THE GREAT UN-ENGLISHMAN.
Mu. COBDEN' has been a manufacturer who knows how to send his wares to the right market at the right time;. and if he has made mistakes in speculations of the kind, he has also attained great. success. Thus, he has produced a pamphlet of 140 pages for the. Peace meeting in the Free-trade Hall of Manchester; the public's, lion appearing just a few hours before market-day, although it had been on the loom for some time previously. it had been he- ralded by the whispered anticipation of its friends, and the not whispered expectations of a larger public ; and-at the Peace meet- ing it was mentioned as having occupied the author in the leisure of the recess. It now appears with something of a studied im- promptu character. The letters are supposed to be written to a clergyman, who had sent Mr. Cobden a copy of a sermon on the death of Wellington. The Apostle of Peace replies by an elaborate disparagement of the Duke as an authority, especially in his lat- ter years; when he became " infantine " in his fears of a French invasion ; fbr, with his usual- fidelity to stereotyped ideas of his own making, Mr. Cobden insists on supposing that almost every- body but himself is afraid', is in a " panic." Mr. Cobden has selected his evidence with a great deal of pains- taking, and a great ostentation of exactness, such as beseeching the reader's close attention to- "'dates." As he has taken some weeks to entangle the raw-material into a pattern of his own de- sign, it is not possible without the wand of Prince Percinet to dis- entangle the elaboration at once. We perceive, indeed, that there are very nicely-clipped pieces from standard authorities, such as Hansard, the Pictorial History of England, diplomatic correspondence, Walter Scott's Life of Napoleon, 8r.e.; and we notice that amongst these exact reproductions there are laxities of statement and suppressions of truth. For instance, he quotes Chauvelin to show the-friendly feeling of France ; but not as he might have done, to show also the friendly manner of England. In the matter of dates, he speaks of the war which began in 1793-
and that which ended in 1'815 as if they were one and indi- visible ; of Wellington, as the instrument of- the potentates
who first took arms against France, though he did not ap- pear on the scene until the contest had become really a de- fensive one against the gigantic encroachments of Napoleon. In like manner, Mr. Cobden does his friend Sir William Moles- worth the injustice of reproducing a letter addressed by Sir Wil- liam to the Spectator on the subject of national defences, before the Usurpation of the 2d December 1851, which has cancelled argu- ments in that letter, such as the one based on public discussion and the representative checks in France. We do not lay any stress upon the fact that Mr. Cobden does not produce the answer with the let- ter, because from this book it is evident that he attaches no im- portance whatever to any representation which does not accord with his view, and thus we can understand hint to rate our reply very cheap : but perhaps Sir William Molesworth has been better instructed by subsequent events. The main arguments on which Mr. Cobden relies for effect in his pamphlet are—that the precedent of 1793 does not prove the in- clination of the French to war upon England, since, although they declared war, we were the aggressive party ; that the French have become too much of a land-owning and trading nation to be any longer inclined for war, besides having no longer the Crown and Church lands, or the assignats, to fall back upon ; and- that even if there were war, we are well provided for our defence, since we have spent so much in "warlike preparations." The first argument runs to waste, because the present public demand for national de- fence is in no degree based' upon the precedent of 1793. The second is plausible, if we could, without examination, trust Mr. Cobden's description ; which we confess we do not, al- though he professes to have an exclusive knowledge of that country, everybody else being " ignorant." We doubt, for example, his pastoral picture of the conscript always returning to his patrimony after service in war; since we remember how many a patrimony is alienated, temporarily or permanently, because it is 'too small to be worth working. The third argu- ment comes home to us; and increases our doubt. If the cost of an article proved its sufficiency, we might be content ; but our
present impression is that Mr. Cobden has a better ground for im- peaching wasteful expenditure than for pronouncing the sufficiency of our forces or forts. And when he tells us that we have spent
15,000;000Z. a year in "warlike preparations," as a proof that we have "provision for ourdefence;" we are impelled to mistrust the
argument of a man who can speak of sums expended in our ordi- nary routine for the whole service of the United Kingdom- and Colonies, including dead-weight and- all, as "' preparations " for our special defence at home
Already, indeed, there have been many expressions of mistrust, in many- quarters: Mr. Cobden is a prophet in- Free-trade Hall, but the press is nearly unanimous in heresy to his faith. The Post dissents; the Chronicle hastens to expose hisrargument ; the Globe corrects his history ; the Standard reams, hia policy ad absurdum ; the Times, gravely commencing a series of refutations with the thorough relish of a man beginning to carve an easy dish, corrects his mistakes about Wellington. Even the Daily News is fain to argue against the Peace indifibrence to national defences. One jmunal writes parallel' to Mr. Cobden—the Morning Herald! But then, besides its traditional function as organ of philanthropie crotchets, the Herald' shares with Lord Malmesbury and Mr. Cobden an enthusiastic reliance on France and the Bonapartes ; in whieh, however, the Member-fbr. the West Riding exceeds his rivals, for he discovers reasons for admiring Louis Napoleon even if he should be a "bad' sovereign ! The journals have for some months concurred in the urgency of making sure our defences • and with this general antagonism in the press, we do not know why Mr. Cobden should have singled out our own journal' for the distinction of his special animadversion by name. Perhaps because we are the easiest to- handle P—or the most formidable P—or, as he is particular about dates, because we were early in the field?' But it is not for us to forget the controversy,, worn out as-it-has become, since the victory has been with our side. He cannot forget, as a libel on his friends the French, in whom he trusty as a real nation of shopkeepers all-governed by the philbsophy of a.Michel Chevalier; our passing note on the exposed state of Osborne—since ordered to be fortified So, it seems, a light word in the Spectator may be followed by more tangible results than these grave agitations in the Manchester Man.ufaeturer's or. Anti-Corn-law Leaguer's third manner I Perhaps it would have been different if he had not been content to urge these anti-national views in pamphlet. or platform but in Parliament. Indeed, he suggests a reason why he did not—that he had' but miserable support in that national assemblage. It seems that his courage for a mission de- pends upon the immediate number of supporters around him he is bold in Free-tra.de Hall, modest in the House of When the new Ministry was in process of construction, some surprise was hazarded by simpleminded' folks, that Mr. Cobden had not been. "sent for.' We remarked at the time, that the grounds for such omissions are not publicly stated; but a very sufficient rea- son will. be found in this pamphlet. It proves Mr. Cobden to be, by a most singular and peculiar id'ea, amounting almost to mo- nomania, disqualified for the service of his country in an official capacity. Unhappily, he is not disqualified for its disservice ; and there is to be vengeance for his erchision from. "power." In the spoken supplement to his pamphlet, in a speech at Manchester on Thursday evening, he an- nounces a "revival " of organized agitation—with a fund—to reemploy the professional lecturers of the " League," and to restore for him a pladorm ; Mr. Cobden pleading under his new brief as counsel for France and Louis Napoleon. This new-agitation is to be one against the press, against the Government, against the Par- liament, against the nation. He does this at' a time when party divisions are melting away before the revival of a lhrger national feeling :. the press, the Parliament, and the public„will be prepared to vindicate that sacred- feeling, and the vindictive antimatronal efforts of a self-excluded party must be abortive..
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