Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 4.djvu/424

376 tion for the Berlin and Milan decrees. Brougham con ducted the lengthened inquiry which took place at the bar of the House, and he displayed on this occasion a mastery over the true principles of political economy and interna tional law which at that time no one else possessed. It saems incredible (though even now the delusion is not entirely dissipated) that the Government of a great com mercial nation should ever have thought that one of the most effectual and essential modes of carrying on war and destroying an enemy is to shut out the trade of neutrals, not perceiving that such measures rea.t with at least equal force against ourselves, and destroy the very sinews by which the burden of war can be sustained. The trade of the country was in truth suffering more from these fatal restrictions than from the war itself ; and nothing in the whole collection of Lord Brougham s harangues is more forcible or more ably reasoned than the speeches in which he described those sufferings, and denounced the cause of them. Nevertheless, in 180S, he was unsuccessful. Neither the evidence taken during a six months inquiry nor the eloquence of the impassioned advocate prevailed. It was not until 1812, when Brougham was himself in Parliament, that he resumed his attack on the Orders in Council with increased authority and vigour, aided by Mr Baring, and still more, perhaps, by the peril and disgrace of the quarrel with America, and he ultimately conquered. No answer was made to his great speech on that occasion, except an intimation from the Treasury bench that the Orders in Council would be revoked. Of this great triumph Brougham afterwards said : &quot; It was second to none of the efforts made by me, and not altogether without success, to ameliorate the condition of my fellow-men. In these I had the sympathy and aid of others, but in the battle against the Orders in Council I fought alone.&quot;

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