"
But, in the words of a political song,--
"There weren't no such luck
For John A. Roebuck,
And he thought he would teach the whole nation
That the Tories were fools,
And the Whigs only tools,
But Roebuck was England's salvation."
And he, according to this programme, set himself to reform the
Constitution and protect the Colonies.
"Nullius addictus jurare in verba magistri,"
he was an eclectic in politics,--acknowledged no leader, had himself no
followers. A chief without a party, an apostle without disciples, a
critic without the merest ordinary penetration, a cynic whose bitterness
was not enlivened by wit or humor, a spouter whose arguments, when he
had any, were usually furnished from the mint, John Arthur Roebuck was
for many years that impersonation of terrific honesty, glaring purity,
and indignant virtue, known in English politics as an INDEPENDENT member
of Parliament. When party-spirit runs high, and many party-men are
disposed to be unscrupulous in the measures and artifices by which they
win or retain place and power, such a position, occupied with judgment
and fortified by modesty and good sense, is a most powerful and a most
beneficent one; but it is useless when seized on by one whose obtrusive
egotism and more than feminine vanity disqualify him for any serious or
permanent influence on his fellow-men.
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