y make it keep all of them under a suspended sentence of
coming dismissal. But the experience of Lord Palmerston's second
Government proves, I think, that these fears are exaggerated. When the
choice of a nation is really fixed on a statesman, Parliament will fix
upon him too. The parties in the Parliament of 1859 were as nearly
divided as in any probable Parliament; a great many Liberals did not
much like Lord Palmerston, and they would have gladly co-operated in an
attempt to dethrone him. But the same influence acted on Parliament
within which acted on the nation without. The moderate men of both
parties were satisfied that Lord Palmerston's was the best Government,
and they therefore preserved it though it was hated by the immoderate
on both sides. We have then found by a critical instance that a
government supported by what I may call "the common element"--by the
like-minded men of unlike parties--will be retained in power, though
parties are even, and though, as Treasury counting reckons, the
majority is imperceptible. If happily, by its intelligence and
attractiveness, a Cabinet can gain a hold upon the great middle part of
Parliament, it will continue to exist notwithstanding the hatching of
small plots and the machinations of mean factions.

On the whole, I think it indisputable that the selecting task of
Parliament is performed as well as public opinion wishes it to be
performed; and if we want to improve that standard, we must first
improve the English nation, which imposes that standard. Of the
substantial part of its legislative task, the same, too, may, I think,
be said. The manner of our legislation is indeed detestable, and the
machinery for settling that manner odious. A committee of the whole
House, dealing, or attempting to deal with the elaborate clauses of a
long bill, is a wretched specimen of severe but misplaced labour. It is
sure to wedge some clause into the Act, such as that which the judge
said "seemed to have fallen by itself, PERHAPS, from heaven, into the
mind of the legislature," so little had it to do with anything on
either side or around it. At such times government by a public meeting
displays its inherent defects, and is little restrained by its
necessary checks. But the essence of our legislature may be separated
from its accidents. Subject to two considerable defects I think
Parliament passes laws as the nation wishes to have them passed.

Thirty years ago this was not so. The nat