Representative British Orations Volume 3 (of 4): With Introductions and Explanatory Notes
History
Representative British Orations Volume 3 (of 4): With Introductions and Explanatory Notes
Speeches, addresses, etc., English
Some people believe that it is a good thing to pay a great revenue
to the state. Even so eminent a man as Lord John Russell is not
without a delusion of this sort. Lord John Russell, as you have heard,
while speaking of me in flattering and friendly terms, says he is
unfortunately obliged to differ from me frequently; therefore, I
suppose there is no particular harm in my saying that I am sometimes
obliged to differ from him. Some time ago he was a great star in the
northern hemisphere, shining, not with unaccustomed, but with his usual
brilliancy at Liverpool. He made a speech, in which there was a great
deal to be admired, to a meeting composed, it was said, to a great
extent of working men; and in it he stimulated them to a feeling of
pride in the greatness of their country, and in being citizens of a
state which enjoyed a revenue of 100,000,000_l._ a year, which included
the revenues of the United Kingdom and of British India. But I think it
would have been far more to the purpose if he could have congratulated
the working men of Liverpool on this vast empire being conducted in an
orderly manner, on its laws being well administered and well obeyed,
its shores sufficiently defended, its people prosperous and happy, on a
revenue of 20,000,000_l._ The state indeed, of which Lord John Russell
is a part, may enjoy a revenue of 100,000,000_l._, but I am afraid the
working men can only be said to enjoy it in the sense in which men not
very choice in their expressions say that for a long time they have
enjoyed very bad health.
I am prepared to admit that it is a subject of congratulation that
there is a people so great, so free, and so industrious that it can
produce a sufficient income out of which 100,000,000_l._ a year, if
need absolutely were, could be spared for some great and noble object;
but it is not a thing to be proud of that our government should require
us to pay that enormous sum for the simple purposes of government and
defence.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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