Political and Literary essays, 1908-1913 | Page 5

repulsion, despotic
bureaucracy was the natural ally of those communistic principles which
the economists deemed it their main business in life to combat and
condemn. Many regard with some disquietude the frequent concessions
which have of late years been made in England to demands for State
interference. Nevertheless, it is to be hoped that the main principle
advocated by the economists still holds the field, that individualism is
not being crushed out of existence, and that the majority of our
countrymen still believe that State interference--being an evil, although
sometimes admittedly a necessary evil--should be jealously watched
and restricted to the minimum amount absolutely necessary in each
special case.
Attention is drawn to this point in order to show that the observations

which follow are in no degree based on any general desire to exalt the
power of the State at the expense of the individual.
Our habits of thought, our past history, and our national character all,
therefore, point in the direction of allowing individualism as wide a
scope as possible in the work of national expansion. Hence the career
of the East India Company and the tendency displayed more recently in
Africa to govern through the agency of private companies. On the other
hand, it is greatly to be doubted whether the principles, which a wise
policy would dictate in the treatment of subject races, will receive their
application to so full an extent at the hands of private individuals as
would be the case at the hands of the State. The guarantee for good
government is even less solid where power is entrusted to a corporate
body, for, as Turgot once said, "La morale des corps les plus
scrupuleux ne vaut jamais celle des particuliers honnêtes."[11] In both
cases, public opinion is relatively impotent. In the case of direct
Government action, on the other hand, the views of those who wish to
uphold a high standard of public morality can find expression in
Parliament, and the latter can, if it chooses, oblige the Government to
control its agents and call them to account for unjust, unwise, or
overbearing conduct. More than this, State officials, having no interests
to serve but those of good government, are more likely to pay regard to
the welfare of the subject race than commercial agents, who must
necessarily be hampered in their action by the pecuniary interests of
their employers.
Our national policy must, of course, be what would be called in statics
the resultant of the various currents of opinion represented in our
national society. Whether Imperialism will continue to rest on a sound
basis depends, therefore, to no small extent, on the degree to which the
moralising elements in the nation can, without injury to all that is sound
and healthy in individualist action, control those defects which may not
improbably spring out of the egotism of the commercial spirit, if it be
subject to no effective check.[12]
If this problem can be satisfactorily solved, then Christianity, far from
being a disruptive force, as was the case with Rome, will prove one of

the strongest elements of Imperial cohesion.
3. _Slavery._--It is not necessary to discuss this question, for there can
be no doubt that, in so far as his connexion with subject races is
concerned, the Anglo-Saxon in modern times comes, not to enslave,
but to liberate from slavery. The fact that he does so is, indeed, one of
his best title-deeds to Imperial dominion.
4. _The Pauperisation of the Roman Proletariat._--This is the Panem et
Circenses policy. Mr. Hodgkin appears to think that in this direction
lies the main danger which threatens the British Empire.
"Of all the forces," he says, "which were at work for the destruction of
the prosperity of the Roman world, none is more deserving of the
careful study of an English statesman than the grain-largesses to the
populace of Rome.... Will the great Democracies of the twentieth
century resist the temptation to use political power as a means of
material self-enrichment?"
Possibly Mr. Hodgkin is right. The manner in which the leaders of the
Paris Commune dealt with the rights of property during their disastrous,
but fortunately very brief, period of office in 1871, serves as a warning
of what, in an extreme case, may be expected of despotic democracy in
its most aggravated form. Moreover, misgovernment, and the fiscal
oppression which is the almost necessary accompaniment of militarism
dominant over a poverty-stricken population, have latterly developed
on the continent of Europe, and more especially in Italy, a school of
action--for anarchism can scarcely be dignified by the name of a school
of thought--which regards human life as scarcely more sacred than
property. It may be that some lower depth has yet to be reached,
although it is almost inconceivable that such should be the