Wat Tyler would have been shocked by the Quarterly Reviewer. Yet the change should surely be intelligible now that we can adopt the historical point of view. To abuse Southey as a renegade was quite natural so long as the old party lines were taken to mark the distinction between right and wrong. But that theory seems to be a little obsolete. I have lived long enough to see a change on a larger scale which may help to account for Southey's supposed tergiversation. We are told by Liberals that they adhere unflinchingly to the immortal principles of their creed. Still, one who was a Liberal fifty years ago must admit that those principles have come to support theories, especially about Government interference, which they were once used to demolish. Southey's conversion was simply a crude anticipation of the same change. It is curious to read Macaulay's review of Southey's Colloquies. Macaulay, as usual, talks a great deal of very sound common-sense, and makes mincemeat of some of Southey's amazing expositions of political economy. Macaulay is a prophet in the school of Adam Smith. He rejoices in a Pisgah-sight of the blessed period when cultivation will be carried to the top of Helvellyn, and there will be no
