I said years ago that I would rather be the man who helped on a rational scheme which should secure the comfort of old age than I would be a general … - John Morley

As for progress, what signs of it are there now? And all we Victorians believed in it from the Utilitarians onwards.

Present party designations have become empty of all contents...Vastly extended State expenditure, vastly increased demands from the taxpayer who has to provide the money, social reform regardless of expense, cash exacted from the taxpayer already at his wits' end—when were the problems of plus and minus more desperate? How are we to measure the use and abuse of industrial organization? Powerful orators find "Liberty" the true keyword, but the I remember hearing from a learned student that of "liberty" he knew well over two hundred definitions. Can we be sure that the "haves" and the "have-nots" will agree in their selection of the right one? We can only trust to the growth of responsibility; we may look to circumstances and events to teach their lesson.

Define it as we may, faith in Progress has been the mainspring of Liberalism in all its schools and branches.