but the pages of history may be ransacked in vain to find a hero who has not confessed his obligations to a mother's teaching, and reciprocated her tenderness; and many a one, in a walk of life far below the heroic, have we seen who, insensible to shame, deaf to the remonstrances of every other monitor, has paused in his criminal career, we hope for his everlasting benefit, when circumstances suggested home and infancy to his mind, and fond memory brought back the image of her who looked upon his childhood. 66 Coningsby's outburst, which was simply the result of disappointed affection, and did not originate in pusillanimity, induced Lord Monmouth to set down his grandson for a spoony;" he might peradventure make a parson, but could never move in the same orbit with his patrician grandfather. But, as Mr. Disraeli well remarks, how hardly are the characters of boys deciphered, which all imagine so easy to read. "How often in the nursery does the genius count as a dunce because he is pensive; while a rattling urchin is invested with almost supernatural qualities because his animal spirits make him impudent and flippant. The schoolboy, above all others, is not the simple being the world imagines. In that young bosom are often stirring passions as strong as our own, desires not less violent, a volition not less supreme. In that young bosom what burning love, what intense ambition, what avarice, what lust of power-envy that fiends might emulate, hate that man might fear." Coningsby returns to Eton-that "wonderful little world," as Mr. Disraeli aptly designates the school-life, to which all Etonians look back with a fondness unfelt in an equal degree, perhaps, by the pupils of any other of our public institutions. We have heard that Mr. Disraeli is not himself an Etonian; but he draws a vivid and graceful picture not only of the antique spires, the muse's seat, but of a young Etonian's happy buoyant feelings. "That delicious plain, studded with every creation of graceful culture; hamlet, and hall, and grange; garden, and grove, and park ; that castle-palace, grey with glorious ages; those antique spires, hoar with faith and wisdom; the chapel and the college; that river winding through the shady meads; the sunny glade and the solemn avenue; the room in the dame's house where we first order our own breakfast, and first feel we are free; the stirring multitude; the energetic groups; the individual mind that leads, conquers, controls; the emulation and the affection; the noble strife and the tender sentiment; the daring exploit and the dashing scrape; the passion that pervades our life, and breathes in everything, from the aspiring study to the inspiring sportoh! what can hereafter spur the brain or touch the heart like this can give us a world so deeply and variously interesting-a life so full of quick and bright excitement, passed in a scene so fair?" Coningsby was now passing through the first great epoch of his life, amidst companions who admire and love him, who surround him afterwards at the University, and finally accompany him into the House of Commons. All who know anything of Eton are aware that her boys are sufficiently precocious, both for good and bad; but Mr. Disraeli has laid the latter portion of Coningsby's time in that establishment in the year 1832, when boys seemed suddenly to peruse newspapers, and discuss the party topics of the day with the zest of veteran politicians. Mr. Disraeli's picture of Coningsby and his Eton. companions discussing the probable results of Lord Grey's resignation, in the spring of 1832, and the duke's sudden acceptance of office, contrary, it is now believed, to the sagacious advice of Sir Robert Peel, is true to the life, as all who were careful observers of that busy period may well remember. Middle-aged men affected to smile at these boy politicians, and old men shook their heads and uttered dismal forebodings; but these boys are many of them now Parliament men, and more are in positions whence their opinions act upon society, and a confession has at length been wrung from many that the fears expressed by boys, in 1832, of their fathers' doings, were well founded. "The future historian of the country (observes Mr. Disraeli) will be perplexed to ascertain what was the distinct object which the Duke of Wellington proposed to himself in the political manoeuvres of May, 1832. It was known that the passing of the Reform Bill was a condition absolute with the king; it was unquestionable that the first general election under the new law must ignominiously expel the Anti-Reform Ministry from power, who would then resume their seats on the Opposition benches in both houses with the loss not only of their boroughs, but of that reputation for political consistency which might have been some compensation for the Parliamentary influence of which they had been deprived. It is difficult to recognize, in this premature effort of the Anti-Reform leader to thrust himself again into the conduct of public affairs, any indications of the prescient judgment which might have been expected from such a quarter. It savoured rather of restlessness, than of energy; and while it proved in its progress not only an ignorance on his part of the public mind, but of the feelings of his own party, it terminated under circumstances which were humiliating to the Crown, and painfully significant of the future position of the House of Lords in the new constitutional scheme. "The Duke of Wellington has ever been the votary of circumstances. He cares little for causes; he watches events, rather than seeks to produce them. It is a characteristic of the military mind. Rapid combinations, the result of a quick, vigilant, and comprehensive glance, are generally triumphant in the field; but in civil affairs, where results are not immediate-in diplomacy and in the management of deliberative assemblies, where there is much intervening time and many counteracting causes, this velocity of decision, this fitful and precipitate action, is often productive of considerable embarrassment, and sometimes of terrible discomfiture. It is remarkable that men celebrated for military prudence are often found to be headstrong statesmen. A great general in civil life is frequently and strangely the creature of impulse-influenced in his political movements by the last snatch of information, and often the creature of the last aide-decamp who has his ear." This is a bold sketch of a living public character, by an author who does not conceal his name; but we fully expect that posterity will ratify Mr. Disraeli's drawback from the iron duke's acknowledged abilities and conduct as a statesman. We regard the illustrious duke with the highest admiration of his many rare qualities, in civil as well as military life, but we will not ascribe to him infallibility, as many of his flatterers now insist upon doing, with a blind devotion similar and not second to the hero-worshippers of heathendom. Mr. Disraeli may well avow his difficulty in comprehending the distinct object of the duke in his attempt to form an administration in 1832, for its abrupt dissolution showed how immature was its concoction. On the 9th of May, Lord Lyndhurst first went to the king, and on the 15th all was over. The Duke of Wel lington, representing the House of Lords, pledged his utmost efforts to relieve the king from the "difficulty and distress," to quote the duke's own report of his sovereign's appeal to himself, and after five days' exertion this man of indomitable will and invincible fortunes retires in discomfiture and despair, assigning for his only reason that the House of Commons had come to a vote which ran counter to the contemplated exercise of the prerogative. From that moment power passed from the House of Lords to another assembly; in less than a fortnight's time, the peers having abdicated their functions by absence, the Reform Bill passed; and William IV., who, a few short months before, had declared his readiness to go down in a hackney coach to assist its progress, now declined giving his personal attendance in Parliament to express the royal assent to its provisions. This important revolution, and such in fact and in truth it was, passed at last in a manner so tranquil that the victims themselves were scarcely conscious of the catastrophe. Mr. Disraeli seems to think that then was overthrown that constitution which, modelled on the Venetian, had governed England since the accession of the house of Hanover. "The cause for which Hampden died in the field, and Sydney on the scaffold (said Coningsby), was the cause of the Venetian republic.' 'How, how (said Buckhurst)?' I repeat it (replied Coningsby), the great object of the Whig leaders in England, from the first movement under Hampden to the last more successful one in 1688, was to establish in England a high aristocratic republic on the model of the Venetian, then the study and admiration of all speculative politicians. Read Harrington, turn over Algernon Sydney, and you will see how the minds of the English leaders in the seventeenth century were saturated with the Venetian type; and they at length succeeded. William III. found them out in an instant. He told the Whig leaders, I will not be a doge;' he balanced parties; he baffled them as the puritans baffled them fifty years before. The reign of Anne was a struggle between the Venetian and the English systems. Two great Whig nobles, Argyle and Somerset, worthy of seats in the Council of Ten, forced their sovereign on her death-bed to change the ministry. They accomplished their object; they brought in a new family on their own terms. George I. was a doge; George II. was a doge: they were what William III., a great man, would not be. George III. tried not to be a doge, but it was impossible materially to resist the deeply laid combination. He might get rid of the Whig magnificoes, but he could not rid himself of the Venetian constitution; and a Venetian constitution did govern England from the accession of the house of Hanover until 1832." Coningsby goes on to caution his companions against retaining Venetian principles of government now that the Venetian constitution had been destroyed; and manifold as he admits the political perplexities of the times to be, exhorts his young friends, panting for immediate action, to "Wait and see whether, with patience, energy, honour, and Christian faith, and a desire to look to the national welfare, and not to sectional and limited interests-whether, I say, we may not discover some great principles to guide us, to which we may adhere, and which, then, if true, will ultimately guide and control others." There is ardour in these aspirations-there is the fresh spirit of youth spread over these political views, but our soberest readers must admit the mixture of more cool judgment and patience, content to abide its time, than they have heretofore probably attributed to "Young England." Certainly nothing could be more perplexed on political subjects than were men's minds in 1832, nor less satisfactory than the solutions offered for the puzzling problems then given forth in shoals for public discussion. There was an eager struggle for place, but feeble strivings for the attainment of principles. The prominent idea of the Tadpoles and the Tapers, who were content to drive the quill and tie up papers in Downing-street or Whitehall, indifferently under either Lord John or Sir James, so that they received their 1,2007. per annum, payable quarterly, et tout pour la tripe-their idea of the necessites of the age was, that they themselves should be in office. "The time has gone by (said Mr. Tadpole) for Tory Governments; what the country requires is a sound Conservative Government." "A sound Conservative Government (said Taper, musingly)-I understand-Tory men and Whig measures." And the question, What are Conservative principles? is a puzzling one still, notwithstanding the protracted discussions which have been held, for the avowed purpose of expounding their character, aim, and objects. What are Conservative principles? Canadian timber merchants, West India planters, and English farmers return different definitions, but all tend to demonstrate that, in the minds of the several respondents, Conservative principles involve no higher consideration than the perpetuation of certain fiscal arrangements. Attempts were undoubtedly made, shortly after the duke's failure in 1832, to construct a party without principles. The abettors of such a scheme were actuated by an infinite variety of motives-some laudable, some barely venial, many selfish and base. The ex-treasury clerk wanted to resume his seat and salary; the timid wished to conciliate, and was ready to resign almost anything for the sake of peace; and the cunning and miserly thought to secure the bulk of their possessions by the surrender of a part. It is impossible to deny that the Tamworth manifesto of 1834 was an attempt, a laudable one we will admit, to effect a confederation, to encourage the timid and confused, to satisfy and conciliate the discontented and disaffected. Ten years have rolled away since Sir Robert Peel sent forth that carefully prepared document; and are men more clear in their perceptions of the real distinctive character of Conservative principles in this instant year of grace, 1844, than they were in the autumn of 1834? Without asking any one to point out the broad and palpable distinction, which we presume exists, between the legislative acts of the Whig Lord John Russell and those of the Conservative Sir Robert Peel, or between the official demeanour and Parliamentary management of Sir James Graham, now he is a Conservative Secretary of State, and the course pursued by him when he was a Whig First Lord of the Admiralty, we will quote Mr. Disraeli's statement of " Young England's" views of Conservative principles :— 66 "There was, indeed, a considerable shouting about what they called Conservative principles; but the awkward question naturally arose, what will you conserve? The prerogatives of the Crown, provided they are not exercised; the independence of the House of Lords, provided it is not asserted; the ecclesiastical estate, provided it is regulated |