, is the policy proposed by
the Socialist Labour party and Industrial Unionism. Circumstances may,
and probably will, modify it in many important details, but there is
the main outline. Is it not more logical, more coherent, more likely
to succeed than any 'citizen army scheme'?"[554]

Love of country has apparently no room in the Socialist's ethics. Its
defence does not trouble him, since he is taught that his worst
enemies are those Englishmen who happen to be better off.

Waste not your ready blows,
Strike not at foreign foes,
Your bitterest enemies tread your own soil;
The preachers who blind ye,
The landlords who grind ye,
The gluttons who revel whilst ye are at toil.

Rise in your might, brothers, bear it no longer,
Assemble in masses throughout the whole land;
Teach the vile bloodsuckers who are the stronger
When workers and robbers confronted shall stand.
Through Castle, Court, and Hall,
Over their acres all,
Onward we'll press like the waves of the sea.
Seizing the wealth we've made.
Ending the spoilers' trade;
Till Labour has triumphed, and England is free.[555]

In their desire to abolish the army, some Socialists argue that "The
whole of your military system is entirely unnecessary."[556] Others
falsify history and boldly assert that British wars, "in nearly every
case have been waged for the suppression of liberty abroad, or from
the irritating desire on the part of British statesmen to interfere
with the internal affairs of other nations."[557] On the other hand,
Mr. Quelch very sensibly argues: "Militarism is an evil against which
we have to fight with all the means in our power, but to talk of
universal disarmament at the present stage is mere Utopianism, a
crying of peace where there is no peace, and where existing
antagonisms make peace impossible. We have at first to eradicate the
causes of conflict. To-day the unarmed nation offers itself as a
temptation and a prey to some mighty brigand Power. War is the last
argument of kings, and all Governments rest on force. So long as that
is the case, it is only the people which is armed that can maintain
its freedom, or can indeed lay claim to be a free people. An unarmed
nation cannot be free. An armed nation, on the contrary, is a
guarantee of individual liberty, of social freedom, and of national
independence."[558] Mr. Quelch would have the same id