ill have a severe attack of indigestion. Mr. Keir Hardie in the
Liberal ranks would do more to disrupt and destroy the Liberal party
than he can possibly do from the outside. Labour, it is true, might
capture the Liberal party, and this is advocated by some, but if this
took place the party would wither away. The capitalist element would
drop out and Labour would be left alone. Labour might just as well
build up a new party outside. It is no use capturing a weapon which
crumbles to pieces as soon as you grasp it. Better make a new
weapon."[650] "The Labour party in the House of Commons is as yet not
disliked only because as yet it is not feared. Until it has made
itself both disliked and feared, it will be far short of having
fulfilled the objects of its very existence. It is not saying too much
to say that in the very near future the measure of the Labour party's
effectiveness will be its unpopularity in the House of Commons.
Acrimonious as are the feelings often evoked by political
controversies, they are urbanity itself as compared with the passions
aroused over economic issues. The limits of Liberal concession must
needs soon be reached. The Liberal-Labour candidate is but a transient
phenomenon of our time, and with his disappearance the storm will
break."[651]

The great Liberal majority was created by accident and it is rapidly
dissolving. "The Liberals succeeded to power through no merit of their
own, but merely through the errors of their opponents. Liberalism is
shedding its supporters at both ends, and is rapidly on the way to
becoming a mere _caput mortuum_."[652] It is true that "at the general
election many Socialists climbed into Parliament on the backs of the
Liberals,"[653] but Liberal-Socialist co-operation is not possible.

Many Socialists believe that Liberalism and Socialism are fundamentally
antagonistic, and that therefore Socialism must fight its battles
unaided. "In Great Britain, as in France, Belgium, Germany, and Italy,
the cleavage has now been definitely marked between capitalist
Liberalism and Socialist Democracy."[654] "Political power, properly
so-called, is merely the organised power of one class for oppressing
another."[655] "All political parties are but the expression of class
interests, and as the interest of the working class is diametrically
opposed to the interests of all sections of the master class, the party
seeking working class emancipation must be hostile to every other
p