Here I take leave to differ, and to range myself on the side of Burke.  Great, indeed—­nay, incalculable—­is “the mastery of laws, institutions, and government over the character and happiness of man.”  The system is known by its fruits.  We may think as badly as we like of the Germans—­as badly as they deserve—­but we must remember the “laws, institutions, and government” that have dominated their national development.  And this is not only a matter of just and rational thinking, but is also a counsel of safety for ourselves.  If, as a result of this war, we allow our personal and social liberties (rightly suspended for the moment) to be permanently abolished or restricted; and, above all, if we bend our necks to the yoke of a military despotism; we shall be inviting a profound degradation of our national character.  It would indeed be a tragical consummation of our great fight for Freedom if, when it is over, the other nations could point to us and say:  “England has sunk to the moral level of Germany.”

V

REVOLUTION—­AND RATIONS

“A revolution by due course of law.”  This, as we have seen, was the Duke of Wellington’s description of the Reform Act of 1832, which transferred the government of England from the aristocracy to the middle class.  Though eventually accomplished by law, it did not pass without bloodshed and conflagration; and timid people satisfied themselves that not only the downfall of England, but the end of the world, must be close at hand.

Twenty years passed, and nothing in particular happened.  National wealth increased, all established institutions seemed secure, and people began to forget that they had passed through a revolution.  Then arose John Bright, reminding the working-men of the Midlands that their fathers “had shaken the citadel of Privilege to its base,” and inciting them to give the tottering structure another push.  A second revolution seemed to be drawing near.  Dickens put on record, in chapter xxvi. of Little Dorrit, the alarms which agitated respectable and reactionary circles.  The one point, as Dickens remarked, on which everyone agreed, was that the country was in very imminent danger, and wanted all the preserving it could get.  Presently, but not till 1867, the second revolution arrived.  Some of the finest oratory ever heard in England was lavished on the question whether the power, formerly exercised by the aristocracy and more recently by the middle class, was to be extended to the artisans.  The great Lord Shaftesbury predicted “the destruction of the Empire,” and Bishop Wilberforce “did not see how we were to escape fundamental changes in Church and State.”  “History,” exclaimed Lowe, “may record other catastrophes as signal and as disastrous, but none so wanton and so disgraceful.”  However, the artisans made a singularly moderate use of their newly acquired power; voted Conservative as often as they voted Liberal; and so again belied the apprehensions of the alarmists.