For forty years this force in the nation of which I speak, though so frequently stirred, has not achieved its purpose. But in nearly every case, directly or indirectly, the thing against which it moved was the Parliament. It would be too lengthy a matter to discuss here why the representative system has sunk to be what it is in modern Europe. It was the glory of the Middle Ages, it was a great vital institution of Christendom, sprung from the monastic institution that preceded it, a true and living power first in Spain, where Christendom was at its most acute activity in the struggle against Asia, then in the north-west, in England and in France. And indeed, in one form or another, throughout all the old limits of the Empire. It died, its fossil was preserved in one or two small and obscure communities, its ancient rules and form were captured by the English squires and merchants, and it was maintained, a curious but vigorous survival, in this country. When the Revolution in 1789 began the revival of democracy in the great nations the old representative scheme of the French, a very perfect one, was artificially resurrected, based upon the old doctrine of universal suffrage and upon a direct mandate. It was logical, it ought to have worked, but in barely a hundred years it has failed. There is an instructive little anecdote upon the occupation of Rome in 1870. When the French garrison was withdrawn and the Northern Italians had occupied the city, representative machinery was set to work, nominally to discover whether the change in Government were popular or no. A tiny handful of votes was recorded in the negative, let us say forty-three. Later, in the early winter of that same year, a great festival of the Church was celebrated in the Basilica of St. Peter and at the tombs of the Apostles. The huge church was crowded, many were even pressed outside the doors. When the ceremony was over the dense mass that streamed out into the darkness took up the cry, the irony of which filled the night air of the Trastevere and its slums of sovereign citizens. The cry was this: "We are the Forty-three!" It is an anecdote that applies continually to the modern representative system in every country which has the misfortune to support it. No one needs to be reminded of such a truth. We know in England how the one strong feeling in the elections of 1906 was the desire to get at the South African Jews and sweep away their Chinese labour from under them. The politicians and the party hacks put into power by that popular determination went straight to the South African Jews, hat in hand, asked them what was their good pleasure in the matter, and framed a scheme in connivance with them, by which no vengeance should be taken and not a penny of theirs should be imperilled.