The Stuff of Empire

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XLIX, Issue 47, 30 November 1922, Page 23

The Stuff of Empire

(By G. K. Chesterton, in -New Witness.)

It is very characteristic of the press that it is quoting a Yankee professor to prove to the English that all is well with England. The recognised way of proving that all is well is to prove that all has been worse; as, for instance, at some previous period like the eighteenth century. In one sense it is true that every generation seems degenerate; the more reason for being really uneasy about any. generation that shrinks from so normal a reproach. In one sense every man does feel a failure; except one particular sort of man who thinks he is a success and who most certainly is a failure, if being a fool is being a failure. Similarly the modern world has'not been unique in being denounced for its" decay; but rather in being so uncommonly touchy in denying it. ', The matter involved in. this case is- the « British Empire, and our American comforter tells us that it was far worse off when it lost America. We fear the comparison is rather ..between a healthy man saved by amputation and a complete man with a bad disease. The same false consolation is applied, to corruption: Just as Walpole's corruption was safer because it was more scandalous - and obvious, so Washington's rebellion was less of a shock because it'was more lucid and therefore more limited. What is happening now is not that people .are breaking away from the Empire" but that it is becoming less and less clear what is involved in being attached to it. The Empire from which Washington separated was English. But what exactly is the Empire from, which Collins and Smuts are not separated? The more we consider" that problem, the more we shall .come back to an old ideal of this paper; the notion of nationalism. v - ' \ Take as an instance, and perhaps the most' striking instance, the.present problem of Palestine. Numbers of normal patriotic Englishmen now know by a sort of H net. that the experiment is dangerous ' for England. But. it. .is impossible to give any intelligent definition of that doubt except in terms of the very notions which the New. Witness so long alone maintained,' and was mocked for maintaining; What is' the matter with the present ■ experiments of Zionism, under the 'protectorate J of the British Empire, is that, it is- Imperialistic without ; being British. It ': is carefully calculated to combine all : the disadvantages which the Little Englander perceives in the policy of pointing the map red, with all : the disadvantages which the Imperialist, perceives in .the policy of scuttle. It is a new kind of 'Cape to Cairo policy, which; connects Denshawi . with ■ Majuba. ' It is an act "of ■ annexation: in its relation 'to the. Arabs; it is an act of evacuation in its .relation to the Jews. point of; view v of the 'French in Syria it is a British occupation; From the point of view. of the " British in Palestine it is a Jewish , oceupaton. Now this is the: .worst possible, compromise or

combination that could conceivably be made. We wave our flag without being in possession of our fort; we make sure of being envied for something we have not got; we run all the risks of land-grabbing without even grabbing the land. For while the flag that flies from the turrets like a. challenge, and almost like a taunt, is our flag, we have filled ■ the fort with strangers whom we have no sort of reason. to trust, and who in any turn of events may find it to their advantage to sell the fort to our foes. Upon this last plain point opinion seems to be singularly blind and bewildered. Perhaps it may. be as well to pause upon it for .some elucidation. In many ways we sympathise more with Zionism, or with any form of Semitism, than with the mere Victorian prejudice of Anti-Anti-Semitism. We - have more respect for a man like Dr. Eder, who declares himself a, Jewish patriot, than for a man like Disraeli who duped the Victorians with the pose of a British patriot. If the Jews could have a real national soil somewhere, if Israel could be a completely independent sovereign state somewhere, nobody would be better pleased than ourselves. But this does not affect the mere distinction of fact that is here involved. The Tories who trusted Disraeli trusted ,*t r him on the assumption that he would act like a British patriot. Let us suppose, for the sake of argument, that he did act like a British patriot. But none of the Tories, who thought that he would do it, ever dreamed of thinking that all Jews would do it. They may have been weak in deducing that he was a British patriot because he was a British subject, but at the. worst they knew that all Jews were not British subjects. The most simple-minded suburban in the Primrose League did not imagine that because Disraeli stood for England, therefore Gambetta in France and Lasaße in Germany 1 and Lombroso in Italy must. all.of necessity stand for England. The Victorian Conservative was ready to believe in British Jaws, or in certain British Jews; but it was because they were British, not because they'-were Jewish. The Victorian Conservative compromise would never have called up Jews from all the ghettoes of the world, and given them the posts of English soldiers and- judges. But that is exactly what Zionism;, does , do, and from its v own standpoint is quite right in, doing. Palestine is to be a national home ,of the Jews; not for the British Jews or the Imperialistic Jews or., the' loyal, respectful and eminently . respectable Jews. ■ A sincere nationalist like Dr. Eder naturally wants to . make provision- for his own nation, for the whole of his own nation, for its vagabonds, its visionaries, 1 , its rebels, its scallywags, and all the rest. His business is to make a refuge for them, t not a rampart for us; and least of all a rampart for us against them. Zionism there-fore-does not merely mean Disraeli in Palestine. It does truly mean Lasalle in Palestine, Trotsky in Palestine, Stinie -Morrison in Palestine, Peter the Painter ,in Palestine. In a word, it is no longer a question of some Jews being used for the British Empire; it is a question of the* British Empire being used for all Jews or any Jews; for Jews who hate the British Empire, for Jews who hate all,empires, for Jews who hate all Britons. We do not quarrel with their hating empires in one sense Ave hate them ourselves. ... We do not quarrel with their hating us they are a nation, and have a right to hate whom they like. We have far more sympathy with many such fanatics than we have either with Disraeli or the dupes of Disraeli. But we are talking about facts; and, it is the fact that such fanatics would bo, as ready to tear the British Empire in pieces as they were to tear the Russian Empire in pieces. Why should they not? They would be violating no patriotism; they would be committing no treason a man. who has drifted from . Riga or Budapesth. into a Jerusalem ruled by Jews, has no more moral connection of loyalty with - the King of England than with the Khan of Tartary. From the point of view of Zionism ho is there because he is -a-: Jew; a Jew who may have any opinions about any Gentiles, but who holds his position not by his attitude to any other peoples, but by his attitude to his own. To-fill our fort with ; such foreigners is the sort fof thing that, is not made safe merely by flaunting our.own flag. •' ' . In short, it was in our view very unwise, but it was in any* view not unnatural, that we should yield, to the temptation of allowing Jews to serve us. But now they are- no lohger serving us. It Is we who are serving them.

, « The turning point was about the time of the South African/ war,, when there was still some show of British interests though ’ really over-shadowed .by ; Jewish / interests. That ; transition marks the difference between Disraeli and Mond.' Disraeli, in the dazzling height of his career, was still in a sense on sufferance. With the rise of Moritz Mond we had come to a time when it was the Christians who were on sufferance, and the Christians who suffered. Now this is only one of many examples, and we dwell on its details only to show that such cases are concrete and real. The point is that people have been forced back on positions which they, once .tjlbfight / fanatical by Hie ' mere pressure of facts. . They have .been forced to., understand them; in many cases they have been; forced to accept them without understanding them. Just as we have been accused of hostility to the Jews, we have been accused? of partiality : for the Irish. But in ; this sense the mistake , about both has been the same : it has been the assumption of the possibility of absorption and the denial of nationality.f Victorian Unionism was . indeed more unreasonable about the: Irish even than about ■ the Jews. It not only " believed: in absorbing them, blit it 'tided, to absorb them, and abuse them at the same time. It professed at.once to; assimilate; them as something contiguous and to , dismiss them as i something remote. The Englishman imagined he could [ despise the Irish as things distant . like the Cannibal Islands, and also devour and digest them as if he were a cannibal himself. But a cannibal cannot .eat, his mis-i sionary and have him. He cannot even eat his missionary and hate him. w .' '•;/ . y ■% : The real case against imperialism is that it neglects: the ■ nationalism of our own , nation/ ' The real weakness of the British Empire is that we cannot keep .it British. More and more its moulds are being filled with alien matter®; Some clumsy cosmopolitan thing that has never heard of; Chaucer or of Constable may crawl along, dragging f a rag-tag and bob-tail of races, or go ,to pieces- in mere chaos. When the English reappear as ,a great nation, it: may be as a small nationality. 1 • , ... ■ J