It generally consists of a man chaining himself up and
then complaining that he is not free. Some say that such larks retard
the cause of female suffrage, others say that such larks alone can
advance it; as a matter of fact, I do not believe that they have the
smallest effect one way or the other.
The modern notion of impressing the public by a mere demonstration of
unpopularity, by being thrown out of meetings or thrown into jail is
largely a mistake. It rests on a fallacy touching the true popular value
of martyrdom. People look at human history and see that it has often
happened that persecutions have not only advertised but even advanced a
persecuted creed, and given to its validity the public and dreadful
witness of dying men. The paradox was pictorially expressed in Christian
art, in which saints were shown brandishing as weapons the very tools
that had slain them. And because his martyrdom is thus a power to the
martyr, modern people think that any one who makes himself slightly
uncomfortable in public will immediately be uproariously popular. This
element of inadequate martyrdom is not true only of the Suffragettes; it
is true of many movements I respect and some that I agree with.
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