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Bright, John, 1811-1889

"Speeches on Questions of Public Policy, Volume 1"

I know that what the noble Lord
said was all very smart, but really it was not true, and I have not much
respect for a thing that is merely smart and is not true. The Chancellor
of the Exchequer made a statement too. The papers made it appear that he
did it with exultation; but that is a mistake. But he made a statement,
and though I do not know what will be in his Budget, I know his wishes
in regard to that statement--namely, that he had never made it.
Those Gentlemen, bear in mind, sit, as it were, on a hill; they are not
obscure men, making speeches in a public-house or even at a respectable
mechanics' institution; they are men whose voice is heard wherever the
English language is known. And knowing that, and knowing what effect
their speeches will have, especially in Lancashire, where men are in
trade, and where profits and losses are affected by the words of
statesmen, they use the language of which I complain; and beyond this,
for I can conceive some idea of the irritation those statements must
have caused in the United States. I might refer to the indiscriminating
abuse of the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Sheffield; and I
may add to that the unsleeping ill-will of the noble Lord the Member for
Stamford.


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