eace not only
reached but secured. Yet are conditions such, even within our favored
borders, that we are ready to disband the particular organized
manifestation of physical force which we call the police?

Despite internal jealousies and friction on the continent of Europe,
perhaps even because of them, the solidarity of the European family
therein contained is shown in this great common movement, the ultimate
beneficence of which is beyond all doubt, as evidenced by the British
domination in India and Egypt, and to which the habit of arms not only
contributes, but is essential. India and Egypt are at present the two
most conspicuous, though they are not the sole, illustrations of
benefits innumerable and lasting, which rest upon the power of the
sword in the hands of enlightenment and justice. It is possible, of
course, to confuse this conclusion, to obscure the real issue, by
dwelling upon details of wrongs at times inflicted, of blunders often
made. Any episode in the struggling progress of humanity may be thus
perplexed; but looking at the broad result, it is indisputable that
the vast gains to humanity made in the regions named not only once
originated, but still rest, upon the exertion and continued
maintenance of organized physical force.

The same general solidarity as against the outside world, which is
unconsciously manifested in the general resumption of colonizing
movements, receives particular conscious expression in the idea of
imperial federation, which, amid the many buffets and reverses common
to all successful movements, has gained such notable ground in the
sentiment of the British people and of their colonists. That immense
practical difficulties have to be overcome, in order to realize the
ends towards which such sentiments point, is but a commonplace of
human experience in all ages and countries. They give rise to the
ready sneer of impossible, just as any project of extending the sphere
of the United States, by annexation or otherwise, is met by the
constitutional lion in the path, which the unwilling or the
apprehensive is ever sure to find; yet, to use words of one who never
lightly admitted impossibilities, "If a thing is necessary to be done,
the more difficulties, the more necessary to try to remove them." As
sentiment strengthens, it undermines obstacles, and they crumble
before it.

The same tendency is shown in the undeniable disposition of the
British people and of British, statesmen