GENTLEMEN, there is (disguise it how we may) a struggle going on, — in some countries an open, and in some a tacit struggle, between the principles of monarchy and democracy. God be praised, that in that struggle we have not any part to take. God be praised, that we have long ago arrived at all the blessings that are to be derived from that which alone can end such a struggle beneficially, — a compromise and intermixture of those conflicting principles.
England has only to maintain herself on the basis of her own solid and settled constitution, firm, unshaken, — a spectatress interested in the contest only by her sympathies — not a partisan on either side; for the sake of both, a model, and ultimately, perhaps, an umpire. Should we be led, by any false impulse of chivalrous benevolence, to participate in the struggle itself, we commit, and thereby impair, our authority; we abandon the position in which we might hereafter do most good, and may bring the danger of a foreign struggle home to our own hearths and to our own institutions.*
George Canning served as Prime Minister for a few months prior to his death in 1827. He had been Chancellor of the Exchequer (1827) and Foreign Secretary twice (1807-1809, 1822-1827); at the time of this speech, he was President of the Board of Control (1816-1821), a trade and industry role, and MP for Liverpool. He strongly opposed the Jacobins, British enthusiasts of the French Revolution, and supported William Wilberforce in his campaign for the Abolition of Slavery.
Précis
In 1820, George Canning MP noted the tide of revolutions sweeping Europe, and urged Britain not to stand in the way of independence for small states breaking away from tired Empires. He warned that if Britain took sides and interfered, she would squander the opportunity to act as a mediator, and the unrest might spread to her streets too. (58 / 60 words)