world knows nothing. It has had no effect on public opinion. No class or party has ever mastered or been moved by its teachings; and in the world of action, knowledge is nonexistent that does not exert some practical influence. If we turn, on the other hand, to the speculative doctrines of democracy, we shall detect their operation in nearly every popular movement that has marked the present century. The Democrats, in rebelling against the established order of things, have always encouraged and justified themselves by an appeal to certain doctrines which they take to be scientific truths. The Conservatives, in repressing these rebellions, have neither wanted theoretic encouragement nor cared about theoretic justification. They have had their convictions certainly, no less than their adversaries; and these, to say the least of them, have been equally firm and honest; but they have rested on a different basis. They have been inherited, not acquired. They have been regarded as things so sacred and self-evident that it would be as idle to prove

their truth as it would be wicked to question it; and thus those who have not only questioned but denied it have been treated less as mistaken men, than as lunatics or as dangerous criminals. They have been repressed or neglected, but they have never yet been refuted. It is largely to this treatment that their growing power is due. From their being the only party that has professed scientifically to defend itself, a superstition has gone abroad that they are the only party capable of scientific defence; and so widely is this superstition spreading itself, that many secretly yield to it who regard it with the utmost horror. Not only does it strengthen the Democrats, but it troubles the Conservatives; and many of the latter entertain a dark misgiving that it represents, after all, the actual truth of things. This must be a familiar fact to every one who has watched modern opinion in the higher ranks of society. The remark, for instance, may often be heard now-a-days that it is only natural for the poorer classes to be Democrats; and the reason given is that they

6

have everything to gain by a change.' Perhaps more frequent still are the even plainer sayings, that Things by this time have passed beyond our control;' and that there is nothing left for us but to wait till the crash comes.' The significance of this helpless despondency is unmistakable. It is a piece of evidence of the strongest possible kind that, so far as science and accurate reason go, conservatism possesses as yet neither defence nor explanation of itself.

I therefore venture to say, though I shall prove the fact more fully afterwards that, with regard to the question of progress in the democratic sense of the word, the only doctrines extant which even pretend to system, or which have ever had any intellectual influence, are the doctrines of the Democrats themselves. The first step, therefore, towards establishing a true social science must be the complete exposure of those doctrines which at present usurp the place of it.

CHAPTER II.

THE PRINCIPLES OF MODERN DEMOCRACY.

I PROPOSE, then, to examine briefly the general theory of modern democracy, and the methods by which it has been arrived at. But here, very likely, a certain difficulty may suggest itself. The Democrats and their theories, it may be said with perfect justice, differ amongst themselves in many important ways. Proudhon, for instance, differed from Louis Blanc; Lassalle differed from SchulzeDelitzsch; and Mr. Bright and Mr. Chamberlain would differ from all four, or may very likely seem to have next to nothing in common with them. The reader, therefore, may be inclined to argue that, though it is well enough for general purposes to regard the Democrats as a single class, yet we can by no means do this for the purposes of accurate

criticism. Such, however, is not really the case. The differences spoken of, important as they may be practically, are differences not as to principles, but mainly as to the application of principles. The principles themselves are in all cases the same; and it is with these alone that we are here concerned to deal. If we can show these to be false, we may leave the disputes based on them to take care of themselves.

Let us consider, then, what these principles are-principles which unite Mr. Chamberlain with Proudhon, and Mr. Bright with Louise Michel. They are very simple, and can be very easily stated. The first and foremost of them is contained in the abstract proposition, that the perfection of society involves social equality. Let us be careful to see what the words exactly mean. They do not mean that equality is the same thing as perfection-for equality in itself might be merely equality in destitution but they do mean that inequality is essentially an evil and an imperfection. The Democrat postulates, no less than the Conser