be proof of great depravity on my part, but I say without hesitation,
that, for a sufficient object, I should not have the least objection
to putting two shillings a quarter on wheat or twopence a pound on
butter. But I must add that the whole argument nauseates me. What sort
of opinion must these gentlemen have of their fellow countrymen, if
they think that the question of a farthing on the quartern loaf or
half a farthing on the pat of butter is going to outweigh in their
minds every national consideration? And these are the men who accused
Mr. Chamberlain of wishing to unite the Empire by sordid bonds! It is
indeed extraordinary and to my mind almost heartrending to see how
this question of Tariff Reform continues to be discussed on the lowest
grounds, and how its higher and wider aspects seem to be so constantly
neglected. Yet we have no excuse for ignoring them. The Colonial
advocates of Preference, and especially Mr. Deakin, with whose point
of view I thoroughly agree, have repeatedly explained the great
political, national, and I might almost say moral aspects of that
policy. There is a great deal more in it than a readjustment of
duties--twopence off this and a penny on that. I do not say that such
details are not important. When the time comes I am prepared to
show--and I am an old hand at these things--that the objections which
loom so large in many eyes can really be very easily circumvented. But
I would not attempt to bother my fellow countrymen with complicated
changes in their fiscal arrangements, or even with the discussion of
them, if it were not for the bigness of the principle that is
involved.

I wish to look at it from two points of view. The principle which
lies at the root of Tariff Reform, in its Imperial aspect, is the
national principle. The people of these great dominions beyond the
seas are no strangers to us. They are our own kith and kin. We do not
wish to deal with them, even in merely material matters, on the same
basis as with strangers. That is the great difference between us
Tariff Reformers and the Cobdenites. The Cobdenite only looks at the
commercial side. He is a cosmopolitan. He does not care from whom he
buys, or to whom he sells. He does not care about the ulterior effects
of his trading, whether it promotes British industry or ruins it;
whether it assists the growth of the kindred States, or only enriches
foreign countries. To us Tariff Reformers these matters are of moment,
an