Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

Now, we say that it becomes more apparent every day that the abolition of promotion by purchase is hardly desirable, and would not effect the improvement once expected from it. That scheme will probably fall to the ground. But expend the same amount in clearing the army of its worn-out members, you will then certainly have a force whose officers shall not be too old for their respective ranks. The difficulty arising from the course of nature will be met in the only effective and liberal manner; and, having disposed of this, it will be your own fault if you allow controllable evils to impair the efficiency of Her Majesty's forces.

Let us now say a few words on Routine, as responsible for the shortcomings of the Civil departments of the State. Here, as in the case of the military force, we are persuaded that the system was less in fault than the public servants who were at the head of those departments. Faults of system there undoubtedly were, and many obsolete forms; but we contend that the state of war was not a condition of the country well chosen for making a revolution in the different offices. Slow as they were before, the sudden change tended to paralyse them still more. That an increased stagnation did not result is attributable to the alterations having been cotemporaneous with a decided expression of impatience on the part of the public. Ministers found it expedient to arouse themselves. They began to work; they exerted their authority and made others work. But the same means would have produced the same result without just then disturbing the old system. The improvement was only temporary. The waxing indignation of the country acted on the great officials like brandy on a sinking patient. It wrought them to a momentary effort; but when the stimulus was withdrawn, the bad spirit, backed by seven others, entered in, and the last state is worse than the first. We have nothing to say against making alterations in the public departments, now that the occasion is suitable. The reform is well as far as it goes; but it is beginning at the wrong end. When

the head is sore, and the heart is sick, it is in vain that we would impart health through the extremities. In proof of what we have advanced, let any man, at the present time, observe the manner of doing things, and the time it takes to do them. Routine, or, as the officials call it, the course of office, does by no means account for the quantity of twaddle and the unconscionable delay. We admit-nay, we insist, that communications and documents affecting different departments of the Government must be made known to each and every department concerned; but at the most five or six days should suffice for this. What are we to say when we find papers, and simple ones, two and three months on their travels through as many offices? What we said when speaking of military renovation we repeat here : reform the heads, and leave them to deal with the members. But in the case of the army, age was the difficulty to be disposed of. In the civil departments are encountered evils of a far more formidable stamp-evils which money can never cure. Delay in transacting business may be regarded as a symptom only of a corroding and alarming disease. The affairs of the nation increase every day in magnitude, and they are conducted by men of whom it is no slander to say that they allot their time, energy, and devotion in the following order :-1st, To the acquisition and abuse of patronage for themselves and their relations; 2d, To extending their political connection; 3d, To the advancement of their party; and 4th (if a few moments remain after caring for the foregoing), To the despatch of the business of the country. If there is in all Britain a dullard who yet requires proof of what we have asserted, we cite the whole national press for the last three years as evidence thereof. Let the Times, with its myriad correspondents, suspicious, discontented, desperate, furious, lead the way into court. Not a village exists from Land's End to John o' Groat's which has not furnished its quota of testimony. If a verdict consented to by the whole nation can establish the charges against Ministers, then are they guilty. We

verily believe that no Briton exists who is satisfied that the resources and the arms of the country were wielded to the best advantage, or her wishes fairly contended for, in the late war. Instead of giving her whole attention to the posture of the enemy, she was compelled to watch jealously the proceedings of her own suspected servants. Deficient, however, as they were in matters affecting the national honour and the public weal, none ever accused one of them of neglecting to use his power for the benefit of a relative or a protegé.

Let us try to picture our old Crimean commander on a day of last year. Every hour teems with events of warfare, and the wondrous wire, like the prophet of old, reveals in the city that which befalls in the far distant camp. Our chief is zealous if not able; and his anxieties are inversely proportioned to his ability. Message after message speeds along the momentous cord, carrying homeward tales of daring and glory, failure and death-while back return the awful dicta which prescribe action or delay, and involve the fate of men and nations. A flush rises to the commander's furrowed cheek as it is announced to him that the brazen head is about to speak, for he expects a communication on which may hang the fame and lives of himself and the host. Quicker and quicker beats his heart as the index, letter by letter, delivers up its charge. At length the words are spelled, the sentence is complete, and in the trembling hand of the old man is placed the spirit-stirring legend, REMEMBER DOWB.”

It might have been expected that though there were no patriotism in the soul from which the miserable command proceeded, there might at such a time have flickered some temporary enthusiasm. Alas, no! such spirits know but one desire. Or shame might have forbid the exposure. He has no shame. Or fear might have withheld the expression of the wish! The wretched official was under no apprehension, and was justitied in his confidence. The British nation frowned, shrugged, and FORGAVE.

The certainty of impunity for great political offences is one of the most

unhealthy symptoms in the conduct of affairs. Every transgressor is sure, from long experience, that he plays a winning game. However vicious may be his acts, he knows that a temporary unpopularity is the worst that he has to dread. A few months tabooing is the utmost retribution inflicted for even moral depravity; and degradation or severe punishment for the offender is now never thought of. But a year and a half have elapsed since Lord John Russell was chased from office for conduct the most disingenuous, and for imposture attempted on the Parliament and the country. While we write, the public journals are calmly discussing his return to office, and elevation to the peerage. We nowhere meet with such a remark as "that the mental obliquity of this statesman disqualifies him for being intrusted with the direction of affairs." Exposed as he has been, he is nevertheless to be readmitted to office, the nation recklessly taking the risk of his future misdeeds. We have found this plan signally fail with offenders against the common law ; and the admission of the ticket-ofleave system (as a fair friend of ours aptly termed it) into political life, will, it may be safely predicted, prove a most unfortunate innovation. With good men it is always expedient to keep alive a belief in the certainty of punishment for offences; but when work is done with tools such as it is the pleasure of this country to employ, the withdrawal of this belief is an invitation to betray us. The only restraining power over them is the dread of chastisement. The ticket-ofleave routine we would therefore denounce in the loudest terms.

It is thought a clever stratagem to combine men of tarnished reputation or suspected morality in Boards or Committees where they may check each other, and cannot commit a great crime without consent of the whole body. This method does, without doubt, produce the favourable effects ascribed to it. There is safety in a multitude of counsellors, and, if safety be the main consideration, if we would hide our talent in a napkin and bury it in the earth, then committees are to be preferred. But

and, we hope, expects, and has a

right to expect, something more than mere caution. The average opinion, which is the best that can be expected from a committee, dilutes or excludes the perspicacity, the decision, the daring of genius. Therefore, a country that desires to be served in the best manner must not only employ able men, but must leave those able men to a considerable degree unshackled. For a department to work well, its head must be largely trusted. The public must observe him, but not vexatiously interfere with him; and he must direct his subordinates. But we have said that in the present day Ministers do not possess, and ought not to possess, the confidence of the country. How then can they be intrusted with more discretionary power !! The answer is, choose Ministers worthy to be trusted, and then delegate the powers.

--

We will for a moment refer to one of the favourite comparisons of writers in the newspapers during the distress of the nation, at the shameful misuse of its resources in 1854 and 1855. It was complained constantly, that private speculators or companies can always obtain servants to carry out their designs with skill and credit, while the public, with all appliances and means to boot a well-filled treasury, a crowd of competitors for employment, and minor assistants ad libitum-has continual reason to lament over the mismanagement of its affairs. The merchant and the large contractor were cited perpetually as affording examples of the facility with which great undertakings can systematically and smoothly be carried onward to successful results, so unlike the frequent abortions of Government enterprise. We would here venture to hint that the analogy between the public and the speculator is incomplete. Certes, duties might be performed for the nation with the same ability, integrity, and success as for the merchant. But does the public take the same precautions as he? Observe his first step in arranging his establishment. He selects with the utmost caution those who are to be his clerks or his foremen. He promotes to those places none but such as have been proved under his own observation in minor offices or as have come recom

mended to him by unimpeachable testimonials. He insists on not only the highest qualification in respect of ability, but at the same time the strictest integrity, and an irreproachable moral character. He knows better than to commit his capital or his professional reputation to persons on whose uprightness he cannot entirely rely. The public, on the contrary, proclaims that it is indifferent about private character-and pays the penalty of its indifference.

Of the fallacies which mislead this our age, none is more deplorable than the doctrine that a man may possess two characters-one public, the other private. In the latter, he may be a voluptuary, a scoffer, a deceiver, grasping, selfish, disloyal; while in the former he is great, patriotic, and honest. He may be unfaithful in that which is little, yet scrupulously trusty in that which is great. Consequently a bad reputation in private life is no bar to public advancement. Complain that a statesman's moral standard is low, or his life disreputable, and you will be laughed at for your objection. Yet, when the corrupt tree brings forth corrupt fruit, the public thinks itself at liberty to complain of its ill-fortune. Is the complaint just, O reader? Would you, in your small principality, set over your larder or your wine-cellar one of whose sobriety and honesty you are not well assured? Would your grocer, think you, leave the key of the till with his idle apprentice? A first-rate charioteer who drinks, an incomparable valet who robbed his last employer, what chance have they of getting places? The truth is but too clear-we are fatally indifferent to our greatest public interests. While the consequences of our indifference are apparent-while we are actually suffering loss or disgrace, or smarting under failure, we call heaven and earth to witness the roguery and incapacity of our servants; but the grievance once past, we relapse into our torpor, till roused by a succeeding calamity. Now, as we before hinted, it is not while there is urgent call for action in a department that it ought to be reformed. The intervals of repose are the proper occasions for calmly and patiently searching defects, and applying re

medies. For placing our departments on a proper footing, now, and not the heat of the war, is the right time.

Let it not be said, as opposed to these suggestions, that statesmanship, like every other craft, requires a training, and that the departments of the State must be headed by men who have learned the arts of government and diplomacy. We admit that it should be so; but we will not insult our countrymen by conceding that the admission involves the contradiction of our design. We only stipulate that, in addition to, and before, other qualifications, irreproachable moral character shall be insisted on in our rulers. And heaven forbid that it be true, that a dozen men of unimpeachable honesty, and, at the same time, equal to the profoundest requirements of statecraft, cannot be discovered among our immense population. The most recent invention the Electric Telegraph for instance- is no sooner discovered, than men are found sufficiently skilled and trustworthy to work it for the benefit of others. And why should government present a difficulty which is found in no other science? I or our own part, we would rather trust a conscientious man, somewhat unpractised in his craft, than the cleverest knave that ever handled red tape. But it is unnecessary to consider the alternatives. Let the country but give the proper encouragement, and the proper call, and the men will be forthcoming.

Let us not be told that our idea is utopian; and that the attempt to supersede practised rulers by sages and saints, has ever demonstrated the impotency in practical life of wisdom and piety. We fully admit that your statesman should be a practical man, and man of the world. Of all classes of the community, we should expect that the higher and wealthier is, for obvious reasons, the most likely to furnish the right men. We maintain that we have required nothing which is not analogous to the requirement of all private undertakings, and that the dispensing with these qualities, not the insisting on them, forms the anomaly. We have not now the right men, because the

country has never insisted on having them. Far from resisting the will of the nation, when expressed in that unmistakable tone which shows it to be in earnest, our statesmen have shown themselves, to a faulty extent, supple and Protean. They mould themselves and their opinions to any forms which the popular fancy for the moment prescribes. Let there be a determined call for upright men, and not only will the really virtuous come to the front, but those will assume virtues who have them not. Palmerston will bid for the favours of Britannia as Tribulation Spintext, and Lord John, heedless of lithotomy and naval tactics, will appear as a miniature Saul, breathing out threatenings, and denouncing the unregenerate through his nose. Thought, discussion, and combination, on the part of the nation are, we feel persuaded, all that are needed to effect this great object. The nation assuredly has the power if it has but the will. That its decree is irresistible, was made apparent when the aforesaid Lord John made himself obnoxious in the spring of 1855. His colleagues, guilty as himself, had not the manliness to fall with him, or the power to rescue him; his own particular supporters forsook him; there was no appeal from the national verdict, and over the side he went, a Jonah for a sprat. Would that, instead of playing fast and loose with him, the country had inflicted condign punishment to avenge the outrage attempted on its common sense and its morality!

[ocr errors]

We would fain have you mark, kind reader, that when, in writing the foregoing, we have frequently used the terms "people," "nation," and "country," we are far from intending that blatant and unrighteous section of our countrymen which generally arrogates to itself those titles. Our remarks touch a subject in which our whole population, from the illustrious lady on the throne to him that pasteth broadsides against a wall, are, and must be, interested. We appeal to no class, no estate, no profession. We perceive, as we think and hope, a dawn of unity and cooperation in the parts of our great body politic. Demagogues and im

postors have passed into that limbo lish tongue shall endure, every reader where

"—all who in vain things

Built their fond hopes of glory or lasting

fame,"

find their inevitable goal. The mighty disenchanter WAR has torn the veil from our eyes. He was a stern leech, but he has left us sane if debilitated, conscious if palpitating. God grant that from the nettle danger we may have plucked the flower safety!

So far have we considered Routine as ordained by ourselves; but, in order to regard profitably this or any other of our established methods, it is well to reflect on another Routine, not of our appointment, yet to which we are inevitably subject. In the scene which Mirza beheld when gazing on the valley of Bagdat, we are all, perforce, actors; to ourselves is left only the choice, whether we will act heedlessly, or with a purpose. The Chinese sage described our passage in a few words,-"They were born, they were miserable, they died.' And even our English translator of nature hath writ

"To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-mo

row,

Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death."

We know little of Tartar temperaments; but of the immortal William we are sure that, when he wrote as above, he had on the previous evening forgotten his relation to all time, and abandoned himself to the allurements of the hour, supping heartily on over-fresh venison, and flushing his inspired gullet with plentiful canaries. The sentiments quoted were, we imagine, penned at early morn, under the influence of most depressing megrim. An hour later, after a dip in the Avon, and a cup of that excellent sherris, to which he has ascribed such invigorating properties, he expressed himself, without doubt, in a more wholesome strain. None knew better than the said William that each man has something appointed for him to do beyond strutting and fretting his hour upon the stage. He executed his own task in such sort, that, as long as our Eng

VOL. LXXXI.-NO. CCCCXCV.

of it will acknowledge a debt to him. Every citizen may do something (though, in many cases, but little) for the age, and for posterity. They who devote time and thought in any degree to public affairs, may profitably consider whether or not they are working to any great end. The consciousness of want of weight is

not a sufficient excuse for an individual's carelessness. Professor Faraday, in expounding the supposed mystery of table-turning, asserted that, where many minds willed in concert, a muscular force, capable of generating and maintaining rotation, was exerted, not only unknown to, but in spite of, the experimenters. Who can doubt that this is true in morals, and that the mere direction of honest opinion proceeding from many, though each be of small estimation, may have an effect apparently magical? To nations not less than to individuals attaches the obligation to work for the present and sucto leave the ceeding generations

country to posterity better than they found it. We must do Britons the justice to say that they have for a century past manifested a disposition to mend the age. But their zeal has not been according to knowledge. Having no just and well ascertained aim themselves, they pinned their faith and gave their powers to schemers who had the assurance, the want of scruple, and the forensic ability to assume a leadership and to promise inordinately. One after another the attempts have failed. The leaders obtained notoriety, patronage, riches; but, for the people, on whose shoulders the leaders were elevated, they had each time to endure disappointment, and betake themselves to another quack. The extent of the nation's patience was astonishing. Instead of becoming more wary, she became more reckless after every failure. At length a moral blindness seemed to smite her, and her last pitiable exhibition was like Titania's-infatuated by an ass's head on the trunk of a weaver ! Absurdity could stretch no farther; things appeared to have reached their worst, and they mended. Hearty shame for that last indiscretion, not

G

« AnteriorContinuar »