OCR Text |
Show ENGLAND'S BULEES. (By Bourke Cockran.) It is always necessary to remember that the English government and the English En-glish people are two very different quantities. quan-tities. I have more than once had occasion occa-sion to say that the government of Great Britain is not English, but Norman. . The fact that English authority is in some places cherished and suyjiorted, while in others it is hated and resisted, is explained by this distinction between the liberty-loving race which has made Eng land a great race by the industry of its laborers, the enterprise of its merchants, the wisdom of its philosophers, the justice jus-tice of its law-givers, and-the cruel, turbulent, tur-bulent, predatory, race which dominates the English government, which for centuries cen-turies tried to strangle English liberties, and which has never ceasedt o eon-:uire against the ancient English constitution. Everybody familiar with history knows that England for eight centnries has been the theatre of a contest between the An-ele-Saxon masses striving to re-establish the laws of the good King Edward, the ancient English common law, against the Institutions of feudalism imposed upon them p.t Hastings. The Norman has always sought war a f.n opportunity for pillage and oppression. The Saxon never drew the sword but with reluctance, yet he was able to place his heel unon the neck of the Norman -when the theatre of war was his own countrr and the prize of battle his own liberties. For two centuries the Norman has been compelled to respeet liberty in England, but he has succeeded in embarking em-barking the English people in adventures beyond the sea utterly inconsistent with the spirit of English liberty. Where colonies founded by the common people of England are self-governing they are contented, seeking prosperitv under tha benign influences of the common com-mon law. In other places, as in India and in Ireland, where English authority is maintained by the sword, we see iii operation Norman rule perpetrating oppression, op-pression, eager for eonliscation, always followed by hatred and usually provoking provok-ing resistance. England stands for civilization in some places and for barbarism in other places, according as the Anglo-Saxon or Norman influence governs her policy. The difference differ-ence between the Norman and the Saxon transmarine enterprise is that the Saxon settles countries while the Norman conquers con-quers and plunders them. The Anglo-S-xon wrinsrs new wealth from the soil by honest labor, while the Norman steals the wealth that is produced by the labor of others. In this country we never had occasion to complain of the English people, but we have had occasion more than once to take up arms against the English government. govern-ment. The English masses have never failed to show friendship for us; the English En-glish classes, who were unable to crush us in our time of difficulty, are assiduously assidu-ously laboring to corrupt us now in our day of strength. The attempt to tax these colonies was not made by the English people, but by the Norman king and the Norman court. The war of 1S12 did not spring from any hostility between tho nations, but from the truculent Norman spirit animating English officers to search our vessels and impress our seamen. It may be said that a sympathizer with the Boer republics would be refused a hearing by the English mobs at the present pres-ent time. If we are to judge by the coarse songs of the concert halis, the shrill clatter of the drawing rooms, tho hoarse roar of the mobs or the arrogant speeches of the politicians it would seem as if the whole English people were unanimously bent on this latest campaign of snoilation. But it must be remembered that these elements have often belied the conscience of the English people in the past, and very likely they misrepresent it now. Through every great contest of liberty in which the English people have been concerned con-cerned the shouts of the violent for a while appeared to drown the voices of the sober, even where the ultimate result has been the triumph of justice. A Utt'.o more than a century ago the government of India was a deliberately organized system of robbery and maintained main-tained without even a pretense of regard for the Indian people, but solely and avowedly for the profit of -a private corporationthat cor-porationthat is tosay , for the plunder of the natives. It seemed then, as it seems now, that the remonstrance of justice jus-tice fell on deaf ears. Just as now, the. bandits outvoted the honest men in parliament by overwhelming overwhelm-ing majorities. But look around you now and tell me whether Saxon justice or oNrman piracy has achieved the durable triumph. What Is left of the nabobs and their ill-gotten wealth, or of the East India company, that fountain of famine whose poison streams still threaten the Indian people with the engine of pillage, which, though long abandoned, still projects a sinister shadow? |