ship in concentrating the new
Conservative party. He so far succeeded--chiefly through the want of
more courage and honesty in the Whigs--that he was again called to
office in 1834, during his brief tenancy of which, no one can withhold
praise for his command of temper, his Liberal tendencies, and his spirit
of general conciliation. In 1841, Sir R. Peel again entered office;
and--though he undeniably was enabled to do so by the Protectionist
party, by the force of circumstances, the stagnation of commerce, the
failure of the crops, and the famine in Ireland--he opened the ports,
and repealed the Corn-laws forever, to the consternation of the world,
and in opposition to all the opinions of his life; this was in 1845.
Since that period Sir R. Peel has been in Opposition, indeed, but not
its leader so much as a distinguished debater, an accomplished
financier, and the expositor of opinions which neither the Whigs nor
Tories heartily espouse.

During forty years servitude in the House of Commons--though not
generally in favor of popular sentiments, and, in religious matters,
rather liberal than generous--Sir R. Peel has undoubtedly rendered, in
addition to his three great measures--the Bullion-law, Catholic
Emancipation, and the repeal of the Corn-law--many minor political
benefits to the country. Of this class of services, that which reflects
on him the most honor, is his amelioration of the Criminal Law. As to
the measures to which we have just alluded, there will still continue to
be a large diversity of opinion. Thousands of the wealthy classes will
regard them all as steps in the declination of the national power; while
the more popular mind, that rarely troubles itself with large or
profound views, has already registered its approval of them.

It is a singular fact, that he spent eleven years in Parliamentary
opposition to the Bullion doctrine that he adopted in 1822; that he
waged strenuous war against the repeal of the Roman Catholic
disabilities for eighteen years, and at last carried them in spite of
his own party; and that for thirty years in the House of Commons, he
maintained that the prosperity of Great Britain depended on the
retention of her Corn-laws, which he repealed in 1845. It is, therefore,
clear that his final measures, in reference to these three great
departments of his political life, were rather concessions to the force
of events, than the voluntary policy of his own mind. His wisdom lay in
the