Part 14

Like all great men, Mr Reid has been responsible for some erroneous impressions. One of the most popular and widespread of these is that he is, by instinct and temperament, a humorist. Nothing could be further from the truth. The late head of the Commonwealth Government is undoubtedly the most serious man that the political exigencies of Australia have ever produced. He has too much insight, too much intelligence not to be serious. Every man who possesses the faculty of making other people laugh must do so by presenting an effective contrast to their own habit of thought. In other words, he must be as different as possible from themselves. Mr Reid is entirely different in thought and disposition from ninety-nine out of every hundred of those who listen to him and laugh with him. _They_ are volatile, fickle, amusement-loving; _he_ is none of these. That is the reason why, when he throws for their delectation certain verbal pictures on a rhetorical screen, they laugh with such boisterous mirth and such riotous abandon. The reason why Mr Reid came to take up the _rôle_ of jester is easy to understand. If he followed out his own inclinations, he would be either a transcendental philosopher, or a poet of the mystic school. He would never speak a word about politics, and he would never make a joke. He is too clever not to recognise the essential meanness of politics; he is too sombre in disposition not to revolt from the tinkling merriment of a crowd. But he has never got quite free from the idea that success is a desirable thing to obtain. It is the one infirmity that sticks to him. He knows that distinction for a man, physically constituted as he is, is not to be won through the channels of transcendentalism, or by the agency of the lofty rhyme. He knows that for a clever man the best and surest way to success is to play the fool. That is why he has talked on such a commonplace subject as politics to tens of thousands of people; that is why he has so successfully, so brilliantly played the fool.

As already stated, Mr Reid is too intelligent to be wedded exclusively to any one faith or shibboleth. But if he has one political leaning over another, it is in favour of Protection. It is true there is a popular idea to the contrary; but then many popular ideas flourish on the most unsubstantial foundations. There is no difficulty whatever in showing that Mr Reid’s one marked characteristic as a statesman is his fondness for Protection. The importers of New South Wales chose to make him their idol. It was not for him to object. It was apparent to him as an intelligent man that if the importer was no better, he was no worse than other people. So it came about that Mr Reid and Free Trade went hand in hand for quite a number of years. But to be strictly devoted to one faith, is to argue oneself blind to the merits of other faiths, and therefore mentally defective. To prove his catholicity of taste, Mr Reid put a few doses of Protection into the Free Trade dish which his fellow colonists were asking at his hands. When at a later stage the invitation came to him to drop fiscalism and merge his free trade in the high-tariffism of Mr Deakin, he gladly did so. There is no doubt that he was getting tired of the old formulas. How could it be otherwise? Mr Reid owes it to himself, and to his reputation as a man of broad views, to give Protection a turn, and in that direction, beyond doubt, his desire lies. There is a foolish idea, fatuously and blatantly insisted upon by newspaper writers, that, because a man has been harnessed to a party at one stage of his career he should remain harnessed to it for ever. The only universal genius is he who has come to recognise the essential quackery and futility of all political faiths now being foisted upon the community. I do not assert that Mr Reid is, or is not, a universal genius. I merely repeat that he is a man who understands. It is possible to look forward to the time when circumstances, and his own desire to be impartial, will bring him out as the champion of Protection in Australia. This is necessary to the complete and artistic balancing of his career. No one knows this better than himself. And whatever we say of G. H. Reid, whatever we think of him, whatever broad or narrow views we take of him, we are bound to admit that he touches nothing, and has touched nothing, he does not adorn.

XIII

THE IMPERIALIST

Regions Cæsar never knew Thy posterity shall sway.

The Imperialist plays an important part in the life of Australia. His influence is to be detected everywhere. It is not always proclaimed in words or manifested in deeds; but, like a subtle essence, it runs through every political and social institution of the country. No one can pretend to understand what goes on in this part of the world unless he makes allowance for the curious blending of the Imperialistic with the local point of view. The two currents do not always flow in unison; but if it were a question of opposing forces, the Imperialist would always carry the day. He is predominant both in the political and in the social world. He is much stronger than his occasional rival, the little “Australian.” He colours most of the legislation, and insensibly affects the habit of thought of the people. Take away the Imperialist from Australia, or even reduce him to a minority, and an entirely new set of conditions, a fresh pathway of national development, would come immediately into view.

The man who calls himself by this term, or even the man who, without assertiveness, acknowledges that it applies to him, is apt to believe that all who differ from him are small-souled and narrow-minded persons. He is inclined to be egotistically self-righteous. He talks of Imperialism as though it were not merely a justifiable political creed, but something superior in the realm of philosophy, something splendid in the domain of morals. The word itself is a large and impressive one. It conjures up wide expanses of territory, great vistas of achievement. It affords unrivalled opportunities for mouth-filling rhetoric and for fine-sounding, platform periods. Its every association is calculated to impress the receptive mind. There need be no astonishment, therefore, at the fact that those who confine themselves to the local point of view, and acknowledge no fondness for world-stretching dominions, are not highly regarded by the majority in Australia.

Yet it is by no means difficult to show that the essential doctrines of Imperialism are incapable of defence either from the rationalist or from the ethical standpoint. They are, in fact, both illogical and immoral. They are illogical, because they are based on the assumption that a wide expanse of territory can be better looked after by a central authority, than can a relatively small district. They ignore the elementary truth that every community is the best judge of its own requirements. The Imperialist is not satisfied to let any one alone. Every race, as far as practicable, must come under the yoke which he himself acknowledges. Every individual must slumber under the form of Government which he himself prescribes. He believes, quite illogically, that his own prestige is in some fashion enhanced whenever his countrymen dethrone another potentate or lay hands on a fresh piece of territory. He is convinced that the welfare of Australia is enhanced by the circumstance that certain gentlemen, living at a very remote distance, can, if they so choose, veto some of our most important pieces of legislation, and overset some of our most intimate concerns.

If it be admitted, as it must be, that the underlying principle of Imperialism is illogical, it will also be admitted that the same principle is decidedly immoral. Every empire is more or less built up by the sword. Every empire is more or less maintained in the same fashion. And it is an elementary truth that the sword and morality have nothing to do with each other. We can judge these things better from a distance. We can see plainly enough that it was wrong and immoral of Xerxes to wish to add to his territories by annexing Greece; that it was grasping of Julius Cæsar to reach out after Gaul and Britain; that it was wicked of Napoleon to covet Egypt; and that it was sinful of Russia to lay hands on Poland and Manchuria. But we are not prepared to speak thus definitely of the moral significance of another nation’s attitude towards Cape Colony and Egypt and India. What we do say in that connection, is that the white man has a burden to shoulder and a duty to accomplish. We are inclined to get angry, and to call the strict moralist--whenever he attempts to dictate the policy of nations--a narrow-minded, insufferable prig. And so, as a matter of fact, he may be. But no harm would be done by admitting, in a general way, that the doctrines of Imperialism and of morality are not precisely identical.

But neither cold reason nor hard rules of conduct can build up and vitalise a nation. There is such a quality as _sentiment_; and it is just this quality that gives the Imperialist his pre-eminent place. For sentiment always has been, and always will be, the most useful and valuable, just as it is the most illogical, faculty that an individual or a nation can possess. When we recollect what it has given us in the domain of poetry, of imaginative prose, of art, of music, of sculpture, we recognise that logic does not deserve to be mentioned with it in the same breath. Sentiment is even greater than morality, because it creates its own morality--a morality very much finer and very much truer than that of any conventional school. The Imperialist, therefore, in spite of his unreason, contains within him a spark of that which illumines and creates. The sentiment of race, the sentiment of religion, the sentiment of patriotism, the sentiment of devotion to an ideal, to a memory, to a national past, to a series of great names, to a battlefield, to a grave--all this is, from the logical point of view, incapable of a moment’s defence. It is fantastic, illusory, absurd. But when one comes to think how unspeakably unlovely would be any existence that was mapped out by reason, and supported by dogma, and guided from infantile beginnings to senile decay, by a cold and brutal calculation of the practical advantages likely to follow on certain acts, one can only feel grateful that the sentimentalist, and not the economist or the calculator, has still the dominating voice in the life of the time.

The Imperialist, therefore, in the sense now being made use of, is a person to be lightly regarded by disciples of Bentham and Bain, and to be warmly admired and applauded by all other sections of the community. This is he who, though he has never been within ten thousand miles of Great Britain, speaks of it as “home,” and incidentally refers to the place of his birth as a land of exile. This is he who, a few years ago, talked often of the necessity of wiping out the memory of Majuba, and who even now does not like to be reminded of Nicholson’s Nek and Magersfontein and the Tugela River. As a member of the human race he might be proud to think that at these places some farmers, his fellow-beings, performed praiseworthy feats in the face of tremendous odds. But the Imperialist assumes that the feats were performed by the wrong people, and is not proud of them. This is he who, by virtue of some curious and unintelligible process, manages to feel himself a larger and more sublime personality because of the fact that, long before he was born, men wearing red uniforms and living at the opposite end of the world purchased with their lives the barren glory of Badajoz, and stood unshaken through the fiery ordeal of Waterloo. And this is he who refers to such and such an action as conceived in the interests of that large and vague thing known as the Empire; who is fond of talking about what “we” ought to do in Afghanistan, and what should be “our” policy in Cochin China; who sublimely ignores the fact that neither he himself, nor the community in which he lives, has any more to do with Afghanistan and Cochin China than it has with the North Pole or the mountains of the Moon.

“Even a Cecil,” observed an Irish member in the House of Commons recently, “will not die for the Meridian of Greenwich.” The remark illustrated a great truth. A man will only die for something that has a history, for something that calls forth an emotion, for something that appeals to his individual or his national pride. He will not die for the Meridian of Greenwich, any more than he will die for the peak of Kosciusko, or for the Sydney Town Hall, or for the Melbourne Parliamentary buildings, or for the Federal tariff. Of what avail is it for a poet to write about the star of Australia? It is likely enough that the star will arise some day, and it is perfectly certain that the event, when it does take place, will be heralded by clouds of war. Every national constellation must rise, if it rises at all, from such a cradle. But in the meantime there is nothing in the history of Australia to awake sentiment of any sort--unless it be a sentiment of disgust at the manner in which the aboriginals were treated, and of shame for the early records of Botany Bay. A nation must have some ties of remembrance and of vanity to hold it together. Australia is still mainly Imperialistic--because of the force of heredity, because of the triumph of unreason, and because of the part that sentiment plays in the life of the people.

Apart from the genuine Imperialist into whose faith the calculation of material advantages does not consciously enter, there is the professing Imperialist of the political type. This individual is to be met with in Parliament, at public meetings, and in the newspapers. Often his opinions are elaborately thought out, and now and again they are adequately expressed. Imagination may have a part, but not the leading part, in his composition. Neither is he a product of any one emotion, or set of emotions. He has usually a large measure of prudence, and always a certain capacity for looking ahead. He talks a great deal about the balance of power in Europe, and the possible shifting of that balance owing to Japanese successes in the Far East. He advocates a larger Australian contribution to the British Navy, and remarks with solemn emphasis that the only guarantee of safety held by this Southern continent--the continent which he inhabits--is afforded by the existence of English ships of war. This political and professing Imperialist will declaim from any number of platforms on the necessity of keeping intact all the existing bonds of Empire, and of manufacturing as many new ones as possible. He foresees a yellow peril, a Russian peril, a German peril, an American peril--in fact any number of perils. He is strenuously alive to the possibility, in fact the imminent probability, of some nation, whether it be white, brown, black, or yellow, casting acquisitive eyes on the new and tempting and half unpeopled continent. Though not imaginative, he can picture the probable result of a conflict between Togo’s vessels and the auxiliary Australian squadron. And he is sincerely desirous that nothing should occur, for the present, to mar existing relations with Great Britain, or to cause the habit of reliance upon the most powerful navy in the world to cease.

The objection to this variety of Imperialist is that he cannot be relied upon. For the motive that animates him is self-interest. And national self-interest is not a whit more dependable, while it is even less admirable, than the self-interest of individuals. It may be that a certain line of conduct appears, for the time being, advantageous. Then the balance of power is shifted, and a diametrically opposite course becomes advisable. The unit may be forgiven for seeking the unit’s good. It is a way that units have. But from the nation, or from the collective spirit of the nation, something more lofty and inspiring might be expected. The political Imperialist reduces everything to a formula. He may deal in high-sounding phrases, but he does not mean them. He may not tell his audience, but he tells himself that a certain course of action pays best. He has no illusions. He is not an idealist. He does not pretend to be heroic. His eye is ever upon the main chance. So far from being a buttress of Imperialism he is in reality its chief danger--the chief danger, that is to say, to its existence as a permanent factor in the life of the world. For undervaluing sentiment as he does, dealing with supposed advantages and disadvantages as he does, he is morally certain to adjust his views to successive changes on the international horizon. The moment Australia becomes, in his opinion, strong enough to protect herself; the moment she can afford to be independent of Downing Street; the moment she is powerful enough to resent interference; that moment becomes, in the view of the political Imperialist, the moment to cast adrift. Manifestly the bonds must be different from those of temporary self-interest if they are to have any holding power.

There remains the important problem of improving the position--assuming that it can be improved--from the Imperialist point of view. We want, first of all, to know where we are. Our relations to Great Britain are of two kinds, the one definite and precise, the other indefinite and somewhat vague. The political relationship is the definite one, the one that exists on paper, the one that is subject at any moment to constitutional readjustment. It implies a certain amount of formalism, a certain hint of subserviency, even a certain suggestion of force. It means that we cannot legislate on all subjects exactly as we like. It means, also, the payment of a certain sum of money in the upkeep of Vice-regal establishments, and in the contributions to the British Navy. As a set off to this political dependence, and to this necessity for paying away occasional sums of money, there are a number of material gains. There is the commercial gain represented by the protection of the British flag. This is a consideration that runs throughout the whole domain of trade and industry, and gives to every transaction a security and confidence that would otherwise be absent. Then there is the financial saving on the defence vote. Instead of spending less than £900,000 a year on defence we should have to spend several millions if there were no reliance on the Imperial forces. Further, there is the social advantage--a great advantage in the eyes of some people, a negative advantage in the eyes of others--implied in the presence of a number of titled personages who represent the Crown in Australia, and add greatly to the importance of a number of socially ambitious individuals. Looking at the constitutional problem as a whole, and weighing material gains against certain definite losses, it may fairly be agreed that the former much preponderate.

Yet the political tie as such is never binding. “A fig for these paper agreements!” exclaimed Mr C. C. Kingston in the Federal House of Representatives a year or two ago. The accompanying snap of the fingers meant a great deal. The first Australian Minister for Customs was, and at the time of writing is, a democrat of the democrats. No one knows better than he that it is not only useless, but criminally foolish to attempt to hold together peoples living on opposite sides of the globe, if their hearts are not in the bond. Australia is mainly Imperialist to-day, because of certain considerations that lie outside the track of any huxtering politician, or of any self-important statesman residing either north or south of the Equator. It is Imperialist because it is susceptible to the breath of impulse, and of memory, and of something finer and more intangible still. It is loyal not so much to a dynasty, or to an individual, or to a parchment bond, as to the tie of race, the idea of kinship, the value of tradition, the glamour of history, the pride that springs from the knowledge of certain achievements--achievements that have helped to make the country and its people what they are.

This Imperialism, which is the result of sentiment, and not of any political arrangement, is to be met with in the street, in the train, in the tram-car, in the hotel, in the private house, in the social circle. The writer was in King Street, Sydney, when the news of the surrender of Cronje was posted outside a newspaper office. And he was in Collins Street, Melbourne, when the announcement of the relief of Mafeking came to hand. The demonstration that took place in either city was instructive from any point of view. When a crowd, and more especially an Anglo-Saxon crowd, becomes fervid with excitement and metaphorically stands on its head, and turns itself into one vast menagerie, it is safe to assume that the motive power is a fairly strong one. It is no explanation to say that the people were merely anxious to create a disturbance--that they were devoid of political convictions and had no definite idea on the subject of international or pan-Britannic relations. The splendid foolishness that everywhere manifested itself on account of the improved fortunes of the defenders of Mafeking--on account, if you will, of the avoidance of whatever national dishonour would have been caused by the fall of the place--was, and is, the most eloquent testimony to the existence of Imperialism as a vital force in Australia. What did it matter to the people in the streets? What was Mafeking to them, or what were they to Mafeking? And yet they mafficked--and in the folly of the moment demonstrated more than a whole tribe of philosophers could disprove in a life-time.

But there are people--anxious, untiring, well-meaning people--who are not satisfied. It is not enough that Australia should have shewn its feelings in the only way in which they can be shewn. It is not enough that the country should have sent soldiers to the war, should have yelled itself hoarse for the cause in which they went, and should have rioted with frantic enthusiasm when they came back. It is not enough that the streets of Melbourne and Sydney should have been converted into Pandemonium. The statement is being made that the bonds of union must be drawn tighter. The necessity is being urged for the taking of steps to prevent any drifting apart. Somebody imagines that constitutional relationships can be improved. The political wheel is asked to be set in motion. There is declared to be danger to the Empire because of possible commercial friction. One Parliament sits at Westminster, and on its own responsibility takes steps that may not only imperil the trade and commercial interests, but place at stake the national honour, and the life of men residing at Brisbane and Ballarat. The political Imperialists say the position is alarming. They are certain that something ought to be done. But what is it to be?