POLITICS AND CHARACTER.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 777, 29 March 1910, Page 2

POLITICS AND CHARACTER.

PROFESSOR POLLARD AND THE ; ETHICS OP PUBLIC LIFE. Professor A. F. Pollard delivered an address on "Politics and Character" at the London Institution recently. There were some people, ho. remarked, who would argue tliatethics was not a part of politics at all. To a Greek politics was a'man's whole existence, Whereas to us it was a.-thing apart. -The .an-, tithesis set up; to ;the Greek form of life between individual character and politics had- gone on growing with the years.'. Diplomacy', of course, was a form of politics, and Sir Henry Wootten 'had said that "an ambassador was ,a good man sent abroad to. lie for his country's good.[' (Laughter.) .'. Lord Melbourne again, at the end of a Cabinet meeting stopped'lris colleagues as they were going out, and putting his back to the door, said: "It does not so much matter, what we say, so "long as we all say tho same thing." Every member of a Cabinet hadto practise an economy of truth; (Laughter.) He had-to'wear a mask in public. .'.-•' .Politics was-always a matter of second best.' If there was t00... muoh character, one-was nearly always-pun-ished for it in 'politics. ,' Each' party seized upon every opportunity to indulgo in.the:same rare luxury of donning the garment.of respectability at the expense of its. opponent. These ■'things, although they.-seemed unpleasant, were necessary in politics, if one's party wore to be efficient. .There must be a certain amount of unity in that' party if they were to carry out any' policy, at all. The greatest evil in politics at the present. time was that nothing was absolutely black, and nothing was absolutely white'. The. public, less than tho House of-Commons, •recognised that there were two.sides' to a question. One reason of this was intellectual indolence, and another reason the innatercombative instinct .of the. .--.,,,,..'.' . ', .. ': tendency was to make nien do .or. say things -that -were against their conscience, yet he did not think it was open'to' dispute'that conscientious people had been among those who had dono tho greatest amount of damage' in the history of the world. A politician.might have to defend measures in public, to which ho was opposed strongly in-Cab- . ihet.. Economy of truth might be justi-, fied in .a politician; indeed, it, might be necessary to tell a lie occasionally— .if,- for ; ;instanoe, T by;;,telling a lie a'man -.'could"save.- his country. _ ~;.* ~-;,-.. , Ho believed ..that... leading. politicians, "as a rule, were of better character than leading men .in. purely private, capacities^'.for' the" reason'that a politician's' possibilities of' doing good were greater than..in any..other walk of life. '■'