Page:Democratic Ideals and Reality (1919).djvu/46

34 surely appear not good, for a time at least, to our present enemies.

'No annexations, no indemnities' was no doubt a rallying cry not meant by its authors to support existing tyrannies. But it is surely legitimate to remark that there is a wide difference between the attitude of the lawyer with his presumptions unless there be proof to the contrary, and that of the business man untied by formulæ. The one does things, and the other, at best, allows them to be done.

In the past, democracy has looked with suspicion on the activities even of popular governments, and therein has shown a wise self-knowledge. It used to be thought, and sooner or later will be thought again, that the main function of the State in free countries is to prevent tyrannous things from being done whether by offenders at home or invaders from abroad. Average citizenship is not a likely base for daring innovations. Adventurers, sole or corporate, must therefore be left to blaze the way to progress. In military and bureaucratic States it is otherwise; Napoleon could be a pioneer, as might have been Joseph. if his conservative subjects had not successfully revolted against him. In Prussia all progress has been State-