Page:History of the Radical Party in Parliament.djvu/247

 1 834.] The First Reformed Parliament. 233 than pleased at the influence they might exercise on ministers. This period of isolation is an inevitable stage in the history of any political or social organization, and is continued longest when men are most impressed with the importance of the principles to which they are devoted, and which they fear to injure by any compromise even on the details of administration. The relation of the Whigs towards the Radicals in this respect has already gone through three stages. The first was that in which the governing class refused to reckon the popular party at all as a source from which the Government was to be drawn or from which the ideas of government were to be derived. The second was when the importance of individual Radicals was recognized, not only on account of their personal ability, but because of their representative character ; but when they were still admitted not to affect the policy, but to strengthen the position of the Whigs. The third stage, which has only been very recently reached, was when not only the persons but the principles of Radicals were admitted into the highest counsels of the Liberal party, and the men were expected not only to support measures in Parliament, but to help to frame them in Cabinets. In all these cases the nation has been the gainer by the increase of the influence of those who have most directly represented the popular wishes who have striven to widen and improve its institutions, and to increase the social, the intellectual, and the political liberties of the people. The actual gain in numbers, and in influence, to the Radical party immediately following the passing of the Reform Act, has been variously estimated. In a work to which reference has been before made (" The Parliaments of England from first of George I. to the present time," by Henry Stocks Smith), the third volume of which was published in 1850, an attempt has been made at party classification, founded, as it appears, on the recorded views of candidates and local records and opinions. In this book the number of avowed or recognized Radicals in the first reformed House of Commons, elected in 1832, is given as forty-six, of which