Part 2 (2/2)

Readiness of any country to buy freely of her neighbours keeps them able and willing to buy whatever she has to sell. Free trade has given Great Britain, New South Wales, and Belgium their choice of the world's markets. Great Britain has also been enabled to keep up much more friendly relations with the rest of Europe than would otherwise have been the case. Liberty of commerce has helped her enjoy peace; and peace has preserved free inst.i.tutions.

The reforms which culminated in free trade showed Englishmen that they could right any wrong without resort to violence. The attempt of the Chartists to overawe Parliament in 1848 was seen to be inexcusable; and it failed ridiculously. Never since then has insurrection in England been even possible. The atmosphere of thought has been so quiet that suffrage was greatly extended in 1867, and made practically universal in 1894. Voters gained the protection of a secret ballot in 1872; and munic.i.p.al self-government was given in 1894 to every part of England where it had not already been established.

No wonder that there is little of the revolutionary ardor of Sh.e.l.ley and Byron in Tennyson, Browning, and other recent poets. They have delighted in progress; but they have seen that it must come through such peaceable changes in public opinion, and then in legislation, as are caused by free discussion. The benign influence of peace has enabled them to display such brilliancy as had not been seen in England for more than two hundred years. No other writers ever paid so much attention to public health and the general happiness. The ablest thought of the century has been devoted to enriching human life, and not to destroying it. This has enabled science to make unprecedented progress. A new period of intellectual history has been opened by Spencer and Darwin.

VIII. Prominent among reformers who had no wish for revolution, and no respect for science, were d.i.c.kens and Carlyle. The latter's (”former's”

Ed.) aversion to political economy as ”the dismal science” was echoed in the pages of _Hard Times_; and the absence of any reference in _Dombey and Son_ to the great movement against the corn laws is characteristic of a novelist whose _Pickwick Papers_ made fun of scientific investigation. What was there called the ”t.i.ttlebat” is really that nest-building fish, the stickleback. Pa.s.sages ridiculing the use of statistics might be quoted at great length from both authors. d.i.c.kens had too much sympathy with paupers, especially those who suffered under the poor-law of 1834; and Carlyle had much too little. They agreed in opposition to model prisons and other new forms of philanthropy. Perhaps it was mainly the habit of indiscriminate ridicule which suggested such caricatures as Mrs. Jellaby and Mrs. Pardiggle. Carlyle's belief that abolitionism was ”an alarming Devil's Gospel” and his denunciation of ”the sugary, disastrous jargon of philanthropy” were legitimate results of idolatry of what he called ”early, earnest times,” namely the Dark Ages. His sympathy with mediaeval methods was so narrow that he spoke of a poet of weak health and high culture, whom he saw suffering under a sentence of two years in a pestilential prison, forbidden books or writing materials, kept most of the time alone and on bread and water, but guilty of nothing worse than a Chartist speech, as ”master of his own time and spiritual resources to, as I supposed, a really enviable extent.” d.i.c.kens shows much more appreciation of the real superiority of modern times, though personal disappointments, during his visit to America, prevented him from acknowledging the merits of democracy.

Carlyle's reverence for the early Hebrews and other primitive barbarians made him present hero-wors.h.i.+p as the only secure corner-stone of politics. His receipt for a perfect government is this: ”Find in any country the ablest man that exists there; raise him to the supreme place; and loyally reverence him.” ”Such a government is not to be improved by voting or debating.” ”Neither except in obedience to the Heaven-chosen is freedom so much as conceivable.” This theory showed its own absurdity in prompting eulogies on Francia and other despots; but Carlyle's apologies for Cromwell were of some service to the cause of liberty fifty years ago, when England had forgotten to honour the champions of the Long Parliament. d.i.c.kens thought more about the asceticism than the independence of the Puritans. He and Carlyle have dispelled some of the prejudices against the heroes of the First Republic; but they perpetuated others. Carlyle's best work was in encouraging the readers of his first books to think for themselves. The power of d.i.c.kens to call out sympathy with the unfortunate will never cease to bless mankind.

As much pity for the outcast has been shown by his great rival, Victor Hugo, and even more fellow-feeling with the oppressed. The spirit which has made France free animates all his writings, especially those grand poems which were called out by the usurpation of Louis Napoleon Bonaparte. His early dramas dealt so vigorously with royal weakness and vice that _Marion de Lorme_ was suppressed by Charles X. and _Le Roi s'amuse_ by Louis Philippe. The work which has made him best known, and which appeared in 1862 in nine languages, is a plea for mercy to criminals, or in his own words, to ”the miserable.” The chief aim is to show ”the oppression of laws,” and the mistake of aiding the tyranny of the police by thinking too severely of the fallen. He finds an opportunity to introduce an enthusiastic panegyric on the victories of Napoleon, closing with the question: ”What could be more grand?” ”To be free,” is the reply. Full justice to the French Revolution is done by that most dramatic of novels, _Ninety-Three_. Here he says: ”The agony of the nations ended with the fall of the Bastile.” ”Perhaps the Convention is the culmination of history.” ”It declared poverty and disability sacred.” ”It branded the slave-trade, and freed the blacks.”

”It decreed gratuitous education.” ”The object of two-thirds of its decrees was philanthropic.” Such facts are all the more worthy of mention, because they were omitted by Carlyle.

SUPPLEMENT TO CHAPTER II

I. Thomas Carlyle's prejudice against democracy was strengthened by the failure of the revolutions of 1848. Const.i.tutional monarchy was as hostile to reform in France as it was friendly in England.

Only one Frenchman in thirty could vote; and the legislature cared nothing for public opinion. Louis Philippe was hated for habitual dishonesty. There had been several attempts at regicide and some b.l.o.o.d.y revolts. One of the latter gave a basis from history for Victor Hugo's _Miserables_. Restrictions on the press and on public meetings increased the unwillingness of the working-men at Paris to be governed by the rich. Socialism was popular, and employment insufficient. The prohibition of a reform banquet caused barricades to be thrown up on February 22d in Paris. The militia took sides with the populace; the King fled to England; and all France accepted the Republic, which was proclaimed on February 24th. Slavery had been reestablished in the colonies by Napoleon; but it was now abolished; and so was capital punishment for political offences.

The example of Paris was followed in March by successful insurrections at Berlin, Vienna, and other German cities, as well as in Lombardy and Venice. Home rule was demanded by Hungary and Bohemia, and const.i.tutional governments were soon established there as well as in Austria, Prussia, and other German states, and in every part of Italy.

The King of Sardinia took the lead in a war for driving back the Austrians across the Alps. Co-operation of French, German, Hungarian, and Italian patriots might have made all these countries permanently free.

Such a union would have been difficult on account of international jealousies; and it was made impossible by the Socialists at Paris.

Scarcely had a provisional government been set up, when recognition of ”the right of employment” was demanded by a workman, who came musket in hand, and was supported by a mult.i.tude of armed artisans. They extorted a decree which promised every citizen work enough for his support. A ten-hour law was pa.s.sed. Co-operative factories were started with aid from the city authorities, and had some success. Opening national workshops was not advised by leading Socialists; but it was considered necessary by some of the Ministry in order to keep the unemployed from revolt. Every applicant drew money constantly, even if not at work. What little labour was actually performed was done so lazily, and paid so highly, that the number of men soon rose to 120,000. The expenses became enormous; and the tax-payers insisted that they too had rights. In order to be able to employ all the labourers a government would have to own all the property; and it would also have to be strong enough to enforce industry. Even Victor Hugo admitted that the experiment had failed. The National a.s.sembly, of which he was a member, notified the men in the shops that they must enlist in the army, or go to work at a safe distance from Paris on state pay, or look out for themselves. They rose in arms against the Republic, and took possession of nearly one-half of the city on June 23, 1848. ”Bread or Lead” was the motto on their red flags; and two of their terrible barricades are described at the beginning of the last Part of _Les Miserables_. They held out against regular troops and cannon during four days of such fighting as had never been seen before in Paris. More Frenchmen are supposed to have fallen than in any of Napoleon's battles. Two thousand of the soldiers were slain; but no one knows how many times that number of insurgents perished in the fight or in penal colonies.

Thenceforth the French Government was much more desirous to repress insurrection at home than to sustain it abroad. Louis Napoleon Bonaparte was elected President that same year, partly on account of his name, and partly on account of his promise that he would defend the right of private property against Socialism. Austrian generals of the rough and reckless type which Carlyle loved forced Lombardy and Bohemia back into the Empire, and restored absolute monarchy at Vienna, while the King of Sardinia was obliged to abdicate after such a defeat in March, 1849, as almost extinguished liberty in Italy. Venice alone held out against them under that purest of patriots, Manin, and suffered terribly during a siege of twenty-one weeks. Hungary was subdued that summer with the aid of Russia. France did nothing except to revive the papal despotism at Rome. Mazzini's republic was crushed by that which had a Bonaparte for President. His power had been increased by the disfranchis.e.m.e.nt of several million French voters of the poorer cla.s.s. His promise to restore universal suffrage joined with memory of the ma.s.sacres of June, 1848, in preventing much resistance to his usurpation of absolute power on December 2, 1851. There was a monstrous vote, next November, for an empire, where the centralisation of administration was complete, and the legislature merely ornamental. Thus the liberation of Europe was prevented, partly by race prejudices, but mainly by attempts to benefit the poor by overtaxing the rich. France and Hungary were left with less political liberty than before; and Italy gained very little; but some of the const.i.tutional freedom acquired in 1848 was retained in Prussia and other parts of Western Germany.

II. It was contrary to the general tendency of wars, that those of the latter half of the century aided the growth of free inst.i.tutions in Italy. An honoured place among nations was given by the Crimean war to Sardinia. Then her patriotic statesman, Cavour, persuaded Napoleon III.

to help him rescue Lombardy from Austria. Garibaldi took the opportunity to liberate Naples; and Victor Emanuel made himself King over all Italy except Rome and Venice. The latter city also was brought under a const.i.tutional and friendly government by a third great war, which made the King of Prussia and his successors Emperors of Germany, while Austria was compelled to grant home rule to Hungary. The liberation and secularisation of Italy were completed in 1870 by the expulsion from Rome of the French garrison. The Emperor had lost his throne by waging war wantonly against a united Germany.

III. The Third Republic was soon obliged to fight for her life against the same enemy which had wounded her sister mortally. Socialism was still the religion of the working-men of Paris, who now formed the majority of the National Guard. Indignation at the failure of the new Government to repulse the Prussians led, on March 18, 1871, to the capture of all Paris by what was avowedly the revolution of the workmen against the shopkeepers, ”in the name of the rights of labour,” for ”the suppression of all monopolies,” ”the reign of labour instead of capital,” and ”the emanc.i.p.ation of the worker by himself.” This was in harmony with the teaching of the International Working-men's a.s.sociation, which endorsed the insurrection fully and formally, and which held with Karl Marx that wealth is produced entirely by labour and belongs only to the working cla.s.s. Socialists were active in the rebellion; but property-holders in Paris took no part; and all the rest of France took sides with the Government. What professed to be the rising of the many against the few turned out to be that of the few against the many. Impressment was necessary for manning the barricades, and pillage for raising money. The general closing of stores, factories, and offices showed that capital had been frightened away by the red flag. One of the last decrees of its defenders was, ”Destroy all factories employing more than fifteen workers. This monopoly crushes the artisan.” This spirit would have caused the confiscation of the funds of the National Bank, if the managers had not said: ”If you do that, you will turn the money your own comrades have in their pockets to waste paper.” The priceless pictures and statues in the Louvre were condemned to destruction because they represented ”G.o.ds, kings, and priests.”

Millions of dollars worth of works of art perished in company with docks, libraries, and public buildings; but this vandalism, like the ma.s.sacre of prisoners, was largely the work of professional criminals.

The capture of Paris, late in May, was accompanied with pitiless slaughter of the rebels, though many lives were saved by Victor Hugo.

Since then the French Republic has been able to keep down not only the Socialists but the Bonapartists and Royalists. It has also succeeded, with the help of writers like Renan, in checking the ambition of the clergy. Continuance of peace in Europe has a.s.sisted the growth of local self-government in France, and also in Germany. The famous Prussian victories seem, however, to have increased the power of the German Emperor; and there is still danger that the growth of standing armies may check that of free inst.i.tutions.

CHAPTER III. DEMOCRATS AND GARRISONIANS

I. The fall of the English aristocracy was hastened by the success of democracy in America. Nowhere were the ma.s.ses more willing to obey the law; and nowhere else were they so intelligent and prosperous. The gains of the many made the country rich; territory and population increased rapidly; and Britannia found a dangerous compet.i.tor on every sea.

Political liberty and equality were secured by the almost uninterrupted supremacy of the Democratic party from 1800 to 1860. Twelve presidential elections out of fifteen were carried by Jefferson and his successors; and the Congress whose term began in 1841 was the only one out of the thirty in which both Houses were anti-Democratic.

Political equality was increased in State after State by dispensing with property qualifications for voting or holding office. Jefferson and his successor, Madison, refused to appoint days for fasting and giving thanks, or grant any other special privileges to those citizens who held favoured views about religion. Congress after Congress refused to appoint chaplains; so did some of the States; and a national law, still in force, for opening the post-offices on every day of the week, was pa.s.sed in 1810. Many attempts were made by Sabbatarians to stop the mails; but the Senate voted in 1829, that ”Our government is a civil, and not a religious inst.i.tution”; and the lower House denied next year that the majority has ”any authority over the minority except in matters which regard the conduct of man to his fellow-man.” The opposition made by the Federalists to the establishment of religious equality in Connecticut, in 1816, increased the odium which they had incurred by not supporting the war against Great Britain. Four years later, the party was practically extinct; and the disestablishment of Congregationalism as the state church of Ma.s.sachusetts, in 1833, was accomplished easily.

The Northern States were already so strong in Congress that they might have prevented Missouri from entering the Union that year without any pledge to emanc.i.p.ate her slaves. The sin of extending the area of bondage so far northwards was scarcely palliated by the other conditions of the compromise. The admission of Maine gave her citizens no privileges beyond what they had previously as citizens of Ma.s.sachusetts; and the pledge that slavery should not again be extended north of lat.i.tude thirty-six, thirty, proved worthless.

The North was so far from being united in 1820 that it was not even able to raise the tariff. New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio wished to exclude foreign compet.i.tion in manufacturing; but the embargo was too recent for New England to forget the evils of restricting commerce. The Salem merchants pet.i.tioned for ”free trade” ”as the sure foundation of national prosperity”; and the solid men of Boston declared with Webster that ”A system of bounties and protection” ”would have a tendency to diminish the industry, impede the prosperity, and corrupt the morals of the people.”

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