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[Page 145]

CONTENTS

June, 1932

Woodrow Wilson — Frontispiece The Principle of Integration — Editorial Poets of Peace and the Civil War — Merle Eugene Curti Our Wit's End — C. F. Ansley Orient and Occident: The Social Problem — Hans Kohn The Reign of Law in Nature — Hugh McCurdy Woodward The Attitude Created by National Power — George Malcolm Stratton Steps Toward Balkan Union — Joseph S. Roucek The Epoch of Aggessive Individualism — Paul Hinner This Praying World-Greece — John William Kitching Book Notes — H. H. Correspondence Round Table

WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE is published by WORLD UNITY PUBLISHING CORPORATION, 4 East 12th Street, New York City: MARY RUMSEY MOVIUS, president; HORACE HOLLEY, vice-president; FLORENCE MORTON, treasurer: JOHN HERMAN RANDALL, secretary. Published monthly, 25 cents a copy, $2.50 a year in the United States and in all other countries (postage included). THE WORLD UNITY PBLISHING CORPORATION and its editors welcome correspondence on articles related to the aims and purposes of the magazine. Printed in U. S. A. Contents copyrighted 1932 by WORLD UNITY PUBLISHING CORPORATION. [Page 146]

WOODROW WILSON

Portrait by F. Soulé Campbell [Page 147]

EDITORIAL

THAT Something more is needed if we are to succeed in solving the crucial world problems, is self-evident. Good and valuable as are the new agencies that have been created and the new forces that have been set in motion, they do not go nearly far enough, nor do they touch clearly the primary and fundamental need of the world today. Among all the panaceas that are being offered and the proposals made to bring about world recovery, the supreme need is for some coordinating and integrative principle that shall become the directing power in this "new age," furnishing new viewpoints, employing new methods and creating literally a new spirit. Efforts to balance budgets, to solve the unemployment problem, to furnish the needed relief—all these are necessary and they will succeed temporarily, but every intelligent person knows that these do not touch the roots of our troubles nor will they solve the really fundamental problems.

As has been said, every statesman in Europe and America and every intelligent business man knows what needs to be done, but either they do not dare to advocate the needed thing or else are powerless to effect it. In our judgment the reason for this strange paralysis resting upon the mental and moral leadership of today, goes deeper than mere political ambitions and economic considerations. It grows out of the absence of any clear coordinating principle that can grip the mind, arouse the imagination and compel the conscience of men and of nations. We are thrashing around helplessly in a medley of seemingly unrelated disorders and problems, without the guiding principle that might relate them so intelligently to one another as to reveal them as parts of one complex [Page 148]whole, that cannot be separated or regarded apart from the whole. This need is suggested in a recent address by Austen Chamberlain of England where he says: "The policy of each for himself and the devil take the hindmost has failed as it always does fail. No man can serve his country well in such times who does not feel himself something more than an American, Englishman, Frenchman, Italian or German; he must remember that he is a citizen of the world." Nicholas Murray Butler finds the same basic fault with our plan to continue for half a century to try to collect war debts. The same need is voiced by the economists and business leaders in all countries in the matter of high tariffs.

Is it not clear that this new age, into which all admit we have come, demands as the basic principle of integration, the sense that we are living in a world that has become one, a world in which all interests have become mutual interests, in which we must all go forward or else backward together, where narrow nationalisms must give way to a more inclusive internationalism, a world in which the ruthless competitions of the past must yield to a more intelligent cooperation along all lines? If this realization of a genuine world unity could become the dominating principle at Geneva now, at Lausanne in June, and later in Washington when the Allied Debts must be reconsidered, how much more rapid our progress might be!

To quote again from John Dewey: "The greatest need of the world today is not for new organizations or new institutions, but rather for an awareness of the new relations into which we have come on this planet... What we need is a new spirit, a new consciousness." It is peculiarly the function of religion to create and foster this new spirit, to awaken this new consciousness. But whether religion can rise to its great opportunity will depend upon its willingness to abandon all petty sectarianisms, its ability to become so possessed by the new knowledge that it will find expression in terms of man's highest and best today, its whole-hearted dedication of itself to the supreme task of building a genuine world community here on the earth.

J.H.R. [Page 149]

POETS OF PEACE AND THE CIVIL WAR

by MERLE EUGENE CURTI Department of History, Smith College

LITERATURE, like art and music, has tended to emphasize the picturesque and romantic appeal of war; yet a few poets in all times and places have spoken out against it. It remained, however, for the poets of Romanticism to make of opposition to war all but a major theme. Coleridge, Byron, Shelley and Cowper exposed its brutality and barbarism, its false glory and glamour, and denounced it in the name of humanitarianism and democracy. Since American literature has been so largely a literature of Romanticism, American poets have not unnaturally added their testimony against Mars to that of their romantic fellow poets in the Old World. Like them, they have, in condemning war, appealed to the heart rather than to the head. Like them, they have dealt in generalities. True to the canons of Romanticism, the pacifism of our poets has also been marked by a deep hatred of oppression.

American poets, however, inspired by the conditions and promise of American life, have given their pacifism a shading in some respects unique. From Philip Freneau to Jaoquin Miller American men of letters have urged that it was their country's special mission to introduce to the world a new order in which there should be no war. In so urging, it is true, they were hardly more than dramatizing the fact that, thanks to geographical good fortune, and the tasks of reclaiming the wilderness, America only very tardily entered the competition for armaments and empire. But to them America, free from standing armies, and possessing a harmonious federal system, seemed to be a model for war-ridden [Page 150]Europe. With buoyant optimism our romantic poets thus identified the reign of peace with a new day which they believed America had been destined by history to herald.

In both England and America the toughness and sincerity of the pacifist convictions of the Romantic poets were tested, during the course of the nineteenth century, by many wars. Of all these struggles the Civil War provided the most stringent test. By its very nature a civil war is a severer test of pacifism than a foreign war, particularly when it is associated with purposes or alleged purposes demanding from idealists some measure of loyalty. Before the Civil War, Emerson, Thoreau and Whitman had long agitated for cultural solidarity, and the War from the beginning promised what the long period of peace had not achieved. Even more to the point was the fact that, after the Emancipation Proclamation, the struggle took on the aspects of a crusade against slavery, tyranny and oppression. Hence the Civil War furnishes a decisive test of the vitality of romantic pacifism on the part of its leading literary exponents. It is the purpose of this paper to examine and interpret the reactions to the Civil War of our leading romantic poets, almost all of whom had previously denounced war and celebrated peace.

Whittier, the Quaker poet of reform, who came as near being the laureate of the American peace movement as anyone, was by reason of his religion best equipped to remain true to his peace principles. He had shown an active interest in the American Peace Society (on his death he was to bequeath to it five hundred dollars, and throughout his life he was ready on every occasion, whether it was a peace congress or the laying of the Atlantic cable, with a hymn of peace. In such occasional poems as The Peace Convention at Brussels (1848) he celebrated the courage of the heroes of peace and bolstered up their faith. His humanitarianism, irreconcilable with bloodshed, found expression in Mogg Megone (1830-1833):

Brutal alike in deed and word, With callous heart and hand of strife, How like a fiend may man be made, Plying the foul and monstrous trade, [Page 151]

POETS OF PEACE AND THE CIVIL WAR

Whose sickle is the reeking sword!

Intense abolitionist that he was, Whittier's Quaker pacifism was sorely tried when the Civ.. War seemed to promise the destruction of slavery. It is true that in the uncertain weeks which preceded firing on Fort Sumter he counselled patience and delay. He would neither yield eternal right by compromise, nor leap into "fratricidal fight." But when once it was decided not to permit the "erring sisters" to depart in peace, Whittier bowed his head to the inevitable:

If, for the age to come, this hour Of trial hath vicarious power, And, blest by Thee, our present pain Be liberty's eternal gain, Thy will be done! And if, in our unworthiness, Thy sacrificial wine we press, If from Thy ordeal's heated bars Our feet are seamed with crimson scars, Thy will be done!

Indeed, had it not been for his allegiance to the Friends, there can be little doubt that he would have compromised with his peace principles even more than he did. At a Friend's gathering in Rhode Island he bade the Quakers, in a poem of reflective thought and poignant feeling, to be true to their testimony against war. It was for them to relieve suffering rather than to take the sword. But one looks in vain in Whittier's war poetry for anything like a condemnation of the War; he does not see fit to observe that even so holy a cause as freedom might be ill-served by bloodshed. No, for Whittier war, unholy instrument though it is, may be used for a great end. If indeed, he does not go quite so far as to say this in so many words, clearly this is his meaning.

Longfellow, the apostle of kindliness and brotherhood, interpreter of half a dozen national cultures to two hemispheres, had, by 1861, raised his voice many times against the war system. In Exangeline (1847) no less than in The Song of Hiawatha (1855) he had pictured the ill-effects of war: [Page 152]All your strength is in your union, All your danger is in discord, Therefore be at peace henceforth, And as brothers live together.

His poem, The Arsenal at Springfield (1844), which particularly well illustrates the pacifism of sentiment and humanitarianism, had been widely used by peace societies, both in America and England for propaganda. The poem, which was inspired by a visit to the arsenal at Springfield on his wedding trip, led Charles Sumner to remark that it was the only justification for the arsenal. Beginning by comparing the "burnished arms" of the arsenal with the pipes of an organ, the poet then tells how, expecting to hear celestial harmonies, he is startled by discordant noises, fierce choruses, and cries of agony. To a nation lifting its hand against a brother nation. let the curse of Cain forever outlaw it from the community of states! Longfellow, with a poet's interests, is not concerned with concrete means of effecting such an outlawry, but merely makes a general indictment. To him war is but the result of ignorance and superstition; in suggesting that the proper remedy is a new attitude towards it, he greatly over-simplified the problem:

Were half the power that fills the world with terror, Were half the wealth bestowed on camps and forts Given to redeem the human mind from error, There were no need of arsenals and forts.

When the Civil War threatened, Longfellow was not at once swept from his feet. Such a conflict was "a bitter thought" indeed. and he had no great heart, in those early months of 1861, for "this ghastly war." If contemplating in his mind "the upturned faces of young dead-the agonies of the wounded," Longfellow felt "what an infernal thing war is," yet he could but interpret it as a contest of "slavery against freedom, the north wind against the southern pestilence." But, partly no doubt, because he was over whelm by grief over the tragic death of his wife, Longfellow had no eart to bless the war in any poem of patriotism. He re mained silent. When at last, in 1863, Tales of a Wayside In appeared, Henry Richard, the greatest English pacifist of the [Page 153]nineteenth century, thought he detected in it evidence that Longfellow was trying to teach a great pacific lesson to his countrymen, who were justifying an unchristian appeal to the sword by the argument that the war was necessary in order to free the slave. For in "The Saga of King Olaf" that redoutable Norse hero, who spreads the word of God by battle, himself perishes; and Richard felt that Longfellow was trying to tell the North that the end, no matter how noble, never justifies an unworthy means-that love is a stronger instrument than the sword:

   <poem>
   Stronger than steel
   Is the sword of the spirit;
   Swifter than arrows,
   The light of the truth is;
   Greater than anger
   Is love, and subdueth!
   </poem>

   But no; Richard, who had desperately hoped to hear from some American friend of peace word of an outspoken adherence to pacific principles, was wrong in thinking that these lines from Longfellow were intended to be such: "The Saga of King Olaf" had been written a year before secession. Tempered by a hatred of oppression, Longfellow's pacifism, like that of other ramanticists, was not of sufficiently tough fiber to make him openly and vigorously protest against the War.

   Longfellow's friend and neighbor, James Russell Lowell, found it even easier to believe that God was on the side of the North. Certainly he was less stirred by the inhumanity of this great contest than Longfellow: he blessed the War in unequivocal terms. This, indeed, was scarcely to be expected from one who had gone so far in his defeatism during the Mexican war as to call upon Massachusetts to secede from the Union and to denounce war itself as murder. Yet on the eve of the Civil War he insisted that he was far from being a "peace at any price" man. Not only did he find no trouble at all in justifying the appeal to arms by the two sections, but in 1865 he wrote to Charles Eliot Norton, "a war with England would be the greatest calamity but one-being afraid of Lowell found his justification for an appeal to arms in a [Page 154]romantic conception that it was a cure for national sickness. He cited. indeed, no less an authority than Shakespeare himself:

O great corrector of enormous times, Shaker of o'er rank states, thou grand decider Of dusty and old titles, that heals't with blood The earth when she is sick, and curest the world O the pleurisy of people!

The pacifism of the author of "Ez fur war, I call it murder," was plainly an opportunistic variety, and all the tributes he had paid to Longfellow for his Arsenal at Springfield as well as his own powerful satire on war were forgotten.

As early as 1838 the Concord philosopher, Ralph Waldo Emerson, had given a public lecture under the auspices of the American Peace Society. In bold terms he expressed the conviction that it was America's special mission to sponsor the cause of peace and he favored a Congress and a Court of Nations to that end Believing that universal peace was as certain as the prevalence of civilization over barbarism, Emerson held that war would increasingly reveal itself to sane men as an epidemic of insanity, "breaking out here and there like the cholera of intiuenza, infecting men's brains instead of their bowels." With the exception of Thoreau. no other outstanding American man of letters paid such deference to the idea of non-resistance. In English Traits Emerson tells us that, asked to name an essentially "American" idea, an American theory of the "right future" of the country, he pointed to non-resistance. It was, he went on, "the gun which does not need another gun; the law of love and justice alone can effect a clean revolution. Indeed, he believed that non-resistance required the highest type of heroism. For if peace were to be maintained, he had once said. "It must be by brave men, who have come up to the same height as the hero, namely, the will to carry their own life in their hands and stake it at any instant for their principle, but who have gone one step beyond the hero, and will not take another man's life. men who have, by their intellectual insight, or by their moral elevation, attained such a perception of their own intrinsic worth that they do not think property or their own body a sufficient good to be [Page 155]saved by such dereliction of the principle as treating a man like sheep."

Yet Emerson, both as an abolitionist and as a patriot, welcomed the Civil War! How can such a discrepancy between words and deeds be explained? I think that individualism, which was the keynote of his pacifism, provides an explanation. Emerson had, even while maintaining that the refusal of men to bear arms and declare war would prove that they no longer had any madness in their brains, also praised the warrior as a hero, as a real individual. It is true that he had been perplexed by the capacity of the soldier for crime as well as for heroism; but in times of crisis Emerson was so struck by the heroism displayed by soldiers that he forgot their crimes. The Civil War furnished no such display of heroism on the part of those who resisted the draft as did the World War, and it seemed increasingly clear to Emerson that the War made men heroes when peace had failed to do so. A study of his Journals shows that it was this conviction which swept away his pacifism.

War, the searcher of character, the test of men, has tried already so many reputations, pricked so many bladders" that Emerson welcomed it as an educator which made men see the bankruptcy of all arrow views; which, as a great realist, "shatters everything flimsy and shifty, sets aside all false issues and breaks through all that is ot real as itself." War now seemed to Emerson a potent tonic, a magnetizer, reenforcing manly power "a hundred and a thousand times." Like a frosty October morning it promised to restore to the individual his moral and intellectual fiber, sharpening the eyes and opening the minds of men to truths that they were once for bidden to speak.

After Appomatox, Emerson, who had made so much of the divine force of love, believed that it was well that the rebels had been "pounded, rather than negotiated" into peace; well that they should remember it; well that their inveterate brag had been tumbled if not cured. After all, perhaps, this was what might have been expected, from one who, in 1863, had felt that, since the contest was one between the highest principles and the worst, a whole neration of men, even if completely annihilated, was not too dear [Page 156]a price to pay for victory. The War to Emerson was a great moral agent which established the conviction that right would get done; that substituted chronic hope for chronic despair, and made many lives valuable that were not valuable before.

Of all American poets, none had celebrated more exuberantly than Walt Whitman the beauties of peace and international solidarity; none had made such a cult of the idea of universal brotherhood of man as the author of Leaves of Grass. Indeed, he had succeeded more than anyone else in making commonplace themes of peaceful life glow with athletic vigor and an almost intoxicating heroism. Yet the student of American poetry in 1861 might with much justification have suspected that Whitman, even more positively than Lowell, Longfellow and Emerson, would glorify the War. When Lowell had called the Mexican crusade murder, Whitman, ardent patriot that he was, believed that our soldiers, by fraternizing with the Mexicans, would spread fraternity and thus justify the War! While Whittier made much of his Quaker background, Whitman seems never to have taken his very seriously. Indeed, he had even maintained that the peace tenets of Quakerism could never become the creed of the race, for as long as men were men they would continue to love "the pride, pomp and circumstance of glorious war." If, moreover, Lowell and Emerson had desired a cultural unity for the whole nation, and if they believed that the Civil War promised to bring about such a cultural solidarity, Whitman had even more reason to support the War on that ground: no one had expressed a more ardent cultural patriotism than he. Like Emerson, Whitman had, in the long years of peace doubted the capacity of American leaders for great passions and deeds. Then, too, should we not expect him to be deeply moved by the sense of comradeship which common dangers and common suffering always arouses? He, Walt Whitman, who had so idealized "intense and loving comradeship," would he not, of all persons, be most easily betrayed by this very root of his romantic pacifism into hearty acceptance of bloody battles?

Indeed, Whitman's first reaction to the sound of the trumpet was one of exultation. Beat! Beat! Drums! could well have been [Page 157]

Poets of Peace and the Civil War

used as a rallying cry by the recruiting agents. During the whole of the time that he served as a war nurse, he never entirely excluded from his mind the thought that, if the call came to him to shoulder a musket, he might well answer the summons. Whitman's patriotism never once flagged, and for no very long period during the War did he fail to find something of grandeur in it. One need only read Drum Taps to appreciate this. Yet, when all this is said, it can still be maintained that Whitman's essential reaction to the War, even while it raged, was that of a friend of peace. He alone of all our poets wrought out of it poetry which takes high rank with that of the greatest poets who have condemned war.

At the first sight of blood, Whitman felt "horrified and disgusted": his heart grew sick of war, which seemed to him "like a great slaughter-house and the men mutually butchering each other." The suffering of the wounded was his suffering: he loved life too well to justify its greatest enemy. It is no wonder that the London Peace Society circulated widely as a tract his moving poem A Letter from Camp," with its poignant, powerful recital of the grief of a family for its dead. Even after the Emancipation Proclamation, Whitman, who had once said that the hideous slave trade should be, if necessary, wiped out by cannon, seriously doubted whether the freedom of the slaves could justify so terrible and so blood, a purchase. In such poems as "A Vigil Strange I kept," Adieu to a Soldier," "Ashes of Soldiers," and "A Sight in Camp the Daybreak Gray and Dim," one finds compelling arguments against war; and always they are inspired by Whitman's passionate love of life and his belief in its absolute sanctity. The wound-dresser could not hate his enemy: "For my enemy is dead-a man divine as myself is dead." To hum this sacredness of human life-he had always opposed capital punishment--was a value far more significant than the values of night and wrong by which Emerson and Lowell were guided in ustifying the War.

In regard to the draft and resistance to it, Whitman was "pulled a dozen different ways in his mind," and hardly knew what to think or do. If he fluctuated in his feelings, he was not without [Page 158]sympathy for those who refused compulsory service. In this question, as in that of the War itself, he suffered by virtue of the conflict in his mind, a conflict between his patriotism and his hatred of the destruction of life. "It is cruel to be so tossed from pillar to post in one's judgment."

Yet he could not put his intense, vigorous belief in life out of his mind or his art:

Melt, melt away ye armies.. disperse ye, blue-clad soldiers Resolve ye back again, give up for good your deadly arms Others the arms, the fields henceforth for you, or South or North, With saner wars, sweet wars, life-giving wars.

Whitman's pacifism is thus at once more virile and more universal than that of men like Emerson and Whittier and Lowell and Longfellow. They hated war in the abstract because it seemed morally wrong; but a given war, which appeared to them right. they... cooted and justified. Whitman hated war, when he once came to know it, because it was incompatible with life. Try as he would to find a mystical compensation in death, he could not forget the pitiless inhumanity of battle; he could not reconcile the mor.. grandeur of war, nor his patriotism, or his exuberant love of mintering to those who were suffering, with the plain fact that wa destroyed the men he loved. Hence he could exclaim

Away with themes of war! Away with war itself! Hence from my shuddering sight to never more return that show of blackened, mutilated corpses! That hell unpent and raid of blood fit for wild tigers or for iap-tongued wolves, not for reasoning men! And in its stead speed industry's campaigns!

Whitman's pacifism, then, is related directly to his love of lite and his belief in its sanctity: this passionate faith in its integrit and validity is the same love and faith which, in the World War inspired thousands of men to resist the War at any cost. Litt wonder that they took comfort from Whitman, and quoted in the harassed little journal his poetry of pacifism. Since pacifism of th sort alone strikes directly at man power, the one indispensable cle [Page 159]ment of warfare in all times, it promises, in the eyes of many friends of peace today, the most certain path to the ending of war. If they are right, Whitman was their prophet and poet in a measure greater than other American poets of peace.

And this, strangely enough, remains true in spite of the fact that, when tested by the Civil War, Whitman faltered, confused and perplexed. A pantheist and a mystic, he was used to saying es to life and yes to death; and war was life and death. This habit of affirmation made it hard for him to discriminate. Yet this very fact saved him from Lowell's complacent acceptance of the War without, apparently, a single qualm; and from Emerson's proneness to resolve a conflict by dealing only in generalities and abstract moral values. Faced with the concrete terribleness of war, Whitman alone came near asking the fundamental question: does an end ever justify war as a means? He did not quite ask it; and in the fact that he did not squarely face this problem lies the essential weakness of his pacifism, and, in a greater degree, that of all the other romantic poets of peace. In varying degrees the pacifism of Whittier, Lowell, Emerson and Whitman was diluted by a loyalty to other ideals, thought of as justice, heroism, and patriotism: in varying degrees these ideals won the ascendancy when the test came. They had talked peace in time of peace, and made war in time of war. [Page 160]

OUR WIT'S END

by C. F. ANSLEY

YA process of reasoning that would not be acceptable to our more sophisticated day, Plato reached the conclusion that the right number of households to constitute a state is 5,040. Aristotle dissented, after expressing his admiration for the high authority; obviously, Aristotle thought, the number is too large. He agreed with Plato that the welfare of the citizens requires that effective measures be taken by the state to keep its households from exceeding the number found to be best, whether 5.040 or some smaller number. It was a hard problem; but, as Plato says, "If after all there be an excess of citizens and we are at our wit's end, there is still the old device of sending out a colony.

The state and the city then were one-a city state. Typically the citizen was a farmer, but he was not a business farmer. His home was inside the walls of his city or near them and he had functions and occupations that are not combined with modern business farming. He made little money by marketing the more or less accidental surplus of raw products of his farm. Other occupations yielded more money than farming, as they do still; but farming gave the household the most of its living and in other ways contributed to a good life.

While a household that farmed no land was unfortunate, so also was a household that did not have its home within or near the city walls. Man, Aristotle says, is more gregarious than bees. The amenities of gregarious living are not now precisely what the were when in a city no larger than Des Moines, Youngstown, or Scranton, one might stop on the street corner to talk with Socrates or Plato, or might see a new play by Sophocles, Euripides, or [Page 161]Aristophanes. Athens, to be sure, was too large, as Plato and Aristotle knew and as the event proved. In our day, however, a city of 5.040 houses, or considerably fewer as Aristotle thought needful, may at least provide good medical and dental service, good schools, and many other things that the business farm commonly lacks.

Man is still gregarious, and many American business farmers understand that their business condemns their families to be underprivileged. Professor T. N. Carver of Harvard says that "the problem of country life is not solved when you have made the farmer prosperous." "Farmers are leaving the farm most rapidly where farming is most prosperous. This is borne out absolutely by statistical evidence."

Farmers move to the city, Professor Carver says, if they can afford to. The most of them cannot move unless they can secure employment in the city; and some difficulty in this matter has slowed up the rural exodus. Metropolitan papers agree that there are too many business farmers, and men in high official stations have urged these farmers to diminish their production; but at present they cannot find employment in the city and must produce all they can where they are. Many of them are assisted more or less in production by refugees from the city-kins-folk or old neighbos Measures have been taken to keep farmers out of cities, but the ways remain open to travel in the opposite direction. The underprivileged are not all on business farms; many in fact prefer what they find there to what they have experienced in the cities.

Aristotle says that "among ourselves"--that is, in a Greek city tate "no one is in want." Business farming was not an approved cupation, but farming to produce what the household could use was approved. Every household, it was held, should have an acre two of land. "Vast" estates, of twenty-five acres or even more. were exceptional and temporary. An acre rightly managed produces an amazing amount, and to the Greeks economics meant arm management.

The husbandmen did not limit their industry to tilling the soil and caring for live stock. Of olives they made oil; of grapes they [Page 162]made wine. The city state ought to be "self-sufficing," though not city state ever quite reached that goal. Over-production was not a recognized evil at that time, and no city state was accused of injuring others by dumping.

After centuries of life in city states, the Greeks accepted more grandiose ideas. The Parthenon was left unfinished, permanently. "The Greek miracle" was ended; the men who had made it were men of city states. Greece continues, but adds no more to the world's orders of architecture or forms of poetry or schools of philosophy or roster of greatest names. While the miracle lasted, wit's end was always a confident new beginning.

New city states were established all through the region. Colonists took with them from the mother city a sacred fire and very little else. The state, Aristotle says, originates "in the bare needs of life" and continues in existence "for the sake of a good life." So the colony originated and continued.

In another connection Aristotle says: "It is true indeed that these and many other things have been invented several times over in the course of ages, or rather times without number; for necessity may be supposed to have taught men the inventions which were absolutely required, and when these were provided, it was natural that other things which would adorn and enrich life should grow up by degrees." When their turn came, the Anglo-Saxon invented ways of colonizing that had much in common with the old Greek ways. The Anglo-Saxons became the greatest colonizers in the world: their total loss of all ability to colonize occurred within the memory of men yet living. A little while ago an American Boston or Windsor, though not at its wit's end, would send out colonist to found a "settlement"—a New Boston or New Windsor. At its wit's end now, an Anglo-Saxon Boston or Windsor, in England or in America, remains at its wit's end.

Like the Greek colony, the American settlement was not much concerned with business farming or with producing anything for the world market. The soldiers of the American Revolution are commonly said to have been farmers for the most part, as no doubt they were; but it is safe to say that there was not [Page 163]among them one business farmer as the term is now understood. Inspection of old accounts show how the business of a settlement was done. The farmer made maple sugar, or nails, or leather, for which he was credited at the store. He bought something else made in the settlement and was charged for it. At the end of the year he balanced his account with the merchant by hauling wood a day and a half with his yoke of oxen. No money changed hands. The merchant, if he wished could issue scrip, as he can today, but there was seldom occasion for it.

Whatever limitations this approximately self-sufficient community had, it had adequate resistance to deflation. Want was almost unknown, and unemployment would have been inconceivable; there is always something to do on an acre of land. Conditions seem to have been favorable to human development as in like communities of human scale in ancient Greece and Palestine and medieval Europe. Not much is to be expected from the social environment of the park bench or the isolated farm.

The individualism of an American pioneer is an urban discovery of recent date. The American Indians were not individualists, and the white men could not hold their own against Indian tribes except in a compact settlement. The settlement organization continued long after danger from Indians ended, for it was an accepted mode of pursuit of happiness. The American pioneer perfectly understood a fact that Aristotle states: "The individual, when isolated, is not self-sufficing." Much of the work of the settlements or neighborhood was done by "husking-bees," "quilting-bees," and other community functions. The logs for the pioneer's house were assembled by his neighbors in a "log-rolling;" "raising" put the logs in place; the completion of the structure was celebrated by a house-warming.

The recent Anglo-Saxon endeavors to colonize by dispersing business farmers over waste land are ephemeral; in Canada, in Australia, in the United States, the dispersing farmers stay only as long as they must. Like other gregarious men, they want physicians, dentists, schools, neighbors. The American government required homesteader to live five years on his quarter section in order to [Page 164]secure title to the wild land; the government has assumed that the farmer is primarily a business man, playing the world market. The outcome of the endeavors toward a segregated tributary agriculture is a chronic need of farm relief.

To Roger Williams or to Brigham Young the problem of surplus population in the cities and on the farms would have seemed much as it would have seemed to Plato or to Aristotle. All these men would now be held visionary. Many things would be repeated to them; in American they would be told that land can no longer be secured, though states are spending much to hide abandoned farms by reforesting. Myths are in the way, and our Phidias or our Abraham Lincoln may keep to his bench in the park.

Planned economics are advocated, but are not accessible to the men on the park benches. No plan is approved; nobody is authorized to draw up a plan. Russia, it is said, has a plan. A goal of that plan, "New Russia's Primer" says, is that all shall live in cities and that "a city of one hundred thousand inhabitants will be considered too large." "The difference between city and village, between peasant and workman, will disappear." The Russian dictatorship has stated from the beginning that it is temporary. Presumably, then, the new cities, combining agriculture and industry, will have some measure of home rule, as the Greek city state or the American settlement had. Russia has not yet achieved its goal; it is embarrassed by disappointments in its business farming.

America is sometimes blamed for intolerance. Its record in the matter might bear inspection. It has shown that it will tolerate any community that does not interfere with others. It has not objected to communism that does not try to force communism on others: many American settlements, beginning with Jamestown and Plymouth, have been communistic. Any race or religion or political faith in America that wishes to establish or strengthen a settlement, capitalistic or communistic, would probably find support and no opposition under our government. The revolution that is discussed, under tolerance, would probably end somehow in compelling people to live in such communities as they are [Page 165]now quite free to establish or strengthen in any state of the Union. The way of the Greek city state or of the American settlement is accessible on its own terms if ever it is preferred to park benches and wit's end. A revolution might be useless if we could not colonize our abandoned land, and it might be unnecessary if we could.

Bankrupt farmers and men from the park benches would find no soft life in building or strengthening a rural community. They would not be leading a soft life. A Roger Williams or a Brigham Young, with the needful divine fire, might induce some of those who find themselves superfluous to see what they could do as a community. Our founding fathers would recognize in such an enterprise the pursuit of happiness. The Greeks would have expected the aristocracy of the colony in later times, the enpatridae, to trace their ancestry back to the men from park benches and business farms-the excess of citizens, at their wit's end, who remembered the old device and knew the fire. [Page 166]ORIENT AND OCCIDENT by HANS KOHN Docton Jovic, Taitersity of Prane

THE SOCIAL PROBLEM

The Labor Morement

INDUSTRIALIZATION, which has been conspicuous in China and India especially, has brought about a state of affairs--in the former country, in particular-which calls to mind the early. industrial period in Europe. The workers are rapidly learning to utilize the strike and the boycott as weapons. The union movement among workers in China spread swiftly. At the first union congress in Canton on May 1, 1923, only fifty delegates were present, representing 230,000 workers from twelve cities. At the second congress in 1925 there were already 230 delegates, representing 570,000 workers. The pan-Chinese labor federation was founded at that time. At the fourth congress in Hankow in May, 1927, as many as 2,800,000 workers are said to have been represented. This pan-Chinese union movement was one of the elements contributing towards Chinese unity, just as the association of producers was.

This association-organized in Tientsin in December, 1926, in opposition to the working class-included manufacturers, merchants and financiers from all parts of China. China was the first oriental country in which the class struggle assumed modern forms. Originally, even here, a co-operation of the middle class with the working class seemed possible, as long as the mass movements of the working class were directed against foreign enterprise. (The strike in May, 1925, in the textile factories belonging to the Japanese is a case in point.) Here social and national motives combined, since foreign powers, in defense of their economic and social interests. [Page 167]threatened even the national sovereignty of China. The movement irst took on the character of a genuine class struggle when it began to spread among the peasantry. Then the great landlords allied themselves with the middle class. The consequence was that a breach occurred between the right and the left wing of the national revolutionary party of China (Kuomintang, February, 1928), with the right wing maintaining the upper hand. China affords the first example in the Orient of the breaking up of the national movement through class oppositions of a social nature. In Turkey and in Egypt the national governments, from the start, have viewed all labor movements with suspicion and have nipped in the bud all questionable communistic activities." A series of strikes in Egypt during the years after the World War, and a number of attempts towards union organization, were without lasting result. Attempts towards an organization of the Arab working class have been made only recently in Syria and Palestine.

Only in India has the labor movement spread more extensively, without having come into opposition here, as yet, with the middle class national movement. The number of industrial workers in India is estimated at one and a half millions. The beginning has been made towards legislation for the protection of labor. The first law for the regulation of factory labor was passed in India as early as 1881, but only the laws of 1911, and of 1922 especially, brought about a marked improvement in conditions. The latter establishes maximum working-day of eleven hours, and a sixty-hour week with a weekly holiday, and prohibits night work for women and all factory work for children under twelve. Protective labor legistion as applied to mines was somewhat improved in 1943, and operators were made universally liable in case of accident. The Indian Trade Union Act of 1926 granted certain rights to unions recognized by the courts. The all-Indian brotherhood of unions meets annually and represents about 250,000 workers. The number of strikes is very great, though in only about a third of these, strikes the workers achieve their objective. As the labor movement hows the beginning of organization, and improvement of working conditions, in all countries of the Orient, the center of gravity of [Page 168]the social struggle in the Orient shifts more and more to the peasantry, from which industrial workers are just beginning to separate themselves during the present generation.

The Peasant Problem

The great social struggles which the Orient is confronting are not struggles of the working class industry, but the movement for emancipation of the peasant class. Bolshevist propagandists in China have already perceived that a social revolution in the East must be, to a still greater extent than in Russia itself, a joint movement of the peasant and the working classes. Because of the constantly increasing population in the last decade and the demand for land which this has occasioned, the situation of the peasantry in the East is becoming worse. The burden of taxation in the Orient falls on the poorer classes, and particularly upon the tillers of the soil, since in all oriental countries, with very few exceptions, indirect taxation and land taxes go to make up the lion's share of public revenues. One of the greatest obstacles in the way of agricultural development is the excessive indebtedness of the small farmer. The means for improvement are to be found not so much in the technical perfecting of agricultural methods as in the awakening of initiative in the masses, sunk in lethargy by inveterate traditionalism and centuries of privation. The co-operative movement which has made advances in India and Egypt of late years offers a partial aid in this direction. But this movement, too, can attain its goal only if the peasantry is trained to a more intelligent and more active participation in economic life. The more progressive elements among national movements in the Orient are making this goal their objective. It is a part of that effort towards the elevation of the people as a whole, which every incipient nationalism preaches. Another phase of this effort is the struggle to raise the status of woman and make possible her participation in public affairs.

The Feminist Movement

In India, as in Muhammedan countries, both traditional legislation and social ethics have refused to place women on a par with [Page 169]men-not only in public affairs but also in the eyes of the law. Only in the last two decades has the emancipation of women in India made any important progress. A woman, Mrs. Annie Besant-a European, it is truc--was president of the all-Indian national congress in 1917. A Hindu woman, the poetess Sarojini Naidu, followed her as president in 1925. As early as 1849 a Hindu founded the first girls' school in Calcutta. Progressive Hindus soon took up the struggle against the exclusion of women from the outer world in accordance with the Muhammedan custom, against child marnages and in mitigation of the evils caused by the prohibition of the re-marriage of widows. Hindu women, almost simultaneously with the women of Europe, have gained the right to vote. The Indian constitution of 1919 gave provincial legislatures the right to grant women the active franchise. In 1920 the two Indian states of Travancore and Jhalawar granted women equal suffrage with men. They were succeeded in 1921 by the provincial legislature of Madras, at its first session. Almost all the other provincial legislatures of India followed. In many instances this concession of the anchise was granted unanimously. When the Indian constitution 1926 offered the possibility of granting women the passive franchise also, they received it at once in the provinces of Assam, Madras, Bombay, the Punjab and the central provinces. In Madras a woman has been elected vice-president of the provincial legislature. In the Indian states of Mysore, copy the full franchise also, and in Travancore a woman delegate s been appointed minister. In the provinces in which women be elected to the legislature they may also be elected to the perial parliament of India, by virtue of a decree of this highest tamentary body in 1922.

The political emancipation of women is taking place more owly in Muhammedan countries. With the exception of the Soviet states, Turkey is the only country in which a full emancipation has en realized. The Turkish republic has carried the social and legal emancipation of women through to a finish. The emancipation efforts of the Soviet authorities have frequently encountered bitter opposition in the more backward parts of the Union. In the [Page 170]more progressive Muhammedan districts, such as Crimea, Azer baijan and Kazan, women were already emancipated immediately after the revolution; in Turkestan concentrated efforts in this di rection were made only after 1927. A congress of working women and peasant women of Uzbeistan was held in Samarkand on Oc tober 1, 1927, at which the announcement was made that in the soviets of this republic there were more than 5,000 women, includ ing twenty-five presidents of village sovicts. Outside of the Soviet Union and Turkey the process of social emancipation for Islamic women is working itself out only by degrees. Political or legal emancipation is still far in the future. Nevertheless, women since the World War are participating in the political life of the country in a way altogether unknown before. During the strikes and riots of 1919, Muhammedan women in Egypt took part in the demon strations. Since that time they have formed clubs which have played their part in the national movement, and have frequenti surpassed the men in radicalism. Muhammedan women in Syria Iraq and Palestine are likewise beginning to participate in the national movement, and to pledge themselves publicly on behalf of their count's destiny. Here the emancipation of women is taking place directly from the angle of the nation's struggle for liberty.

The struggle for the improvement of conditions for women is only a part of the universal movement towards social reform, directed against all those medieval religious traditions-such as polygamy, child marriage, the purchase of women and the caste system-which are at variance with the social feeling of the modern west. The penetration of modern social ideas is destroying the oriental cosmos, loosening the soil and, along with the decomp ition of the old growths, mellowing it for a far-reaching revolu tionization. Young people in particular-student bodies-are be coming the promoters of efforts towards political and social revolu tion. This is true even for countries like Japan. Because of her com servative dynastic policy and her prudent and skilful regulation of the reorganization process from above, Japan seemed proof against too severe shocks. Since 1918 "the people, so solid before the became a nation," are beginning "to split up: the old ethics and [Page 171]customs are already severely shaken by western cultural influences, and in the degree in which the state advanced in international commerce it saw itself exposed to the influences of socialism and communism also." In 1918 the Japanese student movement seemed at the hour of dawn: as German students once fought for the ideals of their time-for the privileges of national freedom and individual liberty guaranteed by a national constitution-so Japanese students pledged themselves to fight for the new ideals of their time. Out of a further hundred-year advance of world history these new ideals were born: to the spirit of social liberation and international peace." Thus, in the transformation of the Orient of today, the national and democratic revolution, which causes it to resemble the Europe of a hundred years ago, is blending with the beginning of the social revolution, which is receiving some of its impetus from what is being done in Russia, just as Europe a hundred years ago was receiving its impulse from what was being done in France. Student movements in Japan, China and India are similar in many respects to those in Russia, in which the word "freedom" has always not only a political but also a social significance. Operating more strongly in this direction than ideological influences is the steadily growing interweaving of the Orient in the international economic system, in intracontinental commerce and communication, which has led during the last decade to the creation of the economic factor for the growing unity of all mankind. [Page 172]

THE COMMON MESSAGE OF THE WORLD'S GREAT TEACHERS

by HUGH MCCURDY WOODWARD Department of Philosophy of Education, Brigham Young University

THE REIGN OF LAW IN NATURE

Are we living in a universe of order, uniformity, dependability, and law or in a universe of caprice and uncertainty? The answer to this question constitutes one of the differences between the lower and the higher religions, between paganism and the great spiritual philosophies. In the undeveloped groups of the race, man is full of fears. The world in which he lives presents a puzzle on all sides. Everything has a spirit within it; the trees, the rivers, the mountains, and the animals. These spirits are apt to act in any way at any time. The uncertainty of their actions fills the animist with terror. He knows he is in contact with life, but he has no idea how that life is going to act. He does the best he can to satisfy these uncertain powers, but from day to day life is much in the nature of chance escape from the whims, emotions, and passions of these supposed spirits. His religious ceremonies consist mostly in exercises to frighten away these evil spirits. Loud noises are made, great shouting, and other disturbances designed to overcome the evil influence of these many spirits. If we were to locate the people among whom animism is most dominant, they would include the natives of Africa, many peoples of the Malay Peninsula, large groups in Southern India, much of the East India archipelago. Some traces of it are found in Japan, China, and the Philippine Islands.

A species of religious worship higher than animism is characterized by animal worship. Such worship represents a stage of a [Page 173]ustment where the mind has become conscious of certain great forces and principles, such as the principle of creation in the procreative functions, the principle of preservation of life, and of the power to destroy life. These powers and principles are identified with certain animals which become sacred. In Egypt throngs of priests chant their ceremonies before the cat, the crocodile, the bull, and the jackal. The bull is made a deity because of his great procreative power. The cow in India becomes sacred, and is worshiped because of her power to save life. In India and Java the snake is worshiped because of its power to kill, and so on, through a list of many different animals which are worshiped because of some supposed power or principle which they represent.

Through these two stages of religion science is beginning to work its way. The Medicine Man is held responsible for results under the penalty of death. He is, therefore, forced to observe the natural phenomena around him. He observes that some plants are good while some are destructive to life. He observes the action of the winds and of the waves. He observes the stars and the wearing away of the rocks. Thus we have the beginning of medicine, astronomy, botany, and geology.

A third stage in religious adjustment is represented by the pagan religions. Here the personalities behind the forces have become more dignified. The pagan gods and goddesses are mostly in the form of men and women. Through this stage of religious development which, in general, is more advanced than animism or animal worship, man has become conscious of some uniformity in the environment about him. His natural surroundings and the men and women with whom he associates have become more reliable. In connection with their activity he detects some dependable principles and laws but he still thinks of his gods as uncertain, capricious, and undependable. Much of Hebrew literature is full of accounts of the people attempting to placate their gods. These pagan gods represent all the uncertain, unreliable, and destructive emotions of men. Some are kind and some are vicious. They are jealous, envious, selfish, and often are represented as gods of revenge. Man gave to these gods great power which made them all the [Page 174]more dangerous and difficult to live with. Since the gods were under no restraint and free to act according to their whims, man was in constant need of keeping them in good humor. This was done by placating them with gifts, by sacrificing to them the things precious to the heart of man, such as the best fruits of the crop and. in many cases, beautiful maidens and brave men. Most of these practices and rituals were established because of the very uncertainty which the nature of the gods produced. Into the personality of these gods man reads the things he discovered and approved in his own nature. In this stage of worship as well as in the lower forms, religion is characterized by an attempt to find life and happiness largely through the senuous nature. The satisfactions of lust and appetites are made part of the ordinary ceremony. The pagan gods of Egypt, Greece, Rome, and Babylon were destroyed in the indulgence of their own lusts and dissipations.

A fourth stage of religious development might well be designated as the Law Giver religions. Here the thought of one powerful God gradually becomes supreme. At first he is a God of power and authority. He is the great Law Giver. To Him man looks for commandments. This one Supreme God, in turn, has his law-givers; such as Moses, Muhammed, and others. It has not yet occurred to the individual adjusting to the Law Giver system that the laws of life are laid in the very heart of nature; that the life of God is expressed in the uniform laws of nature. He still expects God to give personally His commandments direct to man as He will. On tablets of stone as with Moses, or on sheets of silk, as with Muhammed, God’s laws are handed down. His judgments are not to be questioned. His word is law.

In this stage of religious development great orthodox systems are developed because the word of the prophet, or law-giver, is the word of God. It is sacred, and therefore, must not be changed This stage represents a marked advance over paganism, but it has not reached the highest point in religious evolution. Under this type of response, God gradually changes from jealous, revengeful. envious, and powerful king to a loving, merciful, and sympathetic Father. [Page 175]In the great spiritual philosophies discussed in this volume, a new order of things is perceived. In these philosophies which probably represent the highest religious adjustment of the race the master teachers of mankind seem to have risen to a plane of intelligence which sees God, and all Nature, moving forward according to law. Nature becomes dependable; God is just, because of the uniformity of His ways.

It is this vision of the Reign of Law in and through all nature which characterizes the great spiritual religions, and sets them over in direct contrast to paganism and animism. With them there is a moral order in nature as exact as the physical order. To know the law and conform one's life to it is the way of salvation. Morality or righteousness means to be in harmony with the great constructive laws of one's own nature. The principles which underlie moral and spiritual development are as definite and demonstrable as the principles which govern in the physical world. Man, by constant and diligent quest to discover the finer elements of his own nature, can find the very essence of the divine within himself. "The King. dom will not come by observation." It is within the individual. The spiritual life of man will come into full bloom no faster than he becomes master of his own life, physically, mentally, spiritually, and morally. To the extent that man can conform his life to this Reign of Law in the life of God he is saved.

The very concept of the reign of law in all nature presupposes high degree of intelligence. It is this concept of the reign of law that characterizes the modern age of science and constitutes the basis upon which the scientific method rests. Alfred Lord Whitehead, Professor of Philosophy at Harvard University says: "There can be no living science unless there is a widespread instinctive consuction of an order of things and in particular of an order of Nature."

Surprising as it may seem to many of our western minds, this concept is not a new one. It is new to us in the West largely because of our ignorance of what has been taught in other parts of the world and in other periods of history, but as far back as 1500 B.C., carly Hinduism in all its phases rested upon a belief in universality [Page 176]of law in all nature. Nature to the early Hindu was dependable. Brahma was just because his ways were uniform.

Presenting the Hindu theory on this problem, Mr. Williams in his book "Hinduism," says: "Their law is one of naturalness in nature. They can see the greatness in all things and the unified self is the primary benefactor to their belief. Each goes to fulfill the great law which necessarily is that powerful natural law."

In Buddhism the principle is still more prominent. L. Adams Beck in her "Story of Oriental Philosophy," quotes the following: "Whatever arises is inevitably the effect of a previous cause, and therefore, law is the universal and the universal is law. Does this apply to man? Absolutely. To the mind? Again absolutely. All these are forces, sequences, processes, as is everything in the universe. Nothing is unrelated." "All this is law. From this law nothing is exempt; from the mightiest of the astronomical systems to the microscopic life of which science has only lately become aware. And all life is one in stone, plant, insect, animal, man." Buddha, in his last words to his beloved disciples, said: "But twenty-nine was I when I renounced the world, Subhadda, seeking after good. For fifty years and yet another year since I set out; a pilgrim have I been, through the wise realm of System and Law—outside thereof no victory can be won."

The philosophers of India are not the only ones of an early day to conceive of this reign of law throughout all nature. In far eastern China 600 years before the Christian era, Lao Tze, the venerable philosopher said: "Go back to Mother Nature, for lying on her bosom, you will be guided on the proper way." "Leave all things to take their natural course, and do not interfere." "All things in nature work silently. They come into being and possess nothing. They fulfill their functions and make no claim." "Man takes his law from the earth; the earth takes its law from Heaven; Heaven takes its law from Tao; but the law of Tao is its own spontaneity."

Confucius, the man who has done more, perhaps, to influence Chinese thought and Chinese philosophy than any other single individual, gives a system of philosophy and ethics based squarely [Page 177]upon the unformity and dependability in God and nature. To him even the moral law is a part of the great universal law which governs planets, worlds, and men. Concerning the laws of nature within the individual, he said: "What Heaven has conferred is called THE NATURE; to be in accordance with this nature is called THE PATH of duty; the regulation of this path is called INSTRUCTION."

An ode in an early Chinese classic reads as follows: "It is said in the Book of poetry.- 'Heaven in producing mankind, Gave them their various faculties and relations with their specific laws, These are the invariable rules of nature for all to hold, And all love this admirable virtue."

Confucius, commenting upon this stanza said: "The maker of this ode knew indeed the principle of our nature. We may thus see that every faculty and relation must have its law, and since there are invariable rules for all to hold, they consequently love this admirable virtue."

In the following statement Confucius makes the idea still more Jeanite: "The moral laws form one system with the laws by which Heaven and Earth support and contain, overshadow and canopy things. These moral laws form the same systems with the law by which the seasons succeed each other and the sun and moon pear with the alternations of day and night. It is this same system of laws by which all created things are produced and develop themselves, each in its order and system without conflict and confusion, the lesser forces flowing everywhere like river currents, while the great forces of creation go silently and steadily on."

In the same century in which the Chinese philosophers were crystalizing this faith in the universality of law in nature and in the dependability of the ways of God, another philosopher in the western world was voicing the same thoughts. Zoroaster in Persia thus instructs his people: "You have learned earthly things and heavenly things. Learn, then, that you shall not escape the laws of earth while you are on earth, nor the laws of heaven when you are in heaven." [Page 178]Of the forces which have influenced the western mind, the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth stand among the first. Mr. Henry C. King, in his "Ethics of Jesus," states: "He (Jesus) has the clear sense that life is so pervasively one that there can be no accident in it, but that one may count everywhere upon great laws involved in the very fidelity of the Father." The teachings of Jesus are full of such sayings as the following: "It is easier for Heaven and earth to pass than one tittle of the law to fail." "Consider the lilies of the field how they grow. They toil not, neither do they spin, and yet I say unto you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these." Through his entire teachings we feel the dependability of things, the uniformity of law, the justice of God, and the possibility of knowing these laws. "Know the truth and the truth shall make you free." In fact, it is the contention of all these teachers that man can become a free being no faster than he becomes aware of these laws and develops sufficient control to adjust his life to them.

It is this faith in law, this confidence in a definite order running through all things that has been the "pillar of cloud by day" and the "pillar of fire by night" leading scientific research, philosophic study, and religious faith ever forward in their search for truth. By assuming an order of law man has been able to organize and use the following sciences: mathematics, astronomy, geometry, physics, chemistry, zoology, botany, and psychology. It is the principle upon which we are seeking to formulate sociology, economics, and political sciences. The same working hypothesis has made possible many more specialized sciences. By it man has come to know and control much of the physical world. The many thousand inventions have enabled him to turn the forces of nature to his advantage. It would take much space to enumerate the achievements of phsyical science due to this assumption of law. It has given man definite control of many of the laws of physical health. Pestilence and disease have been eliminated by it. Today it bids fair to do even greater work in mental health than it has accomplished in physical health. Gradually we are coming to understand the laws which underlie permanent government and stable social [Page 179]conditions.

THE WORLD'S GREAT TEACHERS

The great masters of wisdom would not only agree with us in all of these modern adjustments to the physical world but they would say also that the building of a beautiful temple of character also rests upon definite principles and laws. Is it unreasonable to assume that this search for law will yet lead the mind of man to recognize those laws and principles upon which his moral, intellectual, and spiritual growth depend? Such, at least, is the hope inspired in one as he reads these great moral and spiritual philosophies.

Mr Raymond Blaine Fosdick writing in The Golden Book Magazine for November, 1930, says: "The advance of the last three generations has been almost exclusively along the line of the natural sciences—physics, chemistry, and biology. In spite of his new weapons and increased powers man himself remains as he always has been—irrational, impulsive, emotional, bound by customs which he will not analyze, the victim of age-old conventions and prejudices. The social sciences have advanced scarcely at all. This divergence between the natural sciences and the social sciences, between machinery and control, between the kingdom of the world and the kingdom of the spirit—this is where the hazard lies."

It is becoming increasingly clearer to the modern mind in every field of life that this important principle, namely, "Know the law and adjust to it," proclaimed by these master teachers, constitutes the basis of all true plans of progress or growth. In numerous ways they have stated that man becomes saved as fast as he knows the law and rightly applies his knowledge. For those who must live by faith alone the teachings of these men on definite subjects have served as a guide. It must, however, be clear to every student of these philosophies that a strong appeal is made for man to demonstrate the law for himself. In fact, the finest scientific spirit of modern times could have no more perfect goal than the thought expressed so often by these master minds: Do the works and know the Law. [Page 180]

THE ATTITUDE CREATED BY NATIONAL POWER

by GEORGE MALCOLM STRATTON Author of "Social Psychology of International Conduct." etc.

EVERY nation seeks power and fears it. For in a nation's own hands power is grateful of itself and is grateful also as an looking out upon any other nation, the more powerful that other nation is, the more is she dangerous and the more to be feared. And so, until a better way is followed, the society of nations commonly runs a course whereby the more a nation is satisfied with herself the less is she liked by others, having become for them an object of dread if not of hatred. And in consequence the satisfaction in one's own power is both embittered and endangered. For while nations enjoy being feared, they are at heart social creatures and enjoy also being praised and not hated, and enjoy feeling secure in their possessions.

In general the more a nation has power, the less is it content with what it has and the less is there of restraint upon its will to have still greater power. For this and other reasons, the greater the extent of territory already held, the greater is the "necessity" for expansion. The diminutive sovereignty of Liechtenstein or of Andorra hardly felt as intolerably cramped before the World War as did Russia and Germany. Italy, having become unified and having gained new territory in Europe and Africa, now begins to feel suffocated by her narrow confines. The United States and Great Britain with their great possessions have almost continually felt the need of another island here and a more extended coast-line there. Their eyes are always lighting on some Naboth's vineyard. [Page 181]

THE ATTITUDE CREATED BY NATIONAL POWER

With smallness there often goes a mind accommodated to being small: there being less of the means to attain political mastery, there is apt to be less ambition, less truculence.

But smallness gives no guarantee of inward happiness, as we know from Ireland and Albania and Nicaragua and many another small state of Eastern Europe, Central America, and South America. Nor does great size always bring a sense of being cramped, as we know from the China of many centuries before the present day. But in general the large countries make their neighbors most anxious; and the small countries make their neighbors least anxious. It is France, Great Britain, pre-war Germany, Russia, and the United States that have been given to restless expansion. No nation that stands in the way of any of them can feel at ease.

But the desire for power is not only a desire for land and its raw materials and ports and markets. There is also a desire for strength through a rounded nationality. Upon the territory adjacent to each nation in eastern Europe there are men and women of one’s own stock and culture, who are no less desirable because with them are perhaps fertile valleys or rich mines or forests or a harbor or a "corridor" from somewhere to somewhere else. Such a population and all these other things are bound up with military strength; they are good in themselves, and good also for soldiery and the support of soldiery. And with the military strength there comes a temptation to be less accommodating; to be a little shorter of speech; and the irritation from this, added to the menace from the armament itself, increases the dislike felt by neighbors. But unfortunately the military strength breeds a sense of security, and brings in also a certain pleasant incense of deference from others, mingled with their dislike. Japan, in developing naval and military power with other western ways, has attained a high place in the councils of the world; she is at once feared and disliked and treated with respect. The United States with great territory and growing wealth and population and a desire to stand with the first in naval strength is beginning to notice a similar complex attitude toward herself.

And besides territory, wealth, and population, there is the [Page 182]grade of a nation’s integration, of its morale. The degree in which a nation possesses nationhood is a part of its power and helps to form the nation’s own attitude and that of its neighbors. But the international danger from any nation is not proportioned—other things equal solely and directly to its strength of organization. There is danger also in want of organization, as well as in fullness of it; for a nation can be a menace to its neighbors not only by being strong in this respect, but in being weak.

The list of nations most completely united, most successful in their political organization, would certainly include Great Britain, France, Switzerland, Holland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Japan, Canada, Australia, Brazil, Argentine, Chile, and the United States. These have both the form of nationhood and its substance; have considerable independence of action and have internal strength. Less completely unified at the moment are Russia, Spain, certain States of the Baltic, the Balkan States, Turkey, Mexico, and several States to Mexico’s south. China, long torn by factions, has at last, let us hope, an effective government. Such countries for the time are less fully nations; so that nationhood need not be present or absent entire, but may be present in varying degree.

This is important, for the less unified countries court intervention, which turns loose the forces of disorder hard to control. Nations that are neighbors to an unintegrated country are awakened with anxiety or cupidity. But disturbance of the normal relation of neighbors may be caused in another way by a nation that lacks morale. For although few things are worse in the end, yet few things are more effective for the moment than a foreign war to tide a nation over internal dissensions; temporarily war acts as a simulant, and gives a certain coherence within. A weak State, if not too weak for the effort, is therefore tempted to pick a quarrel with some still weaker neighbor. Germany sought unity by this course, by wars with Denmark, Austria, and France. The obvious morale which comes in time of successful war is doubtless responsible for the doctrine that a nation degenerates unless at frequent intervals it goes to war—a doctrine which is of course refuted by Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Holland, and Argentina. But [Page 183]

II

But there is another aspect of power and weakness which is perhaps of still more importance today. In spite of the menace which comes from national strength, the robust nations—including, of course, the small robust nations—are the very ones which in general have given the heartier impulse to international advancement. The best promise of order comes, after all, from the peoples of national vigor. Your valetudinarians among the nations are too much preoccupied each with his own little ailment. The rest of the world need not fear them; neither can it count upon them to lend a hand in constructive work.

All this may well be remembered by any nation tempted to case its own anxiety by weakening internally its neighbors, destroying that neighbor's morale by fostering dissension and perhaps rebellion. It is a dangerous road to security, and a blind road. The injury to the neighbor causes bad blood in him, and the weakness in the neighborhood means disorder in the neighborhood, and unhappy days for all concerned. The destroyers of political unity in others thus reap the whirlwind.

Those who work intelligently for their own peace of mind therefore work for a reasonable contentment in their neighbors, with inner strength and lessened grudges there. China for this reason will be most providently dealt with by assisting her to strength. And France is beginning to be reconciled to the thought of a united and prosperous Germany.

But the guarantees against the abuse of power are, on every hand, still unassuring. So that, in the form in which it has usually been sought, power is rarely seen in another nation without distrust. The attitude of the Latin American nations toward the United States has here and there been uncordial, not because of any mysterious defect or excess on these Latin-American countries, nor because the United States is the chief of sinners. America, that could at any moment have taken all of Mexico and much besides, might feel inclined to exclaim as did Lord Clive before those who [Page 184]accused him of taking too much: "By God, Mr. Chairman, at this moment I stand astonished at my own moderation." But America's neighbors cannot but be distrustful of her immense commercial, naval, and political power. And this feeling which exists in the Western Hemisphere exists also in a part of Asia and is appearing in Europe. Nor is it astonishing. For rarely is there love for the man who holds a mortgage on the homestead; or for the frontiersman with uncommonly many pistols in his belt. So the usual distrust among nations is intensified by any extraordinary might. Verbal assurances of goodwill, or even one's own consciousness of rectitude will not prevent this attitude toward a nation which holds the fate of others so largely in its hands. Any nation that in the present stage of international society possesses such uncontrolled power is not merely thought to be a menace, it is a menace. Each nation thus seeks power, and indirectly seeks hatred.

And yet the nations that attain to power are not merely the despair of one who looks for international goodwill; they are also his hope. For there are no better relations among nations all of which are weak. Aggressors were found among the parts of ancient Greece with its miniature States, in the India of earlier centuries, in Italy when she was nothing but fragments. The German States wherever the central power over them was impotent were at loggerheads with one another. The weak States of eastern Europe and of Latin America are not faster friends than are France, England, Germany, Japan, Russia, and the United States. While the growth of power causes in neighbors dismay and the desire to shatter the growing power, yet—as with the union of English and Scots in Great Britain, or of Britons and Boers in South Africa—it marks an extension of order, a lessened friction of the several parts, a disciplining of them mind and body into cooperation. So it has been with the American federation of States, and with united Italy and united Germany. The larger body is more dangerous, and yet it is an achievement in the quieting of discord, in the increase of tolerance and cooperation.

Self-determination, in so far as it means division and the establishment of separate nations by small and discontented peoples. [Page 185]

THE ATTITUDE CREATED BY NATIONAL POWER

must accordingly be looked at askance. It is in general a move in the wrong direction. For if the international life is to be vigorous at needs strong members; it needs nations that have proved their ability to take unhappy elements and make them into fellow-workers. But the decision to become fellow-workers is best when at is attained freely and after long deliberation, rather than at the cannon's mouth. Whenever a people is already within a larger administration not utterly tyrannical, the interest of the nations generally suggests that this people school itself to compromise, to some disappointment of its longing to stand free and alone. It is better not only for Great Britain but also for France, Italy, Germany, and the United States if Ireland finally accepts a place within the Empire. This kind of choice leads toward, rather than away from, a strengthened world-society.

Nations are unwise, then, not in desiring power for themselves, but in desiring disjoined, competitive power; in seeking strength for the nation itself, and relative weakness for all others. The mutual ill-will which comes of such a course they try to meet by obtaining still more power each for himself, and thus increasing the danger to all. But the way out of this vicious circle is beginning to appear in agreements of various kinds which impose voluntary restrictions upon the use of power to create not a common danger but a common security. The power must be so organized as to bring a security in which all the nations can share, and not a security of one group of nations against another group. In so far as the nations move toward this new use of power, the sting of power is gone. [Page 186]

STEPS TOWARD BALKAN UNION

by JOSEPH S. ROUCEK Professor of Social Science, Centenary Junior College, Hackettstoen, N. 1.

Two recent attempts of unofficial representatives of the Balkan nations to initiate steps leading to the eventual formation of a Balkan Union deserve more attention by the world minded observers than has been given to these meetings in our public press and discussions. The Balkans remain one of the most important spheres of the world, insofar as here events may any day disrupt the peace structure of Europe and of the world We must not forget that the conflagration of the World War flamed up there in 1914, that the control of the Balkans and of the Dardanelles was the primary object for which the Central Powers fought their losing battle so determinedly, that through the intervention of Turkey and Bulgaria the greatest war in history was prolonged; it must be added that it was in the Balkans that the victory of the Allied armies was earliest, and most decisivel won. Even after the Peace, the problem of Turkey kept Europe agitated for four more years and the periodical difficulties arisin from the exchanges of the populations have until very recentl required the attention of statesmen and of the League of Nation Nor is it yet a situation to view as settled, for the whole problem of the Balkans is still a challenging one, and the efforts to provide the basis of lasting peace in the Balkans should deserve our mos serious attention.

If we are to appreciate the difficulties with which the enlightened leadership of the Balkans must still contend, we must understand the background of their problems. Let us take a look at the map of Europe. If we focus our attention upon the southeaster part of Europe we shall see that even nature has not been ver [Page 187]

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Charitable. Geographical obstacles are immediately evident and the consequent lack of communications has greatly intensified the separatism of each nation. As the export trade reveals (about three-fourths of the whole are agricultural products), the whole region is industrially undeveloped. Hence there is a lack of balance between industry and agriculture, a balance which would produce social and economic equilibrium, as well as political stability. The Balkan nations so far have had very little reason to depend on the exchange of their products and thus form mutual interests and interchanges of economic goods. Greece alone is in need of imported grain. This lack of economic interdependence is no doubt responsible for the lack of political, social and cultural interrelations and interconnections. At the same time it intensifies the nationalistic behaviour of each nation. Thus there is created an atmosphere in which each country is a potential competitor of each other country.

From the historical viewpoint, the Balkan countries had been most unkindly treated. Subject for centuries to Turkish domination, Serbia, Roumania, Greece, Bulgaria, Montenegro and Albania suffered in every way possible. The impress of the past oppression is still discerned psychologically, if not materially. The weapons of the "weak" had to be used; cheating, chronic opposition, hatred, violent murders, sense of martyrdom and delusions of persecutions (whether based on imaginative or real reasons), consequent delusion of grandeur and exaggerated feeling of self-importance, over-estimation attached to the military profession and to the banditry and the dislike of honest labor-all these and other attitudes have been the heritage of oppression. If the oppressor was long opposed by the general method of non-cooperation and strong passive resistance, the habit naturally remained. In addition, each of the Balkan nations won its independence by a series of wars, by means bloody sacrifices and tremendous efforts. In other words, the sense of nationalism could not but become exaggerated; and while these nations could join against a common oppressor, they could also, as in the second Balkan War in 1913, fight each other.

The same difficulties are apparent in the racial and ethnic [Page 188]elements. Slavic components extend from Yugoslavia to Bulgaria, but their Slav blood does not make them contented neighbors. In addition, we find here Roumanians, Greeks, Albanians, and a variety of other ethnic mixtures, including Jews, Turks, Germans, Hungarians, Gypsies, Czechoslovaks, and others. Even religion is not unified, though the Greek Orthodox Church is the prevailing religion. There is a belt of Roman Catholic population in northern Albania, on the Dalmation coast and in Yugoslavia; there are also Muslim Albanians, the Muslims in Yugoslavia, the Muslims of Thrace, the Muslimized Bulgars and Turks of Bulgaria and the Protestant and Catholic Saxons and Czeklers in Roumania, in addition to the Russians.

With such mixtures of populations it is evident that no boundary, by whatever authority drawn, will satisfy everybody. Thus in the wake of two regional wars in the Balkans before the World War, and following the World War, numerous sources of dissatisfaction arose with the territorial changes. They left behind them a series of minorities, centers of increasing dissatisfaction and hate. The extraordinary hate of each people for each other in the Balkans has been most clearly revealed, in the post-war period, in the activities of the Macedonian organizations, which continue their activities with outrages, murders, bombings and kidnappings, leaving in their wake misery, bloodshed and suspicion in international contacts. Thus the problem of minorities is and will remain one of the most difficult problems that Europe will have to face. The more so because no tentative and concrete solution can be offered, without striking at the emotional basis of nationalism, so dear to every nationalist of south-eastern Europe. Any future redistribution of territory, if there be any, will but make for new bitterness. The exchange of populations has been tried. But it is questionable whether such expensive experiments can be used to meet the general situation.

Let us stop for a moment and consider the chief aims of the individual nations of the Balkans.

Roumania has achieved her territorial ambition in the direction of the Balkans. Hence she would be ready to agree to a Balkan [Page 189]

STEPS TOWARD BALKAN UNION

union, which would also guarantee the present status quo. In fact, Bucharest has no territorial grievances in this respect and will be satisfied with any tendencies in the direction of mutual cooperation. The same applies for the most part to Yugoslavia; but the international situation for this Kingdom is not yet assured. Bulgaria still mourns the loss of Macedonia. The territorial and naval intentions of Mussolini in reference to the Adriatic sea and seacoast turther confuse the situation. The unhappy experiences with Rome also manifest themselves in the political and economic domination of Albania by Italian diplomacy, a situation which does not escape the notice of the Belgrade Foreign Office.

Bulgaria was defeated twice in her ambitions. The loss of territories after the Balkan Wars just before the World War and the additional losses after the "Great Parade" make Bulgaria the most dissatisfied nation of the Balkans. The territorial partitions to Roumania, Yugoslavia and Greece are bitter medicine to the Bulgarian nationalists, as well as to the large numbers of Bulgarian minorities in these states. Consequently Bulgaria will pose, and in act is posing, as the natural protector of the national minorities in the Balkan States. The Macedonians so far have dominated with more or less success the political and cultural life of Sofia and the Macedonian problem, especially because of the terrorist methods and periodical border raids, has its steady influence on relations between Yugoslavia and Bulgaria, though the recent settlements and agreements point a way to the gradual solution of the problem.

Greece, thwarted in her attempt to create a "Greater Greece" the ruins of the Turkish Empire by the persevering policy of Kemal Pasha, can be considered a loser in the direction of Asia Minor and a winner in the direction of the Balkans. The problem the Salonica Free Zone for Yugoslavia has recently been settled After years of negotiations, but the outlet for Bulgaria on the Aegean Sea, promised to the latter country by the Neuilly Treaty, not yet provided for. The liquidation of the problem of the exchange of populations, however, is being very quickly completed and the Turkish-Greek relations have been recently put on a very endly and most hopeful footing. [Page 190]Turkey can be classified as the most disinterested player in the whole game. Kemal Pasha is an astute diplomat and is devoting all his time to the westernization of his country. There exists no legal problem of minorities and there are no territorial ambitions for the present. Indeed, it may be safely assumed that the Foreign Office of Ankara will look with very friendly eye on peaceful and cooperative plans.

We have so far omit ' nia. Intentionally so. Albania is led by the clever and ambitious King Zogu, "The King of All Albanians." The title itself points to the fact that this small Kingdom is aware of Albanians living as minorities in other Balkan States But the country is too small and too weak to entertain any serious territorial ambitions. What is more important in our case is the fact that Albania is completely dominated by the influence of Rome, which looks on the territory as its outpost of influence. In contrast to the Italian influence in Albania, the influence of Paris is most evident in Belgrade, and to a lesser degree in Roumania Italy, however, has been making its counter-moves against the French policy by joining in marriage a royal daughter to the King of Bulgaria, and making treaties with Greece, Turkey and Roumania, while allowing a similar one with Yugoslavia to expire. The Balkans is, therefore, the meeting ground of the diplomacy of two of the strongest European powers. The most disturbing aspect is that the Balkan nations are not allowed to put their own house in order. They must listen to the suggestions and advice of their "b brothers," who, of course, have their own interest at heart. Any move which will not benefit either France or Italy will bring their influences into play. Just as the problem of the Near East was the focal point for the foreign offices of pre-war Europe, so today essentially the same interest remains, though the general background is somewhat changed.

From the above discussion we may assume two points of departure, underlying any attempt to form a Balkan Union and on which any future cooperation will have to be built. In the first place, it is evident that any political union will have to avoid individual mistrusts of any of the Balkan States, and be formed on [Page 191]

STEPS TOWARD BALKAN UNION

with the approval of all Balkan States. This is evidenced by the fact that so far all attempts of two or three states to institute a treaty or agreement of any kind of cooperation have provoked suspicions of the most serious nature, suspicions based to some extent on fact, as the history of the Balkan peninsula has shown for the last fifty years. Secondly, a "hands-off" policy by the Great Powers, meaning absolute non-interfence in the affairs of the Balkans by the Western States, is essential. While in the past the problem facing the Balkans was how to remove the Turk, now the problem is how to keep other Great Powers out of the Balkans. This will become increasingly possible with the gradual formation of sufficient unity to offset the influence of imperialistic foreign states.

On the whole, the two Baikan Conferences, which we shall presently discuss, have achieved a measure of success only because post-war developments are showing the consolidation of various interests and the diminution of certain conditions hampering such progress. The degree of mutual suspicions is decreasing due to the increasing sense of security, based on a series of treaties concluded or in the process of conclusion. The projected exchange of populations is completed and the whole problem practically liquidated. The problem of the Free Zone for Yugoslavia in Salonica has been settled and a similar seaport settlement of Bulgaria and Greece is on the way. The Macedonian question is lessened in its influence on the Yugoslav-Bulgarian-Greek relations, despite the influence of the Macedonians themselves to the contrary. There are and always will be territorial disputes, but the bitterness is decreasing and there are numerous evidences of a desire to deal concretely with the other difficulties on the basis of the present status quo.

The movement for the unification of the Balkan nations has a tradition of more than a century. But in the past the conceptions of such a union have been varied and all of them have been different from the present one. The Balkans in fact were formerly more unified than at present, at least from the legal and political viewpoints, because this territory was under the domination of the Ottoman sovereignty. When this status became unbearable for the [Page 192]oppressed Christian nations, the idea that these nations should fight for their liberty in common was originated. This notion, it is interesting to notice, was basically religious (with few exceptions the oppressed nations belonged to the Greek-Orthodox Church) and came from the Greeks. The famous society "Filiki Steria" tried to gain the Serbs and Bulgars for a conimon anti-Turkish action; the great poet of the Greek struggle for liberty, Rigas Ferreos, was in contact with the rebellious movement of Serbs.

The first national states of the Balkans, Greece and Serbia. though divided from each other by Turkish territory, looked for the possibilities of cooperation for the purpose of liberating their nationals from Turkish domination. Thus in the sixties of the last century the first Serb-Greek alliance was formed, which, however, had no occasion for making itself valid practically. Meanwhile another factor appears on the political horizon of the Balkans. When Bulgaria, in the seventies, made attempts to become free. this effort was appreciated in Serbia and with it the idea of the unification of all Southern Slavs was born. But subsequent events buried this idea; the Serbo-Bulgarian war of 1885 and especially the influence of non-Balkan factors, which divided the whole peninsula into its "spheres of interest," created an abyss which has never been bridged.

After that we meet alternately the first conception of unity, and with the subsequent conception of uniting only certain people in the Balkans. It is, of course, evident that these conceptions contradict each other. The plan to form a Serbo-Bulgarian customs union in 1905 was not considered at that time as running against the interests of other Balkan States; a little earlier than that the Prime Minister of Serbia, Vladan Djordjevic, propounded the idea of mutual close cooperation of all Balkan States with Turkey. But in 1912 and 1913 came the conflict of these two conceptions. The military cooperation of the Christian States against Turkey brought great gains to the individual states; but it was shown then that against the all-Balkan interests the interests of national egotism could fight very successfully; or, to be concrete, Bulgaria fought he Balkan allies. Concurrently, at that time a new factor comes in [Page 193]

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Roumania, which, with the exception of the participation in the struggle against the Turks in 1878, had kept aside, now received southern Dobrogea, a part of the Balkans, and began to have interests in the Peninsula. Turkey not being considered as oppressor any more, could become a cooperator. Finally, another factor appears on the scene in Albania, whose appearance is characterized by the intrigues of foreign powers in the affairs of the Balkans.

The World War buried definitely any possible Slav cooperation. Bulgaria and Serbia joined different camps. Thus the conception of a Slav union, which could dominate the Balkan peninsula, cannot be considered for the future.

In the present post-war period we meet with the gradual settlement of differences and also the gradual consolidation of mutual relations-as discussed in the first part of our article.

A practical step toward the realization of a Balkan Union was taken for the first time in October, 1930, at Athens. The necessity for some "regional understanding" was a matter of discussion of the International Peace Congress held in Athens in 1929, which agreed to set up a commission, at the suggestion of the Greek delegates, to consider the plan of instituting regular Balkan conferences and the establishment of a Balkan Institute in Athens under the auspices of the League of Nations. Subsequently the Bureau of International Peace decided to follow the recommendation of the Balkan Commission and invited the Balkan Governments to send their representatives to Athens. The Greek Parliament offered its hospitality to the delegates, and appointed its director of the Foreign Ministry as official observer. Other Balkan Governments gave instructions to their delegates to follow the proceedings and chose their national delegates.

According to The Central European Observer, the first conference, without having any official character, gathered beneath a specially designed flag of the United Balkans, showing six stars on a multi-colored ground, on October 5, 1930. Altogether about 150 delegates were there, in addition to the diplomats assigned to Athens and representatives of the League of Nations. The proceedings [Page 194]opened with the playing by a military band of the "Balkan Hymn of Peace," composed for the occasion. The delegates included representatives of political parties, of municipalities, social agencies, the press, labor professions, academic circles, and from agriculture, industry and commerce. The presence of Bulgarian and Albanian representatives added to the impressiveness of this gathering. Steps were taken for the foundation of an Institute for Intellectual Cooperation in the Balkans, with its seat in Istanbul. A resolution was adopted requesting the Foreign Ministers of the Balkan States to meet regularly every year to exchange opinions on the Balkan affairs and discuss means of solidarity among the Balkan peoples. The resolution also urged the Balkan States to study the proposed pact of Premier Papanastasiu of Greece, based on the following principles: first, the outlawry of war; second, peaceful settlement of all disputes that arise among them; and, third, mutual assistance in case of violation of the obligation to abstain from war. The economic commission suggested to the Governments that they prepare an agreement to give economic solidarity to the Balkan States. It is unnecessary to deal with other detailed recommendations.

It must be noticed, however, that of the resolutions voted in 1930 very little was realized up to the Second Conference, held in Istanbul in October 1931. Even the psychological progress was not very great. The Governments paid little attention to these pioneers because in that period of one year lay many commercial wars, misunderstandings, the problems of emigration, debts and reparation payments, in addition to the minority questions, the customs tariff problems and even the problem of railway connections.

The Second Conference, again composed of unofficial delegates who began their work on October 20, 1931, reached its crucial point when the discussion centered on the question whether economic problems or political problems involving minorities should be taken up first. The Albanian delegates accused Yugoslavia of illegally Serbizing their nationals in Yugoslavia, and the Yugoslav delegates retorted that Albania was the tool of Italy. This somewhat heated discussion was sidetracked by the formation of a special committee which was to elaborate the non-aggression com [Page 195]

STEPS TOWARD BALKAN UNION

pact with particular reference to the rights of minorities, and submit a report to the various states three months before the opening of the next conference. Parallel with this fundamental problem a series of practical questions have been dealt with, most of an economic nature. Real progress was made in the discussions of the project of a Balkan postal union, the establishment of a common office for controlling and coordinating the production of tobacco, the foundation of a Balkan cereal union, the establishment of a Balkan chamber of commerce which would also examine the problem of partial customs union and at the same time would recommend measures for simplifying the tariff system. Important questions of transport and law were also spoken of: for example, the unification of all civil law, etc. The Balkan-pact resolution was accepted with unanimity. Its final clause confirms the principle of the outlawry of war as a means of international policy and puts the principle of arbitration in its place. In addition, the resolution recommended that the individual states conclude two-party arbitration treaties and expressed the hope that the universal Disarmament Conference in 1932 would achieve positive results.

Both Conferences represent new epochs in the evolution of the new movement, in which all Balkan nations are to forget their old differences and to create the closest relations and improve Balkan conditions. It is interesting to note, for example, that Greece as well as Turkey have evidently given up their old imperialistic policies. As the point of departure must be the principle of status quo, it is significant that the Greek leaders worked for the calling of the Conference in Athens. Turkey, on the other hand, became a gracious host to the Second Conference and in both conferences the Turkish delegates were trying to imbue moderation in the other delegates when the differences became too strong.

Whether the practical results of both conferences will materialize in the near future through the practical steps taken by the Governments concerned is questionable. But the whole movement must be followed with greatest interest by all who are interested in the movements leading to world peace and cooperation. Here met the unifying ideas of a danger-spot of Europe; for the first time [Page 196]the representatives of nations gathered on the constructive basis of possible mutual union; nations who hitherto had imagined themselves as foes, enemies and competitors. Thus from a negative basis the meetings switched to positive and constructive foundations. Here was formed a tradition of direct dealings, personal contacts and mutual knowledge of leading personalities, who were here unofficially, but are the leaders of the public opinion in their respective lands. Here was created the atmosphere of Geneva. If the cultural, economic and social problems of the Balkans will gradually become unified, the psychological results are bound to provide a success in the political realm. The moral beginnings will eventually bring concrete, and especially political consequences. All friends of world unity and peace will make a mistake if they ignore these first two steps and underestimate the present developments.

The thirty-third modern movement presented by WORLD Ustry in its department "The W We Live [Page 197]

THE PATH OF HISTORY

by PAUL HINNER

THE EPOCH OF AGGRESSIVE INDIVIDUALISM (Concluded)

THE impotence of religion, the dissolving of all moral standards, the worship of wealth, the increase in crime, the shallowness of literature and art and their tendency to capitalize the sex-appeal, the subversion of a large part of the press by selfish interest, the commercializing of the professions, the endeavor of the educational institutions to prepare their pupils mainly for the struggle for material riches, the fostering and exploiting of the weakness of the people by business interests, the continuous increase of the world's indebtedness, the impoverishing of the masses, the permanent unemployment of millions of workers, the excessive speculation, the perversion of the conception of justice, the obliteration of the dividing line between legal business and organized crime, the impaired circulation of the currency and the corruption in the highest financial and political circles are some of the many parallel events and consequences of the inner dissolution of the present civilization. The use of intrigue or brutal force by many nations to gain their selfish ends, the bartering of their support for materialistic advantages, the insincerity in their conduct towards each other and the restlessness of many subject people are the external signs of decay

In consequence of the fact that individualism reached its highest possible development in the United States of America, the latter were also bound to be most prominent in the dissolution of the individualistic civilization. The combined effects of the completion of the development of their own domain, of the part [Page 198]played in the World War and of the subsequent financial conquest of the World, placed the United States in a position in which they were fulfilling this function unconsciously; force of circumstances compelled the nation to carry on an economic expansion, for which a necessity did not exist and which therefore was bound to become destructive. The enormous industrial and financial capacities drove the United States to increase and exploit the material desires not only of their own people but of the whole world, in order to develop a market for the products of the industries and to create opportunities for the investment of the surplus capital. This was accomplished through intensive advertising and through the granting of credit in the form of deferred payments at home and a continuous stream of loans and investments of capital abroad. However, this policy not only increased their own interior indebtedness but also the indebtedness of the world in general and drove the present economic system relentlessly towards its climax.

The limit of the ability of the nations to pay interest on invested capital, determines the limit for their combined interior and exterior indebtedness. After this limit has been reached the further investment of capital in their countries ceases on account of becoming unsafe and unprofitable; but as the reinvestment of the profits in new undertaking is an absolute necessity for the maintenance of the circulation of the currency, the vanishing of the opportunities for investment must bring this circulation to a standstill. Through the practice of issuing securities which do not represent actual investments, through the high rate of interest of the outstanding capital, through the centralization of the retail business, through the intensification of the sales methods and through the sale of goods on the instalment plan, the means which draw the capital out of the masses and deliver it to the respective financial centers, have been developed far beyond all previous dimensions. On the other hand institutions and means which would cause the capital to flow back into the masses do not exist. The progressive settlement of the world, the development of the natural resources and the general expansion of the different facilities to meet the demands created by the growth of the population and [Page 199]of the materialistic desires, fulfilled this function up to now and separate organs which would serve this purpose were not needed. The capital flowed of its own accord from the center into new undertakings which promised profits and security, for instance: The settling of new parts of the world, the building and expansion of cities, the extension of railroads, steamship lines and telegraphs, the opening of mines and other sources of raw materials, the erecting of factories, the extension of business facilities and divers other enterprises. In the form of wages or payments for property or material, the liquid capital reached again the broad masses of the people, to return as before through the different channels of business and banking to the center. Now, however, the settling of the world, the development of resources and the construction of necessary facilities have been accomplished and in many instances carried far beyond the measure dictated by necessity. The whole world is equipped with enough factories and industrial plants, etc., to more than satisfy all demands: Additional investments of capital for these purposes is now unprofitable and has practically ceased. Besides that the upkeep of the different facilities requires less of the industrial products than their construction and additional shrinking in the demand for the products of the industries is the natural result.

Furthermore, the sum of all profits, interest charges, dividends, taxes, etc., must forever stand between production and consumption. This is reflected in the low prices for the products of agriculture and the relatively low annual earnings of labor on the one hand and the high prices demanded of the consumer on the other. The continued increase of the world's indebtedness, however, has increased the sum total of the profits and interest charges, etc., and widened the price-gap between production and consumption to such an extent that the income of many producers is insufficient to cover the expenses which they have as consumers. The distress of agriculture and the shrinking of the buying power of ever-increasing masses of people are mainly due to this fact. The selling of goods on the instalment plan is an attempt to bridge this ever-widening gap; however, as that does not decrease but rather [Page 200]increases the burden, it will not prevent the ultimate collapse of the present financial system when the climax is reached.

The gold standard had already become inadequate before the war in consequence of the enormous amounts of the outstanding capital. The amount of money based on gold was insufficient to meet all payments becoming due daily and at the same time accomplish the distribution of the necessities of life. The gold standard therefore was supplemented through an extension of the credit system and a paper currency based on securities. During and since the war it was still more weakened through the further increase of the world's indebtedness, through the one-sided and restricted distribution of the world's gold supply and through the diminishing of the confidence of great masses of people in the stability of the present economic conditions. This waning of the public confidence is clearly demonstrated through the hoarding of gold. The gold which was in free circulation throughout the western world has completely disappeared since the World War because persons or institutions who are in a position to do so retain now all gold coins which they receive in payment. In consequence of the enormous expenditures for the purpose of the war, the indebtedness of the involved countries had increased until the ability of the people to pay the interest was taxed to the limit. Through the effect of the peace treaty the central powers were forced to renounce their interior debts and compelled to assume the obligations contracted by the Allies. In this way the ability and the will of the German people to pay reparations became part of the basis of the present international financial situation. However, the payment of the reparations and of the interest on their legal debts exceed the ability of the German people. Germany has, therefore, during the last few years, borrowed the means to meet the deficit, hoping for a favorable turn in world affairs. This policy has increased the burden still more as the hoped for relief has not materialized. All attempts to improve the situation through increased efforts have also failed, because any new capital is through the reparations automatically drained from the country. Foreign capital, knowing that Germany has reached the limit of its ability to pay, has ceased to flow to the country in the [Page 201]

THE PATH OF HISTORY

form of loans. Through that Germany is placed outside of the International circuit of the currency and its economic life suffers continuously from want of capital. The constant sinking of their standard of living, the continued direct and indirect domination of their affairs by foreigners and the failure of all efforts to bring relief, reveal to the German people more and more the hopelessness of their situation. A state of indifference towards all obligations, whether legal rimposed and towards the consequences of non-fulfillment is developing in the broad masses. The incentive to maintain and support the present political and economic institutions is vanishing, as they have ceased to be of benefit to a majority of the people. It is, therefore, only a question of time when the complete economic and political collapse of Germany must take place. This event in combination with the progressive dissolution of the individualistic civilization will have far-reaching effects. Financial failures, cessation payment of interest on investments and continuous wide-spread unemployment will be the result in many countries and cause great hardships in the large cities and densely populated districts where most people depend entirely on the steady flow of wages or income tom investments. A temporary relief to Germany does not alter the situation but will only postpone for a time the inevitable end and prolong the agony of dissolution, because it is impossible to avoid the consequences of previous developments.

The epoch of civilization which has dominated the affairs of mankind in the Westen Hemisphere since the decline of Rome was the materialization of the principle of aggressive individualism through Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The adherents of these eligions were combined through the common ideal into a living ganic entity. During its ascendency spiritual interests predominated within the epoch, while in the decline, materialistic desires sere strongest. The religious, political and economic institutions were the organs; they supplemented each other and fulfilled all nctions which the development and growth of the epoch required. The fundamental principle, the method of growth and the eign and functions of the organs were suitable only for the ex-poration of the world through colonial expansion, the abolition [Page 202]of slavery and the establishment of political equality. When this purpose was attained the utility of the individualistic principle ceased and it must now give way to the collective principle which is the logical successor and which will govern the affairs of mankind during the next era. The World War was the death-struggle of individualism and the chaotic conditions prevailing in the world today are the dissolution. This dissolution of the individualistic order of society is the natural consequence of the selfishness and extreme love of material possessions which dominate the involved parts of mankind, a vivid demonstration that selfishness will always defeat itself in the end.

This terrible decline of the true humane qualities in mankind a parallel to the barbarism which prevailed in Europe during and after the downfall of ancient Rome. The world is now, the same as it was then, in a state in which the attained object of the dissolving epoch of civilization has not yet been replaced by a new and living ideal. Common spiritual interests and ideals always promote mutual helpfulness and sympathy among their adherents while their lack produces the opposite effect. People without ideal are guided by selfishness and materialistic desires only and must therefore be classed as barbarians, irrespective of whether they hold college degrees or wear the formal dress or elaborate uniform denoting high position. The line of human conduct prevailing the world today and the resulting conditions show an absence of all features which are generally embraced by the meaning of the term "Civilization;" and an absence of civilization is "Barbarism [Page 203]

THIS PRAYING WORLD

by JOHN WILLIAM KITCHING Author of arubaal and Lam

Greece

"GRANT that no word may fall from me against my will unfit for present need."

"G" Here is a Prayer of Pericles (B.C. 429) known as the builder of the Parthenon at Athens. This prayer may be placed alongside a quotation from the Book of Proverbs, "A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in network of silver."

Pericles was the greatest statesman of ancient Greece. His ather was Xanthippus, victor over the Persians at Mycale in 479 BC. His mother was Agariste, the niece of Clisthenes, the law giver. He received a careful education and was especially influenced two of his teachers, Damon, a famous sophist and master of music, and the philosopher Anaxagoras of Clazomende, to whose teaching he undoubtedly owed the independence of thought and reedom from superstition which raised him above the multitude.

For more than thirty years he was the most influential leader Athens. From the first he attached himself to the democratic arty, and under his leadership the complete democratization of Athens was accomplished.

There was, however, strong opposition to Pericles’ policy. The party opposed to him was led by Thucydides, whose ostracism 444 B.C. left Pericles the undisputed leader.

Pericles restored temples destroyed by the Persians and erected new monuments which made Athens the most magnificent city of the ancient world. Most prominent among these monuments were the bronze statue to Athena Promachos, which was erected about 448 at the west end of the Acropolis and a new temple to Athena [Page 204]Polias. The Parthenon was also built on an enlarged and more magnificent scale.

Athens now became a great centre of literature as well as of the fine arts, and philosophy transplanted from Ionia and Italy made its home there for a thousand years.

The imperialistic schemes of Pericles led to the Peloponnesian war. The famous Aspasia was celebrated for her friendship with Pericles.

"O dear Pan and other gods who are here, grant me to become beautiful within and grant that whatever outward possessions I have may be friendly to that which is within. Let me count the wise man a wealthy man. As for gold, give me just so much as none but the prudent man could bear or carry."

This is a prayer attributed to Socrates and is quoted by Plato in the Phædrus.

Socrates (469-399 B.C.), the greatest of the Greek philosophers, was born at Athens. He served in several campaigns in the Athenian army, and distinguished himself by his unusual fortitude. He received as a boy only the old-fashioned elementary education in music and gymnastics, but later familiarized himself with the education of the Sophists in rhetoric and dialectics, with the speculations of the Ionic philosophers, and all the culture of Periclean Athens.

Socrates followed at first the craft of his father, a sculptor and tradition attributed to him a group of the three Graces draped which Pausanias (a Greek traveler and geographer, author of "Guidebook to Greece," 175 A.D.) saw on the Acropolis.

The greater part of his mature life was spent in the market place, streets and public resorts of Athens in conversation with all who cared to listen.

He devoted himself chiefly to problems of life and conduct. Deeply conscious as he was of the need and the lack of clear insight into principles in matters of conduct, he set himself in his intercourse with his fellow-citizens to discover to them, by a method of cross examination, the limitations of their ethical knowledge.

In personal appearance Socrates was notoriously ugly, and [Page 205]the Platonic dialogues he is represented as making jesting references to his snub nose and protruding eyes. Eventually he was accused of impiety and religious innovation and condemned to death.

Plato puts another prayer into the mouth of Socrates which runs: "Lord Zeus, grant us good even without our request; grant us not evil, even at our request." (Alcibiades, II, 143 A.)

<poem> "Oh, may my constant feet not fail, Walking in paths of righteousness, Sinless in word and deed,— True to those eternal laws That scale forever the high steep Of heaven's pure ether, whence they sprang;— For only in Olympus is their home, Nor mortal wisdom gave them birth: And howsoe'er men may forget, They will not sleep For the might of the god within them grows not old." </poem>

This prayer of Sophocles is taken from the Edipus Rex. Sophocles lived from about 490 to 405 B.C. and was a native of Colonus, near Athens. He was famous for his personal beauty, amiable character and political qualities as well as for his pre-eminent poetical genius. There is a story, not likely to be true, that in the last years of his life his son prosecuted him on the ground of incapacity to manage his property and that he defended himself simply by reciting in court a famous chorus from Edipus Coloneus. On the occasion of his first appearance as a dramatist (468 B.C.) he won the first prize, defeating even Eschylus. Only seven of his plays are extant, in addition to a number of fragments. He probably invented scene-painting; and was the first to use Phrygian music. His characters are delineated with great skill and the verdict of his contemporaries, that he was the greatest of the three great tragic poets has never been seriously questioned. Sophocles was a firm believer in the accepted religion and in the gods; but he held that their ways were beyond man’s understanding. His extant plays are the Antigone, Ajax, Electra, Edipus Tyrannus, Edipus Coloneus, Philoctetes and Trachiniae. [Page 206]

BOOK NOTES

Economic Causes of War and Hope for the Future. by Beatrice Pitney Lamb. National League of Women Voters. 40c. Only a few years ago it was generally felt that the "woman’s movement—the association of women as voters with the instruments of political responsibility—had dismally failed. Discouraged liberals forgot that time was required in order to allow the fresh seed of democracy to germinate. Here is a pamphlet which our grandmothers could not have imagined would ever be written by a member of their sex. It appears at a time when the myth of governmental autocracy gives way to a realistic sense of the need to find a way through the confusions of daily living. Such a problem is not masculine nor feminine, but human. If members of the National League truly assimilate this material, they will be prepared for world citizenship sooner than men. The contents include Friction arising out of population pressure; Friction arising out of international trade; Friction arising out of international finance Possible cures of economic friction. The sustaining philosophy is sumed up in the following statement: "Economic life has spread out beyond the existing political units. . . The next larger unit is the world as a whole, with economic internationalism as the corresponding philosophy."

Our International Relations and How to Understand Then by Anna Steese Richardson. The Cromwell Publishing Company 4c. The director of the Good Citizenship Bureau of the Woman Home Companion has made available, in a ten page pamphlet, the information needed by program chairmen, group leaders and individual readers approaching the study of international relations Mrs. Richardson supplies three "Study Outlines" on Who Decide Our Relations with Foreign Nations? What is the Foreign Polic of the United States? and Armament and Disarmament. This section is followed by sources of information on Our Relations wit Central and South America, Groups Working for a Better Under [Page 207]

BOOK NOTES

standing of International Affairs and World Peace, Organizations Which Contribute to the Education of Youth in International Understanding, Magazines and Bulletins Devoted to International Understanding, and Helpful Books on International Relations.. This handbook is extremely useful as a "directory of the peace movement" and will no doubt be widely used throughout the country.

The World Court 1921-1931, by Manley O. Hudson. World Peace Foundation. $2.50. Dr. Hudson, Bemis Professor of International Law, Harvard University, has produced an authoritative manual of the World Court.. He traces the growth of the conception during recent centuries, reminding the reader, incidently, that "The American delegation to the first Peace Conference at The Hague in 1899 was instructed by President McKinley and Secretary Hay to act upon 'the long-continued and widespread interest among the people of the United States in the establishment of an international court,' and to propose a plan for the creation of an international tribunal." Under the subject of Jurisdiction, dealing with the over-emphasized topic of Advisory Opinions, we note that "each of these opinions has contributed to the solution of some perplexing international question." The twenty Advisory Opinions of the Court to date are summarized, following a summary of judgments and Orders of the Court. The final chapter, on Proposed Ratification by the United States, brings the matter up to the Memorandum by Elihu Root on the Protocol for the Adhesion of the United States, January 21, 1931. The book gives a working knowledge of the structure and processes of the World Court. It may not be read by any large number of laymen, but it should be known to all those in political and newspaper circles who assume the responsibility of attempting to mold public opinion on one of the most significant problems of the time.

From World Understanding to World Peace. by Helene Clapede-Spir. Williams & Norgate, Ltd. London. 6s. 6d. An anthology of statements on world peace collected by the author from leading men of England, France, Germany and other coun [Page 208]tries, including the United States. All the statements were made since the European War. Preface by Gilbert Murray, Introduction by David Starr Jordan, Conclusion by Paul Monroe. Such a work indicates the obvious fact that a certain type of public man and scholar, who recognizes the need for peace, can be found in all countries. Similar compilations prove that mystics in all religions have always agreed upon certain fundamental humanitarian ideals, but the fact remains that it is still institutions and not selected individuals who turn the scale in times of unescapable crisis. On the other hand there are doubtless many people in whom such a book will awaken a more conscious world outlook. As Paul Monroe declares, "Humanity has groped painfully up the Calvary of the ages."

International Communications: The American Attitude

International Communications: The American Attitude, by Keith Clark. Columbia University Press. $3.75. "Communication is the measure of civilization. It is a long story, it comprehends all history, it interpenetrates all activity. But the principal mechanisms are few: the post, the telegraph, the cable, the radio. To set forth these definite means which serve the vast ends of living is the object of this essay; particularly as the United States communicates with the world, by connecting its services with the services of other countries, by conforming its national procedure to the international codes." Dr. Clark shows how the United States is being brought into the world family by the pull of invention even while holding back from the inertia of political and cultural provincialism. An unanswerable argument, the more convincing because its larger implications are left unexpressed.

H. H. [Page 209]

CORRESPONDENCE

MARIA WOLTERS New York City

In these days when one reads so much unfavorable about the Japanese and their militarism, the news must naturally turn many Westerners against Japan. But may I be allowed to speak of my experiences in Japan when for six years I lived there and among the natives exclusively, and so had a better chance to study and observe this race than people in foreign settlements and concessions or missionaries or travellers looking from hotel windows. In fact I had no foreign intercourse whatsoever during all these years. But, by the way, I constantly noticed that all foreigners, including the Chinese were treated with the utmost civility. In public places, at concerts and other occasions, the front seats are always reserved and roped off for the foreigners and the Japanese had to be and were content with that which was left.

I lived there just as a plain simple every day human being and was looked upon as such and no ado whatsoever was made about my insignificant person; and so I may justly claim to have gotten a true insight into this race. I lived entirely Japanese fashion in one of their native hotels, wore their native kimono and gettas and ate their native food most of the time.

Teaching them languages, I had among my pupils, professors and students of the Tokyo University and from schools, men and women of high rank in life and also some of the humbler standing, military men, professional and business men, trades people and their children. What greater choice to gather varied and valuable opinions could anyone ask for, and what better chance for a Closer study has anybody than the teacher who holds the key to the inner recesses of the human soul. Most of the Japanese are [Page 210]very ambitious to learn and to enlarge their knowledge of the English language and of the American people for which they all expressed the highest esteem and affection.

The respect and courtesy given me, given all teachers by all ranks alike, was in noticeable contrast to much here in America and in Europe.

The gentle spirit so noticeable in all classes, from the military down to the coolies was a revelation to me, explained when I met the Japanese mothers, and saw the affection and care even the poor and toiling mothers bestowed upon their children, as a result, the children of Japan have a charm indescribable. Devotion and affection for children and mothers and reverence for old age are some of their strongest characteristics I noticed; and not alone towards their own but was manifested towards others as well.

When we started relief work in Japan right after the conclusion of the world-war for the suffering children in Europe and in China, the latter's caused by the terrible drought there in 1919-20, every person in Japan, the poorest as well, chipped in. sometimes by sacrificing meals, and at times saying: "Though the Chinese are no friends of ours but their children shall not starve, may it lay a foundation for a better understanding between their children and our children"—I was a helper and witness when they were sending to all the suffering children in Europe a large sum and also to the Chinese ones at that time were sent over 100,000 yen, contributed by the school-children of Japan, I can back my statement by showing receipts and proofs of this to anybody who wishes to see them. Should not this humane action towards an enemy, and which I believe is very little known, as they do things quietly without talking about, call forth in us a more just attitude towards the Japanese?—How often have I not been asked by my Japanese pupils to introduce them to my Chinese students for the purpose of becoming better acquainted and to develop friendship between them and, though delightful and splendid young men and women the Chinese were, yet, I always felt they were much hesitating to meet the Japanese on equal footing and good terms for friendship. [Page 211]

CORRESPONDENCE

The strong pacifistic tendency of the Japanese at that time was genuine and I four when visiting schools there, that the training of the youth.. this direction was not lacking, as every teacher I met was imbued with the desire to do away with force and help establish a new method by which to straighten out the nations' differences and affairs, all promised their cooperation and with hundreds upon hundreds of schools enrolled as members in the "School Boys' and Girls' World Friendship League," I was happy that Japan had taken such a stand for World Peace and such vital interest in the friendship movement started there 1918.- And it seems, with the world's more just and thoughtful attitude toward the solution of their economic, population and land problems, any militaristic and aggressive tendency of this, at heart really gentle and kind and childlike nation, could have been easily forestalled. On what plane of civilization a nation is standing, is always known by the way it treats its war-prisoners, Japan measured up to the highest in this respect, the war-prisoners told me personally of the humane treatment they received.

There is no need of going into further details and relate about the wonderful hospitality 'one meets everywhere when travelling through Japan, others have experienced that as well as I have; books have been written on it and her peoples' kind and thoughtful actions grace many pages of them.

Naturally, it must have frightened her when she stepped out of her seclusion into the world and looked around after her door was forcefully opened-to see the enslavement and hardships other races had to endure. Nevertheless, Japan held out her hand for friendship; and it is not yet too late to grasp it.

Fortunately, we have here in America statesmen and people who realize the above facts and see clearly that for us to remain nuctral, would serve the cause of peace best, and that it would be more wise and noble, later to try in a kind and just spirit to help mend and adjust the conditions and relations between those two great Asiatic nations, Japan and China; for it is nothing new that, through the imperialistic policy and ambitions of some nations of the white race in the Orient and due to their mischievous [Page 212]machinations, these two splendid nations, Japan and China have become so estranged that their embitterment toward each other has taken on frightful and fateful dimensions, for which the poor and innocent people and boys on both sides have to pay the penalty with their lifes and suffering. And with the red peril and much banditry looming up so near Japan, her position is in fact not an enviable one.

It is indeed a good omen for the future that here in America where the natural, enlightened and affectionate bonds of a League of Nations exist and hold us together in mutual appreciation, helpfulness and cooperation that we begin to realize that no blessing can ever grow out of and come to any nation, organization, or any individual who builds prosperity and fortune on the misery and misfortunes of others.

RONALD A. L. ARMSTRONG

Editor, The Sufi Quarterly

I should be much obliged if you could find space for the publication of this letter.

In your issue for February, under the heading "Round Table", you speak of "Fitzgerald’s neurotic interpretation of a mystical Sufi poem." May I refer you to my article in "The Spectator" of Feb. 14th, 1931, for a confutation of this erroneous conception? Omar Khayyam was not a mystic and was rejected by Sufis of his time as a genuine agnostic. When he said "wine," his contemporaries were convinced he meant it. You will find the case fully stated by that most eminent of authorities, Professor E. G. Browne in his monumental history of Persian Literature. [Page 213]

ROUND TABLE

Cordial acknowledgement is made to the Woodrow Wilson Foundation, and to the artist, F. Soulé Campbell, for the privilege of reproducing the portrait of the principal author of the League Covenant. The passing of time adds to the mystery and tragedy of Wilson's life-the War President who strove so valiantly to serve the Prince of Peace. Woodrow Wilson stood between two different areas of immense conflict-the conflict between philosophy and politics, and the conflict between nationalism and internationalism. While he could not achieve victory for the new forces, he prevented the triumph of the old.

Dr. Curti's "Poets of Peace and the Civil War" is part of the work done by him as a Guggenheim Fellow. Since writing "The American Peace Crusade: 1815-1861," published last year by Duke University Press, Dr. Curti has been working on a new book originally planned as a continuation of the first, but now shaped on a larger scale. We understand that the new volume will deal not only with the organized peace movement, but with the forces making for peace and war throughout American history.

No task is more important than finding the real key to the heart of America-defining the destiny of this immense reservoir of human power, and upholding a goal commensurate with its energy and influence. Too long have Americans themselves thought of their country as merely "better and bigger" than other countries-the most successful nation in the world struggle. If the League of Nations definitely collapses, America will be called upon to achieve world order in sheer self-defense. It is not too soon to create a totally different concept of this nation for the fertilization of its mental and moral powers: a concept establishing the thought that America is not "another" nation, but a representative of all the nations and peoples, formed by them in an effort to evolve out of the limitations of the past. Between us all and [Page 214]

world peace

there is but one real obstacle: the immaturity of the American racial type; and perhaps even this is not an obstacle but the condition requisite to the final failure of every ancient oppression in Europe and the East. America's jealous aloofness may be abundantly justified, however irrational it may appear. Great things grow by instinct, not reason.

We note with interest an announcement that Dr. Dexter Perkins will deliver next year's Shaw Lectures under the auspices of the Walter Hines School of International Relations, on historical aspects of the Monroe Doctrine. Dr. Perkins's articles on international politics, published in World Unity over a period of two years, can be read with interest and profit today.

"The Novel of the War Years" by Dr. Evelyn Newman, has made strange contrast between the ideals born of the suffering incurred in the trenches and the politics played for profit by the Legion in time of peace. Two concluding chapters in the Newman series will be published next fall.

"Social Psychology of International Conduct," by George Malcolm Stratton, a work published in 1929, impressed us at the time as a point of view, a mental technic, representing what might be termed the mature approach to the problem of national relationships. It conveyed the sense of a new and more valid sociology. an effective inner grasp of the forces released in this age. Dr. Stratton's article in the present issue is an expression of that wide outlook which can regard the phenomenon of nationalism as something apart from one's emotional being and hence something which can eventually be controlled.

C. F. Ansley returns to his vital theme, the relations of men to the soil, which underlies not merely the economic but also the social problem. Rejected alike by official socialism and official capitalism, both of which build on the factory, the sense of a regenerated personal being which sustains Mr. Ansley's plea for the family farm and a balanced life-the return of neighborhood and local independence-seems no longer the abstract argument it appeared to be before 1929, but an interpretation of a vast movement actually taking place. [Page 215]

A WORLD COMMUNITY

by John Herman Randall

THE book for those who seek to grasp the world movement as a whole. factors, and a careful analysis of the trends making for international Organization.

It has been included in the reading list issued by the National Committee on the Cause and Cure of War.

NATIONALISM AND INTERNATIONALISM

by Herbert Adams Gibbons

IN THIS book, Dr. Gibbons has infused his historical scholarship with a lifetime of personal experience and participation in international affairs. The result is a study accurate enough for the classroom and interesting enough for the average reader.

"Nationalism and Internationalism" traces the evolution of political force from its first expression in the movement toward modern nationalism, through the nineteenth century, to its present expression in internationalism as the true outcome of national ideals.

SEVEN GREAT BIBLES

by Alfred W. Martin

HERE, at last, are the essential truths about Hinduism, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, Confucianism, Taoism, Muhammadanism, Judaism and Christianity that demonstrate the underlying unity and harmony in the texts from which these religions derive—a very history of the soul of an illumined from age to age by inspired teachers pointing the path to brotherhood and peace.

These three books have been published in the World Unity Library, initiated and sponsored by this magazine. Per copy, $2.00. Any one title, with annual subscription to World Unity Magazine, $4.00; subscription and two books, $5.75; subscription and all three books, $7.50.

WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE EAST 12TH STREET NEW YORK [Page 216]

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