insist on belonging to him or herself, and will express truly their view of things, a true relationship will spring up and unite in bonds of harmony the men and women of all lands.
William Morris was a Socialist after his own kind, and we must be Socialists after our kind. Brought by our similar circumstances to a certain common understanding, we still can find opportunity for ample expression of our own personalities.
We know that Britain is the noblest country the world every has seen. We all know that there is no king who has had ancestors who believed so much in liberty, as our present King, George V. Witness George II., George III., George IV. Witness those who placed the stamp-tax on knowledge. Witness the suffering and imprisonment of the workers and the pioneers of political freedom under those sovereigns.
In 1870, Russia was interested in the Bulgarian atrocities. We all know how politicians live on atrocities. Prime Ministers, literally thrive on atrocities. No single government would be able to keep going if it was not for atrocities. The working men of all countries are so chivalrous. They never think of the slums at home, or of the starving children that inhabit these corners of the home- land; but any little story about people abroad will make these same workers weep copious tears.
At the particular period in the life of Morris to which I am referring now, Britain was the best friend of the Turks, Russia, in the "seventies," got off on a morality campaign, but Britain banked up Turkey in her atrocities in Bulgaria. William Morris came into the political arena and protested against this. Liberals and Radicals were protesting also. William Morris allied himself to the Liberal Party in consequence, but gave an entirely new interpretation to the Eastern Question.
He began to despise the middle-class. He saw that its Liberalism was but a makeshift, and that had nothing in common with the Radical Party. He came to see that his own personal class were the worst class in society. He observed the energy that reposed in the workign people, energy that must be let loose, energy that must be driven or persuaded in the right direction before we can have a decent society. So he began to examine the Eastern Question in this mood. He viewed it not as a political question but as a question which gave expression to economic tendencies in society, which was part of one great question - the emancipation of the world. From this time forward, William Morris became a Socialist.
In 1883, Morris took the great plunge and joined the Social Democratic Federation, whereby he was brought into full contact with the Socialist movement in his country. At the head of the S.D.F. was H.M. Hyndman. Mr. Hyndman was a politician pure and simple. He believed in a certain idea of Political or Parliamentary
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