Every Ministry in England, on going out of office, leaves its contingent of ennobled tradesmen, raised to the peerage solely for their money, and for the way in which they have spent their money for the Party. In this way the so-called Conservative leaders possess a solid phalanx of supporters whose wealth makes them irresistible in the country, and who practically send up to Westminster any men they choose. These great _richards_ find Joseph Chamberlain more to their taste than Lord Salisbury, who is too scholarly, too satirical, and too great a gentleman for them; his health is failing, he speaks rarely, there is a cynical contempt in his occasional speeches which cuts the _novi homines_ like a whip. It is impossible that a man of Lord Salisbury's pride of character and acuteness of intellect should much longer consent to be the mere echo of his Colonial Secretary. There is every sign that his retirement will be followed by the accession to the premiership of Chamberlain. For months past the Imperialist Press, and notably that journal which is the property of the Chancellor of the Primrose League, has been insinuating that no one except Chamberlain is capable of rising to the height required by advanced Imperialism: and what this journal says is certain to be echoed by that party, which, with an audacity almost sublime, still calls itself Conservative.
Chamberlain has continued the work of Disraeli, but he has done so by vulgarising and brutalising it. The best qualities of the English character are, under his influence, lost in a blatant self-admiration. Its sense of morality is blunted; its leaders accept any denial or excuse of the Minister of the Colonies, and he is applauded when, as an independent Member said a few weeks since in the House of Commons, he should be called to the bar of the House. Parliament, and the nation after it, accept the suppression of despatches and telegrams, the use and abuse of censorship, the denial and interruption of free speech, the closure of debate at the moment when its continuance would be inconvenient to ministers: all things previously intolerable to the English people. Chamberlain has educated them into the abandonment of all their ancient virtues. If, as he is almost certain to do if he live, he become before long the Premier of England, he will do immeasurable harm both to Great Britain and the world.