“When you return, I will give you my views on some of the great questions of the day. Don’t adopt them, hear them and compare them with your own. I would have you think for yourself, for I am an old man now and sometimes I distrust my powers of mind.
“The state of this country you, in your situation, ought to be thoroughly acquainted with. It is a very perilous one. Its prosperity, its integrity, nay its existence as a first-rate power, hangs by a thread, and that thread but little better and stronger than a cotton one. Quem Deus vult perdere prius dementat. I look in vain for that constitutional vigour, and intellectual power, which once ruled the destinies of this great nation.
“There is an aberration of intellect, and a want of self-possession here that alarms me. I say, alarms me, for American as I am by birth, and republican as I am from the force of circumstances, I cannot but regard England with great interest, and with great affection. What a beautiful country! What a noble constitution! What a high minded, intelligent, and generous people! When the Whigs came into office, the Tories were not a party, they were the people of England. Where and what are they now? Will they ever have a lucid interval, or again recognise the sound of their own name? And yet, Sam, doubtful as the prospect of their recovery is, and fearful as the consequences of a continuance of their malady appear to be, one thing is most certain, a Tory government is the proper government for a monarchy, a suitable one for any country, but it is the only one for England. I do not mean an ultra one, for I am a moderate man, and all extremes are equally to be avoided. I mean a temperate, but firm one: steady to its friends, just to its enemies, and inflexible to all. “When compelled to yield, it should be by the force of reason, and never by the power of agitation. Its measures should be actuated by a sense of what is right, and not what is expedient, for to concede is to recede—to recede is to evince weakness—and to betray weakness is to invite attack.
“I am a stranger here. I do not understand this new word, Conservatism. I comprehend the other two, Toryism and Liberalism. The one is a monarchical, and the other a republican word. The term, Conservatism, I suppose, designates a party formed out of the moderate men of both sides, or rather, composed of Low-toned Tories and High Whigs. I do not like to express a decided opinion yet, but my first impression is always adverse to mixtures, for a mixture renders impure the elements of which it is compounded. Every thing will depend on the preponderance of the wholesome over the deleterious ingredients. I will analyse it carefully. See how one neutralizes or improves the other, and what the effect of the compound is likely to be on the constitution. I will request our Ambassador, Everett, or Sam’s friend, the Minister Extraordinary, Abednego Layman, to introduce me to Sir Robert Peel, and will endeavour to obtain all possible information from the best possible source.
“On your return I will give you a candid and deliberate opinion.”
After a silence of some minutes, during which he walked up and down the room in a fit of abstraction, he suddenly paused, and said, as if thinking aloud—
“Hem, hem—so you are going to cross the border, eh? That northern intellect is strong. Able men the Scotch, a little too radical in politics, and a little too liberal, as it is called, in a matter of much greater consequence; but a superior people, on the whole. They will give you a warm reception, will the Scotch. Your name will insure that; and they are clannish; and another warm reception will, I assure you, await you here, when, returning, you again Cross the Border.”