THE DUTY OF CANADA.
Having affirmed that Canada had no right to interfere in the war, the
"Nationalist" leaders at once concluded that she was not in duty bound
to do so. That most discreditable inference was, of course, the natural
sequence of the wrong principle aforesaid. They further drew the
conclusion that it was no part of the duty of Canadians to join the
Colors to help winning the war.
It was in flat contradiction of those erroneous notions that I
positively declared, in my letter dedicating my book to my French
Canadian compatriots, that "_in defending with the most sincere
conviction the sacred cause of the Allies, I am doing my duty as a free
subject of the British Empire, as a citizen of Canada and of the
Province of Quebec, as a son of France, as a devoted servant of Justice
and Right_."
Very narrow minded indeed is the man who has no higher conception of his
duty than the one limiting him to the observance of positive and
negative laws enacted by the legitimate authority to protect society and
every one of its members.
When England, together with the other leading nations, was brutally
challenged by Germany, and threatened in her very national existence,
it is beyond comprehension that Canada, and all the British colonial
possessions overseas, could so mistake their bounden duty as to refuse
rushing to help the Mother Country in such a trying occurrence.
Moreover, have we not, merely as men, duties to perform to protect
Civilization against the deadly attack of barbarism, to have Justice and
Right triumphant in international relations?
It is a matter of deep wonder to me that any one could have been so
blind as not to perceive that in joining with Great Britain to defend
the cause of the Allies, we were surely defending our own territory, our
own soil, our own homes. How incredible was the "Nationalist" contention
that we should have waited for the actual German attack of our land
before mustering our resources of resistance. Who could not see, at a
glance, that if Germany had, as it fully expected, easily triumphed over
the combined forces of France, England and Russia, it would have been
sheer madness to attempt resisting the victorious onslaught of a few
hundred thousands of her veteran soldiers, whose valour would have been
doubled by the enthusiasm of their European conquest.
After mature consideration of the possible results of the disastrous
defeat of the combined efforts of the Allies, both on land and sea, the
conclusion was forced upon my mind that Germany, ferociously elated by
such a wonderful success, would no doubt have exacted from England the
cession of Canada to her Empire. So that without even firing a gun
against our territory, our wide Dominion would have been instantly
transferred from the British to the German Sovereignty. I shuddered at
such a vision, and still more deeply realized how much we, Canadians,
were all in duty bound to help the Allies in crushing Prussian
militarism.