Freedom Wears a Crown by John Farthing (review)

REVIEWS OF BOOKS 251 book.It demands to be read,notoncebut several times, notonlyby the armchair traveller, butbytheserious student ofthenorth. Ottawa DONALD SNOWDEN Freedom Wears a Crown. ByJOHN FARTHINO. Editedby JUDITH ROBINSON, withanIntroduction byE. D. FULTON. Toronto: Kingswood House. 1957. Pp.xx,188.$8.50. SOM•. readers willviewthisvolume asnothing more thana well-timed piece of political propaganda (May,1957).Others will doubtless regard it asa timelyandprobing analysis of the sickness of the Canadian governmental system. Somebrowsers will err in hastilysubtitling it Sense or Nonsense? Basically the bookis an attackon the liberaltraditionin Canada,or more specifically onKingandthe"Kingsians" andtheso-called "cultists" (among whom Professor Lower andBruce Hutchison feature most prominently) who apparently aspire foraform ofCanadian unity thatgrows from thegeography ofNorth America andwhich theauthor defines ideologically as"theFrench tradition plus anutter vacuum." TheCrown, Parliament, personal andsocial freedom, trulyresponsible government--all these andmany more esteemed features ofCanadian political lifehave been destroyed, wearetold, bythe Liberal hegemony. YetKing and the Kingsians are notcompletely toblame, for theyinherited, afterall,themodern science thatbegan withNewton, the modern industrial andfrankly materialistic society thatemerged inthefollowingcentury , andrationalism, utilitarianism, andliberalism. In pitting himself implicity against these mighty forces theauthor hascalled tohisaidthebest inhistoric toryism: Disraeli, Burke, and Bolingbroke; faint echoes ofCarlyle and Froude; Laud, Strafford, and Charles I, who fought asimilar battle when theodds weremoreeven;and,of course, Elizabeth I. The author has thought profoundly about theCanadian malaise. Hesuggests a remedy--afirm adherence to the monarchical tradition--butleavesthe Canadian people to decide whether theywishto have theirgovernment founded ontheChristian ideal ofakingly order oflife,where freedom alone resides, or"the mere blind blank absolute willofthepeople." (Bagehot, Lowe, Carlyle, and amultitude ofothers asked thesame question aslong ago as18671) It is a book to bereadandthendiscussed, particularly with students whomayfind the ideasa little lesswornthantheirelders. Mr. E. D. Fulton, M.P.,expressed thehope, in anIntroduction thatcannot be admired foritssubtlety, thatthebook would inspire action. Might hebe cautioned thatgovernments in Canada have often practiced notonly the good policies butalso thebad habits oftheir predecessors? University ofToronto JoH• T.SAYWELL A Study ofHistory. ByARNOLD J.TOYN•EE VII-X.Abridgement byD. C. SOMERW. LL. London, Toronto: Oxford University Press. 1957. Pp. xiv, 414. $5.5o. Toynbee and History: Critical Essays and Reviews. Edited byM.F.ASHL•.Y MONTACU. AnExtending Horizons Book. Boston: Porter Sargent Publisher. 1956.Pp.xiv,885.$5.00. W•THthepublication of D.C. Somervell's second volume, all tenvolumes of ...