t Labour has "come into its own," and is quite sure
that, unless it can get more to eat, it will cease to make munitions,
and so will secure an early, if not a satisfactory, peace. In vain
I suggest to my friend that his vision is obscured by the mist,
and that the apparition which thus strangely exhilarates him is
the creation of his own brain.

Then I turn to the politicians, and of these it is to be remarked
that, however much befogged they may be, they always are certain
that they see much more clearly than the world at large. This
circumstance would invest their opinions with a peculiar authority,
if only they did not contradict one another flat. We are doubling
the electorate: what result will the General Election produce?
Politicians who belong to the family of Mr. Despondency and his
daughter, Muchafraid, reply that Monarchy will be abolished, Capital
"conscripted" (delightful verb), debt repudiated, and Anarchy enthroned.
Strangely dissimilar results are predicted by the Party-hacks, who,
being by lifelong habit trained to applaud whatever Government
does, announce with smug satisfaction that the British workman
loves property, and will use his new powers to conserve it; adores
the Crown, and feels that the House of Lords is the true protector
of his liberties.

Again, there are publicists who (like myself) have all their lives
proclaimed their belief in universal suffrage as the one guarantee
of freedom. If we are consistent, we ought to rejoice in the prospect
now unfolding itself before us; but perhaps the mist has got into our
eyes. Our forefathers abolished the tyranny of the Crown. Successive
Reform Acts have abolished the tyranny of class. But what about the
tyranny of capital? Is Democracy safe from it?

I do not pretend to be clearer-sighted than my neighbours; but in
the mist each of us sees the form of some evil which he specially
dislikes; and to my thinking Bureaucracy is just as grave a menace
to Freedom as Militarism, and in some ways graver, as being more
plausible. We used to call ourselves Collectivists, and we rejoiced
in the prospect of the State doing for us what we ought to do for
ourselves. We voted Political Economy a dismal science (which it
is), and felt sure that, if only the Government would take in hand
the regulation of supply and demand, the inequalities of life would
be adjusted, everyone would be well fed, and everyone would be
happy. As far as we can see through the blindin