w.] BHELBURNE AS .. PRECURSOR. III

Cobden’s pamphlets stamped a deep impression on men’s 1835-6.
minds,—which time, in spite of inevitable phases of reaction Zr. 31.2
and the temporary recrudescence of bad opinions, has only
made mop definite,~—is the decisive circumstance which has
already peop sufficiently dwelt upon, that the huge ex-Pansion
 of the manufacturing interests had, when Cobden
aPPeared, created a powerful public naturally favourable to
the new principles, and raised what would otherwise have
been only the tenets of a school into the programme of a
Rational party,
As we shall see when we come to the Crimean War, the
ROW principles did not at once crush out the old ; it was
not to be expected by any one who reflects on the strength
of prejudice, especially prejudice supported by the conscions-Bess
 of an honourable motive, that so sudden a change
should take place. But the pamphlets are a great landmark
 in the history of politics in England, and they are
still as well worth reading as they ever were. Some of the
Statements are antiquated ; the historical criticism is sometimes
 open to doubt ; there are one or two mistakes. But
they are mostly like the poet's, who spoke of “1 miei non
falst errors? If time has weakened their literal force, it has
confirmed their real sienificance.

In a personal biography, it is perhaps not out of place to
dwell in conclusion on a point in the two pamphlets, which
is of very secondary importance compared with their
Political teaching, and yet which has an interest of its own;
I mean the literary excellence of these performances. They
have a ringing clearness, a genial vivacity, a free and confident
 mastery of expression, which can hardly be surpassed.
Cobden is a striking instance against a favourite plea
of the fanatics of Latin and Greek. They love to insist that
& collegian’s scholarship is the great source and fountain