eir action is always liable to be superseded by the
violent and vehement operations of mere ignorance.' The United States
are no exception to this rule. They have extended their dominion by much
the same means as the empire of the Tsars or our own. Texas and Upper
California, the Philippines and Porto Rico, were annexed forcibly; New
Mexico, Alaska, and Louisiana were bought; Florida was acquired by
treaty; Maine filched from Canada. In no case were the wishes of the
inhabitants consulted. Our own experience of republicanism is the same.
It was during the short period when Great Britain had no king that
Cromwell's court-poet, Andrew Marvell, urged him to complete his
glorious career by demolishing our present allies:

A Caesar he, ere long, to Gaul,
To Italy an Hannibal.

On the other hand, none of the 'autocrats' wanted this war. The Kaiser
was certainly pushed into it.

Democracy is a form of government which may be rationally defended, not
as being good, but as being less bad than any other. Its strongest
merits seem to be: first, that the citizens of a democracy have a sense
of proprietorship and responsibility in public affairs, which in times
of crisis may add to their tenacity and endurance. The determination of
the Federals in the American Civil War, and of the French and British in
the four years' struggle against Germany, may be legitimately adduced as
arguments for democracy. When De Tocqueville says that 'it is hard for a
democracy to begin or to end a war,' the second is truer than the first.
And, secondly, the educational value of democracy is so great that it
may be held to counterbalance many defects. Mill decides in favour of
democracy mainly on the ground that 'it promotes a better and higher
form of national character than any other polity,' since government by
authority stunts the intellect, narrows the sympathies, and destroys the
power of initiative. 'The perfect commonwealth,' says Mr. Zimmern,' is a
society of free men and women, each at once ruling and being ruled,' It
is also fair to argue that monarchies do not escape the worst evils of
democracies. An autocracy is often obliged to oppress the educated
classes and to propitiate the mob. Domitian massacred senators with
impunity, and only fell '_postquam cerdonibus esse timendus coeperat_.'
If an autocracy does not rest on the army, which leads to the chaos of
praetorianism, it must rely on '_panem et circenses_.' Hence it has some
o