Since Dickens's day the exposures effected by the Socialists have
so shattered the self-satisfaction of modern commercial
civilization that it is no longer difficult to convince our
governments that something must be done, even to the extent of
attempts at a reconstruction of civilization on a thoroughly
uncommercial basis. Consequently, the first part of the process
described by Dickens: that in which the reformers were
snubbed by front bench demonstrations that the administrative
departments were consuming miles of red tape in the correctest
forms of activity, and that everything was for the best in the
best of all possible worlds, is out of fashion; and we are in
that other phase, familiarized by the history of the French
Revolution, in which the primary assumption is that the country
is in danger, and that the first duty of all parties,
politicians, and governments is to save it. But as the effect of
this is to give governments a great many more things to do, it
also gives a powerful stimulus to the art of How Not To Do Them:
that is to say, the art of contriving methods of reform which
will leave matters exactly as they are.
The report of the Joint Select Committee is a capital
illustration of this tendency. The case against the censorship
was overwhelming; and the defence was more damaging to it than no
defence at all could have been. Even had this not been so, the
mere caprice of opinion had turned against the institution; and a
reform was expected, evidence or no evidence.
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