Club Dutt

To what extent Imperialism lives on "masked words" it is difficult to realize unless we turn to the language of diplomacy, the verbal armoury of Imperialism. Paramount power, effective autonomy, emissary of civilization, rectification of frontier, and a whole sliding scale of terms from "hinterland" and "sphere of interest" to "effective occupation" and annexation" will serve as ready illustrations of a phraseology devised for purposes of concealment and encroachment. The Imperialist who sees modern history through these masks never grasps the "brute" facts, but always sees them at several removes, refracted, interpreted, and glozed by convenient renderings. Some measure of responsibility for his ignorance he retains, for he must often be aware that the truth is not told him and that he is refusing to penetrate the disguises. This persistent evasion of naked truth endows him sometimes with an almost preternatural power of self-deceit. Mr. Lecky writes: "Of all forms of prestige, moral prestige is the most valuable, and no statesman should forget that one of the chief elements of British power is the moral weight that is behind it." The vast majority of "educated" Englishmen genuinely believe that England's greatest gain from the Boer war is an enhancement of her "moral prestige"!

An error so monstrous is only made intelligible by reference to another curious psychological factor. Nowhere is the distrust of what is termed "logic" as a guide for public conduct, so firmly rooted as in England: a course of conduct which stands out sharply "logical" is in itself suspect. The practice of "party" government has so commonly made "compromises" a necessity that we have come to believe that our national progress is due to this necessity, and that if the sharper and more rapid application of "ideas" had been feasible, we should by following them, have been led into false paths involving much trouble of retracing steps, or over the brink of some revolutionary peril. Though sound "compromise" is no wise illogical, but is simply logic applied within certain limits of time and environment, it easily degenerates into the opportunism of an idle policy of short-range utility. The complexity of modern politics in such a country as Great Britain, reacting on the exigencies and temptations of a party system, has driven the habit of "compromise" to such foolish extremes as to corrupt the political intelligence of the nation.

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Our rough-and-ready, hand-to-mouth, "take-what-you-can-get" politics have paralysed judgement by laming the logical faculty of comparison. Not being required to furnish to ourselves or others clear, consistent reasons for our short-range expediencies of public conduct, we have lost all habit of mental consistency, or, putting it conversely, we have developed a curious and highly dangerous aptitude for entertaining incompatible and often self-contradictory ideas and motives.