n the club, or have no local
reference to it--a principle, if once admitted, of which it would
be next to impossible to regulate and control the application,
and probably be productive of greater evils than those it would
be intended to remedy. On the other hand, the case of O'Connell
is altogether peculiar; it is such a one as can hardly ever occur
again, and therefore may be treated as deserving an exception
from ordinary rules, because it not only cannot be drawn into a
precedent, but the very circumstance of its being so treated must
prevent the possibility of its recurrence. There exists a code of
social law, which is universally subscribed to, as necessary and
indispensable for the preservation of social harmony and decorum.
One man has given public notice that he is self-emancipated from
its obligations; that he acknowledges none of the restraints, and
will submit to none of the penalties, by which the intercourse of
society is regulated and kept in order; and having thus
surrounded himself with all the immunities of irresponsibility,
'out of the reach of danger he is bold, out of the reach of shame
he is confident.' Instead of feeling that he is specially bound
to guard his language with the most scrupulous care, and to
abstain religiously from every offensive expression, he mounts
into regions of scurrility and abuse inaccessible to all other
men, and he riots in invective and insult with a scornful and
ostentatious exhibition of his invulnerability, which renders him
an object of execration to all those who cherish the principles
and the feelings of honour.

November 29th, 1835 {p.321}

There are gloomy letters from George Villiers at Madrid; he
attributes the Spanish difficulties more to the conduct of Louis
Philippe than anything else, who, he says, is playing false
diabolically. Mendizabal is very able, but ill surrounded; no
other public man of any merit. Parties are violent and individuals
foolish, mischievous, and corrupt; the country poor, depopulated,
ignorant--out of such elements what good can come? His letters (to
his mother and brothers) are very interesting, very well written,
clever, lively; he seems a little carried away by the vanity and
the excitement of the part he plays, and I observe a want of
steadiness in his opinions and a disposition to waver in his views
from day to day; whereas it does not appear to me as if the state
of Spain depended upon diurnal circumstances and events, but