The knell of
the British Empire has frequently sounded. It sounded when capital
punishment was abolished for sheep-stealing, when the great reform bill
was passed, when purchase was abolished in the army, when the deceased
wife's sister bill was passed, when the Parliament act became law; and
it will positively sound again when the mediaeval Chinese traditions of
the Diplomatic Service are cast aside. There are many important people
alive today who are so obsessed by those traditions as to believe
religiously that if the British people, and by consequence the German
Government, were made aware of the peace terms, the German Army would in
some mysterious way be strengthened and encouraged, and our own ultimate
success imperiled. Such is the power of the dead hand, and against this
power the new conviction that in a democratic and candid foreign policy
lies the future safety of the world will have to fight hard.
The other subsidiary argument for ignoring the nation is that Ministers
are wiser than the nation, and therefore that Ministers must save the
nation from itself by making it impotent and acting over its head.
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