pointment of public servants,
the everyday texture of all our lives. Then the nobody becomes somebody,
the party hack gets busy, the rat is in the granary....

In these recent debates in the House of Commons one can see every stock
trick of the wire-puller in operation. Particularly we have the old
dodge of the man who is "in theory quite in sympathy with Proportional
Representation, but ..." It is, he declares regretfully, too late. It
will cause delay. Difficult to make arrangements. Later on perhaps. And
so on. It is never too late for a vital issue. Upon the speedy adoption
of Proportional Representation depends, as Mr. Balfour made plain in an
admirable speech, whether the great occasions of the peace and after the
peace are to be handled by a grand council of all that is best and most
leaderlike in the nation, or whether they are to be left to a few
leaders, apparently leading, but really profoundly swayed by the obscure
crowd of politicians and jobbers behind them. Are the politicians to
hamper and stifle us in this supreme crisis of our national destinies or
are we British peoples to have a real control of our own affairs in this
momentous time? Are men of light and purpose to have a voice in public
affairs or not? Proportional Representation is supremely a test
question. It is a question that no adverse decision in the House of
Commons can stifle. There are too many people now who grasp its
importance and significance. Every one who sets a proper value upon
purity in public life and the vitality of democratic institutions will,
I am convinced, vote and continue to vote across every other question
against the antiquated, foul, and fraudulent electoral methods that have
hitherto robbed democracy of three-quarters of its efficiency.

XI

THE STUDY AND PROPAGANDA OF DEMOCRACY

In the preceding chapter I have dealt with the discussion of
Proportional Representation in the British House of Commons in order to
illustrate the intellectual squalor amidst which public affairs have to
be handled at the present time, even in a country professedly
"democratic." I have taken this one discussion as a sample to illustrate
the present imperfection of our democratic instrument. All over the
world, in every country, great multitudes of intelligent and serious
people are now inspired by the idea of a new order of things in the
world, of a world-wide establishment of peace and mutual aid between
nation and nation and ma