LOOKING BACK AND FORWARD
Some one has said that evolution is a fact and progress a sentiment.
This definition casts a doubt on progress: it implies that progressive
thinkers are in the category of sentimentalists who do not deal in
facts.
If no alternative existed between looking back on the slow advance of
evolution and looking forward in a spirit of sentimental hope, the
present situation would be dark indeed; a pessimist might be inclined
to conclude that civilization had ceased to advance, that, on the
contrary, its movement was retrograde.
There is surely a middle course--a course not easy to pursue. It
consists in standing on the ground of fact, however miry, with heart
and head uplifted, and looking forward, with the determination not to
let mankind sink to the level of the beasts that perish, eager to reach
some higher ground.
* * * * *
Looking back over the past seven years, a reflective mind is appalled
by their futility and waste, and yet an analysis of this period as a
whole reveals that quality of ruthless logic, of inevitable sequence,
to be found in some Greek tragedies, in which the naked truth in all
its horror is portrayed with supreme dramatic art.
Each phase of this blood-stained period discloses the same carnival of
mendacity and intrigue, the subordination of the public interest to
the designs of a few ambitious men, the exploitation of patriotism,
self-sacrifice, patience and valour by officials, whose inhuman outlook
and mediocrity of mind were screened by a mask of mystery. A piecemeal
study would be profitless. Military instruction might be gained from
oft-recurring slaughter, and hints on how to hoodwink peoples could
certainly be gathered from spasmodic intervals of peace. But these are
not the lessons the world seeks, they are precisely what it wishes to
forget. Rather, the effort must be made to trace the underlying impulse
in this tragic drama, which runs through it like a “leit-motif,” which
welds together processes so varying in their nature, and renders them
cumulative and inseparable, until they culminate in one unified and
comprehensive act.
In its broadest sense, that impulse had its source in a frame of mind,
in a false conception, expressed in outworn governmental systems left
uncontrolled and tolerated by the victims, who, though suffering,
dreaded change. This frame of mind was general throughout Europe;
it was not confined to the Central Empires, whose ruling classes,
by their superior efficiency, merely offered the supreme example
of autocratic Governments which aimed at world-dominion both in a
political and economic sense. To the junkers and business men in
Germany and Austria-Hungary, the war of liberation in the Balkans
in 1912 was an opportunity to be seized, with a lack of scruple as
cynical as it was frank, because they hoped to fish in troubled waters;
its perversion into an internecine struggle was considered clever
diplomacy. The Treaty of Bucharest in 1913 was regarded as a triumph of
statecraft, since it caused a readjustment of the “Balance of Power”
in favour of themselves. But the so-called democratic Western Powers
gave their tacit acquiescence to these nefarious proceedings; their
association with the Russian Empire, so far from being designed to
correct immorality and injustice, perpetuated all the evils of a system
based on interested motives and selfish fears. The family of nations
consisted of six Great Powers; Small States existed under sufferance
and were treated as poor relations. Their rights were nebulous and
sometimes inconvenient, not to be recognized until they could be
extorted. This happened sometimes. The “Balance of Power” was a net
with closely woven meshes. Even the strongest carnivori in the European
jungle required, at times, the assistance of a mouse.
Judged by its conduct of affairs in 1912 and the early part of 1913,
the British Government was without a Continental policy; at first,
it seemed to favour Austria-Hungary, the Albanian settlement and the
Treaty of Bucharest were a triumph for the “Ball-Platz,”[48] though
both these transactions were shortsighted and unjust. French policy
was paralysed by fear of Germany, and, owing to a mistaken choice of
representatives in almost all the Balkan capitals, the French Foreign
Office was curiously ill-informed. Italy was the ally of the Central
Powers and could not realize her own colonial aspirations without
their help. Russia, as ever, was the enigma, and Russian policy in
the Balkans, though ostensibly benevolent, aimed at the reduction of
Bulgaria and Servia to the position of vassal States. Rumania was also
an ally of the Central Powers. Dynastic and economic reasons made her
their client. She held aloof from purely Balkan questions, and posed as
the “Sentinel of the East.”
Under such conditions, it was idle to expect an objective and
reasonable, or even decent, handling of Balkan questions. Bulgaria was
sacrificed ruthlessly to opportunism and expediency. The most efficient
race on the south bank of the Danube was embittered and driven into
unnatural hostility to Russia. The Balkan _bloc_ was disrupted by
skilful manipulation of national feeling, which was in many cases
honest and sincere, and thus, the Central Empires were able to so
dispose the pawns on the European chessboard as to facilitate their
opening moves, if, from a continuance in their policy of expansion,
there should ensue a European War.
In due course, as was inevitable, the “Great War” came. During
the latter part of 1913 Great Britain had been inclined to favour
Russia’s Balkan policy. This suited France, and so the sides were set.
Throughout the war, the British Empire, save for a brief and disastrous
experiment at Gallipoli, continued to be without an Eastern policy. The
greatest Mohammedan Power in the world allowed itself to be swayed by
French and Russian counsels, and the heritage handed down and perfected
by Warren Hastings, Clive, and Canning was left to the mercy of
events. No Frenchman, however gifted, can grasp the scope and mission
of the British Empire; to the Pan-Slavs who directed Russia’s foreign
policy, our far-flung supremacy in the East was an object of envy and a
stumbling block.
Although the Balkan States, while they remained neutral, were courted
assiduously by the Allied Powers, they were still looked upon as pawns.
A policy which can only be described as unprincipled was pursued.
British prestige became the tool of French and Russian intrigue, and
Great Britain’s reputation for tenacity, justice and fair play was
jeopardized.
Rumania, once she became our ally, was treated as a dependency of
Russia, although the most superficial student of the past history of
these two States could have foreseen her fate. But she, like Servia
and Greece, was only a little country and counted as small dust in the
balance. She could be over-run and devastated, once she had played
her part; that was a little country’s lot. The frame of mind which,
subconsciously perhaps, possessed the French and British Governments
was not so unlike that of the actively vicious autocratic Empires;
they, too, relied on experts and officials, to whom Small States and
helpless peoples were negligible factors, who respected only force and
wealth, who viewed human affairs exclusively from those standpoints,
and, wrapped in a mantle of self-satisfaction, as ignorant of
psychology as of true statesmanship, could not perceive the portents of
the times.
It is possible that historians of the future will select three events
as the outstanding features of the “Great World War”: the participation
of the United States of America, the Russian Revolution, and the
collapse of the German Military System. The first of these was,
undoubtedly, an expression of idealism. Cynics may say that America
was influenced by self-interest, but they invariably judge humanity
by their own worldly standards. The “plain people” of America were
inspired by nobler sentiments; the measure of their sincerity in the
cause of liberty is their present disillusionment, caused by the
failure of democratic Governments to make a democratic peace. The
intervention of America undoubtedly ensured and accelerated the final
triumph of the Allies; but it did more than that, it solidarized
democracy for a brief period, and demonstrated the willingness of free
people to sacrifice their lives and money for an unworldly cause. It
was, to a great extent, an Anglo-Saxon movement, and opened up, till
then, undreamt of vistas; it was a light which, although a transient
gleam, lit up the way for the regeneration of the world.
The Russian Revolution was the outcome of misgovernment by a corrupt
bureaucracy, and the passionate desire of an exhausted, suffering
population for a return to peace. Misconceived by the rest of Europe
and misdirected by Kerensky, it degenerated into civil war; yet it did
prove that even the most down-trodden people possess the power and
instinct of self-liberation.
The collapse of the German Military System removed a formidable barrier
to human progress. Its efficiency, as an administrative and national
institution, had seemed to justify the glorification of the State
at the expense of individual freedom; a dangerous example had been
set which militarists in every land took as a model and a guide. Had
Germany been ruled by statesmen, this odious system might have gained a
further lease of life; by a fortunate fatality it became the instrument
of its own destruction, it was the sword on which Old Europe fell, its
very excellence caused that finely tempered blade to last until it
broke into a thousand pieces, thereby providing a conclusive revelation
of the futility of force.
Events so portentous should have influenced the minds of delegates
who were worthy of the name of statesmen, when they met to make the
Peace at Paris. Unfortunately, this was not the case. The same frame
of mind permeated the Conference as that which had existed before and
throughout the war. Small States and peoples everywhere were sacrificed
to the interests of the greater victorious Powers, whose spokesmen
were the representatives and members of a propertied and privileged
class. Two fears were ever present in their minds: Germany, the monster
python State, had committed suicide, and thus had brought them victory,
but this victory was so sudden and unexpected that they could hardly
understand its meaning. They imagined that following on it would come
a swift reaction, that the old system would revive; in fact, they half
hoped that it would, it conjured up less disturbing visions than this
revolt of a warlike, disciplined people, this abrupt transition from
the old order to the new. Even victory had lost its savour; it seemed
to them a source of danger that the most evil Government should fall,
and so they set to work to recreate the bogy of German militarism
with propaganda’s artful aid. The other bogy was the dread that a
communistic experiment might succeed in Russia. Rather than let that
happen, they were one and all prepared to wage another war.
Either from vanity or jealousy, the four heads of the Governments of
the Allied and Associated States appointed themselves as principal
delegates at the Conference, in spite of the fact that their presence
was essential in their respective countries, where a host of measures
dealing with social legislation were already long overdue. Further,
their incompetence and unsuitability for the task before them were
manifest, and yet, beyond their decisions, there could be no appeal.
Each of the Big Four had, at one time or another, reached place and
power as a tribune of the people, but when they met in Paris they had
undergone a change. Mr. Lloyd George had sold his soul for a mess of
pottage, in the shape of a Parliamentary majority secured by truckling
to reactionaries and the vulgar clamour of the Jingo Press. Mr.
Wilson failed to make good his eloquent professions as an apostle of
democracy; he succumbed to the atmosphere of Paris, and only succeeded
in irritating Italy without establishing the principles for which he
was supposed to stand. With two such men in charge of Anglo-Saxon
policy, the triumph of M. Clemenceau[49] was not left long in doubt.
He could count in advance on the support of capitalist elements in
Great Britain and the United States; and thus, the power and wealth
of the British Empire and America were used by an aged Frenchman as a
stick to beat helpless, starving peoples and to slake a Latin craving
for revenge. A shameful rôle, indeed, for a race which has never known
ultimate defeat and has always been magnanimous in the hour of victory.
Mr. Lloyd George and President Wilson took back to their respective
countries a settlement of European questions of which no sensible
English-speaking citizen could possibly approve. It was at best
a liquidation of the war and marked an intermediate phase. The
Austro-Hungarian Empire, as an administrative and economic unit,
has been destroyed, but no serious attempt was made to put anything
practical in its place; Eastern and Central Europe have been
Balkanized, and in the Balkans the evils of the Treaty of Bucharest
have been consummated; frontiers and disabilities have been imposed
upon the German people which have aroused a widespread irredentism and
cannot be maintained; the policy of intervention against the Soviet
Government in Russia has been immoral and inept, while the vacillation
in regard to Turkey cannot fail to have serious repercussion throughout
the whole Mohammedan world.
A state of moral anarchy has been created, both in the conquered and
victorious States. In France, sane opinion is unable to control the
activities of roving generals obsessed with the Napoleonic legend; in
the United States the general tendency is to leave Europe to its fate,
but disgust with European diplomatic methods has not prevented certain
forms of imitation; in Great Britain, irresponsible politicians have
brought discredit on our Parliamentary system, the House of Commons
does not represent the more serious elements in the country, labour is
restless and dissatisfied, and even moderate men are tempted to resort
to unconstitutional methods, to “direct action,” as the only means of
obtaining recognition for the workers’ reasonable demands.
The decisions of the Supreme Council of the Allies are without any
moral sanction, because, owing to its past acts, the moral sense of the
entire world is blunted. Despair and misery prevail throughout Central
and Eastern Europe; around and beyond the main centres of infection,
the poison is spreading to the world’s remotest parts; India and
Northern Africa are filled with vague but menacing unrest. When the
lassitude of war is passed, more serious developments must be expected:
D’Annunzio and Bermondt are but the forerunners of many similar
adventurers who, both in Europe and in Asia, will find followers and
funds.
Truly, Old Europe has committed suicide. The autocratic Empires have
perished by the sword; the Western States, under the rule of spurious
democrats, bid fair to perish by the Peace. Democracy has been betrayed
by its own ignorance and apathy, by misplaced confidence in mediocre
men, by failure to be democratic, by permitting politicians and
officials to usurp the people’s sovereign power.
A new danger is on the horizon. The men who scoffed at progress, who
at first derided the League of Nations, and to whose influence were
due the prolongation of the Armistice and the worst features of the
Treaties, are alarmed by the present situation. The official mind is
seeking for a remedy, and it now professes to have found it in the
“League of Nations,” to which it does lip-service, meaning to use it,
in the first place, as a buffer, and later as an instrument. These
men do not recognize that with the downfall of the autocratic Empires
materialism in its most efficient form has proved a failure; the fallen
fortunes of Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Russia convey no warning to
them. They think that once again the public can be tricked. They have
made a German peace and are so blind to facts that, in spite of the
testimony of Ludendorff, they do not realize that victory was gained
by peoples, who were unconquerable because they thought their cause
was just. Theirs is the frame of mind of German “Junkers”; to them the
masses are like cattle to be driven in a herd; they will, if given
a free rein, once more subserve the interests of capitalists, and
Governments will be influenced by men who, having great possessions,
take counsel of selfish fears.
A League which includes Liberia and excludes Germany, Austria, Hungary
and Russia, and whose covenant is embodied in the Peace Treaties, makes
a bad start. The intention has been expressed of inviting Germany,
at some future date, to become a member of the League. Whether this
invitation will be accepted will depend on circumstances; in Europe’s
present state of instability the omens are far from favourable to
acceptance. A truly democratic Germany will be a tremendous force in
Europe, and may find in Russia, under a Soviet Government, an ally
more in sympathy with progress than either Great Britain or the Latin
Powers under reactionary governments. The Russians, once our allies,
regard the French and British with hatred and resentment, and these
same feelings animate all the nationalities on whom have been forced
insulting terms of Peace. Poland, Czecho-Slovakia, Yougo-Slavia and the
Greater Rumania are political experiments. These States contain men of
great ability, who may, in the abstract, accept the principles of the
League, but their position is neither safe nor easy; in no single case
can national aspirations obtain full satisfaction without impinging
on the territory of a neighbour, on each and every frontier fixed in
Paris there is a pocket in dispute. It is doubtful whether any of the
small Allied States can be considered trustworthy members of a League,
which, while preaching internationalism, has perverted nationalism into
a “will to power,” for which conditions of membership are defined by
conquerors, whose conduct hitherto has revealed an entire lack of an
international spirit, save in regard to international finance. So many
temptations to recalcitrance exist that, if Germany remains outside the
League, another combination might be formed, under German leadership,
and including Russia, Austria, Hungary, Greater Roumania and Bulgaria.
A combination untrammelled by self-denying ordinances, compact,
almost continuous, controlling the land routes of two continents. No
limitation of its armaments could be enforced on such a combination; it
would have access to Russia’s vast natural resources, and, if war came,
for the first time in history, a coalition of belligerent States would
be impervious to blockade by sea.
While the Treaties stand, and while the present frame of mind of
the Allied Governments continues, such is the situation into which
the world is drifting, and for which the Covenant of the League, as
drafted, provides no panacea. Even the leading members of that League
are dubious adherents to its moral implications; each of them makes
some reservation, not based on the principles of progress, but inspired
by a distorted sense of patriotism which, in its essence, is the
outcome and cult of private interests.
The League of Nations was unfortunate in its birthplace. Throughout
the Conference the frenzied merriment in Paris was characteristic
of the cosmopolitan class which has grown up in an industrial age.
These parasites on the wealth of nations possess neither the spirit
of _nobless oblige_ nor any sympathy with the masses, and yet they
influence affairs; they appear light and frivolous, as though they had
no interest in life beyond dancing and feasting on the ruins of Old
Europe, and deadening reflection with the discords of jazz bands; but
behind these puppets in the show are cold and calculating men, who use
“Society” and the atmosphere it creates to kill enthusiasm, to fetter
and sensualize weaker minds. After listening to the conversation at a
semi-official and fashionable gathering last June in Paris, a French
priest pronounced the opinion that only a second redemption could save
the world. This old man was always charitable in his judgments, he
had heard the confessions of many sinners, but he was roused to moral
indignation by the heartless cynicism of the talk around him; his
feelings as a Christian had been outraged, and, although the remark
was made simply and without affectation, it rang like the denunciation
of a prophet, the speaker’s kind eyes kindled and his small, frail
body seemed to grow in size. My mind went back to the Cathedral Church
at Jassy one Easter Eve. There, for a time, had reigned the proper
spirit; it had been fugitive, like all such moods. As Renan says: “_On
n’atteint l’idéal qu’un moment_.”[50]
If Europe is not to relapse into a race of armaments, world politics
must be controlled by forces less selfish and insidious. A more serious
element is required in public life, an element which will represent
the innumerable men and women who work with their hands and brains.
These are the people who desire peace, who find and seek no profit in
a state of war. They are neither revolutionaries nor faddists, they
are workers; they protest against the Treaties as a flagrant violation
of all principles of right, as an attempt to crush the spirit of the
conquered peoples, to visit the crimes of “irresponsible Governments”
on the heads of innocents; they denounce a policy in Russia which makes
the Russian people pariahs, and despise the men who, before peace had
been ratified with Germany, invited collaboration in the blockade of
Russia from the men they had called the Huns.
A great fact in evolution has occurred, and now mankind is at the
parting of the ways. Those who await a miracle or a hero to save them
from themselves are unworthy citizens and use an idle form of speech
when they talk of a new world. Old Europe’s suicide will culminate
in world-wide chaos, unless Democracy asserts itself and counsels of
wisdom and sanity prevail.
Time presses. The reaction of foreign policy on the internal affairs
of every State is becoming increasingly direct. Peace Treaties have
been signed, but slaughter and terrorism continue. In Central Europe,
great rivers, which are serene and splendid highways, are still defiled
with human blood, still serve as barriers and are charged with sighs.
The old discredited methods of “Secret Diplomacy” are being followed
and the destinies of peoples are still at the mercy of officials who
deal in bargains and transactions. In Great Britain and France, both in
the Press and Parliament, reactionary forces have got the upper hand.
As a consequence, trade is paralysed, and human misery exists on an
unprecedented scale.
While these conditions last, peace will be precarious. But the next
war will not be made by nations; it will be civil war, the misgoverned
will rise against their rulers and the foundations of our social fabric
will rock. The workers in all lands have realised, at last, that their
interests are the same, and that the greatest war in history was, from
their point of view, an internecine struggle. Only the purblind or the
reckless ignore this fact.
But, portentous as it is, this fact is the one redeeming feature of the
present situation, since it is the expression of a change of spirit,
and the first step towards more rational relationships between the
nations. Despair would be justified indeed if pride and prejudice and
greed permeated the masses as they do the classes, if the doctrines
preached by Jingo newspapers or the conversation in certain classes
of society were correct indices of the thoughts and ideals of our
generation.
Fortunately, this is not the case. Five years of war have been a
purifying blood-bath, they have taught innumerable men and women,
through suffering, to think.
A clamour of voices has arisen; their cry is “Forward” and is uttered
by millions of exasperated people, become articulate since the war.
From every quarter comes the tramp of hurrying feet, a mighty movement
is in progress. It cannot, like “sleeping waters,” be pent up, but its
purpose is not destructive. It seeks a useful outlet for a vast store
of human energy, a freer, wider life for manual workers, too long the
victims of exploitation, whose hearts and hands are needed to turn the
new world’s mill.
All lovers of freedom are in this movement; they are of every race
and creed and possess the true international spirit, whose aim is
progress. Not progress towards some impossible Utopia, where human
nature plays no part, but progress by ordered stages towards a more
reasonable social system, wherein the few will not exploit the many and
unscrupulous efficiency will be held in check; wherein idealism will
count a little and mankind, taught by adversity, will no longer wish
to be deceived; wherein “plain people,” however humble, will shake
off the shackles of apathy and indifference to moral issues, and claim
their birth-right.
* * * * *
Egyptian monarchs built pyramids as tombs. Old Europe, during the
process of its suicide, built up a pyramid of errors which may well
serve, not only as the tomb of mediaeval systems, of false conceptions,
but also as a monument to remind succeeding generations of the errors
of the past.
A pyramid is a structure whose form is final, just bare, blank walls
converging to a point, and there it ends, offering a symbol of that
human pride which dares to set a limit to the progress of mankind.
Progress admits of no finality. Filled with the sentiment of progress
and standing on the ground of fact, humanity can look forward and ever
upward, and thus can rear a nobler edifice--a temple broad-based on
liberty and justice, whose columns are poised on sure foundations,
columns that soar and spring eternal, emblems of youth and hope.
THE END
FOOTNOTES
[1] The Ergene is a tributary of the Maritza and lies in Turkish Thrace.
[2] On the Enos-Midia line, thus leaving Constantinople in Turkish
hands with a small hinterland in Europe.
[3] Santa Sofia.
[4] “It is the liquidation of Austria.”
[5] Austro-Hungarian Foreign Office in Vienna.
[6] Turkish statistics: There is good reason to believe that these
figures were approximately correct; it is most improbable, in any case,
that the Turks would have exaggerated the number of Bulgars in this
vilayet.
[7] A bay in the Eastern Mediterranean Coast to which a British
squadron was sent whenever it was necessary to put pressure on the
Turks.
[8] “The Great Powerless.”
[9] “Don’t touch the Adriatic.”
[10] Austria-Hungary.
[11] “An accomplished fact.”
[12] That is a big nothing.
[13] Baron Burian, afterwards Count Burian, a prominent
Austro-Hungarian diplomat both before and during the war.
[14] Count Albert Mensdorff, Austro-Hungarian Ambassador in London for
15 years.
[15] A place close to and just outside the S.W. frontier of Bulgaria,
where the Bulgars resisted the combined attacks of the Servian and
Greek armies for 14 days.
[16] “A Cascade of Thrones.” The title of a series of articles
published by M. Take Jonescu in 1915.
[17] “Balkan haggling.”
[18] See map.
[19] “The Thrust to the East.”
[20] Loans are made only to the rich.
[21] Count Tisza, leader of the Hungarian Conservatives and ultimately
assassinated in Budapest by a Hungarian Socialist.
[22] Abandon Austria and we will abandon the French.
[23] The opportune moment.
[24] The father of M. Bratiano was the celebrated Rumanian patriot
who, in 1878, was tricked out of Bessarabia by Prince Gortchakoff, the
Russian Envoy, at the Treaty of Vienna.
[25] Count Czernin was at this period Austro-Hungarian Minister in
Bucharest; he succeeded Count Berchtold as Chancellor in the Dual
Monarchy after the death of the Emperor Francis Joseph.
[26] An Hungarian province at the confluence of the Danube and the
Theiss, N.E. of Belgrade.
[27] In the war of 1877 between Russia and Turkey, Rumania had come to
the rescue of Russia when the Russian army was held up by the Turks
under Osman Pasha at Plevna.
[28] The husband of Francesca da Rimini, who killed his wife and her
lover.
[29] The French General commanding the Allied Forces at Salonika.
[30] Baron von der Büsche; he became later Under-Secretary of State in
the Foreign Office at Berlin.
[31] The River Sereth divides Wallachia from Moldavia.
[32] Presan was one of Rumania’s ablest generals; he had commanded the
Northern Army at the commencement of hostilities, and was entrusted
with the direction of the operations for the defence of Bucharest.
After the retreat into Moldavia he became Chief of Staff to the King.
[33] Dorna Vatra is a town in the Carpathians on the S.W. frontier of
Bukovina.
[34] The River Pruth defines part of the frontier between Rumania and
Bessarabia and enters the Danube at Galatz.
[35] About 60 per cent. of the supplies of ammunition sent by the
Western Powers to Rumania were lost or stolen in transit through Russia.
[36] These Articles prescribed the position of the King of Rumania
as Commander-in-Chief of all forces in Rumanian territory. After the
retreat into Moldavia, advantage was taken of the somewhat inexplicit
character of these Articles and the preponderance of Russian troops to
place King Ferdinand under the orders of the Czar.
[37] The former German Minister to Bucharest.
[38] “Kyrie Eleison,” the Greek for “Lord have mercy on us,” described
by Cardinal Wiseman as “that cry for mercy which is to be found in
every liturgy of East and West.”
[39] Marasesti is a village in the Sereth Valley, where six Rumanian
divisions repelled repeated assaults by numerically superior German and
Austro-Hungarian forces under Field-Marshal Mackensen. The Rumanians
fought unsupported and caused 100,000 casualties in the enemy ranks.
They held their positions until the signature of peace at Bucharest.
[40] General Nivelles.
[41] To Paris.
[42] To Berlin.
[43] Speech of April 2nd, 1917.
[44] Message of December 4th, 1917.
[45] Declaration of September 27th, 1918.
[46] In a speech at Birmingham University on December 12, 1918, Lord
Robert Cecil said: “Our new ‘Society of Nations’ must not be a group,
however large and important. It is absolutely essential that the
‘League of Nations’ should be open to every nation which can be trusted
by its fellows to accept ‘ex animo,’ the principles and basis of such a
Society.”
[47] In the original--
“Sceptre and crown _will_ tumble down,
And in the level dust _be_ laid,” etc.
[48] The former Austro-Hungarian Foreign Office in Vienna.
[49] During the Conference, a well-known Pole, whose reputation for
shrewd observation is established, remarked: “Mr. Lloyd George has a
passion for popularity and is the most popular man in Paris, but the
‘Tiger’ is running the British Empire.”
[50] The ideal is reached for a moment only.
Transcriber’s Notes
Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a
predominant preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not
changed.
Simple typographical errors were corrected; occasional unbalanced
quotation marks retained.
Ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines were retained.
Text uses both “Fraternalization” and “Fraternization”.
Page 133: “were” was missing in “Fundamentally, they were wrong”;
changed here.
Page 150: “battles are not merely battues” was printed that way, and
may have been intentional.
Page 175: “bass-relief” was printed that way.
Page 188: “nobless oblige” was printed that way.
Footnote 2, originally Footnote 1 on page 20: “Enos-Midia line” appeared
to have been misprinted as “Encs-Midia line”; changed here.
Footnote 18, originally Footnote 1 on page 63, refers to a map. The map
was included in the 1920 edition, printed in Great Britain, but not in
this 1922 edition, printed in the United States.