Page:History of New South Wales from the records, Volume 1.djvu/496

 382 SOCIAL QUESTIONS. 1789 of the First Fleet. But beyond an inquiry addressed to an Under Secretary for a statement of the estimated expendi- ture, probably required for the purpose of the budget, there is no indication that he had devoted more than passing attention to the project. If there were any reason to suppose that he had framed the society which was put Brougham's together on the shores of Sydney Cove by Phillip, it would bis stotes- greatly justify Brougham's opinion of his statesmanship : — " For the leading defect of his life, which is seen through all his measures, and which not even his great capacity and intense industry could . supply, was an ignorance of the principles on which large measures are to be framed, and nations to be at once guided and improved."* There was a still graver defect in his statesmanship to which Brougham made no allusion in his summary of Pitt's shortcomings ; but it was one that was common to all the statesmen of his age. His energies were devoted so exclusively to financial and foreign affairs that the great Social social questions of the time received no attention from him. questions ''- not While he was devising new schemes for improving the revenue, or fresh combinations for checking the progress of the French Revolution, such small matters as the educa- tion of the people, the prevention of crime by means of an effective system of police, the amendment of the criminal laws, the purification of the gaols, and the introduction of sound methods of penal discipline, were entirely overlooked. During his tenure of office as Prime Minister, which lasted for eighteen years, these questions remained as they were when he began his career ; and so far as his administration was concerned, the moral state of the nation benefited no more by his policy than it did by that of Sir Robert Wal- pole, or any other of his predecessors. He seemed, indeed, Internal to think that because questions of internal reform were to the Home officially within the province of his' Home Secretary, they ®P* ®° ■ y^QT^Q beneath the dignity of a Prime Minister, and accord- ^ Statesmen of the Time of George III. Digitized byCjOOQlC