The peril in England at the present time is the illusion of political
leaders in the Socialist Party that the prosperity of the working
classes may be increased without any regard to the economic conditions
in other countries. The painful truth is that these conditions of cheap
labour and long hours, better organisation and greater mechanical
skill, will come smashing into the dreams of the social idealists with
heavy blows of abominable reality.
I do not believe that in our time Great Britain will regain the old
standards of her world trade. It is my firm belief that the next period
of history will see a slowing down in the international exchange of
manufactured goods, and that most countries will have to restrict their
imports because their exports are not wanted on the same scale. That
is to say the nations will become more self-contained, relying more
than ever upon their own supplies of food and the internal exchange of
their own industries. The English people must get back to agriculture,
instead of relying almost exclusively on manufactures and buying
most of their food abroad, and large numbers of their overcrowded
populations in the great cities must get back to the fields at home,
or in the Dominions, where there is room for all. Otherwise they will
surely perish in pauperdom.
Before that happens there is bound to be political strife and social
unrest on a serious and perilous scale. Not only in Great Britain but
all over the world, the intensity of this new competition, the gravity
of this readjustment to new and restricted conditions of economic life,
will provide an excuse for agitators and revolutionaries who desire
to overthrow the whole structure of our present system of Capital and
Labour in the hope of obtaining greater prosperity for the labouring
folk and a broader control of the sources of wealth. Communism,
defeated in Russia, will seek victories in other countries more highly
organised, and the Fascisti, who are in all countries under different
names, will seek to protect their property, privileges and principles
by violent action against this challenge. The bitterness and the need
of nations threatened with economic poverty, unable to support their
industrial populations, thwarted in their attempt to enlarge their
boundaries, will lead to new international jealousies which will tempt
their militarists and their hot-heads to risk again the adventure of
war. The spectre of revolution has not been exorcised from Europe,
and all these pressures of populations, passions, trade interests,
industrial rivalries, and social ambitions, are full of explosive
forces which may lead to another world conflict, unless there is a new
vision at work in the heart of humanity. It is all very difficult!