THE TIMES ON THE COLONIES.

Inangahua Times, Volume II, Issue II, 19 August 1881, Page 2

THE TIMES ON THE COLONIES.

■♦ Speaking of the future prospects of the AustraliatCColonies, the Times of June 3 says: — * Who does not sometimes stop to muse on the future of our English" race, which in two hundred years has occupied nearly all the points of vantnge on the earth's aur~ face, and which seems destined in a few centuries more to "cover whole continents with vast English-speaking communities varying infinitely ac wording to the varieties of climate and circumstance, but all 'carrying with them the vigour and political aptitudes of thrfir native stock ? There is as yet no doubt, some truth in the omplainc which cultivated people often make, that colonial life is not interesting. 'A colonial eivilizition is always imitative/ says some one in ' Kndymion ;' and while a colony remains literally a colony, remains young and dependent, the remark is true. The colonists throw ♦••heir best energies into the material struggle of life; they little have to spare for original thought or for the assimilation lof the highest kinds of culture. But i eyen dow they are workiag out problems of their own, political and other that the old worll might well watch with interest ; and these problems well grow rapidly as population and wealth increase They have their weakness, too these young colonies ; they are .1 little rash about running into debt, they are incurably protectionist, and they carry the admiration of English rank to the length of an absurdity. But these are the wild pats of political youth. It will be different a generation or two hence when this island has become what it must sooner cr later become — the historical centre of a race that numbers its hundreds of millions, speaking our language, reading our books developing our traditions as new mndes of life demand, and looking back upon this country with ihe affectionate regard that the Greek colonists in Sicily or Thrace looked back of old upon the mother city. As time goes on, and as ' Greater Britain ' becomes greater still, it is inevitable that the political tie which binds its parts to eacn other and 'o us will grow weaker ; but if we are wise, if we take care to live politically and individually up to our best lights, the tie of feeling and of interest will become stronger and stronger. 1