heir abominable
unworthiness, but in the case I am discussing I have found no
substantial justification, nor has the deed been backed up to now or
supported by a single _real_ authority. Nothing but condemnation still
hangs round the memory of those hapless ministers who made the world
so full of misery. I repeat, the greatest of all perils is to have a
Government composed of men whose brains are full of kinks, and who do
not reach beyond the bounds of basing their policy on the idea that
some foreigner or other has designs on our national wealth, our trade,
or our vast protectorates. In recent years that view has been
dissipated, and the plan of broadening the national goodwill to men
has been adopted and encouraged by a body of sound, unpretentious
thinkers who have taken pains to train important gifts in the art of
good government in all its varied aspects and international
complexities. The whole public have had to pay appalling penalties in
the past because an impulsive handful of the population is of opinion
that self-advertising, harum-scarum politicians, in and out of office,
are the geniuses who make and keep prosperity. This uncontrolled,
emotional trend of thought comes in cycles and is unerringly followed
by bitter disillusionment. It was so during the wars at the beginning
of the last century, and it is so now. We always reflect after the
tragedy has been consummated. Safe and astute administrators are
always termed the "old gang" by the political amateurs, and the
calamity is that a large public is so often carried away by the
flighty delusions of the real cranks who style themselves the saviours
of their country. At the present time we have as sure an example as
ever the known world has witnessed of the awful disaster the
resignation of the "old gang" has been to the whole of the Powers
interested in this world-war, especially to our own country. We shall
realize this more fully by and by when the naked truth presents
itself. The very people who are conspicuously responsible for the
destruction of unity always bellow the loudest to maintain it after
they have been the high conspirators in breaking it, aided by their
guilty followers. What bitter lessons this land of ours has been
subjected to in other days! For twenty years the country was kept in
the vortex of a raging war, with no more justification than giving Mr.
Jackson instructions that the one imperative idea to keep in his mind
was to take possess