The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1904-07-09
JUSTIN. MCCARTHY on THE BRITISH IN
EASION OF TIBET

Justin Mccarthy has clever letter on poll
tics and Pens in England in the Independent of
June g. in the course of which he thus speaks his
mind on the British invasion of Tibet
Why European civilization, and especially that
which England illustrates, should not leave the
capital and the land of the Tibetans to the excIu-
sive possession of their people il would be diff
tcult indeed for political sophistry to explain. If
the Tibetans desire to keep their country all to
themselves, that desire may, indeed, show them to
be narrow-minded and rather eccentric people,
an DIVE may pity them for their unreasonable ex-
clusiveness. but it would seem to the ordinary NOR
tai that we had better leave them to their odd
principles and not compel them by mere saugh-
ter to accept at hands what pleased to
call civilization. However, it seems to be resolved
by the conservative government--the word conser-
vatlve does not appear we'll suited to policy which
will allow the Tbctans TO conserve any of their
traditional wa5s--that England must force her
way into the Tibet capital over heaps of dead bod
les and then dictate there the conditions which
Tibet must accept. We all understand in England
that this is not the device OF Mr. Arthur Balfour
and his colleagues here at home but that he and
they drawn into it, driven into it, by the
pressure of Lord Curzon, vceroy Of India, and his
councillors.
Of course, the only end of such a policy, unless
some strange change of mood should come over our
advocates of Imperialism, must be the compulsory
surrender of Tibet to England's terms; or in other
annexation of the hitherto unexplored country.
Every attempt which the Tibetans may make
against the British invasion viii only cause the i'm
perialisic voice to be raised in louder and shrer
cry for the complete slubjugation of the land which
has the aJdacity to resist our advance. We shall
be told that the honor Of England and the security
OF Englands eastern possessions demand the utter
subJugation Of the inhosptable race who refuse
TO welcome our incursi0ns and who get themselves
killed IN masses rather than admit our right to do
as we please with what Is not and never yet has
been our own. lie imperialist spirit has become
more and more lntianmatory OF late years and it
must be owned that at the present time its inf1-
ence is not by any confined merely to the po-
lltlcal followers of the conservative government
Among those who sit on the side Of the opposition
there are unfortunately some men of mark and
OF weight whose sympathies go very far with the
tendencies and the movements of imperialism. The
true and genuine leaders of the opposition are in
deed still faithful to their own principles. but the
Liberal party is now sadly divided here and there
and the Spirit of conquest and subjugation has TAX
en- possession OF many men who were once devoted
followers of Mr. Gladstone. We have various little
wars going on in Asia and in Africa and we are
called upon day after day join III exutation over
the conquest of this that dominion or ruler con-
corning whose doings the English people have no
more real interest thar they might have III the CON
dltlon of some unknown planet. When once a war
of any kind breaks out it is the common human in
stnct to eXut over the success of our own national
forces, and thus it viii, I fear come to be with
large proportion of the English people when they
hear of the further advance of the capital of Tibet
The government, may assume, Will rot be sorry
to find public attention thus driven away for the
time from any inquiry into political mismanage-
ment at home, and even Mr. Chanlberlain's scheme
of fiscal reform may fall into the shade while ex-
cessiye accounts are coming in of the resistance
offered by the Tibetans and of its triumphant sup
preston by the guns and the bayonets of the peace
full mission from England