'
I have divided the speeches contained in these volumes into groups. The
materials for selection are so abundant, that I have been constrained to
omit many a speech which is worthy of careful perusal. I have naturally
given prominence to those subjects with which Mr. Bright has been
especially identified, as, for example, India, America, Ireland, and
Parliamentary Reform. But nearly every topic of great public interest on
which Mr. Bright has spoken is represented in these volumes.
A statement of the views entertained by an eminent politician, who
wields a vast influence in the country, is always valuable. It is more
valuable when the utterances are profound, consistent, candid. It is
most valuable at a crisis when the people of these islands are invited
to take part in a contest where the broad principles of truth, honour,
and justice are arrayed on one side, and their victory is threatened by
those false cries, those reckless calumnies, those impudent evasions
which form the party weapons of desperate and unscrupulous men.
All the speeches in these volumes have been revised by Mr. Bright. The
Editor is responsible for their selection, for this Preface, and for the
Index at the close of the second volume.
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