LITERATURE.

Otago Witness, Issue 3522, 13 September 1921, Page 54

LITERATURE.

BOOK NOTICES. A Review of the Development of Democracy'in Our Day. Lord Bryce’s lately published work "Modern Democracies" is a comparative study of the development of democracy in the countries which, up to the time of the Croat War, pL: ced the active forces of government in the hands of the people. It is a long work, yet there are omissions that one would have liked supplied ; thus there is no special study of democracy in Britain, though divisions are devoted to Australia, New Zealand, and Canada. Lord Bryce states the leasoa for this omission m his preface. No British citizen, he says, and especially no citizen who for 40 years has taken an active part in politics can hope to be credited with impartiality. He therefore leaves tins department of the subject to some other thinker, preferably French or American, who will not be under the same disability. But throughout the work the writer lias aimed at preserving a detacned attitude. ‘‘The book," he says, "is not meant to propound theories. Novelties are not possible in a subject the literature of which began with Plato and Aristotle, and has been enriched by thousands of pens since their day. What I desire is not to impress upon my readers views of my own, but to supply them with facts, and far as 1 can) with explanations of facts on which they can reflect and from which they can draw their own conclusions." 1 he first portion of the book is occupied with an examination of the meaning and the evolution of Democracy. Separate chapters are devoted to Liberty, Equality, Democracy, and Education, The Press in a Democracy, Party, Local Government, Tradition, ihe People, and Public (billion. 1 aen the working of democracy in various countries is investigated, the first chapter of this portion giving a review of Ancient Greek democracies. With the decline of t‘lose and tile ascendancy of Roman power democracy died out, not to revive again till the epoch of the French Revolution. Greatly as these little city States with their handful of free citizen population differed from modern democratic States, the record of their experience is still rich in lessons for modern times. The republics of Spanish America are dealt with in a single chapter, while the great democratic powers, France and the United States, and the British Dominions are treated of with tire fulness called for bv their importance. Switzerland, a specially interesting example of a democratic State, has also several chapters devoted to it. The last portion of the book is devoted to examination and criticism of the working of the democratic institutions in the light of the facts described in the previous survey of democratic countries. Of the three human rights claimed bv the revoluntionists of the eighteenth century Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity, Equality is the one that excites far the most interest to-day. The masses have found that political freedom and even equal suffrage go but a small way to secure the means of a desirable existence; while social reform is sought by bringing ever more and more of life * under Governmental regulation. “The enthusiasm for liberty which fired men’s hearts for a century or more from the beginning of the American Revolution down to our own time, has now grown cool. The dithyrambic expression it found in the poets and orators of those days sounds strange and hollow in the ears of the present generation, bent on securing, with the least possible exertion, the material conditions of comfort and well-being. ’ The danger to-day is that liberty may be lost sight of in the pursuit of material wellbeing and economic levelling, while all .forms of socialism and communism, so far promulgated or put into effect, are inimical to individual freedom of action and independence of thought. Lord Bryce’s counsel is timely; “Room should be found in every country for men who, like the prophets of ancient Israel, have alone- with their wrath at the evils of their own time, inspiring visions of a better future and the right to speak their minds. That love of freedom, which will bear with apposition because it lias faith in the victory of truth, is none too common. .Many of those who have the word in their lips are despots at heart. Those men in whom that love seemed to glow with the hottest flame may have had an almost excessive faith in its power for good, but if this be an infirmity, it is an infirmity of noble minds, which democracies ought to honour.” Tn a foot note Lord Bryce mentions Mazzini and Mr Gladstone as the two amongst famous Europeans of the last generation most fully possessed by faith in liberty. “Individual liberty is like oxygen in the air. a life-giving spirit. Political liberty will have seen one of ts fairest fruits wither on the bough if that spirit should decline. ” In the chapter Democracy and Education the question how far mental cultivation is a criterion of capacity for civic functions is discussed. Experience shows that the value of education may easily he overrated. The more enlightened classes often show themselves prejudiced and .short-sighted, while on several occasions in England last century the working classes showed a better ncr.se of the justice of contested causes Ihnu the majority of the upper classes. The American Civil War is a notable example of this. And men of the highest attainments in scholarship and science very often show themselves no wiser than the rank and file. The conclusion is that while too much reliance must not be placed on national education, this must nevertheless be extended and improved as much as possible. “Instruction must ho provided in civilised and uncivilised countries, and the more of it the better, for every man must have his chance of turning to the bast a< .count whatever capacity Nature

has given him, and of enjoying all the pleasure the exercise of his faculties can afford. This will doubtless work out for good in political as well as in other fields of effort. Ihe seed- of education will ultimately yield a harvest in the field of politics, though the gram may be slow in ripening.” In the very interesting chapter De mocracy and Religion Lord Bvvce examines the claim sometimes put forward that socialism is a legitimate development of Ine Gospel teaching, and shows its fallacy. Ihe teaching of Christ was not directed to governments, but to the individual heart and conscience, and placed no reliance on material force. In a genuinely Christian society all oppression and injustice would vanish: all suffering would he relieved through the spirit of brotherly love; there would be little need for the forces of the State; in fact, the State would be superfluous except as an organisation for carrying out purposes useful to all as public works, etc. But Christianity has never been put in practice. “However remote the prospect that such a society can be established on earth, the principles which that teaching inculcates are sufficient to guide conduct in every walk of life. He who does justice and loves mercy and seeks the good of others nay less than his own will bring the right spirit to his public as well as to his private duties. If ever that spirit pervades a whole nation, it will be a Christian nation as none has ever yet been.” LITERARY NOTES. “Good Grain," by Emmeline Morrison, has recently been selected as the prizewinning novel in the John Long £SOO prize competition for the best first novel. The author, who is the wife of a wellknown man in commercial circles in the city, was born in Prestwich, Lancashire, and is the youngest daughter of the late John Cottrill, for many years a J.P. for tne county. At an early age she commenced writing stories, and, with her sister, formed a email “literary dub" of schoolgirls—each member bringing her ta-ies to read at a weekly meeting for other members to criticise. ’ Left a legacy by her uncle, a cotton spinner, she was able to travel, and in a few years had visited many countries and places of interest. Messrs Ward. Lock, and Co. will bs issuing shortly in their well-known Australasian Gift Book Series five important books. “Back to Billabong,” by Mary G. Bruce, is sure to be eagerly sought after, as it is a continuation of" the Billabong Series. “The Ship that Never Set Sail” is by Jean C'urlewis, daughter of Ethel Turner. It was in 1894' “Seven Little Australians” was written bv Ethel Turner, and the sale has reached close on 100.GC0 copies. The daughter has inherited the gilt of her mother, and a good future is predicted for her in the world of literature. New stories will also be published— King Anne," bv Ethel Turner; “The Best School of All,” bv Lillian Pvke ; and “Ginger,” by Isabel X. Peacocke” Mr G. B. Shaw, in his “Back to Methuselah," has an elderly gentleman recapitulating the lessons of history in the followamusing rop.niicr:—’‘Consider this island on which we stand, the last foothold of man on this side of the Atlantic : this Ireland, described by the earliest bards as an emerald gem set in a silver sea ! Can I, a scion of the illustrious British race, ever forget that when the Empire transferred its seat to the East, and said to the turbulent Irish race which it had oppressed but never conquered, ‘At last wc leave you to yourselves : and much good may it do you, the Irish as one man uttered the historic shout, ‘No, we’ll be damned if you do,’ and emigrated to the countries where there was still a Nationalist question, to India, Persia, and Corea, to Morocco, Tunis, and Tripoli. In these countries they were ever foremost- in the struggle for national independence; and the world rang continually with the story of their sufferings and wrongs. And what poem can do justice to the end, when it came at last? Hardly 200 years had elapsed when the claims of nationality were so universally conceded that there was no longer a single country on the face of the earth with a national grievance of a national movement. Think of the position of the Irish, who had lost all their political faculties by disuse except that of nationalist agitation, and who owed their position as the most interesting race on earth solely to their sufferings !” The elderly gentleman continues; “The very countries they liad helped to set free boycotted them as intolerable bores. The communities which had once idolised them as the incarnation of all that is adorable in the warm heart and witty brain, fled from them as from a pestilence. To regain their lost prestige, the Trish claimed the city of Jerusalem, on the ground that they were the lost Gibes of Israel ; but on their approach the Jews abandoned the city and redistributed themselves throughout Europe. It was then that these devoted Irishmen, not one of whom had ever seen Ireland, were counselled bv an English Archbishop, the father of the oracles, to go back to their own country. This had never once occurred to them, because there was nothing to prevent them and nobody to forbid them. They jumped at the suggestion. They landed here : here in Galway Bay, on this very ground. When they reached the shore the older men and women flung themselves down and passionately kissed the soil of lieland, calling on the young to embrace the earth that had borne their ancestors. But the young looked gloomily on, and said : ‘There is no earth, only stone.’ You will see by looking round yon why thev said that ; the, fields here are of stone : the hills are capped with granite. They all left for England next day; and no Irishman ever again confessed to being Trish, even to his own children ; so that when that generation passed away the Irish race vanished from human knowledge. And the dispersed .Tews did the same lest they should be sent back to Palestine. Since then the world, bereft of its Jews and its Irish has been a tame, dull place.”