ABSTRACT
The Disraeli Government, which was formed in February 1874, hardly seemed to be facing any difficult Parliamentary ordeals when in March it took charge at Westminster of what was bound to be a short Session. Adroit and politically profitable as all these things might seem to be, the Tories were not destined to escape their share of political trouble. The party was still above all a Church and State party, and so was impelled, in the words of its Radical enemies, to attempt as much for the parson as it had done for the publican. What helped to increase the strength of the Tory Government’s position was the marked and growing lack of cohesion among the Parliamentary Opposition. Even in the 1874 Session, Gladstone had been shrinking with distaste from the cheerless task of leading, for an indefinite number of years of Opposition, the jangling groups of Whigs, Irish and Radicals which composed “the Liberal party.".
