So he smiles and learns the necessary
wiles. He is all for his country and his friends,--but for his
friends first. He too must be eloquent and well instructed in the
ways of Parliament, must be wise and diligent; but in all that he
does and all that he says, he says he must first study his party.
It is well with him for a time;--but he has closed the door of his
Elysium too rigidly. Those without gradually become stronger than
his friends within, and so he falls.
But may not the door be occasionally opened to an outsider, so
that the exterior force be diminished? We know how great is the
pressure of water, and how the peril of an overwhelming weight of
it may be removed by opening the way for a small current. There
comes therefore the Statesman who acknowledges to himself that he
will be pregnable. That, as a Statesman, he should have enemies is
a matter of course. Against moderate enemies he will hold his own.
But when there comes one immoderately forcible, violently
inimical, then to that man he will open his bosom. He will tempt
him into his camp with an offer of high command any foe that may
be worth his purchase.
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