Mr. Gladstone had now swung away from the Conservative party. In 1864 he had vigorously supported a bill for enlarging the parliamentary franchise by reducing the limit of required rental from £10 to £6, declaring that the burden of proof rested on those who would exclude forty-nine-fiftieths of the working-classes from the franchise. He also, as chancellor of the exchequer, caused great excitement by admitting the unsatisfactory condition of the Irish Church,--that is, the Church of England among the Irish people; sustained by their taxes, but ministering to only one-eighth or one-ninth of the population. These and other similar evidences of his liberal tendencies alienated his Oxford constituency, the last people in the realm to adopt liberal measures; and on the proroguement of Parliament in 1865, and the new election which followed, he was defeated as member for the University, although he was a High Churchman and the pride of the University, devoted to its interests heart and soul. It is a proof of the exceeding bitterness of political parties that such ingratitude should have been shown to one of the greatest scholars that Oxford has produced for a century. It was in this year also that on completing his term as Rector of the University of Edinburgh he retired with a notable address on the "Place of Ancient Greece in the Providential Order;" thus anew emphasizing his scholarly equipment as a son of Oxford.
The Liberal party, however, were generally glad of Gladstone's defeat, since it would detach him from the University. He now belonged more emphatically to the country, and was more free and unshackled to pursue his great career, as Sir Robert Peel had been before him in similar circumstances. Instead of representing a narrow-minded and bigoted set of clergymen and scholars, he was chosen at once to represent quite a different body,--even the liberal voters of South Lancashire, a manufacturing district.
The death of Lord Palmerston at the age of eighty, October 17, 1865, made Earl Russell prime minister, while Gladstone resumed under the new government his post as chancellor of the exchequer, and now became formally the leader of the Liberals in the House of Commons.
Irish questions in 1866 came prominently to the front, for the condition of Ireland at that time was as alarming as it was deplorable, with combined Fenianism and poverty and disaffection in every quarter. So grave was the state of this unhappy country that the government felt obliged to bring in a bill suspending the habeas corpus act, which the chancellor of the exchequer eloquently supported. His conversion to Liberal views was during this session seen in bringing in a measure for the abolition of compulsory church-rates, in aid of Dissenters; but before it could be carried through its various stages a change of ministry had taken place on another issue, and the Conservatives again came into power, with Lord Derby for prime minister and Disraeli for chancellor of the exchequer and leader of his party in the House of Commons.
This fall of the Liberal ministry was brought about by the Reform Bill, which Lord Russell had prepared, and which was introduced by the chancellor of the exchequer amid unparalleled excitement. Finance measures lost their interest in the fierceness of the political combat. It was not so important a measure as that of the reform of 1832 in its political consequences, but it was of importance enough to enlist absorbing interest throughout the kingdom; it would have added four hundred thousand new voters. While it satisfied the Liberals, it was regarded by the Conservatives as a dangerous concession, opening the doors too widely to the people. Its most brilliant and effective opponent was Mr. Lowe, whose oratory raised him at once to fame and influence. Seldom has such eloquence been heard in the House of Commons, and from all the leading debaters on both sides. Mr. Gladstone outdid himself, but perhaps was a little too profuse with his Latin quotations. The debate was continued for eight successive nights. The final division was the largest ever known: the government found itself in a minority of eleven, and consequently resigned. Lord Derby, as has been said, was again prime minister.
The memorable rivalry between Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Disraeli was now continued in deeper earnest, and never ceased so long as the latter statesman was a member of the House of Commons, They were recognized to be the heads of their respective parties,--two giants in debate; two great parliamentary gladiators, on whom the eyes of the nation rested. Mr. Gladstone was the more earnest, the more learned, and the more solid in his blows. Mr. Disraeli was the more adroit, the more witty, and the more brilliant in his thrusts. Both were equally experienced. The one appealed to justice and truth; the other to the prejudices of the House and the pride of a nation of classes. One was armed with a heavy dragoon sword; the other with a light rapier, which he used with extraordinary skill. Mr. G.W.E. Russell, in his recent "Life of Gladstone," quotes the following passage from a letter of Lord Houghton, May, 1867:--
"I met Gladstone at breakfast. He seems quite awed with the diabolical cleverness of Dizzy, 'who,' he says, 'is gradually driving all ideas of political honor out of the House, and accustoming it to the most revolting cynicism,' There is no doubt that a sense of humor has always been conspicuously absent from Mr. Gladstone's character."
Sometimes one of these rival leaders was on the verge of victory and sometimes the other, and both equally gained the applause of the spectators. Two such combatants had not been seen since the days of Pitt and Fox,--one, the champion of the people; the other, of the aristocracy. What each said was read the next day by every family in the land. Both were probably greatest in opposition, since more unconstrained. Of the two, Disraeli was superior in the control of his temper and in geniality of disposition, making members roar with laughter by his off-hand vituperation and ingenuity in inventing nicknames. Gladstone was superior in sustained reasoning, in lofty sentiments, and in the music of his voice, accompanied by that solemnity of manner which usually passes for profundity and the index of deep convictions. As for rhetorical power, it would be difficult to say which was the superior,--though the sentences of both were too long. It would also be difficult to tell which of the two was the more ambitious and more tenacious of office. Both, it is said, bade for popularity in the measures they proposed. Both were politicians. There is, indeed, a great difference between politicians and statesmen; but a man may be politic without ceasing to be a lover of his country, like Lord Palmerston himself; and a man may advocate large and comprehensive views of statesmanship which are neither popular nor appreciated.
The new Conservative ministry was a short one. Coming into power on the defeat of the Liberal reform bill introduced by Mr. Gladstone, the Tory government recognized the popular demand on which that bill had been based; and though Mr. Disraeli coolly introduced a reform bill of their own which was really more radical than the Liberal bill had been, and although at the hands of the opposition it was so modified that the Duke of Buccleuch declared that the only word unaltered was the initial "whereas," its passage was claimed as a great Conservative victory. Shortly after this, the Earl of Derby retired on account of ill-health, and was succeeded by Mr. Disraeli as premier; but the current of Liberalism set in so strongly in the ensuing elections that he was forced to resign in 1868, and Mr. Gladstone now for the first time became prime minister.
This was the golden period of Gladstone's public services. During Disraeli's short lease of power, Gladstone had carried the abolition of compulsory church-rates, and had moved, with great eloquence, the disestablishment of the English Church in Ireland. On the latter question Parliament was dissolved, and an appeal made to the country; and the triumphant success of the Liberals brought Mr. Gladstone into power with the brightest prospects for the cause to which he was now committed. He was fifty-nine years old before he reached the supreme object of his ambition,--to rule England; but in accordance with law, and in the interest of truth and justice. In England the strongest man can usually, by persevering energy, reach the highest position to which a subject may aspire. In the United States, political ambition is defeated by rivalries and animosities. Practically the President reigns, like absolute kings, "by the grace of God,"--as it would seem when so many ordinary men, and even obscure, are elevated to the highest place, and when these comparatively unknown men often develop when elected the virtues and abilities of a Saul or a David, as in the cases of Lincoln and Garfield.