bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Pitfalls and advantages of different strategies for the absolute quantification of N‐acetyl aspartate, creatine and choline in white and grey matter by 1H‐MRS
Authors: Malucelli E. , Manners D. N. , Testa C. , Tonon C. , Lodi R. , Barbiroli B. , Iotti S.
Published: June 2009

This study extensively investigates different strategies for the absolute quantitation of N‐acetyl aspartate, creatine and choline in white and grey matter by 1H‐MRS at 1.5 T. The main focus of this study was to reliably estimate metabolite concentrations while reducing the scan time, which remains as one of the main problems in clinical MRS. Absolute quantitation was based on the water‐unsuppressed concentration as the internal standard. We compared strategies based on various experimental protocols and post‐processing strategies. Data were obtained from 30 control subjects using a PRESS sequence at several TE to estimate the transverse relaxation time, T2, of the metabolites. Quantitation was performed with the algorithm QUEST using two different metabolite signal basis sets: a whole‐metabolite basis set (WhoM) and a basis set in which the singlet signals were split from the coupled signals (MSM). The basis sets were simulated in vivo for each TE used. Metabolites' T2s were then determined by fitting the estimated signal amplitudes of the metabolites obtained at different TEs. Then the absolute concentrations (mM) of the metabolites were assessed for each subject using the estimated signal amplitudes and either the mean estimated relaxation times of all subjects (mean protocol, MP) or the T2 estimated from the spectra derived from the same subject (individual protocol, IP). Results showed that MP represents a less time‐consuming alternative to IP in the quantitation of brain metabolites by 1H‐MRS in both grey and white matter, with a comparable accuracy when performed by MSM. It was also shown that the acquisition time might be further reduced by using a variant of MP, although with reduced accuracy. In this variant, only one water‐suppressed and one water‐unsuppressed spectra were acquired, drastically reducing the duration of the entire MRS examination. However, statistical analysis highlights the reduced accuracy of MP when performed using WhoM, particularly at longer echo times. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Boron doped carbon nanotubes via ceramic catalysts
Authors: Bystrzejewski Michał , Bachmatiuk Alicja , Thomas Jürgen , Ayala Paola , Serwatowski Janusz , Hübers Heinz‐Wilhelm , Gemming Thomas , Borowiak‐Palen Ewa , Pichler Thomas , Kalenńczuk Ryszard J. , Büchner Bernd , Rümmeli Mark H.
Published: June 2009

A facile metal catalyst free route to synthesize boron doped (0.6%–1.0%) carbon nanotubes via ceramic nanowires in which the formation of the nanowires (probably serving as templates), the carbon nanotubes and their doping all occur unanimously in the reaction, is presented.

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(© 2009 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)
Efficacy and safety of Astragalus membranaceus in the treatment of patients with seasonal allergic rhinitis
Authors: Matkovic Zinka , Zivkovic Visnja , Korica Mirna , Plavec Davor , Pecanic Silva , Tudoric Neven
Published: June 2009

The study was designed to investigate efficacy and safety of Astragalus membranaceus (AM) in the treatment of patients with seasonal allergic rhinitis (SAR). AM is an active component in the herbal and mineral complex (HMC) registered in Croatia as a food supplement Lectranal®. The study was designed as a 6‐weeks, double‐blind, placebo‐controlled clinical trial and conducted in 48 adult patients with a moderate to severe SAR. The treatment efficacy was evaluated by the mean change in the symptom score (TSS), quality of life (QoL), specific serum IgE and IgG, nasal eosinophils, and physicians' and patients' global evaluation. Compared to placebo, HMC significantly decreased the intensity of rhinorrhea while for other primary efficacy variables the treatment groups did not differ. In contrast, investigators and patients equally judged the treatment with HMC as more efficacious. In addition, the analysis of changes from baseline inside the groups for TSS, QoL, and 4 main symptoms of SAR were strikingly in favor of the active treatment. In patients with SAR due to weed pollen allergy HMC significantly improved primary variables, reflective TSS and QoL. The study revealed a significant number of positive signals indicating the therapeutic effectiveness of the HMC in patients with SAR which should be further tested in larger, multicentre trials with more patients. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Chondroprotective effects of pomegranate juice on monoiodoacetate‐induced osteoarthritis of the knee joint of mice
Authors: Hadipour‐Jahromy Mahsa , Mozaffari‐Kermani Reza
Published: June 2009

To study the effectiveness of pomegranate juice on osteoarthritis, mono‐iodoacetate induced loss of articular cartilage in the mouse tibiofemoral joint was used as a model. Mono‐iodoacetate is an inhibitor of glycolysis which promotes osteoarthritis similar to that noted in human osteoarthritis. The histopathology of the subchondral bone and cartilage of mouse knee joints treated with a single intra‐articular injection of mono‐iodoacetate (0.1 mg) and killed at 1, 14 and 28 days post injection was investigated. The effect of pomegranate juice (4 mL/kg, 10 mL/kg, 20 mL/kg, orally) was studied in different groups. Histopathological changes in knee joints were seen after 2 weeks. Early osteoarthritis was characterized by areas of chondrocyte degeneration, which sometimes involved the entire thickness of the articular cartilage in the tibial plateaus and femoral condyles. Changes to the subchondral bone and proteoglycan contents, focal fragmentation and collapse of bony trabeculae with fibrosis and necrosis, and synovial cell proliferation were observed. The administration of pomegranate juice dose dependently prevented the negative effects of iodoacetate. Chondrocyte damage was significantly prevented, with proteoglycan less affected, especially in the groups receiving a high amount of pomegranate juice. No cell proliferation or inflammatory cells were detected in the synovial fluid. The effectiveness of pomegranate juice in improving histopathological damage is emphasized and its chondroprotective effect in vivo highlighted. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Antioxidant and antimutagenic effect of quercetin against DEN induced hepatotoxicity in rat
Authors: Gupta C. , Vikram A. , Tripathi D. N. , Ramarao P. , Jena G. B.
Published: June 2009

Diethylnitrosamine (DEN), a potent hepatocarcinogen, is found in tobacco smoke, processed meat as well as in different food products. Quercetin (QC), a naturally occurring flavonoid has excellent antioxidant properties. The present study was aimed to investigate the chemoprotective potential of QC against DEN induced hepatotoxicity in Sprague‐Dawley (SD) rats. Quercetin was administered (10, 30 and 100 mg/kg) for 5 consecutive days after DEN (200 mg/kg) treatment. The animals were killed 24 h after the last dose of QC/saline treatment. The DEN induced hepatotoxicity was evident by elevated malondialdehyde (MDA) and decreased glutathione (GSH) levels in the liver. A significant increase in the levels of plasma aspartate transaminase (AST) and plasma alanine transaminase (ALT) was observed in the DEN treated group. The DEN induced DNA damage was evaluated using a single cell gel electrophoresis (SCGE) assay. A significant increase in the number of TUNEL positive cells was observed in the DEN treated group. Quercetin restored AST, ALT and GSH levels at all the tested doses. Restoration of the MDA level and cellular morphology was observed at doses of 10 and 30 mg/kg of QC. Further, DEN induced DNA damage and apoptosis was ameliorated by QC. The results indicate that QC ameliorates the DEN induced hepatotoxicity in rats and can be a candidate for a good chemoprotectant. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
N2: a potential pitfall for bulk 2H isotope analysis of explosives and other nitrogen‐rich compounds by continuous‐flow isotope‐ratio mass spectrometry
Authors: Meier‐Augenstein Wolfram , Kemp Helen F. , Lock Claire M.
Published: June 2009

Observations made during the 13C isotope analysis of gaseous CO2 in the simultaneous presence of argon in the ion source of the isotope ratio mass spectrometer prompted us to investigate what influence the simultaneous presence of nitrogen would have on both accuracy and precision of bulk 2H isotope analysis of nitrogen‐rich organic compounds. Initially an international reference material, IAEA‐CH7, was mixed with silver nitrate in various ratios to assess the impact that N2 evolved from the pyrolysis of nitrogen‐rich organic compounds would have on measured δ2H‐values of IAEA‐CH7. In a subsequent experiment, benzoic acid was mixed with silver nitrate to mimic the N:H ratio of organic‐rich nitrogen compounds such as cellulose nitrate and RDX. The results of both experiments showed a significant deterioration of both accuracy and precision for the expected δ2H values for IAEA‐CH7 and benzoic acid when model mixtures were converted into hydrogen and nitrogen, and subsequently separated by gas chromatography using standard experimental conditions, namely a 60 cm packed column with molecular sieve 5 Å as stationary phase held at a temperature of 85°C. It was found that bulk 2H stable isotope analysis of nitrogen‐rich organic compounds employing published standard conditions can result in a loss of accuracy and precision yielding δ2H values that are 5 to 25‰ too negative, thus suggesting, for example, that tree‐ring 2H isotope data based on cellulose nitrate may have to be revised. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Inclusion of p‐sulfonatothiacalix[4]arene and its metal complexes
Authors: Wu Mingyan , Jiang Feilong , Hong Maochun
Published: June 2009

As a new member of the water‐soluble calixarene family, p‐sulfonatothiacalix[4]arene possesses unique properties resulting from its inherent structural characteristics. In our recent research, we have investigated the self‐assembly of bowl‐like p‐sulfonatothiacalix[4]arenes with or without transition‐metal ions in the presence of suitable guests. We have obtained a series of compounds with different structural motifs, such as capsules, tetranuclear clusters, and molecular clefts. In addition, p‐sulfonatothiacalix[4]arenes show good inclusion abilities and can capture different guests by utilizing their hydrophobic cavities through supramolecular interactions. Even when a cone‐like conformation is fixed, the p‐sulfonatothiacalix[4]arene can also splay its opposite aromatic rings apart to adjust its cone‐like conformations from C4v to C2v and even lower symmetries. All of these show that it is a good candidate for the research of inclusion phenomena. © 2009 The Japan Chemical Journal Forum and Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Chem Rec 9: 155–168; 2009: Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com) DOI 10.1002/tcr.200800033
A simple model to describe the development of osteoporosis in long bones
Authors: Kienzler R. , Ott I.
Published: June 2009

Advanced theories exist in the literature to describe the extremely complex load‐carrying mechanisms of real bone material. Necessarily, these models rely on constitutive equations involving numerous parameters that have to be determined by extensive (and expensive) experiments. The aim of the present paper, however, is to show that a very simple, one‐dimensional model render first insights possible into the mechanical behavior of bone. Loss of mass and loss of connectivity are considered in a strength‐of‐materials type of theory. Based on constitutive equations with a lot of parameters and the well‐known identification problems, a very simple, one‐dimensional model is proposed to describe loss of mass and loss of connectivity in bone material. Based on thermodynamic considerations involving material forces, evolution equations for the associated internal variables are derived. The parameters of the model are adapted to experimental observations obtained from sheep with glucocorticoid treatment. The qualitative agreement between the results of the proposed model and other theoretical approaches as well as experimental results appears to be quite satisfactory.
Application of the method of multipole expansions in the 3D‐elasticity problem for a medium with ordered system of spherical pores
Authors: Goldstein R.V. , Shushpannikov P.S.
Published: June 2009

A problem of determination of the stress‐strain state in an elastic isotropic 3D‐space containing an ordered system of spherical voids in a bounded region subjected to hydrostatic pressure is considered. A method based on expansion of unknown solution in terms of multipoles located at pores centers is proposed for solving the problem. Expansion coefficients (multipoles intensities) are found by using an alternation method which implies successive satisfying the boundary conditions for each void of the system. Considered examples of application of the proposed method for structures with various number of pores show that the method gives a good approximation to the solution of the problem.
Kilmainham – The Treaty that Never Was
Authors: Powell J. Enoch
Published: June 2009

The letter dated 28 April 1882 which Parnell wrote in Kilmainham jail to Captain O'Shea has become indelibly known to history as the Kilmainham Treaty, with or without benefit of quotation marks or capital letters; and though probably few historians would today maintain that anything properly describable as a treaty was intended, let alone concluded, between Parnell and Gladstone, the influence of the name and myth persists. For example, the most recent and excellent biography of Parnell by Professor F. S. L. Lyons, while repudiating the existence of a bargain, nevertheless refers to ‘the Kilmainham settlement’ and even states that Parnell ‘negotiated the Kilmainham “treaty” that brought the ordeal [of the detainees] to an end’. A re-examination, however, of the original document, its textual content and its detailed circumstances casts a new and sinister light upon the letter, revealing Parnell as the victim of a series of malpractices by O'Shea, to which Joseph Chamberlain was at least partly privy.
VII. Great Britain and the League Council Crisis of 1926
Authors: Carlton David
Published: June 2009

When, on 16 October 1925, the leading European statesmen initialled the famous Locarno agreements, a new era of international tranquillity and peace appeared to have dawned. The British Foreign Secretary, Austen Chamberlain, carried away by euphoria, wrote of ‘feeling like a little child again in spirit’ and of having ‘lived such days and celebrated such a birthday as it is given to no man to experience twice’. In reality, however, the agreements were built on inadequate foundations. As Viscount Cecil of Chelwood foresaw, limited regional security guarantees were an unsatisfactory substitute for the Draft Treaty of Mutual Assistance (1923) and the Geneva Protocol (1924), whose rejection by successive British Governments had spelt the end of hopes that wider collective security provisions and measures of disarmament might be achieved simultaneously. The Locarno agreements were only finally torn up in March 1936 when Adolf Hitler remilitarized the Rhineland; but the spirit which underlay them began to evaporate from the day of their signature. In this essay attention is given only to the first post-Locarno crisis, which was in itself sufficient to disillusion many optimists and to reveal that Franco-German tension was still a potent force in European relations. This crisis arose out of Germany's decision, in part fulfilment of her obligations under the agreements, to apply for membership of the League of Nations.
IV. Lord Clarendon's Attempt at Franco-Prussian Disarmament, January to March 1870
Authors: Herkless J. L.
Published: June 2009

On 26 January 1870 die Marquis de La Valette, French ambassador to London, read to the British Foreign Secretary, Lord Clarendon, ‘a long and able letter’ from Count Daru, the French Foreign Secretary. In this letter Daru suggested that Clarendon recommend to the Prussian Government some measure of reciprocal French and Prussian disarmament. Daru's proposal was immediately taken up. Clarendon wrote to the queen the same day informing her of his intention to do so and to his friend Lord Lyons, the British ambassador at Paris, saying that Count Daru could be sure he would do everything possible ‘to meet his views’. As one might expect from so easy a reception the idea of disarma- ment, especially of Franco-Prussian disarmament, was not a new one to Lord Clarendon. In his letter to Lord Lyons he described it as a subject he had ‘long had at heart’; and he informed Lyons that during the previous summer, whilst he and the Russian Foreign Secretary Gortchakoff had been at a German watering place, he had unsuccessfully proposed that Gortchakoff take up die matter with Prussia. But one must note straightaway that, however warmly Clarendon accepted the idea that he suggest disarmament to Prussia, he did not expect to be successful, i.e. he did not expect Prussia to make any move to disarm in any measure. In his letter to the queen Clarendon says that he feels failure is certain with the king of Prussia. He has some faint hopes with the Crown Prince, Queen Victoria's son-in-law, but he does not dwell on them. In his letters both to Lyons and to the queen, Clarendon says, in almost identical phrases, that while the king of Prussia does not desire war,’… far from it, his army is his idol and he will not be an iconoclast’. It is most unlikely, he continues, that the king will countenance any proposal to reduce the size of his army or to alter the Prussian system of recruitment.
An Aspiring Buffer State: Anglo-Persian Relations in the Third Coalition, 1804–1807
Authors: Ingram Edward
Published: June 2009

Weak states can control strong states, provided the weak can persuade the strong to admit, that they are vitally interested in their integrity and independence. In the late nineteentli century everybody understood the influence of the Ottoman Empire upon British policy, and the influence of Austria-Hungary upon Imperial German policy in the near east. In the heyday of the Great Powers of Europe it was not expected tliat orientals should aspire to similar influence: their futures would be decided by Europeans. Until the work of Robinson and Gallagher revealed the extent to which the khedive of Egypt controlled Lord Cromer, the history of late nineteenth century imperialism was written from this assumption.
V. Prelude to Intervention: Madagascar and the Failure of Anglo-French Diplomacy, 1890–1895
Authors: Schmidt Martin E.
Published: June 2009

The last decade of the nineteenth century brought to a climax Anglo-French tensions on many colonial issues. Generally overlooked in the roll-call of disputes which centred upon Egypt but extended to Newfoundland fisheries, Siam, and West Africa as well, is the position of Madagascar between the two powers at the commencement of the difficult decade. Madagascar warrants greater attention than it has received, for, with Egypt and Newfoundland, it became in 1891 and 1892 the central problem in colonial discussions between the two governments. On the side of France the issue left feelings of bad faith and broken promises which contributed to the strained tone of relations with Great Britain during the decade. This was all the more unfortunate since Madagascar was an issue apparently settled by the colonial arrangement of 5 August 1890 between the two powers. But the instrument which might have been expected to improve relations became instead another source of discord. Madagascar, at the heart of the agreement for France, presents therefore a striking and significant example of lost opportunity in colonial diplomacy. For the diplomatic failure led inevitably to a military solution to the problems confronting France on the Grand Isle.
The Misfortunes of Lord Bute: A Case-Study in Eighteenth-Century Political Argument and Public Opinion
Authors: Brewer John
Published: June 2009

Few politicians can have been as maligned, insulted and manhandled as John Stuart, third earl of Bute. Before 1760, cosseted within the confines of the Prince of Wales's court at Leicester House, this former Scottish representative peer was of little public note although he had acted as the lifeline between Pitt and the reversionary interest between 1755 and 1758. In London society he was known for his intellectual pretensions (he was a very competent botanist), his haughty airs, and a shapely figure which was displayed to such good effect in the theatrical productions held under the auspices of the Princess Dowager. It was only after 1760, when it became abundantly clear that the youthful George — if not his mother - was infatuated with Bute, that the royal favourite was exposed to the bleak winds of political hostility,. Admittedly there were rumours before George's accession about the subsequently notorious liaison between Bute and the Princess Dowager, rumours that Sir John Pringle told Boswell emanated from the intrigues of Bute's rivals at Leicester House. But these were a mere foretaste of what was to come: after 1760, whether Bute was serving the king (1761–3) or out of office, he was attacked by the mob, threatened with assassination, vilified in pamphlets, prints, newspapers, songs, plays, and handbills, and effectively rejected as a potential ally by all the leading politicians of the day except for the none too politically respectable Henry Fox. The bulk of this criticism was levelled in the 1760s, but even after 1770 the so-called ‘Northern Machiavel’ was under withering if increasingly sporadic fire, and as late as the 1780s vestigial elements of the old hostility remained.
From Whitehall after Munich: The Foreign Office and the Future Course of British Policy
Authors: Lammers Donald
Published: June 2009

Readers in die Foreign Office archive for the 1930s will not find many documents longer dian C14471/42/18 of 1938, which fills the major part of die volume into which it has been bound. In line widi British official practice this ‘document’ actually consists of a collection of papers, in this case nine, having a common occasion and a common subject. Bearing die title ‘Possible future course of British policy’, it is at least as interesting as it is long.
‘O decus Italiae virgo’, or The Myth of the Learned Lady in the Renaissance
Authors: Jardine Lisa
Published: June 2009

Let me start by making it clear that, taken at face value, my title is entirely a piece of mischief: I am not about to disclose the fact that there were actually no learned women in Italy in the fifteenth century. Indeed, this paper is built around the careers and works of five distinguished women intellectuals of that period: Isotta Nogarola (1418–66); Costanza Varano (1426–77); Cassandra Fedele (c. 1465–1558); Laura Cereta (1469–99); and Alessandra Scala (1475–1506). There is, however, a serious point to my choice of words in the title. The point is that the ‘learned lady’ of the Renaissance (the cultivated noblewoman, beautiful, charming, gifted, ‘gentile’) has a mythic place in the secondary historical literature on humanism. From Isabella d'Este to Sir Thomas More's daughters and the English Tudor princesses, the cultivated gentlewoman is the Beatrice or the Laura of some male humanist's circle, his hi adoring pupil, his inspiration, his idol. Scholars adopt a fondly indulgent tone when discussing the women, which carries the implication that their intellectual calibre, their actual standing as scholars and humanists, is not a real issue, is perhaps not in fact of any real substance (a figment, rather, of their male admirers' or suitors' imaginations). The single scholarly piece of any significance on the life and work of Alessandra Scala concludes with typical sentimental indulgence:Her noble and elusive aspect – for no portrait of her survives, unless perhaps she smiles at us, unrecognised, in the guise of a saint or a goddess, from one of Botticelli's canvases, or that of some other Florentine artist – yet that aspect shines forth from the shadows of the past, and casts a beauteous and gracious light upon the discordant chorus of Florentine humanism at the end of the fifteenth century.
The Failure of British Counter-Espionage against Germany, 1907–1914
Authors: Hiley Nicholas
Published: June 2009

Modern British counter-espionage effectively began in April 1907, when a joint conference of naval and military officials, formed the previous year to consider ‘the Powers Possessed by the Executive in Time of Emergency’, recommended both an immediate strengthening of the laws against espionage, and a War is Office investigation of ‘the question of police surveillance and control of aliens’. These recommendations were to prove an important initiative, and did much to determine the course of British counter-espionage before 1914, yet at the time they probably seemed little more than an airing of old grievances unlikely to find new support, for they were among the last remnants n. of the abortive ‘Emergency Powers Bill’ which the War Office intelligence department had been advocating to strengthen home defence ever since the invasion scare of 1888. The 1906 joint conference had in fact hoped to further the cause of this great legislative package, with its radically new powers of access, requisition and seizure but, faced with the Liberal administration's commitment to the ‘continuous principle’ that a full-scale landing was impossible, had been forced instead to confine itself to the purely naval and military aspects of home defence. As its report confessed in April 1907, in the prevailing climate of opinion the only hope for the great ‘Emergency Powers Bill’ was as a series of ‘small and independent measures’.
Clericals, Anticlericals and the Women's Movement in France under the Third Republic
Authors: McMillan James F.
Published: June 2009

Most historians of modern France would agree that the quarrel between clericals and anticlericals was one of the most significant political issues in French politics between 1870 and 1914, especially in the period before the passing of the law which separated Church and State in 1905. The charges brought against the Catholic Church by the anticlericals were many, but until recently few students of nineteenth-century France have commented on the fact that one of their most serious allegations was that the Church oppressed women. Perhaps the most celebrated formulation of this theory came from the pen of the historian Michelet who, in a virulent polemic entitled Priests, women and the family, bitterly attacked the powers which priests were reputed to exercise over the female mind through the institution of the confessional, to the great detriment of marital life and family unity.
The British Army and Internal Security 1919–1939
Authors: Jeffery Keith
Published: June 2009

Systematic military policy-making towards internal security in Great Britain dates from the period immediately following the First World War. It was stimulated above all by widespread fears of possible revolution, sharpened by a belief in the collective incapacity of police forces to deal with civil disorder. Many, although by no means all, politicians and senior officials felt that the labour militancy of the 1920s was simply the harbinger of ‘red’ revolt, and preparations were made accordingly. Following the trade unions’ defeat in the general strike of 1926 fears of revolution subsided, although the War Office continued to revise the plans it had made in the early 1920s. Throughout the entire inter-war period, nevertheless, the general staff displayed an extreme reluctance to commit the army to internal security duties. Almost without exception, it seems, military men shared Lord Ironside’s opinion that ‘for a soldier there is no more distasteful duty than that of aiding the Civil Power’.
‘Cambridge Idealism’: Utilitarian Revisionists in Late Nineteenth-Century Cambridge
Authors: Dewey C. J.
Published: June 2009

‘Cambridge idealism’ – the phrase sounds like a mischievous verbal paradox. Idealism, as Richter has accustomed us to suppose, set the tone of late nineteenth-century Oxford; while contemporary Cambridge, Lord Annan teaches, preserved a tradition of empirical rationalism. At Balliol Green and Toynbee evolved a ‘secular religion’ from the metaphysics of Hegel and Kant; at Cambridge Sidgwick and Marshall embarked upon a rationalist revision of utilitarianism, developing (for the most part) suggestions incompletely worked out by Mill. Green and Toynbee were idealists; Sidgwick and Marshall were rationalists: the differences between the philosophic systems thery constructed seem crystal clear. Yet the contrast can be exaggerated. Whether their fundamental premiss was the principle of utility or the conviction that ‘the Universe is a single, eternal activity or energy, of which it is the essence to be self-conscious, that is, to be itself and not-itself,’ Oxford idealists and Cambridge rationalists were both preoccupied by contemporary social problems, both formulated essentially social philosophies concerned with the right conduct of individuals in their relations with others, and both arrived at comparable policy prescriptions at almost exactly the same time.
Lloyd George and the 1918 Irish Conscription Crisis
Authors: Ward Alan J.
Published: June 2009

David Lloyd George was a great war-time prime minister. There seems to be little doubt about this, but his was leadership has been so extolled by his supporters that adverse criticism sometimes smacks of heresy. Nevertheless criticism is warranted which, whilst not attacking the man, will qualify the myth. What follows is a critical examiniation of Lloyd George and his Irish policy in 1918.
IV. The Cobden-Chevalier Commercial Treaty of 1860
Authors: Iliasu A. A.
Published: June 2009

Much has been written about the history of the Cobden-Chevalier treaty, partly because of the eminence of the persons involved in its negotiations and partly because of its significance in Anglo-French relations. By far the most detailed and up-to-date account is that of A. L. Dunham. Besides this valuable contribution to the history of the treaty, accounts of it can be found in nearly all the biographies and personal reminiscences of British statesmen of that period. In addition a large number of articles and monographs have been devoted to it on both sides of the Channel. All these accounts usually contain three main points concerning the origin of the treaty. The first of these is that by the close of 1859 the state of Britain's finances offered yet another opportunity for a major reform of the tariff, and that no one was more conscious of this opportunity than Gladstone, then the Chancellor of the Exchequer. He was particularly concerned about annuities worth £2 million, due to mature the following year, and was determined that this large sum of money should not‘ pass into the great gulf of expenditure there to be swallowed up ’. He informed Richard Cobden that if under the favourable financial circumstances nothing was done for ‘trade and die masses, it would be a great discredit and a great calamity ’.2 Secondly, that while Gladstone was resolved that the large sum at his disposal should not be wasted, the enthusiasm of persons who had no official position, particularly Cobden and Michel Chevalier, directed his attention to the possibility of using that amount to further Anglo-French commercial relations.
VI. The Railway Companies and the Growth of Trade Unionism in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries
Authors: Alderman Geoffrey
Published: June 2009

The deep-seated hostility of the railway companies of the United Kingdom to trade unionism in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries is well known to students of labour history. The foundations of that hostility were two-fold. Railway companies objected to the organization of their employees by outside bodies because this was felt to endanger discipline; in consequence, directors saw the growth of collective bargaining procedures as an attempt to divide responsibility for die running of the railways, and hence as a threat to public safety, for which they, the directors, were responsible. Moreover, the large companies had strong paternalist leanings, and provided their men with many of the housing, educational, recreational and medical facilities associated with a welfare state; they expected loyalty in return, and were quick to react when this loyalty was not forthcoming. Though trade unionism on the railways can be traced back at least to 1848, none of the early organizations survived. Collective bargaining, even in its most elementary form, the presentation of petitions by elected representatives of the men, was strongly discouraged.4
Gladstone and Nonconformity in the 1860s: The Formation of an Alliance
Authors: Machin G. I. T.
Published: June 2009

It is well known that Gladstone's progress to the leadership of the Liberal party between 1859 and 1868 included the building of an alliance with Nonconformity which lasted, wim some interruptions, to the end of his life. This coalition was remarkable in view of the previous diversity of viewpoint between its participants. In the 1830s Nonconformists had already adopted a policy of disestablishment when Gladstone was airing a diametrically opposite opinion in The State in its relations with the Church; and Gladstone's High Churchmanship was disliked by the evangelical Nonconformists, one of whom wrote a pamphlet entitled The Ritualistic Movement in the Church of England, a reason for disestablishment. In view of these differences, how did there develop a firm and continually reviving political alliance, as intimate as that between Gladstone and Irish Home Rulers in the 1880s?
Scottish Orientalism: From Robertson to James Mill
Authors: Rendall Jane
Published: June 2009

It is by now accepted that James Mill’sHistory of British India, which exercised such influence over the British image of India and Indians throughout the nineteenth century, was cast in the mould of‘philosophical history’, the kind of historical writing typical of the Scottish Enlightenment By the 1790s such an approach was faught at Edinburgh by Dugald Stewart, and in Glasgow by John Millar; and their teachings and writings did much to form Mill’s approach, overlaid though it later was by the Benthamite political message. The characteristics of ‘ philosophical history’ can be identified. Writers of the Scottish Enlightenment were concerned to apply to the study of man and society methods of enquiry comparable to those of the natural sciences, and this, for them, involved the formulation of general laws on the basis of observation, and the available evidence about the history, economy, culture, and political institutions of different societies. Certain guidelines were evolved. The starting point was the close interrelationship between all aspects of men's life within society, between the economy, government, culture, and social life of a people. Secondly, a civilisation, by which was implied all these aspects of a society, could be located on an evolutionary scale, a ladder of civilizations running from ‘rudeness’ to ‘refinement’.
The British Government and the Oil Companies 1912–1924: the Search for an Oil Policy
Authors: Jones G. Gareth
Published: June 2009

The overwhelming majority of studies of the relationship between the British government and private industry in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries are, in reality, merely studies of the government's policy towards industry. The attitude of private industry towards the government has been almost entirely neglected, and this has inevitably led to a distorted understanding of the relationship as a whole. It is, for example, hardly ever made explicit in the extensive literature on the growth of state intervention in the British economy that in the decades before 1914 the assault on laissez-faire was pardy led by private industry itself. This development was most noticeable overseas, where the British government became involved in commerce and trade largely in response to requests for diplomatic support from British firms faced with growing competition from continental and American commercial interests, often supported by their respective governments.
The Collapse of Resistance to Democracy: Conservatives, Adult Suffrage, and Second Chamber Reform, 1911–1928
Authors: Close David H.
Published: June 2009

Successive governments in Britain took great steps towards a more democratic form of government between 1911 and 1928. Universal suffrage, first proposed tentatively by a government in the former year, was completed in the latter. In the same period, the house of lords - the rejuvenation of which was treated at least nominally as vital by both the Liberal government and the Conservative opposition in 1911 - was effectively relegated even by Conservatives to an unimportant role. The attitudes and policies of Conservative politicians towards these changes deserve study for diverse reasons. They were part of a national debate about the wisdom of progress towards democracy; and so they form an important chapter in the development of political attitudes. They also do much to explain both how the process of democratization occurred, and how post-war governments viewed the electorate, as Conservatives participated in or dominated governments for most of the years from 1915 to 1945. Finally, the importance of Conservative views has been overlooked by historians, because they have persistently pre-dated the trend to democracy in Britain and so underestimated the scale of controversy about it. These historiographical tendencies are illustrated by the still lingering myth that the franchise before 1914 was close to manhood suffrage, or by the hitherto general assumption that the reform bill of 1917–18 was uncontroversial.
The Ship Money Case,The Case of Shipmony, and the Development of Henry Parker's Parliamentary Absolutism
Authors: Mendle Michael
Published: June 2009

Henry Parker'sThe Case of Shipmony(1640) may be the first intellectually significant political pamphlet of the Long Parliament era. In this crisp and well printed quarto, Parker, a publicist and man of affairs, used issues raised during John Hampden's celebrated test case of 1637 to develop his own political views.Parker wrote in opposition to the royalist majority in the case. But his carefully circumscribed objections to ship money inThe Case of Shipmonyshow him of two minds – his opposition was of a different order from that heard in the house of commons in 1640 and 1641, and was strangely resonant of the royalist arguments. This was not a sign of political timidity. Rather, as Parker grew bolder and as his notions matured in 1640– his views and those of the royalist counsel and judges,mutatis mutandis, became even more congruent. This can be seen by comparing the ship money arguments not only with the positions taken inThe Case of Shipmonybut also with the idiom of Parker's fully developed thought, which is usually (though excessively) identified with his most famous tract,Observations upon Some of His Majesties Late Answers and Expresses(June 1642).
Survival Against the Odds? The French Bishops Elected to the Estates-General, 1789
Authors: Aston Nigel
Published: June 2009

The general view still prevails that the French bishops performed badly in the elections held to the estates-general in the spring of 1789. The final figure of only 49 bishops going to Versailles amid a horde ofcuréstends to be treated by historians as a clear demonstration of the new power of the lower clergy, confirming the view of the episcopal corps as aristocratic, out of touch, and unprepared for an electoral contest on a level of equality with the parish clergy. Prestigious casualties like Rohan-Guémenée at Cambrai, Mont-morency-Laval at Metz, Marbeuf at Lyon, and Dillon at Narbonne have attracted much notice, but they are really the exceptions. Closer examination indicates that the majority of prelates in fact put up a spirited performance, faced with Necker's electoralrèglementof 24 January 1789 – arrangements weighted deliberately in favour of thecurés.
The Geddes Committee and the Formulation of Public Expenditure Policy, 1921–1922
Authors: McDonald Andrew
Published: June 2009

From its inception, the committee on national expenditure chaired by Sir Eric Geddes has been regarded as one of the most controversial exercises in the reduction of public expenditure essayed by any modern British government. The appointment in August 1921 of Geddes and a team of fellow businessmen to report on means of reducing supply services expenditure drew the criticism from contemporaries that it represented the abrogation of the executive's responsibilities for fiscal policy. The three reports which the committee produced in early 1922 were no less controversial: seeking a reduction of almost £87m in supply estimates of approximately £528m, they have been seen as the most radical statement of the policy of retrenchment adopted by the Lloyd George coalition. In view of this, and of the proud hopes of reconstruction which had been fostered after the armistice, the Geddes committee has often been the subject of obloquies from post-war British historians of liberal sensibilities.
At the Threshold of Dissolution: the National Liberals and Bismarck 1877/1878
Authors: Flynn John F.
Published: June 2009

Allied to Bismarck and more national than liberal, the National Liberal party split the liberal movement and became the largest and most successful party in Germany from 1867 to 1879. But it acted singularly ineffectively when it plunged headlong into the greatest crisis of its history by failing to support tax legislation during a year-long negotiation with Bismarck begun in the summer of 1877. For one thing, the party focused its attention on a single issue when many were at stake, any one of which could have been an obstacle to an agreement with Bismarck. Secondly, although its factions had continually demonstrated their willingness to reach unanimity, these agreements had taken so long to develop and lasted so briefly that in effect the party spent the greater part of a critical year in opposition to Bismarck. Furthermore, by weakening the degree of its commitments in response to Bismarck's hostility towards its demands, the National Liberal party appeared indecisive, unreliable and deceptive. The issue which had produced this inept behaviour was the implementation of the party goal of maintaining parliamentary power in Germany, specifically of assuring to theReichstagthe right to vote annually the sources of the revenue of the imperial government. The story of that issue is the concern of this article. It argues that knowledge of the tensions generated by divergent principles and goals on parliamentary rights will clarify both the schismatic tendencies and the character of the National Liberal party in the later 1870s. Thus the proper assessment of the role that the issue played in the history of the party requires that the actual decision-making process be counted at least equally with agreements. Whether continual co-operation among National Liberals on parliamentary rights was based upon increased hostility or cordiality has remained the critical and unanswered practical question.
Ideology and Social Policy: the Origins of the Trade Boards Act
Authors: Blackburn Sheila
Published: June 2009

The issue of sweated labour formed one of the most intractable social problems of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Numerous remedies to solve sweating, such as the restriction of female and child labour, the abolition of domestic workshops, consumers' leagues, and co-operative production were variously advanced but subsequently found to be wanting. Eventually, and bowing to the inevitable, Edwardians finally sanctioned one cautious measure which they thought would curb sweating at its root – that is the legal control of low pay in the form of the 1909 Trade Boards Act. Initially, the act applied to domestic chain-making, ready-made and wholesale bespoke tailoring, paper-box making, and the machine-made lace and finishing trade. In these four industries in which wages were deemed unduly low, boards were established consisting of equal numbers of employers' and workers' representatives, plus independent members nominated by the state. In effect, the boards were thus a form of compulsory arbitration on pay.
The Failure of Peace by Negotiation in 1917
Authors: Stevenson David
Published: June 2009

The First World War was launched in the belief that force could be an effective instrument of policy. Underlying the decisions of July and August 1914 was a hard core of calculation, based on the advice to governments that the fighting would be fierce but short, and that its political and economic repercussions could be contained. In addition, because the two sides were closer to military equivalence than in previous crises, both could believe that they had a reasonable prospect of victory. But such equivalence, given the weapons technology of the day, might also deny either coalition a speedy, surgical triumph. And it is from the prolongation of the war as well as its inception – from its not being over by Christmas – that its historical importance derives. Among the consequences were eight million dead, and the dislocation of the Western economic system. Without the war it is unlikely that either Lenin, or Mussolini, or even Hitler, would have come to office. As far as such things can be said with certainty, the First World War was a precondition of the Second. A four-month rather than a four-year conflagration would have had other, now unknowable, consequences. It would not, presumably, have had these.
‘Galen's Muscles’: Wilkins, Hume, and the educational use of the argument from design
Authors: Rivers Isabel
Published: June 2009

Wilkins'sThe principles and duties of natural religion,edited by Tillotson and published posthumously in 1675, designed to combat scepticism and infidelity, was reprinted nine times up to 1734 and was widely used as a textbook in the education of clergy and ministers. Hume'sDialogues concerning natural religion,substantially written in 1751 but withheld from publication on the advice of friends and only published posthumously in 1779, reversed Wilkins's procedure by scrutinising the tenets of natural religion from the perspective of scepticism. This essay explores the importance of Wilkins's text in the tripartite eighteenth-century scheme of natural religion, revealed religion, and ethics, and shows how Hume's parody of a well known passage from Wilkins – the ‘Galen's muscles’ of the title – was intended to contribute to the undermining of this scheme.
‘Freethinking’ and ‘Freedom of Thought’ in eighteenth-century Britain
Authors: Miller Peter N.
Published: June 2009

In early modern Europe, religious heterodoxy and intellectual inquiry posed serious challenges to the authority of centralizing forces both secular and ecclesiastical. At the same time, however, these dangerous developments had been driven by those individuals whom eighteenth-century writers had adopted as ‘culture heroes’ for an age increasingly self-conscious of its own enlightened status. In Britain, the newly established order defended itself against the scepticism and moral determinism of ‘freethinkers’ by upholding a religious and moral order based on liberty. But ‘freethinkers’ such as Anthony Collins were themselves the inheritors of, and propagandists for, the seventeenth-century revolution in science which underpinned the ideology being wielded against them. Their challenge elicited from Edmund Law an argument which co-opted their epistemology to ground the familiar metaphysics of liberty associated with the Newtonian position of Samuel Clarke. Where ‘freethinking’ had been perceived as a dangerous solvent of the social order, ‘freedom of thought’, within limits that were themselves a leading subject of debate in late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century Britain, could be upheld as consistent with the demands of political society.