PARLIAMENTARY MAJORITIES.

Lyttelton Times, Volume VIII, Issue 505, 5 September 1857, Page 3

PARLIAMENTARY MAJORITIES.

It is possible to have too much of a good thing—too much time, too much money, too many friends, too much support, and so to hold them too cheap and throw them away. Who does not know what it is to have half a day to get ready for a short journey, and to lose one's train in consequence ? Lord Palmerston will start with too good a majority. He will have too large a margin to draw upon, and it will be a matter of indifference to him whether half-a-dozen or so become careless, or sulky, or queer, and leave him for somebody else or nobody else. A majority is a thing tint must be used. " There is a tide in the affairs of men." A good majority is high water, which will carry you safe out to sea if you have everything ready, and can use it without a moment's delay; but will strand you at the sill of your own dock, or break your back on the mud before its.gates if you are five minutes too late. A Parliamentaiy majority is nothing on earth but a snow giant. It looks big and strong, but is melting and crumbling away from the hour it was made. Peel started in 1841 with an imposing and overwhelming majority of 90, and people seemed to think it must last forever, and I that Conservatism was to usher in the i Millennium. But, whether the majority be great or small, it may be observed that in the third or fourth year of a Parliament the Minister finds increasing difficulty in keeping1 his men together. Certain feelings, not quite on the surface, are evidently at work, i which undermine the whole outward form , of things, and the Ministerial party is apt to I become like a ship,- the timbers of which are whole to the eye, but rotten within. The ■ ; majority-must be worked ; it must be committed ; it must be animated and raised in self-respect by the consciousness of doing something and being a working and meritorious majority. An idle majority will cave you or bring you to grief, as surely as

an idle son, or an idle servant, an idle horse, • or:anything that is idle. So Lord Palraerstori must immediately find work for his Majority. The more recondite question of reward and encouragement we willingly Heave to more knowing advisers. The warmest love requires tokens, and no doubt a Minister must dispense'keepsakes,mementoes arid sweet suggestive gifts of all kinds. "That, however, is not by any means so important as work. Better be in debt to a member of Parliament than have no account at all with'hinvno services given or received. In fine, Parliament must be worked; the larger the majority the more it must be worked; and the sooner itis fairly hi harness ;the better.— Times.