the severest strain ever applied to them, that
the life and fortune of the individual did not count, but that the
war and victory were the only interests that any one had a right to
consider--when one remembers all these things, and the use that a wise
financial policy might have made of them, it is impossible to avoid
the conclusion that the history of the war in this country and its
social and political effects might have been something much finer,
much cleaner and more noble if only the weapons of finance had been
more boldly and wisely used. It is not a good thing to indulge in
high-falutin' on this subject. It is absurd to suppose that the war
suddenly turned us all into plaster saints at the beginning, and that
we might have continued so to the end if the State had dealt with our
money in a proper way. But without setting up any such idealistic
arguments as these, looking back on those early days of the war, one
can still remember the thrill of earnestness and of eagerness for
self-sacrifice which has since then given way lamentably to war
profiteering, war strikes, and a general struggle among many classes
of the community to make as much as possible out of the war, merely
because our financial leaders have never really put the country's
financial problem properly before the country.

We were not plaster saints, but we were either Idealistic and perhaps
foolish people who attached great importance to the freedom and
security of small nations and all those items in the programme of
idealistic Radicalism, or else we were good, red-hot, true-blue
Jingoes with a hearty hatred for Germany, and enjoyed the thought that
the big fight which we had long foreseen between the two countries was
at last going to be fought out. Or, again, we were just commonplace
people who did not much believe in idealistic Radicalism or
anti-German bitterness, but saw that the whole future of our country
was at stake, and were prepared to do anything for it. A fine example
was set us in those days by the Trade Union leaders. The industrial
world was seething with discontent. The Suffragettes in London and the
Carsonites in Ireland had shown us how much could be done by appeals
to physical force in a lazy-minded community; and hints of industrial
revolution, with great organised strikes, which were going to tie up
the transport industry of the country were in the air. And then, when
the war came, the Labour leaders said, "No strikes until th