Political and Literary essays, 1908-1913 | Page 2

views with jealous eyes the extension of other and
neighbouring European nations. He will have no fear of competition.
He will believe that, in the treatment of subject races, the methods of
government practised by England, though sometimes open to legitimate
criticism, are superior, morally and economically, to those of any other
foreign nation; and that, strong in the possession and maintenance of
those methods, we shall be able to hold our own against all
competitors.
On the other hand, he will have no sympathy with those who, as Lord
Cromer said in a recent speech, "are so fearful of Imperial greatness
that they are unwilling that we should accomplish our manifest destiny,
and who would thus have us sink into political insignificance by
refusing the main title which makes us great."
An Imperial policy must, of course, be carried out with reasonable
prudence, and the principles of government which guide our relations
with whatsoever races are brought under our control must be politically
and economically sound and morally defensible. This is, in fact, the
keystone of the Imperial arch. The main justification of Imperialism is
to be found in the use which is made of the Imperial power. If we make
a good use of our power, we may face the future without fear that we
shall be overtaken by the Nemesis which attended Roman misrule. If
the reverse is the case, the British Empire will deserve to fall, and of a
surety it will ultimately fall. There is truth in the saying, of which
perhaps we sometimes hear rather too much, that the maintenance of
the Empire depends on the sword; but so little does it depend on the
sword alone that if once we have to draw the sword, not merely to
suppress some local effervescence, but to overcome a general upheaval
of subject races goaded to action either by deliberate oppression, which
is highly improbable, or by unintentional misgovernment, which is far

more conceivable, the sword will assuredly be powerless to defend us
for long, and the days of our Imperial rule will be numbered.
To those who believe that when they rest from their earthly labours
their works will follow them, and that they must account to a Higher
Tribunal for the use or misuse of any powers which may have been
entrusted to them in this world, no further defence of the plea that
Imperialism should rest on a moral basis is required. Those who
entertain no such belief may perhaps be convinced by the argument that,
from a national point of view, a policy based on principles of sound
morality is wiser, inasmuch as it is likely to be more successful, than
one which excludes all considerations save those of cynical self-interest.
There was truth in the commonplace remark made by a subject of
ancient Rome, himself a slave and presumably of Oriental extraction,
that bad government will bring the mightiest empire to ruin.[2]
Some advantage may perhaps be derived from inquiring, however
briefly and imperfectly, into the causes which led to the ruin of that
political edifice, which in point of grandeur and extent, is alone worthy
of comparison with the British Empire. The subject has been treated by
many of the most able writers and thinkers whom the world has
produced--Gibbon, Guizot, Mommsen, Milman, Seeley, and others. For
present purposes the classification given by Mr. Hodgkin of the causes
which led to the downfall of the Western Empire has been adopted.
They were six in number, viz.:
1. The foundation of Constantinople.
2. Christianity.
3. Slavery.
4. The pauperisation of the Roman proletariat.
5. The destruction of the middle class by the fiscal oppression of the
Curiales.
6. Barbarous finance.

1. _The Foundation of Constantinople._--It is, for obvious reasons,
unnecessary to discuss this cause. It was one of special application to
the circumstances of the time, notably to the threatening attitude
towards Rome assumed by the now decadent State of Persia.
2. _Christianity._--That the foundation of Christianity exercised a
profoundly disintegrating effect on the Roman Empire is
unquestionable. Gibbon, although he possibly confounds the tenets of
the new creed with the defects of its hierarchy, dwells with
characteristic emphasis on this congenial subject.[3] Mr. Hodgkin,
speaking of the analogy between the British present and the Roman
past, says:
The Christian religion is with us no explosive force threatening the
disruption of our most cherished institutions. On the contrary, it has
been said, not as a mere figure of speech, that "Christianity is part of
the common law of England." And even the bitterest enemies of our
religion will scarcely deny that, upon the whole, a nation imbued with
the teaching of the New Testament is more easy to govern than one
which derived its notions of divine morality from the stories of the