THE DIFFICULTIES OF DEMOCRACY.
IN the bright speech which Mr. John Morley delivered on Saturday at the Passmore Edwards Settlement, and on which we comment elsewhere, he let fall an °biter dictum which greatly interested us as politicians. It was only a remark implying that the -United States in going beyond this country on the democratic road had not conquered, had, possibly, rather exaggerated, her social difficulties; but we think we may gather from it that Mr. Morley, like most reflective Radicals of our time, is greatly impressed, it may be even appalled, by the incr., -.Bed difficulty of governing which the use of democracy as the grand instrument of gov 'rnment involves. If that is the case we wish Mr. Mon l I, who, though a politician, has a detached mind, would help us all and interest us all by delivering a speech subs antially upon that subject alone. It is becoming an urgent one, if only for two reasons. One is that the short list of statesmen who have the initiative in governing mankind feel this difficulty with ever increasing acuteness, and dread and resist democracy not for itself so much as on this account ; and another is that journalists, fighting politicians, and the majority everywhere fail to recognise it as a formidable obstacle, and therefore provide against everything else. They have not the habit of thinking of Demos as King, and do not perceive that, tested as any other King would be, there are drawbacks in his mental composition which shake the confidence, and even alarm the patriotism, of all, even the most Liberal, statesmen. Demos the King has wonderful instincts, suggesting some- times almost supernatural insight ; he possesses force greater than that of any statesman or group of states- men; and he has a power of endurance such as, among Kings, only Frederick the Great has hitherto displayed; but he has at least three drawbacks, which worry even democratic statesmen into a silent distrust which has often the largest political results. They are undermining the French Republic, for instance, at this minute.
(1) Demos is an ignorant King. He does nct know, and cannot know, the facts upon which his owr decrees must ultimately be based. Ignorance, even of a ivalified kind, is a terrible trouble to any Sovereign, and is still more of an embarrassment to his counsellors, who some- times cannot understand why their arguments, based upon what seem to them the most evident facts, should fall so dead upon the ruler's mind. It is said that Alexander III. of Russia, whose education had been neglected under an idea that he would not reign, felt this difficulty more than any other of the heavy burdens of autocracy, would lay down papers of importance with a sigh of despair, and at last fell back, as he certainly fell back, upon the conviction that as God had chosen an ill-informed man to govern Holy Russia, he would receive sufficient guidance in his work direct from God. Demos knows much less than Alexander III. In foreign affairs he does not as a rule know even elementary facts like the comparative power of States—the French Demos, it is alleged, does not even know where they are—and in financial affairs his counting power stops with the first few thousands. It is futile to talk to him of millions. He honestly believes it possible for any Government which chose to do it, to pension all respectable work- men after sixty as it pensions soldiers. Even in America it may be doubted if Demos perceives that every house in the States pays twelve dollars a year to place all persons who say they suffered by the Civil War beyond the chance of poverty. He cannot realise in the least the cost of war, or of great currency changes, or of Protection; and when talked to about them is so bewildered that his counsellors lose courage and hardly venture to utter their full minds. Talking foreign polities or finance to Demos is, in fact, like talking to an Emperor of China, who believes himself rich if the Palace Treasury is full, who cannot see why his fiat does not create armies, and who thinks of the external world as a disagreeable place full of irrational people who are always menacing. Mr. Morley must have been thinking of this deficiency in Demos when he advised the formation of newspaper classes ; and to men in office it is a never-ending source of trouble and anxiety, which they face usually by giving up the effort to convince and making of the whole question one of "confidence." They do not precisely say to Demos, " You, Sire, do not know and we do," because that would be uncourtly, and Demos is full of suscepti- bilities, but that is what they mean.
(2) The second source of difficulty is that King Demos is so impressionable. He is not " vacillating," as he is usually described. On the contrary, he is exceedingly stub- born. An angel could not convince him in England that a jury ought to consist of less than twelve; or in America that federalism is only an experiment; or in France that to place all property in perpetual settlement is not necessarily wise ; but in spite of his immutability he is strangely liable to a momentary impression. A telegram will make him discharge a trusty servant—the Ferry case—an acci- dental affront will make him prepare for war—the De L'Ome case—a misunderstanding will shake his confidence in an entire party—the Talienwan case. He quite acknow- ledges in theory that policy should be steady, but his counsellors may find him on any morning quivering with indignation, or storming with excitement, or pale with not always reasonable fear. Usually they can calm him, it being part of his impressionability that the voice of his counsellors when loudly raised soothes, or consoles, or tranquillises him ; but occasionally he gets "out of hand," and when he does not his ultra-receptiveness strains the attention and perplexes the judgment of his most experienced advisers. 'What can they do,' they say, with a King whose inner opinions are altered from. day to day by the rumour of passing events, who never listens to reason while the impact of those events is felt, and who, when at last he is sensible, is sensible because he trusts them, and not because he distrusts kaleidoscopic impressions.' No ordinary King would suffer his serious affairs to be impeded by a Miss Cass case, or a Dreyfus case, or a case like that of Pierre Bonaparte, but King Demos will, and the expectation that he will affects his counsellors as an expectation of accident affects ordinary men.
(3) And then there is the dumbness of Demos, perhaps. ofall his deficiencies the one which most adds to the diffi- culties of his counsellors. It is his habit to remain silent till he utters the "word of the King," which he will not withdraw, and which it is political death to disobey. Why he does this no man has ever yet clearly discerned,. but he does it, except in war-time, with a stolid persistence all the more baffling because of his tolerance for noise. Any amount of shouting may go on in the Palace, any amount of trumpeting, any amount of moaning, but his own ultimate will is not revealed by so much as a glance,. a flush, or a quiver of the hand. He sits like an Emperor of China, impassive, immobile, inscrutable, seeing, listen- ing, watching, but giving no sign that he even has a mind, until after immense delays the brief but irresistible order drops from lips which even as they utter it seem reluctant to open. We question if any of the difficulties of his counsellors are so exasperating as this. They desire a policy—say the prohibition of drink—specially in his in- terest; they ask every favourite if he approves, and are assured that he does ; they arrange that he shall be told every day that he approves, and be makes no gesture of dissent ; they feel absolutely certain, and at last demand "the King's word," and are swept out of the Council Chamber by a thundering "No," from which there is no appeal. For this difficulty of dumbness is terribly increased by the fact that King Demos is most silent to those upon whom he depends for counsel. He may reveal his thought for a moment to a favourite of genius, or to a servant, or to a boon companion ; but to a counsellor wise with the wisdom of long experience, acquainted with facts, tolerant of all things, he remains stonily dumb, telling him nothing, hinting to him nothing, warning him of nothing. He regards him, in fact, as too wise to be told, and sits on, silent, not thinking much, not weighing much, but dully, immutably resolved that there shall be but one decision. We ask Mr. Morley, who believes in Demos, but who has a fair mind, whether this is not the permanent lesson of history from the days of Brutus downward, whether he did not see it for himself a dozen times in Ireland, whether he would not as politician sacrifice half his many gifts for the single power of per- ceiving the will of the Silent King before it was uttered aloud. They say the German Emperor sometimes sur- prises his Ministers, but compared with Demos he is the most readable Monarch on the earth.
All this, we shall be told, is an attack on democracy ; but it is not so intended. The conductors of the Spectator are unable indeed to believe that the government of the few wise by the many foolish can be the last word of thought for the guidance of human conduct, but they cordially assent to the decision that the experiment must be tried, must be tried honestly, and must be tried for a long time. So far all other experiments have failed ; and they sincerely wish, in the general interest of the world, that this one should succeed. But it will not succeed the better because of blindness to the obstacles in its way ; and of those obstacles, one of the first is the extraordinary difficulty which those whom we have called counsellors find in guiding this new King. The old Kings were troublesome enough, as all their greatest Ministers have confessed, but this one has in him strengths and deficiencies which alike help to render him unintelligible. Better face a lion in fury than oppose that silent, unregarding, relaxed figure on the throne ; better ask from Kature her most closely guarded secret than try. by the closest watchfulness, the most unrelaxing scrutiny, to ascertain what his will really is. It is not pleasant in this age of the world to be the highest counsellor of King Demos.
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