and take the consequences. And as for selling a teapot, it is an act, I
imagine, in which any properly constituted drunkard would take a
positive pleasure. The advertisement is not good enough; it does not
tell. If I were really martyred for an opinion (which is more improbable
than words can say), it would certainly only be for one or two of my
most central and sacred opinions. I might, perhaps, be shot for England,
but certainly not for the British Empire. I might conceivably die for
political freedom, but I certainly wouldn't die for Free Trade. But as
for kicking up the particular kind of shindy that the Suffragettes are
kicking up, I would as soon do it for my shallowest opinion as for my
deepest one. It never could be anything worse than an inconvenience; it
never could be anything better than a spree. Hence the British public,
and especially the working classes, regard the whole demonstration with
fundamental indifference; for, while it is a demonstration that probably
is adopted from the most fanatical motives, it is a demonstration which
might be adopted from the most frivolous.

ON POLITICAL SECRECY

Generally, instinctively, in the absence of any special reason, humanity
hates the idea of anything being hidden--that is, it hates the idea of
anything being successfully hidden. Hide-and-seek is a popular pastime;
but it assumes the truth of the text, "Seek and ye shall find."
Ordinary mankind (gigantic and unconquerable in its power of joy) can
get a great deal of pleasure out of a game called "hide the thimble,"
but that is only because it is really a game of "see the thimble."
Suppose that at the end of such a game the thimble had not been found at
all; suppose its place was unknown for ever: the result on the players
would not be playful, it would be tragic. That thimble would hag-ride
all their dreams. They would all die in asylums. The pleasure is all in
the poignant moment of passing from not knowing to knowing. Mystery
stories are very popular, especially when sold at sixpence; but that is
because the author of a mystery story reveals. He is enjoyed not because
he creates mystery, but because he destroys mystery. Nobody would have
the courage to publish a detective-story which left the problem exactly
where it found it. That would rouse even the London public to
revolution. No one dare publish a detective-story that did not detect.

There are three broad classes of the special things in which h