the dominant section of the people at the expense of the minority, our new political philosophers profess themselves fervent socialists.  But true socialism, which is almost synonymous with patriotism, is as conspicuously absent in those who call themselves socialists as it is strong in those who repudiate the title.  This paradox can be easily proved.  The most socialistic enterprise in which a nation ever engages is a great war.  A nation at war is conscious of its corporate unity and its common interests, as it is at no other time.  The nation then calls upon every citizen to surrender all his personal rights and to offer his life and limbs in the service of the community.  And what has been the record of the ‘socialists’ in the struggle for national existence in which we have been engaged?  In the years preceding the war they ridiculed the idea that the country was in danger of being attacked, and used all their power to prevent us from preparing against attack.  They steadily opposed the teaching of patriotism in the schools.  When the war began, they prevented the Government from introducing compulsory service until our French Allies, who were left to bear the brunt, were on the point of collapse; they, in very many cases, refused to serve themselves, thereby avowing that, as far as they were concerned, they were willing to see their country conquered by a horde of cruel barbarians; and they nearly handed over our armies to destruction by fomenting strikes at the most critical periods of the war.  This attitude cannot be accounted for by any conscientious objection to violence, which is in fact their favourite weapon, except against the enemies of their country.  Their socialism is, in truth, individualism run mad; it is the very antithesis to the consciousness of organic unity in a nation, which is the spiritual basis of socialism.  In this sense, the nation as a whole has shown a fine socialistic temper; but the disgraceful exception has been the socialist party.  The intense and perverted individualism of the so-called socialist is shown in another way.  Whatever liberties a State may permit to its citizens, it is certain that no nation can be in a healthy condition unless the government keeps in its own hands the keys of birth and of death.  The State has the right of the farmer to decide how many cows should be allowed to graze upon ten acres of grass; the right of the forester to decide how many square feet are required for each tree in a wood.  It has also the right and the duty of the gardener to pull up noxious weeds in his flower-beds.  But the socialist vehemently repudiates both these rights.  Being an ultra-individualist, he is in favour of laisser faire, where laisser faire is most indefensible and most disastrous.