Augustine Birrell was a diluted edition of Sydney Smith, and Bonar Law should have been a professor of theology in a Presbyterian seminary. Sir Edward Carson played the role of an unfrocked priest in the service of demiurgos. Earl Curzon is a political derelict whose presence in the Council Chamber prevents unity and impedes progress.
History will record their acts as the most amazing in the annals of Great Britain. I see nothing for the old order but unconditional surrender. The hand-writing on the wall was visible in 1909, but no preparation was made for the change which is now sweeping the country with cyclonic force.
We, from our side, can do no more than utter some words of warning for the few who have ears to hear, the tidal wave of change not being confined to particular countries or regions.
I, too, when Prime Minister, was blind to the reality, having been born and reared in an atmosphere as foreign to that of the masses as the atmosphere of the Winter Palace was foreign to the peasants of Russia.
We staggered under the load of a wealthy and titled upper class. They consumed the people’s time and imposed infinite misery on some millions of toilers, and for these things we rewarded the men at the top with fresh titles.
As you know, I led the Conservative Party in England for many years, but that Party was, and still is, avid for power.
The Liberal Party was made up of men using Nonconformity as an instrument of advancement. They placed opportunity above the truth, position above principle, power above progress. We were all intellectual automatons, set in motion by springs wound up by leaders who were themselves automatons.
England goes by machinery. Her very existence is mechanical. Now, when a loose screw stops the evolution of the wheels, the whole nation stops.
In what way can we be said to excel in probity of conduct the people of Ireland? In what way are we superior to Irish politicians? The scandals that occurred in London during the war would not have been tolerated in Dublin under an Irish Parliament. And still England is being led by a Welsh Calvinist, opposed by a Scottish humorist who says his prayers, backed by Anglican agnostics and middle-class dissenters overwhelmed with fear.
We always imitate the French, but while we accepted Voltairianism in principle, the French had the courage to put it into practice.