SOME SUGGESTED REFORMS
It is an obvious criticism on the considerations which have been occupying
us in the preceding chapters that they are too purely theoretical to be of
any value. They are indeed speculative, and, perhaps, from one point of
view come under the edge of the usual condemnation of prophecy. Prophecy
is, of course, if one of the most interesting, also one of the most
dangerous of human ingenuities, and the usual fate of prophets is, in nine
cases out of ten, to be proved wrong. Moreover, it is possible that there
may come an issue to the present war which would be by far the worst which
the human mind can conceive. It may end in a deadlock, a stalemate, an
impasse, because the two opposing forces are so equal that neither side
can get the better of the other. If peace has to be made because of such a
balance between the opposing forces as this, it would be a calamity almost
worse than the original war. German militarism would still be unsubdued,
the Kaiser's pretensions to universal sovereignty, although clipped, would
not be wiped out, and we should find remaining in all the nations of the
earth a sort of sullen resentment which could not possibly lead to
anything else than a purely temporary truce. The only logical object of
war is to make war impossible, and if merely an indecisive result were
achieved in the present war, it would be as certain as anything human can
be that a fresh war would soon arise. At the present moment we confess
that there is an ugly possibility of this kind, and that it is one of the
most formidable perils of future civilisation.
AN IGNOBLE PACIFICATION
It is so immensely important, however, that the cause of the Allies should
prevail not for their own sakes alone, but for the sake of the world, that
it is difficult to imagine their consenting to an ignoble pacification.
The Allies have signed an important document, in order to prove their
solidarity, that no one of them will sign peace without the sanction of
the other partners. Let us suppose that the rival armies have fought each
other to a standstill; let us suppose that France is exhausted; let us
further suppose that the German troops, by their mobility and their
tactical skill, are able to hold the Russians in the eastern sphere of
war. We can suppose all these things, but what we cannot imagine even for
a moment is that Great Britain--to confine ourselves only to our own
case--will ever consent to stop until she has achieved her object. America
may strive to make the combatants desist from hostilities, partly because
she is a great pacific power herself, and partly because it is a practical
object with her as a commercial nation to secure tranquil conditions. Yet,
even so, there would be no answer to the question which most thoughtful
minds would propound: Why did we go to war, and what have we gained by the
war? If we went to war for large cosmic purposes, then we cannot consent
to a peace which leaves those ultimate purposes unfulfilled. I think,
therefore, we can put aside this extremely uncomfortable suggestion that
the war may possibly end in a deadlock, because, in the last resort, Great
Britain, with her fleet, her sister dominions over the seas, her colonies,
and her eastern ally Japan, will always, to use the familiar phrase, have
"something up her sleeve," even though continental nations should reach a
pitch of absolute exhaustion.
A NEW EUROPE
It follows then that, even if we admit the purely speculative character of
our argument, it is not only right and proper, but absolutely necessary
that we should prepare ourselves for something which we can really
describe as a new Europe. Thoughtful minds ought imaginatively to put
themselves in the position of a spectator of a reconstituted world, or
rather of a world that waits to be reconstituted. It is necessary that
this should be done, because so many older prejudices have to be swept
away, so many novel conceptions have to be entertained. Let us take only a
single example. If we look back over history, we shall see that all the
great nations have made themselves great by war. There is a possible
exception in the case of Italy, whose present greatness has flowed from
loyal help rendered her by other kindred nations, and by realising for
herself certain large patriotic ideals entertained by great minds. But for
the majority of nations it is certainly true that they have fought their
way into the ranks of supreme powers. From this the deduction is easy that
greatness depends on the possession of formidable military power. Indeed,
all the arguments of those who are very anxious that we should not reduce
our armaments is entirely based on this supposition. The strong man armed
keepeth his goods in peace; his only fear is that a stronger man may come
with better arms and take away his possessions. Now if the new Europe
dawns not indeed for those who are past middle age--for they will have
died before its realisation--but for the younger generation for whose sake
we are bearing the toil and burden of the day, the one thing which is
absolutely necessary is that the index of greatness must no longer be
found in armies and navies. Clearly it will take a long time for men to
get used to this novel conception. Inveterate prejudices will stand in the
way. We shall be told over and over again that peace-lovers are no
patriots; that imperialism demands the possible sacrifice of our manhood
to the exigencies of war; and that the only class of men who are ever
respected in this world are those who can fight. And so, even though we
have had ocular demonstration of the appalling ruin which militarism can
produce, we may yet, if we are not careful, forget all our experience and
drift back into notions which are not really separable from precisely
those ideas which we are at present reprobating in the German nation. The
real test is this: Is, or is not, war a supreme evil? It is no answer to
this question to suggest that war educes many splendid qualities. Of
course it does. And so, too, does exploration of Polar solitudes, or even
climbing Alpine or Himalayan heights. Either war is a detestable solution
of our difficulties, or it is not. If it is not, then we have no right
whatsoever to object to the Prussian ideal. But if it is, let us call it
by its proper name. Let us say that it is devil's work, and have done with
it.
EVIL OF ARMAMENTS
We are trying not only to understand what Europe will be like if, as we
hope, this war ends successfully for the Allies, but what sort of new
Europe it will be in the hands of the conquerors to frame. Those who come
after us are to find in that new Europe real possibilities of advance in
all the higher kinds of civilisation. Not only are the various states to
contain sane and healthy people who desire to live in peace with their
neighbours, but people who will desire to realise themselves in science,
in philosophic thought, in art, in literature. What is an indispensable
condition for an evolution of this sort? It must be the absence of all
uneasiness, the growth of a serene confidence and trust, the obliteration
of envy, jealousy, and every kind of unreasonableness. The cause, above
all others, which has produced an opposite condition of things, which has
created the unfortunate Europe in which we have hitherto had to live, is
the growth and extension of armaments. The main factor, then, in our
problem is the existence of such swollen armaments as have wasted the
resources of every nation and embittered the minds of rival peoples. How
are we to meet this intolerable evil of armaments?
ABSENCE OF PROVOCATION
In the first place, let us remark that on our supposition--the eventual
victory of the Allies--one of the great disturbing elements will have been
put out of the field. Europe has hitherto been lulled into an uneasy and
fractious sleep by the balance of two great organisations. Under the
happiest hypothesis the Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente will have
disappeared into the deep backward and abysm of time. For all practical
purposes there will be no Triple Alliance, and therefore no Triple Entente
to confront it. With Austria wiped out of the map for all purposes of
offence, and Germany restricted within modest dimensions, the three powers
of the Triple Entente--Great Britain, France, and Russia--can do what they
like, and as they are sworn friends and allies they can take their own
steps undisturbed by fears of hostile combinations. Why should these
three allies consent any further to keep up bloated armaments? It is
against their own interests and against the interests of the world. So
long as Germany existed as a power and developed her own ambitions, we
were always on the edge of a catastrophe. With the conquest of Germany
that nightmare will have gone. And observe some of the consequences which
must inevitably follow. It was against the menace of Germany that France
had to pass her three years' law of military service: in the absence of
the German army France can reduce as she pleases her military
establishment. It was against the menace of a German fleet that we had to
incur an outlay of millions of pounds: in the absence of the German fleet
we, too, can do what we please. It is certain also that Russia, so long as
the deep-seated antagonism between Teuton and Slav remained, was under
strong compulsion to reform and reinforce her army.
FEAR OF RUSSIA
There may, it is true, remain in some minds a certain fear about Russia,
because it is difficult to dispel the old conception of a great despotic
Russian autocracy, or, if we like to say so, a semi-eastern and
half-barbarous power biding her time to push her conquests both towards
the rising and the setting sun. But many happy signs of quite a new spirit
in Russia have helped to allay our fears. It looks as if a reformed Russia
might arise, with ideas of constitutionalism and liberty and a much truer
conception of what the evolution of a state means. At the very beginning
of the war the Tsar issued a striking proclamation to the Poles, promising
them a restoration of the national freedom which they had lost a century
and a half previously. This doubtless was a good stroke of policy, but
also it seemed something more--a proof of that benevolent idealism which
belongs to the Russian nature, and of which the Tsar himself has given
many signs. Of the three nations who control the Poles, the Austrians have
done most for their subjects: at all events, the Poles under Austrian
control are supposed to be the most happy and contented. Then come the
Russian Poles. But the Poles under German government are the most
miserable of all, mainly because all German administration is so
mechanical, so hard, in a real sense so inhuman. But this determination of
the Tsar to do some justice to the Polish subjects is not the only sign of
a newer spirit we have to deal with. There was also a proclamation
promising liberty to the Jews--a very necessary piece of reform--and
giving, as an earnest of the good intentions of the Government,
commissions to Jews in the army. Better than all other evidence is the
extraordinary outburst of patriotic feeling in all sections of the Russian
people. It looks as if this war has really united Russia in a sense in
which it has never been united before. When we see voluntary service
offered on the part of those who hitherto have felt themselves the victims
of Russian autocracy, we may be pretty certain that even the reformers in
the great northern kingdom have satisfied themselves that their
long-deferred hopes may at length gain fulfilment. Nor ought we to forget
that splendid act of reform which has abolished the Imperial monopoly of
the sale of vodka. If by one stroke of the pen the Tsar can sacrifice
ninety-three millions of revenue in order that Russia may be sober, it is
not very extravagant to hope that in virtue of the same kind of benevolent
despotism Russia may secure a liberal constitution and the Russian people
be set free.[11]
[11] See _Our Russian Ally_, by Sir Donald Mackenzie Wallace (Macmillan).
MILITARY AUTOCRACY
The end of a great war, however, has one inevitable result, that it leaves
a military autocracy in supreme control of affairs. The armies which have
won the various campaigns, the generals who have led them, the
Commanders-in-Chief who have carried out the successful strategy, these
are naturally left with almost complete authority in their hands.
Wellington, for instance, a hundred years ago, held an extraordinarily
strong position in deciding the fate of Europe. And so, too, did the
Russian Tsar, whose armies had done so much to destroy the legend of
Napoleonic invincibility. Similar conditions must be expected on the
present occasion. And, perhaps, the real use of diplomats, if they are
prudent and level-headed men, is to control the ambitions of the military
element, to adopt a wider outlook, to consider the ultimate consequences
rather than the immediate effects of things. It would indeed be a
lamentable result if a war which was intended to destroy militarism in
Europe should end by setting up militarism in high places.
LIMITATION OF ARMAMENTS
Thus we seem to see still more clearly than before that the size of
armaments in Europe constitutes a fundamental problem with which we have
to grapple. Every soldier, as a matter of course, believes in military
armaments, and is inclined to exaggerate their social and not merely their
offensive value. Those of us who are not soldiers, but who are interested
in the social and economic development of the nation, know, on the
contrary, that the most destructive and wasteful form of expenditure is
that which is occupied with armaments grown so bloated that they go far to
render the most pressing domestic reforms absolutely impossible. How,
then, can we limit the size of armaments? What provision can we make to
keep in check that desire to fortify itself, to entrench itself in an
absolutely commanding position, which inherently belongs to the military
mind? In the case of both navies and armies something depends on
geographical conditions, and something on financial possibilities. The
first represents, as it were, the minimum required for safety; the second
the maximum burden which a state can endure without going into
bankruptcy.[12] Our own country, we should say, requires fleets, so far as
geographical conditions are concerned, for the protection of her shores,
and, inasmuch as she is a scattered empire, we must have our warships in
all the Seven Seas. France, in her turn, requires a navy which shall
protect her in the Mediterranean, and especially render access easy to
her North African possessions. On the supposition that she is good friends
with England, she does not require ships in the North Sea or in the
English Channel, while, vice versa, England, so long as France is strong
in the Mediterranean, need only keep quite small detachments at Gibraltar,
Malta, and elsewhere. Russia must have a fleet for the Baltic, and also a
fleet in the Black Sea. Beyond that her requirements assuredly do not go.
Italy's activities are mainly in the Mediterranean. Under the supposition
that she is conquered, Germany stands in some danger of losing her navy
altogether.
[12] Brailsford's _War of Steel and Gold_: Chap. IX.
PROTECTION OF COMMERCE
It is obvious, therefore, that if we confine ourselves purely to
geographical conditions, and adhere to the principle that navies are
required for the protection of coasts, we can at once reduce, within
relatively small limits, the building of armoured ships. The reason why
large navies have hitherto been necessary is because it has been assumed
that they do not merely protect coasts, but protect lines of commerce. We
have been told, for instance, that inasmuch as we cannot feed our own
population, and our national food comes to us from Canada, America, the
Argentine, Russia, and elsewhere, we must possess a very large amount of
cruisers to safeguard the ships that are conveying to us our daily bread.
If we ask why our ships must not only protect our shores, but our
merchandise--the latter being for the most part a commercial enterprise
worked by individual companies--the answer turns on that much-discussed
principle, the Right of Capture at Sea, which was debated at the last
Hague Conference, and as a matter of fact stoutly defended both by Germany
and ourselves. If we look at this doctrine--the supposed right that a
power possesses to capture the merchandise of private individuals who
belong to an enemy country in times of war--we shall perhaps feel some
surprise that a principle which is not admitted in land warfare should
still prevail at sea. According to the more benevolent notions of
conducting a campaign suggested, and indeed enforced by Hague Conventions
and such like, an army has no right to steal the food of a country which
it has invaded. It must pay for what it takes. Well-conducted armies, as a
matter of fact, behave in this fashion: the necessity of paying for what
they take is very strictly enforced by responsible officers. Why,
therefore, at sea an opposite state of affairs should prevail is really
not easy to understand. Most of the enemy's merchant ships which have been
captured in the recent war belong to private individuals, or private
companies. But they are taken, subject to the decision of Prize Courts, as
part of the spoils of a successful maritime power. I am aware that the
question is an exceedingly controversial one, and that Great Britain has
hitherto been very firm, or, perhaps, I might be allowed to say, obstinate
in upholding the law of capture at sea. But I also know that a great many
competent lawyers and politicians do not believe in the validity of such a
principle, and would not be sorry to have it abolished.[13] At all events,
it is clear enough that if it were abolished one of the main arguments for
keeping up a strong navy would fall to the ground. We should then require
no patrol of cruisers in the Atlantic, in the Pacific, and in the
Mediterranean. One thing at least is certain, that if we can ever arrive
at a time when a real Concert of Europe prevails, one of the first things
which it must take in hand is a thorough examination of the extent of
defensive force which a nation requires as a minimum for the preservation
of its independence and liberty.
[13] Notably Lord Loreburn, in his _Capture at Sea_ (Methuen).
TRADE IN ARMAMENTS
Certainly one crying evil exists which ought to be dealt with promptly and
effectively in accordance with the dictates of common sense as well as
common morality. I refer to the trade in armaments carried on by private
companies, whose only interest it is to foment, or perhaps actually to
produce, war scares in order that munitions of war may be greedily
purchased. A notorious example is furnished by the great works at Essen
owned by Krupp. In the same position are the great French works at
Creusot, owned by Schneider, and those of our own English firms,
Armstrongs, Vickers, John Brown, and Cammell Laird. These are all
successful concerns, and the shareholders have reaped large profits. I
believe that at Creusot the dividends have reached twenty per cent., and
Armstrongs yield rarely less than ten per cent. It is necessary to speak
very plainly about industries of this kind, because, however we like to
phrase it, they represent the realisation of private profit through the
instruments of death and slaughter. It would be bad enough if they
remained purely private companies, but they really represent the most
solid public organisations in the world. We know the intimate relations
between Krupp and the German Government, and doubtless also between
Messrs. Schneider and the French Government. This sordid manufacture of
the instruments of death constitutes a vast business, with all kinds of
ramifications, and the main and deadly stigma on it is that it is bound to
encourage and promote war. Let me quote some energetic sentences from Mr.
H.G. Wells on this point: "Kings and Kaisers must cease to be commercial
travellers of monstrous armament concerns.... I do not need to argue, what
is manifest, what every German knows, what every intelligent educated man
in the world knows. The Krupp concern and the tawdry Imperialism of Berlin
are linked like thief and receiver; the hands of the German princes are
dirty with the trade. All over the world statecraft and royalty have been
approached and touched and tainted by these vast firms, but it is in
Berlin that the corruption is centred, it is from Berlin that the
intolerable pressure to arm and still to arm has come."[14]
What is the obvious cure for this state of things? It stares us in the
face. Governments alone should be allowed to manufacture weapons. This
ought not to be an industry left in private hands. If a nation, through
its accredited representatives, thinks it is necessary to arm itself, it
must keep in its own hands this lethal industry. Beyond the Government
factories there clearly ought to be no making of weapons all over Europe
and the world.
[14] There are one or two pamphlets on this subject which are worth
consulting, especially _The War Traders_, by G.H. Perris (National Peace
Council, St. Stephen's House, Westminster), and _The War Trust Exposed_,
by J.F. Walton Newbold (the National Leader Press, Manchester). See also
_The War of Steel and Gold_, by H.N. Brailsford, Chapter II, "Real
Politics," p. 89. The sentences quoted from Mr. Wells come from _The War
that will end War_ (F. and C. Palmer), p. 39.
FINANCIAL INTERESTS
It has already been remarked that the conditions which limit and control
the size of armaments are partly geographical and partly financial, and
that while the former represent the minimum, the latter stand for the
maximum of protective force. I need say nothing further about the
geographical conditions. Every one who studies a map can see for himself
what is required by a country anxious to protect its shores or its
boundaries. If we suppose that armaments are strictly limited to the needs
of self-defence, and if we further assume that in the new Europe countries
are not animated by the strongest dislikes against one another, but are
prepared to live and let live (a tolerably large assumption, I am aware),
we can readily imagine a steady process of curtailment in the absolutely
necessary armament. Further, if Great Britain gave up its doctrine of the
Right of Capture at Sea (and if Great Britain surrendered it, we may be
pretty sure that, after Germany has been made powerless, no other country
would wish to retain it), the supposed necessity of protecting lines of
commerce would disappear and a further reduction in cruisers would take
place. I cannot imagine that either America or Japan would wish to revive
the Right of Capture theory if we ourselves had given it up. And they are
the most important maritime and commercial nations after ourselves.[15]
The financial conditions, however, deserve study because they lead
straight to the very heart of the modern bellicose tendencies. In an
obvious and superficial sense, financial conditions represent the maximum
in the provision of armaments, because ultimately it becomes a question of
how much a nation can afford to spend without going bankrupt or being
fatally hampered in its expenditure on necessary social reforms. This,
however, is not perhaps the most significant point. Financial conditions
act much more subtly than this. Why has it grown so imperative on states
to have large armies or large navies, or both? Because--so we have been
told over and over again--diplomacy cannot speak with effect unless it is
backed by power. And what are the main occasions on which diplomacy has to
speak effectively? We should be inclined to answer off-hand that it must
possess this stentorian power when there is any question about national
honour--when the country for whom it speaks is insulted or bullied, or
defrauded of its just rights; when treaties are torn up and disregarded;
when its plighted word has been given and another nation acts as though no
such pledge had been made; when its territory is menaced with invasion and
so forth.
[15] As a matter of fact, the United States are opposed to the Capture at
Sea principle.
PROTECTION OF FINANCIERS
But these justifiable occasions do not exhaust the whole field. Sometimes
diplomacy is brought to bear on much more doubtful issues. It is used to
support the concession-hunter, and to coerce a relatively powerless nation
to grant concessions. It backs up a bank which has financed a company to
build railroads or develop the internal resources of a country; or to
exploit mines or oil-fields, or to do those thousand-and-one things which
constitute what is called "peaceful penetration." Think of the recent
dealings with Turkey,[16] and the international rivalry, always suspicious
and inflammatory, which has practically divided up her Asiatic dominions
between European States--so that Armenia is to belong to Russia, Syria to
France, Arabia to Great Britain, and Anatolia and I know not what besides
to Germany! Think of the competition for the carrying out of railways in
Asia Minor and the constant friction as to which power has obtained, by
fair means or foul, the greatest influence! Or let us remember the recent
disputes as to the proper floating of a loan to China and the bickering
about the Five-Power Group and the determination on the part of the last
named that no one else should share the spoil! Or shall we transfer our
attention to Mexico, where the severe struggle between the two rival Oil
Companies--the Cowdray group and the American group--threw into the shade
the quarrel between Huerta and Carranza? These are only a few instances
taken at random to illustrate the dealings of modern finance. Relatively
small harm would be done if financiers were allowed to fight out their own
quarrels. Unfortunately, however, diplomacy is brought in to support this
side or that: and ambassadors have to speak in severe terms if a Chinese
mandarin does not favour our so-called "nationals," or if corrupt Turkish
officials are not sufficiently squeezable to suit our "patriotic"
purposes. Our armaments are big not merely to protect the nation's honour,
but to provide large dividends for speculative concerns held in private
hands.
[16] Turkey has now thrown in her lot with Germany.
INVESTING MONEY ABROAD
The truth is, of course, that the honourable name of commerce is now used
to cover very different kinds of enterprise. We used to export goods; now
we export cash. Wealthy men, not being content with the sound, but not
magnificent interest on home securities, take their money abroad and
invest in extremely remunerative--though of course speculative--businesses
in South Africa, or South America, concerned with rubber, petroleum, or
whatnot. Often they subscribe to a foreign loan--in itself a perfectly
legitimate and harmless operation, but not harmless or legitimate if one
of the conditions of the loan is that the country to which it is lent
should purchase its artillery from Essen or Creusot, or its battleships
from our yards. For that is precisely one of the ways in which the traffic
in munitions of war goes on increasing and itself helps to bring about a
conflagration. Financial enterprise is, of course, the life-blood of
modern states. But why should our army and navy be brought in to protect
financiers? Let them take their own risks, like every other man who
pursues a hazardous path for his own private gain. Private investment in
foreign securities does not increase the volume of a nation's commerce.
The individual may make a colossal fortune, but the nation pays much too
dearly for the enrichment of financiers if it allows itself to be dragged
into war on account of their "_beaux yeux_."
IDEAL AIMS
It is time to gather together in a summary fashion some of the
considerations which have been presented to us in the course of our
inquiry. We have gone to war partly for direct, partly for indirect
objects. The direct objects are the protection of small nationalities, the
destruction of a particularly offensive kind of militarism in Germany, the
securing of respect for treaties, and the preservation of our own and
European liberty. But there are also indirect objects at which we have to
aim, and it is here, of course, that the speculative character of our
inquiry is most clearly revealed. Apart from the preservation of the
smaller nationalities, Mr. Asquith has himself told us that we should aim
at the organisation of a Public Will of Europe, a sort of Collective
Conscience which should act as a corrective of national defects and as a
support of international morality. Nothing could well be more speculative
or vague than this, and we have already seen the kind of difficulties
which surround the conception, especially the conflict between a
collective European constraint and an eager and energetic patriotism. We
must not, however, be deterred by the nebulous character of some of the
ideals which are floating through our minds. Ideals are always nebulous,
and always resisted by the narrow sort of practical men who suggest that
we are metaphysical dreamers unaware of the stern facts of life.
Nevertheless, the actual progress of the world depends on the visions of
idealists, and when the time comes for the reconstitution of Europe on a
new basis we must already have imaginatively thought out some of the ends
towards which we are striving. We must also be careful not to narrow our
conceptions to the level of immediate needs--that is not the right way of
any reform. Our conceptions must be as large and as wide and as
philanthropical as imagination can make them; otherwise Europe will miss
one of the greatest opportunities that it has ever had to deal with, and
we shall incur the bitterest of all disappointments--not to be awake when
the dawn appears.
GREATNESS OF STATES
What, then, are some of those nebulous visions which come before the minds
of eager idealists? We have got to envisage for ourselves a new idea of
what constitutes greatness in a state. Hitherto we have measured national
greatness by military strength, because most of the European nations have
attained their present position through successful war. So long as we
cherish a notion like this, so long shall we be under the heel of a
grinding militarism. We have set out as crusaders to destroy Prussian
militarism, and in pursuit of this quest we have invoked, as a matter of
necessity, the aid of our militarists. But when their work is done, all
peoples who value freedom and independence will refuse to be under the
heel of any military party. To be great is not, necessarily, to be strong
for war. There are other qualities which ought to enter into the
definition, a high standard of civilisation and culture--not culture in
the Prussian sense, but that which we understand by the term--the great
development and extension of knowledge, room for the discoveries of
science, quick susceptibility in the domain of art, the organisation of
literature--all these things are part and parcel of greatness, as we want
to understand it in the future. It is precisely these things that
militarism, as such, cares nothing for. Therefore, if we are out for war
against militarism, the whole end and object of our endeavour must be by
means of war to make war impossible. Hence it follows, as a matter of
course, that the new Europe must take very serious and energetic steps to
diminish military establishments and to limit the size of armaments. If
once the new masters of Europe understand the immense importance of
reducing their military equipment, they have it in their power to relieve
nations of one of the greatest burdens which have ever checked the social
and economic development of the world. Suggestions have already been made
as to the reduction of armaments, and, although such schemes as have been
set forward are, in the truest sense, speculative, it does not follow that
they, or something like them, cannot hereafter be realised. Nor yet in
our conception of greatness must we include another false idea of the
past. If a nation is not necessarily great because it is strong for war,
neither is it necessarily great because it contains a number of
cosmopolitan financiers trying to exploit for their own purposes various
undeveloped tracts of the world's surface. These financiers are certainly
not patriots because, amongst other things, they take particular care to
invest in foreign securities, the interest of home investments not being
sufficient for their financial greed. It will not be the least of the many
benefits which may accrue to us after the end of this disastrous war if a
vulgar and crude materialism, based on the notion of wealth, is dethroned
from its present sovereignty over men's minds. The more we study the
courses of this world's history, the more certainly do we discover that a
love of money is the root of most of the evils which beset humanity.
APOSTLES OF THE NEW ERA
As we survey the possible reforms which are to set up a new and better
Europe on the ruin of the old, we naturally ask ourselves with some
disquietude: Who are the personalities, and what are the forces required
for so tremendous a change? Who are sufficient for these things? Are kings
likely to be saviours of society? Past experience hardly favours this
suggestion. Will soldiers and great generals help us? Here, again, we may
be pardoned for a very natural suspicion. Every one knows that a
benevolent despotism has much to recommend it. But, unfortunately, the
benevolent are not usually despotic, nor are despots as a rule benevolent.
Can diplomatists help us? Not so far as they continue to mumble the
watchwords of their ancient mystery: they will have to learn a new set of
formulæ, or more likely, perhaps, they will find that ordinary people, who
have seen to what a pass diplomacy has brought us, may work out for
themselves some better system. Clearly the tasks of the future will depend
on the co-operation of intelligent, far-sighted philanthropic reformers in
the various states of the world, who will recognise that at critical
periods of the world's history they must set to work with a new ardour to
think out problems from the very beginning. We want fresh and intelligent
minds, specially of the younger idealists, keen, ardent, and energetic
souls, touched with the sacred fire, erecting the fabric of humanity on a
novel basis. Democracy will have a great deal to do in the new Europe.
It, too, had better refurbish its old watchwords. It has got to set itself
patiently to the business of preventing future wars by the extension of
its sympathies and its clear discernment of all that imperils its future
development and progress. Above all, it has got to solve that most
difficult problem of creating a Public Will and a Common Conscience in
Europe, a conscience sensitive to the demands of a higher ethics, and a
will to enforce its decrees against obstructives and recalcitrants. We do
not see our way clear as yet, it is true. But we have a dim idea of the
far-seen peaks towards which we must lift up our eyes. It is the greatest
enterprise which humanity has ever been called upon to face, and, however
difficult, it is also the most splendid.
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