In my judgment, a Liberal is a man who ought to stand as a restraining force against an extravagant policy.  He is a man who ought to keep cool in the presence of Jingo clamour.  He is a man who believes that confidence between nations begets confidence, and that the spirit of peace and goodwill makes the safety it seeks.  And, above all, I think a Liberal is a man who should keep a sour look for scaremongers of every kind and of every size, however distinguished, however ridiculous—­and sometimes the most distinguished are the most ridiculous—­a cold, chilling, sour look for all of them, whether their panic comes from the sea or from the air or from the earth or from the waters under the earth.

His Majesty’s Government are resolved that the defensive measures of this country shall be prescribed by the policy of Ministers responsible to Parliament, and by the calculations, subject to that policy, of the experts on whom those Ministers rely, and not by the folly and the clamour of Party politicians or sensational journalists.  In that determination we as a Government are united, and we shall remain united.  Yet it is clear that the increase in the Naval Estimates of this year must be followed by another increase in those of next year.  That is deplorable.  It will impose upon our finances a strain which some other nations would not find it very easy to bear, but which, if the necessity be proved, this country will not be unwilling, and will certainly not be unable to support.

Well, but what have the Conservative Party got to say about it?  Have they any right to complain of the taxes which are necessary for the maintenance of our naval power?  Do we not see that they are ever exerting themselves to urge still greater expenditure upon the nation?  He is a poor sort of fellow, a penny-plain-twopence-coloured kind of patriot who goes about shouting for ships, and then grudges the money necessary to build them.  And when Mr. Balfour tells us that “gigantic sacrifices” are required, and that those gigantic sacrifices “must begin now,” and then at the same time objects to the taxes by which the Government proposes to raise the money, he puts himself in a very queer position.

I have dealt with two of the causes which have led to our demand for further revenue—­old-age pensions and the navy.  Upon neither of them have the Conservative Party any ground for attacking us.  What is the third?  Ah, gentlemen, I agree that there is one cause of the prospective deficit for which we are budgeting for which the Conservative Party is in no way responsible.  I mean the decline in the consumption of alcoholic liquors.  Nothing that they have said and nothing that they have done has, in intention or in fact, contributed to the drying up of that source of revenue.  On the contrary, by their legislation, by the views they have taken of the rights of the licensed trade, by their resistance to every measure of temperance reform, by their refusal