WA 
 THAT
 
 WAR THINGS THAT 
 MATTER 
 
 FIFTEEN ESSAYS 
 ON THE WAR 
 
 BY 
 BENJAMIN HOARE 
 
 Author of " Preferential Trade," " Figures of Fancy," &c. &c. 
 
 E. W. COLE, Book Arcade, Melbourne 
 
 Sydney and Adelaide
 
 StacK 
 Annex 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 Whatever we may think, the war is on all of 
 us, worker and shirker. No one can dodge it 
 altogether. My years forbid my doing my bit 
 with the sword. But I can wield a pen after my 
 fashion. The wish of my heart is that the pen 
 may in this case be mightier than the sword would 
 have been. 
 
 If it be true that words are things, and that a 
 drop of ink may make thousands think, I would 
 fain believe that these few words on "War Things 
 that Matter" may not be unfruitful. They come 
 out of my very soul ; out of my love for my dear 
 native land; out of my love for Australia, the 
 native land of my children; out of my sense of 
 what is due to justice, truth, freedom, and civilisa- 
 tion. 
 
 All these are at stake; but all are in the hands 
 of an Omnipotent, in Whom I can place unshaken 
 trust. 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 June 21, 1918. 
 
 East Melbourne.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 Pages. 
 
 I. Germany and the War 1-22 
 
 II. The Genesis of the War 23-49 
 
 III. God and the War 50-68 
 
 IV. Great Britain and the War .... 69-102 
 
 V. America and the War 103-125 
 
 VI. Consolations of the War .... 126-155 
 
 VII. Courage and the War 156-182 
 
 VIII. Conscription and the War .... 183-204 
 
 IX. Labor and the War 205-218 
 
 X. Strikes and the War 219-246 
 
 XL Democracy and the War 247-275 
 
 XII. The Pope and the War 276-306 
 
 XIIL Arbitration and the War .... 307-323 
 
 XIV. Ireland and the War 324-336 
 
 XV. The World After the War . 337-355
 
 War Things That Matter 
 
 I. 
 GERMANY BEFORE THE WAR. 
 
 THE KAISER'S CHARACTER. 
 
 Fifty years ago the seeing minds of the 
 nations predicted the renaissance of the Hun in 
 central Europe. 
 
 Bismark's star was then in the ascendant. He 
 was a typical Hun. Blunt, direct, forceful, cruel, 
 unscrupulous. He stood over Europe, rattling 
 the sword for thirty years. 
 
 The present Kaiser, another Hun of the Huns, 
 came in the course of time and displaced him. 
 William is a more plausible type than Bis- 
 mark was. He is by nature quite as brutal, but 
 less frank in his brutality. 
 
 He began his reign with many appeals to 
 Heaven, and with many proclamations of his 
 partnership with God. The first personal revela- 
 tion of the aboriginal savage within him was in 
 1900, when a German contingent was sent to 
 China to suppress a Boxer rising. The Emperor 
 personally addressed his departing troops in 
 these words 
 
 "When you meet the foe you will defeat them. 
 No quarter will be given; no prisoners will be 
 taken. Let all who fall into your hands be at 
 your mercy. Just as the Huns, a thousand years
 
 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 ago, under the leadership of Attila, gained a 
 reputation, in virtue of what they will live in 
 historical tradition, so may the name of Germany 
 become known in such a manner in China, that 
 no Chinaman will ever again dare to look ask- 
 ance at a German. The blessing of the Lord be 
 with you. Give proof of your courage, and the 
 Divine blessing will be attached to your colors." 
 
 There is an exquisite blend of Pecksniff and Bill 
 Sikes in that. 
 
 That counsel was literally followed. At the 
 beginning of the present war, speaking to a divi- 
 sion of his soldiers about to enter Belgium, he 
 said 
 
 "Remember that the German people are the 
 chosen of God. On me, as German Emperor, the 
 spirit of God has descended. I am His weapon, 
 His sword, and His vice-regent. Woe to the dis- 
 obedient. Death to cowards and unbelievers." 
 
 That is the soul of the Kaiser. It has a strain 
 of combined insanity and blasphemy in it. 
 Through twenty years and more Wilhelm has been 
 either a false hypocritical friend, or a blustering 
 enemy. 
 
 He has talked to Britain words of friendship 
 and peace at the very time when he was plotting 
 her overthrow. He was enjoying the hospitality 
 of King Edward at Buckingham Palace while he 
 was negotiating with the Russian Czar a treaty 
 for the ruin of England. He stands now revealed 
 before Christendom as one of the most destruc- 
 tive of the Evil Geniuses that ever afflicted human- 
 ity. 
 
 He came of a race of scoundrels. He is a 
 descendant of Frederick the Great, without his 
 ancestor's capacity. 
 
 Frederick the Great was in a secular sense the 
 Patron Saint of Germany. He bequeathed his 
 name and fame as a great conqueror. But if he
 
 GERMANY BEFORE THE WAR 3 
 
 left territory, power, and comparative prosperity, 
 he also left the terrible heritage of systematic per- 
 fidy. The doctrine that might was right was 
 Frederick's. The same code of public morality 
 governs Prussian policy to-day. He had an in- 
 grained contempt for mankind. He used his sub- 
 jects as counters in a great gamble, as he used cul- 
 ture to cover a selfish and rapacious nature. 
 
 W know that he wrote his name in blood and 
 perfidy through many years and died with his 
 blushing honors thick upon him. But even he, the 
 forerunner of the semi-maniac who sits upon his 
 throne, was but a miserable creature an unduti- 
 ful son of a detestable father, and a licentious 
 libertine in his later life. 
 
 The present Kaiser stands almost at the sum- 
 mit of a dizzy eminence of rascality. He will go 
 down in history as a graduate in unscrupulous 
 treachery. He has sucked in the doctrine that 
 a king is a law unto himself; that what a man 
 can do he may do; that weakness has no rights 
 and strength no wrong; that Right is Might. 
 
 Bismark coined a phrase of his own to express 
 it. Prussia, he said, was to march to power 
 through the medium of "blood and iron." She 
 was to bleed her enemies white, and leave them to 
 stew in their own gravy. "Above all," said Bis- 
 mark, "you must inflict on the inhabitants of in- 
 vaded towns the maximum of suffering, so that 
 they may become sick of the struggle, and may 
 bring pressure to bear on their Government to dis- 
 continue it. You must leave the people through 
 whom you march only their eyes to weep with. 
 In every case the principle which guided our 
 generals was that war must be made terrible to 
 the civil population, so that it may sue for peace." 
 
 Kaiser Wilhelm, with all Bismark's cruelty, has 
 none of the great Chancellor's acute judgment. 
 He assumes the god, affects to nod, and then com-
 
 4 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 pels us to laugh at the anti-climax of his buffoon- 
 ery. He commands perhaps 7,000,000 bayonets, 
 but has no control over his own theatrical bump- 
 tiousness. 
 
 He has sown the earth with spoliation, sacri- 
 lege, and murder. He carries desolation in his 
 heart. He is half fool, half fiend, and claims in 
 his crimes alliance with Omnipotence. 
 
 MILITARY BRUTALITY. 
 
 Yet I would venture to think and hope that 
 out of the schemes of this pitiful villain, the great 
 God will make manifest His power and His jus- 
 tice, as He did in the case of Lucifer, who said 
 it was "better to reign in hell than serve in 
 heaven." Kipling remarks that at least the Arabs 
 offered a choice between Islam and the sword, but 
 the Boche has no philosophy but the sword. It 
 is, as we may say, a problem of the mad dog, 
 and one sees no hope except in the death of the 
 unhappy animal. 
 
 When this war began the German military cast 
 was dominant. The man in military uniform was 
 entitled to inflict any wrongs on mere civilians. 
 A waiter at a cafe, asking for his full score, was 
 stabbed to the heart by an inebriated Hun officer. 
 A lame shoemaker in the streets of an Alsatian 
 town, for some remonstrance against German 
 troops, was cut down in his tracks, and the in- 
 effable "Willie" took the part of the assassin. A 
 civilian, meeting an officer as an old friend, with 
 a friend's intimacy of salutation, was killed for 
 his impertinence. 
 
 The American President, speaking for the rest 
 of the world, has told the Pope that the House of 
 Hohenzollern and its military autocracy must go.
 
 GERMANY BEFORE THE WAR 5 
 
 With that mass of inherited iniquity will go the 
 helotage of millions, and then will come the great 
 deliverance. It will be a deliverance in more than 
 external freedom. It will constitute a rescue of 
 the Teutonic race from the blasting paganism 
 which is its basic inspiration. 
 
 Our common Christianity teaches us that a 
 king may not steal the ewe lamb of his meanest 
 subject. German paganism inculcates that "its 
 might shall create a new law in Europe," and 
 accordingly the Kaiser laid violent hands on Bel- 
 gium, as a pirate seizes a ship and makes its 
 crew walk the plank. 
 
 We get pictures of how Germans reasoned 
 before the war by things they have done and said 
 since it began. Herr Harden is the editor of a 
 paper called "Zukunft." Commenting on one of 
 the earlier atrocities committed on the Belgians, 
 he said 
 
 "Cease these pitiful attempts to excuse Ger- 
 many's action. Not as weak-willed blunderers 
 have we undertaken the fearful risk of this war. 
 We wanted it. Because we had to wish it, and 
 could wish it. May the Teuton Devil throttle 
 those whiners whose pleas for excuse make us 
 ludicrous in these hours of lofty experience. We 
 do not stand, and shall not place ourselves before 
 the court of Europe. Our power shall create new 
 law in Europe. Germany strikes. If it conquers 
 new realms for its genius, the priesthood of all 
 the gods will sing songs of praise to the good 
 war." 
 
 The report of the committee appointed by the 
 Belgian Minister of Justice to inquire into the 
 alleged German atrocities in Belgium is one of 
 those documents, like the report on Putumayo, 
 which it makes one sick to read. No march of 
 Turks through a Christian country ever left a 
 more awful list of horrors behind it. The present
 
 6 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 war is being fought by the Germans with a bar- 
 barism which everyone hoped Europe had escaped 
 from in this humane twentieth century. This 
 predatoriness, we are even told, is a deliberate 
 policy on the part of Germany in order to strike 
 terror into the hearts of her enemies. 
 
 The professional soldier, however, robbing 
 the aged and the unarmed, and outraging defence- 
 less women and children, is a brute and a scourge 
 of humanity. 
 
 Who can contemplate fellowship in a world 
 peopled and ruled by such beings as that? Yet 
 Herr Harden was made what he is, as the Kaiser 
 was, by feeding on the moral poisons taught by 
 the lunatic Nietzsche, who died at 56 an incurable 
 maniac. 
 
 GERMAN PAGANISM. 
 
 Professor Schiller, of Oxford, tells us that 
 Nietzsche's revolt against Christian morals caused 
 him to condemn Christ as a charlatan and a 
 knave. He boasted that the only way to save the 
 world was to "deny God." He taught the Father- 
 land that there was more virtue in war than in 
 a wilderness of good Samaritans. 
 
 An Achilles or a Goliath was the god of his 
 idolatry. His Lord of the World was a "Super- 
 man." The true Superman properly tramples 
 under foot all whom Christ has blessed as "poor 
 in spirit." Weakness has no rights, and it is 
 immoral to give it any. The most despotic of all 
 the Olympian gods could not have exceeded this 
 German philosopher in his contempt for human 
 freedom. To him the Christ-spirit gentleness, 
 kindness, charity loving one another as children 
 of a common father was anathema. He said 
 "I call Christianity the one great curse, the one
 
 GERMANY BEFORE THE WAR 7 
 
 enormous and innermost perversion . . . the 
 one immortal blemish of mankind." 
 
 Professor Schiller says that Nietzsche was an 
 anarchist in his revolt against State supremacy; 
 an aristocrat in his revolt against Democracy; 
 and a brilliant epigrammatic lunatic in his revolt 
 against all the softer virtues. 
 
 He was a man who had nothing but ridicule 
 for the softer virtues. The Indian is apt to regard 
 as a coward the man who will show mercy. So 
 with Nietzsche. He was a refined savage. He 
 could not distantly comprehend that 
 
 "It is excellent 
 
 To have a giant's strength, but tyrannous 
 To use it like a giant." 
 
 In world-politics, the man who would preach 
 that policy was to be regarded as a fool. A giant, 
 says Nietzsche, who would not use his full 
 strength to carve his way to power would be an 
 immoral recreant. He would be making unpro- 
 fitable the talents confided to him. If a nation 
 had the gift of strength, it was for use, not to 
 fall into rust. 
 
 Doctrines like these had captivated Von Roon 
 and Moltke. And Treitschke and Nietzsche 
 tutored their countrymen that Germany had a 
 moral mission to march over the carcases of 
 humanity to the overlordship of the world. 
 
 Bernhardi holds that a world without war 
 would become degenerate. His school believes 
 that "Corsica" has conquered "Gallilee"; that 
 Napoleon was a finer teacher than Christ. 
 
 Professor Cramb revises Christ's teaching 
 thus 
 
 "We have heard how it was said in old times, 
 'Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the 
 earth'; but I say unto you, 'Blessed are the
 
 8 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 valiant, for they shall make the earth their 
 throne/ 
 
 "And ye have heard men say, 'Blessed are the 
 poor in spirit'; but I say unto you, 'Blessed are 
 the great in soul and the free in spirit, for they 
 shall enter into Valhalla.' 
 
 "And ye have heard men say, 'Blessed are the 
 peacemakers'; but I say unto you, 'Blessed are 
 the war-makers, for they shall be called, if not 
 the children of Jahve, the children of Odin, who 
 is greater than Jahve.' ' 
 
 That was the German teaching which preceded 
 the war and prepared for it. To be poor was piti- 
 ful; and pity is poor. Mercy is a maundering 
 quality, which a heroic people should despise. 
 Meekness is the mummery of an idiot. Weakness, 
 wherever found, is there for strength to crush, 
 because strength must live as the survival of the 
 fittest. Honor is a myth, if it conflicts with 
 national advantage. The whiff of grapeshot is 
 the ultima ratio. 
 
 According to the "Rheinisch Wesfaelische Zei- 
 tung," "A country is invaded, not to be taken 
 care of, but to make the people want peace with 
 all their might. Do we shrink because we are 
 likely to lose neutral's sympathies? The more 
 Belgium's goods become ours, the more will our 
 mortal enemy's power in that country be weak- 
 ened. Let's be rich, and we shall have friends." 
 
 Treitschke says that "it has always been the 
 weary, spiritless, and exhausted ages which have 
 played with the dream of perpetual peace." A 
 virile people delight in war. 
 
 It is a very wrong thing, says Bernhardi, to 
 deny to war its place in historical development. 
 "War is a biological necessity of the first impor- 
 tance, a regulative element in the life of man- 
 kind which cannot be dispensed with. War is the 
 father of all things. To supplant or be sup-
 
 GERMANY BEFORE THE WAR 9 
 
 planted is the essence of life; and the strong life 
 gains the upper hand. The law of the stronger 
 hold good everywhere." 
 
 So far from cherishing a desire for peace in 
 the world, the persistent struggle for power and 
 sovereignty governs the relations of one nation 
 with another. 
 
 Right is to be respected only so far as it is com- 
 patible with advantage. Without war inferior or 
 decaying races would easily choke the growth of 
 healthy budding elements, and a universal deca- 
 dence would follow. War is as necessary as the 
 struggle of the elements in Nature. That is Ger- 
 man kultur. 
 
 Germans were taught that though they might 
 be set back now and then by a combination of 
 weaker nations, they had only to bide their time 
 for an ultimate victory over numerical superior- 
 ity. 
 
 They were exhorted to bear another thing in 
 mind. Most of the world is now inhabited. That 
 which is inhabited by inferior races must be taken 
 from them "that is by conquest which thus 
 becomes a law of necessity." 
 
 The conquering Teuton must never be afraid of 
 laying his hands on anything available. The right 
 of conquest is universally acknowledged. If a 
 nation sees foreign territory and desires it for 
 a new home for its people, it must acquire that 
 territory by war. "It is not the possessor, but 
 the victor, who then has the right. In such cases 
 might gives the right to occupy or to conquer. 
 Might is at once the supreme right, and the dis- 
 pute as to what is right is decided by the arbitra- 
 ment of war. War gives a biologically just 
 decision, since its decisions rest on the very nature 
 of things." Bernhardi in "Germany and the 
 Next War." 
 
 That is the literal teaching of Bernhardi, whose
 
 10 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 counsels inspired the Junker war party in Ger- 
 many, and do so now. 
 
 Treitschke is, as fervent in praise of war, as 
 was the great Fritz. They hold that the love of 
 God and of one's neighbor is not applicable to 
 countries, but only to individuals. The Christian 
 morality does not apply to States. States must 
 act on a morality of their own, according as their 
 interests may dictate. 
 
 Such were the teachings. They appear at first 
 sight such a travesty on Christianity that one 
 feels a difficulty in believing that they could be 
 accepted in a Christian nation. But in its policy 
 Germany was much more pagan than Christian; 
 and thus it seemed quite reasonable to the Ger- 
 man that Might should be the world-standard of 
 Right. Germany wanted a place in the sun, and 
 she was justified in taking it by putting all other 
 people in the shade. 
 
 REJECTION OF DISARMAMENT. 
 
 To that end, Germany had rejected all over- 
 tures for disarmament. Seventeen years before, 
 in 1898, the Russian Czar issued an Imperial Re- 
 script, in which he propounded to the world at 
 large a plan of general disarmament. All the 
 nations save one were willing to consider it as a 
 happy means of deliverance from the crushing 
 weight of militarism. The one exception was 
 Germany. The Fatherland laughed it out of 
 practical politics. No one, said the German Chan- 
 cellor, must presume to interfere with German 
 destiny. War was Germany's hope. She culti- 
 vated the thought of it. She taught her sons to 
 long for "The Day." 
 
 Germany had prepared for war on a scale with-
 
 GERMANY BEFORE THE WAR 11 
 
 out precedent. For what? For defence? No! 
 No one was preparing to attack her. Many, it is 
 true, were preparing for defence against her. 
 England was. England had doubled her naval 
 expenditure; but only because, while the Teuton 
 was supreme in military power, she was challeng- 
 ing also the supremacy of the sea. 
 
 England had no army. Both France and Russia 
 had increased theirs; but neither of them was 
 ready for aggression, and but half-prepared for 
 defence. The German power was therefore not 
 for defence, but for aggression, as soon as the 
 Prussian Junkers should think the psychical 
 moment had come. 
 
 There was not much concealment about it. The 
 Kaiser quite openly declared that he meant to 
 "grasp the trident," and that "Germany's future 
 was to be on the sea." In 1900 she made a for- 
 midable increase in her navy. 
 
 This had a tremendous significance to Great 
 Britain, because while the frontiers of Germany 
 are land frontiers, those of Britain everywhere 
 are on the sea. 
 
 Sir John Seeley graphically described the 
 British Empire as "a world-wide Venice, with the 
 sea for streets." Germany's food supply was 
 safe, because she was either self-supporting or 
 fed overland. Great Britain might starve if she 
 lost that sea supremacy which Germany was 
 threatening. 
 
 In 1909, five years before the war came, Sir 
 Edward Grey had said in Parliament that there 
 was no comparison "between the importance of 
 the German navy to Germany, and the importance 
 of our navy to us. Our navy is to us what their 
 army is to them. To have a strong navy would 
 increase their prestige, their diplomatic influence, 
 their power of protecting their commerce; but it
 
 12 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 is not the matter of life and death to them that it 
 is to us." 
 
 Yet Germany's answer to the policy of dis- 
 armament at the end of last century was to almost 
 double her navy in 1900. And again, six years 
 later, the German Emperor told the British 
 Ambassador at Berlin that if the proposed Hague 
 Conference were to discuss disarmament he would 
 refuse to be represented at it, since no State could 
 brook the interference of another. Every nation 
 was to do whatever it was strong enough to do. 
 
 In 1907 Great Britain renewed overtures for 
 a reduction of naval armaments. The German 
 Government said emphatically that no discussion 
 about naval armaments with a foreign Govern- 
 ment could be tolerated; and in that year there 
 was another large increase in the German navy. 
 
 In 1908 Austria-Hungary violated the Treaty 
 of Berlin by annexing Bosnia and Herzegovina. 
 The German Emperor declared that he stood in 
 "shining armor" by Austria's side to support 
 her. It was a provoking challenge to Russia. 
 Germany had "rattled the sabre" against France 
 about Morocco, and against Russia about Bosnia. 
 But Russia was not then strong enough to vindi- 
 cate her right. 
 
 In 1909 the German Chancellor tried to get 
 England to promise neutrality should Germany be 
 at war with France. Had Germany invaded Bel- 
 gium, under that proposal, England's hands would 
 have been tied. Then suddenly Germany sent a 
 warship to Agadir in 1911. That was an open 
 challenge to France; and once more Germany 
 asked Great Britain to pledge neutrality should 
 Germany be engaged in war, which was equiva- 
 lent to asking that the defensive Triple Entente, 
 should be broken up, so that Germany would be 
 left free to deal singly with France, Russia, or 
 Belgium.
 
 GERMANY BEFORE THE WAR 13 
 
 This overture of the German Chancellor for- 
 cibly recalled the words of the German historian, 
 Treitschke, who had written "If our Empire has 
 the courage to follow an independent colonial 
 policy with determination, a collision of our in- 
 terests and those of England is unavoidable. It 
 was natural and logical that the new Great Power 
 of Central Europe had to settle affairs with all 
 Great Powers. We have settled our accounts with 
 Austria-Hungary, with France, and with Russia. 
 The last settlement, the settlement with England, 
 will probably be the lengthiest and most difficult." 
 
 Fresh naval increases were proposed by Ger- 
 many in 1912. The whole trend of her policy was 
 towards war. Her statesmen proclaimed that 
 their mission was the acquisition of strength, 
 since the sword alone must carve out their destiny. 
 
 Germany could never consent to any agreement 
 for disarmament, because it would be a deroga- 
 tion from her imperial destiny. Even if some 
 international agreement were drawn up "no self- 
 respecting nation would sacrifice its own concep- 
 tion of right to it." 
 
 Finally, as a reason why Germany refused the 
 proposal of mutual disarmament, we may well 
 read this passage from Bernhardi : 
 
 "If we sum up our arguments we shall see 
 that, from the most opposite aspects, the efforts 
 directed towards the abolition of war must not 
 only be termed foolish, but absolutely immoral, 
 and must be stigmatised as unworthy of the 
 human race. To what does the whole question 
 amount? It is proposed to obviate the great quar- 
 rels between nations and States by courts of arbi- 
 tration that is by arrangement. A one-sided 
 restricted formal law is to be established in the 
 place of decisions of history. The weak nation 
 is to have the same right to live as the vigorous
 
 14 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 and powerful nation. The whole idea represents 
 a presumptuous encroachment on the natural laws 
 of development." 
 
 German statesmen held that as a matter of 
 national policy, their country should be always 
 ready to take advantage of any favorable oppor- 
 tunity for making war. "The end-all and be-all 
 of a State is power," says Treitschke, "and he who 
 is not man enough to look this truth in the face 
 should not meddle in politics. The State's highest 
 moral duty is to increase its power." 
 
 By that dictum the Christian law of duty and 
 sacrifice does not exist for the State. 
 
 "The Germans are the chosen people of the 
 twentieth century. Hence one law for the Ger- 
 mans and another for other nations." 
 
 GERMAN PROSPERITY. 
 
 There was and is in the German character a 
 marvellous fund of practical common-sense energy. 
 That energy and common sense had been set by 
 Bismark on the road to success, when in 1879 
 he demanded for Germany a complete control of 
 her own markets. Then all her native shrewd- 
 ness and self-seeking were directed to subduing 
 the world industrially. 
 
 Ruskin made an estimate of German character 
 in his "Fors Clayigera," vol. 4, p. 84. He says 
 some things which the last three years have 
 verified 
 
 "Blessing is only for the meek and merciful; 
 and a German cannot be either. He does not 
 understand even the meaning of the words. In 
 that is the intense, irreconcilable difference be- 
 tween the French and German natures. A 
 Frenchman is selfish only when he is vile and
 
 GERMANY BEFORE THE WAR 15 
 
 lustful; but a German is selfish in the purest 
 states of virtue and morality. A Frenchman is 
 arrogant only in ignorance; but no quantity of 
 learning ever makes a German modest. 'Sir,' says 
 Aubert Durer of his own work (and he is the 
 modestest German I know), 'it cannot be better 
 done.' Luther serenely damns the entire Gospel 
 of St. James because St. James happens to be 
 not precisely of his opinions. Accordingly, when 
 the Germans get command of Lombardy, they 
 bombard Venice, steal her pictures (which they 
 can't understand a single touch of), and entirely 
 ruin the country morally and physically, leaving 
 behind them misery, vice, and intense hatred of 
 themselves, wherever their accursed feet have 
 trodden. They do precisely, the same thing by 
 France crush her, rob her, leave her in misery 
 of rage and shame; and return home smacking 
 their lips and singing Te Deum." 
 
 How exactly has this sketch of character been 
 verified in the Belgium invasion. 
 
 The German author of the book "J'accuse" 
 gives a graphic picture of how the German prole- 
 tariat was led by its autocratic rulers to the 
 slaughter. It is the Junkers who rule, and who 
 teach in the persons of their Bernhardis and 
 Treitschkes that the German people are the chosen 
 of God to rule the world. To these have gathered 
 doctrinaires of the schools, disappointed diplo- 
 matists, great cannon kings who were coining mil- 
 lions out of the military cult, and subsidised 
 inflammatory journalists, whose mission was to 
 sow the doctrine of international ill-will. 
 
 These stirrers-up of strife were at most but 
 a small minority of the German people ; but they 
 owned most of its wealth, and were an organised 
 phalanx.
 
 ]6 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 They played with all but invincible power on 
 the passions of the German democracy. 
 
 It was not however the German democracy 
 that got great naval and military budgets passed, 
 that moulded war events, and that forged tens 
 of thousands of war machines ready to go off at 
 the touch of a button. The German democracy, 
 inarticulate in politics, was busy as bees in a 
 hive, redundant in its material prosperity, proud 
 of the Fatherland and its growing opulence and 
 greatness, and fully conscious of the scientific 
 eminence of the nation. Yet all this time it was 
 the merest pawn in the hands of the military 
 machine which it had bought and paid for. 
 
 England's attitude during this time of porten- 
 tous preparation was almost drivelling in its sot- 
 tish stupidity. This was caused by her insensate 
 free-trade fanaticism. Germany's tariff had not 
 only amply protected the Fatherland at Bismark's 
 instance, giving Germany complete command of 
 her own markets, but it had enabled the Teuton 
 to destroy British industries, such as the dye 
 works, the sugar trade, and others. Mr. Cham- 
 berlain had urged all this on his countrymen with 
 a force that had not been heard and felt in Eng- 
 land for fifty or sixty years. But the great 
 body of Englishmen had deaf ears for anything 
 that might be said about peril from Germany. 
 Mr. Leonard Courtney, one of the most fanatical 
 of Cobdenists, said that he would rather see 
 the British Empire crumble than that free- 
 trade should fail. We can all see now in the 
 lurid light of war the folly of those utterances. 
 England sees now that she was actually grinding 
 the German sword to smite herself. When she 
 told her Dominions oversea that in trade the 
 Chinese and Germans were on the same level in 
 her regard as the members of her own family, she
 
 GERMANY BEFORE THE WAR 17 
 
 spoke under the influence of a trade superstition 
 which had completely blinded her judgment. 
 The Cobdenist theory that in trade all men be- 
 come brethren, is demonstrably false, because 
 trade rests upon a competitive basis, and wher- 
 ever men compete whether with guns, tariff, or 
 trade undercutting they are at war. 
 
 German trade was booming before the war. 
 The Fatherland had surpassed every expecta- 
 tion. And what was to her great advantage, 
 England, her great rival, had no smack of 
 jealousy. Germany's production of pig iron had 
 gone up from 2,500,000 tons in 1873 to 14,000,000 
 tons in 1912. Germany had increased her output 
 by 500 per cent. Britain had increased hers by 
 only 50. 
 
 German chemistry came to the help of the 
 great ironmakers and did for them what it has 
 since done for her generals in the field. In 
 paper making the Teuton simply took hold of 
 the trade and made it almost his own. In the 
 production of metals she got her grip almost on 
 the world. 
 
 The German nation was certainly, productively, 
 one of the marvels of the world. She felt within 
 herself those beating pulses that spoke of a capa- 
 city for illimitable expansion, alike in the fields 
 of war and industry. Owing to their protec- 
 tive tariff they made a handsome profit in their 
 own market, whilst establishing these trades, and 
 then sold a penny a pound cheaper in the British 
 market. The free-trade fallacy of that time 
 taught that all the advantage of this was to Great 
 Britain, since Germany was selling under cost. 
 But Germany smiled at British folly and per- 
 severed. 
 
 The Germans saw that the logic of accom- 
 plished fact were in their favor. In twenty
 
 18 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 years they had doubled their trade, whilst Eng- 
 land's trade had increased by only 10 per cent. 
 Their own Professor Schmoller assured the Ger- 
 mans that the Fatherland had invested trade pro- 
 fits in home and foreign securities, to the extent 
 of 600,000,000. 
 
 It is not very wonderful that German feeling 
 towards her neighbors developed into a kind 
 of passive contempt, to be afterwards changed 
 into an active policy. A trade commission of 
 inquiry reported in England that "The Ger- 
 mans seemed to look upon England as a sort of 
 rubbish heap on to which they could shoot all 
 their surplus products at cost price, or a little 
 below." Sometimes, here and there, an English 
 journalist would warn his countrymen. One of 
 them said one day 
 
 "Germany wants in the first place sea-power, and all 
 that sea-power gives, and this she can only obtain from 
 us. Next, Germany wants a great commercial expansion, 
 and this she thinks she cannot obtain except through our 
 overthrow." 
 
 But England did not care. She was deaf to 
 all this. She was supremely content in her free- 
 trade policy. If she could get cheaper iron from 
 Germany so much the better. She could build 
 her ships all the more cheaply. There was noth- 
 ing to mind in German expansion. It was quite 
 natural that Germany, wanting sea-power, should 
 look upon England as her rival. 
 
 And so things went on, and Germany prospered, 
 prospered amazingly; and certainly her pros- 
 perity was due to her own thoroughness. 
 
 She had few -natural advantages. Her coal 
 does not lie close to her ports and foundries, as 
 England's does. Her soil was not rich like Eng- 
 land's; but she increased her cereal harvests, 
 while England allowed hers to diminish. 
 
 All these advantages came to her from her own
 
 GERMANY BEFORE THE WAR 19 
 
 inherent thoroughness in things thoroughness in 
 education, thoroughness in organisation, thorough- 
 ness in work. 
 
 The Australian Prime Minister informed us in 
 1915 that the German grip on the metal industry 
 was portentous. It was, he said, "a scheme of 
 organisation, masterly, complex, and far-reach- 
 ing, and it had been firmly established. By means 
 of it the fortunes and developments of the indus- 
 try were developed by German capital and in- 
 fluence, and its profits flowed into German pockets. 
 This great German octopus, whose tentacles 
 gripped the Australian metal trade, stretched 
 throughout the world. Britain, France, Belgium, 
 America, Africa, were all within its grip. Its 
 power had long been tremendous, and was daily 
 growing greater." 
 
 It is therefore pretty plain that, judging on the 
 surface of things, all the prognostics were against 
 Germany rushing the world into war when she 
 did. Her material interests appeared to be in 
 the maintenance of peace. She was out-growing 
 everything about her. Her population had grown 
 from 41,000,000 in 1871 to 70,000,000 in 1914. 
 It increased by 800,000 a year, whilst that of 
 France was stationary. The Kaiser loved to 
 boast that he had been an upholder of peace for 
 25 years, even in spite of a little sabre-rattling 
 and a few "mailed fist" menaces. Truth to say 
 his peace professions were largely taken as sin- 
 cere because they accorded with the maintenance 
 and continuance of German prosperity. 
 
 These things were open to the eye of the world, 
 and the world saw them. German riches, in 
 forty-five years, had multiplied beyond concep- 
 tion. Its army was the greatest the world had 
 ever seen. Its navy was second only to that of 
 Great Britain. Its colonies were increasing in
 
 20 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 every part of the globe. Its trade was as wide 
 as the hemispheres, and as lucrative as another 
 Golconda. The Fatherland had applied the dis- 
 coveries of science to industry in a manner that 
 had turned her fields, her mines, her forests, to 
 a maximum of profit. She had subdued Nature 
 to her uses. She had cheap power from water, 
 from furnace-gases, from lignite, and even from 
 peat. She had from all an exhaustive store of 
 electric power. 
 
 She had gone further. She had so studied the 
 economy of trade amalgamations and combina- 
 tions that she could outrival all her neighbors, 
 save perhaps America. The German occupation 
 census of 1907 showed 1,423 industrial undertak- 
 ings which employed an average of 1,080 persons 
 each, while the Krupp firm employed 70,000 hands 
 and worked 9,000,000 of capital. 
 
 She had her State-owned railways, the capital 
 of which in 1910 had gone up in thirty years from 
 440,000,000 to 867,000,000. 
 
 GERMANY DIRECTS ALL TO THE WAR. 
 
 Consistently with her moral code Germany 
 spent forty-five years, and all the proceeds of 
 her splendid industrial system in building up her 
 army and navy, after the Franco-German war. 
 She neglected nothing. Not a year passed but 
 her army and navy were stronger, and her volume 
 of trade increased. 
 
 And all the stupendous profits from those in- 
 dustries were converted into guns and explosives. 
 Every German sailor was encouraged to toast 
 "The Day" when his fleet would meet that of 
 Great Britain on terms of equality.
 
 GERMANY BEFORE THE WAR 21 
 
 Far-seeing Englishmen like Lord Roberts im- 
 plored their countrymen to open their sealed 
 vision and recognise the preparations that were 
 going on for the transfer of the Trident to the 
 German navy. 
 
 But the easy-going unsuspicious Briton went 
 laughing on his way. Armaments might multiply 
 on the Continent and Europe might become an 
 armed camp. The spike-helmeted warriors 
 might blaze everywhere in shining armor, always 
 ready, and awaiting only the opportunity. But 
 England still believed that Germany at heart was 
 peaceful. The Kaiser's professions of friendli- 
 ness were accepted, and he awaited his chance to 
 strike. 
 
 That opportunity came through the Serbian 
 assassination and the Austrian ultimatum. Ger- 
 many had bided her time ; and at the end of July, 
 1914, when her great guns were countless as the 
 hosts of Sennacherib ; when her legions were full, 
 and her troops prepared to the last button ; when 
 her stores of munitions were mountains high ; and 
 when she knew that none of her neighbors were 
 in a like state of preparedness, she declared war 
 against Russia and France. 
 
 Her strength was the strength of a Colussus, 
 No other Power cared to think of measuring its 
 might with her. It was at such a time that, with 
 a suddenness as startling as a tropical storm, and 
 with a wantonness as wilful as a maniac's out- 
 burst, she launched her thunders, with a giant's 
 resistless strength. 
 
 The fearful war machine was timed to a minute. 
 It forged its way through fire and fortress in the 
 sheer delight of destruction. It was to blazon a 
 name at which the world should grow pale. 
 
 It was not enough to be a Superman in peace. 
 The Superman must show his Super-humanity.
 
 22 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 He must live in the world without a rival. The 
 semi-maniac maker of uncounted legions needed 
 the mask of Peace no longer. He had but to 
 press a button, and his soldiers could overrun 
 the earth and say to every people "You live at 
 my nod." This was the vaulting ambition that 
 overleaped itself. The best laid schemes aft gang 
 agley. The German Emperor soared like a 
 rocket, only as we hope to fall like a blackened 
 stick.
 
 II. 
 
 THE GENESIS OF THE WAR. 
 
 GERMANY'S MORAL PRECIPICE. 
 
 A lighted cigar is carried into a powder maga- 
 zine probable result, Explosion. 
 
 A tinder spark falls on inflammable matter 
 natural consequence, Conflagration. 
 
 Prodigious and unique military power in the 
 keeping of a semi-insane, ambitious war-lord 
 product, War. 
 
 It has been said that the genesis of this war 
 was "mere sordid trade." We will see. 
 
 Germany had lived on the thoughts of war, had 
 slept on war, had dreamed war got ready for 
 war. She had fought in recent years in three 
 or four successful wars with the Danes, the Aus- 
 trians, the French. She had always won. She 
 felt that she could always win that she was 
 invincible. 
 
 For forty-five years Germany had sedulously 
 built up her army and navy. Quietly, steadily, 
 ceaselessly grew her military machine. Its goal 
 was the establishment of a resistless power. The 
 efforts to create it were quite successful. There 
 was nothing else on earth like it. It was to 
 crush everything that might stand in its way. 
 It was to place Germany in the Overlordship of 
 a dependent world. 
 
 To the German mind that was ethically the 
 correct thing to dp. As I have elsewhere shown 
 the moral teachings of the Fatherland were 
 
 23
 
 24 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 those of the pagan Sophist in Plato's Republic, 
 that Might is Right. That the highest virtue is 
 to be efficient, virile, merciless, strong. That 
 the weak nation is always wrong. That the 
 strong nation is always right. That Strength is 
 Goodness. That the best religion is valor to be 
 hard, bloody, ruthless, so that strength may fulfil 
 its purpose. That Germany's mighty destiny was 
 to be wrought out in "blood and iron." That the 
 true State hero should ride down and trample 
 all in his way. 
 
 Germans were taught to believe that the Beati- 
 tudes of Christ are the teachings of weaklings, the 
 doctrines of human rejects ; that Nietzsche, Bern- 
 hardi, and their Supermen, are the only true 
 national guides. 
 
 One of the most startling of the doctrines 
 preached amongst the Germans was the denial 
 that there are any duties owed by the State to 
 humanity, beyond that of imposing its own 
 superior civilisation upon as large a part of 
 humanity as possible. Another is the denial of 
 any obligation to observe treaties when it is 
 inconvenient to the interest of the State to break 
 them. 
 
 It has to be noted that to modern German 
 writers the State is a much more tremendous 
 entity than it is to Englishmen or Americans. 
 It is a supreme power with a sort of mystic 
 sanctity, a power conceived of, as it were, self- 
 created, a force altogether distinct from, and 
 superior to, the persons who compose it. 
 
 German ethics hold that the State may do 
 morally what an individual may not. It may 
 rob and murder for the benefit of the collective 
 power. The moral responsibilty changes when 
 men act together for the collective benefit. The 
 State has no morality save that which serves its
 
 THE GENESIS OF THE WAR 25 
 
 own interest. There is no ethical .standard for 
 a nation. The highest morality for a State is 
 Force. Goliath applying a battering ram against 
 a Christian citadel would be the ideal German 
 hero. From this standpoint there was nothing 
 wrong in Germany invading Belgium under the 
 plea of military necessity. 
 
 It is not difficult to see that a great military 
 State, holding such views, stands on the brink of 
 a moral declivity over which it is certain to fall. 
 
 This was seen a little later when the Lusitania 
 was torpedoed, with a thousand helpless pas- 
 sengers on board. 
 
 Some German writers were a little ashamed, 
 and inclined to be apologetical. This angered 
 the Hun character, and a typical German jour- 
 nalist burst out indignantly as follows : 
 
 "The civilisation of mankind suffers every time a Ger- 
 man becomes an American. Let us drop our miserable 
 attempts to excuse Germany's action. We willed the 
 sinking of the Lusitania. Our might shall create a new 
 law in Europe. It is Germany that strikes. We are 
 morally and intellectually superior beyond all comparison. 
 . . . We must . . . fight with Russian beasts, English 
 mercenaries, and Belgian fanatics. We have nothing to 
 apologise for. It is of no consequence whatever if all 
 the monuments ever created, all the pictures ever painted, 
 all the buildings ever erected by the great architects of 
 the world, be destroyed. . . . The ugliest stone placed 
 to mark the burial of a German grenadier is a more 
 glorious monument than all the cathedrals of Europe put 
 together. No respect for the tombs of Shakespeare, New- 
 ton, and Faraday. They call us barbarians. What of 
 it? The German claim must be: ... Education to hate. 
 . . . Organisation of hatred. . . . Education to the 
 desire for hatred. Let us abolish unripe and false shame. 
 . . . To us is given faith, hope, and hatred; but hatred 
 is the greatest among them." 
 
 There spoke a Hun in all the sincerity of his 
 Hunnishness. Thinking as the Germans did, feeling 
 as they did, they could not act otherwise than
 
 26 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 as they did ; and the conflict between them and the 
 higher type of civilisation was a mere question 
 of time. 
 
 THE OPPOSITE IDEAL. 
 
 In considering the genesis of this war it is 
 necessary to take a survey of the moral forces 
 which precipitated it. In the preceding section 
 we have had a glimpse of German ethics. We 
 must glance at the governing principles which 
 ruled the rest of Europe. 
 
 Germany's neighbors were not militant. Their 
 writers and thinkers did not glorify war. With- 
 out being spiritually minded, their hero was 
 not Napoleon, but Christ. They believed, at 
 least theoretically, in justice being as much the 
 birthright of the beggar as of the king. They 
 might have a hundred divergent ideas of Right; 
 but no one of them ever dreamed of making Might 
 the standard of Right as a maxim of conduct, as 
 the Germans did. 
 
 So far from holding that small nations have no 
 claims to live beyond those which they can main- 
 tain, they had expressly given to Belgium a 
 national status and pledged themselves to its 
 maintenance. They held that even the weakest 
 sovereign on earth had an indefeasible right to 
 his own. The higher nobility was not the will to 
 secure power by the right of the strong hand, but 
 the will to bless the weak. 
 
 If a State has valuable minerals, as Sweden has 
 iron, and Belgium coal, and Rumania oil; or if 
 it has abundance of water power, like Norway, 
 Sweden and Switzerland ; or if it holds the mouth 
 of a navigable river the upper course of which 
 belongs to another nation, the great State may 
 not conquer and annex that small State as soon
 
 THE GENESIS OF THE WAR 27 
 
 as it finds that it needs the minerals, or the water 
 power, or the river mouth. 
 
 There is such a thing as common humanity; 
 and all nations have obligations to it. They may 
 not neglect that "decent respect for the opinion 
 of mankind" postulated by the framers of Ameri- 
 can Independence. 
 
 They hold that no nation could before the rest 
 of the world, set up the right of being a supreme 
 law to itself. Germany held her right to ignore 
 the wishes of all the rest of the world and consult 
 her own desires exclusively. 
 
 The interests, the sentiments, and the patrio- 
 tism of small nations are of supreme consequence, 
 as typifying the sacredness of right. 
 
 Cardinal Mercier in "The Voice of Belgium," 
 says "The rigidity of pagan morals and the 
 despotism of the Caesars suggested the false 
 principle and modern militarism tends to re- 
 vive it that the State is omnipotent, and that 
 the discretionary power of the State is the rule 
 of Right. Not so, replies Christian theology. 
 Right is Peace; that is the interior order of a 
 nation, founded on justice." 
 
 Civilisation must not turn on itself, nor 
 may barbaric force take the place of culture. 
 People's liberties must not depend on the weapons 
 of the conqueror. 
 
 Modern nations are not to worship a naked 
 sword, as the Scythians did. The God of Justice 
 rules nationally as well as individually. Righteous- 
 ness exalteth a nation; not the weight of gun 
 metal. 
 
 These were the general average level of men's 
 opinions outside the German empire. But they 
 were at the extreme opposite of those which had 
 been growing up in the Fatherland. 
 
 To those who looked below the surface of
 
 28 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 things it was not difficult to see that such diver- 
 gences in the conception of national rights and 
 duties might at any time precipitate a conflict. 
 But this knowledge came very slowly. To teach 
 that the law of Force is the moral law could only 
 have one ending. The Germans foresaw that end ; 
 the other nations did not. 
 
 As it became more and more apparent, a fright- 
 ful chasm seemed to open at the feet of those 
 nations which, like England, had cherished a 
 belief in a peaceful solution of the military situa- 
 tion. It was setting back the onward march of 
 civilisation. The work that had been done since 
 the middle ages to regulate the conduct of war 
 and introduce some mitigations of its essential 
 inhumanity, seem to have been thrown away. 
 All the efforts made to secure the arbitration of 
 international disputes, to provide safeguards for 
 peace, to promote goodwill between the people, 
 were in a moment lost, forgotten, trodden under- 
 foot. We seem to have been suddenly thrown 
 back into the ages of savagery. 
 
 PRECIPITATING THE CONFLICT. 
 
 Such was the state of tension in men's minds 
 at the end of July, 1914, when Austria sent her 
 ultimatum to Servia, and when Russia began to 
 mobilise to protect the Slav. 
 
 We all remember how Sir Edward Grey pleaded 
 with Germany to intervene and get the business 
 settled by a European Conference. And we all 
 remember how Germany emphatically refused and 
 declared war on Russia and France. Prince 
 Lichnowsky, the German Ambassador in London 
 in 1914, has since completely vindicated Britain 
 and put the whole onus of the war on Germany.
 
 THE GENESIS OF THE WAR 29 
 
 That is a German testimony. I will now quote a 
 Belgian one. 
 
 "On the 9th of April, 1839, a treaty was signed 
 in London by King Leopold, in the name of Bel- 
 gium, on the one part, and by the Emperor of 
 Austria, the King of France, the Queen 
 of England, the King of Prussia, and the 
 Emperor of Russia, on the other; and its 
 seventh article decreed that Belgium should 
 form a separate and perpetually neutral 
 State, and should be held to this neutrality in 
 regard to all other States. The co-signatures pro- 
 mised, for themselves and their successors, upon 
 their oaths, to fulfil and to observe that treaty 
 in every point and every article without contra- 
 vention. Belgium was then bound in honor to 
 defend her own independence. She kept her 
 oath. The other Powers were bound to respect 
 and to protect her neutrality. Germany violated 
 her oath. England kept hers." Cardinal Mer- 
 cier's "The Voice of Belgium," p. 23. 
 
 In the Reichstag on the 4th of August, 1914, 
 Chancellor Von Bethman-Hollweg made this ad- 
 mission 
 
 "We were compelled to override the just pro- 
 tests of the Luxemburg and Belgian Governments. 
 Our troops have occupied Luxemburg and are 
 perhaps already on Belgian soil. Gentlemen, that 
 is a breach of international law. It is true that 
 the French Government has declared at Brussels 
 that France is willing to respect the neutrality 
 of Belgium, so long as her opponent respects it. 
 France could wait, but we could not. The wrong 
 I speak frankly that we are committing we 
 will endeavor to make good as soon as our military 
 goal has been reached. The Kaiser had to take 
 the gravest decision which has ever fallen to the 
 lot of a German, and was compelled to order the
 
 30 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 mobilisation of the German forces, following on 
 the Russian mobilisation." 
 
 We know the horrors which have been ever 
 since wreaked on Belgium. 
 
 That speech of the German Chancellor was one 
 of the customary falsehoods circulated at the 
 time. On October 23, Sir Edward Grey stripped 
 the lie of all its plausibility. He said 
 
 "Germany talks of peace. Her statesmen talk of peace 
 to-day, but what sort of peace do they talk of? Oh, they 
 say, Germany must have guarantees against being 
 attacked again. If this war had been forced upon Ger- 
 many that would be a logical statement. It is precisely 
 because it was not forced upon Germany, but forced by 
 Germany upon Europe, that it is the Allies who must 
 have guarantees for future peace. In July, 1914, no one 
 thought of attacking Germany. It is said that Russia 
 was the first to mobilise. That, I understand, is what is 
 represented in Germany as a justification for the state- 
 ment that the war was not an aggressive war on Ger- 
 many's part, but was forced upon her. Russia never made 
 the mobilisation of which Germany complained until after 
 Germany had refused the conference, and she never made 
 it until after a report had appeared in Germany that 
 Germany had ordered mobilisation, and that report had 
 been telegraphed to Petrograd, As a matter of fact, it 
 was the story of 1870 over again preparation for war, 
 not only the preparation of material, but the preparatory 
 stages all advanced in Berlin to a point beyond that of 
 any other country, and then when the chosen moment 
 came a manoeuvre was made to provoke some other coun- 
 try to take a defensive step, and when the defensive step 
 was taken, then to receive it with an ultimatum which 
 made war inevitable. 
 
 "The same thing with the invasion of Belgium. Strate- 
 gic railways had been made in Germany, and the whole 
 plan of campaign of the German staff was to attack through 
 Belgium, and now it is represented that they had to attack 
 through Belgium because other people had planned to 
 attack through Belgium. I would like nothing better 
 than to see those statements that the Russian mobilisa- 
 tion was an aggressive and not defensive measure, and 
 that any other Power than Germany had trafficked in the 
 neutrality of Belgium, or planned to attack through Bel- 
 gium I would like to see those statements investigated 
 before any independent and impartial tribunal.
 
 THE GENESIS OF THE WAR 31 
 
 "German organisation is very successful in some things, 
 but in nothing more successful than in preventing the 
 truth from reaching their own people, and succeeding in 
 presenting to them a point of view which is not that of 
 the truth the statement that the war was forced upon 
 Germany. When England proposed the conference Russia, 
 France, and Italy accepted the conference; when four 
 Powers offer a conference and one Power refuses it, is it 
 the Powers who are offering the conference which are 
 forcing war, or the Power which refuses it? The 
 Emperor of Russia offered The Hague Tribunal. One 
 Sovereign offers The Hague Tribunal and another ignores 
 it. Is it the Sovereign who offers reference to The Hague 
 who is forcing war ? On the very eve of war France gave 
 her pledge to respect the neutrality of Belgium if Ger- 
 many would not violate it. We asked for such a pledge. 
 Was it the Power which asked for the pledge and the 
 Power which gave the pledge which were responsible for 
 the violation of the neutrality of Belgium, or the Power 
 which refused to give the pledge? Belgium knows, as 
 well as very Frenchman and Englisman, that never at 
 any time was there a suggestion that French or English 
 soldiers should enter Belgium unless it were to defend 
 Belgium from the violation of her neutrality, which had 
 first been undertaken by Germany. 
 
 "Why was it that all the efforts to avoid the war in 
 July, 1914, failed? Well, because you cannot have peace 
 without goodwill, and because in Berlin there was the 
 will to war and not the will to peace." 
 
 That was the cause of war, not any hankering 
 after "mere sordid trade." 
 
 The answer to the question of who made the 
 war is not a matter of opinion. It is one of irrefut- 
 able fact. It is settled by the official white books 
 of the several belligerents. But there is a flood 
 of light on it apart from these. The Reichstag 
 statement of Herr Haase, that war was deter- 
 mined at Potsdam on July 5, 1914 three weeks 
 before the ultimatum to Belgium has now re- 
 ceived so many confirmations that it is impossible 
 to ignore that assertion. The Potsdam gathering 
 was held a week after the murder of Prince 
 Francis Ferdinand and his wife, at Serajovo. 
 There were present at that gathering the Kaiser,
 
 32 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Bethmann-Hollweg, Admiral Tirpitz, General 
 Falkenhayn, and among the Austrian group, the 
 Archduke Frederick, Count Berchtold, and Count 
 Tisza. All the chief points in the Austrian ulti- 
 matum to Servia were then decided upon, and it 
 was determined to present that ultimatum in the 
 imperious form in which it was proposed, though 
 it was recognised that such a course might pro- 
 voke Russia to war. After the meeting the 
 Kaiser went on a sea trip, to return to Berlin 
 three days after the provocative ultimatum had 
 been delivered. The denial of this in Germany 
 goes for nothing, because the assertion of this 
 Potsdam conference has been alluded to in other 
 quarters than the speech of Herr Haase. A 
 Danish paper, the "Politiken," directed attention 
 to it not long after the outbreak of war, and Lord 
 Robert Cecil has given us his assurance that the 
 Conference took place just as Herr Haase 
 declares. 
 
 Germany's denials of this Potsdam meeting 
 have provoked a letter from Mr. Lewis Einstein, 
 agent for the American Embassy in Constanti- 
 nople. He tells us that on July 15 the Marquis 
 Garroni, Italian Ambassador at the Porte, in- 
 formed him that Baron Wangenheim, German 
 Ambassador at Constantinople, had just returned 
 from Berlin. The Baron told the Marquis that a 
 few days before he had been present at a confer- 
 ence at Berlin, presided over by the Kaiser, at 
 which war was decided. Mr. Einstein quotes this 
 statement from his diary. He also adds: 
 "Another diplomatist in Constantinople was told 
 by Wangenheim that a month before the outbreak 
 of hostilities the Kaiser summoned the leaders of 
 the army, of finance, and of industry, and asked 
 if they were prepared for war. All replied they 
 were, and Baron Wangenheim gave his Majesty
 
 THE GENESIS OF THE WAR 33 
 
 the assurance that he was ready to answer for 
 Turkey." 
 
 Mr. Henry Morgenthau, formerly American 
 Ambassador to Turkey, has made some remark- 
 able disclosures. He says 
 
 "There is direct evidence that the Kaiser willed 
 the war, and caused it when it suited his purpose 
 and preparations. Marquis Pallavincini, the 
 Austrian Ambassador to Turkey, told me on 18th 
 August, 1914, that the Austrian Emperor had 
 informed him in May that war was inevitable. 
 Baron von Wangenheim, the German Ambassa- 
 dor to Turkey, in an outburst of enthusiasm after 
 the arrival of the fugitive German warships 
 Goeben and Breslau in the Dardanelles, told me 
 that a conference was held in Berlin early in 
 July, 1914, at which the date of the war was 
 fixed. 
 
 "The Kaiser was present at the conference, also 
 Baron von Wangenheim, Count von Moltke, Ad- 
 miral von Tirpitz, and a few selected leaders of 
 German finance and industry. The Kaiser asked 
 then if they were ready for war. All replied 
 in the affirmative except the financiers, who said 
 they must have a fortnight in which to sell securi- 
 ties and arrange loans. The financiers were 
 feverishly, but secretly, busy, while the army 
 marked time. All the great stock exchanges 
 experienced acute depression as German-owned 
 stocks were quietly pushed on the market. 
 
 "Baron von Wangenheim also told me that next 
 time Germany would be even more far-sighted 
 and would have at least five years' supplies of 
 copper and cotton before striking. 
 
 "Later I learned that if Germany were vic- 
 torious she intended to attack America on the 
 ground that America had supplied munitions to 
 the Allies. She would enforce the payment of
 
 34 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 an indemnity which would make Germany the 
 richest nation in the world. I have heard that 
 the sum fixed was 2,500,000,000. The Kaiser 
 has for years been obsessed with his dream of 
 becoming the centre of a great moving picture, 
 directing and controlling the destinies of the 
 world. Prince Henry of Prussia was sent to 
 America to consolidate Germany's strength in 
 the United States. Germany's mastery of the 
 situation in Turkey was so complete that she 
 dictated the postponement of Turkey's entry into 
 the war until a powerful wireless plant at Con- 
 stantinople had been completed, and guns and 
 munitions had been brought to Turkey." 
 
 The Kaiser cabled to President Wilson on 
 August 10 that "Belgian neutrality had to be vio- 
 lated by Germany on strategical grounds, news 
 having been received that France was already 
 preparing to enter Belgium." This explicit ad- 
 mission of wrong-doing can be placed by the side 
 of the Chancellor's, in his celebrated explanation 
 to the Reichstag. 
 
 The Kaiser's message to America was an ad- 
 mission that he was going to injure an unoffend- 
 ing neighbor whom he was pledged by treaty to 
 protect. The excuse that he had heard that 
 France was going to do it, means only that he 
 was anxious to be the first to do a wrong. It 
 deepens his dishonor. It makes that deep blot 
 on his personal escutcheon which has since caused 
 President Wilson to write that he will have no 
 negotiations for peace with the House of Hohen- 
 zollern. 
 
 Almost every week there are further revela- 
 tions of the bad faith which precipitated this 
 war. We have not space here for even the sub- 
 stance of the official negotiations that took place 
 between England and Germany ; but we will quote
 
 THE GENESIS OF THE WAR 35 
 
 one short passage that stands in the resume to 
 the German White Book 
 
 "We were perfectly aware that a possible war- 
 like attitude of Austria-Hungary against Servia 
 might bring Russia upon the field, and that it 
 might therefore involve us in a war, in accordance 
 with our duty as allies. . . . We permitted 
 Austria a perfectly free hand in her action to- 
 wards Servia. . . . Sir Edward Grey had 
 made the proposal to submit the differences be- 
 tween Austria-Hungary and Servia to a confer- 
 ence of the Ambassadors of Germany, France, and 
 Italy, under his chairmanship. We declared 
 that we could not participate in such a confer- 
 ence." 
 
 And why? Because such a conference would 
 have prevented war, and thus have baulked Ger- 
 many of her expected prize when everything was 
 apparently propitious for her to snatch it. The 
 words quoted above give us Germany's own ad- 
 mission that she knew Austria was plunging the 
 world into war and that the Fatherland refused 
 to employ any conference to prevent it. 
 
 In confirmation of this we may cite one short 
 extract from the despatch of Sir M. de Bunsen 
 to Sir Edward Grey. Sir M. de Bunsen was 
 British Ambassador at Vienna, and described in 
 the despatch what took place a few days before 
 the war. Count Berchtold was the Austrian 
 Foreign Minister, and he agreed, on the 30th of 
 July," to the continuance of the conversations at 
 St. Petersburg. From now onwards the tension 
 between Russia and Germany was much greater 
 than between Russia and Austria. As between 
 the latter, an arrangement seemed almost in sight. 
 . . . M. Schebeko (Russian Ambassador to 
 Vienna) repeatedly told me that he was prepared 
 to accept any reasonable compromise. Unfortu-
 
 36 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 nately these conversations at St. Petersburg and 
 Vienna were cut short by the transfer of the 
 dispute to the more dangerous ground of a direct 
 conflict between Germany and Russia. Germany 
 intervened on the 31st July by means of her 
 double ultimatum to St. Petersburg and Paris. 
 The ultimatums were of a kind to which only 
 one answer is possible, and Germany declared 
 war on Russia on the 1st August, and on France 
 on the 3rd August. A few days delay might in 
 all probability have saved Europe from one of 
 the greatest calamities in Europe." 
 
 But those few days of delay were just what 
 Germany did not want. Having everything pre- 
 pared for a coup, as she knew, and her enemies 
 being unready, as she knew, she feared more 
 than anything else to miss that chance of a sud- 
 den stroke. These and other facts like them, 
 contained in the blue books and white books of 
 the belligerent nations, have brought the greatest 
 lawyers of the world to come to one common 
 opinion as to the genesis of the war. 
 
 They hold that the making of this war was a 
 crime against the sense of the world at large. 
 Every nation, save two only, wanted peace. These 
 two were Germany and Austria. Italy, a member 
 of the Triple Alliance, wanted peace, and would 
 not hear of joining her partners in the war. In- 
 deed, reduced to the last residuum, Germany 
 alone wanted war, and she did so because her 
 War Council was convinced that the time was 
 over-ripe for reaching out and plucking the 
 splendid fruit of a world-sovereignty. 
 
 She was drunk with the splendid promises of a 
 vast vaulting ambition. She believed in her very 
 heart that her mission was war, God-guided. She 
 had eaten of the food of war; drunk of the wine 
 of war; toasted the toast of war; prepared as no
 
 THE GENESIS OF THE WAR 37 
 
 other nation had ever prepared for war. "The 
 Day" of war was to her sacred as an inspiration. 
 She was war-made, war-making, war-souled, and 
 war-embodied. 
 
 Paul Rohrback, in his book "The German Idea," 
 puts her aspirations into words "The World has 
 no longer need of little nationalities. They must 
 fall into line with the world-power of Germany." 
 
 Can anybody wonder that a nation, fed daily 
 on such food as that, should have grown sick with 
 over-gorging egotism and vanity. 
 
 Herr K. F. Wolff, another of the tribe which 
 ministered to Germanic mental inflation, told his 
 countrymen that "There are two kinds of races 
 master races and inferior races. Political rights 
 belong to the master race alone, and can only be 
 won by war. The inferior race will not be 
 educated in the schools of the master race, nor 
 will any schools be established for it, nor will 
 its language be employed in public." 
 
 Three times during the 19th century had the 
 Prussian soldier entered Paris and looked down 
 from the heights of Montmartre on a prostrate 
 France. What had been done with less efficient 
 armies might be repeated for a fourth time, and 
 more effectively than ever before. 
 
 GERMAN ATROCITIES. 
 
 Between their gasps of horror at the first 
 stories which came to us of German "Frightful- 
 ness," men paused and asked each other "Can 
 they be true?" 
 
 Never before in civilised warfare, during a 
 period of 2,000 years, has the tiger in man had 
 unchecked freedom. There were rules of chivalry 
 and honor that softened the fiercest contests.
 
 38 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Soldiers might not poison the earth, the water 
 or the air. They might not bayonet the wounded, 
 nor slaughter in cold blood, women and children, 
 or old and unarmed men. 
 
 Such methods were known to the Red Indian 
 in his unredeemed savagery, when his hatchet, 
 his firebrand, and scalping knife were his only 
 law. In the Indian Mutiny, too when the hot 
 blood of the Hindoo was at boiling point female 
 and infant helplessness went down in the orgie 
 and untamed fury of the aboriginal in rebellion. 
 
 But there Christianity did not pretend to rule. 
 The Red men were outside the civilised pale. 
 
 The Germans, Huns as they are at heart, were 
 'professing Christians, and they wore the veneer 
 of civilisation. And yet, as the world, standing 
 aghast, saw with a shudder, German officers and 
 soldiers alike ran amok and murdered unarmed 
 citizens wholesale. In one case, drunk with 
 blood, Hun officers lined up 500 citizens and shot 
 them deliberately in rows, in the sight of their 
 wives, mothers, and sisters. When they were 
 dead, the survivors were compelled to dig their 
 graves and shovel the corpses in. 
 
 Worse still. German soldiery, drunk with pil- 
 laged wine, broke into the sanctuaries of convents 
 and committed on the nuns outrages, the mere 
 thought of which makes the brain reel with 
 horror. 
 
 Cardinal Mercier, at p. 10 of his book "The 
 Voice of Belgium," says "Thousands of Belgian 
 citizens have been deported to the prisons of Ger- 
 many, to Munsterlagen, to Colt, to Magdeburg. 
 At Munsterlagen alone 3100 civil prisoners were 
 numbered. History will tell of the physical and 
 moral torments of their long martyrdom. Hun- 
 dreds of innocent men were shot. I possess no 
 complete necrology; but I know that there were
 
 THE GENESIS OF THE WAR 39 
 
 91 shot at Aerschot, and that there under pain 
 of death, their fellow citizens were compelled to 
 dig their graves. In the Louvain group of com- 
 munes, 176 persons, men and women, old men and 
 sucklings, rich and poor, in health and sickness, 
 were shot or burnt." 
 
 At first mankind was sceptical as to the possi- 
 bility of these things. But unfortunately two 
 separate Commissions of Inquiry sat and gathered 
 data which, after the most careful sifting, left 
 no doubt that the worst of crimes were substan- 
 tiated. 
 
 The excuses of the criminals were that on the 
 entry of German soldiers into captured towns, 
 they were fired at by the citizens from windows. 
 Seeing that they were unable to ascertain the 
 identity of these citizens, they took them en 
 masse and massacred them as a deterrent on 
 others. They wished, they said, that every Bel- 
 gian cheek might grow pale at the mention of a 
 German. 
 
 Lord Bryce, who sat on one of these commis- 
 sions, says that there is no room for doubt that 
 the Kaiser is a blood-stained monster. 
 
 Then came the Lusitania, sunk by order of this 
 German war-lord, with 2,000 passengers on board. 
 The coroner in an inquest on forty infants 
 drowned by that crime, brought in a verdict of 
 wilful murder against the Kaiser. The horror 
 was one that was proved to have been deliberately 
 planned and executed. 
 
 It was known that the ship was unarmed, that 
 the passengers were civilians and women and 
 children, unconnected with the war. It was known 
 that the sinking of the vessel was not an act 
 of war, but one of murder. It was known also 
 that the Kaiser, when the crime was reported, 
 openly rejoiced at the slaughter of the innocents,
 
 40 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 and ordered a school holiday for German children 
 to commemorate it. 
 
 Men, shuddering, asked 
 
 "Can such things be 
 And overcome us like a summer cloud, 
 Without our special wonder." 
 
 But, alas, there was no doubt, and what was 
 worse, the Hun stood up in his infamy, a monster 
 naked and unashamed, his plea being that all is 
 fair in war, even outrages on nuns and babies. 
 
 Cardinal Mercier, in his brave Christmas Pas- 
 toral, denounced especially the hanging and 
 shooting of certain priests. Upon this Colonel 
 Wengersky, the officer commanding in the Malines 
 district, wrote to the Cardinal, saying "In order 
 that I may institute an inquiry, I beg your 
 Eminence to be good enough to inform me if any 
 innocent priests have been killed, and if so to give 
 me their names." 
 
 The Cardinal instantly replied "The names of 
 the priests and the religions of the diocese of 
 Malines who, to my knowledge, have been put to 
 death by the German troops are the following : 
 Dupierreux, of the Society of Jesus; Brothers 
 Sebastian and Albert, Josephites; Brother Cam- 
 didus, Brother of Mercy; Father Maximus, 
 Capuchin; Father Vincent, Franciscan Conven- 
 tual; Carette, professor; and Fathers Lombaerts. 
 Garis, 'de Clerck, Dergent, Wonters, and van 
 Bladel, parish priests." 
 
 The Cardinal added that 143 victims had since 
 been exhumed and identified, and requested that 
 the proposed inquiry should be thorough by being 
 half German and half Belgian, with an American 
 president. 
 
 Nothing was done. Nothing was intended.
 
 41 
 
 Such deeds could not bear the light. The policy 
 of "Frightfulness" was no accident It aimed at 
 cowing mankind before the German name, as 
 Attila became "the Scourge of God." German 
 psychology erred in this as in so many things. 
 Her crimes enraged the world; they did not 
 terrify it. 
 
 AMERICAN OPINIONS ON THE CAUSES OF THE 
 WAR. 
 
 Long before President Wilson had made up his 
 tardy mind about what was his duty in this war, 
 and while he was still writing Notes to Germany, 
 and congratulating the Kaiser on his birthday, 
 the foremost minds of America had quite con- 
 vinced themselves about merits of the conflict. 
 There is not one amongst them, so far as I know, 
 who has found any trace of a "sordid trade" origin 
 in it. 
 
 Dr. J. William White, of the Pennsylvania Uni- 
 versity, has placed on record his impressions. He 
 says "The war is a German-made war, having 
 its source and inspiration in the writings and 
 teachings of the Pan-Germanists ; in the ambition 
 of an autocratic military caste, headed by a 
 highly neurotic, unbalanced, and possibly men- 
 tally diseased overlord, with mediaeval views of 
 his relation to his country and the world, and 
 supported by a subservient corps of 'learned men/ 
 the majority of whom are paid servants of the 
 State." 
 
 Dr. Whitridge, a leading member of the New 
 York Bar, has placed his opinion on record, thus 
 "For many years certain German publicists have 
 been writing about 'a day of reckoning with Eng- 
 land.' They have not been very explicit about 
 the account on which the reckoning was to be
 
 42 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 had, but generally the day of reckoning was that 
 upon which it was to be decided whether many 
 desirable things in the possession of England 
 should be taken away and made German. For 
 nearly as many years also the youth of Germany, 
 especially in the navy, have been drinking to 
 the toast of 'The Day.' 'The Day' has at last 
 come, and brought with it the most gigantic and 
 the most wicked war of the whole Christian era. 
 It is as clear to me as the daylight that the in- 
 vasion of the neutrality of Belgium was the proxi- 
 mate cause of the war, at least with Great Britain ; 
 and there is a sufficient amount of evidence to 
 make it equally clear that Germany had long 
 been preparing for the war, and had intended 
 to have it about this time, before even the par- 
 ticular pretext for it was found." 
 
 Quite a number of eminent Americans have 
 placed on record their conclusions that the Kaiser, 
 puffed with his pleasant confidence in God's part- 
 nership with him, had satisfied himself that the 
 psychical moment had arrived. Others have 
 stated their settled opinions that the differences 
 between democratic and autocratic governments, 
 being radical, the two cannot live side by side 
 save under constant mutual protest. This is 
 because the very concepts of civilisation are not 
 the same in democracies and in aristocracies and 
 autocracies. Some of our American friends have 
 told us that they have espoused our quarrel not 
 from any ties of kinship; but because we are in 
 this war for the rights of humanity as against 
 the oppressions of castes and autocratic domina- 
 tion. We are in the war they say, for the rights 
 of peoples ; "for the cause that Franklin and Jef- 
 ferson and Madison wrote for ; that Patrick Henry 
 spoke for; that Washington and Jackson fought 
 for ; that Lincoln died for ; that McKinley suffered
 
 THE GENESIS OF THE WAR 43 
 
 for; and that every American statesman worthy 
 of the name now lives for." 
 
 When the Americans had quite made up their 
 minds as to the origin of the war, and as to the 
 merits of it, they went a step further; for it 
 began to dawn upon them that their interests in 
 it might be more than academical. They asked 
 themselves what would be the consequences of a 
 German victory ? If all Europe Belgium, Italy, 
 France, and England were under German pat- 
 ronage, what would be the American position in 
 the world? It began to be apparent that 
 America's turn would come for subjugation. 
 "Deutschland uber Alles" would apply to the 
 United States and South America ; for Germany's 
 immense fleet, embracing as it would the warships 
 of Great Britain, could scatter to the winds the 
 Monroe doctrine. And so it was that many of 
 their most thoughtful citizens concluded that if 
 the great work of the Allies was to prevent Ger- 
 many becoming irresistible, that object was just 
 as important to America as to Europe ; and Uncle 
 Sam had his own interest in taking up a part of 
 the burden. 
 
 As that idea took root, it was perceived that 
 the life and death grapple in Europe is really be- 
 tween military imperialism and the divine right 
 of kings on one side, and the democratic rights of 
 peoples on the other. For although German 
 science had laid the world under obligations, so 
 had that of England and France. 
 
 Regarding the situation from that standpoint, 
 Putnam, the American publisher, who had but 
 recently travelled a good deal in both Germany 
 and Great Britain, said he was quite clear as to 
 both the origin and motive of the war. It was, 
 he said, deliberately prepared by Germany in 
 accordance with the Bernhardi doctrine that it
 
 44 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 is the destiny of the strong to take from the weak. 
 The British Empire was popularly believed by 
 German opinion to be ready to fall into the first 
 strong hand that should reach out to grasp it, 
 and Germany was its rightful inheritor. Putnam 
 wrote "In sojourns in England during the past 
 fifty years, I never read or heard an English 
 utterance expressing a desire for anything that 
 belonged to Germany. In Germany, and among 
 German-Americans outside of Germany, I have 
 repeatedly heard the prophecy that the English 
 Empire must be broken up, and that its colonial 
 power must be transferred to Germany." 
 
 He remarked on the intense dislike of Germans 
 towards Great Britain. Nothing is more clear 
 than that our Empire's overthrow was to be the 
 ultimate end, though it was not designed that 
 Britain should suspect this until France had first 
 been "so completedly crushed that she can never 
 again come across our path," as Bernhardi puts it. 
 
 Professor Cramb, in his "Germany and Eng- 
 land," lays it down that the real origin of the 
 war was Germany's intense hatred for England. 
 Britain is a world-empire. She occupies that 
 place in the sun on sea or land which Germany 
 thinks should be her own. Germany believed 
 Great Britain's power to be crumbling to decay; 
 to be ready to fall to pieces at the mere roar of 
 a German big gun. She believed Englishmen to 
 be effeminate, degenerate, bloated by luxury, and 
 weakened by soft-living and over-eating. Ger- 
 many had a great respect for the British fleet, but 
 she believed the British navy to be living on a 
 past reputation. As to her military strength, that 
 was quite beneath German consideration. A 
 couple of German army corps could devour it for 
 breakfast without any sense of repletion. 
 
 Long before America declared war, the bulk of
 
 THE GENESIS OF- THE WAR 45 
 
 her people wished for it. One of her foremost 
 citizens, Geo. Burton Adams, voiced that opinion 
 thus "If it comes to the point when it is neces- 
 sary for the United States to aid the Allies, then 
 I hope it will be done. Germany is opposed to 
 everything for which we stand, and our turn will 
 be next if Germany were successful." 
 
 Lincoln in his campaign for the Presidency, 
 said "No nation can exist one half free and one 
 half slave." Wilson has applied that reasoning 
 to this war when he says in his reply to the 
 Pope's Peace Note "Peace must rest on the 
 rights of peoples, not of governments. The test 
 of every peace plan is whether it is based on the 
 faith of the people, or merely on the word of an 
 ambitious and intriguing government." 
 
 In that same document the American President 
 reveals the immense importance which he attaches 
 to forms of government ; for he says "Our object 
 is to deliver free peoples from the menace of the 
 actual power of a vast military establishment con- 
 trolled by an irresponsible Government, which 
 secretly planned to dominate the world and tried 
 to carry out the plan without regard for treaties 
 and international honor. Germany chose her 
 own time for war, and struck fiercely and sud- 
 denly. She stopped at no barrier either of law or 
 mercy. She swept the Continent with a tide of 
 blood. It is not our business to say how the Ger- 
 man people shall live under their ruthless master, 
 but w r e must see that the rest of the world i=? not 
 left to the mercy of the German Government." 
 
 It would almost seem as if the mind of Presi- 
 dent Wilson is undergoing change. Since he said 
 as above that the German people must choose for 
 themselves as to how they will "live under their 
 ruthless master," he has since repeatedly declared 
 that he will not negotiate with any Hohenzollern
 
 46 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 or other form of German autocracy. Like Lin- 
 coln, he has come to believe that it is with the 
 world as with nations, that it cannot live "one 
 half free and one half slave." The meaning of 
 this is that no nation in the future may be per- 
 mitted to please itself as to the extent of its arma- 
 ment, because the world cannot live in peace 
 while one half of it is armed and the other half 
 unarmed. All must be equally armed or un- 
 armed. If it were not so, the armed half would 
 enslave the other. The Democracies of the earth 
 have usually been least inclined to militarism ; and 
 they are so now. Hence Wilson's resolve against 
 all future autocracies. 
 
 On that point Laurence F. Abbott, an American 
 writer of distinction, says "The leaders of 
 modern Germany wish to dominate Europe the 
 militarists for power's sake ; the industrialists for 
 the sake of commerce; the intellectuals for the 
 sake of imposing German ideals upon the world. 
 . . . I believe it may be said in a very real 
 sense that a victory of the German militarists 
 would destroy the German people, and that a vic- 
 tory of the Allies will save them." 
 
 How THE WORLD HAS ACCEPTED THE INEVITABLE. 
 
 As soon as the nations had time to turn about 
 and consider the frightful cataclysm into which 
 they were plunged, they met their troubles with 
 a very resolute courage. 
 
 They never were much inclined to underrate 
 the formidable strength of the enemy. They 
 knew indeed that that strength was the mightiest 
 the earth had ever seen. But they knew also 
 that the issue was Liberty or Slavery.
 
 THE GENESIS OF THE WAR 47 
 
 Germany had drawn her sword against an un- 
 prepared world, declaring that "Germany shall 
 not confront the twentieth century and its throng- 
 ing vicissitudes as the worshipper of an alien 
 God, thrall of an alien morality." She expressed 
 her belief in a new creed of "Faith and Hope and 
 Hatred." Her first footsteps under that stan- 
 dard were upon a pathway of crime a pathway 
 of blood and fire, smeared over the face of Bel- 
 gium. The pirate standard of "Frightfulness" 
 streamed over the stricken land. But there was 
 never a sign of unmanly fear. The Hun tramped 
 on, over demolished cities, razed cathedrals, burn- 
 ing libraries, profaned altars, desecrated sanc- 
 tuaries. There were bursts of anger, but no ap- 
 peals for mercy. There lay Belgium beneath the 
 iron heel of her conqueror, starving, homeless, 
 bleeding; but never for one moment despairing. 
 Her only sin against Germany was that she lay 
 in the pathway towards France, and that she was 
 a small kingdom which had no right as against 
 a more powerful one. Belgium, which has so 
 often been the cockpit of Europe, has never taken 
 any but a defensive part in war since Caesar's 
 time, and has been one of the most thrifty and 
 humane nations in the world. 
 
 All the world saw and shuddered as the giant 
 struck the dwarf with his bloody gauntlet. But 
 there was no piteous wail. The Belgian died, but 
 did not surrender. All the nations set their teeth 
 and began a preparation such as no man before 
 had any conception of. Even before the Battle of 
 the Marne checked the enemy on the outskirts of 
 Paris, there was a firm belief in ultimate victory, 
 because of the invincible resolve to win it. 
 
 On the part of Great Britain there had been 
 little or no national antipathy towards the Ger- 
 mans. Rather there had been a yearning to cul-
 
 48 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 tivate better relations. The mass of the British 
 people were almost unaware of the antithetic 
 ideals which inspired the German people. British 
 publicists were doubtless familiar with the writ- 
 ings of Treitschke, Nietzsche, and Bernhardi ; but 
 they regarded them rather as the random opinions 
 of speculative cranks than as the deliberate ideals 
 of the nation. 
 
 Viscount Bryce touched this aspect of affairs 
 very happily, when he said that it was neither 
 commercial rivalry nor jealousy of German power 
 that brought Britain into the field. Nor was 
 there any hatred in the British people for the 
 German people, nor any wish to break their 
 power. The leading political thinkers and his- 
 torians of England had given hearty sympathy to 
 the efforts made by the German people (from 
 1815 to 1866 and 1870) to attain political unity, 
 as they had sympathised with the parallel efforts 
 of the Italians. Besides this, he remarked that 
 the two nations German and British were of 
 kindred race, and linked by many ties. 
 
 That was the general feeling when the war 
 broke out. It is different now. The Hun is now 
 everywhere regarded as a savage. He cannot be 
 anywhere regarded as an equal. The Germans are 
 not gentlemen. Their word of honor is given only 
 to be broken. President Wilson tells the Pope 
 "We cannot take the word of the present rulers 
 of Germany for anything, unless it is explicitly 
 supported by conclusive evidence of the will and 
 purpose of the German people." 
 
 Time may carry a wallet on his back, in which 
 he bears "alms for oblivion," but the frightful 
 spoliation of Belgium will remain an unobliterated 
 blot for ever on the pages of modern history. No 
 touch of human pity or thought of human right
 
 THE GENESIS OF THE WAR 49 
 
 softened the brutality which the people had to sus- 
 tain. 
 
 The apostles of "kultur," fired with the lust of 
 war, acted as ravening beasts, to whom the feeble- 
 ness of age, and the helplessness of woman ap- 
 pealed in vain. 
 
 No man, when the war began had even a distant 
 conception of its cost and ravage. But the spirit 
 which began it has remained unshaken. Ger- 
 many, notwithstanding all her might has met 
 more than her match. She was to have first re- 
 duced France to submission, then overrun Russia 
 and dictated peace, after which she could turn 
 her arms against England. 
 
 But things have not worked out according to 
 her calculation. Her military machine, her think- 
 ing machine, her diplomacy, have all reckoned 
 awry. There is room for many differences of 
 opinion about the management of the war ; but on 
 the question of its genesis, it is quite safe to say 
 that impartial history will debit it to a lust of 
 imperious German ambition.
 
 III. 
 
 GOD AND THE WAR. 
 
 GOD'S JUDGMENT ON THE WORLD THROUGH WAR. 
 
 Very many people have expressed their opinions 
 that Almighty God has made visible His chasten- 
 ing hand in this war. They believe that He is 
 scourging the world for its wickedness and its 
 forgetfujness of Him. They say that He is the 
 same God in the twentieth century of the Chris- 
 tian era as He was a thousand years before Christ ; 
 and that, as He burnt Sodom and Gomorrah, be- 
 cause of the heinousness of their offences, so is 
 He now visiting His chastisements on men who 
 have affronted His name. 
 
 One can certainly trust that the great God, who 
 has permitted the earth to be deluged in blood, 
 and these millions of wrongs to be wreaked by 
 wicked rulers, knows most perfectly His own 
 business; and in His way, which is not our way, 
 will turn the curses of iniquity into blessings. 
 
 We may profitably call to mind a speech of the 
 Fifth Harry on the eve of Agincourt. Things 
 looked far more gloomy to that young sprig of the 
 Plantagenets than they have ever done for George 
 of England. The French outnumbered the English 
 by ten to one, and there was no retreat for Harry 
 in case of defeat. Yet he meditated 
 
 God Almighty ! 
 
 There is some soul of goodness in things evil, 
 Would men observingly distil it out. 
 For our bad neighbors make us early stirrers, 
 
 50
 
 GOD AND THE WAR 51 
 
 Which is both healthful and good husbandry. 
 Besides, they are our outward consciences, 
 And preachers to us; admonishing 
 That we should dress us fairly for our end. 
 Thus may we gather honey from the weed, 
 And make a moral of the Devil himself. 
 
 There spoke the prince of optimists. But it is 
 objected that the chastisements of war fall on the 
 guilty and the innocent alike. The poor Belgians 
 taught no paganism, but they felt the first sharp 
 edge of the enemy's sword. God's rain falls on 
 the just and the unjust; and the visitations of 
 Providence in sickness and life's losses are equally 
 without regard to the virtue of those afflicted. 
 
 I recollect that during the last year of the life 
 of the late Archbishop Carr, of Melbourne, of 
 saintly memory, that prelate was several times 
 emphatic in declaring his opinion that war is a 
 direct chastisement of an offended Diety. He 
 said that the fearful sufferings inflicted by this 
 war may well be taken as a stroke from God's 
 correcting hand as a punishment of men's seces- 
 sion from the Divine authority. 
 
 Many others spoke to the same effect. An 
 Anglican prelate in the old country, said "It is 
 for us to ask ourselves, both as individuals and 
 as a nation, whether it may not be said of us, as 
 it was of the Israelites, that our sin, too, is great, 
 and that the fierce anger of God is hanging over 
 us. Certainly, if we look around us in this country 
 there has been for years much to draw down 
 God's anger upon us. God's existence and His pro- 
 vidential care of His creatures, if not denied, are 
 practically left outside the thoughts of everyday 
 lives of men. The idea of Divine worship, man's 
 first duty to His maker, is disappearing even from 
 religious services; and there are millions upon
 
 52 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 millions of men and women whose shadow never 
 darkens the door of a place of worship from year- 
 end to year-end. The sense of sin and the need 
 of atonement for sin is fast disappearing. Men 
 in increasing numbers are ceasing to believe in a 
 Christian revelation, in a future life, in eternal 
 punishment. Pleasure seeking and self-indul- 
 gence are the great objects of pursuit; impurity 
 is spreading like a very plague among the old and 
 young ; and this country is fast becoming notorious 
 for the criminal practices identified with race 
 suicide." 
 
 Another writer of equal authority says "In 
 England the unbelief of the artisan class, the 
 apathy of the agricultural class in all that con- 
 cerns religion, would be portentous were it not 
 so familiar." 
 
 Those are points which scarcely require proof. 
 Kipling had it in his mind when he wrote his 
 "Recessional" "Lest we forget." 
 
 All the world over, the pagan spirit has been 
 advancing. Rich men live for luxury; poor men 
 toil for purely mundane things. These are but 
 the words of Isaiah over again 
 
 "Hear, heavens, and give ear, earth; for the Lord 
 hath spoken I have nourished and brought up children, 
 and they have rebelled against me. 
 
 "The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master's 
 crib; but Israel doth not know, my people doth not con- 
 sider. 
 
 "Ah, sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a seed 
 of evil doers, children that are corrupters: They have for- 
 saken the Lord, they have provoked the Holy One of Israel 
 unto anger, they are gone away backward." 
 
 We see from words like these that history is 
 but repeating itself. To revert to King Harry, 
 on the eve of Agincourt, we find him talking not 
 unlike Dr. Carr and the Anglican Bishop. He 
 says
 
 GOD AND THE WAR 53 
 
 "There is no king, be his cause never so spotless, if it 
 comes to the arbitrament of swords, can try it out with 
 all unspotted soldiers. Some peradyenture have on them 
 the guilt of premeditated and contrived murder; some of 
 beguiling virgins with the broken seals of perjury; some 
 making the war their bulwark, that have before gored 
 the gentle bosom of peace with pillage and robbery. 
 Now if these men have defeated the law, and outrun 
 native punishment, though they can outstrip men, they 
 have no wings to fly from God. War is His beadle; war 
 is His vengeance; so that here men are punished for 
 before breach of the king's law in now the king's quarrel." 
 
 Here we find the British hero-king just as we 
 find the prelates quoted, claiming for war that it 
 is God's instrument of chastisement. In the great 
 Accompt, when hidden things shall stand revealed, 
 it may be seen that through war, invoked by 
 man's soaring ambitions, God vindicates His 
 eternal Providence in a wider sense than that of 
 the poet who said 
 
 "The gods are just, and of our pleasant vices 
 Make instruments to plague us." 
 
 If this be so, then it may follow that God, using 
 man as His instrument, punishes man by fire 
 and sword, and by the great hell-bursts of shrap- 
 nel that lacerate and desolate the beautiful earth. 
 
 Some say that there is a good deal of evidence 
 already available that the war has already acted 
 like a disinfectant on French paganism, convert- 
 ing millions to the God they had before con- 
 temned. That will be examined in another essay. 
 
 THE PLAIN MAN'S DIFFICULTY. 
 
 The man in the street, hearing all this, stops 
 and asks How can you make that good? If 
 the war has been sent as a punishment on the
 
 54 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 wicked, why is it indiscriminating? The innocent 
 Armenians have suffered far more than the per- 
 secuting Turks. 
 
 If God is now punishing the world for its lapses 
 and blasphemies, why do His punishments fall 
 like His rain, on the just and the unjust alike? 
 
 A writer in "The Age" of December 29, 1914, 
 said 
 
 "If Archbishop Carr's views on the war be correct, then 
 the Kaiser is right after all in his assertion that he is 
 God's instrument. For, according to His Grace, it is 
 not the German army which is responsible for the agony 
 of Belgium, but God Himself. It is to be hoped that the 
 homeless Belgians, through the devastation of the Ger- 
 mans, will be properly appreciative of God's interest in 
 them. Having been brought up a Roman Catholic, natur- 
 ally I feel the greatest respect and deference for His 
 Grace, but I am still of the opinion that the war is clearly 
 the outcome of the ambition, greed, and want of con- 
 science of brutal men, apart from any interference of 
 the Almighty." 
 
 A few days later the following appeared in 
 "The Leader": 
 
 "Archbishop Carr is a bad recruiting sergeant. He 
 regards the war as deliberately inflicted upon mankind 
 by the Almighty as a punishment for the wickedness of 
 the world in neglecting divine worship and encouraging 
 the spirit of infidelity. It must be evident that if the 
 war is of God's making, we have been very unjust to the 
 Kaiser, who is merely what he claims to be, the instru- 
 ment of the Most High. Furthermore, if this war is 
 God's war, we are guilty of the very infidelity of which 
 the Archbishop accuses us in raising contingents with 
 the object of putting an untimely end to the sacrifice. But 
 Dr. Carr's assertion leaves us plunged in perplexities. 
 Why is unbelieving Asia free of the scourge? Are we 
 to believe that the United States is a centre of righteous- 
 ness, seeing that it is escaping the infliction which falls 
 so heavily on Belgium, a country not conspicuously 
 wicked? If Archbishop Carr is right, we are all wrong 
 in condemning the abominations and 'outrages of which 
 the Germans have been guilty. Since it is all God's will, 
 where is the sense of reviling His emissaries?"
 
 GOD AND THE WAR 55 
 
 Of course one perceives at a glance that such 
 reasoners as these have quite missed the distinction 
 between first and secondary causes. But they 
 and in good faith, and possibly speak the thoughts 
 of thousands who have but glanced on the surface 
 of theology. 
 
 What puzzles them is why God, being omnipo- 
 tent, permits sin? And, having permitted it, 
 how He can justly punish it? They see clearly 
 enough that the war could not have happened 
 without God's permission. 
 
 They believe the war to be a sinful war. la- 
 deed its wickedness is manifest. God has there- 
 fore permitted to occur a sinful war which He 
 might have prevented. He Who Himself can do 
 no evil, has allowed certain brutalities to be visited 
 on unoffending nations ; and the offenders yet go 
 unpunished. 
 
 That is the Plain Man's stumbling-block. 
 
 THE ARGUMENT FROM HISTORY. 
 
 What is there that can make clear to this Plain 
 Man that war is God's beadle? Where is it 
 manifest ? Can it be shown to be historically true 
 that God does permit bad men to make unjust 
 wars in punishment of sin? We know that the 
 Prophets in the Jewish Scriptures are full of 
 jeremiads concerning such punishments. The 
 Israelites were again and again abandoned to 
 their pagan enemies because of their backsliding 
 and idolatries. 
 
 Two or three examples will suffice here. The 
 Captivity was one. In that instance the Jews 
 were carried away wholesale. 
 
 Josephus, in his 9th book, speaking of the 
 wicked King Ahaz, says "Now, when the King
 
 56 
 
 of Jerusalem knew that the Syrians had returned 
 home, he supposing himself a match for the King 
 of Israel, drew out his army against him, and 
 joining battle with him, was beaten; and this 
 happened because God was angry with him, on 
 account of his many and great enormities. Ac- 
 cordingly, there were slain by the Israelites 
 120,000 of his men that day." 
 
 The same Jewish historian, writing of Hoshea, 
 who had come into the crown of Israel by 
 treachery, says that he kept his crown for nine 
 years ; "but was a wicked man, and a despiser of 
 the divine worship ; and Shalmaneser, the King of 
 Assyria, made an expedition against him and 
 overcame him (which must have been because he 
 had not God favorable to him) ." 
 
 This king of Assyria carried away all the Ten 
 Tribes of Israel into Media and Persia. "So the 
 Ten Tribes of the Israelites were removed out of 
 Judea . . . when they had transgressed the 
 laws, and would not hearken to the prophets . . . 
 and made God to be their enemy." 
 
 Absalom's war against his father David is 
 another historical case in which God sent a war 
 upon the people in punishment for sin. 
 
 "Now therefore the sword shall never depart from thy 
 house, because thou hast despised me, and hast taken 
 the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be thy wife." 
 
 "Thus saith the Lord, Behold, I will raise up 
 evil against thee out of thine own house." 
 Samuel II., 12. 
 
 "God was despised by David, and affronted by 
 his impiety when he had married and now had 
 another man's wife. . . . God would inflict punish- 
 ments upon him on account of those instances of 
 wickedness, and he should be treacherously sup- 
 planted by his son [Absalom]." Josephus, "An- 
 tiquities of the Jews," Book VII., Sec. VII.
 
 GOD AND THE WAR 57 
 
 Absalom in his sinful ambition made war on 
 his father and was slain. His guilty war was 
 a punishment of David's guilty theft of Uriah's 
 wife. 
 
 A third example is found in Christ foretelling 
 the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple. He 
 spoke of it as "the abomination of desolation." 
 The people of Jerusalem had been conspicuously 
 unfaithful to God. 
 
 "And when you shall see Jerusalem compassed about 
 with an army, then know that the desolation thereof is 
 at hand." 
 
 "For nation shall rise against nation and kingdom 
 against kingdom, and there shall be earthquakes in divers 
 places and famines." 
 
 All these things were to happen in punishment 
 of Jerusalem's sins. And they did happen. Was 
 God, therefore, the author of all the crimes com- 
 mitted by the army of Titus? 
 
 That is the question which is raised by the 
 critics of Dr. Carr. If God chooses sinful instru- 
 ments to punish sin, is He not therefore respon- 
 sible for the sins of His instruments? He chose 
 the rebel Absalom to punish David the adulterer. 
 He chose Titus to punish the infidelities of Jeru- 
 salem. 
 
 Byron puts the same question into the mouth of 
 Manfred 
 
 "Must crimes be punished but by other crimes, 
 
 And greater criminals ?" 
 
 DID THE WAR COME BY CHANCE. 
 
 May we not open this section with a question 
 to the good people who say that this war has come 
 about through the greed of men, "apart from any 
 interference of the Almighty?"
 
 58 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 If wars do not come from God, how do they come? 
 Every effect has its cause. There must be a 
 cause for war. To say that a man's criminal am- 
 bition made the war does not help us, because the 
 man himself was the effect of some precedent 
 cause. Follow the logic as you will, it leads 
 you back to a First Cause, or God. 
 
 If you refuse to believe in God at all, you escape 
 no difficulty. You must still find the cause of 
 this effect war. For as Polonius says, "This 
 effect, defective, comes by cause." 
 
 The man who tells you he will believe only what 
 he understands, must refuse to believe in life, in 
 language, in sound, in color, smell, wind, cold, 
 heat, electricity, sleep, fatigue, sorrow, pleasure; 
 he cannot believe in matter, in the growth of a 
 blade of grass, in light, in his own eyesight, in 
 thought. They are all beyond human compre- 
 hension. We only know that they are, not how 
 they operate. We have still to solve the problem 
 the cause of the war. 
 
 It is related of Father Kircher that he was 
 called upon by a young atheist, who wished to dis- 
 pute with him as to God's existence. On enter- 
 ing the priests's library, the young fellow was at- 
 tracted to a globe. Passing his hand over it, he 
 touched a secret spring which set the mechanism 
 in motion, so as to imitate the movements of the 
 universe. When the priest entered, the young 
 man turned, full of admiration, and asked 
 "Father, what genius devised this wonder?" The 
 Father replied "Nobody made it ; it made itself." 
 The young man looked grave, as he said "Father, 
 you trifle. It is against reason that such a splen- 
 did miniature of our universe should be the work 
 of chance or have made itself." "What," said 
 the priest, "you assert that a genius was necessary 
 to make this poor miniature imitation, and yet
 
 GOD AND THE WAR 59 
 
 deny that the universe itself had a Maker." The 
 young man dropped on his knees, and said, "My 
 God, I believe." 
 
 A disciple of Voltaire was once holding: forth 
 in a small company, and proving as he thought 
 that there is no God. Mortified by the resistance 
 of a lady who refused assent to any of his argu- 
 ments, he said "I could not have believed in such 
 a company as this I should be the only one not to 
 believe in God/ The lady replied "You are not 
 the only one. My horses, and my dog, and my 
 cat are in the same category of unbelief as you, 
 only they have the sense not to boast of it." 
 
 The man that made the war was made by God, 
 governed by God, unable to move a hand, think a 
 thought, speak a syllable except through the power 
 received from God. Therefore, if he made the 
 war, he was God's instrument in making it. 
 
 That argument to some avails nothing. 
 
 But does the war come as the result of Chance? 
 Do you take refuge in the theory of accident? 
 Blind Chance? 
 
 What is Chance? It is merely the atheist's 
 negation of God. Has anybody ever defined it? 
 Can anybody ever do so? It is a shadow, a noth- 
 ing, a senseless word. To suppose that Chance 
 governs this world, or anything in it, is to sup- 
 pose that Chance made Father Kircher's minia- 
 ture globe, or the universe it represented. 
 
 It you say that we are in a topsy-turvy world, 
 full of inequalities, where the good people suffer 
 and the wicked thrive, it is fair to ask you, my 
 glib friend, how can you be so sure that what 
 offends your ideas are really confusion and dis- 
 order? You judge things to be useless without 
 knowing a hundredth part of the complexities of 
 being. You think things bad, because you do not 
 know what they are good for. Your want of
 
 60 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 knowledge of the secondary causes surrounding 
 you, certainly does not justify your ascribing the 
 war to Chance. 
 
 Perhaps you may vary the phrase, and say that 
 they come as the accidental conjuncture of circum- 
 stances. But if God rules in the fall of a sparrow, 
 there can be no accident. And you do not show 
 what else rules that fall. 
 
 Can we gaze around us without perceiving that 
 the Universe is under a law? Can we look into 
 the stellar spaces and not see- how perfectly they 
 follow a prescribed course so perfect that our 
 astronomers can predict eclipses centuries ahead? 
 No chance all regulation. 
 
 "I can easily," says Dr. Barry, "believe in 
 miracles, provided that there is a Disposer of all 
 things Who wills to work them; but in blind 
 Chance, or Eyeless Necessity, I cannot so much 
 as discover a positive meaning at all." 
 
 The poet Pope was not without a glimmer of 
 inspiration when he wrote 
 
 All nature is but art, unknown to thee. 
 
 All chance direction, which thou canst not see. 
 
 All discord, harmony not understood. 
 
 All partial evil, universal good. 
 
 In spite of sense, in erring reason's spite, 
 
 One truth is clear whatever is, is right. 
 
 If that be so, then this bad war will eventuate 
 in right, as part of the Divine economy. I turn 
 a leaf of one of Father Lambert's books. His 
 was one of the keenest intellects of his time. I 
 find this 
 
 "If you ask why one creature is more perfect than 
 another; why this one is placed here and that one there; 
 why winter is cold and summer hot; why it rains now 
 and not at another time; why this loss of fortune, of 
 health; why that sickness; why that young child's death, 
 while the old man near to it lives on; why that good 
 man is carried off by death, while the bad man who does
 
 GOD AND THE WAR 61 
 
 nothing but evil is spared I shall reply to you that an 
 INFINITE intelligence, an INFINITE wisdom, an 
 INFINITE justice and goodness have thus regulated 
 these things, and that it is certain that all is in due 
 order, although it may not seem so to us. . . . Chance 
 governs nothing here on earth, because it is itself 
 nothing." 
 
 VINDICATING GOD'S WAYS. 
 
 If, as St. Augustine says, "Nothing occurs by 
 chance in the whole course of our life," then God 
 made this war. 
 
 Now the war is an evil war. Did a good God 
 make an evil war? We turn to the 45th chapter 
 of Isaiah, 6th and 7th verses, and we read 
 
 "That they may know from the rising of the sun, and 
 from the west, that there is none beside me; I am the 
 Lord, and there is none else." 
 
 "I form the light, and create darkness. I make peace, 
 and create evil. I, the Lord, do all these things." 
 
 So that nothing happens on this earth but God 
 wills it, or permits it. He does all, orders all, 
 directs all. He numbers the hairs of our heads, 
 the leaves of the trees, the grains of sand on the 
 seashore, the drops of water in the ocean. He 
 therefore made this war, and it is an evil war. 
 But it does not follow, as we shall see, that the 
 Holy God is the Author of evil. The Prophet 
 Amos says 
 
 "Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the 
 people be not afraid? Shall there be evil in a 
 city, and the Lord hath not done it?" 
 
 How can God will evil? How can He take part 
 therein? He can have nothing in common with 
 sin. Theologians very clearly explain this seem- 
 ing paradox. They point out that in every evil 
 deed two separate elements must be present. There 
 must be the exterior act and the interior malice
 
 62 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 of determination. The exterior act is always 
 God's. It could not happen without Him. The 
 interior malice of determination is man's in the 
 exercise of his free will. 
 
 Cain struck Abel a murderous blow long ago. 
 Brown did the same to Jones yesterday. There 
 were in those wrongful acts (a) the violent 
 motion of the arm, and (b) the malicious inten- 
 tion of the mind. Cain's arm committed no sin ; 
 his mind did. 
 
 God could have paralysed Cain's arm and pre- 
 vented the blow. He permitted Cain's blow to 
 fall upon Abel, and He is therefore the Author of 
 Abel's death, which he could easily have prevented. 
 But not the Author of Cain's malice. 
 
 God permits men to do evil because He will 
 not interfere with men's free will. Abel's death 
 was not an evil to Abel, but only to Cain. In like 
 manner the martyrs' deaths are not evils to those 
 who incur them ; but only to those who inflict. St. 
 Peter, dying on the cross for Christ, incurred no 
 evil, but received a great good. St. Ignatius 
 had his leg broken at the Battle of Pampeluna. 
 That was to him not a bane, but a boon. A rob- 
 ber steals my purse. He does himself an evil; 
 but none to me, if I accept the loss as God's will 
 in my regard. God permits the thief his free 
 will to steal, but has no share in the malice of 
 the theft. 
 
 This principle is one which all the world acts 
 upon in things mundane. For instance, a judge 
 condemns a culprit to death. The executioner, 
 out of a private hatred which he bears to the 
 condemned man, exhibits a fiendish joy in de- 
 spatching him. The hangman's work in the 
 execution is innocent; his private malice is sin- 
 ful. The judge has no share in either. 
 
 A Parliament passes a Conscription Act for
 
 GOD AND THE WAR 63 
 
 the defence of the Commonwealth. A certain 
 recruiting officer, who nurses a private grudge 
 against an invalid citizen, under that law compels 
 the invalid citizen to enlist. Under the hardship 
 of camp life the delicate man dies, and his widowed 
 mother is deprived of her only maintenance. The 
 Conscription law was not blamable for that man's 
 death, which was due to the malice of the recruit- 
 ing officer. 
 
 THE EXAMPLES OF JOB AND JOSEPH. 
 
 Satan, by God's special permission, visited upon 
 Job, tremendous sufferings. Job was a very 
 rich man and beloved of God. "He was perfect 
 and upright, and one that feared God, and 
 eschewed evil." In order that Job's piety might 
 stand revealed to all men, Satan was allowed to 
 strip him of all his vast possessions and to cover 
 him with infirmity of body. His friends come 
 to him and add to his afflictions of body by describ- 
 ing God's judgments upon him to the secret sins 
 of his life. Job scarifies his comforters by telling 
 them "No doubt ye are the people, and wisdom 
 shall die with you." But he prof esseth confidence 
 in God. "Though He slay me, yet will I trust in 
 Him." "For I know that my Redeemer liveth, 
 and that He shall stand at the latter day upon the 
 earth. And though, after my death worms destroy 
 the body, yet in my flesh shall I see God." His 
 friends still taunt him that his secret wickedness 
 hath found him out. He says that wickedness often 
 goeth unpunished here, but that there is a secret 
 judgment for the wicked. God's power is infinite 
 and unsearchable. Then God rebuked Job's unjust 
 critics; showed to them Job's justice; restored all 
 his possessions, and made him twice as pros-
 
 64 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 perous as before. All Job's afflictions came from 
 God, not from the Devil, though it was ttte 
 Fiend's malice that conceived them and which 
 struck Job with them. Job himself expressly 
 says so "The Lord gave, and the Lord hath 
 taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord." 
 Commenting upon this St. Augustine says 
 
 "Behold how this holy man understood the mystery 
 of God's providence! He did not say, the Lord has given 
 me children and riches, and the Devil hath taken them 
 from me! But he said, 'the Lord hath given; the Lord 
 hath taken. As it hath pleased the Lord, and not as it 
 hath pleased the Devil, also it is done.' " 
 
 There, in a sentence, we have the philosophical 
 and theological pith of it. God was the Author 
 of Job's afflictions, and for Job's own good. The 
 Devil was the author of the malice in them; and 
 the sin was overruled for good by a loving God. 
 
 In like manner, Joseph was envied and hated by 
 his brethren. They sold him into Egypt. God 
 was the Author of their exterior act, but not of 
 their interior sin. Joseph afterwards said to his 
 brethren "So now it was not you that sent me 
 hither, but God." 
 
 The reasoning grows perspicuous. Joseph's 
 brethren simply sold Joseph, and sent him as a 
 slave to Egypt. But God, the Author of the 
 exterior act, but not of the interior sinfulness, 
 overruled all for good. 
 
 May He not do the same in this war? With- 
 out being in any way responsible for the pride 
 and ambition which inflated the caitiff Kaiser, 
 may He not have directed events to the correction 
 of creatures who have forgotten Him? 
 
 I take up Father de Lehen's exquisite book, 
 "The Way of Interior Peace." The learned 
 author is a Jesuit, who has spent a lifetime in the 
 study of patristic literature. His work bears the
 
 GOD AND THE WAR 65 
 
 sign manual of his church. Dealing with this 
 subject he says 
 
 "God wills you to be humbled and deprived of temporal 
 goods, that thereby you may become better and more 
 virtuous. It is then really not the sin that humbles you, 
 that plunges you into poverty and misery. It is the blow 
 dealt at your honor, the loss of your wealth, that pro- 
 duces those effects, for the sin itself hurts only him who 
 commits it. We must always discriminate between what 
 God accomplishes through the instrumentality of men, 
 and what their own evil will may add thereto. . . . 
 You complain that some one wrongs you, insults, slan- 
 ders, calumniates you, or unjustly robs you of your 
 property. ... I am firmly persuaded that no greater 
 joy could be granted you than that which has rendered 
 you so disconsolate. I have a thousand reasons for my 
 conviction. And if I knew all that God knows, and saw 
 the future rich with blessings resulting from these suffer- 
 ings, how strengthened I should become in my first 
 convictions." 
 
 And again in another passage which I cannot 
 resist the temptation to transcribe, he says 
 
 "We must not attribute our losses, our misfortunes, 
 our sufferings, to the evil spirit, or to man; but to their 
 true Author, God. Let us not venture to say 'This one 
 or that one is the cause of my misfortune, my ruin.' No: 
 our trials are not the work of man. They are God's 
 own work. This will redound to our greater tranquillity; 
 for all that God, the best of Fathers, does, is full of 
 infinite wisdom. All is subservient to His highest and 
 holiest purposes." 
 
 Judas Iscariot's name is always forced into the 
 mind in reasonings like these. God employed 
 Judas as the indirect instrument of Christ's death. 
 Judas's free will conceived the design of that 
 great betrayal; and God permitted the betrayer 
 to deliver Christ to His enemies. The sin was 
 Judas's, not God's. But God's was the act which 
 wrought our redemption.
 
 66 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 APPLIED TO BELGIUM. 
 
 In the light of this reasoning the critics of Dr. 
 Carr may see that while the Kaiser's war may 
 be God's war, we may still rightly contend against 
 the Kaiser's malice that began it. 
 
 God permitted the Devil to afflict holy Job ; but 
 He did not condemn Job, nor those who would 
 really bring him comfort. 
 
 God allowed Joseph's brethren to sell Joseph 
 into slavery ; but He did not condemn Pharaoh for 
 making Joseph the ruler of Egypt. 
 
 God permitted Potipher's wife to cast Joseph 
 into prison ; but He Himself by the medium of the 
 King's dream effected Joseph's rescue. 
 
 God permitted a certain man between Jerusa- 
 lem and Jericho to "fall amongst robbers;" but 
 He commended the Good Samaritan who succored 
 the victim. 
 
 God permitted Judas to betray Him; but He 
 condemned Judas for his treachery. 
 
 So God has permitted Belgium and France and 
 all the world, to suffer punishment from the 
 myrmidons of a brutal Autocrat; but He may 
 signally bless us if we assist in the punishment 
 of the criminals. 
 
 While God permits the Kaiser to wreak the full 
 measure of his malice, He may make the Allies 
 His instruments for inflicting the full measure of 
 His retribution. 
 
 Scandals indeed must come to the world; but 
 woe to him from whom the scandal cometh. 
 
 There is comfort as well as wisdom and truth 
 in this doctrine. When suffering, misfortune, 
 drought, war, sickness, calumny, or humiliation, 
 come upon us, it is very consoling to feel that 
 they come from God, our Friend; not from the 
 Devil, our enemy. 
 
 Finally, it is permitted to us to hope that Bel-
 
 GOD AND THE WAR 67 
 
 gium in this war has suffered no wrong in any 
 other sense than Job did. 
 
 If God has His omnipotent fingers on the key- 
 boards of all events; if he really sends to me 
 my business losses, and to my brother his sick- 
 ness; and if He sends to both of us alike the 
 assurance that a blessing rests on all His dis- 
 pensations; if we are convinced that He is the 
 same Father to us as He was to Job and Joseph, 
 to Peter and Paul, to all the martyrs in their 
 trials, to St. Ignatius stricken on the field why 
 may not this visitation be to poor pitiful Belgium 
 another of His crowning mercies ? 
 
 There is on this subject a very beautiful and 
 consoling passage in "The Voice of Belgium." Let 
 me give it "Alas, we have all had times in which 
 we too fell under God's reproach. . . . Never- 
 theless He will save us ; for He wills not that our 
 adversaries should boast that they, and not the 
 Eternal, did these things. 'See ye that I alone 
 am, and there is no other God beside me. I will 
 kill and I will make to live; I will strike, and I 
 will heal.' God will save Belgium, my brethren ; 
 you cannot doubt it. Nay, rather, He is saving 
 her. Across the smoke of conflagration, across 
 the stream of blood, have you not glimpses, do 
 you not perceive signs, of His love for us?" 
 Cardinal Mercier, in his Christmas Pastoral of 
 1914. 
 
 The same remark applies, of course, to France, 
 in which religious fervor has greatly increased. 
 We cannot pretend to measure with our petty 
 finite foot-rule the relations of the Infinite with 
 Belgium, or fathom the sufferings and solaces of 
 her people. But we can be sure that every wrong 
 done, both nationally and individually, has been by 
 the permission of an Omnipotence as loving as 
 He is just.
 
 68 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 "God," says the Belgian Cardinal, "has the 
 supreme art of mingling His mercy with His 
 wisdom and justice. And shall we not acknow- 
 ledge that if war is a scourge for this earthly 
 life of ours, a scourge whereof we cannot easily 
 estimate the destructive force and extent, it is also 
 for multitudes of souls an expiation, a purifica- 
 tion, a force to lift them to the pure love of their 
 country and to perfect Christian unselfishness?" 
 
 It may assuage our grief over those hapless suf- 
 ferers to remember that every injury, coming to 
 them from God, if accepted with submission and 
 resignation, may become to the sufferers a source 
 of supreme blessedness. Nor is there any undue 
 egoism in the reflection that for every drop of 
 balm which we have poured into their wounds, 
 we shall earn the divine commendations bestowed 
 on the Good Samaritan.
 
 IV. 
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR. 
 
 THE GIANT AWAKES. 
 
 Fully and broadly Great Britain is now awake. 
 Awake as she has never been since the Spanish 
 Armada. 
 
 Britons may be, have been, in the past just 
 a little unduly proud of their place in the world. 
 They have hugged the flattery of being a "scep- 
 tred isle," an "earth of majesty," "a precious 
 stone set in a silver sea," and of having oversea 
 Dominions compared to which those of Alexander 
 and Augustus were trifles. 
 
 But all Britain's former glories in military 
 achievements and in empire-building, are dwarfed 
 before the stupendous efforts which she has put 
 forth in this war. She was once spoken of by 
 one of her poets as a weary Titan staggering 
 under the vast orb of her destiny. In the last 
 three years she has flung aside every suspicion 
 of a stagger, and she now strides the narrow 
 world like a Colossus. 
 
 When the war began her German critics some- 
 times spoke of her as a "back number." She had 
 grown flabby, they said. At times she may have 
 looked like it. The greatness of the struggle 
 before her may for an instant have dazed her. But, 
 if so, it was for a moment only. The plunge of 
 
 69
 
 70 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 the great nations into a war of giants might have 
 given a shock to the stoutest hearts. But the 
 flood of a mighty purpose surged up in the 
 national bosom, and the instinctive courage of a 
 great people came with all the rush of a reaction. 
 The nation set its teeth as it had not done before 
 since Napoleon's time. 
 
 Some people, half traitors, half fools, have 
 talked about Australians being "war-weary." In 
 the name of heaven, what for? What have they 
 done? What have they suffered? What have 
 they spent on the war? What have they spent in 
 money, work, or privation? 
 
 War weary! Good Lord in Heaven! Where 
 would civilisation and freedom be now if Great 
 Britain had talked the pusillanimous rubbish of 
 being "war-weary." It is a term which the lips 
 of manhood should blush to utter. 
 
 England during the last four years has made 
 history as she never made it before. It has now 
 become a commonplace of the whole world that 
 Great Britain, the Unfit and the Unready, the des- 
 pair of Lord Roberts, and the possessor at the be- 
 ginning of the war of only a "contemptible little 
 army" has made herself, in four years, the greatest 
 war-power on earth. This does not except Ger- 
 many, with her forty years of diligent naval and 
 military preparation. 
 
 Great Britain, we are told, is spending some 
 2,500,000,000 a year on the war. In doing that, 
 she is remaking the country. By converting her 
 annual consumption of 8,000,000 tons of coal into 
 electrical power, she is saving more than half of 
 it. This, with a saving of the big products 
 hitherto wasted, will economise to the extent of 
 100,000,000 in this one article of industry alone. 
 The national motive power will be trebled. The 
 country with the highest motive power will have
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 71 
 
 the highest material prosperity. England is in- 
 deed awake. 
 
 When the war broke out in 1914, Britain had 
 no army. Her navy and her command of money 
 were all that made good her claim to rank amongst 
 the great powers. Now her navy can outmatch 
 all the navies of the world and her military 
 strength is equal to that of the strongest of her 
 enemies. The weight of her war metal in the 
 field outclasses probably that of any other single 
 belligerent. It is a story qf truly bewildering 
 achievement. It means starting from zero and 
 arming 5,000,000 of men, and keeping them armed 
 with all the most perfect appliances that modern 
 military science can suggest. 
 
 When Lord Kitchener first began to enrol his 
 army, the men came in ten times faster than the 
 equipments. There were soon hundreds of 
 thousands of soldiers in camp drilling without 
 rifles, and at the front the enemy could count ten 
 machine guns to our one. Not only was there 
 a dearth of munitions, but an absence of war fac- 
 tories, foundries, and arsenals. The rifles, the 
 bayonet, the bombs, the shells, the shrapnel, the 
 mortars, the howitzers, the great guns, had all 
 to be forged, and so had the very machinery for 
 forging them. 
 
 Never was a great nation caught in such a 
 shiftless state of lunatic unreadiness. The British 
 people had refused to believe in the imminence of 
 a great war in spite of German ostentatious pre- 
 parations. Then came the war; and then also 
 came the miracle. The nation sprang to atten- 
 tion, with more than her traditional national 
 spirit. It was as if every individual Tommy was 
 instinct with the genius of battle. War factories 
 grew, as it were, spontaneously from British 
 soil, as if the earth itself were pregnant with
 
 72 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 the requisites of a great occasion, and gave out a 
 harvest of munitions. 
 
 As an example, the item of explosives may be 
 cited. For every ton of explosives made in Eng- 
 land in September, two months after the war be- 
 gan, there were 350 times as much at the end of 
 the first war year. Even then the factories were 
 only as it were beginning. In another twelve 
 months that is by July, 1916 for every one ton 
 at the start there were 12,000 tons made, and 
 by the end of the year, the amount was 14,000 
 or an increase of 14,000 times in eighteen months. 
 This evinces an all but incredible rapidity of de- 
 velopment. Only a people virile to the very highest 
 degree of masculine capacity could have thus over- 
 taken their neglected military responsibility. 
 
 Britain sent her first troops into the firing line 
 half destitute of bombs ; but the explosive power 
 of this weapon wielded in the middle of 1916 was 
 150 times what it was at the start. In 1918, its 
 magnitude is past computation. 
 
 As it was with one weapon of offence so it was 
 all round. The Empire had not merely sharpened 
 its teeth; it had multiplied them so that it was 
 compacted of one universal bite. 
 
 Artillery ammunition multiplied by 43 times 
 between June, 1915, and November, 1917. Eng- 
 land could produce as many shells in eight days 
 in 1916 as she made in all the first year of the 
 war. She has now a multitude no man can num- 
 ber. And what she had accomplished in the 
 skill and means of making them, she had fully 
 equalled in the provision of artilleryists to use 
 them to the most deadly purpose. 
 
 Indeed at the end of 1916 the British factories 
 were turning out in a week three times as many 
 shells as they turned out all told in the first year 
 of the war. A people who can thus leap to the
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 73 
 
 task of making up a perilous leeway are a sort 
 of Supermen without being aware of it. Great 
 Britain did for herself in three years what Ger- 
 many had taken forty years to accomplish. 
 
 Her formidable guns, during the first year of 
 the war belonged to the navy. But by the middle 
 of .1916 her artillery of all calibres was ten times 
 what it was in 1915, and the Germans found that 
 no system of trenches or dugouts was immune 
 against the unexampled weight of modern metal. 
 
 A better understanding of this may be conveyed 
 by the statement that putting the average monthly 
 product of the first year at 100, that of December, 
 1916, was about 2500. The amount of prevision 
 which all this entailed can only be gradually ap- 
 prehended. A million square feet of new ground 
 had to be covered by factory buildings. No 
 fewer than 14,000 women were engaged in the In- 
 spection Department alone because of the ex- 
 treme necessity for every gun and shell being able 
 to pass the safety test. It is not always that the 
 hour brings forth the man; but it did in this 
 case. 
 
 Mr. Lloyd George was the first Minister of 
 Munitions. It seemed on one side of his charac- 
 ter as if he were born to do nothing else than 
 multiply weapons of death. 
 
 The British army scarcely fired any high ex- 
 plosive shells until after the battle of Loos in 
 1915, because the danger from premature ex- 
 plosion had not been mastered. At that battle, 
 as the Minister of Munitions informed the House 
 of Commons, the "prematures" were so bad in 
 damaging the guns by bursting just at the muzzles 
 that they had to be given up. The knowledge of 
 how to eliminate this danger had to be learned in 
 the process of "filling" and "fusing." It was 
 learned, and learned very rapidly. The very ap-
 
 74 WAK THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 pearance of some manufacturing towns in Eng- 
 land was changed, owing to the number of new 
 factories built and equipped with machinery and 
 tools. The trade unionists, on an appeal to their 
 patriotism, surrendered all their rules and cus- 
 toms which throttled production, and efficiency 
 leaped forward towards perfection. 
 
 The women became a great factor in this vital 
 work of offensive preparation. There were as 
 many as 400 processes in which women had never 
 worked before the war; but at the end of 1916, 
 400,000 women were engaged in almost all kinds 
 of this labor of attending to automatic machinery. 
 Indeed, so successful were they that one engineer 
 declared that when those women had had two 
 years more experience, he would undertake with 
 them to build a battleship complete from the keel 
 upwards. 
 
 Have we Australians ever opened our eyes to 
 the grandeur of these British achievements? If 
 we have, should we not be full of a noble ambition 
 to emulate them as far as we are able ? 
 
 BRITAIN'S ACHIEVEMENTS IN FINANCE. 
 
 If Australians are inclined to plume themselves 
 on what they have done, they may profitably 
 dwell a few minutes on what Great Britain has 
 accomplished in the single item of finance. 
 
 After Britain's hurried mobilisation of the 
 navy, her first thought was towards finance. The 
 sinews of war must be made tense. A war against 
 Germany's tremendous equipments demanded 
 gold in waggon loads. Men with big ideas grasped 
 the situation instantly. The Boer War had cost
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 75 
 
 250,000,000 in two years. But here was a con- 
 flict which would swallow up that sum in a couple 
 of months. 
 
 The imperial mind became imperial in concep- 
 tion. It leaped to a comprehension of the mone- 
 tary aspect as it did to other phases, with an al- 
 most royalty of vision. It could not forecast all 
 the future, but it took in the great fact that the 
 struggle was to be a fight for life to the death. 
 
 So it has happened that in finance as in other 
 departments of the war, Great Britain has out- 
 distanced the whole world, her previous self in- 
 cluded. A month after the first gun was fired 
 in Belgium, the House of Commons voted a war- 
 credit of 100,000,000. Three months later it 
 voted another credit of 225,000,000. That was 
 a financial opening worthy of an empire at the 
 world's apex. 
 
 At the end of eight months the money spent 
 was 362,000,000, or an average of 1,500,000 a 
 day. This was more by over a hundred millions 
 than the whole Boer war had cost, and so far 
 Kitchener was only just beginning to enrol his 
 army. 
 
 The nation which had been called a "back num- 
 ber" was at once a thrilling "Live Extraordinary." 
 The first war loan was for 350,000,000. It was 
 subscribed within a week by 100,000 investors. 
 
 For the next two months the expenditure went 
 up to 2,600,000 a day. By the end of the first 
 twelve months of the war that is in July, 1915 
 the daily outlay was 3,000,000. A year later 
 it was 5,000,000 daily. It is now more than 
 6,000,000 and it is still rising. There was not 
 the ghost of a grumble anywhere, unless it were 
 that the Government had not spent fast enough. 
 
 Well known freetraders forgot their Cobdenism, 
 and urged the Government to put new taxation
 
 76 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 on imports, both to get more money and to pre- 
 vent the entrance of foreign goods. 
 
 At the end of the first year the total war cost 
 stood at 686,000,000. The second year's cost 
 was 1,465,000,000. It meant that every British 
 citizen had been called upon to put at least half 
 of his income at the disposal of the State, either 
 in loan or taxation. What have "war-weary" 
 Australians done to approach that per capita? 
 
 Early in 1917, the British Government asked 
 for a 600,000,000 "Victory War Loan." It got 
 1,000,000,000. That single sentence expresses 
 a volume of intense patriotism. "Money talks," 
 say the cute Yankees. But money does more. 
 It acts. Money is a good soldier. That thousand 
 million Loan spoke of a bulldog grip and deter- 
 mination. Will our Australian people try to 
 understand what it means to take a thousand mil- 
 lions sterling of cash out of the pockets of 
 45,000,000 people? Nothing like it had ever be- 
 fore been known on this planet. It put the crown 
 on patriotic fervor. 
 
 Women who had no money to give or invest sent 
 their jewels. Eighty-seven citizens advanced 
 196,000 free of interest. Forty-four others made 
 free gifts of 66,000. People rose above all nor- 
 mal level in sacrifices quite stupendous. There 
 was an abandonment of all limitation. The only 
 goal was winning the war. The War Lords had 
 but to ask, and the people of England gave. The 
 national purse was as open as that of Fortunatus. 
 
 At the beginning of the war, the British national 
 debt was 700,000,000. On March 31st, 1917, it 
 was 4,900,000,000. Now it is about 
 7,000,000,000. This is at the rate of about 
 150 per head. 
 
 There is a good deal of the same kind that 
 may be said showing that English courage and
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 77 
 
 energy were as phenomenal in her treasury chests 
 as they are deathless in the splendid men who 
 faced shot and shell, frost,, mud and water in the 
 trenches. Will any Australian, contemplating 
 this, tolerate the dastard, faint-hearted poltroon 
 who talks about Australia being "war- weary" ? 
 
 WHAT THE MONEY WAS SPENT IN. 
 
 Mrs. Humphrey Ward has written two books on 
 the war. They are both of them records of 
 Britain's wonderful achievements. The first of 
 them was called "England's Effort." The second, 
 issued last year, was called "Towards the Goal." 
 Both of them alike stir the pulses of the blood. 
 Theodore Roosevelt says in his foreword to Mrs. 
 Humphrey Ward's latest book : "England has in 
 this war reached a height of achievement loftier 
 than that she attained in the struggle wih Napo- 
 leon, and she has reached this height in a far 
 shorter time. England, when on the brink of 
 destruction, gathered her strength and strode 
 resolutely back to safety. A considerable time 
 elapsed before it was possible to make the English 
 people understand that this was a people's war, 
 and of vital concern to the people. In America 
 we are now encountering much the same difficul- 
 ties." Alas, in Australia, one half of the people 
 have not yet realised it. We must hope that their 
 knowledge may not come too late. That know- 
 ledge is of high value as an inspiration to con- 
 structive patriotism. 
 
 We are lost in the magnitude of what our Im- 
 perial Mother has done. At the beginning of 
 the war the navy had a personnel of 140,000. 
 It has now 400,000. And there is no part of
 
 78 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Britain's naval strength that is not incomparably 
 greater than it was in 1914. Its increase of ton- 
 nage is well over a million tons. 
 
 Sometimes we think of the navy as quiescent. 
 Here is an eye-opener: 
 
 1. Eight millions of men moved across the 
 sea almost without mishap. 
 
 2. Ten million tons of explosives carried to 
 the Allies. 
 
 3. A million and a quarter horses and mules 
 carried across the sea. 
 
 4. Forty-seven million gallons of petrol sup- 
 plied to the armies. 
 
 5. 25,000 ships examined for contraband on 
 the high seas. 
 
 The current of hot energy started by Lloyd 
 George in the ammunition shops has never died 
 down. There is the economic side of it too. 
 
 Take one instance. Near to a military camp 
 is a fat factory, which utilised all the food refuse 
 of the camp to get glycerine for the explosives 
 for millions of eighteen pounder shells. It is 
 genius. The refuse of the camp was used up 
 sanitarily and turned into a 240 per cent, profit. 
 
 "This pitiless war," says an author, "seems to 
 have revealed to England herself the quality of 
 her race." Can any Australian, save the cravens 
 who are "war- weary," note this unmoved? Last 
 year the output of eighteen pounder shells was 
 twenty-eight times as much as in 1914. Unlike 
 those of Australia, her efforts increase as the war 
 goes on. England at first had barrack room for 
 only 176,000 men. But soon the limit reached 
 to a million. Fancy what that meant timber, 
 lighting, labor, water, drainage, roads every- 
 thing. Uniforms, too. In a year and a half 
 En<r1arr! had not only equinped her own troops, 
 but was manufacturing for her Allies. The pro-
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 79 
 
 blem had been to find the shortest cut to the mak- 
 ing of an army. Britain found it. And the 
 army she made was the equal of our Australian 
 Anzacs but twenty times as great. 
 
 One wistfully longs that the Australian mind 
 may fully grasp these wonderful things of what 
 the Imperial Mother has done. If it do so, it 
 cannot remain degenerate in achievement. It 
 is so easy to write and read of it afterwards. But 
 the work itself was, as Mrs. Ward says, "per- 
 petual, highly-organised, scientific drudgery." Do 
 the drudgeries and the brutalities of war brutalise 
 the soldier? An eminent General says: "I see 
 no signs of it. The kindness of the men to each 
 other, to the wounded whether British or Ger- 
 man to the French civilians, especially the 
 women and children is as marked as ever it was. 
 It is astonishing the good behavior of the men in 
 the French towns." 
 
 With one pair of eyes one can only see a frac- 
 tion of what is in truth going on. But the whole 
 effect is one of vast and increasing industry. We 
 can only stand amazed at the brain-power which 
 conceived it, and the industry which executed it? 
 "I don't think," says an officer, "that I ever before 
 rated the British soldier at his proper value. 
 When he is not in the trenches his discomforts 
 are enough to kill any ordinary mortal. When 
 he is in the trenches it is a mixture between the 
 North Pole and Hell. I don't think England has 
 ever had as much cause to be proud as she has 
 to-day." 
 
 At home and abroad the feeling is on the heroic 
 level. Thus : "I know many of the dear fellows 
 don't come back. What then? They will have 
 done their job." 
 
 The work done at home in England was quite 
 as important as the work done in the trenches.
 
 80 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 The soldiers understood it. One of them wrote : 
 "You see, at first we used to know that our guns 
 were not nearly so many as the Germans, and 
 that we hadn't the stuff to put over. Now we just 
 climb out of a trench and walk behind a curtain of 
 fire. It makes a difference. It seems to me we 
 are steadily beating the Boche at his own game." 
 
 Nor is it only in the work of destruction that 
 the efforts of Britain have gone on. That vast 
 section of the war concerned with the care and 
 transport of the wounded, like everything else, has 
 been steadily and eagerly perfected during the 
 past year. Never have the wounded in battle, 
 in any war, been so tenderly and skilfully cared 
 for. 
 
 Mrs. Ward's books are a record of the monu- 
 mental war preparation, rushed to perfection in 
 three years. That preparation eclipses all the 
 flights of the most vivid imagination. Can Aus- 
 tralians contemplate it and say that they have 
 already done enough? Can they say that their 
 policy should be "Australia first"? Do they not 
 see that they are partners in Empire, and that 
 partnership involves that each partner has equal 
 duties with the rest? 
 
 BRITISH EFFORTS A SPUR TO AMERICA. 
 
 During the first two years of the war the Ameri- 
 cans got a very false notion of British energy. 
 From erroneous reports, and the very large pur- 
 chases of munitions, they judged that Great 
 Britain was lazy. Some of the papers said she 
 was "taking the war lying down." There never 
 was a greater libel on a great nation's marvel- 
 lous efforts. Britain then began a press propa- 
 ganda to enlighten the Americans as to what she
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 81 
 
 was doing. The truth, when it became known, 
 fired American enthusiasm, and no doubt did 
 much towards eventually bringing America into 
 the war. 
 
 The fact was just what Lord Rosebery said of 
 it "Our exertions since the war began are super- 
 human." Democracies are never prepared for 
 war. It is not their trade. Britain was incred- 
 ibly unprepared. But as soon as Belgium was 
 invaded, she knew the die was cast, and her 
 exertions resembled the energy of a volcano. The 
 "flannelled fools" that Kipling had gibed at, left 
 the wicket, every one of them, and shouldered their 
 rifles instead of their bats. In the coinage of a 
 French phrase, England "improvised the impos- 
 sible." 
 
 She raised 60 per cent, of her total recruitable 
 strength in a few months. Nothing so colossal 
 had ever a record in history. And as the Tom- 
 mies sprang into life, there followed their equip- 
 ment. Shops, factories, camps, leaped almost 
 literally out of the soil. One passed through the 
 country and his guide said: "A year ago, this 
 was all green fields. Now those works employ 
 12,000 workpeople, of whom nearly half are 
 women, who as workers are a triumphant suc- 
 cess." 
 
 "How do you account for it?" 
 
 "How? Why for one thing the raids on the 
 east coast. Yes, the shattered houses and the 
 maimed women and children. Oh ! these women 
 workers are splendid. They don't mind what they 
 do, nor how long they work. Sometimes twelve 
 hours a day, and seven days a week. Go and ask 
 them if they are tired. The women laugh at 
 the question. They were well fed and money was 
 plentiful, but beneath it all was the exultant boast : 
 "We are helping our soldiers to win this war !"
 
 82 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Money was in it lots. But there was a great 
 deal more than money in it. There was a grim 
 sense of honorable self -consciousness. The girls 
 and women amongst their own machinery would 
 look up at a passing visitor as much as to say: 
 "Yes, we are all in it. All doing our bit, helping 
 the boys at the front." 
 
 In one factory out of thousands that could be 
 named, 1,200 machines were erected, and all their 
 shell products were made by women. Yes. Eng- 
 lish women have done almost as much to save Eng- 
 land as English men have. Hardly ever a shirker 
 amongst them. 
 
 No doubt, Lloyd George was the mercury which 
 put energy into the national spirit. His speeches 
 were clarion calls : "Unless we quicken our move- 
 ments damnation will fall on the sacred cause for 
 which so much gallant blood has flowed." And 
 then the German raid did the rest. The word 
 ran through all England: "Hustle, lads! quicker 
 and quicker! more guns! more shells!" 
 
 As to the women, the memory of their fervor 
 comes again and again. "They are not so strong 
 as the men," says a sweet-faced forewoman ; "but 
 look at them. What they lack in strength, they 
 make up in patriotic spirit." 
 
 You go and ask them as they file away to their 
 meals "Are they not tired? What makes you 
 come so cheerfully to this hard man's work?" 
 "Tired?" they answer. "No! We just feel that 
 we must come here and help to kill Germans!" 
 
 In making the heavy shells, men were provided 
 at first to do the lifting, but the women soon 
 thrust them aside. 
 
 It is easy to write about it; but the perform- 
 ances of some of the men too were sustainable 
 only by the highest effort of brave spirits. The 
 exhausting nature of some work on the Clyde can
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 83 
 
 only be known by those engaged on it. Men worked 
 from 50 to 100 hours a week amongst a noise from 
 steam hammers so deafening, and a heat from 
 molten metal so weakening, that most of them 
 were deaf for life. 
 
 Well might Walter Long, the least boastful 
 member of the House of Commons, exclaim in a 
 speech there : "Say what you like ; blame, criticise 
 as you like ! But what this country has done since 
 August, 1914, is an almost incredible story." And 
 so it is. Not only were the soldiers, the workers, 
 the women to be provided, but the places to put 
 them in; the docks, the long lines of ships, the 
 horses, the timber, the rations, the fodder, the 
 coal, the coke, the petrol. Camps and depots are 
 put up "while you wait." 
 
 There was one thing especially that is to be 
 placed to the credit of labor. What is called 
 "dilution of labor" was abhorrent to trades 
 unionism. It seems that in special trades such 
 as engineering, there are certain classes of work 
 that on a pinch can be done by unskilled labor. 
 Unionism is jealous against that mixture. But 
 when it was found that war-efficiency demanded 
 it, the tradesmen gave way to the country's needs. 
 
 In this they did what other classes did in other 
 ways. The war to a great extent put an end to 
 the frivolities of the rich ; to the old wasteful din- 
 ner parties; to great receptions; and to more 
 than half of the drink, chatter and gay dresses of 
 women. There arose a fashion of wearing old 
 clothes, and though the children of the artisans 
 were better dressed than before, the war-spirit 
 evinced itself in a thousand forms of voluntary 
 sacrifice. 
 
 Australia has seen very little of this. We have 
 not suffered anything. Are we to be recreant in a 
 time of noble endeavor? Will we not at least
 
 84 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 fill the bill in the new war loan? When all this 
 became known in America it produced a wonder- 
 ful effect. 
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND AUSTRALIA COMPARED. 
 
 There are men amongst us here who are still 
 not ashamed to shriek from disloyal platforms; 
 "Australia first !" They mean that Australians are 
 not to consider the Empire at large ; to forget Bel- 
 gium and her sufferings, Servia and her martyr- 
 dom, France and her crucifixion. They are to 
 consider Australia first and to refuse further ser- 
 vice, on the grounds that they have done enough. 
 
 It is certain that such people cannot have 
 considered the stupendous part which Britain has 
 played, or they would be ashamed to say that Aus- 
 tralia has already done her share. 
 
 It is only very gradually that the full meaning 
 of Britain's prodigious financial contributions to 
 the war can be apprehended. We can get a grip 
 of it by comparison. Great Britain is now spend- 
 ing on the war 45,000,000 per week, or 1 per 
 head of her people. In Australia we are spend- 
 ing 1,500,000 per week or 6/- per head of our 
 people. Yet head per head, the Victorian Statist 
 says, we in Australia are richer by 69 per head 
 in accumulated wealth than are the people of Great 
 Britain. 
 
 But it is not in money alone that Britain has 
 poured unstinted treasure into this war. She has 
 sent men as freely as she has sent gold. Lord 
 Kitchener said he wanted a voluntary army of 
 3,000,000 and he got them in twelve months. The 
 German atrocities in Belgium, and the Hun threats 
 to Europe had done to England the work that her 
 foresight had failed in. She was aroused as 
 though by the note of a bugle-horn. She had
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 85 
 
 slept through all Lord Roberta's earnest warnings. 
 She had persisted in sleeping. But she was now 
 awake, and at the end of the first year of the 
 war she was as full of life as a disturbed 
 hive of bees, and almost as angry. The roar of 
 the German cannon had done it. As the first blast 
 of war blew across the Channel, she started up 
 as a young dozing giant might spring up at the 
 sting of a scorpion. Nor has she even for an in- 
 stant dozed again. 
 
 There had gone abroad before the war a notion 
 that Britain was a spent force, a played-out 
 nation, sunk in luxury, an Empire on the down- 
 ward slope of decline. German military experts, 
 seeing her unpreparedness, regarded her as eaten 
 up with the dry-rot of indulgence, and quite in- 
 capable of emulating her historical past. 
 
 All the world knew that British Statesmen were 
 passionately attached to peace. They hated to 
 hear the eternal clank of the German sabre. They 
 persisted in believing that the sabre would not 
 strike. And when wise soldiers like Roberts im- 
 plored them to listen to the rumblings of menace 
 about them, the eternal national optimism made 
 them hope for the best, and go on neglecting all 
 military preparation. 
 
 Those English Statesmen went near to the 
 sacrifice of British dignity in their appeals to 
 Germany and Austria to submit their complaints 
 to an International Conference. But if it were 
 ever true, as surmised, that high living, laziness, 
 and luxury, had sapped somewhat the ancient 
 British resoluteness of purpose, the German viola- 
 tion of the Belgian Pact was a perfect prophy- 
 lactic. Consideration like an angel came to 
 Britain and whipped all the dross of effeminacy 
 out of her. 
 
 At that great challenge, she sprang up instantly,
 
 86 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 with the fierce fire of war in her blazing eyes, 
 resolute and iron-hearted. 
 
 In the early period of the war Henry James, 
 the novelist, wrote a few lines which very clearly 
 express this national resurrection. He said: "This 
 grand old country has found herself again found 
 her soul, and her special store of energy, thereby 
 renewing her genius and her sincerity. That 
 nation is taking it all, and doing it, facing it, and 
 meaning it, worthily and splendidly. At this 
 hour she is in a perfectly magnificently moral 
 position, the proudest to my mind of her history, 
 and the considerable, the very considerable de- 
 ficiencies in her material preparations are only 
 the more shining evidences of that." 
 
 Kitchener improvised armies as if by magic. 
 His regiments sprang into life as if by the touch 
 of an enchanter's wand. Just as Roderick Dhu's 
 whistle. 
 
 "garrisoned the glen, 
 At once with full five hundred men," 
 
 so Kitchener's call made all civilian England mar- 
 tial. The blast of war which withered the cities 
 of doomed Belgium, filled every square mile oi 
 Britain with armed men panting to avenge the 
 horrors of German cruelty. 
 
 But this was for men only. When at the end 
 of twelve months Kitchener had got his first three 
 millions of fighting men, it was found that that 
 was only a beginning. More men and still more 
 were wanted. One man in every fifteen of the 
 population had volunteered, and still the cry was 
 "More!" 
 
 In the light of these facts can any self-respect-
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 87 
 
 ing Australian say that we have done enough ? He 
 knows that we can never have done enough till we 
 have done all we can do. But there are those 
 amongst us who meanly say that Australia has 
 done enough. We may answer this by showing 
 her performances compared with those of Great 
 Britain, head for head, and pound for pound of 
 her resources. 
 
 Three gigantic tasks were undertaken and car- 
 ried through by Great Britain. 
 
 The first was her providing of about 
 6,000,000,000 of money for war purposes. 
 
 The second was the enlistment of 5,000,000 of 
 fighting men. 
 
 The third was the supply of guns, shells, ships, 
 and all war material in such abundance that no 
 German force has been able to stand before her 
 greatest attacks. 
 
 All that has been done and done so thoroughly 
 that Great Britain is now a leading military 
 power of the world. 
 
 Great Britain's population is 45,000,000. Of 
 these 5,000,000 are in arms, and another 5,000,000 
 are making arms, ships, and munitions of war. 
 That means that two in every nine of her people 
 are so employed. Australia from a population of 
 5,000,000 raised 350,000 soldiers in the same time, 
 or one in every sixteen of her people. 
 
 The measure of those British efforts is the 
 measure of her Imperial greatness; it is the 
 measure of her pluck and patriotism. They are 
 all on the gigantic scale. The Dominions take a 
 laudable pride in having done well. They have 
 done so. But a comparison of Commonwealth 
 efforts with those of Britain will show the unap- 
 proachable achievements of our Imperial Mother.
 
 88 
 
 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 The appended table is but a sketch: 
 
 Class of Service. 
 
 Great [Common- 
 Britain. I wealth. 
 
 Spent on the war per capita 
 30th September, 1917 . . 
 
 Average per capita wealth 
 in Commonwealth and 
 Great Britain, 1911 .... 
 
 British Victory War Loan 
 1917, per capita yield 
 and Commonwealth do. . 
 
 British and Australian 
 weekly expenditure on 
 the war per capita .... 
 
 Percentage of British and 
 Commonwealth War 
 Workers 
 
 Conscription 
 
 121 
 
 153 
 
 22 
 
 1 
 
 22% 
 (Accepted. 
 
 38 
 222 
 
 4 
 
 Refused. 
 
 That table is given, not to undervalue the ser- 
 vices rendered by Australia, but to indicate the 
 superlative efforts which have been made by our 
 Imperial Mother, and to show by implication that 
 we are far, as yet, from having done our full 
 share. 
 
 It serves another purpose. It evinces the large- 
 ness of Great Britain's heart, the grandeur of her 
 courage, and her all but unlimited resources. She 
 shines resplendently in many a page of history. 
 She has had in full measure her golden days of 
 historic glory. But her efforts in this war have 
 surpassed all her highest by-gone achievements. 
 She has beggared her own past history by the bril- 
 liancy of her present exploits. And what perhaps 
 is quite as much to the purpose, she has out- 
 stripped every possible forecast. 
 
 Great Britain stands before the world to-day, 
 with an invincible navy, and a fighting power of
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 89 
 
 five millions of the best soldiers that the earth ever 
 saw. And she has besides an array of airships 
 and artillery unequalled by any other belligerent. 
 
 Three years of bloody and costly war have placed 
 her almost first amongst the war-giants of the 
 world. She was in the first and bitterest tug of 
 the war in France ; and at the Marne she helped 
 to roll back the tide of invasion from Paris. She 
 has been fighting ever since whenever a German 
 is to be met or hunted, and she never gives a whine 
 that she is "war-weary." 
 
 It seems almost true in a sense that she has 
 thriven on the war. Her strength has grown 
 the more it has been exerted. The German 
 strength was at its maximum at the start, and has 
 been diminishing ever since. The British power 
 began at zero, and has been mounting all the 
 time. 
 
 Great Britain has given, in addition to her five 
 millions of fighting men, an equal number for 
 other war services. 
 
 She has lent to her Allies 500,OOOjOOO towards 
 replenishing their war-chests. 
 
 She has driven every German ship from the 
 surface of the ocean. 
 
 She has stripped Germany bare of every square 
 yard of Colonial territory. 
 
 She is now the most amazing spectacle of 
 strength that a warring world ever looked upon. 
 
 She was dragged into the war without any- 
 thing that could be called an army. Only about 
 three small army corps against forty in Germany. 
 Indeed she was an object of derision to the spike- 
 helmeted Kaiser, who sneered at Britain's "con- 
 temptible little army." 
 
 It was indeed little! And mighty were the 
 millions which it had to meet. But it was never 
 "contemptible" even in its unreadiest days. Von
 
 90 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Kluck found this out during his march from Mons 
 to the Marne. He found it also in the blow which 
 that army struck in turning the fortunes of the 
 battle. And he found it again in his retreat to 
 the Aisne. Britain's army of a few thousands 
 had to contend against German armies counted 
 by the million. And she made good. Her atti- 
 tude was exactly that recommended by Polonius to 
 his son. Beware of entrance to a quarrel, but 
 being in it, bear it so that the enemy may beware 
 of thee. That she did in a manner so thorough, 
 that as a fighting force she can always review her 
 record with a sense of pride. In fact, never be- 
 fore did her national spirit rise to so vast an occa- 
 sion, and rise so vastly. 
 
 She stands to-day facing the future, stronger 
 than at any previous period of her history, and 
 more invincible in her resolution for victory, than 
 on the day when her sword first flashed from its 
 scabbard. * 
 
 She has blundered, of course. She always does. 
 For that matter so do all other nations. But her 
 blunders have been all redeemable. Her mighty 
 heart at the centre of Empire has never once 
 blanched with the infirmity of a doubt or of a 
 divided duty. 
 
 BRITISH NATIONAL SACRIFICE, 
 
 That acceptance of Conscription by the British 
 democracy marks the high water mark of Bri- 
 tish patriotism. It was the casting behind of 
 the lower self, and the proclamation that men 
 and women were raised above themselves by a 
 sublime devotion to the dear old flag. Australia 
 very nearly did the same thing, but just fell short 
 of it. 
 
 The British people hated Conscription quite as
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 91 
 
 much as did the Australian. The British are 
 a non-military people. They have always been 
 so. Conscription was alien to the national habit 
 of thinking. Britain had never submitted to it. 
 It has always been their boast that in all Europe 
 they alone were exempt from the abhorred prin- 
 ciple of compulsory universal military service. 
 
 And yet, when it became clear, as it did after 
 twelve months, that the nation could not exert its 
 full powers under a system of voluntary enlist- 
 ment, every class of the country accepted the 
 policy which was so distasteful. It was a triumph 
 of generous patriotism. It was a recognition 
 that a true democracy demanded equal sacrifice 
 from all. It must be admitted that there were 
 many wry mouths. It was equivalent to the 
 swallowing of a nauseous draught. But it was 
 gulped down by the people at home with a resolu- 
 tion worthy of the men who were fighting abroad. 
 
 Whenever the story shall be fully told of how the 
 British political leaders adopted Conscription, the 
 remembrance of it will be sweet with the flavor 
 of the most exalted patriotism. All those leaders 
 quite consciously took the great risk of going con- 
 trary to the wish of their supporters. They all 
 knew that Conscription as a principle was alien 
 to British thought. But they saw that it was 
 a weapon which was needed to win the war, and 
 that was enough. 
 
 Early in 1917, Mr. Bonar Law, the Conservative 
 leader, paid a generous and graceful tribute to 
 the conspicuous patriotism of English Labor, 
 whose leaders in the House of Commons had sub- 
 ordinated all party aims before a burning desire 
 to defend the Empire. The threat of German 
 f rightfulness had achieved the miracle of welding 
 the warring elements of class antagonism, and 
 bringing the nation to an invincible determination 
 of national defence.
 
 92 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Herein the Mother Country showed herself 
 superior to the public spirit of the Australian 
 Dominions. Mr. Bonar Law was the representa- 
 tive of capitalists in the House of Commons, but 
 speaking as a Briton rather than as the Conser- 
 vative leader, he avowed his pride in contemplat- 
 ing the first three months' record of the war. The 
 pride was because of the manner in which all 
 classes alike had sprung to attention at the call 
 of the Empire. Britons had shown, he said, a 
 self-forgetfulness born of a common peril in a 
 common cause. In other words a great nation 
 had found the spring of its own greatness. 
 
 All Britain's Allies were fighting under Con- 
 scription. To those Allies it was a long habit. 
 To England it was a repellant thing. But Britons 
 felt that they were in a partnership of peril, when 
 each owed to all his partners the utmost of what 
 was in him. They scorned the doctrine of "Eng- 
 land First." Or the still more abominable selfish- 
 ness of Sinn Fein "ourselves alone." It was 
 every man for the Allied cause, and the Allies 
 for all. Such a thought as that which here cries 
 "Australia First" would have been denounced as 
 treason to the common faith of each for all. 
 
 So it was that Great Britain ranged herself 
 beside her Allies as a conscript nation for the 
 first time in modern history. She then stood on 
 the same plane as Russia, Japan, Italy, and France. 
 Great Britain owed to them this voluntary sacri- 
 fice, and she paid it like a sport. She never 
 stood before the world in an attitude of more stir- 
 ring honor then she did that day when her Par- 
 liament passed the Conscription Act. It was as 
 if the whole nation were volunteering as a storm- 
 ing party, moved by the highest sense of duty. 
 Britain, of course, knew in her soul that self-de- 
 fence is the first law of nature, and that Con-
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 93 
 
 scription, being the supreme means of self-de- 
 fence, by it she was facing the issue life or 
 death. 
 
 It was a wonderful evolution of national life. 
 The strongest, readiest, and most virile in the 
 land at least 5,000,000 of them who were with 
 the colors. Women and boys as far as possible 
 had filled the places vacated by the soldiers. Miners 
 could not be so easily replaced. They met the 
 difficulty by working double tasks. 
 
 Then arose the munitions problems. The great 
 foundries of the land must be commandeered. 
 They must give up their ordinary tasks and must 
 manufacture shot, shells, guns, and bayonets. The 
 normal life of the nation had to be turned topsy- 
 turvey. The project was gigantic. Lloyd-George 
 faced it faced it with the flash and fire of genius. 
 Old businesses had to stop and new ones replace 
 them. The machinery of peace was by a stroke 
 converted into the machinery of war. 
 
 The response of the people was splendid. The 
 Labor unionist gave up his strike, the sons of peers 
 enlisted as private soldiers, marching by Tommy's 
 side as a Tommy. Every workshop was made to 
 hum. Every available acre of land was tilled. 
 Bonuses were offered for grain. No square yard 
 of English ground must remain barren. Since 
 nearly ten millions of men were taken away from 
 their ordinary occupations, women, girls, and 
 boys took up the parable and gave every ounce 
 of energy in the place of those gone. 
 
 The times were great. The pettiness of life 
 was driven out. Men- breathed a rarer atmos- 
 phere, in which trivialities found no place. 
 Moneybags gave up his gold in great heaps. Dukes' 
 sons, and cooks' sons, from palace and kitchen, 
 were there ready for any task. Delicate women
 
 94 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 flocked to the nursing ward, and even to the 
 plough. 
 
 Every national achievement in British history 
 pales before those war preparations of 1914-15. 
 There was a spontaneous burst of fervor through 
 the land. All people took up their tasks and 
 did them for dear life. They saluted the flag 
 that symbolised honor; they cheered a King who 
 was an object of loyalty. They pledged them- 
 selves for the integrity of a map. They inured 
 their bodies to hardship; they abjured the siren 
 call of pleasure; they left the silken couch and 
 its perfumed atmosphere; they donned rough 
 uniforms; they stood knee-deep in trench mud; 
 they even suffered the intolerable stench of putre- 
 fying corpses. 
 
 Those who are left of them are to-day higher 
 beings, stronger, harder, even happier for all they 
 have endured. Those who are dead, sleep well, 
 and innocent of the atrocious slander that they 
 died in a "sordid trade war." The spirit that 
 forged those armies struck the foe with the thun- 
 derbolts of Jove. 
 
 JOHN BULL AND His FAMILY. 
 
 The;*e is an imperial aspect of this war that 
 shines like a sun in a sky of darkness. It is the 
 rushing together of all the sections of the Empire 
 in an out-pouring of love. 
 
 When the Mother Country declared war against 
 the Teuton tyrant, because of his invasion of 
 Belgium, she had no time to sound the pulses of 
 her children oversea. For anything she knew she 
 might have stood alone. Her great duty looked 
 like an unmitigated evil. She did it, and in 
 doing it builded better than she knew. 
 
 She began this greatest task of her whole im-
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 95 
 
 perial life with no thought of "mere sordid trade 
 war." She was a guarantor for Belgium and an 
 ally of France. She faced her obligations without 
 one hesitating moment. She had far-scattered 
 Dominions at all the ends of the earth. Not one 
 of them was under any constitutional obligation 
 to come to her assistance. 
 
 Indeed, Germany had expressly calculated that 
 all the constituent parts of the British Empire 
 would fall asunder under the disintegrating in- 
 fluences of the war. Australia was to go. Canada 
 was to go. South Africa was surely to go. And 
 India was rife for revolt. So calculated the Ger- 
 man. John Bull had no guarantee, no assurance. 
 But under the bond of honor and the righteous- 
 ness of his cause, he made war. 
 
 The path of duty proved to be the path of wis- 
 dom and prudence. That which was to disrupt 
 the Empire demonstrated its solidarity, and its 
 strength. It demonstrated it to the whole world. 
 Each and all of the autonomous Dominions in that 
 supreme crisis of Imperial life leaped to the 
 Empire's side, armed and equipped. In a week, 
 in a day, the British Empire stood forth in the 
 blazing light of a formidable proclamation of 
 unity of purpose. It was a spectacle unique in 
 the family of nations. The earth had never seen 
 the parallel. 
 
 Young and strong, hearty and full of fervor, 
 Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and South 
 Africa sent their legions to their mother's side. 
 And India furnished her dusky warriors and her 
 gold with an equal spontaneity. 
 
 Our Imperial Mother stood up before the eyes 
 of the gazing and astonished nations with a 
 stature more than ever superb and imposing. The 
 war did not make British greatness. It revealed 
 it. Great Britain, before this war-fury burst,
 
 96 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 had sat in the counsels of the world, the affable 
 advocate of peace, easy-tempered and the foe of 
 tyranny and injustice. Perhaps John Bull loved 
 his ease too much. But with the first cannon 
 shot fired in Belgium, he was a transformed being. 
 The following verses give a half -humorous, half- 
 tragic description of his lightning change : 
 
 JOHN BULL AND His FAMILY. 
 
 John Bull is a breezy and rollicking soul, 
 
 As he sits in his easy chair. 
 He smokes his pipe, and swallows his swipe, 
 
 And offers his friends a share. 
 He smoothes the wrinkles put of his vest, 
 
 And he rubs his hand with glee, 
 As he laughs from the roots of his hair to his 
 
 boots, 
 In the depths of his jollitee. 
 
 Quaffing and chaffing, 
 Joking and laughing, 
 Sits jolly old John in his old arm-chair. 
 
 He's a hundred youngsters, great and small, 
 
 State-building over the sea, 
 He joys in them all, growing strong and tall, 
 
 And taking their place with the free. 
 He cries to them all " Yo ! ho ! Good cheer ! 
 
 My bonnie brave sons, be true." 
 "Good cheer, Dad, dear! And a Happy New 
 
 Year!" 
 
 They reply ; "And the same to you." 
 So soaking and smoking, 
 Provoking and joking, 
 Sits jolly old John in his old arm-chair. 
 
 And day by day John sturdier grows, 
 And sounder in wind and limb.
 
 He smiles upon foes, for he very well knows 
 
 No two are a match for him. 
 If they frown, John cries : "No harm in a growl ! 
 
 I've done it myself for fun, 
 So have your growl and enjoy your scowl; 
 You'll smile again when your done." 
 So humming and strumming, 
 "A good time is coming." 
 Sits jolly old John in his old arm-chair. 
 
 But, ah! John's brow is as black as night. 
 
 "The Devil!" roars John, and swore: 
 "The Kaiser slights brave Belgium's rights, 
 
 And threatens to march in her gore. 
 The German weens that his damned marines 
 
 Can lord the land and the seas; 
 That Britain must tumble, and France be humble, 
 
 Begging for peace on her knees. 
 No winking or blinking, 
 With him, I am thinking. 
 Out guns! and away with the easy chair." 
 
 "I never delight or find fun in a fight ; 
 
 And I love not Jingo cheers. 
 But God in His might will defend my right, 
 
 As He's done for a thousand years, 
 I've a hundred millions of gold in keep, 
 
 And a thousand more when its done ; 
 My fleets shall sweep from the face of the deep, 
 
 This saur-kraut son of a gun. 
 
 With ship and torpedo 
 We'll show him what we do. 
 I've no further use for my old arm-chair." 
 
 Then came a chorus from over the wave, 
 Where young Britons thrive by the sea 
 
 "Recollect, dear Dad, I'm a handy lad, 
 And ready if you want me."
 
 98 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 It came from the South, and the East, and the 
 
 West, 
 
 John cried with pride on his brow 
 "Why, spike my guns ! I have loved my sons ; 
 But never so much as now. 
 
 We'll stick, boys, together 
 And face the rough weather. 
 We've done for the time with the easy chair." 
 
 He will laugh more joyously than ever yet, 
 please God, when this cruel war is over, and when 
 the caitiff who caused it suffers the penalty of his 
 crime. In that day John's children shall gather 
 under the old family roof-tree, and the welkin 
 shall ring with the gladness of their hearts. 
 
 THE HATRED AND THE LOVE FOR GREAT BRITAIN. 
 
 The Germans have "strafed" Great Britain in 
 this war more than they have all the rest of the 
 world put together. Perhaps they had a cause 
 for it. When Britain began to strike, her blows 
 told instantly. She had no army worth the name. 
 But she had a navy. And such a navy. In a few 
 weeks, no German ship dared fly a flag on the 
 ocean, except as a fugitive flying from detection, 
 or as a sea wolf on prowl. The Germans instantly 
 recognised their chief enemy, and centred all their 
 maledictions on Great Britain. Their press 
 reeked with hatred ; and it was an immense relief 
 to them when one of their poets crystallised the 
 national "strafe" into a "Song of Hate." Ern.st 
 Lissauer is a typical Teuton, and he knew how 
 to concentrate the national malice in good set 
 curses that would gratify the German heart. The 
 song was addressed to "England." It has made
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 99 
 
 millions of us smile for the last two years, and we 
 may do so again. One can fancy Beelzebub, as 
 the spiritual author of the lines, laughingly con- 
 sumedly as they go forth. Here they are all in 
 their beauty : 
 
 "SONG OF HATE ENGLAND." 
 
 French and Russian, they matter not ; 
 A blow for a blow, a shot for c, shot, 
 We love them not, we hate them not. 
 We hold the Weichsel and Vosges gate, 
 We have but one and only hate; 
 We love as one, we hate as one; 
 We have one foe, and one alone. 
 
 He is known to you, he is known to you all, 
 He crouches behind the dark grey flood, 
 
 Full of envy, of rage, of craft, of gall, 
 
 Cut off by waves that are thicker than blood. 
 
 Come let us stand at the judgment place, 
 
 An oath to swear to face to face. 
 
 An oath of bronze no wind can shake ; 
 An oath for our sons and their sons to take. 
 Come hear the word, repeat the word ; 
 Throughout the Fatherland make it heard. 
 We will never forego our hate. 
 We have all but a single hate. 
 We love as one ; we hate as one ; 
 We have one foe, and one alone 
 ENGLAND. 
 
 In the captain's mess, and the banquet hall, 
 Sat feasting the officers, one and all. 
 Like a sabre-blow, like the swing of a sail, 
 One seized his glass, held high to hail, 
 Sharp snapped like the stroke of a rudder's play,
 
 100 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Spake three words only "To the Day." 
 Whose glass this fate? 
 They had all but a single hate. 
 Who was thus known? 
 They had one foe, and one alone 
 ENGLAND. 
 
 Take you the folk of the earth in pay, 
 With bars of gold your ramparts lay. 
 Bedeck the ocean with bow on bow. 
 Ye reckon well, but not well enough now. 
 French and Russian they matter not, 
 A blow for blow, a shot for shot. 
 
 We fight the battle with bronze and steel, 
 And the time is coming Peace will seal. 
 YOU we will hate with a lasting hate; 
 We will never forego our hate. 
 Hate by water, hate by land; 
 Hate of the head, and hate of the hand; 
 Hate of the hammer and hate of the crown ; 
 Hate of seventy millions choking down. 
 We love as one, we hate as one; 
 We have one foe, and one alone 
 
 ENGLAND. 
 Gott strafe England. 
 
 Mr. John Bull, as is customary with him, found 
 in this song more amusement and merriment than 
 offence. Perhaps his national vanity was a 
 little flattered that he had so flayed the hide of 
 the beast as to evoke such a squeal. 
 
 From all parts of the world came consolation. 
 The nations at large understood and acknow- 
 ledged the noble part played by Britain in rushing 
 to the aid of France and Belgium.
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WAR 101 
 
 One tribute in verse, and a noble one, came from 
 America, it was 
 
 A CHANT OF LOVE FOR GREAT BRITAIN. 
 
 By Miss Helen Gray Cone. 
 (Professor of English, New York). 
 
 A song of hate is a song of hell ; 
 Some there be that sing it well. 
 Let them sing it loud and long, 
 We lift our hearts in a loftier song, 
 We lift our hearts to heaven above, 
 Singing the glory of her we love 
 ENGLAND. 
 
 Glory of thought and glory of deed ; 
 Glory of Hampton and Runnymede ; 
 Glory of ships that have sought far goals ; 
 Glory of sword and glory of souls ; 
 Glory of songs mounting as birds; 
 Glory immortal of magical words; 
 Glory of Milton, glory of Nelson; 
 Tragical glory of Gordon and Scott; 
 Glory of Shelley, glory of Sidney ; 
 Glory transcendent that perishes not. 
 Hers is the story, hers be the glory 
 ENGLAND. 
 
 Shatter her beauteous breast ye may, 
 The spirit of England none can slay ! 
 Dash the bomb on the dome of Paul's. 
 Deem ye the fame of the Admiral falls ? 
 Pry the stone from the chancel floor 
 Dream ye that Shakespeare shall live no more? 
 
 Where is the giant shot that kills 
 Wordsworth walking the old green hills? 
 Trample the red rose on the ground 
 
 is beauty while earth spins round !
 
 102 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Bind her, grind her, burn her with fire, 
 
 Cast her ashes into the sea 
 She shall escape, she shall aspire, 
 
 She shall arise to make men free. 
 She shall arise in a sacred scorn, 
 Lighting the lives that are yet unborn, 
 Spirit supernal, splendor eternal 
 ENGLAND. 
 
 Every true son of Britain feels that this glow- 
 ing tribute is but a forecast of that which impar- 
 tial history will chronicle. It was envy of the 
 greatness of Great Britain before the war that 
 spurred Germany into her maniacal outburst. 
 England's share in trampling down the fell war- 
 dragon of the world has eclipsed all her previous 
 glory. 
 
 In Shakespeare's time she was to the national 
 poet 
 
 This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle, 
 
 This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars, 
 
 This other Eden demi-paradise, 
 
 This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this 
 England. 
 
 Now she is all that to three parts of the world, 
 and in addition she stands in shining grandeur 
 beside America, the very exemplar of world free- 
 dom, with Honor, Valor and Humanity inscribed 
 on her banners, and the whole freedom-loving 
 globe's benediction upon her name.
 
 V. 
 
 AMERICA AND THE WAR. 
 
 AMERICA AND THE WORLD'S PEACE. 
 
 Right up to the hilt now America is in this 
 war of Liberation. There has always been a great 
 disinclination in America to contract entangling 
 alliances in Europe. This was the natural coun- 
 terpart of the Monroe doctrine, which forbids 
 European powers obtaining sovereignty in the 
 New World. 
 
 But for all that there has long been a link be- 
 tween America and the Peace party of Europe. 
 The Nobel Peace Prize of 6,000 was awarded to 
 President Roosevelt in 1906, probably as a reward 
 for his services in bringing to an end the war be- 
 tween Russia and Japan. Roosevelt at once handed 
 over the money for the establishment of an In- 
 dustrial Peace Court at Washington. 
 
 The international peace movement was then 
 very active in America. Following Roosevelt's 
 example, Mr. Carnegie gave 150,000 towards the 
 erection of an American Peace Palace at Wash- 
 ington. The building was to provide a central 
 bureau for the whole of the republics of Central 
 and South America. At the same time Mr. Car- 
 negie promised to defray the entire cost of build- 
 ing a Peace Palace at the Hague. 
 
 The Hague Court was constituted in 1902. It 
 had done some little good in settling international 
 disputes, and all the Powers represented at it, 
 
 103
 
 104 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 except Germany, had agreed, at America's sug- 
 gestion, to settle disputes on 
 
 1. The rights and duties of neutrals, including 
 the question of contraband. 
 
 2. The inviolability of private property in naval 
 warfare. 
 
 3. The bombardment of ports, towns, and vil- 
 lages, by a naval force. 
 
 ALLIANCE OF ENGLISH SPEAKING RACES. 
 
 Yet while these Peace movements were in pro- 
 gress, seven or eight years before the war, the 
 earth itself had become a magazine of direst com- 
 bustibles, costing even then 450,000,000 on a 
 peace footing. 
 
 There had been growing up between Great 
 Britain and America a kindlier feeling than be- 
 fore, and when the American fleet visited the 
 various parts of the British Dominions, the racial 
 affinity was cultivated for all that it was worth. 
 
 Millions of people indulged in visions such as 
 had not before been known. Why should there 
 not be a great Federation of the English-speaking 
 people of the earth? Such a Federal alliance 
 would form an impregnable security against the 
 constant menaces of autocratic Germany, which 
 even then kept Europe in a perpetual ferment of 
 expectation of what might fall upon it. 
 
 There was an aspiration after that fashion in 
 millions of loyal British hearts. The ties of 
 brotherhood were felt as they have not been before 
 for a century or more. There was a longing 
 for a closer bond between Britain and America. 
 And when this great war broke out, one of the 
 most comforting of reflections to the average 
 Englishman or Scot would have been to feel that 
 American hearts beat in unison with ours.
 
 AMERICA AND THE WAR 105 
 
 SKETCH OF WOODROW WILSON. 
 
 There sat in the White House a man in whose 
 integrity of purpose the world had confidence. 
 His statesmanship had not been tested. That was 
 to come. He was known to be a man almost en- 
 tirely free from the lower prejudices of caste, of 
 creed, and nationality. He was a staunch Protes- 
 tant, with a Catholic (Jos. P. Tumilty) for his 
 private secretary. He had given to the Ameri- 
 cans at the beginning of the war a pledge to ob- 
 serve the strictest neutrality. 
 
 \Vithout being in the least taciturn, he was 
 reticent on great issues. One who was intimately 
 acquainted with him says that he was always 
 perfectly master of his own thoughts, so much so 
 "that during the period of our neutrality, in two 
 years and a half of Cabinet meetings and of per- 
 sonal conversations, I never heard him utter a 
 word that was contrary to his own plea for neu- 
 trality made to the people at the beginning of 
 the war. This seems like an impossible thing, 
 but it is literally true. He could narrate facts 
 without bias; he could express the reactions of 
 the American people under given circumstances; 
 he could present the law with relation to the facts 
 presented; but, no matter what was underneath, 
 he held strictly to the rule which he asked others 
 to follow. And this at a time when he was sub- 
 jected to the most serious criticism from some 
 who said that he was pro-German and others who 
 said that he was pro-English. This shows com- 
 pletely that he was master of himself." 
 
 That, of course, is the language of eulogy. 
 Many people, in the long days when German out- 
 rages were taking place on American shipping, 
 thought the President carried patience to the 
 verge of pusillanimity. But he felt his respon- 
 sibility to a hundred million Americans, and was
 
 106 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 determined not to be moved to any course by mere 
 impatience. 
 
 He met every new situation by asking, "What 
 is the thing that I can do in these circumstances 
 that will make for the perpetuation of real 
 democracy?" That was his interest in this war. 
 
 Thomas Jefferson was not more truly a demo- 
 crat than he, nor was Lincoln. He visualizes the 
 world not as so much money, land, or machines, 
 but as so many men, and women, and children. 
 
 The Americans say that they have a Com- 
 mander-in-Chief who has courage, patience, sted- 
 fastness, far-sightedness. These are the qualities 
 of a great commander. One who has studied him 
 closely says that "he knows now what he wishes 
 to secure for democracy out of this war, and he 
 is not thinking of the war in terms of personality, 
 or of personal triumph, or of national triumphs, 
 but of the world future, a freer opportunity for 
 the spirit of the man. 
 
 "This is where his ideality comes in. He is a 
 man who knows where he wishes to go, and he 
 has the determination to get there if it is possible, 
 and nothing can stand in his way if his will, 
 backed as it always is by his conscience, makes 
 it possible to reach that end. 
 
 "To such a man it is not a dangerous thing to 
 give great power. He can be depended upon 
 to use it conservatively. He will use whatever 
 power is given to him too conservatively to 
 please many of our people. He would hold in 
 his hand the thunderbolts of Jove, but he would 
 never let one pass from his hands unless he saw 
 that it was vitally necessary." 
 
 BRYAN AND ROOSEVELT. 
 
 That is a brief sketch of the man to whose 
 hands the Americans have entrusted their honor
 
 AMERICA AND THE WAR 107 
 
 and dignity. His right hand man was W. J. 
 Bryan, the Secretary of State. Mr. Bryan has 
 made himself quite as well known as the fore- 
 most man in his country; but it is mostly as a 
 golden-tongued orator, who has coined many florid 
 phrases, such as that of "crucifying the poor man 
 on a cross of gold." Some of his admirers 
 speak of him as a man eminently fitted to 
 administer the Government of a country 
 "bounded on the North by the Constitution and 
 the Aurora Borealis, on the East by the precession 
 of the Equinoxes and the Monroe Doctrine, on the 
 South by the Declaration of Independence, and 
 on the West by the Day of Judgment." 
 
 Bryan is a man of exhaustless energy, and 
 when the war opened, barring that he carried a 
 Peace League bee in his bonnet, he was well 
 fitted to stand up to the toughest demands upon 
 him. 
 
 Ex-President Roosevelt was always in evidence, 
 declaring his opinion of the war that there must 
 not be peace except through complete defeat of 
 Prussianism and of the Hohenzollerns. He 
 thinks Germany's methods of warfare were 
 hideous beyond belief, cruel and unspeakably 
 brutal. The newspapers published in the Ger- 
 man language in the United States he holds to be 
 scandalously disloyal to the republic, and should 
 be suppressed. 
 
 A GERMAN CAMPAIGN OF LIES IN AMERICA. 
 
 A fortnight after the war, as early as August 
 14, 1914, the German Government, recognising 
 that it was well worth while to have American 
 public opinion on the German side, set out on a 
 campaign to capture it. Herr Dernburg was to
 
 108 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 conduct this enterprise. He was to feed the 
 American mind with German news and views, and 
 thus deflect American judgment towards Ger- 
 many. 
 
 This was part of a world campaign. Germany 
 had calculated on a short war, and by a judicious 
 outlay of money, she expected to carry opinion 
 with her. Her plan was to make a great noise 
 about the purity of her intentions, and the pro- 
 vocations she had received. 
 
 By these means the Kaiser calculated upon 
 getting American sympathy. Von Bernstein, 
 the German Ambassador to America, set himself 
 to this task with assiduity. He became a press 
 agent in distributing German literature. He is 
 said in German documents to have placed 400,000 
 weekly at Dernburg's disposal. The complete 
 capture of American sympathy was thought to be 
 worth many millions. No doubt it was. 
 
 The first great point to gain was to prove that 
 Germany had been forced into the war. To this 
 end, 93^German professors drew up a document 
 in October, 1914, declaring 
 
 1. That Germany's enemies were circulating 
 volumes of lies. 
 
 2. That Germany was not guilty of the war, as 
 neither the people nor the Kaiser wanted it. 
 
 3. That Belgian neutrality was not violated, as 
 Belgium had previously given herself over to 
 England and France. 
 
 4. That no German atrocities had been com- 
 mitted in Belgium ; that any punishments were for 
 crimes against the German soldiers. 
 
 5. That the destruction of Louvain was a neces- 
 sity of war, and that it grieved the Germans to 
 do it. 
 
 6. That it was not true that international law 
 was violated by Germans ; but that it had been so
 
 AMERICA AND THE WAR 109 
 
 by the Allies, who had brought Mongolians and 
 Niggers into the fighting line. 
 
 7. That Germany was alone the apostle of true 
 culture. 
 
 8. That they begged humanity to believe Ger- 
 many pure, in the sacred names of Goethe, Beet- 
 hoven, and Kant. 
 
 Such was the document to which 93 German 
 professors attached their signatures, and which 
 by millions was spread through the United States 
 of America. It was a mere statement of opinion, 
 without one quotation from the official documents 
 to support that opinion. The eminent names of 
 men of Kultur were the guarantee for its sound- 
 ness. 
 
 Really, it scarcely touched the American judg- 
 ment, because the press of that country had fore- 
 stalled it by publishing the original documents in 
 the blue and white books. In October, 1914, the 
 "New York Times" submitted the White, Orange 
 and Grey books of Great Britain, Germany, 
 Russia and Belgium to Mr. James Beck, one of 
 the leaders of the New York Bar. His brief was 
 to carefully read all these books and give an 
 opinion as to the legal responsibility for the war. 
 
 He did so. His finding occupied two pages of 
 the paper. It is a close analysis of the evidence 
 and documents. It was published in pamphlet 
 form, and was circulated all over America. This 
 is its final judgment in a few words 
 
 1. That Germany and Austria secretly con- 
 certed a war against Servia. 
 
 2. They made a war against Servia by an 
 ultimatum that was grossly unreasonable. 
 
 3. That Germany had power to restrain Aus- 
 tria, but she abetted her in her unreasonable 
 course.
 
 110 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 4. That England, France, Italy and Russia 
 sought sincerely for peace, and offered every rea- 
 sonable concession to preserve it. 
 
 5. That Russia was within her strict rights in 
 mobilising when she did. 
 
 6. That Germany declared war when a peace- 
 ful settlement was in sight. 
 
 Mr. Beck adds that he reached these conclusions 
 with reluctance, as he had a feeling of deep affec- 
 tion and admiration for the German people. But, 
 he says, "the German nation has been plunged into 
 this abyss by scheming statesmen and its self- 
 centred and highly neurotic Kaiser, who, in the 
 twentieth century sincerely believes he is the 
 proxy of Almighty God on earth, and therefore 
 infallible." 
 
 An American, a Professor Samuel Harden 
 Church, of the Carnegie Institute of Pittsburg, off 
 his own bat, completely knocked out the case of 
 the 93 German learned men. He said the whole 
 rested upon the question of who began the war. 
 If the Allies did, they were without justification; 
 if Germany, she stood convicted of a crime for 
 which there was no palliation. The case, he 
 said, rested on the evidence contained in six 
 official books, and of correspondence. The 
 evidence convicts Germany of the crime of delug- 
 ing Europe with blood, and she stands in the 
 shadow of murder under an "inexpiable damna- 
 tion." 
 
 Germany had considerable influence in the 
 United States, but not by any means so much 
 as claimed by some Germans. The foreign-born 
 German and Austrian sympathisers amounted, it 
 was ascertained, to 33 per cent, of the total of 
 foreign-born Americans. The foreign-born 
 sympathisers with the Allies and Great Britain 
 were 54 per cent. The native-born Americans
 
 AMERICA AND THE WAR 111 
 
 were overwhelmingly with the Allies. Therefore 
 Germany's written "appeal to the Civilised 
 World" fell flat. 
 
 The general public opinion respecting the war 
 did not take long to crystallise. Racial affinity 
 had little to do with it. Putnam, the publisher, 
 and Harvey, of the "North American Review," 
 spoke the thoughts of millions when they gave 
 their reasons for opposing the Germans. The 
 first said "I find myself unwilling to meet Ger- 
 mans, whether friends, acquaintances or 
 strangers." His reasons were the horrible cruelty 
 in killing women and unarmed citizens in Zeppe- 
 lin raids in undefended places. The other took 
 sides with the party that was setting up the 
 battle for freedom on the same lines as "the 
 glorious cause that Franklin and Jefferson and 
 Madison wrote for, that Patrick Henry spoke for, 
 that Washington and Jackson fought for, that 
 Lincoln died for, that McKinley suffered for, and 
 that every American statesman worthy of the 
 title now lives for." 
 
 The Germans never got to the root of the 
 American mind. When the verified intelligence 
 came of the German atrocities in Belgium and the 
 awful sinking of the unarmed Lusitania, there 
 was no longer any hope of the German campaign 
 of press lying. 
 
 In the early part of 1915 Mr. Wm. J. Bryan, the 
 American Secretary of State, replying to Ger- 
 man complaints that America was favoring Great 
 Britain by selling to her munitions of war, said 
 the American markets were open on equal terms 
 to all nations. If Germany was unable to take 
 advantage of them, through having lost sea power, 
 that did not call upon America to close her market 
 to Great Britain. It was also a matter of strong 
 complaint from Vienna that America was supply-
 
 112 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 ing the Allies with munitions of war. Mr. Lan- 
 sing, in reply, reminded the Austrian Government 
 that during the Russo-Japanese war and the Boer 
 war Germany had sold to Great Britain and 
 Russia, hundreds of thousands of kilos of explo- 
 sives and weapons. In one passage, he said 
 "Neutrality itself would be violated by the pro- 
 hibition by a neutral nation of the exportation of 
 arms, ammunition, or other munitions of war to 
 belligerent powers during the progress of the 
 war." 
 
 Austria, however, persisted for some time in 
 her objections, and at last, when Dr. Dumba, the 
 Austro-Hungarian Minister at Washington, was 
 convicted of conspiring to disorganise the Ameri- 
 can munition factories by strikes, President Wil- 
 son sternly demanded his recall. A letter of his 
 own writing proved his guilt. 
 
 Theodore Roosevelt was all this time urging 
 upon the Americans that the invasion of Belgium 
 was a breach of the Hague Convention, and that it 
 imposed a duty on the United States to join the 
 Allies in the war. Others were urging the Presi- 
 dent to call Congress together and make a flat 
 declaration of war. 
 
 THE INDISCRIMINATE SUBMARINE CAMPAIGN. 
 
 It was at this stage, after the war had gone on 
 for about seven months, that the German Council 
 of War, determined on a new departure. They 
 got an idea that it was in their power to reduce 
 Great Britain to famine. 
 
 In February, 1915, the German Government 
 warned America that it intended to sink at sight 
 any neutral or other vessels, in a certain area of 
 the sea around Great Britain. The American
 
 AMERICA AND THE WAR 113 
 
 Government replied that that would be a violation 
 of neutral rights, and the United States Govern- 
 ment would hold the German Government "to 
 strict accountability." 
 
 The Germans answered this by a proposal that 
 they would refrain from sinking American vessels 
 at sight, if America would insist on Great Britain 
 permitting American food supplies to enter Ger- 
 many. 
 
 The American answer was "Your breach of 
 naval law in sinking vessels at sight has nothing 
 to do with Germany's relations with Great Bri- 
 tain. Any loss of an American ship will be a 
 breach of friendly relations." 
 
 The German reply to this was to sink at once 
 half-a-dozen American ships, and it was on May 7 
 that the Lusitania w r as sent to the bottom, with 
 many American citizens on board. 
 
 President Wilson's Note to Germany concern- 
 ing these awful murders on the high seas was 
 generally regarded as patient to the verge of 
 puerility. It contained no threat, no resentment, 
 but merely a firm restatement of "the indisputable 
 right of American citizens to sail in ships, tra- 
 velling wherever legitimate business calls them 
 upon the high seas, and that with confidence that 
 their lives will not be illegally endangered." 
 
 The Note went on thus "The fact that more 
 than one hundred American citizens were among 
 those who perished, made it the duty of the 
 Government of the United States to speak of these 
 things, and once more, with solemn emphasis, to 
 call the attention of the Imperial German Govern- 
 ment to the grave responsibility which the 
 Government of the United States conceives that 
 it has incurred in this tragic occurrence, and to 
 the indisputable principle upon which that respon- 
 sibility rests."
 
 114 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 The Note ended by demanding satisfaction. 
 Everybody felt that the President was wasting 
 valuable time in not preparing for an inevitable 
 war. The American public awaited impatiently 
 the answer to this Note. When that answer 
 came it was to the effect that Great Britain's 
 blockade of Germany justified Germany in sink- 
 ing neutral ships. 
 
 Still President Wilson's patience was not ex- 
 hausted. He wrote in June, 1915, another Note. 
 It was to insist on the lawlessness of German 
 methods. He said "The principal fact is that 
 a great steamer, primarily and chiefly for the con- 
 veyance of passengers, carrying more than 1,000 
 souls who had no part or lot in the war, was 
 torpedoed and sunk without so much as a chal- 
 lenge or warning, and that men, women, and 
 children were sent to their death in circumstances 
 unparalleled in modern warfare." 
 
 The German reply was written on July 8, 1915. 
 It refused to give any of the assurances that 
 America demanded. It refused to condemn the 
 sinking of the Lusitania. It gave no promise of 
 reparation for a hundred American lives lost. It 
 was almost disdainful in suggesting that Ameri- 
 can citizen should travel in American ships and 
 not in an enemy's. 
 
 President Wilson's next Note was dated July 
 28, 1915. He characterised the German Note as 
 "unsatisfactory," and said that any further act 
 would be regarded "as deliberately unfriendly." 
 It was very tiring to the patience of nearly every- 
 body, and earned for the President the derision of 
 being a mere note-writer. The game went on. 
 Notes followed Notes. German insults followed 
 insults, and no hasty word fell from Mr. Wilson's 
 tongue or pen. 
 
 At last Berlin promised that no more passenger
 
 AMERICA AND THE WAR 115 
 
 ships would be torpedoed unless they tried to 
 escape or offered resistance ; but it broke the pro- 
 mise on August 19 by the sinking of the Arabic, 
 and some other vessels soon after. The whole 
 series of incidents between February, 1915, and 
 September of the same year, constituted a posi- 
 tively astonishing volume of national affronts 
 from Germany to America. 
 
 It was manifest that owing to the absence of 
 any military power in America, the German 
 Government did not take the trouble to conceal its 
 contempt. There was for a short time an inter- 
 nal struggle as to whether or not a war of un- 
 limited submarine frightfulness was expedient. 
 At length the Von Tirpitz school triumphed. 
 Germany concluded that Great Britain could be 
 brought to her knees by the U-boat campaign long 
 before America would be in a position to enlist 
 and transport an army. So it came about that 
 after more Note-writing President Wilson sent an 
 ultimatum to Germany that the adoption of an 
 indiscriminate policy of "frightfulness" against 
 neutral ships would mean war. Everyone felt 
 that America's honor had not been vindicated. 
 
 The correspondence continued through the 
 whole of 1916. Germany counted the cost, and 
 resolved on defiance. The U-boats were to save 
 Germany by destroying wholesale the means of 
 transport on the seas. The Germans had con- 
 vinced themselves that this was a certain means 
 to victory. 
 
 About the end of 1916 President Wilson wrote 
 a Note to the Allies suggesting a league of nations 
 to assure universal peace. The Note was one 
 which took a lenient view of German crimes, and 
 suggested that the belligerents might meet on 
 equal terms, and strive for a basis of peace. 
 
 In reply, the Allies, early in January, 1917,
 
 116 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 challenged this position "We feel it our duty 
 to challenge in the most friendly but in the clear- 
 est way the analogy drawn between the opposing 
 belligerents, which directly conflicts with the 
 evidence of history. That has clearly estab- 
 lished one fact, namely, the calculated policy of 
 aggression by which Austria and Germany sought 
 to ensure the hegemony of Europe and universal 
 economic domination. By her declaration of war, 
 and the instant violation of the territory of Bel- 
 gium and Luxembourg, and by her methods of 
 warfare, Germany has proved that she systema- 
 tically scorns every principle of humanity or of 
 the respect due to small States." 
 
 The reply proceeds to set out a further series of 
 the enemy's crimes. It recalls the horrors mark- 
 ing the invasion of Belgium and of Seryia, the 
 atrocious treatment they are now undergoing, the 
 massacres of hundreds of thousands of inoffensive 
 Armenians, the barbarities in Syria, the Zeppelin 
 raids on open towns, the submarining of liners 
 and of shipping, including neutral vessels, the 
 cruel treatment of war prisoners, the judicial 
 murders of Nurse Cavell and of Captain Fryatt, 
 the deportation and enslavement of the civil popu- 
 lations of Belgium and part of France, and says 
 that such a series of crimes disturbs all chance of 
 any peace meeting. The Allies war terms were 
 thus stated : 
 
 "The restoration of Belgium, Servia, and 
 Montenegro. 
 
 "The evacuation of the invaded parts of France, 
 Russia, and Rumania. 
 
 "The reorganisation of Europe on the basis of 
 the right of all peoples to have the enjoyment in 
 full security of free, economic development, and 
 also upon the basis of territorial agreements and
 
 AMERICA AND THE WAR 117 
 
 international arrangements framed to guarantee 
 land and sea frontiers against unjust attacks. 
 
 "The restitution of provincial territories for- 
 merly torn from Allied countries, forcibly or con- 
 trary to the wishes of the inhabitants. 
 
 "The liberation of the Italians, Slavs, Ru- 
 manians, Czechs, and Slovaks from foreign 
 domination. 
 
 "The liberation of the peoples lying beneath the 
 murderous tyranny of the Turks, and 
 
 "The expulsion from Europe of the Ottoman 
 Empire which has proved itself radically alien to 
 Western civilisation." 
 
 The reply concludes: 
 
 "The Allies arc determined to endure every 
 sacrifice in order to press to a victorious close the 
 conflict on which depends our own safety and 
 prosperity and the very future of civilisation." 
 
 At that time President Wilson was quite will- 
 ing to condone every German crime. It was 
 while he was in this lenient frame of mind to- 
 wards Germany that the Boche began his policy 
 of unrestricted sinking of all neutrals at sight. 
 
 About the middle of April President Wilson 
 despatched a Note to Germany warning her that 
 unless the attacks on merchantmen cease diploma- 
 tic relations would be severed. 
 
 The communication was submitted to Congress, 
 which met in joint session in response to a Pre- 
 sidential summons. 
 
 Addressing members, President Wilson de- 
 scribed the Note as "an irrevocable notification 
 ihat the United States will break off relations if 
 the illegal submarine campaign continues" He 
 had sent virtually an ultimatum to Germany 
 which was America's last word. He did not ask 
 for action by Congress, but was simply informing 
 them of the accumulation of evidence that Ger-
 
 118 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 many's assurances to the United States had been 
 violated, and that the submarine campaign had 
 been renewed with vigor. He reiterated the 
 opinion expressed after the sinking of the Lusi- 
 tania, that it was impossible to conduct indis- 
 criminate submarine warfare like Germany's in 
 accordance with the laws of the nations and the 
 laws of humanity. 
 
 After having recited how the United States had 
 continually protested against German outrages, 
 how patiently each fresh outrage had been re- 
 ceived, how all the rules of humanity had been 
 violated, how Americans had been murdered in- 
 discriminately, and how no disavowals on the part 
 of the German Government had been of any use, 
 the President said 
 
 "I have deemed it my duty to say to the Imperial 
 German Government that if it is still its purpose 
 to prosecute a relentless and indiscriminate war, 
 the Government of the United States is forced to 
 the conclusion that there is but one course it can 
 pursue; and that unless the Imperial German 
 Government should not immediately declare and 
 effect an abandonment of its present methods of 
 warfare against passenger and freight-carrying 
 vessels, this Government will have no choice but to 
 sever diplomatic relations altogether." 
 
 AMERICAN DECLARATION OF WAR. 
 
 Within a few days, as the indiscriminate sub- 
 marining of ships was continued, President Wilson 
 formally declared war in a document, which for its 
 stateliness and historical interest stands without 
 a superior. Dealing, as it does, very luminously 
 with the principles of Democracy, I have given
 
 AMERICA AND THE WAR 119 
 
 the document in full in the Essay on "Democracy 
 and the War." I will give only one paragraph 
 here "We are accepting the challenge because 
 we realise in the German Government we could 
 not have a friend. We are about to accept the 
 gage of battle in the struggle for liberty, and if 
 necessary we will spend the whole force of the 
 nation to check and nullify the German Govern- 
 ment's pretensions to power." 
 
 Then, after the waste of a precious year, began 
 an American preparation for war on a scale as 
 gigantic as that of Great Britain herself. Con- 
 gress voted credits amounting to hundreds of 
 millions sterling. America floated a loan of 
 1,000,000,000. She lent 600,000,000 to the 
 Allies. She voted for a national conscription of 
 Americans; and she called up at once 2,000,000 
 soldiers for immediate drill. She set about a 
 system of national shipbuilding to replace the 
 torpedoed vessels, and promised new shipping to 
 the extent of 6,000,000 tons in twelve months. 
 She was very late, but she was very thorough. 
 
 When the revolutionary Russian Government 
 began to talk of a policy of peace with "no an- 
 nexations and no indemnities," President Wilson 
 wrote, early in June, 1917, a Note as follows: 
 
 "The United States will not be content with a peace with 
 Germany which merely restores the status quo ante bel- 
 lum in Europe. I urge the Russian Government to stand 
 firm with the world forces of Democracy. 
 
 "With regard to the phrase 'no annexations and no in- 
 demnities,' the United States says that no people must be 
 forced to obey a sovereignty under which it does not wish 
 to live. No territory must change hands except for the 
 purpose of securing to the inhabitants a fair chance of 
 life and liberty. No indemnities must be imposed except 
 those which constitute a payment for manifest wrongs. 
 
 "The United States Commission to Russia is designed to 
 express the deep friendship of the American people for 
 Russia, and also to discuss the best and most practical 
 means of co-operation between the two people in carrying
 
 120 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 on the struggle for the freedom of the peoples to a suc- 
 cessful consummation. Therefore it is an opportune and 
 appropriate moment to state in the light of the new 
 partnership the objects of the United States in entering 
 into the war. These objects have been much beclouded 
 by mistaken and misleading statements, but the issues are 
 too momentous, tremendous, and significant to permit mis- 
 understandings and misinterpretations to remain uncor- 
 rected. 
 
 "The United States is determined to continue the war 
 until Germany's dream of a great Central European 
 Empire is shattered beyond all possibility of revival. 
 
 "The war has begun to go against Germany, and in a 
 desperate endeavor to escape the inevitable defeat, those 
 in authority in Germany are using every possible instru- 
 ment even using the groups and parties in Germany 
 itself, to which they have never been just or fair to pro- 
 mise a propaganda on both sides of the sea in order to 
 preserve their influence at home and their power abroad. 
 
 "The position of the United States is clear. She does 
 not seek material profit or aggrandisement, and is fighting 
 not for advantages for herself or for selfish objects, but 
 for the liberation of peoples everywhere from the aggres- 
 sions of autocratic force. The ruling classes in Germany 
 have begun to profess a similar liberality and justiae of 
 purpose, but their real objects are to preserve their power 
 for further selfish objects. 
 
 "From Berlin to Bagdad Government after Government 
 has, by German influence, been linked in a net of intrigue 
 directed against the liberty and peace of the world. The 
 meshes of that net of intrigue must be broken. The 
 wrongs done must be righted. Adequate measures must 
 be taken to prevent this net of intrigue from ever being 
 repaired or woven again. 
 
 "Germany is seeking pledges that the war will result in 
 a restoration of the status quo ante bellum. It was this 
 status quo from which this iniquitous war took its rise 
 namely, the power of the German Government within the 
 Empire, and its widespread influence and domination out- 
 side. That status must be so altered as to prevent such 
 a hideous thing recurring. 
 
 "When peace comes, it must give liberty, self-govern- 
 ment, and the right of development free from dictation 
 to all peoples. Wrongs must first be righted, and then 
 safeguards provided to prevent a recurrence of the evil. 
 Phrases will not accomplish result. Questions must be 
 settled by the practical means of effective readjustments. 
 The free peoples of the world must meet in a common
 
 AMERICA AND THE WAR 121 
 
 covenant leading to the genuine and practical co-operation, 
 which will combine their forces in order to secure universal 
 peace and justice. The brotherhood of mankind must not 
 be an empty phrase, but must be given a strength, force, 
 and reality. For these things the United States can 
 afford to pour out blood and treasure. 
 
 "I warn Russia that the day has come to conquer or to 
 submit. If the forces of Autocracy divide us, they will over- 
 come us. If we stand together, victory is certain. 
 
 "We can then afford to be gracious, but we cannot afford 
 that now. It would be weak to omit a single guarantee 
 of justice and security." 
 
 Being now actually over the Rubicon, President 
 Wilson was firm enough. Vacillation was ended. 
 But he had lost for ever in fruitless and humiliat- 
 ing parleying, the opportunities of a whole year 
 the year 1916. He served his countrymen badly 
 in that year, by hoping against hope that the 
 German criminals would eschew crime and live 
 cleanly. He strove so long for peace that he has 
 made the war twice as hard as it would have been 
 had a prompt decision been arrived at. 
 
 A few days later in New York there occurred 
 what were called Flag Day exercises. They were 
 designed to give an impetus to the Liberty Loan. 
 On that occasion President Wilson delivered a 
 further speech that must become historic. He 
 said 
 
 "We are about to bid thousands, hundreds of thousands, 
 perhaps millions of our men to die beneath this flag. The 
 insults and aggressions of the German Government left 
 us no choice. Germany's military masters denied us the 
 rights of a neutral. They filled our communities with 
 vicious spies; attempted to draw our citizens from their 
 allegiance; sought violently to destroy our industries; 
 tried to incite Mexico and Japan against us; impudently 
 denied us the use of the high seas; and repeatedly executed 
 their threats of death of any of our people approaching the 
 coasts of Europe. 
 
 "We are not enemies of the German people. The 
 German people did not originate this hideous war. We 
 did not wish to be drawn in. We are vaguely conscious 
 that we are fightiag their cause as well as our own. They
 
 122 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 are in the grip of the same sinister power that has 
 stretched out its ugly talons and drawn blood from us. 
 The whole world is at war because of the grip of that 
 power. 
 
 "The war was begun by Germany's military masters, 
 who are also the masters of Austro-Hungary. They did 
 not regard the nations as people of like blood as them- 
 selves, for whom Governments exist, but merely as ser- 
 viceable organisations which they could corrupt to their 
 own purposes. 
 
 "Germany's purpose was long-avowed, but it was con- 
 sidered by statesmen of other nations as the incredible 
 dream of minds detached from practical affairs. But 
 Germany's rulers went forward filling the thrones of the 
 Balkan States with German princes', putting German 
 officers in the service of Turkey, developing plans of sedi- 
 tion in India and Egypt, and setting fires in Persia. 
 
 "Austria's demands on Servia were a step in the 
 plan to throw a belt of German military power and poli- 
 tical control across the centre of Europe and into the heart 
 of Asia. 
 
 "Austro-Hungary, Servia, Bulgaria, Turkey, and the 
 autonomous States of the East were to become Germany's 
 pawn. Austro-Hungary was to become part of the Ger- 
 man Empire. The plan contemplated the blending of 
 races which could be kept together only by force such 
 as the proud States of Bohemia and Hungary, the stout 
 little commonwealths of the Balkans, the indomitable 
 Turks, the subtle peoples of the East, who ardently desire 
 undisputed independence, and can be kept quiet only by 
 the constant threat of armed men and then to await the 
 day of revolution. The Germans have actually carried 
 the greater part of their amazing plan into execution. 
 Austria is at their mercy. Its people desire peace, but 
 peace is impossible until leave is granted by Berlin. The 
 so-called Central Powers are but a single Power, taking 
 orders from Berlin, and the net is spread from Hamburg 
 to the Persian Gulf. 
 
 "It is easy to understand Berlin's eagerness for peace, 
 since the snare set for peace has been the talk of the 
 German Foreign Office for more than a year. A little 
 has been made public, but most of it is private. It has 
 come to me by all sorts of channels, but never with the 
 terms disclosed. 
 
 "Germany cannot go forward, and she dare not go back. 
 She wishes to close her bargain before it is too late. 
 Germany's military masters see clearly what fate has 
 brought them. If they fall back or are forced back an
 
 AMERICA AND THE WAR 123 
 
 inch their power at home and abroad will fall like a house 
 of cards. 
 
 "It is their power at home that they are now thinking 
 of more than their power abroad. It is that power which 
 is now trembling beneath their feet, and a deep fear has 
 entered their hearts. They have one chance to perpetuate 
 their military power and political influence. If they 
 can make peace now with the advantages they have appar- 
 ently gained they will be justified before the German 
 people. Their prestige will be secure. But if they fail 
 their people will thrust them aside. A Government 
 accountable to the people will then be set up in Ger- 
 many, as is now the case in all great countries except 
 Germany. If Germany's military masters succeed they 
 are safe, and the German people and the world are undone; 
 but if they fail Germany is saved and the world will be at 
 peace. If they succeed, we and the rest of the world 
 must remain armed, and make ready for the next step of 
 their aggression, but if they fail the world may unite for 
 peace, and Germany may be of the union. 
 
 "One great fact stands above the rest this is a people's 
 war for freedom, justice, and self-government among the 
 nations of the world to make the world safe for the peoples 
 who live on it, and who have made it their own the 
 German people themselves included. 
 
 "We have made our choice, and woe to the men who seek 
 to stand in our way." 
 
 INTERVENTION OF THE POPE. 
 
 About the middle of August, 1917, His Holiness 
 the Pope wrote a very important Peace Note to 
 all the belligerent powers. The Note suggested 
 terms for a preliminary parley for peace. This 
 is treated in this book in a separate essay on "The 
 Pope and the War." It is mentioned briefly here, 
 because President Wilson, on behalf of all the 
 Allies, sent the official answer of the Entente 
 Powers to His Holiness. 
 
 The President was very courteous to the Pope, 
 making special acknowledgment of the good faith 
 of his efforts. He said 
 E
 
 "We think the Pope's plan would involve the 
 recuperation of the German Government to a 
 strength which would necessitate a permanent 
 combination of nations against Germany, and 
 would result in abandoning new-born Russia to 
 intrigue." 
 
 "Can peace be based on the restitution of Ger- 
 man power?" President Wilson asked. "On 
 any word of honor pledged by Germany peace can- 
 not rest. Political and economic restrictions 
 designed to benefit some nations embarrass others. 
 The American people suffered intolerable wrongs 
 at the hands of Germany, but we do not desire 
 reprisals upon the German people. Peace should 
 rest on the rights of peoples, not of Governments 
 upon the rights of all peoples to freedom, 
 security, self-government and participation upon 
 fair terms in economic opportunities. We will 
 include the German people if they will accept 
 equality, and will not seek domination. The test of 
 every peace plan is whether it is based on the 
 faith of the peoples or merely on the word of an 
 ambitious, intriguing Government. The aim of 
 the United States is clearly stated. She believes 
 the intolerable wrongs by the German Govern- 
 ment ought to be repaired, but not at the expense 
 of the sovereignty of any people. We deem in- 
 expedient, and, in the end, worse than futile, such 
 proposals as punitive damages, dismemberment of 
 empires, and the establishment of a selfish, ex- 
 clusive economic league. 
 
 "We cannot take the word of the present rulers 
 of Germany as a guarantee for anything endur- 
 ing, unless it is explicitly supported by conclusive 
 evidence of the will and purpose of the German 
 people. Without such guarantees, treaties, 
 agreements, covenants and territorial adjust- 
 ments, if made by Germany, could not be de-
 
 AMERICA AND THE WAR 125 
 
 pended upon. We must await new evidence of 
 the purpose of the peoples of the Central Empires. 
 God grant it may be given soon." 
 
 A month later, the German Government having 
 returned a favorable reply to the Pope, a state- 
 ment was issued in Washington announcing that 
 nothing has occurred to change the war aims of 
 the United States, which are substantially the 
 same as those of Great Britain and of France. 
 Indeed, the State Department at Washington de- 
 clared it to be necessary that the Kaiser's militar- 
 istic power must be utterly broken before America 
 will discuss peace. A popular form of govern- 
 ment in Germany is one of the essential conditions 
 required by America. 
 
 The members of the Japanese mission to the 
 United States appeared in Congress early in Sep- 
 tember, and were enthusiastically received. 
 Viscount Ishii, in an address, warned members 
 of Congress that there were plots designed to sow 
 discord between the United States and Japan. 
 "Our co-operation," he saicl, "should protect us 
 from these forces of evil. We bring an assurance 
 of Japan's fullest support in order to defeat Ger- 
 many." 
 
 This momentous decision brought all the great 
 democratic powers of the world into line, and the 
 war became definitely 
 
 DEMOCRACY VERSUS AUTOCRACY. 
 
 There is not a shadow of doubt as to the ultimate 
 victory.
 
 VI. 
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR. 
 
 THE FIRST BITTER BLAST. 
 
 The Christmas of 1914 came upon a world that 
 was reverberating to the roar of cannon, and 
 trembling under the tearing wounds of shrieking 
 shrapnel. 
 
 Curiously enough, in that time of Christian 
 peace and goodwill there had been published the 
 German "Gospel of Hate." 
 
 Ah me! Looked at with the reminiscent eye, 
 how shallow appears that philosophy which seeks 
 its satisfaction in hatred. 
 
 Truly has it been said that "the Devil is an 
 ass," or he would never have made the choice 
 "Evil, be thou my good." 
 
 In that Christmas time, with the Infant Jesus 
 and his Bethlehem crib in men's thoughts, with 
 all the charming pictures of that infantile 
 sweetness, the horrors of Belgian bloodshed and 
 desolation blotted out all beauty save that in 
 which one Christian soul ministered to the relief 
 of others in affliction. 
 
 And yet I remember some of the insuppressible 
 aroma of that Christmastide. 
 
 To the external eye, indeed, there was no com- 
 fort. The earth was steeped in blood-lust and 
 hatred. The figtree was blasted, and the vine- 
 yard withering. Cities were scorched and 
 blackened, temples riven, shrines desecrated, 
 
 126
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 127 
 
 priests shot, nuns violated, citizens decimated, and 
 peasants driven to penury and famine. 
 
 But out of this war-welter and this hell-broth 
 of an infernal cauldron, there emerged to the eye 
 of faith and spiritual optimism many gleams of 
 hope. For we know, if we will but remember it, 
 that God reigns always in His heavens, and that 
 out of evil springeth good. There is no darkness 
 but hath its dawn. The individual perishes, but 
 the race is more and more. 
 
 Out of the very horrors of that war, in its first 
 Christmas, some of us, casting our glances around, 
 could behold a wealth of tender affection welling 
 up from millions of melting hearts. 
 
 We could think upon those consolations of St. 
 Augustine 
 
 "How secret art Thou in the highest heaven in 
 silence, thou only great God, sprinkling with an 
 unwearied Providence certain penal blindnesses 
 upon such as have unbridled desires." 
 
 GLEAMS OF HOPE. 
 
 No! We would not credit the ultimate triumph 
 of such an evil as was the making of that war. 
 In the very nature of things, when we reflected, 
 we saw that its detestable cruelties must have 
 their compensations. Some of those compensa- 
 tions indeed were already becoming dimply dis- 
 cernible. There is a dualism that underlies all 
 Nature. As Emerson says 
 
 "Every sweet hath its sour ; every evil its good. 
 Every faculty which is a receiver of pleasure hath 
 an equal penalty on its abuse. It is to answer 
 for its moderation with life. For every grain of 
 wit there is a grain of folly. For every thing 
 you have missed, you have gained something else ;
 
 128 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 and for everything you gain you lose something. 
 If the gatherer gathers too much, Nature takes 
 out of the man what she puts into his chest 
 swells the estate, but kills the owner." 
 
 Of course, we need not concede with the Ameri- 
 can philosopher that his law of compensation 
 always operates here and now. Indeed, we know 
 that in some cases only eternity can fully "justify 
 the ways of God to man." 
 
 But still, even in this life, we may be satisfied 
 that the balance is much more even than a super- 
 ficial estimate reveals. 
 
 On that first Christmas Day of his world-war, 
 the German Kaiser, who had brought death and 
 ruin to tens of thousands, was perhaps as 
 wretched a creature as any of his meanest sub- 
 jects. The owner of fifty castles and the master 
 of six millions of bayonets, he tossed on a feverish 
 couch and fought against a malignant throat, 
 scarcely more content than one of his wounded 
 soldiers lying in hospital under the loss of a lopped 
 limb. 
 
 The Greeks say that the dice of God are always 
 loaded. Omnipotence always governs, making 
 use even of a Judas for the redemption of the 
 world. Drive out Nature with a fork, and she 
 comes running back. 
 
 In fancy I can hear some reader say "This 
 may be all very well. But how does it offer solace 
 to the sufferings of tiny Belgium at the hands of 
 the German Colossus?" 
 
 It is hard to make the answer satisfactory. But 
 Emerson was certainly right in saying that 
 "crime and punishment grow out of one stem. 
 Punishment is a fruit that unsuspected ripens 
 within the flower of the pleasure which concealed 
 it. Cause and effect, means and ends, seed and 
 fruit, cannot be severed."
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 129 
 
 The tree of pagan cruelty, planted and fostered 
 by the brutal Frederick the Great, bears the Dead 
 Sea fruit on which Wilhelm, the criminal maniac, 
 is supping full of horrors. 
 
 It may be confidently said that, though the dead 
 and maimed cannot be restored to life and health, 
 a full reckoning will have to be made by Germany 
 for all her crimes on her unoffending neighbor; 
 and in the meantime the Belgian name and fame 
 stand higher to-day in the sunshine of the world's 
 esteem than they ever did before, while all heathen 
 and Christian peoples alike execrate the German 
 spoiler. Both the spoiler and the spoiled have 
 suffered and are suffering dreadfully. But every 
 son of the earth to-day glories in Belgian heroism, 
 and shudders at Teuton perfidy and cruelty. 
 
 THE COMFORT TO FRANCE. 
 
 And what is to compensate France for her 
 devastated fields and cities and her slaughtered 
 sons and daughters? 
 
 Think a little. There is much. She lived 
 for forty-five years under the nightmare of a bad 
 neighbor. That horror will disappear. It has 
 already disappeared. She will regain, please 
 God. her lost provinces. The end of the war will 
 relieve her of the burden of her peace armaments, 
 which she had to maintain in order to be ready 
 for her threatening enemy next door. She will 
 in the future have no threatening enemy next 
 door. The promise of that is no insignificant 
 compensation. 
 
 But, by the favor of heaven, there is a very 
 much richer one offering to her. She, too, in her 
 high places, in the past, has been dominated by a 
 desolating paganism. Her chief statesmen have
 
 130 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 flung taunts at God. There was in her a 
 national dross which Divine justice is purging in 
 the fires of a national agony. 
 
 Young says that "by night an atheist half be- 
 lieves a God." Under divine chastisement the 
 better side of a people reappears. A letter from 
 a Frenchman told us the other day "In the firing 
 line we are all religious." 
 
 The cannon proves a great preacher. Its roar 
 is eloquent to many hearts. It is not that men 
 are in the least craven. On the contrary, there 
 was never seen more heroism of that sort which 
 evinces willingness to die. But the sermons of 
 the guns make converts. "Soldiers who were 
 sceptics in garrisons are believers in the fighting 
 line." 
 
 The roar, the thunders, the air concussions, ex- 
 plosions from the heavens, from the earth, and 
 under the earth, awake the thoughts of men to the 
 littleness of life and the greatness of eternity. 
 
 Then, again, the very savagery of German 
 paganism has compelled man to turn for relief to 
 the tenderness and the beauty of the Church of 
 Christ. 
 
 The infidel Government and Parliament of 
 France boasted in the year before the war that 
 they meant "to blot out the light of heaven," and 
 "conduct God over the frontier." It was fashion- 
 able everywhere to scoff at religion. It required 
 a man in the army to be morally brave to attend 
 Mass. 
 
 There was no military promotion for a zealous 
 Catholic. M. Viviani, the then Premier of 
 France, was amongst the most intolerant of an 
 atheistical group. 
 
 And yet, as it would seem, during all those 
 years of loud and insulting flouts at the name of
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 131 
 
 God, France, in her secret heart of hearts, was 
 devoutly religious. 
 
 Commenting on these first phases of the war, 
 Lord Bryce made some sound reflections. He 
 said: "Some have said that we are witnessing 
 the bankruptcy of Christianity. It would be more 
 true to say that we see a bankruptcy of civilisa- 
 tion itself, for all that had been effected, not only 
 by the power of the Gospel, but by the forces and 
 influences of every kind that make for moral pro- 
 gress and peace, all that philosophy as well as 
 religion has done, may seem to have gone to pieces 
 and vanished away. The first shock brought 
 many sensitive minds near to despair. If this 
 world war were the outcome of all our marvellous 
 advances in the knowledge and mastery of the 
 forces of Nature, and improvements in the arts of 
 life, from what quarter could we hope for any help 
 to deliver us from a recurrence of like catas- 
 trophies? How begin to rebuild on surer founda- 
 tions the building that had been shattered by this 
 earthquake? Despair, however, is a word that 
 has never been heard from the lips of our country- 
 men. Still less ought it to find a place in the 
 thoughts of a Christian, for to despair would be 
 to abandon faith in the providence of God. One 
 of the great figures of Christianity St. Augus- 
 tine when he saw the fabric of civilisation seem- 
 ing to fall to pieces with the capture of Rome and 
 the instreaming of barbarian tribes through the 
 provinces of the empire, sat down and composed 
 his famous treatise 'On the City of God,' which 
 shone like a beacon light across the troubled 
 waters of the Dark Ages." 
 
 In the first year of the war the French Govern- 
 ment compelled 20,000 priests to join the ranks 
 and take their places in the firing line. Those 
 priests were forced to drop the cassock and don
 
 132 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 the uniform. The motive at first was hatred to 
 the Church. But the presence of the priests in 
 the trenches had a consequence quite unforeseen. 
 By their tenderness to the wounded, their daunt- 
 less courage in battle, and their quite super- 
 natural self-denial, they leavened the army with 
 the Christ spirit. 
 
 One of them, a mere seminarist, tells in a letter 
 how the grace of a regenerated spirit came over 
 the men over whom he was sergeant 
 
 "Here is a little story which will give you pleasure. We 
 had returned for our four days in the trenches. Well, 
 on the first evening my men said to me 'As you are a 
 cure, or nearly one, you ought to say prayers for us.' 
 You can imagine how joyfully I undertook to do so. And 
 so each evening I said prayers aloud, and all answered 
 devoutly." 
 
 A much more striking case was that of an officer 
 from Narbonne, who in August, 1914, bade his 
 wife good-bye and went to the front. The last 
 words he spake to her before leaving were flaunt- 
 ing taunts about religion. Two months later, on 
 October 11, 1914, he wrote to her this letter 
 
 "Taking advantage of a day of rest, I am sending you 
 a long letter. It is ten o'clock, and as it is Sunday I 
 have just been to Mass. That will probably astonish you, 
 but ideas will have changed much after the war. The 
 most violent have become calm, and we go to Mass, which 
 is generally said, as it was this morning, by one of our 
 men. Religion is being restored in this war. Even ac- 
 cording to advanced Socialist opinion, it is thought that 
 the Republic will perhaps restore the salaries of the 
 priests, of which they were so brutally deprived. You are 
 astonished, doubtless, at my talking so. But I am not 
 the only one who has been won over; and when one is 
 face to face with death, as Herve said in his paper last 
 week in speaking of the Socialists, we do not want to die 
 like beasts.' " 
 
 The man who wrote that letter, like millions of 
 others, had taken to heart the chastisement of 
 God. 
 
 Then there are deep lessons to be learned from
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 133 
 
 the work done by holy nuns, under the impelling 
 force of duty. Sometimes that work has been 
 done under fire on the battle field, where women 
 have shown themselves capable of a cool bravery 
 equal to the highest. One witness has described 
 these priests and nuns as "the miracles of the 
 time." Both have given up life, "as 'twere a 
 careless trifle." 
 
 That is where religion shines in supreme splen- 
 dor. The nervous nun, under its inspiration, 
 becomes a heroine, and the cure of souls a physi- 
 cal hero. Sometimes there has been but one 
 official chaplain for 20,000 men. Then it is that 
 the priests who are privates in the ranks are in 
 most request. One of these, full of the sense of 
 his good work, exclaims 
 
 "What a good work, and what an excellent soil! The 
 faith of the old Crusaders was not in it. Wherever you 
 went, and while you remained with these faithful Catholic 
 men, nothing else was anything to them. God bless them 
 all; for they have given me more joy in these three months 
 than the whole rest of my semi-wasted life has given me. 
 It was worth waiting for. It is true to say that the 
 German Kaiser is fighting a community of saints con- 
 verted." 
 
 That is a glorious purple patch in the red 
 records of this war. France was once the eldest 
 daughter of the Church. She spent, per capita, 
 more money in missions to the heathen than any 
 other people. But her atheistical rulers seduced 
 her away from her religion. They insulted and 
 robbed God, Pope, Bishops and Clergy. The 
 penalty has come home in decimated provinces. 
 The French people know and feel it. One French 
 priest has given expression to it thus 
 
 "The regiments at the front the multitudes in town 
 and country see the war with one and the same eye. 
 Those who do not know Catholic France the real France 
 which, true to the Church in spite of the efforts of a 
 hostile Government to make it infidel, has always remained
 
 134 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 faithful to the Church are wofully mistaken if they 
 believe that the Government succeeded in blotting out the 
 light of heaven. If these lights were extinguished, it was 
 only in atheist skies. Even here, thanks be to God, they 
 have been relit." 
 
 It has been well said that on the field where 
 brave men die, religion lives again. In that there 
 should be a wonderful meaning made manifest to 
 us, if we have only the capacity to take it in. 
 
 The priest-soldier of France has been a spiri- 
 tual influence among his comrades, so that some 
 of them fought with nobler motives than that of 
 blood-lust, and went to death or victory, influenced 
 not with hatred of their fellow-men, but with a 
 conviction that out of all that death there would 
 come a new life to nations, and that in killing 
 their enemy they were killing a brutal tyranny 
 with its grip upon the world, and a barbarism 
 which would make human life a slavery. 
 
 The crux we have to meet is how to apply 
 Christianity to the facts of life. Few men have 
 ever seriously tried to apply the principles of the 
 Gospel so as to be in the world and yet not of the 
 world. The call to us all is to begin with his 
 own soul and his own life. We can try to think 
 of what each can do to make the Gospel of love 
 and self-forgetfulness guide his conduct. The 
 circumstances attending this war, and the chal- 
 lenge to Christian principles which it makes, have 
 stirred the depths of men's souls as nothing has 
 done for the last three centuries. 
 
 Bryce suggestively asks "Must we not try, 
 while this impulse is still fresh and strong upon 
 us, to turn it to the fullest account? Must we 
 not make another effort to bring the individual 
 life and the social life and the business life and 
 the national life nearer to those Christian ideals 
 in following which, as we believe, the best hopes
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 135 
 
 for the peace and welfare of humanity are to be 
 found?" 
 
 Sometimes out of the welter, there come to us 
 little streaks of personality which are very charm- 
 ing. A Methodist chaplain in France, Rev. W. 
 Hall, was billeted at Havre with the Rev. Father 
 Bradley. They were tent-mates. After a time 
 they had to separate. When the priest was gone, 
 the Methodist said of him 
 
 "I never met a more gentle and refined Christian char- 
 acter. His one thought was to serve others; and he 
 cared nothing for his own discomfort so long as he was 
 helping some one else. It was a grief to both of us 
 when a little over a month ago, I stood in the middle of 
 the night at a railway station to wish him good-bye. He 
 was ordered to join a field ambulance in the fighting line. 
 His last words were, 'Hall, don't forget to pray for me. 
 Underneath and round about both of us are the Everlast- 
 ing arms." 
 
 Incidents like that, emerging from the bubble 
 of the infernal war cauldron, smell in the face of 
 heaven like incense, and one can imagine them 
 going up to God as so many supplications for 
 mercy, binding the unregenerate earth "with 
 golden chains about the feet of God." They can- 
 not reconcile us to the hateful war, but they sug- 
 gest to us beautiful compensations for its horrors. 
 
 Let no one, after noting those 20,000 French 
 conscript priests, speak of the clergy as "sexless." 
 In the fighting line, in ambulance works, wherever 
 special peril needed heroism, those soldier-priests 
 rank amongst France's doughtiest soldiers. 
 
 Their strength was as the strength of ten, 
 Because their souls were pure. 
 
 Their steel was rigid towards the enemy; but 
 their hearts were melted with pity towards the 
 wounded and dying, while their "Ego te absolvo" 
 was unfailing.
 
 136 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 AN AUSTRALIAN TESTIMONY. 
 
 Bishop Phelan, of Sale, Victoria, went through 
 France just before the war began, and returned 
 four months afterwards. 
 
 On his arrival in Australia, I asked him "Can 
 you say anything of your own knowledge as to 
 whether the French people are returning to their 
 religious duty?" 
 
 The Bishop's eyes lighted with a glint of holy 
 fire. It was the alert love of the prelate to whom 
 religion is the breath of life. He answered 
 
 "I will answer your question best, I think, by giving 
 you two pictures. This is the first. 
 
 "I went through Paris on my way home near the end 
 of July, 1914, just before the breaking out of the war. 
 People were beginning to be alarmed, but were still hope- 
 ful of the war-cloud passing. 
 
 "Father Martin and I were together. We went to half- 
 a-dozen different churches at the time of Holy Mass. We 
 wanted to note the extent of the people's devotion, and to 
 note how many used the confessional. We went on both 
 Sunday and week days. 
 
 "There was desolation so far as the congregations were 
 concerned. I said Mass at one church, where only half-a- 
 dozen people attended. At another there were about a 
 dozen. At Notre Dame itself I counted 17 persons at one 
 of the late morning Masses. 
 
 "We made inquiries. This was quite customary. The 
 people were working in the fields and the streets, as if 
 Sunday had no claims on them. 
 
 "We remembered the threat of the French Premier, M. 
 Viviani, that he would 'blot out the light of heaven.' There 
 also occurred to our minds with a sense of pity and dread, 
 the boast of another French Minister that they meant to 
 'conduct God over the frontier, as they had no further use 
 for Him.' 
 
 *"We visited certain communities of teaching nuns. 
 One of them was my own community at Sale; and we saw 
 where the Government had built up a wall to turn them 
 out of their property, their only offence was that they 
 would not promise to cease teaching religion in the schools 
 which they conducted. 
 
 "The state of infidel persecution in France at the date 
 of our first visit was intensely saddening. It was as
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 137 
 
 if the rulers of France were drunk with the hatred of God. 
 It grieved one to think that so great and noble a people 
 as the French have been, despite their faults and foibles, 
 could have descended so low as to strike a dastard's blow 
 at a woman's religious freedom. 
 
 "Well, that is one picture a very sad one. Now for 
 the other. 
 
 "I went through France again in October, about ten 
 weeks after the war had been waging. The Battle of the 
 Marne had been just fought and won. Paris was safe, 
 quiet and calm. There was no business, because a million 
 people had left it for the war, or for the provinces, or for 
 safety in England. 
 
 "The people had evidently suffered a great and terrible 
 shock. The beautiful plantations around the city were 
 all gone. The noble trees had been cut down and dragged 
 up on high mounds and embankments on the outside of 
 the city to form almost impenetrable barb-wire entangle- 
 ments against the expected foe. 
 
 "I learned then that the Parisians had quite concluded 
 that the Germans would reach Paris and perhaps enter it. 
 
 "They had never despaired of the ultimate result of the 
 war; but they had expected these initial set-backs. This 
 was because they knew that the Germans were ahead of 
 them in mobilisation; and the British army could not be 
 ready in any large force in the early stages of the war. 
 The Belgians had not been expected to make so splendid a 
 stand as they had done. 
 
 "The people, therefore, had gone through a time of 
 fearful chastening. Death had entered every family, and 
 only God knew how many more were to fall into the maws 
 of the grisly king. 
 
 "There was no complaint, no dread, no shrinking; but 
 there was a sense everywhere that the nation was living 
 under the shadow of the Divine chastisement. 
 
 "Now what of the churches? I went and said Holy 
 Mass again in the same building where before I had 
 previously seen only half-a-dozen worshippers. The 
 hour of the day was about the same. The church was 
 nearly full; and I had to exhaust two large ciboriums in 
 giving Holy Communion to the people. 
 
 "Father Martin, who was with me on both occasions, had 
 experiences just like mine. We were both astonished at 
 the change; and we were greatly consoled by it. 
 
 "To one who has made any careful study of God's deal- 
 ings with men, there is no difficulty at all in recognising 
 the Divine finger in this War-scourge which has fallen 
 upon hapless France.
 
 138 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 "While our hearts melt with pity over the fearful suf- 
 ferings of individuals which indeed are greater than 
 those who have not seen them can ever conceive we feel 
 that, like all the chastisements of the Omnipotent, they 
 bear within them the germs of signal blessedness. 
 
 "It is true that the nuns and religious orders and 
 teachers die and suffer with the rest; but to them God's 
 holy will is never a punishment, but a cross which it is 
 a privilege to carry. 
 
 "France is Catholic again. That is the other picture. 
 It may be that the same needed lessons are being taught 
 and learned in the other countries of the belligerent 
 nations. Perhaps even in this." 
 
 THE COMPENSATION TO BRITAIN. 
 
 If we would escape the accusation of pharisa- 
 ism, we must reflect that had there been a higher 
 standard of Christian thought and action among 
 ourselves and elsewhere in Christendom these 
 things could not have happened. Many men in 
 Britain have of late years come to see more clearly 
 than before how much is amiss in their business 
 life, and how far their social arrangements fall 
 short of the Christian standard. Particularly 
 have they noted how inconsistent with Christian 
 principles is the industrial strife which has threa- 
 tened of late years English domestic peace. Many 
 have also asked whether British national policy 
 has been always worthy of the religion they pro- 
 fess. Why has England been regarded by other 
 nations as grasping and overbearing, and so often 
 charged with pharisaism ? 
 
 All these introspections have come perforce out 
 of the afflictions of the war; and they have come 
 in England as well as in France. What is to 
 be done? Is there any other influence from 
 which so much can be hoped as from Christianity? 
 Is there, indeed, any force other than Christianity 
 that will bring back the world towards peace and
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 139 
 
 goodwill? Can something be done to revive the 
 inspiring power of religion? 
 
 The course of history during the last two thou- 
 sand years shows that Christ's Gospel has been by 
 far the strongest of the moral forces. It is the 
 strongest because it begins from within. All 
 improvement begins from the individual soul. 
 "The Kingdom of Heaven is within you." The 
 nation and the State are only so many individual 
 men, and as the men are so will the State be. 
 
 This religion, when it comes to a people, is a 
 greater gift than the political and social privi- 
 leges which lift men to a higher level in life. 
 The trades union may increase a man's pay and 
 shorten his hours of toil; but without religion it 
 will not bring him peace. Religion will sweeten 
 his outlook, restrain his passions, give him cour- 
 age, and make him happier with what he has. 
 
 If it be really true that this war has caused 
 any country, any people, to return to the con- 
 solations of religion it has yielded a great com- 
 pensation for its evils. Any one who has seen 
 the balm of religion healing the wounds of the 
 afflicted, drying the tears of the poor, softening 
 hardened hearts, changing hatred into love, bring- 
 ing patience and resignation and joy into deso- 
 late hearts, will never undervalue this influence. 
 
 There are many material advantages which are 
 possible. 
 
 We have already stripped Germany of her 
 colonial possessions. She will never again, as we 
 hope, be a neighbor of Australia in Papua or in 
 the near Pacific. Certainly she will never again 
 be a neighbor who can menace us. She is cleared 
 out of the Chinese and Eastern Seas. 
 
 Egypt has already become a British possession, 
 its Turkish suzerainty abolished. There are fair
 
 140 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 hopes that the Turks may be driven out of 
 Europe and also out of stricken Armenia. 
 
 But more. Far more. 
 
 Through this war there has come to us a splen- 
 did exhibition of Imperial unity. The price paid 
 is high, but the diadem placed in the imperial 
 crown is beyond compare. 
 
 The great Indian potentates, representing 300 
 millions of people, have shown how they value the 
 Imperial Overlordship of Great Britain. The 
 touch of the German war-spear instantly trans- 
 formed them from a condition of seething, griev- 
 ance-mongers, full of petty complaints against Bri- 
 tish rule, into ardent loyalists, eager to be at the 
 throat of Teutonic tyranny. On their side their 
 services in the war will bring to them a larger 
 measure of autonomous government. 
 
 What is true of India has proved equally so of 
 South Africa. The Empire has there devoted 
 sons who are ready to go to their deaths against 
 the emissaries of German militarism. South 
 Africa is now one of the star gems in the Imperial 
 diadem. 
 
 Canadians, New Zealanders, Australians have 
 given in gold and blood evidence of the strength 
 of the crimson thread of kinship. A world- 
 sounding proclamation, gone forth from every 
 part of the Empire, that every link in the Imperial 
 chain is of tested metal. 
 
 But in that first Christmas after the war the 
 happiest gift was perhaps seen in the instant 
 truce that was proclaimed in Ireland between the 
 Orange and the Green. It was to last at least 
 to the end of the war. If the Belfast Orangeman 
 did not actually embrace his Catholic brother, he 
 ceased to threaten him. They both cried out 
 for a mutual armistice, declaring "Our first duty 
 is to the Empire." It was a magical transforma-
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 141 
 
 tion. It scared and amazed Germany more than 
 could a new army corps of Inniskilleners. 
 
 It is true that these happy relatons were sub- 
 sequently marred by mal-adroit statesmanship 
 and Sinn Fein rancor, followed by a revolt engin- 
 eered by German gold. 
 
 There are some hopeful signs that out of the 
 stress of this war Ireland may find herself. Ulster 
 Orangemen have fought side by side with Munster 
 Catholics and have learned to respect each other. 
 The Irish Convention has sat in Belfast and Cork 
 with happy results in both places. The Chair- 
 man, Sir Horace Plunkett, has told us that every 
 member of it managed to modify some of his 
 opinions. He said to Irishmen recently 
 
 "You see we are getting what I had hoped for 
 that I would, live to see a change of heart, out 
 of which a new Ireland would be born. At the 
 worst, we are gradually narrowing the differences 
 which keep Irishmen apart. At the best we will 
 bring Irishmen of the north and south together 
 in a larger patriotism, whereby they will say to 
 each other, 'My country is thy country,' and, in 
 the larger charity, will say, 'My God is thy 
 God.' " 
 
 Should that day dawn, its sunrise will certainly 
 be out of the work of the war. 
 
 AN ENGLISH-SPEAKING RACE ALLIANCE. 
 
 Perhaps one of the most valuable of world- 
 improvements may come from the drawing to- 
 gether in a bond of love of all the English-speak- 
 ing races of America and Great Britain. There 
 was a good deal to wipe off the slate, and some- 
 thing to fill in. The war has done it. 
 
 There was a recent statement in an American 
 magazine, which said "By the middle of the cen-
 
 142 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 tury, or in 1950, we can count on a population of 
 200,000,000." 
 
 Those figures, with all they meant, made me 
 meditate, and the result was the following 
 verses , \ 
 
 POSSIBILITIES OF THE ENGLISH-SPEAKING RACES. 
 
 In the forest's leafy fastness, where the bell bird rings 
 
 her note, 
 Where the murmurs from the ether in the dreamy 
 
 shadows float, 
 Came to me a train of fancies, whispering to my inmost 
 
 soul, 
 
 Quelling all external senses under mightier control. 
 Heaven seemed to ope its portals as when Paul was 
 
 upward caught, 
 And a melody of meaning filled the pulses of my thought. 
 
 I. 
 
 Yes! the lessons from the sages, and the ages as they 
 
 spin, 
 Are that races rot and ripen just as sorrows come with 
 
 sin. 
 Empires bud, and bloom, and wither; nations live but to 
 
 decay. 
 By th' eternal law of being, kings nad midgets have 
 
 their day. 
 From the waves rose Royal Britain, yclept "the majesty 
 
 of earth," 
 
 Growing like the sturdy oaklet from its tiny acorn birth. 
 First the slow and solid Saxon came to temper Pictish 
 
 flame; 
 Then the hardy venturous Norseman, full of enterprises, 
 
 came. 
 Normans next, with knightly prowess, chivalry and polish 
 
 gave 
 All commingling in the Briton, crowned as brave among 
 
 the brave. 
 Britons! Whose resplendent story through the world 
 
 a welkin rings 
 Rings that Britons rank in empires, an imperial race of 
 
 kings. 
 From their island-hive those races swarmed across the 
 
 Atlantic foam, 
 
 And in western wildernesses made a broader, freer home. 
 Home where, lured to loftier promise, Europe's choicest 
 
 children turned;
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 143 
 
 Home in which the star of freedom with a brighter lustre 
 
 burned. 
 All men prize of shining progress, at its brightest and 
 
 its best, 
 
 In a galaxy of glory, blazes, dazzles in the West. 
 Take old earth's most splendid records; search through 
 
 history's purplest page; 
 Take Assyria, Greece, or Carthage; take high Rome's 
 
 Augustan age; 
 None have matched the march of empire where Columbia's 
 
 children throng, 
 Rearing their unique Republic, full a hundred millions 
 
 strong. 
 
 II. 
 
 Softly fell the heavenly whispers, mellow, musical, and 
 fond, 
 
 Fell perspicuously upon me, voices from the Great Beyond. 
 
 Then methought my musing spirit questioned of the 
 mighty theme 
 
 Is it sooth? And came the answer Learn the future in 
 a dream. 
 
 This is sooth. From Egypt once the light of heaven 
 didst clearest shine, 
 
 Then it changed its radiant focus to the Lake of Pales- 
 tine. 
 
 Now the course of empire blazes where the British foot- 
 prints go, 
 
 From the frozen Bay of Baffin to the Gulf of Mexico 
 
 Blazes where the dusky Sikh and Hottentot had once 
 their sway; 
 
 Where Ind's murky myriads swarm; where Burmese chil- 
 dren live their day; 
 
 Where Australia's sunny regions woodlands, forest, 
 mountain, plain 
 
 Teem with promise of a greater empire in the southern 
 main. 
 
 In the world's chief gates and strongholds British harps 
 to joy are strung, 
 
 And two hundred million voices sing the songs that 
 Shakespere sung. 
 
 III. 
 
 Heed ye well, ye thoughtless Britons! Sway as man ne'er 
 
 swayed before. 
 Take ye heed of what may wait thee in a half a century 
 
 more. 
 None may lift the fateful curtain; none may know what 
 
 shall befall.
 
 144 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 But be this thy faith abiding Wisdom guides and governs 
 
 all. 
 Cherish faith that thine own portion may eclipse thy 
 
 brilliant past; 
 But all power is linked with Duty duty great as power 
 
 is vast. 
 
 All thy manifolded millions may again be multiplied; 
 Deserts teem with golden grain and waste lands blossom 
 
 in their pride. 
 Sunny homes may smile and flourish where the jungle 
 
 screameth wild; 
 And the tiger be supplanted by the lambkin and the 
 
 child. 
 Copious streams of nascent knowledge from a wholesome 
 
 press may flow, 
 
 Heralds of a Future which the Universal Pax shall know. 
 Kindred tongue and racial kinship rival flags in love 
 
 may bind. 
 Sharers of a glorious Past a more resplendent future 
 
 find. 
 Briton and Columbia, partnered, may direct the paths of 
 
 kings; 
 May upraise the thoughts of peoples toward the goal of 
 
 higher things; 
 Curbing tyrants, checking despots, bidding brawlers cease 
 
 their broils; 
 Lifting up the lowly, freeing serfs and bondsmen from 
 
 their toils; 
 Strong, yet merciful; possessing much that much for good 
 
 be given; 
 Seeking human evolution only through the will of heaven. 
 
 rv. 
 
 Heed ye, ye Imperial races! Ye the English tongue that 
 
 speak! 
 Beg for wisdom that may guide ye, strong amid the low 
 
 and weak. 
 How can ye achieve the highest? By the genius of your 
 
 sons? 
 By the beauty of your daughters? By your fleets, and 
 
 forts, and guns? 
 By your energy and courage? By your prowess? By 
 
 your star? 
 By your wealth, or by your wisdom? Heed ye what 
 
 these forces are. 
 They indeed are fertile seedlings such as nations ought 
 
 to sow.
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 145 
 
 But do they suffice for Empire? Can ye build upon 
 them ? No. 
 
 Richest seeds and sods most fertile must depend on God's 
 decree. 
 
 Egypt once topped earthly grandeur, but her greatness 
 ceased to be. 
 
 Where is Babylonia's splendor? Where the great Assyrian 
 powers ? 
 
 Where the Macedonian sceptre? Vanished as the fleeting 
 hours. 
 
 Pagan Rome's imperial eagles held in awe a subject 
 world. 
 
 Monarchs crouched and nations trembled where her ban- 
 ners were unfurled. 
 
 Haughty chieftains craved the honor but to kiss great 
 Caesar's robe; 
 
 While th' Eternal City gathered tribute wealth from all 
 the globe. 
 
 Sunk is Rome and vanished Caesar, mute the myriad cap- 
 tive crowds, 
 
 Melted as the gorgeous fabric in the sunset's gilded clouds. 
 
 V. 
 
 As the past was, so the future; Futures but the past 
 
 repeat, 
 Save when godliness and justice build on lines which 
 
 cannot fleet. 
 Now your English-speaking races forge their pathway 
 
 to the van; 
 
 Umpires of the weaker empires, destined arbiters of man. 
 What secures them that they fail not like the empires 
 
 which have passed? 
 What the soul and life and purpose which can give them 
 
 strength to last? 
 Heed ye! Heed the graven lessons, writ in suffering, blood 
 
 and tears. 
 Glory lasts not; Justice only stands the crumbling of the 
 
 years. 
 Ye must build not on ambition; ye must serve the subject 
 
 race. 
 Ye must rule for love, not tribute; ye must scorn the 
 
 sordid, base. 
 Ye must bathe the world in mercy, sweetening every bitter 
 
 cup. 
 Ye must soothe the sad and suffering, bind their wounds 
 
 and lift them up. 
 Ye must bow your heads in homage; ye must offer God your 
 
 fame.
 
 146 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Ye must render all your glory to your Great Redeemer's 
 
 name. 
 Ye must spurn the pride of empire purchased by a Judas 
 
 kiss. 
 Are you English-speaking races building on a rock like 
 
 this? 
 
 VI. 
 
 Can thy conscience safely answer? What excuses, near 
 
 or far, 
 
 May avail ye in the day when Justice cites ye to the bar? 
 Cite some pages of thy record. Cite the seven deadly sins 
 Which have blurred thy many conquests. Thus thy 
 
 penitence begins. 
 Hastings' murderous thefts in India crimes humanity 
 
 abhors. 
 
 Centuries of Irish misrule; cruel, sordid opium wars; 
 Past enslavements of the negro, red with every ruthless 
 
 deed. 
 Millionaires who sweat the poor, and grind them with the 
 
 lust of greed. 
 
 VII. 
 
 Reverently I raised my head, and answered "Truly, have 
 
 our people erred. 
 We confess our 'scutcheon tarnished with oppressions black 
 
 and blurred. 
 We may fear the scales of Justice, lest our balance kick 
 
 the beam. 
 
 But we pray a purer future may our blotted past redeem. 
 We have faltered; we have fallen; but we have aspired to 
 
 bless. 
 Spite of human slips and lapses, we have aimed at 
 
 righteousness. 
 Towards our Christ, with high ideals, we have toiled with 
 
 struggles brave. 
 
 We have lavished life and lucre to emancipate the slave. 
 We have shattered galling shackles, burst our ebon 
 
 brother's bands. 
 We have torn the gory scourges from the cruel taskman's 
 
 hands. 
 We have pleaded with the nations to adjust their warlike 
 
 claims 
 
 By an arbiter's decision rather than by guns and flames. 
 We have rendered Ireland justice, striking off her searing 
 
 gyves. 
 We proclaim us foes to Anarchs, friends to law and human 
 
 lives.
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 147 
 
 We have striven to guide our courses by the life and love 
 
 and death, 
 And the beautiful example of the Man of Nazareth." 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Then a zephyr whispered softly, falling like a spirit's sigh 
 On my quickened subtle senses, as the Presence made 
 
 reply 
 "If thy words be sooth, thy Empire and Dominion firm 
 
 shall stand. 
 Ye shall grow in might and mercy and in human love 
 
 expand. 
 Be thy might but Right's defender; b'd thy cannons vent 
 
 their awe 
 To sustain the scales of Justice, poised in God's eternal 
 
 law; 
 And the world shall bend in homage; all thy blotted past 
 
 be shriven. 
 
 Ye shall find your foemen only in the rebel foes of heaven. 
 Prayers thy battleships shall follow; wrongs shall die, and 
 
 fears shall cease; 
 O'er the golden earth thy armies shall be guardians of the 
 
 peace. 
 
 If this come, it cometh only when thy People kiss the rod, 
 And in humbleness of spirit bow before their Father 
 
 God." 
 
 GROWTH OF THE PRAYER HABIT. 
 
 We may pause here. 
 
 Since that Christmas of 1914 three more have 
 come and gone, each witnesses to the increasing 
 intensity of the war-god's ravages. But nothing 
 has occurred to diminish our hope and supreme 
 confidence that there is a soul of goodness in 
 things evil. Despite the thick shadow of the 
 black war-cloud, there are many promises of a 
 bright to-morrow. 
 
 The wings of Time are black and white, 
 Pied with morning and with night. 
 
 On last Christmas Day in England one of the 
 British papers summed up as follows the compen-
 
 148 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 sations which were then distinctly in sight, apart 
 from any spiritual blessings 
 
 "1. The war has revealed the extent of our 
 danger before it became possibly insurmount- 
 able. 
 
 "2. It has revealed our deficiencies in military 
 organisation, numbers, armament, and strategy. 
 
 "3. It has revealed the jealousy, envy, and 
 hatred of some Continental peoples. 
 
 "4. It has revealed our friends in need. 
 
 "5. It has revealed the solidarity of the em- 
 pire, and the attachment of every member of the 
 empire family. 
 
 "6. It has revealed the fact that the 'virtue' 
 of the British race is unabated in every rank 
 of society. 
 
 "7. It has strengthened the moral fibre of the 
 British people at large, and has provided a pro- 
 phylactic against the corroding effects of uninter- 
 rupted prosperity. 
 
 "8. It has brought into view more distinctly the 
 duties and responsibilities of an Imperial civilisa- 
 tion. 
 
 "9. It has put to shame the selfish pusillanimity 
 of those who care nothing for the Imperial nation, 
 but wish to huddle in base comfort and material 
 'blessings'." 
 
 God's in the heavens ; and if all's not right with 
 the world, as Browning used to say, it is certain 
 that the said world is all the better for the rod 
 of the Divine Chastener. 
 
 But there is still another aspect of brightness, 
 springing out of the gloom of the war. 
 
 This is the prayer habit which it has brought 
 about. 
 
 Some sections of thinking men are fond of sup- 
 posing that the progress of twentieth century 
 science has eliminated from the average man a
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 149 
 
 good deal of his former proneness to lean on the 
 supernatural. In spite of latter-day spiritism, 
 the belief in spooks is not nearly as prevalent as it 
 was a century ago, when every lane and bridge 
 and hedgerow had its familiar spirit. The belief 
 in witches is almost gone, and no old lady with a 
 hooked nose and a broomstick is anywhere any 
 longer in danger of cremation at a stake. Charms 
 and spells and amulets have lost much of their 
 vogue, and scores of things which formerly called 
 forth people's superstitious reverence now evoke 
 ?. smile of tolerant incredulity. But it would 
 seem from some testimonies concerning the habits 
 of thought amongst the men who have been doing 
 such yeoman service at the French front that the 
 aboriginal mind of man in relation to the Unseen 
 changes very little. The presence of death in its 
 thousand grisly shapes, though it does not terrify 
 the brave man, sobers him, and makes him realise 
 with Hamlet that there are more things in heaven 
 and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy. 
 Mr. Michael MacDonagh, in his volume "The 
 Irish on the Somme" gives us some first-hand in- 
 formation as to the thought and practices of the 
 average soldier on the eve of battle, or in the 
 trenches when the shells are over-intrusive. All 
 regiments have had their mascots, but in this 
 war the individual soldier loves to carry his 
 charm. The tooth of a horse which has come 
 scatheless through a campaign brings good 
 luck; so does the tunic button belonging 
 to a man who has dodged death in the 
 same way. "Touchwood" is the selling 
 name of a tiny oaken imp, mostly head, 
 designed at the beginning of the war by a Mr. 
 Brandon, who has since sold a million and a half 
 of them. In 1916 there was a presentation of 
 1,200 of these "Touchwoods" to officers and men
 
 in Regent's Park. Hundreds of soldiers who have 
 escaped in critical situations ascribe their good 
 fortune to this mascot. The child's caul, which 
 used to be so much valued by sailors as a safe- 
 guard against drowning, went almost out of vogue 
 during the last half century. The dangers from 
 submarines have brought it in again, and its price 
 in all the British seaports has gone up. Fortune 
 tellers and crystal gazers have been reaping rich 
 harvests since the beginning of the war. Old 
 superstitions have come to life again; or rather, 
 they were never dead, but only slept. Human 
 nature, essentially the same, asserts its identity 
 in all ages. 
 
 But this yearning after the supernatural is not 
 confined to the lower levels of mere superstition. 
 According to Mr. MacDonagh, who says that he 
 speaks from personal observation in the trenches, 
 it is seen more strikingly still in a fervent revival 
 of religion. It is not that conscience makes 
 cowards of the noble fellows ; for they face death 
 with an added fearlessness. The constant sight 
 of comrades dropping from one's side, and falling 
 out of time and into eternity, compels a man, 
 whatever be his mould, to contemplate immor- 
 tality from a closer and more direct angle. Men 
 who have perhaps never prayed since they left 
 their mother's guidance, and who would be 
 ashamed of doing so in their old city home, fall 
 readily on their knees in the trenches and join 
 in the general appeal to heaven. The author 
 says that "non-Catholic soldiers of the new armies 
 are turning from materialistic charms to holy 
 emblems," and they carry sacred pictures or 
 medals about their persons or in their knapsacks. 
 Some of them have their rosary beads, and value 
 them highly. 
 
 Perhaps most of them believe in their efficacy
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 151 
 
 only in the same sense that the materialist values 
 his mascot or charm. But then there are tens of 
 thousands who believe that God directs every in- 
 cident on a battle field as He does the fall of a 
 sparrow. Providence "is to them still the Lord 
 and Master of all the forces of Nature; and the 
 turning aside of a bullet or piece of explosive 
 shell would be but the slightest manifestation of 
 His almighty omnipotence." 
 
 Michael O'Leary, V.C., is one of this type. He 
 said "A shell has grazed my cheek and blown a 
 comrade at my side to pieces. There was no 
 reason, as far as I could see, but the act of God, 
 why the shell should not have knocked my head off 
 and grazed my comrade's cheek." 
 
 A man of that type would not listen to the 
 materialistic explanation that he was not in the 
 direct line of the shell's flight. He would answer 
 "I know that. But why wasn't I?" 
 
 He knows full well that thousands pray and 
 wear scapulars, and yet are killed all around him. 
 Like the unshakable Job, in this "though He slay 
 me, yet will I trust Him," MacDonagh's Irish 
 soldier says "Blessed be the holy will of God." 
 
 There is said to be a practical military side 
 to this. Just as it makes a company twice as 
 strong when the men can be kept cheerful, so 
 is it found to be if they are sincerely pious." 
 
 One soldier put it this way "When the shells 
 came near us we used to pray. Prayers are like 
 a double parapet, I think. Yesterday we were 
 reciting the Litany of the Sacred Heart while 
 the shells were annoying us. I was reading the 
 beautiful praises and titles, and both my Catholic 
 and Protestant mates were answering me with 
 great fervor, when one shell hit our trench and 
 never burst ; and, furthermore, no shell came near
 
 152 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 us after that." The enemy had their attention 
 directed elsewhere for the rest of the day. 
 
 It is in this spirit of increased religious fervor 
 amongst the men at the front that an Anglican 
 League of the Cross had up to the end of 1916 
 "sent out over 10,000 crucifixes to Protestant sol- 
 diers." They act like "a double parapet." The 
 best officers in the army, irrespective of creed, 
 know this that religious emotion exalts a man's 
 mentality. It steadies men, calms them, gives 
 them confidence under fire. It eliminates fear or 
 controls that fear, and is therefore part of a sol- 
 dier's training. 
 
 Psychologists tell us that the same man under 
 different conditions of body and mind may prove 
 either a hero or a craven. Everything which tends 
 to keep the soldier cheerful and confident is equiva- 
 lent to multiplying the effective force of the 
 troops. Mr. MacDonagh says that the high com- 
 mands are fully aware of this, and "thus is the 
 wearing of scapulars and medals in the army 
 welcomed as an aid to our arms ; a reinforcement 
 of our military power. In it may be found the 
 secret of much of the dash and gallantry of the 
 Irish troops," who have won eighteen V.C.'s, a 
 share out of all proportion to their numbers. 
 
 An explanation of this mental attitude may be 
 found in a remark of Sergeant Dwyer, V.C., who 
 afterwards met his death on the Somme. Speak- 
 ing to a recruiting meeting in Trafalgar-square, 
 he said "I don't know what the young men are 
 afraid of. If your name is not on a bullet or a 
 bit of shrapnel it won't reach you any more than 
 will a letter that isn't addressed to you." When 
 the Somme bullet reached him, the only remark 
 made was, " 'Twas the will of God." It would 
 seem that more than bullets and death are coming 
 to men out of this war.
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 153 
 
 But apart from the soldiers in the trenches, and 
 the afflicted relatives of those who have suffered, 
 the average civilian has been brought to his knees 
 as rarely before. All England, all France, all 
 Australia, probably all the world, have been made 
 more prayerful. This must mean a more rever- 
 ential and profound recognition of the Father- 
 hood of God. 
 
 In Melbourne we witnessed rounds of prayer 
 meetings in all the non-Catholic churches, in the 
 Jewish Synagogue, and in the Town Hall. In- 
 deed, the Town Hall prayer meetings have been 
 very constant and very fervent. 
 
 In the Catholic Churches there were proclaimed 
 Novenas of Holy Communions everywhere. On 
 dark, rainy winter mornings the wayfarer might 
 see streams of people going to early morning Mass 
 for both the dead and the living warriors. 
 
 Old and young, rich and poor, offered these 
 propitiatory sacrifices. The spectacle evoked 
 admiration from the sceptical. 
 
 It is worth thinking of, and all that it means. 
 These are no formal utterances of prayers for 
 peace. These Novenas of Holy Communions are 
 the intense heart-supplications of people who feel 
 the nearness of God. They are the plaints of 
 people who go to Him piteously, as to a Father 
 and a Brother, with their woes. 
 
 Every morning before partaking in the act of 
 sacrifice, they make six separate petitions 
 
 1. They ask for the restoration of peace accord- 
 ing to the Divine mind. 
 
 2. They beg His mercy upon the souls of the 
 fallen soldiers. 
 
 3. They pray for the speedy restoration of the 
 wounded. 
 
 4. They pray that the wounded who shall die 
 may find eternal rest.
 
 154 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 5. They beg for the safe return of the living. 
 
 6. Lastly, they ask that God may comfort the 
 relatives and friends of those fallen in battle. 
 
 Those communicants do not pray to a distant 
 God, but as to the God within them. "If any one 
 love Me, he will keep My word, and My Father 
 will love him ; and We will come to him, and will 
 make Our abode with him." Therefore they 
 whisper their wishes into an ear that is within 
 them and ready to listen. The doctrine of the 
 Communion of Saints gives to those who accept 
 it the consolation of being able the help the living 
 and the dead. 
 
 Life is full of apparent inequalities. We can- 
 not estimate them by the standard of time. To 
 make things relevant we must measure them by 
 the standard of eternity. 
 
 About ten months after the war began, Bishop 
 Phelan, of Sale, in announcing the Novena of 
 Communions, struck the tender note of helping the 
 departed "Now is the time for us to put into 
 practice the doctrine of the Communion of Saints, 
 which we profess every time we say the Apostles' 
 Creed that sacred union which binds the faithful 
 in this world to pray for each other; which links 
 us to our fellow Christians in heaven ; and which 
 enables us on earth to assist to a speedy happiness 
 those who died in God's friendship, but are not 
 so pure as to find immediate admission to their 
 reward." 
 
 There speak both a faith and a princely charity 
 which know no faltering. That period of the 
 Novena was one of rapt intensity of purpose in 
 the people. Relatives and friends of the soldiers 
 in the firing line trooped silently to the altar rail, 
 silently received and prayed, and silently went. 
 Some were mourning for the dead whose lives had 
 gone out in a blaze of military glory. Some were
 
 CONSOLATIONS OF THE WAR 155 
 
 in grief for the wounded. Others were anxious 
 for the daily risk of the uninjured fighters. 
 
 Men and women who go to God in such causes 
 are no perfunctory suppliants. It is with them 
 no spiritual flash in the pan. They carry their 
 very souls into their supplications. It is a vir- 
 tual storming of heaven, when the Kingdom of 
 Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it 
 away. 
 
 That sort of thing is almost world-wide. Men's 
 hearts are turned heavenward as they have not 
 been perhaps for half a century. May we, then, 
 not exclaim with Tennyson 
 
 "O, yet we trust that somehow good 
 Will be the final goal of ill." 
 
 Aye, even in this ravening slaughterous war. 
 It is a fruitful time with men when the popular 
 heart is softened by afflictions. There is more 
 than consolation in that. There are hopes. If 
 prayers are spiritual forces, and spiritual forces 
 are the spur to physical forces, such a time of 
 humble holy prayer may be as efficacious to the 
 ending of this war as a million bayonets. 
 
 F
 
 VII. 
 COURAGE AND THE WAR. 
 
 THE BRAVERY OP BATTLE. 
 
 The air is crisp with stories of heroism. The 
 papers teem with them. They come in all shapes 
 in reports of the bravery of our soldiers in 
 battle, of rescues achieved under a hell-fire of 
 shrapnel, in accounts of the succor by delicate 
 nurses of wounded men from the imminent deadly 
 breach. 
 
 We have tales of the sea, of strong swimmers in 
 their agony, dying to save weaker shipmates. 
 There was a gallant boy who went down with a 
 French warship in the Mediterranean, saying to 
 a boat's crew who were forced to abandon him in 
 the waves, "Never mind, boys ! Give my love to 
 my mother." 
 
 Stirring they are, those narratives; and true 
 enough, no doubt. The bravery is genuine. It 
 is ubiquitous. It exhibits itself on every side. 
 
 But has this war evoked any unusual degree of 
 courage? Do any wars do so? It may well be 
 questioned. Battle, of course, brings military 
 courage into prominence. It gilds with dramatic 
 brilliance the more tawdry traits of the brute in 
 humanity. 
 
 The war invites us, as all wars in all centuries 
 have done, to apotheosise the barbarism of battle, 
 and to proclaim that it typifies the highest quali- 
 ties of bravery. Which it most certainly does 
 not. Csesar said vauntingly 
 
 "Cowards die many times before their deaths. 
 The valiant never taste of death but once." 
 
 160
 
 COURAGE AND THE WAR 157 
 
 But that was a shallow generalisation of cour- 
 age by a military conqueror, with scarce an atom 
 of truth in it. Caesar piqued himself, as is com- 
 mon with soldiers, on the iron nerve which is a 
 stranger to fear. We may well doubt if there 
 ever was a man without fear. Nelson was said 
 to have been of the warrior type whose pulse 
 scarcely quickens at the smell of battle. 
 
 Caesar, bragging of his own courage, and per- 
 haps quite truly, said 
 
 Of all the wonders that I yet have heard 
 
 It seems to me most strange that men should fear. 
 
 And again, commenting on Cassius's "lean and 
 
 hungry look," he said 
 
 "I fear him not; 
 
 Yet if my name were liable to fear, 
 I do not know the man I should avoid 
 So soon as that spare Cassius. 
 
 But we prefer to believe with Byron that 
 
 Each hath some fear, and he who least betrays 
 Is the only hypocrite deserving praise. 
 
 We may admire the courage that is pulseless, 
 even as we admire the phenomenal brute strength, 
 though at its coarsest, in the pugilist and the 
 champion wrestler. But the men, if there be 
 such, who are insensible to fear, out of a sheer 
 non-apprehension of danger, are hardly heroes. 
 The cool careless audacity that marches up to the 
 mouth of the cannon with a flower in its cap and 
 a frivolous song on its lips, as serene as on parade, 
 is not courage of any high quality, but sheer lack 
 of sensibility. There is more of merit, but not 
 very much, in the courage that dares a quick dan- 
 ger in a sudden emergency. But it is more a 
 matter of habit than of quality. The fact that 
 there is no time to count the cost robs it of any 
 deliberate merit. Many a man, in fact, is sur- 
 prised into a heroism which is really no part of 
 him.
 
 158 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 The presence of fear does not mean the absence 
 of courage. True courage consists not in meeting 
 peril without fear, but in a resolution to face the 
 danger fully realising it, for the sake of duty. If 
 we are brave enough to be honest we need flinch 
 at nothing. 
 
 Man's inclination, rather than his judgment, 
 has always placed military courage in the first 
 rank. The reason is no doubt that feats of battle 
 are spectacular, whilst the greater courage that 
 endures pain or wrong in silence, has no mere- 
 tricious attractions. 
 
 The magnificent dash of the Australians on the 
 hills of Gallipoli, at Pozieres and at Polygon Wood, 
 appeals to the imagination, and exacts admira- 
 tion. Some of those troops were in their bap- 
 tism of fire, when the mere novelty of the peril 
 might have appalled them. We do not like to 
 think of their strong hearts as insensible to fear, 
 as they stormed the enemy under a rain of lead. 
 We rather love to think of them as fully realising 
 all their danger and facing it. The man who will 
 not flee makes his enemy flee. 
 
 Suppose we give a sample of what is meant. 
 Twelve months ago the name of Lieut. Warneford 
 rang through the world, and through the skies, 
 too, for he was an aviator. One day he went up 
 and attacked a Zeppelin single-handed. He soared 
 above the monster and so skilfully dropped bombs 
 on it, that it blew up and the explosion almost 
 ended him, who was only 50 feet over it. At the 
 time I published a few verses about his feat of 
 airmanship. I give them by way of illustration 
 
 DAVID AND GOLIATH. 
 
 "So David prevailed over the Philistine with a sling 
 and with a stone, and smote the Philistine and shew him." 
 I. Samuel xvii.
 
 COURAGE AND THE WAR 159 
 
 Heard the heavens fill with shouting, and there rained a 
 
 ghastly dew, 
 From the nations' airy navies grappling in the central 
 
 blue. "Locksley Hall." 
 
 A MODERN VERSION. 
 
 Star of Honor from the Legion with Victoria's 
 
 Cross doth rest, 
 
 Jointly pinned by France and England on the gal- 
 lant Warneford's breast. 
 All the world hath paused to marvel how like 
 
 Israel's youth divine, 
 England's David met Goliath and hath slain the 
 
 Philistine. 
 Warneford saw the Zeppelin airship proudly 
 
 through the ether prance, 
 Armed with bombs to wreak destruction on the 
 
 naked breast of France. 
 He a ruddy youth, new trained an aviator's skill 
 
 to wield 
 In the tactics of the heavens on the ether battle 
 
 field. 
 Great Goliath loomed above him, like a thunder 
 
 cloud in wrath, 
 Lowering o'er the landscape, cleaving through the 
 
 firmament its path. 
 Bearing crew alert and eager, numbering warriors 
 
 twice a score; 
 Every gunner grim and ready with his shrapnel 
 
 well in store. 
 David touched his smooth propeller, found each 
 
 blade was firm in place; 
 Scanned his wings, his ties, his stanchions, tested 
 
 every iron brace; 
 Gauged with care his stock of petrol, scrutinised 
 
 his steering gear; 
 Leapt into his seat, and shot like bolt into the 
 
 atmosphere.
 
 160 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Full six thousand feet above him slowly was the 
 
 Zeppelin run, 
 Searching for the points most sure, where wreck 
 
 and ruin might be done. 
 Like an eagle soared the airman, all his plumage 
 
 taut and strong, 
 
 Till five hundred feet below him sailed the Zep- 
 pelin along. 
 Just as David loosed his sling and chose his pebble, 
 
 stooping low, 
 Warneford shot his passage down and seized a 
 
 bomb to slay his foe. 
 Dropped the missile towards his f oeman ! Missed ! 
 
 Another ! Missed again ! 
 Then a third and fourth and fifth were loosened, 
 
 but the aim was vain. 
 "Neck or nothing!" muttered he, and sank till 
 
 fifty feet at most 
 Lay atwixt him and the Zeppelin sentry at his 
 
 danger post. 
 "He or I or both!" quoth he, as shot on shot 
 
 came hissing past. 
 Then his bomb with aim plumb centre on the 
 
 bulky Zeppelin cast. 
 Well he knew the aim was true, and touched his 
 
 lever for a flight. 
 But the rock of the explosion caught and whirled 
 
 him in its might 
 Whirled him upwards, tossed him sidewise, turned 
 
 his engine upside down, 
 As he saw the Zeppelin sinking in a flame of 
 
 red and brown. 
 There are moments when the soul is touched with 
 
 deeds of such emprise 
 
 As to calmly gaze on ruin, and look Death be- 
 tween the eyes. 
 "In that moment," says the hero, "thought I that 
 
 the end had come ;
 
 COURAGE AND THE WAR 161 
 
 But I had no dread of dying. Fear itself was 
 
 dead or numb. 
 Then a miracle befell me, or my good machine 
 
 befell, 
 
 As it looped the loop and righted, planing down- 
 ward safe and well. 
 Landed was I, safely landed, with my petrol motor 
 
 dry; 
 Landed in the foeman's lines, but with no enemy 
 
 anigh. 
 Quickly from my petrol tank I fed my trusty 
 
 aeroplane, 
 
 And with wings outspread I took me to the at- 
 mosphere again. 
 God of heaven ! Sweet delivery ! All my soul to 
 
 Thee ascends! 
 See the British lines and colors! Then I sank 
 
 amongst my friends.' 
 Such was Warneford's wondrous story, seen and 
 
 vouched, by heroes told, 
 Splendid mid the super-valiant and the boldest of 
 
 the bold. 
 Star of France's Honored Legion, with Victoria 
 
 Cross shall rest, 
 Jointly pinned by France and England on the 
 
 hero's gallant breast. 
 
 Of course we honor the memory of such a 
 man. 
 
 If in spite of our better judgment we have 
 always given more applause to the bravery of 
 battle than to other aspects of courage, it is be- 
 cause the martial hero stands out as it were in 
 the limelight, and challenges our plaudits. 
 
 When the Canadians got their first taste of war- 
 fare in Flanders, they found themselves in the 
 very hottest of hot corners. They acquitted them- 
 selves like men. They did not know when they 
 were beaten, and so they were not beaten at all,
 
 162 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 proving that the man who shows the last half 
 ounce of mettle, and will not turn back, compels 
 the foe to turn. 
 
 That was a companion picture to the Austra- 
 lians climbing the Suvla Hills and again storming 
 Messines and Vimy Ridge. The world sang paeons 
 of praise about them. They shone out conspicu- 
 ously in the light of their own heroism. Theirs 
 was the spirit of Napoleon's Old Guard "The 
 Guard dies, but does not surrender." 
 
 In the same way, no mail came to hand that did 
 not make visible the gallantry of the Belgians, 
 whose King at the head of his army, stood out 
 before the eyes of the world at large like the 
 figure of some Homeric hero. 
 
 France, too, whose chivalry has been a theme 
 of praise through centuries of history, has shown 
 in this war, more than her characteristic courage. 
 Plus the native elan of the national spirit, which 
 has made the military charge of the French re- 
 nowned amongst nations, La Belle France has 
 developed a steady stubbornness -of endurance 
 which at Verdun and elsewhere will always stand 
 at the zenith of military achievement. 
 
 The personal bravery of the soldier never rose 
 to a higher level than it has done in this war. 
 Tommy Atkins, prosaic and unimaginative, has 
 equalled in his exploits the best traditions of 
 Crecy, Agincourt, Waterloo, and Balaclava. He 
 has marched in rollicking good humor to 
 his doom, cracking his joke in the hail 
 of the machine guns, where the death- 
 bolts fell deadliest, and "the thickest of 
 war's tempest lowered." Nor, in justice should 
 we omit to say that the Italian, the Russian, the 
 Serb, the Rumanian, even the brutal German, 
 have exhibited a contempt for death which proves 
 the common heritage of man in military courage.
 
 COURAGE AND THE WAR 163 
 
 Yes, it must be admitted that the German is as 
 brave as any of us. He faces death superbly. 
 We execrate him because he dares to do more than 
 may become a man. He dares to be a brute- 
 beast. He bayonets wounded enemies out of 
 sheer lust of blood-hatred. He ravages and 
 ravishes. He violates all civilised canons. He 
 is a savage. He sinks unarmed vessels and jeers 
 at drowning crews. He destroys beautiful things 
 from the sheer love of evil. He is a low ravening 
 animal. But he is as brave as the best of other 
 men. 
 
 If this be so, it goes to establish a fact which 
 men have not yet generally recognised that the 
 bravery which faces death in battle is the com- 
 monest of all kinds of courage. It belongs to all 
 races of men, civilised and savage. 
 
 The naked barbarians of the Cannibal Islands, 
 the black tribes of Africa, the Redskins of the 
 American forests, the yellow followers of Con- 
 fucius, the litle brown men of Japan, the tawny 
 warriors of the Indian Hill country, are all equip- 
 ped with personal valor, and as ready to face death 
 as the picked regiments of Europe. 
 
 There was never a clime or a time where it 
 was otherwise. Never was the average man well 
 led, recreant in battle. Courage of that kind 
 is as common as breathing. And therefore, logi- 
 cally, ought not to be a theme of extravagant 
 commendation. 
 
 As a rule those qualities which are the common 
 heritage of the race, possessed by all in about the 
 same average measure, are not a subject of special 
 esteem. It is generally the rare and exceptional 
 gift which evokes admiration. Military courage, 
 though universal, seems always to stand highest in 
 men's esteem. This is because of its ostentatious 
 challenge to the world ; because of its drum-beat-
 
 164 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 ing, its banners, its fanfare and pride. Othello 
 gives the full explanation of this deifying of mar- 
 tial courage in 
 
 "The plumed troop, and the big wars, 
 
 That make ambition virtue. . 
 
 . . The neighing steed, and the shrill trump 
 
 The spirit-stirring drum, th' ear-piercing fife, 
 
 The royal banner, and all quality, 
 
 Pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war." 
 
 There lies the explanation of why men have 
 consented to place the lower kind of human cour- 
 age in the highest place of their regard. 
 
 From the dawn of time poets have sung the 
 praises of battle heroes. A war-seamed veteran 
 carries with him in every cicatriced wound a title 
 to distinction. Every scar is a riband of honor. 
 He has met his country's foes and taken bruises 
 in defence of his fatherland. That is enough. 
 
 Ten to one, everyone of his neighbors is as 
 courageous as he, even those perhaps who from 
 various causes are shirkers in a time of enlist- 
 ment. 
 
 THE COURAGE IN PANICS. 
 
 To say that there have been panics in battle is 
 nothing contrary to the universality of military 
 courage. Brave men at times have fled helter 
 skelter in sauve qui peut, and have afterwards 
 marvelled at the temporary madness which had 
 seized them. 
 
 Panic is sometimes a sudden and utter loss of 
 personal courage, accompanied wih an access of 
 unreasoning terror, which destroys and obliterates 
 all reason for the time, and reduces those so af- 
 fected to nothing more or less than raging maniacs. 
 Of this kind is the battle panic to which even 
 the bravest men are subject. But it has not in-
 
 COURAGE AND THE WAR 165 
 
 frequently happened that if there be only one 
 individual who preserves his mental balance, he 
 may turn the attention of the crowd for an instant 
 and in that second of time they perceive the ab- 
 surdity of their fear, and are retransformed into 
 rational and even heroic beings. A single brave sol- 
 dier has in this way been able to stem the stam- 
 pede of an army, and wrest victory from the very 
 jaws of defeat. 
 
 The soldiers who disgraced their colors at 
 Bull's Run were amongst the bravest men of a 
 brave race. In many a subsequent field of death 
 they wiped out their first stain by carving their 
 way to victory over hillocks of heroic dead. 
 
 The bravest troops that ever hacked their way 
 through a breach in a forlorn hope are amenable 
 to that mysterious magnetic influence known as 
 panic, and also to that insanity of blood-lust which 
 sometimes sways mobs to irrational terror and to 
 crime. Many have marvelled why it is that the 
 cowardice of the few acts so rapidly on the mass 
 of the moderately brave, while the courage of the 
 other few does not? Why should cowardice, in 
 fact, be any more contagious than heroism, and 
 yet yield so instantly, and in most cases so com- 
 pletely, to the influence of the continuous habit we 
 call discipline? 
 
 It may be said that cowardice is visible, and that 
 heroism is not; but the answer is not quite com- 
 plete ; for, besides the fact that men do not catch 
 cowardice by the eye, the heroism is very often 
 in such panics as visible as the fear. Among 
 troops it is often more visible, the officers, who 
 are rarely panic-struck, being the most visible 
 figures in the ranks. 
 
 But no one has yet explained the psychology of 
 panics. Some have conjectured that it arises from 
 the longing to do something ; from the nervous ex-
 
 166 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 citement which makes it so difficult to keep a 
 Zouave regiment, when once under fire, from 
 charging upon the enemy. 
 
 The courage of women is usually passive ; their 
 instinct is to sit and await the calamity, often with 
 a firmness superior to that of men, yet in these 
 wild rushes they are usually the first to rush. 
 
 Fortitude, the courage which can await, is, no 
 doubt, a scarcer quality than bravery; old sailors 
 say that the five minutes before a naval action 
 commences try the men much more than the action 
 itself. 
 
 Panic has so very little to do with either courage 
 or cowardice, that it may assail and has assailed 
 men of the special courage which not only does 
 not quail under danger, but does not feel fear. 
 It is a disease to which every created being, from 
 a man to a ferret the animal which of all others 
 seems least susceptible of fear is under certain 
 conditions liable. It seizes on all parts of organi- 
 sations. 
 
 It is probable that in most men what are called 
 weak nerves are really over-strung, over-sensitive 
 nerves, and those who possess them are more 
 liable to the attack than those who do not; but 
 the brave are liable too some kinds of brave men 
 exceptionally liable just as a herd of thorough- 
 breds is more liable than a herd of cart-horses. 
 The people of Southern Asia, who bear to the 
 rest of humanity much of the relation women 
 bear to men, are exceptionally subject to panic, 
 and know it; and Sikhs or Arabs, as brave as 
 bloodhounds, men who will face anything, will 
 try to protect themselves against the attack by 
 drugs. 
 
 At Moscow, in 1896, 40,000 people were attend- 
 ing a great celebration. In the grey dawn they 
 met. In some way, not explained, there began a
 
 COURAGE AND THE WAR 167 
 
 little rush for some superior positions. It ex- 
 tended as if by magic, and the whole mass was 
 caught in a wild rush and 5,000 of the number 
 were trampled into shapeless masses of battered 
 humanity. This would have been an incredible 
 thing if it were not one too well attested. It was 
 a manifestation of mob mania of which we have 
 had only too many shocking examples. 
 
 There is in all crowds at every moment of time, 
 the potential factors of unmeasured catastrophe. 
 Panics being by their very nature irrational, are 
 independent of any rational cause. The man who 
 could write a scientific exposition of the origin 
 and rationale of panics would illustrate a para- 
 dox, and weigh the gossamer web that divides 
 reason from madness. For a mere gossamer web 
 it is. In the Moscow tragedy there was no sudden 
 spasm of fear to set the magnetic impulse in mo- 
 tion. The motive was an instantaneous obses- 
 sion of competitve greed. 
 
 The brute creation is no less subject to the 
 malady than man is. A herd of prairie buffaloes 
 stampeding from a fire or some other cause of 
 terror, has been known to leap down precipitous 
 banks and crush each other to death in hundreds. 
 A flock of sheep is always the raw material of a 
 first class panic. Let but one plunge into the 
 very depths of the sea or a raging furnace, and 
 all the rest will blindly follow. There is clearly 
 a subtle something common to the animal which 
 passes through crowds like a lightning flash 
 through the sky, infecting them with palsying 
 fear or inspiring them with the heroism of the 
 gods. Panics may not inaptly be described by 
 the Johnsonian line as 
 
 Fears of the brave, and follies of the wise. 
 For certainly no man was ever so constant in 
 resolution as to be above the danger, nor so sane 
 as never to have been infected by the fantasy. 
 
 69
 
 168 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 It would be very interesting to ascertain how 
 many elements in human nature go to produce a 
 panic. The presence of a Tantanoola tiger known 
 to be at large in a district might convert a country 
 side of brave settlers into a number of trembling 
 cowards ; because it is the mystery of the unseen 
 danger that always magnifies the terror. 
 
 Large communities of brave people have some- 
 time been struck with panic, so as to lose their 
 reasoning powers. It was so with whole classes 
 of Englishmen during the Titus Gates revelations. 
 They believed themselves to be environed with 
 Papists' daggers, and that assassination lurked in 
 every shadow. 
 
 Another case was that in Massachusetts, when 
 the people became hysterical from a fear of 
 witches. No fewer than twelve old women were 
 condemned to be burnt by those who were smitten 
 with the superstitious mania. Afterwards when 
 the panic had passed away the people implored the 
 forgiveness of the Lord for the wrong they had 
 done, and led lives of repentance. It seems to 
 be the law of the panic that it is multiplied by 
 contagion. 
 
 In earthquakes men have flung away all sem- 
 blance of self-control, as they have done in epi- 
 demics of murder, when all restraints of decency 
 and morality have disappeared. 
 
 Money panics are as full of scare as any. The 
 bank panic in Victoria in 1893 was an instance. 
 People made fierce runs on perfectly sound in- 
 stitutions and caused a temporary suspension of 
 payment. It was the contagion of fright. All 
 people had their money locked up while the banks 
 had plenty to pay their debts. In a few weeks 
 all those people were as full of financial courage 
 and enterprising as ever. 
 
 In the same way, the same identical soldiers
 
 COURAGE AND THE WAR 169 
 
 who to-day might become the victims of a panic 
 would to-morrow follow a trusted leader to the 
 cannon's mouth. So much for panics. 
 
 It therefore remains true that martial courage 
 is the common gift of almost all men and many 
 women ; and cowardice that refuses duty through 
 fear of death is the exception. 
 
 THE COURAGE OP ENDURANCE. 
 
 In this war, however, there have been exhibited 
 many examples of fortitude far surpassing that 
 which faces death in a splendid charge. The tens 
 of thousands of men who have stood forty-eight 
 hours in muddy trenches, sodden with drenching 
 rains, plastered thick with mud, without warm 
 food, suffering all the physical agonies of frostbite 
 or tetanus, have in these endurances exhibited 
 a heroism compared with which a mere battle 
 charge is a picnic. 
 
 But, again, this higher form of courage is not 
 much more exceptional than the other. Life in 
 the winter trenches has been of the severest. It 
 has tried the endurance of fortitude itself. But 
 there are few men whose spirits have blenched 
 before the ordeal, even when they were physically 
 incapable of sustaining it. Indeed, not a few have 
 told us in their letters that in spite of the filth, 
 the starvation, the wet, the cold, they never wished 
 to be anywhere but where they were. 
 
 This is the courage which may hold its course 
 in the face of certain disaster and disappointment. 
 It is the steadfast setting one's face to go to Jeru- 
 salem. Of all forms of heroism, none will 
 more surely win the love and confidence of human 
 hearts.
 
 170 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 THE COURAGE THAT FACES CALAMITY. 
 
 That courage of endurance in pain and in the 
 strain of trying circumstances is very admirable. 
 But there are still loftier forms of courage than 
 the fortitude of the trench defenders. Calamity 
 is the touchstone of a brave mind. There are 
 military men reported brave who would be 
 cowards if they had courage enough. Rochefou- 
 cault said that a man with true courage will be 
 ready to do without witnesses that which he 
 would do in the face of the world. It has been 
 humorously suggested that the reason why the 
 Turk is brave is because a man with more than 
 one wife should be ready to face death at any 
 time. 
 
 The quiet unobtrusive courage that sustains 
 itself, as it were, upon nothing but its own un- 
 conquerable stamina is of the rarer sort. We 
 find it in the man who, though his fights be all 
 defeats, still fights; who, though he has been a 
 failure in the past, and knows himself to be a 
 failure for the rest of his life, rises patiently and 
 indomitably every morning to face the inevitable 
 defeat of the day with equanimity and sweetness. 
 That is a courage of which martial heroes are 
 rarely capable. 
 
 THE COURAGE OF COWARDICE. 
 
 Shall we say that we find a grander courage still 
 in what some have called the courage of cow- 
 ardice? This is the bravery of the man who 
 is afraid, but who, in mortal funk, and full of fear, 
 with throbbing heart and sweating brow, forces 
 himself to do the thing from which he shrinks. 
 This, which the world sneers at as cowardice, is 
 the highest courage of all.
 
 COURAGE AND THE WAR 171 
 
 Two soldiers were marching shoulder to shoul- 
 der in battle. One was jovial ; the other solemn. 
 The merry soul turned to his comrade and said 
 
 "Tom, my dear fellow, you are pale and your 
 teeth chatter. Are you afraid?" 
 
 "Yes," replied the other, "by God, I am afraid ; 
 and if you were only half as much afraid as I 
 am, you would have run away half-an-hour ago." 
 
 Neither of those men flinched by a hair in the 
 fight. A man may know fear, but he may conquer 
 that fear. If he do, his is the superior heroism. We 
 all at times shake at shadows ; but if we trample 
 on our fears, and face those shadows, they vanish. 
 If, like the soldier whose teeth chattered, we move 
 steadily onward, resolved to shirk no peril, we 
 realise what the Psalmist meant by good courage 
 and strength of heart. 
 
 There is such a thing as screwing one's courage 
 to the sticking place, a course which Lady Macbeth 
 suggested to her husband. It was not that he 
 was in the least a coward. He boasted truly that 
 he dared do all that might become a man. The 
 Third Richard was a man as brave as he was 
 cruel ; but on the night before Bosworth, shadows, 
 he declared, struck more terror to his soul than 
 could the substance of ten thousand soldiers. That 
 did not prevent him in the next day's battle per- 
 forming astonishing feats of valor. 
 
 THE COURAGE OF THE COMMON MAN. 
 
 There are plenty of heroes who are not in the 
 trenches or in aeroplanes. There are hidden in- 
 fluences going on continuously in society strong 
 men making great struggles to strengthen the 
 foundation of the social fabric. There are his- 
 tories, never known abroad, as interesting as
 
 172 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 those which find the light in the columns of the 
 daily paper. Just as there are uncanonised saints, 
 so are there uncelebrated heroes men never 
 known beyond the threshold of their homes. 
 
 The common man has frequently the most diffi- 
 cult task to perform. He has but one dull incen- 
 tive to industry the need of toil in order to live. 
 The hero is different. He has the spur of am- 
 bition to inspire him to his task. Great duties 
 are easier than little ones, though they cost more 
 in blood and agony. Courage mounteth with 
 occasion. The true hero has far more than 
 bravery. 
 
 "Unbounded courage and compassion joined, 
 Tempering each other in the victor's mind, 
 Alternately proclaim him good and great, 
 And make the hero and the man complete." 
 
 There is heroism is bearing up cheerily in the 
 daily grind of life when the fates seem conspiring 
 against us. Then it is that the weakling goes 
 down and the brave man pulls through. The man 
 without courage in the battle of life is like a knife 
 without an edge. Thou shalt be steadfast and 
 thou shalt not fear. He who does not tire tires 
 adversity. Half a heart is no heart. Fortitude 
 is victory. He who bears woe best deserves it 
 least. 
 
 There is no situation in life so bad that it can- 
 not with courage be retrieved. The best remedy 
 in worry is to get up higher. If there is a cloud 
 in your heart, do not let it appear in your face. 
 He who loses money loses much; he who loses 
 friends loses more ; but he who loses courage loses 
 all. Bear your own burdens bravely. You can 
 lighten them by giving others a lift. Fortitude 
 is a real capital. Put pluck in the place of what- 
 ever is missing, and you won't fail. 
 
 It requires an exceptional form of courage to
 
 COURAGE AND THE WAR 173 
 
 speak the truth when the speaking it must give a 
 set-back to one's favorite hobbies; to refuse to 
 some great dignitary compliance with a wish you 
 believe to be wrong; to refuse acquiescence when 
 all around you are fawning to a false ideal; to 
 decline honors or riches w r hich are offered to you 
 with questionable conditions; to say "No" firmly 
 when most of your friends and neighbors are say- 
 ing "Yes." 
 
 Robert Louis Stevenson was wont to say 
 "Give us courage and gaiety and the quiet mind. 
 Spare to us our friends ; soften to us our enemies. 
 Bless us, if it may be, in all our innocent en- 
 deavors. If it may not, give us the strength to 
 encounter that which is to come, that we may be 
 brave in peril, constant in tribulation, temperate 
 in wrath, and in all changes of fortune, and down 
 to the gates of death, loyal and loving to one 
 another. 
 
 Some months ago a poor widowed lady was re- 
 turning to her home, where the children were 
 hungry and the cupboard bare. She picked up 
 on the side-walk a purse containing a ten-pound- 
 note and nine sovereigns. When she reached 
 home her landlord met her with a peremptory 
 demand for his rent and a threat of eviction. 
 Yet the woman had the courage to carry that 
 purse and its contents at once to the police station, 
 trusting to the chance of a reward, which it is 
 comforting to think came to her in a way quite 
 beyond her most sanguine hopes. It is not easy 
 to estimate the heroism of an act like that. Yet 
 the great busy world which enthuses over the sol- 
 dier's bravery, makes nothing of it. 
 
 It is a providential thing that very few in the 
 struggle of life give up in despair. Hope springs 
 eternal in the human breast. Even the most for- 
 lorn indulge the expectation that clouds will be
 
 174 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 sunshine to-morrow. * The man who loses all 
 courage goes out "rashly importunate" to the 
 river or in a pistol flash. 
 
 We talk of Courage in the war. It is a great 
 theme. But the woman who amidst poverty 
 nurses a bed-ridden mother; or who spends her 
 heart and her money on a drunken father, on a 
 reckless brother, or on the orphans of a friend 
 is she not more noble in her courage than the 
 hero of a dashing charge? It is not that we 
 should value the good soldier less, but that we 
 should love that soldier's unselfish mother more 
 the "Mother Machree," whose fingers were toil- 
 worn to furnish her son to battle for his country. 
 
 In one of Stevenson's purple patches, he says 
 "0, toiling hands of mortals! unwearied 
 feet, travelling ye know not whither! Soon 
 soon, it seems to you that you must come forth on 
 some conspicuous hilltop, and but a little way 
 further, against the setting sun, descry the spires 
 of El Dorado. Little do you know your own 
 blessedness; for to travel hopefully is a better 
 thing than to arrive, and the true success is to 
 labor." 
 
 Yes; that is so. The best and the highest 
 heroism, of which the world hears least, has been 
 the heroism of apparently unrequited labor that 
 labor that doth good by stealth and blushes to find 
 it fame. 
 
 Elizabeth Parker's verses on "How Did You 
 Fight?" have a ring of solid truth in them 
 
 "Did you tackle that trouble that came your way 
 
 With a resolute heart and cheerful? 
 Or hide your face from the light of day 
 
 With a craven soul and fearful? 
 O, a trouble's a ton or a trouble's an ounce; 
 
 Or a trouble is what you make it; 
 And it isn't the fact that you're hurt that counts, 
 
 But only How did you take it?"
 
 COURAGE AND THE WAR 175 
 
 There is a great deal of homely philosophy in 
 the advice "Grin and bear* it." Most people 
 who are under the shadow take that counsel some 
 minus the grin. It was Virgil that wrote the 
 line 
 
 "Firm stands the mind though useless tears are shed." 
 
 And so it may ; but the valor that parleys is near 
 yielding. 
 
 There is the selfish man's courage the man 
 who is always ready to bear bravely the misfor- 
 tunes of others. The Irish landlord is an example, 
 writing to his steward "Tell the tenants that no 
 threats to shoot you will terrify me." He goes 
 on jauntily through life, untroubled by wars or 
 rumors of wars. When he hears of want amongst 
 the poor, his righteous soul is indignant at their 
 improvidence which has saved nothing against the 
 rainy day. But his serene egoism is never pierced 
 and his courage rides on triumphant. 
 
 THE COURAGE OF ANGER. 
 
 There is the courage of anger, which Aristotle 
 branded as "false," like that of the mythical lion 
 which was said to lash himself into fury by beat- 
 ing his tail upon the ground. Bob Acres was 
 exactly a man of that sort 
 
 Acres. "I grow full of anger, Sir Lucius! I fire apace! 
 Odds hilts and blades! I find a man may have a deal of 
 valor in him and not know it. . . I believe courage must 
 be catching. I certainly do feel a kind of valor rising as 
 it were. Odds flints, pans and triggers." 
 
 Sir Lucius. Come, come, there must be no passion at 
 all in the case. 
 
 Acres. I must be in a passion, Sir Lucius. I must be 
 in a rage. Dear Sir Lucius, let me be in a rage if you 
 love me. 
 
 There are people of that kidney. They can 
 be brave only in excitement. And then they can
 
 176 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 be very brave. It may be the excitement of anger, 
 or of battle, or of Wine, or any other passion. 
 
 At Elands Laagte, during the Boer War, Major 
 W. Sampson, of the Imperial Light Horse, ob- 
 served a man lying down and ordered him to go 
 on. The poor fellow reported that he was per- 
 fectly willing to go on, but was too paralysed with 
 fear. Major Sampson galloped on, but shortly 
 afterwards the trooper charged past him. "What's 
 the matter?" shouted the major. The trooper 
 showed that his moustache and part of his upper 
 lip had been carried away by a Boer bullet, and 
 yelled, "Where are the devils? Let me get at 
 them." With that he galloped on, and was in 
 front of the charge the whole way. 
 
 People of that sort are grotesque examples of 
 humanity. But for all its grotesquerie it is a 
 humanity which has hidden in its profounder 
 depths great reserves of that kind of courage of 
 which some heroes and heroines are made. 
 
 We meet these people at all kinds of places. 
 
 THE COURAGE OF THE RELIGIOUS. 
 
 The courage which springs out of the love of 
 God, or the love of man for God's sake, is by 
 itself. There is nothing else like it. 
 
 We meet with it at the lonely bedside, watching, 
 tending on the sick, giving hope to the all but 
 hopeless, braving the pestilence. 
 
 Not long ago, in distant Algiers, North Africa, 
 an American tourist visited the lepers' colony 
 there out of pure curiosity. These poor lepers 
 were cared for by a community of Sisters. 
 
 The gentleman was attracted by one of these 
 self-sacrificing women because of her youth, 
 beauty, and refinement, and to his surprise he
 
 COURAGE AND THE WAR 177 
 
 found out that she was an American girl. Being 
 introduced to her, he said 
 
 "Sister, I would not do this work for 10,000 
 dollars a year." 
 
 "No," said the Sister, "nor would I do it for 
 100,000 dollars nor a million dollars a year." 
 
 "Really," said the stranger, "you surprise me. 
 What, then, do you receive?" 
 
 "Nothing," was the reply, "absolutely nothing." 
 
 "Then why do you do it?" 
 
 The Sister lifted the crucifix that was pending 
 from her rosary, and, sweetly kissing it, said, 
 "I do it for the love of Him, for Jesus, Who died 
 for the love of them and for the love of me. In 
 the loathsome ulcers of these poor lepers I see the 
 wounds of my crowned and crucified Saviour." 
 
 Where is the military hero whose courage ever 
 exceeded that of this gentle nun? 
 
 The courage of Father Damien amongst his 
 lepers at Molokai stands out conspicuously. Not 
 because it was greater than many other examples 
 that we never hear of. But because its dramatic 
 features strike the imagination. The man gave 
 his life, his love, his duty to service in squalor, 
 filth, and all loathsomeness. And he did it in 
 order to obey the command of One who gave His 
 life for sin and wretchedness. 
 
 That is a kind of heroism rare amongst those 
 men who live in the glare of the world. It is 
 much more common amongst women, of whom the 
 race never hears. They are heroines who, if 
 discovered, while bearing heavy sorrows, would 
 draw the veil closely, and entreat to be left alone 
 with God. But it is well for the world and its 
 best side that they cannot always remain hidden. 
 If they never emerged from their beloved 
 obscurity their fellow creatures would miss the
 
 knowledge of the highest examples of courage and 
 unselfish devotion. 
 
 In a certain suburb, some time ago, there lived 
 a beautiful young girl, innocent and fresh, but 
 suffering heavy affliction. She was very cheer- 
 ful. Few knew anything of her pain. One day, 
 in a burst of confidence to a friend, she said "All 
 this trouble, as I think and hope, is of my own 
 choosing. Two years ago, my sister's husband 
 was, I feared, on the point of death. They are a 
 devoted couple. His demise would have been 
 an awful tragedy. It distracted me to think of 
 her left a widow and her children fatherless. I 
 prayed earnestly for them, and one day the 
 thought came to me to offer my life or my life's 
 happiness as a sacrifice to God, if it were pleasing 
 to His holy will to accept my sacrifice in exchange 
 for the preservation of my sister's husband. He 
 recovered, and shortly after my troubles began. 
 I accept them from my heavenly Father's loving 
 hand, without repining." 
 
 That is Courage superlative, the courage of 
 Christ the Redeemer. There is a striking in- 
 stance of it in Canon Sheehan's "My New 
 Curate." A beautiful woman offers up the 
 sacrifice of her beauty to rescue a sinner's soul 
 that was in danger. The sacrifice was accepted, 
 and the beauty was destroyed by the small-pox, 
 but the soul of the sinner was rescued. 
 
 In "Luke Delmege," a woman in perfect inno- 
 cence voluntarily incurred the world's mistaken 
 censure, and became a supposed Magdalen in a 
 House of Refuge as a sacrifice to prevent the ship- 
 wreck of her brother's faith. 
 
 One of our authoresses, Miss Yonge, has made 
 a collection of some of these brave lives, and 
 presented it for the admiration of all who can 
 value the highest types of courage. When one
 
 COURAGE AND THE WAR 179 
 
 reaches her last page and drops the book, the 
 thought forces itself "How many millions of 
 such women must have lived and died with their 
 secret unknown except to God! What an orna- 
 ment, if they had been known, might they not 
 have been to humanity!" 
 
 But no! In the spiritual life which they lived 
 to embellish, they were just as great an ornament 
 in their hidden beauty as if their virtues were 
 advertised on the house-tops. If God saw, 
 understood, and approved, nothing else mattered. 
 They most surely enriched their own circles with 
 benisons. And for the rest of the world, such 
 souls sow in secret the seed, of which we pluck the 
 flower and the fruit. 
 
 FINAL THOUGHTS ON COURAGE. 
 
 There has been developed in the last three years 
 a feminine bravery certainly not second to any- 
 thing shown by men. 
 
 There is no battle field but has been linked with 
 examples of women's bravery in risking life to 
 succor and tend the wounded. 
 
 Women in some of their moods are the timidest 
 of creatures, and in others, under the exaltation of 
 a great passion, they will face the martyr's 
 stake. A woman who will shriek at the sight of 
 a mouse, will help to pull a wounded brother, 
 lover, or husband, from under the mouth of a 
 belching cannon. A versicle says of them 
 They're the blessedest big contradictions 
 
 That ever creation has seen; 
 They've got such fine notions of honor; 
 
 Ajid yet they're so awfully mean. 
 The courage of the Frenchwoman in this war, 
 though not ostentatious, has been of the higher
 
 180 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 order. Mr. Belloc Lowndes, writing of her says : 
 "The Frenchwoman and that whether she be 
 duchess or dairymaid does not think of future 
 conscription for her girls, but she has carried out 
 in a very wonderful way what may be called the 
 most remarkable feminine mobilisation the world 
 has ever seen. Little by little, she has taken on, 
 with the one exception of fighting, all the work 
 hitherto done by Frenchmen. To give but one 
 instance; the women of France are very largely 
 running the railways, doing in this particular 
 connection every kind of hard and physically dan- 
 gerous work. A great deal has been written, 
 especially in America, about the noble part 
 Frenchwomen are playing in this terrible contest 
 which their country not only did not seek, but 
 made agonised efforts to avert. In France itself, 
 however, the marvellous part played by her 
 womanhood has not aroused any extraordinary or 
 exceptional comment, for no Frenchman would 
 pay his wife, his daughter or his lover so poor a 
 compliment as to suppose that at such a moment 
 there could be any doubt as to what the attitude 
 of the womanhood of France would be." 
 
 The world frowns on the spy, because of the 
 treachery and dissimulation he must practice. But 
 it requires contempt of peril to be a successful 
 spy. The pity is that it requires also a dis- 
 regard of the finer feelings of honor. The spy 
 will hold his life at a pin's fee, in order to poison 
 a man's wine while exchanging compliments with 
 him. 
 
 William Pitt, Prime Minister of England, and 
 Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, were con- 
 temporaries. One stood at the head of Great 
 Britain's armies, and was the hero of a hundred 
 fights. The other stood at the head of the 
 Government, and marshalled State affairs during
 
 COURAGE AND THE WAR 181 
 
 years of unexampled difficulty. Pitt's need of 
 courage was at least as great as Wellington's, 
 perhaps greater. 
 
 Yet the world classes Wellington as a great 
 hero, and Pitt as a great statesman. The states- 
 man had to face and overcome dangers which 
 might have appalled the warrior. The soldier 
 was environed with military pomp and panoply. 
 The other drank tea and buried his head in blue 
 books in gloomy committee rooms, devising ways 
 and means to get that money and those men which 
 Wellington was spending. 
 
 Some day we shall revise our judgment con- 
 cerning military courage. That will be when 
 we come to see that it is very often inferior to 
 that which distinguishes the citizen in his life- 
 battle against the commonplaces of adverse for- 
 tune. 
 
 There have been many brave soldiers who could 
 sing with hilarity when the blast of war blew in 
 their ears ; but who would have quailed before the 
 daily grind of that poverty which strives in vain 
 to keep the wolf from the door. 
 
 There it all lies. How do we take the rough 
 stages of life? They come to us in all guises 
 on the battle-field, in the street, in the home, on 
 the very hearth. How do we take them ? Gener- 
 ally, like brave men and women. Courage is a 
 ubiquitous virtue. And yet, somehow, it is 
 never commonplace. 
 
 Ninety-nine out of every hundred soldiers are 
 brave ; and so are the citizens and citizenesses who 
 never donned a uniform or shouldered a rifle. The 
 "craven soul and fearful" is the exception. It 
 frequently happens that men and women who are 
 timid in one set of circumstances, carry a lion's 
 heart in another. 
 
 He would be a fool who would deprecate by so
 
 182 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 much as a hair the soldier's courage in the present 
 war. But there is a quality of courage that is 
 higher than the martial bravery of the soldier. It 
 is the chivalry that would scorn to score a success 
 by the unscrupulous policy of "Frightfulness." 
 We may be quite sure that whatever the deeds of 
 noble daring done in the strife, there are others 
 not a whit less high and noble done daily at home 
 by people whose names will figure in no despatches 
 save those of the HIGH ETERNAL.
 
 VIII. 
 CONSCRIPTION AND THE WAR. 
 
 THE PATRIOTIC CALL TO THE SOUL. 
 
 The Australians, by a small majority on a Re- 
 ferendum, turned down Conscription. They 
 were the only people in the world who had the 
 opportunity of dealing with it on a popular vote. 
 
 They have done with it as a working weapon 
 of war. But they have not done with the war. 
 And they cannot be done with it until all the 
 world has done with it. They are in it, and must 
 remain in it till the end. They have therefore 
 had their own hand. 
 
 Every belligerent nation in the present war, 
 save the Australian Commonwealth, and Ireland, 
 is working under the law of Conscription. 
 
 Rightly regarded, a fact of that kind amounts 
 to an almost invincible argument. It shows 
 that a consensus of the world's opinion has de- 
 cided that Conscription is a necessary concomi- 
 tant of a modern war. No people love Conscrip- 
 tion any more than they love taxation. They 
 submit to both ex necessitate rei. And the 
 question may be voted upon and turned down, yet 
 a duty remains. 
 
 A man's country is as a man's personal honor. 
 He must defend it or stand disgraced. There is 
 such a thing as a "Call" to a man's soul, if he has 
 a soul. If not, there is no matter what becomes 
 of him. 
 
 Five millions of Britons felt that call in the 
 
 183
 
 184 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Motherland before Conscription was enacted. In 
 the Commonwealth the 350,000 men who have en- 
 listed and left these shores have felt it. The 
 three millions of soldiers who volunteered in Great 
 Britain before Conscription have all felt it. It 
 may be fittingly described as a "Call to the Soul." 
 We have all heard of young fellows who have no 
 love of fighting, but who could not stay back when 
 the tocsin sounded and the Empire got the Hun's 
 first bloody challenge. 
 
 A picture rises even now before my eyes. A 
 young man of 22 stood before his father. 
 "Father," said he, "I must go!" 
 
 "My son," answered the parent, "You are much 
 wanted here in our business. 
 
 "I know, father. Thank you for saying so. 
 You are my senior partner. But I am more 
 wanted in Gallipoli than here." 
 
 "My dear boy, the calls at home are many on 
 you the calls of love, the calls of mother, sister 
 and brother." 
 
 "Yes, dad, they are strong. I hear them. But 
 the call of duty is deafening." 
 
 The boy went and one of his brothers with him. 
 And love and tears and honest pride went with 
 them. This kind of call has been often told. 
 Here is a sample 
 
 A mother sits in the gloaming dim, 
 
 Her fingers play 
 
 In an idle way 
 With a note just dropped in her lap by Jim 
 
 Her son 
 
 The one, 
 
 Who in frolic and fun, 
 
 Had just slipped out of the house with a run. 
 The mother's lips were drawn and tight. 
 Her eyes were moist, and her cheeks were white. 
 Jim's note had startled her heart to fright.
 
 CONSCRIPTION AND THE WAR 185 
 
 "Dear mother," Jim wrote, 
 
 "This loving note 
 Is to ask you on Referendum Day 
 To vote as an Anzac mother may. 
 Little mother, I hate to pain you so, 
 But the Call has come to me ! I must go. 
 I have held out long ; but I now give in 
 To the summons of Empire, blood, and kin. 
 Forgive me, darling, and don't look grim 
 At your little 
 
 Loving larrikin, 
 
 Jim." 
 
 The mother moaned ; then the struggle passed. 
 
 In tones almost steady, 
 
 She said : "I am ready. 
 I knew it must come to this at last. 
 When poor Bob fell on that Anzac hill, 
 Jim took half the bitterness out of my pill, 
 And nearer and dearer he grew to me still. 
 But I saw him get restless, and day by day 
 He longed to be off where his brother lay. 
 'Twas the dread of my loneliness made him stay. 
 'I'm a shirker, mother!' he'd often say, 
 'I'm ashamed to meet men who are going away.' ' 
 
 She paused for awhile ; 
 
 Then a winsome smile 
 Like a ray of sunshine lighted her face 
 As she said, with a wan yet tender grace 
 "A loving boy is my dear old Jim, 
 And often and often I pity him. 
 The boy's been longing to do his share, 
 But he dreaded the wrench that I must bear, 
 For he knew Bob's death was a cruel blow, 
 And he hadn't the heart to leave me so.
 
 186 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 "They called Jim a shirker ! But well I knew 
 He bore it for me. His courage was true. 
 And he wouldn't go now, but the Anzac Call 
 From the Belgian trenches pierces to all; 
 To peer and peasant, to palace and cot. 
 Every man who can fire a shot, 
 Every man that hath muscle and might, 
 Is called for now to the grizzly fight. 
 
 "Jim hears it. I wouldn't love him so well 
 
 Were he deaf to the calls that around us swell, 
 
 And yet it touched him keenly, I know, 
 
 In writing this note which has grieved me so, 
 
 That the summons has come and that he must go. 
 
 For all his gaiety poor dear Jim ! 
 
 A painful struggle it was to him. 
 
 But duty is duty. To do it is best, 
 
 We'll leave to Providence all the rest. 
 
 "At Duty's call shall I repine? 
 He'll do his bit, and I'll do mine. 
 But how shall I answer my darling boy? 
 How shall I give up my life's best joy? 
 What answer give from my breaking heart? 
 This 'Go, my darling, and do thy part!' 
 Please God, whatever my grief may be, 
 Dear Jim shall hear no whimper from me. 
 
 "There's something sacred, something great, 
 In giving one's best to God and the State. 
 The cause is holy, the aim sublime, 
 That would free the world from the ravager's 
 
 crime. 
 
 My Jim ! My Jim ! My life ! My breath ! 
 I give thee to battle, perhaps death! 
 My gift to the altar that God may deign 
 To bless us with freedom and peace again.
 
 CONSCRIPTION AND THE WAR 187 
 
 "Yes, Jim, my laddie, thou need'st not fear, 
 
 I give thee to serve a cause most dear. 
 
 I give thee to God and the purposes high 
 
 That freedom may live, and tyranny die. 
 
 To the cause of Conscription I give my heart 
 
 That every man bear an equal part." 
 
 Such was the spirit of the true womanly 
 women of Australia. Conscription is now dead 
 and done with. But the call for volunteers is as 
 urgent as ever. There are noble youths answer- 
 ing still. They are neither cowards nor shirkers. 
 May not Jim and Jim's mother prove an inspira- 
 tion to them. 
 
 WHY CONSCRIPTION is NEEDED. 
 
 If there were no shirkers, there would be no 
 need of Conscription. In the early stages of 
 the war, when fortune seemed to be going against 
 us on every battlefield, there used to be a con- 
 stantly ringing cry: "Are we downhearted?" 
 There never failed to follow a thunderous response 
 of "No." 
 
 It was true, too, was that great "No" chorus. 
 Neither Britons nor Australians ever fell into the 
 infirmity of a despairing mood. We were ever 
 bright and cheery, confident, hopeful, resolved. 
 Some are still all that part of the people who 
 are built in the mould of true men not affected 
 with the staggers, or like Bob Acres, with his 
 courage oozing from the ends of his fingers. But 
 what Australian who can claim kindred with the 
 Anzacs can read without a blush, declarations 
 about being "War- Weary"? 
 
 It is not too much to say of such statements 
 that they are steeped in cowardice, penned in pol- 
 troonery, conceived in faint-heartedness, and 
 
 G
 
 188 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 issued in the spirit of the whimperer. They con- 
 tain the spirit of such craven-hearted dastards as 
 Poins and Peto, Bardolph and Pistol, who follow 
 in the wake of every war. 
 
 If we examine the plaint of these "war-weary" 
 souls, we find their aim is that Australia should 
 sneak out of the war as soon as possible, and let 
 others fight to keep them in security. They admit 
 that we stand in a most acute and dangerous 
 crisis, and their remedy is that Australia should 
 back out of the war. That is equivalent to say- 
 ing that however fiercely the enemy may threaten 
 us, and press upon our overworked boys in the 
 trenches, Australians should save their skins, and 
 refuse to play a man's part where defence is re- 
 quired. The times are dangerous ; and yet, like 
 the Russians, we are to throw down our arms and 
 get out of the danger. Is that not the counsel of 
 traitors ? 
 
 Others of the same kidney tell us that there are 
 plenty to fight for us India, China, and America. 
 Why should Australians fight for themselves, when 
 there are hordes elsewhere ready to fight? They 
 ignore the fact that our Imperial Mother has told 
 us in words which cannot be mistaken that her 
 call is to all her sons ? She says that every hand 
 which can fire a shot or throw a bomb is needed? 
 
 Canada has responded by a law of Conscription. 
 South Africa has completed the grand work of 
 clearing all the German power from South Africa. 
 There is no touch of poor-spiritedness about them. 
 
 Some of the war-weary ones cry that Australia 
 is a poor lonely land, with too few people in it to 
 allow us to send any more men away. We are 
 only an outpost of the white man's civilisation. 
 We ought to follow peace, and not war. But what 
 will this white-feathered counsel avail us if Ger- 
 many prevails? What has it availed in Russia,
 
 CONSCRIPTION AND THE WAR 189 
 
 in Rumania, in Poland? Who dare say of us 
 that we have shot our bolt, and have no more 
 strength ? 
 
 The suggestion is sometimes made that Great 
 Britain should conscript India. It is the counsel 
 of Bob Acres and Jerry Sneak. Send the other 
 fellow. Don't send me. He's strong. I'm 
 weak. India has 315,000,000 to choose from. 
 Many of them are the warrior caste, men who love 
 fighting. Australians don't. Why leave Indians 
 almost untouched, and take us away from our 
 warm firesides, from our long-drinks? Why take 
 us soft-peace-loving people from these soft Aus- 
 tral climes ? Why take us who cherish our ease, 
 our "slowing down," and the luxuries which are 
 native to us? 
 
 Is that the Australian spirit, or an abominable 
 travesty upon it? WTiat relation has it to the 
 Anzacs, who have blazoned the Australian name 
 on the brightest honor roll? We all know that 
 Great Britain, who has drafted 5,000,000 of her 
 own sons into the fighting line would have been 
 glad to enrol 10,000,000 of Indians at a smaller 
 monetary cost, were there not grave racial reasons 
 against it. We know that the trying climate of 
 Northern France is deadly to the brave soldiers 
 of the tropics. 
 
 Canada does not cry that she has "done 
 enough." Nor does the more wholesome part of 
 the Australians take that degraded stand. They 
 have stood beside their Imperial Mother at the 
 outset, and they will do so to the end, because they 
 are of the very opposite stuff to the muddy-met- 
 tled coistrils who disgrace the country in which 
 they skulk. It is surely not for the shirkers to 
 boast of what Australians have done. None of 
 those bright deeds are theirs. 
 
 Some of those who refuse to help the recruiting
 
 190 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 movement plead that the loss of more soldiers 
 would drain us dry in three years. But that is 
 not so. And if it were as true as it is false, it 
 would be better to send our last available man 
 along with our last available shilling than to run 
 away from an honorable duty out of craven- 
 heartedness. There is no talk of draining our 
 population dry of its bread-winners. But we 
 may want another 100,000 young men to defend 
 us from a brutal tyrant. Australia in 1919 could 
 take no care of herself if Germany were to win in 
 1918. 
 
 It is sometimes said that Chinese have been 
 taken to conscripted France to carry on French 
 industries, and that the same might be done here 
 if more were sent away. If it be true that the 
 French Government has brought Chinese to carry 
 on French industries whilst the ordinary workers 
 are repelling the invader of French soil, it is a 
 splendid testimony to French patriotism. It is 
 a thing to be proud of. It shows that France is 
 making heroic sacrifices for her soil, and that she 
 is prepared to save her industries at all hazards 
 as one means of saving the nation. 
 
 The very men who cry out about the "sacri- 
 fices," which Australia has already made have not 
 themselves sacrificed as much as the parings of a 
 finger nail. Nor is it true to say that our help is 
 too insignificant to matter. One of the great 
 moral and physical features in the war has been 
 the spontaneous co-operation of the Imperial 
 Dominions. It has been a steel bond of reinforced 
 concrete. If, then, this bond has been of such 
 inestimable service in the past, would not its with- 
 drawal be such a blow at British prestige as would 
 give the greatest encouragement to the enemy ? 
 
 Whether the war be long or short, it is of the 
 utmost importance that Australia should remain
 
 CONSCRIPTION AND THE WAR 191 
 
 in it at her full strength to the end. The policy 
 of funk would stamp her for all time with dis- 
 honor. The men who counsel "slowing down" in 
 defence, pulling out of the war, are the refuse, 
 the rejects, the human scum of the State. They 
 never made a people great, honored or respectable. 
 They are the types never known to rise to the 
 dignity of one heroic action. Their speeches and 
 their policy exhale a rank and fetid odor. They 
 are made up of falsehood and dastardly sugges- 
 tion. In describing this world-struggle as "a 
 foreign war" and a "sordid trade war," they re- 
 veal the traitorous spirit which underlies all their 
 actions. 
 
 What is wanted now in Australia, in all ranks, 
 is a touch of that heroic spirit with which our 
 Anzac boys began the war, and in which they are 
 still prosecuting it. 
 
 THE CRY FOR RECRUITS. 
 
 'Tis our Day of Judgment, brothers! We must 
 
 freely make our choice, 
 Tis the patriot call of Duty! "Yea" or "Nay" 
 
 must be our voice. 
 We have vetoed all Conscription, all compulsion 
 
 for the fight, 
 But it still is ours as freemen to espouse the cause 
 
 of Right. 
 Time was Dephi's great Apollo, speaking from the 
 
 sacred shrine, 
 Sent his mandate to the people as an Oracle 
 
 divine. 
 Now no shrine shall give the mandate; now no 
 
 Delphic priest decree, 
 Ours the suffrage of the lieges ; ours the dictum of 
 
 the free.
 
 192 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 All the world will stand a-watch and mark our 
 
 doings day by day, 
 All the world will weigh our verdict what we do 
 
 and what we say. 
 History gives us no example of so high and proud 
 
 a trust, 
 Trust which makes us sovereign judge of what is 
 
 wise and what is just. 
 Elsewhere Czars and Kings and Kaisers in their 
 
 councils frame the laws, 
 Here the Sovereign people frame them in the 
 
 Sovereign people's cause. 
 Elsewhere in the name of Kings the royal edict 
 
 proudly runs, 
 Here Australia's daughters vouch it, voting with 
 
 Australia's sons. 
 Great our heritage of freedom ; great the suffrages 
 
 we speak; 
 With the Anzac call upon us, scorn we what is 
 
 base and weak. 
 Squarely will the question " meet us "Shall we 
 
 arm to fight our foe," 
 Who in this supreme appeal will give the craven 
 
 answer "No"? 
 Shall we fail in meek surrender all the high part 
 
 we have played ? 
 
 And proclaim to all the world that Austral chil- 
 dren are afraid? 
 Scorn we thus to think of Britons, sprung from 
 
 sires who bled and died 
 On the fields of Cressy, Poitiers, or on seas at 
 
 Nelson's side. 
 Sons of men who fought at Alma, Balaclava, 
 
 Waterloo, 
 In the thin red line of heroes, ever to the standard 
 
 true. 
 Can the kin of Austral heroes ever at enlistment 
 
 blench?
 
 CONSCRIPTION AND THE WAR 193 
 
 Sires and brothers of the men who stormed the 
 
 Pozieres trench? 
 Yes ! Such shames have been and must be, strains 
 
 degenerate and base, 
 Sometimes taint the blood of heroes bastards of 
 
 a noble race. 
 Human weeds of timorous spirit, vaporous, 
 
 watery as the moon, 
 Prompt in abject counsel, craven, feeble as the 
 
 limp poltroon. 
 Hearken to their prate amongst us! Babble they 
 
 of German might, 
 And the hopeless task for Britain conquering 
 
 Teutons in the fight. 
 All their words would damp our courage ; all their 
 
 thoughts would cheer the foe ; 
 All their wish to dodge their duty at the "call" 
 
 to answer "No." 
 "No" to every patriot duty; "No" to every noble 
 
 call; 
 "No" to justice; "No" to honor; "No" to truth, 
 
 to faith, to all. 
 "No" to all above the sordid; all that points to 
 
 honor's goal; 
 "No" to sacrifice unselfish, such as fires the braver 
 
 soul. 
 
 
 
 But there swells another chorus, like the blast of 
 
 bugle horn 
 Chorus of the generous-hearted, full of hope and 
 
 courage born 
 Yes ! my brothers in the trenches, who have given 
 
 us of your best; 
 
 Hasten we to stand beside you, bring your suc- 
 cour, give you rest. 
 Yes, my brothers, we are coming! Coming true 
 
 to all we seemed, 
 True to our last man and shilling ! All that pledge 
 
 shall be redeemed.
 
 194 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Yes, my brothers, trust us ever! And thou, 
 
 Mother England dear, 
 All thy sons shall stand beside thee whilst thy 
 
 flag is floating near. 
 
 Dearest Mother ! Mighty Britain ! All thy quench- 
 less spirit burns 
 In the bosoms of thy children. Unto thee our 
 
 spirit turns. 
 Turns to thee with love and reverence; turns as 
 
 ne'er it turned before, 
 When thy sky was bright and burnished in the 
 
 peaceful days of yore. 
 Never rose thy courage grander; never shone thy 
 
 name so bright, 
 All the world admires and marvels at thy millions 
 
 in their might. 
 Floats thy flag above a navy such as never swept 
 
 the seas, 
 The flag that braved a thousand years above the 
 
 battle and the breeze. 
 Yes, beloved Imperial Mother, count us always 
 
 at thy side, 
 With thee in thy shine and shadow, part of thee 
 
 will we abide. 
 Yes, for everything we cherish earthly hopes 
 
 and hopes above ; 
 Yes, for all that Freedom prizes ! Yes, for glory ; 
 
 Yes, for love ! 
 
 In the absence of Conscription all kinds of 
 excuses are current. 
 
 Some eligible men who have not yet gone into 
 camp have what seems to them good reasons for 
 their omission. They are not afraid of the risk 
 nor of the hardship. But they have a soft spot 
 in their hearts for those here dependent on them. 
 They have mothers and sisters who mourn and 
 entreat. It is very difficult for such men.
 
 CONSCRIPTION AND THE WAR 195 
 
 There is another class of eligible men who 
 have failed to enlist under the voluntary prin- 
 ciple. They, too, have what seems to them a 
 good excuse. They say: "We admit that every- 
 one has a duty to do his bit. We are quite ready 
 and willing to take our part in the war; but we 
 insist that since it involves common sacrifice for 
 the common good, such sacrifice should be equally 
 shared by every eligible. If only the willing ones 
 volunteer, the unwilling ones will dodge their 
 duty. Let the Government call on all alike by 
 means of compulsion. Since this is a special 
 sacrifice, let us all stand on the same footing, and 
 take our just quota of the risk." 
 
 Now, that is not a generous sentiment, but it is 
 not unjust. It once formed an almost invincible 
 plea for Conscription; but that was tried and 
 refused by a majority. The essential equity of 
 it is no doubt one of the reasons why the whole 
 belligerent world, save Australia and Ireland, are 
 under the Conscript law. 
 
 But there is no use in harking back to what 
 has been twice refused in a Referendum. The 
 Commonwealth has sent away 350,000 volunteers, 
 and that great fact is a fair answer to those who 
 say that they will not volunteer until everyone 
 else is compelled to go. 
 
 It is true, of course, that the man who enlists 
 to do his bit knows that he leaves many shirkers 
 behind him; but he knows also that many thou- 
 sands of gallant fellows have gone to their duty 
 without reckoning those who refuse to go. Every 
 man who goes, will go to good company. He will 
 go to the company of the brave, of the true, of the 
 noble, and of the self-sacrificing. There is a 
 good deal in that. Is not that much more com- 
 mendable than to say that because Jack and Tom 
 and Mick and Pat refuse to do their duty, that he,
 
 196 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Bob, will refuse also. If a man wants to choose 
 his own company, will he not rather be with fine, 
 good fellows abroad than with sneaks and 
 skulkers at home? A good Australian young 
 man who is the brother or the son of an Anzac, 
 cannot feel comfortable till he has cast in his lot 
 with the fellows who have said, "This is my own 
 my native land. I will, please God, defend it 
 against foreign tyrants." 
 
 CONSCRIPTION AND THE REFERENDUM. 
 
 Two Referendums in Australia, by a proportion 
 of 106 "Noes" to 100 "Yesses," have defeated 
 Conscription. The strongest Conscriptionist, if 
 he believe in the princfple of the Referendum, 
 must accept that verdict. 
 
 The decision may be wrong; it was wrong; it 
 is wrong; but the popular voice is final until 
 reversed, and the whole community must take the 
 consequence. 
 
 In England it was different. The Parliament 
 decided it, not the people. The Labor members 
 in England voted for Conscription, but only as a 
 war-necessity. 
 
 In June, 1915, Lloyd George had said to his 
 countrymen : "Pray don't talk about Conscription 
 as if it were anti-democratic. We won and 
 saved our liberties in this land on more than one 
 occasion by compulsory service. France saved 
 the liberty she had won in the great Revolution 
 from the fangs of tyrannical military empires, 
 purely by compulsory service. The great Re- 
 public of the West won its independence and 
 saved its national existence by compulsory ser- 
 vice. Two of the countries of Europe to-day 
 France and Italy are defending their national
 
 CONSCRIPTION AND THE WAR 197 
 
 existence and liberties by means of compulsory 
 service. It has been the greatest weapon in the 
 hands of Democracy many a time for the winning 
 and preservation of Freedom." 
 
 All that is quite true. Not a tittle of it can be 
 denied. But it does not alter the fact that in 
 Australia Conscription is no longer a question in 
 practical politics. The Commonwealth must get 
 its men, so far as it can get them, by persuasion. 
 It was a Labor Prime Minister who first declared 
 that Australia would help in this war to defend 
 the Empire to "her last man and l*st shilling." 
 That was mere rhetoric. More's the pity. But 
 if we cannot conscribe, we can recruit. If we 
 would remain free, we ourselves must strike free- 
 dom's blow. 
 
 There is a thing called a war indemnity. It can 
 be squeezed by a conquering enemy out of capital- 
 ist and worker alike. The Allies are in grips 
 with an enemy wKo says he will sacrifice his last 
 man to defeat them. 
 
 That enemy is the strongest military Power 
 that earth has ever seen. Clearly, then, we are 
 faced with only two alternatives. 
 
 The Allies must fight with their full strength 
 for their liberty, or they must lose it. The enemy 
 makes war with all his might under Conscription. 
 If we do anything less we risk losing. We are 
 running that risk, being without conscription. If 
 we lose, we pay. We must accept the terms of the 
 conqueror. He commands. We obey. There 
 is no evading the sentence. The loser pays the 
 bill. 
 
 Apart from patriotism, there is an argument 
 of the pocket. France had to pay Germany, 
 after a three months' war, 200,000,000 as a war 
 fine. If she went down in this long and costly 
 war she would most likely be taxed to the extent
 
 198 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 of 1,000,000,000. Russia is to pay 900,000,000. 
 What would be the quality of German mercy to 
 Great Britain? What would Australia have to 
 pay? We are told on every hand that German 
 hatred of England brims over with quite un- 
 paralleled malignity. England alone stood in 
 Germany's way of universal domination. Had 
 England held aloof when Germany's sword flashed 
 from its sheath, the Teuton could have been in 
 Paris in a month. German ships commanding 
 the sea, could have seized all France's colonies, 
 and France would have been compelled to a 
 separate peace in three months. The Germans 
 and Austrians could then have turned all their 
 fury on the Russians, and have brought the Czar's 
 legions to a standstill. These two great foes 
 being disposed of, the German could have turned 
 his undivided attention against England; and 
 Australia would have been amongst the first to 
 feel the weight of his gun metal. 
 
 What Cassius said to Caesar, every Australian 
 would then be bound to say of the war-glutted 
 Kaiser, at the head of his conquering legions : 
 ' 
 
 "Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world 
 Like a Colossus, and we petty men 
 Walk under his huge legs and peep about 
 To find ourselves dishonorable graves." 
 
 The alternative is, therefore, enlistment and 
 triumph, or shirking and defeat. One shirker 
 makes many. The disease is infectious. 
 
 "To be or not to be that is the question. 
 Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer 
 The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, 
 Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, 
 And, by opposing, end them."
 
 CONSCRIPTION AND THE WAR 199 
 
 The opponents of Conscription have pleaded 
 their love of Liberty. Conscription, they say, 
 interferes with man's freedom. That is quite 
 true, but though we have decided against Con- 
 scription, we risk the loss of a still greater liberty. 
 If a man will not do that duty, his country may 
 suffer slavery as Russia is doing. Conscription 
 deprives him of his liberty no doubt, so does a 
 victorious enemy. It is useless to plead the 
 pricelessness of human liberty,' and that in the 
 face of a foe who, if victorious, would take the 
 last vestige of that liberty away from us. That 
 is surely the very sublimation of unreason. 
 
 Liberty! Is not the freedom of the citizen 
 restricted at every turn for the common good? 
 Does not the law restrain the freedom of the 
 motorist, the cab-driver, the shopkeeper, the 
 liquor-seller, the very citizen on the footwalk? 
 Are we not compelled to pay taxes and to observe 
 the Sunday for the common good ? Liberty ! What 
 the anti-enlistment man asks is the liberty to lose 
 his own liberty and ours also. 
 
 The Labor Party in Canada supported enlist- 
 ment there for the reason that without it Canada 
 could not render to the Motherland all the help 
 she needed. 
 
 In Australia it is felt that the defeat of Great 
 Britain would mean Australian defeat. It fol- 
 lows, as the night the day, that had Great Britain 
 left France and Belgium to their fate, her own 
 turn would have come as soon as Germany could 
 have got her single-handed. If the Empire were 
 to be defeated in this war abroad, we should be 
 quite unequal to meet German warships sent to 
 ravage Australia. The war, then, is Australia's 
 war. 
 
 We are told sometimes that Australia has 
 already done her share. Are we, then, to fight
 
 200 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 this war, or any other war, with all our strength, 
 or with only a part of our strength. England is 
 fighting with all her strength. France is fight- 
 ing with all her strength. England adopted Con- 
 scription because voluntary enlistment failed ; and 
 because the democratic principle of equal rights 
 and equal duties demanded that the whole burden 
 of the fighting should not be thrown on the most 
 unselfish and high-spirited and courageous, but on 
 all alike. 
 
 In obedience to her Referendum Australia 
 gives up all thoughts of Conscription in this war ; 
 but it devolves on her to so much the more enforce 
 on our free people the sense of national duty, lest 
 worse comes of it. 
 
 THE ETHICS OF CONSCRIPTION. 
 
 I. 
 
 Conscription's a thing, and Conscription's a word 
 Which Folly perverteth to meanings absurd; 
 Which Rancor distorts with ignoble abuse, 
 And Prejudice robs of legitimate use. 
 Conscription, when used in the service of man, 
 Means common endeavor co-ordinate plan; 
 Means concert in effort humanity's call, 
 And co-operation extending to all. 
 
 II. 
 
 The call for defence means the national fate ; 
 To the high, to the low, to the poor, and the great. 
 Conscription of men and Conscription of wealth ; 
 To age with its riches, to youth with its health. 
 'Tis a call most supreme man's sublimest ap- 
 peal 
 
 The greedy must heed, and the generous must feel, 
 None can be exempt ; none can claim to be free, 
 As the strength is to bear, so the burden must be.
 
 CONSCRIPTION AND THE WAR 201 
 
 III. 
 
 The world is at war, and men's souls are afire, 
 They sigh for a peace which eludes their desire. 
 Their souls are aweary of ravage and gore, 
 Their nerves are aquake with the thunder and 
 
 roar, 
 
 They longingly yearn, like a bird for its nest, 
 For peace, gentle peace, and for silence and rest; 
 For the warblings of birds and the music of 
 
 streams, 
 And God's holy calm in humanity's dreams. 
 
 IV. 
 
 But hark ! 'Tis the cannon ! The spoiler is there 
 His guns in the trenches, his bombs in the air. 
 His deadly torpedoes make frightful the sea, 
 As the pirates black flag and its crossbones may 
 
 be. 
 The world stands in arms with its millions of 
 
 guns, 
 
 The War-god is raging, devouring our sons, 
 And the gallant and gayest and fairest must go 
 To meet the defiance and mocks of the foe. 
 
 V. 
 
 But why must they go ? Ah, list to the cry 
 Of woe-weary victims "Bring help or we die!" 
 That call is as deep and resistless as doom, 
 It comes from the cradle ; it comes from the tomb ; 
 From war-stricken sufferers whose wrongs can- 
 not cease 
 
 Till earth gains the pledge of a permanent peace. 
 Through travail alone can sweet Peace come 
 
 anigh ; 
 And only through war can the War-Demon die.
 
 202 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 VI. 
 
 The Pacifist all of these reasons denies, 
 He holds them as fictions, as Tyranny's lies. 
 As excuses for filling the world with alarms, 
 And keeping deluded the millions in arms. 
 The war he holds curst, and the conscript a slave, 
 Who fights for a badge or a pitiful grave. 
 Conscription, he says, is an order to kill, 
 It makes men assassins in spite of their will. 
 
 VII. 
 
 Fond dreamer! He heeds not the tyrants on 
 
 thrones, 
 
 He sees not the victims ; he hears not their groans. 
 He has pills for an earthquake, and brooms for a 
 
 flood; 
 
 With smiles he'd propitiate an Ogre of Blood. 
 He would banish ambition by begging it cease ; 
 And conquers Goliath with palm-leaves of peace. 
 He would shut out the evils which compass the 
 
 land, 
 Like the ostrich by boring his head in the sand. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Trade unionists swear by the unionist bond, 
 They hold not as brothers the workers beyond. 
 Conscription's conceived in a similar sense 
 A National Union of Common Defence. 
 If its "scabbing" to be a non-unionist worker, 
 What is it to be a Conscriptionist shirker? 
 Can unionists turn down Conscription with grace, 
 Yet starve a non-unionist out of his place? 
 
 IX. 
 
 They tell us Conscription is cruel a breath 
 That sentences some widow's son to his death. 
 Conscription's no sentence; the conscript's a 
 guard ;
 
 CONSCRIPTION AND THE WAR 203 
 
 His duties are really more noble than hard. 
 Conscription means service most high for the 
 
 State; 
 
 Not a sentence of death ; for in God's hand is fate. 
 And honor and service and duty well done, 
 Are all a good mother should wish for her son. 
 
 X. 
 
 Men prate of their freedom. On Labor's own 
 
 plan. 
 
 Can freedom abolish the duty of man ? 
 Can man amidst social advantages live, 
 And owe no return for the boons which they give ? 
 Can men have a Right and no duty belong 
 To safeguard that Right from infraction and 
 
 wrong? 
 
 The first of all duties a free man can owe 
 Is fending his freedom from every foe. 
 
 XI. 
 
 That duty no free man can dodge ; it must fall 
 In the weight of its burden most equal to all. 
 Men say that Conscription may be misapplied 
 To plant a death blow in Democracy's side. 
 But there is not a thought in the Commonwealth 
 
 soul, 
 
 But Democracy holds it in perfect control. 
 Conscription no risk to the people e'er brings, 
 Save when under Juntas or Kaisers or Kings. 
 
 XII. 
 
 Conscription is true, and Conscription is square ; 
 Conscription is justice; Conscription is fair; 
 Conscription's Democracy's buckler and helm ; 
 Conscription's the measure and strength of the 
 
 realm. 
 'Tis dread to the craven; 'tis hope to the slave;
 
 204 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 'Tis fear to the shirker; 'tis joy to the brave; 
 This that which is forging the way to advance 
 In Britain, America, Canada, France. 
 
 We hope that this war may be the last. But 
 it will always remain an indubitable truth that 
 in a world subject to war, Conscription is, and 
 must be, the only fair and democratic provision 
 for the insuring of a common national duty.
 
 IX. 
 LABOR AND THE WAR. 
 
 LABOR PATRIOTIC EVERYWHERE AT THE START. 
 
 When the first news of hostilities came, the 
 Empire in all its parts was moved with a one- 
 ness of feeling. It was a determination to stand 
 together. Since the die was cast for war, war 
 let it be. The manual workers of the Empire 
 were amongst the most ardent in their patriotism. 
 Organised Labor, in England and in Australia 
 alike, was foremost in energy. 
 
 In Britain, the laborers and the artisan class 
 rushed into enlistment with a spontaneity quite 
 admirable. For many months British statesmen 
 believed that the nation would voluntarily supply 
 all the soldiers which the war would require. 
 Lord Kitchener himself was a sharer in that 
 belief, and remained so for twelve months. 
 
 It was demonstrable almost from the start that 
 however ready Britons might be to take their 
 places in the fighting line, there was no industrial 
 organisation for war purposes worth speaking of. 
 Quite as much as men, the nation required muni- 
 tion factories such as might produce unlimited 
 supplies with a minimum of waste. For some 
 time there was no directing brain. At length 
 the need called forth the man. That man was 
 Lloyd-George. 
 
 On this side of the world Labor at the outset 
 did equal honor to itself. A Commonwealth 
 general election took place during the first months 
 
 205
 
 206 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 of the war in 1914. The Labor manifesto spoke 
 in the highest spirit 
 
 "Our interests and our very existence are bound 
 up with those of the Empire. In time of war 
 half measures are worse than none. If re- 
 turned with a majority we shall pursue with the 
 utmost vigor and determination every course 
 necessary for the defence of the Commonwealth 
 and the Empire in any and every contingency. 
 
 "Regarding, as we do, such a policy as the first 
 duty of the Government at this juncture, the elec- 
 tors may give their support to the Labor Party 
 with the utmost confidence. And this we say 
 further, that, whatever be the verdict of the 
 people, we shall not waver from the position taken 
 up by Mr. Fisher on behalf of our party, viz., 
 that 'in this hour of peril there are no parties so 
 far as the defence of the Commonwealth are con- 
 cerned, and that the Opposition will co-operate 
 with the Government and stand behind it as one 
 man.' 
 
 "The position, then, is that if the electors give 
 us a majority we shall expect Mr. Cook and his 
 supporters to stand behind us. On the other 
 hand, if Mr. Cook has a majority, we shall stand 
 behind him in all things necessary for the defence 
 of the Commonwealth and the Empire." 
 
 That was the pledged attitude of Labor in Aus- 
 tralia in 1914. It would have no half-and-half 
 war measures. It was a whole-souled Win-the- 
 War Party. Mr. Fisher, its leader, pledged the 
 party to back up the Empire to the last man and 
 the last shilling. It was quite equal to the best 
 patriotic Labor spirit in Great Britain. 
 
 In both places enlistment began on the volun- 
 tary principle. At the end of the first twelve 
 months of war, Britain had 3,000,000 men en- 
 rolled, and Australia had more than 200,000. It
 
 LABOR AND THE WAR 207 
 
 was considered a remarkable proof of the fervor 
 with which the ordinary citizen sprang to the 
 defence of freedom against the menacing mili- 
 tarism of Germany. 
 
 Things progressed very satisfactorily for some 
 months more, till Great Britain had 4,000,000 new 
 soldiers and the Commonwealth had nearly 
 300,000. 
 
 LABOR TROUBLE BEGINS. 
 
 By the Christmas time of 1915 it became evi- 
 dent that the supply of voluntary enlistment was 
 not equal to the requirements. This was mani- 
 fest both in Great Britain and in the Common- 
 wealth. Mr. Arthur Henderson was a Labor 
 member of the British Cabinet, as the Labor 
 Party in England had consented to a Coalition 
 Government. When Conscription began to be 
 talked about, it was a matter of conjecture as to 
 how Labor would take it. The event proved 
 that though Labor, like all parties, disliked Con- 
 scription as a national policy, it was prepared to 
 accept it on the ground of necessity. Labor 
 members of the House of Commons, though sus- 
 picious of changes in recruiting methods, had 
 never assumed an irreconcilable attitude toward 
 Conscription. They placed before everything 
 else the needs of the country. They had only 
 one policy to win the war. That fact will 
 always stand to the undying honor of the British 
 Labor Party. But the Party sacrifices made 
 were very great. 
 
 Kitchener, in March, 1916, told the Government 
 that the supply of men was not adequate. There 
 had been slack work, too much drink, and too 
 many trades union restrictions. Lloyd-George 
 urged that Labor should suspend all union rules
 
 that tended to restrict output, and also stop all 
 excessive drinking, as Drink was a more deadly 
 foe than the German. In all munition areas the 
 sale of liquor was controlled. Again the men 
 submitted. 
 
 Lord Derby reported to the Government that 
 many men who were eager to enlist were pre- 
 vented by business and financial engagements. 
 The canvass had distinctly shown that it was not 
 want of courage which kept the men back, and 
 there was abundant evidence of a general deter- 
 mination to see the war through, cost what it 
 might. 
 
 During this period of hesitation, the Asquith 
 Government was much more vacillating than 
 the people. Labor Unionists protested against 
 branding all unenlisted men as slackers. Some, 
 as was said truly, had mothers, sisters, or other 
 relatives depending on them. But the majority 
 of the people, to their honor be it said, were quite 
 ripe for Conscription long before the Government 
 could make up its mind. Great Britain's Allies 
 in France, Italy and Russia were disappointed at 
 the Asquith Government's timidity in dealing with 
 Conscription, as all the belligerents, save Britain, 
 were under Conscription. 
 
 A Labor member of Parliament, in one of the 
 Asquith fits of hesitation, said to the Govern- 
 ment "Temporise no longer. Go the straight 
 course. Tell the House that the necessity has 
 now arisen, and must be met, and you need not 
 fear for the response of the people." Mr. Lloyd- 
 George declared that the British working classes 
 and Labor generally were anything but "doubt- 
 ful neutrals." By this he meant that they were 
 ardent patriots. 
 
 The British Government was questioned in 
 August, 1915, as to its intentions to bring in Con-
 
 LABOR AND THE WAR 209 
 
 scription. It said "No." Mr. Asquith had not 
 the nerve. It was hoped, he said, that a free 
 people would rise to the supreme heights of a 
 great sacrifice without Conscription. His motto 
 was always "Wait and see." The people had 
 enlisted to the extent of more than five millions, 
 just as Australia had to the extent of 300,000. 
 
 There were Labor troubles then as there always 
 had been. It was intolerable, said Lloyd-George, 
 that the life of Britain should be imperilled over 
 a question of a farthing an hour in wages. Who- 
 ever was right or wrong, labor troubles must end. 
 The life of the country was before all; for the 
 war had to be fought in the workshops of Britain 
 and France. The Government then took power 
 to make all workshops Government shops. It 
 was seen that the need was in more munitions 
 quite as much as in more men. 
 
 The South Wales coal miners downed tools in 
 1915. The cause of grievance was the enormous 
 profits being made by the coal owners. This dis- 
 pute was adjusted by an equitable concession to 
 the men. The people sympathised with the 
 miners; and it was seen that in all cases the 
 people were ahead of the Government in their 
 readiness for new methods of prosecuting the war. 
 
 At last the question of compulsory service could 
 be delayed no longer. Ministers must grapple 
 with it, however distasteful it might be. The 
 sense of justice came to the aid of the Conscrip- 
 tion principle. The workers of the country 
 were shrewd to perceive that while Kitchener was 
 enrolling his millions of volunteers, it was hard 
 that the selfish should go scot free while the bur- 
 den of sacrifice fell on the most generous of the 
 people. 
 
 Mr. Arthur Henderson, the Labor Cabinet Min- 
 ister, was amongst the first to declare himself, in 
 a very eloquent speech, for Conscription, and
 
 210 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 when the third reading of the measure took place 
 on May 16, 1917, there were only 35 voices against 
 it, not half a score of them being Labor. On the 
 25th of May the King addressed a letter to his 
 people, thanking them for almost unanimously 
 accepting Conscription, after having enrolled by 
 voluntary effort, "no fewer than 5,041,000, an 
 effort far surpassing that of any other nation 
 in similar circumstances, recorded in history." 
 
 That was the way in which Great Britain mud- 
 dled her way through to Conscription. She had 
 been 21 months toying with it. When it came 
 it was made the law of the land with the full 
 consent of an almost unanimous Labor Party. 
 
 There is another great free concession that 
 stands to the credit of Labor in Britain. It is its 
 free breaking up for the time of its union rules 
 in order that continuity of occupation may be per- 
 fect in the munition shops. Every man in those 
 shops freely submitted to military discipline and 
 necessity, because every worker placed the good 
 of the Empire before the interests of his particular 
 union. 
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN LABOR PARTY. 
 
 Everything in which British Labor was patrio- 
 tic, high-souled and admirable, found its contrast 
 in the Australian Commonwealth. 
 
 It may be doubted whether any great political 
 party anywhere has ever presented a spectacle of 
 such eclipse as that which fell on the Australian 
 Labor Party in 1916. The party had always 
 been well led, and was distinguished as much for 
 patriotism as for intelligence. 
 
 It had been a party which had made Defence a 
 special feature of its policy. It was the first to 
 introduce the policy of Conscription in the train-
 
 LABOR AND THE WAR 211 
 
 ing of Australian cadets. And when the war 
 broke out, it was most pronounced in leaving 
 nothing undone, to the last man and last shilling, 
 in helping the Motherland to win the war. It was 
 placed in power in 1914 on a vigorous win-the-war 
 policy. And yet 
 
 Well, it is very difficult indeed to account for 
 the extraordinary swing round of the party in 
 1916. Its leaders, from some cause which has 
 never been explained, boxed the entire political 
 compass. 
 
 All that one can do is to record the circum- 
 stances as they occurred. When Labor came into 
 power in 1914, Mr. Andrew Fisher, the Prime 
 Minister, resigned and took the High Commis- 
 sionership in London. Thereupon Mr. W. M. 
 Hughes took the Prime Ministership. 
 
 Before the new Labor leader went to England, 
 he made a great patriotic speech in the Melbourne 
 Town Hall, and referred to certain influences 
 v.-lvch were disrupting the party. He said 
 
 "I appeal to the people of this country to join 
 the expeditionary forces. I appeal to them to 
 join that heroic band of men who have cast an 
 eternal lustre on the name of Australia. I ask 
 them to strike a blow for their family, for this 
 great Australia of ours, which has done so much 
 for them. I appeal to those men ; I appeal to the 
 manhood of Australia. 
 
 "I do not appeal to those men who, posing as 
 lovers of liberty, do what they can to prevent 
 men joining the expeditionary forces. These 
 men I must speak plainly pretend to speak as 
 the chosen mouthpiece of Labor and Unionism. 
 They have nothing in common with Labor or 
 Unionism. They are foul parasites. They have 
 attached themselves to the vitals of Labor. They 
 seek as it were to take up their foul abode in 
 the vitals of their host, to speak for him, to
 
 212 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 usurp those functions which belong to him. There 
 is between Syndicalism and that is its name 
 and Unionism and Labor, as we know it in this 
 country, a gulf as wide as hell. . . . Those 
 men know no nationality, religion, or principle, 
 and in the name of Unionism and Laborism I pass 
 them out like devils.'* 
 
 With these words of red hot denunciation ring- 
 ing in the ears of certain leaders of the Labor 
 party, Mr. Hughes went to Great Britain and 
 made an almost triumphal progress through the 
 country. He delivered a series of twenty-one 
 orations, received the freedom of many cities, and 
 captivated Britain by the brilliance of his deliver- 
 ances. Lloyd George said of those speeches, that 
 they were like shells of the highest detonating 
 quality." "Mr. Hughes," he says, "is essentially 
 a man of action who can do things. He has placed 
 all his gifts at the disposal of Britain in the day 
 of its peril. He is a flame-bearer to help us to 
 victory." 
 
 During Mr. Hughes's absence in England the 
 men in the Labor party whom he had called "foul 
 parasites " were not idle. Some of them were 
 emissaries of the I.W.W. Others were infected 
 with the principles of that body. They believed 
 in Syndicalism, which embodies the doctrine of 
 the universal strike. They taught "slowing down" 
 and a war on Capitalism. 
 
 Years before, in his book, "The Case for 
 Labor," Mr. Hughes had denounced these doc- 
 trines as the folly of madmen and fools. When 
 he returned he found himself in an atmosphere of 
 frigid friends and heated enemies. 
 
 All the patriotism which had distinguished 
 Labor in the days of Andrew Fisher's leadership 
 was gone. When Mr. Hughes began to talk of 
 introducing Conscription, which Great Britain 
 had just done, he was met with silence and frigid
 
 LABOR AND THE WAR 218 
 
 looks. He appealed to his caucus. The most he 
 could get was a reluctant assent to put the pro- 
 posal to a Referendum of the people. 
 
 His party had told the electors in 1914 that 
 if returned to power, they w r ould "pursue with the 
 utmost vigor and determination every course 
 necessary for the defence of the Commonwealth 
 and the Empire in any and every emergency." 
 
 That was a very distinct pledge, and it was 
 added that "the electors may give their support 
 to the Labor party with the utmost confidence" 
 that it would "not waver from the position taken 
 up by Mr. Fisher," who had promised Australia's 
 "last man and last shilling." 
 
 They were well aware that Britain had adopted 
 the policy of Conscription, as necessary to win 
 the war. They knew that the British Labor party 
 had endorsed that policy. They were well aware 
 also that every belligerent in the war had found 
 Conscription to be necessary, save only Canada 
 and New Zealand, and that both those Dominions 
 were preparing to follow suit with all the rest. 
 Yet in spite of this, and in the face of their pledges 
 of 1914, they refused the policy of Conscription. 
 
 But they did far more. The parasitical power 
 of Syndicalism had got such a grip on the Political 
 Labor Councils of the party that it was able to 
 threaten all members of Parliament. It issued 
 a mandate that no Labor member was to be free 
 to advocate Conscription. Any member who did 
 so was to be refused nomination at the next elec- 
 tion. 
 
 This was a manifest violation of the Labor Con- 
 stitution, which made every member free except 
 as to his pledge to the authorised platform of his 
 party. It was a violent usurpation of authority. 
 It subverted the basic principle of the party. It 
 changed a democratic constitution into an oligar-
 
 214 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 chic one. The party was no longer to rule itself. 
 A Junto was to command it. 
 
 The Referendum on Commonwealth Conscrip- 
 tion was put to the people. It was the first time 
 such a question had ever been put to a direct 
 popular vote. The Labor party was split in two 
 parts. 
 
 The weaklings crouched to their Syndicalist and 
 I.W.W. leaders, and to the disloyalists who de- 
 clared that Australia had already done more than 
 her full share in the war, and those political 
 weaklings took the platform, as they were ordered, 
 against Conscription. They formed in numbers 
 no contemptible party. They had with them all 
 the disloyal Sinn Feiners, and every man who 
 felt a grudge against Britain on the Irish Home 
 Rule question. But their greatest strength lay 
 in the votes of all the young Australians who 
 wanted to avoid the necessity of putting on khaki, 
 and of the female vote bent on "saving the boys 
 at home." 
 
 On the other side was arrayed every man and 
 woman who realised that this war is a struggle 
 between the ideal of force and the ideal of right; 
 that it is a struggle between the ideal which has 
 made the political government of Britain and the 
 ideal of military despotism. There were also 
 ranged on its side, all those Labor leaders who 
 scorned to bow the knee to the usurping com- 
 mands of the Political Labor Councils. Every 
 non-Labor body was in that Referendum appeal 
 working for the policy of Conscription. The 
 result of the direct appeal to the people was as 
 follows : 
 
 CONSCRIPTION REFERENDUM. 
 
 Total "No" Vote 1,136,539 
 
 Total "Yes" Vote 1,077,616 
 
 "No" majority 58,923
 
 LABOR AND THE WAR 215 
 
 "YES" MAJORITIES. 
 
 Victoria 25,807 
 
 Western Australia 53,381 
 
 Tasmania 10,734 
 
 Federal Territories 867 
 
 "NO" MAJORITIES. 
 
 New South Wales 116,496 
 
 Queeensland 9,050 
 
 South Australia 26,223 
 
 Three of the States and the Northern Terri- 
 tory polled good majorities for Conscription. Two 
 others polled large majorities against it. In New 
 South Wales the pastoral vote, and in South Aus- 
 tralia the German vote turned the scale. 
 
 Since the date of that Referendum the Labor 
 party has drifted further and further away from 
 loyalty to the Empire. Its first act was to expel 
 from its ranks every man who voted for Con- 
 scription. It next refused to join in a Coalition 
 Government with a win-the-war policy. In the 
 third place it insisted on a dissolution of Parlia- 
 ment and an appeal to the people against the 
 Conscription party. 
 
 That election took place on May 5, 1917. There 
 was only one issue of consequence in it. Loyalty 
 to the Empire or Disloyalty. All the disaffected 
 elements were with Labor, though it is right to 
 say that many Laborites were not themselves 
 disloyal. Loyal Laborites who still advocated 
 voluntary enlistment gave no explanation for their 
 glaring breach of their 1914 war pledges. They 
 went to the people a broken and discredited party. 
 They were shorn of almost all their best leaders. 
 They had expelled those leaders for daring to hold 
 their own opinions on Conscription. In this 
 expulsion of their friends they blew out their own 
 brains.
 
 216 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 A few extracts from their election speeches 
 will fully reveal them for what they are : Brook- 
 field, the man who won the Broken Hill seat, said 
 to his constituents "The red flag is the only flag 
 I'll spill my blood for. As for this British flag 
 they talk about the Union Jack I'll never spill 
 a drop of my blood for it." 
 
 Lest it might be thought that this was merely 
 a specimen of isolated disloyalty, it should be said 
 that when the leaders of Labor were asked to 
 disavow it, they passed motions in support of the 
 man who uttered it. 
 
 On February 26th, 1917, E. H. Coombe, a 
 Labor member of the South Australian Parlia- 
 ment, was fined 10 for using words calculated 
 to cause disaffection. 
 
 In Hobart, W. E. Dicker, another Labor mem- 
 ber, was fined 10 for making a statement pre- 
 judicial to recruiting. He said "I would as soon 
 be under German Rule as under British. If Aus- 
 tralia were in trouble, Britain would not fire a 
 shot to help her." 
 
 Ex-Senator Stewart said in Parliament "In 
 my opinion, one of the first duties of the Allied 
 communities after the War is over, and the Em- 
 peror of Germany is defeated and degraded, as 
 I hope he will be, must be to see that every 
 Crowned Head including that of our own Empire, 
 is dethroned." 
 
 It should be mentioned that the I.W.W. is a 
 violent disloyal body the reject of humanity. 
 The preamble of the I.W.W. condemns law-abid- 
 ing Unionism, and urges a general strike as one 
 of the best means to enable the workers to get 
 possession of the earth. 
 
 The Mr. Brookfield spoken of above was re- 
 ported in the Broken Hill "Miner" of January 18, 
 1917, as saying "If I happen to fluke this billet,
 
 LABOR AND THE WAR 217 
 
 I will fight like hell to get the I.W.W. men in 
 Sydney released as soon as possible." 
 
 The next week, the same paper of January 25, 
 1917, reports him "There is no man who be- 
 lieves in the preamble of the I.W.W. constitution 
 more than I do." 
 
 After the selection Mr. Brookfield received a 
 letter from Mr. Evans, the general secretary of 
 the P.L.L. of N.S.W., stating that "his candida- 
 ture had been unanimously endorsed, and also 
 every word he had said off the box regarding the 
 imprisoned I.W.W. men." Broken Hill "Truth," 
 9th February, 1917. 
 
 Some of the leaders at the Trades Hall were 
 prosecuted and sentenced for discouraging recruit- 
 ing. What had been the great Australian Labor 
 Party became a mere broken remnant of dis- 
 credited disloyalists. It was very pitiable. 
 
 The result was that in the elections, being 
 deserted by the tens of thousands of unattached 
 Liberals who had supported them, they were 
 utterly defeated in every State. They lost every 
 Senate seat which they contested. Their prestige 
 fell to zero; their patriotism was tarnished; and 
 their leadership was a byword and a jeer. 
 
 It was clear to every one outside the infatuated 
 party ranks that there was a pregnant meaning 
 in this unprecedented Labor overthrow. It sig- 
 nified that the people were as eager as ever for 
 the effective prosecution of the war, and they re- 
 sented the manner in which the Labor party had 
 turned its back upon its former promises. 
 
 The only hope now remaininig for the Aus- 
 tralian Labor Party was to recognise its folly 
 and repair it. Unfortunately, being still misled 
 by the I.W.W. influence, it lacked the virtue to 
 do this. Having been cast aside by the great 
 democratic vote in the elections, it resolved to 
 regain by an oligarchic coup the political author- 
 ity it had forfeited.
 
 218 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 To that end the hot-brained Unionist leaders 
 organised a Syndicalist Strike. The scheme was 
 to lay the State railways, the Commonwealth ship- 
 ping, the coal mines, and the wharf labor of Aus- 
 tralia idle, and thus paralyse the business of the 
 Continent, as a means of compelling the Federal 
 and State Governments to do the bidding of or- 
 ganised Labor. The scheme was that of hare- 
 brained fanatics, who put party first and the 
 country nowhere. 
 
 It was duly launched, and for two months it laid 
 a paralysis upon Australian production. It 
 brought dreadful suffering to the wives and fami- 
 lies of the deluded strikers, and it inflicted loss 
 upon the entire community, without so much as 
 one atom of gain to anybody. Australia is poorer 
 by a couple of millions sterling because of it, and 
 is so much less competent to find the means of 
 prosecuting the war. 
 
 Labor may recover itself in the coming years. 
 It is much to be desired ; for the time was when it 
 was a great progressive party, fecund in ideas, 
 and energetic in their prosecution. The country 
 is poorer for the degeneration of the party. There 
 can be no resurrection for it till it has the insight 
 to cut itself adrift from the lawless elements 
 which have crept into its ranks. The one cardinal 
 need for it is leadership. But unfortunately it 
 has ejected from its ranks almost every man of 
 real capacity. 
 
 That in brief is the narrative of Labor and the 
 War. In Great Britain the name of Labor stands 
 higher than ever it did before because of its 
 patriotism and wisdom. In Australia it has lost 
 the high reputation it once enjoyed. In 1914 the 
 People gave it a mandate to rule the Common- 
 wealth on a win-the-war policy; and it is now so 
 low in popular esteem that it is difficult to fore- 
 cast any date for its recovery.
 
 X. 
 
 THE STRIKE AND THE WAR. 
 
 THE NATURE OF THE STRIKE. 
 
 There is an intimate relation between the indus- 
 trial Strike and War. They are blood cousins. 
 Both are conceived in hatred, and born in violence. 
 The Strike is a direct application of the doctrine 
 of Force to compel others to do the will of the 
 Strikers. The war declares Might to be Right. 
 The Strike does the same. 
 
 All wars, of course, are not wrong. So in the 
 same way some strikes may be justified. A war 
 which is undertaken to repel an unjust invader is 
 right. A strike undertaken to prevent oppression, 
 when there are no other legal remedies, may be 
 justified. 
 
 The Strike was a legitimate weapon in the early 
 days of Unionism, just as was the duello at a time 
 when the law sanctioned private combat. 
 
 But wherever the law has provided legal tri- 
 bunals for the settlement of trade disputes, the 
 resort to the Strike is a reaction towards bar- 
 barism. 
 
 If this be true of the Strike of a single ur 'on, 
 it becomes accentuated in importance in the "sym- 
 pathetic" strike, in which a number of unions, 
 having no grievance of their own, strike in sup- 
 port of some one which alleges a grievance. This 
 is so because every union which downs tools in 
 sympathy inflicts more loss and suffering on the 
 general community which has nothing to do with 
 
 H 219
 
 the strike, than on anyone else. It is clear, there- 
 fore, that such a strike aims at reaching its object 
 by forcing loss and suffering on the whole com- 
 munity, and not by any appeal to reason. In that 
 it is akin to war. And it adopts this violent 
 course at the very time when the tribunals are 
 open to it, and in which it might obtain justice. 
 All these sympathetic strikes are therefore a 
 deliberate abandonment of reason, and an appeal 
 to force. 
 
 The Rev. L. M'Kenna, S.J., M.A., lecturing on 
 "Strike Ethics" in Limerick, has something to 
 say about strikes in general which the plain man 
 will do well to assimilate. He is an expert who 
 has thought himself into his subject, and he has 
 some very clear teaching about Strikes. Some 
 of his observations are well worth a permanent 
 record here. He regards the Strike question as 
 "terrible and delicate." He says 
 
 "For many unions to-day a strike is merely an episode 
 in the war between the classes, a declaration of open 
 hostilities, to be made whenever a good opportunity occurs; 
 a kind of preliminary manoeuvre preparing the battalions 
 of the people for the universal strike which is some day to 
 destroy the present system of society. 
 
 "For the Christian union a strike is something very dif- 
 ferent. It is a declaration of war, if you will, but of an 
 economic war to be declared only as a last resort, for a 
 just cause, and to be carried on without violence. 
 
 This, he says, is so because, while a workman 
 is free to say that he will or will not work, and 
 an employer is free to say he will or not carry 
 out a certain enterprise, both are subject, in jus- 
 tice and charity, not to injure the other without 
 very sufficient reason. What that sufficient reason 
 may be can never be a question when there is a 
 court open to decide it. 
 
 "The right to strike, under certain conditions, can no 
 more be denied the workman than his right to unite. At 
 the same time, it is a matter of concern that many work- 
 men, even those professing to be Catholics, do not seem
 
 THE STRIKE AND THE WAR 221 
 
 to realise the heavy responsibilities which such a right in- 
 volves. 
 
 "It is not an absolute right, to be exercised at any time. 
 It is a relative right, conditioned by duties of prudence, 
 charity, humanity, justice. 
 
 "In the first place, it cannot be exercised without a just 
 cause. It cannot, for instance, be exercised in order to 
 extort a wage which would be unjust. 
 
 "Not merely must the object of the strike be just; it 
 must be a weighty object, a very weighty object, propor- 
 tioned to the sufferings and risks which are incurred by 
 the terrible decision of declaring a strike. Strikes are a 
 true "plague to society," to use Pope Leo's words about 
 them. They mostly fail it is said that 60 per cent, 
 fail and, when they fail, they inflict severe and per- 
 manent losses upon the people." 
 
 Before striking the injury that must be done to 
 many poor workers must be taken into account. 
 This is so because men may not seek to remedy 
 one small evil by creating a bigger one. 
 
 "In this connection, however, it is only fair to remember 
 that just as an incident, trifling in itself, may involve some 
 principle important enough to justify a State in unchain- 
 ing the horrors of war, so some trifling incident, some 
 unjust dismissal, for instance, might possibly (though 
 rarely) justify recourse to the supreme arbitrament of a 
 strike. 
 
 "Just as a declaration of war, owing to the fearful 
 calamities and sufferings which the war is certain to 
 entail, is unlawful whenever there is not a reasonable pros- 
 pect of success, so a body of workmen who, without a 
 well-founded hope of success, expose themselves, their 
 families and the general public to the certain suffering and 
 inconvenience of a strike, are acting unlawfully." 
 
 Especially is this judgment definite concerning 
 Strikes in disputes where there are other means 
 of getting a settlement. 
 
 "Another condition, evidently necessary in order that a 
 strike be lawful, yet a condition often not complied with, 
 is that every other means of ending the conflict should 
 be seriously tried before recourse be had to such a terrible 
 weapon of defence. 
 
 "The question, however, on which Catholic principles 
 are most directly opposed to the principles of too many
 
 222 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 unions is the question of the means which may be em- 
 ployed in carrying on the strike. 
 
 "A man may never violate the strict right of another. 
 Therefore the destruction of the employer's materials or 
 machinery is never lawful. It is unlawful also to use 
 violence in repelling those who wish to take the strikers' 
 places. But the workman on strike who uses bodily 
 violence against those who wish to replace him is using 
 violence against those who in most cases are doing as 
 far as justice is concerned what they have a perfect right 
 to do. 
 
 "The men who offer to take the place of strikers are 
 acting in a way calculated to render vain and fruitless the 
 sacrifices and sufferings and risks faced by the strikers. 
 All the same to repel them by violence is to do wrong, 
 and one can never do wrong in order that good may come 
 of it. The end does not justify the means. 
 
 "You may ask what is the use of acknowledging a right 
 to strike if the right to prevent others from taking the 
 strikers' places is not recognised too? I answer that 
 the strikers have the right of defending their jobs, but 
 not the right to use violence for that purpose. They 
 have other means, peaceful means, at their disposal, moral 
 suasion, agitation, appeals to public opinion, and also the 
 method of 'peaceful picketing.' " 
 
 Is SYNDICALISM PRACTICABLE? 
 
 By the term Syndicalism one means a federation 
 of trades unions, or a union of unions. The root 
 idea of Syndicalism is such a complete and per- 
 fect organisation of federated Labor as would 
 make every part of it instantly respond to the 
 call of a central authority. So that if one union 
 has a grievance which it is unable of itself to 
 remedy, it may call upon other unions, and by a 
 united pressure obtain what it desires. 
 
 On the face of it, this contemplates no moral 
 force, no search for what is right, no attempt to 
 persuade by an appeal to reason. Its ultima ratio 
 is Force. It is war sheer war brute war. 
 
 There are many thoughtful trade unionists -who
 
 THE STRIKE AND THE WAR 223 
 
 regard Syndicalism or the "General Strike" as a 
 fantastic dream. Some of these people would be 
 quite willing to adopt it if it were practicable; 
 but they do not see how it can work out in prac- 
 tice. 
 
 We may consider for a moment whether this 
 idea of a complete federation of Labor is feasible. 
 
 In the first place, in order to be successful, it 
 is clear that all the workers in the State must be 
 drawn into the Unions. It would not do to have 
 the community made up as it is now, of Unionists 
 and Non-unionists, because if that were so, a 
 strike would be unsuccessful, through the non- 
 unionists being ready to take the place of the 
 strikers. 
 
 Syndicalism, therefore, to be successful, pre- 
 supposes that every worker will be an enrolled 
 unionist. What are the chances of bringing this 
 about? That can be answered only by an appeal 
 to the experiences of the past. Every worker 
 knows the impossibility of getting even one half 
 of the working class into unions. This arises from 
 the nature of humanity. 
 
 Men are so variously constituted that they re- 
 fuse to be squeezed into compartments according 
 to uniform patterns. But even if they were all 
 willing to become unionists, would they all con- 
 sent to strike at any moment at the bidding of 
 some body of officials for a purpose of which they 
 would be in complete ignorance? When we re- 
 member the broad differences of opinion that are 
 manifested in every union, it is impossible to con- 
 ceive of fifty separate unions all consenting to 
 strike together for some point about which they 
 would hold different opinions. For these reasons 
 Syndicalism, or the General Strike, is an impos- 
 sibility, while men value liberty of action and 
 freedom of mind. 
 
 But suppose that its practicability were COR-
 
 224 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 ceded. In that case would it be desirable? It 
 is worth while following out the inquiry. 
 
 The object of Syndicalism must be to improve 
 the conditions of Labor. It would compel that 
 improvement by laying all industry under an 
 interdict. The General Strike would compel 
 Capital to grant the desires of Labor. That is to 
 say the organised many would compel by Force 
 the organised few. 
 
 Reflect what this means. The wage-paying class 
 are not more than 15 per cent, of the community. 
 The wage-earning class are 85 per cent. Assum- 
 ing that Syndicalism has got all that 85 to stand 
 as one man ready for a strike at the word of 
 command, why should 85 resort to violence to 
 constrain 15 ? If 85 per cent, of the people can be 
 got to combine for a strike, why could they not 
 combine to carry out their wishes through Parlia- 
 ment, or through Parliament and a Referendum? 
 Surely it would be better to appeal to the Court 
 of Reason than to the Court of War. 
 
 We know as a matter of fact and experience 
 that it would be just as impossible to get those 
 85 per cent, of wage earners to vote together as 
 to strike together. They are men and women of 
 various minds and moved by various impulses. 
 Some would be moved by a land question, a home 
 rule question, an educational question, a patriotic 
 question, or a religious question, more than they 
 would by a wages question. 
 
 The large majority of that 85 per cent, of wage- 
 earners are loyal citizens who do not believe in 
 force, but in reason. They would not strike to- 
 gether to arbitrarily compel a minority ; and they 
 would not vote altogether for the same political 
 leaders. 
 
 Before it would be possible to drill all wage 
 earners to vote together, or to strike together, 
 they must merge all their individuality in the
 
 THE STRIKE AND THE WAR 225 
 
 wage-question. That would be to change the 
 whole character of the man. There are other 
 questions beside the wage-question. If man 
 could be made to vote like a machine on one ques- 
 tion only, it would be to make him a stunted and 
 atrophied character. 
 
 In that 85 per cent, of wage earners there are 
 men and women who abhors the doctrine of in- 
 surrectionary force. They prefer appeals to Rea- 
 son rather than resorts to violence and compul- 
 sion. Such people would rigidly hold aloof from 
 a system of Unionism which might at any 
 moment entangle them in a General Strike for 
 something which they might not approve. 
 
 Syndicalism must have at the bottom of its 
 motives the desire to place the ownership and 
 control of capital in the hands of the workers. 
 Could it ever accomplish that object? There is 
 not even the remote possibility of such a thing, 
 because as soon as the control should be gained, 
 that instant there would be division of opinion as 
 to the exercise of it. 
 
 Then again, you cannot prevent a man from 
 asking himself in every enterprise whether he 
 loses more than he gains in it. A wage-earner 
 who should become a Syndicalist for a General 
 Strike, could never be a free man for five minutes 
 in the year. His personal liberty to work or 
 not to work, to have a home or to lose it, would be 
 at the bidding of another, over whom he would 
 have no more control than a slave has over his 
 master. 
 
 In short Syndicalism means the most grinding 
 of slavery, from which a man of independent 
 mind would sheer off as he would from the plague. 
 
 Trades-unionism has grown stronger than ever 
 before because our Arbitration Acts have com- 
 pelled workmen to belong to unions before they 
 could get the benefit of an award in Court as to
 
 226 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 wages, hours, or any other benefit. But while 
 the numbers of unionists have very largely in- 
 creased, there are more than half the workers still 
 outside the unions. This renders the prospect of 
 a "General Strike" impracticable. 
 
 EVEN IF PRACTICABLE, is IT DESIRABLE? 
 
 From what has been said in the preceding 
 section it is fairly manifest that Syndicalism as 
 a panacea for Labor troubles is chasing rainbows. 
 Its root principle is violence, desolation, war. It 
 appeals only to people of arbitrary minds. Its 
 only fascination is that it forecasts a time when 
 Labor will have its hand on the throat of Capital. 
 That means that it is actuated by the same prin- 
 ciple as the German militant, that Might is Right. 
 
 The advocates of the general strike delight to 
 call themselves class-conscious reformers, and 
 they welcome what they call "the Armageddon of 
 the class war." They do not seek betterment in 
 wages or shorter hours, or any particular good 
 to the workers. They are out for a fight for any- 
 thing, for "the ninth part of a hair," as Hotspur 
 was ; or against a card system as the New South 
 Wales railway men were. No matter what, so 
 that the strikers may assert their authority. 
 
 Syndicalism or the General Strike is a travesty 
 of true trades unionism. If it could be brought 
 about, chaos would be brought with it. In a few 
 days there would be no food, no drink, no travel- 
 ling, no light, no law, no police, no repression of 
 crime. The idea of it is more stupid than wicked ; 
 but it would lead to unthinkable wickedness. 
 
 Pope Leo XIII., in his splendid Encyclical on 
 Labor, which has obtained world-wide acceptance, 
 quite admits that there may be cases in which the
 
 THE STRIKE AND THE WAR 227 
 
 Strike is not only permissible, but in which it be- 
 comes a duty. This is where the worker is asked 
 to "give up his soul to servitude," and to betray 
 the rights of his fellow men. But he and every 
 other authority of the Catholic Church hold that 
 the Strike is an extreme weapon which should be 
 used only in cases of extremity, and when there is 
 no other remedy. 
 
 That is just. the very antithesis of what the 
 sympathetic or General Strike aims at. The Syn- 
 dicalist or sympathetic strike is to be called into 
 operation for every union's grievances. Its bene- 
 fits must apply to all or none. The learned lecturer 
 before quoted, the Rev. L. McKenna, has some 
 special words on the "Sympathetic Strike." He 
 says 
 
 "A 'sympathetic strike' is one which is declared by some 
 body of laborers with a view to supporting the claims of 
 other laborers. It io plain that the question of its law- 
 fulness is an extremely serious one. If the doctrine 
 which holds it to be lawful be understood in a universal 
 sense, viz., that any body of men has the unconditional 
 right and even duty of declaring a strike in order to sup- 
 port the just quarrel of any other body, the doctrine is 
 subversive of society, and spells ruin and suffering for all 
 classes in the State, for workers, employers and the out- 
 side public. At any given moment there may be in some 
 place or another some body of workers out on a just 
 strike. If all other workers were justified in going out 
 on strike to support it, then in the case of some small 
 labor dispute in a small country town, for instance, there 
 would be a general paralysis of industry and a general 
 disturbance of the public peace throughout the whole 
 country; indeed, throughout the whole world if (as is often 
 said to be desirable) the solidarity of labor becomes inter- 
 national. In order that a few score of men should win 
 their cause (which they could easily do by means of 
 their union), millions of men and women in no way con- 
 cerned with the quarrel would be exposed to unspeakable 
 misery and suffering. If such a principle were adopted 
 by the whole laboring class all social intercourse would 
 be paralysed, all the advantages of our civilisation (which 
 the poor enjoy as well as the rich) would be destroyed, 
 all mercantile concerns (factories, shops, offices, banks,
 
 228 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 etc.) would have to close, the cultivation of the soil, the 
 production of the wealth on which rich and poor alike 
 depend, would come to an end. There would be universal 
 starvation and red-handed anarchy. 
 
 "A universal sympathetic strike could never be neces- 
 sary for the protection of the rights of individual workers. 
 On the other hand, everyone now recognises that the 
 rights of the individual laborer can only be efficiently 
 guarded by the solidarity of his fellow laborers, that is, of 
 those engaged in the same trade and united in an organ- 
 isation sufficiently numerous to protect the individual 
 members. It is impossible to conceive a cause that could 
 justify a universal sympathetic strike. It would be a 
 remedy out of all proportion to the evil it would be in- 
 tended to cure. It would be as if a doctor, called in to 
 cure some trivial scratch on a man's leg, were to amputate 
 the limb, to the imminent danger of the man's life. 
 
 "The policy of 'tainted goods' is really the same in its 
 effects, at least as that of the sympathetic strike. A 
 moment's thought will show that if adopted in its univer- 
 sal sense by employers or by employes it would rapidly 
 extend the sphere of any strike or of any lock-out to every 
 form of industry in a country, and, indeed, to every kind 
 of industry throughout the world. To preach such a 
 policy as a universal principle could never be justified, and 
 would be gravely sinful. Though in the wild and whirling 
 rhetoric of industrial conflicts it is sometimes recom- 
 mended, it is never applied in its entirety. Employers do 
 not apply it, for they see it would be madness to do so. 
 Neither dp the responsible leaders of the laboring classes 
 adopt it in its entirety, because they see that it would 
 mean the destruction of their own organisations, and that 
 it would ruin the general interests of the laboring classes. 
 Much as labor leaders speak of the international solidarity 
 of labor, it would, I think, be extremely unlikely that the 
 unions of England, for example, would, in carrying out 
 the 'tainted goods' policy, go out on strike themselves in 
 order to support a strike in France or in Ireland. 
 
 "The doctrine of the universal sympathetic strike ia 
 utterly indefensible. Does it therefore follow that a 
 sympathetic strike is never justifiable? No. A sym- 
 pathetic strike, like any other strike, is to be judged 
 justifiable or not according to the principles already laid 
 down. It must be insisted on, of course, that the reasons 
 which would justify such an extended strike would require 
 to be of proportionately greater importance and gravity 
 than those which would suffice to justifv an ordinary 
 strike, and that proportionately greater efforts should be 
 exerted to avert it.
 
 THE STRIKE AND THE WAR 229 
 
 "It may be argued that employers who have no real 
 bond of trade interest with each other (e.g., brewers, 
 bakers, cloth manufacturers, builders, etc.), sometimes 
 combine in federations, and that therefore each of the 
 various bodies of men engaged by such employers, in com- 
 ing to the help of its fellows, is in reality defending itself. 
 
 "Such a combination of employers would, of course, be 
 acting unjustly if it were to support, by a general lockout 
 or by financial assistance, any of its members who might 
 be engaged in an unjust quarrel with his employes. In 
 such a case it would be lawful for the unions, whose just 
 rights would be thus challenged, to combine in support of 
 the injured workers, and of course only as a last resort 
 declare a concerted strike. 
 
 "There are certain absolute necessities of modern life, 
 such as gas, water, electricity, railways, letter carriage, 
 etc., which are entrusted to great public or quasi-public 
 services. Now those who are engaged in such services 
 evidently do not on that account cease to enjoy their rights 
 as free men. They, like other employes, possess their 
 natural rights of defence, the right that every man has to 
 withhold his labor, given good cause. Yet, owing to the 
 fact that their uninterrupted services are immediately and 
 absolutely necessary for the peace and well-being of the 
 whole State, such men are bound by a heavier respon- 
 sibility in the exercise of their rights. They cannot ignore 
 the absolute necessities of the general public, and there- 
 fore a more than ordinary care and deliberation is incum- 
 bent on them before they can be justified in striking. If 
 strikes occur in such services the State is bound to employ 
 her forces even her armed forces to prevent the suffer- 
 ing and calamities which would result to the general 
 public. On the other hand, the employes of such public 
 utility services have a right to be compensated for the 
 extra difficulties which the nature of their work places in 
 the way of the prosecution of their rights. The State 
 is bound, therefore, to provide the very fullest machinery 
 equitably formed arbitration boards and the like for 
 permanently and effectively giving satisfaction in a 
 generous spirit to the employes of such services. A 
 conscientious Government cannot allow those who thus 
 work for the general advantage of the citizens to be op- 
 pressed or harshly treated." 
 
 That deliverance is so just, so impartial, and 
 so clear as to appeal instantly to the unbiassed 
 judgment. But it is more than that. It is an 
 authoritative statement on the moral aspect of
 
 230 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Strikes. I feel therefore that this essay on Strikes 
 and the War, would be wanting in an essential 
 feature if it did not include that weighty deliver- 
 ance. 
 
 THE CRAZE FOR STRIKES. 
 
 We live in a time when Strikes are in the air 
 and on the earth. They swarm upon us, both 
 with and without reason. Mr. Dooley gives us 
 the humor of the situation, with hardly an exag- 
 geration 
 
 " 'I see th' strike has been called off,' said Mr. Hen- 
 nessy. 'Which wan,' asked Mr. Dooley. 'I can't keep 
 thrack of thim. Somebody is sthrikin' all th' time. 
 Wan day th' horseshoers are out, an' another day th' 
 teamsters. Th' Brotherhood of Molasses Candy Pullers 
 sthrikes, an' th' Amalgymated Union iv Pickle Sorters 
 quits in sympathy. The carpenter that has been puttin' 
 up a chicken coop f'r Hogan knocked off worrk when he 
 found that Hogan was shaving himself without a card 
 from the Barbers' Union. Hogan fixed it with the walkin' 
 dillygate of th' barbers a' th' carpenter quit wurrk be- 
 cause he found that Hogan was wearin' a pair iv non- 
 union pants. Hogan wint down town and had his pants 
 unionised an' come home to find that th' carpinter had 
 struck because Hogan's hens were laying eggs, without the 
 union label. Hogan induced th' hens to jine th' union. 
 But wan iv thim laid an egg two days in succession, an' 
 th' others struck, th' rule of th' union being that no hen 
 shall lay more eggs thin th' most reluctant hen in th' 
 bunch.' " 
 
 Mr. Justice Higgins admitted recently in his 
 Court that strikes had increased from 208 in 1913 
 to 508 in 1916. At the very time when Courts 
 were open everywhere to hear Labor disputes, 
 the workers struck on an average ten times every 
 week in one place or another and on the most 
 paltry of pretences. Those useless strikes cost 
 2,000,000 days' labor, and made the community 
 poorer by 2,000,000.
 
 THE STRIKE AND THE WAR 231 
 
 Strikes are more numerous than ever. They 
 are chronic. There is a mania for them. It is a 
 positive social disease. If a grocer does not see 
 eye to eye with a manufacturer of soap he 
 strikes. If a baker wants to light his employers 
 oven in the morning instead of night he strikes. 
 If a wharf worker wants to sign on at the wharf 
 instead of at the office he strikes. If a carter 
 wants to deliver his goods at 10 o'clock instead 
 of at 2 he strikes. If a coal miner thinks his 
 day's work should begin when he steps into the 
 cage to go down, instead of when he takes up 
 tools to work he strikes 
 
 Yet there are tribunals appointed to settle all 
 these things, if the striker would but apply for 
 a peaceful settlement. But he will not. His 
 union decrees the strike. He carries out the 
 orders given. Work stops. The community 
 suffers. It is" the militaristic tyranny over 
 again. The strikers denounce wars, and they are 
 all for war themselves. 
 
 THE SLAVERY OF THE STRIKER. 
 
 There is another serious aspect of this appalling 
 Strike mania. It is the condition of slavery to 
 which it reduces the unionist, who is compelled to 
 strike sometimes against his will and conscience 
 to "go out" when ordered to down tools. 
 
 In nineteen cases out of twenty he knows noth- 
 ing of the trouble. The "card system" is to him 
 so much Sanscrit. All that he knows is that 
 someone somewhere calls him out, and he has to 
 go or be called a "scab." He is as much a crea- 
 ture of a machine as were the Germans under their 
 Junkers. He was formerly a hireling at the 
 mercy of his employer. He is now a poor help-
 
 232 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 less weakling who dare not have a soul of his 
 own when his union gives him orders; or rather 
 when a little governing coterie of it does so. 
 
 The best minds amongst the unionists perceive 
 this with dismay, and some of them are expressing 
 it with all the emphasis that is born of the galling 
 of their gyves. They lament and resent the fact 
 of their unions becoming corrupted by intriguing 
 political adventurers. Mr. Berry, the Secretary 
 of the Adelaide district Australian Engineers, 
 was one of these men. His words are redolent of 
 the wrath which a man feels at finding an enemy 
 sowing tares in his wheat fields. He told his 
 comrades at the end of August, 1917, that "Trades 
 Unionism is not responsible for the present up- 
 heaval; but the bastard elements of German in- 
 trigue, the I.W.W., and red-raggers called So- 
 cialists, who are strangling legitimate trades 
 unionism. I am confident that craft unionism 
 will come put of the furnace purged of the dross 
 and rise higher in public favor." 
 
 That man's testimony was supported by the 
 fact that in the Australian Strike wherever the 
 trade unionists were afforded a fair oppor- 
 tunity of a secret ballot, they were averse to the 
 violence of the Strike. This despotism of unionism 
 is a tyranny which, like an iron chain, has chafed 
 many good men. But there was no help for him. 
 He must obey the Juggernaut or it would crush 
 him. And in the "sympathetic" Strike he has 
 no means of judging whether he is striking for 
 what is just or unjust. 
 
 Some Unionists have felt the degradation so 
 acutely that they have broken away and formed 
 new unions, one rule of which is "There shall be 
 no Strike." They hold that the majority of 
 unionists in Australia were always against the 
 strike, and that it is not by their will that thou- 
 sands of unionists were out of work, and that
 
 THE STRIKE AND THE WAR 233 
 
 their families are suffering distress and hardship. 
 
 True and loyal trades unionism, they hold, is 
 necessary for the protection of the workers, and 
 as such is of benefit to the country. But unionism 
 can achieve protection of the workers' interests 
 by lawful and constitutional methods. Arbitra- 
 tion tribunals and wages boards are the lawful 
 methods by which this end can be achieved, and 
 the great majority of trades unionists believe in 
 these methods. 
 
 In recent years Australia has been invaded by 
 the militant "red raggers" preaching "direct 
 action" by means of the strike, and disregard- 
 ing and treating with contempt the laws of the 
 country, which the workers hav^ had such a large 
 share in making. These "red raggers" have suc- 
 ceeded of late in gaining control of many unions, 
 and by executive action have refused to members 
 the right of the ballot. 
 
 These new Unionists are quite convinced that 
 there can be no industrial stability whilst execu- 
 tives and union officials are allowed to retain the 
 untrammelled power of declaring strikes at their 
 own sweet will, and in violation of the sound 
 democratic principle of majority rule. 
 
 They argue that if unionism is to live, and serve 
 the purpose for which it was created that of 
 preserving to its members the industrial privi- 
 leges which Unionism won, before it was captured 
 by the "red-rag militants" it must be delivered 
 from their grip, and the workers be restored 
 their political freedom, which is the privilege of 
 every free man in a democratic community. This 
 would ensure that the unions shall not be used to 
 serve the political ambitions of paid officials and 
 Trades Hall political "bosses." 
 
 They appealed to all true Unionists in the Com- 
 monwealth, who believe as they do to promote the 
 cause of new Unionism on the above lines. The
 
 Unions which they formed have adopted for their 
 guiding principles the substitution of conciliation 
 and arbitration for Strikes; no Strike or cessa- 
 tion of work, to be sanctioned in any case unless 
 authorised by a secret ballot of its members ; full 
 political freedom to every member of the union. 
 The time is ripe for the consummation of these 
 true union ideals throughout Australia . They 
 appeal to those who have served sane Unionism 
 in the past to come forward, and with voice and 
 pen, and by forming or joining such unions, help 
 to establish Unionism once again on a sound basis. 
 
 THE LOVE OF FIGHTING. 
 
 There is a pugnacity in human nature which 
 disposes the average man to a contest whenever 
 he has reason to think that any fractional part of 
 his rights are invaded. 
 
 Plume ourselves as much as we like on our re- 
 finement and civilisation, unregenerate man in his 
 heart of hearts is very much of a fighting animal. 
 The duellist continued to fight his private com- 
 bats as long as the law permitted, and a little 
 longer. But for the law against breaches of 
 the peace, we should witness quarrels in the 
 streets every day, some of them fought out with 
 pistols or fisticuffs. They who are now forecast- 
 ing the time in Europe when wars shall be no 
 more always pre-suppose that the arbitration 
 settlement of disputes will be compulsory, with 
 the sanction of force to compel compliance with 
 it. 
 
 Men being what they are, Strikes will be put 
 down only as duelling was by stamping it on the 
 statute book for the heinous crime that it really 
 is. A Strike inflicts on society quite as much suf-
 
 THE STRIKE AND THE WAR 235 
 
 fering as would wholesale robbery and murder. 
 Strikers who have legal remedies and refuse them 
 are rebels who commit stupendous crimes, and 
 their offences should be made as penal as treason ; 
 for they are treason against the public weal. 
 
 If the Parnassian gods could still take stock 
 of the freaks of mortals, there would be shrieks 
 of Olympian laughter at the folly of men who 
 seek their own misery and that of others as a 
 means of settling differences. That is the exact 
 fact. 
 
 Labor boasts of having and retaining the right 
 to strike. It would be as wise to vaunt their right 
 to cut their own ears off. Germany flaunting 
 her pride in war, and Labor bragging of its right 
 to strike, are companion pictures of idiocy. 
 
 We all regard it as a sad circumstance when 
 we hear of a couple of thousand of men being 
 without employment; but the Strike record of 
 New South Wales presented at the beginning of 
 1917, shows that an average of 3,556 men were 
 out on strike every day all the year round of 
 their own accord. And that when peaceful tribu- 
 nals were open to them for the equitable settle- 
 ment of their disputes. 
 
 The fighting striker sometimes finds a positive 
 enjoyment in his contests, and sees humor in them. 
 After talking with one of them one day I jotted 
 down this conceit 
 
 AN ILL WIND THAT BLOWS SOMEBODY 
 
 GOOD. 
 
 CHORUS OF UNEMPLOYED. 
 It's nonsense to say that the Strike is a curse. 
 It's a blessing to us, whoever is worse. 
 Before this 'ere Strike we had nothing to do. 
 But now we've good billets and good money too. 
 We have lashings of labor and wages and food. 
 So you see an ill wind can blow somebody good.
 
 236 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 CHORUS OF CABINET MINISTERS. 
 
 Thank God for the Strike and the strikers, say 
 
 we. 
 
 They have been our political saviours, you see. 
 The Parliament talked about turning us out 
 Just before This most opportune strike came 
 
 about. 
 
 But the strike made it steady and altered its mood. 
 So you see an ill winds blows a Ministry good. 
 
 CHORUS OF POLICE. 
 
 All hail to the Strike! May its shadow increase! 
 It has served both our footmen and mounted 
 
 police. 
 
 It has given us a trip to the city to stay, 
 With little to do and good holiday. 
 We fully enjoy it, as patriots should. 
 So you see an ill wind blows the bobbies some good. 
 
 CHORUS OF CATTLE, SHEEP AND POULTRY. 
 
 Hurrah for the Strike ! May it never have end ! 
 To us it has been a most merciful friend. 
 Men starve on a crust, and can no longer eat of us, 
 When slaughtermen strike and refuse to make 
 
 meat of us. 
 
 Success to the Strike! May it stand as it stood! 
 Its an ill wind that blows to fat animals good. 
 
 It is in this light-hearted spirit that not a few 
 men "down tools" and stop the industrial machine. 
 
 THE TRADITION OF THE STRIKE MAKES IT POPULAR. 
 
 The Strike, bad as it is, is softened by a cher- 
 ished tradition. 
 
 Carlyle wrote seventy years ago, when the 
 workman's strike called forth very much of his 
 sympathy. Yet he gave to the workers of his
 
 THE STRIKE AND THE WAR 237 
 
 day, this advice "No one has worked, or can 
 work, except religiously; not even the poor day 
 laborer, the weaver of your coat, the sewer of 
 your shoes. All men, if they work not as in a 
 Great Taskmaster's eye, will work wrong, work 
 unhappily, for themselves and you." 
 
 The Strike as now wielded is no instrument of 
 defence. It is thrust like a poisoned dagger into 
 the vitals of the national life. It is a bludgeon 
 in the hands of ferocious selfishness, used with- 
 out mercy against the body politic. It is as cruel 
 as a drunken German regiment raiding a Bel- 
 gian city; and as conscienceless as the submarine 
 pirates who sank the Lusitania and the Sussex. 
 This is not the language of rhetoric, but of hard 
 concrete fact. For all kinds of reasons the striker 
 is ready to fly to arms, or rather to lounge into 
 idleness. Sometimes his excuses are serious, and 
 at others as light and trivial as the zephyrs 
 amongst summer roses. He revels in shutting 
 up factories, in cutting off the sources of other 
 people's livelihood, in the spread of destitution 
 and poverty. It shows his power. He cries 
 triumphantly "See what I can do if you provoke 
 me." He is as ruthless as a drunken Boche in 
 his blood-lust. The strike leader marches at will, 
 with upraised club, smashing as he goes, and there 
 is no one to say him nay. He does more mischief 
 than the burglar. He is a more fell enemy of 
 his species than the garotter. And yet the law 
 will hang the one and smile on the other. 
 
 And why is this? 
 
 There was a time, not so very far behind us, 
 when all Parliaments were the creatures of Capi- 
 talism; when it was all but impossible to wring 
 from them any relief for the toiling masses. In 
 that day the man who had only his labor to sell, 
 could get for it only what the employer would 
 give the bare pittance based on a starvation
 
 238 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 wage. Then the child of six was compelled to 
 toil in the darkness of the mines, and his father 
 must work there twelve and fourteen hours a day. 
 The toiler's life was hopeless and helpless save 
 for the streak of faint light that came through the 
 windows of primitive trades unionism. 
 
 In those dark days the Strike was a hallowed 
 weapon. It was as sacred as is now the sword 
 raised in France against the despoilers of Bel- 
 gium. In those days to be a striker was to take 
 a part full of danger. The striker had to be a 
 brave man. He could be arrested on a very thin 
 pretence, and he would have to be tried before 
 benches prepared to believe him a criminal. His 
 duty in the strike might land him at the gallows 
 or in the penitentiary. 
 
 The tragedy at Peterloo was but the beginning 
 of a revolt that grew ever more resistless. The 
 Strike, then as now, was war, civil war; but it 
 had the fair excuse then which it has not now, 
 that there was no other tribunal to appeal to. 
 This was a part of the theme of Kingsley in 
 "Alton Locke," and of Disraeli in "Sybil." 
 
 In these facts we have the -explanation of why 
 the Strike, which has ceased to be a virtue, and 
 become a crime, is still looked upon with a toler- 
 ance which it does not deserve. We are now liv- 
 ing in quite other times. Labor demanded reme- 
 dial legislation and got it. Labor has got an 
 equal vote with Capital. It can sway Parliament 
 to insist on a fair day's wage for a fair day's 
 work. The seller of labor is no longer at the 
 mercy of the buyer of it. The great principle 
 of a living wage is embodied in the decisions of 
 the Courts. And a living wage as such as will 
 enable the poorest laborer to rear his family in 
 comfort. The first remedy for the Strike is that 
 the whole People shall cast away every shred of
 
 THE STRIKE AND THE WAR 239 
 
 tolerance towards it shall regard it as the crime 
 that it really is. 
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN WAR STRIKE. 
 
 There is little doubt that the recent strike of 
 railway workers in New South Wales was a chal- 
 lenge to the Government of the State. It was in 
 defence of no principle of Unionism. An ultima- 
 tum was sent to the Railway Commissioners to 
 withdraw a certain "card system" of time-keeping 
 within 24 hours on pain of a stoppage of the 
 works. It was the act of men who felt that they 
 held in their hands a great power for mischief , who 
 were determined to make their power felt. The 
 ultimatum was a claim to have a ruling voice in 
 the workshops of the State. 
 
 One of the lessons which the community must 
 learn from this Australian Strike in war time is 
 rather a political than economic. The Strike was 
 not launched to gain an advantage for Labor. 
 There had been no dissatisfaction in the wage 
 rate and the conditions of Labor. But the Labor 
 party had become a great political power, and it 
 aimed at becoming the supreme power. In Octo- 
 ber of 1916, it entered on a campaign against the 
 Conscription policy. By a small majority it suc- 
 ceeded. Thus encouraged, it began another cam- 
 paign against the life of the Federal Government. 
 Seven months later it forced the Government to 
 a reluctant dissolution of the House. A general 
 election was held on May 5, 1917. There was only 
 one issue a vigorous prosecution of the war 
 or a perfunctory one. The leaders of Labor had 
 swung round from their eager policy of 1914. 
 They would not hear of Conscription on any terms. 
 Many of them refused to countenance recruiting, 
 on the ground that Australia had done enough in 
 men and money, and could not afford to do more.
 
 240 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 The electors on May 5, 1917, by an enormous 
 verdict, decided against Labor. It was a tremen- 
 dous surprise to the party. The leaders of that 
 party then decided to govern by strikes and ter- 
 rorism, since they could not govern by constitu- 
 tional means. They felt themselves to be mas- 
 ters in the industrial world. The miners, wharf 
 men, sailors, and railway men hoped that they 
 might gain by civil war what they had lost in 
 democratic politics. But they were to receive a 
 very rude awakening. Trade union members 
 may submit to be slave driven by their bosses. 
 Not so the whole community. Free men, boys, 
 and women, rushed into the vacancies created by 
 the strikers, and carried on business as well as 
 might be pending settlement. The people indig- 
 nantly refused to see all public business para- 
 lysed by a conspiracy of organised Unionism. 
 
 THE TREASON OF THE AUSTRALIAN STRIKE. 
 
 To that end some of our Judges of the Arbitra- 
 tion Courts have given to public opinion a strong 
 lead. Towards the end of September, 1917, a 
 case came before Mr. Justice Heydon, in which 
 Sydney coal lumpers had refused to put coal 
 aboard a troop transport ship. His Honor's judg- 
 ment was one of the finest given in our courts. 
 As an education to public opinion we find a place 
 for it in these pages. His Honor said 
 
 "In this case a strike by the Coal Lumpers' Union, 
 justifying the cancellation of its registration, was so 
 abundantly proved that in ordinary circumstances I should 
 do no more than direct the cancellation. The circum- 
 stances, however, are so amazing that I think that they 
 should be put on record. On June 23 last year the 
 Minister for the Navy made a very special and peculiar 
 agreement with the Sydney Coal Lumpers' Union. His 
 desire evidently was to secure guarantees against any delay
 
 THE STRIKE AND THE WAR 241 
 
 in the vitally important wharf work of coaling transports 
 and naval cargo-ships. Members of the Coal Lumpers' 
 Union seem to have been formed with their own consent 
 into a quasi -military body, spoken of as a battalion, and 
 their officials, or some of them, received honorary rank in 
 the Royal Australian Naval Reserve. The hope of the 
 Minister seems to have been that in assuming a definite 
 military character for the purpose of naval work the men 
 would perhaps realise that they were working for their 
 country and helping in the war, and it is very hard to 
 see how they can have failed to realise that. Moreover, 
 they received, as part of the consideration for the agree- 
 ment, definite protection against any call for enlistment. 
 That is to say, their work at coaling the navy was given 
 a value and character which made it as definite war work 
 as that of the men in the trenches, and, in consideration 
 of the promises which Uhey made in the agreement to do 
 this work, they were recognised as soldiers fighting in 
 Australia, and honorably relieved of all pressure to enlist 
 for actual fighting. For this and other advantages 
 extended to them by the agreement they promised that 
 they would at all times give the Navy Department first 
 call on their labor for coaling H.M.A. transports and 
 naval cargo-ships; that they would report at once any 
 improper cessation of work, causing delay in transport 
 coaling to the officer commanding the battalion, and that 
 the executive of the union would also punish men guilty of 
 such improper cessation. 
 
 "Will it be believed that in the face of such solemn en- 
 gagements, such high patriotic duties, such clearly recog- 
 nised responsibilities as these they refused to coal trans- 
 ports ? On Saturday, August 11, it was known that two 
 transports would be ready on Monday, August 13, with 
 two colliers alongside each for coaling. On the llth the 
 men refused to take orders to do that coaling on Monday, 
 because they were going to hold a meeting on Monday. 
 They refused then to do the work on Tuesday, because 
 they had postponed their meeting to Tuesday, and the 
 whole week went by without the work being touched, and 
 the men never have touched it. Captain Glossop and 
 Captain Waley tried to arrange to meet and address the 
 men, but apparently the men would not hear them. They 
 refused to give them the opportunity, and they never did 
 the work. According to the affidavits the refusal was 
 quite specific. They refused to do any coaling 'either on 
 transports or on other vessels.' Loyal workers were 
 then advertised for and responded, and the work was at 
 last done.
 
 242 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 "What is to be said to such appalling facts as these ? Are 
 the coal lumpers of Sydney really moral lunatics, or are 
 thev children of five years old? No-. Children five 
 years old might be as wilful, as frivolous, as irrespon- 
 sible; I doubt if ever they would be so insensible to their 
 word. The coal lumpers are not at the front, but they 
 are to send along to the front the men and munitions and 
 supplies necessary for the assistance and safety of the 
 men at the front. And they deliberately refused to do 
 so, although they had not ever a poor defence that coal 
 might help the railways or factories or even hospitals. 
 It is quite plain that it could help no one in the world but 
 Australians who are fighting Germans, and that help these 
 men refused. 
 
 "I must confess my inability to find language which can 
 fittingly stigmatise such atrocious conduct. Desertion 
 in the face of the enemy is no worse. These men, who 
 have carried their mania so far as to dare to declare Aus- 
 tralians in the trenches 'black' for that is what their 
 refusal to work for them means have the incredible in- 
 solence to call loyalists who have taken their places 
 'scabs.' If they are a fair sample of unionists which 
 God forbid and if the men who took up their work are a 
 fair sample of 'scabs,' then 'unionist' is a term of the foul- 
 est disgrace, and 'scab' shines out as a title of lofty 
 honor. Between such unionists and such 'scabs' let me 
 be the 'scab' a million times over. The great union of 
 Australia may Heaven protect her from domestic fools 
 and imported traitors is that to which these so-called 
 'scabs' have proclaimed their loyalty, and not one of us 
 can do better than range up beside them. There stands 
 the true unionist, and such callous treachery, such 'scab- 
 bing' on the men at the front, as has been shown in this 
 case, is as much lower than ordinary 'scabbing' as Austra- 
 lia stands higher than an ordinary trade union. 
 
 "In the face of a case like this, is it not the time 
 for many thousands of honest Australian unionists to 
 pause and consider where they are going? If it is in- 
 deed an essential principle of unionism that you must 
 'scab' for your union, that you must be false to your 
 country for your union, that you must trample underfoot 
 honor and good faith for your union, then has unionism 
 become an ugly idol, which instead of being protected 
 deserves to be destroyed. As a system of defence of the 
 interests of the workers unionism deserves all honor and 
 assistance. As a system of faithless disloyalty it must 
 inevitably, so soon as its character is really recognised, 
 be swept away by the indignation of the community."
 
 THE STRIKE AND THE WAR 243 
 
 Just at the same time, Captain Glossop, speak- 
 ing at a social function in Sydney, said : "From 
 the beginning of tne strike I foretold that the 
 greatest trouble would be with the shipping people. 
 My chief difficulty is to get crews for ships, and I 
 regret to say that the latest act of the Seamen and 
 Firemen's Union is to try to prevent a crew being 
 obtained for a hospital ship. (Cries of "Shame.") 
 It is a most disgraceful affair. They have kept 
 Captain Dunn and myself on a string for the past 
 week, saying that a crew would be available. To- 
 day the secretary of the union sent a message to 
 the effect that they will not provide a crew for the 
 hospital ship." 
 
 The Returned Sailors and Soldiers' Imperial 
 League carried the following motion "That this 
 committee of the Returned Sailors and Soldiers' 
 Imperial League, New South Wales branch, de- 
 precates in the strongest terms the action of any 
 body that refuses to coal and man hospital ships 
 and transports, thereby, in Mr. Justice Heydon's 
 words, declaring our comrades at the front 
 'black.' " 
 
 The same thing was referred to in Parliament 
 when in answer to a question Mr. Cook said that 
 he was sorry that it was so. A crew had been 
 refused for the ship. No reasons had been given. 
 The Seamen's Union had refused to provide a crew 
 for the ship. 
 
 Later, Mr. Catts asked Mr. Cook whether there 
 was not something in the administration of his 
 deDartment in New South Wales which might pos- 
 sibly be the explanation of the refusal to man the 
 hospital ship? 
 
 Mr. Cook replied that he knew no more than 
 was contained in the following telegram from the 
 captain in charge at Sydney : 
 
 "Unable to provide crew hospital ship. Unions
 
 244 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 refused to man her. Am taking special steps by 
 
 advertisement." 
 
 i 
 
 That hospital ship, added Mr. Cook, should have 
 left on her voyage on the day before, and she 
 could not sail because the unions had refused to 
 give her a crew. If he were Mr. Catts he would 
 not ask questions about an abominable thing of 
 that kind. There could be no excuse for it. 
 
 In the Sydney State Industrial Court, at the end 
 of September, 1917, Judge Curlewis cancelled the 
 registration of the Cold Storage Employees' 
 Union. His Honor, having referred to the fact 
 that the union had declared certain goods, not- 
 ably frozen rabbits, "black," said "I do not in- 
 tend to waste time expressing my opinion of this 
 action, which meant stopping supplies for the 
 troops. Treason and baseness are such common 
 attributes of a certain type of unionist in these 
 times that one has ceased to feel surprised. This 
 union cannot boast that it was as traitorous or 
 as base as the unions which refused to coal trans- 
 ports or man hospital ships, but it has the con- 
 solation of knowing that it was as traitorous and 
 base as it had the power to be." 
 
 Judge Rolin, in the Industrial Court, cancelled 
 the preference clause in the award of the Coke 
 Workers' Union. The union, he said, had been in 
 the highest degree disloyal, because it had refused 
 to permit coke, which was indispensable to the 
 conduct of munition works, to be made. 
 
 It would be difficult to conceive of anything that 
 can add to the disgrace which has fallen on the 
 name of Trades Unionism from these events. 
 Their meanness is equalled only by their treachery 
 to the brave Australian troops who are giving 
 their lives and limbs for these disloyalists. 
 
 We hear of strikes in other lands; but the 
 Labor Strike of 1917 in the Australian Common-
 
 THE STRIKE AND THE WAR 245 
 
 wealth stands out as quite unique in its heartless 
 treason to the Empire. Labor has indeed de- 
 scended from its high estate. It formerly carried 
 the confidence of the people. The verdict of the 
 5th of May, 1917, was that a large majority of 
 the people voted to depose it in every State. The 
 cause was its own treachery to democratic govern- 
 ment at home and disloyalty to the Empire 
 abroad. 
 
 Since that time, the Strike, beginning on 
 August 1, 1917, has deepened the evil reputation 
 which Labor earned by breaking its war pro- 
 mises. Its name has become steeped in obloquy. 
 Its recovery must be a matter of the distant 
 future; for though the public memory of party 
 misdeeds is not usually long, Labor's dishonor, 
 arising from its refusal to discharge its duties 
 to the Empire in time of war, is of a kind 
 which carries with it an odor peculiarly detest- 
 able. 
 
 THE GOOD NAME OF LABOR IN ENGLAND. 
 
 There was a very different attitude on the part 
 of Labor in England. There the trades unions 
 are quite as militant against capital as they are 
 in Australia ; but they have never been a dominant 
 political power as they have been in every State 
 of the Commonwealth, and in the Commonwealth 
 itself. They had therefore no political tempta- 
 tions to create an industrial mutiny. There was 
 besides a sterling patriotism in the Labor Party 
 in England that was wanting in Australia. Labor 
 unionists at the other end of the world willingly 
 submitted to Conscription as an unpleasant 
 necessity. They saw and acknowledged that the 
 war could not be won without it. They repressed 
 party aspirations before the demands of the
 
 246 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Empire. They compromised trade disputes, they 
 suppressed strikes, they sacrificed some of their 
 union rules to the exigency of the war. They 
 were instinct with high-wrought patriotism, of 
 which they exhibited rare examples when they 
 conceded the persuasions of the British Prime 
 Minister to declare an industrial peace for three 
 years, or for the term of the war. The Labor 
 Party in Great Britain covered itself with glory. 
 They were Britons first, and Labor men after- 
 wards. 
 
 The British Labor Party went further. Con- 
 trary to its ordinary principles, it consented to 
 join in a Win-the-War Coalition Government. 
 They have stood up to their duties with a spirit 
 worthy of the five millions of men who have 
 joined the colors. 
 
 The Strike has long been growing in disfavor, 
 because of its senseless punishment of both 
 friends and foes. But the Strike carried out 
 against the Empire in time of war is an iniquity 
 so damning that its blot will not be easily erased 
 from the Labor escutcheon.
 
 XI. 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE WAR. 
 
 WHAT DEMOCRACY MEANS. 
 
 It is, I think, true to say that the principles of 
 Democracy have been more discussed in connec- 
 tion with the present war than with any other 
 since the American War of Secession. 
 
 This is only what might have been expected. It 
 is really a war in which the principles of Democ- 
 racy are in collision with those of Autocracy. 
 
 And when, after nearly four years of fighting, 
 America announced her intention of taking a hand 
 in the struggle, the reasons assigned, both to the 
 Americans at home and the world at large, were 
 that the war was one for the maintenance of the 
 rights of small nations to govern themselves ac- 
 cording to their own ideas that human freedom 
 was at stake. 
 
 Great Britain, France, and Italy were the 
 exemplars of Democracy. Germany, Austro- 
 Hungary, and Turkey stand for Autocratic prin- 
 ciples. This war, therefore, so largely turns 
 upon democratic principles the rights of free 
 peoples to freely govern themselves that Democ- 
 racy forms an integral aspect of the war. 
 
 It may be worth while to get an inner grip of 
 what men mean when they talk of Democracy. 
 John S. Mill laid it down as an axiom that the 
 ends of government are to give the people 
 governed the maximum of pleasure and the mini- 
 mum of pain. This includes man's full rights in 
 
 247
 
 248 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 his own labor and protection in the enjoyment of 
 those rights. 
 
 He went on to show that if any one man, as a 
 king, or any coterie of men, as a body of auto- 
 crats, govern a people, they will always take from 
 the people whatever they may desire. There- 
 fore aristocracies and autocracies cannot be en- 
 trusted with supreme power. The people must 
 govern themselves if they would preserve for 
 themselves their liberties and personal rights. 
 However, inasmuch as they cannot all meet under 
 a tree or in a hall to enact their own laws, they 
 must choose representative men who will make 
 laws, in their name and of the kind they desire. 
 
 On the other hand, there are wise men, like 
 Macaulay, who argue that the people cannot 
 wisely govern themselves. They say that the end 
 of all government should be that "the people are 
 to be governed for their own good ; and, that they 
 may be governed for their own good, they must 
 not be governed by their own ignorance." 
 
 That is another way of saying that somebody 
 somewhere must select wise governors for the 
 people, because the latter are too ignorant to make 
 a wise selection for themselves. But the 
 Macaulay doctrine grinds no corn. The wise men 
 whom he would choose to govern me and others 
 might be fertile in their own interest, and sterile 
 in mine. 
 
 GLADSTONE ON DEMOCRACY. 
 
 A much greater statesman than Macaulay has 
 declared that that has been the invariable ex- 
 perience of the world. Mr. Gladstone, in the 
 course of an exhaustive controversy with Robert 
 Lowe, showed that the judgment of the un- 
 learned multitude is always wiser than that of the 
 learned few.
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE WAR 249 
 
 In spite of the dense ignorance which often 
 seems to cover a promiscuous crowd as a pall, 
 those who have most closely studied the popular 
 instinct have left on record that it is to be trusted 
 before the sectional predilections of any select 
 coteries. Mr. Gladstone said, after fifty years of 
 experience, that on great political questions "the 
 popular judgment on these broad issues has been 
 more nearly just and true, has gone more to the 
 root of the matter, than that of the higher 
 orders." And when asked to give a reason why 
 the uneducated masses were politically wiser than 
 the educated classes, he said: "The superiority 
 of the popular judgment in politics, so far as it is 
 superior, is, according to my view, due mainly to 
 moral causes, to a greater mental integrity, which 
 again, is greatly owing to the comparative 
 absence of the more subtle agencies of temptation. 
 But the working man whom Fortune does not 
 taint, and whom it is nobody's interest to corrupt, 
 is one thing; the working man practised upon, 
 courted, flattered, is another. His little barque 
 will carry no great breadth of canvas; and the 
 puff of factitious adulation will act upon its 
 equilibrium like a squall." 
 
 There we have the argument for democratic 
 government, because on broad issues it is more 
 nearly just and true than class government, how- 
 ever erudite. 
 
 There is a judgment of the head, he argued, and 
 a judgment of the heart. The head will direct 
 men to adopt that course which conserves their in- 
 terests. The heart will prompt men to incur 
 sacrifice for the good of others. Mr. Gladstone 
 submitted a pretty long list of questions, such as 
 the abolition of flogging in the army, the emanci- 
 pation of the slaves, Catholic Emancipation, and 
 the extension of the franchise. In all those ques- 
 tions, for a period extending over half a century,
 
 250 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 the unlettered multitude of Englishmen had been 
 instinctively right, and the cultured representa- 
 tives of the Universities and others had been in- 
 variably wrong. Wherefore, he reached the con- 
 clusion that there is more political wisdom in the 
 masses of the people than in any sections of them, 
 however wise or cultured those sections may be. 
 
 This led Mr. Gladstone, on another occasion, to 
 define the difference between the Conservative 
 and Liberal thus "The Conservative instinc- 
 tively distrusts the people. The Liberal instinc- 
 tively trusts them." 
 
 It is, of course, admitted that there may be 
 spasms of excitement and of suspicion, of bigotry 
 and rancor, in which a whole people temporarily 
 loses the control of reason. But that is true of 
 all classes alike, and therefore disqualifies equally 
 the many and the few. But given a popular ap- 
 peal in which the public judgment is calm and 
 undeflected by passion, the masses of the people 
 are the truer judges of rectitude. 
 
 As an example of this the origin of the war 
 may be cited. That war is a war of nationalities, 
 but it was not made by peoples. Its originators 
 were a comparatively small band of unscrupulous 
 and conceited persons who were clever and per- 
 sistent enough to demoralise a whole people. The 
 chief blame lies on the small band. Europe is 
 laid waste, hundreds of thousands of men mur- 
 dered, and practically every human being made 
 to suffer in order to satisfy the idiotic ambitions 
 of a handful. 
 
 Those German Junkers who made this war were 
 wise men able men. Perhaps they were the 
 pick of German culture. It may be conceded to 
 them that they sincerely thought they were ser- 
 ving Germany in making the war. But events 
 have shown that they were frightfully mistaken. 
 All Germans now see that ; and the German masses
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE WAR 251 
 
 may say to themselves : "At any rate we couldn't 
 have done worse than that." The masses know 
 that if the war decision had been openly sub- 
 mitted to a representative German chamber, in- 
 stead of being taken in concealment and amid 
 disgusting chicane, no war would have occurred. 
 It is held by many as absolutely certain that the 
 triumph of Democracy, and nothing else, will end 
 war as an institution. 
 
 We say so much at this stage of the argument 
 by way of corroborating the Gladstonian conten- 
 tion with one of the greatest examples in his- 
 tory. One of the greatest mistakes ever made 
 by a Government was made in 1914 by the Ger- 
 man autocratic form of government. It could 
 not have been made by a Democracy, because the 
 delays in decision would have prevented the 
 ultimatums which precipitated the war. 
 
 AN ADVANTAGE POSSESSED BY AN AUTOCRACY. 
 
 It may be readily admitted that in the making 
 of war an Autocracy has an advantage over a 
 Democracy. The Autocracy can prepare in secret 
 and spring its surprise. The Democracy is com- 
 pelled to more openly deliberate on the pros and 
 cons of the projected war. The German Autocracy 
 was ready for war to the last button in 1914. No 
 Democracy was ready, when the Junker thunder- 
 bolt fell. But if the Autocrat ^nds himself pos- 
 sessed of greater facility of preparation for war, 
 he is more open to the danger of entering upon a 
 disastrous war. 
 
 There is a broad general principle which links 
 all the neutral nations of the world with an in- 
 stinctive sympathy, to the Entente. It is the 
 sense of mutual protection against a power which 
 i
 
 252 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 threatens all alike with its dominating military 
 absolutism. And yet autocratic as was the war 
 in its origin, the democracies of Germany and 
 Austria, so far as they have any development, are 
 solidly behind it. The German democratic ele- 
 ment which finds its voice in the Socialist Party, 
 had no part in making the war had no thought 
 of it, no wish for it, no interest in it, no conception 
 that it was imminent. Yet when the war broke 
 out the Socialists became the pliable creatures of 
 the military machine. They could not be other- 
 wise. 
 
 Whatever there was of German Democracy in 
 1914, it was quite unorganised. It may have 
 been strong and intelligent on its own lines ; but 
 when the battle bugle sounded to "defend Ger- 
 many from being encircled by the enemies of the 
 Fatherland," Democracy became as passionate in 
 its patriotism as Junkerdom itself. But that 
 offers no fair ground of complaint against Demo- 
 cracy per se. The German democrats were 
 caught up and carried off their feet in a mad 
 whirl of military ambition. It was given no 
 chance to pause, to reason, to weigh, to think. 
 Where Democracy has been free it is spontane- 
 ously with the democratic Allies. Wherever our 
 eyes turn across the planet, the Democracies are 
 all with the Allies in heart and mostly in arms. 
 The unfettered heart of humanity has everywhere 
 pulsed true to its breeding. 
 
 PARLIAMENTS A DANGER TO DEMOCRACY. 
 
 It not infrequently happens that Parliaments, 
 which are elected by the Democracy, do all they 
 can to defeat the democratic principle. Many of 
 our Electoral Acts have got into such a condi-
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE WAR 253 
 
 tion owing to Parliamentary failure that it is 
 impossible for the electors to speak their true 
 mind. This is because 5,000 electors choose a 
 member in one place, and 30,000 in another. One 
 man has thus equal to five times the electoral 
 power that another has. Parliament is never 
 eager to give to the people their due ; and that is 
 a strong reason why the electors should insist on 
 getting the Referendum as a part of their politi- 
 cal machinery, so that "direct action" on the part 
 of the electors may rectify the failure of Parlia- 
 ment. This inequality of the franchise is a per- 
 petual disfigurement of Democracies. 
 
 Here arises a very important question concern- 
 ing Democracies. Why is it that Parliaments 
 are so careless about vindicating the democratic 
 principles? The more the fact is investigated 
 the clearer it will become that Parliaments are 
 always far more concerned in guarding their own 
 corporate rights than in safeguarding the broad 
 and equal privileges of the Democracy. On the 
 hustings the average candidate is profuse in pro- 
 mises. In Parliament he is very rarely reliable 
 in keeping them. That is one of the weak parts 
 of every Democracy. The remedy would be the 
 direct action of the Initiative Referendum. Par- 
 liaments are no more to be trusted with undis- 
 puted power than monarchs are. If the Demo- 
 cracy would hold its own, and be the masters in 
 its own household, it must possess the right of the 
 Referendum. 
 
 It does not follow that because Democracy holds 
 to the ideal of political equality, that it under- 
 values the advantages of heredity. Claude Mel- 
 notte summed up the position when he said 
 
 "I would not, were I fifty tim^s a Prince, be a 
 pensioner on the dead. I honor birth and an- 
 cestry when they are the incentives to exertion, 
 not the title deeds to sloth. I honor the laurels
 
 254 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 that overshadow the graves of our fathers. It 
 is our fathers I emulate when I desire that be- 
 neath the evergreen I myself have planted my 
 own ashes may repose." 
 
 How DEMOCRATS UNDERMINE DEMOCRACY. 
 
 It is curious and interesting to note that sincere 
 and professed Democrats are always liable to get 
 off the track of their own principles. When the 
 British Seamen's Union recently declared that its 
 members would refuse to carry delegates to the 
 Stockholm Peace Conference, it quite uncon- 
 sciously took up the attitude of oligarchy. The 
 right of saying who should attend that confer- 
 ence belonged to the Government of the whole 
 people, the Democracy. For a Trades Union to 
 usurp that authority was a violation of Demo- 
 cracy. 
 
 Another example of this was recently found in 
 the Labor movement of the Australian Common- 
 wealth. The leaders of that party jumped the 
 power of saying that no Labor man should be a 
 Conscriptionist. That was a right which had 
 belonged to all; it could be taken away only by 
 the democratic principle of a majority vote. When 
 it was abolished by the mere dictum of certain 
 Lodges, it was the usurpation of Oligarchs. 
 
 The Labor Party committed the same sin 
 against the Democratic principle in its attitude on 
 Education. In declaring that only secular schools 
 can be national schools, it attacks liberty of 
 conscience which a Democracy of its very nature 
 must respect. When Mr. Elmslie said "Hands 
 off the Education Act," he said in effect that 
 while all citizens equally pay the school tax, only 
 those who think as he does shall share in the ex- 
 penditure of the money. That is absolutism, not
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE WAR 255 
 
 Democracy. The endowm3nt of a State system 
 of Education based on Secularism only is the 
 equivalent of the endowment of a State Church. 
 There is no difference in principle in a Parliament 
 endowing one particular Church from the public 
 funds and endowing one particular brand of edu- 
 cation. In each case it is taking the money of 
 the whole people to spend on a section. In Great 
 Britain the democratic principle is maintained. 
 Those who want secular schools can have them, 
 and they who have denominational schools are 
 equally treated. 
 
 THE FAILURES OF DEMOCRACY. 
 
 It is sometimes objected against Democracy 
 that it has not achieved the results expected of it. 
 Corruption is known in all forms of government. 
 Democracy is not exempt from it. Even as I 
 write these lines revelations are being made in 
 Paris which show how the secret service money 
 of the enemy has been spent to corrupt French- 
 men in Paris itself, while the German guns were 
 within hearing. 
 
 In the same way we know that on the free 
 Democracy of America Tammany scandals 
 blackened the name of government. But this 
 may be confidently said that the worst corrup- 
 tions of democratic peoples are but the faint 
 shadow of those which have blotted the records of 
 kings and aristocracies. Those who say that the 
 Democracy cannot grapple with complex ques- 
 tions of policy are not speaking by a card. The 
 American Democracy has mastered problems be- 
 fore which the best statesmanship of monarchism 
 might have failed that science of government 
 which has made a hundred millions of diverse 
 minds homogeneous in patriotism.
 
 256 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 It may be that Democracy's weakest point is 
 its distaste for discipline, its aversion to criticism, 
 and its appetite for praise. But it would be diffi- 
 cult to show that in the last two qualities a Democ- 
 racy is more amenable to censure than any other 
 forms of government. In the matter of discipline 
 it is probably true; and in all teaching establish- 
 ments the fact should be borne in mind and made 
 a special feature in the training of the coming 
 generation. 
 
 America is very often pointed to as an example 
 of how far Democracy has failed to give to the 
 people those things upon which they have fixed 
 their desires. The criticism is quite just as re- 
 gards the fact, but not in placing the failure to the 
 debit of Democracy. Americans constantly hear 
 of "the right of the people to rule," and they are 
 quite conscious that they can never command that 
 right. It seems a little anomalous that a great 
 Republic like the United States, in which are 
 nearly a hundred million people working under a 
 broad democracy, should in this twentieth century 
 find it necessary to discuss "the right of the 
 people to rule." But so it is. It is because 
 Democracy cannot get its limbs free of the 
 shackles of the dead hand in antique constitutions. 
 They are struggling to break through the clogs of 
 unworkable Parliaments. At present the Ameri- 
 can people can no more compel their own Par- 
 liaments to carry out their wishes than the Aus- 
 tralian or English people can. This is why, 
 under the conviction that Democracy must help 
 itself, there is so insistent a demand for the Re- 
 ferendum. It is not a sign of sound judgment to 
 ascribe failure to Democracy when that Democ- 
 racy has been deprived of free play by the clog- 
 ging of effete Parliaments. 
 
 Lord Acton, speculating concerning the opera- 
 tions of Democracy, and with that sense of dread
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE WAR 257 
 
 which novel forms of government always en- 
 gender in men of mature judgment, said 
 "Liberty depends upon the division of power. 
 Democracy tends to unity of power. To keep 
 asunder the agents one must divide the sources; 
 that is, one must maintain, or create, separate 
 administrative bodies. In the view of increasing 
 Democracy, a restricted federalism is the one 
 possible check upon concentration and central- 
 ism." There are not many thinkers now-a-days 
 who will entertain any fears of Democracy from 
 an over-concentration of power. The democra- 
 tic tendency is rather centrifugal than centri- 
 petal; while we find much unity of power under 
 despotic forms of government. 
 
 DEMOCRACY AND MILITARISM. 
 
 A fact which stands out in prominence before 
 all eyes is that the military horrors of the pre- 
 sent war are not the result of the hostility of 
 peoples against peoples, but by unrepresentative 
 rulers against nations. Democracy had no voice 
 in making this war. 
 
 The three forces which precipitated the world 
 into the hell fire which consumes it were 
 Kaiserism, Junkerism, Militarism. Each and all 
 of them were the very antithesis of Democracy. 
 But, united, they held a strangle hold on the 
 liberties of the race, and our many-millioned 
 humanity stood in thrall to the Autocrat and the 
 Oligarch. The few made the war, and the many 
 fight and pay for it. The few called the tune; 
 the many pay the piper. Crime and folly were 
 with the few. Wisdom lay with the multitude. 
 
 If it be true, as everybody seems to say, that 
 Democracy is to displace all other forms of
 
 258 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 government in the world, we should be quite con- 
 tent that it has its critics. Men like W. H. Mai- 
 lock tell us that Democrary, reduced to its last 
 analysis, can be nothing better than the ignis 
 fatuus of visionaries. Its basic principle of 
 "government of the people, by the people, and for 
 the people," must always end in delusion. This, 
 they say, must be so because no form of such 
 government can be for all the people taken as a 
 whole. 
 
 This means that when Sir Josiah Gudge 
 is elected for the Radical borough of Slocum, he 
 can represent only that section which endorses 
 his programme. That is true, but if he repre- 
 sents the majority of his borough on the pro- 
 minent questions of the day, and his neighbor does 
 the same for the neighboring borough, and so on 
 through the State, that State would have a Par- 
 liament which reflected the mind of the people. 
 If, superadded to that, the democratic trump card 
 of the Referendum be added, Democracy prevails 
 in that State without any delusion. 
 
 But, say the critics, Democracy has been 
 defined as a system whereby "every man in virtue 
 of his manhood alone shall have an equal voice in 
 the affairs of the common country." If this 
 were possible "manhood alone" the numskulls- 
 Walt Whitman's "divine average" would super- 
 sede all our experts, philosophers, and wise men. 
 The country would be governed by its foolishness. 
 If the influence of every man be equal, the judg- 
 ments of 90 average men would defeat the judg- 
 ments of 10 superior men. If the 90 men permit 
 the opinions of the 10 superior men to guide them, 
 then 10 men carry the votes of 90 other men in 
 their pockets, and the primary principle of Demo- 
 cracy is violated. 
 
 But that argument is the flimsiest of flimsy 
 delusions. Democracy postulates the rule of the
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE WAR 259 
 
 people by the people. If the 90 average men see 
 good reason for adopting the proposals of the 10 
 superior men, they are still the people, and give 
 their free suffrages in that direction. There is 
 no violation of democratic principle. 
 
 Democracy's principle of "One Vote One Value" 
 does not signify that every voter must exercise 
 the same influence. There does not live a man 
 in any community who is not influenced by the 
 opinions of other men. The man who can offer 
 the strongest reasons for his political faith, acting 
 freely on other free men, sways popular judg- 
 ment in the highest degree without detracting a 
 scintilla from any other man's political status. 
 
 Democracy stands up as flawless as ever. 
 
 Beneath the rule of men entirely great, 
 The pen is mightier than the sword. 
 
 This is so because the tongue or the pen of one or 
 a dozen men, acting on the free thoughts of a 
 multitude of average men, has reconstructed their 
 thinking organs, giving to them an elevation 
 above their former level of thought. Is it not 
 plain that if the 90 average men fully assimilate 
 the reasonings of the 10 superior men, those 
 superior reasonings become their own, just as the 
 10 had previously adopted them from other 
 teachers, and in the same way as every man liv- 
 ing assimilates a part of what he sees and hears. 
 But it is not true that any community is divided 
 into such factions as 90 average men and 10 
 superior ones. The 90 are always superior to 
 the 10 in many things. A carpenter, in making 
 window sashes, is superior to a Professor of 
 Logic. A bootmaker, in making shoes, is 
 superior to both. A jockey, in riding a horse 
 over fences can give points to them all. The 
 most that the Professor of Logic can claim is that 
 in his own sphere he has more knowledge than
 
 260 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 have the carpenter, the bootmaker, and the jockey. 
 But that by no means establishes his superiority 
 as a political guide; for it so happens that 
 amongst the 10 "superior people" there is another 
 Professor of Logic who demolishes all the politi- 
 cal teachings of the first. So falls all Mr. Mai- 
 lock's flimsy house of cards. Democracy is as 
 solid as ever. 
 
 The weak point about Democracy, as we have 
 to depend upon it in Parliamentary government, 
 is not that the average man fails to think and 
 speak coherently ; but that when they have spoken, 
 their rulers in Parliament play false with the 
 pledges by which they gained the democratic suf- 
 frage. That, however, in no way whatever in- 
 validates the soundness of the democratic prin- 
 ciple. It shows only that that principle is im- 
 peded by Parliament. 
 
 All these democratic reasonings were current 
 before the war. To what extent they may be 
 strengthened by this Titanic struggle cannot be 
 easily measured. But the collapse of Autocracy 
 in Russia and the declarations of democratic 
 America seem to warrant the conclusion that when 
 the brutal Turk has been driven out of Europe, 
 and the equally brutal Junkerism gets its final 
 overthrow, Democracy should be stronger in the 
 world than ever it was before. 
 
 Last year Professor Hearnshaw published a 
 very readable book called "Freedom in Service." 
 He is not a whole-souled admirer of Democracy. 
 but he has reached the conclusion that "there is 
 now no alternative to Democracy but Anarchy." 
 It is a little curious how that conclusion of the 
 inevitable has come to him. Democracy was not 
 found adequate in ancient Greece or Rome; and 
 most certainly in modern America, Britain, 
 France, Italy, and Belgium, there are many de- 
 ficiencies in it. It does not give the Australian
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE WAR 261 
 
 people one half of what they have demanded at 
 the ballot box. 
 
 What, then, are its recommendations? Why has 
 it no alternative but anarchy? The real answer is 
 that its partial failure in all the cases mentioned 
 is because it has never had free play in any of 
 them. The people have never had the Referen- 
 dum, or only in a small degree, while their suf- 
 frages at the ballot box have been systematically 
 thwarted by the reactionary intrigues of Parlia- 
 ments. Indeed the democratic failure of the twen- 
 tieth century is Parliament. This is now almost 
 universally recognised. 
 
 Professor Hearnshaw reminds us that "Mill 
 has emphasised the possibility that Democracy 
 may govern badly and oppressively; Maine has 
 warned us that the dominance of the commonalty 
 may end in a triumph of the mediocre, and a more 
 than Chinese stagnation ; Carlyle has denounced 
 Democracy as powerful for destruction, but im- 
 potent for building up, as helpless in the face of 
 great emergencies as incapable of choosing good 
 leaders; Lecky has demonstrated the danger of 
 corruption of the Democracy by evil politicians; 
 others have shown how it tends to develop, and 
 then becomes a slave to a bureaucracy; Graham 
 Wallas has portrayed the psychological peril of 
 hypnotisation by colors and claptrap." 
 
 Suppose we were to admit them all. What 
 then? That goes but a little way in the argu- 
 ment ; for all these possible dangers, even if real 
 and lumped together, are not as perilous as the 
 alternative system in which the destinies of mil- 
 lions lie in the single will of one Imperial Auto- 
 crat, or in the decision of a small knot of Oli- 
 garchs. 
 
 There may, as Mill and Maine suggest, be in- 
 competence in the decisions of a mob, but so also 
 may there be a worse incompetence in a Kaiser
 
 262 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 or a Sultan. As to Carlyle's comment that De- 
 mocracies cannot build, Britain, America, and 
 Australia are monumental refutations of the 
 folly of the Chelsea dyspeptic. To say that 
 Democracy may be corrupt is only to say that it is 
 human; but it cannot be so corrupt as its rival 
 forms of government, because its doings are so 
 much more under corrective in the blaze of pub- 
 licity. 
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE PRESS. 
 
 The Press is a great Democracy. No privileges 
 of rank can live in it. Junius's letters, the pro- 
 duct of anonymity found an entrance through the 
 royal cuticle of stout King George, and struck dis- 
 may to the heart of the Duke of Grafton. The 
 Press, however powerful, can never become a 
 despotism because it depends for its influence on 
 the free suffrages of its readers. The Press is 
 as many-sided as the mind of man. It pulls 
 men's inclinations in all sorts of contrary direc- 
 tions, and thus providentially balances what 
 would otherwise be an irresistible force. If it 
 could roll along in one flood, it might become a 
 despotism. It might be as destructive as an 
 avalanche. But a free Press, like any other 
 Democracy, is split into many mutually opposing 
 forces, which neutralise one another; and out 
 of these frictions of unfettered thought there 
 emerge the golden grains of Truth. 
 
 I remember that some years ago a Baptist 
 minister in Melbourne instituted a comparison 
 between the religion of the slums and that of the 
 palaces. He said "the greatest sinners are not 
 in the slums, but in the suburbs, where 'elegant 
 pagans' play golf on Sunday mornings, bridge on 
 Sunday nights, and on the other six days of the
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE WAR 263 
 
 week ride in motor cars to worship at the shrine 
 of the 'goddess of getting.' The Protestant 
 churches and the Democracy are at cross pur- 
 poses." In support of this rather sweeping asser- 
 tion, he said that of the three and a half millions 
 of people in New York two millions have no in- 
 terest in religion ; and not more than one-seventh 
 of the people of Liverpool attend a church. In 
 London only about one in six do so. 
 
 THE CATHOLIC CHURCH AND DEMOCRACY. 
 
 The Catholic Church has had to face Democracy 
 at many turns in her history, and has never feared 
 it. She holds out her hand with the greatest 
 friendliness to the most advanced Democracy. She 
 is quite as content to see an intelligent people rul- 
 ing themselves as she is to see a monarch on the 
 throne. Leo XIII. gave us the most perfect guid- 
 ance on Democracy in his Encyclical "Immortale 
 Dei." He says 
 
 "The Almighty has appointed the charge of the human 
 race between two powers the ecclesiastical and the civil; 
 the one being set over Divine, the other over human things. 
 Each in its kind is supreme. Each has fixed limits, 
 within which it is contained, which are defined by the 
 special nature and the objects of the province of each, 
 so that there is, we may say, an orbit traced out within 
 which the action of each is brought into play by its own 
 native right. But inasmuch as each of these two powers 
 has authority over the same subjects, and as it might come 
 to pass that one and the same thing . . . might belong 
 to the jurisdiction and determination of both, therefore 
 God, who foresees all things, and who is the Author of 
 these two powers, has marked out the course of each in 
 right correlation of the other. For the powers that are, 
 are ordained of God. . . . One of the two has for the 
 proximate and chief object the well-being of this mortal 
 life; the other the everlasting joys of heaven. Whatso- 
 ever, therefore, in things human is of a sacred character, 
 whatever belongs either of its own nature or by reason
 
 264 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 of the end to which it is referred for the salvation of souls, 
 or to the worship of God, is subject to the power and 
 judgment of the Church. Whatever is to be ranged under 
 the civil and political order is rightly subject to the civil 
 authority. Jesus Christ has Himself given command that 
 what is Caesar's is to be rendered to Caesar, and what be- 
 longs to God is to be rendered to God." 
 
 That is how the Catholic Church reconciles itself 
 with Democracy. 
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE REFERENDUM. 
 
 The more Democracy is studied in the lurid 
 light of the German war-scourge, the plainer be- 
 come its faults. They lie on the surface. But 
 when compared with any of its alternatives our 
 confidence increases in it, and the more we cherish 
 the hope that it will prove stable in the day of 
 trial, when administered by an enlightened com- 
 munity in its full freedom of the Referendum. 
 
 Of course Democracy must be prepared to meet 
 its enemies, or it will go down. Those enemies 
 are sometimes not in the open. When the rail- 
 way servants in New South Wales laid down their 
 tools in open rebellion against the State Govern- 
 ment, it was an attempt to set up a trades union 
 authority as superior to that of the Democracy. 
 And when the Victorian Railway Union pledged 
 itself by resolution to give to the rebels "any assist- 
 ance required," the Democracy of Australia was 
 openly challenged. At the same time there came 
 another challenge to it. The Waterside Workers 
 announced that their union should be the judges 
 as to what should or should not be exported from 
 Australian shores; and several other Unions ap- 
 plauded the waterside dictation. 
 
 That was a crisis for Democracy. Would it 
 yield or would it temporise? Those railway men 
 and those waterside workers and coal miners
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE WAR 265 
 
 were a part of the Australian Democracy which 
 they challenged. How did the main body of the 
 Democracy answer that menace? It recognised 
 at once that the Railway Striker stood in the 
 same position as the soldier who lays down his 
 arms in the face of the enemy. In his employ- 
 ment the Railway worker is a soldier in an indus- 
 trial army. There is a very sacred contract be- 
 tween him and the body politic. He is a confi- 
 dential servant of the Democracy. He is not free 
 to judge in his own cause; not free to deliver an 
 ultimatum to the community; not free to delimit 
 the extent of his obedience. To do that was 
 to subvert the government of the people and to 
 set up his own government in the place of it. 
 
 How did the great Australian Democracy de- 
 mean itself in this crisis? It discerned instantly 
 that Labor was in rebellion against the cardinal 
 principle of the Democracy, and it set its face 
 like flint against the rebels. Labor loyalists, 
 flocked to the assistance of the threatened indus- 
 tries. Volunteers came to the railways, the 
 trams, the wharves, the coal mines, and the men 
 who had set up the standard of revolt were de- 
 feated with ignominy, as they deserved to be. 
 
 A great and permanent service to the Austra- 
 lian Democracy has been rendered by "The Age," 
 in its constant appeals for a Referendum as the 
 corrective of Parliamentaiy failure. The appeals 
 have been made to the people at large; for any 
 plea for a Referendum made to the Conservative 
 or Fusion party would be just about as effective 
 as expounding the differential calculus to the Hot- 
 tentots. Such people do not reason on questions 
 of drastic reform. They turn away from such a 
 democratic principle as the Referendum as a 
 child turns from a grimacing bogeyman. 
 
 Yet a man cannot be more than half a demo- 
 crat if he squirms at the Initiative Referendum,
 
 266 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 which is essentially a system by which the people 
 may govern themselves for themselves. It may 
 very well be used as the nitric acid test of true 
 Democracy. The Tory shies at it. 
 
 Once on a time when there was a tribal war 
 amongst the Israelites in Palestine, one Jeptha 
 seized all the fords of the Jordan River, after 
 having defeated the Ephraimites. The latter be- 
 ing scattered, wanted to get back across the river 
 to their homes. The victorious Jeptha hit upon a 
 plan for infallibly distinguishing his friends 
 from his retreating enemies. The Ephraimites 
 always pronounced the word that denoted ripe 
 wheat as "Sibboleth," instead of "Shibboleth." 
 Every man who came to a ford to cross the Jor- 
 dan was compelled to say the word "Shibboleth," 
 and everyone who said "Sibboleth" was slaugh- 
 tered. 
 
 The Tory finds the Referendum Democracy his 
 "sibboleth." 
 
 Another illustration. When Satan made up 
 his Mephistophelean mind to tempt Eve, he sat in 
 the shape of a toad at her sleeping ear, whispering 
 disobedience. His disguise was adopted in order 
 to prevent the vigilant angelic sentinels from dis- 
 covering him. When Ithuriel came along, he saw 
 the toad and touched it with the point of his 
 spear. Its magic power as a touchstone to fraud 
 compelled the Arch-fiend to resume his natural 
 shape, and he stood revealed. 
 
 True Democracy finds in the Initiative Referen- 
 dum as applied to the Conservative the same 
 power as "sibboleth" had with the Israelites and 
 the angel's spear touching the toad. If, as is 
 said, Democracy is to be the inevitable policy of 
 the future, it may be profitable to remember this 
 quality of the Referendum respecting it.
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE WAR 267 
 
 DEMOCRACY IN RUSSIA. 
 
 Mr. Arnold Bennett, not long ago, made some 
 very just and pertinent remarks in one of the 
 London dailies. He said 
 
 "Democracy in the present hour is splendidly 
 justifying itself. Autocracy (however disguised) 
 is fighting its last fight. The defeat of militarist 
 Germany will be a great stride in civilisation. 
 The defeat of the institution of autocracy will be 
 a second and a greater. Sagacious persons, with 
 eyes to see beyond their noses, will soon perceive 
 upon the horizon the vague forms of the conse- 
 quences of autocracy's defeat ; and those who des- 
 cry most accurately will come off best. In what- 
 ever manner this war ends there will be very 
 great democratic doings at the end of it." 
 
 The Government of Britain has quite dropped 
 the ancient theory that the common people are 
 a prey, to be exploited in the last resort and at 
 the gravest crisis. It is necessary to con- 
 sider the relations of democracy to the war. 
 Let not this fact be forgotten. Democracy will 
 not forget it. And foreign policy in the future 
 will not be left in the hands of any autocracy, by 
 whatever specious name the autocracy may call 
 itself. The masses understand foreign policy 
 now. They understand that in spite of very 
 earnest efforts in various Cabinets, the ruling 
 classes have failed to avert the most terrible dis- 
 aster in history. 
 
 Two of the greatest developments of Democracy 
 which the world has ever seen perhaps came on 
 the Eastertide of 1917. In a record-breaking age 
 Democracy broke all records when the 200,000,000 
 Russians deposed their Czar and set up a republi- 
 can government. Within a week or two of that 
 time the great Republic of the West declared war 
 on Germany because, as President Wilson put it
 
 268 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 "A steadfast concert of peace can be maintained 
 only by a partnership of democratic nations. No 
 autocratic government can be trusted to keep faith 
 and observe covenants." 
 
 Almost like a bolt out of the blue came that 
 stupendous upheaval in Russia. Nothing com- 
 parable with it was ever before seen on the earth. 
 The world stood looking on as at a miracle; and 
 yet there was no miracle about it, but an ordered 
 concatenation of causes and effects. A thousand 
 invisible springs had long been bubbling in Rus- 
 sian society. But we cannot forecast the earth- 
 quake. No one was prescient enough to foresee 
 how the semi-somnolent Muscovite giant could, 
 in the birth-pangs of war, spring with a single 
 bound from dreamy inertness into conscious life 
 and purpose. 
 
 Democracy has before had its great inspira- 
 tions. The French Revolution was one, springing 
 out of the welter of Bourbon oppression. The 
 American Declaration of Independence was an- 
 other. Great Britain springing into this war to 
 the rescue of France and Belgium was a third. 
 But that Russian democratic birth of the Easter 
 of 1917 when the hordes of semi-serfs suddenly 
 leaped to life and compelled their "Little Father" 
 to abdicate, beggars all previous experiences. 
 
 As by a flash it was perceived that Csesarism 
 in Germany and Russia were too much alike to 
 hope for freedom from either. Shrewder eyes 
 saw national treachery operating in the palace of 
 the Czar. The great war had done for Russia 
 what nothing else could do. It had made the 
 great armies, the great generals, the political 
 leaders, and the people, think all alike. It had 
 made them think for Russia. It had made them 
 think against Germany. And when the soldiers 
 were ordered to fire on the people who had risen 
 in defence of the Duma, they refused, and went
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE WAR 269 
 
 over to protect that Duma which the Czar had 
 ordered to dissolve. In that once supreme psychi- 
 cal momet Russia's Autocracy fell; and fell like 
 Lucifer never to hope again. The Russian Democ- 
 cracy has since fallen into Anarchy, but it will rise 
 again. Almost at the same time, at the opposite 
 side of the world, President Wilson was declaring 
 for war "to make the world safe for Democracy." 
 It was a wonderful month, never to be forgotten. 
 
 DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA. 
 
 In the month of August, 1917, shortly after the 
 Pope's second Peace Note had been given to the 
 world, the American Secretary of Commerce in 
 the Wilson Cabinet, wrote to an American peace 
 advocate, saying "Your letter overlooks the rape 
 of Belgium and other German atrocities. You 
 seem not to know that the two great opposing 
 ideals in the war are Democracy and Autocracy. 
 Which must fall? Autocracy has its feet on 
 Belgium, Servia, Montenegro, Rumania, and part 
 of France. The world's democracies stand against 
 the military autocracy of Germany, which is a 
 desperado among the nations. Americans abhor 
 Autocracy, and will fight till Democracy gloriously 
 triumphs." 
 
 In the sixteenth century Democracy was almost 
 unknown. The people were regarded as an ab- 
 ject portion of human society, unworthy of honors 
 or happiness, and fit only to serve. And yet 
 through religion the seeds of a more humane 
 policy were sown. Christianity was the root of 
 these ideas. Aristotle was taught in the schools 
 and was called "the Philosopher." But his repel- 
 lent doctrines respecting the working classes were 
 rejected by Christian writers. The Church was
 
 270 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 greater than the pagan philosopher. Christianity 
 abhorred the caste system, and the Church stood 
 between the plebeian class and slavery. The de- 
 velopment of industry and commerce gave a great 
 spurt to Democracy. This was especially notice- 
 able in Spain and the Hanseatic Towns. The 
 growth of great factories was the growth of the 
 power of the worker, who formed guilds and found 
 monarchs ready to make Jaws to protect them. 
 The Church, as dictinct from the feudal tradi- 
 tions, proclaimed always that "Reason and justice, 
 knowledge and virtue, are everything. The mere 
 will of man, and his birth and titles are of no 
 intrinsic value." The words were heard in the 
 palace and the cottage. But in the Autocracies 
 of middle Europe these democratic principles 
 never made much way. 
 
 In America it was different. There the natural 
 equality of the rights of man to life, liberty and 
 the pursuit of happiness were ideas that took 
 kindly root; and when this war broke out at the 
 instance of tyrants, the American mind seized in- 
 stinctively the side of Liberty. It saw that a 
 German victory signified a world in slavery. 
 American citizens were impatient with the slow- 
 moving mind of the President ; but they had con- 
 fidence in him, and they were not disappointed. 
 
 When the cannons had been roaring for twenty 
 months, and American ships were going down 
 everywhere under German torpedoes, the Presi- 
 dent's patience, at long last, was exhausted. He 
 called an extraordinary session of Congress on 
 April 3, 1917, and addressed to them a speech 
 that will always stand as a land mark in history. I 
 give it here in its entirety, both for the nobility 
 of its thought and the dignity of its tone 
 "Gentlemen of Congress, 
 
 "I have called you together in extraordinary 
 session because there is a serious a very serious
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE WAR 271 
 
 choice of policy which must be made immedi- 
 ately, and which it is neither right nor constitu- 
 tionally permissible that I should assume the re- 
 sponsibility for making. 
 
 "On February 1 last I informed Congress of 
 Germany's intention to undertake ruthless sub- 
 marine warfare, and to sink every vessel which 
 approached Great Britain or any European ports. 
 This followed on Germany's earlier compromise 
 that passenger ships would not be sunk without 
 warning and when resistance was not offered, and 
 that the crews would be given a fair chance to 
 escape with their lives. 
 
 "These precautions were meagre and hap- 
 hazard enough, as was proved by the distressing 
 instances in the progress of the cruel, unmanly 
 business, but a certain degree of restraint was 
 observed. The new policy, however, has swept 
 every restriction aside. All vessels, irrespective 
 of cargo and flag, have been sent to the bottom, 
 without help and without mercy. Even hospital 
 and relief ships, though provided with the Ger- 
 mans' safe conduct, were sunk with the same 
 reckless lack of compassion or principle. 
 
 "For a while I was unable to believe that such 
 things could be done by any Government subscrib- 
 ing to civilised practice. The intention of inter- 
 national law was to establish a rule which would 
 be respected and observed on the high seas, which 
 is the world's free highway. Germany swept 
 aside this rule under the plea of retaliation, 
 throwing to the winds all scruples of humanity. 
 
 "Germany's submarine warfare is no longer 
 directed against the belligerents, but against the 
 whole world. All nations are involved in Ger- 
 many's action. The challenge is to all mankind. 
 Wanton, wholesale destruction has been effected 
 against women and children while they have been 
 engaged in pursuits which even in the darkest
 
 272 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 periods of modern history have been regarded as 
 innocent and legitimate. 
 
 "The German submarining warfare is against 
 mankind and all nations. American ships have 
 been sunk. There has not been discrimination. 
 Germany challenges all mankind. Each nation 
 must decide how to meet the challenge. Our 
 choice must be made. 
 
 "Moderation of counsel and temperateness of 
 judgment will be fitting for the nation. Our 
 motive will not be revenge or the victorious asser- 
 tion of physical might, but the vindication of 
 right. 
 
 "Submarines are outlaws. It is common pru- 
 dence, indeed a grim necessity, to endeavor to 
 destroy them upon sight. Germany has inti- 
 mated that the armed guards on our merchantmen 
 will be treated as pirates. Therefore armed neu- 
 trality is absolutely ineffectual. 
 
 "There is one choice I cannot make. I will 
 not choose the path of submission, and suffer the 
 most sacred rights of the nation and of the people 
 to be ignored and violated. 
 
 "With a profound sense of the solemn and even 
 tragic character of the step I am taking, and of 
 the grave responsibilities involved, but in unhesi- 
 tating obedience to my constitutional duty, I ad- 
 vise Congress to declare that the recent course of 
 the German Government is nothing less than war 
 against the United States, and that the United 
 States accepts the status of a belligerent which 
 has been thrust upon it, and will take immediate 
 steps to put the country into a thorough state of 
 defence, and to exert all her power and resource 
 in bringing Germany to terms, and in ending the 
 war. 
 
 "This will involve the utmost practicable co- 
 operation with the Powers now at war with Ger- 
 many, and the extension to those Governments of
 
 DEMOCRACY AND THE WAR 273 
 
 the most liberal financial credits in order that our 
 resources may be added to theirs. 
 
 "It will also involve the organisation and 
 mobilisation of the material resources of the 
 country, in order to supply the necessities of war 
 and the full equipment of the navy to enable it 
 to cope with submarines, and an immediate addi- 
 tion to the armed forces. The United States has at 
 least 500,000 men who should be chosen upon the 
 principle of universal liability for service, and 
 also subsequent additional increments of an equal 
 force as soon as they are needed and trained. 
 
 "We must not interfere with our duty of supply- 
 ing the Allies with materials. They are in the 
 field, and should be helped in every way possible. 
 I will suggest detailed measures for the accom- 
 plishments of these objects. 
 
 "Meanwhile I must make our motives and ob- 
 jects clear. They are the vindication of the 
 principles of peace and justice, as against selfish, 
 autocratic power, and the establishment of con- 
 certed purpose and action, which will henceforth 
 ensure the observance of these principles. 
 
 "We are at the beginning of an age which will 
 insist that the same standards of conduct and re- 
 sponsibility for wrong shall be observed among 
 nations and Governments as among individual 
 citizens. 
 
 "We have no quarrel with the German people, 
 but a feeling of sympathy and friendship. Ger- 
 many entered the war without the German people's 
 knowledge or approval. This war was provoked 
 in the interests of ambitious men, who used their 
 fellow-men as pawns^nd tools. 
 
 "Self -governed nations do not fill neighboring 
 States with spies, nor employ intrigue to pro- 
 duce a critical state of affairs which will enable 
 them to make a conquest. Such designs and cun- 
 ningly contrived plans of deception and aggres-
 
 274 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 sion can only be carried out where no one has the 
 right to ask questions. 
 
 "A steadfast concert of peace can be maintained 
 only by a partnership of democratic nations. No 
 autocratic Government can be trusted to keep 
 faith and observe covenants. 
 
 "Recent events in Russia have added hope for 
 the future peace of the world. The great Russian 
 people are now a mighty force fighting for free.- 
 dom, justice, and peace. They are a fit partner 
 in a League of Honor. 
 
 "From the outset of the war Germany has 
 filled America with spies and set afoot criminal 
 intrigues against our peace and commerce. In- 
 trigues have been carried on under the personal 
 direction of official agents of Germany, accredited 
 to the United States. An intercepted note sent to 
 Mexico proved that Germany endeavored to stir 
 up enemies at our very doors. 
 
 "We are accepting the challenge because we 
 realise that in the German Government we could 
 not have a friend. We are about to accept the 
 gage of battle in the struggle for liberty, and, if 
 necessary, we will spend the whole force of the 
 nation to check and nullify the German Govern- 
 ment's pretensions to power. 
 
 "We will be glad to fight for the peace, liberty, 
 and rights of the small and great nations, and to 
 make the world safe for democracy. We do not 
 desire conquest or dominion. We do not seek in- 
 demnities for ourselves or material compensation. 
 In the sacrifices which we intend to freely make 
 we will scrupulously observe the principles of 
 right and fairplay. 9 
 
 "Austria endorsed Germany's submarine war. 
 Therefore it is impossible for the United States 
 to receive Count von Tarnowski as ambassador. 
 But Austria has not actually engaged in warfare 
 against the United States on the seas. I there-
 
 DEMOCRACY AND "THE WAR 275 
 
 fore postpone discussion of our relations with 
 Vienna. 
 
 "The irresponsible German Government has 
 thrown aside considerations of humanity and 
 right, and is running amok. 
 
 "We hope to prove friendship for the German 
 people by our attitude toward the millions of men 
 and women of German birth and native sympathy 
 in our midst, the majority of whom are true loyal 
 Americans. But if there is disloyalty it will be 
 met by stern repression. 
 
 "There are many months of fiery trial and sacri- 
 fice ahead, but we dedicate to the fight our lives 
 and fortunes everything, with the pride of 
 knowing that the day has come when America is 
 privileged to spend her blood and resources for 
 the principles that gave her birth. God helping 
 her, she can do no other." 
 
 This Speech was received with tremendous 
 cheering. In a few days Congress voted for war, 
 voted the funds, and America formally joined the 
 belligerent nations as a protagonist for the great 
 world-cause of Democracy.
 
 XII. 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR. 
 
 THE POPE THE CENTRAL FIGURE OF EUROPE. 
 
 Standing aloft and alone, in a world whirling 
 and swirling in conflicting currents of sheer mun- 
 dane tempests, the white-draped figure of Bene- 
 dict XV., unique in position and dignity, stands 
 before the eyes of all men, friendly or hostile, as 
 the symbol of Other- Worldliness. 
 
 All around him menaces the panoply of military 
 might, on a scale so stupendous as to dwarf all 
 former conceptions of human strength. Forty 
 millions of men in arms or making arms, is a fact 
 too large for the imagination to cope with. We 
 may speak the syllables, but cannot grasp all they 
 mean. And when to these numbers are added 
 millions of instruments of destruction some of 
 them on a scale so magnitudinous that a single 
 explosion from them shivers the solid founda- 
 tions of the "sure and firm set earth" we get 
 only an incommensurate idea of how truly awful 
 are the pride, pomp, and circumstance of war, 
 waged with all the resources of chemical and 
 mechanical science in the twentieth century. 
 
 The very centre, as it were, of that diabolic in- 
 ferno, where the war-blast roars unceasingly, 
 lives the Pope's figure, armed only with his rosary 
 and the olive branch of peace. Ever and anon 
 his feeble voice is heard above the thunders of 
 the war, crying "My little children, love one 
 another !" 
 
 276
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 277 
 
 But the passions of men sweep on, and the sub- 
 lime message is lost for the time. But not for- 
 gotten. No, not forgotten. Not one syllable of 
 all those appeals, so puny in the ears of men, has 
 gone unregarded before the Great White Throne. 
 And thence only will emanate the final decision 
 concerning this mighty war. 
 
 The eye of a supreme faith looks out over and 
 beyond the mightiest of armaments, and knows 
 that the God of Battles towers in incomparable 
 majesty, omnipotence, and immensity over every 
 human engine of destruction, unmoved, and direct- 
 ing all to His own wise issues. 
 
 We who have an unshakable belief in the effi- 
 cacy of prayer know that by prayer 
 
 "the whole round earth is every way 
 Bound by gold chains about the feet of God." 
 
 The Pope is a fountain of prayer in a way that 
 half the world knows not of. He is the Spiritual 
 Father of nearly 300,000,000 of the world's 
 people. That is, nearly one-fifth of the human 
 race looks to him for guidance and consolation. 
 
 The figure of the living Pope, physically as weak 
 as a reed in a gale, stands out majestically before 
 the eyes of all men in this war. But august as 
 that figure is in the person of Benedict XV., it 
 becomes exalted a thousand-fold when we remem- 
 ber whence his office has come down to him. He 
 is the 260th of an unbroken line in direct succes- 
 sion from St. Peter. It is a line in which all but 
 a very few of its occupants were chosen for the 
 eminence of their sanctity and mental gifts. 
 Macaulay's oft-quoted passage speaks but the 
 literal truth 
 
 "The proudest royal houses are but of yesterday when 
 compared with the line of the Supreme Pontiffs. That 
 line we trace back in an unbroken series from the Pope
 
 278 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 who crowned Napoleon in the nineteenth century to the 
 Pope who crowned Pepin in the eighth; and far beyond the 
 time of Pepin the august dynasty extends till it is lost in 
 the twilight of fable. The Republic of Venice came next 
 in antiquity. But the Republic of Venice was modern 
 when compared to the Papacy; and the Republic of Venice 
 is gone, and the Papacy remains. The Papacy remains, 
 not in decay, not a mere antique, but full of life and youth- 
 ful vigor. The Catholic Church is still sending forth to 
 the farthest ends of the world missionaries as zealous as 
 those who landed in Kent with Augustine, and still con- 
 fronting hostile kings with the same spirit with which she 
 confronted Attila." 
 
 Such is the Papacy as an institution. 
 
 THE POPE A FOUNTAIN OF PRAYER. 
 
 From tens of thousands of altars, in every lati- 
 tude and longitude, by direction of the Pope, peti- 
 tions for Peace go up every day. Every Catholic 
 priest in the world after every celebration of the 
 Holy Mass, is enjoined by His Holiness to recite 
 to his congregation the following prayer 
 
 "Dismayed by the horrors of a war which is bringing 
 ruin to peoples and nations, we turn, O Jesus, to Thy most 
 loving Heart as to our last hope. O God of Mercy, with 
 tears we implore Thee to end this fearful scourge, O King 
 of Peace, we humbly implore the peace for which we long. 
 From Thy Sacred Heart, Thou didst shed forth over the 
 world divine charity, so that discord might end, and love 
 alone reign among men. During Thy life on earth Thy 
 Heart beat with tender compassion for the sorrows of men. 
 In this hour, made terrible with burning hate, with blood- 
 shed and with slaughter, once more may Thy Divine Heart 
 be moved to pity. Pity the countless mothers in anguish 
 for the fate of their sons. Pity the numberless families 
 now bereaved of their fathers. Pity Europe, over which 
 broods such havoc and disaster. Do Thou inspire rulers 
 and peoples with counsels of meekness. Do Thou heal 
 the discords that tear the nations asunder. Thou, Who 
 didst shed Thy Precious Blood that they might live 
 together as brothers bring men together once more in lov- 
 ing harmony. And as once before to the cry of the
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 279 
 
 Apostle Peter: 'Save as, Lord, we perish!' Thou didst 
 answer with words of mercy, and didst calm the raging 
 waves, so now deign to hear our trustful prayer, and give 
 back to the world peace and tranquillity. 
 
 "And do thou, O most holy Virgin, as in other times of 
 sore distress be now our help, our protection, and our 
 safeguard. Amen." 
 
 That is a prayer which Benedict composed and 
 ordered nearly four years ago to be said at the 
 close of every Mass and it has been most punc- 
 tiliously carried out. Think of what this won- 
 derful man at the Vatican is. For his three hun- 
 dred million followers he speaks on matters of 
 faith and morals as infallibly as spoke the 
 Apostles St. Peter and Paul to theirs. He 
 has an army of 360,000 priests under him. They 
 are men of all climes and colors; but every one of 
 them thinks his exact thoughts, and preaches even 
 to the smallest tittle the same doctrine. 
 
 That army of prelates and priests celebrates 
 about 400,000 Holy Masses every day. They are 
 celebrated every day in the year from January 1 
 to December 31. They are in the twelve months 
 146,000,000 perfect Acts of Sacrifice before the 
 throne of the Living God. Every hour of every 
 day there are offered some 17,000 Masses. In 
 every Mass is that Pope prayed for, and that 
 prayer of his for Peace is offered up. He may 
 be a weak old man ; but he is incomparably more 
 powerful than any other sovereign in the world. 
 
 If we fully accept the belief that God rules the 
 world, in spite of the doings of great generals 
 and great armies; and that He is a God who 
 hearkens to prayer, then this Sovereign Pontiff, 
 with his uncounted armies of spiritual soldiers, 
 must indeed wield a wonderful spiritual power. 
 
 For nearly four years hundreds of millions 
 of people, throughout the world, in all languages, 
 have been daily sending that prayer tothe Throne
 
 280 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 of Mercy pouring it into ears which are ever 
 heedful. That has been the business of the Pope, 
 the Vice-gerent of the God of Peace. 
 
 ATTILA AND POPE LEO I. 
 
 May it not be interesting to examine a few 
 examples of that spirit with which, in Macaulay's 
 words, the Church and the Papacy, confronted 
 Attila the Hun leader. The story of Attila is an 
 incident in the life of St. Leo the Great. Leo 
 was elected to the Popedom in 440. The Roman 
 Empire was then in the process of dissolution. It 
 was under threats from the Goths, Huns, and 
 Vandals. The Vandals had taken the African 
 province in the year before the beginning of Leo's 
 pontificate. Britain was abandoned six years 
 later. The Goths had seized portions of Spain 
 and Gaul. The most threatening figure on the 
 face of Europe was Attila, the leader of the Huns, 
 who had overrun much of the East, crossed 
 through Germany and Austria, pillaging seventy 
 cities. Valentinian III. was Emperor of Rome. 
 Attila marched into France, where he was met 
 and defeated at Chalons by Aetius, the "last of the 
 Romans." He then turned south into Italy and 
 threatened Rome. His name was a terror. He 
 was afterwards called the "Scourge of God." He 
 was as merciless as was the Hun in Belgium a 
 couple of years ago. He made the boast that 
 where his horse once trod, no grass would ever 
 grow again. The Emperor Valentinian, who had 
 fled from Ravenna to Rome, begged Leo to go 
 and meet Attila. The courageous Pope consented. 
 Accompanied by the Consul Avienus and the Pre- 
 fect Trigetius, he journeyed to the great camp of 
 the Hun leader, near Mantua, on the confluence
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 281 
 
 of the Po and the Mincio rivers. The journey 
 was one of nigh 200 miles. It required in those 
 days the courage of a lion, and the Pope had it. 
 It was like a man walking into a lion's den and 
 facing the king of beasts. Attila was really a 
 King of beasts. Leo was filled with the spirit of 
 the martyr, ready to die for his beloved city. 
 
 The Hun leader was seated in his tent. His 
 barbarian retinue surrounded him. Clad in his 
 sacred vestments Leo approached. His was a 
 majestic figure. It is said of him that his elo- 
 quence was as great as his dignity. His ser- 
 mons, some 200 of which have come down to us, 
 are pronounced to be models of persuasive power. 
 It was a meeting between brute strength and 
 moral power, both in their fulness. 
 
 The Pope's manner, when he chose to be most 
 gracious, had a fascination and a charm that was 
 said to be irresistible. In that interview with 
 Attila he brought his every gift to bear upon his 
 savage opponent. He pleaded in the name of the 
 High God, the Lord Jesus. Attila softened, wav- 
 ered, yielded. The man who had trampled on the 
 Roman eagles and defied the Caesar's power, bowed 
 before God and His Vicar. All kinds of apocry- 
 phal stories have grown up of this celebrated in- 
 cident. One tradition says that when Attila left 
 his tent his followers asked him what had made 
 him yield to the solicitations of Leo; and he had 
 replied that he had not yielded to the Father of 
 the Christians, but he saw the Apostles Peter and 
 Paul standing one on each side of Leo with drawn 
 swords intimating to him that the powers of 
 heaven commanded him to desist from sacking 
 Rome. 
 
 More than a thousand years later, Raphael, or 
 one of his pupils, immortalised that meeting in 
 a fresco called "St. Leo halting Attila." The face 
 of the Pope which appears in the painting is that
 
 282 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 of Leo X., who was the reigning Pope when the 
 painting was executed. 
 
 A second example of the same spirit came only 
 two years later to the same Leo, who had another 
 meeting with a barbarian. Attila was dead ; but 
 Genseric, King of the Vandals, who were a mix- 
 ture of many races, sailed from the African coast 
 and crossed the Mediterranean for Rome. There 
 was a multitude of ships. Valentinian the 
 cowardly Emperor of Rome, again fled in ter- 
 ror, leaving the defence of the city to Leo. The 
 great Pope was not so successful as he had been 
 with Attila, but we learn from Gibbon that "his 
 fearless spirit, his authority, and his eloquence, 
 mitigated the fierceness of a barbaric conquest." 
 
 Four centuries later, when the Fourth Leo was 
 Pope and King, the Saracens attacked Rome in 
 as fierce a manner as had the Huns and the Van- 
 dals. Pope Leo the IV. emulated the courage of 
 his former namesake. He fortified the city, and 
 when the Saracen fleet came to a head off Sar- 
 dinia, he met it and destroyed it. Of his character 
 Gibbon says "He was a born Roman. The cour- 
 age of the first ages of the Republic glowed within 
 his breast. And amidst the ruins of his country 
 he stood erect like one of the firm and lofty pillars 
 that rear their heads above the fragments of the 
 Roman Forum." 
 
 POPE HlLDEBRAND AND HENRY IV. 
 
 Pope St. Gregory VII. is often called Pope 
 Hildebrand. That was his name before his papal 
 consecration. The German Emperor at that 
 time had the right of nomination to the Papacy. 
 Gregory was against it. He legislated to make 
 the papal election dependent solely on the College 
 of Cardinals, as it is to-day. Henry IV. of Ger-
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 283 
 
 many was enraged, but bided his time till some 
 local revolts were put down and then turned his 
 arms against the Pope. He deposed Gregory 
 and appointed a new Pope. In the meantime 
 Gregory ex-communicated him and all the Ger- 
 man bishops who supported him. Henry was 
 the most powerful sovereign of his day. But the 
 excommunication was more powerful still. Many 
 of his subjects fell away from him, and the elec- 
 tion of a new Emperor began to be a topic of the 
 day. 
 
 Hildebrand had a character as strong as 
 Henry's. Ranke, in his history, calls him "the 
 greatest ecclesiastical statesman." He had been 
 a monk of austere sanctity in a Roman monastery. 
 His soul had sickened at the sight of unworthy 
 Bishops being appointed by secular royal patron- 
 age. He had a mind of crystal clearness, a will 
 inflexibly firm, and a courage that knew no fear. 
 He determined to put an end to the simony which 
 purchased bishoprics. This it was that made 
 him cry put that he was encompassed by affliction. 
 He published a decree excommunicating all pre- 
 lates who received their benefices by purchase. 
 Henry continued to sell his church offices, and 
 treated Gregory's decree with scorn. However, 
 when Gregory summoned him to answer for his 
 misdeeds, and his people began to revolt, he 
 yielded. 
 
 Gregory was then at Canossa, the guest of 
 Henry's kinswoman, Matilda, the Great Countess. 
 
 Clad in penitential garb, within the outer wall 
 of the fortress, and barefooted on the snow- 
 covered ground, for three days the proud Emperor 
 stood begging an interview with the unbending 
 Pope. His English biographer points the moral 
 of weakness triumphing over strength. The 
 scene, as the suppliant King approached the Pon- 
 tiff, must have been singularly striking. The
 
 284 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 vigorous Henry, of lofty stature and commanding 
 features, thus humbled himself before Gregory. It 
 was an abasement of physical before moral power 
 of the sword before the crozier which the 
 great struggle then in progress was fated to 
 accomplish. 
 
 NAPOLEON AND THE POPE. 
 
 There was a memorable contest between the 
 Pope and the world's conqueror when Napoleon 
 seized Rome in 1798, and proclaimed it a Roman 
 republic, deposing Pius VI., who refused to sub- 
 mit. The Pope was 80 years of age, and very 
 feeble. He died on his way to France as a 
 prisoner. However the cardinals assembled in 
 Venice and chose Pius VII., who returned to 
 Rome. Napoleon endeavored to made him a 
 pliant tool for his political designs. He insisted 
 that the Pope should become his ally as against 
 England. The Pope, however, was as firm as 
 adamant. Napoleon took him prisoner. The 
 Pope excommunicated the mighty conqueror. 
 Napoleon laughed, and said with a sneer "Does 
 the old man think the arms will fall from the 
 hands of my soldiers?" 
 
 Napoleon began his 1812 campaign against 
 Russia. He was gripped by a winter frost which 
 literally tore the arms from his soldiers' hands and 
 vanquished him. Allison, the English historian, 
 referring to this, says "There is something in 
 these marvellous coincidences beyond the opera- 
 tions of chance, which even a Protestant historian 
 feels himself bound to mark for the observation 
 of future ages." 
 
 Madam de Stael wrote on this "What a power 
 is religion, which gives strength to the weak when 
 all that was strong has lost its strength."
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 286 
 
 Napoleon returned from his Russian disaster; 
 but his sun of glory was eclipsed, and he soon 
 sank never to rise again. The Pope whom he 
 had wronged appealed to England to give him a 
 chaplain at St. Helena. Napoleon had dashed 
 his power against the Popedom, only to find it 
 shattered in the impact. 
 
 BISMARK AND POPE LEO XIII. 
 
 There is one other illustration that may be 
 given. It is the case of the Iron Chancellor Bis- 
 mark. He was as tough a problem as Napoleon. 
 But he, too, had to yield. 
 
 Leo XIII. had many trials and many triumphs, 
 but none that gave him such joy as his victory for 
 the Church over the then ruler of Germany, Prince 
 Bismark. The story has been told a hundred 
 times. This is one version of it 
 
 "Like all proud nations, Germany was thirsting for ex- 
 tension of territory, and chafing under the restraint of 
 ecclesiastical discipline. Bismark declared that, come 
 what may, he 'would not go to Canossa.' But he did. 
 
 "The difficulty with Spain over the Caroline Islands 
 was submitted to the Pope, and although Leo decided in 
 favor of Spain, Germany bowed to his ruling. 
 
 "But a more humiliating road to Canossa lay before the 
 Iron Chancellor when the Pope succeeded, with the young 
 Kaiser, in abrogating laws which Bismark had passed for 
 the purpose of crippling the action of the Church in the 
 Germanic Empire. Dioceses had been deprived of their 
 Bishops, and parishes of their priests; the freedom of 
 public worship was infringed, and the ecclesiastical 
 seminaries interdicted. But all were restored at the 
 demand of the Pope as the price of peace. 
 
 In truth the trouble had really been very great. 
 Churches were closed, bishops were in prison, and 
 the sacrifice of the Holy Mass was forbidden in 
 1300 parishes. Bismark was making a good 
 fight of it.
 
 286 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 But so were the German Catholics. They 
 organised their political power so well that in the 
 1874 elections, they increased their parliamentary 
 strength from 63 to 91. Over a hundred Catholic 
 newspapers were established in place of six which 
 had existed before the persecution of the Falk 
 laws. The war was fierce on both sides. Bis- 
 mark hurled defiance on the Church of Rome, and 
 hunted priests who remained loyal to their 
 bishops. 
 
 The Government suspended the monetary pay- 
 ments to the priests due under the law. The 
 people replied by doubling their voluntary sub- 
 scriptions. The Government then bribed a few 
 corrupt priests to say Mass for the people. The 
 people refused to hear them. 
 
 Then all the religious Orders were expelled 
 from the country, and civil marriage was made 
 compulsory. It was a bold move, but it failed 
 utterly. We have the testimony of the "Encyclo- 
 paedia Britannica," which in its article on Ger- 
 many says "The Government had used all its 
 resources ; it had alienated millions of the people ; 
 it had raised up a compact party of nearly a hun- 
 dred members of Parliament. The attempt of 
 the Liberals to subjugate the Church had given 
 to the Papacy greater power than it had since 
 the days of Wallenstein." 
 
 Bismark had formed a union of anti-Christian 
 members to carry his policy in the Reichstag. 
 They were against all churches and all monetary 
 institutions. The Chancellor saw his danger. 
 The Conservatives were dead against him and the 
 Catholic party were determined to defeat his 
 budget. 
 
 The life of the Emperor had been twice at- 
 tempted by the violent parties of the Empire. 
 Anarchy began to hold up its head. 
 
 Bismark dissolved the Chamber. The new
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 287 
 
 House found the Catholic party further increased. 
 Bismark could no longer govern without its help. 
 He threw over the Socialists, made friends with 
 the Catholics, and promised that the Falk laws 
 should go. Bismark found it was easier to come 
 to terms with the Pope than with the Socialists. 
 In this battle with the Papacy Bismark had 
 no dislike to the Catholic Church. His one idea 
 was that he would make the State supreme, so 
 that the Pope should not appoint the German 
 bishops. An infallible Church with an infallible 
 Pope was an obstacle to him. It must be crushed. 
 Bismark seemed to have the ball at his feet. Link 
 by link he forged his chain, only to find it snap 
 as fast as it was linked together. Eventually he 
 had to go to Canossa. Leo XIII. signally main- 
 tained his spiritual authority over the German 
 branch of his Church. 
 
 There was a clever cartoon in one of the Italian 
 papers. It represented the burly Bismark tug- 
 ging at a rope coiled round the spire of St. Peter's. 
 The Devil approached, and asked "What are 
 you doing?' "Trying to pull down that Church," 
 answered Bismark. "Pooh !" said the Devil, "I've 
 been trying to do that for nineteen hundred years, 
 and have failed. You had better give it best." 
 Bismark acted on that advice, and made friends 
 with an opponent which had proved too much 
 for him. 
 
 It was indeed a memorable contest. They were 
 both redoubtable antagonists Leo XIII. and Bis- 
 mark, but the undoubted victory rested with the 
 Pope. 
 
 Travelling thus along the avenue of Time, we 
 have just glanced at a few of those instances in 
 which the secular power has been shattered in 
 its collision with the Papacy. The waves of 
 assault have dashed themselves against the Rock
 
 288 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 of Peter. The Rev. Michael Phelan, S.J., sums 
 this up with as much eloquence as truth 
 
 "Those waves dissolve, melt, and vanish, but the rock 
 remains. Sitting calmly in his boat to-day Peter looks 
 out upon the present. He sees kingdoms rising and new 
 Empires spring up in lands undiscovered when Attila's 
 power was flung over the earth like a shadow. He sees 
 old nations with foundations corroded by false principles 
 and anti-Christian teachings; proud empires broken, and 
 tossed like foam before the winds. Peter looks into the 
 future and sees dark storms rising, and gloomy portents 
 appearing above the surface. The hoarse roar of coming 
 revolutions, and the fierce gusts of anarchy and socialism 
 threaten; but Peter has no fear, for over all walks the 
 Lord, and Peter clasps His hand. Peter fears no fear, 
 not only because God upholds him to-day, but because his 
 mind goes back to a scene by a Galilean lake, when the 
 tall mountains cast their shadows over its placid waters, 
 when the stillness of the valley was stirred by words 
 which fell from lips divine, and when upon his ears the 
 promise broke, that every page of history makes true 
 'Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My 
 Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.' " 
 
 BENEDICT XV. AS PEACEMAKER. 
 
 Benedict XV., the figure of Peace standing in 
 the centre of the warring nations, and appealing 
 in the name of Christ for "counsels of meekness," 
 is a figure worthy of the greatness of his heritage. 
 
 We, the spectators of the drama, can hardly 
 realise the full measure of its greatness. As far 
 back as August, 1915, the Pope began his direct 
 efforts to sow amongst the belligerents a willing- 
 ness to reconsider the situation. 
 
 The letter which the Pope sent out in the be- 
 ginning of August, 1915, expressed his determina- 
 tion to devote his every activity to "the recon- 
 ciliation of the peoples engaged in this fratricidal 
 struggle." He adjured them to put away their 
 mutual desire for destruction, and to reflect that
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 289 
 
 nations do not die. If countries are humiliated 
 and oppressed, they prepare to retaliate by trans- 
 mitting from generation to generation hatred and 
 a desire for revenge. The suggestion was made 
 that there should be a direct or an indirect ex- 
 change of views between the belligerents, who 
 should endeavor, if possible, to arrange their 
 aspirations so that all shall be contented. In con- 
 clusion, his Holiness stated: "We invite all 
 friends of peace to unite with us in our desire to 
 terminate the war and to re-establish the empire 
 of right by resolving henceforth to solve all dif- 
 ferences not by the sword, but by equity and jus- 
 tice." 
 
 A few days later, the "Deutsche Tages-Zei- 
 tung" the organ of the German Agrarian League, 
 commenting on the Pope's appeal, said: "No 
 country will receive the Pope's proclamation with 
 greater respect or less prejudice than Germany. 
 She will accept as reasonable peace conditions 
 those which are in accordance with the even 
 balance of progress and the safety of nations, 
 because she is being attacked by an overwhelm- 
 ing coalition whose sole aim is the destruction of 
 the Germans for reasons of vulgar avarice on the 
 part of the common enemy." 
 
 The Rome newspaper "Messagero" is a news- 
 paper independent of Church influence. It de- 
 clared that the Pope had made a mistake in not 
 addressing his letter directly and exclusively to 
 the real authors of the war, Austria and Ger- 
 many; while other Italian newspapers declared 
 that the war would not finish except as a victory 
 for the Allies. 
 
 Very little came of this first Note of the Pope. 
 It was courteously acknowledged, but the general 
 feeling was that the time for effective interven- 
 tion had not arrived. A week or two later a 
 high ecclesiastical dignitary was interviewed in
 
 290 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 England and said : "Intervention now would not 
 be premature. The German advance in Poland 
 is inconclusive. All the belligerents are wearied, 
 and especially the apparent victors. The Pope 
 thus chose well the moment of the first words of 
 Peace, which would be followed by other words 
 more energetic and more efficacious." 
 
 That was a mistaken estimate of the war. 
 
 The "Corriere d'ltalia," a paper in the confi- 
 dence of the Vatican, said that the Pope was work- 
 ing for a peace which would respect the right of 
 nations, and that he was not an advocate for this 
 or that people, not even for his own Italian people. 
 "His voice," continued the journal, "ought to re- 
 sound a solemn admonition to those who desire to 
 impose peace without regarding the rights of op- 
 pressed peoples, and we commend this to the more 
 careful consideration of Germany and every other 
 nation experiencing remorse of conscience." 
 
 His Holiness, for the next twelve months, busied 
 himself about getting exchanges of prisoners and 
 alleviating the hard life of those who were sick 
 in foreign hospitals. He was of course made the 
 subject of a great deal of both friendly and hos- 
 tile criticism. Some believed him to lean to Aus- 
 tria and Germany, while the Germans accuse him 
 of favoring the Allies. 
 
 At length on August 15, 1917, the Pope's second 
 Note addressed all the belligerent powers. It 
 was prefaced by a statement that His Holiness 
 had aimed, since his accession in 1914, at observ- 
 ing absolute neutrality, but at the same time to do 
 everything in his power to hasten the end of the 
 war. It stated that the Pope had not ceased, 
 during three painful years, to exhort the bellig- 
 erent peoples and Governments to resume frater- 
 nal relationships, although everything done to 
 attain that object had not been made public. He
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 291 
 
 referred to the lack of success which had so far 
 attended his efforts for peace. He said 
 
 "Since then the war has become more cruel. It is ex- 
 tending on land and on sea, and even in the air. Defence- 
 less cities and quiet villages, with their innocent inhabi- 
 tants, have been striken with desolation and death. We 
 see in our mind's eye the multiplied and aggravated suf- 
 ferings which will be caused if the war continues, per- 
 haps for years, and we ask, must the world become a field 
 of death, and must Europe speed to the abyss, and lend 
 a hand to its own suicide? 
 
 "Therefore, a sense of our supreme duty as the father 
 of the faithful, and also the solicitations of our children, 
 imploring intervention, and the voice of humanity and 
 of reason, impel us to renew the pressing appeal for peace. 
 But in order not to confine ourselves any longer to general 
 terms, as we previously did, we now submit more concrete 
 and more practical proposals. We invite the belligerent 
 Governments to deliberate on the following points, which 
 seem to form the basis of a fair and lasting peace. 
 
 "The primary and fundamental point ought to be the 
 substitution for the material force of arms of the moral 
 force of right from which would come an agreement for 
 the simultaneous and reciprocal reduction of armaments, 
 according to rules and guarantees, to a degree only neces- 
 sary for the maintenance of public order in each State. 
 Then would come the establishment of international arbi- 
 tration, with a provision for concerted action to enforce 
 penalties against any State refusing to submit inter- 
 national questions to arbitration, or to accept the decisions 
 of the court.' ' 
 
 His Holiness went on to enlarge on this topic. 
 His reasoning seems to have been specially 
 directed to the declarations of the Allied powers 
 that they will make no peace that leaves Ger- 
 many with power to prepare for another war. 
 The Note said that once the supremacy of right 
 as against might is established, rules could be 
 fixed assuring real liberty and the "freedom of the 
 seas," and thus eliminate numerous causes of 
 dispute, throwing open to all new sources of pros- 
 perity and of progress. The Pope stated that he 
 sees no other means of solving the question of 
 reparation and the payment of the cost of the
 
 292 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 war than "than complete mutual liquidation" as a 
 general principle. He referred in this connection 
 to the immense benefits from disarmament, and 
 stated that besides that it is incomprehensible that 
 the carnage should continue for economic reasons. 
 Following up that course of reasoning, His 
 Holiness, proceeded thus 
 
 "Peaceful agreements are not possible without the re- 
 ciprocal restitution of occupied territories. Consequently 
 Germany should evacuate Belgium, guarantee her unham- 
 pered independence, and also evacuate French territory. 
 The other group of belligerents should restore the Ger- 
 man colonies. In regard to territorial questions, such as 
 those at issue between Italy and Austria and Germany 
 and France, it is to be hoped that the opposing nations will 
 in a conciliatory way examine these matters, taking into 
 consideration the aspirations of the people as far as pos- 
 sible, and co-ordinating their special interests for the 
 general good of human society. The same spirit of equity 
 and justice should animate the examination of other terri- 
 torial and political questions, particularly those relating 
 to Armenia, and the Balkan States, and the territories 
 comprising the old kingdom of Poland. The noble historic 
 traditions and the long suffering of Poland, especially in 
 the present war, should arouse the sympathies of th 
 nations." 
 
 Whatever opinions may be held about these 
 suggestions, no one can find fault with their states- 
 manship, or the spirit of compromise which they 
 exhibit. The Note then became a little argu- 
 mentative, pointing out that the acceptance of the 
 leading points thus enumerated would prevent the 
 recurrence of quarrels, and prepare for the solu- 
 tion of the economic questions. It concludes with 
 an earnest and prayerful appeal to turn a favor- 
 able ear to the communication. 
 
 Cardinal Gasparri, the Vatican Secretary of 
 State, in a letter covering the Note, asked His 
 Majesty King George to convey copies to the Pre- 
 sidents of France and of the United States, and 
 to the King of Italy, in consequence of the absence
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 293 
 
 of diplomatic relations between the Vatican and 
 those Governments. 
 
 THE POPE'S PROPOSALS COLDLY RECEIVED. 
 
 As was very natural, the Note evoked criticism 
 of a very strenuous kind. It was graciously re- 
 ceived by all the Powers, even by those who are 
 least favorable to the terms suggested in it. But 
 it was exceedingly distasteful to a large section 
 of the British and French press. The suggestion 
 that all the German colonies should be restored 
 as a quid pro quo for Germany restoring Belgium, 
 France, and Poland is very objectionable in Aus- 
 tralia. Still it had to be admitted that it was 
 not an unreasonable proposal as coming from an 
 intermediary anxious to bring the combatants to 
 a parley. 
 
 Some people hinted that the Pope was no better 
 than a sordid intriguer, trying to win back his 
 way to a place in the comity of nations, and per- 
 haps with an eye on the restoration of his tem- 
 poral power. 
 
 Father Bernard Vaughan (brother of the late 
 Cardinal Vaughan, and a distinguished member 
 of the Roman Catholic Church in England) de- 
 livered a speech at York on August 16, 1917, in 
 which he referred to the Pope's Peace Note. He 
 said : 
 
 "No people desires peace more than the British, but His 
 Holiness the Pope has not realised the fact that the 
 Allies cannot come to terms with the enemy until they are 
 able to dictate the terms. Experience has taught us that 
 it would be useless to deal diplomatically with an enemy 
 who has broken so many pledges. If the sword is 
 sheathed before its work is completed it will mean armed 
 neutrality until the foe is ready to wreak vengeance on 
 hated England and our children, or pur children's children. 
 Similarly the foe would attack Belgium and Armenia."
 
 294 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Mr. Theodore Roosevelt, in an address to the 
 members of the Belgian Mission in New York, 
 said that an inconclusive peace would be the 
 greatest menace to civilisation. No peace would 
 be acceptable which did not give the heaviest pos- 
 sible indemnity to Belgium. 
 
 Regarding Father Bernard Vaughan's criti- 
 cism, "that it would be useless to deal diplomati- 
 cally with an enemy who has broken so many 
 pledges," it may be remarked that the Pope's 
 Note anticipated that when it proposed "the 
 simultaneous and reciprocal reduction of arma- 
 ments," and the "substitution for the material 
 force of arms of the moral force of right." Be- 
 fore the war Germany stubbornly refused all dis- 
 armament, because she was bent on the subjuga- 
 tion of her neighbors. If she were to accept this 
 proposition in the Pope's Note, the Allies would 
 not be dependent on her fidelity to her pledges. 
 
 AMERICA REPLIES TO THE POPE. 
 
 After the lapse of a week it was given out that 
 America was to reply to the Pope on behalf of all 
 the Allies. In the third week in August, 1917, 
 that reply was given. In its outset. President 
 Wilson says: 
 
 "Every heart is touched with the dignity and force of 
 the moving appeal of His Holiness the Pope, but the re- 
 sponse must be based on firm facts. The Pope does not 
 desire the mere cessation of arms, but a stable and endur- 
 ing peace. The agony must not be gone through again." 
 
 After haying summarised the Vatican pro- 
 posals, President Wilson continues: 
 
 "It is manifest that no part of the programme can be 
 carried out unless restitution of the status quo ante bellum 
 furnishes a firm and satisfactory basis. Our object is to 
 deliver the free peoples from the menace and actual power 
 of a vast military establishment controlled by an irrespon-
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 295 
 
 sible Government, which secretly planned to dominate 
 the world, and tried to carry out its plan wtihout regard 
 to treaties or international honor. Germany chose her 
 own time for war, and struck fiercely and suddenly. 
 Stopped by no barrier, either of war or mercy, she swept 
 the Continent with a tide of blood. 
 
 "It is not our business how the German people can live 
 under a ruthless master, but we must see that the 
 rest of the world is not left to the mercy of the German 
 Government. We think that the Pope's plan would in- 
 volve the recuperation of the German Government's 
 strength, which would necessitate a permanent combina- 
 tion of the nations against Germany, and result in the 
 abandoning of the new-born Russia to intrigue. 
 
 "The aim of the United States has been clearly stated. 
 We believe that the intolerable wrongs by the German 
 Government ought to be repaired, but not at the expense 
 of the sovereignty of any people. We deem inexpedient, 
 and in the end worse than futile, such proposals as 
 punitive damages, dismemberment of empires, and the 
 establishment of a selfish, exclusive, economic league. 
 
 "Can peace be based on the restitution of German power 
 or on any word of honor pledged by Germany? Peace 
 cannot rest on political and economic restrictions designed 
 to benefit some nations and to embarrass others. The 
 American people have suffered intolerable wrongs at the 
 hands of Germany, but we do not desire to make reprisals 
 on the German people. Peace should rest on the rights 
 of the peoples, and not of Governments upon the rights 
 of all peoples to freedom, security, self-government, and 
 participation upon fair terms in economic opportunities. 
 We include the German people if they will accept equality 
 and not seek domination. The test of every peace plan 
 is whether it is based on the faith of the people or merely 
 on the word of an ambitious and intriguing Government. 
 
 "We cannot take the word of the present rulers of Ger- 
 many as a guarantee of anything enduring unless it is 
 explicitly supported by conclusive evidence of the will and 
 purpose of the German people. Without such guarantees, 
 treaties, agreements, covenants, and territorial adjust- 
 ments if made by Germany, could not be depended upon. 
 Therefore, we must await new evidence of the purpose 
 of the peoples of the Central Empires. God grant that 
 it may be given soon." 
 
 That document is honorable alike to the Pope 
 and to the writer of it. It recognises the dig- 
 nity and force of the Holy Father's appeal, and
 
 296 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 the beauty of the motive which prompted it. But 
 Germany's treachery to her own plighted word, it 
 declares, has placed her beyond the category of 
 honorable negotiation. It is a tremendous thing 
 for one responsible Great Power to say of 
 another. But there it is. Germany is an out- 
 law, with whom reputable nations refuse to treat. 
 She must first undergo all the humiliation of 
 utter defeat. This may be, and must be, a costly 
 and bloody remedy; but it is declared to be the 
 only way of ridding the world of a Frankenstein 
 monster. 
 
 Towards the end of August, 1917, the Vatican 
 Secretary of State (Cardinal Gasparri) gave pub- 
 licity to a statement which amplifies the Pope's 
 peace proposals. It was as follows : 
 
 "The first two points in the Pontifical appeal for peace, 
 which treat respectively of disarmament and the freedom 
 of the seas, were suggested by President Wilson's mes- 
 sage to the Senate. Consequently we are inclined to be- 
 lieve that they will find the same reception in the United 
 States as when President Wilson proclaimed them. 
 
 "The third and fourth points, in which a 'mutual con- 
 donation' of war expenses and damages and a mutual re- 
 stitution of occupied territories are spoken of, were for- 
 mulated from public speeches by statesmen of the belli- 
 gerent nations, and from resolutions passed by their 
 respective Parliaments. Therefore the same statesmen 
 cannot refuse them now without contradicting themselves. 
 Moreover, it is necessary to remark that, as to the con- 
 donation of damages caused by the war, there is an excep- 
 tion which applies particularly to Belgium. 
 
 "The fifth and sixth points concern special territorial 
 questions about which the Pope could not propose a 
 definite concrete solution, and consequently confines him- 
 self to hoping that they will be examined in a conciliatory 
 spirit. 
 
 "The Pope wishes to emphasise the fact that the appeal 
 was not suggested by any belligerent. 
 
 "Finally, the Pope said nothing about democracy, be- 
 cause history teaches that a form of government imposed 
 by arms cannot live, and also because any people which 
 has universal suffrage may choose any form of govern- 
 ment it pleases. Furthermore, democracy will receive
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 297 
 
 such an impulse from this war that wisdom must prevent 
 it from deteriorating into excessive forms such as 
 anarchy." 
 
 Cardinal Gasparri's statement, and particularly 
 his suggestion that Belgium should be given com- 
 pensation, at once created a more favorable im- 
 pression on the American Department of State 
 than the original plea for peace put forward by 
 the Pope. The belief was expressed in Washing- 
 ton that peace may depend on the ability of the 
 Pope to secure from Germany the consent to 
 making such reparation. 
 
 The idea in the mind of the American Presi- 
 dent is that the world cannot be half autocratic 
 and half democratic that autocracy must be ex- 
 pelled from the world in the interests of the 
 world's peace. But this conflicts with his speech 
 which says that ihe Allies have nothing to do with 
 the form of German Government. 
 
 THE ECONOMIC TEACHING OF THE POPE. 
 
 No one, Catholic or Protestant, can fail to ap- 
 prehend the extreme importance of the Pope's 
 position in this war. He stands so much above 
 the hurley-burley of combatants as to be able to 
 take a view larger than most others. His judg- 
 ment thus has to be classed as the moral verdict 
 of a neutral whose neutrality is alien to none. 
 His last Note is therefore a clarion call upon the 
 attention of the world. All nations have con- 
 ceded to it the attention demanded. This it is 
 which compels even a giddy world to pause and 
 listen. 
 
 Many people may intensely dislike the Pope's 
 spiritual office and pretensions, but they are com- 
 pelled to concede his moral authority over one- 
 fifth of the world; and it is scarcely possible to
 
 298 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 deny that he sits aloft and above most of the 
 streams of influence which bias human judgment. 
 He speaks, too, under the ever-present respon- 
 sibility of a Vice-gerent of heaven. When such 
 a personage calls upon mankind to pause and 
 listen, the call becomes all but imperative. 
 
 The world is listening listening even amidst 
 its affectation of sneers; and ten thousand pens 
 to-day are translating the thoughts of the Holy 
 Father into the vernacular of a thousand 
 Christian communities. Varying minds will, of 
 course, receive the Papal message with varying 
 degree of assent and dissent. Everyone feels that 
 there are forces surging up around us that are of 
 mighty, menacing, and mysterious import. A 
 former pontiff (Leo XIII.) pointed to this some 
 years ago in his Encyclical on Labor "The ele- 
 ments of a conflict are unmistakable ; the growth 
 of industry and the surprising discoveries of 
 science; the changed relations of masters and 
 workmen; the enormous fortunes of individuals 
 and the poverty of the masses ; the increased self- 
 reliance and the closer combination of the work- 
 ing population; and finally a general moral 
 deterioration." 
 
 That was the outlook nearly twenty years ago. 
 How much is all that accentuated to-day! To- 
 day, when crafty agitators pervert men's judg- 
 ment and stir up the people to sedition. Few 
 things are more insisted on by the present Pope 
 (as it was by Leo XIII.) than the right of eveiy 
 man to possess private property. Yet that right 
 is boldly disputed by the Socialists, who are pro- 
 claiming here and elsewhere that "all property is 
 robbery." 
 
 Inequalities in the world there must always be 
 because of those natural inequalities which 
 Nature herself creates in men. One man has a 
 genius for one avocation, another for a different
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 299 
 
 one. One man is born to guide, another to fol- 
 low. On this Leo said "If any there are who 
 pretend differently who hold out to a hard- 
 pressed people freedom from pain and trouble, 
 undisturbed repose, and constant enjoyment 
 they cheat the people, and impose upon them, and 
 their lying promises will only make the evil worse 
 than before." 
 
 When men's opinions on basic truths are flung 
 into the melting pot, as they are to-day, it is of no 
 small benefit to the world to have a great central 
 authority proclaiming the immutability of certain 
 great principles. 
 
 "It is one thing," says the Pope, "to have a right 
 to the possession of money, and another to have 
 the right to use the money as one pleases. Man 
 should not consider his outward possessions as his 
 own, but as common to all." 
 
 THE POPE AND NEUTRALITY. 
 
 How does the Pope stand towards the belliger- 
 ents? Where lie his sympathies? Does he 
 lean to the enemy, or to the Allies? These are 
 questions which are constantly canvassed. They 
 ought to be examined here. There are three 
 simple facts which may throw some preliminary 
 light on the point. They are these 
 
 1. The Pope's enemies amongst the Entente 
 Powers say that he leans to Austria-Hungary and 
 Germany. 
 
 2. The Pope's enemies amongst the Central 
 Powers say that he leans towards Italy, France, 
 Great Britain, and America. 
 
 3. The Pope's friends on both sides assert that 
 he has maintained an attitude of correct 
 neutrality.
 
 300 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 The task here is to scan the situation critically 
 and impartially. We have to remember that 
 Benedict XV. is confronted with a seething caul- 
 dron of socialistic opinion, superadded to the 
 surging sway of opposing interests arising from 
 the world-war. 
 
 He has dear spiritual children in both camps. 
 He has German cardinals who have published a 
 book in order to persuade him that the Belgian 
 populace were monsters of cruelty against the 
 German soldiery. He has, on the other side, dear 
 friends like Cardinal Mercier, who assure him 
 that these allegations are the false concoctions of 
 German courts-martial, fabricated in order to 
 palliate their own diabolical savagery against the 
 Belgian peasantry. 
 
 It is difficult for any ordinary man to compre- 
 hend the burden of the responsibility which he 
 feels. He seeks for a peace, the terms of which 
 shall not too deeply excoriate any of the parties. 
 Some men have sneeringly asked what Chris- 
 tianity has done for the world. The Pope stands 
 there to answer that Christianity is the only sheet 
 anchor of safety to a drifting planet. 
 
 The Germans allege against the Pope that he 
 seeks to abolish militarism by establishing courts 
 of arbitration for the settlement of international 
 disputes. 
 
 The Entente Allies find fault with him because 
 he proposes a peace without indemnities on either 
 side, and the restoration of all captured terri- 
 tories. 
 
 His friends say that he is merely seeking a pre- 
 liminary basis on which he may bring the con- 
 tending parties of the arena of war and into the 
 Courts of Reason. 
 
 That devoted Belgian Cardinal, the idol of his 
 country, is certainly a competent witness. He 
 says
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 301 
 
 "With a touching goodness our Holy Father Benedict 
 XV. has been the first to incline his heart to us. When a 
 few moments after his election, he deigned to take me in 
 his arms, I was bold enough to ask that the first Ponti- 
 fical Benediction he spoke should be given to Belgium." 
 
 He narrates, in the "Voice of Belgium," how 
 the Pope instantly complied by sending, under 
 his own hand, a written message in which he said 
 amongst other things 
 
 "Could we fail to be moved by the keenest sorrow at 
 the sight of the Belgian nation which we so dearly love, 
 reduced by a most cruel and most disastrous war to this 
 lamentable state? 
 
 "We behold the King and his august family, the mem- 
 bers of the Government, the chief persons of the country, 
 bishops, priests?, and a whole people enduring woes which 
 must fill with pity all gentle hearts, and which our own 
 soul, in the fervor of paternal love, must be the first to 
 compassionate. 
 
 "We have been informed that the faithful of that nation, 
 so sorely tried, did not neglect in their piety to turn to- 
 wards us their thoughts, and that even under the blow of 
 so many calamities they proposed to gather this year, as 
 in all preceding years, the offerings to St. Peter, which 
 supply the necessities of the Apostolic See. This truly 
 incomparable proof of piety and attachment filled us with 
 admiration. We accept it with all the affection that is 
 due from a grateful heart. But having regard to the 
 painful position in which our dear children are placed, 
 we cannot bring ourselves to favor that project, noble 
 though it is. If any alms are to be gathered, our wish is 
 that the money should be entirely devoted to the benefit of 
 the Belgian people, who are as illustrious by reason of 
 their nobility and their piety, as they are to-day worthy 
 of all sympathy. 
 
 "Amid the difficulties and anxieties of the present hour 
 we would remind the sons who are so dear to us that the 
 arm of God is not shortened, that He is ever able to save, 
 and that His ear is not deaf to prayer." 
 
 That extract shows that in the mind of the 
 great Belgian Cardinal there was no tinge of 
 jealousy concerning the attitude of the Pope. At 
 page 106 of the same book, there is a still more 
 striking testimony. He says
 
 "From the beginning of the war, certain cunning, evil, 
 and treacherous minds have persisted in encouraging the 
 rumor that the late Pope Pius X. and our Holy Father 
 Benedict XV., the present Pope, gave financial help or 
 moral approval to our enemies, and through weakness, 
 did an injustice to the rights of the Belgian people. These 
 are calumnies, my Brethren nothing but infamous 
 calumnies. The simple, loving, and generous heart of 
 Pius X, was incapable, I do not say of any cowardice, but 
 of so much as the appearance of an accommodation with 
 injustice, even though it were triumphant. The truth is that 
 the noble old man succumbed to the grief that overcame 
 him when he saw the European nations rent by murderous 
 war, and Providence left him no time to express in public 
 the holy horror these orgies of blood inspired in him. 
 
 "As for our Holy Father Benedict XV., what could he 
 do for the Belgians that he has not done?" 
 
 The Cardinal then proceeds to enumerate the 
 various marks of love, sympathy, and assistance 
 received from the Pope. He quotes a very tender 
 letter from Cardinal Gasparri to him, saying 
 
 "His Holiness the Pope Benedict XV. let his eyes rest 
 first on Europe, convulsed by this terrible war, and fixed 
 them upon Belgium, as he followed the sorrowful events 
 that were taking place there. . . . His Holiness has made 
 a point of joining to his prayers the offering of his 
 fatherly charity. In spite of the actually embarrassed 
 condition of the Holy See, he directs me to send you the 
 sum of 25,000 francs, which I have great pleasure i en- 
 closing herewith. 
 
 "As a token of heavenly favor, and of his peculiar pre- 
 dilection, His Holiness grants a special Benediction, with 
 all warmth of heart, for your Eminence, for the epis- 
 copate, the clergy, and the people of Belgium, and at the 
 same time he gives his blessings to all who help them in 
 their troubles." 
 
 I think all English readers will be interested in 
 the perusal of such passages as these. At pages 
 214-15, there is a personal touch which is of the 
 most conclusive character as to the attitude of the 
 Pope. In 1916, Cardinal Mercer went on a visit 
 to Rome. He told his people 
 
 "I assure you that my journey was especially blest, and 
 that I return to you happy, very happy. 
 
 "Our Holy Father showed me the most touching kind-
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 303 
 
 ness. As soon as I arrived, he deigned to fold me in his 
 arms; he invited me to come and see him as often as pos- 
 sible; he allowed me to tell him everything, to confide in 
 him fully, to think aloud before him. During the many 
 hours I had the consolation of spending in his august 
 presence, he comforted, illuminated, and encouraged me 
 paternally. He understands and shares our anxieties 
 concerning our religious liberties and our patriotic feel- 
 ings. He was good enough to sum up his profound thought 
 on your behalf, which I received most eagerly in the in- 
 scription traced by his own august hand beneath his por- 
 trait. I hereby transcribe it for you in all simplicity 
 
 " 'To our revered Brother, Cardinal Mercier, Arch- 
 bishop of Mechlin. We give the Apostolic Blessing with 
 all our heart, assuring him that we are always with him, 
 and that we share his grief and his anguish, inasmuch as 
 his cause is our cause.' 
 
 "One day I went with my heart full of gratitude, to tell 
 the Sovereign Pontiff that he could never doubt the per- 
 fect filial piety of the Belgian people, and that we nad 
 conceived a desire to give him a fresh evidence of this in 
 the near future. 'Most Holy Father,' I said, 'we would 
 like to ask the faithful throughout the country to take 
 part on the first Sunday in May in a general Communion 
 tor the intentions of your Holiness.' 'And my intention,' 
 replied the Holy Father immediately, 'is Belgium.' " 
 
 That passage leaves nothing to be desired as a 
 proof that the Pope is heart and soul with the 
 cause for which Belgium is fighting. 
 
 THE POPE'S MORAL STATUS IN THE WORLD. 
 
 I remember once asking a lady who was in 
 extasies over some Papal function in her church, 
 what it was that so impressed her. She replied 
 "I thought of whom that Pope is. I thought 
 of him as the great Vice-gerent of Christ on 
 earth; and then I thought what a living witness 
 he is, in a sceptical world, of the promise of 
 Christ to be with His Church for everlasting. I 
 thought of him as the man chosen by the Holy 
 Ghost, through that conclave of Cardinals, to rule 
 over nearly 300,000,000 of his spiritual subjects,
 
 304 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 of every tongue and clime and color. I reflected 
 on how exactly he seems to typify his Master. He 
 has gone into all the world and preached Christ's 
 gospel to every people; and every people have 
 heard him. More than that hearing him, they 
 have bowed to him. Like Christ, he has no 
 earthly power. The world has despoiled him 
 even of his own. He is not the master of swords, 
 guns, bayonets. He commands no legion of 
 spiked helmets. He can threaten no sovereign 
 with military force. And yet there is no power 
 to which the world listens with more of breath- 
 less interest that it does to him a prisoner in the 
 Vatican." 
 
 What that lady spoke, hundreds of millions 
 speak, or rather feel ; and, feeling, hold the Pope 
 in a reverence such as is felt for no other earthly 
 personage. 
 
 People are apt to stand aghast at the spectacle 
 of a pontiff making a crowned king wait three 
 days as a penitent in the snow. Such a power, 
 they say, is dangerous. Perhaps it is; all such 
 power may be abused ; but is it half as dangerous 
 as was that power of Autocracy which made a 
 rascal like the Kaiser the despot over six or seven 
 millions of bayonets. Yet your politician shies 
 at the one and tolerates the other. And would 
 not four-fifths of the world rejoice to see that 
 imperial caitiff compelled to undergo such peni- 
 tence? 
 
 People will not, or cannot, think in true pro- 
 portions. If they could, they would ask What 
 Pope has ever misused his powers as secular 
 rulers have done theirs? 
 
 We hear lecturers who amuse their audiences 
 with talk about "the paralysis of Rome." But the 
 very people who tell us about "the declension of 
 the Papacy," know that that Papacy never shone 
 more resplendently than now; that it has rarely
 
 THE POPE AND THE WAR 305 
 
 towered in virtue and character more than in its 
 last four Popes Pius IX., Leo XIII., Pius X., 
 and Benedict XV. 
 
 It has been sometimes a reproach against the 
 Popes that they were too severe as sticklers for 
 the sanctity of marriage; but in that the impar- 
 tial judgment of history has generally vindicated 
 them ; for had they given way on that point in the 
 Middle Ages, there would have been a cataclysm 
 of passion broken loose. Macaulay makes the 
 remark at page 9 of his History that "even the 
 spiritual supremacy arrogated by the Pope was, 
 in the dark ages, productive of far more good 
 than evil. Its effect was to unite the nations of 
 western Europe in one great Commonwealth." 
 
 There has been of late some public discussion 
 concerning the attitude of the Papacy towards the 
 Spanish Inquisition. I find in my copy of Balmes's 
 "European Civilisation," in a chapter on that 
 much debated topic, this statement "It is a re- 
 markable thing that the Roman Inquisition was 
 never known to pronounce the execution of capi- 
 tal punishment, although the Apostolic See was 
 occupied during that time by Popes of extreme 
 rigor and severity in all that relates to the civil 
 administration. We find in all parts of Europe 
 scaffolds prepared to punish crimes against reli- 
 gion; scenes which sadden the soul were every- 
 where witnessed. Rome is an exception to the 
 rule; Rome which it has been attempted to re- 
 present as a monster of intolerance and cruelty. 
 . . . The Popes, armed with a tribunal of in- 
 tolerance, have not spilled a drop of blood. Pro- 
 testants and philosophers have shed torrents." 
 The Court of Rome, he says, were constantly ap- 
 pealing to the Spanish King and Queen for more 
 gentleness and mercy in carrying out the work 
 of the Inquisition. But the State's relation with 
 the Moors and Jews led to abominable cruelty.
 
 306 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 THE PAPACY AND THE PRESS. 
 
 There is one especial subject on which the late 
 Popes have spoken with the greatest earnestness. 
 That is the promotion of the religious Press, as 
 a means of advancing civilisation. Here is a gem 
 of counsel bequeathed by Leo XIII. : 
 
 "We renew our advice to you who labor with as much 
 zeal as prudence for the publication and diffusion of 
 Catholic newspapers. For in these days people form 
 their opinions and regulate their lives almost entirely by 
 their daily reading of newspapers. 
 
 "Amongst the best means adapted to the defence of 
 religion, there is none, in our opinion, more efficacious and 
 more suited to the present time than that which consists 
 in meeting the press by the press, and thus frustrating the 
 schemes of the enemy of religion." 
 
 Leo was a pontiff who had fully grasped this 
 mission of the Press. One Catholic writer says 
 of him that he had filled a forty-page pamphlet 
 by his shrewd observations on the possible mission 
 of an active and able Press. But his successor, 
 Pope -Pius X. was scarcely second to him in ad- 
 vocacy of this means of spreading enlightenment. 
 He said 
 
 "There is no nobler mission in the world to-day 
 than that of the journalist. My predecessors used 
 to consecrate the sword and armor of Christian 
 warriors. I am happy to draw down blessing on 
 the pen of a Christian journalist." 
 
 It does not require a man to be a member of 
 the Catholic Church to enable him to see the mar- 
 vellousness of the Papacy. It is the embodiment 
 of the strength of moral and spiritual forces 
 weak to the last stage of physical feebleness, but 
 strong with the strength of spiritual irresisti- 
 bility. What part this wonderful institution will 
 play at the end of this war is a master problem of 
 the future.
 
 XIII. 
 ARBITRATION AND WAR. 
 
 CAN ARBITRATION PREVENT WAR? 
 
 With an emphasis never previously heard on 
 the earth the question is now being propounded 
 from a thousand platforms, and in ten thousand 
 publications "Are not wars preventable by 
 means of arbitration?" "Does it surpass man's 
 wit to supersede the arbitrament of the Sword by 
 the dictates of Reason?" 
 
 The questions are of coiyse forced to the front 
 rank of man's attention by the events of the war. 
 It is pointed out that as nine-tenths of the human 
 race will always" desire peace on earth and good- 
 will amongst men, they will always choose, when 
 they are free to choose, peace rather than war. 
 
 But the question is not what men wish, but what 
 is practicable. Are the forces which make for a 
 permanent peace strong enough to overcome the 
 fighting instinct in man? 
 
 Eighteen years ago, in 1899, the Czar of Russia 
 proposed to the world a pact of mutual disarma- 
 ment. It came to nothing, for reasons to be after- 
 wards considered. But the world has never for- 
 gotten that Peace Rescript of the Czar Nicholas. 
 Neither have men forgotten that France, Great 
 Britain, Italy, and America were at the time quite 
 willing to take up and consider the Russian pro- 
 posal. 
 
 Evil may eclipse good for a time, but such ideas 
 as were embodied in that Czar's Peace Rescript 
 
 307
 
 308 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 never die. In America the document was exhaus- 
 tively discussed, and it took on a variety of 
 aspects. It has merged of late years in an Ameri- 
 can proposal for a "League to Enforce Peace." 
 In England there was formed "The League of 
 Nations Society." The object of it was to study 
 the problem of a perpetual peace on the basis of 
 a world-guarantee. 
 
 It may be well to consider these two bodies a 
 little. The rules of the American League were 
 these 
 
 "Article I. 
 
 "All justiciable questions arising between the signatory 
 Powers, settled by negotiation, shall, subject to the limita- 
 tion of treaties, be submitted to a judicial tribunal for 
 hearing and judgment, both upon the merits and upon any 
 issue as to its jurisdiction of the question. 
 
 "Article II. 
 
 "All other questions arising between the signatories 
 and not settled by negotiation shall be submitted to a 
 council of conciliation for hearing, consideration, and re- 
 commendation. 
 
 "Article III. 
 
 "The signatory Powers shall jointly use forthwith both 
 their economic and military forces against any one of 
 their number that goes to war, or commits acts of hos- 
 tility, against another of the signatories before any ques- 
 tion arising shall be sumbitted as provided in the tore- 
 going. 
 
 "Article IV. 
 
 "Conferences between the signatory Powers shall be 
 held from time to time to formulate and codify rules of 
 international law, which, unless some signatory shall sig- 
 nify its dissent within a stated period, shall thereafter 
 govern in the decisions of the judicial tribunal mentioned 
 in Article I." 
 
 The final shape of the English Society was as 
 follows : 
 
 1. That a treaty shall be made as soon as possible, 
 whereby as many states as are willing shall form a league 
 binding themselves to use peaceful methods for dealing 
 with all disputes arising among them.
 
 ARBITRATION AND WAR 309 
 
 2. That such methods shall be as follow: 
 
 (a) All disputes arising out of questions of inter- 
 
 national law or the interpretation of treaties 
 shall be referred to the Hague Council of Arbi- 
 tration, or some other judicial tribunal whose 
 decisions shall be final, and shall be carried 
 into effect by the parties concerned. 
 
 (b) All other disputes shall be referred to and in- 
 
 vestigated and reported upon by a Council of 
 Inquiry and Conciliation, the Council to be 
 representative of the states which form the 
 League. 
 
 3. That the states which are members of the League 
 shall unite on any action necessary for the ensuring that 
 every member shall abide by the terms of the treaty, and 
 in particular shall jointly use forthwith their economic 
 and military forces against any one of their number that 
 goes to war, or commits acts of hostility against another 
 of the signatories before any question arising shall be 
 submitted as provided in the foregoing articles. 
 
 4. That the states which are members of the League 
 shall make provision for mutual defence, diplomatic, 
 economic, or military, in the event of any of them being 
 attacked by a state not a member of the League, which 
 refuses to submit the case to an appropriate tribunal or 
 council. 
 
 5. That any civilised state desiring to join the League 
 shall be admitted to membership. 
 
 The aims of both the English and American 
 Leagues are all but identical. They would not 
 absolutely prevent war, but they would make it 
 very perilous to be the first to ? { vht the war-torch. 
 
 In addition to these documentary evidence as 
 to what men have thought about it in the past, it 
 may be noted that Arbitration Treaties between 
 certain nations have been negotiated with excel- 
 lent results. Many international disputes have 
 been thus settled with satisfaction to all parties. 
 
 The institution of the Hague Tribunal is a vis- 
 ible monument to the peace desires of many great 
 powers. 
 
 Notwithstanding the teachings of a certain 
 school of thought, that War is a thing in itself 
 desirable because of the virility which it cultivates
 
 310 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 in the race, the general opinion of mankind is that 
 so far from bringing happiness to men, war has 
 been the constant handmaid of tyranny and the 
 source of more than half the miseries of man. Al- 
 though some wars have been necessary and have 
 given occasion for the display of splendid heroism 
 wars of defence against aggression, or to suc- 
 cour the oppressed most wars have been need- 
 less or unjust. The mark of an advancing civili- 
 sation has been the substitution of friendship for 
 hatred, and of peaceful for warlike ideals. Small 
 peoples have done and can do as much for the 
 common good of humanity as large peoples. Trea- 
 ties must be observed, for what are they but re- 
 cords of national faith solemnly pledged, and 
 what could bring mankind more surely and swiftly 
 back to that reign of violence and terror from 
 which it has been slowly rising for the last ten 
 centuries than the destruction of trust in the 
 plighted faith of nations? 
 
 It is pretty safe to say that such sentiments as 
 these prevail to-day over nineteen-twentieths of 
 the human race. 
 
 Before touching the arguments for and against 
 the total abolition of war, it may be noted that all 
 the declarations of the Allied Powers against 
 making peace on the present attitude of the belli- 
 gerent nations, are based on the statement that 
 such a peace can be but a prelude to future war. It 
 is in the minds of all the Entente combatants that 
 militarism is to die with the present war; that 
 the next peace is to have guarantees against any 
 power making war on its own initiative ; that the 
 right of making war, hitherto belonging to every 
 autonomous power, is absolutely to cease. This 
 war, say the Allies, is to end only with a positive 
 guarantee against the recurrence of another war 
 of the same nature The idea in all men's minds 
 is that the coming peace is to be one that no one
 
 ARBITRATION AND WAR 311 
 
 nation shall break. It is to be a pact in which 
 each shall be a guarantee for all, and all for each. 
 The idea is really the realisation of the poet's 
 dream, 
 
 When the common s^ense of most shall hold a fret- 
 ful realm in awe, 
 
 And the kindly earth shall slumber, lapt in univer- 
 sal law. 
 
 That is what the Allies declare very definitely 
 that they are fighting for. They at least, there- 
 fore, must believe in its feasibility. 
 
 The Pope, in his recent Peace Note addressed 
 to all the belligerents, made national disarmament 
 one of the conditions of peace. Such disarma- 
 ment, he said, must be reciprocal and simul- 
 taneous. In reply to this Note of His Holiness, 
 Germany has declared her perfect readiness to 
 treat on that basis. She was before the only 
 nation that stood out as the apostle of Force, con- 
 tending that every nation must on that subject 
 be the supreme and only judge of its own destiny. 
 These are the preliminary considerations which 
 throw light on the question as to whether Arbitra- 
 tion can prevent war. 
 
 WARS ALWAYS HAVE BEEN AND MUST BE. 
 
 Millions of people may hope for a time of per- 
 manent peace, and that this super-horrible war 
 has prepared our old war-loving world for it; but 
 what grounds are there for such a hope? The 
 world, we are told, cannot go on without war. 
 There has never been a year or a day, since 
 Adam's fall, without a war in it. 
 
 But more than this. Not only has war always 
 been ; but it ought to be. Treitschke believes that 
 only "spiritless and exhausted ages play with the
 
 312 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 dream of perpetual peace." War, it is contended 
 by Bernhardi, "is a biological necessity of the first 
 importance, a regulative element in the life of 
 mankind which cannot be dispensed with." The 
 law of the stronger must hold good everywhere. 
 Might is at once the supreme right, and the dis- 
 pute as to what is right is decided by the arbitra- 
 ment of war. 
 
 War is good, argues Treitschke, because "a thou- 
 sand touching traits testify to the sacred power 
 of the love which a righteous war awakes in noble 
 nations." If a man showed a love to another 
 country, it would argue a want of love for his 
 own. Not only is war an unqualified necessity, 
 but it is justifiable from every point of view. The 
 politician, says Bernhardi, must be amazingly 
 short-sighted who believes that international dis- 
 putes can be settled by Arbitration Courts. Even 
 if such a court could settle disputes, its finding 
 could be enforced only by war, which is the very 
 thing to be avoided. In fine, says Bernhardi 
 
 "If we sum up our arguments we shall see that the 
 efforts directed towards the abolition of war must not 
 only be termed foolish, but absolutely immoral, and must 
 be stigmatised as unworthy of the human race. To what 
 does the whole question amount? It is proposed to 
 deprive men of the right and the possibility to sacrifice 
 their highest material possessions, their physical life, 
 for ideals, and thus to realise the highest moral unselfish- 
 ness. It is proposed to obviate the great quarrels 
 between nations and States by Courts of Arbitration 
 that is, by arrangements. A one-sided restricted formal 
 law is to be established in the place of the decisions of 
 history. The weak nation is to have the same right to 
 live as the powerful and vigorous nation." 
 
 Holding that view, in common with multitudes 
 of his countrymen, Bernhardi gave vent to the 
 aspiration that Germans would see to it "that the 
 maintenance of peace never can or may be the 
 goal of a policy." He was confident that God would 
 see to it that wars will always recur.
 
 ARBITRATION AND WAR 313 
 
 Lest any one should conclude these views lack 
 all justification, their author proceeds to give his 
 reasons for holding them. The be-all and the 
 end-all of a State, he says, is power, not good 
 government, or holding the scales of justice even. 
 It is power, and he who will not look that truth in 
 the face should not meddle with politics. "The 
 acts of the State are not to be judged by the stan- 
 dard of individual morality." The State's "highest 
 moral duty is to increase its power." There is 
 no Christian duty higher than the State's history. 
 Feebleness in the State "is the political sin against 
 the Holy Ghost." 
 
 Therefore the State must get power by any and 
 every available means, and to that end may make 
 war, and should make war, if making war will 
 conduce to the State's benefit. Such are the Ger- 
 man ideas in favor of war. 
 
 Mr. W. H. Mallock on other grounds doubts the 
 power of Arbitration to prevent war. While ex- 
 posing the faulty philosophy of Bernhardi, he 
 seems to hold with him that nations will find it 
 impossible to create a peace tribunal strong enough 
 to compel refractory countries to obey its de- 
 cisions. 
 
 There are others who say that while such a 
 peace might be very desirable, it cannot be got 
 for the mere wishing, or even by the making of 
 treaties. No scheme for preventing future wars 
 will have any chance of success unless it rests 
 upon the assurance that the States which enter 
 into it will loyally and steadfastly abide by it, and 
 that each and all of them will join in coercing by 
 their overwhelming united strength any State 
 which may disregard the obligations it has under- 
 taken. They doubt if this can be done.
 
 314 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 WARS No MORE A NECESSITY THAN DUELS OR 
 SLAVERY. 
 
 Very few people who analyse the arguments in 
 favor of war, as set out in the preceding section, 
 will fail to discover the radical unsoundness in 
 most of them. To say that wars are necessary 
 because they always have been, is to argue that 
 progress is impossible. 
 
 Slavery was always a recognised institution 
 until within the last generation. It no longer is 
 so. The growing sense of the world's justice 
 abolished it. Man has come to see the brother- 
 hood of man and the Fatherhood of God as he 
 never saw it in past ages> and this basic idea 
 was incompatible with slavery. Slavery has 
 gone. There is no more inherent difficulty in 
 forecasting the abolition of war than there once 
 was in forecasting the abolition of slavery. 
 
 Duelling was a species of war, and a very ab- 
 surd and detestable kind of war. The claims of 
 warrior nations to appeal to the supreme arbitra- 
 ment of battle is on the same plane as were the 
 former claims of the duellist to the right of pri- 
 vate combat. An analogous claim is that of the 
 Trades Unionist to have the right to order a 
 combined general strike. The duellist has been 
 relegated to the realms of barbarism. The General 
 Striker will soon be so ; and as it is in the power 
 of the nation to abolish the duellist and the striker, 
 it should be so for an International Court to sup- 
 press a recalcitrant disturber of the Great Pax. 
 
 Formerly every swashbuckler who chose to con- 
 sider his honor aggrieved had the right of com- 
 pelling his opponent to meet him in private battle 
 at ten or twenty paces, or be spitted on a rapier 
 point. As the private code then stood, he had 
 more than a right ; he had an obligatory duty. The 
 complainant must challenge, and the challenged
 
 ARBITRATION AND WAR 315 
 
 man must fight, or be branded as a "scab" or 
 "blackleg." 
 
 The most amiable and inoffensive man in the 
 kingdom was not exempt from the citation to shoot 
 or be shot at sunrise. He had perhaps said or 
 done something that someone thought he should 
 not have said or done; or omitted to say or do 
 something which someone thought he should have 
 said or done. It didn't matter which it was, or 
 what it was. If he were "called out" he must 
 come. 
 
 The "law of honor," as it was called, was not 
 to be questioned. The law was one of Mr. and 
 Mrs. Grundy's making. But every mother's son 
 must obey it, or be disgraced. It compelled a 
 man like O'Connell, on being challenged by a pro- 
 fessional duellist named D'Esterre, for having 
 said the Dublin Corporation was a "beggarly" in- 
 stitution, to go out and stand fire. O'Connell went 
 out, contrary to his religious conscience, and 
 shot his man dead. It was a terrible mental trial 
 to him for the rest of his life; but he could not 
 escape the ethics of the duello without incurring 
 social and political ruin; and with his own ruin, 
 the ruin of his great cause. 
 
 In our day the common sense of men votes that 
 sort of thing to be the quintessence of tomfoolery. 
 But that tomfoolery at its very worst, did not 
 equal in folly the absurdity of a world-system 
 which in 1914 placed the life interests of 
 1,000,000,000 men and women at the mercy of a 
 dozen men in a German War Council. 
 
 That is how affairs stood on this globe of ours 
 before the war broke out. A single war-lord and 
 a dozen of his flunkeys could blast three parts of 
 the human family. There was no one to say them 
 nay. National militarism is the tyranny of the 
 duel multiplied by a million. The one has gone. 
 Why not the other? 
 x
 
 316 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 If the sanction of the State law has been 
 strong enough to abolish the duello and the feudal 
 broil, why may not an international law, with all 
 the sanction of a cosmopolitan power behind it 
 in a world where disarmament had been made all 
 but complete be strong enough to maintain the 
 peace of nations? 
 
 When people argue that because a thing always 
 has been that therefore it must be, they overlook 
 the fact that the world has changed in a thousand 
 ways. Men once travelled in stage coaches. They 
 now journey by railway or aeroplane. They once 
 sent messages of importance by special post boys. 
 They now send by telegraph, telephone, and wire- 
 less. We once ploughed our fields with a wooden 
 plough and threshed our wheat with a flail in a 
 barn. We now have steam ploughs with a dozen 
 shares, and cut, gather, thresh, and bag the crop 
 on the field with a single machine. 
 
 We have printed more books and magazines in 
 the last half century than were printed in all time 
 previously. Half the world's entire stock of 
 literature has been produced in the last fifty years. 
 We are the heirs of all the ages, and our heritage 
 is enormously increased beyond what our fathers 
 received. 
 
 To say we must always be at war because our 
 fathers were, is to say that we must have turn- 
 pike roads and stage coach travelling because our 
 fathers had, and that in a world changed in almost 
 all other customs, war is to remain a constant 
 factor. 
 
 In the beginning of last century Malthus taught 
 the doctrine that the world could not feed an in- 
 creased population. Now we know that the earth 
 can feed 2,000,000,000 of people as easily as it 
 could feed 1,000,000,000 a hundred years ago.
 
 ARBITRATION AND WAR 317 
 
 Science teaches us that we can assign no limit 
 to the fecundity of the earth. Another half 
 century may see green fodder crops growing in the 
 sands of Sahara. 
 
 To speak of war as a "biological necessity" is 
 as if I should say I must fight my neighbor as the 
 sine qua non of preserving my life. To say that 
 the abolition of war would be immoral is to con- 
 tradict the God of Peace who commanded His 
 disciples to love one another. 
 
 To say that the abolition of war would be to 
 deprive people of the opportunity of self-sacri- 
 fice is a contradiction on terms. All wars of ag- 
 gression are waged for selfish purposes, and the 
 soldier who fights for glory and ambition is the 
 most selfish of God's creatures. He is ready to 
 march to triumph over the mangled bodies of 
 millions of better men. 
 
 To assert, as these advocates of war do, that the 
 end of all government is power, is to egregiously 
 mistake the first duty of those to whom is com- 
 mitted the management of the Commonwealth. 
 Mill holds that the end of all government is the 
 happiness of those who are governed, to diminish 
 to the utmost their pains and increase to the ut- 
 most their pleasures. What a fall from this to be 
 told that the be-all and the end-all of government 
 is power! 
 
 Is it true that the State has no standard of 
 morality, except getting power? Is it true that 
 the State may do anything that conduces to its 
 power? That it may slaughter and despoil its 
 neighbor and should do so when the first oppor- 
 tunity comes? That small States have not the 
 same right to live as large ones ? Do we not feel 
 that these are doctrines that can be respectable 
 only in a den of thieves?
 
 318 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 COULD THE PEACE COURT ENFORCE ITS 
 JUDGMENTS? 
 
 The objection that has hitherto found most 
 popular acceptance is that the Arbitration Court 
 must have behind it an army to enforce its 
 judgments ; and that such army means war. 
 
 But that is not so, because such a Court would 
 be adjudicating in an unarmed world. 
 
 But people who use this argument, do not take 
 into account that under the conditions postulated 
 all countries would be disarmed, the International 
 Court alone maintaining a force strong enough to 
 enforce its judgments. Mallock holds that the 
 police force of such a Court must be an army 
 strong enough to cope with rebel nations. But 
 it is manifest that if disarmament were thorough 
 enough, there could never be any rebel nations in 
 arms. It is true that civil force must be the 
 sanction of every decree ; but civil force in a nation 
 never means civil war, though the police may have 
 to arrest a malefactor. 
 
 Under a World's Peace Court or Court of In- 
 ternational Judicature, great national battle fleets 
 and armies would be by law abolished. If any 
 one country should violate that law of disarma- 
 ment, it would be the interest as well as the duty 
 of all the rest of the world to reduce the refractory 
 nation to obedience. There being no great armed 
 nation to suppress, a comparatively small military 
 force under the command of the general Concerted 
 Peace Powers of the World would be efficient for 
 the insurance of obedience to the Court's decrees. 
 
 It is true that this war has brought out the 
 essential unity of human aspiration. Four con- 
 tinents have joined against this German tyrant. 
 Thus the whole world is interested in preventing 
 the recurrence of such a calamity; and there is 
 a general feeling throughout the world that the
 
 ARBITRATION AND WAR 319 
 
 causes which have brought it upon us must be 
 removed. 
 
 There is an almost universal declaration, which 
 even Germany, under the stress of military de- 
 feat now agrees to, that armaments must be re- 
 duced, that the baleful spirit of militarism must 
 be quenched, that the peoples must everywhere 
 be admitted to a fuller share in the control of 
 foreign policy, that efforts must be made to estab- 
 lish a sort of league of concord some system of 
 international relations and reciprocal peace alli- 
 ances by which the weaker nations may be pro- 
 tected, and under which differences between 
 nations may be adjusted by courts of arbitration 
 and conciliation of wider scope than those that 
 now exist. 
 
 As this is an important point we may dwell on 
 it a little. Be it remembered that all the bel- 
 ligerents now declare themselves in agreement 
 with a policy of world-disarmament. The Allies 
 came first to that decision. When America joined 
 in the war, President Wilson was emphatic that 
 Prussian militarism must be destroyed, and that 
 is to be done by national disarmament. 
 
 The reason for coming to that decision is that 
 Prussian militarism has been the creation of cen- 
 turies of persistent spoliation. It has been a 
 policy that never slept. It was held in abeyance 
 for only the briefest space by the Napoleonic re- 
 gime. The Prussian robber never died. 
 
 As Fritz stole Silesia from Austria, and after- 
 wards purloined a slice of Poland, so there fol- 
 lowed in due time the acquisition of slice after 
 slice of territory from all the neighbors. At one 
 time it was the theft of Schleswig and Holstein 
 from Denmark ; at another Alsace-Lorraine from 
 France. Along with these operations went on 
 the slow process of weaning independent German
 
 320 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 States from Austrian influence, and their federa- 
 tion under the Prussian King. 
 
 That is what Prussian militarism has always 
 meant German growth, increase of German 
 strength in the world. For this reason there is 
 to be a general disarmament. Nations are no 
 longer to be a law to themselves as to what forces 
 they maintain. 
 
 America has repeatedly acclaimed that doc- 
 trine as one of the necessary conditions of peace. 
 France and Italy have done the same in almost 
 identical terms. The Russian proclamation was 
 that "a new world-conflagration must be made 
 impossible," by rendering it beyond the power of 
 any State, or combination of States, to launch 
 upon humanity such a military cataclysm as that 
 of 1914. 
 
 Lloyd-George, speaking for Britain, was as 
 emphatic as any of the other Allies. He said 
 "Great Britain did not seek for intervention when 
 she was not prepared for the fight. She will 
 tolerate none now that she is prepared, until the 
 Prussian military despotism is broken beyond 
 repair." 
 
 In every case it is distinctly understood that 
 general disarmament is to be the central factor 
 of the future cosmopolitan polity. 
 
 As said previously, the Pope made this an essen- 
 tial item in his proposed peace conditions, and 
 Germany in reply assented to it. This is remark- 
 able because, before the war she had refused it 
 as being inconsistent with the sovereign rights of 
 the Fatherland. One of those rights, she said, 
 was that each nation's destiny must remain 
 strictly in its own keeping. The only question is 
 as to whether this means total or partial disarma- 
 ment. To break the Prussin military system be- 
 yond repair must mean total disarmament. 
 
 There are difficulties, of course, in any scheme
 
 ARBITRATION AND WAR 321 
 
 of peace. The first and greatest perhaps is as 
 to what should be the forces that are to be the 
 guarantee for carrying out the Peace Court's 
 decisions. What are such forces to consist of? 
 Who is to command them ? To what extent would 
 such a League insist on national disarmament? 
 Would most of the British navy have to be scrap- 
 ped? Would war air-craft, war submarines, save 
 those under the authority of the Peace League, be 
 forbidden ? 
 
 Those are details to be adjusted after the main 
 principles of thorough disarmament has been 
 affirmed. The nations are slowly coming to clear 
 perceptions of what they mean. The disarma- 
 ment all round must be real. Under it probably 
 nineteen-twentieths of the British fleet must go to 
 the scrap heap, and all the German navy. It cost 
 annually, before the war, 450,000,000 to main- 
 tain all the world's armaments on a peace footing. 
 That money must be saved, save a few odd mil- 
 lions. Are we nearing that time? 
 
 That is one of the' essential conditions in order 
 that the Peace League shall be able to enforce the 
 judgments of its Arbitration Court. 
 
 No NEED TO DREAD THE CHANGE. 
 
 Great reforms demand bold remedies. The 
 world will have to face them. If nations were 
 permitted to have armies, there would be con- 
 tinual grounds of suspicion and dispute. In the 
 early years of this century secret arming was 
 always going on. 
 
 In January, 1907, it was left to the Czar to call 
 a Peace Conference at the Hague, and to fix the 
 date of it. June was the time suitable to all the 
 powers; but there was a hitch about holding it
 
 322 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 because the Kaiser resolutely refused to take any 
 part in it if the policy of natioal disarmament were 
 placed on the agenda. 
 
 Three or four times in later years Great Britain 
 proposed a halt in the insane growth of naval 
 power ; but the same reply came always from Ger- 
 many. She must be free to follow her destiny. 
 This was a euphemism for preparing for "The 
 Day." 
 
 It seemed to her quite clear that "The Day" 
 had arrived in 1914. She stood ready both in the 
 East and the West for a lion's spring. She had 
 'caught her neighbors unawares. She had but to 
 gather the fruits of her long preparation to reap 
 the harvest of her plentiful sowing in strength. 
 
 But the Kaiser proposed, and God disposed 
 quite differently. William's Heavenly Ally was 
 not at one with him. Except in its initial stages, 
 that lion-spring failed to reach its mark. It is 
 now a half -spent force. A world in arms, a score 
 of millions strong, has arrested the invader. 
 
 But the world wants to get out of its armor, so 
 that there may be no invader. To that end the 
 call is for total disarmament. 
 
 To those who say that there must be war, as 
 there always has been, the man of faith points to 
 the Hebrew prophet, who foretold a time "in the 
 last days," when the followers of Christ "shall 
 heat their swords into ploughshares, and their 
 spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not lift 
 up sword against nation. Neither shall they learn 
 war any more." 
 
 Is that a saying too hard to be believed? 
 
 But in this war more than 60,000,000 people are 
 at present either bearing arms, making arms, or 
 carrying arms from the factory to the field. What 
 is to happen when such vast numbers of the most 
 virile of the earth's workers find their occupa-
 
 ARBITRATION AND WAR 323 
 
 tion gone? Such are the questions which men 
 put to one another. 
 
 But why should they find their occupation 
 gone? Why should not the millions who are now 
 fighting one another, turn their arms against the 
 ruggedness of the uncultivated fields ? There are 
 cities and hamlets and villages enough to be re- 
 built, vineyards to restore, orchards to replant, 
 canals to dig, deserts to reclaim, swamps to drain. 
 
 Why should not governments which can borrow 
 untold millions for war, borrow as freely for re- 
 habilitating the war-maimed earth ? May not the 
 sanity of peace have at least as much vigor in- 
 fused into it as heretofore the insanity of War 
 has had?
 
 XIV. 
 IRELAND AND THE WAR. 
 
 THE ONE BLOT IN THE EMPIRE. 
 
 There is so much to be said about Ireland and 
 the war. But how can we say it ? Or rather, where 
 can we begin? 
 
 There is in the picture so much of brightness; 
 there is so much of murky darkness; of bright 
 honor in the records of the Irish on the Somme; 
 of deep damnation and disgrace in the Sinn Fein 
 murders in the detestable rebellion of 1916 that 
 the judgment halts between admiration of the 
 brave and detestation of the treacherous. 
 
 There is something about Ireland at her best 
 which made Mr. Harold Begbie, in "The Lady 
 Next Door," chant paeans of delighted praise. 
 There is something in the Irish character at its 
 worst which nauseates by the blackness of its 
 treachery. 
 
 In this war Ireland has exhibited both sides of 
 her character. 
 
 We can never forget that unselfish life and 
 beautiful death which Major Willie Redmond 
 closed on the battle-field in France, saying that he 
 felt he served the cause of Ireland best in thus 
 serving the great Empire of which she is a part. 
 And we can never forget the pathetic death scenes 
 of his brother, the Nationalist leader, who died 
 with a heart broken by the ingratitude of the 
 people whom he had served. O'Connell had 
 lived and served and died in the same way. As 
 
 324
 
 IRELAND AND THE WAR 325 
 
 followers of a great leader, the Irish are probably 
 the most boisterously perfervid in the world, and 
 the most ungrateful and inconstant so soon as 
 their Joss is challenged by a rival with a new 
 programme. 
 
 O'Connell, with his policy of moral force, was 
 supplanted by the hot-brained Young Irelanders 
 with their ridiculous cabbage garden insurrec- 
 tion. The great leader was thrown over for 
 smaller fry, and he died in disappointment. 
 
 John Redmond, having devoted his life to con- 
 ciliating irreconcilable sections of his own 
 countrymen to the cause of Home Rule, and hav- 
 ing all but reached his goal, was deserted by Sinn 
 Fein rebels and fanatics, who wrecked his labors, 
 and he saw his country thrown back into a state 
 of violent chaos and bloody rebellion. He heard 
 himself denounced for being too slow, saw his 
 party disrupted, and died, as he told his confessor, 
 broken-hearted. That is the way Ireland treats 
 her most trusted leaders. She acclaims them 
 with the rabid fervor of fanaticism, and then 
 curses them with desertion and ingratitude. 
 
 It is now proved beyond all question that the 
 Dublin Rebellion of the Easter of 1916 was in- 
 spired by Sinn Fein and aided by German gold 
 and German counsel. It was exactly what the 
 late Archbishop Carr denounced it as being, "an 
 act of insane criminal folly." Its motive was to 
 help the German to embarrass England. It was 
 carrying out the maxim which has become em- 
 bodied in Irish insurrection that "England's 
 difficulty is Ireland's opportunity." 
 
 We heard the same polity advocated on an Irish 
 platform in Melbourne on the St. Patrick's Day 
 celebration of 1918, when a prelate said "Let 
 Ireland bide her time ! Let her watch her oppor- 
 tunity; and take it!" That, too, was a direct 
 incitement to the Sinn Fein-German plot, which,
 
 326 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 in the month of May, this year, has just been 
 revealed. Such conduct is directly antagonistic 
 to the spirit and teaching of the Catholic Church, 
 which enjoins obedience to "the powers that be," 
 since all power comes from God. Cardinal Mer- 
 cier, at page 60, of the "Voice of Belgium," is in- 
 sistent on this, saying "We have shown that to 
 resist any legitimate authority is to resist God." 
 The Sinn Fein rebels are offering that resistance, 
 and their sympathisers in Australia are in rebel- 
 lion against God. 
 
 We are accustomed to hear from the lips of 
 Sinn Fein advocates in Australia assurances that 
 Sinn Feiners are not disloyal, but are a perfectly 
 legitimate body of political thinkers. In spite 
 of the Dublin Rebellion of 1916, the plot for a 
 rising in 1917, and the recent revelations of 1918, 
 they say that Sinn Fein simply means "Our- 
 selves Alone," and that when applied to govern- 
 ment it is merely an autonomous form of Home 
 Rule. That, if true, would be a revolting act of 
 selfishness. In a world divided as ours is by 
 the warring forces of despotism and militarism 
 on one side, and freedom and the right of small 
 nations on the other, no people can cry, "Our- 
 selves Alone." Every man owes his loyalty to 
 the cause of liberty. 
 
 But that excuse for Sinn Fein is not true. It 
 is not a mere declaration of selfishness. It is a 
 movement, which in its very essence is treasonous 
 to the Empire. I shall quote the very text of a 
 Sinn Fein document to prove this. 
 
 In 1906 there was published by James Duffy & 
 Co. Ltd., and M. H. Gill & Son, of Dublin, a penny 
 pamphlet entitled "The Sinn Fein Policy." It is 
 an official proclamation of the organisation. It 
 embraces the report of the first annual convention 
 of the National Council, held in the Rotunda, on 
 Tuesday, 28th November, 1905. The policy, as
 
 IRELAND AND THE WAR 327 
 
 expounded in the speech of Mr Arthur Griffith, 
 one of those just recently arrested for complicity 
 in the Irish-German plot, and who was then the 
 official spokesman of the National Council, makes 
 it plain that an "anti-enlisting movement" was an 
 integral part of Sinn Fein. The following quota- 
 tions from that pamphlet speak for themselves 
 
 "The Irishman who joins the British army, the British 
 navy, the British Royal Irish Constabulary, necessarily 
 becomes from that moment the active enemy of his coun- 
 try. He has taken up arms against Ireland." 
 
 We see from this that Sinn Fein condemned the 
 late Major Redmond, and every one of the splen- 
 did Irish heroes of the Somme, as enemies of 
 Ireland. It also explains why Dr. Mannix so 
 persistently refused to go on any recruiting plat- 
 form in Australia. I quote again 
 
 "In Ireland we cannot reduce England to impotence by 
 cessation of labor; but we can seriously reduce her 
 strength by strikes of another kind strikes against using 
 her goods, for instance, and against filling the ranks of 
 her armed forces. In the latter direction, the ANTI- 
 ENLISTMENT MOVEMENT has done good; but a great 
 deal remains to be done." 
 
 Since that promulgation was made twelve years 
 ago, a great deal has been done. More than half 
 Ireland has declared itself against enlistment in 
 the Imperial armies. Almost the whole of Ire- 
 land has declared against Conscription. When 
 we remember that England, Scotland, and Wales 
 Labor and non-Labor alike have all accepted 
 Conscription, which they heartily disliked, as an 
 essential means of winning the war, this refusal 
 of Ireland to do her bit with the rest, proves the 
 essential disloyalty of Sinn Fein. 
 
 That attitude in Ireland of Sinn Feinism is 
 exactly on all fours with those here who 
 are persistently declaiming that Australia has 
 done her share and more than her share. 
 Sinn Fein is no new sentiment. It has
 
 328 WAK THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 been an Irish toast for many a year, like the Ger- 
 man toast of "The Day," and it has always had 
 a sort of oracular meaning associated with it. Its 
 esoteric significance meant setting up in Ireland 
 an authority for "Ourselves Alone." 
 
 There is a brainlessness about this Sinn Fein 
 treason that has always made it more a matter of 
 contempt than dread. Its votaries have been 
 almost invariably shallow-pated fanatics. But 
 the veriest noodle can set a conflagration going. 
 So these Sinn Feiners have combined the malig- 
 nity of wholesale murder with the folly of the 
 lunatic. 
 
 In Ireland they persecuted Redmond to his 
 death. In Australia they are a kind of scum on 
 the surface of our great honest Democracy. They 
 disfigure that surface with their mutinous and 
 riotous rant; they stir up racial bitterness where 
 there were harmony and peace; but they do not 
 reach the sound heart of the loyal Australian 
 people. 
 
 They have their little coteries and secret caves, 
 no doubt; but they are the contempt of every 
 truly loyal citizen who would see German despot- 
 ism beaten down and freedom and humanity 
 triumph. Reason has no power upon them. They 
 are alien to it. They do not want it. They 
 are moved by quite other impulses. They hate 
 England "with more than a German hatred, and 
 they would see her beaten to her knees. They 
 are racial fanatics an anachronism on a free 
 Democracy, which they inhabit only to abuse. 
 
 THE BRIGHTER SIDE OF IRELAND. 
 
 It is a matter of deep thankfulness that this 
 atrabiliary hatred of the Empire is not charac- 
 teristic of the saner class of Irishmen, such as
 
 IRELAND AND THE WAR 329 
 
 those who recognised the Redmond leadership. 
 Almost the entire Catholic Irish episcopacy is said 
 to be convinced of the "incoherency" of Sinn Fein. 
 The touching codicil in Major Redmond's will, 
 made in December, 1916, is a beautiful gem to 
 contrast against the foulness of Irish treason. 
 That codicil reads 
 
 "If I should die abroad, I will give my wife my last 
 thoughts and love, and ask her to pray that we may meet 
 hereafter. I should like all my friends in Ireland to 
 know that in joining the Irish Brigade and going to 
 France, I sincerely believe, as all the Irish soldiers do, 
 that I was doing what was best for the welfare of Ireland, 
 in every way." 
 
 He gave his life for the Empire, believing he 
 served Ireland thereby. He did not believe that 
 any man had done enough in this war till he had 
 done all he could dp. When strong oppression is 
 banded for the dominance of the world, the friends 
 of humanity should not disintegrate, but stand 
 together. This points to the highest form of 
 national well being. 
 
 As an example of this, I will quote another 
 Irishman, the Right Rev. Monsignor Cassidy, 
 Rector of Fall River College. He said 
 
 "I was nurtured in an atmosphere hostile to England. 
 I am sprung from the loins of a Fenian father, who was 
 taken in arms against the British Government. I was 
 nursed at a breast of as true an Irish mother as ever 
 came from the land of the shamrock. You American men 
 of all births for there are men of many bloods and births 
 bearing a grievance against England in your blind desire 
 for retribution, you forget that all must stand or fall 
 together. If England stands, we stand. If England 
 falls, we fall. Victory and honor, or defeat and dishonor, 
 shall come on all alike; and God forbid that there should 
 be any so low and base and blind as to wish to strike at 
 the heart of England through the soul of their own coun- 
 try. When men ask ye, what fight ye for, tell then in 
 tones that shall wake up the dead of the '87 I fight for 
 freedom's sake, for righteousness, for all my country's flag 
 has represented. I fight for peace, that justice may pre- 
 vail; that frightfulness and inhumanity may not possess 
 the earth. And if any one shall dare to ask you why
 
 you sacrifice all for your country's sake, tell them, in a 
 voice that will admit of no questioning I give all to her, 
 my country, because she has given all to me. After God, 
 she has given me my life. After God, she has protected 
 me. Her children that have come and gone before me 
 have withstood the summer's heat and the winter's cold; 
 and struggled and suffered and bled and died, that I 
 might be a free man. The right to worship God un- 
 trammeled she insured to them. She gave them all, 
 reserving nothing; and now, when she is in need and calls 
 to me, with all I have I quickly answer, 'Here.' That's a 
 soldier's answer to a slackers' 'Why?' '' 
 
 That is a noble utterance of a distinguished 
 Irishman, a son of the Catholic Church. How 
 true it rings as contrasted with the utterances of 
 some others who have cast a stain on that com- 
 munion. 
 
 I will adorn this page with another war state- 
 ment of a kindred nature. Cardinal John M. 
 Farley, Archbishop of New York, has earned an 
 eminence which none may question. He recently 
 granted an interview to an American journalist. 
 He said 
 
 "Every Catholic pulpit in America is ringing with 
 appeals from bishops and priests, demanding that the 
 people contribute to the utmost of their means to do the 
 war work at home and abroad. About 40 per cent, of the 
 American navy and 35 per cent, of the army are Catholics. 
 There will be no enduring peace except through the 
 victory of the United States and the Allies. I cannot see 
 how peace can come except through the defeat of the 
 German arms in the field, or the rejection of the Prussian 
 autocracy and the Prussian military policy by the people 
 of Germany themselves. The horrors of the war may 
 have an effect on the character of the people. Neverthe- 
 less, despite the possible hardening effect of war upon the 
 coming generation, there is the higher principle of inter- 
 national justice to be considered. We cannot permit 
 entire nations to be sacrificed to, or live in constant fear 
 of, a giant Colossus dreaming of world dominion. We 
 must oppose such ambition. Even the Gospel counsels it. 
 . . . The one cry now must be: Help America win the 
 war!" 
 
 One notes the hard common sense mingled with 
 patriotism, in that pronouncement. It gives com-
 
 IRELAND AND THE WAR 331 
 
 fort to Australian Catholics. At the end of 
 April, 1918, there was a similar speech made by 
 a Catholic Irishman at Perth, Western Australia. 
 Speaking at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Con- 
 eeption, the Very Rev. Chancellor Hallinan, is 
 reported in the "Western Australian," of April 
 26, to have said 
 
 "The inspired spirit and the soul that sent forth their 
 young men to the distant shores of Gallipoli was God. 
 They went forth to battle against a terrible injustice, an 
 injustice begun by the violation of the Kingdom of Bel- 
 gium and the tearing up of solemn treaties, a violation of 
 justice that had never since ceased. Many people seemed 
 to think that it was a war of commercialism. What was 
 commercialism to those fearless Australians, those men 
 of a blessed and God-favored country? It was a desecra- 
 tion of their memory to say that the war was one of 
 commercialism, or that the taint of commercialism should 
 attach for one single instant to any Australian soldiers 
 leaving these coasts. What of the heart and mind of 
 Anzac? They died in joy and without sorrow. They 
 died rejoicing that they had done their duty. They chose 
 to look upon their lives as only given for their fellowmen, 
 and for the honor and glory of God they would find it 
 eternally hereafter." 
 
 I turn finally to the pronouncement of an 
 English Catholic Bishop, with an Irish name. Dr. 
 Keating, Roman Catholic Bishop of Northampton, 
 reprobates the attempt to arouse an anti-Popery 
 campaign. The Irish bishops, he states, have 
 taken a grave step in regard to the Conscription 
 proposals, but it is exclusively their own action. 
 They have not consulted either the Vatican or the 
 British bishops. He hopes that Irish prelates 
 will yet find a way of diverting attention from 
 domestic troubles, and succeed in making avail- 
 able Ireland's resources to fight against the great- 
 est menace to the world's liberties. 
 
 Bishop Keating adds that he associates himself 
 with the terms of the following message, which 
 was telegraphed to Mr. Lloyd George recently 
 from a public meeting of Woolwich Arsenal
 
 332 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 workers: "The Germans want you to go, the 
 pacifists want you to go, but we, the workers, 
 don't want you to go. Your enemies are our 
 enemies. Damn them all ! God save England !" 
 
 IRELAND'S WRONGS WHAT ARE THEY? 
 
 While seated before my own fireside recently, 
 the conversation turned on the everlasting ques- 
 tion of Irish Home Rule. We were all of one 
 mind as to the expediency of self-government. 
 One gentleman incidentally remarked 
 
 "When Ireland gains her freedom, other things 
 will right themselves." 
 
 This was the signal for a notable dialectical 
 passage. He was asked 
 
 "What do you mean by Ireland gaining her 
 freedom?" 
 
 "I mean governing herself." 
 
 "Do you mean that England has not yet gained 
 her freedom, seeing that she has no more Home 
 Rule than Ireland has?" 
 
 "England has the House of Commons, her own 
 Parliament." 
 
 "But the House of Commons is no more Eng- 
 land's Parliament than Ireland's Parliament and 
 Scotland's Parliament, and Wales's Parliament." 
 
 The first speaker paused as if a new gleam of 
 light had broken in on him. Then he said 
 "England has much more strength in the House 
 of Commons than Ireland has." 
 
 The other answered "But not nearly as much 
 strength in proportion to her population. Ire- 
 land has thirty more members in the British Par- 
 liament than she is entitled to in proportion to 
 her numbers." 
 
 "At any rate," said the advocate of Irish free- 
 dom, "Ireland has not got self-government."
 
 IRELAND AND THE WAR 333 
 
 "In that you are in error," said the other. "She 
 has more of self-government, or representative 
 government, than either England, Scotland, or 
 Wales. If the State Parliaments in Australia 
 and the State Ministries, and the State Governors, 
 were to be abolished, and a simpler form of pro- 
 vincial government adopted, under the Federal 
 Parliament, would you say that Victoria had no 
 freedom?" 
 
 "No. I think not. I have sometimes wished 
 for something of that sort, because I think that 
 fourteen Houses of Parliament, and seven Gover- 
 nors for Australia make us ludicrous in over- 
 government." 
 
 "Well, t|$at is Ireland's case. If the Victorian 
 Parliament were abolished to-morrow, we should 
 be just as free as ever. The Federal Parliament 
 would transact all our big business, and the 
 Local Government system, enlarged a little with 
 bigger functions, would do the rest." 
 
 "Perhaps you are right as far as Australia is 
 concerned, but the same thing would not do for 
 Ireland," said the stickler for freedom. 
 
 "That may or may not be so," said the other. 
 "But the facts as they stand prove that Ireland 
 has now, and has had for half a century or more, 
 a measure of freedom equal to that of England or 
 any other part of the British Empire. To talk 
 about Ireland gaining her freedom is to talk slip- 
 shod nonsense. To speak of her lying 'enslaved 
 at the feet of England,' is to circulate a brazen 
 mendacity." 
 
 That conversation embodied a truth not always 
 remembered. The fact is that Ireland has a 
 great deal more freedom than any other part of 
 the United Kingdom, or any other part of the 
 Empire, except Australia. She is free from con- 
 scription. Very unjustly so. But there it is. 
 
 About the middle of May, 1918, the New York
 
 334 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 "Times," in a leading article, stated: "Ireland 
 runs over with prosperity, while England lives on 
 close rations. We have heard too much of the 
 wrongs of Ireland. For a generation England 
 has sought to confer benefits on Ireland and to 
 redress old injuries. Is England blamable for 
 the quarrel of Irishmen and for the abstention of 
 so many Irish from the war? Is seems to us un- 
 intelligible and monstrous." 
 
 That is a literal statement of fact. We may go 
 further and say that Ireland is the pampered 
 partner in the group. I will quote another from 
 Mr. Ian Hay's pamphlet, "The Oppressed Eng- 
 lish." At page 31 there is this eye-opener 
 
 "For generations the cry had gone up from Ireland that 
 Irish land was owned by great landlords of English 
 descent, who spent most of their time in London, and con- 
 fined their energies as lords of the manor to evicting such 
 of their tenants as could not, or would not, pay their rent. 
 This was obviously a very wrong state of affairs and 
 fifteen years ago a Unionist Government set out to put 
 it right. Parliament passed George Wyndham's Land 
 Purchase Act, the object of which was to enable the tenant 
 farmers of Ireland to buy their farms from the landlords. 
 The tenant was invited to state the sum which he could 
 afford to pay for his farm, and the landlord was invited 
 to state the sum he was prepared to accept. This was 
 indeed a gorgeous opportunity for both tenant and land- 
 lord. The two amounts, having been stated, were ad- 
 justed and comfirmed by a Board, and the intervening gap 
 no small gap as may be imagined was bridged by the 
 English taxpayer. This little experiment in philanthropy 
 cost the tyrannical English considerably more than five 
 hundred million dollars. Under its provisions every 
 English peasant is now his own proprietor. Evictions are 
 a thing of the past. Yet how often is this fact so much 
 as admitted by soulful exploiters of Erin's wrongs in 
 America or the Dominions?" 
 
 That is the way in which Ireland is "en- 
 slaved." She rolls in prosperity lavished on her 
 by her over-indulgent partners She is as much 
 self -governed as a representative system can make 
 her, bar a Parliament in College Green. She is
 
 IRELAND AND THE WAR 335 
 
 probably better off than any other small nation in 
 the world better off than England, Scotland, or 
 Wales. 
 
 But nothing softens the black bile of her 
 Sinn Feiner's national malignity towards Eng- 
 land. 
 
 A TRAIT OF IRISH CHARACTER. 
 
 It is a popular superstition that the Irish are a 
 very placable people, that it is necessary only to 
 treat the Irish with justice and kindness to bring 
 out in them all that is amiable. 
 
 The history of the assassinations and rebellions 
 of the last fifty years quite set that theory aside. 
 The House of Commons has exhausted its in- 
 genuity in devising legislation to satisfy the Irish 
 mind. Yet there is not the smallest Irish recog- 
 nition of this. The memory of the famine and 
 the evictions of a century ago fill the same space 
 as ever in the rhetoric of the demagogue. Crom- 
 well's deportations are still served up as fresh as 
 new paint, and form a part in the present day pic- 
 ture of "England grinding Ireland under her 
 heel," or as one demagogue chooses to phrase it 
 "Ireland lying enslaved at the feet of England." 
 
 Mr. Lloyd-George passed a Land Valuation Act 
 and a National Insurance scheme for the rest of 
 the United Kingdom; but he exempted Ireland 
 from both, because the Irish people were averse 
 to them. It was the same with the Military Ser- 
 vice Act. Mr. Ian Hay puts the case exactly 
 "Ireland was once more exempted. To the black 
 shame and grief of every true Irishman, Ireland 
 to-day stands officially aloof and alone in the 
 struggle for liberty and humanity. The thou- 
 sands of her gallant sons who are fighting in the 
 trenches alongside their English and Scottish and
 
 336 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Ulster comrades, find difficulty in filling up the 
 gaps in their ranks." 
 
 Ireland won't take her part in the crisis won't 
 do her bit. And when asked why, says she is 
 "enslaved." Scotland and England have had 
 their troubles in past centuries. So has it been 
 with Wales. But there is no black blood in those 
 cases. It is only with the brooding and unfor- 
 giving Irish, with whom no present kindness can 
 give oblivion of past wrongs. 
 
 John Bull, in his bluff, large-hearted way, has 
 poured out his bounty on Ireland. It has been 
 greedily mopped up, but it has made no difference 
 to the implacable Irish nursing past grievances. 
 Because Cromwell two and a half centuries since 
 took a drastic course in repressing rebellion, the 
 Irishman of to-day feels he has a sacred mission 
 to exhort Ireland to "bide her time ; to watch her 
 opportunity, and take it." 
 
 There is but one way of dealing with people of 
 that sort. Firmness, justice, and repression. 
 Kindness is mistaken and wasted.
 
 XV. 
 THE WORLD AFTER THE WAR. 
 
 SOME MINOR CHANGES. 
 
 No man can judge from what the world has 
 been, what it will be after the war. There are so 
 many things which must be radically changed. 
 For one, we shall have spent 30,000,000,000 in 
 destroying property, worth nearly as much again. 
 The world will be therefore poorer in material 
 good things which men desire by perhaps 
 50,000,000,000 in value. 
 
 The employments of people have been changed. 
 Ships are built to standards. Ordinary indus- 
 tries have ceased, and factories everywhere have 
 been turned info munition shops. Cities have been 
 levelled ; villages have been blotted out ; vineyards 
 uprooted. 
 
 Sixty millions of men or more under arms, or 
 making arms, will have had to change their occu- 
 pations. 
 
 As things are now, men are working probably 
 as hard as ever perhaps much harder; but in- 
 stead of working for profit, they are laboring for 
 destruction. Women are doing men's work in 
 both field and factory. The readjustments may 
 never get back entirely to normal conditions. 
 
 Then again the war has ruined many avoca- 
 tions, and has brought vast profits to others 
 beggary here, affluence there. The policy of pay- 
 ing special war-profits taxation has been adopted 
 in most countries as a legitimate means of equal- 
 
 337
 
 338 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 ising the burdens of the war. And at its close 
 further legislation is quite conceivable in further- 
 ance of that end. 
 
 But even when all that shall have been accom- 
 plished, and when those who survive the carnage 
 shall return to their places in the community, it 
 can scarcely be to anything like the same world 
 which they left. 
 
 The Russian, in place of living under a despotic 
 Czar, will find himself in a Democracy in which 
 he is politically the equal of every other of his 
 countrymen. He will hardy know himself. In 
 fact he has already lost himself. And it must 
 require much before he finds himself again. 
 
 The Allies have given mutual pledges that there 
 shall be no peace till Hohenzollernism is over- 
 thrown. Great armaments are to cease. The 
 armies and navies of the earth, which in pre-war 
 days cost in maintenance 450,000,000 a year, are 
 to be cut down to a few millions. That huge sav- 
 ing will go to the restoration of the desolated 
 globe ; but the soldier and warship sailor will find 
 his occupation gone. 
 
 DEBT DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 Civilisation will stagger under a war debt of 
 perhaps 50,000,000,000. The annual interest on 
 that may reach to 2,500,000,000. It becomes a 
 question as to whether the Have-nots will consent 
 to permanently pay that huge sums to the Haves. 
 It is almost certain that in some places there will 
 be proposals for repudiating the scraps of paper 
 which make these burdens a bond on posterity. 
 We have already heard it made in Australia. As 
 the whole nation will owe the money to a small 
 portion of itself, the temptation to wipe clean
 
 THE WORLD AFTER THE WAR 339 
 
 the national slate may become almost irresistible, 
 and where national honesty prevails, Taxation of 
 income may blot out more than half of every un- 
 earned income. 
 
 There will be mammoth questions to settle. 
 Even in the very start of the new peace there 
 will be the gradual transfer of 40,000,000 men 
 and women from the avocations of war to those of 
 peace. 
 
 There will be the restoration of the world's war- 
 wasted wilderness; perhaps the readjustment of 
 society on a new standard of living, adaptable to 
 the diminished means of the people. The reign of 
 unbridled luxury may be suppressed for a whole 
 generation. Should that eventuate it would make 
 an enormous change in the habits and thoughts of 
 mankind. 
 
 THE COST OF WAR. 
 
 Before this war it was estimated that in three 
 centuries Great Britain spent 1,400,000,000 in 
 war. Four years of this war have cost her 
 6,0000,000,000, or more than four times as much 
 in a year as in a century previously. The Crimean 
 War cost her altogether not more than 
 70,000,000; the Boer War 250,000,000. The 
 cost is always going up, but not the mortality. 
 Camille Flammarion estimated that the cost of 
 killing every soldier who dies in battle was 1400. 
 Assuming that the number of men killed in battle 
 in this war may be 4,000,000, apart from those 
 wounded and taken prisoner, the cost of killing 
 that four millions has been excessive beyond all 
 previous experience. We may get an approxi- 
 mate estimate by remembering that the war will 
 have cost at least 55,000,000,000. Dividing that 
 total cost by the number of soldiers killed, the
 
 340 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 expenditure will work out about 17,000 for every 
 man slain. 
 
 This consideration, as we shall see, will have a 
 bearing upon the future of the world. It has 
 always cost a great deal to kill a soldier in war. 
 The continually increasing and multiplying taxes 
 of all nations are never sufficient to pay for the 
 butchery of human troops. The nations have 
 always had to go into debt for that slaughter. For 
 many years, before this war, Europe spent 
 450,000,000 a year in preparing for the means 
 of shedding her children's blood. The War of 
 Secession in America cost 3,200,000,000. 
 
 From the Crimean War down to the Franco- 
 German War of 1870, the civilised nations of 
 Europe and America spent 4,000,000,000 in de- 
 stroying one another. But all that pales into 
 insignificance before the appalling expenditure 
 in this war. What that has been may be gath- 
 ered from the sudden jump in the world's in- 
 debtedness. 
 
 The public debts of the Great Powers in 1870 
 were 4,000,000,000. Thirty years later at the 
 end of the century, they were 6,000,000,000, an 
 increase of 50 per cent. In 1917 they were not 
 less than 30,000,000,000, an increase of 500 per 
 cent. They may now stand at 40,000,000,000. 
 
 In the hundred years of the nineteenth century 
 the total war cost was about 28,000,000,000, as 
 estimated by Camille Flammarion. In the four 
 years of this war, adding war taxation to the in- 
 crease of loan indebtedness, the cost has been 
 more than 40,000,000,000. In four years the 
 cost has been once and a half as much as the war 
 cost of the previous century. This gives us a 
 grip of what modern war means. 
 
 A survey of the Powers of Europe shows that 
 from the beginning of last century to the end of 
 1896 Turkey had experienced 37 years of war
 
 THE WORLD AFTER THE WAR 341 
 
 and 59 of peace; Spain comes next with 31 years 
 of war and 65 of peace ; France, with 27 years of 
 war and 69 of peace ; Russia, 24 years of war and 
 72 of peace ; Italy 23 years of war and 73 of peace ; 
 England, 21 years of war and 75 of peace; Aus- 
 tria-Hungary, 17 and 79; Germany (exclusive of 
 Prussia) , 13 and 83 ; Sweden, 10 and 86 ; Portugal, 
 12 and 84; and Denmark, 9 and 87. 
 
 In the Franco-Prussian war the number of 
 German killed and wounded was not more than 
 80,000. In this they are estimated, after 47 
 months at 5,000,000. 
 
 General statistics prove at the same time that, 
 since the Trojan war 3000 years ago that is, 
 since the beginning of history not a single year 
 has elapsed in which some war has not killed its 
 proportionate number. 
 
 During the 30 centuries which have elapsed 
 since the beginning of Asiatic and European his- 
 tory since the time of Sesostris and David, of 
 Xerxes and Cyrus a loss of 40,000,000 a cen- 
 tury makes the total number destroyed by war 
 to be 1,200,000,000 a number very nearly repre- 
 senting the total population of the globe at the 
 present day. 
 
 Thus, in the last 3000 years, in the wars of 
 the Pharaohs, in the Mongolian and Chinese in- 
 vasions and the conquests of Alexander, &c., &c., 
 as many human beings as now inhabit the globe 
 have been slain, very often while singing canticles 
 to their gods or drawing strains of joyful music 
 from their instruments. 
 
 The monetary aspect of the war is quite as im- 
 portant as its mortality in its bearing on the 
 future of the world. This is so because the length 
 of the national purse has quite as much to do 
 with achieving victory as has the keenness of the 
 national sword. The longest purse makes the 
 strongest army. But for Great Britain's almost
 
 342 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 limitless command of cash and credit, she could 
 not have improvised her five millions of soldiers 
 and backed them with tens of thousands of can- 
 nons and countless millions of shells. 
 
 SOCIAL AND POLITICAL CHANGES. 
 
 In order to pay our debts and begin national life 
 again under fairer auspices, many of the pro- 
 blems between Capital and Labor may force them- 
 selves to a settlement under new ideals. Many 
 are venturing the opinion that the wage system as 
 we know it will disappear in favor of some sort of 
 partnership, or co-operation, or division of profits, 
 such as will give employes a voice in the manage- 
 ment of the industries upon which their living de- 
 pends. 
 
 All these speculations are nothing more at pre- 
 sent than mere vaticinations. But they are an 
 expression of the universal unsettlement of opinion 
 on industrial matters. 
 
 Any one of us may be pardoned for wondering 
 as to how much truth there is in them. Every- 
 body is saying that things are to be different after 
 the war. Everybody seems to think so. If so, 
 how is the difference to come about? Are we 
 ourselves to undergo change corresponding to the 
 mutations of our environments ? Are we to view 
 social obligations from a new angle of vision? 
 
 Does all this signify that the world will have to 
 begin life again under a new set of conditions? 
 If so, what conditions? And how are we to adapt 
 ourselves to them? 
 
 Early in 1917 Mr. Bonar Law expressed his 
 wonder that in Great Britain, under the stress of 
 war, the traditional party spirit in politics had 
 disappeared. He predicted that, as one of the
 
 THE WORLD AFTER THE WAR 343 
 
 results of the great war, there would come in the 
 future a fairer distribution of wealth. 
 
 Many people indeed, in view of the spontaneity 
 with which Britons flocked to the ranks of both 
 fighting men and munition-makers, conceived that 
 an era of idyllic national brotherhood had set in 
 for good. They told us that it gave more than a 
 glimpse of Burns's prophecy, that 
 
 It's coming yet, for all that, 
 That man to man the warld o'er 
 Shall brithers be and a' that. 
 
 Time was, after the wars of former days, that 
 Waterloo and Balaclava heroes went back into the 
 industrial ranks, and drifted down, unmarked of 
 everybody, into penury and an unhonored death. 
 
 That time is not to come again. The men and 
 women who have carried aloft our flag in this 
 national crisis whatever of other gifts they may 
 have or lack will stand a-tiptoe through the 
 rest of their lives in the consciousness that they 
 bear the badge of a patriot's nobility. A recog- 
 nition of their claims is a charge on all. 
 
 How are our obligations to be met? That will 
 be one of our greatest tasks after the war. The 
 war problems have been prodigious. The peace 
 problems will be scarcely of lesser magnitude. 
 How will these problems be faced? 
 
 There are those who say that since the party 
 hatchet has been buried, we should see to it that 
 it shall have no resurrection. 
 
 But that would be a post-w r ar change of very 
 doubtful character. Why should we think of 
 abolishing party? Party organisations are the 
 cradle of political activity. They stimulate 
 thought ; they are the forbears of progress. Pro- 
 gressive legislation can scarcely be looked for 
 except through the competition of rival parties.
 
 344 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Out of them evolution is born. Just as the fric- 
 tion of thought with thought evokes the best of 
 mental activity, so the conflict of parties is the 
 very salt of national development. 
 
 There is nothing but what is encouraging to 
 be spoken of political parties. The greater the 
 number the more virile the State, because parties 
 stand for principles. 
 
 This advocacy of party activity as a post-war 
 principle does not embrace Party Government, 
 which is not the use but the abuse of the Party 
 system. A government, in order to be at its 
 best should be stable. It cannot be stable if it 
 depends for its life on the dominance of one party 
 over all others. It should stand above all parties 
 and embrace most of them, being selected by ballot 
 to represent not one half of Parliament, but the 
 whole of it, as is the case with the War-Govern- 
 ment in the House of Commons. 
 
 This may be one of the lessons taught by the 
 war. The war taught Great Britain that a Party 
 Government was not strong enough to develop 
 the full national strength in the prosecution of 
 the war. It may teach her that the full national 
 strength is just as much wanted in peace as in 
 war. 
 
 If the war should have the effect of abolishing 
 party government, by teaching the almost self- 
 evident truth that every democratic system of 
 government requires the collective wisdom of the 
 whole Parliament and not the emasculated notions 
 of one half, that reform will be of truly priceless 
 value. 
 
 THE NEW DEMOCRACY OF THE WORLD. 
 
 There is room for another hope. There are 
 45,000,000 of people in the British isles. In many
 
 THE WORLD AFTER THE WAR 345 
 
 cases, perhaps half of them, their war sacrifices 
 have been prodigous. They have given their 
 lives and their money as never before for the life 
 and freedom of the nation. They will have spent 
 much of their best blood, and haply 7,000,000,000 
 or 8,000,000,000 of solid gold for their mutual 
 protection against the ravening wolf of mili- 
 tarism. Is it not permissible to hope that people 
 who have been comrades in such a war will come 
 out of it with clarified perceptions of human 
 worthiness, and with more tolerant judgment of 
 one another? 
 
 I try to think so ; and my native optimism helps 
 me to believe it. There may, too, after the war, 
 be more of the democratic spirit abroad all 
 over the earth ; and especially in Russia and Great 
 Britain. The old order of Gentry may lose some- 
 thing of its class privilege; but only that the 
 quality of its manhod may shine out more con- 
 spicuously. In the rough and tumble of the battle 
 field and the trench the duke's son and the cook's 
 son gave common service, and vied with each other 
 for the order of merit. Rank was there shown to 
 be but the guinea's stamp. The man behind the 
 title was the only gold. 
 
 The British taxpayer is only at the beginning of 
 his task; but his courage in facing it has been 
 equal to that of the best of those who stormed 
 Vimy Ridge and Messines. As? a shoveller out 
 of the shekels he never before knew his own 
 strength. He has paid 300,000,000 a year in 
 extra war taxation, and has scarcely indulged in 
 his proverbial grumble. He has played one of 
 the most wonderful parts in the wonderful British 
 war story. 
 
 When Germany made the mistake of setting 
 down the Briton as a played out degenerate, as 
 Prince Lichnowsky reported of her to the Kaiser, 
 she did not dream that those British revellers in
 
 346 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 luxury were ready almost to a man to instantly 
 cast aside the triflings of a life of pleasure and 
 give out every ounce of service within them in the 
 national cause. 
 
 What these men will think and say when Peace 
 comes may not be very manifest; but people who 
 have proved themselves true metal in the ex- 
 tremity of need, with a giant's strength and de- 
 termination, are not likely to subside into weak- 
 ness when the day comes for national resusci- 
 tation. 
 
 The British democracy has a proud sense that 
 it is pitted against a military autocracy. When it 
 shall have won the conflict and set Europe free, 
 it will almost certainly insist on holding the reins 
 of government. 
 
 Woman will have come into her own in this 
 triumph of Democracy. There will be much to 
 learn, but keen minds to learn it. The past can 
 teach little only what to avoid. But the war 
 has given to all classes a greater respect for the 
 good that is in all. It has shown that the upper and 
 lower strata of society are in essentials compacted 
 of much the same clay, and never of finer texture 
 than now. It has shown also that the pride and 
 charter of a great race can win at Armageddon 
 against the dragon of a federated military 
 tyranny. 
 
 President Wilson recently called on school 
 teachers in the United States to devote more time 
 to problems of national life, emphasising that the 
 war is inculcating a new appreciation of the 
 aspects of life and a deeper understanding of the 
 aims and meaning of democracy. "When the war 
 is over," he adds, "we must apply our acquired 
 wisdom to purging the world's life."
 
 THE WORLD AFTER THE WAR 347 
 
 DRINKING HABITS OF THE FUTURE. 
 
 After the war will the drouthy old earth ever 
 drink strong drink again as much as it used to 
 do? To a marvellous extent it has purged out 
 the alcoholic taint. Will it continue to maintain 
 the abolition of the poison ? 
 
 The alcoholic habit is one which the war has 
 interfered with perhaps more than any other. The 
 Grand Duke Nicholas was the first to start the 
 campaign against it, when in 1914 he reported 
 to the late Czar that vodka was an enemy in 
 Russia more dangerous than the German. 
 
 In 1895 the Russian Government made vodka a 
 Government monopoly. At that time there were 
 100,000 drink shops in Russia, making the peasant 
 brutal. When the Government monopoly began 
 all those private drink shops were closed. 
 
 But that did nothing to diminish drunkenness. 
 The Government sold the drink by the bottle. 
 The peasants took it home, and the total amount 
 consumed was as great as before. The differ- 
 ence was that the drunkenness was in the home 
 instead of in the vodka shop. 
 
 It is on official record that a million Russians 
 died every year from the vodka poison. The 
 Government made a revenue profit of 100,000,000 
 in 1913 from this drink traffic. 
 
 Russia was in the war. She wanted all that 
 money; but still more she wanted soldiers fit to 
 fight an enemy. She took her courage in both 
 hands, and by a single stroke of the Czar's pen 
 she stopped the sale of vodka, and Russia became 
 a non-alcoholic country, and every peasant was 
 better fed, clothed, and housed fitter for duty. 
 She has since got drunk with her new-found 
 freedom. But she will get sober again some day, 
 perhaps to have a bad national headache. 
 
 France was another case. Before the war the 

 
 348 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 Frenchman stood in deadly peril from the curse 
 of absinthe. Sober France was fast becoming 
 drunken. Early in the war the French Govern- 
 ment cut off absinthe as Nicholas had cut off 
 vodka. Under medical advice the use of light 
 wines was permitted, and the French soldier in 
 the trenches was allowed daily 20 grams of 
 alcohol in a daily "tot" of rum. The reform was 
 instant; its effect was almost miraculous in the 
 increase of the French soldier's fighting powers, 
 which have been one of the marvels of the war. 
 
 In England the changes were less dramatic, 
 but almost as marked. They are certainly such 
 as have braced up the national character. The 
 note had been struck by Mr. Lloyd-George in 1915. 
 He said 
 
 "We are fighting Germany, Austria, and Drink ; 
 and as far as I can see the greatest of these deadly 
 foes is Drink. If we are to settle with German 
 militarism, we must first of all settle with Drink." 
 
 But England was not Russia. There was no 
 despotic Czar to issue a ukase. The drink in- 
 terests were powerful. The Asquith Government 
 was feeble in the presence of class interests. Yet 
 England needed every man's full work in growing 
 wheat and in making munitions. A hundred 
 thousand yeomen were taken out of the fields and 
 drafted into the fighting ranks. Thirty thou- 
 sand women were sent upon the farms to take the 
 men's places. Drink must go to a great extent 
 in order to increase the average output of the 
 workers. In 1917 the Government, by Minis- 
 terial act, restricted the sale of wines and spirit 
 in bond, and forbad the brewing of beer to the 
 extent of 30 per cent. This was under the power 
 of the War Precautions Act. The Government 
 cut down England's drink bill by one half, and 
 said that should it become expedient drinking
 
 THE WORLD AFTER THE WAR 349 
 
 would be as completely stopped as it had been in 
 Russia. 
 
 The English people exhibited an admirable 
 patience. There was scarce a whimper; while 
 many, in a spirit of voluntary sacrifice, abolished 
 drink from their homes, as the King had pre- 
 viously done. A large body of public opinion 
 ripened toward prohibition. The Conservative 
 "Spectator" called for a policy of "Down Glasses." 
 
 There was a splendid sanity in the people. They 
 said 
 
 "Sixty-five million bushels of grain are every 
 year being turned into beer ; while 360,000,000 Ibs. 
 of sugar are used every year by the liquor trade. 
 Then 3,000,000 acres of arable land are devoted 
 to the growth of foodstuffs to be converted into 
 alcoholic liquor. These acres would grow enough 
 wheat to keep the whole of London supplied all 
 the year round." 
 
 Arguments like these are cogent when there is 
 prospect of the shortage of food. The bread- 
 eaters, paying a shilling a loaf, had it shown to 
 them that the brewer's van stood between them 
 and the bread carts. The cry came pretty 
 strong, "Send the brewing men to do the fighting." 
 
 Those were crises in which character was 
 evolved. The British people came out sterling 
 gold. This, too, must be a great factor in the 
 sum of things in the days after the war. 
 
 SELF-GOVERNMENT IN THE FUTURE. 
 
 Then we have to recollect that the world will be 
 the inheritor of this war's wonderful experiences. 
 At the present moment it is divided into two sec- 
 tions. The belligerents and neutrals who favor 
 the Allies and the belligerents who stand with the
 
 350 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 They may be classified as fol- 
 
 WITH THE HUNS. 
 Germany, 
 Austria-Hungary, 
 Bulgaria, 
 Turkey. 
 
 Central Powers, 
 low: 
 
 WITH THE ALLIES. 
 
 Great Britain, 
 
 France, 
 
 United States, 
 
 Italy, 
 
 Japan, 
 
 Russia, 
 
 Belgium, 
 
 Servia, 
 
 Montenegro, 
 
 Rumania, 
 
 India, 
 
 Australia, 
 
 New Zealand, 
 
 Canada, 
 
 South Africa, 
 
 Greece, 
 
 Portugal, 
 
 Cuba, 
 
 Bolivia, 
 
 China, 
 
 Nicaragua, 
 
 Honduras, 
 
 Paraguay, 
 
 Liberia, 
 
 Brazil, 
 
 Argentina, 
 
 Peru, 
 
 Uruguay. 
 
 If we turn to the few nations which have man- 
 aged to maintain their neutrality, we find that 
 they are almost entirely hostile to Germany, be- 
 cause of the brutal treatment which their sailors 
 and ships have received. Denmark, Sweden, Nor- 
 way, Spain, and Switzerland have their hearts set 
 on the overthrow of Germany, because of her 
 domineering and imperious tyranny as a neighbor.
 
 THE WORLD AFTER THE WAR 351 
 
 After the war all those two dozen and odd self- 
 governing nations and dependencies will have a 
 free voice in a free world. Is it likely that any 
 of them will ever again have on the world the 
 same outlook which they had before? We can 
 hardly suppose so. 
 
 In the first place, they will nearly all be deeply 
 in debt. Does a man deeply involved in mort- 
 gages ever act and think quite the same as the 
 man who has a plethoric banking credit? In 
 this respect the individual and the nation are 
 equally liable to feel their monetary obligations 
 exercising a steadying effect upon them. 
 
 In the past the world has known all kinds of 
 governments the rule of patriarchs, priests, 
 autocracies, democracies, and monarchies. Three- 
 fourths of the governments have been those of 
 kings. The republics of the ancients were not 
 a very blazing success. The people require to 
 have emerged from primitivism before they are 
 ripe for self-government. 
 
 In the future, Aristocracies, Oligarchies, and 
 Autocracies will have disappeared, and all nations 
 will have settled down into Republics or Limited 
 Monarchies. What is still more pertinent is 
 that Democracy will in some form or other have 
 covered the whole earth, as it does even now a 
 nine-tenths of it. 
 
 But we may go a great deal further and say, 
 with a great chance of the future verifying the 
 prediction, that the Democracy of the coming 
 time will no longer be content with Parliamentary 
 Government, which has of late years proved little 
 more than a nullification of the popular will. 
 
 As the people become more educated in the root 
 principle of Democracy, they grow less satisfied 
 with their Parliaments, which constantly fail to 
 carry out the decrees given at the elections. 
 
 From this cause there has arisen in many lands
 
 352 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 an insistent demand for some form of the Referen- 
 dum which, as in Switzerland, enables the people 
 by a direct vote to demand and decide upon their 
 own policy. A Democracy, plus the Initiative 
 Referendum, is the most progressive form of 
 government known to man, and in the next 
 quarter of a century it is likely to be the prevalent 
 form of government in the world. 
 
 Am TRAVEL THE TRANSPORT OF THE FUTURE. 
 
 There will be other differences in man's en- 
 vironments. For one thing, air navigation has 
 made tremendous strides. It promises to revo- 
 lutionise transport. There are no national 
 boundaries in the air, and that may modify the 
 importance of those on land. Men can now 
 traverse a thousand miles through the clouds in 
 a day. With the dawn of peace travel will assume 
 a new aspect. The wireless message will con- 
 nect the man at the South Pole with the inhabi- 
 tant of the Tropics. All the earth will be within 
 whispering distance; and we may be sure that 
 the whispers will never cease. The hustling and 
 bustling are likely to be greater than ever, with 
 the wear and tear of humanity correspondingly 
 increased. 
 
 The globe will really be a mammoth sounding- 
 board. The private chat of two men at Tim- 
 buctoo may next morning form a subject of gossip 
 over five continents. Certainly the aeroplane 
 will make the old world a new one in many 
 respects. 
 
 The war has doubtless been the chief stimulus 
 to this cloud travel. The aeroplane before the 
 war was an ingenious and captivating toy. In 
 twelve months it became the means of striking
 
 THE WORLD AFTER THE WAR 353 
 
 deadly blows out of the sky, like God's thunder- 
 bolts. The concentrated force of human in- 
 genuity was focused upon flying, and all at once, 
 as it were, men have become almost as much at 
 home in the air as they are on the water and the 
 land. 
 
 THE MODIFICATION OF MAN. 
 
 Perhaps the question of greatest moment is not 
 these evolutionary and revolutionary changes 
 not the fall of the Hun Autocracy and the rise of a 
 World-Democracy but will human nature con- 
 tinue as now drugged with the dross of its own 
 selfishness ? Will not the fires of the war-furnace 
 have purged it of its worst grossness? Can the 
 nations which have seen all this abomination of 
 desolation in earth, sky, and $ea, remain unchas- 
 tened by the suffering from it? A belief in 
 such would scarcely be a wise one. In trying to 
 estimate what this world would be like after the 
 war, it would be anything but scientific to omit 
 the Fatherhood of God as a vital factor. 
 
 In our essay on "God and the War," it was 
 shown that the Divine finger plays on the key- 
 board of events so minutely that nothing occurs 
 but by Celestial direction. This war was there- 
 fore a part of the Divine economy. It had a 
 definite purpose, part of which was to punish sin 
 and purge humanity. If that be so, we may 
 fairly hope that man will not remain unchanged 
 in a changed world ; that he will correspond with 
 higher and better motives; live for purer ideals; 
 and being drawn nearer to the source of All Good, 
 find his happiness and inspiration in a spirituality 
 more sublime than was that of the cast-off coil of 
 his past selfishness. 
 
 It is not suggested that human nature per se is
 
 354 WAR THINGS THAT MATTER 
 
 at all likely to undergo any change. The raw 
 material of man is the same yesterday, to-day, and 
 3,000 years ago. But the spiritual man and the 
 unspiritual man are moved by different impulses ; 
 and it is not making an undue demand upon our 
 hopeful expectations that men after the war may 
 regard their duties to one another and to the 
 State from a loftier plane than that which was 
 too common before greed and ambition plunged 
 them into the seething vortex in which they now 
 writhe and struggle. 
 
 This is a beautiful world if men would only 
 permit it to bloom after the plan of the Creator 
 
 Strange, that where nature loved to trace 
 As if for gods a dwelling place, 
 There man, enamored of distress, 
 Should mar it into wilderness. 
 
 Yet it is so. The gods make our passions our 
 plagues. 
 
 What might be done if men were wise ! 
 
 What glorious deeds, my suffering brother! 
 Would men unite in love and right 
 
 And cease their scorn for one another. 
 
 Oppression's heart might be imbued 
 
 With kindling drops of loving kindness, 
 
 And knowledge pour from shore to shore 
 Light on the eyes of mental blindness. 
 
 All slavery, warfare, lies, and wrongs, 
 All vice and crime might die together; 
 
 And wine and corn, to each man born, 
 Be free as warmth in summer weather.
 
 THE WORLD AFTER THE WAR 355 
 
 The meanest wretch that ever trod ; 
 
 The deepest sunk in guilt and sorrow, 
 Might stand erect in self-respect, 
 
 And share this teeming world to-morrow. 
 
 What might be done? This might be done ; 
 
 And more than this, my suffering brother 
 More than the tongue e'er said or sung 
 
 If men were wise and loved each other.
 
 INDEX 
 
 America and Democracy 
 
 269-275 
 
 American Opinion . . . . 41-6 
 America and England ... 80 
 America and the War, 103-125 
 America and the Pope . . 294 
 
 Arbitration 307-323 
 
 Atrocities (See Brutalities). 
 
 Attila 280 
 
 Australia 84-88 
 
 Australian War Strike . . 239 
 Australian War Strike, Trea- 
 son of 240 
 
 Autocracy 251 
 
 Belligerents 350 
 
 Bernhardi 7, 9 
 
 Bismark 1, 3, 285 
 
 Brutalities 4, 37-41 
 
 Bryan, W. J 107, 111 
 
 Bryce, Lord . . 39, 48, 131, 134 
 Bull, John (See John Bull). 
 
 Catholic Church and Demo- 
 cracy 263 
 
 Chance 57, 61 
 
 Christian Ethics . . ..... 26-8 
 
 Conscription . . . . 90, 183-204 
 
 Consolation 127-155 
 
 Courage 156-182 
 
 Courage of Women, 173-4, 179 
 
 Courtney, Leonard 16 
 
 Cramb 7 
 
 Czar Nicholas . . 307 
 
 David and Goliath . . 159-162 
 Debts of the War .. .. 338 
 Democracy and the War . . 247 
 
 Disarmament 10-14 
 
 Drink Traffic 347-8 
 
 Dwyer, Sergeant 152 
 
 English-speaking Races . . 141 
 English, the Oppressed . . 334 
 Ethics of War . . . . .' . 24-28 
 Ethics of Conscription . . 200 
 
 Carnegie, Mr 108 
 
 Carr, Archbishop . . 51, 54, 57 
 Caesidy, Monsignor . . . . 329 
 
 Farley, Cardinal 330 
 
 Failures of Democracy . . 255 
 
 357
 
 358 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Fighting, Love of . . . . 234 
 
 Finance 75-7 
 
 France, Compensation to 
 
 129, 136-138 
 
 Genesis of the War 
 
 11, 37, 108-111 
 
 Germany and the War . . 1 
 German Prosperity . . . 14-20 
 
 German Ethics 24-6 
 
 Gladstone on Democracy 
 
 248, 250 
 
 God and the War .... 50-68 
 Great Britain . 69-102, 138-141 
 Grey, Sir. Ed. . . 11, 28, 30, 35 
 
 Haase, Ilerr 31 
 
 Hallinan, Very Rev 331 
 
 Harden, Herr 5, 6 
 
 Hatred 25, 99-102, 126 
 
 Heydon, AJ r. Justice . . . . 240 
 Higgins, Mr. Justice . . . . 230 
 Hughes, W. M 212 
 
 Inquisition 305 
 
 Ireland and the War . . . . 324 
 Ireland and her . Army . . 333 
 Irish on the Somme . . 149 
 
 Kircher, Father 58 
 
 Kitchener, Lord 71 
 
 Labor aiid the War . . 205-218 
 
 Lambert, Father 60 
 
 Lehen, Father de 64-5 
 
 Leo XIII 263, 287, 298 
 
 Liberty 199 
 
 Lies, Campaign of . . . . 107 
 
 Lincoln, Abraham 45 
 
 Lloyd-George 73, 93 
 
 Love, Song of 101 
 
 Lusitania 25, 39 
 
 M 
 
 Macaulay 278 
 
 Man Modified 353 
 
 Masses 279 
 
 McKenna, Rev. L. 
 
 220-2, 227-230 
 Mercier, Cardinal 
 
 29, 38, 40 67, 300-3 
 
 N 
 
 Napoleon 284 
 
 Nietzsche 6, 7 
 
 O 'Leary, Michael, V.C. . . 151 
 
 Job 63-4 
 
 John Bull .. 94-98, 100, 336 
 
 Kaiser 1-4, 11, 33, 34 
 
 Keating, Bishop 331 
 
 Paganism 5, 6, 24, 130 
 
 Panics 164-169 
 
 Parliaments, One Danger of 
 252, 351 
 
 Phelan, Bishop 154 
 
 Phelan, Michael, S.J 288 
 
 Pitt, William 180-1
 
 INDEX 
 
 359 
 
 Poet Pope 60 
 
 Pontiffs 123-276 
 
 Pope Benedict XV. 
 
 123, 276, 288, 299 
 
 Pope Hildebrand 282 
 
 Prayer Habit . . . . 147, 278 
 
 Press 262, 306 
 
 Priest . . 131 
 
 Strikes and the War, 219-246 
 Submarine Campaign . . . . 112 
 Syndicalism 222-6 
 
 Traditions of the Strike . . 236 
 Travel of the Future . . . 352 
 Treitschke . . . . 8, 10, 13, 14 
 
 Recruits, Cry for 191 
 
 Redmond, Major 329 
 
 Referendum . . 196, 214, 264-6 
 
 Religion 176 
 
 Roberts, Lord 21 
 
 Roosevelt 107 
 
 Ruskin 14 
 
 a 
 
 Sacrifice 90, 176-9 
 
 Sinn Fein 92, 326-328 
 
 Voltaire . 
 
 59 
 
 W 
 
 War, Genesis of . . . . 23, 49 
 War, German Ethics of, 24-26 
 Wars of the World . . 311-321 
 
 Wars, Cost of 339 
 
 Wellington 180-1 
 
 Wilson, President 
 
 45, 105, 114-125 
 
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