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George R. Parkin and the concept of Britannic Idealism1
- Journal of Canadian Studies/Revue d'études canadiennes
- University of Toronto Press
- Volume 10, Number 3, August 1975
- pp. 15-31
- Article
- Additional Information
Ann Arbor, University Microfilms Inc., 1966, p. 201. 11. R. W. B. Lewis, The American Adam, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1955, p. 5. 12. Susanna Moodie, Roughing It in the Bush, NCL edition, p. 30. 13. Susanna Moodie, Life in the Clearings, ed. R. L. McDougall, Toronto, Macmillan, 1959, p. 258. 14. R. L. McDougall, ed., in Susanna Moodie Life in the Clearings, Toronto, Macmillan, 1959, p. XV. ' 15. Susanna Moodie, Roughing It in the Bush, NCL edition, p. 29. 16. Ibid. 17. Susanna Moodie, Life in the Clearings, p. 258. 18. Susanna Moodie, Roughing It in the Bush, NCL edition, p. 127. George R. Parkin and the concept of Britannic Idealism1 TERRY COOK In the recent debate about the nature of Canadian imperialism, the importance of the ideas of Sir George Parkin is unquestioned. Yet the interpretations thusfar advanced that Can'adian imperialism was really "one form of Canadian nationalism" and conservatism ,2 or that it was a wider "Britannic or pan-An·glo-Saxon" nationalism3 - are not entirely satisfactory in explaining Parkin's thought. Since his main treatise has been correctly judged "the most comprehensive case ever penned for imperi·al unity"4 and since both schools of historians have used his ideas to bolster their arguments, some attempt to provide a general pattern for his thought might not be out of place. Such a conceptual framework must include both the maim of visible publ'ic issues - his views of Canada and the Empire, in short, his imperialism - and that of his personal and social ethics. George Robert Parkin was born on a backwoods farm at Salisbury, New Brunswick, in 1846. As the youngest of th'irteen children of a Yorkshire emigrant, he necessarily had Journal of Canadian Studies 19. Ibid., p. 24. 20. Ibid., p. 29. 21. Ibid., p. 33. 22. Susanna Moodie, Roughing It in the Bush, Toronto, McClelland and Stewart, 1923, p. 251. 23. George Grant, "In Defence of North America," Technology and Empire, Toronto, Anansi Press, 1969, p. 117. 24. Susanna Moodie, Roughing It in the Bush, Toronto, McClelland and Stewart, 1923, pp. 249-250. 25. Susanna Moodie, Roughing It in the Bush, NCL edition, p. 25. 26. Susanna Moodie, Life in the Clearings, ed. R. L. McDougall, Toronto, Macmillan, 1959, p. 4. 27. Ibid., pp. 279-280. to make his way by dint of his own ambition and ability. That he did, and by middle age was the intimate associate of leading figures in Canada and Britain. Through his teaching, writing, and public speaking, he exerted a tremendous influence acknowledged by friend and foe alike. John S. Ewart called him "the prince of Imperialists and their first missionary."5 An exasperated Liberal, writing of the Toronto imperialists, felt that Parkin was "the only man of force in the combination . The rest are children."6 Lord Rosebery termed him the "bagman of Empire" while another believed that "no one ... had more to do with conversion of public opinion on this question [imperial unity] than Dr. Parkin."7 Until 1902 much of his work was done at a frantic pace, with long separations from his beloved and growing family, and with great anxiety over his lack of financial security. "Those are the times," he once recalled , "that carve the lines upon a man's face."8 Yet they were also "exhilarating" times, for the opportunity to "change the current of public thought on some questions in a very distinct way" always proved ·irresistible to him and inspired him ·in his great public campaigns for Empire, school, and church.9 Parkin's life was a veritable panorama of 15 the Britannic world, for he moved freely and frequently throughout the imperial community . He owed his passion for imperial unity and elitist education not to such indigenous Canadian factors as United Empire Loyalism or the Canada First movement, but rather to influences and men he encountered in England during 1873 and 1874. Returning from Oxford, he taught school for many years in Fredericton. In 1889 he became for six years an imperial propagandist in Australia , New Zealand, Canada, and especially Great Britain. In 1895 he returned to Canada to revive Toronto's Upper Canada College. Finally...