190 IDEALISM AND POLITICS 



tion of the distinctive landmarks of modern civilised 

 progress." 



That this picture has been drawn by passion is evident. 

 It bears all the marks of such an authorship, for passion 

 has never more than one colour on its palette. All its 

 pictures are unrelieved, and all its objects have only one 

 aspect. Nevertheless, this description is not void of all 

 truth. If a drag-net were, at any time, drawn through the 

 nethermost depths of our political life, specimens of the 

 corrupt practices and evil passions to which Mr. Hobhouse 

 refers would be found clinging to its meshes. Moreover, 

 the times through which we have been and are still passing 

 are particularly favourable to some of the noxious growths 

 he has so vigorously condemned. Our moral and intel- 

 lectual temper is not all that could be desired. We verily 

 are an ill-educated, or, rather, a half-educated people. Our 

 pursuit of truth is not serious or sustained. We are 

 "general readers" who gain from the journalistic Press 

 and the novel that slack knowledge and smattering ac- 

 quaintance with the great principles of science and philo- 

 sophy which cheapens them and makes them stale. And 

 naturally, the first consequence of science made easy and 

 philosophy popularised by such means is to liberate us from 

 old spiritual responsibilities without establishing new ones 

 in their stead. New conceptions of the invariable physical 

 order, of the continuity of history and of the reign of law 

 in human affairs imply results with which the old methods 

 of a dogmatic faith are incapable of dealing, and they are 

 incompatible with the freedom that was confused with 

 indeterminism and with the responsibilities it was believed 

 to imply. Matters pertaining to our moral and religious 

 life, which once rested securely on authority, are now sub- 



