Originally published in Fraser's Magazine (James Fraser) vol.4 #20 (Sep 1831).
Sir Francis Burdett enters Brookes's at that hour of the day when the greatest number of members are usually assembled, and seeing Lord Duncannon sitting by himself, asks him, in an audible whisper, the reason why Lord Althorp did not attend the two last cabinet councils held in Downing Street. The answer of his lordship is totally inaudible; but it is observed that he looked unusually grave, and led the baronet into a corner, where they continued in earnest conversation for some time. Next day there appears in the Morning Post a paragraph, announcing to the public that serious differences have occurred between the Premier and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, relative, as is conjectured, to the reform bill. On the evening of the same day it is stated in the Standard, that the differences alluded to by "our excellent contemporary" originated in the determination of Lord Althorp to support the proposed amendment of his "bosom friend," Lord Milton, which is warmly opposed by the noble Earl and the Lord Chancellor.
In the course of the conversation between Sir Francis Burdett and Lord Duncannon, they are overheard by Sir Robert Wilson, who has edged himself as near to them as possible, to repeat the word "patent" with marked emphasis. This word is at once presumed to be the key to the whole of their interesting discourse. Sir Robert having occasion to write to Edinburgh in the course of the evening, informs his correspondent, confidentially, that the honourable member for Westminster is speedily to be elevated to the peerage; and that in fact he, Sir Robert, has reason to believe that the patent of his nobility is actually being made out. There accordingly appear, much about the same time, two paragraphs, very differently worded, in the Edinburgh Observer and the Morning Herald, announcing this important fact to the public.
There is no foundation whatever for—not the least shadow of truth in—either of these rumours; but they pass current, and are credited by thousands, nay by millions, for a day, a week, a month, or perhaps till they are formally contradicted by authority. But even then there will still remain many thousands of persons far less inclined to credit the contradiction than the original statement.
Such are the bases on which rests a large portion of the private information and fashionable intelligence of the newspapers. The invention or the hoax speedily becomes what is called a "rumour," is soon circulated from club-room to club-room, is talked of in "our box" at the Opera, is whispered in the drawing-room, and at length finds vent in one of the daily journals, to which it is furnished by some professional eavesdropper and caterer of small news, at so many farthings or pence per line. But there is little harm in this—the scandal is innocent—it inflicts no wound, and leaves no sting—it has but an ephemeral existence, and is soon forgotten.
Let us, therefore, take another illustration. Some differences of a domestic nature are known to have occurred in a family of rank, residing in Park Lane or Portman Square. A thousand rumours are instantly on wing, every one of them false, ascribing the misunderstanding to some discoveries of a painful and delicate nature. Lord Frizzle, dining with a party at Long's, states that he had for some time observed a partiality on the part of the lady for Captain S-- of the Guards. Mr. Thompson knows, by mere accident, having occasion to call on professional business, that the attorney of the husband had a long consultation with Mr. Sergeant Adams that very morning. Lord Frizzle looks at Mr. Thompson significantly—Thompson returns the stare silently, and nods—then turns up his eyes towards the ceiling—looks down again, and anon empties his glass. A dead silence ensues for about three minutes—the mystery is unravelled, and the poor lady is doomed.
Next day the affair is all over town; the story is amplified and amended—published in a hundred various forms, to suit the different calibres of credulity—and at last it appears in the Court Journal or the John Bull—is transferred thence into the Times and the daily papers, names only being suppressed, but the parties being sufficiently pointed out, and the affair stated to be one which has already engaged the "gentlemen of the long robe," and likely to lead to "extraordinary disclosures."
This is another specimen of the intelligence which forms the light reading of the newspapers. Citizen Guzzle of Farringdon Street believes every word of it. Alderman Muggins gloats over it with delight. Mr. Deputy Goose reads it to his wife and daughters at the breakfast table; and Mr. Tapeshort, the linendraper, who sells stolen goods, and writes articles against capital punishments in the Morning Herald, expatiates upon it before he goes to chapel on Sunday, as a proof of the gross immorality which prevails among the higher classes at the West End.
Now, however, the rumour, or rather the falsehood, meets the eye of the injured parties in a tangible shape. It has appeared in the newspapers, and the printer and publisher are fixed. Ask them for the author? they have none to give. Demand a contradiction? they are ready with it, as flat and positive as possible—most willing to send the antidote after the poison; but as to being able to trace the report to its origin, or bring the inventors into a court of justice, they might as well be required to set the Thames on fire, or make Lord John Russell swim across the Atlantic with a majority of the House of Commons on his back. It is no excuse for them to plead that the libel was in general circulation—that it was a subject of common conversation—that it was a topic of gossip in every coterie and club-house. Nothing of this kind would avail them; they are answerable as if they were the authors, and must abide the consequences.
Such is the law: to these responsibilities the newspapers are subject, and it is proper they should be so. But as to the moral effect, as regards society, or the consequences to the parties libelled, in what degree are the newspapers more guilty than those ten, twenty, or a hundred thousand persons, by whom the slander had been propagated ore tenus? The publication of it in a newspaper affixes no authenticity to the rumour. Its appearance in the Times or the John Bull is no evidence of its truth—is not intended, and is not considered, to be any confirmation of the prevailing report. It may indicate the belief of the party who published it; although in most instances this is not the case, inasmuch as the publisher was totally ignorant as to whom it alluded.
The question, then, comes to this, with respect to these specimens of credulity, inadvertence, or unconscious slander, on the part of the press, as given above, whether the newspapers, the mere echoes of public opinion, and of public scandal in such cases, have not rather a salutary instead of a pernicious influence on public morals and private character—the publicity of their proceedings, and their severe responsibility, not only acting like a restraint upon defamation, but enabling the injured party to avail himself of the most efficient means of vindicating his reputation? Were it not for the journals, the poison would circulate more slowly perhaps, but more insidiously, and much more destructively, through the whole mass of society. Slander flies swifter than the arrow by night. It strikes the victim in the dark, and he dies by an unseen hand. A thousand tongues circulate the falsehood, and yet detection is impossible. It goes into all houses, passes from street to street, wings its way in letters franked and sealed, is whispered confidentially, each confidant being forbidden to tell it, and yet all eager to disseminate it, till it is in every mouth, beating at every ear, astounding the very servants who wait upon him or her whom it dishonoureth. But for the newspapers—the imprint of a steam-press upon taxed paper—the slander would be unassailable, and the victim have no excuse for denying or proving that to be false, which no one has asserted, no one has been prosecuted for, far less found guilty of having uttered.
In directing our inquiries to the influence of the newspapers on public opinion in this country, it is necessary at the outset to notice this fertile source whence that kind of intelligence is drawn which is most acceptable to the prurient taste of the great mass of readers, against which those who suffer from it, or imagine they suffer from it, most loudly declaim, and which is made a handle of by those, either inimical to a free press from fear or from ignorance, and who regard it as a violation of the decencies of society, and a prostitution of its influence for the base objects of gain, and the baser objects of personal malice. The view, however, which we take of the utility and influence of the journals, and the grounds on which we rest our opinions, preclude us from joining in this common outcry. The personalities of the press, or what some term its licentiousness, where private character is concerned, constitutes, in our apprehension, a minor evil in the catalogue of its sins. For the reasons we have stated, we consider its inroads, as they are called, into domestic affairs, to be nothing else than the concretions of public rumours, the extension and circulation of party and club-room Whispers, rendered tangible by being printed; and instead of being confined to the fashionable loungers of St. James's and the blacklegs of Pall Mall, are converted into a morning repast for common-councilmen, the small scandal-mongers of beer-shops and libraries, the young lady behind the bar and the old women before it, and all the other interesting persons who, for one penny per diem, read the Chronicle, or the Times, or the Advertiser, from beginning to end, the advertisements and the bankrupt list included. What does it signify to a minister of the crown, or a lady of Almack's, whose reputation is torn to rags every morning and evening in the public places of a fashionable kind which we have named, whether the scandal which there assails them is transferred into the columns of a daily paper, and served up, seasoned with garlic, to the grosser appetites of the mob? The injury, if such be the tendency of the falsehood, is not in the least increased by this increased publicity. On the contrary, it is often diluted and rendered harmless; but when the reverse is the case, as undoubtedly it sometimes is, the opportunity of meeting it, of enforcing its contradiction, or of punishing the responsible authors, is something considerable, and almost invaluable in the scale of mitigation, tending more effectually to the vindication of the offended or slandered party than any penal liabilities, apart from the responsibility of the press, which could possibly be devised for the suppression of private libel.
Let us take a case in illustration. The Times newspaper, instigated by certain parties, whom its versatile and trading politics make it ever ready to serve, and in whose cause, when their power is in the ascendant, it is ever prepared to prostitute itself, circulates a report that a certain illustrious person, by his attentions to a certain lady, has plunged a noble family into sorrow, and made its head and protector the victim of a painful and revolting suicide. The report is an invention, intended to wound the private reputation of the illustrious victim, and drive him if possible from his home and his country. A grosser, or more criminal, or more diabolical libel cannot be conceived. It excites a thrill of horror in every human breast. It is the subject of indignant conversation for a few days. But knowing its utter falseness, and writhing under the poignancy of so grave a charge, the slandered party demands redress. A court of law is sure to do him justice; a conviction must follow, and a heavy fine and a gaol be the result. The Times, however, convinced of the error into which it has been trepanned by interested parties, and alive, like other speculators, to the consequences of a pecuniary mulct, and a long term of imprisonment, loses no time in giving the slander, which it was the first to propagate in a public manner, a direct and unequivocal contradiction—laments the mistake into which it had fallen—does penitence in as open a manner as a rogue in a pillory, or a confessed liar in a white sheet—eats its words like a coward—and falls on its knees, like Daniel O'Connell before his parish priest. Who will say that this is not apology enough? Could any contradiction be more ample and satisfactory? Could any appeal to a jury remove the sting of the libel in a more effective manner? The character of the injured party is not only vindicated and avenged, but the whole consequences of the servile confession and the acknowledged falsehood fall on the head of the responsible proprietor of the newspaper—his veracity is held up to scorn, his venality or his malice to general execration.
In this is the best protection of the public, not only against libels invented and propagated for party or private purposes, but against the malevolence and personal rancour of the journalists. Every detected calumny of this kind militates against the credibility and respectability of the newspapers. It is their interest to avoid such slanders, and be perpetually on their guard against the machinations of those who invent them. Publicity, therefore, is the best corrective of defamation.
In justice, therefore, to the newspaper press, we are bound to consider its errors in this respect, its personalities, and its attacks on private character, for which it is so generally held up to reprehension, as much more salutary than pernicious. These have their origin in public rumour, in private malice, in the schoolmaster being abroad, and, consequently, in the yawning appetite of the public for vulgar scandal. If one paper offend in this respect more than another—if some of them, of the lowest class, make slander a means of profit, execrable though the traffic be, the example has nevertheless a wholesome effect upon others. The more respectable abhor the practice, and avoid the consequences with juster fears and a more discriminating sense of honour. The heartless prostitution of the few, catering to the depraved appetite of the most demoralised portion of society, excites disgust in the many, and inspires them with a higher respect for truth and decorum.
From these remarks, it will be gathered that we consider the influence of the press upon private character as much more limited than it is usually considered to be, and rather a corrective of than a stimulant to personal slander. Its influence on public morals, in another way, is of a much more serious nature. The newspapers give publicity to all the details of vice, crime, and infamy, which can be collected in police offices and our various courts of justice. They make every reader as familiar with the lowest scenes of debauchery in the brothel, drunkenness in the tap-room, knavery in the gaming-house, and bold-faced villany in the den of burglars, as are the victims of these vices themselves, with whom they too often sympathise. They introduce the language of Newgate and the police courts into our kitchens; and the slang of the pickpocket, the blackleg, and the prizefighter, the corrected and amended vocabulary of Petticoat Lane, into our clubs and drawing-rooms. They render the details of prostitution a source of amusement and of gain. They make Ikey Solomons a hero of romance, and John Thurtell, who was hanged for a cruel murder, a martyr to gallantry. Adultery is made a subject of interest to every girl in her teens; an elopement, a matter of jest; profligacy, in cases of seduction, a sort of patriotism in the rake, at which the gentle nursery-maid laughs, and the staid matron, behind her counter, deprecates for the sake of example, but still reads with avidity. The frailty of a poor wretch, prevented from committing suicide from the balustrades of Waterloo Bridge, provides incidents sufficient for a fashionable novel—fiction being impressed to give colour to infidelity, and misfortune made an excuse for inebriety and a life of licentiousness.
These, in addition to what we have enumerated, form a large portion of the interesting matter—the agreeable light reading of the newspapers. The wife of a London shopkeeper, when she takes a the paper in the morning, first turns her eyes to the Bow-street reports, or, may-be, to the proceedings in the sheriff's court, where the report of an action of crim. con. occupies three or four columns. A murder may arrest her attention; but if there should be a paragraph, stating that Mr. Peter Giles's wife was caught emerging from the chambers of a barrister of the Temple, her husband being on the watch, and the paramour bearing her arm, her whole attention is attracted to this. The scene that is described is, as may be imagined, of the most revolting nature; but it makes a deep impression, and continues to be the theme of gossip, till it merges in some affair of deeper interest and more astounding guilt.
It is not for us to say whether this appetite for vice is forced upon, or created by the newspapers. The taste of the public is capricious, and it is carefully followed and fed by the journals. A laxity of morals encourages new ministrants to licentiousness. The penal laws of China do not prevent the importation of opium. If an epicure prefer capsicums and cayenne to black pepper in his ragoûts, he will find abundance of cooks to indulge his fiery propensities. If plain English fare do not suffice, the maître d'hôtel will engage a French artiste. If the people of England love prize-fights—if they delight in blood, and what they call "courage"—if, in a personal rencounter, the man who first knocks out the eye of the other be considered a hero, and the first blow on the mouth or nose be a question on which large sums of money depend,—it is natural that the newspapers should minister to this depraved taste, and adopt the slang of the blackguard, and the activity of the partisan, in contributing to the gratification of their readers, in extending the field of their popularity, and in augmenting the amount of their profits. If the public taste incline towards private scandal, the exhibitions of connubial infidelity, the gross scenes of a London watchhouse, the feats of inebriety and street outrage, the intrigues of profligacy, the debaucheries of a green-room, or the indelicacies of a poor idiot under a commission de lunatico inquirendo,—who can blame the newspapers, whose existence and profits depend upon the public will, for following this bent, and gratifying popular passion, by burning the only incense that is acceptable? The plays of Beaumont and Fletcher are, as far as theatrical representation goes, now obsolete. Why? Public taste has undergone a change, and the wit of the authors is considered repugnant to what is called the spirit of the age. This is entirely owing to the circumstance, that the terms and subjects of ridicule have undergone a complete change. The people do not now choose to have their vices or their follies censured in the same language as they were a few centuries ago. Not that they are more moral; on the contrary, they are less so; but they are more fastidious with respect to phraseology. A lie is not now a lie—it passes by some other name. A fraud 1s not now called a fraud. A liaison by an actress is a mere error in sentiment—an excusable breach of morality under peculiar and unavoidable circumstances. But if our language has, in these respects, been rendered less gross, or more pure, certain it is that our ideas of morality have retrograded. Women are made familiar with descriptions of brutal outrages, and of acts of obscenity—with the minutest details of lust, and of nameless crimes—with the ornate representations of low vice in the police courts—with, in fact, scenes that should be veiled from the eyes of youth and innocence, and which, in the times of their grandmothers, would have raised a blush on every female cheek. The consequences of this familiarity with vice must be pernicious. These, indeed, are apparent in the enormous increase of crime—the fearfully corrupt state of morals in the metropolis—the profligacy and dishonesty of the lower classes—the exhibitions of female indelicacy in the streets—and the openly avowed disregard of religion and decorum.
The only difficulty in the case, is to ascertain and decide, upon rational grounds, after a careful examination of the whole facts, how far the newspapers, as they have been and are conducted, have contributed to this revolution in sentiment, and are responsible for the deterioration in national morality which is admitted on all hands to have taken place. Let us use for an illustration one of those festivals of blackguardism and brutality called a prize-fight—one especially in the immediate precincts of London. To this arena are attracted all the worst characters of the metropolis. The housebreaker and the swindler—the professional bully, and his friend, who keeps a house of ill-fame—my lord the patron, in his tandem, and a pickpocket on a stolen horse—in short, the whole, or nearly the whole, of the ragamuffinry of town proceed to this fight. There is little harm done by the combat per se, and there would not be much if one moiety of the spectators were con amore to knock out the eyes or the brains of the other; but the misfortune is, that the outrage perpetrated upon the spot is not confined to the combatants and the on-lookers. The battle is fought over again next morning in all the newspapers—every round described with most felicitous and pugnacious accuracy—every blow struck is counted, and where it fell upon is told—nay, every word which each blackguard said to the other is faithfully repeated. What is the effect of this on the readers of newspapers—on young men, and apprentices especially? Why, a strong desire to mix in the next affray of the kind that takes place. The organs of combativeness are excited—the details of the fight are perused by thousands, who, but for the newspapers, never would have heard of it; and the abominable slang, the lingua-franca of thieves and prostitutes, instantly and henceforward becomes the favourite language of the lower orders.
For this, at least, the newspapers are answerable. If such, then, be their influence on public feeling and national manners with respect to prizefights and feats of brutality, do we go beyond a fair and rational inference, when we assume that, as concerns other vicious examples, and details of a still more exceptionable kind, their influence is equally extensive and more contaminating? If Schiller's play of the Robbers converted many of the youth of Germany into banditti—if, in our own country, Gay's Beggar's Opera transformed even the sons of the nobility into amateur pickpockets and fancy-men; and a low farce, called Tom and Jerry, further initiated them into the mysteries of the bravo, exciting them to drunkenness for the purpose of committing outrages and raising riots in the streets—have we not grounds for apprehending, that the emblazonry of other offences against law and morals—the levity and flippancy with which unchastity is treated in the journals—the disgusting reports of criminal conversation—the proceedings in divorce cases, which are made the subject of newspaper jokes—and the sympathy which is too often evinced for some canting hypocrite at the foot of the gallows, or some unblushing wanton assuming the airs of innocence—have we not reason to fear that details of this nature have a prejudicial influence on public morals? To be totally ignorant of the contaminating vices of society is the best proof of innocence. This particularly applies to the gentler sex and to female virtue. To raise the curtain, however, and shew vice its own image, in the purlieus of St. Giles's, or the environs of Shire-lane, transporting the debaucheries of London to the remotest parts of the country, is not the way to perpetuate the chaste impressions which are instilled by a pure and virtuous education. But this the newspapers do daily. If their contaminating influence were confined to the metropolis, we should have less to regret; but when filled, as they are, with descriptions which no modest female should ever be permitted to see, and when these are thrust upon public attention, meeting the eye of every reader, and naturally exciting the curiosity of many who would be ashamed to peruse them in the presence of a friend, we may easily guess the injury they inflict, the thoughts they generate, and the happiness they destroy.
But, as regards certain classes, the greater evil is, that this "the best possible public instructor," is the only instructor. God knows, it is the very worst instructor that could have been invented. The middle orders of the community, the mechanics and operatives of large towns, the smoking interest of the beer-houses, draw their information from the newspapers, and from no other source. The ideas they imbibe in this way are all derived from the same quarter, the monopoly of the daily press (caused by excessive taxation) placing the antidote, in the shape of information of an opposite nature, entirely beyond their reach. The natural and unavoidable consequence is, that, besides being initiated into all the vices of London society, they are rendered discontented. The Times newspaper, in the hands of such persons, is like the drugged cup presented by a swindler in a gaming-house to his victim. They read as he drinks—the latter is robbed, and drowns himself in despair; the former are instigated to crime, and are banished for life, or are hanged!
The distinction, therefore, between the two cases, or kinds of influence, which we have attempted to explain, consists in this, namely, that, in the first, the attacks upon private character, the newspapers yield an efficient, and, as we think, a wholesome remedy; but in the other case, namely, the contaminating influence of their promiscuous reports, and their details of vice and crime, they offer no corrective, and possess no remedy. The former is a simple denial, an act of justice to the injured party, demanded and exacted by himself. The latter is an offence against society in general, and therefore there is no party to demand redress, or in a condition to enforce it.
But we should treat the journals unfairly were we not to admit that their propensity to pander to the vices of the community has its origin rather in the acts of the government than in the bad taste of the conductors of newspapers. The morning papers, which have the most extensive circulation, and consequently the greatest influence, are chiefly supported by, and dependent upon, the middle and lower classes, the shop-keepers, and operatives of London. If such papers as the Times, the Chronicle, and the Herald, were not to furnish their readers with these reports, they would cease to have any influence; for other papers would publish them, and consequently the sale of the former would be diminished. No matter, therefore, how ably a paper is conducted; to be profitably conducted, it must indulge all the vulgar propensities of the great body of its readers. Whatever be the line of its politics, its sources of intelligence, or the reputation of its writers, it has no chance of succeeding as a London morning paper, unless it shall assiduously court the favour of the tavern interest—the constituency of the beer and coffee-houses—the rabble who read newspapers, and read nothing else. This abasement of the respectable portion of the press, that which is conducted at the greatest expense, is truly lamentable; but we contend that it is caused solely by the fiscal regulations and the oppressive imposts of the government. The effects of these heavy burdens has not only created a monopoly in the press, but it has rendered the journals of London, what the journals of Paris are, the organs of public sentiment to the nation at large. What is written to gloat the perverted taste of the chandler-shoperie of the capital, and, in the first instance, is alone appreciable by this demoralised class, gradually is made familiar to provincial readers, till it is eventually engrafted into their habits. It is impossible to separate what is useful and instructive from what is hurtful and destructive. The poison and the wholesome aliment go together, the former too often predominating, and the first that is swallowed. A newspaper printed in London at the price of sevenpence, is carried all over the country postage free. This is a positive bounty in favour of metropolitan papers. The reader in the capital is severely taxed, in order that the people in Manchester, Birmingham, Carlisle, Edinburgh, Dublin, Glasgow, and Cork, and all places within the range of the general post, may have the same commodity at the London price, and be initiated into all the scenes of vice and prostitution, reported exclusively for the benefit of readers in Shoreditch, Houndsditch, Saffron-hill, St. Giles's, and old Westminster. It is in this way that the whole nation is influenced by the taste of London; and for this extension of London vices, the government, and, we fear, the Tories more especially, are justly chargeable, and seriously culpable. The bounty is unjust, on every principle of policy and morality. It would be better to allow the London papers to be sold duty free, than that they should be carried to all parts of the country postage free. The leading journals of the metropolis have been the constant advocates of free trade; it would be well if some of their principles were enforced against their practice, and that they should have the benefit of their own example, in being deprived of bounties which they condemn in every other traffic but their own.
But proceed we now to a much more important branch of the inquiry, namely, the political influence of the newspapers.
To confess one's antiquity, thereby furnishing, as it were, a certificate of dotage, is an unpleasant task; but we who write here, courteous reader, for your edification, are not yet ashamed of our gray hairs, although we can well remember seeing Henry Brougham, now Lord High Chancellor of England, handling his brief, Macpherson versus Dalgleish, in a case of illegal "horning," before the court of session in Edinburgh. This, however, is an old affair; but in the long series of years that have passed, the present is the only period we can remember when the press, or rather the daily and weekly papers, were not ranged fairly upon opposite sides, the one Tory, and the other Whig, with, in a few obscure instances, a stray luminary holding up its feeble light in favour of Bonaparte and French Jacobins. Under Pitt's administrations, and the ministries of Perceval and Lord Castlereagh, there was an able and efficient Tory press, and, to do justice, an equally able array of Whig journals on the side of Fox, and the poor glow-worms who, with no other light than what is in their tails, pretend, as they go backwards, to follow straight forward in his steps. The press then was easily managed, for it was fairly matched. Talent was encouraged; and the influence and patronage of the government had a counteracting influence upon the democratic propensities of the popular journals. In those days there were no Peels and Goulburns—no small creatures of the class of Dawson—no trimmers, canters, or mock-expediency men—no hybrids between the sincere and the pretended Tory—no Mawworms, no Joseph Surfaces—no parvenu, whose father was the first gentleman of his family, and who, invoking public support, professed himself to be a Tory acting upon Whig principles. There was nothing of this class of philosophers in the days to which we look back with pride and pleasure; when the country was happy and prosperous—the farmer following his team, or walking in the wake of his reapers, with a joyful heart—the labourer loyal and contented—the weaver singing to the music of his shuttle, earning adequate wages, and going regularly, not to the workhouse, but to church or chapel on the sabbath, with his well-clad children, like an independent and honest man.
These times, however, have gone by. We are now an enlightened and intelligent people!—an educated, reading, and thinking people!—marvellously wise in our generation, but, alas, miserably poor—dreadfully shattered in our rigging, and out at the elbows in a way which is beyond the power of tongue or pen to describe. It is, indeed, a melancholy coincidence, that as we have (as is asserted) advanced in knowledge, and since Mechanics' Institutes have initiated our labouring population into all the depths and mysteries of philosophy, we have retrograded in every other respect essential to human or social happiness. Public opinion, that is to say, the voice of the multitude, the sweet voice of democracy, is now paramount and dominant; but while we, the Tories, are told to bow to it, and while many of our trimming seceders, disgraced by apostasy, bend down before it in the dust, we look in vain for any indications of real patriotism, or sound views of national policy in the men whom this imperious voice, equally tyrannical and unjust, has called to the helm of affairs. For be it understood, that the nation has not suffered from the ascendency, but from the abandonment, of Tory principles. The Liberals—be they known by the name of Tories or Whigs, or by any other designation—have had full sway in England for the last ten years. They have dictated every measure; rendered every error in policy popular in the highest degree; undermined the system by which we prospered as a nation; and, under the specious pretext of extending our commerce, and giving the manufacturer the benefit of foreign produce imported in foreign ships, thereby conferring peculiar advantages upon every continental rival, they have culpably, and in some instances fraudulently, given the foreign artisan and corngrower unwarrantable encouragement, to the serious detriment of our own countrymen. Do we blame the ministers? do we blame the parliaments! Fools —fools all, collectively and individually. Their principal error was in listening to "public opinion." They met the wishes of the people on questions which they did not understand, and sanctioned those repeals and concessions, which have converted them into paupers. Since Lord Londonderry died, there has rarely been a question of policy, mooted in parliament, or founded upon the petitions of the manufacturing classes, which has not been yielded on grounds of expediency. And yet, who dare deny that each of these concessions, in the order of their surrender, has added to the totality of public distress, and plunged a thousand families into ruin for every hundred that have been in the slightest degree relieved? The repeal of the protective laws in favour of silks has inundated the market with French manufactures, encouraged wholesale smuggling, such as never was carried on before, and sent hundreds of happy and industrious families into the workhouse. The glove bill inflicted the same extent of privation upon the manufacturers of Worcester, and other towns. The admission of German linens into our colonies has beggared the greater part of the north of Ireland. The boon conferred upon the Norwegians, Danes, Prussians, and other northern powers, has reduced the value of our mercantile marine full fifty per cent. It is now an unprofitable trade in all its branches. But the crowning evil—thanks to Sir Robert Peel that which has struck at the marrow of society—that which has blown out the furnaces in the iron districts, and compelled the farmer and grazier to pay their rent out of their stock—that which has ruined every small manufacturer, and established the truck system, is—THE CURRENCY BILL! Do we make it a matter of accusation against the working classes, or the "enlightened people," that they did not understand nor foresee the consequences of this measure? By no means. They knew as little upon this subject as did the honourable the representatives of the nation. The flippant talker in the Commons' House of Parliament—the all-wise treatise-vender of political economy—the gabbler against "filthy rags"—the Blue-coat-school boy of the Times, a genuine cockney in mind and manners, strong in its lungs, and impudent as well as wicked,—none of these parties, receiving their wages in gold or bank notes, and estimating the resources of the nation by the thumb-and-nail rules of Fleet-street and Cheapside, knew any thing of the fatal consequences of this measure. It was no sooner passed, however, than it deranged the affairs of every man in business. It wounded public credit in the most vital part. It gave the large capitalist unlimited control in the market, and compelled the active and industrious manufacturer, whose competition was salutary in restraining monopoly, either to retire from business, or become the mere furnisher of those who could take advantage of his embarrassments. By this nefarious and cruel bill, the value of a fixed annuity was doubled—the mortgagee was placed at the mercy of the lender—the salaried official had his income increased fifty per cent—the taxes were doubled, and wages and profits, among the middle classes, were reduced one half. This bill, in short, laid the foundation of all the privation and suffering we have endured as a nation since 1819. From that year—may it stand aye accursed in the calendar!—to the present, we have been rapidly declining as a commercial people; contending with difficulties which we, being a nation of philosophers, ascribed to other causes; meeting fresh embarrassments at every reduction of taxation, and finding our coats becoming more bare, and our comforts more narrowed, and our profits more reduced, and our wages verging nearer the starving point, without ever once dreaming of the real cause, or compelling the minister of the day to institute an inquiry.
But what has all this to do with the newspapers? Much more, most enlightened reader, than you have any conception of. Bear in mind that Sir Robert Peel, the author, or at least the foster-parent of the currency bill, was the coadjutor of Canning in his new-fledged views of policy; of Mr. Huskisson, the author of the free trade system and the reciprocity treaties with the northern powers of Europe; and that this same Sir Robert Peel was the man who, as a Tory acting upon Whig principles, affected to despise the influence of the press—the journals honestly opposed to him—at the very moment he was strengthening the revolutionary part of the press, and giving it an influence and a voice which it never possessed before. Now, mark the consequences. He courted the applause of those of whom he was the dupe, whose sentiments at this particular juncture were favourable to his finance plans, who cheered him on in those speculations which have degraded him as a statesman, made his conduct proverbial for its inconsistency, and his policy the most pernicious that ever was inflicted upon the British empire. Sir Robert Peel was at great pains to announce to the world that he placed no value in the advocacy of the journals. The result was, that he lost the support of his real friends, and threw himself into the arms of those who, advocating his particular line of policy from selfish motives, nevertheless despised and hated the man and his principles in their hearts. If any proof of this be wanting, let us just call to recollection the loud burst of triumph which followed his downfal, and sounded far and wide like the weird sisters' chant of malice and diabolism, when he ceased to be the leader of the House of Commons. Even the Times, that had supported him during the Wellington administration, turned round like an enfranchised slave to heap upon him its vulgar and menial obloquy. The Herald and the Chronicle followed the same course. The Courier, that had fawned upon him, transferring its editorship to a penny-a-line subaltern of the Globe, attacked him with a virulence violent enough in all conscience to shake the foundations of New London Bridge, of which its chief proprietors were the architects.
The Tories, or the pretended Tories, by their own acts of apostasy and ingratitude, having fallen into obloquy—their inconsistencies being disgusting, and their whole conduct selfish, thankless, and in some instances invidious, cruel, and tyrannical—mercilessly vindictive as regarded their consistent advocates, and despotically oppressive as regarded the rights of free discussion and the liberty of the subject—the whole power of the press was turned against them. Do we say that this was not a just and well-merited punishment? By no means. The truckling minister was treated as every gentleman is treated who, instead of using his sword-stick or his fists, prefers the dalliance of smooth words, and entreats the tender mercies of a set of pickpockets and ruffians by whom he is attacked. Sir Robert Peel first worshipped the majesty of "public opinion," and besought the suffrages of the organs of a revolutionary faction; and after he had served them to the best of his ability, and obeyed their commands to the uttermost, he was, as might have been expected, immolated as their victim. His conduct convinced even the respectable portion of the press that it was not safe to give an honest support to any ministry; that faithful services had no chance of reward; and that, in the whim of the moment, the most able and consistent advocate might be discarded or given over to the vindictive persecution of a Whig attorney-general, hired for the purpose. He therefore encouraged that ascendency of rabble adulation, that domination of the newspapers, of which he now complains, and under whose incessant lashings he now writhes. And let him! He cherished the viper, and he must endure the sting.
But, politically speaking, what is this "public opinion?" Are the newspapers the sources of it, or the mere channels and conductors?—are they the real thunder, or merely the echo?—the speaker, or the brass trumpet which he uses? We shall see. Let us take London to contain a population of two million souls. This may be classed nearly as follows:—
These may be further classed thus:—
A newspaper speculator, in making his calculation as to the probable amount of profits, which is the first consideration, and cherishing no opinions but such as shall sell most extensively, will naturally consult the population returns of the metropolis, which he classifies as we have done above. He knows that the upper classes are not the encouragers of newspapers; and even if they were, the field of consumption is comparatively narrow. On the other hand, the lower classes are the most voracious readers of newspapers, the easiest imposed upon, the easiest excited upon all questions of a public nature, and their passions convertible to the advantage of the journalist. The consideration with him is, whether he should speak the sentiments that prevail in the higher ranks of an intelligent aristocracy, or the sentiments of the more formidable mob, the voice of numbers, the market where there is the greatest demand for the commodities or empirical medicines which he purposes to vend. A moment's reflection would point out the course he ought to take. Self-interest dictates the rest, and he accordingly pays court to the rabble.
It requires but a slight acquaintance with the manner in which the London papers are conducted, to know that it is upon calculations such as these that the principles they advocate are based. There are one or two honourable exceptions, we admit; but the greater proportion of them have no opinions but those of the multitude. If, for instance, the shop-keepers, the gin sellers, and the rabble of London, entertain a notion that the effect of the present corn-laws is to add a penny to the price of a quartern loaf, or a farthing to that of a gallon of beer, the repeal of these laws must be a popular subject. The newspapers accordingly keep it constantly under discussion—setting forth the most ingenious sophistries in favour of the repeal, and shewing by arguments founded upon calculations of their own making, and every one of them erroneous, or upon the falsehoods of others, the happy consequences that should result from a free importation of corn. The persons to whom these arguments are generally addressed are incapable of understanding the policy of these laws, or if they do understand them, selfishness is stronger than reason; and they have no regard for the interests of other parties, or the honour and independence of the country, provided that the supposed additional penny upon the loaf could be saved to be expended upon gin. Then, again, there exists the envy which this order of persons entertain towards the aristocracy. Here is an unbounded field for the popularity of the newspapers. The cobbler and tinker are told that part of their wages are wrung from them by oppressive laws in order to provide pensions and sinecures for the nobility. "Why should this be?" exclaims the indignant journalist, "seeing that you are the only useful classes, and your labour, and that of the carpenter and tailor, the butcher and bricklayer, is the chief source of national wealth?" This is sheer falsehood—wicked and mischievous misrepresentation—but the unwashed patriots receive it all as truth, and swallow it with avidity. It is merely following up the same sentiment, and keeping it perpetually before the eyes of their dupes, that such papers as the Times, Chronicle, and Herald, deviate from the usual course of attacking the system, and occasionally direct the whole force of their malice upon individuals. If any gentleman happens to oppose himself publicly to these sentiments, he is instantly held up to mob execration. The faults and follies of his father and grandfather are collected and thrown, in the form of an accusation, in his face. If they were public men, magistrates or clergymen, officers of state or ministers of the crown, they are at once declared to have been public robbers and tyrants, the oppressors of the poor, and the amassers of wealth at the national expense. Hence, with an easy perversion of induction, it is concluded that the estates of the offending party are not his own—that the lands he purchased do not properly belong to him—that the titles he is proud of were surreptitiously obtained; and he is called upon to surrender his property for the benefit of the learned inditer of the article in the newspaper, and the tinker and cobbler aforesaid.
The "people" being thus ministered to daily by the functionaries of Printing-House Square, Fleet Street, and the Strand, and their natural jealousy of the higher orders being raised to blood heat by these appeals to their passions, it is no wonder that they are hostile to the institutions of the country, and clamorous for that reform which shall sweep them away, and level all the distinctions of society. In such a flood-tide of revolution, many of these men calculate on bettering their condition, from the simple circumstance that it could not be rendered more despicable. The great mass of such persons, however, cherish no such hopes—they are mere blockheads; and they join in the clamour for no other reason than because they see others join—as one dog follows another without seeing what the foremost one is in pursuit of. Let us enter the haunts of some of these readers of the popular journals, and see of what materials they are composed. Let it be the "Pig and Whistle," or the "Hog in Armour," or any other hostelry of a licensed victualler. A low back-parlour, the floor thickly sanded, and the walls smoke-polished, into which the rays of the sun never penetrated, and which is furnished, much after the manner of a stable, with stalls, which are called boxes, the tables black and fetid, the forms dirty, and a huge blaze of gaslight pouring from a tube under a circular canopy corroded with soot. This is the favourite hospitium of some twelve or twenty tippling politicians of the neighbourhood. The place smells of rum, brandy, gin, porter, tobacco, sulphur matches, and other horrible odours, while huge pewter tankards of beer, and half-empty tumblers of the other compounds—some as cool as the philosopher who sits beside them, others steaming like the politician who declaims—adorn the different boards. The Times newspaper lays, or rather lies, on one table, and the Herald and Globe on another. In one quarter sits a man, in a black coat, bald head, red bushy whiskers, with a turned-up nose, and a squint in the left eye—the last two marks being considered indicative of genius. He is the son of nobody, being a foundling, reared in a charity school at the expense of the parish. He is a respectable person in his way nevertheless, is a vender of tripe in the adjacent street, and is supposed to have a few hundred pounds in the funds. He is a reformer, however—a dead hater of capital punishments—a friend to education—an abhorrer of the abominable Court of Chancery—an admirer of Buonaparte and the brave Belgians—and, like Lord John Russell, a friend of civil and religious liberty all over the world. By the way, the coat he wears he has worn ever since Hunton the quaker was hanged, in pure sympathy with the newspaper he reads—the Times. But there is one thing which rankles deep in his heart. He cannot understand why it should be that he should not have an inch of land in the whole world, except in the kingdom of Poyais; while the Duke of Newcastle is in possession of the demesne of Clumber, and the lands of Newark. He cannot understand this, and therefore is he an unhappy man. He pays 7l. 5s. 6d. of assessed taxes, fourteen shillings for his dog, twenty-five shillings for church-rates, besides several pounds per annum for poor-rates, which he verily believes is wholly expended by the overseers in eating and drinking. He cannot comprehend why he should be compelled to pay these sums of money, or rather why he should not be allowed to vend his tripe, tax and rate and dog free. He is consequently a reformer; and he solemnly believes that he will never be released from these vexatious payments till there is a pure House of Commons, elected by the only persons who are above the influence of bribery—namely himself and the mob.
But mark the man who sits opposite the tripe-seller—a lank-haired, whale-oil faced, juggler-damaged person, with tortoise-shell spectacles, and an old blue surtout, fashion à la militaire, evidently never measured for him, and buttoned up to the chin. This is the gentleman who writes the city correspondence of the Morning Herald, sometimes the Lisbon and Paris correspondence at home; and a most erudite and right merry gentleman it is. There is one trait in this person's character, which renders him an admirable contributor to that excellent journal, namely, he has an alacrity in discovering some important piece of foreign news, two or occasionally three days after it has been in all the newspapers. This careful and abstemious propensity is invaluable; for it prevents him from committing any mistakes, except in his character of Lisbon correspondent. On that point he is left to his ingenuity, and is allowed to invent ad libitum. He has another equally valuable quality, viz., that professionally he has no principles whatever. In his reports of the rise and fall of the funds, he may occasionally, it is true, discuss the policy of free trade, or offer an opinion on the differences between the Company's agents at Canton and the Mandarins, or hazard a conjecture as to the expense of cutting a canal from Falmouth to Manchester, or he may arraign the fashionable nuisance of smoking cigars in Kensington Gardens or Hyde Park on Sunday; but these digressions are capital in their way, as coming from a city correspondent, watching the fluctuations of the three per cents, and reflect the highest credit on his taste, and on the liberality of the Herald.
But what is he doing here among the publicists of the Hog in Armour? Bless you, felicitous reader! he is one of its choicest spirits and principal supporters. He is the oracle of the room, the Gamaliel at whose feet the tripe-vender sipped the inspiration of politics. But for him, how could the important discussions of the evening be carried on? He is an ultra-reformer, and, it is said, has some pretensions to represent Saffron Hill in the new chamber of delegates. He is to be supported by his employers, and has engaged to report all the proceedings of the house in its private sittings during the interregnums of the fourth estate. His argument is this: the newspapers are the arbiters of public opinion, ergo, his is the public opinion. He must be returned—but how paid? Three pounds three shillings per week will be quite enough for a member of the reformed parliament.
Observe that little man with a humped back, but primly dressed, taking snuff out of a silver box which he bought cheap last Christmas at a pawnbroker's, and who is conversing with our veritable city correspondent. He is an apothecary of twenty years' standing, an honest man, who, like the fleshless chemist in Romeo and Juliet, sells drugs to all sorts of people, for all diseases of the bowels or brain, without asking any questions. He is also a patriot, and a huge admirer of the politics of the Herald. He is a sentimentalist of the finest water—opposed to all taxes; and although he has never been charged with poisoning more than thirteen persons, is an immense stickler for free trade in corn and medicine. He deprecates the sanguinary laws of England: "Too many men," he says, "lose their lives needlessly, without the interference of the hangman!" This opinion of his is a matter of conscience, not of idle speculation.
But need we describe seriatim the whole of the assembled politicians? We could make nothing of them. They belong to the undistinguishable herd of listeners—mere listeners; all reformers, it is true, but not one of them able to assign a single reason why he is so. They imbibe their sentiments with their beer; both go to their stomach, the quarter where the taxes are supposed to pinch. They are elective purists after their own way; but ten pounds expended on a supper of cows' entrails and onions would purchase the whole clique, whether the candidate were Sir Charles Wetherell, Henry Hunt, or Sir Balaam Key, Bart., Lord Mayor of London.
Perhaps the reader may, from "inadvertence," be tempted to think that we have been sketching a caricature. We enter our solemn protest against this unwarrantable supposition. We appeal to every man of experience who has dared to penetrate the lower haunts of London society, and make himself acquainted with the pretensions of the parties who form the constituency of the popular newspapers, whether our specimen of the politicians of these haunts is not true as life, and whether such persons do not compose three-fourths of the readers of the Times, Chronicle, Herald, and some of the evening journals. The only difficulty in the case is to convince the public at large that the opinions of these obscure, and illiterate, and ignorant cockneys, are not formed by, but rather followed and pandered to, by the journals before mentioned. In our own mind there is no doubt whatever, and we shall put the fact to the proof. Not one of these papers dare array itself against this low caste of what is called "public opinion," in any way whatever. Their whole study is to watch and reflect the prevailing bias, or the ascendant excitement. In the case of Queen Caroline, this principle was rigidly followed by the Times, as a matter of fair, and, as the result proved, of profitable, speculation. The same journal pursued the same policy in 1815, during the passing of the corn-bill of that period, and, after mature deliberation, dismissed the then editor of the paper, to make room for one less fastidious as to principle, and more subservient to the ruling interest. The Herald, as the competitor of the Times, is conducted on the same rules. Whoever writes for that paper must prostitute himself to the prevailing bias, otherwise his contributions are valueless and inadmissible. No matter how transcendent may be his talents, no matter how convincingly his arguments are enforced, no matter how truly just are his animadversions or his eulogiums; the interest of the proprietors is an insuperable bar to his genius or his correct views, and he must flatter every vulgar demagogue, and advocate the most servile and obnoxious principles, deal out perdition to his dearest friends, and place in the most favourable light sentiments which he abhors, or—his occupation's gone! It is a case involving the fortune of individuals; interest, influence, and self-preservation, are all at stake. The mob must be followed, the constituency of the tap-room must be cheered, the drayman must be called a gentleman, and his trull a lady, the demagogue a patriot, the spouting attorney a statesman, and the canting philanthropist, engarbed as a quaker, a Daniel come to judgment—or the vested interest of the journal is endangered, the rabble incensed, and the beer-mongers up in arms.
The traces of this subserviency and versatility are marked so deep in the career of the Times, that he who runs may read and understand them. We are not now discussing the venality of that journal; this will be done hereafter, in a way that shall bring the blood, and leave the marks of the lash: at present we are speaking of its truckling, and trimming, and shifting, and debasing servilism to mob opinions. Ingratitude and slander are instinctive habits to vulgar minds, and they are only indulged to criminal excess by the Times, when they can be indulged safely, namely, when the parties are either dead or powerless. During the Wellington administration, the duke being popular with the London constituency, for reasons of which his grace, we have no doubt, is now heartily ashamed, the Times was the fulsome adulator of the premier and Sir Robert Peel. When the Whigs, in 1830, through their organ, the Edinburgh Review, proclaimed war against the ministry, the Times undertook their defence: it stigmatised the Whigs as a worthless, grasping, and unprincipled party, whose professions were hollow, whose hostility was factious, and whose sentiments, besides being justly suspected, were propagated as a foil to their secret intentions, namely, the desire of peace, and the attainment of that power which they were sure to abuse, and by means of which, should they attain it, the liberties and interests of the people of England would be remorselessly sacrificed. They were described as subtle and despicable political empirics—trustless in their professions,and mercenary in their views—ostentatious in their opinions, but utterly unworthy of public confidence. The object of the Times was to support the Wellington administration, for no other reason than to gratify the private ambition of its principal proprietor, then looking down upon his former obscurity as the high sheriff of a county, but whom the aristocracy of his neighbourhood nevertheless held in scorn as an arrogant printer's devil, who had acquired wealth by means of flagitious calumny and political incendiarism. In a cause so dear to private interests, the Times did not then disdain to extol the virtues, the moral influence, and the transcendent talents of Sir Robert Peel; and the right honourable baronet was not unsusceptible to the flattery, for he returned the compliment in kind, eulogised the Times as a most exemplary and respectable journal, and this in his place in parliament, and while he was a minister of the crown. The fact is undeniable that, to the last hour of his official life, the Times—the same writer who now writes—hung by the skirts of Peel, singing his praises, advocating his measures, and fighting his battles against the Whigs, who had previously declared open war. But, alas! how slippery are political friendships! On the day after Sir Robert's expulsion from office, the demagogue newsmonger joined the outcry against him, barked at his heels like the other common curs of the city, and with the coolest effrontery imaginable told readers that it had for some time anticipated his downfal as the unavoidable consequence of his incompetency. But this was not all. The ink was scarcely dry, in which it had denounced the Whigs as a feeble factious race, unfit for office, and unworthy of public confidence, when a new light burst upon it, and it all at once discovered that these same Whigs were the only men qualified to rescue the nation from its embarrassments, the profoundest of statesmen, the very models of English patriots, popular in the highest degree, and entitled to the warmest support of the Times!
Then came the Reform Bill, as cataplasm to Lord Althorp's blunders, the last rash effort of a sinking and incapable ministry. The Times, forgetting that it had supported the Duke of Wellington after he had put forth his famous declaration against all reform, not having passed the slightest censure upon that declaration, and forgetting also that it had denounced the men by whom this reform bill was introduced—the Times, forgetting all this, nevertheless rushed forward in its support, at the head of the scum and sans-culotterie of London. Its furious appeals to the mob during the period of the elections will never be forgotten. Every ruffian was summoned to appear at the various hustings armed with a bludgeon, and with missiles in his pocket, to give effect to his vote, if he had one; but at any rate to pelt and massacre, if necessary, the anti-reform candidates, wherever they might shew themselves. The brutal passions of the rabble were thus called into play. The most atrocious outrages were committed in all parts of the country. Gentlemen of the highest character and talents were restrained, by the dictates of self-preservation, from canvassing the electors, or standing a contest, in those places where the mob could appear in formidable numbers. Such was the influence of the Times, its provincial coadjutors and partisans, upon "public opinion."
The watchword of the party and their newspapers, at the outset, was "the bill, the whole bill, and nothing but the bill." To effect this, the rabble without took upon themselves the task of dragooning the members within. Every representative of the people who dared to vote according to his conscience, and in opposition to this favourite maxim, was instantly denounced and considered a traitor to the popular cause. Alderman Thompson one evening, forgetting who his constituents were, committed the grievous mistake of giving an independent vote in favour of the borough of Appleby and against ministers. The howl in the city next day was like the breaking in of waters. If a thousand rabid terriers had been let loose at the Royal Exchange, the consternation could not have been more terrible. Meetings were immediately held, to call the refractory and terrified alderman to account, and either compel him to do penance for not sustaining the "whole bill," or retire from the honourable station to which he had been elevated. The newspapers were boiling against him; the rabble were foaming and menacing him with danger. Alderman Thompson chose the better part of valour. He met their worships in full assembly—he bowed to the mountebank—he smiled upon the daw—he kissed his hand to the scavenger—and made a most abject apology. He declared upon his honour that he voted "inadvertently"—that he had been dining out, and came in too late to understand clearly what he was doing—and was excessively sorry for the mistake, promising never to offend again in a similar way. Oh Heavens, what a sight to see in a man arrived at the years of discretion! He looked like a large, whimpering, over-fed and under-lashed schoolboy, down upon his knees, begging pardon for a theft; or like Tony Lumpkin, half-seas-over, attempting to say grace. Their worships, the mob, were graciously pleased to forgive him.
One would think that the Times, which took an active, or rather a prominent, part in exacting such humiliating terms from an alderman, and binding him hand and foot, despite honour or conviction, to the "whole bill, and nothing but the bill," would after this exhibition be more chary of its own conduct. And so it would, had the mania in favour of the bill not considerably subsided. The Times, as is well known, opposed ministers on the clause for the divisions of counties. The consistent Times, that had but a few weeks before so stoutly combated for the "whole bill," was at length the first amongst its radical supporters to find a flaw in it—the first to call upon the people to meet and oppose that which had been a principal feature in the bill from its introduction, and which had never been carped at, or animadverted upon, till now. Here is consistency with a vengeance!—but it is the consistency of the "leading journal."
The reason for all this trimming may easily be explained. We wish we had Hunt at our elbow to speak—write he cannot any more than a hedgehog—to the point, for he could do it well. The honourable member for Preston, however, cannot be spared from his duties, therefore the task devolves upon us. The Times foresees that the bill has not the slightest chance of passing into a law. Even the chandler-shoperie part of its readers are already sick of it and its patrons. The nine-days' wonder has become stale, and the cockney is tired. The Times, therefore, which first started the objection, and which is now adopted by the Chronicle and the Herald, wishes to take all the credit to itself of foretelling the disaster which is sure to happen. It is now an opponent of the bill, for the bill is virtually lost. The great mass of the liverymen of London are fools, it is true, and. ever ready to follow certain leaders for a time; but they are not such fools as not now to see that the grand revolutionary measure would be a death-blow to their prescriptive and corporate rights. They are bawling reformers, we admit; but they are not so monstrously stupid as to pull down the temple merely for the pleasure of being immured in the ruins. The Times, and the Chronicle, and the Herald, all know this full well. The juncture, therefore, has arrived when they may safely play the old game of the Whigs, and defeat that of which they pretend to be mightily enamoured. We ask no other proof that the tide has turned against ministers, and that public opinion has undergone a complete change, than the simple fact, that the popular journals are dissatisfied with the present measure, and doing their utmost to strangle it in the House of Commons.
To this conclusion we are impelled by the circumstance that neither the Times, nor any other London paper extensively circulating among the lower classes, dare, for a single week, advocate opinions at variance with those of the great majority of their readers. The leading journal has occasionally attempted this, but has invariably failed. It was disposed to support ministers on the Belgian question, by reiterating the undignified censures of Lord Palmerston against the King of Holland. But these censures were unpalatable in the city, and it deserted the noble lord after a brief flirtation of four days. It made a similar diversion in favour of the speech of the King of the French, and praised as a manly and graceful effusion that tasteless piece of bombast; in twenty-four hours it saw cause to change its opinion. But if the Times can no more than Alderman Thompson shake itself free from the trammels of its constituency, can we reasonably expect a greater share of independence on the part of the Chronicle, the Herald, the Globe, the Sun, or the Courier? No; these are now all embarked in the same cause, and they come under the same rule.
This, then, is the political influence of the popular journals. It amounts, after all, to nothing; it is mere servilism to the opinions and prejudices of the multitude. Theirs are the mere echoes of the opinions of the people of London, the court of aldermen, and the wardmotes of the common council. And when did it ever happen that the sentiments of these persons were in unison with those of the intelligent part of the nation? What minister ever paid homage to these sentiments who did not become their martyr? Did Pitt, did Fox when he was in power, did Addington, did Perceval, did Lords Liverpool or Londonderry? Not one of them. Canning endeavoured to court popular favour by flinging himself into the arms of the low Whigs and the Burdett radicals, but he died broken-hearted in the first year of his premiership. Peel courted the same grade of persons, and was soon forsaken and despised. Goderich was too imbecile to survive long enough as First Lord of the Treasury to be either feared, respected, or opposed. Lord Grey is entirely in their hands, and his doom is fixed.
In the nature of things it is impossible that it can be otherwise. The opinions of these persons are too capricious and selfish, too much wedded to narrow attachments, and they themselves are too apt to forsake the cause to which they had pledged themselves, on the slightest pretence, or by the first loophole opened for their escape, for any minister to place dependence upon. He that does so is a lost man. He leans upon a reed, and spins for his cable a rope of sand. The Times, being nothing more than the mouthpiece of these opinions, we invariably make it a rule, and it is one which long experience proves to be correct, to measure the duration of a ministry by the confidence it reposes in this organ. We beg leave to call Sir Robert Peel as a living evidence of this fact. It never yet supported a ministry that lived over the second twelvemonth; it never yet advocated a cause which it did not injure; it never espoused the quarrel of a friend without turning his weapons against him;—Queen Caroline herself was its victim!
Popularity at all times, in this country, is not only deceitful, but the very worst foundation which any statesman could possibly build upon. We use the word in its ordinary acceptation, thereby meaning the approbation of the fickle million whose sentiments are represented by three-fourths of the London journals. It has no endurance, no stability—no basis that the winds of heaven do not shake—no anchorage whose tenacity defies the gale—no abiding point of attraction, which the turning of a scale, or an additional nail in the half-boot of a drayman, does not render as variable as the weathercock on the spire of St. Bride's.