UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 AT LOS ANGELES
 
 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 OF A MID AND LATE VICTORIAN
 
 BY THE SAME AUTHOR 
 
 THE ETHICS OF SOCIALISM 
 THE RELIGION OF SOCIALISM 
 
 OUTLOOKS FROM THE NEW STAND- 
 POINT 
 
 STORY OF THE FRENCH REVOLU- 
 TION 
 
 GERMAN SOCIETY AT THE CLOSE 
 OF THE MIDDLE AGES 
 
 THE PEASANTS' WAR IN GERMANY, 
 1525-1526 
 
 THE RISE AND FALL OF THE 
 ANABAPTISTS 
 
 GERMAN CULTURE, PAST AND PRE- 
 SENT 
 
 ALSO, JOINTLY WITH WM. MORRIS 
 SOCIALISM : Its Growth and Outcome
 
 Cofyt if/it photo by] 
 
 E. BELFORT BAX. 
 
 [C. Vandyk, Ltd.
 
 REMINISCENCES AND 
 REFLEXIONS of a MID 
 AND LATE VICTORIAN 
 
 BY 
 
 ERNEST BELFORT BAX 
 
 (BARRISTIR-AT-LAW, MIDDLE TXMPLK) 
 
 LONDON: GEORGE ALLEN & UNWIN LTD. 
 RUSKIN HOUSE 40 MUSEUM STREET, W.C. i
 
 6 PREFACE 
 
 there are almost bound to be some reminiscences which 
 strike some reader or other as being uninteresting 
 and perhaps trivial. These may be the very parts 
 of the book which attract another class of reader. 
 Of the reflexions, again, naturally, while some will 
 appeal to one, the same will antagonize another reader. 
 As regards reviewers, in this connexion, I suppose 
 I shall come off badly at the hands of him or her whose 
 views are those of pro-Feminist fanaticism, who will 
 doubtless find the book very insipid, or at least will 
 say so. The religious fanatic who has the charge of 
 noticing the book in the Press will also probably have 
 his " knife into me," and express himself to a similar 
 scornful effect. These are things of course an author 
 has to put up with in taking up a definite standpoint 
 on controversial subjects where feeling runs high. 
 
 Notwithstanding such not unbiased judgments 
 that I probably have to expect from the aforesaid 
 reviewers, I must plead guilty to the conviction that 
 there are those among the reading public who, should 
 they come across the book, will find at least something 
 to interest them in the somewhat varied contents 
 of its pages. 
 
 PS. The publication of this book has been unavoidably 
 delayed for more than a year, mainly owing to the diffi- 
 culties attending the operations of the printing and 
 publishing trades at the present time. Meanwhile, I may 
 remark, the death of more than one person alluded to in 
 the following pages as living has unhappily supervened. 
 Since 1916 changes, moreover, in the political situation, 
 notably the Russian Revolution and its developments, have 
 taken place. These events, however, I do not think 
 materially affect anything in the contents of the volume. 
 
 E. B. B. 
 
 January 28, 1918.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTKK PAGE 
 
 I. REMINISCENCES OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH . 9 
 
 II. MEN AND MOVEMENTS OF THE EARLY EIGHTIES . 34 
 
 III. ON CENTURY - END LITERATURE, ART, AND 
 
 PHILOSOPHY . . . . .58 
 
 IV. THE SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC FEDERATION . . 73 
 
 V. PERSONALITIES OF THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT IN 
 
 ENGLAND . . . . -94 
 
 VI. PERSONALITIES OF THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT ON 
 
 THE CONTINENT .... 126 
 
 VII. LITERARY WORK ..... I$6 
 
 VIII. CLUB AND TEMPLE LIFE IN LONDON AT THE END 
 
 OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY . . 173 
 
 IX. THE MENTAL OUTLOOK OF THE ENGLAND OF 
 
 TO-DAY AND YESTERDAY . . . 187 
 
 X. VARIORUM REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS .211 
 
 XI. WHEN THE WAR CAME .... 234 
 
 XII. CONCLUDING REFLEXIONS .... 257 
 
 INDEX . 28j
 
 Reminiscences and Reflexions of a 
 Mid and Late Victorian 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 REMINISCENCES OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 
 
 AMONG the crowd of vaguely remembered trivial 
 incidents of very early childhood, the earliest that 
 has distinctly impressed itself upon my mind is the 
 identification of the colour blue in general with the 
 sky in particular. This I have reason to believe 
 occurred at Leamington about the month of September 
 in the year 1857. I must have been then a little over 
 three years of age, having been born on July 23, 1854. 
 One or two other things I can recall concerning childish 
 ways of regarding the world which illustrate the parallel 
 between the mind of the young child and that of primi- 
 tive man. I can recall, for instance, how on one 
 occasion our cat returned to the kitchen one morning 
 with evidences of having been out in a fight during 
 the night. How well I remember, in pondering over 
 the incident of the battle of the cats, that I could 
 not divest myself of the notion of their having talked 
 to each other and so started the quarrel, although 
 well aware that my elders did not believe in animals 
 talking. Mine was then clearly a state of mind in 
 which myths of talking beasts arise in early ages. It
 
 10 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 is undoubtedly an interesting fact to be able to recol- 
 lect, if only in a glimpse or two, a childish mental 
 condition, quickly outgrown, but which indicates 
 having passed through a state of mind, however tran- 
 sitory, corresponding to that of primitive humanity. 
 
 The scene of most of my earlier childish reminis- 
 cences was Brighton, where we lived for some years. 
 At that time the atmosphere of the George IV period 
 still lingered in the town. Superannuated old gentle- 
 men, in costume approaching that of the earlier part 
 of the century, were still occasionally to be seen sunning 
 themselves on the sea-front, and especially in the King's 
 Road, of an afternoon. It was at Brighton that I 
 first became aware of the larger issues of the world. 
 The American Civil War and the cotton famine in 
 Lancashire were among my earliest recollections of 
 public events. The International Exhibition of 1862, 
 to which I was taken late the following Autumn, was 
 also a noteworthy event of the time to me. I remember 
 the talk occasioned by Encke's comet in 1861, but 
 as it was in the middle of Summer I was never allowed 
 to stop up late enough to see it myself. 
 
 At that time yellow-bodied carriages with a mottled 
 black and white dog running behind them were still 
 to be seen rolling up and down the King's Road. Then 
 was the period that of the early sixties of the uni- 
 versal pot-hat (the old beaver was still occasionally 
 to be seen with elderly gentlemen), of the broad-cloth 
 frock coat, of women with enormous crinolines 
 the younger ones with hair done up in nets, the older 
 ones sporting long curls ; of tallow candles, which 
 might be seen hanging up in bundles outside oil-shops, 
 of bedroom candlesticks with their necessary snuffers.
 
 CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 11 
 
 Gas had only recently been introduced into private 
 houses and was still looked at askance by some as 
 a dangerous innovation. The tea-urn was in its after- 
 noon glory. Daguerreotype photographs were by no 
 means out of date, though they were just beginning 
 to be superseded by the more modern photography. 
 Smoking was not as yet very common among the 
 middle classes, but where practised, it was chiefly in 
 the form of the cigar, cigarettes being quite unknown 
 to the general public. Dickens, it may be remem- 
 bered, in " Nicholas Nickleby," describes it as a dis- 
 tinguishing mark of some Spaniards he alludes to, 
 that they smoked what he calls " little paper cigars." 
 The clay pipe was universal among the working classes. 
 Turning to the literature of the period, in the depart- 
 ment of fiction the great lights of the early sixties 
 were of course Thackeray who died in 1863, Dickens, 
 Wilkie Collins, Bulwer Lytton, and a host of minor 
 writers, such as Anthony Trollope, Whyte Melville, 
 Mrs. Henry Wood, Miss Braddon, etc., who produced 
 novels sold in red and yellow covers which were pro- 
 minent in all station bookstalls. For the more in- 
 tellectual reader the works of the Brontes, George Eliot, 
 and Charles Kingsley were the vogue. In the more 
 serious departments, Hallam and Macaulay, recently 
 dead, Carlyle, Mill, Grote, etc., were in the heyday of 
 their glory as embodying the cultured side of English 
 life. Poetry was represented chiefly by Longfellow 
 and Tennyson. Browning's fame came a little later. 
 Darwin had but recently startled the public and shocked 
 the theological world by the publication of the " Origin 
 of Species." But the really cultured class existing 
 at that time in England was, as compared with the
 
 12 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 present generation, a very restricted one. The in- 
 tellectual possibilities of the English people were then 
 stunted and cramped by the influence of the dogmatic 
 Calvinistic theology which was the basis of its tradi- 
 tional religious sentiment. 
 
 The life our family lived during my childhood was, 
 owing to various causes, exceptionally quiet and retired. 
 Most of the relations and friends who used to visit 
 us were socially uninteresting and of no great account 
 from the side of intellectually profitable intercourse. 
 My paternal grandfather, I may mention, however, whose 
 family originally came from Ockley, in Surrey, was 
 born in the year 1777, dying in 1868, and was conse- 
 quently in a position to remember the French Revo- 
 lution. I recollect as a child once questioning him 
 upon the subject, and his relating to me the horrible 
 reports of civil slaughter in Paris that reached his 
 native village. I have since thought that the special 
 event he may have had in his mind was possibly 
 the September massacres of 1792. But the old man, 
 to my disappointment, showed a tendency to switch 
 his conversation off on to the more recent events of 
 1848, which seemed to me a very insipid change of 
 venue. My grandfather also recollected hearing some 
 of the great singers of the early part of the nineteenth 
 century, notably John Braham. On the whole, how- 
 ever, as will be seen, it was my lot to grow up 
 under no very favourable conditions for intellectual 
 development. The subjects talked of in the family 
 circle were mainly connected with religious dogma, 
 or the sectarian interests of the various religious bodies. 
 Preachers and the pure quality of their orthodoxy, 
 as opposed on the one side to " Romanism " and on
 
 CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 13 
 
 the other to " Latitudinarianism," bulked largely 
 among the topics of conversation with ours as with 
 other middle-class families at the time. A severe 
 censorship in the matter of the literature that was 
 allowed into the house was maintained. The only 
 reading encouraged was that directly or indirectly 
 favouring the " Evangelical " theology. As usual 
 with the bulk of early and mid- Victorian middle -class 
 society, the theatre in all its forms was banned. In 
 fact in many cases, ours among them, any form of 
 amusement was supposed to savour more or less of 
 godlessness. In those where it was not absolutely 
 forbidden there was a tinge of disapproval attaching 
 to it as having the shadow of " worldliness " upon it. 
 The most cruel of all the results of mid- Victorian 
 religion was perhaps the rigid enforcement of the most 
 drastic Sabbatarianism. The horror of the tedium 
 of Sunday infected more or less the whole of the latter 
 portion of the week. Many a story was laid before 
 the youth of the period to the effect that the boy who 
 began by Sabbath-breaking inevitably ended his days 
 on the gallows. In fact, didactic narrative, often 
 embodied in the form of the religious tract, was a 
 much commended means in the Evangelical world 
 for converting the sinner from the error of his ways. 
 Thus, to discourage the gratification of the taste for 
 the drama, a moral, inculcating the retribution which 
 the Evangelical God sometimes inflicted on frequenters 
 of " play-houses," was drawn from the history of 
 fires that had taken place in theatres. But this was 
 not all I can recall a tract (I think it was) which 
 told the story of the conversion of a lady playgoer 
 who, on passing into the theatre, was struck by seeing
 
 14 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 the words "To the pit" in illuminated letters in front 
 of her. The notion that entering the pit of a theatre 
 would inevitably land her ultimately in the other 
 " pit " said to be bottomless, appealed to her as a 
 solemn warning ; so she turned back, sought out a 
 suitable conventicle, and became a converted character. 
 But although brought up in this hot-bed of Calvin- 
 istic Methodism, and hearing the duties of becoming 
 converted and of cultivating one's soul in the direc- 
 tions approved of by the Evangelical sects, the whole 
 theological business never affected me very deeply. 
 The introspection of the soul and the whole sentiment 
 connected with the Christian cult did not specially 
 appeal to me. I believed in it, of course, in a way. 
 knowing nothing else, and hence it being the only theory 
 of the universe available for my young intelligence. 
 What interested me more than any maunderings 
 anent the individual soul, being " born again " and 
 the like, was when my old governess, who took a truly 
 maternal interest in me, used to talk to me about 
 Daniel's image and its four monarchies. This gave 
 me, in its way and within the limits of the current 
 orthodox creed, a theory of history, such as it was, and 
 I have always felt the need of an intelligible doctrine 
 of history. It appeared to me as much more inter- 
 esting than any reflexions on the communion of the 
 individual soul with the living presence of its God 
 or its Saviour, and so forth. But if my childish belief 
 in Christian dogmas was somewhat perfunctory, there 
 was one thing that I did believe in, although I did 
 not talk much about it, and that was the supernatural. 
 The somewhat inconsequent assurances of my elders 
 that God, although in the past He had done so, did
 
 CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 15 
 
 not permit any manifestation of the supernatural 
 since the beginning of the Christian era, and certainly 
 not in our days, was not quite good enough for me. 
 The credentials of their assurances in this connexion 
 seemed to me doubtful, and the assurance itself to 
 express a purely arbitrary assumption. 
 
 The foregoing were the current ideas of the English 
 middle class half a century ago. In economics and 
 politics a few crude aphorisms were supposed sufficient 
 to satisfy every reasonable mind. The enonomic 
 problem of the distribution of wealth, of the antithesis 
 of rich and poor, was supposed to be satisfactorily 
 accounted for and settled by the assumption that 
 wealth was the reward of industry and virtue, and 
 poverty the result of laziness and incompetence, either 
 in the present generation or their fathers. The politics 
 of the middle classes of the sixties was Manchester- 
 School Liberalism, coloured more or less more in some 
 circles and with some persons, less in others with a 
 snobbish deference to the upper classes, and especially 
 Queen Victoria, who, the middle-class mind of the 
 time flattered itself, was a woman after its own heart. 
 Cobden, Bright, and Palmerston were names to conjure 
 with in middle-class political circles. As regards 
 foreign politics, the views of the English middle classes 
 were largely dictated by their anti-Catholic sentiments, 
 Garibaldi was their popular hero, for example, even 
 more because he fought against the Papal domin- 
 ation in Italy than as a national patriot. This feeling 
 played a part with many people even as late as 1870 
 in determining the strong sympathy with Germany 
 in the Franco-Prussian War of that year. In short, 
 the middle-class mind of fifty and sixty years ago ran
 
 16 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 in certain well-defined grooves which determined its 
 attitude in all particular cases. The main interest, 
 for the middle-class man or woman of the period 
 in question, outside " business " or the " home " was, 
 as already intimated, religion, especially the inter- 
 necine rivalry and quarrels of the various Christian 
 sects and churches. For art there was little feeling. 
 In fact, there is only one form of art which can be 
 specially associated with the society of the period, 
 and that was in music, viz. the Oratorio. It is true 
 even the Oratorio, as being a form of public enter- 
 tainment, was looked upon somewhat doubtfully by 
 the ultra pious. But still Oratorio music did un- 
 doubtedly represent the special form in which the 
 consciousness of the society in question seemed to find 
 its artistic expression. For every society has its own 
 artistic expression, such as it is and what there is of it. 
 That the intrinsically ugly and, to many of us to-day, 
 repulsive Calvinistic theology of Evangelicalism could 
 have given birth to any genuine feeling at all, it is 
 difficult to understand. But, as I said above, such 
 as it was, undoubtedly it received its expression in 
 the Oratorio music of Handel and Mendelssohn, par- 
 ticularly in the " Messiah " and the " Elijah." I 
 would signalize especially, in this respect, as typical, 
 the aria " O Rest in the Lord." It is said that when 
 Mendelssohn had written this melody he was inclined 
 to strike it out of his work as being too sickly sweet, 
 but was prevailed upon by his friends to leave it in. 
 That the composer was intrinsically right in his esti- 
 mate of it will be probably the opinion of many 
 in the present day, but it is none the less true that 
 it does typically embody the emotional religious senti-
 
 CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 17 
 
 ment of the English middle classes of the fifties and 
 sixties, in so far as that was genuine. This was shown 
 by the enormous vogue it had. It was to be heard 
 in every church, chapel, and parlour where there was 
 a piano, at this time. It is one of those remarkable 
 musical inspirations which seem to carry in them the 
 whole atmosphere of a period. In its own way, a 
 very different way certainly, it is in this respect com- 
 parable with " Ein' feste Burg " and the " Marseillaise." 
 The latter embody the virility of the German Refor- 
 mation and the French Revolution respectively. " O 
 Rest in the Lord " embodies the artificial, even where 
 genuine, bourgeois emotional sweetness of the " place 
 of worship " and the family parlour with its anti- 
 macassars and tea-urns of the English mid-nineteenth 
 century. 
 
 Before taking leave of this world of the sixties this 
 world of tallow candles, snuffers, tea-urns, women's 
 hair-nets and crinolines, men's broadcloth, stocks and 
 pot-hats, four-post bedsteads, feather beds, hymns and 
 oratorios there is one question, which has always 
 interested me, to be mooted. In how far are we to 
 regard the religiosity, the theological and ecclesiastical 
 interests, of the early and mid- Victorian period as the 
 product of hypocrisy, and in how far was it genuine ? 
 That some of all this was genuine and a good deal of 
 it deliberate hypocrisy I have no doubt whatever, but 
 I should attribute the bulk of it to something between 
 these two extremes which I should term unconscious 
 hypocrisy. By unconscious hypocrisy I understand 
 an attitude of mind which succeeds in persuading 
 itself that it believes or approves certain things as 
 it professes to do, while really in foro conscientice this 
 
 2
 
 18 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 profession is dictated by a sense of its own interests, 
 real or supposed. For instance, in discussing Free- 
 thought in religion or Radicalism in politics, as a make- 
 weight to the conventional arguments against such 
 subversive doctrines, one often heard it thrown in, 
 that if Freethought prevailed, or the political con- 
 stitution were overthrown, there would be no security 
 for property and its interests. Apart from the truth 
 of theological doctrine or political theory, religion 
 and the existing English constitution were necessary 
 to keep the lower classes in order. Now it was this 
 sort of remark, thrown in as above said as a make- 
 weight, that first opened my eyes to the subconscious 
 insincerity or unconscious hypocrisy of much of middle- 
 class public opinion on these subjects. I could not 
 escape the conviction that this secondary considera- 
 tion, ostensibly a mere " aside " in the argument, 
 was really the determining one in the formation of that 
 opinion, albeit this fact was in many cases not con- 
 sciously realized by the persons in question themselves. 
 A fairly typical illustration of what is said is afforded 
 by the case of Dr. Colenso, Bishop of Natal, who 
 in 1862 published a book on biblical criticism, the 
 views contained in which are in their substance com- 
 monplaces to-day, but were at that time regarded as 
 staggeringly subversive. The view that if the world 
 in general came to disbelieve in the Mosaic authorship 
 and the historicity of the Pentateuch, the world 
 itself bien entendu the mid- Victorian world of that 
 date would fall to pieces, was the current middle- 
 class opinion. It seems scarcely credible to-day, but 
 so it was. Hence the zeal with which the current 
 theology with its dogma of biblical infallibility was
 
 CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 10 
 
 defended at all costs. But in the case of the aforesaid 
 Bishop of Natal there was an additional reason for 
 using the cry of heresy as a means for effecting his 
 discomfiture. Dr. Colenso was an eminently humane 
 and just man, and in consequence was zealous in de- 
 fending the rights of the native population of Natal 
 against attempts of the British settlers to ride rough- 
 shod over those rights and to exploit the natives in 
 their own interests. Hence the worthy Bishop was by 
 no means a persona grata with the influential colonial 
 magnates, or with the colonists generally, of his diocese. 
 The charge of heresy was therefore a godsend to these 
 gentry as a weapon for getting him removed. Some- 
 how or other they failed, owing, it was said, to their 
 having played their cards badly with the Ecclesias- 
 tical Court which judged the case. 
 
 But notwithstanding the power of the middle-class 
 ostracism of heterodox opinions, the decade of the 
 sixties from its beginning onward showed an increas- 
 ing number of books published, venturing to traverse 
 the current conventional opinion of the day. My 
 own childhood was padded towards the fag-end of the 
 period of moral and intellectual slavery in question, in 
 which the Calvinistic dogmas of Evangelicalism in religion 
 and the Cobden-Bright dogmas of the Manchester 
 School in economics and politics, modified by a snobbish 
 reverence for authority in general and the upper classes, 
 dominated the mentality of the whole social atmo- 
 sphere. Those who want to know what it had been at 
 an earlier period of the century, say during the forties 
 and fifties, may consult the two volumes of the late 
 Mr. A. W. Benn's excellent " History of English Ration- 
 alism in the Nineteenth Century," or the short survey
 
 20 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 in Professor Bury's " History of Freedom of Thought " 
 (pp. 176-251). But though my youthful days were 
 passed towards the end of the period in question, 1 
 experienced quite enough for it to have left an en- 
 duringly unpleasant reminiscence behind it. This is 
 the more to be regretted as it affects one's memories 
 of persons long since dead, whom one cannot alto- 
 gether dissociate in one's mind from the at once morally 
 repulsive and intellectually foolish beliefs they held, 
 or professed to hold, and expected other people to 
 hold. In themselves doubtless excellent, good-hearted 
 people, their characters were poisoned and warped by 
 the foulness and follies of their creed. 
 
 In the year 1864 we left Brighton and went to Hamp- 
 stead. Here we led a life almost as retired as that 
 of Brighton. I went to school for a short time, but 
 my education was mainly conducted by private tuition. 
 Here I began to take a definite interest in things, 
 among others natural history, and especially entomology. 
 Here also I made various acquaintances and two 
 friendships, the one a schoolboy friendship originating 
 in common interests, butterfly collecting, etc. This 
 was with the late Vivian Byam Lewes, who subse- 
 quently became the great chemist, whose lectures 
 on the subject of practical chemistry in relation to 
 the war are well known, and whose labours and studies 
 in this department were only terminated by his sudden 
 death at the comparatively early age of sixty-three 
 in October 1915. Though close associates in boy- 
 hood and early youth, we subsequently drifted asunder 
 owing to various causes, distance of residence, diversity 
 of interests and other things, and I seldom saw Lewes 
 after he had attained to manhood. While not pos-
 
 CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 21 
 
 sessed of any special intellectual qualities, Lewes was 
 the type of the conscientious and thorough, if narrow, 
 scientific specialist. He was the nephew of George 
 Henry Lewes, the son of a brother of his who was 
 killed as an officer of the Army Medical Corps in the 
 Crimean War. His mother, a bright, intelligent woman, 
 was a connexion of the Wellesley family. She much 
 impressed me during my later boyhood owing to the 
 freedom of her views on theological and political sub- 
 jects. As regards the latter, it is true she clung to 
 many of the prejudices of her time and class, with 
 a tincture of aristocratic antipathies thrown in. This 
 was still more the case with economic questions, where 
 she was Manchester School to the backbone. Yet, 
 strange to say, in spite of this strain of Whiggery 
 and Manchesterism in her, this woman was one of the 
 half-dozen persons of my acquaintance from whom 
 a few years later I got some sympathy on the subject 
 of the Commune. The barefaced misrepresentations 
 and obviously unjust judgments of the bourgeois Press, 
 and the brutalities of the Versaillaise soldiery, com- 
 bined to disgust her with the enemies of the Commune. 
 She also was prepared to recognize the high ideal 
 underlying the movement and animating many of its 
 advocates. Mrs. Edward Lewes was the first woman 
 I had met having any pretensions to high culture or 
 intelligence, and her intellectual superiority to othw 
 women I knew was a revelation to me. 
 
 The other friendship I made in Hampstead during 
 the late sixties was more enduring than that of Lewes, 
 and happily subsists to this day. William Boulting, 
 the distinguished authority on mediaeval and renais- 
 sance Italy, was, when I first met him, a student of
 
 medicine at University College. He used to attend 
 with his father and mother a Baptist conventicle in 
 Heath Street, Hampstead, in which my family also 
 held what were known as " sittings." I used to have 
 long walks with Boulting at this time, and one thing 
 I can remember very well is that it was our delight 
 on " sacrament " Sundays, while our elders were sacra- 
 mentalizing within the walls of the chapel, to go for 
 a walk on Hampstead Heath, and in that breezy atmo- 
 sphere to indulge in free discussion of matters specu- 
 lative, social and political. During a period of half 
 a century I have never lost sight of Boulting for any 
 long period, and our friendship has always remained 
 unclouded. For long a medical practitioner in Hamp- 
 stead, Boulting always found time for progressive 
 self -culture, but it is only some twelve years ago that 
 he was able to retire from practice and devote himself 
 to the work of his life, the only work really congenial 
 to him, viz. to his studies in Italian history, and to 
 original thought in philosophy. A scrupulously exact 
 and conscientious historical investigator, and an acute 
 and careful philosophical thinker, 1 have always found 
 the greatest intellectual stimulus and advantage from 
 intercourse with him. May he live long to continue 
 the good work 1 e has done in his own special depart- 
 ment of history, and to produce the work he is capable 
 of in philosophy ! Before leaving the subject I may 
 mention, as illustrating the conscientious thorough- 
 ness of Boulting's historical work, that the Italian 
 history published in one thick volume by Messrs. 
 Routledge and Sons as an edition of Sismondi's 
 " Italian Republics " is really a work of independent 
 research. The editor, having found so much needing
 
 CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 28 
 
 correction and alteration in its proportions to bring 
 the original work of Sismondi up to date, decided to 
 treat it in the manner of Wallenstein's war-steed, of 
 which we are told " the head, neck, legs, and greater 
 part of the body have been renewed ; all the rest is 
 the real horse." There is one thing I always admire 
 and envy in Boulting's work, and that is the faculty 
 it shows for exact and careful research. 
 
 I have spoken above, in dealing with the early period 
 of my childhood, of how, in spite of the mid- Victorian 
 common sense, as embodied in my elders, I was imbued 
 with the naive primitive belief of early man in the 
 supernatural, as it is termed. About the age of 
 eight or nine, it only required a very little sugges- 
 tion to make me go to bed in abject fear of the appear- 
 ance of a ghost, the devil, or some other unpleasant 
 supernatural figure, out of the darkness by the bedside. 
 Once I remember rousing the household by my screams, 
 on being woke up by the squalling of cats immediately 
 outside the window, believing the room to be full of 
 hobgoblins. This state of mind was also stimulated 
 by nightmares. I can well recall the peculiar horror 
 of one of these, in which I saw seven gibbets on which 
 were hanging seven beings howling. These seven 
 beings were either seven great gaunt cats or seven 
 thin, wizened, hideous old women which, I could not 
 tell. This dread of the dark and supernatural was, 
 I suppose, common to the children of two or three 
 generations ago, and was not infrequent with those 
 of the time I am speaking of. With the modern child 
 I imagine it hardly exists any more. A noteworthy 
 point in connexion with it is, that this sense of the 
 supernatural, which was the groundwork of the fear,
 
 24 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 in some cases survived sporadically and on rare occa- 
 sions into earlier adult life. This has been confirmed 
 by two or three friends of my generation. If I re- 
 member rightly, Goethe also has somewhere alluded 
 to this feeling and its gradual cessation with advancing 
 years, in his own life. The last instance of it in my 
 case was soon after I was married to my first wife, 
 when I was in the early twenties. We were looking 
 for a house, and had seen one which seemed not un- 
 suitable at West Croydon. There was nothing par- 
 ticular about the house, which was a comparatively 
 small double-fronted one, with a good-sized walled 
 garden, and dating probably from about the end of 
 the first quarter of the nineteenth century. The 
 taking of the house was noted as worthy of considera- 
 tion, and it being somewhat late in the afternoon, we 
 went home. But that same evening in the bedroom, 
 the matter coming up again for discussion, my wife 
 made the remark, " I don't know why it is, but some- 
 how or other I feel there is something uncanny about 
 the house. I can't help fancying that at this moment " 
 it. being then about ten o'clock " goblins might be 
 holding their revels in that front room." " Very 
 odd," I remarked ; "I had a precisely similar feeling 
 myself this afternoon on leaving that house ! " I 
 give this as it was a singular coincidence a house 
 not specially noteworthy in itself having excited similar 
 fancies in two different persons at the same time. 
 This was the last occasion on which I can remember 
 having experienced a survival of the old childish feel- 
 ing of the presence of the supernatural. In later life, 
 as Goethe also has remarked, if I am not mistaken, 
 in the passage above referred to in the " Wahrheit
 
 CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 25 
 
 und Dichtung," it is difficult even to recall what this 
 old childish feeling was like. 
 
 With regard to the new quasi-scientific form assumed 
 by the idea of the supernatural, supernormal, or occult 
 (as one may choose to call it), as embodied in the 
 labours and investigations of the " Society for Psychical 
 Research," I am not entitled to offer a decided opinion, 
 since I have not gone into the matter with any serious 
 purpose. The reason for this is that I have always 
 doubted, with regard to some of the chief subjects 
 occupying the attention of this body, whether the 
 probabilities of the case are sufficient to make it worth 
 while to spend time and energy in investigating the 
 subject. This of course, I know, is the commonplace 
 opinion probably of the majority of educated man- 
 kind, but I hardly think the published results of the 
 Society's work are sufficient, up to date, decisively to 
 rebut it. In addition to this, there is a positive side 
 to the matter, apart from the negative one of waste 
 of time and energy, and that is the apparent tendency 
 of such researches to deteriorate and debilitate the 
 intellect. How often do we find men of fair average 
 intelligence and strength of understanding who, be- 
 ginning these " occult " studies in a perfectly reason- 
 able and scientific spirit, after a time degenerate into 
 credulous cranks. At the same time, as regards the 
 Psychical Research Society, I would not deny that 
 in certain departments of their investigations they 
 have achieved some results. Notably is this the case 
 in the matter of thought-transference. Here, they 
 seem to have succeeded in establishing by their evi- 
 dence, to say the least, a certain justification for the 
 assumption of the possible interaction of individual
 
 26 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 minds directly and apart from the ordinary sense- 
 channels. As concerns other departments of their 
 studies touching the supernormal in its more strict 
 sense, my own attitude, and it is shared, I think, by 
 a good many persons of intelligence in the present 
 day, might be described as an " agnostic " one, with 
 a bias in favour of the negative opinion. 
 
 The dogmatism, in these matters, of the early and 
 mid- Victorian man of education is now generally 
 admitted to be scientifically indefensible, however 
 much we may regard the balance of probabilities as 
 being against the affirmative side. Speaking personally, 
 my rationalistic conscience (using the word " ration- 
 alistic " in its traditional sense) sustains a far greater 
 strain from the ordinary events of so-called " chance " 
 in the world, by which, in defiance of all probabilities, 
 as we generally understand them, one man is peren- 
 nially lucky in the affairs of life, while the other (who 
 probably belongs to a larger class) is perennially un- 
 lucky. It would seem as though what we call " chance," 
 in events where human interests are involved, has 
 as its peculiar characteristic the being a respecter of 
 persons, rather than, as in theory it ought, allowing its 
 rain to descend equally "on the just and the unjust." 
 In other words, events of this kind might seem to give 
 the occultist a colourable pretence for his belief in the 
 interference of supernormal or infra-normal (as one 
 likes to regard it) intelligences or wills in the course 
 of human affairs. 1 These commonplace and everyday 
 
 1 For instance, as illustrating the apparent impish design in 
 chance, there is the well-known phenomenon of the successful 
 lottery ticket the almost invariable coincidence that if the 
 ticket be lost, destroyed, or otherwise become unavailable, it 
 unfailingly wins the first prize.
 
 CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 27 
 
 events of luck and ill-luck pursuing particular indi- 
 viduals respectively, certainly seem to me, as far as 
 they go, to tend more to weaken the rationalistic way 
 of looking at things than the alleged " phenomena " 
 (exceptional in any case) which interest Spiritists 
 and Psychical Researchers. The special interest in 
 these studies has its origin, of course, in the desire 
 to arrive at an affirmative solution, on rational grounds, 
 of the problem of the survival of personal identity 
 and consciousness after death. I may mention here, 
 in passing, the remark of a friend of mine who has 
 dabbled considerably in Psychical Research, but who, 
 unlike many others, has kept his mental balance, 
 that none of the accredited evidence he had had before 
 him afforded, in his opinion, any valid grounds for 
 the assumption of the action of intelligences other than 
 those " incarnated " ones concerned in the different 
 experiments. 
 
 When about the age of fifteen my interest in music 
 acquired a strong ascendancy over me. I began to 
 study seriously musical theory with a view to devoting 
 myself to composition. Although I broke off from 
 time to time, I more than once resumed my endeavours 
 in this direction, until subsequently I came to the 
 conclusion that my inspiration fell so much below 
 my aspiration in the domain of musical creativeness 
 as to discourage me from pursuing the matter further. 
 It was, however, some years later that I definitively 
 resolved to abandon devoting myself to music as a 
 career. Meanwhile, during the years (1875-6) that 
 I was in Stuttgart, I zealously attended the Conser- 
 vatorium for which that town is famous. 
 
 It was in 1870, just at the time of the outbreak of
 
 28 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 the Franco-German War, that we left Hampstead 
 for Streatham, now a suburb of Greater London, but 
 at that time still retaining some few surviving traces 
 of its old rurality and village character. Thrale House, 
 of Johnsonian memory, was then still standing. The 
 Franco- German War of this year was the first public 
 event that I followed with anything like continuous 
 interest. The general sentiment in England with 
 regard to the struggle was strongly pro-German. 
 Nothing was known at that time of the " faked " 
 telegram and of the true inwardness of the policy 
 of Prussia and of Bismarck. The general notion was 
 that the sole explanation of the war found expression 
 in the fact that it was a gambler's last stake on the 
 part of Napoleon III to rehabilitate himself by a great 
 victory with the army, after the results of the plebiscite, 
 recently held, had given such strong evidence of his 
 waning popularity in French military circles. 
 
 The war, however, though it strongly interested me, 
 was only the exordium to the drama of the Paris Com- 
 mune of the following Spring, which proved a promi- 
 nent landmark in my mental career. But of this more 
 anon. During this winter of 1870-1 I did a consider- 
 able amount of reading in well-known books of the 
 time, among which I may mention Lewes's " History 
 of Philosophy " and " Life of Goethe," Lecky's 
 " Rationalism " and " European Morals," Bain's 
 psychological works, Spencer's " First Principles " 
 and Mill's " Logic." 
 
 The beginning of February 1871 saw the end of 
 the war and the bases of an unsatisfactory future 
 peace laid. But the internal condition of France, and 
 especially Paris, continued disturbed. Finally, on the
 
 CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 3d 
 
 i8th of March the insurrection broke out in Paris 
 which led to the establishment of the Commune, the 
 first organized Government founded in the interests 
 of the working class and having for its conscious 
 aim the transformation of existing civilization in the 
 direction of Socialism. I say in the direction of 
 Socialism, for, though all those who took part in 
 the Commune were almost entirely Socialists by in- 
 stinct, yet they were not by any means all Socialists 
 by understanding, in the scientific sense of to-day. 
 Their general aspirations were towards a society of 
 economical and political equality, but beyond this 
 there was great nebulosity of view. The followers of 
 Proudhon were still very numerous among the educated 
 French working class and their representative men. 
 But all this did not alter the fact that the Commune 
 was, in essence, the outcome and embodiment of the 
 first great movement of the working classes towards 
 Socialism (for the abortive insurrection of June 1848 
 was too short-lived to count as such). Although at 
 the time my own ideas of the aims of true social progress 
 were nebulous enough, merely embracing political 
 liberty and democracy together with economic equality 
 in a vague and abstract way, yet I could see the signi- 
 ficance of the new movement in Paris from the first. 
 My interest grew as events developed and culminated 
 with the horrors of the semaine sanglante. I can well 
 recall the tears I shed during these days, in secret 
 and in my own room, over this martyrdom of all that 
 was noblest (as I conceived it) in the life of the time. 
 Henceforward I became convinced that the highest 
 and indeed only true religion for human beings was 
 that which had for its object the devotion to the future
 
 30 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 social life of Humanity. The martyrs of the Commune 
 who died, as one of them expressed it, pour la solidarity 
 humaine, appealed to me as far nobler than any martyrs 
 the Christian creed has had to show. The Communist 
 believed that his end at the hands of the Versaillaise 
 soldiery meant the extinction of his personality, but 
 perhaps a step towards the realization of his ideal, 
 and in this belief he faced death. The Christian 
 martyr, on the other hand, we may presume, was sin- 
 cerely convinced according to the tenets of his creed 
 that his death at the hands of the executioner opened 
 for his personality the gates of a paradise of never- 
 ending bliss. 
 
 These considerations, only intensified by the foul 
 abuse and lies with which the bourgeois Press assailed 
 the Commune and all those connected with it, made 
 an ineffaceable impression upon me. The idea of 
 human progress as the proper object of religion led 
 me some time after this to attach myself somewhat, 
 although I never formally joined it, to the Positivist 
 body, the leaders of which at that time were Dr. Richard 
 Congreve, Mr. Frederic Harrison, Professor Beesly, 
 and Dr. Bridges. Professor Beesly having died in old 
 age recently, Mr. Frederic Harrison is the only living 
 survivor of this group. I was the more attracted to 
 the Positivists from the fact that they were the only 
 organized body of persons at that time in the country 
 who had the courage systematically to defend the 
 movement of which the Commune was the outcome, 
 as well as the actions of the Commune and its adherents 
 themselves. Exception must be made, of course, of 
 the small circle that gathered round Karl Marx and 
 formed the nucleus of the British Branch of the Inter-
 
 CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 31 
 
 national Association. But the old International, not- 
 withstanding its influence on the Continent, had never 
 any real hold on the English intellectual or working 
 classes, and it is extremely doubtful whether more 
 than a few, more or less in the inner circle, fully realized 
 what the Commune meant, or sympathized with its 
 aims. For the rest, the other popular movements 
 of the day, which centred round Charles Bradlaugh 
 and the National Secular Society, were steeped in 
 Manchester School economic prejudices and were 
 thoroughly insular in their general outlook. As a 
 consequence of this they were mostly unsympathetic 
 to the French " Red Republican " party, as it was 
 then the fashion to call it. The Positivists, on the 
 contrary, manfully espoused the cause of the Commune 
 in the Fortnightly Review, at that time edited by Mr. 
 John (now Lord) Morley. The same may be said 
 of the weekly journal, The Examiner, originally estab- 
 lished by Albany Fonblanque, and to which in its 
 early days John Stuart Mill was a regular contributor. 
 It was edited, at the time of which I speak, by my 
 elder contemporary and friend, the late Mr. Fox Bourne. 
 The latter, although a thorough Manchester School 
 man and political Radical of the Cobden-Bright type, 
 was also thoroughly honest up to his lights, and re- 
 spected the honesty and self-sacrifice of those who 
 had suffered for their ideal in Paris, little as he might 
 appreciate that ideal itself. He has informed me 
 that during the period of the Commune and for some 
 time after he was a frequent caller at Marx's house 
 in Maitland Park, Haverstock Hill, where he received 
 the true account of things which were taking place, 
 and after the Commune had been suppressed he met
 
 32 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 many of the refugees who used to visit there. It thus 
 came about, as stated, that The Examiner bravely 
 defended the honesty and courageous enthusiasm of 
 the Commune and its adherents. 
 
 As is well known, the following year, 1872, saw what 
 was practically the wind-up of the old International 
 (founded in 1864) at the Hague Congress. Its end was 
 the work of Marx and his friend Engels. The latter 
 stated, in a speech closing the International Socialist 
 Congress held at Zurich in 1893, that they felt the 
 situation to be becoming on the Continent too dangerous 
 for the old organization to be maintained. They feared, 
 he said, lest its maintenance might mean the wrecking of 
 the liberty and perhaps the lives of too many valuable 
 workers for the cause under the existing conditions 
 in many European countries. 
 
 I have dwelt upon this matter of the Commune at 
 some length, as it had a strong influence upon the 
 whole course of my thought on things social and political, 
 and led ultimately to my becoming a convinced Socialist. 
 At the time being, of course, it was the heroism of the 
 Communards in their championing of the cause of 
 the people, of the economically oppressed and down- 
 trodden, that fired my youthful imagination. 
 
 During the early years of the seventies I continued 
 my studies in various directions, until in August 1875 
 I went to Stuttgart, where, still with a view of devot- 
 ing myself to music, especially composition, I joined 
 the Conservatorium. Stuttgart was at that time 
 still a quaint old town as regards its central portion, 
 although a circle of new streets and buildings was 
 akeady sufficiently in evidence on its outer fringe. 
 I remained in Stuttgart for somewhat over a year,
 
 CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 83 
 
 mixing freely with all sorts and conditions of men. 
 From Stuttgart I went down South into French Swit- 
 zerland, residing for two or three months in the house 
 of a pasteur at the little village of La Sarraz, in the 
 Canton de Vaud, not very far from Lausanne. I 
 returned home to Streatham in the Autumn of the 
 year 1876. A year later I married. My wife was 
 the collateral descendant of John Hoole, the contem- 
 porary and friend of Dr. Johnson, and the well-known 
 translator of Tasso and other poets of the Italian 
 Renaissance. 
 
 With the few details given above I may appro- 
 priately close the present chapter of reminiscences 
 belonging to the period of childhood and youth. What 
 is known as the mid- Victorian period was soon to 
 lapse into the late- Victorian period.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 MEN AND MOVEMENTS OF THE EARLY EIGHTIES 
 
 IN the Summer of 1880 I received a call to Berlin 
 to act as assistant correspondent to the late Dr. Carl 
 Abel, who was at that time engaged as chief corre- 
 spondent of the Standard. I well remember how the 
 room in Dr. Abel's residence which served as office 
 overlooked the study of the late Professor Droysen, 
 and how from my desk the Professor was to be seen 
 inditing his historical works. Bamberger, the cele- 
 brated National-Liberal member of the Reichstag, 
 lived in a house standing in its own garden, also nearly 
 in front of us, while the well-known friend of Heine, 
 Fanny Lewald, resided not far off. In the November 
 of this year 1880 I went to report the festivities 
 connected with the restoration of Cologne Cathedral. 
 Although the completion of the twin spire was un- 
 doubtedly carried out as ably as possible in accordance 
 with the original plan, I, for my part, quite share 
 William Morris's regrets for the unfinished condition, 
 with the quaint " mediaeval crane " still remaining 
 where it was left by the members of the old guild of 
 masons in the sixteenth century. 
 
 Old Gallenga, the well-known writer on the staff of 
 The Times, was also in Cologne reporting the pro-
 
 MEN AND MOVEMENTS 85 
 
 ceedings. An amusing incident occurred in connexion 
 with Gallenga. I was sitting next to him one day 
 at luncheon in our hotel, and on the other side was 
 a pompous Prussian. As, after the meal, we were 
 rising from the table, our pompous Prussian addressed 
 Gallenga, asking whether he were not the correspon- 
 dent of The Times. Gallenga, somewhat taken aback, 
 admitted that he was. ' Then, sir, are you aware that 
 you have grossly insulted the whole German nation ? " 
 Gallenga replied that he was not conscious of having 
 committed any indiscretion of the kind. " Do you 
 not know then, sir." retorted the pompous Prussian, 
 " that you described the assembly at the celebration 
 as wearing shabby overcoats ? " As Gallenga told 
 me afterwards, all that he had said was that the 
 brilliant uniforms of the military made a striking 
 contrast with the overcoats of the civilians, and 
 that the contrast gave the latter almost a shabby 
 appearance. 
 
 An interesting personality I met in Berlin at that 
 time was the late Edward von Hartmann, the author 
 of a book which had an enormous run in its day and 
 was translated into all the important European lan- 
 guages, " Die Philosophic des Unbewussten " (The 
 Philosophy of the Unconscious). Hartmann was lame 
 and could not get out much. I was frequently at 
 his house and had many a discussion on philosophical 
 questions with him. Especially I remember talking 
 over the possibility of a corporate social consciousness 
 being in the womb of time and evolution. This idea 
 was new to him, and he seemed rather at a loss as 
 to his attitude towards it. He wa? a good amateur 
 vocalist and used to sing the baritone parts in Wagner,
 
 86 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 especially " Wie oft in Meeres tiefstem Schlund " 
 from the " Fliegender Hollander." My friendship 
 with Von Hartmann at this time has always been 
 a pleasant memory with me, and I only regret that 
 after leaving Berlin I never saw him again. He died 
 early in 1914. 
 
 On Dr. Abel's retirement in 1881 from the correspon- 
 dentship of the Standard, I left Berlin and returned 
 to England, where I fixed myself for the next few 
 years at Croydon. This period, that of the first half 
 of the eighty decade, was an important turning-point 
 in the intellectual and social life of England. It was 
 in the Spring of 1881 that Hyndman founded the 
 " Democratic Federation," which subsequently became 
 the " Social Democratic Federation " and in later 
 years " The British Socialist Party." The Bradlaugh 
 struggle with the House of Commons was a prominent 
 feature of these years. Charles Bradlaugh was still 
 the bete noire of the British propertied classes, who 
 had the idea that he was a desperate revolutionist, 
 whose subversive teaching was calculated to place 
 the institution of private property in jeopardy. This 
 notion was not broken down until his great debate 
 with Hyndman at St. James's Hall on April 20, 1884, 
 in which he appeared as the champion of the existing 
 order of society and the bitter opponent of Socialism 
 and of all reforms tending in the direction of Socialism. 
 But it is singular to note that the change in public 
 opinion as regards Bradlaugh was also symptomatic 
 of a change in the attitude of British sentiment 
 towards theological heterodoxy and disbelief in general. 
 Bradlaugh, who was President of the " National Secular 
 Society " and a militant Atheist lecturer, had for this
 
 MEN AND MOVEMENTS 87 
 
 reason alone hitherto been their special bogy. Now, 
 on his coming down firmly on the side of the sanctity 
 of the existing economic social order and of private 
 property in the means of production, they willingly 
 forgave, or at least condoned, his Atheism. But 
 this matter of Bradlaugh was really, as already said, 
 no more than a symptom of a change in the whole 
 attitude of the British mind towards religion. The 
 change had begun in the later sixties, and was marked 
 by the growing popularity of the works of Darwin, 
 Spencer, Lecky, and others, but it was only beginning, 
 and, as pointed out in the last chapter, Evangelical 
 dogma, church- and chapel-going, and all that that 
 implies, continued to rule the roost with the vast 
 majority of the middle-class population of these islands. 
 During the seventies undoubtedly a further advance 
 was made towards the breakdown of thi. ; obscurantism, 
 but it was not till the early eighties that it can be said 
 to have definitively and finally collapsed. To those 
 of the younger generation it is to-day inconceivable 
 what the social ostracism, backbiting, and persecution 
 of unpopular opinion meant in the sixties, and even, 
 though to a lesser degree, in the seventies, of the last 
 century. Well, as we have said, this state of things 
 seemed to break down fairly completely with more or 
 less suddenness between the years 1880 and 1885. 
 The taking of Charles Bradlaugh, in a manner, into 
 the bosom of British Respectability about the close 
 of this period was only one of the straws showing 
 the shift in the direction of the social current. Brad- 
 laugh, it was true, had pronounced against Socialism, 
 but he had not gone to the Canossa of " Respectability " 
 in the matter of Atheism. In this respect British
 
 88 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 Respectability met him more than half way. For 
 the rest, the capitalist classes of this country, had they 
 had any sense, might have known years before that 
 Bradlaugh's views on social and economic questions 
 were not dangerous to them, from his attitude towards 
 the " International Association " and the Paris Com- 
 mune. It is a fact worth noting before leaving 
 the subject that the effective movement for freedom 
 of thought and toleration of opinion in this country 
 began almost exclusively from the literary and cul- 
 tured side. Freethought among the masses, as repre- 
 sented by the National Secular Society, continued 
 till the period in question to be regarded not merely 
 as crude and coarse in its inception and expression, 
 as indeed it very often was, but as socially disreputable. 
 It was not till the early eighties and the prosecu- 
 tion of Foote for blasphemy that the better-educated 
 middle classes began to have sense and justice enough 
 to see the movement from below for freedom of thought, 
 commonly known as Secularism, for what it was, 
 namely, the plucky effort of men of the small middle 
 and working classes to emancipate themselves, up to 
 their lights, from the thraldom of an encumbering 
 and galling superstition, fatal to all advance in know- 
 ledge and to all independent intellectual effort. Since 
 the early eighties, social persecution in matters of 
 opinion, whether theological or otherwise, has happily 
 ceased to be a stumbling-block in the path of the 
 intellectual and general progress of this country. 
 
 In 1882 I joined the Democratic Federation, rather 
 more than a year after its foundation. But before 
 entering upon the history of Socialism in England, the 
 beginnings of which were identified with the organi-
 
 MEN AND MOVEMENTS 3d 
 
 zation in question, I may perhaps say a few words 
 about some men whose acquaintance I made some 
 little while before this. Hermann Jung was a working 
 watchmaker by trade, and a French Swiss (Vaudois) 
 by origin. He used to live and carry on his business 
 in Charles Street, Clerkenwell, where I on several 
 occasions had conversations with him. Jung was an 
 extraordinary autodidact. He had lived in London 
 for many years indeed, since he was quite a young 
 man. Speaking English, French, and German alike 
 fluently, before long he came into close touch with 
 political refugees of the '48 movement, and made the 
 acquaintance of Marx and his circle. He soon got to 
 be one of Marx's intimate disciples, and when the 
 International Association was founded, in the Autumn 
 of 1864, he took his place among the most enthusiastic 
 spirits of the London section. He used to have much 
 to tell of his relations with Marx, for whom he had 
 the profoundest admiration. They finally quarrelled 
 over the break-up of the old International. The 
 reason of the difference was Jung's disapproval of the 
 arbitrary and, as he considered, unfair methods adopted 
 by Marx and his friend Engels at the Hague Congress 
 of 1872 to get rid of the disciples of Bakunin and other 
 non-Marxian and anti-Marxian elements in the body. 
 The Marxists, as is well known, succeeded in over- 
 riding all opposition and getting their motions carried, 
 the most important of these being the transference 
 of the General Council of the Association to New York. 
 This meant, of course, as it was intended to mean, 
 the death-blow of the old organization. The reasons 
 given for the Marxists' action by Friedrich Engels, who 
 was probably its chief promoter, at the Zurich Congress
 
 40 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 of 1893, have been stated on a former page. The 
 immediate result of the steps taken at the initiation 
 of Marx and his friends was the split up of the Inter- 
 national into three or four fragments, each claiming to 
 represent the original body. Hermann Jung, although 
 theoretically as strict a Marxist as ever, sympathized 
 strongly with the opposition parties and with their 
 determination to tieat the resolutions of the Hague 
 Congress, obtained by intrigue and unfair means, as 
 he viewed the matter, as null and void. The fragments 
 dragged on a precarious existence for a few years, but 
 by the end of the decade of the seventies the old Inter- 
 national had definitively ceased to exist. 
 
 I first made the acquaintance of Hermann Jung 
 at one of the meetings of the London Dialectical Society, 
 then held in Langham Hall, Great Portland Street. 
 The lecturer was the late Mr. Leonard Montefiore, 
 his subject being " German Social Democracy." He 
 treated the matter from the then conventional middle- 
 class point of view as a somewhat foolish aberration 
 of the masses, although he strongly denounced the 
 anti-Socialist coercion laws, the enactment of which 
 Bismarck had jiist succeeded in procuring. The treat- 
 ment of the subject in the somewhat de haul en bas 
 manner of the lecturer brought Jung, as soon as 
 the lecture was concluded, to his feet in a fury. The 
 result was one of the most effective and rousing speeches 
 in defence of Socialism I have ever heard. There was 
 no mistake about it. Hermann Jung was a born 
 orator. When I knew him he seldom took part in 
 public meetings, but in his younger days, when he 
 was an active propagandist, he must have been extra- 
 ordinarily effective and powerful.
 
 MEN AND MOVEMENTS 41 
 
 Poor Hermann Jung came to a sad end. Among 
 the numerous persons who, claiming to be political 
 refugees, always found a welcome in his workshop, 
 was a French criminal who, while Jung was bending 
 over his bench, struck him a blow on the head with 
 some sharp instrument which killed him at once. The 
 object was robbery, but his assailant, although he fled 
 from the house, did not succeed in escaping, being 
 caught red-handed, and in due course tried and executed. 
 
 Another man with whom I became acquainted through 
 Jung was the then Socialist and subsequent Anarchist, 
 Johannes Most. At the time I first met him, at the 
 end of the seventies, he had quarrelled with the leaders 
 of the Social Democratic party in Germany, and was 
 editing a paper of his own, Die Freiheit, in a street 
 off Tottenham Court Road. Most was rather an insig- 
 nificant-looking man, but with a fund of unmistakable 
 energy in him. His Socialism had been much influ- 
 enced by the writings of Eugen Duhring, Professor 
 of Political Economy in the Berlin University, a man 
 now almost forgotten, but who at that time aspired 
 to play a role as a theorist of Socialism in competition 
 with Marx, and who had a considerable vogue for a 
 few years among a section of the German Social Demo- 
 crats, especially in Berlin. His fame now rests upon 
 the polemical treatise of Friedrich Engels directed 
 against him, in which his pretensions were effectually 
 and finally disposed of. 
 
 Most became notorious in England through his 
 prosecution, after the slaying of the Czar Alexander II 
 by the Nihilists in March 1881. In his article in the 
 Freiheit, Most not only justified the " removal " of 
 Alexander II in particular, or Czars in general, but
 
 advocated a similar treatment for the heads of all 
 States " from St. Petersburg to Washington " inclusive. 
 The Liberal English Government of the time, with 
 the late Sir William Harcourt as Home Secretary, 
 probably influenced from Berlin by the German authori- 
 ties, of whom Bismarck was then the head, undertook 
 a prosecution. Most, as is well known, was sentenced 
 to eighteen months' imprisonment with hard labour. 
 His treatment in prison seems to have been vindictive 
 and scandalous. This took place immediately after 
 my return from Berlin in the Spring of 1881, and the 
 last time I ever saw Most was in the dock at Bow 
 Street during the police court proceedings before the 
 trial at the Old Bailey. He subsequently went to 
 America, where he became more than ever Anarchist 
 and Terrorist in his views, and published a paper in 
 this sense which again brought him into trouble, this 
 time with the American governing powers. In 1907 
 he died in New York. 
 
 Another well-known though very different figure to 
 whom I was introduced by Hermann Jung was Prince 
 Kropotkin, whose picturesque and benevolent-looking 
 head has since become familiar in many English social 
 circles. At that time he had only just come over 
 to England, and, indeed, had not very long escaped 
 from Russia. He arrived, however, immediately from 
 Geneva, where he had for some time been editing his 
 paper, Le RJvolte. His theoretical Anarchism furnished 
 a fertile subject of controversy between us on more 
 than one occasion. I well remember a long walk I 
 had with him one day in the early summer of 1882 
 from Croydon to Leatherhead, during which he ex- 
 pounded his views on the Social Revolution and had
 
 MEN AND MOVEMENTS 48 
 
 much to say against Marx and other leaders of the 
 main Social Democratic movement. Prince Kropotkin 
 subsequently obtained distinction in this country for 
 the exceptionally able popular articles on the results 
 of up-to-date science which he wrote in the Nineteenth 
 Century and elsewhere. He still, I believe, retains in 
 its essentials his old standpoint in social and political 
 matters, which he has endeavoured to illustrate in more 
 than one book published since then. His industry 
 and accuracy in collecting facts aie undeniable, and 
 especially in his work " Mutual Aid " there are some 
 just and useful aperfus, but I fail to see that they 
 point in the direction of the theory of Social Anarchism 
 I understand him still to hold. Kropotkin always 
 struck me, when I conversed with him, as having a 
 lingering belief in the individualist-introspective ethics 
 of the ordinary bourgeois Puritanism with the idea 
 of individual self-immolation through asceticism, in 
 its various modes, as having an intrinsic value in itself. 
 As regards Economics, he insisted on the theory that 
 concentration in industrial processes was only a passing 
 phase in industrial evolution, which had reached its 
 greatest intensity during the period in which steam 
 was the main motive-power in production, but that 
 the full development of the era of electricity would 
 show a return, in a large measure, to the old small in- 
 dustry of individual production, owing to the fact that, 
 unlike steam-power, electricity can be split up without 
 losing its efficiency. It is now more than thirty-five 
 years ago since Prince Kropotkin expounded this, to 
 me, novel doctrine, in the course of our peregrinations 
 among the Surrey hills. The subsequent history of 
 Industrial Progress has certainly falsified the prognos-
 
 44 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 tications suggested by the theory. The answer to it, 
 indeed, is obvious, even assuming the scientific basis 
 of Kropotkin's view to have been adequate, or indeed 
 sustainable at all in the present day, as to which I 
 am not competent to judge. The concentration of 
 manufacturing processes, with the division of labour 
 involved therein, began long before the steam era 
 before, indeed, any motricity other than that more or 
 less immediately produced and controlled by the hand 
 of the workman was so much as thought of. Yet, 
 notwithstanding this, the concentration of production 
 under one roof and one direction progressively and 
 steadily made headway from the second half of the 
 sixteenth century onward in ever more branches of 
 industry, little by little supplanting the old individual 
 craftsmanship. The introduction of complex machinery 
 on a large scale, and still more of steam-motricity at 
 the end of the eighteenth and beginning of the nine- 
 teenth centuries, certainly accelerated the complete 
 domination of the centralizing process in all branches 
 of production, thereby inaugurating what we call the 
 " Great Industry " of the industrial revolution. But 
 steam-driven machinery most assuredly did not create 
 the tendency by which the principle of concentration, 
 with its correlative division of labour, has progressively 
 superseded the individual handicraft industry from 
 the close of the Middle Ages onward. Hence, I say, 
 even assuming the accuracy of Kropotkin's forecast 
 as to the possibilities inherent in the application of 
 electricity to industrial processes, by which in certain 
 departments of production (for it could, of course, only 
 apply to certain depaitments) a return to the methods 
 of the small industry might take place, yet the same
 
 MEN AND MOVEMENTS 45 
 
 cause the greater effectiveness of combined and or- 
 ganized over isolated labour which originally gave 
 rise to the supplanting of handicraft methods by 
 concentration of production under one roof, with division 
 of its processes, must continue to operate in realizing 
 the same tendency, just as it did before the intro- 
 duction of steam and modern machinery. 
 
 About this time I began seriously to study Marx's 
 great work " Das Kapital," and towards the end of 
 1881 I wrote a short monograph on the subject of Marx 
 and his work in a monthly review called Modern Thought, 
 now long since defunct. This notice, although by 
 no means faultless as regards its accuracy, pleased 
 Marx and Engels. Marx himself, being at the time 
 too ill to write, sent me his thanks and many appre- 
 ciative messages in a letter written ' by his daughter 
 Eleanor. The great founder of the theoretic basis 
 of modern scientific socialist economy lived for more 
 than a year after this incident, but he was away for 
 his health during a considerable portion of the time, 
 and I never met him. The circumstance of the article 
 referred to, however, led to an invitation a short time 
 after Marx's death in March 1883 from Friedrich Engels 
 to visit him, a visit which began an acquaintance and 
 friendship lasting till his own death in 1895. 
 
 Friedrich Engels I consider to be one of the most 
 remarkable men of his time a man of encyclopaedic 
 reading and of considerable up-to-date knowledge in 
 all branches of science anything that Engels had to 
 say or to write always had its points and was worth 
 consideration, even in subjects of which he was not 
 complete master, as he was of Political Economy. 
 But Engels had his limitations intellectually. For one
 
 46 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 thing, he was somewhat hide-bound to the shibboleths 
 of the old dogmatic materialism. He, like Marx, 
 had sprung from the left wing of the old Hegelian 
 school, of which Ludwig Feuerbach was the most 
 popular literary exponent. This school, while retaining 
 the Hegelian Logic or Dialectic, strenuously repudiated 
 Metaphysics and all interest in the problem of 
 Metaphysics. The reaction against the Idealism of 
 the main current of German philosophy, as the latter 
 existed to wellnigh the end of the earlier half of the 
 nineteenth century, led, as might have been expected, 
 to the assertion of a somewhat crude and dogmatic 
 materialism. This was very noticeable in Marx and 
 Engels. In their case, it received a special colouring 
 from their economic and historical studies. Its best- 
 known result was the so-called " Materialist theory 
 of history." This meant the reduction of all the 
 changes in the development of human society to eco- 
 nomic terms. It meant, that is, that all political, moral, 
 aesthetic, religious, intellectual evolution is to be 
 regarded as the reflex merely of economic change, by 
 which is understood change in the mode of the pro- 
 duction of wealth or of the distribution of wealth 
 in other words, of the manner in which the material 
 modes of existence of the community are determined. 
 According to the old theory, the dominant factor in 
 the life of any age or people was always its speculative 
 or religious beliefs. This theory may now be fairly 
 regarded as exploded. It is to the everlasting credit 
 of Marx and Engels to have pointed out the impor- 
 tance of the material or economic basis of society in 
 moulding and influencing that society's life and destinies. 
 But what the Marxian school fails to recognize is
 
 47 
 
 that this one factor, important and even fundamental 
 though it be, is not by itself necessarily the sole 
 determining cause in social evolution. Moral, intel- 
 lectual, and other non-material factors also play their 
 part, and it may be quite as important a part, in deter- 
 mining the current of human affairs. In one age and 
 under one set of circumstances, the economic factor 
 may play the leading role ; in another age and under 
 another set of circumstances, a religious, moral, or 
 political belief or conviction may occupy the leading 
 place and economic conditions a comparatively secon- 
 dary one. In one or two articles written quite at the 
 end of his life and published after his death, Engels 
 himself would seem to have to some extent recognized 
 the inadequacy of what is regarded as the orthodox 
 Marxist position. But Engels, as I knew him, held to 
 the theory in all its one-sidedness. Speaking generally, 
 Engels showed a tendency to regard all other studies 
 and departments of knowledge, so to say, as appendices 
 of his own special department, i.e. Political Economy. 
 I have often noticed this when conversing with him, 
 I suppose we must regard it as the necessary drawback 
 of the specialist, this tendency to regard everything 
 else as subordinate to his specialism. For instance, 
 if you spoke with Engels on some purely philo- 
 sophical or psychological problem, he could only envisage 
 it as the expression of some social antagonism, or as 
 the point of view of some special economic class, at 
 some special moment of its development it might be 
 the decaying feudal class, or the rising capitalist class, 
 or what not. He could not, it seemed, see that the 
 problem had an intrinsic quality, meaning, and interest 
 of its own and in itself. The whole historical course
 
 48 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 of speculative thought was to be interpreted eco- 
 nomically as the varying expression of class aspiration 
 or antagonism. I remember one day, when discussing 
 with him the materialist doctrine of history, challeng- 
 ing him to deduce the appearance, in the Roman 
 Empire of the second century, of the Gnostic sects, 
 and the success of many of them for a time among 
 the populations of the larger cities of the Mediterranean 
 basin, from the economic conditions of the Roman 
 world at the time. He admitted he could not do this, 
 but suggested that by tracing the matter further back 
 you might arrive at some economic explanation of 
 what he granted was an interesting side-problem of 
 history. What he meant by this retrospective inter- 
 pretation I am unable to say, for the conversation 
 was interrupted by the arrival of visitors and was not 
 resumed. 
 
 Marx and Engels, as is well known, were always 
 recognized as a sort of court of ultimate appeal by 
 the Social Democratic party, in spite of the fact that 
 on one occasion, that of the negotiations with the 
 Lassalleans before the Erfurt Congress, their views 
 were overridden by the actual leaders of the party in 
 Germany, Bebel and Liebknecht. But this was quite 
 exceptional, and I believe, indeed, the only case of such 
 a thing occurring. As a general rule, Marx and Engels 
 were final arbiters in questions of party policy. After 
 Marx's death this role became naturally concentrated 
 in the person of Engels. Though prepared to give 
 due weight to the practical exigencies of the situation 
 on all occasions, the old colleague and survivor of 
 Marx till the last held to the view that the social revo- 
 lution could not be inaugurated otherwise than by
 
 49 
 
 the methods of forcible insurrection least of all in 
 Germany. I have more than once heard him say that 
 as soon as one man in three, i.e. one-third, of the German 
 army actually in service could be relied on by the party 
 leaders, revolutionary action ought to be taken. Engels 
 would certainly not have recognized the Socialism (?) 
 of Scheidemann, Siidekum, Noske, and the rest of the 
 present " Revisionist " crew constituting the actual 
 majority of the party representation in the Reichstag 
 as anything else than reaction in its worst form. 
 
 The earlier career of Engels was interesting in many 
 ways. Born at Barmen, in Rhenish Prussia, in 1820, 
 after completing his studies at the University of Berlin 
 he was sent over to England to Manchester, to look 
 after a cotton-spinning business in which his father, 
 who was a man of some means, had a share. It was 
 here that his interest in Social problems received its 
 most powerful stimulus, from the conditions in the 
 housing and life of the labouring class which he found 
 prevailing there. His investigations resulted in the 
 production of his first work, " Die Lage der arbeitenden 
 Klassen in England " (The Position of the Working 
 Classes in England) . From this residence in Manchester, 
 dating from when he was quite a young man, Engels 
 acquired a thorough acquaintance with English life, 
 manners, and thought. He had some interesting ex- 
 periences to relate concerning English society and ways 
 during the first half of the nineteenth century 
 the time, as he was wont to express it, before salad 
 oil appeared on English dinner-tables. He related 
 to me how, smoking at that time being regarded as 
 more or less " bad form " in society, he was on one 
 occasion requested by the master of the house where 
 
 4
 
 50 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 he was dining, who, notwithstanding the shocked pro- 
 prieties of his daughters, was addicted to his pipe 
 after dinner, to join him for the purpose of a tranquil 
 smoke in the kitchen ! and this was a well-to-do 
 Manchester manufacturer who lived in a good house ! 
 Again, he had reminiscences of port and sherry as the 
 only wine drunk by or known to the average English- 
 man, This fact was humorously illustrated by the 
 contemporary translation into English of the opening 
 line of Leporello's drinking song in " Don Giovanni " as 
 " Come, let us be merry with port and with sherry " 
 the idea of being merry with any other wine, save 
 perhaps with the rare and costly exception of cham- 
 pagne, being inconceivable to the English mind of 
 the period. He had a story also of how he, wearing 
 a beard, at that time regarded as a great eccentricity, 
 being worn by few Englishmen, when he went out for 
 a stroll on Sunday morning would meet occasionally 
 a fellow bearded man, who would greet him with some- 
 thing like a religious fervour, and perhaps anon another. 
 These bearded eccentricities were the surviving fol- 
 lowers of the notorious Johanna Southcott, who affirmed 
 that she would be delivered of a supernatural being, 
 Shiloh, on the igth of October 1814, but who died of 
 dropsy a few days after instead. Her followers, who 
 were said to have originally numbered one hundred 
 thousand, did not become extinct before the middle of 
 the nineteenth century. They regarded the wearing of 
 the beard as a sign of the elect. As illustrating the 
 universality of church- and chapel-going on a Sunday 
 in the England of the forties and fifties of the last 
 century, Engels told of a conversation which took 
 place at the house of one of his Manchester acquaint-
 
 MEN AND MOVEMENTS 51 
 
 ances during a midday dinner (they did not call it 
 luncheon in those days in middle-class circles) to which 
 he was invited one Sunday. The talk, as was then 
 inevitable, turned on the morning's preachers, and 
 Engels, on being asked what " place of worship " he 
 attended, replied that he always took a walk in the 
 country on Sunday morning, that being, he found, the 
 best way of spending the early hours of his leisure day. 
 On hearing this, his host addressed him with the remark, 
 ' You seem to hold peculiar religious views, Mr. Engels 
 somewhat Socinian, I think ! " The observation is 
 amusingly significant of the notions prevalent at that 
 period, when " somewhat Socinian " was about the 
 extreme limit of theological heterodoxy conceivable 
 to the respectable middle-class mind. The notion of 
 the devout Atheist Engels being " somewhat Socinian " 
 is also very funny. 
 
 It is noteworthy that Friedrich Engels, notwith- 
 standing his long residence in England and acquaint- 
 ance with the English people, never in himself became 
 completely anglicized. He always retained to the 
 last his German individuality. It is singular too that 
 Engels, with all his versatility and literary capacity, 
 never produced any great independent literary work. 
 His writings mainly consisted of articles, with occasional 
 longer essays, the most important of which have been 
 collected and published in German under the auspices 
 of Bernstein, Kautzky, and Mehring. His independent 
 publications during his lifetime were mostly of the 
 nature of expanded brochures. Such was " The Posi- 
 tion of the Working Classes in England." His greatest 
 literary achievement was undoubtedly his work against 
 Duhring. But here again we have no more than an
 
 32 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 expanded polemical essay. This is much to be re- 
 gretted. Had Engels undertaken to embody his wide 
 knowledge and often extremely keen intellectual in- 
 sight in a substantive and systematic form, he would 
 undoubtedly have produced something of real and 
 permanent value for the Socialist thought not merely 
 of the present time but of the future. As it is, the 
 form which his writings took suggests a danger of their 
 more or less falling into oblivion within a generation 
 or two from the time of his death. 
 
 Like other men of considerable intellectual capacity, 
 
 Friedrich Engels had very markedly the proverbial 
 
 " defects of his qualities." Together with his friend 
 
 Marx, and like other Socialist leaders I could name, 
 
 he was a thoroughly bad judge of men. Moreover, 
 
 he was absurdly jealous of any one he did not know 
 
 himself entering into any close personal relations 
 
 of friendship with Marx. An apt illustration of this 
 
 is afforded by the case of my friend H. M. Hyndman. 
 
 Hyndman had become acquainted with Marx, and the 
 
 acquaintanceship had ripened into a cordial friendship. 
 
 It would appear (I take Engels' own version of the 
 
 matter as the basis of my remarks) as though Engels 
 
 had no sooner perceived that Hyndman had made an 
 
 impression on Marx, than he sought to undermine 
 
 the friendly relations between the two men. The 
 
 pretext, for I am afraid we must regard it only as a 
 
 pretext, was found in the fact that Hyndman early 
 
 in 1882 had published a little book entitled " England 
 
 for All," in which he put, in a popular and very brief 
 
 form, the main economic positions of modern Socialism, 
 
 derived of course from Marx, but without mentioning 
 
 their source by name. In this it should be understood
 
 MEN AND MOVEMENTS 58 
 
 Hyndman did not pretend to claim them for his own, 
 but admitted that he was indebted for them to an 
 eminent foreign Economist. His reason for not re- 
 ferring directly to Marx at that moment was, I under- 
 stand, that the intimation of their having been made 
 if not " in Germany," at least by a .Jew of German 
 birth, might prejudice their reception, new and un- 
 familiar as they were, in this country of insular pre- 
 judices. Be this as it may, the omission of Marx's 
 name afforded the excuse for Engels to persuade Marx 
 that Hyndman's friendship covered a designing intent 
 to suck Marx's brains and obtain the credit in English- 
 speaking countries for the results of Marx's work. Marx 
 at first excused Hyndman to Engels on the ground 
 that the book was written specially for certain London 
 Radical clubs and he believed was not in general cir- 
 culation. Thereupon Engels orders the brochure from 
 his bookseller, and a few days after proceeds trium- 
 phantly to Maitland Park, holding it aloft and shaking 
 it as he advances to meet Marx. Marx yielded to 
 Engels' blandishments. Result, a " coolness " which 
 practically ended the relations between Marx and 
 Hyndman. 
 
 Another instance of Engels' womanish prejudice 
 against a man to whom he had taken a dislike, based 
 on preposterously inadequate grounds, is afforded by 
 his attitude towards that excellent Socialist, Adolphe 
 Smith. The origin of this antipathy, as stated by 
 Engels himself, almost passes belief in its absurdity. 
 Adolphe Smith, as is well known, took part in the Com- 
 mune. On his arrival in London, after his escape 
 from Paris early in June 1871, he started a series of 
 lectures in defence of the Commune, and, as was only
 
 54 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 to be expected considering the attitude of the Press 
 and the ferocity of the hatred worked up among the 
 British bourgeoisie against the Commune and all who 
 defended it these lectures, although exciting some 
 interest at first, soon ceased to pay their way, and had 
 to be discontinued, with a loss to Smith, a compara- 
 tively poor man, of time and money. Among the 
 known sympathizers with the cause to whom an an- 
 nouncement of the lectures was sent were Marx and 
 Engels, who duly attended them on more than one 
 occasion. Engels himself admitted Smith's defence 
 of the Commune to have been satisfactory. But it 
 so happened that shortly after the cessation of the 
 lectures Smith was one of the signatories to a protest 
 against the somewhat high-handed action of the Marxian 
 party on the central committee of the International. 
 This protest, in which there were certain, what we 
 should call now Anarchistic elements, involved, con- 
 tained expressions which Smith in his maturer years 
 has allowed were crude and ill-conceived. He also 
 admits his having signed the manifesto at all to have 
 been dictated by youthful enthusiasm, genuine but 
 not overwise. Now, Adolphe Smith's participation 
 in the document in question was a thing Engels never 
 forgave the unfortunate Smith. It rankled in his mind 
 for a quarter of a century, until the day of his death. 
 But this was not all. On the basis of his resentment 
 Engels built up the following preposterous hypothesis, 
 which he retailed as fact. Smith, as we have seen, 
 had sent himself and Marx a syllabus of his lectures 
 requesting their attendance and recommendation to 
 friends. The lectures proved a financial failure. Smith, 
 according to Engels, regarded their failure as being
 
 MEN AND MOVEMENTS 55 
 
 due to lack of interest shown by himself, Marx, and 
 their friends in the enterprise. Thereupon, vowing 
 vengeance in his wrath, the malignant Smith, as Engels 
 declared, drew up and circulated the wicked mani- 
 festo attacking the Marxian policy ! Hinc ilia lacryma I 
 Such was the absurdly malevolent construction Engels 
 chose to put upon two utterly disconnected facts. 
 Any one who knows Adolphe Smith mut recognize, 
 of course, how entirely impossible is the assumption 
 of Engels and how utterly inconsistent it is with the 
 character of the man in question. Adolphe Smith, it 
 should be observed, is one who .e record for unostenta- 
 tious and ungrudging work for the Socialist movement 
 has been exceeded by few. Other men have got at 
 least a certain amount of kudos and public recognition 
 for their work. Adolphe Smith's work has been mostly 
 of a kind unrecognized by the general public. So 
 bitter was Engels' animosity, that on one occasion 
 towards the end of his life, when Smith had been per- 
 suaded by some mutual friends to join them in a call 
 on Engels, the latter could not restrain himself in his 
 own house from the most ill-mannered conduct towards 
 the man he so bitterly and unreasonably hated. 
 
 Another instance on the other side of Engels' utter 
 incapacity to judge men was his vehement champion- 
 ship of Dr. Edward Aveling, the husband (in free 
 marriage) of Eleanor, the daughter of his friend Marx. 
 No amount of evidence of Aveling's delinquencies in 
 money matteis, or of the untrustworthiness and com- 
 plete unreliability of his character generally as -a man, 
 would induce Engels to cease placing his trust in him. 
 What was worse, he was continually trying to foist 
 him as a leader upon the English Socialist and Labour
 
 56 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 movement. His sincerity in this, as in the rest of his 
 actions, is undoubted, but is one more illustration of 
 the very serious defects of his qualities in this, in many 
 respects, great man. 
 
 In giving the foregoing incidents tending to show 
 the unpleasant sides of Friedrich Engels, I am not 
 actuated by any mere love of scandal, but by the fact 
 that the incidents narrated have not been without 
 influence on the International Socialist movement. 
 Engels' fierce dislike of Hyndman, for instance, did 
 not end with his achievement of causing a breach 
 between Hyndman and Marx, but continued to work 
 its evil influence after Marx's death in exciting a distrust 
 and prejudice against Hyndman among the best of the 
 "old guard" of the German Social Democratic party, 
 such as Liebknecht, Bebel, Singer, Kautzky, and others ; 
 and although the ill-feeling was got over in some cases, 
 notably that of old Liebknecht, who subsequently 
 became on very friendly terms with Hyndman, yet 
 for a long time it distinctly caused a certain strain in 
 the relations between the old German party of twenty 
 or thirty years ago and the only English party really 
 representing Marxian Socialism, i.e. the Social Demo- 
 cratic Federation. 
 
 Similarly with Adolphe Smith. Although, owing to 
 the relative positions of the two men in English Social- 
 ism, its effect was not so obvious in his case, it never- 
 theless gave rise to most unjust suspicions against 
 one of the worthiest and most disinterested members 
 of the English party. Yet again, Engels' exaltation 
 of Aveling and his representing of him as a leading 
 figure in the British Socialist party, which he never 
 was, often gave occasion, in its turn, to an entirely
 
 MEN AND MOVEMENTS 57 
 
 false estimate on the Continent of the situation in the 
 British movement. These things being so, I hold 
 it well that the above unpleasant facts, although in 
 themselves of a purely personal nature, should be 
 placed on record for the benefit of the future historian, 
 when he may come to deal with the international side 
 of Socialism as it stood during the last two decades 
 of the nineteenth century.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 ON CENTURY-END LITERATURE, ART, AND 
 PHILOSOPHY 
 
 THE expression fin de siecle, which sprang up originally, 
 if I remember rightly, in the early eighties, became 
 very popular as the century more nearly approached 
 its close. It had, indeed, an actual significance. As 
 already observed in a previous chapter, the early 
 eighties did undoubtedly mark the culmination of a 
 great change in English popular thought. Perhaps 
 the year 1884 may be specially mentioned in this con- 
 nexion. It was in this year that the modern English 
 Socialist movement really began to take root and excite 
 interest in the country. With this, however, I propose 
 to deal at length in another chapter. But in other 
 ways also the advent of the mind of a new genera- 
 tion showed itself about this time. The old English 
 Puritanism ceased to concern itself primarily with 
 theological dogma, but turned it* principal attention 
 to practical issues and questions of conduct. Its 
 view of moral problems of course centred in the 
 old bourgeois Puritan notions. The circumference 
 of morality still mainly circled round the question of 
 sex relations : sexual abstention under the name of 
 " Social Purity " bulked largely, as it has always done
 
 LITERATURE, ART, AND PHILOSOPHY 59 
 
 with this type of mind, as the great moral achievement. 
 The late W. T. Stead was its chief literary and jour- 
 nalistic coryphaeus, and the Rev. Hugh Price Hughes 
 its prophet and priest in pulpit and on platform. The 
 movement was also mixed up with Feminism, with 
 which I intend also to deal in a later chapter. 
 
 Now was the time of the great Browning " boom." 
 Browning clubs sprang up in all cultured middle-class 
 circles. Robert Browning was proclaimed as the poet of 
 the age, and the study of his poems was declared by 
 many enthusiasts as a liberal education in itself. Alto- 
 gether, in the years of these early eighties it became 
 clear that the culture, using the word in its widest 
 sense, of mid- Victorian England had lost its savour 
 and survived its influence. The late-Victorian period 
 which ushered in the twentieth century was already 
 in full swing. The contrast between the new culture, 
 as we may term it, and that of the so-called early- 
 Victorian period of the forties and fifties, became 
 very marked indeed. Dickens, to take an example 
 from fictional literature, began to get distinctly old- 
 fashioned as the society of his heyday died off. Even 
 his sarcasms and delineations of character in some 
 cases lost their force. Notably is this true of- his 
 religious impostors, his Tartuffes. Take for instance 
 " Stiggins." Now, Stiggins had become already an 
 impossible caricature long before the end of the last 
 century. The Stigginses of that time, as of our own 
 day, did not as a class, while preaching teetotalism, 
 perpetually get drunk on rum-punch or anything else. 
 Such crude form of hypocrisy, if it ever existed out- 
 side the caricatures of a novelist, had long since died 
 out. The hypocrisy of this later period may be
 
 60 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 intrinsically no better than that of the " Stiggins " of 
 " Pickwick " ; on the contrary, it is worse, in so far as 
 it is far more subtle and hence more dangerous. A 
 pious " shepherd " like our old friend " Stiggins " is 
 after all very easily found out, and when found out, 
 his reputation inevitably collapses. Nobody would 
 take up his defence. Things are different now. The 
 pious Nonconformist preacher of our own day and 
 the recent past still preaches abstinence, alcoholic and 
 sexual, aw&'-gambling, and anti many other things, 
 only not, of course, anti-moneymaking by the approved 
 methods of capitalistic exploitation. The type of the 
 modern Stiggins, the modern Tartuffe, is rather to be 
 found in the Nonconformist divine who declaims 
 against all the above sins in the pulpit and on the 
 platform, and whose sincerity " moults no feather " 
 (as Shakespeare has it) in other words, who probably 
 practises what he preaches in this respect. (At least 
 there is no evidence that he does not do so.) But 
 now comes the test. Our Nonconformist divine, who 
 prides himself on devoutly exhorting pillar as he is 
 of the Nonconformist conscience to bourgeois morality 
 in all its hues, has influential friends connected with 
 mining speculation in another continent. He acquires 
 stock amounting perhaps to valuable holdings in their 
 mining companies. It becomes the interest of the 
 mining magnates to acquire the political control of 
 the land in which their mines are situated, in order to 
 obtain thereby greater freedom for the exploitation 
 of mining labour. In consequence, the magnates in 
 question, under cover of a patriotic cry, engineer a war 
 for the conquest of the territory concerned and its 
 annexation to Great Britain. What does our Non-
 
 UTERATVRM, ART, AND PHILOSOPHY 61 
 
 conformist, pious and devout, zealous in seeking to 
 save the normal non-ascetic human non-ascetic, that 
 is, in the points above referred to as the subject of 
 his pulpit and platform diatribes what does this 
 gentleman (who, bien entendu, was accustomed, when he 
 had everything to gain and nothing to lose by it, to 
 plead the cause of peace and the freedom and inde- 
 pendence of small and weak nationalities) what, I 
 say, does he do when it is a question of an aggressive 
 war and the conquest and annexation of a numerically 
 weak people in the interest of his friends, the mining 
 magnates, and the enhancement of the value of his 
 own holdings in the mines ? He champions the war, 
 denounces its victims, and places himself unreservedly 
 on the side of the mining war agitation of his friends, 
 prepared to defend all the trickery, treachery, and 
 lying involved in their wantonly provocative conduct. 
 This man almost certainly never in his life got drunk 
 on rum-punch or on any other alcoholic stimulant. 
 On the contrary, he is reported to have drunk himself 
 to death on tea, as befitted a pillar of the Noncon- 
 formist conscience and a leading light of total abstin- 
 ence. No ; our modern Stigginses and Tartuffes know 
 a trick worth two of the rum-punch business, the red 
 nose, and, for that matter, of sexual gallantries or other 
 like peccadilloes abhorrent to the Nonconformist con- 
 science and its votaries. Class interest and financial gain 
 are more in their way than personal and private sins. 
 This in an illustration of how Dickens and the early- 
 Victorian novelists have lost already their savour and 
 are likely to become pointless for future generations. 
 
 The question of the evolution of hypocrisy, as of 
 roguery generally, is always interesting. The mediaeval
 
 62 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 fraudulent baker would stick a lump of clay or a stone 
 in the middle of his loaf to make it weigh heavier. 
 The modern fraudulent baker is better advised than to 
 play such a clumsy trick. He makes his extra profit 
 through cheapening his flour by adulteration, or other- 
 wise lessening the cost of production, to the deterioration 
 of the product. So the modern Stiggins scorns the 
 methods of hypocrisy affected by his Dickensian proto- 
 type. The hypocrisy he so ably cultivates bears the 
 impress of calculated thought and sober reflection. 
 The above is, of course, only one instance of the way 
 in which the wit and wisdom even of such a classic 
 humorist in fiction as Charles Dickens has worn thin 
 within a couple of generations. Many more could be 
 given, such, for instance, as some of the pleasantries, 
 and above all the Cockney speech of Sam Weller the 
 latter, of course, as has been often noticed, having 
 become to some extent pointless and its funniness 
 blunted to the present generation of Englishmen. 
 
 The like observations might be made as regards other 
 novelists that delighted our fathers and mothers, and 
 for that matter, ourselves also, in our early days, that 
 is, those of us who are already beginning to take on 
 the autumn tints of the " sere and yellow." 
 
 In Art, the declining nineteenth century expressed 
 itself in what is known as Decadence in its various forms. 
 The aesthetic movement proper, of which John Ruskin 
 was regarded as the protagonist, and the extreme and 
 more especially decadent forms of it which were repre- 
 sented by Oscar Wilde and his circle, were alike dominant 
 at this time. For other decadents we have only to 
 mention, in painting and designing, the names of 
 Whistler and Aubrey Beardsley to recall a host of
 
 LITERATURE, ART, AND PHILOSOPHY 68 
 
 imitators. As for the (as we may term it) old legiti- 
 mate aesthetic movement, as realized in the art of 
 painting and designing, it was represented during the 
 period in question, first and foremost by Burne- Jones, 
 for life a close friend of William Morris, and by his 
 disciple, Walter Crane, who carried on the artistic 
 tradition of it till his death early in the year 1915. 
 On the Continent, this line of artistic conception, in 
 so far as it was not merely imitation, may be deemed 
 to have been embodied in the works of Arnold Bocklin, 
 the Swiss painter (1827-1901). There was consider- 
 able difference, no doubt, but the painting with the 
 suggestion of decorative design in it which character- 
 ized the English movement is unmistakably present 
 in the latter artist. The influence of this art in Central 
 Europe is very marked indeed. There is a peculiar 
 sweep of line of a scroll-character, eminently Bocklinian, 
 which meets one continually in the more recent 
 decorative art of the Germanic countries. 
 
 The cult of Decadence, as we may call it, in litera- 
 ture and poetry, of which the Oscar Wilde gioup was 
 the extreme wing, had a considerable vogue in the 
 declining years of the nineteenth century, and traces of 
 its effects may still be seen in the minds of the younger 
 generation. The " Fleshly School," as it was termed, 
 of Swinburne, with its offshoots, was countered by the 
 " Idyllic School," as championed by Robert Buchanan, 
 representing the older tradition in English poetry. 
 Both were caricatured by Gilbert and Sullivan in 
 " Patience." The rapid development of Decadence in 
 art issued in a morbid craving for, and striving after, 
 mere bizarrerie. It mattered not whether a thing were 
 beautiful or ugly, provided it were sufficiently bizarre.
 
 4 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 This decadent tendency run mad, when transferred 
 from the sphere of literature and art to that of morals 
 and manners, resulted, as is well known, in the down- 
 fall of Oscar Wilde himself. While giving full weight, 
 however, to the decadent current in promoting un- 
 natural proclivities in sex as in other matters, it must 
 not be forgotten that the " Social Purity " movement 
 so-called, led at that time by men like Stead and Price 
 Hughes, may easily furnish the seed ground for such 
 forms of erratic vice. In this connexion I cannot 
 but recall what was told me by an eminent Egyptian 
 judge, now holding a distinguished position on the 
 mixed tribunal at Cairo. Speaking of Oriental litera- 
 ture, and especially of the " Arabian Nights," he related 
 to me how, in discussing the subject with a learned 
 Mollah, he asked him what he thought of the gross 
 licentiousness of much Mohammedan literature, and 
 whether he could justify it. " Yes," replied the Mollah ; 
 " you see, the true believers, who were the authors of 
 this literature, had to do with populations in which 
 unnatural sexual vice was prevalent. Now, their aim 
 was to provide a counteractive by lascivious descrip- 
 tions and stories which excited the passions of men in 
 the right direction, turning their lusts into the normal 
 channel." Whether this pronouncement of the Mollah 
 was historically accurate, and such was really the high 
 moral purpose of the Islamic authors of erotic Eastern 
 literature, may perhaps be doubted. But anyway, the 
 contention itself has something to be said for it. You 
 cannot suppress natural passion. The authors of 
 Eastern literature, according to the Mollah, found a 
 tendency for it to run into unnatural channels, and 
 tried by their literary allurements to entice it back
 
 LITERATURE, ART, AND PHILOSOPHY 65 
 
 into natural ones. Conversely, promoters of the Social 
 Purity campaign, in trying to cast stumbling-blocks 
 moral and material in the way of the natural outlet 
 of human passion, are pursuing a course which may 
 well lead directly or indirectly to sexual perversion. 
 
 In Music, the cult of Decadence, although its first 
 beginning may be traced as far back as the eighties, 
 has reached what one may hope is its extreme develop- 
 ment only in our own day. The eccentricities of 
 Richard Strauss have been outdone recently by the 
 senseless bizarreries of a Schonberg, and the madness 
 of an Italian apostle of mere noise. At the end of the 
 last century Wagner had entered fully into the appre- 
 ciation of the English musical public. Very little 
 was listened to or cared for in the direction of Opera 
 that was not Wagner. In classical music Brahms 
 still held the field with many, but everywhere the 
 Wagnerian music-drama brought full houses. Shaw 
 discoursed on Wagner in the columns of the World, 
 and published the substance of his articles in his little 
 volume " The Complete Wagnerite." As regards 
 Shaw, by the way, in connexion with Wagner about 
 the time of the first production of the " Meistersinger " 
 in London, in June 1890, he called my attention to 
 the curious fact that the main themes of the work 
 were built up on the interval of the fourth. He and 
 I were, during this period, joint musical critics of an 
 evening paper. He wrote over the pseudonym " Corno 
 di Bassetto," I over that of " Musigena." I had often 
 occasion to be away on the Continent at this time, 
 and I remember on this very occasion of the first intro- 
 duction of the " Meistersinger " I had arrived home 
 just in time to attend the performance, which fell to
 
 66 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 ray department. This rather disgusted Shaw, who 
 felt himself unduly cut out. The result was that 
 as my frequent absence from London often threw my 
 side of the work on Shaw, I thought it only fair to 
 resign the whole to him. He, I believe, held it for 
 a little time longer and then also resigned, presumably 
 finding that the columns of the World gave him enough 
 scope for the expression of his views on music, and 
 that the pressure of other literary work absorbed more 
 and more of his time. 
 
 In Philosophy, outside the still considerable though 
 waning influence of Mill, and still more of Herbert 
 Spencer, the so-called " young Hegelian " movement 
 held the field. Thomas Hill Green, who died in the 
 early eighties, was its protagonist at Oxford. The 
 movement in question must not be regarded as a mere 
 resuscitation of the philosophy of Hegel himself. It 
 rather represented a rehabilitation and re-adaptation 
 of the whole fundamental line of thought in German 
 philosophy, which, though it ended with the old 
 Hegelian school yet took its first origin from Kant. 
 The movement produced a not inconsiderable philo- 
 sophical literature in England and America. R. B. (now 
 Lord) Haldane and his brother Dr. J. S. Haldane, 
 especially the former, were zealous propagandists of 
 the new departure in British philosophy. Indeed, 
 perhaps the most notable production of the movement 
 may be considered Lord Haldane 's book, " The Pathway 
 of Reality," which dates, however, from much later, 
 having been published in 1903. The general position 
 of this school was the leading one in English philosophy 
 until well into the present century ; afterwards, at 
 least in its original form, it succumbed to the assaults
 
 LITERATURE, ART, AND PHILOSOPHY 67 
 
 of criticism, and its basic positions began to be chal- 
 lenged by various cross-currents, perhaps the chief of 
 which was the line of thought centring in Henri Bergson. 
 Notwithstanding, however, its vulnerability to criticism 
 in the older shapes in which it has been presented, 
 the philosophical Idealism, embodied in the move- 
 ment from Kant to Hegel, unquestionably contains 
 a fundamental element of truth which all future philo- 
 sophical speculation will have to take into account 
 as basal. 
 
 In 1882 I contributed my own quota to the dominant 
 philosophical interest by my translation of Kant's 
 " Prolegomena " and " Metaphysical Foundations of 
 Natural Science," preceded by a short biography of 
 Kant, published in Bonn's " Philosophical Library " ; 
 and, three years later, by my " Handbook to the History 
 of Philosophy " in the same series. The Aristotelian 
 Society was founded in 1881 by a small band of inde- 
 pendent students of philosophy, with the late Dr. 
 Shadworth Hodgson as president. In its early years, 
 as I remember it, it had not yet become so much the 
 haunt of academic dignitaries, men of the chair, as 
 it did at a later period. 
 
 In History, especially the history of institutions, 
 the century-end showed some remarkable achievements. 
 Freeman was still writing at the beginning of the 
 nineties, and he, in conjunction with J. R. Green (then 
 recently deceased), and Canon Stubbs were the leading 
 lights in the new views of historical research as applied 
 to English history. Green's ", Short History of the 
 English People," which originally appeared in 1874, 
 achieved enormous success, and was read by every 
 Englishman and Englishwoman with any pretence to
 
 68 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 education during the last two decades of the nine- 
 teenth century. " Stubbs' Constitutional History," 
 though appealing to a more restricted class, had an 
 almost equal success on its own lines. The most 
 remarkable work in general history in this country 
 produced by the declining nineteenth century may 
 fairly be said to be the late Thomas Hodgkin's " Italy 
 and Her Invaders," the separate appearance of the 
 eight volumes of which extended from 1880 to 1899. 
 Hodgkin belonged to the same school as the historians 
 above mentioned, and his work undoubtedly contains 
 the most complete and exhaustive history of the 
 " Barbarian invasions " that has ever been written 
 in any language. One rises from a perusal of Hodgkin 
 with the conviction that, as regards actual historical 
 fact, at least, the last word has been said on this great 
 subject. Covering as it does the ground of a consider- 
 able part of Gibbons' work, " Italy and Her Invaders " 
 is a striking object-lesson in the advance of historical 
 scholarship during the nineteenth century. 
 
 Talking of historical scholarship, it is a curious thing 
 to notice how one occasionally finds a man of undoubted 
 ability and real scholarship, who will be once in a way 
 caught tripping in the most elementary fashion, within 
 the bounds of the special subject to which he has 
 devoted perhaps the greater part of his life. Thus, I 
 believe it was the late Mr. F. J. Furnivall and if any 
 one was an adept in English Elizabethan literature 
 certainly he was who, on one occasion, in a review, 
 made the outrageous gaffe of criticizing a preface by 
 Ben Jonson to some contemporary author as if it had 
 been the production of a modern editor. A more 
 recent instance, not so flagrant as this, but showing
 
 LITERATURE, ART, AND PHILOSOPHY 69 
 
 at least a singular ignorance or lapse of memory as 
 regards a well-known historical source, came under 
 my notice in connexion with the eminent classical 
 scholar and authority in Roman History, Professor 
 Ferrero, of Turin. Conversing on various points relating 
 to the civil wars at the end of the Republic, I mentioned 
 a well-known passage in ' Plutarch's "Life of Sylla," 
 in which the story is told with considerable detail of 
 a satyr or faun captured by the soldiery and brought 
 to Sylla. I asked Professor Ferrero what he thought 
 it meant. He, however, while hazarding the opinion 
 that it possibly referred to some cretin, almost animal- 
 like in appearance, such as are to be found in some 
 mountainous districts, notably the Val d'Aosta, at this 
 day, stated that he was quite unaware of the existence 
 of the passage in question ! And yet perhaps Professor 
 Ferrero knows the sources of Roman history in general 
 
 ., 
 
 better than any other man living. May we take this 
 as showing that the greatest scholars and the greatest 
 specialists may be fallible even as other men fallible, 
 too, on elementary matters concerning their own 
 specialism ? 
 
 But even more than in the domain of general his- 
 torical research is the period of the declining years 
 of the nineteenth century signalized by the remarkable 
 work done in connexion with the early history of 
 institutions, together with Comparative Mythology and 
 the science of Anthropology generally. As in history, 
 so here, English scholars received a vast amount of 
 assistance from, and were powerfully influenced by, 
 continental, and especially German, scholarship. But 
 there was also much original work done by English 
 writers, besides the collection of material and its pre-
 
 70 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 sentation as a coherent whole of theory. Asked to 
 name the most striking contribution to human know- 
 ledge in the departments above mentioned, I think 
 there are few competent to judge who would not give 
 the palm to that remarkable book " The Golden Bough " 
 of Professor (now Sir James) Frazer, of Cambridge, 
 of which the first edition was published in 1890, and 
 new editions, each with large additions of fresh matter, 
 have been constantly appearing since. This great 
 work has produced, in many respects, a revolution in 
 our views of primitive society and of the early periods 
 of universal history. Valuable work was also done 
 by other -writers, but none of quite so much originality 
 as that of Frazer. 1 
 
 Among works dealing with anthropological studies 
 from another side may be mentioned Morgan's " Ancient 
 Society," which Karl Marx was one of the first to appre- 
 ciate on its appearance in 1876. But it did not receive 
 general recognition till the century was nearing its 
 close. The works of Von Maurer and Maine, belonging 
 to the period of the mid-century or a little later, formed 
 the groundwork for much of the research into the 
 beginnings of social history during the time of which 
 we are speaking. 
 
 As before remarked, the early eighties marked the 
 
 1 Talking of the " Golden Bough," an incident occurred quite 
 recently, illustrating at once the increase of education and 
 intelligence in the English working classes of the present day 
 as compared with the last generation, and the wide social range 
 of the celebrity attained by this famous book. A window- 
 cleaner coming one morning to perform his functions, and 
 seeing a copy of one of the volumes of the " Golden Bough" 
 lying open on my study table, observed to one of the household, 
 with much apparent interest, pointing to the open page, " Ah, 
 that's a very remarkable book, ma'am a very remarkable book ! "
 
 LITERATURE, ART, AND PHILOSOPHY 71 
 
 climax of a great change in the intellectual life of 
 England. It was then that the advent of a new gene- 
 ration made itself very distinctly felt. The difference, 
 for instance, between the England of the sixties and 
 the England of the eighties, is immense as regards the 
 relative culture of the two periods alike in respect 
 of its depth and extension. In the sixties an indepen- 
 dent all-round intellectual life was strictly limited to 
 a section of the academic, literary, and scientific classes, 
 and even here the outlook was as a rule very narrow 
 compared with what it became a couple of decades 
 afterwards. The social strata affected by intellectual 
 interests showed an enormous advance in the later as 
 compared with the earlier period. Middle-class house- 
 holds, where in the sixties antimacassars, wax-flowers, 
 on the walls religious texts worked in Berlin wool, 
 sentimental drawing-room songs, cheap dance music or 
 transcription of banal Italian opera airs lying on a 
 chair beside the piano, religious books alternating with 
 cheap novels in the bookcase, Martin Tupper's 
 " Proverbial Philosophy," and, as the nearest approach 
 to actual literature, Longfellow's poems, on the drawing- 
 room table domestic establishments such as these 
 gradually disappeared in the interval between the two 
 periods. The generation which came to its own in 
 the eighties had acquired truer instincts and higher 
 interests in art, literature, music, and the deeper prob- 
 lems of life, individual and social, than its predecessors 
 of the early- and mid- Victorian period. The penetra- 
 tion of what is known as the " higher culture " into the 
 ranks of the working classes proper followed some 
 years later. It is noteworthy in this connexion that the 
 Socialism of the eighties and even the early nineties
 
 72 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 i.e. the new scientific Socialism of Marx and all that 
 that implied was mainly a middle-class movement. 
 The working classes, to whom in the nature of things 
 the movement ought to have appealed, were largely 
 apathetic and unresponsive in this country for a long 
 time. The work of education in the new social and 
 economic views was mainly done by middle-class men. 
 So it was generally. The new intellectual life of the 
 country began to affect the bulk of the working classes 
 in England hardly before the late nineties. Progress 
 has been taking place, of course, ever since, but it is 
 not amiss to recall the fact that the starting-point of 
 much of our subsequent advance dates from the last 
 twenty years of the nineteenth century and the new 
 intellectual life which grew up during that time. 
 
 In the present chapter I have only attempted to 
 call attention to some of the leading features in the 
 literature, art, and science of the period in question. 
 The picture here outlined can be readily filled up by 
 all who will. Those days do not lie long behind us 
 in reality, but the strain and stress of modern life have 
 had a tendency to alter our perspective of events 
 and periods, and already this nineteenth century- 
 end begins to wear the aspect of history, and to seem 
 more remote from us than its actual distance in 
 time would warrant.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 THE SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC FEDERATION 
 
 IN the late seventies and the early eighties the work- 
 man's club was a strong political force in the land. 
 This was especially the case as regards London, where 
 there was a considerable and well-organized network 
 of these clubs throughout the whole metropolis. At 
 this time the workman's club movement on its political 
 side was not much more than a wing of the official 
 Liberal party. There was little or no political initia- 
 tive or influence of ideas outside the range of 
 current political questions and party politics in any 
 of them. The leading political workman's club in 
 London was the " Eleusis Club," Chelsea, the con- 
 stituency for which the late Sir Charles Dilke at that 
 time sat. But there was not a district throughout 
 the metropolis that did not boast of one or more of 
 them, though of course they varied much in size and 
 influence. Now it occurred to the, at that time, inde- 
 pendent Radical, Henry Mayers Hyndman, early in 
 1881, to endeavour to weld the best elements in these 
 clubs into an independent and coherent political party, 
 under the name of the " Democratic Federation." 
 The principles on which it was to be based were un- 
 pretentious enough at first glance, but Hyndman, who, 
 as we have seen, had come into contact with Marx, had 
 
 73
 
 74 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 the foundation of a British Socialist party already in 
 view. The preliminary meeting was held and the 
 organization founded in the early Spring of 1881. At 
 its inauguration there were some persons associated 
 with it, such, for instance, as the late Butler Johnstone, 
 who, as its aims became more closely denned, dropped 
 out. But the organization continued, small and un- 
 pretentious as it was, notwithstanding, though it 
 never achieved altogether its original ostensible aim, 
 namely that of uniting in one solid phalanx the Radical 
 workmen's clubs of the metropolis. Speaking of myself, 
 I made the acquaintance of Hyndman in 1882, and 
 the same year joined the " Democratic Federation." 
 At this time the Irish agrarian question and the Land 
 League were very much to the fore, and the new or- 
 ganization was largely occupied with matters connected 
 with the Irish agitation. 
 
 The offices of the Democratic Federation were 
 at 9 Palace Chambers, Westminster, opposite the 
 Houses of Parliament, and here in February and 
 March 1883 a series of conferences were held on certain 
 pressing questions of the day, which subsequently 
 became crystallized under the name of " stepping- 
 stones " (to Socialism) in the practical programme of 
 the organization. At the same time new and impor- 
 tant recruits came in, who infused fresh life into the 
 movement and enabled Hyndman to give it a definite 
 Socialist direction. These were J. L. Joynes, who 
 had just resigned his mastership at Eton ; H. H. 
 Champion, the son of the late General Champion, 
 an Army officer, who had given up his commission, 
 disgusted with the Egyptian War of 1882 ; Harry 
 Quelch, then a journeyman packer in Cannon Street ;
 
 THE SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC FEDERATION 75 
 
 John Burns, who, if I remember rightly, joined a few 
 months later, and William Morris. The present writer 
 also, now that the movement was becoming more 
 definitively Socialist, began to take a more active 
 interest in it than heretofore. During the Summer of 
 1883 much propaganda work was done in the open air. 
 In the late Autumn of that year I joined the executive 
 committee of the Democratic Federation. About the 
 same time the donation of 300 from the well-known 
 poet and writer on Social subjects, Edward Carpenter, 
 towards the founding of a weekly organ for the new 
 body, led to arrangements being made for the starting 
 of the paper Justice in January of the year 1884. 
 The first editor was an Irishman, an ex-military man 
 named Fitzgerald, who had been war correspondent 
 for English newspapers in the Russo-Turkish campaign 
 of 1877-8, and who claimed to be a great authority 
 on affairs of the Near East. This good man, I may 
 remark parenthetically, some ten years later seems 
 to have come to a mysterious and premature end. 
 Having again taken up his old metier of journalist- 
 correspondent, he went out to Greece, where he married 
 the daughter of the French Consul at Corinth. While 
 on a journalistic tour into Thessaly and other parts 
 of the Balkan peninsula, all trace of him was lost, and 
 he was never heard of again. The presumption was 
 that he had been murdered by Turks. Austria and 
 Turkey, it may be mentioned, were always his especial 
 betes noires. To come back to Justice. Our friend 
 Fitzgerald not proving the ideal editor, Hyndman 
 undertook the editorship himself. We all collaborated 
 in the endeavour to make the journal a success : Hynd- 
 man, Joynes, Champion, the Austrian revolutionary
 
 76 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 Andreas Scheu, and the present writer used to work 
 regularly for it. Morris, who had by this time thrown 
 himself enthusiastically into the movement, contri- 
 buted his well-known poem " All for the Cause " to the 
 first number, and afterwards other poems and articles. 
 I well remember how, at the annual conference of the 
 Democratic Federation in the Spring of the previous 
 year, I successfully exercised my arts of persuasion 
 in inducing Morris, whom I had recently come to know, 
 to join the executive council of the new party, he 
 having refused when first proposed. But of Morris I 
 shall have occasion to speak more fully later. 
 
 The Summer of 1884 showed a vastly increased 
 activity in the ranks of the S.D.F. This activity took 
 various forms. Besides the getting out of the paper 
 Justice week by week, the publication and distribution, 
 often at the corners of the streets, of leaflets and other 
 propagandist literature, added to the preaching of 
 Socialism in the open air, kept the leading members 
 of the organization sufficiently busy. The last-men- 
 tioned means of serving the cause resulted in frequent 
 collisions with the police authorities on the ostensible 
 ground of " obstruction." But, however, that this 
 was merely the ostensible and not the real ground was 
 proved by the fact that itinerant preachers of the 
 orthodox Christian sects and teetotal advocates were 
 not interfered with. The obstruction of traffic only 
 existed, or at least only became a public nuisance, 
 where Socialist orators were concerned. This inter- 
 ference at last reached such a point that in the interests 
 of the right of free speech and public meetings in the 
 open air, the Radical and workmen's clubs of London 
 took the matter up. Things culminated in what was
 
 THE SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC FEDERATION 77 
 
 known at the time as the " Dod Street victory." 
 Members of the Democratic Federation having been 
 summoned for technical " obstruction " on successive 
 Sunday mornings at a space in Dod Street where no 
 foot or vehicular traffic was really interfered with, it 
 was decided to make a definitive stand. Accordingly, 
 in conjunction with the Radical Associations and the 
 workmen's clubs of the metropolis a great demon- 
 stration was organized. This took place one fine Sunday 
 morning, when a procession of some forty thousand 
 people marched to Dod Street for the purpose of holding 
 a mass meeting. Before this imposing demonstration 
 the local police Jacks-in-office had to give way. The 
 meeting was successfully held and addressed by all the 
 well-known political Democrats of London, in addition 
 to the Socialist members of the Democratic Federation. 
 From that time forward the persecution of the speakers 
 at Socialist meetings became less frequent. 
 
 Towards the end of the Summer of 1884 two currents 
 of opinion became manifest on the executive council 
 of the Federation. The annual congress of the body 
 was held in August in one of the larger meeting-rooms 
 of Palace Chambers, Westminster. At this meeting 
 the name Democratic Federation was changed to that 
 of Social Democratic Federation. In the council 
 elected on this occasion it was that the differences 
 spoken of later on arose. Personal questions un- 
 doubtedly played their part, but there were con- 
 flicting opinions also upon matters of tactics on the 
 one side were Hyndman, Burns, Williams, Quelch, 
 Fitzgerald, then acting as secretary of the body, and 
 Champion, who were supposed to be anxious to sub- 
 ordinate the propaganda of Socialist principle to the
 
 urging forward of immediate practical aims in politics 
 by the ordinary political methods. Such was at least 
 the view of their aims taken by Morris, Scheu, Eleanor 
 Marx (the daughter of Karl Marx), who had been elected 
 on to the council at the August conference, myself, 
 and others, who were desirous of pushing a purely 
 Socialist propaganda without regard to the expedi- 
 encies or exigencies of practical politics, and without 
 wasting time (which might be better employed, it was 
 thought) with the methods and aims of the political 
 life of the moment. This as nearly as possible repre- 
 sents, I should say, the main theoretical difference 
 between the two tendencies on the executive council 
 of the S.D.F. (as it was now becoming the custom to 
 abbreviate the full name), which culminated in the 
 " split " in the body that took place at the end of the 
 year and the foundation of the Socialist League early 
 in January 1885. There were of course, as before 
 said, personal friction, suspicion, and mistrust, such 
 as are always engendered on similar occasions. How 
 unjust some of this suspicion was, the subsequent 
 course of events has shown. For example, the notion 
 that Hyndman ever had in him the nature of a time- 
 serving politician, capable of subordinating convictions 
 to the chances of a political career, seems now too 
 absurd for words. Not to speak of his sacrifice of 
 political success on the ordinary lines to his general 
 Socialist convictions, it is in part, at least, thanks to 
 his rigidly uncompromising attitude on every point 
 of political and economic principle that he is not at 
 the time of writing a member of the House of Commons. 
 The " split " was unfortunate from many points of 
 view, not only from that of the regrettable personal
 
 THE SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC FEDERATION 79 
 
 differences it engendered between individuals, and 
 which it took some years to compose, but also from 
 that of the Socialist cause, the progress of which it 
 undoubtedly headed back for a while, although not 
 so much as might have been expected. As time showed, 
 the excuse or reason for the rupture, so far as its theo- 
 retical grounds were concerned, was utterly inadequate. 
 The divergence, in matters of tactics and political 
 policy, was not nearly so wide or important as many 
 of the withdrawing section imagined. Looking back 
 at the events of the time, it is impossible to resist 
 the conclusion that the personal element differences of 
 temperament and ways of looking at things, even where 
 fundamental convictions were held in common leading 
 to the mistrust and suspicion above referred to, sus- 
 picion fostered by mischief-makers, was largely at the 
 back of the secession. 
 
 The last meeting of the old council of the S.D.F., 
 which finally determined the breach, and which took 
 place in a room rented as offices by the body in the 
 basement of Palace Chambers, Westminster, on the 
 evening of the 24th of December 1884, was of a dramatic 
 character. Mrs. (afterwards Lady), Burne- Jones on 
 hearing Morris's description of it the next day, said it 
 reminded her of one of the scenes in Turgenieff's novel 
 " Smoke," in which was depicted the coming together 
 of a Russian secret political society. There was a full 
 attendance of members of the council, eighteen in all, 
 who sat round the centre table. The rest of the room 
 was crowded with partisans of either side. All the 
 members of the council made speeches in their turn, 
 their points being greeted by vociferous demonstrations 
 of approval and disapproval. Various incidents took
 
 80 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 place. The debate was on a vote of censure on Hyndman 
 as regards his political attitude and conduct in con- 
 nexion with the affairs of the Federation. On the vote 
 being taken, the result was ten for, and eight against, 
 the motion ; the names including : for the resolution 
 William Morris, Robert Banner, Andreas Sheu, Edward 
 Aveling, Eleanor Marx Aveling, myself ; and against 
 the resolution H. M. Hyndman, H. H. Champion, 
 J. C. Frost, John E. Williams, Henry Quelch, John 
 Burns, etc. 
 
 Though, as will be seen, the supporters of the reso- 
 lution were in a slight numerical majority, nevertheless 
 immediately it was passed they declared their own 
 resignation from the body. This somewhat erratic 
 proceeding was due to the fact that Morris objected 
 to himself and his followers, who backed the resolution, 
 remaining in the body under conditions which he felt 
 would inevitably lead to a continuance of violent 
 controversy and personal recrimination. The matter 
 had been discussed at a meeting of the seceding section 
 held the day before the council meeting. Morris, 
 after strongly urging this point of view, succeeded 
 in carrying it, and exacting pledges from all his sup- 
 porters to follow the course of action he proposed. 
 Accordingly, the somewhat anomalous procedure was 
 witnessed of the majority of a council resigning, to 
 leave the organization it represented in the hands of 
 the defeated minority. But the seceders, notwith- 
 standing their abandonment of the original organiza- 
 tion, had no intention of abandoning work for Socialism. 
 
 The result of the secession from the S.D.F. was the 
 foundation, a few days later, at the beginning of January 
 
 \f 
 
 1885, of the Socialist League under the auspices of
 
 THE SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC FEDERATION 81 
 
 William Morris. The manifesto of the new League, 
 expounding in brief the principles of Socialism on 
 which it was founded, was drawn up by William Morris 
 and myself on the New Year's Eve. Offices were 
 taken for the organization in the upper story of a 
 building in Farringdon Road, a new paper appearing 
 as the organ of the League, for the first year monthly, 
 but afterwards weekly, to which, at Morris's sugges- 
 tion, was given the name of The Commonweal. TheX 
 basis of the new organization rigidly excluded any- 
 thing of the nature of immediate political action, such 
 as -the taking part in electoral contests, whether par- 
 liamentary or local. The principle of the League 
 was to be, for an indefinite time at least, purely edu- 
 cational, though the belief in the comparative nearness 
 of a cataclysmic social revolution loomed in the back- 
 ground in the minds of many. The idea implicit in 
 not a few of those who belonged to the Socialist League 
 was more or less that of a federation of Socialist societies 
 throughout the country, bearing some sort of analogy 
 to the federated Jacobin Clubs of the French Revo- 
 lution, which should educate and organize public 
 opinion, especially of the working classes, so that 
 when the cataclysm to which the capitalist system 
 was leading up should supervene, these societies 
 might be in a position to give direction to the revo- 
 lutionary movement. But as things turned out, this v 
 total abandonment of all political and practical action 
 generally on the part of the League had untoward 
 consequences, to which the organization itself finally 
 succumbed after an existence of some seven years. 
 Nevertheless, for the first two or three years from its 
 foundation the Socialist League undoubtedly did much 
 
 6
 
 fruitful work in the direction of Socialist propaganda. 
 Meetings were held in halls and in the open air, leaflets 
 and pamphlets were published, including manifestos 
 on important current events, such as the Home Rule 
 question, the Soudan War, the war in Burmah, etc. 
 The Commonweal, to which Morris and the present 
 writer regularly contributed, also did well for the first 
 two or three years. Some of Morris's poems, subse- 
 quently published separately, first appeared in The 
 Commonweal. A selection of his political articles, 
 written at, this time, might be worth republishing in 
 book-form, as likely to be interesting to his many 
 admirers. I continued to assist Morris in the editor- 
 ship of The Commonweal till the Summer of 1888, when, 
 owing to reasons which will directly be made clear, I 
 resigned from the League, though without any breach 
 in my personal friendship with Morris. 
 
 Certain untoward consequences resulting, in a great 
 measure, from the strictly anti-political action prin- 
 ciples of the League have been already spoken of. 
 These consequences were not long in showing them- 
 selves, though it took some two or three years for 
 them to develop to a marked extent. The attitude in 
 question of the League, combined with a certain want 
 of precision in the definition of its theoretical prin- 
 ciples on certain sides, left the door open for the in- 
 trusion of doubtful elements of an anarchistic character. 
 These elements grew stronger as time went on, and 
 found support in a certain side of Morris's own tem- 
 perament. The result was as might have been foreseen. 
 fhe Socialist League became impossible for those who 
 ished to see it grow up into a strong party organi- 
 ition for the propagation of the principles of scientific
 
 Socialism, and if not immediately, at least later on, 
 definitely to take part in political action of some kind. 
 The great bulk of those who thought thus in the League 
 resigned, in this way leaving the body in the hands 
 of a rump consisting of Anarchists and Semi-anarchists, 
 with a few others who did not formally resign for fear 
 of hurting Morris's feelings. The further history of 
 the League was a record of internal disputes and failure 
 to achieve anything towards the ostensible objects 
 for which the organization had been founded. Morris 
 struggled manfully with adversity for a time, but 
 finding those associated with him impossible to work 
 with from any point of view, gradually lost heart, and 
 ultimately, in the Summer of 1890, himself withdrew 
 from the now rapidly disintegrating section of the 
 Socialist movement he had himself founded, followed 
 by the few personal friends who had continued with 
 him. As may be imagined, the remains of the body 
 soon after this fell to pieces, the Commonweal went 
 under, and the Socialist -League even in name ceased 
 to exist. 
 
 Though the original secession from the Social Demo- 
 cratic Federation was an unquestionable mistake, yet 
 the mistake having been made, the foundation of the 
 Socialist League and the work he put into it reflects 
 the highest credit on Morris personally. Kudos he 
 had enough already in other directions, and financially 
 the maintenance of the movement and all that apper- 
 tained thereto was a heavy drain upon his time and 
 purse. Altogether, a more personally disinterested 
 man in his public work never existed. 
 
 There are two public incidents that occurred during 
 the existence of the League which should not be passed
 
 84 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 over without mention. The first was the great London 
 riot on the 8th of February 1886. The story of this riot 
 is well known. A meeting was called for the after- 
 noon of that day, a Monday, in Trafalgar Square, to 
 discuss the question of " fair trade " and " sugar 
 bounties." There being much unemployment at- the 
 time, Trafalgar Square became crowded, long before 
 the hour announced for the meeting, by numbers of 
 hungry, workless men who found in the event a means 
 of distraction. The opportunity was taken, alike by 
 speakers of the Federation and the League, to point 
 out the futility of nostrums such as the " fair trade " 
 and " sugar bounties " agitation, and to urge the claims 
 of Socialist reorganization as the only cure for the 
 evils of the present system, with its recurrent crises, 
 in which large sections of the working classes are thrown 
 upon the pavement. Some of the speeches made were 
 strong in their language. One of the League speakers 
 delivered himself of an oration in which the words 
 " lead " and " bread " appeared in antithetical juxta- 
 position, in suchwise, it was alleged, as amounted to 
 an incitement to violence. However this may have 
 been, the promoters of the meeting, finding them- 
 selves outwitted by the Socialist agitators, peremp- 
 torily closed the proceedings, which were beginning 
 to become disorderly. Meanwhile, it was proposed by 
 the S.D.F. speakers, to the crowd, to march through 
 the West End to Hyde Park, there to hold another 
 meeting on the question of unemployment. Accord- 
 ingly, some eight or ten thousand persons, headed by 
 H. M. Hyndman, H. H. Champion, John Burns, and 
 John E. Williams, advanced in the direction of Pall 
 Mall. There rioting began, the immediate causes of
 
 THE SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC FEDERATION 85 
 
 which were variously stated, and continued along the 
 route to Hyde Park. A somewhat uproarious meeting 
 was held in the Park, after which the rioters dispersed 
 eastwards in straggling bands, looting shops on the way. 
 The affair, as might be expected, caused an enor- 
 mous sensation at the time. The newspapers were 
 full of it for days afterwards. There was a perfect 
 panic : the " Mansion House Fund for the Unemployed " 
 jumped up in a day or two from 3,000 to 75,000. 
 Such was the terror of the wealthy classes at the new 
 danger that they imagined threatened them ! The 
 incident had its upshot in the prosecution of Hynd- 
 man, Champion, Burns, and Williams on a charge of 
 sedition. Resulting circumstances brought the per- 
 sonalities of the League and the Federation much 
 closer together than heretofore. One of the papers 
 published an alleged interview with Morris in which 
 he was made to blame the conduct of our S.D.F. friends 
 as the cause of the riots. He promptly wrote pro- 
 testing against having said anything of the kind. At 
 the same time, while exonerating the S.D.F. leaders 
 from all responsibility as to having had any share in 
 causing the riots, he expressed the opinion that the 
 latter had not been without their uses in opening the 
 eyes of the middle and upper classes to the realities of 
 things. The trial resulted in the acquittal of all four 
 of the accused. Singularly enough, the man who 
 seemed nearest to conviction on account of his alleged 
 utterances was the since so moderate Liberal politician, 
 John Burns. This was partly owing to the attribution 
 to him by the Prosecution of a speech he had never 
 made, to wit, that anent " bread " and " lead." The 
 result ^of the prosecution was a distinct fiasco for the
 
 86 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 Government, and the whole affair of the riots, from 
 beginning to end, was a tremendous advertisement 
 foi Socialism, especially the S.D.F. The incident 
 certainly brought home the social problem, in a manner 
 which probably nothing else would have done, to the 
 average mind of the middle and upper classes. The 
 circumstances attending the riots also called the atten- 
 tion of the working classes to the fact that Socialism 
 offered a solution of the social problem. 
 
 The second of the events referred to was the dis- 
 turbances in connexion with the proclaimed meeting 
 in Trafalgar Square on November 2ist of the next 
 year, 1887. After the riots of February 1886, during 
 the panic following them, the Chief of the Police, Sir 
 Edmund Henderson, resigned as having failed to cope 
 with the exigencies of the situation. In his place came 
 an Army man, Sir Charles Warren, whose aim evi- 
 dently was to pose in the role of a Saviour of Society 
 and as a person of great determination of character. 
 He decreed, accordingly, the closing of Trafalgar Square 
 for public meetings. The matter was brought to a 
 test by the announcement, on the part of the Irish 
 party, the Radicals, and the Socialists of the metro- 
 polis, of a mass meeting to be held in Trafalgar Square 
 on Sunday, 2isJ; of November 1887, to discuss the 
 Irish matters which were then uppermost in the general 
 interest of the public. The unemployed question 
 being still acute and likely to be heard of at the meeting, 
 also the fact that one of the main objects of its pro- 
 moters was to test the question of the right of assembly 
 in Trafalgar Square, the situation was an interesting, 
 not to say a threatening one. The police were in 
 strong force and the military behind. As the con-
 
 THE SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC FEDERATION 87 
 
 tingents of the various Radical clubs, branches of the 
 Socialist organizations, and Irish Societies of London 
 debouched through the streets leading into the Square, 
 they were attacked and mostly dispersed by the police. 
 Many persons were injured in scuffles with the con- 
 stabulary, and one man, John Linnell, was killed and 
 had a public funeral the following Sunday. The whole 
 affair created almost as much sensation as the riots 
 of twenty months previously. I was myself away 
 in Zurich at the time. What gave a special interest 
 to this event was the effect it had upon Morris's views. 
 Up to this time he had more or less believed in the 
 possible success of a revolutionary outbreak on the 
 part of the populace of our great cities a revolutionary 
 outbreak in the old style of the French Revolution, 
 of Paris in July 1830, or the June days of 1848. But 
 Morris, who headed the contingent furnished by the 
 Socialist League on this occasion, lost all his confidence 
 as to the power of an unorganized or imperfectly 
 organized crowd to offer an effective resistance to the 
 forces of the modern State. So far at least as England 
 was concerned, whether rightly or wrongly, the occur- 
 rences of this day seemed to have practically settled 
 the matter for him. He wrote me a letter immediately 
 afterwards to this effect, telling me that he had always 
 recognized the probability of any scratch body of men 
 getting the worst of it in a rough-and-tumble with 
 the police, not to speak of the military, yet he had 
 not realized till that day how soon such a body could 
 be scattered by a comparatively small but well-organized 
 force. Later on, when I had come back to London, he 
 vividly described to me how, singly and in twos and 
 threes, his followers began for a few moments to make
 
 88 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 a show of fight with the police, and how in vain he 
 tried to rally them to effect a determined dash as a 
 united body on their goal, namely, Trafalgar Square 
 itself. The whole affair, he iraid, was over in scarcely 
 more than three or four minutes. This incident cer- 
 tainly had a strong effect in making Morris pessimistic 
 as to the success of any popular civil rising under 
 existing circumstances, however just might be the 
 cause in which it was undertaken. 
 
 Before leaving the subject of the Social Democratic 
 Federation and Socialist League, I may recall an 
 amusing incident which occurred in connexion with 
 the Croydon branch of the former body, as illustrating 
 the value sometimes to be attached to a crowd's mani- 
 festations of sympathy or antipathy at a meeting. 
 Our Croydon friends were in the habit of holding 
 Socialist meetings on fine Sunday afternoons during 
 the Summer on an open space called Duppas Hill. 
 Some young men of the small clerk and shopman type 
 were incited by paid agents of the Tory party to inter- 
 rupt speakers and disturb the meetings. This went on for 
 two or three Sundays in succession, when our friends, 
 who had succeeded in getting the addresses of these 
 agents, " bethought themselves of negotiating with 
 them. Accordingly, they called upon the leader and 
 offered him for the next Sunday two shillings a head 
 for his men to keep order, in place of the eighteen- 
 pence he admitted he had been receiving from the 
 Tories to create disturbance. Result : the following 
 Sunday consternation for the knot of youths of the 
 small clerk and shopman type, who found their sport 
 spoilt and their persons threatened by their whilom 
 friends and encouragers ! During the ensuing week
 
 THE SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC FEDERATION 89 
 
 the leader of the provocative agents, who by the way 
 was a professional pugilist, succeeded in inducing the 
 Tories to raise their price to half-a-crown a head for 
 his future services to their cause. The following 
 Sunday therefore found things again as they were 
 before. In view of the situation, the finances of the 
 branch not admitting of its being " raised " in this 
 way sixpence per head per week indefinitely, and 
 also as the time of year for open-air meetings was 
 nearly over, our friends decided to discontinue 'the 
 gatherings for that season, although the pugilist leader 
 intimated that he was still open to an offer from 
 their side. 
 
 The history of the S.D.F. after the collapse of the 
 Socialist League need not detain us in detail. Many 
 of those who had been connected with the League 
 since its foundation, including myself, who had, as 
 already stated, resigned from the body in 1888, after 
 it became clear that the anarchistic and quasi-anar- 
 chistic elements were getting the upper hand, had 
 already rejoined the Social Democratic Federation 
 before the League finally broke up. The original 
 body now became for some years the only Socialist 
 organization in the country. Speaking of my own 
 revived connexion with it, I was soon re-elected to 
 the London Executive Council, and for a short time 
 in 1892 took over the editorship of Justice, which Hynd- 
 man, owing to the pressure of other work, had been 
 compelled to abandon. I was myself obliged to retire 
 before very long, owing to the fact that family calls 
 gave occasion for my absence from England at*' this 
 time for some months during the year. Henry Quelch 
 was then appointed editor at a regular salary, which,
 
 90 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 comparatively small though it was, especially at first, 
 enabled him to give up all other work and devote 
 himself entirely to the paper and the organization it 
 represented. The efficiency and laborious energy he 
 put into his new occupations from the beginning con- 
 tinued till his death in 1913, a period of over twenty 
 years. The Social Democratic Federation maintained 
 its activity under that name till 1911. For some time 
 before this a feeling had grown up within the body 
 for enlarging (as it was deemed) the scope of the 
 influence of the old organization. 
 
 The Independent Labour Party, which was started 
 early in 1893 as a working-class political organization 
 independent of the two traditional political parties in 
 the State, though at first founded on a non-Socialist 
 basis, in a few years became permeated with Socialist 
 ideas (albeit in many cases of a somewhat nebulous 
 character), and before long openly declared itself 
 Socialist. It thenceforward tended to absorb most of the 
 vague floating Socialist aspiration of the country. About 
 the same time as the Independent Labour Party came 
 into existence, Robert Blatchford, with a small circle 
 of collaborators and sympathizers, started his weekly 
 paper, The Clarion, in which most of the main principles 
 of Socialism found expression in a popular form. The 
 Clarion had considerable influence throughout the 
 country, societies of its supporters, calling themselves 
 " Clarionets," being founded in many of the larger 
 towns. But the influence alike of the Independent 
 Labour Party and of the Clarion and its devotees 
 was largely in the provincial centres of the Midlands 
 and the North, especially the 'latter. In London and 
 the South of England the S.D.F. still held the field. 
 Now, the desire on the part of its members to acquire
 
 THE SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC FEDERATION 91 
 
 a largely increased influence in the industrial districts 
 of northern and central Britain induced them to give 
 ear to the promptings of Victor Grayson (the elect of 
 Colne Valley in 1908) and others, to merge the S.D.F. 
 in a larger national party, it being represented that 
 the S.D.F. would never make appreciable further pro- 
 gress under its old name, having acquired an evil 
 reputation throughout the country for narrow sectar- 
 ianism. This meant presumably that it was too little 
 time-serving in its policy, and that its adhesion to 
 Socialist principle was too strict. Be this as it may, 
 a resolution to change the name of " Social Democratic 
 Federation " to that of " British Socialist Party " was 
 passed at the conference of the year 1911. The result 
 hardly justified the expectations which led to the 
 surrender of the original name, honoured as it was 
 by wellnigh a generation of hard uphill work in the 
 propaganda of Socialist principles, and in the endeavour 
 to make Socialism a political force in the country. 
 At first a few Independent Labour men, " Clarionets," 
 and some hitherto unattached Socialists joined the 
 rechristened organization, but most of these outside 
 elements soon fell away, so that the new " British 
 Socialist Party " before long became, as regards 
 membership, practically identical with the old " Social 
 Democratic Federation," the change of name having 
 had no appreciable effect one way or the other on its 
 numbers ofc influence. The general history of the 
 organization since it was reconstituted as the British 
 Socialist Party belongs more to the region of current 
 events than to that of reminiscences, and hence need 
 not detain us here. 
 
 The general progress of Socialist ideas in this country 
 within recent years is by no means commensurable
 
 92 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 with the membership of any definitely organized 
 Socialist body. The whole of modern Democratic 
 thought is more or less permeated with Socialist ideas 
 and aspirations. The administrative changes to which 
 the European War has given rise have educated the 
 public opinion of the working classes, on more than 
 one side of elementary economic reconstruction, in a 
 Socialist direction. The apparent temporary eclipse 
 on the political side of the old principle of International- 
 ism, the substitution even for the moment of the struggle 
 of races in place of the struggle of classes, is, I am 
 convinced, far more superficial and far more temporary 
 than many would have us believe. In this respect 
 the Great War will undoubtedly be found to have 
 cut both ways. While on one side it will have tended 
 to inter-racial estrangement, on another side it will 
 have tended equally to effect an advance in race- 
 solidarity. But it is not to be doubted that in the 
 long run, and with the resumption of the class-struggle 
 in its full intensity, all estrangement, all race-pre- 
 judice, will before very long disappear in face of the 
 rise of a new International, which the working classes 
 of the civilized world, taught by the experience of the 
 past, will raise to a strength and influence in the 
 determining of inter-racial disputes (mainly interesting 
 as they are to the dominant classes of the countries 
 concerned) such as will render any renewal of the great 
 race struggles of the past for ever more impossible. 
 With the firm establishment and corresponding in- 
 fluence of such a new International the United States 
 of Europe, hitherto regarded as a Utopian dream, will 
 be, if [not at once realized, in a fair way towards 
 realization.
 
 THE SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC FEDERATION 9t 
 
 As to the ideal side of Socialism, the decline in effec- 
 tiveness of the old objects of religious sentiment and in 
 the theoretical basis generally of what I have else- 
 where termed " introspective " Ethics and Religion, 
 through the universal collapse of a living and active 
 faith in the Supernatural and its sanctions, together 
 with the accompanying equally universal spread of an 
 " agnostic " attitude of mind towards all dogmatic 
 creeds based thereupon, has opened the way for the 
 definite substitution of a human and social ideal, 
 and of human and social sanctions, forJJ the old 
 theological ones. The definite acceptance of Socialism, 
 with all that it connotes in its ulterior consequences, 
 unconsciously serves to fill a place in men's minds 
 formerly occupied by the various creeds outworn. 
 Thus does the conception of Human Brotherhood and 
 Unity, as expressed in the old Trinity of the French 
 Revolution Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity ac- 
 quire alike a new and definite meaning in itself and 
 a fresh significance as the object of religious sentiment. 
 The economic reconstruction which is the material 
 basis of Socialism, and which is often taken to be the 
 whole of Socialism, will, with the growth alike in 
 diffusion and in intensity of the new meaning and 
 implications involved inhuman destiny, be seen in its 
 true proportions. While the politico-economic revolu- 
 tion in the organization of Society will be more than 
 ever before recognized as the first and indispensable 
 condition of all higher social life, whether in thought, 
 in art, or in conduct, the Socialist ideal will be seen 
 not to be limited to this mere politico-economic change, 
 but to reach forward to something above and beyond 
 any mere material transformation.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 PERSONALITIES OF THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT IN 
 
 ENGLAND 
 
 THE first place in any characterization of the individuals 
 who have played a part in the Socialist movement 
 in Great Britain must be given to the man who is in 
 every way the founder of that movement, Henry Mayers 
 Hyndman. I first became acquainted with Hyndman 
 in 1882. He was then living in Devonshire Street, 
 Portland Place, and was regarded generally by Liberals 
 and orthodox Radicals as an eccentric political free- 
 lance who was working in the Tory interests. This 
 was largely owing to the fact that he had strongly 
 opposed the Russophile agitation of Gladstone from 
 1876 to 1878, during the crisis which led up to the Russo- 
 Turkish War, and during the war itself. His pro- 
 Turkish and anti- Russian views on the war had 
 naturally thrown him into contact with the Tory party 
 and with Beaconsfield, at that time its leader. His 
 relations with Beaconsfield, Salisbury, and other Tory 
 celebrities will be found given in detail in his two 
 autobiographical volumes entitled respectively " The 
 Record of an Adventurous Life" and " More Reminis- 
 cences." Another circumstance which led with some 
 
 \ 
 
 enthusiastic Radicals to suspicions as to the thorough-
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 95 
 
 going character 1 of Hyndman's democratic sentiments 
 was that at the preliminary meeting at which the 
 Democratic Federation was founded in the Spring of 
 1 88 1, over which he presided, he had opposed a motion 
 to place the immediate abolition of the monarchy on 
 the practical programme of the Federation. This 
 was imagined at the time by some of those present to 
 be an expression of Tory respectability and loyalty to 
 the throne. It was really nothing of the kind, but 
 simply due to a desire not to encumber the new 
 platform with " planks " for the time being inexpedient. 
 The old Dilke Republican agitation of the seventies 
 had comparatively recently " petered out " from lack 
 of public interest. As a matter of fact-, a year or two 
 later, opposition in principle to all monarchical forms 
 of government was inserted with Hyndman's full 
 approval as one of the objects of the organization, 
 though not on its programme for immediate agitation. 
 It must not be forgotten, moreover, that the Demo- 
 cratic Federation was not founded at first as a Socialist 
 body, but with the object of uniting the Radical and 
 workmen's clubs of London, first of all on a general 
 Democratic programme wide enough, if possible, to 
 include them all. 
 
 At the time I speak of, Hyndman was not merely the 
 prime mover and the director of the affairs of the new 
 organization founded under his auspices, but also its 
 chiejf financier. Heavy pecuniary losses subsequently 
 disabled him from continuing this assistance, but it 
 lasted long enough to place the Democratic Federation 
 on a sufficiently stable footing to attract important 
 new recruits, among them William Morris, also a man 
 of means, whose financial assistance for a year or two
 
 96 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 subsequently, that is, until the " split," was timely 
 and valuable. 
 
 The special characteristic of Hyndman has always 
 been his perennial buoyancy of temperament. Through- 
 out all his career one hardly ever found Hyndman 
 downhearted. Many have laughed at the expression 
 so often heard from him in the early eighties, " things 
 are getting hot," an expression used at a time when 
 there were little or no signs of revolutionary pertur- 
 bation, outside the local question of Ireland, on the 
 political horizon. It was all that the Socialist advocate 
 could do to raise a small section of the working classes 
 out of their apathy to take any interest whatever in 
 their position and in the means to the attainment of 
 a state of society in which they should cease to be 
 mere wage drudges. But his very buoyancy of dis- 
 position, which saw things moving much faster than 
 they were doing in reality, undoubtedly helped to 
 sustain the flagging energies of many of Hyndman's 
 followers in the Federation. Indeed, some thought 
 that these expressions of confidence in the rapid pro- 
 gress of the elements of disruption in our capitalist 
 society, as in the mental preparedness of the masses 
 for social reorganization, were made with express 
 calculation for the purpose of encouragement. I do 
 not think, however, this, if at all, was more than partially 
 the case. Hyndman's optimism was undoubtedly the 
 result of his natural temperament, and a very desirable 
 temperament it is for one engaged in the uphill work 
 involved in the advocacy of an unpopular cause, or 
 at least a cause towards which the mass of men are 
 for the time being apathetic. The " never say die " 
 attitude which takes no discouragement is certainly
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 9? 
 
 one of the most striking characteristics of the man 
 Hyndman alike in connexion with public and private 
 affairs. 
 
 Hyndman's sincere enthusiasm for the cause to which 
 he has so zealously devoted his life is in nothing more 
 crucially exhibited than in his conduct after the " split " 
 had deprived the S.D.F. of Morris's financial assistance 
 and of many workers on its behalf. He ranged himself 
 alongside of the proletarians of the organization, not 
 only in open-air speaking in the parks and elsewhere, 
 but even in the selling of Socialist literature along 
 Fleet Street and the Strand. This reminds me of one 
 of Hyndman's traits that has often been the subject 
 of jest and animadversion among the profane. I 
 allude to his partiality for the frock-coat, the pot-hat, 
 and the linked shirt-cuff. It was in this garb that 
 he was on more than one occasion to be seen selling 
 Justice in the thoroughfares named. Now, speaking 
 personally, nothing would induce me to don this to 
 me hideous and sordid uniform of the capitalist era. 
 But then I suppose I should be termed Bohemian in 
 such matters. There is, however, nothing of the 
 Bohemian in the usual sense of the word about Hynd- 
 man. While, therefore, it might justly be considered 
 a censurable affectation on the part of myself, and of 
 those of like temperament with me, on public occasions 
 to deck ourselves in a costume of this description, to 
 Hyndman, who, as regards ways of living, distinctly 
 has his conventional side, it was natural, and he might 
 well have been accused of affectation (just as was Keir 
 Hardie when he drove up to the House of Commons 
 in 1892 in cycling knickerbockers and cloth cap) had 
 he appeared otherwise. Anyway, those Bohemians 
 
 7 '
 
 98 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 who, like myself, are individualists in the matter of dress 
 to the extent of claiming for themselves and conceding 
 to every other man the social right to dress as he likes 
 and as he deems suits him best, have no claim to cast 
 stones at Hyndman for choosing to array himself in 
 the conventional vesture of the privileged classes of 
 his day and generation. While on the subject I may 
 mention a couple of further illustrations of the con- 
 ventionally " respectable " side of Hyndman's attitude 
 in the matter of ways and manners. Hyndman is a 
 great raconteur, and has always a store of amusing 
 stories on hand. Now, most great raconteurs have a 
 selection of risque" or smoking-room stories on their 
 repertoires. With Hyndman this does not seem to 
 be the case. Although I have often listened to stories 
 of his, many of them very good ones, yet I have rarely 
 if ever heard him relate anything calculated to bring 
 the proverbial blush to the proverbial maidenly cheek. 
 Not that Hyndman is by any means in general a votary 
 of the Nonconformist conscience. He is, and claims to 
 be, simply an ordinary man of the world. It is viewing 
 him as such that I note this peculiarity as interesting. 
 Then, again, in the matter of drink. Hyndman is 
 not an abstainer, or at least not on principle. On 
 the contrary, he rather prides himself on his good 
 taste in wines. Yet nevertheless he has often shown 
 himself a rigid disciplinarian in the matter of tem- 
 perance, especially as regards the proletarian. Always 
 a man scrupulously moderate himself, he is inclined to 
 be hard, many think excessively hard, not on drunken- 
 ness, which of course is out of the question, but on 
 anything suggesting the idea of the very slightest 
 excess in liquor in others, especially if those others
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 99 
 
 ^happen to be working men. Of the above the follow- 
 ing may be taken as an example. There had been 
 a meeting somewhere in the Midlands one Sunday 
 evening at which several members of the organization, 
 including Hyndman, had taken part. They all re- 
 turned to London in the same third-class saloon carriage 
 on the Monday morning. Having some few hours' 
 journey before them, some of the working-class members 
 of the party bethought themselves to while away the 
 time with a game of cards. No sooner had they 
 taken their places alongside the narrow centre table 
 than one of the " comrades " produced a bottle of 
 whisky. Glasses and some water were procured, and 
 the party proceeded to enjoy themselves. Our friend 
 Hyndman, who was in another part of the carriage, 
 passing along and observing the alcoholic debauch, 
 could not restrain his indignation, and rebuked the 
 men in well-set terms as acting in a disgraceful manner. 
 Well, seeing there were some five or six persons among 
 whom the bottle of whisky had to be divided in a three 
 or four hours' journey, one would have thought that 
 the potations per man could not be regarded in the 
 light of a serious transgression. Hyndman, it would 
 seem, thought otherwise. I was not present myself on 
 the occasion, but have heard the story from two or three 
 members of the party who strongly resented Hyndman's 
 attitude. Of course, it must not be forgotten, as regards 
 the story, that Hyndman has an original and quite 
 peculiar aversion to the Keltic spirit above all other 
 alcoholic beverages. So this may have had something 
 to do with what to some may seem the extreme severity 
 of his criticism on the conduct of the " comrades " on 
 the occasion in question. Such are the minor merits
 
 100 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 or defects, according as we regard them, of our friend 
 Hyndman's character. The importance of the role 
 Hyndman has played as the protagonist of Socialism 
 in England, and his influence generally on Labour 
 politics, lends an interest even to small traits of char- 
 acter that in a lesser man would be unworthy the 
 attention of the recording angel. For the rest, Hynd- 
 man's career alike as a politician, an expositor of, and 
 agitator for, Socialism, no less than as a journalist and 
 writer on political and social questions in general, is 
 an open book to the British public, and hence it is 
 unnecessary to dilate upon it at greater length in 
 these reminiscences. 
 
 One of the men who in the early days of the Social 
 Democratic Federation was most active as a speaker 
 and organizer was H. H. Champion, before referred to, 
 the son of the late General Champion, and himself 
 an ex-artillery officer. Champion had been out in 
 India, and, I believe, resigned his commission in 
 consequence of his disapproval of the Egyptian War 
 of 1882, commonly known as the " Bondholders' 
 War." This fact alone spoke for the man and ren- 
 dered him sympathetic to Democrats and Radicals. 
 On leaving the Army, Champion occupied a position 
 in a publishing house, and before long bought an 
 interest in a printing-office, where he continued to 
 work as acting partner for some years. Champion had 
 a short, incisive manner with him which undoubtedly 
 impressed those with whom he came in contact. He 
 was also an effective speaker, partly, doubtless, owing 
 to the incisive manner spoken of, with many audiences. 
 At first a devoted adherent of Hyndman, he seemed 
 always possessed, as Hyndman himself put it, with
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 101 
 
 an impatience to make twelve o'clock at eleven. This 
 temperament of his caused him after a few years to 
 tire of the slow and more or less monotonous business 
 of agitating and organizing in the interests of Socialism, 
 a kind of labour for which he possessed undoubted 
 ability. Instead of continuing the work to which he 
 had set his hand, after his first enthusiasm had spent 
 itself, he developed a tendency for political intrigue 
 with a view, as he in all probability sincerely thought, 
 of obtaining immediate results in the improvement of 
 the condition of the working classes and in general 
 progress. The habit of intrigue once having laid hold 
 of him, the tendencies which nearly always accompany 
 it were not slow in showing themselves, and issued in 
 acts towards former fellow-workers and friends of a 
 nature which not only destroyed old ties of intimacy, 
 but which no considerations of political expediency 
 or anything else could, as most of us thought, morally 
 justify. Owing perhaps to early family associations, 
 Champion's intrigues were mainly connected with the 
 Tory party, and conducted through acquaintances of 
 doubtful political : antecedents on the fringe of that 
 party. In this way Champion became, from our point 
 of view, politically completely demoralized, and the 
 habit of political intrigue unfortunately, as already in- 
 dicated, seemed not without a repercussion, for a time 
 at least, on his general character and conduct. In 
 himself Champion was by no means a bad sort. He 
 had a certain brightness and charm of manner com- 
 bined with a ready mother-wit which made him good 
 company in whatever society he found himself. I 
 can well recall how, some years after the period here 
 specially referred to, Champion was the life of a party
 
 102 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 of English delegates to the Zurich International Socialist 
 Congress of 1893, one afternoon, in an excursion to 
 Kiissnacht, on the lake of Zurich. Notwithstanding 
 that many of those present disliked and suspected 
 him politically, all were more or less for the nonce 
 under the spell of his personal magnetism. The Con- 
 gress spoken of in Zurich, in the Summer of 1893, was, 
 I believe, the last occasion, in Europe at least, when 
 Champion figured at any Socialist function. Shortly 
 after he emigrated to Australia, where he now lives in 
 Melbourne. To me Champion was always friendly, 
 and of his own accord sought to renew our acquaintance 
 by correspondence a few years back ; but the corre- 
 spondence lapsed, owing, I imagine, to his dislike of 
 my attitude in the matter of Female Suffrage and prob- 
 ably on the woman question generally. For Cham- 
 pion, since he has been in Australia, has apparently 
 developed into a fanatical Feminist, owing perhaps, in 
 part at least, to the family ties he has formed out there. 
 Another man^ also associated with the early days of 
 the Socialist movement in England was James Leigh 
 Joynes, who unfortunately died prematurely of heart- 
 disease, now wellnigh a quarter of a century ago. 
 Joynes was a master at Eton, as was his father before 
 him. Of thoroughly Democratic sympathies, Joynes 
 was practically compelled to resign his mastership 
 owing to the action against him taken by the late Dr. 
 Hornby, who was at that time head master of the 
 college, in consequence of the publication of a little 
 book by Joynes on the subject of a recent visit of his 
 to Ireland the Irish question being then uppermost 
 in which he strongly took the side of the tenants against 
 the landlords and championed Home Rule and the
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 108 
 
 Land League. As a matter of fact, the whole atmo- 
 sphere % of Eton was uncongenial to a man of Joynes's 
 views and temperament. The same remark, I believe, 
 applies to Joynes's brother-in-law, Mr. H. S. Salt, the 
 founder of the Humanitarian League, who also re- 
 signed from his Eton career at about the same time 
 as Joynes. On leaving Eton, Joynes came up to live in 
 London and devoted himself energetically for some time 
 to political work as a member of the Federation. He 
 did a good deal of free-lance journalism at this time, 
 writing much for Justice, besides letters to the daily 
 Press. He was the author, too, of many witty verses 
 dealing with social questions, while his translations 
 of the poems of Freiligrath, Herwegh, and others 
 belonging to the period of the '48 movement in Ger- 
 many, are admirably done. In January 1884 Joynes, 
 in conjunction with myself, started the magazine To-Day 
 as a monthly Socialist review. The list of contributors 
 for the first six numbers embraces the names of Kegan 
 Paul, Paul Lafargue, William Morris, William Archer, 
 H. M. Hyndman, Boyd Kinnear, Edward Carpenter, 
 Michael Davitt, E. Lynn Linton, " Stepniak," Havelock 
 Ellis, etc. It may be interesting to note that the first 
 publication of George Bernard Shaw's, viz. " The 
 Unsocial Socialist," was run as a serial through the 
 first volume of To-Day. The story, the appearance 
 of which in To-Day was the first introduction of Shaw 
 to the public (if we except perhaps isolated letters to 
 journals), excited considerable interest, and Hyndman 
 declared that in Shaw lay the makings of an English 
 Heine. How far time has confirmed this opinion may 
 be left to the judgment of the reader. The review 
 To-Day held its own throughout the year fairly well,
 
 104 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 but the " split " in the Socialist movement dealt with 
 in the last chapter adversely affected it, and subse- 
 quently it passed into other hands, the late Hubert 
 Bland ultimately becoming its editor. It, appeared 
 finally in a reduced form and at a lower price as the 
 International Review, dying a natural death, I believe 
 at the end of the eighties. 
 
 Joynes himself began to fail in health at the close of 
 '84, and went in consequence, for change of air, to 
 stop with some relations on his mother's side at Wies- 
 baden. He afterwards undertook a tour in Italy, 
 returning to England in the Summer of 1885 apparently 
 benefited. He spent some time with me at Worthing, 
 where I was at that time staying,- soon after his return. 
 On going back to London he conceived the idea of 
 studying for the medical profession and entered him- 
 self at Middlesex Hospital. He continued his studies 
 for a year or two, but the work was too much for him, 
 and his health this time seriously broke down (he 
 suffered from valvular disease of the heart), the result 
 being that he had to abandon all idea of the medical 
 profession and devote himself to invalidhood. Till 
 now Joynes had been a strict vegetarian, but was 
 induced by his medical adviser, perhaps under the 
 circumstances with doubtful wisdom, henceforth to 
 adopt a diet of butcher's meat. The change at least 
 did him no good. Poor Joynes, it is true, lived on 
 for a few years in Sussex, but as a confirmed invalid. 
 He died on the I2th of February 1893 at East Grin- 
 stead, beloved and regretted by all who had known 
 him. 
 
 John Burns, who had previously been active in the 
 Secularist propaganda of Charles Bradlaugh, joined
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 105 
 
 the S.D.F. early in 1884. He is, as is well known, 
 one of the best mass-meeting orators the country has 
 produced. For the next three or four years from '84 
 onward Burns used his powers untiringly in the Social- 
 ist cause. Many of us can still remember the emphasis 
 with which he insisted on Socialism, on a revolutionary 
 reorganization of society, as the only hope for the 
 working classes. He would have nothing of those who 
 pretended that Teetotalism, Malthusianism, or even 
 Trade-Umonism, would suffice to effect any essential 
 improvement in the lot of the working class as a class. 
 " I am a Trade-Unionist," he would say, " a practical 
 Malthusian, a Teetotaller, and have always been so, 
 and yet I remain for all these things what I was a 
 member of the working class, subsisting on a weekly 
 wage." But as time went on, in spite of the part he 
 played on the occasion of the disturbances of the 8th 
 of February 1886 and the 2ist of November 1887 
 for his action on which latter occasion he suffered a 
 month's imprisonment towards the end of the eighties 
 Burns slacked off in his revolutionary ardour. Like 
 Champion, he became afflicted with a desire to effect 
 immediate results in practical politics, but, unlike 
 Champion, he did not adopt a policy of intrigue with 
 the fringe of the Tory camp. He made friends with 
 certain Liberal and Radical politicians and proceeded 
 to contest his native place, Battersea, as a Labour 
 candidate, smiled upon by the Liberal party. His 
 subsequent career is written in English political and 
 labour history during the ensuing years. 
 
 Much severe criticism has been directed on Burns 
 from the Socialist side, on account of his desertion of 
 the S.D.F. and of Socialist propaganda generally, for
 
 106 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 work on the lines of ordinary Liberalism. The criti- 
 cism is doubtless well founded up to a point. Burns 
 did in fact in practice, if not directly in theory, turn 
 his back on the principles he had professed and the 
 cause he had served for years past. It is only natural 
 that his action should be resented by those who are 
 convinced that the complete Socialist reorganization of 
 society is the only thing seriously worth working for. 
 On the other hand, I am unable to sympathize with 
 the personal attacks, involving accusations of deliberate 
 dishonesty, with which Burns has been assailed. For 
 a Revolutionary Socialist by conviction it may be 
 difficult to explain a change of front such as that of 
 Burns otherwise than by the suggestion of personal 
 motives of a questionable character. But let us look 
 at the matter fairly. After four or five years of hard 
 work at preaching the pure doctrine of Revolutionary 
 Socialism, a man of Burns's energy of character sees 
 little apparent result. He dwells on this aspect of 
 things as it appears to him. Finally, the thought 
 suggests itself, Would it not be better to let my revo- 
 lutionary principles slide into the background for a 
 while and throw in my lot with the ordinary Radical 
 politicians by whose aid I may at least be able to effect 
 some palliative reforms ? This may be a common- 
 place attitude to take up, but it is undoubtedly one 
 which appeals to a good many persons, and there is 
 no ground, I contend, for assuming the man who adopts 
 it, however much we may disagree with him, to be 
 actuated necessarily by personally interested motives. 
 Once in the swim of parliamentary life, we all know 
 the facilis descensus effected by surroundings, includ- 
 ing direct personal influences, to which most men are
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 107 
 
 more or less amenable, in one way or another, with- 
 out always themselves realizing that these influences 
 are the real cause of modifications in their views and 
 tendencies. 
 
 Burns, doubtless, has his faults, like other humans, 
 but as far as my acquaintance with him goes, they 
 seem to be mostly on the surface. He is often accused 
 of having too good an opinion of himself. But after 
 all, this probably refers to a certain breezy self-con- 
 fidence of manner not without bonhomie and hence not 
 offensive. There is nothing " smug " about Burns, 
 and " smug " conceit is after all the most intolerable 
 form in which personal egotism manifests itself. As 
 has been more than once remarked to me, Burns's 
 entrance into the Cabinet made no difference in his 
 manner. It never caused him " to put on side." As 
 for mere material considerations, it must not be for- 
 gotten that Burns resigned his seat in the Cabinet 
 with its 5,000 a year on a point of scrupulousness. 
 There was nothing fundamental in his views either 
 past or present which would not have justified him re- 
 maining in the Government, as Lloyd George and others 
 did. He had never professed to be a Pacifist as some 
 men count Pacifism. Neither did he find any extenu- 
 ating circumstances for the Prusso-German Govern- 
 ment in precipitating the war. He simply thought 
 that a Labour member ought on principle to vote 
 against appropriations for military purposes, and also 
 that the country was unprepared for war on a great 
 scale, as in fact it was. After all said and done, Burns, 
 unlike some others, after he once turned to parlia- 
 mentary life and current politics, never pretended to 
 represent Socialism while acting the part of a bourgeois
 
 108 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 politician. He was at least honest in this way. The 
 reader must not suppose from the foregoing that there 
 is not much in Burns's political, and more especially 
 administrative, action that I strongly disapprove. But 
 there have been so many, as I consider, unfair 
 attacks and insinuations respecting Burns's personal 
 character on the part of Socialists, that I have felt 
 bound to enter my humble protest on the other side. 
 Adolphe Smith, the expert on matters of sanitation, 
 has already been alluded to in a former chapter. From 
 the time when he took part in the Paris Commune 
 to the present day he has always been ready to give 
 his services in any direction to help the Socialist 
 movement. 
 
 Among the " old guard " of the S.D.F. must not 
 be forgotten the Viennese comrade, Andreas Scheu. 
 An able and zealous open-air orator, Scheu was a 
 personality who impressed himself upon all who came 
 in contact with him chiefly through his vigorous utter- 
 ance and the obvious sincerity of all he said. What- 
 ever view he took up, he did so whole-heartedly, but 
 he was a man withal of strong personal sympathies 
 and antipathies. He was a great friend of William 
 Morris, who liked his bluff and trenchant way of putting 
 things as well as his inexhaustible enthusiasm. 
 
 A word must be said of the late Edward Aveling 
 and Eleanor Marx Aveling, daughter of Karl Marx, 
 with whom Aveling lived in relations of free marriage. 
 The tragic end of Eleanor is well known. During the 
 two last decades of her life she laboured unceas- 
 ingly not only in the Socialist movement proper, but 
 in the geneial working-class and Trade-Union move- 
 ment. She it was who helped to found what is known
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 10d 
 
 as the New Unionism, being especially active in con- 
 nexion with the Gasworkers and General Labourers' 
 Union, at the meetings of which her speeches were 
 often greeted by the men with the cry of " Good old 
 stoker ! " In appearance she was stout and took 
 strongly after her father's side of the family, bearing 
 a marked Jewish impress. 
 
 As for Edward Aveling, there is not much that is 
 good to be said, save that he worked hard at times, 
 although in a rather mechanical way, for Socialism, 
 as he had before done for Secularism, when he was 
 associated with the late Charles Bradlaugh. His repu- 
 tation, financial, amatory, and otherwise, was very bad, 
 but was kept afloat partly at least by the fact that 
 stories ever and anon got into circulation about him 
 which people believed on the ground of his general 
 character, but which, as it happened, were not true, 
 and when this was discovered it naturally had the 
 effect of negatively improving his reputation by con- 
 veying the impression that if this story were false 
 others might be so also, and that the" man, after all, 
 might .be the victim of malicious tongues. As an illus- 
 tration of this I will quote a story that went the round 
 about Aveling at the time of the " split " in the S.D.F. 
 It was to the effect that cheques were continually 
 being drawn by William Morris in his favour. Now, 
 it came out on the evidence of Morris himself that 
 up to this time he had never given Aveling a single 
 cheque or furnished him with money in any way. 
 This was, of course, a great triumph for Aveling, who 
 obtained credit and loans in various quarters in con- 
 sequence. It is only fair to say that he also later 
 made amends for his previous reticence in the matter
 
 110 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 of exigent borrowing in the case of Morris himself. 
 All this shows the danger of crediting specific stories 
 about a man on insufficient evidence, or merely on 
 the strength of his general reputation, a habit that 
 often has the effect of undeservedly buoying up a bad 
 man's character. It is a habit, however, most people 
 are very apt to acquire. 
 
 One of the early members of the S.D.F. was Helen 
 Taylor, stepdaughter of John Stuart Mill. Of a thin, 
 spare figure, her self-conceit was unbounded. She 
 had a lofty smugness about her which had to be seen 
 to be appreciated. Lecturing once at the Eleusis 
 Club, she informed her audience that she would never 
 marry, as she thought there was no man worthy of her. 
 Elected a member of the School Board for London, 
 she related one day at a meeting of the S.D.F. council 
 in my hearing that she had that morning been driving 
 through the Borough to a meeting of the School Board, 
 and had noticed groups of workmen sitting or standing 
 (it was dinner-hour) at the side of the road, who looked 
 up as she drove past and then turned to each other 
 and nodded, as much as to say " There she is at her 
 work ! " The last phrase was delivered with a special 
 empressement of the haw-haw tone which was habitual 
 to her. The fact that the honest proletarians in ques- 
 tion may not even have noticed her noble self, but 
 merely indicated by their nods that they were agreeing 
 that Challenger rather than Paladin was likely to win 
 the chief race of that day, seems never to have entered 
 the worthy lady's swelled head. And the funny part 
 of it was that this preposterous creature, with her airs 
 of pseudo-dignity, succeeded in imposing on otherwise 
 sensible people, who at the council meetings of the
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 111 
 
 S.D.F. used to rise from their chairs as she majestically 
 flaunted into the room. Morris did this at first, but 
 on my remonstrating with him promised me not to 
 do it any more. The good woman died, I believe, 
 some years ago, in the bosom of the Catholic Church, 
 attracted thither probably by the cult of the Virgin. 
 The Christian Trinity of itself would have been doubtless 
 much too masculine a proposition for her. Poor Mill ! 
 
 A typical specimen of the London proletarian was 
 J. E. Williams, an indefatigable as well as a popular 
 agitator in the parks and at the street corners, in every 
 way to which he could lay his hand in the cause of 
 the working classes and of Socialism. He took part 
 in public movements from his earliest years, and has 
 remained true to his convictions from start to finish. 
 
 Another man of a different type who in his own way 
 contributed his quota of work for the cause of Social- 
 ism at this time was Herbert Burrows. He was a 
 member of the Democratic Federation from the begin- 
 ning and did excellent propaganda service, especially 
 in the Midlands, where his calling as a civil servant 
 often took him. He is a well-known figure at Socialist 
 congresses and Socialist funerals. 
 
 The proletarian leader of Socialism in this country 
 with whom I was in closest personal touch was my 
 old friend Harry Quelch. I have already given a 
 sketch of his life and of my own relations with him, as 
 an introduction to a volume consisting of a selection 
 of his articles and short stories published shortly after 
 his death by Messrs. Grant Richards & Co. Born 
 at Hungerford, in Berkshire, in the late fifties, succes- 
 sively cattle-drover in his native place and, on coming 
 to London as a young man. worker in a tan-yard, and
 
 112 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 later on warehouseman packer to a firm in Cannon 
 Street, then Trade Union secretary, and finally editor 
 of Justice, Quelch was one of the most remarkable 
 instances of the successfully self-educated man that I 
 have ever met. He had a fine intellect, which readily 
 grasped a subject in all its bearings, and was quick 
 at assimilating new ideas when once placed before 
 him. We used, whenever I was in London, to lunch 
 together regularly once a week and discuss current 
 events and the editorial policy of Justice. Quelch 
 remained in harness almost to the last. When already 
 struck by mortal illness, he accepted the invitation to 
 deliver a course of lectures on Socialism at Ruskin 
 College, Oxford, for which, at his request, I drew up a 
 detailed syllabus that he seems to have closely followed. 
 He died a few months after this, and was buried on 
 September 20, 1913. His funeral was attended by 
 a large concourse of Socialists of every shade, and 
 speeches from the representatives of all the various 
 Socialist organizations were made at the grave-side. 
 Quelch is one of those men whom one .never forgets. 
 Always scrupulously loyal to his convictions, he was at 
 once a clear thinker and an able and logical exponent 
 of the views he professed. 
 
 No account of the history of Socialism in England 
 would be complete without the mention of the inde- 
 fatigable secretary for thirty years of the S.D.F., 
 Henry William Lee. One cannot emphasize too much 
 the debt that the old organization and the Socialist 
 movement in England generally owes to the steady 
 work of this energetic man. After the death of Quelch, 
 Lee left the secretaryship of the old body to become 
 the editor of the weekly, paper Justice, where his abilities
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 118 
 
 have proved equally effective in his new sphere of 
 party usefulness. 
 
 Among the early pioneers of modern Socialism in 
 Great Britain, George Bernard Shaw was conspicuous. 
 At a later period successively journalist, critic in music, 
 painting, and the drama, novelist, and last but not 
 least, dramatic author, Shaw first became known to 
 the British, and especially the London, public mainly 
 as an eccentric and unattached exponent and advocate 
 of Socialist principles. He was zealous in attending 
 meetings at this period and taking part in all discussions 
 as they arose. There was scarcely an evening through- 
 out the week when his voice and mother- wit were not 
 to be heard in some hall or place of discussion in the 
 metropolis or the suburbs, from the then existing 
 Dialectical Society to the humblest workman's club 
 where beer was drunk and pipes smoked. His Sundays 
 were regularly booked for this latter class of resort. 
 The audience was not infrequently poor alike in numbers 
 and intelligence. He would even sometimes find clubs 
 at which he had been invited to speak utterly unpre- 
 pared to receive him. On one occasion he discovered 
 the members 'of the club for which he was announced 
 playing billiards, and arriving five minutes before the 
 time fixed for the meeting, he inquired of the billiard 
 players when and where the lecture he had been invited 
 to give was to be held, receiving for reply the obser- 
 vation that they didn't " want no damn'd lecture," 
 but intended going on with their game. 
 
 However, in spite of such small rebuffs as these, Shaw 
 continued with praiseworthy diligence, and without re- 
 ceiving a penny of material reward, in his endeavours to 
 instruct the London proletariat in the economics and 
 
 8
 
 114 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 politics of Socialism as he conceived it. At first, Shaw 
 lectured often for the Social Democratic Federation and 
 the Socialist League on general Marxist principles. Later 
 on he attached himself to the group of Sidney Webb, 
 Graham Wallas, Hubert Bland, and others, who founded 
 the Fabian Society, the policy of which was oppor- 
 tunism and " permeation " of existing political parties 
 and the intelligent middle classes generally with 
 Socialist aims and policy, postponing direct propaganda 
 for the realization of Socialism itself till a more con- 
 venient season. He and Sidney Webb concocted 
 between them a new economic groundwork of Socialist 
 theory based on Stanley Jevons's conception of "scarcity 
 value " as being the measure of all value, which he 
 designated by the name of " final utility." 
 
 Shaw at this time lived with his mother and sister in 
 Fitzroy Street, N.W., and it was there that his earlier 
 writings were produced, though some of them were not 
 published until later. I may here relate an anecdote 
 from this time illustrative of Shawesque humour. One 
 evening Shaw and I had been to a meeting or a concert 
 (I forget which), and on coming out we found it was a 
 wet night. Shaw, although never at any time showing 
 the usual symptoms of impecuniosity, happening at the 
 moment to be short of pocket-cash, borrowed half-a- 
 crown of me for a cab. The next day I duly received 
 from G.B.S. a post-office order for the half-crown. Hap- 
 pening to meet Shaw again two or three evenings later 
 with others, I mentioned the fact, and rallied him on 
 his somewhat pedantic scrupulosity in taking the trouble 
 to buy and forward a post-office order when he knew 
 he would be seeing me again in a day or two and might 
 have settled the matter then. " Oh ! " said Shaw,
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 115 
 
 "it is my habit to show punctilious accuracy in small 
 money matters, so that when the time comes I may 
 pull off my big coup with success. To achieve that 
 it is absolutely essential to acquire a reputation for 
 rigid and undeviating accuracy in small debts. The 
 commonplace man does not understand that ! " 
 
 The fame and fortune that have later come to Shaw 
 through the brilliancy of his plays have doubtless to 
 some extent spoiled him for general purposes. When 
 a man has to live up to the character of being a perennial 
 fountain of wit, the quality of the wit is often apt to 
 become strained. As a matter of fact, if you analyse 
 them you can reduce many of Shaw's effects to varia- 
 tions on one or two well-marked types. For instance, 
 what I may term the " paradox- joke " is a staple with 
 Shaw. The following may be taken as a rough illus- 
 tration of what I mean. The conversation turns on 
 natural scenery, and especially mountain landscapes. 
 On some one expatiating on these natural beauties, 
 Shaw would, it is likely, at once start and maintain the 
 thesis that Mont Blanc from the point of natural beauty 
 is not a patch upon Primrose Hill. If you analyse 
 it you will be astonished how much in Shawesque 
 humour is reducible to the type of this " paradox- 
 joke." This he runs rather hard at times, as, for in- 
 stance, when he asserts that he likes snobs. A paradox, 
 of course, in itself often enshrines a profound truth 
 which has been overlaid or distorted by the conven- 
 tional thought of interested classes or of the multitude. 
 It is the function of the paradox to unmask current 
 pseudo-wisdom and to emphasize its real character. 
 Now, it is the very importance of this true function 
 of paradox in showing the hollowness of much in
 
 116 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 current opinion that passes for truth that renders 
 it effective when used in the sense of a reductio ad 
 absurdum in other words, in the form of a joke. But 
 the thing can be overdone, and when it is overdone 
 it begins to pall. Once you detect the mechanism its 
 effectiveness evaporates. It may fairly be questioned 
 whether Shaw does not run at least very near the limit 
 of the legitimate employment of the " paradox-joke," 
 if it is to be an efficient instrument of wit and wisdom. 
 But apart from this side-issue, as many will regard 
 it, the question arises, Is Shaw's work as literature 
 likely to survive in the sense of becoming an English 
 classic ? This is a difficult question to answer with 
 anything like decision. Yet I think there is some 
 ground for believing that some at least of it will. 
 Shaw's points, though many of them are topical and 
 hence are destined increasingly to lose their force, 
 have nevertheless a present freshness in them which 
 will give them a good start, and probably run them 
 through at least a couple of generations with their 
 smartness but slightly dulled. This was the case with 
 Dickens, who is only now beginning to show sere and 
 yellow to the appreciation of the younger contemporary 
 generation. Such, of course, is the inevitable fate of 
 all literature dealing essentially with contemporary 
 manners and customs or with contemporarj' issues. 
 But the warding off of the time when " points " begin 
 to be blunted and interests dulled is itself an evidence 
 of genius of no mean order. The further problem 
 then is, Will the work, having lost its special kind of 
 interest when written, renew its youth like the eagle's, 
 in acquiring the riper and more dignified position of 
 a classic ? Will mankind ever place Shaw in the rank
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 117 
 
 of Dickens, Thackeray, Heine, Balzac, etc. ? Time 
 will show. Meanwhile the question remains an inter- 
 esting subject of speculation for the literary-minded. 
 
 I come now to talk of the man who, after H. M. 
 Hyndman, occupied the most prominent place in the 
 public eye as a pioneer of Modern Socialism in Great 
 Britain, though the prominence attached to the name 
 of William Morris in this connexion was originally 
 largely due to his already acquired fame as a poet 
 and authority on decorative art. I first met Morris 
 in the early Spring of 1883, and later at the annual 
 conference of the then Democratic Federation, which 
 he had recently joined. As stated on a former page, 
 I induced him to allow himself to be nominated 
 for the Executive Council after he had first declined. 
 In view of later developments, and of the way 
 in which the Socialist movement absorbed his time 
 "and energies during the ensuing years, Morris often 
 used to chaff me with what I had let him in for, 
 remarking of himself, " he little thought when he set 
 out of running such a rig." In his connexion with 
 Socialism the typical vehemence of energy and enthu- 
 siasm of Morris's nature were conspicuously exhibited. 
 Whatever he took up with, he threw himself into it 
 heart and soul. For four or five years after he had 
 definitively joined that movement, Socialism both in 
 its theory and as a practical propaganda occupied the 
 first place in his thoughts. All his other work fell 
 for the time into the background. 1 To relate all the 
 incidents of my close association with Morris during 
 the years in question would occupy too much space 
 in these reminiscences, but a few illustrative of Morris's 
 character may be given.
 
 1X8 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 If there was one trait especially characteristic of 
 Morris's disposition it was his good-heartedness and 
 genial jollity. He liked good cheer for himself and 
 others. The thing he hated most as a view of life was 
 Puritanism in all its aspects. While in no way coun- 
 tenancing intemperance, or for that matter serious 
 excess of any kind, he abominated teetotalism as he 
 did every other form of ascetic fanaticism. He was 
 a thorough Pagan in the best sense of the word, who 
 believed in living and letting live. With the mortifi- 
 cation of the flesh in any form he had no sympathy. 
 Such being Morris's general attitude to life in its every- 
 day aspects, it will surprise no one to hear that he 
 would never meet a friend without " standing drinks." 
 He was indeed generous to a fault in every way. Being 
 regarded as a good quarry by impecunious anarchist 
 refugees from the East of Europe, he would keep a 
 drawer full of half-crowns for almsgiving in this kind. 
 They called in, he told me, and began to narrate stories 
 in unintelligible English, which he generally cut short 
 by the production of one or more of these half-crowns, 
 according as the personality of the visitor seemed 
 sympathetic or not, and this generally had the effect 
 of causing him to leave with thanks. Morris kept 
 open table at which visitors used to call in casually 
 to take "pot-luck." He was strongly averse to all 
 formality, and neither gave dinner-parties in the ordinary 
 sense nor attended them if he could help it. But he 
 was always glad to see his friends drop in at any meal. 
 Evening .dress he never wore, or a frock-coat. In fact, 
 it is impossible to picture Morris otherwise than in 
 his well-known garb, consisting of a dark blue serge 
 suit and blue shirt without cravat and a " wide-awake "
 
 , ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 119 
 
 hat. Morris was a Bohemian through and through. 
 But good-natured and warm-hearted though he was, 
 Morris could at times become a prey to the most violent 
 fits of passion, in which he objurgated freely. As a 
 rule, however, these fits, probably attributable to gout 
 (uric acid in the system), only lasted for a few minutes, 
 after which his habitual bonhomie reasserted its 
 sway. In fact, if anything, he seemed to think it 
 incumbent on himself to be more than usually amiable 
 to the objurgated person after one of the fits in 
 question. . 
 
 Morris's solicitude for his friends' safety and welfare 
 was always a noticeable trait in his character. On 
 one occasion I had the intention of going to Sicily 
 especially to visit the ruins of Agrigentum (Girgenti). 
 Now at the time there had been some talk of brigandage 
 in Sicily. Morris, on my mentioning my idea to him, 
 insisted upon my not deciding to go before consulting 
 his friend Richmond, the painter, who knew Sicily 
 well. Accordingly, we repaired forthwith to Mr. Rich- 
 mond's house in Hammersmith. We found the dis- 
 tinguished artist suffering from gout and sitting up 
 in bed reading Jowett's " Plato." The upshot was that, 
 although the danger did not seem very great, Morris 
 thought, all things considered, I had better abandon 
 the idea of Sicily for the time being. " There is another 
 point, Bax," he said; "if anything should happen it 
 might mean my having to stump up a thousand pounds 
 or so cash at a moment's notice, which, though of course 
 I should do it if necessary, would still be inconvenient 
 to me just at the present time." I should mention 
 that some such sum had shortly before been paid as 
 ransom for an Englishman captured by brigands.
 
 120 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 Needless to say, after this expression of Morris's view 
 the projected expedition was abandoned. 
 
 Another less pleasant incident illustrating the same 
 forethought I may here give. Once, during a few 
 days' walking tour in Sussex, somewhere between 
 Pulborough and Midhurst, we were passing through 
 some fields by the side of a stream. Suddenly Morris 
 became morose and unsociable in manner. A little 
 while after again coming upon the highroad we turned 
 into an inn for luncheon. Sitting after the meal, I 
 asked Morris the reason of his grumpiness. He replied 
 that he was much exercised in passing through those 
 fields in that he saw bulls regarding us in a more or 
 less menacing manner, and that although he himself 
 could have escaped by swimming across the little river, 
 knowing that I could not swim, he 'was perplexed as 
 to what course to pursue in the event of a bovine attack. 
 Hence his surliness. 
 
 Morris was all his life an indefatigable historical 
 student. His knowledge of the by-ways of history 
 was marvellous. To this he added, especially latterly, 
 the study of comparative mythology and what may 
 be termed the newer anthropology. His love for the 
 Middle Ages as well as for early society generally, but 
 especially as exemplified in early Gothic and Germanic 
 life, is notorious, and is notably enshrined in some of 
 his later prose works. However, I discussed with him 
 once what historical surroundings one would wish to 
 be reborn into after the manner suggested in Plato's 
 myth of Er, and on the question being raised whether 
 it would be preferable to be reincarnated as a mediaeval 
 baron of the twelfth century or an Athenian Eupatrid 
 of the fifth century B.C., to my surprise he seemed
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 121 
 
 inclined to " opt " for the " Athenian gentleman," on 
 the ground of the general intellectual life of the classic 
 epoch, as against the rudeness of existence in the 
 mediae val castle. The choice would be an obvious one 
 to the average cultivated man, but for Morris, with 
 his love of the Gothic, the barbaric, and the mediaeval, 
 it came to me somewhat as a surprise. For my own 
 part I should always choose to be reborn into a country 
 retreat somewhere on the shores of the Eastern Medi- 
 terranean in the second century under the Antonines. 
 Friedrich Engels once observed to me that so far as 
 he was concerned he should give his vote for a new 
 lease of life to the Italian Renaissance of the fifteenth 
 century. 
 
 The falling off in Morris's vigour during the last year 
 or two of his life was painful to witness. As the kidney 
 disease from which he suffered advanced, in spite of 
 occasional flashes of his old energy, his powers were 
 obviously ebbing away. He died on the 2ist of Sep- 
 tember 1896. A cruise he had taken a few weeks before 
 in Norwegian waters for the benefit of his health not 
 only failed in its object, but which shows the com- 
 plete decay of his powers, mental and physical 
 did not seem to excite any special interest in him. 
 
 Morris's views on literature were decided arid peculiar. 
 Among English poets he did not care for Wordsworth, 
 while his admiration for Byron and Shelley was moder- 
 ate. Of Coleridge he had a very high opinion. Among 
 the moderns, Tennyson he liked, but Browning failed 
 altogether to appeal to him as a poet. He thought 
 him a vain man personally. He used to say that when 
 he met him in society Browning always pretended 
 to have forgotten who he was. For the smaller fry
 
 122 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 he did not care much. Among novelists, Dickens held 
 an especially high place with him. He was, it should 
 be said, an omnivorous novel-reader. Of the old painters, 
 Giotto was his great hero, and among contemporaries 
 his old friend with whom he used to breakfast reli- 
 giously every Sunday morning, Burne- Jones. To William 
 Morris, when one thinks of him, the somewhat hackneyed 
 quotation from "Hamlet" seems notably to apply 
 " He was a man, take him for all in all," we " shall not 
 look upon his like again." For Morris was a specially 
 striking personality. As a friend of his expressed it 
 to me, " by his death one felt as though a piece of one's 
 own life had been cut out." 
 
 In the present chapter I have gathered together 
 impressions of the most prominent leaders of the 
 Socialist movement at the time of its inception in this 
 country. They all, with the exception of Shaw, ori- 
 ginally belonged to the Social Democratic Federation. 
 Of course, names will be missed of men who have sub- 
 sequently become identified with one or another form 
 of Socialism in Great Britain. The Independent Labour 
 Party and the Fabian Society have both produced 
 many such. To have included them in this place 
 would have carried us too far. Of many, their Social- 
 ism is open to criticism, to say the least, and although 
 the present writer has had no personal quarrels with 
 any of them, their introduction into the present chapter 
 would have necessarily suggested polemical discussions 
 which lie outside its scope and purpose. 
 
 An exception may be made, however, in the case 
 of one figure, namely that of Ben Tillett. Ben first 
 came into prominence through the part he played in 
 the Great Dock Strike of 1880. The account of the
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 12 
 
 strike and its inner working he has himself given in 
 an ably written pamphlet. Ever since this great 
 landmark in the history of English labour, Ben Tillett, 
 the secretary of the Transport Workers' Union, has 
 been to the fore in all labour disputes. At first, while 
 recognizing his ability as an agitator and an organizer, 
 I was not altogether impressed with his attitude, in 
 which I thought I detected signs of a certain phil- 
 andering with the Nonconformist conscience and the 
 section of the bourgeoisie connected therewith. Whether 
 this were so or not at that time may be doubtful, but 
 in any case the fault, if it ever existed, was short- 
 lived with Tillett, who has since come out as a 
 thoroughgoing Socialist and a member of the Socialist 
 movement. I first became personally acquainted with 
 Tillett in 1903, on the occasion of a meeting of the Labour 
 party of Southampton to choose their parliamentary 
 candidate for the next election. The two men in the 
 field were he and my old friend Harry Quelch. I 
 may confess that before going to the meeting both 
 Quelch and I regarded the nomination of Tillett as 
 a hostile move and Tillet himself as a dangerous adver- 
 sary. What was our surprise when, on joining Ben 
 before the meeting, we found that though he had 
 accepted the nomination in form and had come down 
 to Southampton ostensibly as a counter-candidate to 
 Quelch, he had done so with the intention of throwing 
 the whole weight of his support into the scale for Quelch- 
 In a brilliant speech Tillett proclaimed his Socialism 
 and urged his hearers to vote for Quelch as the best 
 man they could have to represent them. The chival- 
 rous and unselfish conduct on this occasion of Ben, 
 who up to this time had not been regarded as a declared
 
 124 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 Socialist, naturally endeared him throughout the ranks 
 of the S.D.F 
 
 As a raconteur Ben is in his way inimitable. I shall 
 never forget his description of the trial of a Chinaman 
 in Australia, brought up before a police-court for a petty 
 theft ; the lengthy colloquy of the prisoner and his 
 interpreter being given in due style, with reminiscences 
 of the Chinese language, which on the final demand 
 of the weary magistrate as to what the prisoner really 
 had to say for .himself, resulted in the interpreter's 
 laconic reply, " Please, your Honour, he says he didn't 
 do it ! " The duologue with its anti-climax was given 
 as only Ben can give it. 
 
 There is probably no one in England who has the 
 same power of holding and managing the most un- 
 ruly or the roughest crowd with the magic of his words 
 as Ben Tillett. In a strike he is the one man most 
 hated and most feared by the capitalist class. The 
 popular idea is that Ben Tillett is the typical fomenter 
 of strikes. Nothing can be more untrue. For in- 
 stance, in the Transport Workers' strike of 1912 Tillett, 
 as secretary of the Union, strongly opposed the strike. 
 It was only when once decided upon by the Union 
 against his own wishes that he threw himself, as in 
 duty bound, heart and soul into it, in order to make 
 the best of things. As a matter of fact, no labour 
 leader wants a strike for its own sake. He has every- 
 thing to lose and nothing to gain by it. If it fails or 
 anything goes wrong, all the blame of the men falls 
 upon his shoulders. If it is successful " Well ! He's 
 only done his duty." (Voild tout.) The hatred and abuse 
 of the employing class and their Press he receives in 
 full measure in eithei case. This notion of the labour
 
 ENGLISH SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 125 
 
 leader being a strike promoter iu one of the most foolish 
 of the many foolish ideas entertained by the middle 
 classes on labour matters. But, as Trinculo says in 
 the "Tempest," "adversity makes us acquainted with 
 strange bedfellows," and one is strongly reminded of 
 this when one reads of the obnoxious strike-promoting 
 Ben being smiled upon, and his recruiting meetings 
 presided over, by dukes and other pillars of the State, 
 as has been the case during the great European War.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 PERSONALITIES OF THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT ON 
 THE CONTINENT 
 
 THE modern Socialist movement on the continent of 
 Europe preceded the movement in England by some 
 decades. The imaginative faculty of the continental 
 workman is, as a rule, much stronger than that of his 
 English colleague, and without an appreciable amount 
 of what we may term constructive imagination in the 
 masses, no world-historic movement can get under 
 way. Then in all the principal continental countries 
 there has been a revolutionary tradition that is want- 
 ing in Great Britain. Even the Chartist movement 
 of the thirties and forties was a flash in the pan, so 
 far as revolutionary action was concerned, and hence 
 could supply no starting-point for a revolutionary 
 tradition such as we meet with in so many continental 
 countries. More than this, its failure before the ad- 
 vancing tide of Liberalism rather tended to damp 
 down, or we might even say to kill off, all ideas of 
 drastic revolutionary change. This may at least partly 
 account for the obtuseness of the British working 
 classes even to grasp, still more to become enthusiastic 
 for, an ideal outside the range of current politics, or, 
 indeed, to concern themselves with aught beyond the 
 
 13*
 
 FOREIGN SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 127 
 
 sordid issues of the moment, such as a trifling rise in 
 the rate of wages, etc. This is partly due to lack of 
 education and knowledge of history, which leads the 
 British workman to the view that things as they are 
 and were in his lifetime were always so and ever 
 shall be, and that any idea of a fundamental change 
 in social and economic relations is unworthy of the 
 attention of the sensible, practical man that he is. In 
 most continental countries, on the other hand, the 
 workman is better educated than here, and owing to 
 this and his greater imaginative grasp of things, is 
 able to look forward to the future in a manner alien 
 to the average uneducated English mind, more es- 
 pecially as that mind was constituted during the middle 
 and even later decades of the nineteenth century 
 Hence the priority and the more effective spread of 
 Socialist ideas in the minds of the continental working 
 class that have hitherto been so noticeable. 
 
 Of all European countries, the revolutionary tradition 
 is, and has been since the Great Revolution, strongest 
 in France. Hence France throughout the middle 
 period of the nineteenth century was regarded as par 
 excellence the home of political and social revolution. 
 At the same time the great '48 movement seized Europe 
 from end to end, and so created a democratic revolu- 
 tionary tradition in countries such as Germany (for 
 instance), where, in spite of the prince-made wars which 
 had devastated it, such a tradition had before been 
 almost wholly absent. If the first suggestions of 
 modern Socialism in theory are to be found in the 
 Communist manifesto, in practical political life the first 
 attempts, vague and inchoate though they may have 
 been, are to be looked for in the French Red Repub-
 
 128 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 lican movement of '48. Between this period and the 
 Paris Commune of 1871 the first International was 
 founded, and about the same time, or a little before, 
 
 r 
 
 arose the first beginnings of German Social Democracy. 
 The International took root and spread in France, 
 especially in Paris. The ideas of the old French Red 
 Republican party began to grow in clearness, although 
 it was still nebulous as regards many of its elements. 
 Then came that epoch-making event for modern Social- 
 ism, the Paris Commune. I have already briefly dealt 
 with the Paris Commune, and I need only here remind 
 the reader that the Commune was the first government 
 manned by the working classes and which had the 
 Socialistic reorganization of society as its aim. The 
 Paris Commune, therefore, and the year 1871 afford 
 us a convenient date for reckoning the birth 'of 
 the modern Socialist movement in the wider form in 
 which we have known it during the last decades of the 
 nineteenth and the opening years of the present cen- 
 tury. The beginnings, of course, in various lands date 
 from an earlier period, as already pointed out ; but 
 from the seventies onward the Socialist movement in 
 all countries has become a world-movement, the im- 
 portance of which is universally recognized, which 
 cannot be said of the earlier and more local movements 
 out of which it developed. 
 
 As already explained in an earlier chapter, the Com- 
 mune it was that awakened me, as it awakened many 
 others, to an interest in the Social problem, and the 
 first Socialists that I met were members or adherents 
 of the Commune. There was Pascal Grousset, a hand- 
 some man, who in the later seventies was a regular 
 attendant at the British Museum Reading-room. About
 
 FOREIGN SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 129 
 
 the time referred to, I used to see a good deal of him, 
 and often talked over the Commune. He deplored the 
 want of initiative and of a coherent policy which char- 
 acterized it. He also told me how ignorant the non- 
 political Parisians were of the actual facts of the struggle 
 going on around them. During the semaine sanglante, 
 he said at a time, that is, when the unfortunate Com- 
 munards were being butchered by the Versailles troops 
 on all sides he overheard a woman saying to a child 
 she had in her arms, in tones of indignation, " Oui, 
 oui, mon petit, nous nous rappelerons de la Commune, 
 nous, n'est-ce pas?" the idea being, of course, that 
 the Communards were the slaughterers instead of the 
 slaughtered. 
 
 During their exile in London, the adherents of the 
 Commune used to celebrate the outbreak of the 
 insurrection of the i8th of March by a banquet in a 
 French hotel named, if I remember rightly, the " Hotel 
 de la Cloche," in one of the passages off Holborn. I 
 was present by invitation on one of these occasions 
 (1880), when I remember that Charles Longuet, who 
 married Jenny Marx, Karl Marx's eldest daughter, 
 and became father of Jean Longuet, at present editor 
 of I'Humanite and member of the Chamber, made a 
 speech in which he set forth the failure of the Commune 
 to achieve its ends as being due to the fact that the 
 Commune had to struggle with the military situation 
 throughout. This hampered its social and economic 
 work, while at the same time it was unable to cope 
 with the military situation itself. Hartmann, the 
 Russian Nihilist, was present at this anniversary dinner. 
 Dr. Albert Regnard, the secretary of police under the 
 Commune, a man with an extraordinarily impressive 
 
 9
 
 130 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 head and, like Pascal Grousset, a constant student at 
 the British Museum, was also present. Charles Longuet, 
 Paschal Grousset, and Albert Regnard are all three long 
 since dead, as also Camelinat, the governor of the 
 Tuileries during the Commune, and many others who 
 were there. Of those who took a leading part in 
 the events of the Spring of '71 there are few, if any, 
 survivors left. The last time I met some of the " old 
 guard " together was about the January of 1899, a ^ 
 a little friendly gathering one evening in a cafe some- 
 where off the Boulevard St. Michel. " Papa " Longuet, 
 as he was called, I saw, however, for the last time at 
 a luncheon party at his house in the Autumn of 1900, 
 after the Paris Congress of that year. 
 
 Of the newer men of the French Socialist movement, 
 the one who played the most prominent role was Jean 
 Jaures. He came noticeably to the front in the later 
 years of the nineties. Jaures studied for an academic 
 career at the University of Paris, and was a contem- 
 porary of the celebrated Henri Bergson as a student. 
 Subsequently he became Professor of Philosophy at 
 the University of Toulouse. His strikingly brilliant 
 oratorical powers are known to all the world. Staunch 
 and consistent to his declared convictions throughout 
 his whole political career, his fairness and rigid im- 
 partiality of judgment procured him the esteem of 
 men of all parties. His achievements in the way of 
 work were something extraordinary. With all his 
 parliamentary duties he found time to write a detailed 
 and carefully documented history of the French Revo- 
 lution, perhaps the best existing. As a conversation- 
 alist, Jaures was not so striking as he was as an orator. 
 A nervous twitching of the eyes, especially when in
 
 FOREIGN SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 131 
 
 company, was a marked characteristic. Jaures never- 
 theless had remarkably persuasive powers in dealing 
 with men. No other man could have succeeded in 
 uniting the apparently irreconcilable sections of the 
 French Socialist party and welding them into an 
 organized whole as Jaures did after the Amsterdam 
 Congress of 1904. This was the more remarkable a 
 triumph of personal magnetism and of the respect 
 inspired by character, seeing that Jaures had un- 
 doubtedly played a distinctly opportunist role during 
 the Combes administration. His bowing to the decision 
 of the Amsterdam Congress, which was practically a 
 condemnation of his attitude in the matter in question, 
 was an act of self-abnegation which showed a true 
 sense of Internationalism. Altogether, Jean Jaures 
 was a rare personality. Possessed of personal ami- 
 ability combined with extraordinary powers alike in 
 the intellectual and practical spheres, and an integrity 
 of character not merely moral, but political as well, 
 which was absolutely stainless, it is difficult to find 
 his equal as an all-round man, at once a capable theorist 
 and a remarkable leader. 
 
 Another very different personality, well known in 
 French Socialist circles at one time, although as a poli- 
 tical force somewhat of an homme manque, was Paul 
 Lafargue, who married Laura, the second daughter of 
 Karl Marx. A pleasant and genial fellow, who had 
 sat at the feet of Marx himself and was an intimate 
 friend of Engels, Lafargue was chiefly known as a 
 writer of propagandist pamphlets, of which the most 
 popular was the " Droit a la Paresse," and polemical 
 essays on the materialist theory of history, on Marxian 
 lines. He was, however, elected to the Chamber once,
 
 132 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 though he failed to make his mark there. His writings 
 were vivacious and clear, but for the most part super- 
 ficial and without originality. He was a striking- 
 looking man personally, with a dash of negro blood in 
 his veins. His devotion to his wife was extraordinary, 
 and they committed suicide together by means of 
 morphia injection early in 1912 in his house at Draveil, 
 near Paris, the alleged ground being dread of approach- 
 ing old age, though some say financial embarrassment 
 was the cause. He was close upon seventy and his 
 wife a few years younger. Lafargue, as I knew him, 
 was a fairly well-to-do man, but had the reputation, 
 whether justly or unjustly, of being somewhat close 
 in money matters, for which reason, I suppose, he 
 obtained the nickname in the French party of le 
 petit dpicier. 
 
 An abler man than Lafargue and, like Jaures, a power- 
 ful orator, is Jules Guesde, who became a member of 
 the first French coalition War Ministry. An intimate 
 personal friend of Lafargue, he was the leader of the 
 specially orthodox Marxian wing of the French Socialist 
 movement. Tall and striking, with his long black 
 beard, Guesde has been an impressive figure at all 
 International Socialist Congresses. His uncompro- 
 mising zeal for the purity of the party in the sense 
 of its rigid adhesion to principle, and his abhorrence 
 of all contamination with the trickery of bourgeois 
 party politics, were notable features of his policy and 
 speeches on all such occasions. I shall never forget Jthe 
 fiery and powerful attack he made at the Amsterdam 
 Congress of 1904 on the policy of Jaures at that time, 
 which favoured the participation (under suitable 
 guarantees, of course) of Socialists in the work of exist-
 
 FOREIGN SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 183 
 
 ing governments. Jaures, as already stated, subse- 
 quently receded from this position in deference to the 
 decision of the International Congiess, and was instru- 
 mental in the formation of the French United Socialist 
 party, on which, of course, Guesde and Jaures became 
 reconciled. Guesde has been accused recently of dere- 
 liction of principle in having joined the coalition French 
 Ministry. It may fairly be argued, however, that the 
 principle of abstention from co-operation with non- 
 Socialists or anti-Socialist governments, even in matters 
 where they are prepared to make concessions from a 
 Socialist point of view, does not apply to the abnormal 
 conditions arising from a national crisis precipitated 
 by an invasion and the presence of a hostile foreign 
 force on the national territory. Besides, the case of a 
 coalition government in normal times is quite different. 
 In an ordinary government the theory is that complete 
 unity and solidarity obtain as between its members. 
 The mere participation, therefore, in such a govern- 
 ment necessarily indicates, at the very least, bare assent 
 to all its measures, and to give even this implied assent 
 to measures, many, or probably most, of which will be 
 designed with the purpose of bolstering up the present 
 capitalist system in some form or shape, is obviously 
 inconsistent for a Socialist who is the sworn enemy 
 of that system. The case of a coalition ministry in 
 time of war, however, is by no means the same. Here 
 there is no pretence of agreement on any other point 
 than the desire to provide the most effective organiza- 
 tion for the national defence, and there is no question 
 of any legislation not bearing on this one question 
 being introduced. Hence, whether advisable or un- 
 advisable as a matter of expediency in a particular
 
 134 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 case, I fail to see any breach of essential consistency 
 in the course adopted by Jules Guesde as regards 
 France, or for that matter by Emile Vandervelde as 
 regards Belgium, in joining the coalition Ministries 
 of their respective countries. The divergencies of view 
 and hostility between various members of such coali- 
 tion ministries are openly and directly admitted on 
 any or on all points lying outside the immediate purpose 
 for which the government in question has been formed. 
 This being so, membership of an emergency cabinet 
 of this sort does not, I contend, necessarily infringe the 
 principle of abstention from co-operation with non- 
 Socialist political parties. 
 
 Other of the later leaders of Socialism in France I 
 have met on different occasions, but have not known 
 more closely. If I remember rightly, I sat with Aristide 
 Briand at the London Congress at Queen's Hall in 
 1896 on the Standing Orders Committee. The late 
 Charles Vaillant, the old member of the Commune, 
 was also there. 
 
 Turning from France to its eastern neighbour, little 
 Switzerland, in taking note of the proletarian and Social- 
 ist movement, one can hardly fail to remark as one of 
 its foremost representatives the name and figure of 
 Hermann Greulich, the Labour Secretary for the Swiss 
 Confederation. The shaggy figure of Greulich, with its 
 shock head of white hair and ragged beard and its rough 
 garb, of which the homespun jersey generally forms 
 a part, has been prominent at all Socialist Congresses. 
 Greulich is an autodidact, and a very remarkable one. 
 Born in Breslau in 1843, of poor parents, he was appren- 
 ticed to the bookbinding trade, after having received 
 the ordinary school education. During the Lehrjahre
 
 and Wander jahre, which at that time formed part of the 
 curriculum through which every skilled workman in 
 Germany had to pass, Greulich improved every occasion 
 for self-education. This he has continued throughout 
 his life. As a young man Greulich emigrated to 
 Switzerland, becoming a Swiss citizen, and ultimately 
 settling in Zurich. What is remarkable in Greulich 
 is his all-round culture. He is not merely well read 
 in the literature of Socialism, in general economics, or 
 in the aspects of industrial history, having an especial 
 bearing on the present conditions of the working class, 
 but there are few departments in which he is not equally 
 grounded. Greulich has all the qualifications of a 
 scholar and what the Germans call a Schongeist, and 
 would have doubtless made a name for himself in 
 scholarship or in literature had he been born in different 
 circumstances. As it is, his conversation never fails 
 to leave the impression of a man of wide reading and 
 independent thought. 
 
 As might be expected, no name throughout the 
 working-class and Socialist movement of Switzerland 
 is better known than that of Hermann Greulich. It 
 is a curious circumstance that Greulich has been the 
 victim more than once of false reports of his death. 
 Some years ago one of my sons, returning from a visit 
 to New York, told me that a report was current in Swiss 
 circles there that Greulich was dead. I immediately 
 wrote to him stating that I had heard he was dead, 
 but hoped it was not true. A few days later I received 
 a reply from him that he was not dead, although he 
 had not been very well lately. 
 
 Singularly enough, not very long after this another 
 report of his death arose, and this time in Zurich itself.
 
 186 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 The rumour spread very widely that the well-known 
 labour leader, parliamentary representative, cantonal 
 and municipal counsellor, Hermann Greulich, was no 
 more. That evening the Choral Society of Zurich, of 
 which Greulich was an active and influential member, 
 met for rehearsal, when the conductor, on taking his 
 seat at the desk, addressed the society on the sad 
 news of the loss they had sustained in the death of 
 one who had done so much for the society and for 
 choral music in Switzerland generally. He invited 
 his hearers to rise in their places as a sign of respect 
 for the deceased before proceeding with the work of 
 the evening. This act of homage was only just per- 
 formed when Greulich himself walked in. Already in 
 the afternoon of the day the same rumour had spread 
 round the shores of the lake, where silk- weaving factories 
 and other industrial establishments are situated. In 
 many of these the workmen demanded that work 
 should cease for the day as befitting the occasion of 
 the loss of the great Swiss labour leader. This was 
 objected to by the employers, and after some alter- 
 cation the matter was arranged by the compromise 
 that work should continue that day till the usual hour, 
 but that the factory should be closed altogether on 
 the day of the funeral. Accordingly, the same evening 
 a committee was formed for celebrating the obsequies, 
 wreaths bought, and a speaker chosen to deliver the 
 funeral oration. Next day that committee dissolved. 
 I remember very well one afternoon sitting with 
 Greulich in the Labour Bureau, when the late Sir Randall 
 Cremer, whom I knew slightly, appeared seeking some 
 piece of information or other. I had to act as inter- 
 preter for Sir Randall, who did not speak German.
 
 FOREIGN SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 187 
 
 The upshot was an invitation for Greulich and myself 
 to dine with him that evening at the Bellevue Hotel, 
 where he was staying, to meet the late Sir John Lubbock 
 (afterwards Lord Avebury), who was also a guest there. 
 We went and met Sir John, but I am bound to say 
 the distinguished man did not impress Greulich or 
 myself as giving evidence of any great intellectual 
 power in his manner and conversation. Whether the 
 report was true that his books were by no means 
 entirely original, but largely the work of "ghosts," I 
 am unable to say. On the other hand, it is of course 
 undeniable that the capacities of able men by no 
 means always translate themselves into an impressive 
 personality in social intercourse. 
 
 The German Social Democratic party, owing to various 
 circumstances, to its direct connexion with the chief 
 founder of modern scientific Socialism, to its rapid 
 growth and consequent numerical greatness, as well 
 as to its perfect organization, acquired up to the out- 
 break of the war in 1914 a certain hegemony over the 
 International Socialist movement as represented by 
 the National Socialist parties of other countries. Hence 
 the German party, as it existed from its inception until 
 recent years, has a unique interest and importance 
 of its own. Latterly, of course, as many of us had 
 long suspected, and as events have proved, it had 
 degenerated into a favourable nest for political in- 
 triguers and adventurers of the worst type. But 
 this is a development of the last twenty years, 
 and, indeed, in its worst form, of much less time. 
 It was not always so. And even now there is no 
 evidence at present forthcoming that the defection 
 and corruption of the majority of its actual parlia-
 
 138 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 mentary leaders is shared in by the bulk of the rank 
 and file. There can be no doubt, however, that im- 
 patience with mere propaganda, and the desire to play 
 a role in current, or as it would be termed " practical," 
 politics, has prepared for many years past a suitable 
 soil for " Revisionists " and political tricksters of all 
 sorts. On the other hand, in the conduct of the party 
 from its early beginnings in the sixties to near the end 
 of the nineties of the last century there is no serious 
 breach of principle that can be charged against it as 
 a whole. For the earlier period I refer, of course, to 
 the Marxian party. The followers of Lassalle were 
 always Nationalist. The question of International- 
 ism was indeed one of the great bones of contention 
 between them and the Marxians. The tendency of 
 the Lassallian party, moreover, was undoubtedly not 
 without inclinations to traffic with non-Socialist parties. 
 But from the union of the two sections at Erfurt in 
 1875, when the bulk of the Lassallian section accepted 
 the Marxian programme in its entirety, until, let us 
 say 1895, although mistakes may have been made 
 by individual members, there was nothing in the conduct 
 of the party as a whole calculated to forfeit the respect 
 and confidence of the Socialists of other countries. 
 
 Now, the personalities with whom I was best ac- 
 quainted in the German movement were those who 
 flourished in the period named the so-called " old 
 guard " of German Social Democracy. The names 
 of the late Wilhelm Liebknecht, of the noble conduct 
 of whose heroic son Karl we have heard so much during 
 the present war, August Bebel, Paul Singer, and others 
 less known to the outside public, will hold a distin- 
 guished and an honourable place in the history of the
 
 FOREIGN SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 139 
 
 Socialist movement for all time. My introduction to 
 the men of the German movement during the eighties 
 was in the main, directly or indirectly, through Friedrich 
 Engels. Karl Kautzky, upon whom the mantle of 
 Engels as theorist of the German movement fell after 
 the latter's death, I met first at Engel's house in Regent's 
 Park Road. Bernstein I first saw in Zurich in 1886. 
 He was then editing the party organ, the Sozialdemokrat, 
 there, it being during the period when Bismarck's 
 anti-Socialist legislation was in force. Of several of 
 the then prominent members of the party I made the 
 personal acquaintance at Zurich and St. Gallen, at 
 the time of the great party Congress held at the latter 
 town in October 1887. This Congress was necessarily, 
 under the circumstances, of a more or less secret char- 
 acter. I was invited to attend by the executive council 
 of the party, the members of which arrived in Zurich 
 from Germany a few days before the Congress met. 
 Our train was received at the St. Gallen station by a 
 committee of trusty party men, who had been in the 
 town already for a day or two, organizing the arrange- 
 ments, and who conducted us to the inn " Zum Schonen 
 Weg," some two miles out. I remember that Grillen- 
 berg, the Reichstag member for Niirnberg, who had 
 come by a previous train, and had been followed from 
 Germany by a Government spy, on remonstrating at 
 being dogged by this man, was assaulted by him with 
 a life-preserver and left bleeding on the road. He 
 was, however, taken to the house of a friendly inn- 
 keeper in St. Gallen for recovery. The proceedings 
 of the Congress lasted nearly a week, and during this 
 time I naturally came into close relations with all the 
 more important members of the movement, lodging
 
 140 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 in the same Gasthaus with Liebknecht, Bebel, Singer, 
 Auer, Hasenclever, etc. Not one of these men of the 
 " old guard " of the German party is now living. Among 
 the burning issues discussed at this Congress was a 
 vote of censure on certain members of the party for 
 having supported a Government project, to wit, the 
 construction of the so-called Baltic Canal. The majority 
 of the party, including all the leaders with the excep- 
 tion, I think, of Hasenclever, were for maintaining in 
 its integrity the principle of opposition to all important 
 Government enterprises. This Congress of the German 
 party of October 1888 created considerable sensation 
 at the time, as it was the first that had been held since 
 the passing of the anti- Socialist law. 
 
 Old Wilhelm Liebknecht, who died in 1900, I often 
 met during the ensuing years both at Socialist congresses 
 and in private. But the man with whom I came 
 most in contact among the leaders of the " old guard " 
 of German Social Democracy was August Bebel. This 
 was largely owing to the fact that Bebel, whose daughter 
 Frieda married and was living in Zurich, built himself 
 a house at Kiissnacht, about three miles from the town, 
 on the lake. Many are the discussions on points of 
 Socialist policy, on the woman question, etc., I have 
 had with him during these years. I can recall one 
 incident of a somewhat amusing character to those 
 who witnessed it. One evening I had crossed the lake 
 to Kiissnacht from a place on the other side with some 
 friends. At Kiissnacht we boarded the steamer going 
 to Zurich. Bebel was on deck with a group of com- 
 panions. Among my own party was a Socialist from 
 Koln, who had fled to Switzerland, having been threat- 
 ened with a prosecution for some article he had written
 
 FOREIGN SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 141 
 
 in the local party organ. Now, it should be said that 
 a ukase had recently been issued by the Council of 
 the party that those threatened with prosecutions of 
 this kind should not flee, but " face the music." The 
 immediate occasion of this decision was the fact that 
 certain persons, having expatriated themselves for the 
 foregoing reason and not finding employment whither 
 they had gone, had become a financial charge upon 
 the party. Such, however, was not the case with 
 the person in question, who had sufficient means of 
 his own to live on. Hence he maintained that the 
 rule referred to did not in intention apply to his case. 
 Bebel, however, took the view of the stern moralist, 
 fearing, as he afterwards told me, that the comrade 
 in question would tend to become demoralized by the 
 idle life he was leading, being still quite a young man. 
 Accordingly, with perhaps questionable tact, Bebel 
 seized the occasion of meeting the unfortunate Rhine- 
 lander on the steamer for rebuking him severely for his 
 conduct in not only infringing party discipline, but 
 withdrawing himself from his legitimate sphere of 
 usefulness. The scene was distinctly humorous. There 
 stood on the deck of the steamer our passive Rhinelander, 
 looking rather " small," while his party leader, confront- 
 ing him, poured forth a flood of admonishing rebukes, 
 the two principal actors in the scene being surrounded 
 by an audience of some twenty persons, consisting of 
 friends, acquaintances, and casual outsiders. 
 
 I chaffed Bebel afterwards at the exhibition of the 
 Rhinelander in the role of the poor sinner being 
 rebuked by his father-in-God. Bebel pleaded that he 
 had only acted with the best intentions for the man's 
 good. The man himself, however, apparently took
 
 142 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 this matter otherwise, and a few days later, at a little 
 dinner-party given by a mutual friend to which our 
 Rhinelander, Bebel, and myself were invited, the 
 Rhinelander was conspicuous by his absence. 
 
 My intercourse with the circle in Zurich in which 
 Bebel moved belonged mainly to the nineties of the 
 last century. It was not confined to members of the 
 Socialist party, but included some men of the '48 period, 
 already, as may be imagined, having attained " the 
 sere and yellow " stage. Most of them were refugees 
 from Germany who had settled down in Switzerland 
 on the collapse of the '48 revolutionary movement. 
 The somewhat belated ideas of these good men and 
 their want of understanding of modern Socialism were 
 amusing and instructive. 
 
 The later years of Bebel's political career were some- 
 what clouded for many of his Socialist comrades by 
 the unfortunate speech suggestive of jingoism which 
 he made in the Reichstag in March 1907. Returning 
 from the South of France through Zurich a few weeks 
 after its delivery, I there met his wife, Julia Bebel. On 
 my expressing my regrets at the pronouncement in 
 question, she entirely agreed, remarking, " I told August 
 that he had made a great mistake and that his state- 
 ments would be resented by many." This was the 
 last time I saw her, for she died a few months later. 
 Bebel himself lived six years longer, being found dead 
 in his bed on the 20th August 1913, at a health resort 
 near Chur, in Eastern Switzerland. 
 
 Talking of the German party and its " old guard," 
 I must not forget my old friend the " Red Postmaster," 
 as he was called, from the fact of his having organized 
 the transmission to Germany from Zurich of the
 
 Sozialdemokrat during the period of the anti-Socialist 
 law. Julius Motteler had been a member of the 
 Reichstag from the beginning. A Swabian by birth, 
 he early became attached to the party, where his 
 exceptional abilities as an organizer soon made him 
 one of its most indispensable members. His steady and 
 unswerving devotion throughout his life to his ideals 
 (he died in 1907, aged seventy) and his amiability of 
 character have left an ineffaceable memory with those 
 who knew him. 
 
 Of the leaders of the Austrian party, though I have 
 met them all at congresses and elsewhere, the one with 
 whom I have had most personal intercourse is the 
 original founder of the party, and still its leading repre- 
 sentative, Victor Adler. Adler devoted a considerable 
 part of his personal fortune to organizing the Austrian 
 movement in its earlier stages. Austrian Socialism 
 owes much to him. It should be said that Adler per- 
 sonally deprecates the credit he has got for his pecuniary 
 sacrifices to the party, saying that it was not so much 
 after all, and that too much had been made of it. In 
 any case, however, it amounted to the best part of 
 the fortune his father left him. Suffering for some 
 years from asthma and chronic bronchial catarrh, 
 Adler was in the habit, up to the outbreak of the war 
 in 1914, of spending some two or three months of the 
 worst part of the winter on the Riviera, where I often 
 met him. He has, of late years especially, developed 
 marked opportunist or, as it would be called in the 
 German-speaking world, " Revisionist " tendencies. 
 His belief in parliamentary action as a means for the 
 emancipation of the proletariat is unbounded. He 
 seems at times, indeed, to regard Socialist principles
 
 with a certain amount of impatience, as a hindrance 
 to the party's activity in so-called " practical politics." 
 
 One of the most effective speakers amongst Austrian 
 Socialists (Adler himself is not a good speaker) is the 
 former Radical and veteran party politician, Engelbert 
 Pernerstorfer. There are few men in Austria who 
 can sway a large popular assembly with their eloquence 
 as can Pernerstorfer. 
 
 The Austrian movement has produced many able 
 men whom the exigencies of space preclude from par- 
 ticularizing. There is one, however, who, not himself 
 a member of the Socialist party though generally 
 sympathetic with its aims, is well known in certain 
 circles in this country as the energetic secretary of 
 the " International League for the Protection of 
 Workmen," having its central bureau in Switzerland, 
 at Basel. I refer to Stephen Bauer, who, in addition 
 to his secretaryship of the League in question, occupies 
 the position of Professor of Political Economy in Basel 
 University. Bauer was a great friend of the late Sir 
 Charles Dilke, at whose house he was a frequent visitor. 
 His International League for Workmen's Protection, 
 which was founded at a meeting of International dele- 
 gates held at Zurich in 1897, is anything but Socialistic 
 in its character and mode of working. It is based 
 rather on the notion of gaining the support and assist- 
 ance of the various national governments in the 
 furtherance of its object ; in a word, it relies on the 
 official class in the various countries rather than on 
 the democracy for the realization of its object. Still, 
 small as may be the faith of the Socialist in any serious 
 amelioration of the lot of the workman resulting from 
 these methods, even he must pay a tribute to the
 
 FOREIGN SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 145 
 
 energy of the League's secretary in waiting on ministers, 
 under-secretaries of departments, not to speak of the 
 smaller fry of officialdom, soliciting both personally 
 and by letter their support and interest with their 
 respective governments on its behalf. And he claims 
 to have achieved at least something. Whether this 
 something is worth the time, energy, and machinery 
 expended on it, and whether such might not have 
 been used to a better purpose, is another question. 
 Stephen Bauer is a good linguist, a brilliant conver- 
 sationalist, and knows his Anglo-Saxondom, both British 
 and American, well. 
 
 The mention of Basel reminds me of another pro- 
 fessor (though not an Austrian) at the Basel University, 
 a man of acute and powerful intellect, a friend and 
 colleague of Bauer's, to wit, Robert Michels. Of an 
 old German family of the Rhineland, Michels has 
 lived for many years in Italy, and has, I believe, 
 recently become a naturalized Italian. Michels began 
 life as a German officer, but the horrors of militarism 
 in general and of the Prusso-German military service 
 in particular led him to renounce his original pro- 
 fession and take to an academic career. He soon 
 after joined the Socialist movement, but it was not 
 long before he became dissatisfied with the inaction 
 and opportunism of the party as represented in the 
 Reichstag, which he criticized, not sparing some of 
 the honoured leaders, in more than one scathing article. 
 During his residence in Italy, where he obtained the 
 professorship of Political Economy at Turin, his member- 
 ship of the German party seems to have lapsed. He 
 was, however, present at the International Congress at 
 Stuttgart in 1907. Here occurred a trifling incident 
 
 10
 
 146 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 which affords an illustration of a significant trait in 
 the German national character, to wit, its excessive 
 tendency to hero-worship. Some appreciative remarks 
 to some of the Germans present having been made 
 by an English delegate d propos of Michels, the obser- 
 vation came from the German side that Michels, it 
 was understood, had written something against Bebel, 
 the implication being that if this were so he was a 
 man with whom one should have nothing to do. Now, 
 Michels, in denouncing the slackness and opportunist 
 tendencies of the Socialist party in the Reichstag, had, 
 as a matter of fact, criticized Bebel. But there was 
 nothing in his article of a personally offensive nature, 
 or that was otherwise than what would elsewhere 
 have been regarded, whether right or wrong in itself, 
 as perfectly fair comment. But the shuddering horror 
 at the laying of a sacrilegious hand on the party leader 
 is, as already said, characteristic. It is only fair to 
 Bebel to add that he himself took the matter much 
 more sensibly, and meeting Michels in a hotel in a 
 Swiss health resort a year or two later, became perfectly 
 friendly. 
 
 Bebel's own good sense in the matter excited the 
 indignation of, I am sorry to say, other Germanic 
 colleagues, among them Victor Adler, who expressed 
 to me the opinion that Bebel ought to have refused 
 to speak with his critic in terms of social intercourse. 
 I had a further illustration of this same national char- 
 acteristic on Bebel's will becoming known, and this 
 time it was again exemplified in the person of Adler. 
 Speaking of the will, I ventured the harmless remark 
 to Adler that I was rather surprised that Bebel had 
 not left a larger sum to the party. I did not say this
 
 FOREIGN SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 147 
 
 in any spirit of severe criticism or even of disapproval, 
 but the bare remark was enough to excite Adler's in- 
 dignant remonstrances, which even tended to overstep 
 the limits of personal courtesy. Hero-worship up to 
 a point may be an excusable and even a laudable 
 sentiment, but hero-worship developed to the point 
 of an idolatry which would place its object above 
 criticism, thus making of the latter a kind of God 
 Almighty, whose name must not be mentioned save 
 in terms of reverential adulation, is surely to be depre- 
 cated. Adler comes, of course, of Jewish stock, but, 
 as is often the case with the Jewish race, he has com- 
 pletely assimilated the characteristics and tradition 
 of the nationality with which his family have been 
 for so many generations identified. And the trait 
 just referred to is, I venture to think, significant beyond 
 what might at first sight appear. It seems peculiar 
 to the German character and national habit this 
 slavish attitude towards persons in authority, whether 
 party leaders, kings, kaisers, policemen, or non-com- 
 missioned officers. It will explain much in the some- 
 what abject role played by the German peoples towards 
 their Prussian rulers in recent events. This servile 
 strain in the German character is a strange blemish 
 in a race otherwise possessed of such great intellectual 
 powers. The " cold-shouldering " of Robert Michels 
 for criticizing Bebel by his former colleagues of the 
 Social Democratic party is of a piece with the tolera- 
 tion by the German people as a whole of the laws of 
 Use-majeste and Prussian military discipline, etc. 
 
 Turning to the Italian comrades, among those 
 I have known best are Turati, since become a some- 
 what moderate and chastened Socialist light of Monte-
 
 148 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 Citorio. At the time I knew him he was in association 
 with Madame Kolischoff, a Russian lady who has 
 played a not uninfluential part in the Italian Socialist 
 party in earlier years. Much more intimate than 
 with Turati was my acquaintance with that genial 
 free-lance Paulo Valera. A clever and even brilliant 
 journalist, Valera has never been in the Italian Chamber, 
 or has, indeed, played any very important role in the 
 party organization itself. He is known best as pamph- 
 leteer. In this capacity and on his own lines he has 
 scarcely an equal in Italy, though the chief seat of his 
 activity remains local, to wit, Milan and Lombardy. 
 Professor Enrico Ferri, whose picturesque figure of 
 old Roman type did not fail to attract attention at 
 Socialist Congresses, was known as a fine orator, and 
 for a time led the left wing of the Italian movement. 
 Of genial disposition, and socially agreeable as he was, 
 I have always regretted his defection from his old 
 principles. It is not so many years ago since I was 
 one of a large number of Socialists of all countries to 
 sign their names to an illuminated address which was 
 presented to him as a testimony to his services for 
 the cause. 
 
 Among the Russians, I have already in an earlier 
 chapter spoken of Kropotkin. The late Wolkowsky 
 was for some years well known in London political 
 circles. He was also prominent as a lecturer on his 
 personal experiences in the Russian movement. I 
 heard him deliver his lecture entitled " The Story of 
 my Life," in which he described his persecutions at 
 the hands of the Russian authorities, in the Temple, 
 to the members of the Hardwicke Society. A more 
 important person than the last mentioned was Sergius
 
 FOREIGN SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 149 
 
 Stepniak, whose real name was Kravchinsky. Of 
 powerful build, thickset, and of strong Mongoloid face 
 and figure, Stepniak was a prominent personality in 
 advanced London society during the eighties and early 
 nineties. I cannot recall anything especially striking 
 in his conversation, though the man conveyed an un- 
 doubted impression of power in his whole personality. 
 " Underground Russia " and " The Career of a Nihilist," 
 the latter book a novel that excited the warm admira- 
 tion of Shaw, undoubtedly give evidence of literary 
 genius, each in its own way. Stepniak's untimely 
 death by an express train on the level crossing near 
 Turnham Green assuredly cut short the career of one 
 who would have achieved much more than he did had 
 he lived. 
 
 Another personality among the advanced Russian 
 politicians with whom I came much in contact is 
 worthy our attention for a moment. I refer to the 
 one time Slade Professor of Slav language and litera- 
 ture at Oxford, the late Maxim Kowalewski. Like 
 most cultivated Russians, he spoke fluently, besides 
 his native tongue, English, German, French, and Italian. 
 Though not himself a professed Socialist, Kowalewski 
 was on terms of personal friendship with many of the 
 leading representatives of Socialist thought through- 
 out Europe. Marx and Engels he knew well and was 
 much liked by them. Vandervelde was also a friend 
 of Kowalewski and a frequent visitor at his villa in 
 Beaulieu, besides other more or less prominent members 
 of the Socialist party. Speaking for myself, I shall 
 always have pleasant recollections of the hospitality 
 received at the Villa Batava. Kowalewski had a man- 
 servant or valet of local origin named Baptiste, but who
 
 150 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 was colloquially spoken of as " Leporello," of whom he 
 used to relate amusing anecdotes. On applying for the 
 situation, this worthy gave as one of his qualifications 
 that he had received the first prize for dancing in his 
 native village. On one occasion when Kowalewski 
 was about to give a large dinner-party, he duly instructed 
 " Leporello," when serving at table, to help the older 
 ladies before the younger ones. " Leporello " en- 
 deavoured conscientiously to carry out his master's 
 instructions. Now it so happened there were two 
 ladies sitting near each other, alike of doubtful and 
 uncertain age. Accordingly, our " Leporello," not quite 
 knowing which to serve first, decided to solve the matter 
 by putting the question straight to them, " Mesdames, 
 laquelle de vous est la plus ancienne?" During the 
 latter years of his life Kowalewski resided in Russia, 
 where, probably as a sop thrown to the left wing of 
 the Duma, he was offered a seat on the Russian Imperial 
 Council. He accepted it, he told me, when he called 
 on me a year or two ago on a flying visit to his old 
 haunts, thinking he might bring successful pressure to 
 bear on the Government in favour of political prisoners. 
 This seems actually to have been the case in some 
 instances. 
 
 Before closing the present chapter it may be worth 
 while to say a few words on the general subject of 
 International Congresses. The first of the series of 
 International Socialist Congresses, which were inter- 
 rupted by the outbreak of the European War, though 
 not before they had resulted in the establishment of 
 the International Bureau, thereby constituting the 
 New International, as it was called, was held in 1889 
 in Paris. At tjiis Congress, which divided itself into
 
 FOREIGN SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 151 
 
 two, owing to the split between the Guesdist and the 
 Broussist sections of the French party, I was not 
 present. A second Congress was held two years later 
 at Brussels, in which I also took no part. The third 
 Congress was at Zurich in 1893, and on this occasion 
 I attended as a delegate of the Social Democratic 
 Federation. This Congress was notable for the fact 
 that Friedrich Engels made the closing speech, in the 
 course of which he explained the reasons for the action 
 of Marx and himself which led to the break-up of the 
 old International in the seventies. The reasons given, 
 as I have already stated, were that they both felt that 
 the organization in its then existing form had done 
 its work, and tha*t it was not strong enough to face 
 the opposition and persecution with which it was 
 threatened by the Governments of Europe. They felt, 
 he said, that its continued existence at that time was 
 likely only to result in unnecessary suffering for members 
 of the working-class movement, and perhaps even 
 the loss of some of its best leaders. This authoritative 
 statement made by Engels has undoubtedly consider- 
 able interest for the historian of the Socialist party, 
 although the point of view taken might have, and has 
 indeed, been traversed by those not belonging to the 
 Marxian section in the narrower sense in which the 
 French used to speak of " la chapelle Marx." For 
 the rest, the Zurich Congress of 1893 was signalized by 
 some disturbances created by the Anarchist and 
 quasi-Anarchist elements that had got into certain of 
 the delegations, especially the French and the Dutch. 
 Up to the Zurich Congress these meetings had been 
 held every two years, as decided by the Paris Congress 
 of 1889. But at Zurich the German party pressed
 
 for a longer interval between the International gather- 
 ings, suggesting even iour or five years as not too long. 
 Eventually three years was decided upon, and the 
 next Congress took place in 1896 in London. It was 
 held at the Queen's Hall, and I was elected on to the 
 Standing Orders Committee. The Congress opened 
 noisily, owing to the intrusion of Anarchist elements. 
 The French delegation had stormy sittings and even- 
 tually became split into two parts, the moderate section 
 of which Millerand was a member refusing to work 
 any longer with the extreme section. The latter 
 section, if not actually Anarchist, certainly had Anar- 
 chistic tendencies, though its opponents, it is only 
 fair to say, included men like Millerand himself, whose 
 Socialist principles were unquestionably of a very 
 doubtful character. At this Congress measures were 
 taken for the exclusion of Anarchists and, as far as 
 possible, other disturbing elements from future Con- 
 gresses. 
 
 The next Congress was held in Paris in 1900, at the 
 time of the Exhibition. It was due in 1899, but the 
 German party, having failed to secure officially a longer 
 term than three years for the interval between the 
 Congresses, obtained by intrigue behind the scenes 
 a prolongation of a year. The same tactics were 
 adopted by the German party on more than one sub- 
 sequent occasion. The chief feature of the Paris 
 Congress of 1900 was the dissension between the sections 
 of the French party, which had as its result a defective 
 organization of the arrangements. In consequence 
 the gathering, although well attended, was not as 
 successful as some others have been. 
 
 I may mention that, the week immediately preceding
 
 FOREIGN SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 153 
 
 the Paris Congress of 1900, the German party held 
 its own Congress at Mainz, at which I was also present. 
 Here I made the interesting acquaintance of the Kapell- 
 meister and composer Weissheimer, who was a friend 
 of Wagner and is referred to with, for him, an unusual 
 appreciation in his autobiography. Weissheimer, who 
 conducted the opera at Mainz for many years, was 
 a member of the Social Democratic party and took 
 part in the Congress. At the close of the proceedings 
 one evening, in reply to a question of mine respecting 
 the best place to obtain genuine Rhenish wine, Weiss- 
 heimer took us to a special Weinstube that he knew of, 
 when more than one flagon of " Rhenish " was con- 
 sumed in fact, more perhaps than a stern moralist 
 in these matters like my friend Hyndman would have 
 approved. Weissheimer, I remember, was particularly 
 pleased when I told him that Felix Moscheles, the son 
 of Ignaz Moscheles, the celebrated pianist, by whom 
 he had been taught in his youth, was, if not a declared 
 Socialist, at least a Democrat, an Internationalist, and 
 a strong anti-militarist. 
 
 A very interesting Congress was that held at Amster- 
 dam in 1904 (the Germans having again succeeded in 
 postponing it for a year). It was on this occasion that 
 the question of opportunism and the taking part by 
 members of the Socialist Party in current politics was 
 discussed, with the results already spoken of in the 
 unification of the French party. The debates at this 
 Congress issued in the passing of resolutions condemn- 
 ing the participation of Socialists officially in existing 
 State governments, and generally in " bourgeois 
 politics." The Congress held at Stuttgart in 1907 
 was memorable for the expulsion of Quelch from Wiir-
 
 154 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 temberg for his characterization of the diplomatic 
 conference, then sitting at The Hague, on the peace 
 question, as a " thieves' supper." It was also remark- 
 able for the strong stand made by Gustave Herve on 
 the question of patriotism and national military organi- 
 zation the same Herve who is now so enthusiastic a 
 patriot. 
 
 If we except the special Peace Congress called at 
 Basel on the outbreak of the Balkan War, the last 
 International Socialist Congress was that held at Copen- 
 hagen in 1910. Here also the question of armaments 
 and peace was largely to the fore, but in general the 
 gathering, though successful in every way as a Congress, 
 the arrangements of the Danish comrades having been 
 altogether excellent, was not distinguished by any 
 special features. The following Congress should have 
 taken place at Vienna in 1913, but this time once more 
 the German party insisted on having it put off for a 
 year. All arrangements had been made for holding 
 the gathering in Vienna in August of the fateful year 
 1914, but the great world catastrophe intervened, and 
 International Socialism was deprived of the possibility 
 of making a united pronouncement on the question 
 of international relations generally, and of the special 
 circumstances that had led up to the European situation 
 as it then stood in particular. This is much to be 
 regretted, since had the Congress been held in 1913 
 according to the instructions given to the International 
 Bureau at Copenhagen, the probabilities are it would 
 have resulted at least in the clearing of the air on the 
 general question of war, and on the attitude of the 
 various Socialist parties towards it, in the event of 
 hostilities arising. I know it may be said that in general
 
 FOREIGN SOCIALIST PERSONALITIES 155 
 
 terms the question had already been dealt with at 
 previous Congresses, but the terms were too general. 
 Moreover, in the three years that had elapsed since 
 the last Congress, that at Copenhagen, the international 
 situation had considerably changed, and in a sense 
 undeniably rendering essential a more detailed and 
 more precise pronouncement on the eventuality of a 
 great European war, for determining the practical 
 attitude of the party on this all-important question.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 LITERARY WORK 
 
 IN writing these reminiscences, I have, as already 
 stated in the preface, made it a rule to damp down the 
 personal note as far as possible, and to avoid the ex- 
 ample of Lord Herbert of Cherbury of giving prominence 
 to my own valiant deeds. But, seeing they are after 
 all personal reminiscences, it would seem out of place, 
 and even pedantic, to suppress altogether all account 
 of the individual reminiscencer's achievements, such 
 as they are and what there are of them. In the present 
 chapter, therefore, I am going frankly to talk about 
 myself, so those not interested may pass it over. But 
 what I have to chronicle I should premise are no glorious 
 deeds of valour, but resolve themselves simply into a 
 little modest literary work. 
 
 My first excursions into the regions of print con- 
 sisted in a few articles in obscure monthlies devoted 
 to natural history, a subject on whicji at the time, 
 being then in my early teens, I was very keen. It was 
 some few years before I produced anything more. My 
 next piece of literary output, so far as I can recollect, 
 was in 1876, and was a result of my studies on the 
 French Revolution, namely a little book in vindication 
 
 of Jean Paul Marat. I returned to this subject, I 
 
 156
 
 LITERARY WORK 157 
 
 should say, over twenty years later at the suggestion 
 of my friend Mr. Grant Richards, who published a 
 life of Marat by me in the nineties of the last century. 
 About the time of my first sketch of Marat's life an 
 article from my pen on the subject appeared in the 
 Gentleman's Magazine. Barring articles in periodicals 
 and newspapers, as also the episode of my newspaper 
 correspondentship in Berlin alluded to in an earlier 
 chapter, my next literary effort was a translation of 
 Kant's " Prolegomena to all Future Metaphysic " and 
 his " Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science," 
 with a life of Kant and an introduction to the " Critical 
 Philosophy " prefixed, the latter occupying about a 
 third of the whole volume, which was published in 
 " Bohn's Philosophical Library." This was followed 
 a year or two later by my " Handbook of the History 
 of Philosophy," also in the same series, a book which 
 was very well received and had a considerable success, 
 as works on philosophy go, with the British public. 
 Later on I published with the same firm (Messrs. Bell 
 and Sons) a translation of a selection from Schopen- 
 hauer's " Parerga and Paralipomena " under the title 
 of " Schopenhauer's Essays," preceded by a life of 
 Schopenhauer and a critical exposition of his philosophy. 
 It was about the middle eighties that I began the 
 publication of a sequence of popular works on Socialism 
 for Messrs. Sonnenschein 8r Co.'s " Social Science 
 Series." The first of them was " The Religion of 
 Socialism," consisting of essays dealing with various 
 aspects of Socialism. These, of course, are now a genera- 
 tion old, and, addressed as they were to a public of over 
 thirty years ago, their point of view and expression 
 naturally may strike the reader of the present day
 
 158 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 as not being quite up to date. As to this, while main- 
 taining in full the essential principles put forward in 
 these earlier essays, I am prepared, of course, to admit 
 that there are some things which from the present-day 
 standpoint may appear over-emphasized, while there 
 are others either omitted or from the same stand- 
 point insufficiently elaborated. I already acknowledge 
 this in my preface to the fifth edition (1901). And 
 what I said then applies, of course, still more to-day. 
 But the book has passed through so many editions 
 that it may well be left as it is always, of course, on 
 the assumption that in essentials it still expresses the 
 views of the author. The success of the " Religion 
 of Socialism " led to the production of other books 
 of a similar character and scope by myself and others. 
 In fact, it practically gave a send-off to the " Social 
 Science Series." l My own next contribution was the 
 " Ethics of Socialism," the success of which was almost, 
 if not quite, equal to that of the " Religion of Socialism," 
 notwithstanding the fact that it was not, as in the 
 former case, exclusively concerned with Socialism, 
 containing three rather important essays on other 
 subjects. Following this appeared a third volume of 
 similar character entitled " Outlooks from the New 
 Standpoint." This book had a fairly good sale, although, 
 curiously enough, not nearly equal to that of the two 
 former, in spite of the fact that it contained essays deal- 
 ing with subjects more " topical " than either of them. 
 During the anniversary years of the French Revo- 
 lution I contributed my " Story of the French Revo- 
 lution " to the same series. A little later I wrote for 
 the Twentieth Century Press a short history of the 
 i Now published by George Allen & Unwin Ltd.
 
 LITERARY WORK 159 
 
 Commune of Paris of 1871. This little book, though 
 scarcely more than a brochure, is, I believe, the only 
 history of the Commune within the same compass in the 
 English language. It was based largely on Lissagaray's 
 exhaustive work on the subject. It is satisfactory to 
 know that it circulated widely amongst English Social- 
 ists. The same may be said of a pamphlet entitled 
 " A New Catechism of Socialism," in which my late 
 friend Harry Quelch and myself collaborated. The 
 allusion in the title was to an old pamphlet published 
 at the beginning of the English movement by J. L. 
 Joynes called " A Socialist Catechism," now out of 
 print. Our own brochure, consisting of some forty- 
 four pages, was published by the Twentieth Century 
 Press at twopence, and has had a circulation of many 
 thousands. 
 
 The nineties saw the successive publication of my 
 three volumes on the social side of the Reformation 
 in Germany, bearing the respective titles of " German 
 Society at the Close of the Middle Ages," " The Peasants' 
 War," and " The Rise and Fall of the Anabaptists." 
 These three volumes contain an exhaustive history 
 of certain sides of the Reformation period in Central 
 Europe, such as is not to be found otherwise, I may 
 venture to say, in the whole range of English historical 
 literature. But although well reviewed, they never 
 attained a second edition. Purely historical literature, 
 like purely philosophical literature, has apparently no 
 great public among the reading population of the 
 British Islands, except where it connects itself with 
 some popular interest of the day or some problem 
 which happens to have come temporarily into 
 prominence.
 
 160 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 Shortly before the appearance of the first of the 
 volumes last mentioned I published, also with Messrs. 
 Sonnenschein, a small philosophical work entitled "The 
 Problem of Reality," containing in a brief sketch 
 suggestions for a philosophical reconstruction. This 
 little book, while its theses were based on philosophic 
 Idealism generally, was opposed to the current neo- 
 Hegelian position, which was at that time still para- 
 mount in English philosophy. About the same time I 
 published another small volume, entitled " Outspoken 
 Essays," dealing with historical and social subjects. 
 During these early years of the nineties I also colla- 
 borated with the late William Morris in the work we 
 entitled " Socialism, its Growth and Outcome," which 
 was also published (as a double volume) in Sonnen- 
 schein's " Social Science Series." It claims to be a 
 history of the development of the Socialistic idea, in 
 its practical aspects, beginning with primitive Com- 
 munism, tracing the decay of the communistic group 
 system and the rise of Individualism, economical and 
 otherwise, and the various fluctuations throughout 
 history in respect to these two principles, leading up 
 to the modern Socialist movement, as embodying con- 
 sciously Socialism as the ideal of the future. The 
 book, although it had a fair sale, has not passed with- 
 out criticism from various sides. That it has its defects 
 and weak points may be true, but I still contend that, 
 taken as a whole, it is as adequate a statement of a 
 big subject as could be compressed into the same 
 compass. 
 
 About this time I was called to the Bar at the Middle 
 Temple, which I had joined some three years before. 
 For a year or two after this I had some notion of actively
 
 LITERARY WORK 161 
 
 following the legal profession, and took steps in that 
 direction, but subsequently abandoned the idea. My 
 time was thus left free for other studies and literary 
 work. Continuing my record with regard to the latter, 
 the new life of Marat already referred to was written 
 at the end of the nineties, and reached a second edition 
 two or three years after its publication. Early in the 
 new century a volume of mixed contents was published 
 by Grant Richards under the title " Essays in Socialism 
 Old and New." It comprised most of the pieces con- 
 tained in the " Outspoken Essays," which had appeared 
 some ten years earlier and had gone out of print, and 
 a number of new pieces. The above was followed by 
 what I personally regard as my most important literary 
 production, to wit, " The Roots of Reality." This 
 book was based upon the conclusions put forward 
 tentatively some years previously in the brief sketch 
 before alluded to, " The Problem of Reality." The 
 positions there laid down are in the later and much 
 larger volume developed, corrected, and added to, 
 and other problems dealt with. It is now out of print 
 and awaiting a second and enlarged edition on the 
 conclusion of the present war ; but as it stands, it labours 
 under the disadvantage that its criticism of the Hegelian, 
 or, as I have termed it, the " pallogistic " position in 
 philosophy, is disproportionately emphasized in view 
 of the fact of the changes that have taken place during 
 the last ten years in the general outlook of speculative 
 thought in this country. " Pragmatism," Bergson, and 
 other influences quite foreign and even opposed to the 
 Hegelian Pallogism or Intellectualism (as it is some- 
 times called), have since become fashionable, and from 
 the point of view of " The Roots of Reality " call for 
 
 II
 
 162 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 a special criticism of their own. There are also other 
 suggestions I have received as regards presentment 
 and illustration, to the intent to render the positions 
 advanced more readily understandable of the lay reader, 
 and these also demand serious consideration in the 
 revised edition, which the writer hopes in due time 
 will see the light. 
 
 After ' The Roots of Reality " had appeared, I 
 bethought me of a promise to my old friend William 
 Morris, made not long before his death, to write a history 
 of that, even to most students, little-known event at 
 the close of the French Revolution, Gracchus Babeuf's 
 " Conspiracy of the Equals." This undertaking I 
 now endeavoured to fulfil to the best of my ability, 
 and the result was the volume entitled " The Last 
 Episode of the French Revolution " (Grant Richards), 
 which appeared in 1911. The book, though well 
 enough reviewed, had the sale one expects from purely 
 historical monographs having little or no bearing on 
 current events or practical interest for the present time. 
 It remains, however, as the only English study on the 
 subject obtainable, even Bronterre O'Brien's trans- 
 lation of the contemporary Buonarotti's work having 
 been out of print for more than half a century. 
 
 This was followed in 1912 by another volume of 
 essays, entitled " Essays on Men, Mind, and Morals," 
 comprising some previously published and some un- 
 published pieces, among the former the article that 
 originally appeared in the International Journal of 
 Ethics on the Socialist view of the fundamental 
 principles of morality, and my reply in the Fortnightly 
 Review to Dr. Beattie Crozier's attack on Socialism. 
 Jn November 1913 appeared " The Fraud of Feminism,"
 
 LITERARY WORK 163 
 
 just after Sir Almroth Wright's " Unexpurgated Case 
 against Woman Suffrage." In this little book of less 
 than two hundred pages I claim to have disposed of 
 the arguments (save the mark !), so constantly heard 
 and so seldom contradicted or refuted, of the advocates 
 of Feminism. I have clearly drawn the distinction 
 between Political Feminism (as I have termed it) and 
 Sentimental Feminism. The Political Feminist claims 
 for women equal political and social rights with men. 
 The Sentimental Feminist, under the sham pretence of 
 chivalry, claims impunity for women from the un- 
 pleasant consequences of their own conduct. Between 
 the two, and they are usually combined in the same 
 person, we arrive at the delightful conclusion that 
 women have a right to claim an equal position with 
 men wherever it suits their book, i.e. in all honourable, 
 agreeable, and lucrative positions, and at the same 
 time to demand special treatment from that accorded 
 to men whenever " equality " would spell unpleasant 
 consequences for themselves a charming doctrine truly 
 for the female sex, in which the " equality " appears 
 with its picturesque chivalry " all on one side." 
 
 My efforts in this book, as in previous essays, to ex- 
 pose the claptrap and lies of the advocates of Feminism 
 have naturally not been to the taste of the Suffragette 
 sisterhood, who have lost no opportunity of venting 
 their petty spite in feeble efforts to say nasty things. 
 I give just one instance of this. In the Spring of 1915 
 appeared a volume called forth by the war, entitled 
 "German Culture, Past and Present." 1 It consisted 
 largely of excerpts from my previous volumes on the 
 social side of the Reformation in Germany, with two 
 * George Allen & Unwin Ltd.
 
 164 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 concluding chapters on Modern Germany. The book 
 was very favourably received by the Press generally, 
 but there was one dissentient voice in a certain London 
 morning daily of strong Feminist tendencies, wherein 
 appeared a notice in which every one detected the hand 
 of the Suffragette. The lady in question, who, of course, 
 wrote under the veil of anonymity, headed her article 
 " Mr. Bax in extremis \ " (she probably meant in 
 excelsis !). After a few words of general attack on 
 the ground that all the contents were not new, she 
 proceeded to single out and quote from the last chapter 
 a couple of plain-sailing English sentences, upon which 
 she pronounced her ip$e dixit that the style was " bad " 
 and the thought " jejune." Now, what does the reader 
 think these two " bad " and " jejune " sentences pur- 
 ported to say ? Simply that in the humble judgment 
 of the author the influence of the writings of Nietzsche 
 on Modern Germany was not as powerful as some 
 writers on the war had represented. Of course, I may 
 have been wrong in my view as to this, but I submit 
 that to describe such an opinion, whether right or wrong, 
 precisely as " jejune " indicates a singular ignorance 
 of the correct use of the English language as possible 
 with advanced womanhood. As a matter of fact, 
 these last two chapters of the book in question were 
 written somewhat hurriedly, and in consequence one 
 or two real if trivial errors had crept into them, which, 
 unimportant as they were in themselves, were such as 
 in the hands of a skilful critic bent on being " nasty " 
 might (especially in a short notice) have been effec- 
 tively exploited against me. These, however, my 
 female critic had evidently neither the brains nor the 
 knowledge to take advantage of. Accordingly, the
 
 LITERARY WORK 165 
 
 foolish young woman who aimed at smartness 
 achieved silliness. 
 
 This incident, which might hardly seem worthy of 
 mention in itself, is nevertheless otherwise significant 
 inasmuch as it betrays a type of mental attitude 
 prevalent in the younger present generation, and 
 especially in the youthful " emancipated " female. It 
 is the morbid craving after literary fireworks the 
 dread of the commonplace become a disease. Every 
 sentence that does not wrap up an epigram, every 
 expression of opinion that does not wear the air of a 
 paradox, is voted dull and vapid. These fatuous 
 would-be up-to-date young prigs seem, moreover, obli- 
 vious of the everyday fact that it is often necessary 
 in controversy and otherwise to remind an opponent, 
 or even the casual reader, of what ought to be obvious. 
 There are plenty of people, for that matter, with whom 
 it is necessary on occasion to call their attention to 
 the fact that two and two make four. But, even apart 
 from this, the demand of priggish up-to-datism that 
 every paragraph, if it is to be worth the trouble of 
 reading, must enshrine an uninterrupted series of 
 epigrams or paradoxes, is silly and insufferable. In 
 fact, the overdoing of the epigrammatic and paradoxical 
 may very easily run to seed in a claptrap and a ban- 
 ality of its own. As pointed out in an earlier chapter, 
 it may fairly be doubted whether Shaw, able man 
 though he is, does not sometimes overshoot the mark 
 in this respect. Talking of Shaw reminds me, by the 
 way, of an incident bearing on the above. On my 
 remarking to Shaw one day that our mutual friend 
 J. L. Joynes had observed to me that he should not 
 particularly care to have him for a companion in a
 
 166 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 long tour, Shaw replied, " Well, I can't reciprocate 
 the sentiment, for I think Joynes would suit me very 
 well as a travelling companion ; but I know what he 
 meant : I dare say I should be always trying to say 
 smart things, and this after a time might tend to become 
 boresome." So it is. Excessive wit may weary, just 
 as excessive sweetness may satiate. If there is but 
 one step from the sublime to the ridiculous, there are 
 likewise not many steps from the brilliant to the banal. 
 And the steps are counted in the overloading of writing 
 or discourse with points and effects and this however 
 good these may be in themselves. 
 
 As regards my literary activity, I have always been 
 at the disadvantage of not having the faculty possessed 
 by many of expanding a subject I am writing upon 
 indefinitely. I have the scheme of what I conceive to 
 be essential in the exposition of my subject, and I write 
 up to it. But I have a difficulty in filling out beyond 
 this to meet the exigencies of printers and publishers. 
 The above is an undoubted drawback, since the dilution 
 of one's subject with words and style is what in many 
 cases the public wants. On the other hand, the facility 
 in reeling out verbal material has its disadvantages 
 even in historical writing, although not nearly so much 
 as in philosophical. Even where the material is not 
 purely verbal, but to a large extent real, there is always 
 a danger of overweighting, so that the reader is apt 
 to get into the position of not being able to see the 
 wood for the trees. The salient points which are 
 essential are apt to get confused in a mass of relatively, 
 and sometimes more than relatively, unimportant 
 detail. The observance of proportion in the subject- 
 matter of serious work, though obviously an essential
 
 LITERARY WORK 167 
 
 in all such writing, is as often as not failed of attain- 
 ment even with men of ability. In historical writing 
 it is exceedingly difficult to steer between the Scylla 
 of bareness and sketchiness and the Charybdis of over- 
 weighting with incidental material, which leaves con- 
 fusion as to the general import of events in the mind 
 of the reader. This applies, of course, more to popular 
 historical writing than to works of scholarship designed 
 for students, where a certain amount of overweighting 
 is scarcely avoidable. Of the latter class of work 
 Gibbon is supposed to be the model in this respect. 
 But it may fairly be doubted whether Gibbon's hand- 
 ling of his material in the " Decline and Fall," as 
 regards proportion, is not excelled by Hodgson in 
 his " Invaders of Italy." 
 
 Where, however, the reeling out of an immense mass 
 of verbal product is most dangerous to effectiveness 
 is in highly abstract subjects, especially philosophy. 
 Here diffuseness is absolutely fatal to the leaving of 
 any strong impression on the mind of the reader. This 
 is especially noticeable in certain American writers, 
 notably Professor Baldwin, whose three volumes 
 ' Thought and Things " are devoted to material which 
 on a liberal computation might easily be got into one. 
 Other American writers of philosophical treatises are 
 guilty of the same indiscretion, to wit, of drowning 
 the essentials of their thought in portentous volumes 
 of closely printed pages which look imposing but 
 leave little impression on the reader. In philosophy, 
 more than in anything else, it is desirable to avoid 
 diffuseness and overexpansion, not only by mere 
 verbiage, but by the introduction of a mass of detail 
 a nd discussion of fifth-rate problems on the fringe of
 
 168 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 the main subject. One sometimes finds this over- 
 elaboration in works of real genius and even of epoch- 
 making character. For example, the " Kapital " of 
 Marx is not wholly free therefrom. It is, indeed, more 
 particularly noticeable in the posthumous second and 
 third volumes, although, especially as regards the third 
 volume, since it was left by its author in a condition 
 of notes and jottings merely, it would be manifestly 
 unfair to saddle these shortcomings altogether on Marx 
 himself. 
 
 Returning to my own literary work, I may mention 
 that it has been my fortune to have what we are told 
 is the sincerest form of flattery, namely, imitation, 
 more than once practised upon me. The authors who 
 have done this have at the same time been careful 
 not to acknowledge the source of their indebtedness. 
 Thus a year or so after the publication of my little 
 sketch " The Problem of Reality " appeared a work 
 by an eminent British statesman of philosophic pre- 
 tensions, which contained a criticism of the Hegelian 
 Pallogism, especially with reference to its modern 
 expressions in the works of Thomas Hill Green and 
 others, which was practically identical with my own. 
 Conclusions arrived at independently, the reader will 
 say ! Possibly, but the similarity of the argument, 
 and even of its expression, seemed singularly close, 
 and for me the more significant in view of the fact 
 that I had some grounds for believing the distin- 
 guished philosophic statesman in question might not 
 have been altogether without knowledge of my own 
 humble and insignificant effort. 
 
 Again, in the works of a well-known popular essayist 
 I could point to paragraphs which are almost identical
 
 LITERARY WORK 169 
 
 reproductions of passages of my own. Another well- 
 known writer on social and economic subjects, in a 
 work of his published a year or two ago, devotes a long 
 final chapter to the elaboration, without acknowledg- 
 ment, of my speculation as to the evolution of a 
 social consciousness presented in " The Roots of Reality " 
 (pp. 126-36). I am not making a personal grievance 
 out of these things, but I may say that as a general 
 principle I cannot approve of the literary morality which 
 does not hesitate to " lift " ideas, and in some cases 
 even turns of expression, from an isolated thinker, a 
 thing no one would dare to do in the case of a man 
 holding an academic chair or otherwise very much in 
 the public view. In the first case the " lifting " may 
 pass unobserved ; in the second, those who practised 
 it would be likely to be " dropped upon " at once. 
 
 An amusing, because so flagrant, a case of the false 
 attribution of an idea in the interest apparently of 
 the academic " guild " in general is the cool reference 
 by a distinguished American professor of philosophy 
 of the term " alogical," in the sense in which I have 
 used it, to Professor Bergson. Professor Bergson 
 himself, who, in spite of his eminence in the world of 
 modern philosophic thought, is personally the most 
 modest of men, told me in conversation that, while 
 approving of my use of the word, he had not seen it, 
 certainly in the sense used by me, before he read 
 " The Roots of Reality." 
 
 All I have to say upon this question of property 
 in ideas is that if the provenance of ideas or literary 
 expression is to be acknowledged at all, it should be 
 acknowledged equally all round without distinction of 
 persons. To acknowledge, perhaps with effusiveness,
 
 indebtedness for a thought when its author holds a pro- 
 fessorship or is prominently before the public eye in 
 other ways, and to reproduce a thought without a word 
 of acknowledgment of its source where its author holds 
 no distinguished post or is generally less in the public 
 view, I think it will be admitted by most impartial 
 persons savours of a certain degree of meanness. Yet 
 there seems to be a notion abroad that the works of 
 such a one may be used as an open quarry and their 
 contained ideas fully appropriated, the original author 
 being conveniently ignored. 
 
 Setting aside the purely philosophical issues dis- 
 cussed in " The Roots of Reality," which are too tech- 
 nical to be entered into at length in a book of this 
 nature, some readers might be inclined to ask what 
 I consider as my special contribution to modern 
 thought on the subjects on which I have written. It 
 is difficult to answer this question satisfactorily. 
 But among the few small services my work may have 
 helped is the calling attention to the distinction 
 between the morality of early society, with its basis 
 of communal or group feeling and thinking, and the 
 introspective morality, sometimes called the Ethics of 
 Inwardness, based on the individual and his relation 
 as a spiritual being, considered more or less per se, to a 
 deity who is the supreme power of the Universe. In 
 the first case the basis of morality and religion is custom 
 and traditionally prescribed action or ritual, the ques- 
 tion of individual motive hardly entering into it ; in 
 the second, the inner motives and feelings of the indi- 
 vidual occupy the foremost place. I think I may 
 claim, without pretending to be the actual protagonist 
 of this idea, to which modern anthropology has been
 
 LITERARY WORK 171 
 
 leading up for many years, to have been the first popu- 
 larly to emphasize the distinction in connexion with 
 the light it throws upon the doctrine and aspirations 
 of the Socialism of to-day. The distinction between 
 the communal thought or feeling by which the man 
 was absolutely merged in the group clan, tribe, or 
 people before individuality or logical thought, in our 
 sense, had arisen ; and that of civilization, which meant, 
 as one of its chief features, the development of the 
 individual as such, and his freeing from the ties and 
 order of ideas which identified him with the group 
 under earlier conditions of society, it was always my 
 endeavour to impress upon the thinking section of 
 Socialists and of those interested in social problems. 
 This point, that I have since a generation ago, in a bare 
 and, I willingly admit, inadequate form, endeavoured 
 to popularize among my contemporaries, has of late 
 years, with perhaps certain modifications and on a 
 more extended scale, been worked out from another 
 side in a most original manner and with considerable 
 learning by the new Cambridge school of anthropo- 
 logists. The fact that classical scholarship has largely 
 been employed to this end, and the evolution of ancient 
 Greek society taken as typical, I hold to be no disad- 
 vantage, but rather the contrary. Useful and indeed 
 indispensable as the comparative method of the inves- 
 tigation of the conditions of existing savage and bar- 
 baric communities may be, Greece nevertheless lies in 
 the main stream of human evolution, and must there- 
 fore, with the other self-evolving civilized races of the 
 ancient world, represent the type of social progress in 
 a manner which the existing survivals of early society in 
 outlying parts of the world do not. The latter may
 
 172 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 be compared to eddies and side-streams of the main 
 course of human development, which do not neces- 
 sarily represent in their present conditions the exact 
 counterpart of any past phase in the evolution of the 
 historic races, however much they may afford us illus- 
 trations of, and clues to, the general course of that 
 evolution. 
 
 There are plenty of other points which I have 
 endeavoured to bring out in my literary work. The 
 above I only give as a specimen of an important one. 
 I am aware that I have the misfortune, for the rest, 
 while able perhaps sometimes to throw out ideas worthy 
 of consideration, in a bare and sketchy manner, to lack 
 the equally necessary capacity of working them out 
 in detail and thereby demonstrating their truth. I am 
 perfectly willing to admit this as a defect ; whether 
 a defect of my qualities must depend upon the decision 
 of others and the public generally as to whether I have 
 any. With this observation I may fairly conclude the 
 present, I trust not too long, chapter on my own literary 
 doings and sufferings.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 CLUB AND TEMPLE LIFE IN LONDON AT THE END 
 OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY 
 
 THE decade of the nineties has already receded from 
 us sufficiently to become interesting as a retrospect. 
 Though the change in English thought and ways of 
 looking at life, as regards what had gone before it, was 
 not nearly so profound or far-reaching as that the 
 early eighties had to show, yet the nineties had none 
 the less a character of theii own. The ideas and move- 
 ments which had struck root in the eighties were 
 growing up and sprouting out in various directions, 
 but it is less with the intellectual than with the social 
 life of that period that I propose to deal in this chapter. 
 In the course of the year 1889 I joined a well-known 
 club in the West End of London, and the following year 
 I took up my residence in the Temple, as already men- 
 tioned in an earlier chapter. The club I joined was a 
 large one, with a membership embracing all sorts and 
 conditions of men. Moreover, it was a political club, 
 and included at that time men who have since played 
 a prominent part in the public life of the country. 
 Journalists not unnaturally bulked largely among the 
 membership Men of law, some of them not wanting 
 in eminence, were also among the habitues of the smoking- 
 room. Living as I was by myself in chambers at the 
 
 173
 
 174 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 time, as is the wont in such cases, I tended to drift 
 into the club during the latter part of the day. Here 
 I mixed with the other habitual frequenters, among 
 whom there were some noteworthy types which have 
 not failed to impress themselves upon my memory. 
 There was a barrister with a sufficiently good practice 
 who got the credit of being remiss in the matter of 
 standing drinks. This reminds me, by the way, of one 
 notable difference which twenty odd years have made 
 in one at least of the social customs of club-life. In 
 the early nineties, giving and accepting of alcoholic 
 refreshment played a much greater part in the social 
 intercourse of club smoking-rooms, as indeed it did 
 also in life outside clubs, than it does nowadays. No 
 one who remembers the time, even as late as that 
 referred to, can fail to appraise at its true value the 
 cant which declaims against drink as being the special 
 curse of the England of to-day. Even from twenty 
 to twenty-five years ago there was at least twice as 
 much alcohol consumed as there was, let us say, in 
 the summer of 1914, i.e. before the special war re- 
 strictions on liquor came into force. If we go farther 
 back, ot course, the difference is still more striking. 
 The days depicted by Dickens in " Pickwick " are 
 astounding to the modern man. 
 
 But to return to the club. There was the 
 youngish gentleman, undergraduate of the London 
 University, who did a little journalism and acted 
 on occasion as electoral agent and canvasser for 
 party candidates whom he approved. Having a 
 little means of his own, he did this work for the 
 most part gratuitously. A constant inmate of the 
 club at this time, he was a well-known character.
 
 CLUB AND TEMPLE LIFE 175 
 
 Especially was he famous for the air of blaseness and 
 ennui which he usually assumed. The idea ever 
 present in his mind appeared to be that to seem bored 
 was rather " tony." Hence the idea of boredom 
 occupied a considerable place in his thought. It was in 
 vain I pointed out to him that excessive sensitiveness 
 to bores and boredom had never been a characteristic of 
 the greatest minds ; that, on the contrary, it was usually 
 the mark of a mind without resilience and without 
 formative power of its own. The really great mind, 
 save under great provocation, is, generally speaking, 
 tolerant in this respect, and certainly above being 
 bored by every commonplace man it meets. The 
 idea of boredom still remained an obsession of this 
 gentleman. It was not so much that he was bored 
 as that he thought he ought to appear bored. 
 
 Another among the characters of the club was the 
 middle-aged Irish doctor, staunch patriot and ardent 
 Catholic, with somewhat uncouth manners, who was 
 given to laying down the law on all questions. He 
 was generally regarded as somewhat of a crank, and 
 not the least by his own countrymen. There were 
 also among the members those of the House of Israel, 
 the mention of which fact recalls a humorous sally 
 of a well-known member of the present Parliament, 
 recently knighted. The incident was as follows : The 
 gentleman in question was in conversation one day 
 in the smoking-room with a barrister of the Jewish 
 race. Sitting in a group not far off was an elderly 
 club-member, since dead, who in loud tones was heard 
 to express the opinion that there were too many of 
 " these damn'd Jews " in the club. The remark, of 
 course, had no reference to the Jewish gentleman with
 
 176 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 whom our M.P. was speaking, whose presence a short 
 distance off had probably not been observed by our 
 anti-Semitic friend. However, it reached the ears of 
 the former, whose indignation was at once aroused 
 to the extent of his getting up and going over to 
 remonstrate with the insulter, as he deemed him, of his 
 racial colleagues in the club, whose remarks he took 
 as a personal affront to himself. An altercation ensued 
 on the merits of the Hebrew, which was threatening 
 to become hot, when our M.P. interposed with the 
 observation that he thought the whole difference be- 
 tween his friend and the old gentleman was due to a 
 misunderstanding ; if he had heard aright, he under- 
 stood the latter's objection to refer, not to Jews in 
 general either within or without the club, but only 
 a special class of Jews, to wit, damn'd Jews. " Now," 
 he said, " we none of us approve of damn'd Jews." 
 His friend the speaker had expressed the opinion that 
 there were some of this class of Jew in the club. If 
 there were, he would be the last to defend them, but 
 although he had numerous acquaintances among the 
 Jewish members of the club, he could not recall a single 
 "damn'd Jew" among them. Therefore he hoped that 
 the gentleman whose observation had given offence 
 to his Jewish friend might have spoken from hearsay 
 and be mistaken in his opinion. Thus the oil of 
 humorous banter was poured on the troubled waters of 
 anti-Semitism. Another Jewish club-story. A member 
 of unmistakably Hebrew physiognomy, but who ob- 
 jected to be afnched as a Jew in the smoking-room, was 
 present when one of the chasseurs was calling out as 
 " wanted " the name of Mr. Solomon Isaacs. The 
 member in question was evidently not there, as no
 
 CLUB AND TEMPLE LIFE 177 
 
 response came, but the boy, zealous in the execution 
 of his duty, seeing our friend of the Hebrew countenance 
 sitting with his circle in a corner of the room, went up 
 to him and addressed him, " Are you Mr. Isaacs, sir ? " 
 "No, boy; do you take me for a bloody Jew?" re- 
 torted the irate son of Israel. This anecdote illus- 
 trates the curious objection many members of the 
 Jewish race have to acknowledge their racial origin, 
 which may possibly have something to do with the fact 
 that in all countries the Jew is the most aggressive 
 patriot and jingo for his adopted or acquired nationality 
 which that country can boast. In every nation the 
 Jew is to be found on the side of the most fire-eating 
 section of national chauvinists. 
 
 As I have above said, the journalist fraternity 
 bulked largely in the membership of my club. Now, 
 it is very curious to observe the type of mentality 
 which work on the daily Press seems to attract, or 
 develop, or possibly both. The pressman, while seldom 
 a scholar or a man of depth of knowledge or of thought, 
 is yet seldom ignorant or stupid. The intelligence of 
 the average man of Fleet Street is aptly covered by 
 the word " smart." He is a promiscuous gatherer of 
 knowledge as he goes through life, as distinguished 
 from the systematic student. The conditions of his 
 working career of course lead to this partly, at least ; 
 partly also there is no doubt the profession of journal- 
 ism attracts to itself men of an alert type of mind, 
 whose interests are easily awakened to almost any 
 subject, but who are yet without either the depth or 
 the range which is the result of intellectual staying 
 power. Of course, there are exceptions. There are 
 men of scholarly type and scholarly attainments in 
 
 12
 
 178 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 the ranks of journalism on the one side, as there are 
 men of crass ignorance and dullness on the other. But 
 as a rule the successful journalist, the journalist who 
 gets plenty to do and makes his way in the profession, 
 is neither of the one nor the other, but a man who 
 has the capacity for getting up any subject at command 
 to the extent which is necessary to dilate upon it with- 
 out making gross blunders, and with an air of authority 
 suggesting untold reserves of knowledge behind. This 
 is very noticeable when one takes up the books written 
 by journalists. I have known men who have spoken 
 to me on certain departments of general history, or 
 on the histories of special countries, and who showed 
 by their questions that the subject was quite new to 
 them, and that in fact their knowledge concerning it 
 was of the most elementary kind, and yet who a few 
 months afterwards produced a book which professed 
 glibly to instruct the public on the matter as though 
 from the chair of a university. The man who can do 
 this is the type of the successful journalist. Never- 
 theless, as above remarked, while you have on the one 
 hand the exceptional journalist who is also a scholar 
 and a man of depth as well as width of thought and 
 reading, you have also on the other the exceptional 
 pressman of elementary ignorance. A specimen of the 
 latter, when the Moroccan question was to the fore, 
 some few years ago, seriously asked me whether Morocco 
 was north or south of Spain ! This man, bien entendu, 
 did not belong to the much despised tribe of mere 
 reporters, but was an accredited pressman connected 
 with a reputable London " daily " ! Now, all these 
 types of the great profession were represented in my 
 club at the time to which this chapter specially refers,
 
 CLUB AND TEMPLE LIFE 
 
 and many a pleasant hour have I spent in their 
 society. 
 
 Amongst the men who added distinction to the club 
 was a well-known author of books on English economic 
 history, an Oxford professor and member of Parliament, 
 long since dead ; also two eminent authorities on Roman 
 Law, one of whom is no longer living, and the other 
 is still a member of the club, and not only living, but 
 working hard at intervals on an edition of an early 
 Greek text of the Justinian Institutes, with all the 
 careful industry of a Scottish man of learning. I 
 should not omit to mention also the distinguished- 
 looking member of the clerical profession, the author 
 of a popular but none the less scholarly work on Romano- 
 Jewish history. He is one of the widest-read men 
 on the subject of early Christian antiquities that I 
 know, the other two being a Privy Councillor, the 
 author of numerous works on the origin and early 
 history of Christianity, also a member of the club, 
 and Mr. Joseph McCabe (not a member), whose labours 
 in this direction are equally famous. But it would 
 be impossible to recall all the men of eminence in their 
 several departments who have been members of the 
 club in question. It is a club which, without claiming 
 to be in any way " select " in the ordinary sense of 
 the word, admirably does the work of a clearing-house 
 for a considerable variety of men of political, social, 
 and intellectual aims and interests of diverse character. 
 Its catholicity in the types of its membership has 
 always given, and does still give, occasion to the 
 enemy to blaspheme or at least to speak disrespectfully 
 of it as of a haunt of the philistine. Nevertheless, 
 as I contend, it has from the beginning served, and
 
 still serves, a useful and perhaps unique purpose in 
 the life of modern London. 
 
 Life in the Temple in the decade of the nineties, 
 the time, that is, when I was residing there, had a well- 
 marked character of its own. The Middle Temple, 
 which was my Inn, with its old Elizabethan Hall and 
 relics, its Vandyke Charles the First, its silver tankard 
 for loving-cup, its snuff-box made of the wood of the 
 Armada, as alleged, has an unfailing charm for most 
 of its members. When I was there, there was an aged 
 butler, such as might have made a figure for Dickens 
 or Thackeray. Many were the stories told of this worthy 
 and of his ways and means of enriching himself at 
 the expense of the members. Some Middle Templers 
 may recall his celebrated " old beer," of which by some 
 means or other he had acquired a special cask, and 
 which he used on occasion to dole out to the various 
 " messes " after dinner in Hall. It was certainly the 
 finest English ale that I have ever tasted. This curious 
 human relic, whose object in life seemed to be perquisites, 
 had been connected throughout his career with the 
 legal profession, as servant to judges, as almoner in 
 the Inns of Court, or what not. He regarded himself, 
 as was very evident from his bearing and conversa- 
 tion, as an essential, if humble, limb of the law. He 
 is now long dead, and the memory of him has probably 
 begun to fade among the frequenters of the Middle 
 Temple Hall. 
 
 Few of the men who haunted the precincts of the 
 Middle Temple in the nineties are to be found there 
 now. Twenty years have left their mark on the Temple 
 as elsewhere. The jealousies between the briefless and 
 the briefed doubtless continue, though the human
 
 CLUB AND TEMPLE LIFE 181 
 
 material changes. From among the numerous barristers 
 whom I encountered during my residence in the Temple, 
 one or two have impressed themselves upon my memory 
 from their having come to a tragic and untimely end. 
 There was poor ^Eneas Macintosh as the name im- 
 plies, of Scottish Highland descent who was originally 
 intended for the Army, but who left the military career 
 on a point of conscience after reading Spielhagen's 
 novel, " Problematische Naturen," and took to the 
 Bar. In him was present the type of the traditional 
 Highland gentleman. He was courageous, of marked 
 courtesy of manner, with a strong touch of old Highland 
 Keltic superstition. I remember that after the death 
 of a girl with whom he had had to do, he was troubled, 
 or at least impressed, with the visits of a black cat to 
 the window-sill of his bedroom on successive morn- 
 ings, and was evidently disposed to connect the black 
 cat in an occult manner with the deceased girl. He 
 worked hard as a barrister, and at one time had a fair 
 practice, but some years later, for reasons of health, he 
 went to Canada, where he was buried in a snowdrift 
 and never seen or heard of again. 
 
 Another Kelt, this time an Irishman and a man of 
 a very different mould from the last mentioned, whom 
 I saw much of during the last years of my residence 
 at the Temple, was Michael Farelly, an amiable, feck- 
 less, thriftless person. He was always financially more 
 or less on his beam-ends. Never very successful in his 
 practice at the Bar, Farelly emigrated to South Africa 
 some two or three years before the Boer War broke 
 out. He seems to have played a somewhat doubtful 
 role in the events which preceded the war. After 
 going to Pretoria as an avowed friend and adviser in
 
 182 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 the Boer cause, and failing to obtain the entire con- 
 fidence of Paul Kriiger and the other leaders, he went 
 off on the other side. The book he published in the 
 course of the war seems to afford documentary illustra- 
 tion of his double-sidedness. In a chapter dealing with 
 the causes of the war, evidently written when he was 
 hoping to be taken into the service of the Transvaal 
 Government, after giving a good and, indeed, unanswer- 
 able statement of the Boer case, a final paragraph, 
 apparently written just before going to press, is clumsily 
 tacked on to what it is plain was originally intended 
 to be the end of the chapter. This, while ignoring the 
 whole of the previous argument, crudely sides with 
 the aggressive Imperialist policy of Great Britain 
 against the Dutch Republics. Farelly came over to 
 England for a few weeks after the conclusion of peace, 
 but I never met him again. He returned, after his 
 brief sojourn in this country, to South Africa, where 
 he shortly after died. Farelly was not without his 
 good qualities, notably a certain Irish openheartedness, 
 but financial embarrassments apparently drove him, as 
 they have driven many others, into tortuous courses. 
 
 Before leaving the subject of my residence in the 
 Temple, it may be interesting to mention that among 
 the visitors to my chambers was the composer Leon- 
 cavallo, who one evening, shortly before the first per- 
 formance of his " Pagliacci " at Co vent Garden, came 
 and played over on the piano for me the score of the 
 new opera. 
 
 In 1897 I gave up my chambers in the Temple, 
 having married a second time, after some years of 
 widowerhood. My wife was the daughter of a 
 Thuringian physician,
 
 CLUB AND TEMPLE LIFE 188 
 
 The great political feature at the end of the nineties 
 was the intrigues of the mining magnates of the Trans- 
 vaal to bring about the conquest of the country by 
 Great Britain in the interests of their financial oligarchy, 
 which culminated in the outbreak of war in the Autumn 
 of 1899. As is well-known, practically the whole of 
 the Radical and Socialist elements in the country were 
 on the side of the Boer Republics. The present writer 
 did his share in the agitation of the ensuing years. We 
 all felt at the time bitterly ashamed of our nationality, 
 and were most of us furiously antipatriotic, as British 
 patriotism was then understood. I remember a group 
 of us subscribed for a wreath to place on the bust of 
 Kriiger at the Paris Exhibition of 1900. The Dutch 
 Consul in Paris, who I believe was a strong Tory and 
 individualist, objecting to the declaration on the red 
 ribbon of the wreath, to the effect that it was a tribute 
 to the righteousness of the Boer cause in its resistance 
 to the crime initiated by a gang of financial capitalists, 
 had it removed. We appealed, however, to Dr. Leyds, 
 who was then in Paris, and got it reinstated. Subse- 
 quent events, and notably the great times through 
 which we have been passing lately, have obliterated 
 to a considerable extent the memory of the South 
 African War and the bitterness of feeling it engendered. 
 It is well, however, for our national pride to recall the 
 fact that it is not only the German people who can 
 allow themselves by a little beating of the " jingo " 
 patriotic drum to be made the tools of an infamous 
 gang with influence in high places, in perpetrating or 
 abetting a hideous and abominable crime. The scoun- 
 drels of Johannesburg and London who machined the 
 South African War in 1899 are not intrinsically a whit
 
 better than the scoundrels in Berlin and Vienna who 
 machined the European War of 1914. The difference 
 is one of the magnitude in the issues of the crime, rather 
 than in the intentions or acts of those guilty in bringing 
 it about. It would be disastrous indeed if the result 
 of the World War should be to increase the pompous 
 self-righteousness of the British race and to blind the 
 better part of the nation to the fact that profit-hungry 
 capitalism, aggression, and militarism are intrinsically 
 the same, and work the same evil results, in all peoples 
 alike. 
 
 The end of the nineties and the opening of the twen- 
 tieth century gave rise to the seemingly inevitable 
 dispute as to the year from which the new century 
 was to be reckoned as starting. The majority of the 
 disputants were, if I remember rightly, in favour of 
 1901 as being the first year of the century, in spite of 
 the fact of scientific authorities such as the late Lord 
 Kelvin opting for 1900. That this latter view is 
 the only possibly correct one, I must confess, is to me 
 so obvious that I can hardly conceive of any person of 
 sense and education taking the opposite one. The 
 century obviously begins with the first hour of the 
 first year and not with the first hour of the second year. 
 The cardinal number of the current year is plainly 
 that of the last completed year. It is the ordinal 
 number which gives you the real position of the year 
 in question. Thus a man on his fortieth birthday, let 
 us say, is properly deemed to be just entering upon 
 his forty-first year, and this notwithstanding the fact 
 that he will continue to be reckoned forty years of age 
 until his next birthday, i.e. the completion of his forty- 
 first year, when, though " cardinally " forty-one, he will
 
 CLUB AND TEMPLE LIFE 185 
 
 be " ordinally " in his forty-second year until his follow- 
 ing birthday, and so on. A child when it is born 
 enters upon the first year of its life. It does not begin 
 its first year after it is one year old. The conclusion 
 is obvious as regards the age of the so-called Christian 
 Era itself. With the ist of January 1900, by a parity of 
 reasoning, it is clear that the Christian Era as a measure 
 of time entered upon the 190 ist year of its existence ; 
 in other words, on the ist of January 1900 the first 
 year of the new century began, though of course it 
 was not completed until the ist of January 1901. 
 It is indeed astonishing that this perfectly plain and 
 obvious piece of arithmetic should not have been 
 grasped by large numbers of persons, who were deceived 
 by the cardinal number of the completed year I into 
 regarding it as the ordinal or first year of the century. 
 In this, as in so many other cases, the popular mind was 
 deceived by a false analogy. It treated a measure of 
 time having a beginning and ending as a concrete 
 object in space irrespective of time. I have thought 
 it worth while to devote a few remarks to this question, 
 keenly debated as it was at the junction of the two 
 centuries, inasmuch as, comparatively unimportant 
 though it is, it aptly illustrates the stupidity of the 
 average intelligence, and its inability accurately to 
 gauge anything involving a little effort of thought 
 discrimination. At the same time it shows its readi- 
 ness to be led astray by a false analogy, provided it 
 offers but the most superficial semblance of plausibility. 
 It would scarcely be believed that this absurd con- 
 troversy engendered so much heat at the time that 
 the matter came once or twice before the police courts 
 in the form of assault cases, one gentleman having
 
 186 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 tried, or at least threatened, to throw his opponent 
 on this burning question out at the door of the railway 
 carriage in which they were sitting. 
 
 Altogether, the decade of the nineties had a character 
 of its own, although not so strongly marked by new 
 departures as that of the eighties. It continued, with 
 certain modifications, the movements of the eighties, 
 while adding little substantially to those movements. 
 In its human element, the types entering upon man- 
 hood or womanhood during the nineties show little 
 essential difference from those produced by the previous 
 decade, beyond perhaps that increasing tendency to 
 blas6ness which was enshrined in the current phrase 
 of the time fin de siecle. The " decadence " of the 
 life and point of view of the cultured middle-classes 
 of the nineties was very pronounced, and was not con- 
 fined, as was the " aestheticism " of the eighties, to a 
 comparatively narrow circle of those who made a 
 special pose of it. A general atmosphere of " decadence" 
 seemed to pervade the intellectual middle-class circles 
 of the decade in question, apart from conscious affec- 
 tation. This, although it died down, or at least became 
 modified, after the opening of the new century, never- 
 theless left its general mark upon English society, 
 amid the rise of other movements and interests, until 
 the outbreak of the World War in August 1914, and had 
 a strong repercussion in new fashions in art, especially 
 in painting and music. Bizarrerie and incoherence 
 were the signs-manual of this movement.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE MENTAL OUTLOOK OF THE ENGLAND OF 
 TO-DAY AND YESTERDAY 
 
 WRITING as I now am, while the great European War 
 is as yet unfinished, in speaking of the England of to-day 
 I am perhaps hardly quite accurate. In due strictness 
 I should have said the England of Midsummer 1914. 
 But inasmuch as no new development has as yet arisen, 
 the fact that the great wave of the war influences has 
 for a moment submerged all other issues would hardly 
 justify us in assuming that below this wave the ways 
 of looking at things, at the period immediately pre- 
 ceding the war, do not still subsist, although tor the 
 moment obscured. That the years of the war will 
 leave their profound mark on the British character, 
 and especially on its attitude towards practical social 
 and political issues, I regard as a certainty. But the 
 change wrought by the war will probably mark its 
 full measure some years after the conclusion of peace, 
 and meanwhile the mental attitude, at least in theo- 
 retical matters, that obtained in the Summer of 1914 
 will maintain itself in essentials perhaps for a generation 
 to come as the groundwork of the national world-view. 
 I speak of " national world- view " as it is convenient and 
 more germane to these reminiscences to regard these
 
 188 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 manifestations of modern thought as they express 
 themselves in this country and as coloured by its habits 
 and traditions, although of course, strictly speaking, 
 there is nothing essential in modern types of thought 
 that is purely provincial or national and not more 
 or less common to the whole of civilized humanity, 
 i.e. to all Europe and its colonies, including, of course, 
 America, and not omitting Japan. But, as above said, 
 it belongs to this work to deal more especially with 
 the movements of thought of to-day and of the past 
 generation as manifested in the English-speaking race, 
 and especially in Great Britain itself. The temperament 
 of the Anglo-Saxon race, moral and intellectual, has 
 undoubtedly something peculiarly its own. This has 
 become evident ever since the close of the Middle Ages, 
 and it remained notably true till the end of the mid- 
 Victorian period, as it is termed. Even now, notwith- 
 standing the more cosmopolitan atmosphere of the last, 
 and especially the current generation, it is a fact which 
 has not lost its significance. 
 
 I have already dealt in earlier chapters with the 
 rise and progress of the Socialist movement in Great 
 Britain, and this, therefore, need not detain us here. 
 What I propose to deal with in this chapter is the actual 
 position of English popular thought in short, of current 
 opinion towards certain religious, ethical, civic, and 
 aesthetic questions as contrasted with two generations, 
 and even one generation, ago. 
 
 First of all, let us examine the present position of 
 the popular English mind towards certain problems 
 usually regarded as at the basis of religious ideas. We 
 have already seen how in the early sixties the crassest 
 obscurantism, based on the current creed, prevailed in
 
 THE MENTAL OUTLOOK 189 
 
 the moral and intellectual attitude of the whole middle 
 class, and in fact with all but a few literary and spe- 
 cially intellectual circles. Things were just beginning 
 to move then, but very slowly. Intellectual darkness 
 and social terrorism, as described by the late Mr. Benn 
 in his " History of English Rationalism during the 
 Nineteenth Century," was but little shaken till quite 
 the close of the sixties. The view that religion was 
 necessary for the masses, and that anything tending 
 to shake the belief or dull intellectual acquiescence of 
 these same masses in the current theology was fraught 
 with grievous danger to property and the State, and 
 hence to be severely discountenanced, was commonly 
 to be heard up to the beginning of the seventies. That 
 generation has now, however, passed away. The average 
 man in society no longer thinks it necessary even to 
 pretend to any belief in the dogmas of the Christian 
 Churches, but it was long before the fundamental 
 articles of theological belief ceased to be regarded as 
 a necessary badge of respectability. 1 The question 
 then arose how the problem was to be solved of not 
 discarding the badge or social cachet while getting rid 
 of the obligation to profess any positive belief in old 
 Theistic dogma. 
 
 It was solved on the following lines. While it was 
 
 1 Even to-day we see the remains of the old obscurantist 
 sentiment flickering in certain quarters. Thus, in journals and 
 publications intended for general reading, we commonly find a 
 tendency to defend as much of whilom orthodox opinion as is 
 possible in the face of modern knowledge and modern thought 
 generally. In any doubtful point the case is mostly presented 
 to the general reader with the scales weighted in favour of the 
 less heterodox view, whatever that may be. This may be 
 regarded, let us hope, as a last dying rumble of the old 
 intolerant thunder.
 
 190 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 felt that to avow Atheism under that name, or in any 
 unequivocal form, would have meant a serious rupture 
 with the tradition of speculative respectability, a 
 convenient way out was found by which a man with 
 a social position to guard might retain his disbelief 
 in Theism, while vehemently repudiating the charge 
 of Atheism. A new word was coined to this end by 
 the late Professor Huxley at one of the gatherings 
 of the old Metaphysical Society, which used to meet 
 in the early eighties at the late Mr. James Knowles's 
 house on Clapham Common. To save his social and 
 speculative respectability, the Atheist had now only 
 to call himself an Agnostic and he was comparatively 
 all right. A somewhat doubtful line of distinction 
 was sought to be drawn between the alleged point of 
 view of the despised and rejected Atheist and the 
 relatively acceptable Agnostic. The Atheist, it was 
 said, was a foolish, if not wicked person, who thought 
 he could prove the non-existence of God. The Agnostic, 
 on the other hand, was, whether one agreed with him 
 or not, a decent and reasonable person, who did not 
 deny the Theistic contention, but merely asserted the 
 necessary absence of all proof of that contention as 
 being deducible from the nature of human knowledge. 
 The absence of any categorical denial on his part thus 
 saved the situation as regards respectability for the 
 happy Agnostic. 
 
 Now, as to the alleged ground of distinction between 
 the scorned and the tolerated opinion, if we examine 
 it, we shall find, I think, that it is more vulnerable to 
 criticism than its protagonists imagined. In the first 
 place, it may fairly be doubted whether the Atheist 
 supposed ever existed in the flesh in short, whether
 
 THE MENTAL OUTLOOK 191 
 
 he is not a dummy man of straw, set up by the Agnostic 
 for the purpose of being knocked down again. Per- 
 sonally, I cannot recall the case of any reputed Atheist 
 who claimed that he could prove the non-existence of 
 the Deity as a general proposition, although he may 
 have contended that some particular conception or 
 definition of such a Being involved inconsistencies or 
 even absurdities. It is certain, however, that before 
 the days of Agnosticism any one who repudiated a 
 positive belief in the Theists' dogma, on the ground 
 that the evidence of its truth was lacking, would have 
 been counted an Atheist. But in the second place, 
 even admitting the theoretical validity of the distinc- 
 tion sought to be drawn by the Agnostic between his 
 own position and that of the Atheist, it is not difficult 
 to show that it has no practical importance, or even 
 significance, whatever. Between the absence of all 
 proof of an affirmative and the presence of the proof 
 of a negative there may be a logical distinction, but 
 it is without practical results. We see this even in 
 ordinary life, in a weaker form, in the distinc- 
 tion between an impossibility and a high degree of 
 improbability. 
 
 Here, also, the undoubtedly sound theoretical dis- 
 tinction has no bearing whatever on conduct. I take 
 an illustration I have given elsewhere. The ordinary 
 suburban resident believes in the possibility of the fall 
 of aerolites, and he disbelieves in basilisks (let us say) ; 
 in other words, he regards the latter as an absurdity, 
 or an impossibility. Nevertheless, if he is contem- 
 plating an evening stroll on Clapham Common, he will 
 be just as little concerned with the undoubted possi- 
 bility, albeit high improbability, of having his head
 
 192 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 smashed by the fall of an aerolite, as he would be with 
 the absurdity or impossibility of his being scorched by 
 the glance of a basilisk. For practical purposes 
 there is thus no distinction between theoretical im- 
 possibility and theoretical possibility, when the pro- 
 bability falls below a certain standard. Hence, to 
 come back to our original point, the Atheist's alleged 
 belief that the non-existence of a deity can be demon- 
 strated, and the Agnostic's admitted conviction that 
 the nature of human knowledge precludes the possi- 
 bility of any positive demonstration, or even probable 
 proof, of his existence, amounts for practical purposes 
 to precisely the same thing. Yet if the distinction 
 commonly alleged between the Atheist and the Agnostic 
 rests on what is little better than a logical quibble, 
 it is not impossible perhaps, if we try, to discover 
 a real distinction. But should we do so, it is in 
 the region of ethical sentiment, rather than logic or 
 speculative theory, that we must look for it. 
 
 While conceding the impossibility of proving the 
 negative of the Theist's contention, the Atheist may 
 be supposed to address the Theist as follows : " Even 
 admitting the truth of your speculative position as to 
 the existence of some sort of personality who is the 
 creator and orderer of the Universe, there is nothing 
 in the nature of the ordering of this Universe that 
 would entitle me to regard such a being as an object 
 worthy of my worship. To any argument based on 
 the imperfections or positive evils of which the ordering 
 of the world is full, you Theists of all sects and per- 
 suasions content yourselves with replying by vague 
 assurances that, to use a vulgar metaphor, ' it will all 
 come out in the washing ' that all is meant for the
 
 THE MENTAL OUTLOOK 198 
 
 best, and will ultimately turn out to be for the best. 
 In fact, in your theology and ethics you accept the 
 position of the victim of the confidence-trick man. 
 Just as the former is willing to hand over his cash 
 into the keeping of a person of whose bona fides he has 
 no evidence, so you are prepared to pledge your faith 
 and religious ideal on the unproven assumption that 
 the author and providence of this Universe is ethically 
 good, and that all is for the best in this best of all 
 possible worlds. Now, I am not prepared to do this. 
 Nay, further, I find you are acting more foolishly even 
 than the victim of the confidence-trick man. The 
 latter is usually a plausible person, at least, and his 
 victim has nothing definite on which to base his sus- 
 picions. The case with the creator and providence 
 whose existence you assume is far otherwise. Here 
 the horrors and evils present in the world of his 
 supposed creation and ordering are very real, and 
 obtrude themselves upon our notice. In the face 
 of these facts my conscience will not allow me to 
 regard the author or permitter (for that matter) of 
 these things as worthy of my respect, not to say 
 adoration. I am not to be beguiled by cheap 
 references to the limitations of the human faculty, 
 by tall talk about ' wise purposes,' ' beneficent 
 ends,' etc., in excuse for the ways of your assumed 
 deity. 
 
 "The limitations of the human viewpoint cannot 
 possibly justify us without other adequate grounds 
 in concluding the very opposite of what that viewpoint 
 indicates. The distinction sought to be drawn 
 between action and permission, to palliate from the 
 Theistic point of view the|evils of the world, is futile.
 
 194 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 If I permit a wrong to be perpetrated which I could 
 prevent, I am at least passively guilty of that wrong. 
 To plead it as an excuse would be, in fact, a mean 
 attempt to evade the moral judgment that condemns 
 me. There is a well-known legal maxim which says 
 ' qui facit per alium facit per se.' There are, moreover, 
 certain actions and omissions, certain vile and mean 
 lines of conduct, which no end can justify as means. 
 The most pious bourgeois condemns the conduct of the 
 little boy who steals money from the till in order to 
 put it in the missionary -box, or of the gambler who 
 cheats at cards in order to maintain his aged mother, 
 yet conduct which he would reprove in the little boy 
 or the cardsharper he condones in his God. That 
 the end justifies the means may possibly in some cases 
 be admitted as regards Man, with his limited outlook 
 and powers of action. But I submit that on any 
 ethical basis it can never apply as an excuse for the 
 prima facie evil acts of a being possessed of the power 
 and knowledge assumed in the notion of God as the 
 creator and providence of this world. For my con- 
 science no amount of ' wise purposes ' or ' beneficent 
 ends ' will exonerate the author of the world as it is. 
 They are to me as the ' good intentions ' with which 
 the way to Hell is said to be paved. The transparent 
 sophistry of theologians in attempting the impossible 
 task of justifying their divinity fills me with nothing 
 but disgust and loathing." 
 
 Thus the Atheist. This moral attitude might possibly 
 be regarded as differentiating the conscientious Atheist 
 from the mere Agnostic. According to this definition, 
 the Atheist is essentially ethical and religious in his 
 judgment, while the Agnostic need not be so. It must
 
 THE MENTAL OUTLOOK 195 
 
 be admitted, however, that the Atheist thus becomes 
 an anti-Theist. 1 
 
 One of the most striking phenomena of social change 
 in the present generation, the counterpart of the rise 
 and domination of Imperialism in politics, is the 
 installation of imperialistic or patriotic sentiment in 
 the place of the old religious feeling. Patriotism, as 
 it is called, has undoubtedly taken the place for- 
 merly occupied by Christian sentiment and aspiration 
 in the mind of the average man. This was noticeable 
 enough before the war, but the war, of course, has thrown 
 it into the strongest possible relief. In how many 
 thousands of those who have volunteered for the front 
 do we not find the ideal object for which they are 
 prepared to sacrifice themselves to be England or the 
 British Empire. And yet how many of those who 
 profess, and sincerely profess, attachment to England 
 as their ideal object, if they thought a little, would 
 not have to admit that there is much in England, 
 politically, socially, and morally, of which they dis- 
 approve ! Yet this does not prevent the ideal of 
 nationality from dominating their whole emotional 
 being. Of course, to a great extent the present-day 
 religion of Patriotism has been worked up more or 
 less artificially in the Press and on the political plat- 
 form. The new religion of Patriotism is even preached 
 by the different Christian sects as the modern expres- 
 
 1 I have often thought that, given a new Dante or Milton, a 
 great epic might be written on Theistic lines, entitled " The 
 Remorse of God/' understanding by God a personal or quasi- 
 personal creator and providence. The idea would be, admitting 
 the essential moral goodness of the latter, his gradual awakening 
 to a sense of the moral perversion and wickedness involved in 
 the doing or permitting of evil for the problematical achievement 
 of " wise purposes " and " beneficent ends."
 
 196 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 sion of their creed. It is inculcated through the Boy 
 Scouts' movement and in the present-day education 
 of our youth. For the religion of Patriotism, the 
 national or imperial State is the ultima ratio. It does 
 not recognize any organism or collectivity as object of 
 conduct higher than the State. Humanity is for it 
 a mere phrase. The solidarity, moreover, of those 
 scattered through many existing States, holding like 
 views and like aspirations, never suggests itself to it 
 as perhaps an intrinsically higher object of conduct 
 than any existing State, on the analogy of the mediaeval 
 conception of Christendom. The only alternative to 
 this erection of imperialistic jingo sentiment, under 
 the name of Patriotism, into a religion, is Socialism. 
 The aspiration towards a classless society and inter- 
 national brotherhood is for Socialism a supreme ideal 
 of life and conduct. 
 
 The whole outlook of to-day shows the complete 
 loss of hold of the older faith on modern society. The 
 change of mental attitude between now and fifty years 
 ago is enormous. It would perhaps not be going too 
 far to say that the difference between the mental out- 
 look of the average man of 1866 and of 1916 is quite 
 as great as, if not greater than, that between the man 
 of 1866 and the corresponding man of 1766. Such has 
 been the acceleration of the tempo of social and 
 intellectual changes within the last two generations. 
 
 Amid the various movements indicating modified 
 views of the relations of life, what is known as the 
 woman's movement has not failed to attract much 
 attention. I do not propose here to discuss this ques- 
 tion at any length. I have already done so elsewhere. 1 
 1 E.g. in the " Fraud of Feminism" (Grant Richards),
 
 THE MENTAL OUTLOOK 197 
 
 But there are certain of its aspects with which one is 
 continually confronted at the present day. The freeing 
 of women from the conventional bonds of the society 
 of fifty years ago has had a wide influence : among 
 other things, it has had the result of producing a new 
 set of sex-illusions in men. The scorning and dis- 
 paragement of the old idea of the domestic function 
 as being pre-eminently the raison d'etre of woman, which 
 has become the commonplace of many advanced circles, 
 has led, on the one hand, to the illusion among men 
 that they must look in their womankind not merely 
 for sexual fidelity, and kindliness in word and conduct, 
 but for intellectual companionship, and to the reading 
 into their relations with their wives and other female 
 associates an intellectual companionship which is not 
 there. On the other hand, it has led in women to the 
 cultivation of self-assertion and priggery, in order to 
 make up in the eyes of men for their real intellectual 
 deficiencies. The assumption of intellectual indepen- 
 dence gives to the woman of the present day a special 
 impress. Yet it is noteworthy that after the complete 
 social and intellectual emancipation of the female 
 sex, which has been going on now for wellnigh two 
 generations (reckoning from its first beginnings), that 
 the number of really eminent women of the first class 
 has not increased. The George Sands, George Eliots, 
 the Rosa Bonheurs, the Charlotte Brontes, all belong 
 to the period when women were not emancipated as 
 they are now. What has the present day to show on 
 the score of female geniuses ? That there are a suffi- 
 ciency of intelligent and able women going about is 
 of course not to be denied, but I can only recall one 
 who could be quoted as showing an intellectual calibre
 
 198 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 which could take its place in that of the front rank 
 of men in the same department. In the authoress of 
 ' Themis " we undoubtedly have, even more than in 
 the women of earlier generations mentioned above, an 
 intellectual power and flexibility of intellect which 
 may truly be termed masculine. 
 
 Otto Weininger, in his book " Sex and Character," 
 remarks upon the fact that in both the sexes you usually 
 find a more or less of ingredient of the opposite sex. 
 This may be slight and almost inappreciable, or it 
 may be an important factor. It may manifest itself 
 also in various ways, physically, morally, and intel- 
 lectually, but the appearance at rare intervals of a 
 woman with an exceptional muscular development, an 
 exceptional strength of purpose (a Lady Macbeth, a 
 Jeanne d'Arc, etc.) or of intellectual perception, 
 approaching or equalling that of the first rank of men 
 in the same department, may fairly be regarded as 
 examples of lusus nature, rather than us indicating 
 any general potentialities on the part of the female 
 sex. Had there been anything approaching real 
 equality in mental disposition between the sexes, this 
 equality should, I contend, have shown itself in the 
 course of the last half century in an unmistakable 
 manner, and this it certainly has not done. 
 
 Those who are forever contending for the average 
 intellectual equality of women with men, it is difficult 
 to believe do so in complete bona fides. They studiedly 
 ignore that prominent characteristic of the human 
 female, the inability to follow out a logical argument, 
 coupled with the unwillingness to admit the plainest 
 fact or proof which tells against a cherished prejudice 
 or emotion. How often do we find a woman, con-
 
 THE MENTALijOUTLOOK 199 
 
 fronted by such fact or proof, stop her ears, or rush 
 out of the room with some such phrase as " Oh, leave 
 off, I can't bear it ! " I would ask the apostles of 
 female equality if they have ever heard of a man acting 
 in this way. Or, again, how many women they have 
 known who do not change their opinions with their 
 moods, or with changes in their relations with persons. 
 The sort of conduct referred to belongs to the hysterical 
 side of woman, of which so many aspects present them- 
 selves to common observation, but which Feminist 
 advocates are often found dishonest enough to ignore 
 or even to deny. 
 
 With all the talk of equality between the sexes, we find 
 the notion of chivalry, based upon the opposite theory 
 of woman's physical and mental weakness, " moult 
 no feather." Women, as before remarked, are to have 
 all the rights and responsibilities of men so long as these 
 are honourable and agreeable, but there is no serious 
 suggestion amongst Feminists that they should give up 
 any of the privileges " chivalry " (so called) accords 
 them by virtue of their sex. Evidence galore of this 
 is to be found, not only in the comparatively unim- 
 portant manners and customs of everyday life, but in 
 our courts of law, criminal and civil. We never hear 
 a hint from the side of the woman's movement that 
 men and women convicted respectively of the same, 
 or equally heinous, offences should have the same 
 measure of punishment meted out to them. There 
 is no notion among the Feminist fraternity that what is 
 sauce for the gander should also be sauce for the goose. 
 On the contrary, every effort is made by the pretended 
 advocates of equality to emphasize and strengthen 
 the so-called chivalric sentiment, based on an entirely
 
 200 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 different view of the respective powers and capacities 
 of the sexes, together with the consequences as regards 
 female privilege deducible from that sentiment. 1 Such, 
 in a few words, describes the body of opinion known as 
 the woman's movement up to the early Summer of 1914. 
 The attitude of public opinion as regards the marriage 
 question, though partly coloured by the view taken 
 of the woman question generally, is by no means alto- 
 gether so. On the contrary, it runs frequently on 
 independent lines. The question of the right of the 
 State to determine the private relations of the indi- 
 vidual in the matter of sex is one which has acquired 
 increasing prominence during the present generation. 
 Although long before the matter of private reflexion 
 and discussion among the thoughtful, it was lifted 
 into the arena of public debate largely through the 
 publication by the late Mr. Grant Allen of his didactic 
 novel, " The Woman Who Did." Viewed on rational- 
 istic principles, and apart from theological preposses- 
 sions or ethical prejudices deriving or surviving from 
 earlier social conditions, it has become to many persons 
 increasingly doubtful whether the sex relation in itself 
 is a subject belonging to morality at all, any more 
 than the exercise of any other physiological function. 
 This, of course, at first sight wears the aspect of an 
 astounding paradox. But it may be observed that I 
 italicize the words in itself. For it is quite clear that 
 in the general run of human conduct it often involves, 
 
 * A striking illustration of the unfair twist to emotion given by 
 the chivalric sentiment was afforded during the present war by 
 the Cavell case. Amid all the admiration showered upon Edith 
 Cavell, and indignation at her execution, not one word was heard 
 of the case of the Belgian architect, Philippe Bancq, who was 
 shot for precisely the same offence, at the same time and place, 
 as Edith Cavell herself 1
 
 THE MENTAL OUTLOOK 201 
 
 owing to the conditions surrounding it, serious moral 
 considerations. But the distinction between this sex 
 question considered per se and per aliud has never 
 as yet been kept sufficiently in view. Granting the 
 distinction named, the question resolves itself into 
 how far society is justified by moral pressure, or still 
 more, through its organ the State, by compulsory legal 
 enactment, in interfering with what is au fond a purely 
 private and personal question for the individual man 
 or woman. The chief point, of course, in which the 
 sex-relation of the individual affects society in general, 
 in fact, we may say the only point in which it directly 
 affects it, is the question of offspring. How far can 
 the welfare of offspring be effectively safeguarded in 
 society as at present constituted ? Is the coercion 
 of the individual, either by moral pressure or by legal 
 compulsion, such as the existing Marriage Laws, neces- 
 sary, or is it the most effective way of achieving the 
 end in view ? An increasing body of opinion among 
 the thinking classes of the community is tending to 
 pronounce against the necessity and even against the 
 practical expediency of the existing coercive Marriage 
 Laws, and in favour of the constituting of the marriage 
 relation as an entirely free union, or at best as one in 
 which the law would only concern itself, as in other 
 cases of contract, with the enforcement of the condi- 
 tions, if any, originally agreed upon between the 
 parties themselves. Marriage would become thenceforth 
 another case of the oft-quoted principle enunciated 
 by the late Sir Henry Maine, that legal progress is 
 from status to contract. It is certainly difficult to see 
 that the retention of the marriage relation as a status 
 has been productive of the happiness or well-being of
 
 202 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 the community. That other and more efficient means 
 of safeguarding the welfare of children than such as 
 aim at the legal handcuffing together of the parents 
 and the hampering of their personal freedom for this 
 is the result of the Marriage Laws of to-day will 
 hardly admit of a doubt by any open-minded person 
 who has given the subject his careful consideration. 
 The progress made within the last few years in intelli- 
 gent public opinion as regards this question is indeed 
 remarkable. The question of marriage has at least 
 reached the stage in which opinions differing from the 
 traditional and conventional ones are admitted as 
 being reasonably and honestly held, and acted upon, 
 by many people. It is noteworthy that some of the 
 Suffragette leaders profess to be champions of the 
 conventional opinions in the matter in question. Is 
 this with a view to winning over reactionary opinion, or 
 is it for the purpose of maintaining the unfair incidence 
 of the present coercive Marriage Laws upon the husband, 
 whereby the wife is enabled to browbeat him at her 
 pleasure ? In any case, the question of free or legal 
 marriage union can at most be one of civil expediency 
 rather than of morals. The subjecting oneself or not 
 to a legal form, whichever way it be decided, cannot 
 possibly be a question of morality or immorality. 
 
 Leaving social and political matters and reverting 
 to those of religious or speculative interest, a word 
 should be said on the comparative success in the early 
 nineties of that singular personality known as Madame 
 Blavatsky. Whether impostor, as most people regarded 
 her, or not, she certainly had a somewhat sensational 
 success in the declining years of the last century. The 
 speculative tenets she promulgated, under the name
 
 THE MENTAL OUTLOOK 208 
 
 Theosophy, or, as I believe it was originally termed, 
 Esoteric Buddhism, were, as Professor Rhys Davies 
 assured me, when they received their first boom, not 
 Buddhist at all, but represented the common Yogi 
 doctrines of India. As a matter of fact, we may trace 
 them in Europe at least as long ago as the second 
 century with its Gnostic systems. Especially may be 
 noticed in this connexion the writing known as the 
 " Pistis Sophia." But mystic doctrines of a similar 
 character are traceable in various parts of Southern 
 and Western Asia long before the Christian Era, and, 
 as we all know, spread throughout the Roman Empire 
 with considerable success during the first and second 
 centuries. They seem to have a tendency to reappear 
 whenever a particular civilization becomes worn out 
 and its traditional shibboleths and the notions pre- 
 viously binding it together are rapidly going into 
 the melting-pot. It is true that, in our present tran- 
 sitional period, the ideal of social evolution has for 
 the first time appeared above the horizon of human 
 thought and aspiration in a definite form, but it is 
 not yet strong enough to supersede the old interest, 
 among the thoughtful, in the fortunes of the individual 
 personality or soul. To overcome, even in thought, 
 this self-centredness of the individual self-consciousness 
 and its interests, in favour of that which from its own 
 standpoint is external to, and appaiently detached 
 from, itself, is indeed a hard thing for most men. Such 
 an attitude may indeed, as every great crisis shows, 
 obtain sporadically on a wave of exceptional enthu- 
 siasm, and be the stimulus to the most heroic self- 
 sacrifice, but it does not endure as a permanent state 
 of mind. Jaures puts the thing trenchantly (" L'Armee
 
 204 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 Nouvelle," p. 404). Speaking with reference to the 
 hopelessness of countless individual lives and destinies 
 under Capitalism : " Quand on songe que dans notre 
 univers encore barbare, la vie et la conscience sont 
 discontinues ; que chaque centre de sensibilite est 
 impenetrable aux autres ; que pour Findividu la douleur 
 individuelle est un absolu ; que la continuity et 1'in- 
 finit6 des choses sont encore tout ext^rieures et super- 
 ficielles ; que pour tout tre vivant la loi se resume 
 tout entiere en son propre destin ; que la trame illimitee 
 du temps est dechiree en autant de lambeaux qu'il 
 y a d'e"tres ephemeres, et que, par un surcroit de 
 durete et de scandale, beaucoup ont souffert et meurerit 
 sans avoir mme entrevu a quoi leur douleur et leur 
 mort peuvent servir ; quand on pense en effet a tout 
 cela, il n'y a pas de progres social qui puisse pleine- 
 ment consoler de toutes les souffrances qui en furent 
 la rarigon." 
 
 It is undoubtedly the feeling to which Jaures refers 
 in this passage, of the absoluteness and intranslata- 
 bility, so to say, of the individual personality and its 
 interests, which is the stumbling-block with many 
 in the way of an ideal, for which any given personality 
 is rather accidental than essential. And the strength 
 of this feeling still remaining it is on which theories 
 of the supernatural, including many a new quackery, 
 base their success in the modern world. This was 
 undoubtedly the soil in which Madame Blavatsky's 
 propaganda struck root. The rejection of Christian 
 dogma does not necessarily mean any lack of inter- 
 est on the part of the individual in the destiny and 
 fortunes of his own soul. The dogmatic assurances of 
 Christian Theology in this connexion having lost their
 
 THE MENTAL OUTLOOK 205 
 
 hold, refuge is sought in other means of consolement. 
 Although I would not for a moment be understood 
 as placing the two movements on the same level, the 
 above remarks apply, as already observed, at least to 
 some extent, to the Psychical Research Society. The 
 latter, there is no doubt, represents a movement based 
 on scientific lines and run by men of scientific standing. 
 But the motive inspiring many of those who take an 
 interest in it may unquestionably be found in the 
 clinging of many minds to the individual soul and its 
 fortunes. It would be futile to deny the existence of 
 this feeling in some of the best of us, but it is also 
 absurd to pretend that, natural though it may be, there 
 is anything specially high and noble in it, and that, 
 on the contrary, those who find their strongest concern 
 and supremest aspiration in the realization of a higher 
 humanity do not represent a loftier ideal than the 
 seekers after the destiny of their own souls. 
 
 We may conclude this chapter by noticing, in con- 
 trast to modern notions, one or two specimens of the 
 bourgeois wisdom of one's youth which have long since 
 lost their savour. They afford an insight into the 
 mentality of the British middle-class man of the early- 
 and mid-Victorian epoch. These pieces of wisdom 
 were coined for the purpose of edification. Thus, the 
 youth of that period were seriously told, as an argument 
 against the use of strong language, that it was un- 
 dignified, since it implied that the man who swore did 
 not consider his own bare word as carrying enough 
 weight of itself to guarantee the truth of what he said. 
 The idea of any one taking this somewhat wiredrawn 
 piece of casuistry seriously seems funny at the present 
 day. It would be interesting to know whether many
 
 206 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 ingenuous youths of, say, the fifties and sixties of the 
 last century were really deterred from the expression 
 of their feelings " in well set terms " by the terrible 
 implication that their doing so meant that they under- 
 valued their own character for veracity. The habitual 
 use of strong language on any and every occasion, we 
 may agree, is to be deprecated, as both indicating and 
 tending to encourage an unbalanced emotional temper. 
 But there is no doubt that there are occasions on which 
 the employment of purpled speech is not only a useful 
 and salutary vent to the feelings, but also impresses 
 the hearer. In any case, the reason for abstaining 
 from it excogitated by the pious Victorian brain is 
 characteristic and amusing, if not convincing. 
 
 Another select specimen of edificatory Victorian 
 wisdom on somewhat similar lines to the last may be 
 found in the appraisement of the moral bearings of 
 suicide, which consisted in the assertion that the man 
 who took his own life exhibited cowardice in so doing, 
 since his act was a proof that he lacked the courage 
 to face the responsibilities of existence. Now, we may 
 fairly ask ourselves whether the good Victorian souls, 
 who felt it their duty to put forward this thesis for 
 the sake of edification, did not do so with their tongues 
 in their cheeks. The unsophisticated human being 
 knows that the man who deliberately faces death in 
 any form, and whether self-inflicted or not, is the very 
 opposite of a coward. He may be everything else that 
 you like, but he is most assuredly not a coward. The 
 willingness to face death, no matter for what cause, 
 whether it be good or bad, is of itself an all-convincing 
 guarantee at least of one virtue courage. No amount 
 of feeble paradoxical casuistry will suffice to stamp
 
 THE MENTAL OUTLOOK 207 
 
 the man who is prepared to do this, whatever be his 
 motives, as other than a brave man. The universally 
 accepted definitions of courage and co wax dice essentially 
 involve this, and the bona fides of the goody-goody 
 Victorian moralist who would have called it in question 
 by his sophistications may fairly be doubted. We 
 know, of course, that the habit of tampering with truth 
 for the sake of edification is not a new one, but its ethical 
 justification is, to put it mildly, at least highly debatable. 
 One of the gems of the bourgeois wisdom of the 
 Victorian era, which was supposed by its votaries to 
 be crushing as against all theories of economic equality, 
 was the assumption that poverty was the result of 
 laziness, and wealth of industry on the part of its 
 possessors. According to the assumption in question, 
 the existence side by side in the same society of a 
 working class and a capitalist class was due to the 
 fact that one set of human beings, or its progenitors, 
 was idle and thriftless, and another set industrious 
 and thrifty. The working classes, the wage-earners, 
 those who live by the toil of their hands, represented 
 the first class, those who possessed wealth and lived 
 on their incomes in a word, the aristocracy and the 
 middle classes stood for the second. The exact way 
 in which this great economic difference came about 
 was never explained ; but the worthy bourgeois none 
 the less persuaded himself, or professed to have per- 
 suaded himself, into a belief that it was even so that 
 once upon a time there existed a lot of idle, worthless 
 rascals side by side with another set of frugal and 
 industrious saints, and that these two sets of persons 
 were the progenitors and the protagonists of the poor 
 and the rich classes of to-day respectively, to whose
 
 208 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 descendants the vices of the one class and the virtues 
 of the other had been for the most part transmitted. 
 The above is no exaggeration of the social and economic 
 beliefs of otherwise fairly well-educated people in this 
 country a generation or two ago. That, speaking 
 generally, poverty has no more to do with idleness and 
 thriftlessness, or wealth with industry and frugality, 
 than either have with the spots on the sun, is a pro- 
 position the average bourgeois mind of the England of 
 the fifties and the sixties of the last century would have 
 confessed itself altogether unable to grasp. The socio- 
 logical views of our grandparents on this question 
 afford another illustration of the often-noted fact 
 that, if the sheerest nonsense be only enough repeated 
 and dinned into the ears of people by themselves and 
 others, it will be accepted without further investigation 
 as though it were a proved scientific fact. Of course, 
 in this case the acceptance of the doctrine in question 
 was aided by the class interest, which led to the wish 
 to believe what was pleasant and consoling to itself. 
 
 The above illustrations are, I think, fair specimens 
 of the lines on which the popular middle-class wisdom 
 of a couple of generations ago ran. The idea was 
 always edification edification, that is, from the current 
 bourgeois point of view first, truth and correct reason- 
 ing very much afterwards. 
 
 We may remark, by the way, that we find sub- 
 stantially the same thing to-day in what is known 
 as " judge-made law," especially criminal law. All 
 such judicial decisions will be found on examination 
 to have for their end, not the logical interpretation 
 of a law or statute, but " edification " from the 
 judge's point of view, to wit, the enlarging of the
 
 THE MENTAL OUTLOOK 209 
 
 scope of the law as much as feasible, i.e. the bring 
 ing as many acts as possible under its ban. Thus, 
 the decision by which, in the case of two persons agree- 
 ing to commit suicide together, and only one of them 
 dying, the survivor is chargeable with the murder of 
 his partner ; or that other decision, according to which 
 any one unintentionally causing the death of another 
 person, through the perpetration of an illegal act, is 
 likewise guilty of the crime of wilful murder, are both 
 plainly at variance with justice, as they are with any 
 reasonable or common-sense definition of the crime of 
 wilful murder. These decisions, especially the last 
 named, even amount to an impudent violation of the 
 obvious intention of the common law, the element of 
 wilfulness being plainly absent. It is the same with 
 most other cases of decision-law. Statutes are wrenched 
 out of their sockets, with the aid of the most trans- 
 parent casuistry, to make them cover cases they were 
 never meant to cover, to satisfy the lust of the judiciary 
 for the manufacture of new crimes or the enhancing 
 of the severity of punishment in the case of old ones, 
 thereby increasing their own power over their victims. 
 The flagrant and shameless violation of principle, of 
 logic, and of right judgment in the interpretation of 
 law by the judiciary in the interests of this theory, 
 that it is desirable to catch as many victims as possible 
 in the net of the law, and thereby augment the power 
 of its administrators, amounts to a scandal. 
 
 What changes the great World War will make in the 
 general character of the British mind in its activities 
 and receptivities it is of course impossible to say as 
 yet, but, as already pointed out in the beginning of the 
 present chapter, it seems hardly likely that views and 
 
 14
 
 210 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 ways of looking at things will undergo an immediate 
 and complete transformation, although they can hardly 
 fail to be modified by the crisis through which the 
 world has passed since the Summer of 1914. Mean- 
 while, I offer these admittedly detached remarks on 
 certain aspects of the nineteenth and early twentieth- 
 century thought to be followed up at will by those 
 interested.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 VARIORUM REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 IT may not be amiss to say a few words on some of 
 the more noteworthy men I have known otherwise 
 than in connexion with the Socialist movement. Let 
 us begin with Philosophy. Foremost amongst the 
 Englishmen who took an active part in what was 
 known as the " Young " or Neo-Hegelian movement 
 in this country was Richard Burdon Haldane (now 
 Lord Haldane). I first met Haldane in 1882, when 
 this movement in Philosophy was at its height, having 
 driven back the old English empirical or associations! 
 school (to employ a military metaphor) to its second 
 and third line of defences. In a word, the British 
 empirical school, whose doctrines had long been thought 
 the final word in Philosophy, was already regarded by 
 the up-to-date men as old-fashioned and commonplace. 
 I saw Haldane for the first time at a meeting of the old 
 Aristotelian Society, at which he spoke in favour of the 
 Neo-Hegelian position. Our acquaintance ripened, and 
 he used sometimes to come down to Croydon, where I 
 was then living, on a Sunday, and many a walk I have 
 had with him on the Surrey hills. Among the smaller 
 incidents of these walks I remember, while we were 
 crossing a field, Haldane's impressing upon me the legal
 
 213 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 point that should any question of trespass arise in such 
 a case, the correct thing was to tender a small coin for 
 technical damage to the owner or his agent, with the 
 words " I claim no right," which should stop all further 
 proceedings. 
 
 I can well recall a Sunday in 1885 when he arrived 
 and informed me that he was about to devote him- 
 self to a political career, and had entered as Liberal 
 candidate for Haddingtonshire. He proceeded to 
 argue that the principles of Gladstonian Liberalism 
 represented the political outcome or reflex of the 
 Hegelian thought-movement of the " Ictee." A dis- 
 cussion ensued, in which I traversed his main position 
 alike in Philosophy and in politics. Later on the 
 champion of Woman Suffrage Bills, Haldane at this 
 time and for some years after was opposed to the move- 
 ment, remarking to me on one occasion that the main 
 object many of these women had in desiring the 
 suffrage was to force rascally and unjust laws against 
 men onto the Statute-book. It is to be regretted, from 
 the point of view of consistency, that Haldane sub- 
 sequently undertook the ministerial piloting through 
 the House of Lords of that most infamous piece of 
 anti-male legislation, the so-called " White Slavery 
 Act " of 1912. 
 
 Throughout his career Haldane has never aban- 
 doned his devotion to Hegel, and always has a 
 portrait of the great German thinker near him in the 
 room where he is working. This, together with his 
 well-known appreciation of German thought and German 
 literature generally, has undoubtedly been the cause 
 of some of the attacks with which he has been assailed, 
 with insinuations as to his being a " pro-German,"
 
 VARIORUM 218 
 
 during the present war. Whatever view we may 
 take of Haldane's career as a politician, or of his theo- 
 retical opinions, political or otherwise, there is no doubt 
 that he has been subjected to most unfair criticism, 
 which is really based on the fact of his interest in the 
 intellectual side of German life. As regards another 
 of the accusations against him, we must never forget 
 that a man who has not the point of view of Socialist 
 criticism as regards all existing Capitalist govern- 
 ments, and hence who does not distrust them ab initio, 
 is very likely, with the best intentions, to be befooled 
 in his diplomatic intercourse. Besides, even apart 
 from this, a thinker is not necessarily the best judge 
 of character or a good reader of the intentions of men, 
 and 1 for one can see nothing remarkable in the fact 
 that Haldane, in the Spring of 1912, acting in perfect 
 good faith, allowed himself to be, partly at least, be- 
 guiled by the Kaiser and the clever and unscrupulous 
 politicians of the Wilhelmstrasse. After all, Haldane's 
 real interests have always lain in Philosophy. The 
 real Haldane is Haldane the metaphysician. Haldane 
 the politician is merely the ordinary, intriguing mani- 
 pulator of one of the traditional parties in the State. 
 
 Of the rest of my philosophical friends and acquaint- 
 ances, with the exception of Eduard von Hartmann, 
 already referred to on a previous page, I can recall 
 no name that would interest the general reader save 
 that of Henri Bergson. I met Bergson for the first 
 time at a dinner given in his honour by Mr. Wildon 
 Carr at the Savile Club, when he was in England 
 some few years ago. This dinner was an interesting 
 one^from many points of view. We all made after- 
 dinner speeches, I remember Shaw, Zangwill, Graham
 
 214 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 Wallas, myself, and others, besides the guest of the 
 evening, all contributing their quota. As may be 
 expected, the " elan vital " and the " duree " figured 
 largely in many of these discourses. Bergson, as he 
 told me afterwards, was much gratified with the even- 
 ing's entertainment, and with the sociableness and 
 informality that characterized the proceedings. I sub- 
 sequently saw Bergson on different occasions in Paris, 
 and had some interesting conversations with him. On 
 my questioning Bergson as to why he had not dealt 
 with certain of what are usually regarded as the funda- 
 mental problems of Metaphysics, he replied that as 
 yet he had not done so, as he had had his special work 
 to do, which was to emphasize Reality as an inter- 
 penetrative movement of which Time was the essential 
 element, in opposition to the older Metaphysics, for 
 which the arrested moment of consciousness, repro- 
 duced in reflexion, on the analogy of spacial relation, 
 was regarded as the prius of the world of living reality. 
 He said further that he doubted whether the time was 
 ripe as yet for a complete philosophic synthesis. The 
 evolution of philosophic thought, he was of opinion, 
 should follow a course similar to the evolution of 
 physical science. Each worker in the field of Philo- 
 sophy should, like the scientific investigator, work at 
 his own special problem as far as possible, without 
 attempting to spread himself over the whole field and 
 reduce all problems equally under his purview. The 
 time would then eventually come, each separate prob- 
 lem being thoroughly worked out, for the elaboration 
 of a complete and systematic philosophic synthesis. 
 
 Bergson has told me that he was a contemporary of 
 Jaures as an undergraduate at the University of Paris,
 
 VARIORUM 215 
 
 and, if I remember rightly, also of Sorel, the well-known 
 writer on Syndicalism and Anarchism, Speaking of 
 the feminist question, he expressed himself as opposed 
 to female suffrage at the present time, but as regards 
 the question of comparative intellectual power as 
 between the sexes, he stated that, in looking over the 
 exercises of his pupils, he was often unable to pro- 
 nounce upon the sex of the writer until he saw the 
 signature at the end. Respecting this point, however, 
 I may recall to mind the remark made to me by Pro- 
 fessor Sinzheimer, of Munich, as the result of his obser- 
 vation, to the effect that while in the first year or two of 
 their university career he found that female students, 
 as a rule, showed little or no inferiority in their work 
 to men, yet that after this they rapidly " tailed off," 
 and that at the conclusion of their course of studies, 
 the difference between the male and female students 
 who were contemporaries, i.e. who had entered the 
 university at the same time, was often very con- 
 siderable indeed. To return to Bergson. He is one 
 of the marvels of the age, not so much on account 
 of his undoubted genius and literary gift of presenting 
 the special philosophic problem or problems with 
 which he concerns himself, as for his power of attracting 
 the extra-philosophic popular mind. Bergson's repu- 
 tation outside the philosophic world, properly so-called, 
 is not only greater than that of any other contemporary 
 thinker, but there are probably few metaphysicians in 
 the past who have enjoyed a popular fame while 
 living anything like equal to that of the amiable and 
 brilliant professor at the College de France. 
 
 Of my friend Boulting, whose excellent work on 
 Giordano Bruno has lately been published, I have already
 
 216 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 spoken on an earlier page. Hitherto the only writings 
 of his before the public have related to Italian history. 
 
 The International Congresses of Philosophy, to the 
 institution of which Mr. Wildon Carr, who retired from 
 the City to give his whole time to the interests of 
 Philosophy, has devoted himself, were abruptly inter- 
 rupted by the outbreak of the European War, just 
 when arrangements had been made for holding the 
 fifth Congress in London in 1915. Of the usefulness of 
 such gatherings in the furtherance of investigation 
 and discussion of the leading problems in the various 
 departments of Philosophy there can be no question. 
 
 While on the subject of Philosophy, I cannot refrain 
 from protesting against a practice dear to many academic 
 exponents of the subject. It is a practice which may, 
 I suppose, in the modern world be regarded as dating 
 from Spinoza. I refer to the habit of giving to the 
 Absolute the appellation God. This seems to me 
 to be utterly unjustifiable from every point of view. 
 The temptation to court popularity by using a popular 
 theological term, nevertheless, seems to be irresistible 
 to some thinkers. But it is a fraud and a deception, 
 notwithstanding. The Absolute of which the philo- 
 sopher speaks is not only not identical with God as 
 ordinarily understood, but has hardly any analogy 
 therewith. Not only the man in the street, but all 
 persons, educated or uneducated, outside the special 
 ranks of philosophical students, know roughly what 
 they mean by God, and this meaning is not that of 
 the Absolute of the metaphysician. The word God, 
 outside Spinoza and later thinkers who have followed 
 him, has always had a theological connotation. It 
 has always stood for a personal or quasi-personal Being,
 
 VARIORUM 217 
 
 over against the world, who has created and who orders 
 the world, as a despot orders his government, or, if 
 you prefer it, as a loving father of patriarchal days 
 ordered his household. Now, the Absolute of Philo- 
 sophy has nothing whatever to do with this. By the 
 Absolute is meant simply the ultimate principle which 
 the analysis of conscious experience discloses as its 
 own ultimate ground. It lies altogether outside the 
 Theistic assumption. And it is, I submit, a gross 
 deception to attempt by juggling with a word to befool 
 the man who is seeking what Professor Gilbert Murray 
 terms the " friend behind phenomena," with some- 
 thing totally different. I know that many intrinsically 
 honest thinkers have been guilty of this subterfuge 
 (as it seems to me). Even such a straightforward man 
 as the late Jean Jaures, in his otherwise excellent and 
 acute treatise, " De la realite du monde sensible," has 
 not been above resorting to it, a circumstance, by the 
 way, which necessitated an explanation on his part 
 when challenged as to his real meaning on one occasion 
 in the French Chamber. Verily, Spinoza's Deus sive 
 natura has much to answer for ! The example of the 
 great Jewish philosopher has been only too largely 
 followed by a host of epigoni up to the present day. To 
 my thinking, as above said, to cheat the unfortunate 
 creature hankering after the " friend behind pheno- 
 mena " with the Absolute of Metaphysics is grossly 
 unfair. What he wants is a personality over against 
 himself, and not a metaphysical postulate embracing 
 himself, no matter how " spiritual " the terms in which 
 it may be interpreted. 
 
 For the rest, the increasing interest in the higher 
 issues of speculative thought, even though its growth
 
 218 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 may be slow, is nevertheless an undoubted fact and 
 an encouraging one. The number of people, outside 
 purely academic circles, who take an interest in these 
 problems is unquestionably greater than ever before. 
 This is, of course, partly one side merely of the general 
 spread of intellectual activity and intellectual interests 
 among ever widening sections of the population. There 
 is perhaps, as a consequence of the above, too much 
 tendency to regard Philosophy as no more than a 
 branch of general literature. But while duly discount- 
 ing this fact, we are justified, I think, nevertheless, 
 in concluding that there is far greater genuine interest 
 and intellectual alertness, with the average intelligent 
 man of to-day, as regards these subjects, than was the 
 case with a similar man of (say) a couple of generations 
 ago. At that time, the theological interest was upper- 
 most with the serious-minded. To-day, the meta- 
 physical interest has at least partially entered into 
 its inheritance, the major part of human interest being 
 necessarily and justly occupied by the problems of 
 the physical sciences, and still more of the human 
 sciences. 
 
 The popularity of Bergson, though partly literary 
 and partly mere fashion, nevertheless helps to confirm 
 the above remarks. The British interest in Kant or 
 Hegel, or, so far as France is concerned, in Victor Cousin, 
 was in its day not a tithe of that shown to-day in the 
 case of Bergson. One thing is also of prime importance, 
 and that is the general consensus of conviction that 
 no subject of human knowledge can be treated ade- 
 quately in an isolated manner, but that, in the last 
 resort, all derive from the subject-matter of the problems 
 with which Philosophy deals. The old theory that
 
 VARIORUM 219 
 
 Metaphysics is vanity has given way before a sense of 
 the fact that the problems raised by metaphysics cannot 
 be finally ignored or explained away, but that the 
 human mind is doomed to seek some solution of them ; 
 if not a final solution, at least one which shall satisfy 
 it for the present, while awaiting the more adequate 
 one that time must inevitably bring with it. As to 
 whether a final, in the sense of a fully adequate, solution 
 will ever be reached, is a question the discussion of 
 which would lie outside a book of reminiscences and 
 more or less cursory reflexions. 
 
 Reverting from this digression into the regions of 
 the " higher thought " to the reminiscence side of my 
 present labours, the late poet, William Sharp, I may 
 take as a specimen of the purely literary man. Sharp 
 had no real interests outside pure literature. He had 
 no special convictions on political or social matters, 
 or on speculative questions, save insofar as they pre- 
 sented themselves in the guise of literary form and 
 style. During the years 1879-80 I saw a good deal of 
 Sharp and had many walks with him. I invariably 
 found that all other interests with him were super- 
 ficial, and contributory to the " stylistic " interest 
 which was always the dominant one. His ambitions 
 were purely literary, and one felt in his case what 
 Morris used to say of Swinburne, that he ought to 
 have been born between two calf covers. My general 
 impression of Sharp was that while his literary faculty 
 was obvious, he was an inconstant, uncertain, and 
 whimsical person, liable to moods and affectations of 
 moods, that often made themselves apparent alike 
 socially and in his literary efforts. If I am not mis- 
 taken, Shaw, on more than one occasion, in reviewing
 
 220 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 him, trounced him somewhat severely for the arti- 
 ficiality of his literary emotions. He and I drifted 
 asunder in the early eighties, and I rarely met him 
 subsequently. In fact, I do not think I saw him at 
 all after he had begun to publish under the name of 
 " Fiona Macleod." It seems undoubted that the whole 
 " Fiona Macleod " business was a pure mystification 
 of Sharp himself, but yet there appear to have been 
 people who profess to have seen the original " Fiona 
 Macleod " in the flesh, at her home in the Highlands. 
 A friend of the present writer relates that in the year 
 1900, in a Paris salon of which the hostess, it may be 
 mentioned, was the sister of an eminent French writer 
 he heard a Scotchman " of credit and renown" relate 
 a circumstantial story of a visit he paid to " Fiona 
 Macleod," and of her personal appearance as being 
 that of a young and attractive woman little more 
 than a girl, in fact. Pressed to give details, the gentle- 
 man in question excused himself on the ground that to 
 do so would be a breach of confidence, inasmuch as 
 the lady wished to remain in strict seclusion until she 
 deemed that the time had come to carry out a long- 
 cherished plan of initiating a revival in Scottish life 
 and literature. The statements of the guest referred 
 to appeared to be accepted without question by the 
 rest of the company, which included several Scotch- 
 men. I give the fact of the party and of the reputable 
 Scot's story for what it is worth. It should be observed 
 that certain crankisms of the time, notably the pose 
 of Jacobitism then fashionable, were represented 
 amongst the circle assembled on the occasion, the 
 soi-disant acquaintance of " Fiona Macleod " boasting 
 himself an ardent Jacobite The whole history of Sharp
 
 VARIORUM Ml 
 
 and his double shows the facility of successfully faking 
 a quasi-myth, even in the present day. 
 
 Quite a different man from Sharp was another well- 
 known author I used to meet sometimes in the early 
 eighties, to wit, Havelock Ellis. An able essayist, 
 the interests of Havelock Ellis lay in the human sciences 
 rather than in literature. His interesting and valuable 
 researches into the psychology of sex were subsequently 
 enshrined in a work of five volumes, which, in spite of 
 its strictly scientific character, was, to the shame of 
 those concerned, prohibited in this country, and had 
 to seek a publisher in America. Besides this monu- 
 mental work on the subject, Havelock Ellis, as is well 
 known, is the author of various books and articles 
 dealing with the interpretation and analysis of the 
 sexual impulse in Man, in the protean forms in which 
 it manifests itself. Ellis is in appearance and manner 
 the type of the quiet and laborious student. He was, 
 I believe, at one time engaged to be married to Olive 
 Schreiner, now Mrs. Cronwright Schreiner, of South 
 African fame, but the engagement was broken off. 
 
 As regards Ellis 's special subject of investigation, 
 nothing can surely well be more absurd or anachron- 
 istic in the modern world than the notion held by 
 many persons, who ought to know better, that a ring- 
 fence should be drawn round this subject, not only 
 as regards the freedom of its treatment in imaginative 
 literature, but as to the publication of the results of 
 purely scientific investigation. To ignore or exclude 
 an important branch of practical human psychology 
 from the research of the scientist, merely on the ground 
 that the bare recital of the facts connected therewith 
 may possibly offend the morbid delicacy of certain
 
 222 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 unwholesome people, is to head back progress just as 
 much as it would be to discourage or prohibit (in the 
 manner of the Church and Galileo) the publication 
 of the results of scientific research in any other depart- 
 ment of knowledge. Yet this is precisely the attitude 
 that certain members of the English judiciary took 
 up as regards the researches of Havelock Ellis there- 
 by affording one more instance of the essentially 
 obscurantist and reactionary role played by the High 
 Court Bench in the national life. 
 
 In respect to the reactionary character of the wearers 
 of ermine, and of the sort of quasi-divinity that doth 
 hedge a judge in the estimation of that stolid and 
 patient ox the British public, the national intelligence 
 does not seem to have changed so very much within 
 the last two or three generations. But that the national 
 character as well as the national physiognomy within 
 the last fifty years of the nineteenth century has altered 
 considerably, I have the evidence of an aged American 
 gentleman who came over to England in 1901, and 
 shortly after his arrival paid me a visit. This gentle- 
 man, whose name was Hinton, had been one of the 
 friends and companions of John Brown in the Harper's 
 Ferry incident of 1857. He wrote a history of the 
 whole affair in an interesting book with which he pre- 
 sented me. What, however, especially struck me in 
 his conversation was not so much his American reminis- 
 cences, as the astonishment he repeatedly expressed at 
 the total change he, found as between the English 
 people of 1901 and the English people of 1848, fifty- 
 three years before, which was the date of his last visit 
 to this country. He had lived, it should be said, in 
 the meantime, in a part of the United States where
 
 VARIORUM 228 
 
 he had had little opportunity of meeting Britishers, 
 either emigrants or casual visitors. According to his 
 statement, the change was not confined merely to 
 obvious things, such as dress, outward customs, etc., 
 but extended to the physiognomy of the people and 
 their natural ways and manners. The first walk, he 
 said, that he took down the Strand on revisiting Eng- 
 land, looking into the faces of the crowds he met, was 
 a revelation to him. The men and women he saw 
 appeared to him like another race from the men and 
 women he had cast his eyes upon in a similar walk down 
 the Strand a little more than half a century before. 
 This was to me very interesting, as illustrating the 
 impressions of one who had not had his perception 
 of the difference of two generations blunted by passing 
 through the observation of the intervening stages 
 leading up to the change he found. 
 
 Among the random reminiscences and reflexions in 
 which I am taking the liberty of expanding myself 
 in this chapter, I should not forget one or two amusing 
 incidents in connexion with the London correspondent 
 of a certain Italian newspaper, when he was in England. 
 My Italian friend was one of the jolly-goodfellow sort, 
 but possessed withal of a guileless disposition, which 
 was taken advantage of at times by friends for the 
 purpose of practical jokes, and by others for more 
 sordid objects. One night, after having just cashed 
 a cheque for five pounds in the club to which I belonged, 
 and of which he was also a temporary member, he 
 bought some evening journals at the corner of the 
 Strand, handing, as he thought, five halfpennies to the 
 newspaper boy. No sooner had he boarded his omni- 
 bus, however, than it occurred to him that he had
 
 224 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 had no money, and had for that reason cashed a cheque, 
 with the conclusion that he had paid five pounds for 
 his evening papers. Springing hastily from the omni- 
 bus, and rushing wildly back to the newspaper-selling 
 corner, he found to his intense surprise that the boy 
 was gone ! On another occasion, after a convivial 
 evening with some friends in the neighbourhood of 
 Fleet Street, one of them kindly offered to put him 
 in a cab to take him home to Bloomsbury. Our guile- 
 less one, who, as may be supposed, had partaken of 
 a few whiskies in the course of the evening, fell off to 
 sleep, and awoke anon to the consciousness of the fact 
 that the cab-drive was an unusually long one for his 
 destination. His attempted remonstrances with the 
 cabman brought no result beyond the assertion that 
 it was all right. Finally the cab drew up at the 
 entrance to Finchley cemetery ! The consternation of 
 our journalist may be better imagined than described 
 on the cabman's asseveration that he had been in- 
 structed to drive there by the gentleman who had 
 hired him. 
 
 An incident recalls itself that occurred to me in con- 
 nexion with this same Italian friend, which serves to 
 illustrate the part imagination may play in an appar- 
 ently plain and obvious matter. I had arranged with 
 the friend in question to leave the club and walk up 
 the Strand with him, but as I was detained in the club 
 later than I expected, he proposed I should meet him 
 in a quarter of an hour's time at the Strand telegraph 
 office, where he was about, according to his custom, 
 to dispatch his evening wire to Italy. Having finished 
 what I was doing, I accordingly walked straight to the 
 Strand telegraph office and inquired by name for our
 
 VARIORUM 225 
 
 friend, who wai known there, but was told to my sur- 
 prise that he had not as yet called in that evening. 
 The reason, I subsequently learnt, was that he had 
 been taken aside by an acquaintance as he was about 
 to leave the club, and had been detained by him in 
 conversation some minutes, during which I, unknown 
 to him, had left. But the sequel is interesting. I 
 learnt the next day from him that a few minutes later 
 than myself on the previous evening he had duly been 
 at the telegraph office, and inquired whether any one 
 had called there asking for him. The clerk replied that 
 there had been only one gentleman, and that a few 
 minutes previously. The gentleman in question, he 
 said, was Italian in appearance, and spoke very broken 
 English ! A promising illustration this of auto- 
 suggestion for the psychologist ! 
 
 Many frequenters of the Athenaeum will recall the 
 figure of old Stuart Glennie, author of sundry books 
 on anthropology and the philosophy of history. Glennie 
 was an old member of that distinguished literary 
 centre. A typical old Highlander, this side-line relic 
 of the Stuarts was not an unattractive personality, 
 albeit intellectually he was not specially strong. In 
 intention he was excellent, in general a good Socialist, 
 and a keen student of history and the origin of insti- 
 tutions ; but the ideas which he elaborated in a some- 
 what heavy and laborious style were not in themselves 
 very original. Their main purport had been expressed 
 before, and in many cases better expressed. Never- 
 theless, there are to be found in his writings, here and 
 there, aperfus and suggestions on the subject of the 
 general movement of history that are not altogether 
 to be despised. His was an active mind, though of 
 
 15
 
 226 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 indifferent quality. In appearance and style, Glennie 
 gave the impression of the old gaillard. Shaw has 
 related to me how he met him in Trafalgar Square at 
 the proclaimed meeting of November 21, 1887, and 
 how in the middle of a conversation he, suddenly point- 
 ing with his umbrella to a movement in the crowd in 
 another part of the square, charged off in that direction, 
 as Shaw expressed it, " just as one of his ancestors 
 might have done at Culloden." 
 
 Among the recruits to Socialism in England which 
 the new century brought with it, a prominent figure 
 was the Countess of Warwick. Lady Warwick had 
 always taken a keen interest in the Education question, 
 the feeding of the children at school, etc., but it was 
 not, I believe, before the opening of the twentieth 
 century that she definitely declared herself a Socialist, 
 and joined the Social Democratic Federation. Her 
 entry into the movement was followed by a ffite she 
 gave to the London members of the body one Sunday 
 in the Summer of 1905 at Easton Lodge, Essex, of 
 which all present, I have no doubt, retain most agree- 
 able recollections. I can well remember the occasion, 
 and the democratic spirit in which this and a similar 
 entertainment given a few years later were carried out 
 as regards all the arrangements. Still more interesting 
 personally are my remembrances of a week-end house- 
 party at Easton Lodge, at which myself and my wife 
 were guests, in company with Hyndman, the late 
 Walter Crane, Hunter Watts, and their wives, and of 
 the discussions on matters political and social which 
 took place during our stay. Lady Warwick's gener- 
 osity towards individual members of the party is too 
 well known to need enlarging upon here. Her genuine
 
 VARIORUM 227 
 
 enthusiasm in all she undertakes sometimes leads her 
 to underrate the difficulties in the carrying out of her 
 intentions, but the disinterestedness which she has 
 shown in attaching herself publicly to movements from 
 which she has nothing personal, in the shape of material 
 advantage or social or political kudos, to gain, must 
 always entitle her to the esteem of all democrats. 
 
 The old school of Radicals of the Cobden-Bright 
 period, the advanced men of the sixties and seventies, 
 formed a well marked type, intellectually and other- 
 wise. The very advanced ones were to be found during 
 these decades in the Dialectical Society, a London 
 Debating Club founded in the sixties for independent 
 discussion of all questions. Although this rule was 
 fairly well adhered to, there were certain sets of opinions 
 which came specially to flourish among the members 
 of the Society, and which were characteristic of the 
 extreme Radicalism of the period, of which Neo-Malthu- 
 sianism, as the movement for the limitation of families 
 was called, was a conspicuous instance. The late Dr. 
 Charles Drysdale was the chief protagonist of the view 
 that poverty sprang from large families, and that the 
 reduction of offspring, universally practised, would, 
 if not precisely usher in the millennium, at least bring 
 us halfway towards it. The notion sounds funny 
 to-day, but at that time it was almost an article of faith 
 amongst advanced Radicals, and was accepted as a 
 self-evident proposition by almost all the members 
 of the Dialectical Society, Secularism, in the cruder 
 form which obtained in the ranks of popular freethought 
 at the time, was also largely represented in the Society, 
 of which Charles Bradlaugh and Annie Besant were 
 prominent members. Shaw also was a frequent atteu-
 
 228 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 dant at the bi-monthly meetings, which took place 
 in the later period of its existence at Langham Hall, 
 Great Portland Street. The Society was rather an 
 odd mixture. While it was not infrequently addressed 
 by men of eminence in their several departments, and 
 in its membership were to be found some persons of 
 good intellectual standing, it was largely composed of 
 intelligent self-educated, middle-class men and women. 
 I believe it finally ceased to exist somewhere at the end 
 of the eighties, though I do not know the precise date 
 or circumstances of its ultimate fate. The last meet- 
 ing I attended must have been somewhere about 1887. 
 It was held in a hall off Holborn, if I remember rightly. 
 I was the lecturer of the evening, and delivered an 
 address traversing the pretensions of Feminism, Shaw 
 being in the chair. This was the last I knew of it 
 directly, though I believe it dragged on an existence 
 for some time longer. 
 
 Talking of the Dialectical Society and the old school 
 of Radicals reminds me of a prominent member of 
 the Society referred to in an earlier chapter of a man 
 who was of some mark in journalism and the journal- 
 istic side of literature in his day, Fox Bourne. He 
 was at one time editor of the Examiner, in which 
 capacity, it should be said, he was strenuous in carrying 
 out those principles of free discussion and just judgment 
 of unpopular causes which he had advocated all his 
 life. He was also the author of a " Life of John Locke " 
 in two volumes, which, as he himself admitted, was open 
 to adverse criticism, and in fact was not altogether 
 a literary success. But the work for which Fox Bourne 
 will be best remembered was as the founder and secre- 
 tary and the leading spirit of the Aborigines' Protection
 
 VARIORUM 229 
 
 Society. He was untiring in his advocacy of the 
 claims of native races against the European exploiter 
 and the military martinet acting in the service of the 
 exploiter. Fox Bourne's intentions in this matter 
 were admirable, and if he failed in some cases to do 
 all he might have done, it was often owing to his not 
 understanding the true nature of the Capitalism whose 
 interest it is to exploit backward races and seize their 
 land. For though, as I incidentally mentioned in a 
 former chapter, he was at one time a frequent visitor 
 at Karl Marx's house, he never understood the mean- 
 ing of modern scientific Socialism. I knew him well, 
 especially in his later years, and, agreeable as he was, 
 I always found him hidebound in the ideas of the old 
 individualistic middle-class Radicals of the mid- Vic- 
 torian period. Not long before his death, I dined 
 with him and the late Roger Casement at a West End 
 London Club. The unfortunate Roger Casement, it 
 should be said, was at that time doing good work in 
 connexion with the Congo. My impression of Fox 
 Bourne will remain as that of an eminently sincere, 
 just, and consistent man, but one whose mind was 
 unadaptable to new ideas, and whose outlook conse- 
 quently remained throughout his later life extremely 
 limited. 
 
 Another man who was one of the founders of the 
 Dialectical Society, and a constant and prominent 
 figure there in its halcyon days, was J. H. Levy, who 
 used to pride himself on being an ultra-individualist. 
 While holding in the main most of the planks of the 
 old political Radicalism, his gospel always remained 
 Mill's " Essay on Liberty." His hatred of all State 
 action, other than that of the barest and most necessary
 
 280 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 police regulation, was an obsession with him. His 
 political faith might be summed up in the phrase 
 laisser faire a outrance. Yet, like Fox Bourne, Levy 
 was a scrupulously tolerant person, always ready to 
 give his opponents a fair hearing, who regarded free 
 discussion as the first of the rights of man. He was 
 prepared, indeed, to press this point against all comers, 
 and on one occasion, as he told me, he got into hot- 
 water with some of his political friends by inviting a 
 prominent Socialist to state his case, at one of a series 
 of meetings organized by a well-known Liberal club, 
 against the wishes of some of the members of the 
 organizing committee, of which he acted as secretary. 
 Levy, it may be said, left the impression upon all who 
 knew him, friends and foes alike, of a man of thorough 
 sincerity in word and deed. As a mattei of fact, he 
 devoted his life, without fee or reward, to the pro- 
 mulgation of the theories he believed in. 
 
 About the year 1886, R. B. Cunninghame Graham 
 began to come prominently before the British public 
 as an advanced democratic leader. Unlike Stuart 
 Glennie, who sprang from a side branch of the Stuarts, 
 Cunninghame Graham, I believe, as the great-grandson 
 of the Earl of Monteith who took part in the Jacobite 
 Rebellion of '45, can claim descent from the direct 
 line of Stuart ancestry. His picturesque appearance, 
 recalling as some say Vandyke's Charles the First, and 
 others a Spanish hidalgo of the sixteenth century, 
 contributed undoubtedly to spread his fame. A fluent 
 speaker, though hardly a brilliant orator, Graham soon 
 found himself in the forefront of the democratic and 
 Socialist movement of the latter years of the nineteenth 
 century, but somehow or other, after his first few years of
 
 VARIORUM 281 
 
 public life, he. never made any further headway as a 
 popular leader or as a political influence. Defeated at 
 the General Election of 1892, he largely gave up active 
 political work and devoted himself to literature. He 
 mainly excels in shorter sketches of men and countries, 
 in which his light touch and characteristic style have 
 given him a well-earned success. Socially, Cunninghame 
 Graham is the most charming of men, but there is one 
 point in his character which has been adversely anim- 
 adverted upon by some of his best friends, and that 
 is his passion for fashionable dress. He never appears, 
 or at least I and others have never seen him, either in 
 public or in private, save in the latest most superb 
 Bond Street cut, with material to match, and this has 
 given the profane cause to make allusions to the " tailor's 
 block." This passion for playing the part of the 
 sartorial figure is perhaps less excusable, seeing that 
 our friend Graham is the happy possessor of a striking 
 face and figure, such as would assert itself in any cos- 
 tume, even the simplest, to the advantage of the wearer. 
 Speaking of Cunninghame Graham leads me to recall 
 a friend of his, a strange Scotchman, whose name, if 
 I remember rightly, was Stirling, who wrote a weird 
 book, published anonymously, entitled " The Canon," 
 which I can best describe as a quasi-mystical inter- 
 pretation of certain principles the author found running 
 through the history of architecture. The book I re- 
 viewed at some length at the time in the Daily Chronicle. 
 This man, who led a lonely life in lodgings off the south 
 side of the Strand, appeared suddenly to take on 
 illusions as to being persecuted by certain females on 
 the ground of his alleged attentions to some girl or 
 other. Not having seen him for some time after the
 
 232 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 interview in which he had disclosed his fears in this 
 connexion, myself and a friend, who also knew him, 
 decided to call at his address and inquire if he were 
 away or ill. The servant who opened the door at 
 first gave somewhat evasive replies to our inquiries. 
 She subsequently admitted, however, that Stirling 
 was no longer living, going on to tell us that his letters 
 had accumulated for fully a week before his closed and 
 locked bedroom door; and when at last an entrance 
 was forcibly effected, poor Stirling was found stretched 
 out on the bed, dead, with his throat cut. 
 
 I will conclude the present chapter with the name 
 of a man whose personality has a double interest. His 
 life-long championship, through good report and 
 through evil report, of Internationalism and anti- 
 patriotism, as patriotism is understood to-day, is well 
 known. The name of Felix Moscheles is familiar in 
 connexion with the International Peace and Arbi- 
 tration Association. A special interest also attaches 
 to Felix Moscheles as the son of the eminent pianist 
 and composer of pianoforte music, Ignaz Moscheles, 
 and as the godson of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy, 
 whose forename he bears. The aged and refined face 
 and figure of Felix Moscheles (he is eighty-four at the 
 time of writing) is one to impress itself on the memory. 
 Age has certainly not staled his enthusiasm in the 
 cause to which he has devoted his life. The journal 
 Concord, which he edits and largely writes, in con- 
 junction with the secretary of the Peace Association, 
 Mr. J. F. Green, is evidence of this. Many are the 
 anecdotes Moscheles has to tell of the music and musicians 
 of the first half of the nineteenth century, especially 
 of his father's closest friend, Mendelssohn ; but as these
 
 VARIORUM 288 
 
 are mostly recorded in his own autobiographical memoirs, 
 it would be superfluous to reproduce them here. He 
 has taken great interest in collecting and preserving 
 mementoes of the older classical composers, possessing 
 autograph scores, besides numbers of letters from the 
 great German masters of the early nineteenth century. 
 A particularly precious relic is a curl from the head of 
 Beethoven, with whom his father as a young man was 
 acquainted. Felix Moscheles's pleasantest recollections 
 of his days as an art student in Paris connect themselves 
 with Rossini, at whose house at Passy he was a fre- 
 quent visitor. Meyerbeer, I believe, he also knew. 
 He speaks of Auber as a somewhat disagreeable man 
 socially, and says that this was also the opinion of 
 his father and Mendelssohn. I should not forget to 
 mention Moscheles's gifts as an artist. While his 
 " genre " painting is sufficiently striking, it will be 
 probably on his skill as a portrait-painter that his future 
 fame will rest. He has in this branch a singular faculty 
 of reproducing the finest shades of expression in his 
 sitters. His portraits of Mazzini, of George Jacob 
 Holyoake, of the late William Clarke, the journalist, 
 and many more, afford evidence of what is said.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 WHEN THE WAR CAME 
 
 IN considering the attitude of the world in July 
 1914, one irresistibly recalls the passages in the Gospels 
 referring to the advent of the expected Messiah : " Two 
 men shall be in the field, two women shall be grinding 
 at the mill," etc. This idea of the daily round, 
 and the utter unexpectedness of a catastrophic event, 
 was certainly realized in the Summer days of July 1914. 
 Those who gave the European situation more than a 
 cursory thought were few indeed among the general 
 public. One day, about the middle of July, I was 
 walking across Piccadilly Circus with an intimate 
 friend, a well-known London publisher, when on the 
 latter making some observation upon some current 
 political topic, probably the Irish Home Rule question, 
 I replied that all that was of no immediate interest or 
 importance, but what really mattered was what was 
 passing in Central and Eastern Europe, where the 
 situation seemed to be big with stupendous events. 
 My friend expressed surprise at the time, as he had 
 not been particularly following the course of inter- 
 national politics recently, but he has more than once 
 reminded me of the circumstance, which I had almost 
 forgotten, during the last two years. As it was with
 
 WHEN THE WAR CAME 235 
 
 this cultured and active-minded man, so it was, only 
 very much more so, with the average British man or 
 woman. The political horizon of the British public 
 was bounded by Ulster, Sir Edward Carson, and Home 
 Rule. The social and domestic horizon was filled by 
 the usual round of business and summer interests, 
 week-ends, cricket, prospective holiday arrangements. 
 I can well remember having occasion to call on relations 
 on the afternoon of the eventful Saturday, the ist of 
 August, itself. I found them preparing to go to a 
 cricket match ! No interest, in fact, in the European 
 crisis was visible with the general British public before 
 the last week in July, when the possibility of the great 
 upheaval seemed quite suddenly to dawn on this 
 unimaginative intellectual element. It was on the 
 Wednesday in the week in question that one first 
 noticed anxious faces, groups discussing the question, 
 and public interest generally aroused. Even then, as 
 above shown, it was only partial. There were plenty 
 of circles still obtuse to the actualities. 
 
 On Sunday, the 2nd of August, I attended the great 
 Peace demonstration in Trafalgar Square, to which 
 Socialist bodies, Radical clubs, and Trades Unions 
 sent their delegations. The meeting was well attended, 
 the Square being nearly full, but during the proceed- 
 ings the boys appeared with the " specials " announcing 
 the violation of the Luxemburg territory. Little 
 attention was paid to the speakers, and there seemed 
 to be a feeling of unreality about the whole proceedings. 
 Everybody seemed to feel that the die was cast, and 
 that the exhortations to peace amounted to little 
 more than idle talk. As the meeting was being brought 
 to a close, a heavy shower of rain hastened the dispersal
 
 236 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 of the crowds, and in a few minutes I found myself 
 in the vestibule of my club, where numbers of members 
 and their friends, fresh from the Square, had already 
 taken refuge. Suspense and excitement were on all 
 faces that Sunday evening. The sound of half-sup- 
 pressed conversation made itself everywhere heard. 
 
 The next day, the Monday, which was Bank Holiday, 
 I received from my son in Paris a letter stating that 
 he was trying to get away, as Paris was no longer safe 
 to remain in. Hurrying to town to ascertain as far 
 as possible what routes were open, I noticed two or 
 three of the customary wagonettes with their load of 
 Bank Holiday makers bent on a day's outing in the 
 country, but only two or three. In place of the usual 
 Bank Holiday emptiness of the London streets, I found 
 groups of people in the chief West End thoroughfares. 
 Parliament Street and Whitehall were particularly 
 noticeable in this respect. The approach to the Foreign 
 Office was barred by the police. The club, usually 
 deserted on an August Bank Holiday, was as full as 
 the streets. Relieved of anxiety for my son by re- 
 ceiving a telegram announcing his arrival in London, 
 I remained in the club to hear the parliamentary news 
 read out, as it came up on the tape, to the assembled 
 members in the smoking-room. Everybody (including 
 the London correspondents of some German papers 
 who had for long been temporary members of the 
 club) was breathlessly awaiting news of the decision 
 of the Cabinet as regards war or peace, but no decision 
 came that day, and not before the afternoon of the 
 following day, Tuesday, the 4th of August, with the 
 arrival of the telegrams announcing the invasion of 
 Belgium, was the ultimatum of the British Government
 
 WHEN THE WAR CAME 2*7 
 
 proclaimed, which was to take effect the ensuing mid- 
 night. On Wednesday, the 5th of August, accordingly, 
 all England woke up to the fact that the country was 
 at war, not with native races in backward parts of the 
 earth, or with the Dutch colonists of South Africa, but 
 with the first of Europe's military Powers. Many 
 people seemed stunned by the sudden realization of 
 the fact. A certain panic was universal, which chiefly 
 took the form of a dread of scarcity. All the gold 
 possible had already been drawn out of the banks to 
 be hoarded in private. Preposterous stores of pro- 
 visions were laid in by many households against the 
 contingency of Britain's food supply being cut off. 
 People were in vain adjured to go about their " busi- 
 ness as usual," but somehow or other business did not 
 seem to be quite as usual. As will be remembered, a 
 moratorium was at once proclaimed, and the banks 
 officially closed till the Friday of that fateful first week 
 of August. A general distraction fell upon the popu- 
 lation, none knowing what was coming. Yet such 
 is mankind that in a few weeks matters quieted down, 
 and the population of the British Islands got, in some 
 measure at least, used to the new conditions. 
 
 To follow the events of the war from this time forward 
 would lie altogether outside the scope of the present 
 book. During the terrible period we have traversed 
 since that August week of 1914, I have resided partly 
 near London and partly, and indeed for longer periods, 
 in the South of France. Thus I have had the oppor- 
 tunity of watching the effect of the course of events on 
 the psychology of both the British and the French 
 populations. Of the former it is perhaps as yet too 
 early to form any generalizations, but as regards the
 
 288 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 latter there is one change as compared to the traditional 
 behaviour of the French temperament which cannot 
 fail to strike every one at a glance. Hitherto, in 
 national crises, and in none more than in the war of 
 1870, nothing has been more noticeable than the con- 
 tinued recurrence of gusts of excitement and panic. 
 Nous sommes trahis was the cry on the occasion of 
 every slight reverse, or absence of actual success. Men 
 fancied spies everywhere. A state of nerves was 
 chronic in the population. To-day, how very different 
 the aspect of affairs ! The impression gained by me 
 in the course of a residence^ in both countries during 
 the war is that of the two populations the British 
 was more " nervy " than the French. The quiet, 
 solid reasonableness with which the French popu- 
 lation hasf behaved during the present crisis is the 
 more remarkable in contrast to)what it has been on 
 former occasions, when one considers the fact of the 
 occupation of a considerable section of French territory 
 by the invader. Such a contrast is surely noteworthy, 
 even if we discount the effects of the change in the French 
 military'system since the last war. Another point worth 
 mention' is the altered aspect of the French town, includ- 
 ing Paris, since the war. The proverbial French gaiety 
 has disappeared from the surface of things. The bands 
 on the terraces of the cafes, so familiar to the residents 
 and visitors of French towns, were no longer to be 
 seen or heard after the outbreak of hostilities. Similarly, 
 closed theatres, and the absence of all forms of public 
 entertainment, was the rule. In the early period of 
 the war even the terraces of the cafes themselves were 
 abolished in some towns, no one being served except 
 inside. These and sundry other severities in public
 
 WHEN THE WAR CAME 280 
 
 manners, however, were subsequently relaxed. But 
 all the same the traditional lightheartedness, and, as 
 unkind British critics of the Puritan persuasion used 
 to have it, the " frivolity " of the French temperament, 
 has certainly been nowhere in evidence since the war 
 began. 
 
 I have spoken of the aspect on the eve and on the 
 outbreak of the war. In Paris, as I heard from my 
 son on his arrival in London, there had been no very 
 serious apprehension on the part of the people at large, 
 till the Saturday, the ist of August, when the fateful 
 declaration came from Berlin. Thereupon the panic 
 was indescribable, and not least among the foreign 
 population, who were given twenty-four hours to leave 
 Paris without formalities. But the difficulty was the 
 money question. There was no change to be got any- 
 where. All the silver seemed to have disappeared 
 as if by magic. The rush of the eager, clamouring 
 crowds at all the great railway termini to obtain 
 tickets, where no change was given, can hardly be 
 imagined. The lucky ones who succeeded in boarding 
 the trains counted themselves happy if they could 
 squeeze into a guard's van or on to a goods 
 truck. 
 
 But what of the provincial towns of France lying 
 on the eastern and north-eastern frontier, in the way 
 of the threatening invasion ? As an illustration of 
 this a friend resident in Rheims has kindly furnished 
 me with the following particulars : 
 
 ' The opinion generally expressed in Rheims was 
 that some means would be found to avoid war. One 
 of my friends called to the colours, on departing, 
 said, ' Don't worry : it's only a false alarm ; I'll be
 
 240 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 back in a few days.' Poor fellow, he never will come 
 back. 
 
 " The mobilization order was posted up on the first 
 day of August, and strangers had to report themselves 
 at the Town Hall. On going there, we found the great 
 courtyard full of a seething mass of humanity. It 
 took many days to deal with all these foreigners, and 
 the people of Rheims were amazed to see how many 
 enemy aliens were living in their midst. The authorities 
 seemed very determined to rid the town of them all, 
 and no permits to stay were given. This gave rise to 
 some sad scenes. I remember noticing an intelligent- 
 looking Hungarian, who was parted from his children 
 and their French mother, for want of the legal knot. 
 He was an enemy alien and must go ; his family were 
 French and must remain. We left him weeping bitterly. 
 
 "About this time we saw the departure of several 
 battalions of a famous regiment of the first line of 
 defence. The first battalion left near midnight, almost 
 secretly. There was no enthusiasm, hardly a spectator. 
 They marched along, silent and grave. There was no 
 flinching, and there would be none, though they were 
 marching to their doom. 
 
 "It may not be historically correct to describe Eng- 
 land as taking France's part, but that is how her declara- 
 tion of war against Germany was construed. The 
 effect was magical ; foreboding gave place to confidence. 
 So the departure of the second battalion was marked 
 by scenes of enthusiasm. The soldiers were decked 
 out in flowers. Their tread was martial. Courage 
 and determination seemed to radiate from their ranks. 
 The contrast between these two scenes made a profound 
 impression on me.
 
 WHEN THE WAR CAME 241 
 
 " The prompt answer of the nation to the call to arms 
 was grand. All classes of society, from working men 
 to learned professors, might be .seen in those terrible 
 red trousers which, it is said, cost the French troops 
 such heavy losses in p the early months of the war. I 
 did not hear of one ' conscientious objector/ though 
 there can have been no illusion as to the deadly nature 
 of the ordeal before them. 
 
 " Opinions as to the result of the war fluctuated a 
 good deal. We had no official news of French disasters, 
 and were easily elated by the great Servian victories, 
 and by the Russian advance, which would land our 
 allies so soon in Berlin. But whatever elation those 
 distant victories provoked soon gave way, before the 
 steady advance of the German armies on Paris, to a 
 feeling of hopelessness. ' What can we do against 
 such desperate odds ? ' people asked. And when the 
 Germans occupied our town, many said to me, ' I sup- 
 pose we are Prussians now ! ' or words to that effect. 
 There was a feeling of despair that all was lost, and 
 that nothing remained, as even the most sanguine 
 people said, but to make peace, pay an indemnity as 
 in '70, and wipe the slate clean again. 
 
 " The town was administered admirably by the Mayor, 
 who was quite the man of the hour, and who formed 
 committees to regulate every branch of the town's 
 activities. Coin had disappeared from circulation ; 
 it was replaced by paper money, the smallest coupon 
 being 25 c. (2^d.) . The prices of the principal articles 
 of food were fixed, and so there was no rise. 
 
 " Towards the end of August, Belgian soldiers who 
 had escaped from Namur began to arrive. Then for 
 days there was a steady stream of refugees pouring in 
 
 16
 
 242 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 from Mezieres and that region. These people were of 
 all ages and conditions. Most of them bore bundles 
 on their backs or pushed baby-carriages loaded with 
 a heterogeneous array of ill-assorted household goods 
 clocks, frying-pans, clothes, crockery, all thrown to- 
 gether pell-mell, testifying to their hasty flight before 
 the dreaded German invasion. In the last degree of 
 exhaustion, they presented a most forlorn picture of 
 ' mail's inhumanity to man.' For ten terrible days 
 they had tramped along the highways, living for the 
 most part on what raw roots they could scratch up as 
 they passed along, sinking by the roadside when they 
 could drag themselves no farther. How the children 
 survived I do not know. 
 
 " Rheims gave them the kindliest welcome. They 
 were housed, fed, and comforted, and then sent on, 
 it was said, to the South of France. Some of them 
 had terrible tales to tell of butchery and burnings, 
 but most of them had their faculties too blunted by 
 what they had gone through to give any account of 
 themselves. 
 
 " On September 3rd seven Uhlans rode in and estab- 
 lished themselves at the Town Hall. Next day staff 
 officers of the Saxon Army arrived, and while they were 
 closeted with the Mayor the town was violently bom- 
 barded. The Saxons accused the Mayor of treachery, 
 and threatened terrible reprisals. It is already a 
 matter of history how the Mayor proved conclusively, 
 from fragments, that the shells were German ones, 
 and thus saved the town from one of those scenes 
 of bloody reprisals which characterized the German 
 advance through Belgium and France. 
 
 " Apart from this tragic event, the Saxon domination
 
 WHEN THE WAR CAME 248 
 
 was bearable. Their requisitions, it is true, were on 
 a vast scale. This organized robbery was evidently 
 part of their campaign of ' frightfulness.' But the 
 courage, energy, and diplomacy of the Mayor and his 
 coadjutors conjured every peril. 
 
 " The Saxon soldiery, speaking generally, were correct 
 in their behaviour. What they bought they paid for 
 in cash. I heard of very little thieving. Some of them 
 could speak a little French, and made friendly advances 
 to the inhabitants. I heard one of them explaining, 
 with many gestures, that the Saxons were not Prus- 
 sians, whom they detested they were ' Saxon-Englisch.' 
 Another drew a coin from his pocket, and tapping the 
 effigy of the Kaiser with his finger, exclaimed, ' Lui, 
 tres mauvais ! ' 
 
 "The officers were arrogant and highhanded. Every 
 day saw some new proclamation threatening death 
 for any breach of its regulations. They were also 
 accused of plundering the houses they were billeted 
 in. I was not brought much in contact with them, 
 but found them polite enough. 
 
 " The Saxon occupation lasted barely ten days. On 
 retreating, they carried off about one hundred hostages, 
 whose names were posted up, and a proclamation an- 
 nounced that they would all be ' hanged ' if the army 
 were molested in its retreat. However, they came 
 back safely, and reported that the commander had 
 expressed his satisfaction with the conduct of the town, 
 and promised that it should not be again bombarded. 
 If he meant this as a joke, it was a grim one, for that 
 same night the first shells of a bombardment that 
 has already lasted more than two years (October 
 1916) fell on the town, and the destruction of the
 
 244 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 Cathedral of Rheims quickly followed this deceptive 
 promise. 
 
 " The bombardment which marked the entry of the 
 victors made over one hundred victims. When we 
 first saw those horribly mutilated and mangled bodies, 
 lying in great pools of blood, all feelings of pity and 
 compassion were swamped by the physical repulsion 
 and nausea that overpowered us. Our one desire 
 was to get away, and it required a tremendous effort to 
 remain and render aid where it could be of any avail. 
 As the recurrent bombardments inured us to the sight 
 of death, I observed a change in our mental attitude. 
 We no longer sought to avoid the ghastly sights result- 
 ing from German ' frightf illness,' but rather felt a morbid 
 curiosity as to what had happened, and this developed 
 into something like callousness. I do not think we 
 felt less sorrow for suffering, but a certain numbness 
 of sensation had befallen us. Yet we did not lose all 
 capacity for emotion. We were living under the 
 constant menace of a sudden arid horrible death, and 
 the ruthless and barbarous slaughter of so many 
 innocent people, mostly old men, women, and children, 
 aroused intense indignation. Anger, keen and vehe- 
 ment, was openly expressed, and the Kaiser would have 
 received a short shrift had he fallen into our hands. 
 
 "Our only refuge from the shells was the cellars of 
 the great champagne houses. It is difficult to give 
 you a clear impression, in a few words, of life in those 
 cellars. Imagine several hundred people, congregated 
 in grolips, lying on straw or boxes, on a cement flooring, 
 fifty or sixty feet below ground, in semi-darkness, 
 for there was but^a (/ candle every dozen yards or so. 
 Little food but bread. No hot meals, though the
 
 WHEN THE WAR CAME 245 
 
 manager made them tea as long as his stock lasted. 
 Sanitary arrangements improvised in the most primitive 
 manner. Many of the people never washed themselves, 
 judging by appearances. The 1 predominant emotion, 
 fear, finding vent in vociferous apostrophes to the 
 Deity, especially in moments of panic. It was a night- 
 mare from which we were glad to escape when occasion 
 at last offered. We found the quiet and tranquillity 
 of Paris strange after the noise and devastation of 
 Rheims. Nothing would induce us to repeat our 
 experiences. But we shall not readily forget the dark 
 champagne cellars, nor the kindness of those in charge 
 of them." 
 
 A noteworthy fact in connexion with the earlier 
 period of the war was the ignorance in which both 
 the French and British public were kept as to the 
 course of events. Had they known of the great defeat, 
 reported as a " check," of the French Army between 
 Metz and Strasburg, towards the end of August, or 
 of the rout of Rennenkampf's army in East Prussia, a 
 few days later, also reported as a " check," of the full 
 extent of the reverses at Moris and Charleroi, or of the 
 full significance of the march on Paris, there might 
 have been something like a panic in both countries. 
 The second week of September the battle of the Marne 
 of course altered the face of the situation. But no 
 one for weeks after realized the true import of the 
 change consequent on that event, from the " war of 
 movement " to the " war of positions." Up to this 
 time the hostilities had been conducted pretty much 
 on the accustomed lines of warfare the sending out 
 of scouts, followed by the advance of armies, en- 
 gagements in the field, strategic manceuvrings, etc.
 
 246 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 From the middle of September onward the course of 
 affairs began to change, till before another month had 
 elapsed they had assumed quite another character, 
 and one that may fairly be said to have been unknown 
 to the wars of previous European history. Though 
 in all warfare entrenchment has been an incident, 
 yet it has been no more than a local incident, a matter 
 of hours or at most of days. In the present war 
 the case is quite different. Here entrenchment is the 
 central fact of the war, the main factor on which 
 the whole course of hostilities has turned, after the first 
 two or three months of the campaigns on the various 
 fronts. The causes of this great revolution in the 
 conditions of warfare is of course a highly interesting 
 subject of inquiry, but one which only a technically 
 equipped and competent authority on military matters 
 can effectively handle. One consequence of the change 
 is, however, sufficiently noticeable to the layman. 
 Trench warfare on a great scale, as at present, would 
 seem indefinitely to prolong a campaign by rendering 
 decisive engagements highly improbable, where not 
 impossible. In trench warfare a Waterloo or a Sedan 
 is scarcely conceivable. The section of a line even 
 seriously broken does not by any means necessarily 
 imply a disastrous defeat for the army in question, 
 which by judicious retreat and reconstitution of its 
 line may quite well continue to operate as if nothing 
 had happened to it, provided it has sufficient reserves. 
 In former wars things were quite otherwise. 
 
 The earlier stages of the war are remarkable for 
 having been the soil on which originated among English 
 people two thoroughgoing and elaborate myths of the 
 approved antique pattern. The first of these was the
 
 WHEN THE WAR CAME 247 
 
 story of the angels at Mons, and the second the wide- 
 spread, and for a few days the almost universally 
 accredited, report of the huge Russian army landed 
 in Scotland, and sent down South to check the German 
 advance on Paris. The angels at Mons, of course, 
 had the usual vouchers in the shape of personal wit- 
 nesses which are forthcoming wherever the super- 
 natural is in question. Valiant British soldiers, as 
 was alleged, swore to having seen something not of 
 this earth, though as to precisely what it was the 
 accounts varied. One version had it that it was a legion 
 of angels that held up the German advance and saved\ 
 the British battalions ; with others, it was the solitary 
 figure of St. George on horseback, as impressed on 
 the five-shilling piece. In deference to the French 
 allies, there were, I think, one or two variants which 
 identified the celestial visitation 'with the figure of 
 St. Michael, and, if I remember rightly, of Jeanne d'Arc. 
 According to the opinion of many persons the whole 
 thing arose out of a little feuilleton by Mr. Arthur 
 Machen in the Evening News, though' there were others 
 who strenuously denied this, alleging the reports in 
 question to have originated before Mr. Machen's article 
 appeared, and in any case quite independently of it. 
 Be this as it may, among those who professed to believe 
 the story were at least one popular Nonconformist 
 minister, and, if I mistake not, two or three other 
 members of the clerical profession well known to 
 the public. 
 
 The other myth referred to bore no overt relation 
 to the supernatural, but presented all the character- 
 istics of a true myth, notwithstanding. Here also the 
 origin of the astounding report was un traceable. There
 
 248 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 was not even a Mr. Machen or a newspaper statement 
 to fall back upon. The story of the Russian army 
 landed in Scotland spread like wildfire from mouth to 
 mouth among the public before it even got into the 
 newspapers. Of this there is no question. People 
 had seen blinded trains at various junctions and had 
 caught a glimpse of undoubted Cossacks peering out 
 of railway compartment windows. The evidence was 
 such, indeed, as to deceive the very elect of true British 
 caution and common sense. 
 
 As already indicated, I was living near London when 
 the war broke out, and remained there till the begin- 
 ning of December, when circumstances urged me to 
 go to Paris, partly for family reasons, and partly as a 
 stage towards seeking my appartement in Nice, for 
 considerations of health, during the winter months. 
 Travelling on the Continent just then was generally 
 regarded as an unpleasant business. Many had been 
 the stories told in the papers, during those early months 
 of the war, of trains held up and their occupants turned 
 out into some temporary shed, to make room for con- 
 voys of wounded ; of other trains run into sidings 
 and left there for hours, or it might be a day or two, 
 with their passengers, in order to leave the line clear 
 for the transport of troops. This being so, most 
 civilians were disinclined to hazard their luck in crossing 
 the Channel, an undertaking itself regarded as more 
 or less risky, owing to the danger of submarines. Never- 
 theless, accompanied by my wife and my friend the 
 London publisher before alluded to, I went, albeit 
 with ceitain misgivings of what might happen, this 
 being my first experience of travelling, in war-time, 
 through a tract of country that had been partially
 
 249 
 
 occupied by hostile troops not more than three months 
 before, and which was still within comparatively short 
 distance of the battle-front. However, beyond an 
 unpleasant and tempestuous Channel crossing, nothing 
 happened. The journey from Boulogne to Paris by 
 way of Beauvais, the railway viaduct near Amiens, 
 blown up by the Germans, not having as yet been 
 rebuilt, passed off without incident, though it neces- 
 sarily took some two hours longer than by the usual 
 route. 
 
 We found Paris itself quiet and wonderfully dark 
 on our arrival. The next day further showed us a 
 city chastened 'by adversity, but no signs of excite- 
 ment or panic of any kind. The Boulevards looked, 
 indeed, somewhat deserted as compared with ordinary 
 times, but the restaurants and caf6s were open as 
 usual. My friend and myself having accomplished 
 what we had to do in Paris, we started by the night 
 train for the South, where we arrived, also without 
 having encountered any incident suggestive of war- 
 time, the following afternoon. It is interesting to note 
 that, contrary to the experience of others at the time 
 we are referring to, we were not challenged for our 
 " papers " in Paris or on the journey. 
 
 The winter of 1914-15 was naturally a gloomy one 
 for the Mediterranean towns. At Nice the opera- 
 house was closed, and the theatres likewise, leaving a 
 few " cinemas " as the only form of popular enter- 
 tainment to be indulged in. There was one thing; 
 however, which agreeably distinguished the Mediter 
 ranean littoral from the places in the North nearer 
 the seat of war. There was no restriction as to light- 
 ing beyond what municipal parsimony, encouraged
 
 250 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 by the absence of visitors, suggested. For the rest, 
 the dreary monotony of the daily bulletins of trenches 
 taken, lost, or retaken, told on the spirits of the genial, 
 children of the South, no less than on those of less 
 favoured climes. 
 
 In dealing with the war, every Socialist is naturally 
 brought up against the fact of the treachery to the 
 fundamental principles of Socialism, as well as to 
 International party ties, on the part of the Social 
 Democratic members of the Reichstag. When we 
 consider that but a few days before the outbreak of 
 the war, both at the meeting of the International 
 Socialist Bureau at Brussels and, on the part of cer- 
 tain of the leaders at least, a day or two subsequently 
 in Paris, the strongest assurances were given by members 
 of the present majority of the Reichstag " fraction " 
 that the German proletariat would never consent to 
 fight their French brethren, and that the party mem- 
 bers in the Reichstag would never vote war credits 
 for the Government when we consider this, the action 
 of these very same men, and of the colleagues in whose 
 name they spoke, scarcely more than a week later, 
 must constrain the mildest and most indulgent critic 
 to admit that history can hardly show a baser and a 
 viler instance of treachery and broken pledges than 
 their conduct. Of course, writing as I am before 
 the end of the war, when most of what is going on 
 in Germany is hidden from the view of the outer world, 
 it would be unfair to assume that the majority of the 
 Social Democratic Party throughout the country ought 
 to be regarded as in any way accomplices in this act 
 of treachery. Until a party Congress can be held 
 at which all members of the party, those now at the
 
 WHEN THE WAR CAME 
 
 front no less than those at home, can be represented 
 and speak their minds freely through their delegates, 
 we have no right to assume that the majority of the 
 party in the country is in sympathy with the majority 
 of the present Reichstag representation. We know, 
 as a matter of fact, that the followers of Karl Lieb- 
 knecht are numerous throughout Germany, but we do 
 not know how numerous, or what proportion they 
 represent to the other sections of the party. One 
 thing is certain, however, and that is that, outside 
 Germany, no one calling himself a Socialist should 
 consent again to meet in Congress or to hold any 
 intercourse whatsoever, either directly or indirectly, 
 with traitors to the principles of Socialism, to the 
 International Socialist Party, and to Humanity, such 
 as the " majority " of the present representation of 
 the Social Democratic Party in the German Reichstag. 
 It does not lie within the scope of this chapter, as 
 conceived by the author, to provide one more of the 
 fancy sketches of the political reconstruction of Europe 
 with which the British public has been regaled since 
 the beginning of the war. It behoves all friends of 
 progress and peace to look to it that the European 
 democracy is not cheated, by any secret understanding 
 among the governing classes of the Entente States, of the 
 full attainment of that object which has been so often 
 officially proclaimed as that for which we are fighting 
 to wit, the extinction of Prussia as an independent 
 military Power, and the reconstitution of the German 
 States on the basis of equality in & loose federal bond, 
 the necessary consequence of this. We may be good 
 pro- Allies, but it is well for us not to forget that govern- 
 ing classes are governing classes all the world over,
 
 252 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 have interests in common against the democracy, and 
 that, as William Morris was fond of saying, " Dog 
 doesn't eat dog ! " Into the details of the actual 
 reconstruction after the war it is in my opinion prema- 
 ture to enter at the present time of writing. 
 
 The effect of the war upon the Socialist movement 
 more or less in all, but especially in belligerent, countries 
 has had its repercussion in Great Britain in the split 
 in the British Socialist Party, and the foundation of 
 a rival organization, the National Socialist Party, by 
 a large and growing section of British Socialists, com- 
 prising, almost to a man, all the surviving " old guard " 
 of the pioneer Socialist body of this country, the old 
 original Social Democratic Federation. 
 
 From the beginning of the war was visible an 
 inevitable tendency to scission between partisans of a 
 " peace at any price," even at the price of leaving 
 Prussian despotism and Prussian militarism intact, 
 to continue to terrorize Europe and start another war 
 probably in less than ten years' time, and those who 
 wished to see the military monarchies of Central Europe 
 destroyed once for all, and who cherished the hope at 
 least that the present war, the most terrific in the 
 world's history, may prove to be the last war, at least 
 on a large scale. Those who take this view regard 
 the 'Entente Powers as acting simply in the capacity of 
 a politico-international police force to punish crime and 
 aggression. 
 
 There is an elemen,t in the psychology of the ultra- 
 pacifist British Socialist which must not be lost sight 
 of. It is the acute anti-patriotic bias which reduces 
 political and ethical judgments to an absurdity. The 
 bias implies that because Great Britain happens to be
 
 WHEN THE WAR CAME 253 
 
 on a particular side, that side must necessarily be in 
 the wrong and its enemies in the right. Now, it is 
 quite true that in the colonial wars of the nineteenth 
 century, and last, but not least, in the Boer War which 
 ushered in the present century, this country has almost 
 invariably played an aggressive and criminal role as 
 a State. Hence the moral judgment of all fair-minded 
 arid disinterested persons, with a strength of con- 
 science sufficient to resist the " jingo " or patriotic 
 bias, has condemned the policy of this country. In 
 that most flagrant case, the Boer War, so much bitter- 
 ness was engendered, and the moral sense of a large 
 section of Englishmen was so much shocked by the 
 official conduct of their country, that it is not perhaps 
 surprising that the strength of the anti-British bias 
 then engendered should still be operative, especially 
 among certain sections of Radicals and Socialists who 
 bore the heat and burden of the protest at that time. 
 This, there is no doubt, is the underlying cause of much 
 of the Pacifism and pro-Germanism in England to-day. 
 It is, nevertheless, strange to find such an utter lack 
 of logical faculty in these worthy persons that they 
 cannot see that precisely the same moral principles 
 which led them to execrate the action of Great Britain 
 in the Boer War ought necessarily to lead them to 
 execrate the action of Germany in the present war. 
 To allow one's anti-patriotic bias to run so wild as 
 to kick over all the bounds of ethico-political logic 
 seems scarcely compatible with the sane mind. Yet 
 so it is. In addition to this, of course, certain well- 
 known fallacies play their part, as, for example, the 
 obsession alluded to by Mill in one of his chapters on 
 Fallacies (" Logic," vol. ii. p. 351), to wit, that there must
 
 254 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 always be faults on both sides, an obsession which blinds 
 a man to truth and justice when it is to be found 
 on one side only, as it very often is. Another fallacy 
 which in this as in other cases is apt to lead the 
 ordinary man astray, is the confusion of issues. 
 This fallacy of the untrained mind is very much 
 in evidence amongst the pacifist and pro-German 
 Socialists. Because Socialists have attacked all exist- 
 ing governments as institutions for the mainten- 
 ance of the present class-State, in the interests 
 of Capitalism and land-monopoly, it is therefore 
 argued that we cannot take the side of the Allied 
 States in the present war for the overthrow of the 
 Prussian military power. Here comes in the fallacy 
 of failing to grasp the bearings of a specific issue. The 
 Allied Powers may have all the evil qualities in their 
 governmental institutions, as in the economic system 
 common to all existing States, that Socialist criticism 
 ascribes to them, and yet they may be wholly in the 
 right as regards the specific issue of this war. The 
 distinction is recognized in common life. The most 
 strenuous votary of the Nonconformist conscience 
 would presumably not trip up a policeman while chasing 
 a burglar, on the ground that he was a person of 
 immoral life. In most cases, indeed, he would hardly 
 claim it to be his duty, on the above ground, even to 
 refuse him his active assistance to capture the burglar. 
 He would generally have sense enough to recognize that 
 the question of the private conduct of the policeman's 
 life, and his act of apprehending a burglar, were two 
 distinct and irrelevant issues. And so it is with this 
 war. Russian despotism at home and British earth- 
 hunger abroad do not affect the issue of the present
 
 WHEN THE WAR CAME 255 
 
 struggle. However bad in themselves these charac- 
 teristics of the States in question may be, their policy 
 may nevertheless be wholly justified in its resistance 
 to Prussian aggression. 
 
 There is another thing to be observed in this con- 
 nexion. Although the colonial policy and the colonial 
 wars of England have, almost invariably, from any 
 consistently Democratic or Socialist point of view, 
 been infamous, yet British action in continental politics 
 has not quite invariably been so. Thus, though the 
 war with revolutionary France organized by Pitt in 
 the interests of European reaction was scandalous 
 enough, the later campaign for the overthrow of the 
 military empire of Napoleon I was undoubtedly in 
 the interests of the peaceful development of Europe 
 generally, apart from any legitimate patriotic justi- 
 fication it may have had in removing from the country 
 the threat of invasion. The present situation is in 
 some respects analogous. In place of the French 
 Empire of Napoleon Bonaparte we have the Prusso- 
 German Empire of the Hohenzollerns. In either case 
 the war represents the resistance of Europe to an 
 aggressive military despotism. As to the ultimate 
 issue of the war, the terms of peace, etc., at the time 
 of writing it would seem futile, as already said, to 
 enter on any discussion. I may remark, however, 
 that I agree with my friend Jules Guesde in deprecating 
 any far-reaching cutting-up of German territory, while 
 holding fast by the principle of the absolute and final 
 destruction of the military power of the Central Mon- 
 archies. The future of Germany, it seems to me, 
 should take the form of a loose federation of the different 
 German States, without the hegemony of any one
 
 State, with no military power beyond that of a local 
 State militia, in general analogous to that of Switzer- 
 land, but without any central or national directing 
 power, or Ober-commando. This would seem to repre- 
 sent the general terms, the minimum conditions, under 
 which a lasting peace with the Central Nations (I 
 expressly forbear to say the Central Powers) could be 
 effected.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 CONCLUDING REFLEXIONS 
 
 IN thinking back on the course of one's past life, there 
 are obviously many interesting reflexions which are 
 suggested. 1 One such presented itself to me recently, 
 when I bethought me that my own personal memory- 
 synthesis included within its purview a span of time 
 equal to that of the whole life of Shakespeare. It was 
 while reading the two monumental volumes on Shake- 
 speare's England, recently published for the three- 
 hundredth anniversary of his birth by the Clarendon 
 Press, that I was led to recall the above circumstance. 
 The celebration of the anniversary of Shakespeare's 
 birth in the year 1864 I can distinctly remember. I 
 was at Brighton as a boy at the time, and I believe 
 was taken to hear one of the many discourses that 
 were being delivered on the Bard of Avon in the Spring 
 of that year. It was about the time that Garibaldi 
 paid his celebrated visit to England and was received 
 with the wildest demonstrations of enthusiasm. From 
 that time to this my memory of the main flow of events 
 is of course distinct, and more or less continuous, and 
 it is somewhat startling to reflect that this span of 
 
 1 I must ask the reader to excuse these concluding reflexions 
 being somewhat varied. Their connexion one with another 
 consists mainly in their reference to the present time and its 
 contrast to former periods within my personal experience. 
 
 17 257
 
 258 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 time, covered by one's own mental experience, repre- 
 sents the whole life-period of the immortal one. Such 
 a reflexion as the above is only one of the many to 
 which the advance of age in oneself gives rise. 
 
 The changes in opinion and attitude in the British 
 mind, as decade succeeded decade, and much more, 
 of course, as generation succeeded generation, during 
 the lifetime of the present writer, have been already 
 dwelt upon in the course of these reminiscences. As 
 illustrating again a remarkable change which has 
 taken place within the present century owing to the 
 progress of mechanical invention, I may note an inci- 
 dent which happened to me about the middle of the 
 nineties, i.e. not much more than twenty years ago. 
 I was speaking at a Socialist meeting, and on some 
 objection being raised to a suggestion I made, on the 
 ground of its involving difficulties of transit, or 
 something to that effect, I replied that the problem 
 of aerial locomotion would probably have been solved 
 before long, and that airboats and flying-machines 
 would not only supplement, but might even have 
 superseded, the then existing methods of transit. It 
 seems worth recording to-day that this remark of mine, 
 made less than a quarter of a century ago, was greeted 
 at the time with a roar of laughter from the audience, 
 who evidently regarded it as the mad dream of an 
 unpractical, scatterbrained Utopian, if not as an 
 intentional joke. Looking back at the incident from 
 the standpoint of to-day, one is inclined to think what 
 fools peopled the world in the nineties. Yet we see 
 similar instances of short-sightedness, even among 
 people at other times the most intelligent. 
 
 The power to rise above the ruts of thought in which
 
 CONCLUDING REFLEXIONS 259 
 
 one has grown up is not everybody's affair. . The 
 members of my audience in the nineties had been 
 accustomed all their lives to the notion of flying- 
 machines and dirigible aircraft as no better than a 
 whimsical crankism. They had never taken the trouble 
 to reflect on the implications of the bird's flying power, 
 and of the quite obvious possibility of imitating and 
 reproducing mechanically the organic conditions on 
 which it is founded. 
 
 To take an illustration from another department. 
 Some years ago the Socialist lecturer was constantly 
 met by would-be wiseacres with the assertion that 
 the stimulus of necessity, and in the last resort of 
 hunger, was requisite to induce men to work at all, 
 laziness being one of the fundamental characteristics 
 of what they were pleased to term " human nature," 
 They had heard this thesis proclaimed as an axiom, 
 by those whom they deemed sagacious persons, from 
 their youth up, and never having taken the trouble 
 to look closer into the motives of men, they had come 
 to regard any theory which ignored it as an absurdity. 
 This is a remarkable instance of the short-sightedness 
 of the average man, since it requires such a very little 
 study, or even ordinary observation, of " human 
 nature " to show that the theory is baseless. In the 
 first place, the phrase " human nature " itself is a 
 very vague one, since in the course of Man's evolution 
 it has changed its character on so many sides. But 
 let this pass. By " human nature " the persons in 
 question generally mean the human nature of them- 
 selves and their neighbours, in other words, human 
 nature as moulded by the capitalist civilization of the 
 nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Let us then take
 
 260 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 the men and women surrounding us to-day. If we 
 do, we shall find that in every average normal man 
 or woman there undoubtedly exists a strain of aversion 
 to excessive toil, yet that there is an equal aversion 
 to absolute idleness. Find me the most leisured man 
 without the slightest necessity of earning his liveli- 
 hood who yet does not choose to work at something 
 or other, very often of a quite unremunerative character. 
 I don't say it is always useful work, by any means, 
 but yet it is work, and sometimes hard work, and 
 not idleness. Even the man who devotes himself to 
 athletics, or to games such as football or cricket, as a 
 serious business in life, without fee or reward, though 
 it may be a question whether he is doing anything 
 useful, is certainly not idle or lazy. He toils, and 
 sometimes very hard, when there is absolutely no 
 necessity for his doing so. Again, look around to-day 
 at the numbers of men, some of them men of means, 
 many of them leaving good and easy positions in their 
 several walks of life, who have voluntarily accepted, 
 not only the chances of death on the battlefield, but 
 the arduous labours of the trenches, and that not 
 merely without any prospect of material gain, but 
 at a positive material loss to themselves. Once more, 
 look at the hundreds of women who, equally without 
 any stimulus of gain or economic necessity, have under- 
 taken heavy, and in itself often unpleasant, work as 
 nurses. And these cases are more the rule than the 
 exception during these last three years. Oh, but, you 
 will say, the force of public opinion drove these men 
 and women to hard and unremunerative labour. Even 
 if the statement be admitted up to a certain point, 
 can those who say this be so dense as not to see that,
 
 CONCLUDING REFLEXIONS 261 
 
 in a Society organized on a Socialist basis, an infinitely 
 stronger force of public opinion would constrain men 
 and women to fulfil their moderate and just share of 
 the necessary work of the world ? One would not 
 deny the existence of pathological specimens of 
 humanity to whom all work is distasteful. But such 
 are so exceptional as to be negligible from a practical 
 point of view. The tendency to exaggerate their 
 numbers by superficial and thoughtless people is due 
 to the fact that under the present anarchic conditions 
 of society so many men are forced by circumstances 
 to seek their livelihood in uncongenial occupations. 
 That such persons should show an inclination at times 
 to shirk the uncongenial work to which circumstances 
 have condemned them does not by any means imply 
 that they are averse to all work. In a reasonable 
 society this fact of " human nature " would of course 
 be taken into account. There are few men for whom 
 some form of useful labour is not endurable or even 
 attractive. The thing is, in the process of the education 
 of youth, to find out what this special form of work 
 is. To do so is indeed one of the most important 
 functions of educational training, though as yet this 
 function has been entirely neglected. And even if it 
 had not been so, the results obtained would have been 
 largely useless under present capitalistic conditions. 
 
 One of the changes which distinguishes the present 
 generation from those preceding is undoubtedly the 
 tendency to a mistrust of all conventional shibboleths. 
 The present generation is quite prepared to reconsider 
 all positions. What would formerly have been con- 
 sidered paradox is the breath of its intellectual life. 
 This tendency to paradoxism with the modern man,
 
 262 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 healthy though it be in itself, is, as I have already 
 pointed out in a former chapter, apt at times to run 
 to excess, as possibly in the case of Shaw and his 
 perennial paradox-joke. Shaw undoubtedly has the 
 signal merit of having stimulated the mind of the 
 English-speaking peoples to independent thought and 
 Socratic questionings, but it is doubtful whether 
 the backwash of his influence has not tended to 
 promote a craving for paradoxical fare intellectually, 
 which on the analogy of the much decried craving 
 for alcohol, or for highly spiced condiments gusta- 
 tively has destroyed all taste intellectually for 
 plain statements of fact, not wearing the garb of 
 paradox. Now, this is certainly not healthy. The 
 well-known Delphic motto " Nothing in excess " applies 
 as much to paradox as to anything else. In fact, the 
 excess in the case of paradox, if without measure, may 
 well have the result on the coming generation of pro- 
 ducing a reaction by sheer surfeit. This may for the 
 time being obscure the good effect left by the critical 
 spirit aroused in the existing generation, with the 
 consequence of a general reactionary falling back on 
 old and exploded dogmatic positions, by way of relief. 
 Such reactions are common phenomena in history. 
 The well-known case of the generation succeeding the 
 French Revolution may serve, mutatis mutandis, as an 
 illustration. The present generation does not fully 
 realize that mere paradoxical brilliancy and smartness, 
 like everything else, may pall after a time upon the 
 intellect satiated with it. 
 
 Again, among the special fashions of the present 
 time is the one before alluded to in passing, namely, 
 the elevation of the nation-State into a god or object
 
 CONCLUDING REFLEXIONS 263 
 
 of supreme devotion, with a corresponding cult of its 
 own, which has really, if not nominally, substituted 
 itself for the old religious faith. Of this sentiment, 
 which in its present form as Imperialism is traceable 
 for thirty years or more back, and has, as one might 
 expect, been accentuated a hundredfold by the present 
 war, it is unnecessary to speak. In antithesis to this 
 cult of Patriotism, now dominant, stands the Inter- 
 nationalist principle of Socialism. It has been often 
 said of late that Internationalism does not mean Anti- 
 nationalism. But if it does not mean Anti-nationalism 
 it certainly means anti-Imperialism. And more than 
 this, the Internationalism of the consistent Socialist 
 certainly does imply the relegation of nationality, or 
 race, and all that it connotes, to a place secondary to 
 that of Humanity. In what I may term the religion 
 of Patriotism, of which we hear so much nowadays, 
 Humanity merely exists as a background to " one's 
 country." The first consideration is the material 
 aggrandizement and the moral honour and glory of 
 the nation-State into which one has been born. This 
 is the first consideration with modern Imperialism, 
 which is the form in which Patriotism inevitably clothes 
 itself, in the case of a nationality that is also a great 
 World-Power. 
 
 The conflict between these two principles, Imperial- 
 ism and Internationalism, between national material 
 interest on the one side, as opposed to human interest 
 with its moral sanctions on the other, can hardly fail 
 to constitute one of the great issues of the world in 
 the near future. I say this in the full consciousness 
 of the fact that for the time being the principle of 
 Internationalism seems to have suffered a defeat at
 
 264 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 the hands of its rival, convinced as I am that it is no 
 real defeat, but merely a temporary set-back ; and 
 furthermore, that there are many among those who 
 are heart and soul with the cause of the Allies in the 
 present war who are so, less on the ground of Patriot- 
 ism than from a desire to see justice among peoples, 
 and the rights of our common Humanity vindicated. 
 Of course, for the moment, the call of Patriotism has 
 the upper hand and dominates the world, but even 
 now the idea of the closer union of the Allied nations, 
 though born of antagonism and war, may later on, when 
 present hatreds have died down, be one of the factors 
 that will pave the way for the truer and more complete 
 Internationalism of the future. 
 
 The present war, as the Boer War and other wars 
 have done before, gives rise to a singular ethical problem. 
 The moral aspects of the wars in question are, generally 
 speaking, perfectly plain. The right and wrong of the 
 causes of the wars, i.e. the right and wrong when judged 
 according to ethical standards universally admitted 
 otherwise in private life, must be obvious, one would 
 think, to any one judging impartially on the facts. 
 Yet how is it that men of good repute personally, and 
 decently honourable in private life, can bring them- 
 selves in international concerns to profess publicly to 
 justify the side of their own country, when it is not 
 merely in the wrong, but criminally in the wrong ? 
 We have all of us known, at the time of the Boer War, 
 Englishmen who as ordinary citizens were men of 
 integrity, truthful and fair in their dealings, and who 
 nevertheless pretended to justify the action of the 
 British Government in its aggression on the two South 
 African Republics, not to speak of the " methods of
 
 CONCLUDING REFLEXIONS 265 
 
 barbarism " in its conduct of the war. These men 
 ignored, or lamely attempted by falsehoods to explain 
 away, the admitted facts of the case. To-day we see 
 precisely the same phenomenon in the case of Germany. 
 Here again you have men, doubtless equally honourable 
 in their private life and dealings, who are prepared to 
 come forth publicly and defend an act of international 
 brigandage, and this without one word of reprobation 
 for the further inhuman crimes committed in carrying 
 it out. Now, how are these things to be reconciled ? 
 The self-interest of men holding positions under govern- 
 ment, or the party considerations of politicians, no 
 doubt is a large, perhaps the chief, factor therein. 
 But these merely selfish reasons would hardly suffice 
 completely to explain the case in all instances, though 
 they might do so in some. I think we are driven to 
 the conclusion that a genuine psychological blindness 
 plays its part in the matter. Some at least of these 
 men are really affected by a kind of ethical myopia 
 for the time being ; the patriotic sentiment which they 
 have possibly inherited, or which in any case has been 
 hammered into them from their youth up, and has 
 lately been taking on the aspect of a religion, has uncon- 
 sciously warped their whole ethical nature. Of course, 
 there are a large number who know well enough that 
 their country is wrong, and only defend it from inter- 
 ested motives. But I believe there are also some who 
 are not consciously dishonest in the matter and to 
 whom the foregoing remarks will apply. This will 
 continue to be the case, it is to be feared, until the 
 modern religion of Patriotism is supplanted in the 
 minds of men by the religion of Humanity, the senti- 
 ment of a common human brotherhood. Once admit
 
 266 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 Patriotism as the highest sentiment, as religion, and 
 you have the problem of contradictory Patriotisms to 
 deal with. When they laud Patriotism, people gener- 
 ally mean their own Patriotism. But how about 
 " the other fellow's " Patriotism ? How about the 
 Prussian's, for example ? If " My country right or 
 wrong " is a noble sentiment on the banks of the 
 Thames, how does it look on the banks of the Spree ? 
 Let us turn now to other phases of the modern mind. 
 One of the curious things I have noted is the growth 
 for at least a generation past in the medical profession 
 of what I may term medical asceticism. Asceticism, 
 it should not be forgotten, is quite as constant a phe- 
 nomenon of human psychology as self-indulgence. We 
 have before had theological asceticism, to wit, an 
 asceticism based on the notion of the harsh treatment 
 of the body being conducive to the welfare of the soul. 
 This, of course, has played a great part at different periods 
 in the Christian religion, but we find it largely sup- 
 planted at the present day by medical asceticism. The 
 perennial ascetic bias of the human mind, feeling the 
 theological basis of ascetic practice to be unsatisfac- 
 tory and out of harmony with the general modern 
 outlook on life, believes itself to have found a more 
 satisfactory basis for the mortification of the flesh, not 
 for the benefit of the soul of man, which has fallen 
 into the background, but for the welfare of his body. 
 Hence medical asceticism, which tends to reduce to 
 the minimum, if not to utterly abolish, the lusts of the 
 flesh and the sensible enjoyments of life, on physio- 
 logical grounds. Take the case of alcohol. This is 
 seen in the crusade, not of course against obvious 
 excess, which every one condemns, but against alcohol
 
 CONCLUDING REFLEXIONS 267 
 
 altogether. 1 And this is only one manifestation of 
 the tendency in question. It is the habit of the medical 
 profession nowadays to forbid its patients, and to dis- 
 courage, at least, on the part of mankind in general, 
 the use or practice of anything conducive to the satis- 
 faction or delight of the bodily sense. In all living, 
 that which is conducive to the ease of the body is 
 condemned. Not only in drinking is the mellowing 
 influence of alcohol denounced as incompatible with 
 bodily health, but the eating of everything that is 
 palatable is declared noxious. Smoking is objected 
 to, and has recently been sought to be made illegal 
 for the young person. 
 
 As an instance of the curious ascetic phase through 
 which the art of medicine is passing, I may mention 
 that a friend of. mine, who was suffering during the 
 very hot weather from the condition of the skin known 
 as " prickly heat," was seriously advised by an able 
 medical man that he should on no account indulge 
 in cooling and effervescing drinks ! This patient, 
 I should say, in spite of the injunction, continued to 
 take his cooling and effervescing drinks, and the "prickly 
 heat " symptoms went notwithstanding. It is difficult 
 for a layman to regard the prohibition in question as 
 anything else than a piece of medical asceticism, since 
 it seems hardly possible that refreshing beverages, 
 
 1 It is a noteworthy fact that the physical degeneration of the 
 Scotchman of to-day is coincident with an increasing abste- 
 miousness as regards whisky. There was, I believe, a Royal 
 Commission established to inquire into the causes of Scottish 
 degeneracy before the war, and, so far as I am aware, no 
 report has as yet been made. It is not probable, however, 
 that in the present anti-alcoholic state of public opinion 
 emphasis would be laid by any Royal Commission on these 
 facts, still less any correlation be admitted between them.
 
 268 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 which give relief and tone to the system, can have an 
 irritating effect on the skin. It is curious, but never- 
 theless undoubtedly true, that at the present day there 
 are many among the public who would lose confidence 
 in a doctor who did not prescribe for them something 
 of the nature of penitential and purgatorial diet. A 
 generation or so ago the patients expected the doctor 
 to order them highly coloured and nauseating drugs, 
 so much so, that I knew of a medical man who used 
 to keep different coloured waters with a little harmless 
 but nauseous flavouring in them, to satisfy those of 
 his patients who did not have much the matter with 
 them, and who did not really require any medicine at 
 all. The same practice has prevailed, I believe, in 
 sundry London hospitals. At a still earlier date the 
 " patient " public thought the doctor was not doing 
 his duty if he did not prescribe copious blood-lettings. 
 The fashion is now all for ascetic dieting ; no alcohol, 
 no condiments, no smoking, no anything but what is 
 to the bodily senses of man fade and insipid. As 
 regards this whole question of dietetics, a medical 
 friend of mine told me that in a recent interview with 
 an elderly colleague, the author of a well-known book 
 on the subject, he expressed his serious doubts whether 
 the whole modern theory of diet had any scientific 
 basis to it, to which the elder man replied, " You are 
 twenty years younger than I am, but it seems you 
 have already come to the conclusion at which I 
 have only just arrived myself." The obvious and 
 common-sense view, one would think, would be, that 
 it is for every human being to find out by experience 
 what suits him or her best, and that diet is not a subject 
 on which any effective rules and regulations can be
 
 CONCLUDING REFLEXIONS 269 
 
 laid down for general observance. Medical, like other 
 fashions, have their day and cease to be, though some- 
 times, as with the bleeding mania, their passing may 
 be slow. 
 
 The principles and propaganda of Feminism were 
 running high in the land up to the outbreak of the 
 war, and though for the time being undoubtedly over- 
 shadowed by the great events of the last two years, 
 there is no reason for thinking that Feminism, theo- 
 retical and practical, will not reassert itself when the 
 present crisis is over. In my book on the subject I 
 have distinguished between political and sentimental 
 Feminism. The propaganda of Feminism has for its 
 practical object to exalt the woman at the expense 
 of the man. We have had echoes of sentimental 
 Feminism during the war itself, notably, as already 
 mentioned, in the case of Edith Cavell, where we have 
 a woman exalted to the rank of a demi-goddess of 
 heroism, while of the Belgian architect, Philippe Bancq, 
 who suffered at the same time, for the same offence 
 against the German invaders of his country, not a word 
 has been said. Compare the case of Captain Fryatt, 
 whose murder was even more in contravention of the 
 laws of civilized war than that of Edith Cavell, and yet 
 we hear of no streets named after him and no festivals 
 in his honour ! The general theory of sentimental 
 Feminism seems to be that the shooting of one woman 
 non-combatant outweighs the murder of ten men non- 
 combatants. Such divinity doth hedge a female of 
 the human species ! 
 
 As regards the theoretical basis of the Feminist 
 contention, a case has recently come under my notice 
 which may serve to supplement the instances, as given
 
 270 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 in my book, of special pleading, and indeed of the 
 complete perversion of scientific fact in the interest 
 of Feminist theory. The object of the theorists of 
 Feminism is to prove that woman is mentally the 
 equal of man. If they can only make her out to be 
 superior, so much the better. A Viennese professor, 
 of Feminist proclivities, has recently, I think, fairly 
 " taken the cake " (as the phrase goes) in this con- 
 nexion. As is well known, it is the grey matter of the 
 brain which is correlated with sensation, thought, and 
 conscious action, while the white matter consists of 
 nerve-strands communicating between the cell-group 
 centres of grey matter. Hence the obvious fact that 
 upon the quality and the amount of the grey matter 
 depend the amount and quality of the intellect of the 
 individual. Now, it is a further well-ascertained fact 
 that the comparison of the brains of the average man 
 and woman shows a vastly greater preponderance of 
 grey to white cells in the former than in the latter. 
 These well-authenticated, and hitherto universally 
 admitted, scientific facts obviously constitute a very 
 awkward stumbling-block in the way of the theory 
 Feminists are anxious to propagate as regards sex- 
 capacities. Accordingly, the Viennese Feminist pro- 
 fessor spoken of decided to take the bull by the horns, 
 and attack the well-established conclusions of science 
 in this matter, by declaring -the latter to be all wrong, 
 the white and not the grey matter of the brain being 
 the most important elements in its structure as cor- 
 related with the higher mental processes ! Needless 
 to say, the unbiased results of generations of research 
 in cerebral structure and function stand now as firmly 
 as ever they did, the unshotted broadside levelled
 
 CONCLUDING REFLEXIONS 271 
 
 against them by the distinguished Feminist Viennese 
 professor notwithstanding. It is well for laymen to 
 be on their guard against Feminist pseudo-science. 
 That men professing to be savants can lend themselves 
 to this species of charlatanry is nothing less than 
 disgraceful. 
 
 The present war is affording a stalking-horse for 
 more nostrums than one The trick is to trace the 
 atrocities and misdeeds of the Prusso-German Govern- 
 ment and armies to the absence in Germany of the 
 influence of one's own particular nostrum. Thus, the 
 Feminist will try to persuade you that the crimes of 
 the German Army are due to defects in the German 
 character, arising from the absence of the cultus of 
 Woman among German men and of the emancipation 
 of Woman in the Feminist sense in the Fatherland. 
 The shooting of Miss Cavell and sundry outrages on 
 women in Belgium and the North of France, we are 
 told, are referable to an insufficient spirit of gallantry 
 or chivalry, i.e. of kowtowing to femalehood, on the 
 part of German men. If female suffrage and female 
 influence generally had been present in German social 
 and political life, it is alleged, we should have had no 
 war, or, in case of war, no " frightfulness," and 
 above all the sacrosanct sex would have been spared 
 and treated with the due reverential awe which it 
 becomes vile man to show in his dealings therewith. 
 All this sort of talk is, I suppose, swallowed by a section 
 of the British public at its face- value, being, as they 
 are, utterly ignorant of the facts of the case. Either 
 the Feminists who seek to make propaganda for their 
 theories out of the misdeeds of the German Army do 
 not know these facts themselves or they are dishonest.
 
 272 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 in their attempt to snatch an advantage out of the 
 war-feeling of the British public. As having had some 
 considerable experience of Germany and things German 
 before the war, I can answer for it that there has 
 been now for years past as strong a current of Feminist 
 sentiment and opinion in Germany as elsewhere, in all 
 circles claiming to be advanced. The only difference 
 is that in Germany, owing to Militarism with its blood- 
 tax, the incidence of which, of course, fell exclusively 
 on men, the injustice of allowing the sex exempted 
 from the blood-tax to swamp with their votes the male 
 elector who was subject to it came home, perhaps, 
 more to the average " man in the street " than in 
 other countries where the same conditions did not 
 prevail. Books on Feminism had a wide circulation. 
 Women had played a part in political agitation for a 
 generation past, at least, in the largest political party 
 in Germany. There was no sex-bar in the matter of 
 membership of that party, or of the share taken in 
 the life of its organization. There was and is, more- 
 over, so far as I am aware, a special organization ex- 
 isting in Germany for the furtherance of female suffrage 
 and other " planks " in the ordinary Feminist pro- 
 gramme, while, morebetoken, one of its most prominent 
 leaders is more violent in her jingoism than Count 
 Reventlow himself. All the talk about the position 
 of the German woman, by those who have never lived 
 in Germany, and do not in most cases even know the 
 language, deserves nothing but contempt. It serves 
 the purpose, however, I suppose, of Feminists and 
 advocates of female privilege in general, for pointing 
 a moral and adorning a tale in favour of their own 
 nostrum.
 
 CONCLUDING REFLEXIONS 278 
 
 The trick of using a wave of war-hatred and prejudice 
 for the purpose of snatching an advantage is not a 
 new one, and Feminists are not the only offenders. 
 In the present instance the religious bodies are quite 
 equal to trying-on the same game. Just as certain 
 Feminists seek to make out the " frightfulness " of the 
 German Army to be due to the absence of Feminism 
 in Germany, so the Christian sects want to make it 
 out to be due to German lack of " religion " and 
 the influence of " materialism." This in face of the 
 fact that the Kaiser talks more about God than all 
 the prominent military and political personages on 
 the side of the Allies put together, and that the most 
 truculent incitements to national hatred and cruelty 
 have been formulated from the pulpits of German 
 Protestant pastors. They ignore at the same time the 
 circumstance that the majority of the educated as well as 
 the working classes of the French nation are avowedly 
 freethinkers, and yet the French Army has not deve- 
 loped any " frightfulness " as yet, so far as I am aware. 
 Of course, they will say, I suppose, that German religios- 
 ity is not of their own true, genuine, and approved 
 brand. This is the usual retort, and one that anybody 
 can make, but the fact remains that you have in Ger- 
 many all the accredited forms of Christianity repre- 
 sented, Catholic and Protestant, with their services 
 every Sunday, as in other countries. As for the decline 
 in the belief in dogmatic theology, that is not peculiar 
 to Germany, but is common to the whole civilized world. 
 
 If I mistake not, the " social purity " mongers have 
 also made an attempt to snatch their bit of advantage 
 by exploiting current anti-Germanism. According to 
 them, of course, the evil mentality from which the 
 
 18
 
 274 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 German nation is alleged to be suffering at the present 
 time is due to an insufficiently severe standard of 
 sexual manners in their unhappy country. Now, this 
 statement, I do not hesitate to say, speaking in com- 
 parison with other countries, has no foundation what- 
 ever in fact. Not only is there not a trace of evidence 
 that laxity in sexual behaviour is more prevalent in 
 Germany than among any other European peoples, 
 but, if one comes to that, the Balkan populations, 
 including the Servian and Roumanian, will probably 
 be found on investigation to be farther from the chaste 
 heaven of the " social purist " than any section of 
 the German nation. Besides, it is well known that 
 there was an active " social purity " campaign in 
 Germany before the war, which was not, I believe, 
 the case in (say) France or Italy. I can recall in the 
 Spring of 1914 reading a long report in one of the 
 leading German newspapers of a great " social purity " 
 meeting in Frankfort, in which those enrolling them- 
 selves in the league by which the meeting was called 
 were required to take a pledge never under any cir- 
 cumstances to utter a loose jest, or to tell a story that 
 might raise the colour on the most sensitive maiden's 
 cheek ! Besides, as regards cruelty, it would not be 
 difficult to show, if one wanted to, that there is a ten- 
 dency in the " social purity " campaign itself to develop 
 cruelty : witness the flogging clauses of the so-called 
 " White Slave " Act of 1912. No, it is assuredly not 
 the absence of " Feminism " or of " religion," or of 
 " social purity " which is responsible for the aggres- 
 sive war-mania of Germany, or for the way the war 
 has been conducted by the German Army. It is the 
 ascendancy of Prussia and the Prussian military caste
 
 CONCLUDING REFLEXIONS 275 
 
 throughout the German-speaking countries of Central 
 Europe, its material power in government, and its 
 moral influence derived therefrom, with its inculcation 
 of war and military glory as the highest aim of the 
 nation this is the all-sufficient explanation of what 
 has happened. The disingenuous attempts to exploit 
 the situation in the interest of special nostrums are 
 beside the mark and altogether lacking in basis. 
 
 In the short sketch contained in the present volume, 
 we have come into contact with many social and 
 intellectual changes, in this country especially, though 
 corresponding changes might easily be traced through- 
 out the civilized world, many of them by no means 
 slight in their character, within the limits of a lifetime, 
 representing at the moment of writing scarcely two 
 generations. 
 
 The economic changes that have taken place, con- 
 siderable though they have been, have not been funda- 
 mental. They have been on the line of continuous 
 development, rather than revolutionary in character. 
 The great industry of modern times was already in 
 full swing when I was born. All the main trunk-lines 
 of the English railways have been in existence as long 
 as I can remember. The modern forms of industry, 
 commerce, and finance were already in substance 
 firmly established a generation or two before I was 
 born. Great as has been their development during 
 my lifetime, they are not changed in essentials. The 
 " opening-up " of the outlying, the barbaric, and 
 savage parts of the earth to capitalistic enterprise 
 and exploitation has gone on apace with geographical 
 exploration and discovery. The great capitalistic era 
 has given birth to Socialism as an active faith and
 
 276 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 ideal with a large section of the working-classes, and 
 with thinking men and sincere well-wishers for Human- 
 ity among all classes. The growth of socialistic sym- 
 pathy among large sections of the population, as well 
 as the formation of a Socialist party that counts in 
 all countries, are events that have evolved themselves 
 since my youth. Of the further development of these 
 factors, or of the appearance above the horizon in the 
 near future of new factors, I refrain from speculating 
 at the present moment. Qui vivra verra I whether 
 I shall be one of those who will see them I know not. 
 
 In politics I have seen the aftermath of the '48 move- 
 ment, and the rise of the new spread-eagleism, the 
 political side of the latter-day developments of Capital- 
 ism, with the race of modern armaments which has 
 issued in the present World War. I have witnessed 
 the growth of this upas-tree of modern Imperialism 
 in all civilized countries the rush for new markets 
 and for new populations to force under the yoke of 
 wage-slavery, and all under cover of the hypocritical 
 " swindle " of Patriotism, the " white man's burden," 
 and so forth. At the same time I have witnessed the 
 birth and growth among the various nations of the 
 tender plant of Internationalism, and have done my 
 little to promote it ; and although for the moment 
 beaten down by the winds of national hatred and 
 passion, I am more convinced than ever that before 
 another two or three generations are passed it will 
 have grown to be a mighty tree, while the principles 
 opposed to it will be withering beneath its shade, as 
 the ideal of national independence will largely have 
 given way before that of national interdependence. 
 
 In Philosophy, when I began my studies the British;
 
 CONCLUDING REFLEXIONS 
 
 empiricists and the Scottish Psychologists held the 
 field. Mill, Bain, and Lewes, on the one side, and 
 Hamilton and Mansel on the other, were in their glory. 
 But the great English philosopher of the seventies and 
 eighties was Herbert Spencer, whose " synthetic philo- 
 sophy " was regarded as the last word of speculative 
 wisdom. By way of reaction there is now, of course, 
 a tendency unduly to depreciate Spencer. This period 
 was followed by the rise of the young Hegelian school 
 at Oxford, partly influenced by a book published some 
 years before, Hutchison Stirling's " Secret of Hegel." 
 This movement, which ran on for many years, met 
 with its reaction at the opening of the twentieth cen- 
 tury, in the shape of various counter-currents, such 
 as Pragmatism at Oxford, and the Philosophy of Henri 
 Bergson, in which the Concept is discredited, and Sense 
 and Immediate Consciousness as the content of Time 
 take the place of the Absolute. The late Professor 
 Sidgwick is reported to have said on one occasion, 
 shortly before his death : " One of the things I could 
 never understand is the relation of the Absolute to 
 Time." This difficulty of interpreting to oneself the 
 inner meaning and significance of Time as regards the 
 Absolute I confess to having felt, and hence can sym- 
 pathize with. Bergson cuts the knot, if I understand 
 him rightly, in identifying Time with the Absolute 
 sans phrase. 
 
 But perhaps the most remarkable, and in the true 
 sense of the word epoch-making, change which has 
 taken place within the experience of my lifetime has 
 been the outlook opened up to civilized mankind at 
 large by the doctrine of Evolution. When I was 
 born the notion of Evolution was the dream of a few
 
 278 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 isolated thinkers. Now it is the basis of Civilized 
 Man's conception of the Universe. This stupendous 
 revolution in the intellectual outlook is comparable, 
 mutatis mutandis, with the revolution in material 
 things consequent on the transformation of the con- 
 ditions of human life wrought by the introduction of 
 the machine industry and the new methods of loco- 
 motion in the early part of the nineteenth century. 
 The intellectual world, before and after the acceptance 
 of the doctrine of Evolution, is in its own way analogous 
 to the material world before and after the introduction 
 of machinery, so far as regards the chasm that divides 
 the two epochs from one another in other words, 
 that separates the world of to-day from all previous 
 periods of human history. The changes I have wit- 
 nessed in the fifty-odd years which these reminiscences 
 cover, as regards speculative thought, religious senti- 
 ment, and toleration of opinion in the British people, 
 are sufficiently dealt with in previous chapters of 
 this book. 
 
 When one considers the fragment of the course of 
 history through which one has lived, with its passing 
 show, and the queer personalities that have come 
 and gone while it lasted, the usual reflexions on the 
 evanescence of human interests and concerns crowd 
 in upon us. 
 
 They say the Lion and the Lizard keep 
 The Courts where Jamshyd gloried and drank deep : 
 And Bahrain, that great Hunter the Wild Ass 
 Stamps o'er his Head and he lies fast asleep. 
 
 So it is with the transience of our mundane affairs. 
 But as regards the actual scenes of our doings and
 
 CONCLUDING REFLEXIONS 279 
 
 sufferings through life, " Old Khayyam " at least had 
 the prospect of his " wilderness," which he found 
 " Paradise enow," remaining after his death as it was 
 in his life, while we, living in the great capitalistic 
 era, have to see the " wildernesses " and " paradises " 
 of our youth become the emplacement of slums or 
 factories even before we die. I, for my part, should 
 not mind the lion and the lizard disporting them- 
 selves on the sites of my youthful or mature relaxations, 
 but I must confess I do resent the thought of the 
 railway company keeping them in a metamorphosed 
 condition as shunting yards. I would certainly much 
 rather think that the lion and the lizard keep the 
 Halls where I had " gloried and drunk deep " (not 
 that I ever did so), than that their sites should be 
 reserved, not for the roar of the lion, but for the shriek 
 of the steam whistle. Such is sentiment ! 
 
 The interest and utility for future ages of the class 
 of literature of which the present work may be taken 
 as a humble and imperfect example have never as yet 
 been fully recognized. The historian, who has made 
 it his task to resuscitate for his contemporaries a period 
 of the past, can never have too much contemporary 
 material of this kind at his disposal. In some respects, 
 the less brilliantly original the writer is, provided he 
 is but a fairly keen observer and gifted with average 
 powers of generalization, the more valuable are his 
 notes and comments. Of this fact Pepys' Diary is a 
 crucial illustration. Pepys was by no means a man of 
 genius, but his Diary has justly become a classic, as 
 affording us an insight into the real life lived in England 
 in the second half of the seventeenth century, such as 
 we have for few other periods. What would the modern
 
 280 REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS 
 
 classical scholar not give to have such an imperfect 
 set of reminiscences and reflexions even as those con- 
 tained in the foregoing pages, written in the year 116 
 by an inhabitant (say) of Rome, Alexandria, or Antioch, 
 born in the year 54. How many points would be made 
 clear concerning that interesting period of the world's 
 history, which are hopelessly obscure to us now. It 
 would not be amiss if, say, in some family where the 
 literary faculty were not wholly lacking, it should be 
 regarded as a sacred duty for one member of the family, 
 at least, in every generation, on reaching sixty years 
 of age, to pen, for better or for worse, his own account 
 of the times he had lived through. Such a series of 
 autobiographical sketches succeeding each other in a 
 continuous chain of varying literary or intellectual 
 merit, some clever, some commonplace, or even stupid, 
 would be an aid in the distant future to the appre- 
 ciation of past history which would be simply priceless, 
 as compared with anything the present-day historian 
 has at his disposal for his investigations into the his- 
 torical period he may be at work upon. If but one 
 person in every generation, before passing into the 
 eternal silences, would leave as a legacy to future 
 mankind a systematic sketch of the inner life of the 
 world and his relations to it, for the fifty or sixty years 
 that his experience covers, he would be performing a 
 real, and, as far as it went, inestimable service to the 
 understanding of human psychology in its historical 
 development, and to laying the foundations of a scientific 
 theory of history.
 
 INDEX 
 
 Abel, Dr. Carl, 34 
 
 Adler, Victor, 143-4, 146-7 
 
 Atheism and Agnosticism, 
 
 thoughts on, 190-4 
 Aveling, Edward, 109-10 
 Aveling, Eleanor Marx, 108-9 
 
 Bauer, Stephen, 144-5 
 Bebel, August, 140-2, 146 
 Bergson, Henri, 213-15, 218 
 Blatchford, Robert, 90 
 Blavatsky, Madame, 203-4 
 Boulting, William, 21-3 
 Bradlaugh, Charles, 36-8 
 Brahamjohn, early nineteenth- 
 century singer, 12 
 Brighton, childhood at, 10 
 Browning, Robert, 59 
 Burns, John, 104-8 
 Burrows, Herbert, in 
 
 Champion, H. H., 100-2 
 Club and Temple life, 173-86 
 Colenso, Bishop, 18-19 
 Cologne Cathedral, 34 
 Commune, the, 29-32, 128-30, 
 
 159 
 Croydon, author's life at, 36 
 
 Dialectical Society, the, 227-8 
 
 Ellis, Havelock, 221-2 
 Encke's Comet, 1861, 10 
 Engels, Friedrich, 45-57 
 European War, the, 234-56 
 
 Evangelical theology, 13-14, 
 
 16 
 Evolution, 277-8 
 
 Feminism, 163, 196-300, 269- 
 
 74 
 
 I Fox Bourne, 228-9 
 I Franco- Prussian War, 15, 28 
 French Revolution, 12 
 
 Gallenga, correspondent of The 
 
 Times, 1880, 35 
 Glennie, Stuart, 225-6 
 Graham, Cunninghame, 230-1 
 , Grayson, Victor, 91 
 Greulich, Hermann, 134-7 
 Guesde, Jules, 132-4 
 
 Haldane, Lord, 211-13 
 
 Hampstead, author's school- 
 life at, 20-2 
 
 Hyndman, Henry Mayers, 73- 
 5, 78, 94-100, 103 
 
 International Association, the, 
 
 38-40, 56 
 International Congresses 
 
 Amsterdam, 153 
 
 Copenhagen, 154 
 
 London, 152 
 
 Mainz, 153 
 
 Paris, 150-2 
 
 Stuttgart, 153 
 
 Zurich, 151 
 International Review, The, 104 
 
 281
 
 282 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Jaur^s, Jean, 130-3, 204, 214 
 Journalism, thoughts on, 178 
 Journalist, the author as, 34, 
 
 156, 166 
 Essays on Socialism, 157-9, 
 
 161, 168-9 
 Collaboration with William 
 
 Morris, 1 60 
 Reformation in Germany, 
 
 163-4 
 
 Joynes, James Leigh, 102-4 
 Jung, Hermann, 39-41 
 
 Kowalewski, Maxim, 149-50 
 Kropotkin, Prince, 42-4 
 
 Laf argue, Paul, 131-2 
 Late-Victorian period, 58-72, 
 1 86 
 
 Anthropology, 70 
 
 Art, 62-3 
 
 Club and Temple life, 173-86 
 
 History, 67-9 
 
 Literature, 59-64, 71 
 
 Mentality, 188-210 
 
 Music, 65 
 
 Philosophy, 66-7 
 Leamington, childhood at, 9 
 Lee, Henry William, 112 
 Levy, J. H., 229-30 
 Lewes, Vivian Byam, chemist, 
 
 20-1 
 
 Literary work, the author's, 
 
 157-72 
 
 Roots of Reality, The 
 169-70 
 
 Marriage Laws, the, 200-2 
 Marx, Karl, 30-2, 39, 45, 48, 
 
 52-3 
 
 The Marxian School, 46-7 
 Medical asceticism, 266-9 
 Michels, Robert, 145-7 
 Mid- Victorian life, 10-27 
 
 Literature, n, 19-20, 28 
 
 Religion, 12-20 
 
 Mid-Victorian economics and 
 
 politics, 15 
 Music, 16-17 
 Morris, William, 75-6, 80-1, 
 
 87, 95, 97, 103, IOQ-IO, 
 
 117-22 
 
 Moscheles, F61ix, 232-3 
 Most, Johannes, Socialist and 
 
 Anarchist, 41 
 Music, author's early devotion 
 
 to, 27, 32 
 
 Patriotism, 195-6, 263-6 
 Pernerstorfer, Engelbert, 144 
 Philosophy, 216-19, 276-7 
 Popular thought in England, 
 recent development of, 
 188-210, 222-3 
 Religion, 188-94 
 Patriotism, 195-6 
 Positivism, 30-1 
 
 Quelch, Harry, 111-12, 123, 153 
 
 Revolutionary tradition, 126-7 
 Rheims in the first weeks of 
 the war, 239-45 
 
 Sabbatarianism, 13 
 
 Scheu, Andreas, 108 
 
 Sharp, William (" Fiona 
 
 Macleod "), 219 
 Shaw, George Bernard, 103, 
 
 113-17, 165, 262 
 Smith, Adolphe, 53-6, 108 
 Socialism, 29, 36-8, 45-57, 
 
 92-3, 263, 275 
 Democratic Federation, the, 
 
 38, 73793 
 International Association, 
 
 the, 38-40, 56 
 Modern English Socialist 
 
 Movement, 58 
 Socialist League, the, 80-5 
 Personalities of the Socialist 
 Movement in England, 94- 
 125
 
 INDEX 
 
 288 
 
 Personalities of the Socialist 
 
 Movement abroad, 126-155 
 German Social Democratic 
 
 party, the, 137-8, 250-1 
 Philosophy of Socialism, 
 
 170-72 
 Effect of the war on the 
 
 Socialist Movement, 252 
 Social Democratic Federation, 
 
 the, 73-93 
 Founded by Hyndman in 
 
 1882, 73-4 
 
 Its paper, Justice, 75 
 Development, 76-7 
 The " split," 78 
 Reconstituted as the British 
 
 Socialist Party, 91 
 South- African War, the, 183 
 
 Stepniak, Sergius, 148-9 
 Streatham in 1870, 28 
 Supernatural, author's early 
 belief in the, 23-7 
 
 Taylor, Helen, no-ii 
 Temple, the, 173, 180 
 Tillett, Ben, 122-5 
 To-Day, monthly Socialist re- 
 view, 103 
 
 Von Hartmann, Edward, 35-6 
 
 Warwick, the Countess of, 226-7 
 Williams, J. E., in 
 
 [ Zurich, Socialist Congress at, 
 139 
 
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 Visits to Walt Whitman 
 
 BY J. JOHNSTON, M.D., AND J. W. WALLACE 
 
 Crown %vo. 6s. net. 
 
 SECOND EDITION. 
 
 " Graphic and charmingly interesting." The Sketch. 
 
 Workhouse Characters 
 
 BY MRS. MARGARET WYNNE NEVINSON 
 Crown %vo. Cloth. $s. 6d. net. 
 
 "Workhouse Characters" is a series of short stories which have 
 appeared in the Westminster Gazette and other papers, attracting much 
 attention for the abuses brought to light, especially with regard to the 
 law of coverture and the iniquitous legal and economic position of 
 women under these out-of-date laws. Mrs. M. W. Nevinson writes 
 with much power and sympathy, and her sketches have been called the 
 best on the Poor Law since Dickens. Some time ago a grim little play, 
 " In the Workhouse," was produced by the Pioneer Players, and 
 attracted a storm of fury in the Press. The truth was too appalling 
 for the innocent critics, though some of stronger fibre dared to praise : 
 ' The main value of the piece is that it is a superb genre picture. One 
 or two of the flashes from this strange generally unknown world are 
 positive sparks from life,"
 
 Japan 
 
 at the Cross Roads 
 
 BY A. M. POOLEY 
 
 Late Exhibitioner of Clare College, Cambridge. Editor of " The Secret 
 Memoirs of Count Hayashi," etc., etc. 
 
 Demy 8vo. to/. 6d. net. 
 
 " Extremely critical and of exceptional interest." Daily News. 
 " Is arrestingly candid and absorbingly interesting." Glasgow Herald. 
 
 War and Revolution in Asiatic 
 
 BY M. PHILIPS PRICE 
 
 Demy $vo. About los. 6d. net. 
 
 In this book Mr. M. Philips Price, who went to the Near East in 1915 as 
 the correspondent of the Manchester Guardian, gives an account of his 
 experiences and observations during his journeys through Northern Persia, 
 Armenia, and the Caucasus. The first two chapters tell the story of the 
 War on the Caucasus Front down to the Fall of Erzerum. Other chapters 
 consist of the journal of his travels through the territories occupied by 
 the Russian Army, where he spent many months in organizing relief 
 for the destitute native population. The last four chapters describe the 
 Revolution in the Caucasus, and discuss the racial problems and the 
 political future of the countries he visited. 
 
 Three Aspects of the Russian 
 
 Revolution BY EMILE VANDERVELDE 
 
 TRANSLATED BY JEAN E. H. FINDLAY 
 
 Crtwn Svt. $s. net. 
 
 M. Vandervelde's book gives in broad outline a comprehensive view 
 of the Russian Revolution in its political, military, and industrial aspects. 
 M. Louis de Broukere, the well-known Belgian Socialist, and Lieutenant 
 de Mann, who accompanied M. Vandervelde on his recent mission to 
 Russia, contribute valuable material on the industrial and military 
 problems. The book is characterized by a lucidity and breadth of view 
 which enable us to arrive at definite conclusions regarding the much- 
 discussed question of the future of Russia and her share in the recon- 
 struction of Europe. 
 
 A Dying Empire 
 
 BY BOGUMIL VOSNJAK 
 WITH A PREFACE BY T. P. O'CONNOR, M.P. 
 
 Crtwn Svo. jj. 6J. net. "Postage ^d. 
 
 In this account of the Dying Empire of Austria the author has tried 
 to describe the sociological factors in the breakdown of the Hapsburg 
 Empire, and to show that in the fabric of a " Central Europe " is closely 
 woven the idea of a predominating Pan-Germanism. Either Germany 
 must stretch from Hamburg to Trieste and Salonika, or Austria-Hungary 
 must be dismembered. There is no alternative,
 
 Macedonia 
 
 BY TIH. R. GEORGEVITCH, D.PHIL. 
 
 Demy Svo. j s . 6d. net. 
 
 In spite of all Bulgaria's treachery and baseness in this war, part of 
 European public opinion* even unfortunately in justice-loving England, 
 still takes Bulgaria's part with regard to Macedonia. The reason for this 
 lies in pure ignorance of the fact that the Macedonians are Serbs as to 
 their origin, their history, their language, tradition, national character 
 and customs, and, last but not least, in their national sentiment, both in 
 the past and present. The misleading Bulgarian impression in Macedonia 
 is a purely artificial and forced product. This book purposes to prove by 
 documentary evidence what is the only truth concerning Macedonia, 
 viz. that it is Serbian. 
 
 The International Solution 
 
 BY H. E. HYDE 
 
 Crown 8vo. Cloth. 3/. 6d. net. 
 
 The author deals with what Mr. Lloyd George has described as one 
 of our most important war aims "The creation of some international 
 organization to diminish the probability of war." He aims to show 
 how the adoption by the Allies of international government (a complete 
 scheme of which is contained in the book) and its inclusion in our war 
 aims would in itself supply a basis for immediate peace negotiations 
 which would insure to us the complete overthrow of militarism and a 
 better prospect of security for the future than any military victory, no 
 matter how complete, could hope to do. 
 
 England and India 
 
 BY THE REV. R. GORDON MILBURN 
 
 Crown %vo. Stiff Paper Coven. 21. 6d. net. 
 
 The author, who has spent twelve years in India, deals with the 
 political problems of the day. He examines both the Home Rule and 
 the Anti-Home Rule positions, and suggests an alternative policy 
 embodied in a number of practical proposals. Matters of concern for 
 the clergy in India are dealt with in an appendix. 
 
 Wars and Treaties, 1815-1914 
 
 BY ARTHUR PONSONBY, M.P. 
 
 Demy Svo. Paper Covers. ^i. net. 
 
 A very useful book of reference which gives briefly in a couple of 
 pages the essential facts as to the origin and result of each of the forty 
 principal wars in the last hundred years and the main provisions of 
 the more important treaties. 
 
 LONDON: GEORGE ALLEN & UNWIN LIMITED
 
 MAY1 1 
 WYB 
 
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