



Produced by Brian Foley, Keith Edkins and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
file was produced from images generously made available
by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries)





Transcriber's note: A few typographical errors have been corrected: they
are listed at the end of the text.

       *       *       *       *       *


Page numbers enclosed by curly braces (example: {25}) have been
incorporated to facilitate the use of the Table of Contents and Index.

       *       *       *       *       *


A SHORT HISTORY OF
ENGLISH LIBERALISM



BY

W. LYON BLEASE



    _No rational man ever did govern himself by abstractions and
    universals.... A statesman differs from a professor in an university;
    the latter has only the general view of society.... A statesman, never
    losing sight of principles, is to be guided by circumstances; and,
    judging contrary to the exigencies of the moment, he may ruin his
    country for ever._

    BURKE, "On the Petition of the Unitarians."



T. FISHER UNWIN
LONDON: ADELPHI TERRACE
LEIPSIC: INSELSTRASSE 20

       *       *       *       *       *


TO
"THE MANCHESTER GUARDIAN"



_First Published in 1913_

(_All rights reserved._)

       *       *       *       *       *


CONTENTS

  CHAPTER                                                 PAGE

  I. LIBERALISM AND TORYISM                                  7

  II. POLITICAL CONDITIONS IN THE REIGN OF GEORGE III       42

  III. THE FIRST MOVEMENT TOWARDS LIBERALISM                69

  IV. THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND ENGLISH OPINION            100

  V. THE DECLINE OF TORYISM                                142

  VI. THE MIDDLE-CLASS SUPREMACY                           168

  VII. THE MANCHESTER SCHOOL AND PALMERSTON                190

  VIII. THE BEGINNING OF THE GLADSTONE PERIOD              230

  IX. GLADSTONE VERSUS DISRAELI                            265

  X. THE IMPERIALIST REACTION                              294

  XI. LIBERALISM SINCE 1906                                324

       *       *       *       *       *


{7}

A Short History of English Liberalism

CHAPTER I

LIBERALISM AND TORYISM

This book attempts to trace the varying but persistent course of Liberalism
in British politics during the last hundred and fifty years. It is not so
much a history of events as a reading of them in the light of a particular
political philosophy. In the strict sense a history of Liberalism should
cover much more than politics. The same habit of mind is to be discovered
everywhere else in the history of thought, most conspicuously in religious
history, but not less certainly in the history of science and of art. The
general victory in these innumerable conflicts of opinion has been to
Liberalism, and the movement of the race, during the period with which the
writer is concerned, is precisely measured by the degree in which the
Liberal spirit has succeeded in modifying the establishments of the
preceding age. The object of this book is to investigate the course of that
process of modification in politics.

By Liberalism I mean, not a policy, but a habit of mind. It is the
disposition of the man who looks upon each of his fellows as of equal worth
with himself. He does not assume that all men and women are of equal
capacity, or equally entitled to offices and privileges. But he is always
inclined to leave and to give them equal opportunity with himself for
self-expression and for self-development. He assumes, as the basis of his
activity, that he has no right to interfere with any other person's
attempts {8} to employ his natural powers in what he conceives to be the
best way. He is unwilling to impose his judgment upon that of others, or to
force them to live their lives according to his ideas rather than their
own. They are never to be used by him for his own ends, but for theirs.
Each is to be left to himself, to work out his own salvation. The Liberal
habit of mind has its positive as well as its negative side. Just as it
leads its possessor to refrain from interfering with the development of
others, so it leads him to take active steps to remove the artificial
barriers which impede that development. Natural obstacles will remain,
though even these may be diminished. But the artificial conditions, which
prevent or hinder growth, are perpetually obnoxious to the Liberal. Upon
class distinctions in society, privileges of sex, rank, wealth, and creed,
he wages unceasing war. They are, in his eye, weights and impediments. To
one