There are public speakers and writers of letters to newspapers who, when they wish to be particularly impressive, begin a sentence with the words; “I tremble to think” These people usually tremble to think what would happen if some ridiculously modest proposal were acted upon. In the House of Lords recently a peer confessed rbar he ire rubied to think what would happen to British agriculture if admittedly cruel rabbit-traps were abolished. I was not present at the debate, so that I cannot say for certain whether or not the noble lord’s hand really shook or his voice really quivered as he spoke the fateful words. People who tremble to think are usually, in my experience, as cool as cucumbers. A man who trembles to think in a public speech has commonly [2] forgotten all about the matter by the time dinner is on the table.

A short time ago, a correspondent, writing to a great newspaper in defence of the sale and export of arms to foreign countries, declared that he trembled to think of the horrors and cruelties that would have taken place in the Chaco War if the combatants on both side had not been provided by more advanced countries with the most efficient modern weapons. Did he really tremble as he compared the lot of men massacred and mutilated by the very latest thing in shells with that of their hapless ancestors who fought with stones and knives and bows and arrows? Did he tremble to think what a hell war would have been if some kindly inventor had not tempered its harshness with the discovery of poison gas ? A man must have very little to tremble to think about who trembles to think how horrible war would be without the most modern products of the manufacturers of munitions and armaments. He would be better engaged, I fancy, in trembling to think what will happen to the world if the use of these humane killers and humane maimers and mutilators ever becomes general again.

As a rule, a man who trembles to think is a man who has scarcely paused to think. He is a [3] defender of things as they are because he cannot imagine the world other than it is. A few months ago he crumbled to think what would happen to cricket if the new l.b.w. law were passed. Before the War he trembled to think what would happen if women got the vote. I knew an excellent Radical who was so perturbed by the prospect of sex- equality that he had a nightmare vision of an England in which men charged with any offence against women, how- ever innocent they might be, would be convicted by merciless juries of women and condemned to long terms of imprisonment. He was himself a model citizen, but he was convinced that women had no sense of justice, and that under the reign of women - who are after all in a majority and would, of course, all vote and act together - the liberty of a model male citizen would hang by a thread. It is hardly necessary to point out: that nothing of the sore, rhar he foresaw lias happened. Men would nor tremble to think so often if they realized that, so far as legislation is concerned, the things chat people fear, like the things that people hope, seldom come to pass. Or it might be nearer the truth to say that neither great apprehension nor great hope is, as a rule, justified by the event.

I do not know how old the phrase “I tremble [4] to think” is, but I fancy it must have come into common use not long after the discovery of the art of controversy. It is easy to imagine that, when Moses brought down the Ten Commandments, there were discontented Israelites who trembled to think of the consequences of these invasions of individual liberty. What, for example, they might have asked, was likely to be the effect of the Commandment . ‘Honour thy father and thy mother’ on family life ? Human nature being what it is, was ir wise to make filial piety compulsory? Would not the element of compulsion in the Commandment defeat its purpose ? Was there not some justifica- tion for the fear that many children, who would otherwise have been devoted to their parents, would he driven into rebellion through irritation at filial love’s being made a matter of law and associated with vulgar reward? Arguments as specious have been put forward against many oi the good laws that have been passed since the time of Moses. There are people still living who once trembled to think whac would happen to family life if hungry schoolchildren were fed at the public expense. In the first place, they thought, this would destroy the pleural sense of responsibility and pur. an end to that thrift which is so strong a tie between underpaid patent and underfed [5] child. Home would cease to be sweet home if mothers had no longer to deny themselves the necessaries of life in order to keep the bodies and souls of their infants together. The sanctity of family life must not be violated by free sandwiches. I happen to believe in the institution of the family, but I could never see how underfeeding children was the best way to preserve it. Similarly, I could never see how the institution of the family was imperilled by the work of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. Yet many people once trembled to think what the consequences would be if the prying officials of this society were permitted to interfere with the sacred relationship between a parent and a child who suffered miseries unspeakable at his hands.

Children indeed have had some odd defenders. Many people used to tremble to think what would happen to them if the half-time system were abolished in the factories. The child, we were told, became an asset to the home when it was allowed to work in a factory at an early age. Without its small wage, it would become a burden and therefore, perhaps, incur a certain unpopularity with the older members of the household. And the half-time system, was also defended by those who trembled to think what [6] would happen to industry without child labour. I remember reading a speech by an an eminent statesman in which he declared that child labour was the corner-scone of the linen industry and that without child labour the industry could not continue. Since then the industry has had its ups and downs, but its downs have been due not to the abolition of child labour, but to changes of fashion and competition from Japan and elsewhere.

The protection of the aged like the protection of children has found its chief opponents in people addicted to trembling to chink. There was a great deal of trembling to think when old- age pensions were first proposed. Men who had inherited vast riches trembled to think how the spirit of thrift would be undermined in labourers earning thirty shillings a week, if, without contributing a penny towards it, they were sure of getting five shillings a week as soon as they reached the age of sixty-five or seventy. Who with this small fortune awaiting him, could fail to play rhe spendthrift: with his pennies in the intervening years? The sturdy independence for which the Englishman was famous all over the world would be gone. The national character would be dipped. A race of free men would be converted into a race of state-aided beggars. And so forth.[7]

For many years, too, we have had people who have tried to make us tremble to think of the consequences of our giving occasional pennies to street-musicians and other mendicants. To give a penny to a poor man, we have been told, is an act of self -indulgence performed at the expense of the poor man’s strength of character. We are tempting him to go on indolently blowing into a cornet in the streets instead of making a man of himsel at honest work. Apparently it is the character only of a poor man that you can undermine; give a rich man all die oysters, champagne, and cigars that he can consume, and at the end of it all, his character remains as firm as the Rock of Gibraltar.

I am inclined to the opinion that people who tremble to think are nearly always wrong. I doubt whether they tremble, and I am sure they seldom think. They are usually people who are irritated by change, especially by some change that interferes , however slightly, with their interests or pleasures. Many motorists trembled to think of the consequences of the imposition of the speed limit in built-up areas. They said that this would make people drive faster in built-up areas and so increase the dangers of the streets. They persuaded themselves that other motorists, instead of regarding thirty miles an [8] hour as a maximum speed in towns, would regard it as a minimum, and would rush wildly through, crowded streets in which they ought to proceed at a careful crawl. Of course, nothing of the kind happened. The speed limit has produced, not a more dangerous motorist p but only a more dangerous pedestrian.

Let us then cease to tremble to think, and take to thinking instead. If we do, we may even discover some way by which agriculture can be preserved without the torture every year of millions of rabbits and other wild creatures. If we cannot abolish admitted cruelty, I tremble to think of the future of civilization.