The agitation for Federal Union in Australia has gone on for many years; the examples of both the United States and Canada have been open to Australian study, and hence the easy construction of a system might have been assumed. Yet it was only when the responsible statesmen of the different colonies, and of the different political parties in these colonies, had met in general conference that a formal plan other than the essays of amateurs was placed before the public. We have in our own generation seen the union of Italy and that of Germany consummated under the strain of intense national passion, and yet we know that even the chief agents in working out those great movements could only feel their way as they went along, taking advantage of opportunities and advancing with the advance of public sentiment--and that it was only when near their goal that they saw clearly the precise form which national unity would take. One may therefore with some confidence appeal to history in support of the position that no great work of national consolidation has ever been carried out which started from a defined initial plan. The plan has been the crown of effort, not its starting-point. {300} For this there are two manifest reasons. Years of discussion and agitation are almost necessary, especially under free popular constitutions, before that public opinion can be formed which enables statesmen to determine what sacrifices or concessions communities are willing to make to secure even a great end. Again, only statesmen practically and closely in touch with the people, familiar with the passions or prejudices of the communities concerned, and accustomed, moreover, to the work of practical administration, are able to give adequate constitutional expression to aspirations or desires for unity--necessarily more or less vague even when vehement; they alone can judge where compromise or concession must be made, or where it would be fatal. It is on such grounds as these that advocates of the more complete political unity of the Empire have hitherto chiefly confined themselves, to pointing out the fundamental defects of the existing system, to the inculcation of principles, the study of facts, and the dissemination of information bearing upon the question. They have directed their efforts to bringing about conferences of statesmen duly qualified to deal with the questions at issue, and at the same time to creating a public opinion which would justify such conferences in taking vigorous action. They have felt that the formulation of detailed plans should be left for statesmen who had received a mandate from the people, and who would be responsible to the people for the results of their decisions. {301}