heoretical and idealistic;
these things could not have been done in practice. Perhaps not, though
it is by no means certain, when we look back on the very different
temper that ruled In the country in the early months of the war. If
anything of the kind could have been done it would certainly have been
a practical proof of determination for the war which would have shown
more clearly than anything else that "no price was too high when
Honour was at stake." It would also have been an extraordinary
demonstration to the working classes of the sacrifices that property
owners were ready to make, the result of which might have been that
the fine spirit shown at the beginning of the war might have been
maintained until the end, instead of degenerating into a series of
demands for higher wages, each one of which, as conceded to one set of
workmen, only stimulates another to demand the same. But even if we
grant that it is only theoretically possible to have performed such a
feat as is outlined above, there is surely no question that much more
might have been done than has been done in the matter of paying for
the war by taxation. If we are reminded once more that our ancestors
paid nearly half the cost of the Napoleonic war out of revenue, while
we are paying about a fifth of the cost of the present war from the
same source, it is easy to see that a much greater effort might have
been made in view of the very much greater wealth of the country at
the present time. I was going to have added, in view also of its
greater economic enlightenment, but I feel that after the experience
of the present war, and its financing by currency debasement, the less
about economic enlightenment the better.

What, then, stood in the way of measures of finance which would have
obviously had results so much more desirable than those which will
face us at the end of the war? As it is, the nation, with all classes
embittered owing to suspicions of profiteering on the part of the
employers and of unpatriotic strikes on the part of the workers, will
have to face a load of debt, the service of which is already roughly
equivalent to our total pre-war revenue; while there seems every
prospect that the war may continue for many half-years yet, and every
half-year, as it is at present financed, leaves us with a load of debt
which will require the total yield of the income tax and the super-tax
before the war to meet the charge upon it. Why have we allowed ou