THE BRITISH FLAG.
NOW and again one may still meet with men who seem incapable of distinguishing symbols from the ideas for which they stand, and who express their loathing for the latter by heaping ridicule upon the former. Thus may a half- educated, free-thinking cobbler think that he is seriously attacking Christianity in mocking the outward signs of belief, or a poor, half-witted anarchist hope to help in pulling down a Monarchy by howling at the crown and sceptre. These, of course, are but instances of the extremity of folly and ignorance. But there is a foolishness which is more common, and which, if it displays less actual ignorance, is more hopelessly and incurably stupid ; and that is the foolish- ness of those who confound symbols and ideas wilfully because they hate all ideas that have to be expressed by symbols. There is, for example, the man who pretends to see nothing more in the Union Jack than a flag with, as the Irish policeman said, "a red look." A little cross-examination of the gentle- man speedily reveals the cause of his blindness; he sees nothing in national glory, be sees nothing in anything at all that cannot be computed in pounds, shillings, and pence. In fact, upon the ideal side of his nature he is totally blind ; and it is well to bear that mental infirmity in mind, and not to attempt to argue with him. To such a man, to die for an idea, for the sake of one's country, or for any other reason than impossibility of escape, is simply the act of a fool ; the sight of the torn and blood-stained colours that stand for a regiment's glory, stir in him no enthusiasm, though it may perhaps move him to indignation when he reflects upon the large waste of rate- payers' money which it suggests. He is wont to say of him- self that he is a practical man, and no dreamer ; as a matter of fact, he is rather a dull man, whose naturally slow wits have never had a chance of development, whose ideas are limited by his own narrow experience of life, and whose experience of life has been kept within strictly parochial bounds. As a townsman, or a vestryman in some small community, he is not without his merits. As a citizen of a great Empire, he is a failure, chiefly because he lacks the necessary knowledge that goes to the formation of wider ideas, or the imagination which is sufficient to take the place of that knowledge. Happily, he represents a class which is certainly more rare to-day than it used to be, notwithstanding the concentrated selfishness of the modern doctrines of Socialism. But it is presumably for the delectation of this man and his like that the Daily Chronicle's remarks the other day, upon the subject of the Union Jack, must have been written.
The constant references that have been made of late to that sign and symbol of Great Britain's unity, and the songs that have been poured out by Messrs. Kipling, Alfred Austin, and Walter Pollock, have at last, it seems, goaded our con- temporary into a state of frenzy, until the very mention of the Union Jack excites it as a red rag does a bull. What is the meaning of it all P it asks. Is it not too absurd, "all this hysterical versifying, waving of flags, and tawdry boasting of the divine glories of the Empire ? " Really, it thinks, for a sober-minded people, we do "gratuitously contrive to make ourselves ridiculous." Seen from the Daily Chronicle's point of view, there is not a shadow of doubt about it,—we are sometimes supremely absurd and ridiculous. From another point of view, we are not indisposed to glory in our absurdity. There are two occasions on which the average Englishman is wont to feel an altogether absurd and ridiculous emotion. One is when, separated from his fellow- countrymen for many long and weary months, he suddenly comes across his country's flag, flying, let us say, in some foreign and far-distant harbour. Another, when he makes one of a crowd that rise to their feet and uncover while their National Anthem is played. The unsentimental Englishman, especially if he has knocked about the world at all, not un- frequently feels on these occasions that rising lump in the throat which betokens a strong and sudden emotion; and yet this same man will contemplate with perfect equanimity rows of banners borne by " Demonstrations," or even listen to a speech by a County Councillor without feeling in the least degree moved. This weakness is no doubt inexplicable to the stay-at-home person of the unimaginative order. To the latter, a Union Jack is a piece of bunting commonly used for decorative purposes, and the National Anthem is the most hackneyed, and therefore the most tiresome. of tunes. It is hardly his fault, for imagination is not given to every one ; and it requires some imagination to grasp the idea of the British Empire. To such men as these, men of narrow ideas and little aims, and to their contempt for everything that is outside their ken, our contemporary makes its appeal on behalf of the Disruption Bill. Everybody knows, it says, that "certain constitutional readjustments must be made, and every one but a handful of ignorant roughs and fanatics in Belfast, is quite cool about it." It is not difficult to gauge from these sentences the intelligence of those readers whom it particularly wishes to convince ; for the description of the Home-rule Bill as a " constitutional readjustment " is no more intended to be comic than is-the ludicrous estimate of the opposition to it. And what is this flag, to which the ignorant roughs appeal, and why should Englishmen respect it P " There are two sides to the history of the BritishlFlag. Their knowledge of history is so limited that they imagine that the Union Jack has never been disgraced." The Daily Chronicle knows better, though its knowledge of history seems to be curiously limited upon the other side. What is England's greatness P what are the glories of the Empire ?,what is the use and meaning of it all to the anti-English party ? The flag has been disgraced ; the soldier who sacrifices his life for it must therefore be a fool. The Empire has not been created without bloodshed; the states- man who seeks to preserve it intact must be a knave. A dis- contented faction wish to pull it to pieces ; let them do so in peace and quietness,—those who would restrain them must be ignorant roughs and fanatics. And this is the sum and sub- stance of the anti-English Englishman's doctrine,—a doctrine that is partly dictated by a selfish fear lest his security in his present private possessions should be threatened, lest his own property should be endangered in the defence of what is public property, and partly caused by his inability to appreciate what the value of that public property is. He takes no pride in the Empire which his fathers and forefathers have built up. He openly scoffs at its "divine glories," and secretly dreads its responsibilities. How can such a man be expected to revere the symbol of an idea that he cannot grasp ? He is not an African slave seeking freedom under the British Flag. His business does not take him to distant lands, and he has no need to ask its protection. He has not imagination enough to find any pleasure in his birthright; and the proud boast, " Civis Romanus sum," is in his ears simply a piece of unintelligible braggadocio. He believes in nothing from which he cannot derive an immediate and tangible benefit, and he hates all ideas by which his comfort may be endangered. Happily, he only represents but a very small minority of his fellow-countrymen.
The majority thinks otherwise, and with good reason. It knows the value of what it wishes to maintain, and recognises the use of a symbol in that maintenance. Let it be granted that the rough crusaders transgressed the law of the Cross a hundred times in their self-imposed task ; that does not detract from its value as a symbol, or prove that their faith could have filled their ranks without the help of that outward sign. If the sentiment of nationality is a laudable one, then is the reverence paid to the national flag also laudable. Even the most modern nations recognise that simple fact. If any man attempt to insult or haul down the "Stars and Stripes," let any American who is witness of it fire upon the insulter of his country. That is the rough-and-ready law in the States, and it holds good in all the American Republics, which are, as a rule, intensely jealous of the honour of their national emblems. There are people,'it is true, who protest that the national sentiment is a mischievous one, and that it is our duty to renounce and forget it, striving to replace it with that of the" Universal Brotherhood." A very praiseworthy belief, no doubt, were there any remote prospect of its realisation ; but as on this side of the grave there is absolutely none, it is best for us to continue to look upon patriotism as a virtue, and to cherish the national idea. And in this matter our contemporary is curiously inconsistent. The British nationality is a welbeetablished fact, with a glorious history behind it in the past, and a no less glorious future, let us hope, before it; and yet it is one which our contemporary treats with impolite derision. On the other hand, it is anxious to discover all kinds of reasons for the aspirations of its Irish friends towards a separate nationality which never had an existence in the past, and whose future, were it possible, would be frankly ridiculous. Apart from the great national sentiment—the sentiment that stirred the country that fought at Waterloo, that saved India from herself, and that still moves even the most distant of our Colonies to claim a share in our rejoicings and in our dangers—there is, of course, the separate and lesser sentiment of the Scotch, Irish, and Welsh peoples. No one desires that they should be utterly forgotten because they are merged in the greater nationality, just as their emblems are merged in the Union Jack ; but their pre- servation does not depend upon the destruction of that greater nationality. Irishmen are apt to forget their share in the flag when they speak of the Union Jack as a "party emblem," and the Daily Chronicle does them no great service in ridi- culing its display.
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