The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 83
Lord Cairns
Lord Cairns.
It is remarkable that the two most eminent subjects of Queen Victoria who have died within the past four years, or since Beaconsfield's demise, were Evangelicals—General Gordon and Lord Cairns. Mr. Gladstone, the most eminent living Englishman, is of the same type, though less pronounced. This trio is composed not of clergymen, but of a soldier, a lawyer, and a statesman. Then we have Lord Selborne, and the late Lord Hatherley, to set off against the jurists who are so violently anti-theological, and led by Sir James Fitzjames Stephen.
Lord Cairns was similar to Gordon in his complete possession by the spirt of religion. With both it was the bringing of every thought in subjection. Cairns regularly spent half-an-hour in private prayer before the Cabinet councils, at the time when the tension between England and Russia was so critical, in 1878. Lady Cairns said this was the explanation of his being so calm, when all the other ministers were irrepressibly excited. He would insist on maintaining his hour of private devotion in the morning, even if it restricted him to only a couple of hours' sleep after an exhausting parliamentary debate. While studying for the Bar, he rose at four, and his religious exercises occupied him till six, when he began his legal work. These particulars are only samples from the unbroken tenor of his life.
He was the peacemaker who accommodated the differences between Mr. Gladstone and Lord Salisbury, over the Franchise Bill, a few months ago. Ever since the Beaconsfield Cabinet went page 78 out, he has been the tempering medium. The nation has owed much to him in this period.
His end was that perfectly beautiful peace which all must desire. We remember a very impressive passage in a sermon by the Dean of Llandaff, on Dean Stanley's passing away. The watchers round the bed perceived that for a time the soul hung wavering as it were, between the two worlds. While Lord Cairns lay unconscious, with life ebbing away, his family joined in prayer that a few lucid moments might be vouchsafed. They came. He died in the full possession of his senses, with a cool testimony on his lips to the security of his faith. Resting his head on the shoulder of Lady Cairns, his last words were "Eternal Life. Eternal, Eternal Life."
Beaconsfield spoke of the intellect of Cairns as "transcendent," a strong word for a cynical, free-thinking associate to use, and one who had trodden the arena of politics with Lyndhurst and Brougham. This reminds us that Lyndhurst died a thorough Christian. Lyndhurst and Cairns were indisputably the foremost legal intellects of the nineteenth century.
Among all the Christian prattlers, we cannot find one in a thousand with any sense of the meaning of words when they talk of making the best of both worlds. The pietist is to live 1,234,567,890 years in the next world, and millions, billions, sextillions, and nonillions more, yet observe how he risks the chances of this time, to sail as close as possible to the wind in securing the height of enjoyment during, perhaps, only one year that he will have to live here. The fact is there is a lurking fear in everybody's mind that no future life is provided at all. Pious people go on the principle of fire insurance, and cut the premiums as fine as they can.
In Lord Cairns we have a man of the highest excellence, but he lived in the height of luxury. He prided himself on being a magnificent shot, and with justice, for he once brought down three stags dead with three successive shots. He could not bear the cruelty of not shooting the poor things dead, but then, you see, he would risk it. Not a word had his evangelical friends to say to him about the iniquity of this; but please observe how horrified they would be if a costermonger went to see "Ada, the Betrayed," acted at the Mary lebone Theatre.
A timely little Memoir of Earl Cairns has been published, by a Miss Marsh. It further accentuates the amiable features of his character as we have been gratified to set them down. A very significant anecdote is given of his business success. After his admission to the Bar, he sedulously attended his chambers every day from 10 to 4, although no clients came for a very long time. One Saturday afternoon his friends wanted him to go down the Thames with a pleasure party, but no, he would not leave his page 79 office. At a few minutes before four o'clock he was summoned in a hurry, and not for any of the bogus business of Dr. Robert Sawyer, M.D., late Nockemorf. It was an important legal job, through a veteran counsel being out pleasuring. This incident was the whole foundation of Cairns's professional success.
From August to October in each year he lived at his noble Scottish mountain estate of Dunira, with his family, and his residence was at delightful Bournemouth for the rest of the year, when he could steal away from London. In paying over £11,000 or £12,000 to Miss Fortescue, we fancy that Lord Cairns regretted that he had not adhered to the injunction, "Lay not up for yourselves treasures on earth."
We wish to stand well with the religious world, and hope it will be perceived that, while piercing those joints in the armor which are found in every man, we recognize in Lord Cairns a very good one. Miss Marsh records that Lord Cairns said to a friend, apropos of his riches, "They don't satisfy!" and the friend saw a higher hope in his clear, blue eye. And the London Record says it was a peculiar privilege for him to die so close to Easter Sunday, spending it in heaven. But he would rather have spent it on earth.