ing left to govern themselves, they will
govern in harmony with English interests and according to English
principles. The privilege is not estimated so highly. They go their own
way and not our way, and therefore we must look facts in the face as
they are, and not as we wish them to be. If we extend to Ireland the
independence which only links us closer to Australia, Ireland will use
it to break away from us. If we extend it to Bengal and Madras and
Bombay, we shall fling them into anarchy and bring our empire to an end.
We cannot for our safety's sake part with Ireland. We do not mean to
part with our Asiatic dominions. The reality of the relation in both
cases is the superior force of England, and we must rely upon it and
need not try to conceal that we do, till by the excellence of our
administration we have converted submission into respect and respect
into willingness for union. This may be a long process and a difficult
one. If we choose to maintain our empire, however, we must pay the price
for empire, and it is wiser, better, safer, in all cases to admit the
truth and act upon it. Yet Englishmen so love liberty that they struggle
against confessing what is disagreeable to them. Many of us would give
Ireland, would give India Home Rule, and run the risk of what would
happen, and only a probability, which reaches certainty, of the
consequences to be expected to follow prevents us from unanimously
agreeing. About the West Indies we do not care very earnestly. Nothing
seriously alarming can happen there. So much, therefore, for the
general policy of leaving them to help themselves out of their
difficulties we have adopted completely. The corollary that they must
govern themselves also on their own responsibilities we hesitate as yet
to admit completely; but we do not recognise that any responsibility for
their failing condition rests on us; and the inclination certainly, and
perhaps the purpose, is to throw them entirely upon themselves at the
earliest moment. Cuba sends representatives to the Cortes at Madrid,
Martinique and Guadaloupe to the Assembly at Paris. In the English
islands, being unwilling to govern without some semblance of a
constitution, we try tentatively varieties of local boards and local
councils, admitting the elective principle but not daring to trust it
fully; creating hybrid constitutions, so contrived as to provoke ill
feeling where none would exist without them, and to make impossible any
to