them even in this country. They may perhaps give
serious trouble and interfere with progress on sound lines. The historic
House of Commons must be the means of carrying out Reconstruction so far
as legislation, and of controlling it so far as State action is
required. Some changes in its methods will be discussed in the chapters
on Reform, but the maintenance of the Constitution as the best
instrument for promoting orderly, peaceful, and real progress is
essential.

The peace we need would only be uselessly disturbed, and the practical
reforms most urgently required would only be delayed by raising
controversial questions about the form of the Constitution. We may well
let them alone, and get on with something that will be of real benefit.

CHAPTER IX

PEACE AND DEMOCRACY

_There is no more unsafe politician than a
conscientiously rigid doctrinaire, nothing more sure to
end in disaster than a theoretic volume of policy that
admits of no pliability for contingencies._--J.R. LOWELL.

It is often assumed that a change in the form of Government in Germany
would completely alter the attitude and conduct of the nation, and
secure permanent peace, but that alone would not be sufficient. It would
undoubtedly help; for under a more popular Government it would be easier
for a different spirit in the German nation to assert itself.
Democracies, however, have from time to time been aggressive, and have
claimed to dominate their neighbours. A change far deeper than a change
in the form of Government is needed. The claim put forward both by word
and deed to impose the German will on others by organised force of any
kind must be abandoned utterly, if the world is to be really at peace
with Germany and with those whom Germany has been able to compel or to
beguile into alliance with her. The conflict is not simply between
autocracy or oligarchy and democracy, but between different ideals and
diametrically opposed notions of duty. The conception of their State as
an organisation carefully arranged to impose its will on others
regardless of their feelings and their rights must be eradicated.
Democracy and Liberty do not necessarily go together. There may be
democracy without liberty, and it is possible though not probable that
there may be real liberty without the form of democracy. An enlightened
monarch, governing as well as reigning, may express the real will of a
nation more truly than the vote of a