y Pigott. But it differs further from
ordinary misrule in the vital matter of its object. The coercion was not
imposed that the people might live quietly, but that the people might
die quietly. And then we sit in an owlish innocence of our sin, and
debate whether the Irish might conceivably succeed in saving Ireland.
We, as a matter of fact, have not even failed to save Ireland. We have
simply failed to destroy her.

It is not possible to reverse this judgment or to take away a single
count from it. Is there, then, anything whatever to be said for the
English in the matter? There is: though the English never by any chance
say it. Nor do the Irish say it; though it is in a sense a weakness as
well as a defence. One would think the Irish had reason to say anything
that can be said against the English ruling class, but they have not
said, indeed they have hardly discovered, one quite simple fact--that it
rules England. They are right in asking that the Irish should have a say
in the Irish government, but they are quite wrong in supposing that the
English have any particular say in English government. And I seriously
believe I am not deceived by any national bias, when I say that the
common Englishman would be quite incapable of the cruelties that were
committed in his name. But, most important of all, it is the historical
fact that there was another England, an England consisting of common
Englishmen, which not only certainly would have done better, but
actually did make some considerable attempt to do better. If anyone asks
for the evidence, the answer is that the evidence has been destroyed, or
at least deliberately boycotted: but can be found in the unfashionable
corners of literature; and, when found, is final. If anyone asks for the
great men of such a potential democratic England, the answer is that the
great men are labelled small men, or not labelled at all; have been
successfully belittled as the emancipation of which they dreamed has
dwindled. The greatest of them is now little more than a name; he is
criticised to be underrated and not to be understood; but he presented
all that alternative and more liberal Englishry; and was enormously
popular because he presented it. In taking him as the type of it we may
tell most shortly the whole of this forgotten tale. And, even when I
begin to tell it, I find myself in the presence of that ubiquitous evil
which is the subject of this book. It is a fact, and I think it is n