As Mr. John Morley improves as a platform orator, he
falls off as a detached thinker. His speech on Wednesday at the Free Trade Hall in Manchester was a capital. rattling party speech. But it was not a good speech. It made a great. show of absolute contempt for the present Government which we do not believe that he really feels anywhere but on one of those platforms where men cease to be reflective and become political pugilists. He complimented the Chancellor of the Exchequer on having delivered a happy thrust at bimetallism, and this he did presumably mainly because he wanted to remind the Lancashire bimetallists that they had nothing to hope from Mr. Balfour. Again, he delivered a sharp attack on Mr. Chamberlain for encouraging the idea of a commercial union with the Colonies, probably because he wished to suggest that the Government was likely to desert Free-trade. If Mr. Balfour may be a bimetallist without in any way committing the Government, Mr. Chamberlain may favour a Zollverein with the Colonies without in any way committing the Government; but that was not at all what Mr. Morley intended to suggest. He was as scornful as it was possible to be towards the Government, not only on the Agricultural Rating Bill and the Education Bill, but as to its policy in the Soudan and its policy towards the Church.
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