anchise 'Reform' Bills--and it is astonishing to what use
'reform' can now be put--can be rushed through Parliament, like Crimes
Acts, in twenty-four hours; and there is the 'voluntary' professional
army, under military law, to overawe the recalcitrants who may resent
the suffrage and the ballot-box being jerrymandered against the
popular interest. But none are so likely to be overawed by threatened
displays of armed force--whether voluntary or conscript--as those who
have a difficulty in distinguishing the butt end of a rifle from its
muzzle."[530]

Under the heading "Will it come to barricades?" we read: "The
barricade is to-day, all will agree, in this country at any rate, an
impossible weapon. Armed insurrection on the part of the workers in
this country would to-day be the height of folly, and will continue to
be so, so long as our standing army of hired mercenaries exists.
Standing armies are the instruments of capitalist oppression at home
and aggression abroad. But so long as even one great Power maintains
the present form of military organisation, so long as war is possible,
so long will it be necessary that some form of military organisation
exist in all countries. We dare not preach peace when we know there
can be no peace. This is why the Socialists of all countries are
to-day in favour of an educational policy which will make every
citizen fit for military service within the ranks of a citizen army,
organised and maintained for purposes of defence only. The advantages
of such a force, from the Socialist standpoint, are so obvious that
they need hardly be stated. And it would at least put the working
class in a position to understand what a barricade means, and how, if
need be, to act in their own defence. There are, I am well aware, a
handful of individual Socialists with us who are against universal
military training, but they are a diminishing quantity, and will in
due season find their natural vocation within the ranks of the
Liberty and Property Defence League."[531]

Mr. Quelch, the editor of "Justice," shares the foregoing opinion, for
he tells us: "Revolutions, it is said, can no longer be accomplished
by force, but only by peaceful means--the vote, Parliamentary action,
and legislation. It may be so, but it will be unprecedented if the
present ruling class surrender without a struggle. And if they had the
armed force of the nation at their command, they would struggle
successfully no matter what t