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They did, in fact, make large concessions. Their co-operation in military measures only stopped short of actual fighting :

The joining without arms in patrol work had been expressly approved by English Friends in a letter prepared by Fox, primarily addressed to Friends in Nevis, but also directed to the other Caribbean islands, which included the Windward Isles, whose centre of government was Barbados. It congratulates the Friends of Nevis upon having a governor who allows them to watch in their own way, without carrying arms, a thing that Friends in Jamaica and elsewhere would willingly have done.*

It is interesting to learn that some of the younger Quakers affected by this compromise "thought the work all one with military service, and not bearing a faithful testimony." Appeal was made to the London Meeting for Sufferings, and the scruples of the younger men were disallowed. It was even stated that digging trenches " was a legitimate method of assisting in war, without actually fighting! We cannot be astonished that such compromises were felt to be profoundly unsatisfactory, and, in point of fact, the society came finally to disallow them. Quakerism is now frankly committed to a complete and indiscriminating condemnation of war.

It may, perhaps, be doubted whether the Quaker protest against war would have become so celebrated and so influential if it had not gained the warm approval of Voltaire, whose most attractive trait was a genuine detestation of cruelty and oppression. His colloquy with Andrew Pitt ceases to be amusing, and becomes actually enthusiastic when it deals with the peaceful government of Pennsylvania, and the Quaker's denunciation of war. The latter is thus stated :

We never go to war: it is not that we fear death; on the contrary, we bless the moment which unites us with the very Author of Life; but it is because we are not wolves, or tigers, or dogs, but men and Christians. Our God, who has commanded us to love our enemies, and to suffer without murmuring, unquestionably does not desire that we should cross the sea to cut the throats of our brethren because redcoated murderers, wearing caps two feet high, enrol citizens by making a noise with two small drum-sticks on a tightly-stretched ass's skin. And when, after battles have been won, the whole of London glows with illuminations, the sky is on fire with rockets, the air resounds

VOL 246.

The Second Period of Quakerism," p. 620.

No. 502

Y

with thanksgivings, bells, organs, canons, we groan in silence over the murders which cause the public festivity.

"It is impossible to say," observes Lord Morley, "how much of the kindliness with which he (Voltaire) speaks of them (the Quakers) is due to real admiration of their simple, dignified, and pacific life, and how much to a mischievous desire to make their praise a handle for the dispraise of overweening competitors." The same uncertainty as to motive attaches to the compliments which, on all hands, are now showered on the Quakers. If it cannot be denied that their generous charity and public-spirited concern for social improvement are deserving of the highest praise, it may be fairly pleaded that they have no monopoly of these achievements. But their open repudiation of a professional ministry and of the sacraments, commends them to that numerous public which holds loosely to organized Christianity, and welcomes such respectable sponsors for its prejudices. Quietism, or-to use the more familiar term-mysticism, has ever appealed to those deeply religious souls for whom hierarchies, rites, and ceremonies are more an affliction to be endured than an assistance to be embraced.

In times of moral and intellectual confusion, when the beaten paths of tradition are largely abandoned, and the pilot-stars of faith and duty, under a clouded heaven, are no more visible, men seek for themselves new paths, and find much to allure them in a version of Christianity which carries none of the familiar disadvantages. The Quakers, frankly casting aside their old crudities of thought and practice, and asserting boldly their right to the whole heritage of culture and science, may perhaps provide a denominational home for many cultivated persons who can plainly find no other; but it may well be doubted whether the aristocratic type of religion which they now present can ever commend itself to the mass of mankind. For the masses, institutional Christianity-in spite of the heavy disadvantage of its historic scandals, and the special difficulties which the modern world is presenting-will continue to be both indispensable and beneficent.

HERBERT DUNELM

*Dictionnaire Philosophique, " Quakers." Oeuvres iv, 303;

Paris, 1818.

THE HOUSE OF LORDS

I. Functions of an English Second Chamber. By G. B. ROBERTS. George Allen and Unwin. 1926.

2.

The Referendum. By J. ST. LOE STRACHEY. T. Fisher Unwin. 1924.

3. The New Democracy and the Constitution. By WILLIAM SHARP MCKECHNIE. John Murray. 1912.

4.

Second Chambers. By J. A. R. MARRIOTT. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

1910.

5. The British Commonwealth. By HOMERSHAM COX. Longmans, Brown, Green and Longmans. 1854.

THE

'HE most important of all the political issues now before the country is the question whether Great Britain shall abandon the system of two-chamber government which-except for one brief interval at the time of the Commonwealth-has been an essential feature of the English legislature for at least six centuries. The importance of this issue rests upon the fact that if the second chamber were either abolished or left with its present inadequate powers, the country would be at the mercy of any chance majority in the House of Commons. The theory of our constitution still is that legislative power is shared by three separate authorities: the king, the lords, the commons. In practice the legislative power of the king is, and long has been, purely nominal. The occupant of the throne is expected to act, and does act, in accordance with the advice of a body of ministers whose position depends on the will of the House of Commons. Therefore, failing the existence of an effective second chamber, a ministry that commands a majority in the House of Commons has absolutely autocratic powers.

Even if we could always be sure of the patriotic intentions of successful politicians, that would be a dangerous situation. The possession of autocratic power is itself a corrupting influence. It breeds a spirit of vanity that tends to make even the best men ignore both the need for prudence and the obligation of fair play. That alone is a sufficient reason against the establishment of an autocratic single chamber. In addition there is the unpleasant fact that no electoral system provides any guarantee that the men who win parliamentary prominence will necessarily be fitted for

the responsibility of ruling a great country and helping to guide a great empire. In practice parliamentary success depends on party manœuvring. A candidate for a seat in the House of Commons has, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, no chance of winning a majority if he stands before the electors solely on his own merits. He must stand as the nominee of some wellorganized political party, and he will be selected by that party for reasons which may have very little to do with his suitability to share in the responsible task of governing a nation.

More serious still is the fact that when these nominees of a party organization have been elected to serve the nation in parliament, they become the servants, not of the nation, but of the party machine that worked the election. There are 615 members in the present House of Commons; of these, only four register themselves as "Independent." Independent." Of the remaining 611, perhaps as many as twenty, or even a few more, are in practice more or less independent and prepared to vote against their party, even on a critical occasion; but it is safe to say that at least ninety per cent. of the members of the House of Commons are-while professing to represent " the people "-the obedient servants of a party machine.

Even that fact does not fully reveal the danger to the country that is involved in the autocracy of the House of Commons. For it not infrequently happens that the government of the day is dependent, not on a single party that has secured the support of a majority of the electors, but on a combination of parties, each representing only a minority, but each insistent on its own particular policy. In that event, policies to which the nation is opposed may be passed into law by the combined vote of two discordant parties.

The history of the Parliament Act of 1911, which abolished the veto of the House of Lords, is itself an outstanding example of this method of making laws. At the beginning of the year 1906, the Liberal party came into power with an unprecedented majority over all other parties. That majority was won in a straight fight with the Tory party, mainly on the issue of free trade. In order to secure that straight fight the Liberal leaders had the good sense, on the eve of the election, to drop the policy of Home Rule for Ireland, to which their party had been committed for twenty years. During those twenty years the Liberals

had learnt, by repeated experiences, that they were flogging a horse that would carry few votes in English or Scottish constituencies.

It was in 1886 that Mr. Gladstone startled the country by suddenly taking up Home Rule after his previous warnings against it. A large number of Liberals at once revolted and formed the Liberal Unionist party, with the result that Mr. Gladstone's Bill was defeated in the House of Commons, and the Unionist partyformed of a combination of Conservatives and Liberal Unionistscame into power. In 1892 there was a fresh election, but the Liberals only succeeded in winning a minority of seats in England and Scotland; and were dependent for their narrow majority in the House of Commons on the assistance of 80 Irish Home Rulers. In the following year, 1893, a second Home Rule Bill was introduced, and was forced through the House of Commons by a combination of Liberal and Irish votes. If there had been no second chamber this Bill would have become law, and Ireland would have been separated from Great Britain in spite of the fact that a majority of the people of Great Britain had declared their opposition to that separation. Happily we then had a second chamber with an effective power of veto. By an overwhelming majority the House of Lords rejected the Bill. The Liberal Government, knowing full well that the House of Lords was expressing the will of the country, accepted the rebuff, and there was no fresh election till 1895. The Unionists then secured a sweeping majority. They secured an almost equal majority in 1900, when the Liberals were still handicapped by their advocacy of Home Rule.

In 1906 a new chance came for the Liberal party. Mr. Joseph Chamberlain had succeeded in forcing upon the Unionist party his personal hobby of imperial tariff preferences, based upon food taxes. He had the capacity to see and the honesty to proclaim that, without food taxes, any system of imperial preferences would be of very little value. Many prominent Conservatives and Liberal Unionists were strongly opposed to Mr. Chamberlain's policy, and it was fairly obvious that the country was not prepared either to abandon the general principles of free trade or to submit to taxes on essential foods. But the Liberal leaders realized that if they were to secure the full advantage of the new situation they must get rid of the incubus of Home Rule. They therefore

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