here is no denying or concealing that it is a very
serious disaster. The moral effect of beginning with a defeat is
bad; it discourages the wavering and timid, who might have felt
half disposed to support the Government and the constitution. The
trial of strength leads to very uncomfortable reflections, for
every man of these 317 is prepared to go all lengths; and though
there are probably none among the majority who will support
Government, there are some among the minority who will oppose
them--Dudley Stuart, Angerstein, and Burdett, who went away.

[Page Head: PARTIES BALANCED.]

The majority of the world naturally look at this event with the
eye of party, and as a triumph one way and a mortification the
other; but I, who have no party prejudices and predilections, and
care nothing who is in the chair, and not much who is in office,
provided 'the thing,' as Cobbett calls it, is kept going, look at
this division with sorrow and alarm, as affording undoubted
evidence that no prospect appears of the possibility of this or
any other Government being able to accomplish the purposes for
which a Government is intended. We seem to be arrived at what is
vulgarly termed a dead lock. Nothing can be more clear than that
the present Ministers are in a minority, and that all the other
parties in the House united can beat them when they will. It is
equally clear that they can beat any section of their opponents
whenever these are disunited. The political attraction which
binds together the mass cannot last long, and there are too many
elements of repulsion in _esse_ or in _posse_ not to insure the
speedy disjunction of the several atoms; but in the meantime, if
they can be held together, what is to happen? Peel will take a
beating or two, but he _may_ be so beaten as to be compelled to
resign or again dissolve. Suppose he dissolves. The Tories think
the reaction is on the increase, and that the Conservative
interest would gain largely by another dissolution; still there
is scarcely a hope of their gaining enough to enable Peel to
carry on the Government with such constant and dependible
majorities as can alone render it efficacious and secure. On the
other hand, if Peel resigns, the Opposition, should they return
to power, must dissolve; for what can they do against 300 Tories?
and what Ministry can by possibility be formed that can have a
certain majority _of its own_ out of the heterogeneous mixture of
Whigs, Radicals, Repeal