his followers sit in Parliament
prepared to practice all the arts of obstruction. The Irish members, in
the second place, perturb and falsify the whole system of party
government. The majority of Great Britain wish to be ruled say by Lord
Salisbury; the Parnellites do not care whether Lord Salisbury or Mr.
Gladstone is Premier, but they do care for making the English executive
feeble, and ridiculous. They can, therefore, by the practice of a very
little art, seize some opportunity of putting Lord Salisbury in a
minority, and turning him out of office. Mr. Gladstone comes back into
what is ironically called power. The same game begins again. The
Parnellites coalesce with the Tories, we have a change of Cabinet, and
possibly a dissolution. Nor are changes of Ministry the whole of the
evil. The high tone of party politics is degraded. English or Scottish
members of Parliament are but men; they are liable to be tempted; the
Parnellites have the means of offering temptation; and temptation,
members of Parliament intimate to us, will in the long run be too great
for their virtue. The presence, in short, at Westminster of eighty-six
gentlemen who do not respect the dignity or care for the efficiency of
Parliament is absolutely fatal to the success of Parliamentary
government, and to the character of Parliamentary statesmanship. We
must, it is inferred, let the Parnellites have a Parliament of their own
in Ireland, or else we shall soon cease to have any Parliament worth
keeping in England.

[Sidenote: Criticism.]

The force of this line of argument, as far as it goes, cannot be denied.
The presence in the House of Commons of politicians disloyal to
Parliament causes immense inconvenience; but to anyone not a member of
the House of Commons, it appears singular that men of sense should think
the inconveniences of obstruction a sufficient ground for breaking up
the Constitution. The whole thing is a question of proportion. The
nation suffers a good deal from obstruction, but the suffering is not of
a kind to justify revolution. A toothache is a bad thing, but a severe
toothache hardly suggests suicide; and though life might not be worth
having, if toothache were to last for years, the thoughts of putting an
end to one's existence are removed by the knowledge that an aching tooth
can be drawn by a dentist. Now the more obvious evils of obstruction can
clearly be removed by changes of procedure. Members of Parliament appear
to t