Imperialism without noble imaginations, it seemed to him, was simply
nationalism with megalomania. It was swaggering, it was greed, it
was German; its enthusiasm was forced, its nobility a vulgar lie.
No. And when he turned to the opposite party he found little that
was more attractive. They were prepared, it seemed, if they came
into office, to pull the legislature of the British Isles to pieces
in obedience to the Irish demand for Home Rule, and they were
totally unprepared with any scheme for doing this that had even a
chance of success. In the twenty years that had elapsed since
Gladstone's hasty and disastrous essay in political surgery they had
studied nothing, learnt nothing, produced no ideas whatever in the
matter. They had not had the time. They had just negotiated, like
the mere politicians they were, for the Nationalist vote. They
seemed to hope that by a marvel God would pacify Ulster. Lord
Dunraven, Plunkett, were voices crying in the wilderness. The sides
in the party game would as soon have heeded a poet. . . . But
unless Benham was prepared to subscribe either to Home Rule or
Tariff Reform there was no way whatever open to him into public
life.
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