still greatly
superior in tone to that of any other nation--are sufficient guarantees
against relapse into the morass of political immorality which
characterised the relations between nation and nation, and notably
between the strong and the weak, even so late as the eighteenth
century.[4] It is to be hoped and believed that, for the time being,
this contention is well founded, but what assurance is there--if the
Book which embodies the code of Christian morality may without
irreverence be quoted--that "that which is done is that which shall be
done"?[5] That is the crucial question.

There appear to be at present existent in England two different Imperial
schools of thought, which, without being absolutely antagonistic,
represent very opposite principles. One school, which, for want of a
better name, may be styled that of philanthropy, is occasionally tainted
with the zeal which outruns discretion, and with the want of accuracy
which often characterises those whose emotions predominate over their
reason. The violence and want of mental equilibrium at times displayed
by the partisans of this school of thought not infrequently give rise to
misgivings lest the Duke of Wellington should have prophesied truly when
he said, "If you lose India, the House of Commons will lose it for
you."[6] These manifest defects should not, however, blind us to the
fact that the philanthropists and sentimentalists are deeply imbued with
the grave national responsibilities which devolve on England, and with
the lofty aspirations which attach themselves to her civilising and
moralising mission.

The other is the commercial school. Pitt once said that "British policy
is British trade." The general correctness of this aphorism cannot be
challenged, but, like most aphorisms, it only conveys a portion of the
truth; for the commercial spirit, though eminently beneficent when under
some degree of moral control, may become not merely hurtful, but even
subversive of Imperial dominion, when it is allowed to run riot.
Livingstone said that in five hundred years the only thing the natives
of Africa had learnt from the Portuguese was to distil bad spirits with
the help of an old gun barrel. This is, without doubt, an extreme
case--so extreme, indeed, that even the hardened conscience of
diplomatic Europe was eventually shamed into taking some half-hearted
action in the direction of preventing a whole continent from being
demoralised in order that the d