At the end of his deeply interesting address Lord Morley
defended his policy in regard to the Press. The Act, he declared, meddles with no criticism, however strong, of Government measures. It discourages the advocacy of no policy, social, moral, political, or economic. Yet the Act bad been described as one judging cases of seditious libel without a jury. It was no restriction of the freedom of the Press. It was said that the incendiary articles—for they were in. cendiary and murderous—were mere froth. "Yes, they are froth, but they are froth stained with blood." When you had men admitting that they deliberately wrote these articles and promoted these newspapers with a view of furthering murderous action, " to talk of the freedom of the Press in connexion with that was wicked moonshine." "You may put picric acid in the ink and pen just as much as in any steel bomb." Lord Morley ended his speech on a note of optimism which we feel sure was sincere, and was also fully justified. "If a crisis coma," he declared, " it will find us ready. We have a dark, ugly moment before us, but we shall get through it, but only with self-command and without any quackery or cant, whether it be the quackery and cant of order or the quackery and cant of sentiment."
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