Browning and His Century

by Helen A. Clarke

It is interesting to note in this connection that one of the principal factors in the making of Gladstone into the stanch liberal which he became was the freeing of Italy, in which Napoleon had so large a share. Gladstone himself wrote in 1892 of the events which occurred in the fifth decade: “Of the various and important incidents which associated me almost unawares with foreign affairs ... I will only say that they all contributed to forward the action of those home causes more continuous in their operation, which, without in any way effacing my old sense of reverence for the past, determined for me my place in the present and my direction toward the future.” In 1859 Gladstone dined with Cavour at Turin, when the latter had the opportunity of explaining his position and policy to the man whom he considered “one of the sincerest and most important friends that Italy had.” But as his biographer says, Gladstone was still far from the glorified democracy of the Mazzinian propaganda, and expressed his opinion that England should take the stand that she would be glad if Italian unity proved feasible, “but the conditions of it must be gradually matured by a course of improvement in the several states, and by the political education of the people; if it cannot be reached by these means, it hardly will by any others; and certainly not by opinions which closely link Italian reconstruction with European disorganization and general war.” Yet he was as distressed as Mrs. Browning at the peace of Villafranca, about which he wrote: “I little thought to have lived to see the day when the conclusion of a peace should in my own mind cause disgust rather than impart relief.” By the end of the year he thought better of Napoleon and expressed himself again somewhat in the same strain as Mrs. Browning, to the effect that the Emperor had shown, “though partial and inconsistent, indications of a genuine feeling for the Italians—and far beyond this he has committed himself very considerably to the Italian cause in the face of the world. When in reply to all that, we fling in his face the truce of Villafranca, he may reply—and the answer is not without force—that he stood single-handed in a cause when any moment Europe might have stood combined against him. We gave him verbal sympathy and encouragement, or at least criticism; no one else gave him anything at all. No doubt he showed then that he had undertaken a work to which his powers were unequal; but I do not think that, when fairly judged, he can be said to have given proof by that measure of insincerity or indifference.”

Gladstone’s gradual and forceful emancipation into the ranks of the liberals may be followed in the fascinating pages of Morley’s “Life,” who at the end declares that his performances in the sphere of active government were beyond comparison. Gladstone’s own summary of his career gives a glimpse of what these performances were as well as an interpretation of the century and England’s future growth which indicate that had he had another twenty years in which to progress, perhaps fewer, he would beyond all doubt have become an out and out social democrat.

“The public aspect of the period which closes for me with the fourteen years (so I love to reckon them) of my formal connection with Midlothian is too important to pass without a word. I consider it as beginning with the Reform Act of Lord Grey’s government. That great act was for England, improvement and extension: for Scotland it was political birth, the beginning of a duty and a power, neither of which had attached to the Scottish nation in the preceding period. I rejoice to think how the solemnity of that duty has been recognized, and how that power has been used. The threescore years offer as the pictures of what the historian will recognize as a great legislative and administrative period—perhaps, on the whole, the greatest in our annals. It has been predominantly a history of emancipation—that is, of enabling man to do his work of emancipation, political, economical, social, moral, intellectual. Not numerous merely, but almost numberless, have been the causes brought to issue, and in every one of them I rejoice to think that, so far as my knowledge goes, Scotland has done battle for the right.

“Another period has opened and is opening still—a period possibly of yet greater moral dangers, certainly a great ordeal for those classes which are now becoming largely conscious of power, and never heretofore subject to its deteriorating influences. These have been confined in their actions to the classes above them, because they were its sole possessors. Now is the time for the true friend of his country to remind the masses that their present political elevation is owing to no principles less broad and noble than these—the love of liberty, of liberty for all without distinction of class, creed or country, and the resolute preference of the interests of the whole to any interest, be it what it may, of a narrower scope.”

Mr. Gladstone entered Parliament at twenty-three, in 1832, and a year later Browning, at twenty-one, printed his first poem, “Pauline.” The careers of the two men ran nearly parallel, for Browning died in 1889, on the day of the publication of his last volume of poems, and Gladstone’s retirement from active life took place in 1894, shortly after the defeat of his second Home Rule Bill. Though there is nothing to show that these two men came into touch with each other during their life, and while it is probable that Browning would not have been in sympathy with many of the aspects of Gladstone’s mentality, there is an undercurrent of similarity in their attitude of mind toward reform. The passage in “Sordello” already referred to, written in 1840, might be regarded almost as a prophecy of the sort of leader Gladstone became. I have said of that passage that it expressed the ideal of the opportunist, not that of the revolutionary. Opportunist Mr. Gladstone was often called by captious critics, but any unbiased reader following his career now as a whole will see, as Morley points out, that whenever there was a chance of getting anything done it was generally found that he was the only man with courage and resolution enough to attempt it.

A distinction should be made between that sort of opportunism which waits upon the growth of conditions favorable to the taking of a short step in amelioration, and what might be called militant opportunism, which, at all times, seizes every opportunity to take a step in the direction of an evolving, all-absorbing ideal. Is not this the opportunism of both a Browning and a Gladstone? Such a policy at least tacitly acknowledges that the law of evolution is the law that should be followed, and that the mass of the people as well as the leader have their share in the unfolding of the coming ideal, though their part in it may be less conscious than his and though they may need his leadership to make the steps by the way clear.

The other political leader of the Victorian era with whom Gladstone came most constantly into conflict was Disraeli, of whom Browning in “George Bubb Dodington” has given a sketch in order to draw a contrast between the unsuccessful policy of a charlatan of the Dodington type and that of one like Disraeli. The skeptical multitude of to-day cannot be taken in by declarations that the politician is working only for their good, and if he frankly acknowledged that he is working also for his own good they would have none of him. The nice point to be decided is how shall he work for his own good and yet gain control of the multitude. Dodington did not know the secret, but according to Browning Disraeli did, and what is the secret? It seems to be an attitude of absolute self-assurance, a disregard of consistency, a scorn of the people he is dealing with, and a pose suggesting the play of supernatural forces in his life.

This is a true enough picture of the real Disraeli, who seems to have had a leaning toward a belief in spiritualism, and who was notorious for his unblushing changes of opinion and for a style of oratory in which his points were made by clever invective and sarcasm hurled at his opponents instead of by any sound, logical argument, it being, indeed one of his brilliant discoveries that “wisdom ought to be concealed under folly, and consistency under caprice.”

Many choice bits of history might be given in illustration of Browning’s portrayal of him; for example, speaking against reform, he exclaims: “Behold the late Prime Minister and the Reform Ministry! The spirited and snow-white steeds have gradually changed into an equal number of sullen and obstinate donkeys, while Mr. Merryman, who, like the Lord Chancellor, was once the very life of the ring, now lies his despairing length in the middle of the stage, with his jokes exhausted and his bottle empty.”

As a specimen of his quickness in retort may be cited an account of an episode which occurred at the time when he came out as the champion of the Taunton Blues. In the course of his speech he “enunciated,” says an anonymous writer of the fifties, “one of those daring historical paradoxes which are so signally characteristic of the man: ‘Twenty years ago’ said the Taunton Blue hero, ‘tithes were paid in Ireland more regularly than now!’