rward as towards a door of hope!

Parliaments, I think, have proved too well, in late years, that they are
not the remedy. It is not Parliaments, reformed or other, that will ever
send Herculean men to Downing Street, to reform Downing Street for us;
to diffuse therefrom a light of Heavenly Order, instead of the murk of
Stygian Anarchy, over this sad world of ours. That function does not lie
in the capacities of Parliment. That is the function of a _King_,--if
we could get such a priceless entity, which we cannot just now! Failing
which, Statesmen, or Temporary Kings, and at the very lowest one real
Statesman, to shape the dim tendencies of Parliament, and guide them
wisely to the goal: he, I perceive, will be a primary condition,
indispensable for any progress whatsoever.

One such, perhaps, might be attained; one such might prove discoverable
among our Parliamentary populations? That one, in such an enterprise as
this of Downing Street, might be invaluable! One noble man, at once
of natural wisdom and practical experience; one Intellect still really
human, and not red-tapish, owlish and pedantical, appearing there in
that dim chaos, with word of command; to brandish Hercules-like the
divine broom and shovel, and turn running water in upon the place, and
say as with a fiat, "Here shall be truth, and real work, and talent
to do it henceforth; I will seek for able men to work here, as for the
elixir of life to this poor place and me:"--what might not one such man
effect there!

Nay one such is not to be dispensed with anywhere in the affairs of
men. In every ship, I say, there must be a _seeing_ pilot, not a mere
hearing one! It is evident you can never get your ship steered through
the difficult straits by persons standing ashore, on this bank and that,
and shouting _their_ confused directions to you: "'Ware that Colonial
Sandbank!--Starboard now, the Nigger Question!--Larboard, _larboard_,
the Suffrage Movement! Financial Reform, your Clothing-Colonels
overboard! The Qualification Movement, 'Ware-re-re!--Helm-a-lee! Bear a
hand there, will you! Hr-r-r, lubbers, imbeciles, fitter for a tailor's
shopboard than a helm of Government, Hr-r-r!"--And so the ship wriggles
and tumbles, and, on the whole, goes as wind and current drive. No ship
was ever steered except to destruction in that manner. I deliberately
say so: no ship of a State either. If you cannot get a real pilot on
board, and put the helm into his hands, your