LONDON, April 13th, 1866.—This is my never-to-be-forgotten day. Auntie P. and I did St. G. in the E., taking flowers there. I read to a roomful of oakum-picking women. We went to the House afterwards, quite on the chance ; and had the immense luck of hearing the famous Mr. J. S. Mill make a most perfect speech in favour of the Franchise Bill. In spite of the cry-down humour the Tories are in, it was striking to have this small-voiced philosopher listened to with the greatest possible attention and respect ; and indeed the speech was irresistibly fair, profound, and trenchant. Three or 4 times he made a dead pause of more than a minute, but only to produce some new, cogent argument armed at all points and perfectly expressed ; though he was keenly satirical once or twice, the whole tone of his speech was gentle and temperate to a degree. The Opposition held their tongues as if bewitched ! He followed Sir Bulwer Lytton, who made a slashing, clever speech. I found myself a good deal struck and moved, coming straight out of one of the depths of misery and pauperism, to hear the claims of the people so grandly brought forward : those "dumb" thousands, as Bright called them, among whom there must be so many feeling, as none of us can feel, for all this degradation ; and voiceless in the nation whom they might help to rouse to the most noble of battles
Just compare & contrast with Daniel Finkelstein’s If you thought this was bad, just wait in today’s Times
It is hard to imagine anyone of the stature of John Stuart Mill becoming a member of today’s House of Commons
The House may have listened respectfully to Mill on this occasion, but he was not an especially effective MP overall. He used to bore & offend members with his lofty lectures on land economics & the proper response to the Cattle Plague. And of course he lost his seat in the 1868 Election
Which came as something of a relief to Mill, who went on to spend much of his time in Avignon. As he later wrote:
“It is an infinitely pleasanter mode of spending May to read the Gorgias and Theatetus under the avenue of mulberries, surrounded by roses and nightingales, than it would be to listen to tiresome speaking for half the night in the House of Commons.”
Although MPs do not often these days have to sit through half the night there must be an awful lot of MPs today (not to mention their families) who are wishing devoutly that they had found more pleasant & restful occupations
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Lady Frederick Cavendish (2)
The N word then & now
