226 



MY LIFE 



[Chap. 



us, now, that all who agree with me that there can be no national honour 

 or glory apart from justice and mercy, and that to take away people's 

 liberty and force our rule upon them against their will is the greatest of 

 all national crimes, should take every opportunity of making their voices 

 heard. If, for instance, every Socialist in our land, and I hope a very 

 large proportion of workers and advanced thinkers who may not be 

 Socialists, would agree to maintain this as one of their fundamental 

 principles, to be continually brought before the people through the Press 

 and on the platform, to be urged on the Government at every opportunity, 

 and to be made a condition of our support of every advanced Parlia- 

 mentary candidate, we should create a body of ethical opinion and feehng 

 that would not only be of the highest educational value at home, but which 

 would influence the whole world in their estimate of us. It would show 

 them that though our Government is bad — as all Governments are — yet 

 the people at heart are honest and true, and that it will not be very long 

 before the people will force their Governments to be honest also. 



This, I submit, would be really practical pohtics." At the present 

 day we have got so far as this— that none of the Great Powers wages a 

 war of aggression and conquest against another Power without some 

 quarrel or some colourable pretence of injury. But surely the fact of 

 there being such a party as I have outlined, and especially if it would (as 

 I think it certainly could) compel the next Government to make some of 

 the smaller concessions here indicated and adopt the general principle of 

 respecting the liberties of even the smallest nationalities, would so reduce 

 the amount of envy and hatred with which we are now regarded as to 

 considerably diminish the danger of combined aggression upon us. 



I should have liked to say something about Russia, and the fact that 

 we are answerable for the present war in the Far East, by so long up- 

 holding Turkey, and preventing Russia from acquiring free egress into 

 the Mediterranean, in exchange for which concession she would (after the 

 Russo-Turkish War) have willingly agreed to the neutralizing of Constanti- 

 nople as a free port under the guarantee of the Powers. We had at that 

 time a preponderance of power in Europe, as shown by what occurred at 

 the Peace Congress but Lord Beaconsfield used that power for a bad 

 purpose, as Lord SaHsbury afterwards admitted. 



I greatly regret being obhged to differ so radically from a man I 

 admire and respect so much as I do Robert Blatchford ; but, as I am 

 known to be a Socialist and a constant reader of the Clarion^ it might be 

 thought that my silence would imply some degree of agreement. The 

 present letter is merely for the purpose of making my views clear on this 

 vitally important question, and with the hope that others who agree with 

 me will not longer keep silence. 



Alfred R. Wallace. 



About the year 1899 house at Parkstone became no 

 longer suitable owing to the fact that building had been 

 going on all around us and what had been pretty open 



