" SIMPLICITY " IN GOVERNMENT. T HERE is an error current
among public men, both in England and America, which at a time when a great Republic is in serious danger of a revolution towards autocracy is worth a moment's discussion. They are apt to believe, and even to say, that whatever its other defects, a real Monarchy in which an individual is the final referee on all questions is at all events a " simpler " method of governing a great State. They get tired, espe- cially in middle life, of the endless work of persuasion ; they grow to resent the jars and hesitations among the minds around them ; and they become impatient to disgust of the ignorances, perversities, and whims of the multitude to whom, under any honest Constitution, the ultimate appeal must lie. The enormous power of opinion, half. informed as it must always be, frets and galls them till they feel the kind of angry alarm at its rushes and re- -treats which is developed when a man is threatened by an unintelligent force,—a fire, a flood, or a stampede. They sigh in their hearts for the power to give an order without explanations, and think the soldiers, for all their risks, luckier than the statesmen. They forget that men must be governed somehow, and that Monarchy, however "pure," usually involves, indeed except in one single case always involves, for the Monarch and his great servants complications as perplexing and as galling as Republicanism or constitutional government. It has happened, we believe, in the history of mankind, though in exceedingly few instances, that absolute power has fallen to the man who not only is, but is acknowledged by his servants to be, best qualified to exercise it. In that case, ruling is simplified for the Sovereign, as it probably -was for the two Antoniues, for Frederick the Great, and for Napoleon I.; but as a rule the Monarch is not a recog- nised man of genius, and if he is not, his position is as complicated as that of any statesmen. He must work even harder than they do, as Philip II. and Louis XIV. persistently worked till their very brains grew fatigued ; he can only work through agents whom he is usually limited in choosing, and who disobey or misapprehend him at every crisis ; he is overwhelmed with contradictory advice which he dare not simply ignore—read Parma's letters to Philip II.—he knows from the first that physical force rests either with his armies or his peoples; and he becomes conscious, often to a most acute and painful degree, that all who approach him have either "axes to grind" or parties behind them whom they must advance or protect. He is conscious, though seldom accurately conscious, of his own limitations, and feels, though he does not say so except to the women close to him, as much " strained " and hampered and weary as any Re- publican or constitutional chief of a State. His life is often a burden to him, by reason of the perversity of events which he cannot rule, and men whom he can only imperfectly trust. For his great servants, again, the comphcatIons are even greater. The King can, at all events, if driven, give the order, and trust to the Almighty for the result, which he himself cannot foresee-4 Alexander III. of Russia, a dense but perfectly honest man, used habitually to do—but the Vizier, Premier, or Minister cannot do that. He has no legal right to act till he has persuaded the Sovereign, and persuading the Sovereign may be more difficult than persuading a great party or a people, for oratory is no help. Richelieu used to say, it is reported, that the one thing that overtaxed him was his master's closet, as it was the one place where Pitt's imperiousness and habit of certainty usually failed him. Take a better example than either. Read, not like a novel, but with care. Bismarck's autobiography, and judge if he thought Monarchy a " simple " method of governing. He had sometimes as much difficulty in per. suading his master—who was, remember, a competent master—as ever Mr. Gladstone or M. Thiers had in per- suading a people, and had to do it without the invaluable weapon of persuasive eloquence. He had to study him as closely as any American "boss" ever studied electors, to know every turn of his mind—and no considerable minds are simple—to prick his 'virtues into action, to play on his foibles, to en. lighten his ignorances, in short, to persuade all toilfully as ever British Minister persuaded the House of Commons. Once when the King wanted to abdicate, Bismarck only succeeded by appealing to his ingrained instincts as a Prussian officer ; once he practically had to cheat him— about the Imperial title—and once he totally failed, for it is not success to obtain from a Sovereign or a plebiscite this kind of consent, which Bismarck received to the peace with Austria :— "Inasmuch as my Minister. President has left me in the lurch in the face of the enemy, and here I am not in a position to supply his place, I have discussed the question with my son ; and as he has associated himself with the Minister-President's opinion, I find myself reluctantly compelled, after such brilliant victories on the part of the army, to bite this sour apple and accept so disgraceful a peace." Then read how he dreaded—sincerely dreaded—all hostile or doubtful influences on his Sovereign's mind ; how he came even to hate the thoughtful Queen Augusta, and the Liberal Crown Princess, and all clever women generally, because he thought they would harden the King's mind to unreceptiveness of his own ideas. That is described is proof of his lowness of disposition, and it may have been, but do English Premiers love candid critics within their own party, or chiefs of " Caves " who may obtain too much of the public ear, or their own rivals in the Cabinetr Sir William Harcourt hints at intrigues against him, an we dare say Lord Rosebery thinks of them also; but B marck was nearly overthrown by Count Arnim, an in one great department of his work actually w overthrown by the great soldiers, who reduced hi to such powerlessness that, as he confesses, he h actually to depend on the Times correspondent. information as to what they were doing or resolve The all-powerful Minister did not know why the see, did not become the storm of Paris. Could our duo democracy puzzle a statesman or threaten to willow him worse than that ? And to the democracy the state man, if he has the gift, can appeal with eloquence, W, emotion, with promises ; while Bismarck had to write arguments, running the risk, sometimes a very real o of being intolerably tedious. His Sovereign, be remembered, was a good one to serve, a man who one man from another, a man singularly free from ea or jealousy, and one who had made up his mind /3 to be parted from his great adviser. Yet it is clear every chapter of Bismarck's Life that the thing which him was the difficulty of persuading and managing ultimate authority, that it made him in secret venom bitter, and that the difficulties in his way from this alone drove him to more than threats of resignation, consideration at least whether it would not be bet quit the world.
The truth of the matter is that, whatever the fo government, the work of governing is not simple, with the spread of an imperfect kind of information, the gigantic growth of armies which will not for remain "silent," and with the new and universally desire of physical comfort in a world which hardly enough comfort to go round, it will become less al every day. The world grows much more comPlell
II
Tenure of events is sharper, and the atmosphere through aiich we all must move, being surcharged with telegrams, pinions, and separate interests, becomes denser and aore obstructive. This will be equally the case under donarchies and Republics, and will in the end, we can tamely doubt, produce, by increasing the complexity of Hairs, simpler statesmen. There will be two kinds,— hose who rely upon a caste, as will probably be the case n the Continent, and if they content the soldiers will be areless of aught else, as happened in the later Roman rorld; and those who rely upon the people, and, aware hat democracy is unrevealing, will go straight forward, loing their duty, giving their real advice, and leaving esults, if they are believers, to God, and if they are inbelievers, to the rushing stream of tendencies and vents. The brain of Sir Robert Peel with the disposition f Alexander III. will, we conceive, be the qualifications those statesmen of the future who will seek the general wile& of entire populations. Whether they will collide nth the military statesmen or not we do not know, but t is probable that as science advances, and with it the Limns of destruction, they will prove for defence at least ,s powerful as their rivals. Could Germany conquer Tolland if every Dutchman had a repeating rifle, while he thin line of regular troops were all artillerymen louring out dynamite shells ? Possibly they might if xmies that rule would ever remain ascetic, but they will Lot, and non-ascetic armies cease to conquer. All that, iowever, is for the future ; for the present our contention s that the existence of an absolute or nearly absolute tiler does not, except in the rarest cases, that is when he a ruler by natural force as well as position, simplify he highly complex and irritating work of ruling.
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