Chapter 3

GEORGE CANNING.

[Sidenote: 1720-87--Canning and the King]

[Transcriber's note: the above dates are what were in the book, but 1820-37 would seem more logical.]

We have seen how the course of the proceedings taken against the Queen deprived the Liverpool Ministry of the services of its most brilliant member, George Canning. Canning had made up his mind from the beginning that he could not appear as one of the Queen's accusers, although he had consented, as a compromise, to the omission of her name from the Royal Liturgy. He had consented to this compromise because, although he did not believe in the worst of the charges against the Queen, he could not help admitting that there was much in her conduct which rendered her unsuitable as the reigning consort of the King; and at the time he did not understand that the King's disapproval of her actions was to take the form of a prosecution and a demand for divorce. He had applied to the King for leave to resign his office in the Ministry, and had only been induced to remain on the understanding that he was not expected to take any part in the public proceedings against the unhappy Caroline. When, however, it became evident that the whole question would be raised in the House of Commons, and that he must either give a silent assent to the course taken by the King's advisers or publicly condemn it there, he felt it his duty to send in his resignation of his place in the Ministry and to stand by his resolve. Canning withdrew from office and became, for the time, merely a private member of the House of Commons. King George got it into his mind that his former minister had deserted his cause at an anxious and critical moment, and the King, who was flighty enough in most of his purposes, seldom forgot what he regarded as an injury. He never forgave Canning, {32} although the time was now coming when hardly any choice was left him but to take Canning back into his service again, and under conditions that gave Canning a greater influence over public affairs than he had ever had before.

[Sidenote: 1720-87--The early life of Canning]

[Transcriber's note: see the note on page 31.]

After the group of illustrious men, which included the elder and the younger Pitt, Fox, Burke, and Sheridan, had disappeared from English public life, Canning was through the whole of his career the greatest Parliamentary orator and leader in England. Up to the time at which we have now arrived, he had not yet won his highest reputation as a statesman. He was born under conditions which might have been depressing and disheartening to one of different mould. His father was a man of old family and well connected, who had in his earlier years developed some taste for literature, and was regarded by most of his relatives as one who merely brought discredit on his kindred by his mean ambition to devote himself to the profession of letters. The elder Canning does not seem, however, to have had a capacity for making a real success in that way, and, indeed, it would appear as if he had too much of the often fatal gift of the amateur in his composition to allow him to concentrate his energies on any one pursuit. He sought for success in various fields and never found it, and he died soon after his son, George Canning, was born. The mother of the future statesman was thus left a widow while she was still young, and, as she had great beauty and believed that she had a vocation for the stage, she did her best to make a living for herself and her child by becoming a professional actress. She was not much of an actress, however, and, being unable to make any mark in London, she passed for a time into the provinces, and at last married an actor and disappeared from historical notice.

Meanwhile, the education of George Canning the son had been provided for by his uncle, a wealthy merchant and banker, Stratford Canning, whose son was afterwards famous as Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, the "great Elchi" of Kinglake. This uncle seemed anxious to make reparation for the manner in which his dead brother had been {33} treated by the family in general. The young Canning was sent to Eton and to Oxford, and began to study for the bar, but he displayed such distinct talents for literature and for politics that there seemed little likelihood of his devoting himself to the business of law. He soon became known at Oxford as a charming poet, a keen and brilliant satirist, and a public speaker endowed with a voice of marvellous intonation and an exquisite choice of words. He made the acquaintance of Sheridan and of Burke; by Burke he was introduced to Pitt, and by Sheridan to Fox, and it is believed to have been on the suggestion of Pitt that he resolved to devote himself to a Parliamentary career. He married a woman who had a large fortune, and he obtained a seat in the House of Commons. In that House he remained silent for a whole session after his election, and devoted himself to a close study of the rules, the usages, and the manners of the representative chamber. In those far-off days it was considered becoming on the part of a young member of the House to observe a modest silence for a great part of his first session, and to make himself familiar with the assembly before he ventured on any public display of his eloquence. The time had not yet come when it was considered humanly possible for a member of Parliament to make his first speech on the very day of his first introduction to the House of Commons.

Canning's first speech was a distinct success. He was thought by some critics to have imitated too closely the magnificent rhetorical style of Burke, but the exquisite voice and the noble elocution of Canning were all his own and certainly could not have been improved by any imitation of the voice and manner of Burke. Many of Canning's friends took it for granted that the young member would ally himself with the Whig Opposition, but Canning at once presented himself as the devoted follower of Pitt. Canning was afterwards the foremost among the creators of the _Anti-Jacobin_, a famous satirical periodical set up to throw ridicule on the principles and sentiments of the French Revolution, and of all those who encouraged its levelling theories or who aped its exalted professions of {34} humanity and of universal brotherhood. Canning made his way rapidly in public life, and became an Under-Secretary of State three years after his election to the House of Commons. His next appointment was that of Treasurer to the Navy, and in 1807 he became Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. A quarrel began between him and Lord Castlereagh, one of his colleagues, arising out of the unfortunate Walcheren expedition, and the quarrel resulted in a duel, after the fashion of the day, in which Canning received a wound.

[Sidenote: 1822--Canning and the governorship of India]

The policy of Castlereagh made as strong a contrast with the policy of Canning as even the contrast which was brought under the notice of every listener by the Parliamentary speeches of the two men. Canning was master of a polished eloquence which, at the time, had no rival in either House of Parliament. Castlereagh was one of the most singular and striking illustrations of the fact that a man may sometimes become a power in the House of Commons without the slightest gift of eloquence. Canning was a master of phrase, tone, and gesture. Castlereagh's language was commonplace, uncouth, and sometimes even ridiculous, and it happened only too often that in his anxiety to get his words out he became positively inarticulate. His policy represented the ideas of the Holy Alliance in their narrowest and most reactionary meaning; while Canning, although entirely opposed to the principles of mere revolution, had an utter contempt for the notion that a conclave of European sovereigns could lay down limits and laws for the growth and the government of all the European nationalities. The policy of Castlereagh has long since ceased to have any believers even among the advisers of autocratic sovereigns, while the policy of Canning is the recognized creed of statesmanship all over the civilized world.

Canning resigned his office as Foreign Secretary in 1809, and was for a short time sent on a special embassy to the Court of Lisbon. Then he became President of the Board of Control, which may be said to have divided at that time the management of our Indian possessions with the East {35} India Company, and he held this important office for about four years. Meanwhile he had resigned his seat for Newport, in the Isle of Wight, and had been elected as representative of the great and growing port of Liverpool in the House of Commons. The visitor to Liverpool at the present day can hardly go far through the great city without meeting some memorial of the veneration in which the illustrious name of Canning is held by the dwellers on the Mersey. A vacancy arose in the office of Governor-General of India, and the directors of the East India Company invited Canning to accept the splendid and commanding position. Canning at once made up his mind to close with the offer. The position would in many ways have suited his genius, his deep interest in the government of states, and the freshness of his ideas on all subjects connected with the growth of the Empire. Moreover, he knew that he had offended the King, and that George was not a man likely to forgive such an offence, and he thought he had reason to believe that, for the present at least, there was not much prospect for him of advancement in English political life. Many of his friends endeavored to persuade him against accepting a position which would make him an exile from England at a time when England's interests on the European continent required just such a genius as his to guide her foreign policy, and they felt sure that the time could not be far distant when he must be invited to resume his former place in the Administration. Canning, however, held to his purpose, accepted the offer of the East India Company, and went to Liverpool in order to take farewell of his constituency before setting out on his voyage to the scene of his new duties.

He stayed while in Liverpool at Seaforth House, the residence of Mr. John Gladstone, one of the merchant princes of Liverpool, whose son William Ewart Gladstone was afterwards to make the name of the family famous in history. During his stay at Seaforth House, Canning used to spend much of his time gazing out upon the sea, while the little boy William Ewart Gladstone played on the lawn near him. It was here that Canning heard the news {36} which led to an entire change in his purpose, and opened the way to his greatest success. His late colleague, his late rival, Castlereagh, was dead--had died by his own hand. Castlereagh had lately succeeded to his father's title, and had become Marquis of Londonderry; but as the marquisate was only an Irish peerage, he could still sit in the House of Commons as the chosen representative of an English constituency. His mind had seemed, for some time, to be darkened by troubles of which he gave no account to his friends, and he suddenly committed suicide. There are many conjectures and suggested explanations as to the immediate cause of the act, but all we know for certain is that the strong mind seemed suddenly to give way, and that Castlereagh could endure life no longer. Seldom, indeed, has the death of a public man in modern times been received with any such demonstrations as those which in many places followed the news that Castlereagh had done himself to death. In every community all over the country, and indeed all over Europe and the civilized world, there were those who proclaimed that the death of such a man was a positive blessing to the human race. Wherever men were struggling against despotism and suffering from tyranny, there were those who felt and who declared that the departure of Castlereagh from this world was a benefit to humanity at large.

[Sidenote: 1822--Canning as Foreign Secretary]

Yet the man himself had not a cruel or an ignoble nature. He had through all his life friends who loved him, and whose love his private character and conduct had well deserved. But he had made himself the English representative of the policy of the Holy Alliance at a time when every lover of liberty, and every believer in the development of free institutions and the beneficent results of their working, must have felt that even the excesses of the French Revolution gave no excuse for the deliberate setting-up of the doctrine of combined despotism. Men of liberal opinions were in an especially angry mood just then because England seemed to have gone in deliberately for the policy which authorized the "crowned conspirators," as Sydney Smith called them, to impose their edicts {37} on the whole continent of Europe. This condition of things may help to explain the cry of rejoicing with which the news of Castlereagh's suicide was received in so many places. The London crowd who followed the funeral procession to Westminster Abbey greeted the removal of the coffin with yells of execration. Byron wrote verses of savage bitterness about the dead man and his deed of self-murder--wrote some verses which no English publisher now would put into print.

The death of Castlereagh became a turning-point in the career of Canning. The whole voice of Liberal public opinion at once proclaimed that Canning was the only man left in the country who was capable of redeeming England's foreign policy from the discredit and disgrace brought upon it by Castlereagh's Administration. Even Lord Liverpool himself soon came to see that there was no other course left to him than to recommend the King to offer to Canning the place of Foreign Secretary. The King at first fought hard against the advice of his Prime Minister. The letters which passed between him and Lord Liverpool are a curiosity in their way. George had evidently persuaded himself that Canning was a monster of ingratitude, who had committed a positively unpardonable offence against his lord and master. Indeed, it was only by playing upon the King's personal vanity that Lord Liverpool at last brought him to accept the wholesome advice tendered to him. Lord Liverpool reminded George again and again that one of the noblest of a monarch's prerogatives was his power to grant forgiveness to any repentant sinner. George was probably beginning to be weary of the discussion, and perhaps had natural shrewdness enough to see that it could only end in one way. He therefore seemed to be taken by the appeal made to his generosity for pardon to a penitent offender, and he consented to make approaches to Canning with regard to the office of Foreign Secretary. At first, however, the King made so ostentatious a profession of his magnanimous desire to pardon the remorseful wrong-doer that Canning could not bring himself to accept the abject position which {38} his sovereign was arranging for him. He therefore declined at first to take any office under such conditions, and the King had to come down from his high horse and treat with his subject in less arrogant fashion. The King, at last, so far modified his language as to leave the prerogative of mercy out of the question, and Canning, by the advice of all his friends and supporters, consented to become once more a member of the Administration and to undertake the duties of Foreign Secretary.

[Sidenote: 1822-27--Canning's fitness for Foreign Minister]

This, we have said, was the turning-point in the career of Canning. It was also a turning-point in the modern history of England. The violence of the reaction against the principles of the French Revolution had spent itself, and the public mind of this country was beginning to see that the turbulence of democracy was not likely to be safely dealt with by the setting-up of despotism. Canning himself was a living illustration of the manner in which many great intellects had been affected by the course of events between the fall of Napoleon and the death of Castlereagh. Canning in his earlier days was in sympathy with the theories and doctrines of popular liberty, and we have seen that up to the time of his actually entering Parliament it was generally believed he would rank himself with the Whig Opposition. But, like many other men who loved liberty too, he had been alarmed by the aggressive policy of Napoleon, and he believed that the position of England was best guaranteed by the later policy of Pitt. Then came the Congress of Vienna, and the deliberate attempt to reconstruct the map of continental Europe, and to decree the destinies of nations according to the despotic principles of the Holy Alliance.

Canning soon recognized the fact, obvious enough, one might have thought, even to a man of intellect far lower than that of Canning, that the traditions, the instincts, and the feelings of a people must count for something in the form and manner of their government, and that there are forces at work in the hearts and minds of peoples which can no more be governed by imperial and royal decrees than can the forces of physical nature itself. He {39} had unconsciously anticipated in his own mind that doctrine of nationalities which afterwards came to play so momentous and so clearly recognized a part in the politics of the world. He saw how the policy of Castlereagh had made England the recognized ally of all the old-world theories of divine right and unconditional loyalty, and had made her a fellow-worker with the sovereigns of the Holy Alliance for the restoration of tyranny all over the European continent. He understood the nature and the meaning of the new forces which were coming up in political life; he saw that the French Revolution was not destined to end in the mere restoration of mediaeval despotism. He saw that the American Revolution had opened a new chapter in the history of the modern world, and that no man, whether he called himself Tory or Whig, was fit to be intrusted with the administration of England's foreign policy who had not learned the lessons taught by the closing years of the eighteenth and the opening years of the nineteenth century. Canning had much of that imaginative faculty without which there can hardly be any real statesmanship. Even his gift of humor helped him in this way. He was able to understand the feelings, the tempers, and the conditions of men with whom he had little opportunity of personal contact. He could bring himself into sympathy with the aspirations of peoples who were wholly foreign in race to him, and who would have been mere foreigners and nothing else in the eyes of many of his political colleagues.

If Lord Londonderry had lived and had continued, as no doubt he would have done, to hold the Foreign Office, he would have been England's representative at the Congress of Verona. The new chances opened by his death inspired that demand for the services of Canning which compelled the King at last to yield and invite Canning back to his old place. The Congress of Verona was in fact a reassembling of the Holy Alliance for the purpose of taking once more into consideration the disturbed state of Europe, and laying down once more the lines of the only policy which, according to the judgment of the despotic {40} sovereigns and their ministers, could restore peace to the Continent. The disturbances arose simply from the fact that some of the European populations were rising up against the policy of the Holy Alliance, and were agitating for the principles of constitutional government. The immediate and ostensible object for the summoning of the Congress was the fact that Greece had been trying to throw off the yoke of Turkey, and that the leading members of the Holy Alliance believed it was their business and their right to say what was to be done with Greece, and whether or not it was for their convenience that she should be held in perpetual bondage.

[Sidenote: 1822-27--England and the Congress of Verona]

But there were troubles also in Spain, because the Spanish sovereign had been giving way to the desire of his people for a system of constitutional government and for the recognition of the principle that a people has something to do with the making as well as with the obeying of laws. The restored Bourbon Government in France declared that it saw dangers to its own rights and its own security in these concessions to popular demand, made in a country which was only divided from French territory by the barrier of the Pyrenees. It was intimated in the clearest manner that the Bourbon Government of France would be prepared, if necessary, to undertake armed intervention in the affairs of Spain in order to prevent the Spaniards from thus setting a bad example to the subjects of the Bourbon dynasty. Then the condition of Poland was giving some alarm to the despotic monarchs of the Continent everywhere; for, if Poland were to rise and were allowed to assert its liberty, who could tell on what soil, sacred to despotism, other rebellious movements might not also break out. Therefore, the monarchs of the Holy Alliance were much perturbed, and came to the conclusion that, as the Congress of Vienna had not succeeded in enforcing all its edicts, the only wise thing would be to call together another Congress, to be held this time at Verona, and there go over all the work again with greater vigor and determination.

Now it was unavoidable that England should be invited {41} to take part in this Congress, seeing that, but for the assistance given by England, there would never have been a chance for even the Congress of Vienna to make any attempt at the regulation of Europe. Besides, it was well known that Lord Londonderry had been a main instrument in the formation and execution of the plans laid down by the Congress of Vienna, and although England, on that occasion, had not been able to go quite as far as her allies would have wished her to accompany them, yet it was not thought possible to leave England without an invitation to be represented at the Congress of Verona. On the death of Lord Londonderry it was resolved by the English Government to send the Duke of Wellington to Verona. The Duke had never professed any particular ideas of his own with regard to foreign policy, but he was the most loyal of men in obeying the instructions of those who were properly authorized to direct his movements, and in whom he could place his confidence. When Canning consented to accept office the Duke at once put himself into communication with the new Foreign Secretary, and wrote to him from Paris informing Canning of his belief that the Spanish question would be brought, in some shape or other, under the consideration of the Congress, and asking Canning for instructions as to the course which he ought to adopt. Canning despatched a reply to the Duke, one passage of which may be regarded as a full illustration of the new principle which he had determined to establish in England's foreign policy. The words of the great statesman cannot be read with too close an attention. Canning declares that, "If there be a determined project to interfere by force or by menace in the present struggle in Spain, so convinced are his Majesty's Government of the uselessness and danger of any such interference, so objectionable does it appear to them in principle as well as in practical execution, that when the necessity arises--or, I would rather say, when the opportunity offers--I am to instruct your Grace at once frankly and peremptorily to declare that to any such interference, come what may, his Majesty will not be a party."

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[Sidenote: 1822-27--Canning and the Bourbons]

The Duke of Wellington faithfully obeyed the instructions which had been given to him. He made it clear to the Congress of Verona that England would not sanction any project for the interference of foreign sovereigns with the domestic affairs of Spain. When the Duke found that his arguments and his remonstrances were of no avail, he withdrew from the Congress altogether and left the members of the Holy Alliance to take on themselves the full responsibility of their own policy. Now it would be hardly possible to overrate the importance of the step thus taken by England at a great crisis in the public affairs of Europe. The reign of George the Fourth would be memorable in history if it had been consecrated by nothing but this event. The utter disruption between the old state policy and the new was proclaimed by the instructions which Canning sent to the Duke of Wellington, and which were faithfully carried out by the Duke. No English Government has, in later days, ventured to profess openly any other foreign policy than that announced by Canning. Other ministers in later times may have attempted, now and then, to swerve from it in this direction and in that, and to cover their evasion of it by specious pleas, but the new doctrine set up by Canning has never since his time found avowed apostates among English statesmen. It would have been well if such a principle could have inspired the foreign policy of England in the days when the French Revolution broke out, and if England had then proclaimed that she would be no party to any attempt made by foreign States to prevent the people of France from settling their own systems of government for themselves. Europe might have been saved a series of disastrous wars. France might have been relieved from counter-revolutions, seasons of anarchy, and seasons of military despotism. England might long have had friendly neighbors where even yet she has perhaps only concealed enemies.

The designs of the Holy Alliance soon made themselves manifest. The French Government had brought so much pressure to bear on the feeble King of Spain that he revoked the Constitution which, at a better moment, he had {43} granted to his people. There was an attempt at revolution in Spain, and the attempt was put down by the strong hand with the assistance of France, and the leading rebels were at once conducted to the scaffold. Portugal still kept those free institutions which England had enabled her to preserve, and still retained her sympathy with freedom. Canning soon saw that a part of the policy of the French Government was to bring Portugal also into subjection, and against this danger he provided by a bold announcement of policy. He declared in the House of Commons that if Portugal were, of her own accord, to engage herself in a war with France, the English Government would not feel bound to take any active part in the struggle, but that if the King of Spain were to accept or call in the assistance of the King of France to suppress Portugal, the Government of England would put its armies into the field to maintain its ancient ally. Then there arose a great question concerning the Spanish colonies and possessions across the Atlantic. The policy of France was to enable Spain to reconquer some of her American colonies which had long been withdrawing themselves from their condition of subjection, and the scheme of French statesmen evidently was that Spain would hand over some of her American possessions as a tribute of gratitude to France for the services she had rendered to the cause of absolutism in Spain.

On this question, too, Canning announced to the House of Commons a determination on the part of the English Government which put an effectual stop to this audacious policy. Canning declared that, although Spain had long since lost any real control over her transatlantic colonies, yet if she were to attempt their actual reconquest for herself England, however little in sympathy with such a purpose, might not feel that it was any part of her business to interfere by force of arms. But he went on to tell the House that, if Spain should claim the right to hand over any of those colonies to France as a part of the policy arranged between France and Spain, the English Government would then intervene directly and at once on behalf {44} of the Spanish-American colonies. This was the course of action which Canning described to the House of Commons in an immortal phrase when he told the House "that he had called in the New World to redress the balance of the Old." No words employed by an English minister during the last century have been more often quoted, and none have ever more thoroughly justified themselves in history. The schemes of the French and the Spanish Bourbons were blighted in the bud by Canning's memorable declaration.

[Sidenote: 1822-27--The Monroe Doctrine]

Canning had indeed called in the New World to redress the balance of the Old in a sense more complete than the accepted meaning of his words, at the time, appeared to signify. He had secured for his policy the moral co-operation of the New World's greatest power--the Republic of the United States. It was on the inspiration of Canning that the President of the United States embodied in a message to Congress that declaration of principle which has ever since been known as the Monroe doctrine. President Monroe, who knew well that he was proclaiming no doctrine which his influence and his authority with his country would not enable him to carry out, made known to Congress that it was his intention to warn European sovereigns against the danger of setting up their systems in any part of the New World. The United States, according to President Monroe's declaration, had no idea of interfering with existing systems, but if European sovereigns were to set up governments of their own on any other part of the American continents and against the wishes of the populations, the United States must regard any such attempt as a menace and a danger to the American Republic. This is in substance the meaning of that Monroe doctrine which has often been criticised unfairly or ignorantly on this side of the Atlantic, and its proclamation was undoubtedly due, at the time, to the advice which came from George Canning. President Monroe never meant to say that the Government of the United States had any idea of interfering with British North America or with the Empire of Brazil. The {45} Canadian provinces of Great Britain were, of course, perfectly free to remain a loyal part of the British Empire so long as it suited the interests and the inclinations of the Canadians. If the people of Brazil chose to be governed by an emperor, the United States Government did not assert any right to interfere with their choice. But what the Monroe doctrine did declare was that if any foreign sovereigns attempted to bring liberated American colonies again under their sway, or to set up by force new subject colonies on American shores against the wishes of the populations concerned, the United States must regard such action as a menace and a danger to the American Republic, and must not be expected to look quietly on without any attempt at intervention. This was, in the truest sense, the announcement of a policy of peace, for it frankly made known to the despotic rulers of the Old World what their risk must be if they ventured on the futile experiment of setting up despotic states on the shores of the New World.

It would have been well indeed if European monarchs at a later day had always remembered the warning and rightly estimated its weight. It would have been well for Louis Napoleon if at the zenith of his imperial success he had studied that message of President Monroe and properly interpreted its meaning. Such a course would have prevented him from making his ill-starred attempt to set up a Mexican Empire by the force of French arms on the ruins of a subjugated Mexican Republic. It would have saved him from defeat and disaster, and would have saved the unhappy, ill-advised, and gallant Maximilian, his puppet emperor, from a tragic fate. The attempt to retrieve the disgrace of his enforced withdrawal from Mexico led Louis Napoleon into that policy of the desperate gambler's last throw which ended in the occupation of Paris and the fall of the Second Empire.

Meanwhile the policy of Canning had accomplished its purpose. The Congress of Verona had been an idle piece of business, the sovereigns of the Holy Alliance had found that their day was done, and the New World had been successfully called in to redress the balance of the Old.

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