A short essayistic work by Sir William Blake Richmond, framed as a prologue and a dream, asking whether democracy is false or true. Dedicated to the honest working classes of England, rich and poor, it reflects on democratic ideals from the perspective of one of themselves. It is worth hearing for its thoughtful historical view of democracy and society.
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Cover of the original edition (Project Gutenberg, public domain).
Text source: gutenberg.org · The work is in the public domain.
Opening of the book
DEMOCRACY— FALSE OR TRUE? A Prologue and Dream BY SIR WILLIAM BLAKE RICHMOND K.C.B., R.A. London - - - Cecil Palmer Oakley House Bloomsbury Street WC1
Printed at The Morland Press Ltd 190 Ebury Street London SW1 Dedicated to the honest working classes of England, rich and poor, by one of themselves
FIRST
EDITION
1920
COPY
RIGHT
DEMOCRACY
§ 1
It is a dangerous, but agreeable, game to play the prophet, perhaps unwise; but while admitting that, I am going to do so, not because I feel sure, but because I want to sift my own thoughts. I may be told
“why not do so in private?” I’ve done that already. Probably it does not matter what an old man says, “He is a weather beaten block waiting for axe or fire.” Whatever Ideals are mine, there are few which are in agreement with the fashion of to-day. Still I am capable of looking forward. I’ve looked back a great deal in my life, and been a humble student of “Cause and Effect.” Young enough to believe, even though it lies distant from hence, in Utopia, and I make bold to say so. I still believe in the human race. I still believe in a capacity for repentance and change of direction from bad to a better state of things. It is likely that the desirable, according to my philosophy, would be the undesirable to many, perhaps, just now, most people!
Nevertheless I mean to state it.
William Morris made a delightful story, “News from Nowhere”; he thought that Socialism would realise his Ideal, perhaps it might; anyway Socialism is a pleasanter word than Individualism, it suggests
“Thou,” the other cries “I.” Thou has not been in the air of late. I has
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