If, Sir, the
complaints against the general body of the West Indians had been
substantiated, I should have deemed it an unworthy artifice to attempt
diverting the attention of the House from the question immediately at
issue, by merely proving that delinquencies existed in other quarters;
but feeling as I do that those charges have been overthrown in debate, I
think myself entitled and bound to show how capricious are the honorable
gentlemen in the distribution of their sympathies among those different
objects which call for their application."
Mr. Gladstone, "having turned the tables upon his opponents," concluded
by demanding justice, and the motion before the House was rejected.
About one month later Rev. Samuel Wilberforce, afterwards Bishop of
Oxford, and of Winchester, wrote to Mr. Gladstone: "It would be an
affectation in you, which you are above, not to know that few young men
have the weight you have in the House of Commons, and are gaining
rapidly throughout the country. Now I do not wish to urge you to
consider this as a talent for the use of which you must render an
account, for so I know you do esteem it, but what I want to urge upon
you is that you should calmly look far before you; see the degree of
weight and influence to which you may fairly, if God spares your life
and powers, look forward in future years, and thus act _now_ with a view
to _then_.
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