To the Editor of the "Nowrn-Cmwa Dany News."
Si,—A couple of months ago you wore " good enough to publish some remarks of mine on the question of Imperial unity from the Colonial point of view. We have now Mr. Chamber-Jain's case. It is, I think, as rotten as his advocacy is able. The great strength of his position, apart from his ability and prestige, is that the principle of Imperial unity (which is at bottom the genuine principle in his scheme) is a principle which, can be grasped by the popular imagination, " principle for which Lord Rosebery was "ready to die" some fifteen years ago. In short, Chamberlain appeals to patriotism. Similarly Napo-loon appealed to and half-destroyed France. Whereas Free Trade is not an inilaming principle. It is a deep, wide, sedimentary truth. It is not a heavenly peak covered with barren eternal snow, but a fertile plain to support a hardworking, tranquil population's daily needs. To grasp the benefits of Free Trade and the evils of Protection requires a wide induction over Time and Space. Even "Tammany" in the concrete is not clear to the popular eye. For much of its corruption is veiled by its services, its poor relief, its adaptation in so many ways, not merely to the frailty, but to the inconveniences of mankind.
fragment ina speech by Mr. Wyndham concentrates more than anything I have seen elsewhere the false philosophy of Imperialism. It was spoken at Dover on October the 28th. It contains this "Fifty years ago commerce been, but to a large extent becoming less, private matter of mutual accommodation between private citizens of the world. Commerce now is to a very grout extent, and year by year is becoming more, a conflict between States and Empires waged by each State aid each Empire for the benefit of its izens and to the detriment of the 18 of other States." Well may Impenalism take Eagles and Lions for its cniblems, tearing and killing with beak and teeth, paws, and claws, roaming through illimitable veldts secking carcases devour! Well may the "Times " put as its heading over Wyndham's peroration, Commerce is a conflict between States."
Eighteen hundred odd years ago (one might parody Wyndham) the "golden rule" may have been to some extent true, but now we know hetter,—Eye for Tooth for tooth—Do ut Des—Vee Vietis,—Big battalions,—theso are onr_ prin: ciples (Elijah, Isaiah, Jesus, Cobden, Ruskin, Tolstoi notwithstanding), for they didn't know everything down in Judec.
But I will try to stick to that partless and unmagnitudinal thing, the point.
"If England would escape her doom she must weld her Colonies into one with herself.' These are the words in which a modern writer summarised Chamber-Jain's view. Can I answer better than in the words of Reid of New South Wales as quoted the other day by Lord Goschen "When the day arrives that England can only maintain her trade by artificial preferential barriers, on that day England is doomed. A time may arrive when England must place tariffs round herself, but that will be the very last ditch in which a defeated and driven-back nation attempts to defend herself against her conquering foes."
This is the very "Passing of Arthur. Getdown your Tennyson and read it again. The Knights of Energy, of Enterprise, of Intelligence have all fallen. Sir Go-a-Head, Sir Thorough, Sir Think-it Out have all been slain. "The Lady of the Golden Rule has gone wrong with that Chartered Libertine, the Lord of the Golden Mines. The Excalibur (Free Trade) is taken from the " ruined shrine," thrown into the sea "making lightnings in the splendour of the moon." Russia presumably overrunning India and Germany taking her "place in the sun "—till at last the British Empire is but "one black dot against the verge of dawn" and on the mere (the Atlantic, shall we say, and the Pacific, too?) the wailing dies away.
Excuse me; I cannot stick to the point. It is not a point at all. It is a principle. The lust of Empire is to the nation what the love of money is to the individual. Wealth to the individual is a trust. The desire for " Independence" in a nation is right, like the desire for " Competence"
the individual. But ye brought nothing into the world and it is certain shall carry nothing out. Your Empire was made ina "fit of absence of mind" and it will dissolve under sub-political denudation in some way we cannot predict. What is certain is that the "Days are the destinies." We are judged (whether nations or individuals) by what we do, not by length of years, or by population, or by square miles. We have administered India; we have thrown off Colonies, we have poured out blood and money to pacify South Africa and the valley of the Nile. We have made many mistakes, but we have done many things well and of our good deeds we are justly proud. While we have work to do, let us work.... But for eternity we need not scheme. The centuries may look down on us from the past; we need not look up to them for the future. "'Colony-welding" for "Doom-escaping" is an illegitimate undertaking. Political fragments may fly together under some gravitation, but one fragment should not appeal, in its own interest merely, to the other fragments, saying, "Let us wold, or I am doomed." Suppose England said: "Canada, you will be gobbled up by U. 8. A. Australia, you will be terrorised by Germany. I myself am getting old and feeble. Let us join together; we shall all feel better." Such an appeal would be (assuming the facts correct) a legitimate appeal. But the facts are not correct. U.S. A. could never gobble up such an indigestible thing as Canada. It would have to be hotted up with civil war or something like that first. Australia, on the other hand, would have to be cooled and
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.