LEVER)
Born 1851, Lancashire. Educ.: Bolton Church Institute; Chairman of
Lever Bros., Port Sunlight; High Sheriff, Lancaster, 1917.
[Illustration: LORD LEVERHULME]
CHAPTER XIII
LORD LEVERHULME
_"Dullness is so much stronger than genius because there is so much
more of it, and it is better organized and more naturally cohesive_
inter se. _So the Arctic volcano can do nothing against Arctic
ice."_--SAMUEL BUTLER.
The reader may properly wonder to find the figure of Lord Leverhulme
brought before the mirrors of Downing Street.
But let me explain why I introduce this industrial Triton into the
society of our political minnows.
Lord Leverhulme rejected politics only when politics rejected him. He is
of that distinguished company to whom the House of Commons has turned
both a deaf ear and a cold shoulder. He failed where Mr. Walter Long
succeeded, and fell where Dr. Macnamara rose.
I once asked a Cabinet Minister how it was that a man of such
conspicuous quality had failed to win office. "I really cannot tell
you," he replied with complacency, "but I remember very well that the
House of Commons never took to him. It is curious how many men who do
well outside the House of Commons fail to make good inside."
Curious indeed! But more curious still, we may surely say, that the
House of Commons should continue, in the light of this knowledge, to
enjoy so good an opinion of itself.
I suppose that nobody will now dispute that Lord Leverhulme is easily
the foremost industrialist, not merely in the British Isles, but in the
world. I can think of no one who approaches him in the creative faculty.
Not even America, the country of big men and big businesses, has
produced a man of this truly colossal stature. Mr. Rockefeller is a name
for a committee. Mr. Carnegie was pushed to fortune by his more resolute
henchmen. But Lord Leverhulme, as is very well known in America, has
been the sole architect of his tremendous fortunes, and in all his
numerous undertakings exercises the power of an unquestioned autocrat.
Mr. Lloyd George once remarked to me that the trouble with Lord
Leverhulme is that he cannot work with other men. But this is only true
in part. Lord Leverhulme can work very well with men who are not fools.
When I told him of Mr. Lloyd George's remark, "Well, I don't know," he
replied, "I have been working with other men all my life!" Yes, but
this, too, expresses onl
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