THE CLERGY AND CO-OPERATION 93 



secured, one is speedily brought face to face 

 with conditions peculiar to Belgium, and hardly 

 to be compared with those of any other country. 

 What one finds is that this extensive develop- 

 ment of agricultural institutions in Belgium is 

 the result, not so much of a deliberate attempt 

 to meet changing economic conditions, as of a 

 most practical effort on the part of the clergy, 

 supported by the present " Clerical " Govern- 

 ment, to prevent the spread of Socialism in the 

 rural districts, and to increase the hold alike of 

 the Church and of the Clerical Party on the agri- 

 culturists of the country by taking effective 

 measures to improve their material and social 

 position. There is, in fact, scarcely one of the 

 " free " agricultural associations indicated by the 

 statistics given above that has not been more or 

 less inspired, if not actually brought into exist- 

 ence (and in many cases even still controlled), 

 by some parish priest or other. The reasons for 

 this distinctly curious position of affairs are 

 deserving of some consideration. 



Not only is Belgium a country where political 

 partisanship is carried to an extent unknown 

 in Great Britain, but the ramifications of the 

 Socialist propaganda, in particular, have under- 

 gone great extension there of late years. So 

 long as that propaganda was confined to the 



