A reason to be optimistic in 2018 – from The Spectator in 1847

2018 will doubtless be a stiff test for the UK – but there’s nothing new in that. When The Spectator ushered in 1847, for instance, its founder and editor R.S. Rintoul (1787-1858) used that year’s opening column to outline the looming challenges and reaffirm the country’s urgent need of strong and capable leadership:

The New Year opens for England with heavy clouds in the sky, but with no sunless horizon. Never did the country enter upon a year with more work to be done. Ireland alone presents a task without precedent: England has there to reorganize an old country… The progress of the new Free-trade policy has to be looked after. The public law of Europe is unsettled, and an eye must be kept on that. But with all this Herculean amount of work, the country never had better means of performance. The very urgency and momentous importance of the tasks compel earnest zeal.