LESSONS OF HISTORY.

Evening Post, Volume LXXIX, Issue 71, 26 March 1910, Page 10

LESSONS OF HISTORY.

ROMAN AND BRITISH EMPIRES COMPARED. . At the annual meeting of the Classical Association, held on 11th January, Lord Crbmer, the retiring president, delivered an interesting address on "Ancient and Modern Imperialism." He addressed them, he said, not as a soldier, but as a politician and an administrator. In a sense, it might be said that Imperialism was as old as the world. One of the most recent writers on Egyptian history, Professor Breasted, had termed Thothmes 111. "the first great empire builder of the world," and the true forerunner of Alexander and Napoleon. The experience of the shortlived Empire of Athens could not be used as an argument to prove that democratic institutions must necessarily bo incompatible with the execution of a sane Imperial policy (laughter), but rather as one to show the fatal effects produced by democracy run mad. Our great Imperial problem of the future was to what extent some 350 millions of British subjects, aliens to us in race, religion, language, manners, and customs, were to govern themselves or were to be governed by us. Rome never had to face such an issue as this. ANALOGY WITH ROME. The first points of analogy which must strike any one who endeavoured to institute a comparison between Rome and modern, notably British, Imperial policy was that in proceeding from conquest to conquest, each step in advance was in ancient as it had been in modern times accompanied by misgivings, and was often taken with a reluctance which was by no means feigned; that Rome, equally with the modern expansive Powers, more especially Great Britain and Russia, was impelled onwards by the imperious and irresistible necessity of acquiring defensible frontiers ; that the public opinion of the world scoffed 2000 years ago, as it did now, at the alleged necessity ; and that each onward move was attributed to an insatiable lust for an extended dominion. The Romans, or at all events some of the wisest amongst them, struggled as honestly and manfully to check the appetite for self-ag-grandisement as ever Mr. Gladstone and Lord Granville strove to shake off the Egyptian burden in 1882. But all efforts to check the rising tide of Imperialism were in vain. The methods of Romaii6 and British were also very similar. In both cases, undaunted audacity characterised their proceedings, and both nations had been largely aided by auxiliaries drawn from the countries which they conquered. Lord Cromer went on to point out how the science of Imperial government had improved. It was not, he said, until the convulsion of 1857 forced it upoii the rulers of India that they adopted the principle which lay at the root of all sound administration, and which in quite recent times had been flagrantly violated in Turkey, Egypt, and the Congo. That principle was that administration and commercial exploitation should not be entrusted to the same hands. There had been no thorough fusion, no real assimilation between the British and their alien subjects, and, so far as they could now predict, the future would in this respect be but a repetition of the past. Language was not, and never could be, an important factor in the execution of a policy of fusion where divergences of religion and colour barred the way. Indeed, in some ways it rather tended to disruption, inasmuch as it furnished the subject races with a very j powerful arm against their alien rulers. THE DIFFICULTY OF GOVERNMENT, j In ancient times, famine and prevent- , able disease must have swept millions of persons prematurely into the grave. Nowhere did the policy of modern differ more widely trom that of ancient Imperialism than in dealing with matters of that sort The modern Imperialist would not accept the decrees of Nature. He struggled manfully, and at enormous cost, to resist them. The policy of preserving and prolonging human . life — even useless life — was noble. It was the only policy worthy of a civilised nation, but its execution inevitably increased the difficulty of government. In India it had in some provinces produced a highly congested population, and it had thus necessarily intensified the struggle for life of the survivors. They had at times heard a good deal of what was called th© impoverishment of India. But he was well convinced that whattever impovcrish>ment had taken place was much more due to good than to bad government. It was largely attributable to a beneficent intention to. deliver the people of India from war, pestilence, and famine. What answer would the modern Impeiialiet give to the question quo vadis? The Englishman would be puzzled to give any definite answer, for he was always striving to attain two ideals, which were apt to be mutually destructive — the ideal of good government, which connoted the continuance of his own supremacy, and the ideal of self-government, wnicn connoted the whole or partial abdication of his supreme position. With regard to India, he said it would be well for England, better for India, and best of all for the cause of progressive civilisation m general if it \vere clearly understood from the outset that however liberal might be the concessions which had now been made, and which at any future time might be made, we had not the smallest intention of abandoning our Indian possessions, and ithat it was highly improbable that any such intention would be entertained by our posterity. The foundation-stone of Indian reform must be the steadfast maintenance of Britibh supremacy.