the foregone
conclusion of the meeting. One advantage of having a recognized organ of
a political party is, that its members do not decide too precipitately.
They listen before they determine, and if they have a doubt, they
will grant the benefit of it to him whose general ability they have
acknowledged, and to whom they willingly give credit for having viewed
the question at issue in a more laborious and painful manner than
themselves. Without a leader, they commit themselves to opinions
carelessly and hastily adopted. This is fatal to a party in debate; but
it often entails very serious consequences when the mistakes have been
committed in a less public and responsible scene than the House of
Commons.

In the present case, there was only one individual who took any
considerable lead in the management of the party who ventured to suggest
the expediency of pausing before they pledged themselves to support an
unconstitutional measure, proposed by a government against which they
were arrayed under circumstances of urgent and unusual opposition. The
support of an unconstitutional measure may be expedient, but it cannot
be denied that it is the most indubitable evidence of confidence. This
suggestion, though received with kindness, elicited little sympathy, and
Lord George Bentinck, who had not yet spoken, and who always refrained
at these meetings from taking that directing part which he never wished
to assume, marking the general feeling of those present, and wishing to
guide it to a practical result advantageous to their policy, observed
that the support of the Coercion Bill by the Protectionists, ought to be
made conditional on the government proving the sincerity of their policy
by immediately proceeding with their measure; that if life were in
such danger in Ireland as was officially stated, and as he was bound
to believe, no Corn or Customs' Bill could compete in urgency with the
necessity of pressing forward a bill, the object of which was to arrest
wholesale assassination. He was, therefore, for giving the government
a hearty support, provided they proved they were in earnest in their
determination to put down murder and outrage in Ireland, by giving a
priority in the conduct of public business to the measure in question.

This view of the situation, which was certainly adroit, for it combined
the vindication of order with an indefinite delay of the measures for
the repeal of the protective system, seemed to pleas