h Canada, Australia,
and New Zealand took their modern form, Wakefield was a leader in
constitutional as well as in economic matters, and Canada was favoured
not only with his opinions, but with {239} his presence. In the _Art
of Colonization_ he entered into some detail on these matters. There
was a certain breezy informality about his views, which carried him
directly to the heart of the matter. He understood, as few of his
contemporaries did, that in all discussions concerning the "connexion,"
the final argument was sentimental rather than constitutional; and he
accepted without further argument the incapacity of Englishmen for
being other than English in the politics of their colony. "There would
still be hostile parties in a colony," he wrote as he planned reforms,
"yes, parties instead of factions: for every colony would have its
'ins' and 'outs,' and would be governed as we are--as every free
community must be in the present state of the human mind--by the
emulation and rivalries, the bidding against each other for public
favour, of the party in power and the party in opposition. Government
by party, with all its passions and corruptions, is the price that a
free country pays for freedom. But the colonies would be free
communities: their internal differences, their very blunders, and their
methods of correcting them, would be all their own; and the colonists
who possessed capacity for public business would govern in turns far
better on the whole than {240} it would be possible for any other set
of beings on earth to govern that particular community."[9] He was,
then, for a most entire and whole-hearted control by colonists, and
especially Canadians, of their own affairs. But when he came to define
what these affairs included, he had limits to suggest, and although he
was aware of the dangers implicit in such a limitation, he was very
emphatic on the need of imperial control in diplomacy and war, and more
especially in the administration of land.[10] How practical and
sincere were his views on the supremacy of the home government, he
proved by supporting, in person and with his pen, Sir Charles Metcalfe
in his struggle to limit the claims of local autonomy.

Powerful and suggestive as Wakefield's mind was, he had, nevertheless,
to own a master in colonial theory; for the most distinguished, and by
far the clearest, view of the whole matter is contained in Charles
Buller's _Responsible Government for the C