vm. PECULIAR WORE OF THE LEAGUE. 405

"ere too honestly satisfied with the triuxaph of the cause 16848.
for which they had banded themselves together eight years Jr. 42.
880, to take any interest in so small a matter as the distribution
 of good things. in Downing Street and Whitehall.
That was no affair of theirs. It was enough for them that
they had removed a great obstacle to the material pro-Sperity
 of the country, that they bad effectually vindicated
What the best among them believed to be an exalted and
Uyilizing social principle, and that in doing this they had
filed to reverence no law, shaken no institution, and injured
20 class nor order. It is impossible not to envy the feelings
of men who had done so excellent a piece of work for their
®uniry in so spirited and honourable a way. When the
¥Mmouncement was made from the Chair that the Anti-Corn-Law
 League stood conditionally dissolved, a deep silence
fol upon them all, as they reflected that they were about
Srally to sepasate from friends with whom they had been
long ang closely connected, and that they had no longer in
“Ommon the pursuit of an object which had been the most
therished of their lives.*
The share which the League had in procuring the con-Summation
 of the commercial policy that Huskisson had
firs, opened four-and-twenty years before, is not always
“ightly understood. One practical effect of a mischievous
king hag followed from this misunderstanding. It has led
People into the delusion that organization, if it be only on a
ufficiently gigantic scale and sufficiently unrelenting in its
Mportunity, is capable of winning any virtuous cause. The
"Bitation against the Corn Laws had several pretty obvious
Peculiayities, which ought not to be overlooked. A large
Sud wealthy class had the strongest material interest in
peal, What was important was that thir class now
bappened to represent the great army of consumers.
} Soe Mr. Bright’s speech, quoted in Mr. Ashworth’s little book, p- 218.