Page:History of the Radical Party in Parliament.djvu/106

 92 History of the Radical Party in Parliament. [i Soy- ordinary social and political influences, and nearer in sym- pathies to the rough and suffering millions, than to the smooth and subservient courtiers and placemen. Easy-going and respectable folk, fearful of giving offence, and anxious to stand well in the opinion of their little world, are not the stuff by which the forlorn hopes of politics are led. To give and take rough words and hard blows were the inevitable conditions of such a position, and this must be remembered when any attempt is made to estimate the character and the work of the Radicals in the beginning of this century. The two men who first assumed a position of antagonism to the old parties on behalf of the popular cause were not by social position and fortune separated from those whom they attacked. Lord Cochrane and Sir Francis Burdett, we are told by the writer previously quoted, " had become popular by disclaiming all attachment to all parties and factions." The writer goes on to say that the abilities and energy of Sir F. Burdett "had procured him a reputation not to be tarnished by any or all of the surmises concerning the danger of innovation, that is, the danger of timeous reformation and reparation." * In accounting for the hold which Burdett had at this time obtained upon the confidence and almost the affection of the people, we must not look forward to the eccen- tricities and follies of his later years, when, puffed by vanity and ambition, he played tricks which shocked his friends and admirers ; or when, disappointed in his inordinate desire for notoriety, he deserted the cause of which he had constituted himself the champion. In 1807 he aroused enthusiasm, because he made himself the spokesman of the wide-spread feeling that without constitutional changes no substantial reform of any kind was possible, and because he declared that neither of the two great parties in the State really desired such changes. The new Ministry soon began to show the principles upon which they considered that government ought to be conducted, and the new Parliament as quickly gave the assurance of its
 * "Annual Register," 1807.