Maxims And Opinions Of Field Marshal His Grace The Duke Of Wellington, Selected From His Writings And Speeches During A Public Life Of More Than Half A Century by Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington

A >> Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington >> Maxims And Opinions Of Field Marshal His Grace The Duke Of Wellington, Selected From His Writings And Speeches During A Public Life Of More Than Half A Century

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In a few days after, the Marquis of Anglesea, the lord lieutenant, who
had always been the avowed supporter of the Catholics, also addressed a
letter in reply to one he received from Dr. Curtis, in which he gave the
Catholics advice as to the best mode of proceeding in order to attain
emancipation. This conduct on the part of the viceroy, together with the
open countenance he gave to the leading catholics in Dublin, gave the
strongest offence to the king, and amounted to such a breach of duty
that the Duke of Wellington was compelled to recall the marquis from
Ireland.

The public mind was now in the greatest perplexity. On the one hand, the
state of Ireland seemed to render some measure of concession inevitable,
while on the other there was the letter to Dr. Curtis, and the dismissal
of the lord lieutenant--facts which seemed to discountenance all hope.

The year 1829 was the most eventful in the civil career of the Duke of
Wellington. He had been throughout his life the opponent of Roman
Catholic emancipation: he was now to come before the public in the new
character of a prime minister prepared to grant, as a measure of free
grace, that which he had hitherto denounced as inconsistent with the
safety of the Protestant constitution.

Up to within a few days of the opening of parliament, however, the
design of the government was wholly concealed, but in the speech from
the throne parliament was recommended to entertain the question. In the
debate on the address the Duke of Wellington announced it as the
intention of the government to introduce a measure for the emancipation
of the Catholics. And now arose a political storm almost unparalleled in
the history of party, from the effects of which we are scarcely yet
recovered.

The Duke and Mr. Peel were immediately made the objects of the most
unrelenting hostility by the opponents of emancipation. Seeing the
favour in which the two statesmen are now held by their party, it would
be almost impossible to believe that such abusive language as was then
poured forth could have been used towards them, were it not on record.

The Duke especially was charged with a treble treachery; to Mr. Canning,
on account of the transactions previously referred to; towards the
Protestant party, of whom he had been the chosen leader, and whom he was
about to betray; and lastly a personal treachery in the concealment of
his design until the moment of execution, by which he prevented others
from coming forward and taking the station he had abandoned, as leader
of the opponents of emancipation.

The Duke's replies to all these charges will be found at length in the
following pages. But the charge of personal treachery was afterwards put
in a shape which compelled the Duke of Wellington to take a very
different notice of it. The Earl of Winchelsea wrote a letter to the
secretary of King's College, in which, after adverting to the support
which the Duke had given on Protestant principles to that institution,
he stated that he now believed that the Duke's conduct had been only a
blind to the high church party, and that he was about, under the cloak
of the Protestant religion, to carry into effect his insidious designs
for the infringement of our liberties, and the introduction of Popery
into every department of the state. This letter the Duke found himself
bound to notice; but the earl refused to retract. A correspondence took
place, which ended in a duel. Neither party was hurt, and the earl
subsequently made a public apology for the original expressions.

In the meanwhile the Emancipation Bill was steadily progressing. On the
19th of February, in introducing the bill for the suppression of
dangerous associations, the Duke of Wellington declared that there had
been no previous bargain or compact with the Roman Catholic party while
the Emancipation Bill was in the House of Commons. Short discussions
took place almost every night in the House of Lords upon its merits, in
which whenever the Duke joined he did so with the greatest reluctance.
At length, on the 2nd of April, he moved the second reading of the bill
in the House of Lords, in a speech which reflected credit upon him for
moral courage, if not for consistency.

In fact, great moral courage is one of the most striking features in the
character of the Duke of Wellington. Some of his supporters will doubt
this assertion; and will point to the Emancipation Act as a proof that
the Duke wanted the firmness to act up to his avowed principles. This
involves a wrong assumption. It is one thing obstinately to adhere to an
opinion in defiance of its impracticability: another to retract that
opinion so soon as its impracticability is demonstrated. Whether the
Duke was right or wrong in his opinions, no one will deny that it
required great moral courage for him to stand up in the face of the
country, braving the anger of his old associates, and declare that he
could no longer resist the force of public opinion.

It was in the course of the speech introducing the Emancipation Bill
that the Duke made his well-known declaration "that he would sacrifice
his life to prevent one month of civil war."

One fruit of the angry passions excited during the progress of the
Emancipation Bill was a series of prosecutions against the _Morning
Journal_ for libels on the Duke of Wellington, the Lord Chancellor, and
the government collectively. These prosecutions were conducted with
unusual acrimony by Sir James Scarlet, the Attorney-General; and the
Duke of Wellington came in for a very considerable share of public
censure for having authorised such prosecutions. Probably the Duke
intended to inflict another "great moral lesson," as he has always set
his face against the unrestrained license of the press; but, looking
back with calmer feelings to the events of that excited period, and
admitting that the language used by the editor was certainly too strong,
though faithfully representing the feelings of a large class of the
public, it is certainly difficult to avoid now coming to the conclusion
that Mr. Alexander, when sentenced to twelve months' imprisonment in
Newgate and heavy fines, was treated with a severity scarcely
justifiable. It is probable that the Duke of Wellington, acting on his
rigid notions of the division of responsibility, after ordering the
prosecution, left the affair to Sir James Scarlet, and from that moment
declined to interfere.

Among the discussions to which the prosecutions gave rise, an amusing
speech of Sir Charles Wetherell, on the 2nd of March, 1830, in the House
of Commons, will repay perusal.

In a debate which took place in the House of Lords on the first night of
the session, upon the state of the country, the Duke of Wellington
delivered a speech upon the causes of the existing distress, which
proved (allowances being made for differences of opinion) that his
qualifications to deal with the most intricate questions involved in
civil government were very little inferior to his military talents.
Passages from that speech will be found in the following pages. At the
time many of his views were ridiculed by those political economists who
were destined so soon to rise to power under shelter of the reform
question; but it will be seen that the improved experience of the
country after ten years' undisputed sway of those gentlemen, confirms
many of the chief conclusion to which the astute and practical mind of
the Duke of Wellington then led him. That speech, however, raised a
hornet's nest around him in the House of Commons. Among others, Sir
Francis Burdett made a personal attack on the Duke, in which he said
that his administration showed how correct was his estimate of his own
powers when he said he would be mad to think of being prime minister.
That illustrious individual, he said, had been treated with much
tenderness, because he had conferred the greatest benefits on his
country; but if his services had been great his recompense had been
great also. Mr. Brougham, also, made a most personal attack on the Duke
on the day before parliament closed.

In the mean while, George the Fourth died (on the 26th of June), and
parliament was dissolved. The new parliament, called by William the
Fourth, was opened by the king in person on November the 2nd. It was
decidedly unfavourable to the ministry, against whom were arrayed a most
talented and unscrupulous opposition. They swayed with almost absolute
power the great mass of the people, who hoped everything from
parliamentary reform, and had not as yet had experience of the
extravagance of such hopes. A part of the tactics of the whig leaders
was to excite personal animosity against the Duke of Wellington, who was
libelled as a sort of would-be military dictator, seeking to introduce
in civil affairs the iron discipline of the camp, and to ride rough shod
over a free people.

With the clamour for reform out of doors and in the commons, it was not
to be supposed that even the impassible Duke of Wellington could avoid
referring to the subject in the debate on the address. This he did, with
more candour than prudence, by his well-known declaration against
reform, and in favour of the existing system. It will be found at length
elsewhere. The excitement it produced was enormous: so great, that in
three days afterwards ministers advised William the Fourth not to
proceed to the City to visit the Lord Mayor, lest there should be
tumults.

On the 15th, they were defeated in the House of Commons, upon a motion
of Sir Henry Parnell, for a committee to inquire into the civil list;
and on the following day the Duke of Wellington and his colleagues
resigned; being apprehensive that the same majority would vote for the
principle of parliamentary reform in a day or two after, and not wishing
to virtually give up that question by going out after being beaten on it
in the House of Commons.

During the year 1831, while the discussions on the Reform Bill were
going on, the Duke made frequent speeches against the measure, and led
the opposition in the House of Lords in a manner quite consistent with
his declaration in November. In a speech he made on the 28th March,
explanatory of the causes of his resignation, he distinctly denied that
the reform fever was owing to that declaration, and asserted that it
was to be attributed to the effect on the public mind of the revolutions
in France and Belgium.

On the 10th of October, after the Reform Bill had been thrown out in the
House of Lords, the Duke of Wellington was insulted by a mob on his way
to the house. In the evening, the windows of his mansion at Hyde
Park-corner were broken. It is to be lamented that any class of
Englishmen were to be found so degraded as to be guilty of this
ingratitude.

Fortunately, the worst of the evil was averted, by the total
indifference of the Duke to all such demonstrations. The greatest men
have been despisers of mankind, of the swaying multitude, that is to
say, the unthinking, the headstrong, and the violent--not of necessity
merely, from that intrinsic superiority and natural antagonism which
forbid their commingling; but also, and with a more hearty potency, from
the experience which they, alternately the adored or the scorned, have
had of the inconstancy of the giddy people. In this light estimation,
indeed, of the judgment of their less worthy fellows, lies the secret of
their greatness and their strength. They ride towards their goal while
the stream tends that way, and when the course of the current is
diverted, they are not dismayed. Their scorn of the means leads them to
pass on by their own strength, or to rest secure on the foundation-rock
of our moral nature--principle, and the consciousness of duty done.

In April, 1832, on the motion for the second reading of the new Reform
Bill in the House of Lords, the Duke made a speech, characterised by
unqualified opposition to the measure, at a time when many of the
conservative peers (called "waverers,") were for giving it a qualified
support. But, after a defeat of ministers in committee, on Lord
Lyndhursts motion of the 7th of May, followed by their resignation, and
when the king, rather than agree to create peers, called on the Duke of
Wellington to form an administration, he expressed his readiness to do
so upon the principle of moderate reform.

This sudden inconsistency the public could not understand; the Duke's
avowed reason was that when called on by his sovereign he could not
leave him alone in his difficulty. However, the Duke's efforts were
brought to a summary conclusion by the refusal of Sir Robert Peel to
join in the attempt.

It is amusing to see the opposite Views these two statesmen took of
their duties to their king. Sir Robert Peel considered that "his
acceptance of office pledged to carry an efficient Reform Bill, he being
a determined enemy to such a measure, would be a political immorality
which would not allow him to enter on his services with a firm step, a
light heart, and an erect attitude." The Duke said, "if he had refused
to assist his majesty, because he had hitherto given his opposition to
parliamentary reform, he would not have been able to show his face in
the streets for shame of having deserted his sovereign in circumstances
so painful and alarming." The result of Sir Robert's refusal was, that
the Duke gave up the attempt, and Earl Grey was recalled.

During the sessions of 1833 and 1834, the Duke was the leader of the
opposition in the House of Lords; always at his post, and always ready
to grapple with the different questions brought before the peers. On the
9th of June, 1834, took place his installation as Chancellor of the
University of Oxford;--a brilliant scene, at which some of the most
distinguished men of the day assisted.

In November, 1834, on the death of Lord Spencer, and the dismissal of
the whig ministry, the king called on the Duke of Wellington to form an
administration. The Duke recommended his majesty to entrust that office
to Sir Robert Peel, who, however, was then at Rome. During the interval
that elapsed before his arrival, the Duke accepted, provisionally, the
office of First Lord of the Treasury, and the seals of the three
secretaryships of state. On Sir Robert Peel's arrival, he gave up the
government, with the exception of the office of Secretary for Foreign
Affairs, which (December 9th) he retained.

Much clamour was at this time raised against the Duke by the whigs, on
the old score of dictatorship, and also as to a supposed insult offered
to Lord Melbourne.

On the meeting of parliament in the following February (on the 24th),
the Duke gave an explanation of his conduct (inserted in this volume),
sufficient to clear him in all impartial eyes of all the charges then
urged against him by party spirit.

On the 8th of April following, in consequence of the repeated defeats
sustained in the House of Commons by Sir Robert Peel, the conservative
ministry resigned, and with them of course the Duke of Wellington. From
that time until the re-accession of Sir Robert Peel to power, in 1841,
the Duke continued to lead, with his accustomed vigour and unpretending
ability, the opposition in the House of Lords. In this position, he
exercised the utmost forbearance towards the government; never using his
power except when circumstances absolutely required its exercise.

One of these instances occurred at the opening of the session of 1836,
when the principles of a particular measure were recommended in a speech
from the throne. To the address the Duke moved an amendment,
condemnatory of the practice of thus pledging the sovereign in a speech
from the throne to the principles of any measure. The amendment was
agreed to by the whigs.

During the whole interval between 1833 and 1841, the Duke is to be found
occasionally speaking in the upper house, in his capacity of leader of
opposition. The same sound practical sense which has been already
attributed to him, characterised his whole proceedings. It is needless
to particularise the different important debates in which he took part.

In August, 1839, a grand banquet was given to the Duke at Dover, as Lord
Warden of the Cinque Ports. A splendid pavilion was erected for the
occasion, in which two thousand persons, including some most
distinguished men, sat down to dinner. The gallery was filled with
ladies. The most interesting point in the day's proceedings, was when
Lord Brougham, the most active and distinguished civilian of his age,
rose to propose the health of the Duke of Wellington, the most
illustrious military commander. Eulogium could scarcely he carried
farther than it was by Lord Brougham in these words:--

"Although no man," said the noble and learned lord, "on such an
occasion, is entitled to entertain any personal feelings on his own
behalf, it would be affectation--it would be insolent ingratitude--were
I not to express the sentiments which glow within my bosom, at being
made the instrument of making known those feelings which reign
predominant in yours. Enough, however, of myself--now for my mighty
subject.--But the choice you have made of your instrument--of your
organ, as it were, on this occasion--is not unconnected with that
subject; for it shows that on this day, on this occasion, all personal,
all political feelings are quelled--all strife of party is hushed--that
we are incapable, whatever be our opinions, of refusing to acknowledge
transcendant merit, and of denying that we feel the irresistible impulse
of unbounded gratitude; and I am therefore asked to do this service, as
if to show that no difference of opinion upon subjects, however
important--no long course of opposition, however contracted upon public
principles--not even long inveterate habits of public opposition--are
able so far to stifle the natural feelings of our hearts, so far to
obscure our reason, as to prevent us from feeling as we ought--boundless
gratitude for boundless merit. Neither can it pluck from our minds that
admiration proportioned to the transcendant genius, in peace and in war,
of him who is amongst us to-day; nor can it lighten or alleviate the
painful, the deep sense which the untried mind never can get rid of when
it is overwhelmed by a debt of gratitude, too boundless to be repaid.
Party--the spirit of party--may do much, but it cannot operate so far as
to make us forget those services; it cannot so far bewilder the memory,
and pervert the judgment, and eradicate from our bosoms those feelings
which do us the most honour, and are the most unavoidable, and, as it
were, dry up the kindly juices of the heart; and, notwithstanding all
its vile and malignant influence on other occasions, it cannot dry up
those juices of the heart so as to parch it like very charcoal, and make
it almost as black. But what else have I to do? If I had all the
eloquence of all the tongues ever attuned to speak, what else could I
do? How could a thousand words, or all the names that could be named,
speak so powerfully--ay, even if I spoke with the tongue of an angel, as
if I were to mention one word--Sir Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington,
the hero of a hundred fields, in all of which his banner was waved in
triumph; who never, I invoke both hemispheres to witness--bear witness
Europe, bear witness Asia--who never advanced but to cover his arms with
glory; the captain who never advanced but to be victorious; the mightier
captain who never retreated but to eclipse the glory of his advance, by
the yet harder task of unwearied patience, indomitable to lassitude, the
inexhaustible resources of transcendant skill, showing the wonders, the
marvels of a moral courage never yet subdued. Despising all who thwarted
him with ill-considered advice--neglecting all hostility, so he knew it
to be groundless--laughing to scorn reviling enemies, jealous
competitors, lukewarm friends, ay, hardest of all, to neglect despising
even a fickle public, he cast his eye forwards as a man might--else he
deserves not to command men--cast forward his eye to a time when that
momentary fickleness of the people would pass away, knowing that in the
end the people are always just to merit."

The Duke's acknowledgement, was simple, according to his character, and
modest as became his position. He said, "The noble lord, who I hope will
allow me to call him my noble friend, has stated to you with great
truth, that there are times and circumstances in which, and under which,
all feelings of party, all party animosity, all descriptions of
political feelings must be laid aside. I must do my noble and learned
friend the justice to say, that for years and years there has been
nothing of that description in social life as between him and me,
notwithstanding which it is certainly true that I have had the
misfortune of differing in opinion with my noble and learned friend upon
many points of internal and possibly of other descriptions of policy.
But I am afraid that, notwithstanding my most anxious wish to co-operate
with all of you in the public service in which we have all been
employed, I may happen (I know it does happen) to differ with some of
you upon subjects of political interest to the country. But my noble and
learned friend judges of you correctly when he says that such feelings
of difference would not prevent you--as they have not prevented
you--from doing me the honour of inviting me to this festival, and of
bringing here to meet me not only the whole of this interesting county,
but persons from all parts of the kingdom and even from abroad.
Therefore my noble and learned friend does you as well as himself
justice when he states that there are occasions--occasions in relation
to individuals as well as in relation to public interests and
services--in which all feelings of party politics and opinions must be
laid aside, in order to carry on the public service to the greatest
point of advantage to the public interest. I have had sufficient
experience in public life to know that this must be the case. I am
convinced that it is that feeling which has induced you to pay this
tribute of respect to the person holding the situation of Lord Warden of
the Cinque Ports, in order that you might encourage others hereafter to
perform their duty honestly and conscientiously in the same honourable
office."

On the 18th November, the same year, the Duke had an attack of epilepsy,
which for a short time alarmed the public greatly for his safety, on
account of his advanced age. Sir Astley Cooper and Dr. Hume were down at
Walmer with him for a week, at the end of which time he recovered,
greatly to the joy of the whole nation. It turned out that the Duke had
brought on the attack adopting, to cure himself of a slight illness, a
mode of treatment which would not be the most wise in a man of
twenty-five, but was most dangerous to one so advanced in years. The
Duke is very determined on such points--can never be persuaded that he
is not the same man in point of constitution that he was when in the
Peninsula; and still preserves all the hardy habits of a soldier's life.
On this occasion he had sought to cure himself by fasting and cold
bathing: he then, while under this treatment, followed the hounds, the
consequence of which was that he fainted, and was soon afterwards seized
as described.

On the return of Sir Robert Peel to power, in 1841, the Duke of
Wellington again joined him; but this time he took no office, though
accepting a seat in the cabinet. He still continued to lead in the
lords, where his influence is fully felt, and where he constantly
astonishes the house and silences his detractors by displaying a degree
of knowledge on all legislative subjects scarcely compatible with his
military education, and an activity and attention to business that would
be admirable in any one, but which are still more praiseworthy as the
voluntary service of a man who has conferred such distinguished benefits
on his country.

* * * * *

Few men have been so blessed by fortune as to have been enabled to
achieve a first-rate reputation in arms, and afterwards to arrive at as
great distinction in the arts of peace. Rarely, at long intervals in the
lapse of time, such opportunities have been afforded to great men; but
still more rarely have even the greatest men been able to use them. To
the Duke of Wellington, in our own time, has this high honour been
especially vouchsafed; and no man ever yet lived who shewed himself more
worthy the distinction, or more able to fulfill the demands of his
country, whether in peace or in war. His youth and prime were spent in
achieving victories: to preserve to posterity the fruits of those
victories, in steady government, together with free institutions; to
make England such an example for foreign nations as would render all
such victories unnecessary hereafter; this has been the still more
glorious task of his declining years.

The military reputation of the Duke of Wellington rests on so firm a
basis, that it will never be shaken. So long as military science is
necessary in the world, so long will his system of tactics be followed
by commanders responsible in their own hearts for the lives of their
soldiers, and to their country for the conduct of their enterprises.

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