVATIVE AND 
 
 CONSTITUTIONAL ASSOCIATIONS, 
 
 ST Stephen's chambers, bridge st., Westminster, s.w. 
 
 1882.
 
 SPEECH 
 
 AT 
 
 THE BANQUET GIVEN BY THE SCOTTISH 
 CONSEEYATIYE CLUB 
 
 IN THE CORN EXCHANGE, EDINBURGH, 
 23d NOVEMBER 1882. 
 
 My Lokd Dalkeith, Ladies and Gentlemen, — 
 
 I thank you most sincerely for the .very kind 
 manner in which my health has been proposed by Lord Dalkeith 
 and received by you. And T feel how much encouragement it is 
 to all who are engaged in the arduous duties which now fall on 
 those who fight in the Conservative ranks, to realise that they are 
 sustained and animated by the support of powerful and influential 
 meetings, such as this. It has been thought, perhaps, something 
 of an intrusion that we should come to this metropolis of Liberal- 
 ism at all. But we have benevolent views with regard to this 
 metropolis of Liberalism, and we hope soon to clothe it with a 
 fairer name. And it is thought still more an intrusion that we 
 make this unwelcome exhibition of our zeal at a time when the 
 Government imagined that their opponents were a scattered and 
 defeated party, crushed to the earth by wonder at their marvellous 
 achievements in diplomacy and war. Well, perhaps an event 
 that happened in Wiltshire two days ago, may have pointed out to 
 them that the English people do not necessarily hold precisely the 
 same exalted estimate of what has taken place that they do. I 
 think they will find that, however keen we may all be, in unison 
 with the views which we have heard from my gallant friend to- 
 night, to tender the homage of our unrestrained admiration for 
 the valour which has fought in Egypt, and the skill by which that 
 valour has been guided, we cannot undertake to transfer bodily
 
 to her Majesty's Government the whole of the merits acquired by 
 our army. I think before that imputation takes place, this coun- 
 try will require to examine — and examine by the lioht of those 
 feelings which are produced by the process of paying the bill — the 
 policy by which the war in Egypt was rendered necessary, and 
 later on, to examine the results to which this expenditure of blood 
 and treasure has led. 
 
 In speaking of the policy which has led to this war in Egypt, T 
 do not think it necessary to notice the attempts which have been 
 made by some minor organs of the Government to infer that what 
 has happined at the end of 1882 was the necessary result of what 
 was done in 1879. The system of Government, or the system of 
 financial administration, I should rather say, which we counselled 
 the Khedive to set up, was one of which her Majesty's Government, 
 when they acceded to office, expressed their approval of, and which 
 they could have altered or abandoned if they disapproved of it. 
 The system of dual control, say some of the advocates of her 
 Majesty's Government, was one which it was impossible for the 
 Government to manage, and would necessarily overthrow them. 
 You will have often noticed that if a horse and his rider unfor- 
 tunately part company, it is always afterwards found to be the 
 fault of the horse. But any such imputations are not, to do them 
 justice, authorised by the heads of the Government themselves, 
 and it was perfectly open to the Government to have abandoned 
 the system if they found it fraught with either inconvenience or 
 danger. But it is notorious that they approved of it from the 
 first. I am not myself so far enamoured of it that I should now 
 propose its restoration. But it was an expedient perfectly suited 
 to the circumstances under which it was set up, and it might have 
 been maintained for a very considerable time if there had been 
 applied to it those qualities which are necessary in sustaining any 
 oriental system of administration — namely, that the authority 
 which was vindicated should be vindicated by force so soon as it 
 was vindicated by words, and that no time should elapse between 
 the utterance of a defiance and its justification. That is the con- 
 dition of the maintenance of authority in every oriental country. 
 If in India you were to deal with a rising against your authority, 
 by telling them in January that you treated them as foes, and 
 waited and took no action till May or June, you would speedily 
 compromise your power of taking any action at all. But this 
 lack of promptitude and vigilance — though, no doubt, it was the 
 lack of those qualities which made the maintenance of the previous 
 arrangements impossible — are not, to my mind, the only contri- 
 bution which her Majesty's Government have made to the catas- 
 trophe which we saw last summer. 
 
 You may remember, when the late Government had to deal 
 
 ^^\ -
 
 with difficulties in Egypt, our immediate course was to appeal to 
 the suzerain Power, and we were able — by earnest appeals, no 
 doubt — to influence the suzerain Power so far, that necessary 
 measures were taken for modifying the conditions of government ; 
 and the result of this policy was, that the deposition of the Khed- 
 ive — being done by the authority of the Caliph — commanded the 
 assent of the Mussulman world. When her Majesty's Govern- 
 ment came to office, they came weighted with the unlucky pledges 
 which were delivered in this county. They came, bound to show 
 hostility to the Government of Turkey, and upon the first diplo- 
 matic occasion that arose they were forced to fulfil that pledge. 
 The difficulties of Montenegro, the difficulties of Greece, were not 
 matters that interested this country very largely. They could 
 have been settled — it was easy to settle them, at any moment, 
 if you chose to do so, — by disregarding the wishes of the Sovereign 
 of Turkey. But we never could venture on that course, because 
 we knew there were other problems and difficulties behind, which, 
 if you made the Soverign of Turkey your enemy, must lead you 
 into formidable embarrassments. The key of this question of 
 Egypt lay in those previous diplomatic communications with re- 
 spect to Montenegro and to Greeee. At the time it was thought 
 a great triumph that they were settled so easily, and so much to 
 the satisfaction of the certain nations with whom many persons in 
 this country deeply sympathise — that men did not sufficiently see 
 that they were setting against them the only Power tliat could 
 help them to a pacific solution of any difficulties that might arise 
 in Egypt. 
 
 Well, then, look at another peculiarity of this Egyptian campaign. 
 The first thing that strikes you when you look at it as a whole, 
 is wonder that Arabi Pasha with his force, with his opportunities, 
 should have defied as he did the power of such a country as Great 
 Britain. How is that mystery to be solved? If any nation 
 suffers itself to get into war with a weaker nation which is suffi- 
 ciently civilised to know the great difference that exists between 
 them, you may depend upon it there is something in the conduct 
 of the stronger nation which induces people, induces the weaker 
 nation, to believe it will never exert its strength. We have heard 
 a great deal about 'prestige. I detest the word. It does not 
 really express what we mean. I should rather use the phrase 
 military credit. But military credit stands in precisely the same 
 position as financial credit. The use of it is to represent military 
 power, and to effect the objects of a military power without the 
 necessity of a recourse to arms. You know that a man posses- 
 sing great financial credit can perform great operations by the 
 mere knowledge of the wealth of which he is master, and that it 
 is not necessary to sell him up to ascertain if he is solvent and can
 
 pay twenty shillings in the pound, in order to have the benefit of 
 all the wealth he can command. It is the same with a military 
 nation that is careful to preserve its military credit. If it does 
 so it may, without shedding one drop of blood or incurring one 
 penny of expenditure, effect all the objects which, without that 
 military credit, can only result in much waste of blood and trea- 
 sure. Now we were in the position of a financial operator who 
 had ruined his own credit by doubtful and dangerous operations. 
 We had squandered our military credit at Majuba Hill — we had 
 taken up the position of a Power that was willing to submit to 
 any insult that might be placed upon it. We had proclaimed to 
 the world that we were not ready to fight for our military renown, 
 and the tradition of our ancestors was lost in us. It was a false 
 proclamation — a proclamation that the Ministry had no authority 
 from the nation to make — and which the nation at the first 
 opportunity forced them to disavow. But the disavowal has cost 
 blood and treasure which, if they had been more careful of the 
 reputation of this country, need never have been expended. You 
 know, gentlemen, that in times past, three years ago, those who 
 maintained such doctrines and insisted on the necessity of the 
 maintenance of your military credit as one of the most precious 
 inheritances of the nation were denounced as Jingoes. But these 
 Jingoes are justified now. They have her Majesty's Government 
 for converts. They have forced her Majesty's Government to 
 demonstrate in action that which is their principal contention, 
 that if you suffer military credit to be obscured the fault must be 
 wiped out in blood. My Lords, I feel how inadequate I am to 
 deal with a question of this kind in a place such as this. I know 
 it has been occupied by a much greater artist, and I feel that 
 there has been a loss to the world of splendid specimens of politi- 
 cal denunciation, because the misdeeds of the Ministry of 1882 
 were, unfortunately, not subject to the criticism of the orator of 
 1880. What magnificent lessons, what splendid periods of elo- 
 quence we have lost. Just think that if Mr Gladstone — when the 
 spirit of 1880 was upon him, if he could have had to deal with 
 the case of a Ministry professing the deepest respect for the con- 
 cert of Europe, the deepest anxiety to obey its will, a Ministry 
 which, with those professions upon its lips, assembled a Confer- 
 ence, and kept it for months in vain debate, and under cover of 
 its discussions prepared its armaments, asked for leave to invade 
 a country which the Conference refused to give, and then, when 
 the refusal was given and the armaments were ready, the Confer- 
 ence was calmly shown to the door, and the country which they 
 had asked the leave of Europe to take, they took in despite of 
 Europe's will ! If the orator of 1880 had had such a theme to 
 dwell upon, what would he have said of disingenuousness and
 
 subtlety — of the fair name of England soiled, and the necessity- 
 above all things, as a safeguard against selfish politics, of scrupu- 
 lous obedience to the united will of Europe ? Or take another 
 case. Supposing that unequalled orator had had before him the 
 case of a Government who sent a large fleet — a vast fleet — into a 
 port where they had no international right to go, and when that 
 fleet was there, had demanded that certain arrangements should 
 be made on land, which they had no international right to de- 
 mand, and when these demands were not satisfied, had forthwith 
 enforced that by the bombardment of a great commercial port, 
 would you not have heard about political brigandage ? What 
 sermons you would have had to listen to with respect to the 
 equality of all nations — the weakest and the strongest — before the 
 law of Europe ! What denunciations would you not have heard 
 of those who could, for the sake of British interests, expose such 
 a city to such a catastrophe, and carry fire and sword among a 
 defenceless people ! That great artist drew a picture of Sir Ered- 
 erick Eoberts. I cannot help wishing that he had to draw a 
 picture of Sir Beaiichamp Seymour. But allow me to say in 
 passing, that if my poor pencil could be employed, it would be 
 drawn in nothing but the most flattering colours. I think, if we 
 can imagine anything so impossible as the orator of 1880 having 
 to describe arpd comment on the events of 1882, that he would 
 have noticed one of the most remarkable coincidences which the 
 history of this country furnishes. It is a very curious fact that we 
 have only had one member of the Society of Eriends — commonly 
 called, and I believe in the statute-book called " Quakers," so that I 
 may use the word without ofl'ence — in the Cabinet. We have only 
 had one Quaker in the Cabinet; and only once in the history of the 
 world — so far, at least, as this hemisphere is concerned, if I am 
 not mistaken — has a great commercial city of the first class been 
 subject to naval bombardment — and it is a very remarkable fact 
 that when the order was given to bombard that commercial city, 
 that Quaker was in that Cabinet. At all events, grave as these 
 events have been, I think they will furnish some good fruit at 
 least for the future. I hope we have taken a new departure in 
 Liberal politics. I trust that for the future any Minister who 
 cares about British interests, and thinks it right to go to war in 
 their defence, will not be subject to denunciation on the part of 
 the Liberal party for doing so. I am quite aware that British 
 interests were treated with scant respect in 1880 ; I am quite 
 aware that Mr Gladstone denounced as monstrous the idea that 
 we could claim to control a country, simply because it lay on our 
 route to India — but if ever there was a war — I don't know what 
 to call it ; I believe it was not " a war " — but if ever there were 
 sanguinary operations undertaken for the sake of British interests,
 
 8 
 
 undoubtedly these recent operations in Egypt have deserved that 
 character. 
 
 Well then, again, I trust that something has been added to our 
 knowledge of the doctrine of national self-defence. You may 
 remember that in the case of the Afghanistan and Zulu wars we 
 were denounced as unworthy of the slightest moral consideration ; 
 in fact, very much stronger words were used, because we main- 
 tained that it may be necessary, purely for the purposes of self- 
 defence, that the Power which is defendinor itself should strike the 
 first blow and become technically the aggressor. If a preparation 
 is being made in a foreign country that is by the side of your own, 
 and a preparation which threatens the security of your possessions, 
 you are, we maintain, by the law of national self-defence, justified 
 in using forcible means to bring those preparations to an end. 
 That was the justification of the Zulu war, that was the justifica- 
 tion of the war which we undertook in Afghanistan, because the 
 Eussian representative was admitted to the Court of Cabul while 
 our own was driven back. 
 
 But what was the justification of these operations which ended 
 in the utter destruction of Alexandria ? Why, that preparations 
 were being made on the land — on land not belonging to us, but 
 which, if prosecuted, might have compromised the safety of our 
 fleet, which chose to lie in the harbour, but which might have gone 
 out if it pleased. After that precedent it will be quite impossible 
 for any Liberal Government to limit, as they have done in the past, 
 the rights of national self-defence. With respect to the end of the 
 war we have yet to wait. We do not know what the present 
 negotiations may bring forth. We must suspend our judgments 
 until we see what the result will be. I confess that I should be 
 inclined to look on all these circumstances to which I have 
 adverted with a very indulgent eye if the result of the negotiations 
 which are impending should be to extend the strength, the power, 
 and the predominance of the influence of the empire of Great 
 Britain — for I am old-fashioned enough to believe in that empire, 
 and believe in its greatness. I believe that wherever it has been 
 extended it has conferred unnumbered benefits upon those who 
 have been brought within its sway, and that the extension of the 
 empire, so far from being the desire of selfishness or acquisitive- 
 ness, as it has been represented to be, or deserving to be compared 
 to acts of plunder in private life, is in reality a desire not only to 
 extend the commerce and to strengthen the power of our Govern- 
 ment here at home, but to give to others those blessings of freedom 
 and order which we have always prized and maintained amongst 
 ourselves. Let us, therefore, in all the negotiations which are 
 before us not be ashamed of our empire. 
 
 We are now the predominant Power in Egypt ; the valour of
 
 9 
 
 our troops has made us so. Let us observe with rigid fidelity 
 every engagement we have taken to the amiable and respectable 
 prince who rules in Egypt ; but as regards the other Powers of 
 Europe, let us follow our position to its logical result. We are 
 the predominant Power, why should we cease to be so? Why 
 should we allow diplomacy to fritter away what the valour of our 
 soldiers has won ? If the Government acts in that spirit there 
 will be little inclination to scrutinise the steps of the policy by 
 which the result is reached ; but if they allow themselves to be 
 made the mere tools of others — if they act the part of mere thief- 
 takers to the Khedive of Egypt, and are satisfied with bringing 
 this unlucky Arabi Pasha to trial — if no greater or more solid 
 benefit than that accrues from the loss of so many valuable lives 
 and the spending of so much treasure, severe indeed will be the 
 judgment of the people of this country on the Government to 
 whom that result is due. 
 
 This matter of Egypt is in suspense, and so also is the other 
 great difficulty with which the Government have had to contend. 
 They are proud of what they speak of as the improved condition 
 of Ireland. I wonder whether it does not occur to them that, both 
 with respect to Egypt and Ireland, if there is an improved condi- 
 tion, it is due to the fact that they have repudiated and cast, out 
 the doctrine that " force is do remedy," and that they have listened 
 to the advice which their political opponents have not ceased to 
 tender them. We have maintained that no good could be done in 
 Ireland, no matter what grievances you have to redress, unless the 
 primary duty of the Government was first discharged — of main- 
 taining order and performing justice. Now, they will tell you 
 that the comparative quietude of Ireland is due to their remedial 
 measures. Their remedial measures were introduced with the 
 spring of last year. Ever since their introduction the outrages in 
 Ireland went on in an increasing ratio, until they culminated in 
 the lamented deaths of Lord Frederick Cavendish and Mr Burke. 
 Then came the other policy ; then came a real genuine attempt to 
 re-estal>lish order and to enforce the administration of justice: 
 and no sooner was that passed by Parliament, and executed with 
 even moderate firmness by the Administration of the day, than 
 at once outrages diminished, and the peace of Ireland began to 
 amend. In the face of this chronology, it is ridiculous to tell me 
 that it is what they call the remedial measures of the Government 
 that has produced the improvement of which they speak. I do 
 not at all deny that it was very desirable to introduce remedial 
 measures ; but I should not have counselled the trying of remedial 
 measures which have only had the effect of destroying all confi- 
 dence in the country, and of driving capital from the land. I 
 should not have counselled measures which destroy the confidence 
 
 B
 
 10 
 
 of every landholder in the security of his own property, and intro- 
 duced causes of dispute between landlord and tenant. If you 
 were to do anything, it should have been in the direction of an 
 effort — no matter of how small a kind, because in such a matter 
 you could not move fast— an effort to have bound to the fortunes 
 of the empire a larger portion of the population by the links of 
 ownership. I should have counselled such an effort. But, unfor- 
 tunately, the hope of that has been dissipated by two causes. The 
 fund from which it could have been done — the Irish Church Fund 
 — has been sacrificed to an absurd Arrears Bill ; and the tenants 
 have been prevented from any effort to become owners by pur- 
 chase by being offered a far more eligible fate. Nobody who can 
 get his land by bullying will care to take it by buying. They 
 have been taught by the experience of facts that agitation will 
 bring them what they want, and it will be a long time before they 
 will learn the lesson to take a more humble and more honest part. 
 Well, gentlemen, we have before us these two difficulties of Egypt 
 and Ireland, which have not reflected much credit on the Govern- 
 ment, who adopted a means of action borrowed very much from 
 the advice of their political opponents, and that necessity will 
 necessarily affect their policy in other matters. 
 
 We have heard it said by distinguished authorities that there 
 are Liberals and Liberals. I should prefer to say that the Liberals 
 are not a party — they are an alliance or a confederation-^and it is 
 necessary that each member of the alliance should get something 
 in order to bind him to the common standard. 'Now, hitherto it 
 has been one of the great merits of the present Prime Minister 
 that he has been able, by vague and mysterious language, to in- 
 sinuate promises which may go as far as your imagination pleases 
 to wander, and which yet, if grammatically tested, bind him to 
 scarcely anything at all. Now we have before us the instance of 
 the unfortunate Quaker. . I suppose, if the election of 1880 con- 
 veyed any lesson at all, it was to assure the members of the 
 Society of Friends that they were safe for the future from all wars 
 waged for the purpose of securing British interests, or keeping 
 open the route to India — and we see, by the secession of their 
 eminent representative, how deep their disappointment has been. 
 I have no doubt, if you examine the language of Mr Gladstone, 
 you will find nothing in it which absolutely binds him to the con- 
 struction of the Quakers. But that is the marvellous skill and 
 cleverness of the man. He can 
 
 " Keep the word of promise to the ear, 
 And break it to the hope." 
 
 You remember what class of being it was said was capable of 
 that performanance. There are others who have been fed upon
 
 11 
 
 the same food, but have not yet been subjected to the same dis- 
 enchantment. We don't know what is reserved for them — 
 whether the word of promise is to be kept to the ear or to the 
 hope. For instance, there are those who desire the disestablish- 
 ment of the Church of Scotland. Eead. over the speeches of Mr 
 Gladstone, and they will certainly convey to you the idea, that 
 although he undertook — which was not necessary he should 
 undertake — not to disestablish the Church without a Parliament- 
 ary majority for the purpose of enabling him to do so, though he 
 undertook expressly not to smuggle the Church of Scotland out 
 of existence, still that his general intention was to accomplish 
 that desirable reform whenever he had an opportunity. I have not 
 a notion which of the two interpretations he intends in practice to 
 give to his words, and I have a shrewd suspicion that he does not 
 know any more than I do. He is perfectly ready to sail north or 
 to sail south, but he cannot tell you which he will do until you tell 
 him which way the wind will blow. Well, then, there is the case 
 of the farmer. He used language which may mean the rankest 
 Communism, or may mean merely such mitigations of the law as 
 few Conservatives would refuse to consider. It is impossible to 
 know on which alternative he will ultimately decide, but I am 
 told that within the last few weeks the Government have shown 
 a strong inclination to get up a small Ireland in the west of Scot- 
 land. I am not the least surprised that they should do so. Ire- 
 land has been very useful to them, and if they can only* multiply 
 a country in which they might first say force was no remedy ; and 
 then afterwards, when it was quite evident that nothing would 
 succeed but force, pass coercion measures ; such countries would 
 tend to the longevity of an Administration, and would be mul- 
 tiplied by every Minister who regarded the prospects of his own 
 colleagues. I have no doubt that by refusing to the arm of the 
 law and the decree of the Court of Session the necessary force, 
 efforts will be made to get up that sort of question in the west of 
 Scotland, which may bring landlords generally into contempt, and 
 may give the Government an opportunity of making those alter- 
 nate displays of leniency and vigour which have conferred so 
 many benefits on the empire. 
 
 Well, then, the last specimen of this vague and mysterious 
 language is a much more serious matter. It is with respect to 
 the future legislation for Ireland. Whenever there is to be a 
 Parliamentary hitch, whenever the calculations of the whips have 
 become nervously uncertain, Mr Gladstone is always throwing 
 out hints of his devotion to the cause of local government in 
 Ireland, which his advocates in this country have interpreted to 
 mean nothing but county boards, but which the Irish members 
 themselves have always taken as an encouragement to agitate for
 
 12 
 
 the disintegration of the empire. And when the moment of 
 decision conies, when it has to be determined whether it is county 
 boards or the disintegration of the empire which has been pro- 
 mised, I will engage to you that Mr Gladstone's words are so care- 
 fully poised and so judiciously vague, that no one shall be able to 
 say that he has been misled. But that is a cruel way to deal with 
 the interests of a great empire. On the firm belief in the Irish 
 that the inhabitants of these islands mean to maintain the link 
 between the two countries unbroken and unimpaired, depends all 
 hope of the restoration of order or the return to prosperity of that 
 unhappy land. On it depends all the chance of retaining that 
 loyal, that stout-hearted population, furnished in a great measure 
 from our country of old to Ireland, and on which the mainte- 
 nance of any hope of English supremacy over Ireland utterly 
 depends. There is no worse service that Mr Gla'dstone has per- 
 formed to the future of the empire over which he rules than the 
 persistency with which he has used language to persuade them 
 that nothing is fixed, nothing is determined ; that if they agitate 
 enough anything may be gained ; that no question is ever fixed ; 
 that finality is perpetually adjourned; and that if they will 
 only press hard enough, the deepest interests of the empire, the 
 laws which concern its very existence, are matters for legitimate 
 discussion. 
 
 I confess I do not often envy the United States : but there is 
 one feature in their institutions which appears to me the subject 
 of greatest envy — their magnificent institution of the Supreme 
 Court. There, if Congress passes any measure inconsistent with 
 the constitution of the country, there exists a Court which will 
 negative it at once, and gives a stability to the institutions of 
 that country which, under the system of vague and mysterious 
 promises, here we look for in vain. Now, gentlemen, I have de- 
 tained you a long time, but I am only trying to impress upon 
 you that you must not suppose that because in this matter of 
 foreign policy the doctrines which we have urged have been to 
 a great extent accepted, that therefore there is no danger to be 
 guarded against in internal matters of legislation. We do not 
 know what the future may bring forth. We have no guide to 
 enable us to interpret Ministerial promises. All that we know is, 
 that hitherto they have been restrained by no scruple with respect 
 to ancient institutions, by no reverence for private right. They 
 have freely abolished what was old. They have rendered nugatory 
 rights which had existed from a hoar antiquity. They have can- 
 celled contracts which were signed only yesterday. They have de- 
 termined that rights which men had acquired in confidence from 
 the promise of Parliament were of no avail, and were not to be 
 respected. And only the other day they have made this further
 
 13 
 
 innovation upon our constitutional traditions, that for the first 
 time they have limited freedom of speech in the representative 
 House of the council of the nation. With these warnings before 
 you, you would be indeed unwise if you relaxed your efforts or 
 weakened your organisation. And do not imagine, as many are 
 forward to tell you, that those efforts have no hope, and are a vain 
 beating against the inevitable. I cannot admit that, either with 
 respect to the Conservative party generally or the Conservative 
 party in Scotland. Generally we have this consolation, that we 
 know that since Mr Gladstone introduced his Land Bill, we have 
 won several seats, and we have not lost one. And we also know, 
 that in important matters of policy the Government have found it 
 necessary to borrow the principles of the Opposition. With re- 
 spect to Scotland,! am told — and my noble friend beside me repeated 
 it — that you are fighting an uphill fight There is no doubt it is the 
 case. It is a fight which will tax all your energies, and claim all the 
 efforts you can give to it, but it is not a fight without hope. 
 Depend upon it, although you have to deal with a people who are 
 singularly tenacious of an adverse prepossession when they have 
 once conceived it, yet you have also to deal with a people probably 
 above every other in Europe shrewd and penetrating in their 
 judgment. You must not believe that they will continue inde- 
 finitely to hold opinions in a changed condition of things, because 
 those opinions were formed when matters were ver)^ different. 
 They are quite keen enough to see that political names have altered 
 their meanings, that political parties have changed their stand- 
 points. The Liberal party is forced by the very law of its existence 
 — it is its constant boast — to march constantly onwards. They 
 call it progress, but they have not made up their minds to 
 what goal that progress tends. Already they have' traversed the 
 field of the older Liberalism. They have passed from the land 
 where they were under the shadow of the older doctrines of 
 political economy and of freedom of contract. Before them lies 
 the wide expanse of Socialism, towards which they are advancing. 
 By an inevitable law they must march onwards. Those who 
 appeal to revolutionary instincts can do many things, but the one 
 thing they cannot do is to halt. They must go on. They have 
 already passed the border in many points. Their legislation in 
 respect of Ireland, for instance, suffers strongly from the Socialist 
 venom. It will take some time, perhaps, before the peoj^le of 
 Scotland are persuaded that the party which was their old favour- 
 ite is so degenerated. Time must elapse — perhaps generations 
 must change ; but in the long run I feel confident that the people 
 of Scotland will not accompany them on this dangerous enterprise. 
 Already, from all I hear, there are signs of change. There is that 
 most pregnant sign of all, that the young are Conservative where
 
 14 
 
 the old are Liberal. That is to say, that the men who are bound 
 by their prejudices and antecedents remain Liberal, and the men 
 free to judge become Conservative. You may be sure that pro- 
 cess will continue. It may not happen rapidly, it may happen 
 slowly; but it will happen surely. They will turn from the 
 party which is leading them to revolutionary projects inconsistent 
 with the industrial wellbeing of society, and they will turn to that 
 party to whom has fallen the defence of individual liberty ; of the 
 rights of property; of the sacredness of religion; and of those 
 institutions by which liberty, property, and religion have hitherto 
 been so marvellously sustained.
 
 SPEECH 
 
 IN ANSWER TO THE ADDRESSES PRESENTED BY 
 
 CONSEEYATIYE ASSOCIATIONS IN THE EAST 
 AND SOUTH OF SCOTLAND 
 
 24th NOVEMBER 1882. 
 
 Sir Graham Montgomery, my Lords, Ladies, and Gentlemen, — 
 
 I have to express my sincere acknowledgments for the 
 addresses which have just been presented to me, and to Mr Murray 
 for the kind manner in which he has introduced the address from 
 this city;^ and to you, ladies and gentlemen, for the^very kind 
 manner in which you received me when I rose. It is a matter of 
 great satisfaction to me to receive these evidences of Conservative 
 activity and exertion in various parts of this populous and influ- 
 ential country, at a time which appears to me to be singularly 
 important in our political history, and to engage, more perhaps 
 than any time that I can remember, the sympathies and the earnest 
 effort of every Conservative, because we live in a time of rapid 
 transition. It is said that the Ministry of the day are in the 
 flood-tide of their fortune. I am a little sceptical of that con- 
 fident assertion ; but be it true or false, it is a transitory phenom- 
 enon, having little effect upon the deep political changes which 
 are going on by the side of it. Parties are changing their char- 
 acter. Political names are alterins: their simiiflcation. New 
 questions are coming to the front, and new calls are being con- 
 sequently made for Conservative self-devotion and activity. It is 
 a very common thing for Liberal speakers to try to commend their 
 cause to-day, by references to what they are pleased to call the 
 history of the success of their party in the past. That history is a 
 little legendary. They are apt to claim for themselves the advan- 
 tage of every good thing that has been done by anybody, and to 
 ignore any mistakes or mishaps that may have happened to them 
 
 ^ See Appendix.
 
 16 
 
 in their career. I am not going minutely to compare the per- 
 formances of the two parties in the past. I am well satisfied with 
 the record that we should have to show. 
 
 In the matter of those important acts of legislation which affect 
 the wellbeing of the community directly, and the comfort and hap- 
 piness of every individual, we have no small performances to show. 
 If we had nothing else to quote but the relaxation of the criminal 
 code, and the passing of the Factory Acts — the most beneficent act 
 of legislation of this century — these things Avere the work of the 
 Tory party, and on them alone I should be content to repose our 
 claims. With respect to the great political changes, both parties 
 are very much on the same level. Up to the moment when a 
 change became, for good or evil, inevitable, both parties re- 
 tained their preference for the state of things as it then existed. 
 Neither party wished to abandon the system of protection, or to 
 accept the system of household suffrage till just on the eve of the 
 change. It was imposed upon both of them simultaneously, in 
 each case by a power superior to their own. And in each case the 
 political opinions of the parties were adapted to the circumstances 
 of the time. But the character of the parties in the past seems to 
 me, in the present state of our politics in this country, to be a 
 wholly irrelevant consideration. What we have to deal with is 
 not the past but the present. The identity of present parties with 
 the parties in past times is a matter with regard to which some 
 curious controversy might be raised. I never quite understand 
 how the Liberal party, of which not only the men are changed, 
 but all the principles have changed too, can be precisely identical 
 with the Liberal party of the past. On this matter of identity we 
 know that the distinguished statesman who is at the head of her 
 Majesty's Government entertains very curious opinions. He 
 appears entirely to forget that his opinions are not precisely iden- 
 tical with those which he entertained when he was a young man. 
 I remember on one occasion, in a general denunciation of the Tory 
 party, he quoted what was said of the Tory Goverment of 1834, 
 saying that the Governments of Eussia and Austria rejoiced at its 
 advent to power, but every friend of liberty repined. He entirely 
 forgot that he was a member of that Tory Government of 1834; 
 and so, I think, when the Land Bill was introduced last year, he 
 denounced with great vigour the wickedness of Parliament in 
 having conferred, as he expressed it, behind the backs of the Irish 
 tenants, the power of eviction on the landlords. They did this in 
 the year 1860, when Mr Gladstone was Chancellor of the Ex- 
 chequer, and he was consequently the dominant authority wdth 
 respect to all that passed in the House of Commons. This identity, 
 in the course of his constant transformations, he seems to have 
 forgotten in his own person, and is anxious to proclaim for the
 
 17 
 
 party to which he belongs. I entirely dispute the claim to that 
 identity. The Whigs and Tories in the past have fought with each 
 other, have criticised and condemned each other; and as their 
 criticisms might meet the circumstances of the time, or the popular 
 approval, one or the other succeeded in obtaining the privilege of 
 serving the people of this country. 
 
 But there was no more than the maintenance of the particular 
 principles of the Government to which they were attached, and the 
 criticism of the acts of the party to which they were opposed. 
 Solely and greatly under the influence of the present Prime Minis- 
 :ter, a change has come over the action of English parties. The 
 Kadical party has now come to the front, — a party whose power 
 feeds upon and depends on the existence of discontent. And as 
 their power depends upon the existence of discontent, so they are 
 not only quick to find it out, but eager to encourage and to promote 
 it when it appears. If they find anywhere a crack that is tending 
 to divide two classes in the community, they hasten to drive in the 
 wedge, and to split it into a chasm. Their office, their function, 
 seems to be to exasperate every animosity between class and class, 
 to fan it into a fiame, and draw from it that electoral support 
 which is the object of their industry and their action. Of course, 
 I have no doubt they will tell you that their mission is to hear of 
 grievances and to obtain their redress. Yes ; but a party whose 
 mission it is to live entirely upon the discovery of grievances, and 
 which, if these grievances do not exist, and are not found, must 
 die of inanition, is very apt to manufacture the element upon 
 which it subsists. So it is with the informer. It is very good 
 that crimes, if they exist, should be informed against, and public 
 justice should act against them, but still the common informer is 
 a common nuisance. I remember some time ago in London there 
 was a man brought up for the crime of arson, and he w^as discovered 
 to pursue this curious industry. It was the practice of the police 
 to give every man half-a-crown who should be the first to inform 
 them of any fire that might exist. So the practice of this man 
 was first to set fire to a building and then to rush off to the police 
 and earn half-a-crown for informino; them of the fire. Now that 
 is precisely the position of the liadical party in this country. It is 
 no doubt their function to detect and redress grievances, but if 
 you will watch them, you will observe that their entire industry is 
 devoted to aggravating and inflaming any animosities or griev- 
 ances that may exist. 
 
 Now, gentlemen, this party is a very different thing from the 
 old Whigs and Tories. It is a party whose action cannot in 
 any State be continued for any length of time without seriously 
 compromising that unity between the various classes of the State 
 on condition of which alone a great empire can be sustained ; and
 
 18 
 
 let me say that this peculiar form of political activity which has 
 been developed into the foundation of a party in our time tells 
 more severely against the humbler classes of society than against 
 the richer. Their favourite topics are those subjects that may 
 tend to inflame the poorer and the well-to-do against each other. 
 Even the great man who is at the head of the Ministry is not 
 entirely above this weakness. I remember when the issue of the 
 last election was announced, he very ostentatiously took credit 
 to himself because he was opposed in London where he said wealth 
 was produced, and in Westminster where wealth was expended. 
 Now it is quite right for a statesman to be forward in defence of 
 the poor; and no system of political opinion which is not just as 
 between rich and poor can hope to survive in this country. But 
 it does not follow that a man is doing any service to his country, 
 or that he is in any way serving the interest of the poorer class, 
 by setting rich and poor against each other. Consider what it is 
 which really concerns the industrial members of society, whether 
 they are workmen or whether they are tradesmen. Great political 
 measures touch them little. Even if you could suppose measures 
 of great spoliation which should divide the property of the rich, 
 how little value could it be to each individual workman or shop- 
 keeper in this great country. But what is of all things important " 
 to them is that capital should flow, that employment should exist, 
 that wages should maintain a high level, and that the expenditure 
 consequent upon a high level of wages should fertilise the channels 
 of commerce. But capital will not flow unless there is confidence; 
 and every system of political doctrine which tends to create ani- 
 mosities between the various classes of society is directed fully 
 and in front against that confidence which is vital to the existence 
 of industry. In order that capital may flow, in order that enter- 
 prise may exist, enterprise must be free, and investment must be 
 secure. There are plenty of people who are willing enough, when 
 they have money, instead of investing it in such remunerative 
 undertakings as will cause the employment of labour and the 
 general growth of the wealth of the community, who are content 
 to spend it in idle luxury; and in precise proportion as the free 
 flow of capital is discouraged that tendency will gain strength. 
 Look what it is in other countries — in Asiatic countries — where 
 Government is notoriously insecure. Why, there you find that 
 there is the greatest possible luxury and the absolute absence of 
 enterprise. Men who possess capital only hasten to enjoy it 
 because they know they cannot trust their Government, and that 
 if they were to try and increase that capital by remunerative and 
 profitable employment, they would run a great chance of losing it. 
 Now, of course, I am only indicating to you the dangerous ten- 
 dency. We know very well that our social forces in this island
 
 19 
 
 are as yet too strong to allow any such danp^erous results to 
 follow to any perceptible degree ; but if you wish to see what is 
 the real tendency of such treatment, look at the sister country, look 
 at the state of Ireland. Whenever the Liberals ask you to listen 
 to them on the ground of their past achievements, just consider 
 the case of Ireland. Ireland, as it is, is a Liberal creation. I 
 know that there is a popular belief that Oliver Cromwell and 
 William of Orange were Tories ; but it is not true. The Whigs 
 imposed the penal laws — the Whigs imposed those restraints upon 
 the industry of Ireland of which we have heard so much com- 
 plaint. The Whigs and Liberals during the present century have 
 had the control of almost every measure designed for the iniprov- 
 raent or alleviation of the condition of Ireland. It was the 
 Liberals who passed the Encumbered Estates Act, which threw 
 out and expropriated the old families of the land and drew the 
 commercial investor in land — that very man whose misdeeds they 
 now profess to denounce, and whom they have calmly deprived of 
 his property. 
 
 Well, now, in Ireland you have had a policy which in my 
 belief was objectionable from two very different points of view, 
 and in very different degrees. The land policy of the present 
 Government is objectionable in the first instance because it inter- 
 feres seriously with freedom of contract. Don't understand me to 
 say that that of itself is necessarily a fatal objection. I, am quite 
 aware that Parliament claims, and must always claim, a right to 
 interfere and dictate the circumstances of contracts if it thinks 
 fit ; but though it has done so — sometimes wisely, sometimes 
 foolishly — the tendency of modern science and experience has 
 been to discourage the exercise of that power to the utmost pos- 
 sible extent. That very law to which I have just referred — the 
 Factory Act — was an interference with freedom of contract — a 
 most beneficial and wise interference ; but on the other hand, you 
 have such an interference as the Usury Laws, which were aban- 
 doned by universal consent, because they had not fulfilled any 
 of the objects for which they were set up. I think it may be 
 said generally — but, of course, there are exceptions — that when 
 questions of life, or limb, or health are at issue, Parliament does 
 wisely to interfere with freedom of contract. But when it is a 
 question of money, — when it is a question of what men should 
 commercially gain or lose by a baro;ain,^Parliament had better 
 let grown men settle with each other their own bargains, and 
 any interference on which it ventures is likely to be injurious to 
 both parties. Of course the chief evil that is the result of inter- 
 ference with freedom of contract is to discourage the industry 
 which these contracts affect. Men will not invest their money, 
 and thev will not run risks or give their labour, if their efforts are
 
 20 
 
 thwarted in this direction or in that by the ignorant interference 
 of a power which frequently does not understand the conditions 
 of the industry with which it meddles. And the other evil is 
 that there will be a constant effort to evade the interference of 
 Parliament ; or, rather, there will be a constant effort to get out 
 of the conditions to which the law applies. 
 
 Now see what Parliament has done for Ireland. It has laid 
 down a land law which settles how and on what conditions 
 people are to take land; settles it for the tenant and settles it 
 for the landlord by a number of minute and, in my judgment, very 
 vexatious j-egulations. But, of course, it was impossible to carry 
 out that prohibition, that restriction, to the largest class of hold- 
 ings. The theory was that the Irish peasant was a mild, gentle, 
 exceedingly simple individual, who was perfectly unable to take 
 care of himself, and who required the interference of those 
 gentlemen at Westminster to settle on what terms he was to 
 pursue his industry. Even if that was true— it obviously was 
 not true of the grazier who held land to the value of £150 or 
 £200 a year or more ; so Parliament has had to allow those who 
 held on that level— I think the limit is £150 a year — to contract 
 themselves out of that Act. Now, mark the result of this pro- 
 ceeding, because it is an instructive instance of the danger of 
 interfering with freedom of contract. Every landlord |vnows that 
 if he can get his land into blocks forming farms worth £150 a- 
 year, he can get himself out of the vexatious restrictions of the 
 Land Act. Well, of course, there will be many landlords — men 
 attached to their tenantry, attached to their estates — who will 
 not take any advantage of the law, and will be kindly to their 
 tenants, though it be to their own hindrance. But you must not 
 count on sentiment of that kind. The only wise legislation is the 
 legislation that assumes that every man will act according to his 
 own interests ; and so in a great many instances — in the in- 
 stances of weaker and poorer men who are struggling for their 
 lives, and who depend on their estates for the maintenance and 
 education of their families — you will find that they will take 
 advantage of every relief that the law can give them. And if a 
 man of that kind were to go to his man of business and say, 
 " What should I do to get out of the restrictions and privations 
 that this Land Act imposes upon me?" the man of business 
 would reply, " Why, you will watch your tenants carefully, and 
 the moment a man is in arrear with his rent, you will get rid of 
 him. You should evict him without mercy ; and then, when you 
 have brought together a sufficient number of holdincrs to make up 
 larms of £loO or more, you will be free from the operation of 
 this Land Act. 
 
 I do not hold up such conduct to you as humane or laudable,
 
 21 
 
 but I point out to you the effect of this Act, judging it upon those 
 principles of human conduct, those principles of self-interest, 
 which the Legislature must take as its guide. The effect of it is 
 to make it the direct and imperious interest of the landlords of 
 Ireland to insist upon those very evictions to which we are told 
 the whole misery of the population is due — and that is the effect 
 of interfering with the natural freedom of contract. But there is 
 much worse than this in the legislation on Irish land. To inter- 
 fere with freedom of future contracts is well within the jurisdic- 
 tion of Parliament; but to take a contract that already exists, and 
 say that one side of it shall keep all the advantages and the other 
 shall sacrifice its advantages — that is not within the competence 
 of Parliament to enact. What do you imagine the effect will be? 
 Suppose you bought a cow, and Parliament comes down and says, 
 " You have bought that cow ; you shall keep your cow, but only 
 pay one- third or three-fourths of the price." What do you 
 suppose the effect of that enactment would be upon the man who 
 sold the cow ? Very naturally lie would never care to trouble 
 himself with selling cows again, and keep himself well out of the 
 way of the spoliating action of Parliament. That is what has 
 happened with respect to the land in Ireland. Parliament invited 
 men to come into Irish land on commercial principles. By the 
 passing of the Encumbered Estates Act, and many subsequent 
 Acts, it avowedly encouraged men to come and invest their 
 savings in the purchase of land, and then when they boiight that 
 land it says — the tenant shall keep the land, but you shall only 
 have two-thirds or three-fourths of the rent. The effect of that, 
 for which present expediency may be pleaded in its behalf, must 
 be fatal to the future prosperity of the country. Every man 
 knows that this action of the Government is not the limit to 
 which those under whose influence it is walking would wish it 
 to go. While the Government is taking a third or a quarter, Mr 
 Davitt is going about preaching that it ought to take the whole. 
 Well, under these circumstances, do you think that men are likely 
 to invest their money in the improvement of land — do you think 
 they are likely to carry their capital to a country where such 
 things occur ? 
 
 I lately saw a letter from Mr Mitchell Henry — a Liberal gentle- 
 man, but a very philanthropic one — pointing out the enormous 
 wealth that might be made by the application of money to the 
 improvement of Irish bogs. Mr Bright is very fond of dwelling 
 on the water-power of Lough Corrib, and the wonderful results 
 that would come to Ireland if that water-power could be utilised. 
 Well, we had the other day a letter from a clergyman in the west 
 of Ireland, giving a piteous account of the misery of whole 
 districts; and one of the causes that he assigned was that there
 
 22 
 
 now was no remunerative employment. But these are the natural 
 penalties that fall upon a land that is afflicted by this curse, that 
 a Government, whose first duty it is to protect property, instead 
 of that becomes the spoliator of property in its turn. The agita- 
 tors may tell you that it is the rich man, the' comparatively rich 
 man, who is in question, and that it is he who will suffer the 
 effect of such laws. But economical laws are pitiless in their 
 action. It is not the rich man who will mainly suffer when con- 
 fidence is destroyed. When confidence is destroyed capital will 
 not How, enterprise cannot be created, wages must fall, and com- 
 merce must stagnate ; and when the Government, under the 
 pressure of electoral motives, commits a breach of the rights of 
 property, apparently for the sake of a class whom you are told 
 is poor and suffering, depend upon it that in the long-run the 
 class which lives by industry will be the sufi'erer, because the 
 Government has departed from the right and honest way. 
 
 There is another matter to which 1 should like to refer, because 
 it is a question which justifies, I think, the activity and the 
 energy of those Associations whose addresses have been kindly 
 presented to me, and which is likely to occupy at a very early 
 time the attention of Scotsmen— I mean the Established Church 
 of this country. Now, remember you are constantly told that the 
 distinction between the Conservative and the Liberal party is that 
 the Liberals are ' the party of progress, and the Conservatives 
 desire to stand still. Now, in the first instance, I deny that the 
 Conservatives desire to stand still. We know very well that we 
 live in a changing world, but all that we say is — before great 
 chansfes are made in the fundamental laws and institutions of this 
 country, and the principles which have been handed down for a 
 long time, let us be certain that the change commends itself to 
 the settled will and judgment of the people of this country, and 
 is not adopted in obedience to the wishes of a chance majority. 
 But when the Liberals tell you they are the party of progress, is it 
 impertinent to ask them where they are progressing to ? A man 
 may tell you that he is a great walker, and is undertaking a profit- 
 able journey ; but if you ask him where he is going to, and he 
 was unable to say, you would think he was a very odd sort of 
 undertaker. Where is the point to which this progress is to lead ? 
 I isuppose there is some fixed point at which everybody, according 
 to this hypothesis, would be a Conservative. I presume the most 
 advanced of our Radical friends have particular things in their 
 minds — though they won't disclose them — which if they had got 
 they would then be Conservative, and desire to stop there. But 
 what we wish to know is the point to which they desire to go. 
 And there is no matter in respect to which this frankness would 
 be more desirable than in regard to this question of the Estab-
 
 23 
 
 lished Church. You know how the question has arisen. Some 
 thirty or forty years ago, owing to a very unfortunate decision on 
 the part of a nobleman — who is not a nobleman to whom 
 Conservatives look back with much affection — the great schism of 
 the Free Church occurred. But in the first instance, and for 
 many years, that division was a matter of purely religions concern, 
 with which politicians were not required to trouble themselves. 
 The Free Church fully recognised that it was the duty of the State 
 to maintain an Established Church. But then came in the 
 agitators — then came in the missionaries of discontent — then 
 came in that party who live by creating division between the 
 various classes of her Majesty's subjects — and they have turned 
 the religious issue into a political one ; and now the political 
 conflict in Scotland threatens the subversion of the most ancient 
 institution of Scotland, and one closely bound up with all the vicis- 
 situdes and fortunes of the country. 
 
 It is not necessary that I should dilate to you upon the advan- 
 tages of an Established Church. You know that it is at once the 
 great security for the presence of religious ministrations, alike in 
 rich and in poor districts ; and at the same time it is a security 
 that the great influence of the Church shall be exercised in a 
 manner that is advantageous, and in harmony with the welfare of 
 the State. I do not for a moment say that the Church cannot exist 
 without the State. I know well that it is otherwise : but a 
 Church divorced from the State runs two risks. There is always 
 the risk that the individual ministers will be tempted, and perhaps 
 forced, to excite the zeal and to secure the support of their 
 particular congregations by the constant administration of un- 
 wholesome spiritual stimulants, and there is the other danger that 
 the Church itself will not be subject to that modifying influence 
 of the laity, so favourable to toleration and to breadth, which 
 is the result of the influence which the Establishment confers, 
 upon the State. The loss of the connection with the State will 
 be the loss of a great power for good, and the loss of a security 
 that influence would be constantly exercised with wisdom and 
 with moderation. I am more concerned to call your attention to 
 the dangers which these great and venerated institutions may run 
 at this time. You were told again and again at the last election 
 that the issue of disestablishment was not immediately before the 
 country, and that the country would be consulted again before 
 such an issue could be dealt with. But the point that I think 
 was not sufficiently considered by those to whom the Established 
 Church is precious in this country is, that if you place in power 
 the enemies of the Established Church, even though they may not 
 at once proceed to the exercise of that power to its detriment,, 
 you place in their power the opportunity of so modifying and
 
 24: 
 
 manipulating electoral arrangements, that at a future time the 
 Church will be at their mercy. 
 
 I can see that those desiring disestablishment, both in this 
 country and across the Border, are supporting the present Govern- 
 ment in spite of many discouragements — in spite of being com- 
 pelled very often to eat their principles, and to approve of that 
 vi^hich they should denounce, because they hope from this Govern- 
 ment may proceed some manipulation of the machinery by which 
 Parliaments are elected, which shall enable them in the future to 
 attain their ends. It is against that you have to guard. That is 
 the great danger which requires the constant attention of the 
 Conservatives. To those who consider the state of our institutions 
 at this time, and under the spirit which now dominates the con- 
 duct of affairs, it is alarming to see how great their insecurity and 
 instability are. Everything depends on the results, whatever they 
 may be, of the chance humoar, or the passing caprice of that one 
 day on which a general election is held. You know what a gen- 
 eral election is. You know the kind of questions which affect 
 this or that constituency. You know how one constituency 
 votes this way or that way because a particular harbour has 
 not been made. Another constituency is animated by the 
 temperance movement, a third by the anti-vaccination move- 
 ment, a fourth by a fondness for some particular local dignitary, 
 and a fifth by the unpopularity of some other local dignitary ; and 
 there are a thousand other secondary motives or transient motives, 
 even be they of momentary importance, which go to make np the 
 decision on which the proudest of your institutions may depend. 
 The lasting and far-reaching power which is given to the decision 
 of one particular day — to a decision which often is not prompted 
 bv any consideration of the great questions Parliament will have 
 to decide — that is, in my mind, the strongest argument and incen- 
 tive to careful organisation and the careful arrangement of your 
 electoral forces. You never know when the danger may be upon 
 you. Y^ou never know when the moment for exertion shall arrive; 
 but you do know that great institutions, such as your ancient 
 Church of Scotland, are in that hour committed to your keeping ; 
 that if you then neglect your trust, evils will follow that you can- 
 not repair. And I know no stronger incentive to that energy and 
 activity of which these Associations whose addresses I have now 
 received bear such distinguished evidence than the consideration 
 that, upon the industry with which they pursue, and the judgment 
 with which they achieve the great objects for which they exist, 
 will depend the averting of dangers that we all of us dread to look 
 ;ipon, — the saving of institutions which generations have regarded 
 with respect, the prevention of results which the latest generation
 
 25 
 
 of their descendants may deeply regret, but which no subsequent 
 efforts shall have the power to reverse. 
 
 Gentlemen, I feel that on this side of the Border the exhorta- 
 tion to electoral union and to electoral activity is invested with 
 even more importance than any words that could be uttered in 
 England, because here the danger is more immediate, and there- 
 fore greater interests at issue. When you are asked to help, when 
 you are asked to join in the efforts which other Conservatives 
 are making, remember that upon your refusal or upon your cordial 
 acquiescence depends whether or not you will bear a worthy part 
 in defending that institution which all Scotland is bound to 
 honour and revere.
 
 SPEECH 
 
 FOLLOWING OX THE 
 
 PEESENTATION OF THE EAEL OF DALKEITH'S 
 POETEAIT TO THE COUNTESS OF DALKEITH. 
 
 25th NOVEMBER 1882. 
 
 Mr Chairman, my Lords, Ladies, and Gentlemen, — 
 
 As an old friend for many years of tlie noble Duke, 
 and as a member of the Conservath'e party, I have been per- 
 mitted to say a few words — and they shall be very few — in 
 support of this motion which has now been submitted to you. 
 In appearing before this audience, it is difficult not to remember 
 that this particular hall has within the last two or three years 
 acquired a historical reputation in reference to enterprises that 
 were undertaken in this county against the influence and family 
 of the Duke of Buccleuch, and in reference to certain very remark- 
 able and strikincr and influential sentiments which were ad- 
 dressed to audiences here. They were shown to me this morn- 
 ing. If I were to repeat them here, I am afraid you would think 
 they were so incongruous with the present state of affairs, that I 
 was laughing at you. I remember noticing that it was in this 
 hall that the most thrilling, the most pious, denunciations were 
 levelled against those who pointed the terrible implements of mod- 
 ern artillery against uncivilised races. I wonder if, with the 
 distinguished orator who uttered those sentiments, it crossed his 
 mind that within three years he would be directing those who 
 served the Queen to point far more terrible implements of artillery 
 against uncivilised races in another part of Africa? And there 
 was also a sentiment about burning villages which took very much 
 at the time — an appeal to the ladies of this county to think of the 
 fearful sufferings of those who were turned out of their villages, 
 and of the guilt of those whose warlike operations led to the de- 
 struction of those villac^es. I wonder if it occurred to him that it
 
 27 
 
 would be his fate within three years to direct military operations 
 which would have the effect of burning, not villages, but one of 
 the proudest cities of the earth, and to initiate operations of which 
 the effect would be the appalling misery that results from turning 
 on the world the inhabitants — the peaceful inhabitants — of a vast 
 city. I do not, of course, refer to these things for the purpose of 
 insinuating that any moral guilt lies upon the right hon. gentle- 
 man. I do not think so ; but I think that events have proved to 
 him and to you, and possibly will prove to others in this part of 
 the country, that those pious and noble sentiments were uttered a 
 little recklessly and hastily — that they were not really a just foun- 
 dation for the measureless denunciations which were delivered at 
 the time against the Government that then ruled in this country, 
 and at those who, like my noble friend and the noble Duke, sup- 
 ported it ; and that men will learn not to trust entirely to the 
 effusiveness and the seeming religiousness of political denunciations, 
 but to measure their just application to the facts before them. 
 However, the matter which I wish to press upon your attention is 
 of a more peaceful kind. I desire rather to dwell, not upon the 
 defects of his assailants, but upon the individual merit of the noble 
 Duke himself. As a politician he occupies a remarkable and a 
 very distinguished position. His career, if you will examine it, 
 has a remarkable merit of judgment and moderation and far- 
 sightedness which few of the passing generation of statesmen have 
 imitated. At the great crisis of the Corn Laws in 1845 it was 
 given to him, I think almost alone among the Ministry of Sir 
 Robert Peel, on the one hand, to see that the position of agricul- 
 tural protection was not tenable, and was one which ought not to 
 be defended ; and on the other hand, to see that the difference 
 from his party in that respect was no sort of justification for 
 changing his opinions and allies on all other political matters. 
 And therefore it was that he, I think alone, while joining the 
 Ministry of Sir Eobert Peel in that which was a right and neces- 
 sary act, when that controversy was over, quietly took his rank 
 again by the side of those to whom his former opinions had always 
 united him. Many, too many of his colleagues, and Mr Gladstone 
 at their head, appeared to find in that one difference of opinion a 
 justification for renouncing all that they had ever supported, and 
 supporting all that they had formerly opposed. It is no slight 
 merit in a statesman that he was able to resist the luring example 
 of so many distinguished colleagues, and to draw the line between 
 adhering to doctrines that were obsolete and untenable and the 
 opposite excess to which so many of his friends rushed, of throw- 
 ing over and changing their political convictions altogether. 
 What he has been in public he has been in private — the same 
 calm, moderate, equable, just, and energetic man. I need not
 
 28 
 
 dwell upon his private virtues to you, for they are well known to 
 you by personal experience ; but it is impossible not to see in the 
 iniiuence, which through a long life he has maintained, a testimony 
 to the virtues by which that influence has been deserved. In some 
 other lands it might be said that his rank and his great wealth 
 were of some account in the power he had obtained and the 
 attachment that was tendered towards him ; but in modern Scot- 
 land, at least, that is not the case. Here, I believe, in this thriv- 
 ing and busy population, where the constant creation of wealth 
 tends to stimulate the sentiment of equality — here, I believe, if a 
 man who has great wealth and rank, at the same time preserves a 
 vast influence and popularity, it is a conspicuous proof of the 
 personal merits by wdiich that popularity has been earned. 
 Throuojh a lono- life he has devoted himself with unflao-ging; and 
 ungrudging labour to the various and complicated duties which 
 his high position has imposed upon him, and he has obtained as 
 his reward a widespread attachment, which it has been given to 
 few to obtain, and fewer still to deserve.
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 "TO THE MOST NOBLE THE MARQUIS OF SALISBURY, K.G., 
 
 &c. &c. &c. 
 
 " We, the members of the City of Edinburgh Conservative Associa- 
 tion, beg to offer your Lordship a hearty welcome to the capital of 
 Scotland. We hail your presence among us as a fresh proof of the 
 cordial relations which subsist between the Conservative party and its 
 leaders. In all the vicissitudes of political fortune you have main- 
 tained our principles with unfailing courage and constancy, and you 
 possess in the fullest measure our gratitude and our confidence. Your 
 past services to the nation are matters of history, and no detraction 
 can dim their lustre. We do not forget that you were the associate of 
 Lord Beaconsfield in restoring Great Britain to her rightful place in 
 the councils of Europe, in maintaining her honour not by war but by 
 diplomacy, and in securing fresh guarantees for the peace of the world ; 
 and if the full advantage of these great achievements has been im- 
 perilled by the rash language and the vacillating conduct of your suc- 
 cessors in office, you have witnessed the vindication of your policy, 
 not less in the success which has attended its imitation than in the 
 ignominy which has followed its reversal. In the illustrious House 
 whose best traditions are embodied in your person, and to whose pa- 
 triotism the country owes so much of its order and its freedom, your 
 influence is deservedly paramount. We feel assured it will always be 
 used on behalf of those ancient and popular principles in Avhich lie 
 the best hopes both of individual liberty and of national strength. 
 Ere long, we trust, it will again be wielded with all the weight that 
 attaches to a Minister of the Queen. 
 
 *' In the name and on behalf of the Association, 
 
 '' T. GRAHAM MURRAY, 
 Chairman." 
 
 The Address, which was read amid cheering at the intervals, was 
 also signed by the Chairmen of the Conservative Associations of West 
 Aberdeenshire, East Aberdeenshire, Berwickshire, Old Deer and Long- 
 side, Clackmannanshire, Dumfriesshire, Eifeshire, Forfarshire, East 
 Lothian, Kincardineshire, Kinross-shire, Kirkcudbrightshire, Linlith-
 
 30 
 
 gowshire, Mid-Lothian, Mid-Calder and Kirknewton, AVest Calder, 
 Colinton, Dalkeith, Penicuik, Peeblesshire, Perth-^hire, Roxburghshire, 
 Hawick District, Jedburgh District, Melrose District, Selkirkshire 
 District, Wigtownshire, City of Aberdeen. Arbroath Burgh, Cupar- 
 Fife Burgh, Dunbar Burgh, Dunfermline Burgh, Eastern District of 
 Edinburgh, JSTorthern of Edinburgh, Southern of Edinburgh, South- 
 Western of Edinburgh, Western of Edinburgh, Forfar District of 
 Burghs, Haddington Burgh, Hawick Branch of the Border Burghs, 
 Jedburgh United, Kirkcaldy, Kirkcudbright Burgh, Leith, Linlithgow 
 Burgh, Maxwelltown, Musselburgh, North Berwick, City of Perth, 
 Portobello, St Andrews Burgh, Selkirk Burgh, Whithorn Burgh, 
 Wigtown Burgh, Edinburgh. University, St Andrews University, 
 Peebles Conservative Club, Aberdeen Conservative Club, Dumfries 
 and Maxwelltown Junior Conservative Association, Committee of 
 Management of the Dumfries Conservative Association, Edinburgh 
 Conservative Working Men's Association, Aberdeen Conservative 
 Working Men's Association, &c. 
 
 PRINTED BY WIT.I.TAM BI^ArKWOOD AND SONS.
 
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