The Mirrors of Downing Street: Some Political Reflections by a Gentleman with a DusterBegbie, Harold
History
The Mirrors of Downing Street: Some Political Reflections by a Gentleman with a Duster
Begbie, Harold
Great Britain -- Politics and government -- 1910-1936; Statesmen -- Great Britain
The nation has reason on its side for suspecting Lord Robert Cecil. In
the mind of the British people nothing is more settled than the
conviction that the conquering qualities of a great captain are courage
and confidence. He has given no sign of these qualities. Nature, it
would seem, has fashioned him neither pachydermatous nor pugilistic. He
appears upon the platform as a gentleman makes his entrance into a
drawing-room, not as a toreador leaps into the bull ring. He expresses
his opinions as a gentleman expresses his views at a dinner-table, not
as an ale-house politician airs his dogmatisms in the tap-room. The very
qualities which give such a grace and power to his personality, being
spiritual qualities, prevent him from capturing the loud and grateful
loyalty of a political party.
Now, while a man like Mr. Lloyd George can only affirm his own essence
by the exercise of what we may call brute force, and by making use of
vulgar methods from which a person of Lord Robert Cecil's quality would
naturally shrink, it is nevertheless not at all necessary for a man of
noble character and greater power to employ the same means in order to
earn the confidence of his countrymen.
What is necessary in this case is not brute force but fanaticism, and by
fanaticism I mean that spirit which in Cromwell induced Hume to call him
"this fanatical hypocrite," and which Burke adequately defined in saying
that when men are fanatically fond of an object _they will prefer it to
their own peace_.
Lord Robert Cecil need not adopt the tricks of a mountebank to achieve
leadership of the British nation, but he must contract so entire a faith
in the sacred character of his mission that all the inhibiting
diffidencies of his modest nature will henceforth seem to him like the
whisperings of temptation. He must cease to watch the shifts of public
opinion. He must cease merely to recommend the probable advantage of
rather more idealism in the politics of Europe. He must act. He must
learn to know that a man cannot give a great idea to the world without
giving himself along with it. The cause must consume the person.
Individual peace must be sacrificed for world's peace.
From the very beginning of the War Lord Robert Cecil perceived that the
need of the nation was not for a great political leader, but for a great
moral leader. He told me so with an unforgettable emphasis, well aware
that under the public show of our national life the heart of the British
people was famishing for such guidance. He numbered himself among those
anxiously scanning the horizon for such a leader. He should have been
instead answering the inarticulate cry of the people for that leader.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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