If they want to keep them they will have
to shut their own professors' books, and study the intimate history of
the British Empire. We are old hands at the business; we have lost more
colonies than ever they owned, and we begin to think that we have learnt
the secret of success. At any rate, our experience has done much for us,
and has helped us to avoid failure. Yet the German colonial party stare
at us with bovine malevolence. In all the library of German theorizing
you will look in vain for any explanation of the fact that the Boers
are, in the main, loyal to the British Empire. If German political
thinkers could understand that political situation, which seems to
English minds so simple, there might yet be hope for them. But they
regard it all as a piece of black magic, and refuse to reason about it.
How should a herd of cattle be driven without goads? Witchcraft,
witchcraft!
Their world-wide experience it is, perhaps, which has made the English
quick to appreciate the virtues of other peoples. I have never known an
Englishman who travelled in Russia without falling in love with the
Russian people.
Pages:
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36