Punch or The London charivari: Punch or The London charivari (2.1842)

THE POLITICIAN.

My own dear Turnstile,—You are above the prettinesses
of poetry, and therefore deserve a Valentine of good, serviceable,
wrought-iron prose. That you are dear to Punch—oh, most
dear !—is manifest to the whole world. I look upon you as a
bit of myself, a piece of my own wood, a chip sliced from my own
heart : indeed, from Macchiavelli to Peel, how often have the
scions of polities been confounded with myself ! How often has
it puzzled the wisest of the earth to know the difference between
Punch and the Politician, the Politician and Punch !

These, my dear Valentine, are portentous times. You must
learn to speak another tongue,—you must, at least, affect a
sympathy for man and his miseries,—you must " have a heart,"
an organ hitherto unnecessary to your species. You must listen
with the profoundest attention to the complaints of misery ; and
though you have not the remotest idea of removing them, you
must let your eyes moisten at the history. There was a time
when salt-water was no more expected from the statesman than
" milk from a male tiger ;" now, an onion is indispensable to the
politician. If he have the swallow of the crocodile, he must also
have its tears.

I said you must learn another tongue : it is most true. You
must forget the old conventionalities of political speech, the long-
drawn sinuous nothings that have been the stock of your ancestors,
and acquire the cant of benevolence. We have the Hamiltonian
system for the easy acquisition of the dead languages; but the
Stanieyian mode of teaching the jargon of phUanthropy may be

easily <*~'iiiprehended by the very narrowest intellect. The Greek
radicals, under the best teachers, are hard to master ; but the
whole grammarof the tongue of Downing-street (as now published)
is retained as fast as it is read. In one week the illiterate are
erudite.

In times of terrible distress, when the people with surpassing
complacency are mild and meek as the shepherds of Arcady,—
when Famine herself becomes quiet and resigned as a six weeks'
dowager,—when Beggary smiles wanly at the rags that hang
about her, and Destitution, naked, but cheerful as Musidora,
lays her down on the bare earth, and tries to dream away her
pains,—oil ! then, most dear Politician, exhibit the sympathy of
politeness to the sufferers ; then tell Famine that her ashy face
has a most becoming hue ; compliment the bl.ueness of her lip,
the dulness of her eye ; swear that Beggary wears her tatters
with the grace of a gipsy queen ; and vow that utter Destitution
is rendered so sacred by the dignity of her bearing, that you
want the courage to make yourself familiar with her. Whatever
may be the price of corn, surely there need be no sliding-seale tor
compliment.

Misery is feminine, and, like all of the sex, will swallow
flattery, and sometimes think it solid pudding.

So to my words do thou thine ear incline,
And be mine own and Famine's Valentine !

Yours, your great progenitor,

Punch,