558 LI¥E OF OOBDEN. {omar.

1851. any indications of u breeze in the direction of Reform. P gople
Wn. 47, are 00 well-to-do in the world to agitate for anything. Did
you ever know or read of any movement for organic chang®
when wheat wag under 40s., to say nothing of cotton at 44.7
I am willing to do my share in the House or out of its 8°
an individual; but when you suggest a Conference under
the auspices of Wilson and ourselves in Manchester, it
well to consider whether we may not be under the risk of
deceiving ourselves or misleading others as to the meaning
of such a step. }
“If we move together at the head of an organization, ib
will be assumed that we are going to bring the Leagu®
following with us, This will be a delusion practised upon
people at a distance, and probably upon ourselves ; for depend
 on it, we shall not carry with us those who co-operated
with us in that struggle. Since I have beon down here
[Midhurst], I have been amusing myself under an old yow~
bree by looking over several bushels of old letters which I
received during the League agitation. The names of ll
those who did the work of that seven years’ struggle aro
fresh in my memory. Do not decéive yourself; the same Mme"
will not fight the battle of Parlivmentary Reform. If we gO
into the conflict, we must seek for recruits from amongst
another class. Let this be understood beforehand by ow
selves and the public; otherwise we do harm to all parties,
by misleading the country snd ourselves.
“But is ib not a proof that the country is not ripe for &
really great measure of Reform, that there is no spontaneots
movement for it? In all great movements, new men Spring
up. They are the vouchers for the reality of the publi®
interest in the Reform in question. When the Catholics
were ready to free themselves, it was so. When the day®
of the Corn Low were numbered, it was so. But where are
the men who now ask you and me and Wilson to pub our