World Unity/Volume 4/Issue 3/Text

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WORLD UNITY

A Monthly Magazine

for those who seck the world outlook upon present

Joun Herman Ranpatt, Editor Horace Hourey, Managing Editor

C. F. Anstey W. W. Atwoop

A. Menpetsoun Bartuorpy

Baron Baupran

L. F. pz Braurort Gaaait A. Benexer Pigrre Bover

Epwin Argtnur Buxrr Harry Cnarterswortu No Poon Cuzw Rupotpes I. Corraz Bayarp Dopcs Georces Dunamer Anna B. Eckstein Havetocr Ex.is AvuGustg Foret

C. F. Gates

V. Scnutze GAveRNITz

Hetemutu von Gercacnh Hersert Apams GiBBONs

Kanwuit Gipran

Cuarvotte Perxins GILMAN

Joun W. Granam

MaryaGruNDMANN-KOSCIENSKA

Frank H. Hankins

SP eon

Contributing Editors

A. Eustace Haypon Witt Haves

Yamato Icuicwasnt1 Morpecat W. Jounson Rurvus M. Jones Davip Starr Jorpan Samuet Lucas Josa Ernust Jupet Viapimir Karapetorr P, W. Kuo

Ricuarp Les

Harry Levi

Axain Locke Georce pg Luxacs Louis L. Mann

Sir James Marcnant Victron MarGuErittTE R. H. Marxuasm Acrrep W. Martin F. S. Marvin Kiratirey F, Matnzr Lucia Ames Meap Frep MerriFieLD Kaxin Micitacis Herpert A. Mitrer

developments of philosophy, sctence, religion, ethics and the arts

Duan Gopat Mukerj! Iba Mutter

Yonge Nocucni

Harry ALLen Overstrect Dexter Perkins " Joun Herstan Ranpatt, Jr. M. D. Repticu Forrest Reip

Paut Ricnarp

Cuarces Ricnet

Tu. Ruyssen NATHANIEL SCHMIDT Witttam R. Snepuerp Mary SigGrist

Appa Hitec Sitvrre Istpor SINGER

Davin G. Sreap Aucustus O. Tomas Gicbert Tuomas Isapetta Van METER Rustum VAMBE&RY Water Watsu

Hans Winpero

M. P. Wittcocxs

Frank Ltoyp Waicut

Editorial Office-—4 East 12th Street, New York City

Worip Unity Macazinzg is published by Wortp Unity Pustisninc Corpo- RATION, 4 East 12th Street, New York City: Mary Rumsey Movivs, president; Horace Howey, vice-president; FLorENCE Morton, (¢reasurer; JOHN HERMAN RANDALL, secretary. Published monthly, 35 cents a copy, $3.50 a year in the United States, $4.00 in Canada and $4.50 in all other countries (postage in- cluded). Taz Woritp Unity Pusiisninc Corporation and its editors do not invite unsolicited manuscripts and art material, but welcome correspondence on

articles related to the aims and purposes of the magazine. Printed in U. S. A.

Contents copyrighted 1929 by W

orLD Unity PusuisninGc CorporRaTIon. �[Page 166]

m= °

ewer

Fe time I am bound East I have the sensa-

Of

tion of journeying towards myself. The feeling

is at bottom a humble one, quite unlike the usual self-sufficiency of the western tourist who pro- ceeds condescendingly to the backward Orient to behold things exotic. It arises from the feeling that the East, where least Europeanized, has preserved more that is intrinsically human thap the West and stands closer to the sources of our being. . . . The significance that attaches to the habitual daily do- ings dwindles to nothing. Our sensations, excite- ments and struggles decrease in importance; our certainties seem more and more doubtful. I have a revelation of something grander and profounder. The sky is higher, the air clearer, and the range of vision greater. I am encompassed by the quietude of profound loneliness. I become more distinctly aware of myself, as the walker through empty chambers

hears the reverberations of each footstep. I appre- :

bead

Gesesy

a0

beat

nia

vt

bed iLed

Pi ead

- hend, so to speak, the beating of my own soul... . In this backward Orient one feels closer to the truth and farther from illusion. In this world of simple realities one learns to think essentially, not only formally, and the distinction between kernel and shell issues more sharply.

—The Soul of the East

Marcus EHRENPREIS

�[Page 167]WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

VoL. IV JuNE, 1929 No. 3

EDITORIAL CAMS

THE WAR DEBTS SHOW A PROFIT

T THE date of this writing, the final outcome of the meeting of economic experts at Paris, under the chair- manship of Mr. Owen D. Young, is still a matter of dramatic s‘spense. No one can yet predict whether the

war debts are to . wholly transformed from a political to an economic issue, and the financial losses of the European conflict set Off against the vast trade increases of the coming years, or kept indefinitely in the area of nationalistic passion and com- petition—the fertile germ of another human collapse.

Enough has already happened, however, to encourage those who believe in and endeavor to promote the ideal of world order as the goal of social evolution. What could be more sig- nificant than the failure of the nations to arrive at a practicable figure covering losses and indemnities, or to establish a feasible method of collection, by customary political agencies? The fact that the problem has had to be transferred to economists—and that from their conferences has emanated the proposal of a world bank—indicates an amazing progress in public opinion during the brief period since the end of the War.

The real victory won on the battlefields of Europe was not that of the Allies over the Alliance, but of business (representing present normal human relationships) over politics (representing human relationships created in the past). By the proposal of a world bank, internationalism has registered the adherence of the business world. We can now begin to envisage internation- alism as a process consciously accepted by the real leaders of public opinion rather than a platform subject to political parti- sanship in its blindest form.

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To be specific. Under the illusion of military victory, the Allies by the Versailles Treaty attempted to meet their losses and cover their extraordinary expenses by draft on Germany. At the same time, they felt compelled to render Germany help- less so as to prevent another war later on. They found that a ruined foe would be a grave liability in their own recovery, and gradually aimed to mortgage her future instead of destroying her present resources and powers. This transition moved the problem steadily forward from political to economic considera- tions. At present the situation is that industry has come to appreciate its interdependence, and the mass of people every- where are citizens of two unrelated and possibly hostile societies —the interests controlled by their governments and the interests controlled by industry.

This dual loyalty, forced upon practically everyone, is noth- ing less than anarchy operating under the most efficient modern organization. It has produced a moral chaos in which che most pernicious of doctrines—communism—has found opportunity to justify itself not only as the sole hope of the oppressed but also as the sole basis of efficiency and order on a world scale.

The present conference, seen against this background, thus appears to be something far more vital than an effort to collect debts incurred by war. In reaJity it may be the final opportunity given our civilization to decide between two states of mind: the backward-looking view, molded by age-old limitations and fears, and the progressive view which realizes how easily twenty years of international cooperation can write off this obligation and at the same time vastly raise the standard of living throughout the world. If commercialized now, at practically any figure, the war debts will soon represent no more obligation than the capital stock issued by Henry Ford or General Motors when the auto- motive era was young.

What we all need is education in the possibilities of the future. What more effective program of public activity could be adopted by Rotary and other business organizations in the international field? �[Page 169]SCIENCE AND RELIGION

by

NATHANIEL SCHMIDT Department of Semitic Languages, Literatures and Oriental History, Cornell Universsty

E relation of science to religion has often been discussed and may be profitably considered, if it is done with due appreciation and in the right spirit. That, however, is not the subject with which I wish to deal here. Rather is it

my desire to point out certain ways in which both 6f these power- ful forces in man’s life have contributed, and may still further contribute, to the movement towards world unity. The object of this movement is, of course, not uniformity, which is unattainable and undesirable, but unity in diversity. Differences of race, nation- ality, language, intellectual and esthetic development, moral codes, and religious views and practices have existed since time immemorial, and are likely to continue. But unity is possible, regardless of these differences.

Science has not always and in every respect assisted in bring- ing about this unity. To mention only a few striking examples, it has made possible the invention of ever more formidable weapons for the destruction of life and property, thereby render- ing the struggle more bitter and disastrous, and giving a false sense of security and power over others through armaments. Knowledge is power, and the advance of science has enabled the stronger races, nations, and groups of individuals to take pos- session of desirable lands, cultivate them intensely, and exploit their natural resources and man-power, thereby creating envy, jealousy and strife among themselves, and discontent among the weak and disinherited. It has increased the opportunities that wealth gives for security and leisure, comfort and esthetic enjoy-

ment, thereby ‘ostering an exorbitant craving for pleasure, and

o 169 �[Page 170]170 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

a wrong valuation of the means by which it can be obtained. It has advanced through machinery for enlarging our knowledge and applying it, and has tended to make man himself a machine, not knowing or caring whither he is going or what the intrinsic value of his achievements is. No wonder that a keen and thought- ful critic has recently ventured to call science ‘The False Messiah."

Religion has not always and invariably led in the direction of world unity. It has frequently been a divisive factor. Its advance from lower to higher forms has generally been attended by ex- clusiveness, disparagement of others, and spiritual pride. Such religions as Judaism, Christianity, and Islam have at times gone beyond their rivals in intolerance, arrogance, and resort to violence. By an exaggeration and perversion of instincts laud- able in themselves, immeasurable evil has been wrought. The awakened sense of something in man that cannot be buried in the ground or consumed by the flames shifted the interest to an imaginary world beyond. The observation that a prudent conduct on the whole leads to prosperity and a reckless life to disaster led to an impossible theory of retribution on earth, and, as a corollary, to the conception of heavens of idle bliss and hells of never-ending physical and mental torture. The consciousness of being called to high service carried with it the idea of election for privilege and a line of demarcation between the elect and the non-elect. The love of truth and of clear statements of what it is, led to insistence upon belief in incomprehensible formulas on pai of everlasting damnation. The very foyalty to some great prophet of the soul has led to contempt for all other forms of religion, and even religious wars against their adherents. No wonder that there are those who look upon religion as an enemy of progress.

The facts should be recognized, and not glossed over. But it is important that all facts be considered. Extreme conclusions are often based on a partial reading. A more comprehensive survey may correct the perspective. In the case of such important factors in man’s life it is particularly desirable that judgment be free from bias and onc-sidedness. My present purpose cannot, of �[Page 171]SCIENCE AND RELIGION I7I

course, be to give anything like an adequate conception of even the most significant achievements in the various branches of science. It is simply to indicate that the advance of science has had a tendency to change man’s general attitude toward the universe, his mental outlook upon life, his method of approach to the manifold objects that attract his attention and the ques- tions they raise. How far this change has yet affected the thinking and actions of the masses of men, or how thoroughly it has been experienced even by many earnest and hard-working scientists of today, is beside the point. The fact that through science a change has been wrought remains and this has a direct bearing on the movement towards world unity.

Astronomy has revealed to us that our earth is only a small body moving with its sister-planets around the sun; that our solar system holds but an insignificant place in a galaxy of similar suns; that beyond this galacteal system there are others removed from ours by inconceivable distances; that neither the telescope nor the sensitive photographic plate can register the number of Stars in a universe that appears to have no boundaries. The spectro- scope has taught us that the stuff out of which worlds are made is essentially the same throughout the universe, and the micro- scope has allowed us to look into the structure of the atom. Chemistry has made it certain that there are ninety-two elements and that transmutation is here and there possible, though all of them have not yet been discovered and their ultimate nature and relations are still obscure. Physics has made us familiar with the play of forces and measured their energy with astounding pre- cision, though not quite satisfied with either the undulatory or the corpuscular theory and calling for keener instruments to determine the exact position and speed of the electron.

Geology has shown that our earth is likely to be more than a hundred million years old and that the general character and relative age of the various strata of its crust can be ascertained. Palaeontology has found in the fossil inclusions evidence of suc- cessive floras and faunas, and biology has, aided by the micro- scope, discovered some of the principles of cellular activity and

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the evolution of species. Archaeological remains have borne testimony to mammalian races bridging the chasm between the most gifted animal and the least developed human being of to- day. History, as the science dealing with the social phenomena of man's life from the point of view of their development,. and sociology, describing, classifying and explaining them, have made their natural origin manifest and at least been able to divine some of the laws operative in human society. Technology, in its different branches, has given us new machinery for communica- tion, transportation, and production, while mathematics and logic, dealing with objects created by the mind itself, have sharpened our intellectual tools, our reasoning powers.

Theology, as the science dealing with all the rcligious phe- nomena of man’s life, has made it increasingly clear what religion is, how it manifests itself, and what causes its varied expressions. Jurisprudence has given direction to the codification of common law growing out of generally observed social customs, and also considered the line of conduct of which the law should take cognizance and the proper character of its sanctions. Medicine has made marvelous discoveries as regards the causes of physical and mental disorders and found new methods of preventing and curing disease. Philosophy, in its search for ultimate reality, has learnt to base its conclusions more firmly on actual observatioa of the nature and operations of the mental faculties, and to proceed more cautiously into the realm of speculation, while ethics has occupied itself, not only with the description, classification and explanation of mores, or customs, but also with a quest for principles of universal validity.

In every field the pursuit of science and its main results have had a tendency to produce a change of attitude toward the universe and to the problems with which it confronts us. The cumulative effect is all the greater because of the increasing necessity for coordination and cooperation. It is scarcely pos- sible at present for an investigator to do his best work, even if he stakes out for himself very narrow limits, without taking note of what is done in adjacent branches of inquiry, and without �[Page 173]é %

SCIENCE AND RELIGION ~'° 173

getting a vague idea at least of the general movement of thought and the outstanding achievements in the whole arcana of sciences. Some of the most marked effects may be indicated. The advance of science has tended to make us more modest. Man obviously does not hold as significant a position in the universe as he once supposed. Though his knowledge grows from day to day and is capable, in a measure, of verification, it is fragmentary, relative, and subject to constant revision. Dogmatism is out of place, loud affirmation not permissible. The method of science, proceeding by induction and deduction, circumspectly, warily and tenta- tively, from the less to the more adequately known, is at once the most revolutionary element and the greatest agency for fostering humility and modesty. The boundless space, the infinite stretches of time, the exhaustless energy, the orderliness of all the processes of nature, the unexplored beyond in every direction cannot fail to inspire a sense of awe and mystery and reverence. Science has engendered a new feeling of solidarity. Man is tied to the past and to the future, bound up with the whole scheme of things in a causal connection, and so are all the manifestations of his life. It is nct possible for him to be alone. Yet in spite of his insignificance and close genetic connection with less developed forms of existence, so emphasized by science, it has also made him conscious of something intrinsically great within himself, a Capacity to peer into nature's workshop, .9 observe, compare, verify, conclude, generalize, aspire. This tends to give him a fresh sense of exaltation, zest for renewed effort, a joy unspeak- able and full of glory. The wonders accomplished by the scientific technique, far more impressive than all the miracles he dreamed of in his youth, have revealed that there is in his nature a vast fund of creative ability. He can change his material and social environment; he can change himself; he can change the heredity and environment of posterity.

In its essence religion seems to be at once a psychological factor and a social product, an impulse seizing upon all of man’s mental faculties, his intelligence, will, and emotion, and directing them towards that which, temporarily or more permanently, in �[Page 174]174 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

varying degrees of adequacy, appears to him as the highest, and an elative force set in motion by the necessities of social life. Religion may be defined as devotion to the highest. It has un- folded its true nature in the course of its development. During long ages it expressed itself in conceptions that are gradually becoming known to us as manaism, totemism, mura-muraism, and animism, and in practices associated with these ideas. In more recent times, including the last few thousand years, it has manifested itself in polytheism, henotheism, monotheism, pan- theism, monistic and pluralistic notions of ultimate reality, and other supreme objects of devotion, like humanity, the social ideal, the moral law, or deliverance from all evil, and in practices naturally associated with these conceptions. There have been many outward forms of religion, systems cherished within limited ethnic groups and others transcending the boundaries of race and nation, part of ancient folk-lore or of prophetic origin. In all of them there have been progressive and retarding forces. But in the main a trend is discernible in the direction of the general social development.

Thus the mythical material has largely disappeared or been embodied in definite creeds, the creeds have crystallized into dogmas; the dogmas have become venerable records of the past, to be allegorically or historically interpreted, without binding force as tests; or these articles of faith have been abandoned for the free expression of opinion in harmony with observed facts. Human sacrifices have given place to animal sacrifices; these to . bloodless sacrifices or sacraments effective ex opere operato; these to symbols in fixed form and at stated times; and these to spontane- ous expressions of religious sentiment. Religious organizations have been supported by the sovereign or the state, protecting them against schisms and heresies; and they have become vol- untary associations, depending upon their own strength and attractiveness. The infallible authority of prophets, priests, councils, and standards has been subjected to critical examina- tion, and the records of man’s religious lite everywhere and at all times have come to be studied with the same detachment and �[Page 175]~CIENCE AND RELIGION . 175

the same sympathy in the impartial quest for truth. Religion has become more and more ethical, and the growth of morality has intensified its concern, not only with the perfectionment of the individual, but also with the improvement of social life.

In all this process the most significant fact is the change that has come over men in their spiritual attitude. It has made them more modest and more truly reverent. They are no longer so sure that they can define in unquestionable terms the object of their devotion, or so certain of their exceptional position. They are less dogmatic and less assertive, more docile and more humble before the infinite complexity of life. The growing interest in religious views and customs different from those held and prac- tised by the student himself, and yet presenting certain marked similarities, has created a strong impression of the solidarity of man’s religious life, its common origin, and its development in various directions according to definite and ascertainable laws. This again has fostered a kindlier feeling towards groups once feared or despised, misunderstood or ill-treated. What a power- ful and marvelous impulse religion is! Through it man shares in the creative work. He adopts his means to the highest end he can conceive; he modifies his environment; he casts his own life in a fresh mold; he shapes his destiny; he gives direction to posterity; he brings order out of chaos; he fashions a new world.

In view of these great forces we certainly cannot think so meanly of human nature as to assume that it will always be baffled by the obstacles that now stand in the way of a reasonable unity within our world. War between nations and classes, slavery, and forced labor, economic exploitation and financial imperialism, racial and ethnic hostilities, still flourish. But the search for truth by rigid and effective methods, which 1s science and the devotion to the highest with mind and heart and will, which is religion, working harmoniously together, should cer- tainly be able to rid the world of such frightful evils, and to grapple with the still greater tasks that must be undertaken if human society is to become a properly functioning spiritual organism. �[Page 176]QYRIZLODRY ANDY CDR O

HOW SHALL THE PLAIN MAN UNDERSTAND

INTERNATIONAL PROBLEMS ?

by NorMAN ANGELL Editor of Foreign Affairs, London

ow shall the non-expert layman, busy with the things of H his daily life, manage to keep himself informed on inter- national affairs and to understand the fundamental is-

sues of the international problem?

International politics have now become exceedingly complex —a specialism split up into many other specialisms, ranging in subject-matter from Chinese Civil War to German internal poli- tics, American elections, rival naval armaments, Bolshevism and Fascism, the Dawes Plan, Balkan frontiers, the League of Nations, the meaning of Article XVI, the Monroe Doctrine, Egyptian Na- tionalism, Rhineland manoeuvres... .

The quantity of material now published is so great that the layman, absorbed by the daily drive of life, has certainly not time to read even a considerable fraction. It would not be physically possible to do so.

The subject already possesses a vast literature dealing with a mountainous mass of facts with which no ordinary layman could hope to become familiar. A single aspect, like the relations of the East and the West, the problem of China, of Japan, of India, might well become the study of a life-time. A question like Russia's re- lation to the West leads us into a discussion of difficult economic issues, Communism, the Class War. Or, ‘f we approach the ques- tion first from the angle of modern Imperialism, equally do we become involved in economic questions concerned with markets, investments, commercial rivalries, development of backward countries and so forth. If one takes up a problem like Nationalism, 176 �[Page 177]HOW SHALL THE PLAIN MAN UNDERSTAND? 177

and how to satisfy nationalist aspirations, one is immediately in- volved in disputes touching conflicting national claims, about which experts themselves are bitterly divided, and are brought to problems of psychology and anthropology, mass action, herd in- stinct, human nature in politics, to which authozities have de- voted all their lives.

How is the ordinary layman to find his way in this mass of detail? How can he be at once economist, historian, anthropolo- gist? How can he know, in the numberless racial disputes of Europe, on which side right lies?

He cannot solve the question by any such easy generalization as that people should be allowed to govern themselves as they see fit, because in most instances—in Ireland, in Poland, in China, in India, in Alsace and in twenty other states, the whole dispute is as to which is the people, what constitutes the nation in which the national authority should be vested, and if Irish, or Indians, or Poles or Chinese, are themselves in disagreement as to what is or should be the national unit, how can outsiders, thousands of miles away, answer that question?

It may be said that we do not need to answer it. ‘‘Let them settle their own disputes.’’ But this very question as to whether, in that very small and crowded place which the world has become, these geographical groups can be left to fight it out, is itself one which the layman has to answer. There is no doubt as to how history, the most recent equally with the most remote, has answered it.

If, nearly two thousand years ago, what was happening in the British Isles concerned the government in Rome; if, a thousand years later the difference between French and English brought them to war; if, in the eight hundred that followed we find re- current conflicts between English and French, English and Dutch, English and German; if we find that differences at the uttermost ends of the world, now in North America, now in India, now in China, now in the Near East, bring people into conflict, we have at least fair ground for assuming that the peoples of the world are bound to come into contact, to enter into relation the one with the �[Page 178]178 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

other. Isolation is and has been for thousands of years, for most countries of the world, impossibie.

In those inevitable contacts differences are bound to arise, often honest differences as to the respective rights. Often the greatest students of history have completely disagreed as to those issues. Very few historians of one nation will ever agree, or come near to agreeing, about a given event with the historians of an- other nation. Incidentally it is noteworthy that historians include among their number many who reveal themselves as pugnacious nationalists, with a tendency to glorify war and warriors, their own nation’s warriors, that is, though not as a rule the warriors of rival nations.

The question I am asking here is not made less disturbing by the fact that it is often the plainest issues that go most astray, and that education as we know it, seems to do very little in the way of making men aware of those errors.

The nations that made the war and the peace, Germaay and France, for instance, are highly educated nations. Germany was ruled by the most educated ruling class in the world. It was guilty again and again of some of the worst judgment and the silliest policies that history records. This is in keeping with past experience of the relation of education to public policy. Just 7s it is a high literary and academic culture which has made of the emotion of nationalism a destructive and anti-social force, so was it a highly learned order which four or five centuries ago turned the religious emotion into passions that nearly destroyed Europe, giving us wars of religion, the burning of women and children, the massacres of St. Bartholomew. Great learning was not then and is not now synonymous with wisdom.

The mistakes which have nearly smashed European civiliza- tion have been due, not to faulty judgments on matters of great complexity, but to a refusal, on the part of whole nations, to face self-evident facts. During the war most of the non-German world stood aghast at errors of conduct and mistake ; of judgment which to outsiders appeared childish. Everyone was astonished that seventy million of the most educated people in Europe could ap- �[Page 179]HOW SHALL THE PLAIN MAN UNDERSTAND? 179

prove policies which were bound to result in disaster. But when the Allies came to make the peace we saw the other nations— British, French, Italian, American—demand a settlement which those same nations now admit to be quite unworkable and which, if they had to make it today in their present temper, would be something entirely different. Yet the facts were as available then as they are now. The unworkability was self-evident. But it was not seen. The European continent will not be able to support its population if its thirty-five states continue the hates and animosi- ties which mark their nationalism, unless, that is, they can achieve some measure of unity, like that achieved by the forty-eight states of the American continent. In calm moments the minority of thinkers and students admit this. But the voices of thirty-five nationalist peoples rise into flaming protest if any move is made to act upon the evident truth. Patriotic fanaticisms are likely still to cause as much misery in Europe as was caused by the religious fanaticisms which produced the wars of religion and the In- quisition.

Is then the problem of making decisions, and drawing con- clusions in matters where the specialists themselves are in dis- agreement, a hopeless one for the layman? Not necessarily. For the layman is entitled, in one respect, to place himself definitely above the expert. The layman is entitled to say what he wants and to employ the expert to get it for him. It is the expert's job to find the means of achieving ends which the layman decides, and this aspect of the relationship between the layman and the expert is one which, curiously enough, though so fundamental, is com- monly overlooked. It is not the expert's job to tell the layman what he wants. In this matter it is for the layman to say whether he wants war or peace, and that, curiously enough, very often the layman has not decided, because, although he wants peace he wants other things as well, such as national independence and complete sovereignty, sovereignty, it may be, over highways, or raw materials indispensable to the lives of people of other na- tions. None of us want war; but some of us want things which will in fact produce war. In other words, before the layman can �[Page 180]180 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

answer the question as to whether he wants war or peace, he must know what is indispensable to peace, what it will cost him, and whether he is prepared to pay the price.

Can we have peace for instance, if each nation is to preserve its absolute sovereignty, to be its own judge of its own rights? Can we, under such a system (or want of system), accord to other nations what we claim for ourselves—the right to be their own judges of their rights?

Now many who are very learned in the detail of international politics, learned as European diplomats are learned, have not answered such basic questions. And until they have, their learn- ing can serve little purpose to the ends of promoting human unity.

Before we can derive much wisdom from a study of the details of international affairs we must be clear what we want of inter- national arrangements. And to get some notion of what we must pay for what we want (say, peace) we must have some notion of the basic mechanism of human society, should be able to explain for instance why we expect anarchy as between nations to work smoothly when we do not believe that anarchy as between in- dividuals would work at all.

In this subject we should get some idea of general principle before we attack the details. And if it be said ‘‘What are the general principles?’’ then plainly that is one of the first studies to which we should direct ourselves. �[Page 181]

THE WORLD WE LIVE IN

Men live less and less in geographical and more and more in spiritual communities. The involuntary elements of existence tend to be limited to the regional area, che voluntary elements find increasing opportunity of self-expression through association of likeminded people selected out of the entire population by identity of interests and ideals. In this department, World Unity Magazine will publish each month a brief description of some important modern movement, voluntary in character and humanitarian in aim, believing that knowledge of these activities is not only essential to the world outlook, but also offers the true remedy for the sense of isolation and loneliness which has followed the breakdown of the traditional local neighborhood.

THE MUNDANEUM

Headquarters Palais Mondial, Brussels Branch Offices 8, Rue Bonnet, Geneva

N 1930, ten years will have elapsed since the new era of

Universal Peace was willed into existence by the nations

as a condition of Progressive Life; ten years in which the

League of Nations will have labored, in a union of good will, to construct a new Code of Right; ten years in which International Associations of all kinds will have cooperated for that essential end.

A fact like this should be commemorated. It can be so only by the realization of a great common work—an enterprise in- formed with the very spirit of a new age, a work worthy of the forces which will unite to accomplish it, and so permanent as to make of it an instrument fit for the great tasks imposed on all humanity.

It has therefore been proposed that, within the boundaries of Geneva, on land acquired for that purpose, there shall be or- ganized a demonstration of the real present state of the world, with its complex mechanism and its interdependent, universal

life.

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Each nation will be represented in the scheme, in a synthetic way showing the natural resources of its territories, its popula- tion, its economic system, its institutions, its culture.

Each International Association will reveal in it the structure and functioning of that part of the entire universe to the study and exploitation of which it devotes its efforts; for example, health, production, transportation, technic, social relationships, education, art, science, letters, philosophy or religion. And, in it, those interested in the study of the past will show the historic evolution of humanity by means of a short reconstruction of the great civilizations.

In it the League of Nations will explain its aim, its con- stitution, its own work. It will make plain its reasons for exist- ing, derived from history, political development, the great need of maintaining orderly life in many varied factors, and assuring their full unfolding in complete security.

It (The Mundaneum) will be a vast monument, an aggrega- tion of a number of separate buildings, each one given shape within the limits of a general plan and bearing witness to the power and unity of the whole. The buildings will be simple, with no useless luxury; inspirec by the ideas of modern archi- tecture, and adjusted to internal requirements, not to considera- tions involving costly and extraneous decoration.

In form, it will show that it results from cooperative initi- ative, based on free understandings and realized without regard for any political considerations. In law, it will be a World Foundation under the high protection of the League of Nations and all the Governments concerned. It will have the expressive and international name of ‘‘Mundaneum,’’ and be at one and the same time an exhibition, a museum, a library, a place for statistics and instruction, a center for studies, meetings and congresses, and a sanctuary of human brotherhood, to which pilgrimages will be made.

It is not enough merely to consolidate and generalize. Organic growth is necessary. In the eyes of many, the inter- national movement is merged in the movement in favor of peace, �[Page 183]THE MUNDANEUM 183

and that should concern governments, acting according to the principles of an international law which would have forbidden war. This, however, is only a part of the matters involved. The international movement tends to multiply relationships for inter- changes, to coordinate various activities, to realize unifications and understandings, to consider both material and moral progress as the highest aspiration of human collectivity. Outside of gov- ernments and nations there are Men, who show their initiatives in free groups and associations. Outside political interests, there are all sorts of other interests, concerning health and hygiene, technic and economic matters, education and the cultures which subsist beyond all frontiers.

So true is this, that, henceforward, the object to be aimed at by the good will of all should be nothing less than the construc- tion of a universal civilization, a complete civilization setting the general interests of humanity above private interests; striving to make all human factors conscious of the task they have to accomplish; setting intellectual and moral values on the apex of the pyramid of values, and subordinating material values to them as less important, although necessary.

It follows that, henceforward, governments should no longer be regarded as the sole agents of an organization, a civilization, conceived in the way above suggested. Governments represent official organs, and act by methods which, at the end of things, are built on force. Their duty is to watch over the interests of groupings which are, more or less, artificial, formed in the course of history, by wars, revolutions and agreements which have assured the positions of conquerors.

Governments are ‘“‘historical’’ and, as a matter of fact, transitory. Humanity is perpetual. The League of Nations, as an association of States represented by their governments, is of supreme importance. But it should not be over-estimated as the complete representation of the interests of humanity. And surely these, as they turn more and more in their evolution towards intelligence and conscience, should not allow themselves to be restricted within such narrow limits. �[Page 184]184 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

The entity called ‘‘Humanity’’ thus appears to be quite distinct from the entity called ‘‘The League of Nations,’’ and superior to it, as a purely spiritual and moral entity, the key- stone of the whole ideal sociological edifice. The League of Nations will have been one of its manifestations. But other manifestations, great groupings of persons, interests, sentiments and ideas, have grown throughout the ages in the hearts of States and beyond their boundaries. We have churches, scientific and intellectual institutions, moral and social groups, economic conventions—in a word, all that is now implied in generic terms in international, world-wide universal associations. There are several hundreds of them in the world, and, since the beginning of our century, their tendency has been more and more to become allied, to constitute a vast union of free forces, to act, sometimes side by side with officialism, sometimes to cooperate with it, sometimes to be incentives and stimulators, sometimes pioneers, discoverers and clearers of new lands. Their special mission is to develop the ideals or examples indispensable to universal civilization, and to compel the creation of the mighty tools required for that purpose.

We are thus led to imagine, on one hand, a new phase in the development of the League of Nations, and, on the other, of those International Associations. The former has been rebuked for being a great body, a mechanism, a mere organism, and not a soul. But this great body, with the already far-reaching ramifi- cations of its committees, and sub-committees, and the complex administration of its departments, does works without always having faith. The Associations have faith, but cannot always achieve works worthy of it. Therefore, the alliance of the two entities is desirable, in a permanent and general relationship, not preventing their differentiation and basic autonomies. �[Page 185]YR ODE ANOLE ODL YR

RACIAL RELATIONSHIPS AND INTERNATIONAL HARMONY

by Frank H. Hankins Department of Sociology, Smith College

IV. The Significance of Different Rates of Increase of Races and Nationalities

HE question I wish now to discuss is whether the unity

and organization of the world are in any way affected by

different rates of population increase. It is an obvious

fact that the population of some countries is increasing rapidly while that of others is increasing slowly. Do such diverse trends tend in the long run to upset the balance of power, cause international friction and necessitate some readjustment of either national boundaries or national status? This is broader than the question whether unequal growth of population in different countries is a source of war, though this is a major part of the former question. We cannot reasonably assume that we have achieved an era of world peace until we have achieved control over the primary conditions which lead to war. Of course, it is possible to argue that war is solely due to the malice or stupidity of diplomats and politicians. But, without denying considerable importance to the qualities of the men who are in political power, it is wel] to perceive that they do not actually control the major social forces amidst which they operate. Rather, they give ex- pression to such forces, or are actually controlled hy them. Nor does history warrant us in placing ultimate faith in the efficacy of treaties or even the so-called ‘‘outlawry’’ of war. Indeed, our own Civil War is a poignant reminder that a federal union ‘‘to

promote peace’’ may not be able to prevent conflict among its 185 �[Page 186]186 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

members, unless there be a far-sighted coordination of those economic interests from whose antagonisms modern wars spring.

It was an important thesis of the Malthusian doctrine that increase in population leads, among other things, to war. Malthus held that population must either be restrained at the source or kept in check by the human evils of famine, vice, crime, disease and war. Malthus pointed out there was a persistent tendency for population to encroach on its means of subsistence. The general acceptance of his views made the outlook of his generation as regards the socio-economic future, the most pessimistic of modern times. Poverty and war were accepted not only as inevitable but as the only alternatives to repeated famine and pestilence. It was an age in England in which ‘‘man’s inhumanity to man’’ was scarcely relieved by even a nigsrardly charity.

Malthus’s imagination, however, was not able to visualize the enormous advances in the agricultural and industrial arts during the century and a quarter since he wrote. Moreover, he failed to take full account of the importance of the settlement of the Mississippi Valley, Canada, Argentina, Australia and New Zealand for increases in the world’s food supplies. One result of such settlement was that the pessimism which Malthus fostered gave place to a vigorous optimism regarding the future standard of life among western nations. One of the early signs of a more sanguine view was the dream of world peace through freedom of trade, advanced by Bright and Cobden,—a dream rudely shattered by the intensification of nationalism and the revival of protection- ism. But the phenomenal growth of wealth so far outran the enormous increase in population that a whole pageantry of new dreams of human amelioration moved the political forces toward uplift policies. The pessimism of Malthus had given place to a rampant optimism. There has never been a time in the history of mankind when so many reforms for the benefit of inany millions of workers were winning adherents so easily and when glimpses of social utopia had caught the imaginations of so many states- men and men of affairs as in Europe and America in the years immediately preceding the world war. �[Page 187]RATES OF INCREASE OF RACES AND NATIONALITIES 187

Meanwhile two important changes had taken place in the statistics Of population increase. The birth-rate had declined perceptibly, or even sharply in nearly every country of the white man’s world. This in itself was a cause of increased optimism regarding future material welfare. So far as increase in numbers was concerned it was offset, however, by the decline in the death rate. Populations had grown so large that even a smaller excess of births over deaths added great numbers to the population aunually. Europe had increased in total population from 175,- 000,000 iN 1750 tO 400,000,000 in 1900 and over 475,000,000 today and had sent many additional millions to swell the rapidly grow- ing populations of the Americas and other outlying areas. No such increase in numbers had ever previously occurred in the whole of human history.

It began to be clear to various students of such matters that populations could not continue to increase at such rates without bringing the world face to face with famine and war. Germany had increased in population from around 20,000,000 at the open- ing of the nineteenth century to around 65,000,000 in 1910 and her power in the councils of the world had enormously increased. By contrast the French population had increased but little after 1870. German publicists were already hinting that their country was becoming crowded and would need more room in the not distant future. The balance of power on the continent had shifted perceptibly during tne generation following the Franco-Prussian war. Even in this country prophets were foretelling European conflict largely as a result of the differences in population pressure.

Today the world situation appears to be even more alarming than it was fifteen years ago. The waste areas are being filled with people, and yet the population of the globe is increasing at the rate of a million a month. We have ceased to take that childish and ignorant pride in rapidly increasing numbers so characteristic of America during the last century. Japan has seen her subjects increase from less than forty millions in 1880 to nearly double that number today in Japan, Formosa and on the continent; and they are still increasing at the rate of fully 800,000 �[Page 188]188 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

a year. Italy is by her own admission overpopulated, but the policy of Mussolini is to maintain or even accelerate her birth- rate. It would seem that the dictator's p’ ‘cy is to create an overcrowded condition as a basis for a fresh war of expansion. In the last analysis, such a nation would prefer to die fighting for relief through added territory than to die of starvation, help- less and inactive.

The gradual revival of the Malthusian view in our own times is clearly expressed in the policies of immigration restric- tion. It took a good part of a generation for the American people to fullv realize that America could not continue indefinitely to receive the surpluses of Europe. With the disappearance of free farms, America was no longer the ‘‘land of opportunity’ she had been. The policy of protecting the native-born population against inundation by swelling and limitless streams of foreigners became an evident necessity. Even more than a high tariff, the restriction of imported population is a protection of home in- dustries and the American standard of living. It will do more for the full dinner pail than all the tariffs on imports or bounties on exports yet devised.

But the American policy is not without its significance for world affairs. Italy found it impossible to accept it with good grace. With an annual increase of 700,000, a large part of whom would have otherwise come to this country, Italy's problem of crowded poverty is greatly aggravated by the stoppage of so large an outlet; and it certainly cannot be a matter of more than a few years until more or less desperate measures will have to be taken by Italian statesmen. The French have already grown restive under the influx of Italians since the war and will no doubt take measures against it. Such influx carries a direct threat to the integrity of the present French nation, especially inasmuch as Mussolini has already asserted that southern France is in reality an Italian province. When one recalls the vigor and brutality of present Italian policy in the Trentino and her greedy grasping for territory across the Adriatic, in northern Africa and farther east, one can easily imagine a time in the not distant �[Page 189]RATES OF INCREASE OF RACES AND NATIONALITIES 189

future when Italy will find it necessary to make war for the sake of more elbow room. National aggressiveness is a compound result uf many causes, one of which is the combined sense of power and of need which a swarming population brings. That numbers and need alone will not produce aggression is evident from the traditional peacefulness and docility of the Chinese, but when combined with heightened self-consciousness and ambitious leadership they seem likely to produce a thrust for territory or power.

Then there is the Japanese aspect of immigration restriction. Many Japanese, with gentlemanly candor and forebearance, recognized that restriction was a valid policy from our view- point. There can be little doubt that unrestricted immigration and equal economic and political rights would have, in time, made our Pacific States predominantly Oriental in racial com- position. This would have led to racial antagonism and race con- flicts, and in time probably to some test of physical strength between this country and Japan. But the American aspect of this question is only one small phase of the opposition of the white world to immigrant invasion by colored races. Wherever there is threat of such it raises fears and sooner or later legal barriers.

We thus see the territory of the globe being divided into three major divisions. There is first the white world into which can come few Orientals or Africans except students, travelers and business men. Then there are the great Oriental areas, into which no whites except travelers, explorers, adventurers and merchants care to penetrate. Finally, there is the Dark Continent, where mere handfuls of whites are seeking to exploit the wealth and labor of millions of blacks, but where the cry of ‘‘Africa for the Africans’’ becomes steadily stronger and more insistent.

Certain writers with a flair for publicity have seen the sig- nificance for the future peace of the world of the rising tide of race consciousness thruughout the colored world. They have very correctly pointed out that white domination by military force approaches its end. The world’s balance of power is slowly shifting because areas of the globe hitherto unorganized and torn �[Page 190]190 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

by internal strife are achieving unity, self-consciousness and strength—and strength produces respect and toleration in the white world. But when these same writers have sought to create the spectre of future world domination by some combination of colored peoples they have indulged in grotesque fancy. There are several considerations which make such an outcome highly im- probable at any time in the foreseeable future. The most important is that the white stock of mankind is increasing at a more rapid rate than the colored. It has beert estimated that the total increase of all the white races is about 10,000,000 per year or fully four times the increase of all the colored peoples combined.

Then the white nations are now in possession of nearly all those azeas on the globe which are relatively underpopulated and which can, therefore, most easily maintain the additional hundreds of millions that seem likely to be added‘.to the earth's inhabitants during the present century. This country, Canada, Argentina, Russia, Siberia and Australia are incomparably less densely populated than Japan, China or India. Finally, the white world is enormously strong in material wealth, productive capacity, scientific knowledge and national organization. Unless it should be divided against itself, it seems likely to resist en- croachments from the darker races. Such wars as the last, how- ever, must hasten the day of their declining power over colored peoples and might lead to actual invasion of their territory by the latter.

At the present juncture then, the expansion of the white race, which has been one of the chief features of world history during the past century and a half, still continues. It is increasing as fast as ever in total numbers, but at a lesser rate. Moreover, it has about reached the limit of new areas of expansion. Future diffusion must be into less attractive territory than the Mississippi Valley or the Argentine pampas. At the same time the nigh standard of life and the spread of contraceptive knowledge have brought the birth-rate in certain areas of Europe and America close to or even below the death-rate. We are getting more and more frequent prophecies that the time is not far distant when �[Page 191]RATES OF INCREASE OF RACES AND NATIONALITIES I9I

some of the great powers will actually begin to decline in numbers. That seems, in fact, to be the case with France already. A century ago France was easily the greatest power in continental Europe. Yesterday the whole world was impressed by the rising power of Germany; and today we see the rising power of Japan; tomorrow, so many prophets tell us, we shall witness the rising power of Russia. Herein appears the really fundamental problem of per- manent peace, namely, can the rights and privileges of the various nations be adjusted to their ever-changing weight in the actual affairs of the world?

This question appears especially pertinent when one notes the transforming effects of the spread of the industrial revolution. The combined effects of machinery, technology and science in transforming the material basis of life were first manifested in England a century ago. Since then much of Western Europe and America has been industrialized. Such industrialization results in a complete overturning of traditional social relationships. As related to our problem, its first effect is to greatly increase wealth and thus to make possible the sustentation of an increas- ing population. Before 1750 the population of Europe had long been at nearly a standstill. Anything like notable increase was confined to favored trading areas. With the spread of the factory system and the growth of trade, population growth became phenomenal. We are just now witnessing this result in Japan. What will be the effects of the introduction of machinery and modern medicine in India and China remains to be revealed.

A second effect of industrialization is to pile up the popula- tion in great urban centers. This results in a lack of national balance between city and country. The cities come to require more food and raw materials than rural areas can produce. Thus far the United States is the only great industrial nation that 1s not under the necessity of importing vast quantities of food. Even we no longer have a notable surplus, because the food values we import tend to balance those we export. Japan, with little chance for agricultural expansion, seems to be engaged in a rigorous effort to expand her industries fast enough to secure �[Page 192]192 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

food and raiment for her spawning millions. Today she feeds 20,000,000, or one-third of her home population, on a plain diet of fish and rice by exported manufactures. England, long con- sidered ‘‘the workshop of the world’’, was a food exporter until the opening of the nineteenth century, but today she imports one-half of what she eats. Germany has systematically built up her agriculture by public policy, but she imports one-quarter of her food.

We thus broach a primary question. As the nations which are now food exporters become industrialized and hence food importers, where will the extra food come from? Will the present industrialized nations be forced back toward a more even balance between industry and agriculture? Or, will it be possible to develop in the tropics great food-producing areas, while the temperate zone nations are specializing in manufactures? In any Case, it seems certain that the future will produce momentous problems of readjustment both within and among nations.

Industrialization thus continually alters the balance of the world. The mechanized areas become insatiable consumers of food and raw materials. They reach out to the ends of the earth for markets for their finished products and for sources of food, cotton, wool, silk, rubber, copper and oil. Herein lies the basis of modern imperialism and the dangers to future peace.

This picture of the situation is not, however, without its brighter aspects. I think it possible to find in these processes the chief promise of the final integration of the world. Contrary to most persons who class themselves as liberals, I am strongly inclined to see in economic imperialism the chief influence now working for the elevation of the standard of life throughout the world and the cultivation of genuine internationalism. A present threat of war, it points the only realistic way to a solid organiza- tion of world affairs.

Let us enumerate some of the changes in the world situation being effected by international finance. In the first place, it hastens the processes of cultural diffusion. The push of the western trader has introduced cigarettes and the kerosene lamp �[Page 193]RATES OF INCREASE OF RACES AND NATIONALITIES 193

into the remotest parts of Asia and Africa, but the push of the exploiting capitalist is introducing farm tractors, the electric light, power machinery, the railway, the trolley, the automobile, the ‘ictrola and the moving picture into all parts of the world. Thus the outstanding features of western culture are spreading everywhere. Such unification of cultural elements should promote mutual understanding and lay a basis for a greater community of ideas and interests.

In the second place, this spread of western mechanisms and technology tends to raise the standards of material welfare among backward peoples. No doubt economic imperialism has been, and still is, accompanied by a large amount of heartless exploitation of native peoples. For much of this no worthy apology can be found. It seems probable, however, that in the long run the introduction of machinery with modern methods of transporta- tion, mining, lumbering, manufacturing and tilling the soil will so increase wealth as to provide not merely improved food, clothing, housing and sanitation, but better highways, better schools and newspapers and the other paraphernalia of modern democratic societies. In the third place, economic imperialism is greatly increasing international interdependence. Every part of the world is being linked with every other part by the bonds of trade and investment.

Before the great war we were frequently told in this country that international capitalism had become so strong that further wars were impossible; ex-chancellor David Starr Jordan regaled the country with a powerful lecture on a mysterious ‘‘Invisible Empire’ of international finance which would compel peace in the interest of investments. Such a picture was a bit premature, but it would seem to be hastening toward realization. An illustra- tion may be found in the manner which American loans to European national and municipal governments and investments in European lands and industries have increased our substantial interest in European affairs. Our stake in Europe now exceeds a score of billions of dollars and is steadily and rapidly increasing. We shall not be able to hold ourselves aloof, but will inevitably �[Page 194]194 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

become more and more deeply concerned in the peace and pros- perity of that continent. Likewise the advanced nations are acquiring mutual interests in many countries partly because they have made extensive investments therein, and partly because these investments have been made through international trusts or banking houses.

Finally, it may be pointed out that the spread of trade and investment, by increasing the wealth and population and hence the economic importance of the backward areas, advances their power and dignity and thus promotes their standing in the family of nations. This country was itself largely developed by English and Dutch capital; and now the United States, England, Holland, Germany and France are hurrying the development of Mexico, Central and South America, Asia and Africa. Thus the resources of the entire globe are being brought under utilization under con- ditions which, in the long run, make some kind of world organ- ization inevitable. It does not seem possible to conceive any other realistic and workable plan whereby such a result could be attained. The political manifestations of these underlying economic forces will become more prominent and powerful with every increase in international industrialism.

We thus see the entire world in a rather rapid process of transition and development. Wealth, population and economic and military strength are by no means increasing in all areas at the same rates. New centers of organized social resources are arising and some old ones are scarcely holding their own. There will be new demands for recognition and for ‘‘a larger place in the sun.’’ But the organization of international intelligence proceeds apace. We may at least hope that the prestige and power of the League of Nations will advance fast enough to enable it to grapple successfully with the crises of readjustment which are bound to arise in the future. �[Page 195]QELZODLEHWOLE OLE LD

THE WISDOM OF THE AGES

Edited by

ALFRED W. MartTIN Soctety for Ethical Culture, New York

The Sacred Scriptures of Mubammedanism

O OTHER scriptures, not even the Christian, are so widely

or so frequently read as the Muhammedan Koran. Some

two hundred million Moslems turn to this sacred Book

every day, in accordance with a decree of Muhammed. Before coming to its contents we must take note of certain pre- liminary considerations essential to proper understanding and appreciation of the Book.

Thirteen centuries ago, on the Arabian peninsula, where the streams of commerce and of culture met and mingled in the Middle Age, Muhammed founded a new type of Semitic religion which bears his name and which today extends over an area equal to one- third of the globe. From Arabia it spread eastward over Persia, Turkestan, Afghanistan; westward, across Turkey and Asia Minor; northward, to Syria; southward, to Africa, covering more than half of that continent. It found its way also to India, and beyond, to the islands of Sumatra, Java and Borneo.

The Niger and the Nile, the Jordan and the Ganges, the Maritza and the Yang-tse-Kiang, all fertilize Muhammedan soil. Twice did this religion threaten to overrun Europe. First, in 732, when Abd-er-Rahman had his famous encounter with Charles Martel, and forthwith the cross, not the crescent, became the emblem of European faith. Then, again, in 1683, when John, King of Poland, at the head of twenty thousand soldiers, defeated the Muhammedan army at Vienna, it was once more decreed that Muhammedanism should not be the religion of Europe. Yet

195 �[Page 196]196 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

how incalculably great is the world’s debt to the early repre- sentatives of this faith! For it was they who transmitted the treasures of Greek literature from the Middle Age to the Renais- sance; they who originated the graceful art forms of which the Taj-Mahal and the Alhambra are the most famous examples. It was they, again, who contributed to the sciences of algebra and chemistry, astronomy and medicine; they who dotted the Saracen empire with universities and who built at Bagdad and at Cairo the most renowned libraries in the world. During those centuries of ecclesiastical despotism when the Christian Church suppressed all intellectual activities save those that were theo- logical, causing the talent that reproduces to supplant the genius that creates, Muhammedans did all in their power to encourage and stimulate research in every branch of human inquiry: Arabic is the most widely-spoken language on earth and though Chinese characters are used by more people, knowledge of Arabic will carry one farther round the world. And with the Arabic vocab- ulary has gone the Muhammedan religion. Today we decorate our walls and floors with fabrics that Muhammedans taught us to weave. We regale our senses with perfumes they taught us to make, we teach our children algebra and higher mathematics from text-books traceable to Muhammedan sources. All this de- serves to be remembered especially because of the still widespread impression that indebtedness is on the side of Muhammedans alone, that they owe to the civilizing agencies of Christianity their gradual emergence from semi-barbarism!

Thouga Muhammed was born twelve centuries after Con- fucius we know far less of him than of the Chinese sage. The only contemporary source of information concerning Muhammed is the Koran, but its concern is with beliefs and observances rather than with biographical details which were known to his hearers and so needed no mention. The earliest biography of Muhammed, like that of Jesus, was written long after his death, and its unre- liability is considerably accentuated by the rapidity with which legends gathered about him as they did about Jesus. The name Muhammed means ‘“‘the praised one,’’ an epithet attached to his �[Page 197]THE SACRED SCRIPTURES OF MUHAMMEDANISM 197

real name which tradition tells us was Kutam. Born at Mecca in 571 he was orphaned before he had reached his teens. How deeply he felt the deprivations of orphanage is attested by many a pas- sage in the Koran, enjoining upon the faithful tender regard for the person of orphans and scrupulous care not to touch their property. Thus, in the ninety-third ‘‘Sura,’’ we read:

‘Did not Allah find thee an orphan and hath he not taken care of thee? And did he not find thee wandering in error, and hath he not guided thee into truth? And did he not find thee needy, and hath he not enriched thee? Wherefore, oppress not the orphan: neither repulse the beggar; but declare the goodness of thy Lord.”’

Bereft of both father and mother the lad was adopted, first by his grandfather and later by his uncle, a rich, generous, mag- nanimous man, who though disapproving of his nephew's radical tendencies in religion, yet, on grounds of kinship, gave him freely of the abundance of his possessions. But one day financial reverses came to this noble guardian and the boy was obliged to earn his own living. For several years he tended sheep on the neighboring hills, till, at the age of twenty-four, he entered the service of a rich widow, Kadijah by name, acting as camel driver and con- ductor of caravans journeying between Jerusalem and Damascus. So infatuated was she with Muhammed that she married him, and though she was fifteen years his senior, their married life seems to have been both happy and mutually inspiring. While Kadijah lived she was Muhammed’s only wife and only after her death did he begin his remarkable accumulation of consorts. Some of them were widows of followers and he took them out of charity but in most of his marriages his passion for beautiful women is apparent. No authentic portrait of Muhammed has come down to us, chiefly because of that abhorrence of idolatry and image- worship which the prophet instilled into the hearts of his fol- lowers. All the portraits that have come down to us are outright fabrications, in the production of which imagination and preju- dice have proven powerful creative agencies. Nevertheless, from various sources, especially the ‘‘Sunna”’ or tradition, we are en- abled to form a mental picture of Muhammed’s personal appear- �[Page 198]198 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

ance. A man of medium height he was, with a large, well-shaped head; his dark, curly hair streaming down upon his broad shoul- ders and his restless eye looking out beneath heavy eyelashes and heavier eyebrows. His nose was slightly aquiline and his teeth were regular and white as hailstones. Intellectually his attain- ments were slight. Learning in Arabia in his time consisted in knowledge of poems and tribal traditions and stories, all acquired orally. It is doubtful whether Muhammed could read or write. His education consisted in observing men and facts, and instinct took the place of logic. A multitude of incidents illustrate his knowledge of human nature and his practical judgment, wisdom and tact. On the other hand, his attempt to assimilate those parts that he could not understand of Judaism and of Christianity, as they were presented to him through fanciful tales, led to frightful confusion of ideas and gross misinterpretations of both these religions.

Morally, his life was exemplary in its simplicity, sincerity and courage. His was indeed the simple life, lived at times to the point of severe austerity. We read that at times he would go fora month or more without eating a single hearty meal, lighting his own fire, cooking his own food, mending his own clothes and shoes in order that his slaves might enjoy a larger share of free- dom. In the staunchness with which he stood by his unpopular convictions, he showed great moral bravery and, again, in the vehemence with which he denounced the idolatries and polythe- isms of the Meccans. No amount of opposition swerved him from his prophetic path. Often disheartened and depressed he yet held to his belief in the certain victory of his cause. His was a gift not always possessed by prophets,—wisdom to insist on the main es- sentials and to stop at the point where insistence becomes danger- ous or fruitless; wisdom, also, to be conservative in pushing his reform ideas. Afflicted with a nervous disorder that sometimes caused loss of consciousness, it was in one of these attacks, while meditating in a cave, that he became apprised of his mission. Tradition tells us that he fell into convulsions, streams of perspi- ration rolled down his cheeks, his eyes burned like glowing coals, �[Page 199]THE SACRED SCRIPTURES OF MUHAMMEDANISM 199

and as he was about to end his misery by leaping over the bluff he heard the voice of the angel Gabriel saying, ‘‘Stop, thou art the prophet of the Lord.’’ Running to Kadijah, he exclaimed, ‘Am I in truth a prophet, or am I mad?’’ To which Kadijah answered: “‘Thou hast spoken truly; no harmful thing has hap- pened thee; thou dost not return evil for evil; thou art kind to relatives and friends. Rejoice, thou wilt be the prophet of proph- ets.’’ What a significant reply! For assuredly there can be no safer test of fitness for a prophetic career than the possession of precisely such moral traits. But Muhammed hesitated at first, just as Jesus and Gotama, Zoroaster and Moses hesitated before entering upon their prophetic calling. The temptation-legends, related of these leaders,—what are they but the figurative expres- sion of that moment of doubt as to the true path of duty which all five experienced prior to assumption of the prophetic office? Hearing that assassination was planned, Muhamme | resolved on flight, making his memorable escape in the dead of night, July 16, 622, to the city north of Mecca, now known as Medina, and there he passed the remaining ten years of his life. Thus the ministry of Muhammed was identified with both Mecca and Medina.

A word as to the difference between the two ministries, for it conditions intelligent reading of the Koran. Throughout his ten years’ ministry at Mecca, Muhammed had been simply the negative type of reformer, denouncing the vices of his country- men, rebuking low standards of business dealing and decrying the crass idolatry into which his own native Arabian religion had degenerated. He was an Amos preaching to a small community. But at Medina he becomes a Hildebrand, ruling all Arabia with an autocratic hand. He assumes the rdle of legislator, social and political organizer, conqueror. He drafts a new charter for the city, defines the duties of citizens, converts indiscriminate alms- giving into systematic taxation for the support of his theocracy, prohibits intersectarian warfare and compels the disputants to submit their differences to him for settlement. Finally, he leads an aggressive, conquering crusade, winning over all Arabia to his message and claims. �[Page 200]APOSTLES OF WORLD UNITY

XVIII—HENRI DUNANT by

EstHER CAUKIN

American Association of University Women

HE period of the Second Empire in France was a focal

point for the movements characteristic of the nineteenth

century. In the span of years covered by the reign of

Napoleon III movements that had begun in the last decades of the previous century came to fruition, and others, which were to condition the life of the next century, first raised their heads. The triumph of bourgeois democracy in western Europe coincided with the raising of the red flag of revolutionary socialism; colonial imperialism in the form in which the twentieth century knows it was established with th. spread of western political domination to the Far East; the idealistic doctrines of nationalisin were linked up with cynically realistic international behavior, and at the same time the lesson of international cooperation in non-political matters was being learned; a sense of social re- sponsibility for the welfare of the members of society was bring- ing about the institutionalization of humanitarian movements. It was in this atmosphere that Henri Dunant conceived the prii- ciples which were to be embodied in the Geneva Convention of 1864 and in the International Red Cross.

Henri Dunant was born in Geneva in 1828, of a familv prominent in the affairs of that city for many generations. He grew up with a sense of the responsibility of the leisure class for the welfare of the community, and devoted himself to phil- anthropic activities. His work in the field of international hu- manitarianism commenced with a journey which he undertook

200 �[Page 201]HENRI DUNANT 201

in 1859. He witnessed the Battle of Solferino, an engagement so sanguinary that it shook the nerves even of the victorious French Emperor. The political implications of the battle struck Dunant far less than its effect upon the combatants, especially those who were wounded.

The medical service in the army had developed less than many other parts of its organization, and there were rarely enough physicians and attendants to take care of the men wounded in battle. When an army could not take care of the medical needs of its own troops, it was not surprising that the enemy wounded received very little attention. A few rules had been established as to the treatment of wounded officers who fell into the hands of the enemy, but the welfare of the common soldiers was not taken care of by international agreement. One of the most seri- ous obstacles in the way of adequate care for the wounded was the fact that it had been impossible to neutralize the medical personnel and equipment of the opposing armies. Even though it was recognized generally that medical corps, hospitals, and field units should be immune from attack the policy was difficult to carry out because each army had a different flag for its medical division and the enemy seldom recognized it.

Henri Dunant realized the existence of these general condi- tions, and the situation of the men who were victims to them won his immediate sympathies. He undertook to improve the lot of as many as he could reach through his own efforts, and organized voluntary groups in Castiglione, a small town near the battlefield, to relieve the sufferings of the wounded men who had been transported there. After several days of incessant ac- tivity,—directing the work of his volunteer helpers, attending large numbers of the wounded, and securing and distributing supplies,—he determined to see Marshal MacMahon and bring to his attention the condition among the wounded men. An all-night ride took him to the French Headquarters, where he was received by Marshal MacMahon, who arranged for him to see Napoleon III. The Emperor was deeply impressed by Du- nant’s account, and at his request issued an order that the Aus- �[Page 202]202 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

trian medical men who had been taken prisoners should be released, to return with Dunant in order to care for the wounded.

Dunant tried, also, to organize relief for the wounded from outside the immediate vicinity of Solferino. He wrote to friends in Switzerland, asking for supplies, and for several young men to assist in attending the wounded men. Some money was raised for the purposes of relief, though the two men who started to go to Dunant’s assistance arrived too late to be of much service.

The work of Henri Dunant at the Battle of Solferino was valuable in itself, but it came to have a part in shaping inter- national developments through the Souvenir de Solferino, which he wrote on his return to Geneva. In this little book Dunant described the battlefield and the horrible conditions of the wounded, and told the story of his own efforts to relieve their suffering. He also outlined an international system which would eliminate many of the causes of these conditions. An international agreement for the neutralization of the wounded and of medical men and equipment should be drawn up, and the nations should agree upon uniform insignia for the medical divisions of all armies. In order to provide adequate supplies and personal care for the wounded men, he suggested that civilian societies be organized in each country which would make themselves re- sponsible for collecting equipment and training volunteers for assistance to the medical staffs of the armies.

The plan outlined by Henri Dunant was received vith en- thusiasm by his friends in Geneva, and the Geneva Society of Public Utility, under the presidency of Gustav Moynier, ap- pointed a commission of five of its members to study the project, while Dunant, himself, undertook to win the interest of the governments. Napoleon III was especially anxious to assist in getting Dunant’s principles written into international law, though, strangely enough, it was from the French Minister of War that the most vindictive opposition to Dunant came. He had no patience with civilians who tried to mix in military affairs. Dunant visited the German States and won the sympathy of the rulers of Prussia, Saxony, and Austria. The last was per- �[Page 203]HENRI DUNANT 203

haps the greatest achievement, because the opposition of Austria had been the most important factor in preventing an earlier acceptance of the neutralization of the wounded and their at- tendants.

On the recommendation of the Geneva Commission M. Moynier called an international conference to discuss the project outlined in Un Souvenir de Solferino. The conference, which met in Geneva October 26-29, 1863, was composed of representatives of sixteen states, as well as of the Order of St. John ot Jerusalem. It passed resolutions asking for the neutralization of the wounded, of hospitals, and of medical personnel, and for the adoption of an identical flag in every country for the medical division of the army. It also named the Geneva Commission a “‘Comité Inter- national”’ to carry out the resolutions of the Conference.

The Swiss Federal Council, having assured itself of the support of Napoleon III, invited twenty-five states to send official delegates to a formal diplomatic conference to be held in Geneva in August 1864. Thirteen European nations and the United States were represented at this conference, which drew up the First Treaty of Geneva, now known as the International Red Cross Convention. It was framed on the principles advo- cated by Henri Dunant,—the neutralization of wounded men and of medical personnel and equipment, and the adoption of uniform insignia for the medical corps. In honor of Dunant and the Swiss Republic the conference designated as the insignia the Swiss flag reversed, with a red cross on a white ground. The Convention recognized the voluntary societies which would take as their special task the assistance of the medical departments of the armies, for the improvement of the condition of the wounded in time of war.

The immediate signers of the treaty were France, Switzer- land, Belgium, The Netherlands, Italy, Norway, Denmark, Spain, and Baden. Great Britain, Saxony, Sweden, and the United States delayed their signatures, the last until 1882.

From 1864 until 1870, Henri Dunant devoted himself to work- in; out the principles thus adopted by international agreement, �[Page 204]204 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

his last official act being the creation of a special committee in Paris for work among the prisoners of war during the Franco- Prussian War of 1870. Shortly after this time he lost his fortune by bad investments, and retired to live in Heiden, a Swiss village, under the care of his friend Doctor Altherr. He was forgotten by the world to the extent that a Geneva newspaper declared, some twenty years later, that he had long been dead.

In 1895 George Baumberger, a German journalist, went to Heiden, where he found Henri Dunant and recalled him to the memory of the world. He described him at that time as a seventy-year old gentleman, presenting a fine figure with noble head, pale coloring, silver white hair and silver white beard.

As a result of Baumberger’s efforts Dunant's last years were provided for. The Russian dowager Tsarina, Feodorovna, gave him a life pension, and the Twelfth International Physicians’ Congress voted him a pension of five thousand francs. As a crown- ing token of recognition of the vision and work of Henri Dunant the Norwegian Parliament in 1907 awarded him one-half of the first Nobel peace prize. His death was as peaceful as most of his life had been, for he passed away in his sleep during the night of October 30, 1910, at the age of eighty-two years.

The claim of Henri Dunant to be ranked among the apostles of world unity rests first of all, upon his humanitarianism,—his realization that whether men marched under one national banner or another they were human beings, and entitled to human care when their bodies were maimed and their spirits broken by the machinery of international warfare. Secondly, and perhaps even more important, he conceived of the care of these men as an international responsibility, and worked out a practicable scheme for inducing the governments to acknowledge their responsibility. And finally, with the aid of his close friends in Geneva, he exerted the effort to make his scheme an integral part of international law. In his philosophy of life and in his approach to the problem which he took for his own he was a true son of the enlightened nineteenth century. �[Page 205]SCIENCE, PHILOSOPHY AND RELIGION by

Epwin Artuur Burtt Department vf Philosophy, University of Chicago

IWI—Tue Tentativeness ofr ScieENTIFIC THINKING

F THERE 1s a feature of scientific research that has more than any other impressed its stamp upon the overt intellectual habits of modern times it is its empiricism. The modern world prides itself upon being empirical. Now empiricism

means respect for facts. And not only has the modern business man acquired this respect sufficiently to relish having at his command men who can show that they know the facts, but the fashion is even quickening the minds of democratic statesmen, some of whom find it not impossible to gain reelection when they have supported impartial investigatiors of relevant data before passing important legislation affecting their constituents.

What is the alternative to ascertaining and respecting the facts? Of course, following somebody's precu..ceived opinions about the matter in question. But if we are tempted to suppose that the difference between fact and preconceived opinion is an innocent thing, and that it is easy to say just what is a wise way of showing respect for facts, we are greatly mistaken. The differ- ence testifies to a devious evolution of thought and experience and the genuine habit of respecting facts is a most remarkable human achievement.

If we question anybody's affirmation that so-and-so is a fact, what do we normally regard as the most indubitable con- firmation of it? Unquestionably that the thing was seen, or heard, or touched, or otherwis. directly reached through the medium of the senses, and this by enough cautious people so that the

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possibility of illusion becomes remote. And experience seems clearly to support the supposition that a great many events can be vouched for as real facts without serious likelihood of error. Such are those agile motions of external objects which from the _ Start of our conscious experience force themselves upon our atten- tion and bring about their own differentiation from the back- ground upon which they move, as in the case of people, animals, rolling balls, the swaying limbs of trees, and the like. Having been many times startled into attentive observation by these shifts in the external scene, we extend the same lesson while still in our cradles by spontaneous manipulation of things that we can suck, thump, and push. The solid deposit of such expe- riences in memory, together with the later won ability to com- municate by language similarities and differences, enables us to make use of the testimony of others; accordingly we vastly extend the factual content of our personal experience by appro- priating what we take to be things seen or heard as facts in the experience of our parents or friends.

Thus there rapidly takes shape around all of us a world of objects and events that we accept without question as factual.

But when we raise a few critical questions about even the minimum of assumptions involved in this procedure we find ourselves in puzzling difficulties, while if we attempt to extend the range of our assurance still more serious ones becloud us. We are embarking on no systematic essay in the psychology of perception and hence shall simply select one of the most decisive factors to consider.

We must note first that what we call a ‘“‘fact’’ is funda- mentally a social matter, an affair of community agreement. Examination of cases of illusion and of error shows that unless we can secure social corroboration of our perceptions we inevi- tably lose confidence in them ourselves, or at most confine refer- ence to them to our personal soliloquies. This can hardly be avoided, for our relations with other people are so pervasive that we need to have a foundation of social objectivity in the things that we take to be real facts. We need to live in a common �[Page 207]THE TENTATIVENESS OF SCIENTIFIC THINKING 207

world, not a world of individual imagination, and what we affirm to be a fact must be a member of that common world. Secrecy is all right in its place, but facts must be tough enough not to waver before others.

But is there really any such common world to be found? To common sense of course it seems evident that there is, and common sense is right to the extent that different people do manage within limits to identify the same objects by the same names. If we examine, however, a factor which always condi- tions our perceiving activity, we shall run into certain perplex- ities, and it is these to which we must largely appeal in the effort to lay bare the real significance of the modern respect for facts.

We are all familiar with the interesting historical circum- stance that the three official accounts of the final French surrender in the way of 1780 differ greatly “in their description of certain particulars. One account was by a German war correspondent, one by a French attaché, and the third by a visiting reporter. Presumably none of these three men could be shown to be ab- normal by any accepted tests of abnormality, and presumably all were interested in seeing just what happened and in describ- ing it faithfully. Why then the irreconcilable differences in the accounts? Well, it is evident that the expectations of these men would be different; they would not be looking for exactly the same things, and this because their controlling mood and bias in the whole series of events of which this was a part diverged greatly. The German would be eager to note everything that might heighten the glamour of the victory and exaggerate the humility of the conquered; the Frenchman would be as blind as possible to such things and would be on the watch for evidences of dignity in defeat as well as for tokens of arrogance on the part of the victor; while the visiting correspondent, although presumably more impartial in these respects, would naturally have a special eye for those features of the occasion that chimed with his anticipations or would be of special importance to his readers. In short, does not experience testify with sufficient force �[Page 208]208 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

to the hypothesis that what we see is very largely determined by what we expect to see, and that what we expect to see is determined in the same way by our prevailing mood—the latter being but a shortened way of saying, by what we want so per- sistently that it leaves its effective stamp on our character?

Some years ago a German professor staged a mock riot in his classroom. The students who were to participate were given careful instructions in advance, and no one else knew any- thing about the plan. The riot was brief and what actually transpired was simple enough, though of course highly unusual and totally unexpected except by the few who took part. At the close of the strange scene the professor asked everyone in the room to write a full description of what had happened. All the accounts were erroneous in some particulars, the percentage of error varying from twenty-six to eighty, and contradictory statements of this or that detail were many. Had the affair been argued in a court of law it would have been a sorry puzzle indeed for a judge or jury to determine with any confidence just what had taken place from the irreconcilable offerings of these eye- witnesses to the scene.

Cases more or less similar are well known to all of us. How much do they indicate?

Any event which thus thrusts itself upon our attention Starts in motion at once a train of attempted interpretation. That such a train is functioning is of course still more obvious in the situations created by our own active curiosity when we pursue systematic observations of a puzzling occurrence. We do not at first know what it is that is going on, but are interested in finding out if we can. What fact we shall take the events to be depends upon the outcome. Now examine this train of inter- pretation in order to see how it operates. It is evident at once that we shall have to resurrect from our past experience the general images and conceptual pigeon-holes with which to classify it, for we have no others. Next, it is evident that the order in which we try the pigeon-holes which seem possible 1s determined by our expectation of their probabilities; 1f we see �[Page 209]THE TENTATIVENESS OF SCIENTIFIC THINKING 209

firse a distant object that catches our attention as a dog burrow- ing in the grass it is because of the various possible ways of per- ceiving it at that distance our expectation favors a dog more than other alternatives. But what, further, determines the expectation itself? In part, what has seemed to be verified pre- viously in situations similar; in part, our dominant interests, which play over the images and ideas congenial to.them much oftener than others, and make it easier for the ones thus favored to flash into mind as answers to puzzles that spring up in expe- rience than the ones not thus favored by our desires.

Now this is again to say, of course, that the simplicity and assurance of so-called empirical fact have quite vanished in the distance. It means that, strictly speaking, the ‘‘common’’ world which we take for granted so easily is not actual but represents an ideal which for practical community needs we try desper- ately to attain. Moreover, the distinction between empirical fact and preconceived opinion has vanished also, at least as an absolute distinction, for we see that we always necessarily per- ceive in terms of the concepts which our past experience has made familiar and which the hovering interests shaped by the past lead us to apply. What we call fact is always a selection among preconceived opinions. Fundamentally, we can no more disentangle ourselves from this necessity than could the most conservative of medieval students; what then does it really mean to speak of science as empirical and of an age vitally affected by science as an empirical age?

I think the answer to this question will be found if we ask ourselves how, in the light of the conditioning factors just outlined, we should go about it to render our perversions neg- ligible and our perception as objective as possible. In general terms it is evident that we can make progres: in this direction only by consciously endeavoring to withhold confident inter- pretations till in the face of the event in question we have passed beyond all the alternatives that at first aroused our expectation and are freely considering ones that originally ran contrary to our dominant mood. In this way only can we be confident that �[Page 210]210 " WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

our prejudices are not seriously affecting what we take to be fact. And this general statement involves two important corol- laries. The first is that our controlling interest itself must have outgrown biased moods, so far as possible, and have taken into itself a constant readiness for the novel, so that we count it more important to discover in any occurrence what transcends our original expectations than merely what fulfils them. Thus alone are we able to bring to light important distinctions that had not been noted before we may express the same truth in terms of habit: the virtue of empiricism lies in the formation of the habit of looking in any situation for more than our pre- vailing interests and the concepts formed under their guidance would lead us to anticipate. Our observation, in short, must become live and creative rather than merely repetitive.

But if we are to mean by fact something socially objective there is another corollary equally important. Since what we per- ceive is determined so strongly by what we are interested in per- ceiving, if we are to be able to perceive what others are likely to perceive and thus live in a common world with them we must share their prevailing interests. It is not physiologically compul- sory for us to see what other people see. We may affirm then that the observation most likely to issue in objective results is the observa- tion delivered by a mind which has bzen sympathetically socialized as widely as possible. It may be that the real reason why all of us are able to reach agreement over such a large area of our observations is that our ordinary purposes in dealing with the surrounding world are the same, or contain a large identical element.

To have made a broad beginning in the direction of this transformation is a remarkable achievement of the modern world; we must certainly count it so if we compare the empirical attitude of science with the torpid basking in traditional au-

hority in which the thinking of medieval times was so lazily embedded. That is the attitude of committing oneself to a close- knit hugging of the interpretative concepts given shape in the past; instead of being always ready to transcend the meanings �[Page 211]THE TENTATIVENESS OF SCIENTIFIC THINKING 211

for which acquaintance with these concepts prepares us we fearfully feel it impious to admit anything novel and bathe ourselves in an atmosphere of unquestioning loyalty to an inherited system of ideas, forgetting that each of them was once as novel as those we now fear to embrace.

The issue of fact versus preconceived opinion means at bottom then the issue between an observation freely ready to criticize and outreach the traditional ideas with which all ob- servation must begin and an observation ultimately mastered by loyaity to such ideas. But when the matter is stated thus we are brought face to face with the characteristic of scientific thinking which the present chapter promised to discuss, namely its tenta- tiveness. Let us explore some of the further considerations sug- gested by the notion of tentativeness and see how far their con- sequences prove identical with those to which the chapter has already introduced us. The human achievement which this word represents is really a stupendous one. We do not ordinarily sup- pose that learning how to see and hear facts is a difficult matter, but such is really the case, and to extend the necessary tentative- ness to other situations is sometimes harder still.

The prevailing assumption of the ancient world was that there was really no fruitful, promising state between knowledge and ignorance; knowledge meaning full, self-conscious posses- sion of the truth and ignorance its complete absence. One of the toughest difficulties faced by Greek philosophy arose from this fact and is reflected for us in the dialogues of Plato. How can knowledge ever be acquired? For either a man possesses it or he does not; in the former case it does not need to be acquired, and in the latter case he is empty of everything which would enable him to take any genuine step toward knowledge. One completeiv in the dark cannot even make a sensible guess as to the direc- tion in which he needs to move. Of course there is what Plato called right opinion; judgment which happens to hit the mark by a happy guess but is not certain that it has hit it and cannot therefore correct itself by conscious possession of a standard. Obviously, as far as the attainment of knowledge is concerned �[Page 212]212 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

right opinion is hardly more promising than complete ignorance, for to have truth by chance is little more likely to offer confi- dent control for the future than not to have it at all. Plato's answer to the problem was accordingly quite consistent. Know]- edge really never can be acquired at all, and to account for what we actually do possess of it we must hold that it is implicitly carried over from a previous existence of the soul and is recalled to mind from point to point by occurrences in our present expe- rience. Aristotle did better with the difficulty but was still far from attaining the notion that is essential to modern science. And it is certain that most people today are pretty much one with the Greeks on this question; where they are ignorant of a matter they would be at a loss to know how to remedy their ignorance in any other manner than that of asking somebody who already knows. The perfect naturalness of this method, rendered perennially so in the daily relation of child to parent and pupil to teacher makes it easier to understand the proneness of the western world which believes in the fatherhood of God to be convinced also that he must have left somewhere a written revelation enclosing clear answers to all its important problems. But until the advent of modern science the question how any- body could have found anything out in the first place was a baffling difficulty. If we can bring ourselves to share this per- plexity with pre-scientific thinkers we shall realize how inevitably they felt themselves forced to the conviction that the only way out of the puzzle lay either in our possession of knowledge in a previous state of existence or in the assumption of an omnis- cient God, from whom, either directly or indirectly, all human knowledge was derived.

But so far we have touched on the intellectual form of the puzzle merely. There is a much broader social and moral con- flict involved, and this is perhaps the causal factor behind the intellectual bewilderment.

With some apologies to a handful of scientists and to practi- cal statesmen who never generalized their actual procedure, it may be stated as the common conviction of the ancient and medieval �[Page 213]THE TENTATIVENESS OF SCIENTIFIC THINKING 213

world that it is quite improper and socially dangerous to be un- certain about anything of moment. Ignorance is a crime; sure knowledge is morally required. Now this insistent feeling might have buttressed an eager and careful search for dependable knowledge, but as a matter of fact its spontaneous form seems rather to have been hysterical demand that what already passed for knowledge in the community must be adhered to unques- tioningly as certain, conformity to which is therefore a funda- mental moral duty.

The belaboring given agnosticism when it was formulated two generations ago by Huxley is a most interesting recent indication of the continuing resistance to the scientific notion of tentativeness on the part of popular attitudes. To be an ag- nostic 1s simply to say that one does not know whether the great faiths of religion are well founded or not. That the common re- ligionist did not distinguish between atheism and agnosticism may in part be accounted for by the almost universal tendency to be careless in dealing with unfamiliar distinctions. But that there should be such a deep-seated feeling that agnosticism was socially as dangerous as atheism illustrates the assertion that the prevalent human attitude insists that maintaining a show of certainty about traditional knowledge is a basic virtue and doubt a social crime.

Before science came to have general influence on human thinking the only champions of genuine tolerance to be found were an occasional philosopher like Spinoza or a statesman who discovered that fruitful endeavor to mould his people into a real unity of national feeling was quite impossible as long as groups of theologians each maintaining dogmatic infallibility wrangled ferociously over pinpoints of doctrine and walked about in frown- ing suspicion of all who differed on any contention of their lengthy creed. The great plea of Oliver Cromwell to the contentious churchmen of his day allies him to the scientific spirit already beginning to season minds of a more speculative and experi- mental teraper around him: ‘‘My brethren, by the bowels of Christ I beseech you, bethink you that you may be mistaken.” �[Page 214]214 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

The key to the whole historical change at this point lies in the discovery of a method of verifying and extending knowl- edge such as for the first time reveals clearly what is the true medium between knowledge and ignorance. That medium we may curtly describe as ignorance really on its way to confident knowledge. This is none other than the method of scientific hypothesis. It is a method of putting to use the most adequate ideas which at any given time we possess in such a manner that the range of their application becomes more closely defined and the further ideas needed to correct and supplement them are stimulated to take shape in imagination, themselves in turn to be verified and disciplined. |

When a scientist finds himself ignorant with respect to a challenging problem he does not turn to divine revelation to find the answer nor does he feel himself confined to a series of chance guesses one of which may without his knowing it be the true answer. He knows how to go about it so as to make definite progress toward knowledge. Let us describe his procedure in general terms and then turn to a concrete illustration. First, he brings to bear the best ideas already available on the matter, and under their guidance engages in systematic observation of the problematic situation. This observation is of course thor- oughly empirical in the sense in which empirical has recently been defined. As he pensively scans the puzzling data guided by what the past has taught but always ready to see something more, suggested explanations of the puzzle arise in his mind. What are these and where do they come from? Not being God, he has of course not created them out of nothing. They are ideas by which in the past he has successfully solved difficulties which in this or that definite respect are similar to the present baffling event. But as yec any such idea is a suggested solution only, it lacks verification. Now just as he put the best past ideas to work in guiding his observations and producing a relevant suggestion, he puts in the second place the suggestion thus secured to work in a manner calculated to bring about its own verification or

disproof. �[Page 215]THE TENTATIVENESS OF SCIENTIFIC THINKING 2159

A suggestion discovered and used in this way is what we call a hypothesis. The suggestion itself is an idea, a concept, and cannot be empirically observed; it is therefore necessary to de- duce from it certain consequences that can be empirically observed in order to tell whether it fits the facts and may pass from the stage of hypothesis to that of verified law or whether it is to be rejected as a mistaken guess. If the idea is true, what follows from it in the way of overt results that must then also be true? And the telling itself is a matter of further observation, combined where pos:'ble with experimental manipulation of the data in such a manner as to produce situations which could not other- wise be observed or to render them observable in less confusing and more manageable ways. If such verifyi ing observations lead to the collapse of the theory, this does not mean a complete impasse; the scientist knows how to use this failure to make the next step more likely to succeed. Just what was there about the hypothesis that made it disagree with the facts? As he ponders this question in the light of his experimental observation, other suggestions will tend to come to mind that will avoid the in- adequacy of the rejected hypothesis while at the same time con- forming to all the other considerations that his work to date has shown to be respected. This second hvporhesis he then puts actively to work in the same way as before, with the probability increased that it will win confirmation instead of rejection.

How radically different this attitude from that zest for certainty which characterized practically all ranges of pre- scientific thinking, especially on matters of morals and religion! The feeling pervading scientific research is that our native ten- dency to hug certainty should be willingly surrendered in favor of a quite different valuation, a conviction namely that the highest intellectual goal is rather readiness to use the best knowl- edge already available for its own correction. The type of char- acter accordingly which the scientific interest tends to develop is one in which this forward-looking intellectual tentativeness is focal and controlling. The difficulty, of course, in this psy- chological transformation is that one does not see at first sight �[Page 216]216 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

how to combine this attitude of tentativeness with practical readiness to act on the basis of one’s knowledge. Such practical readiness is an elementary and inexorable demand of life. All of us face situations in which we have to commit ourselves to action on the guidance of the best ideas available, as when a loved one is stricken with disease or a decision affecting the whole »f our future must be made. It helps greatly in committing ourselves decisively to action if we can suppose that the guiding ideas are absolute and certain; in fact, this is probably the underlying pragmatic reason for the insistent feeling of humanity that the moral and religious convictions most momentous for man's welfare are sacred and backed by omniscient authority. Perhaps the greatest achievement of character which the world needs is the combination of practical decisiveness in moments requiring it with unreserved intellectual progressiveness. This is the new

«ideal of character revealed in and supported by the tentative procedure of modern science. Difficult as it is, all of us have to attain it at times. When afflicted with a serious and obscure ail- ment we place ourselves unreservedly in the care of an expert physician, knowing that his judgment on the matter is likely to be the best available at the time, while knowing equally well that his judgment is fallible and often no more than a hazy guess. The possibility of achieving this combination over wider ranges of life is indicated by the scientist's readiness to put his theory actively to rigorous experimental test while it is still a quite uncertain hypothesis. Intelligent action does not require cer- tainty, and this fact itself must be recognized if we would become by the grace of science more certain than we are.

It is evident that on this general point of tentativeness the human meaning of empiricism and that of hypothesis entirely coincide.

Empiricism means tentativeness expressed in the specific activity of observation; hypothesis means precisely the same attitude expressed in the use of ideas drawn from the past to guide observation. They are the same purpose realized in two different ways. �[Page 217](RHR IOAN OW OR MODE

YOUTH AND THE MODERN WORLD Edited by

IsABELLA VAN METER

‘Above and beyond all war and death is our deep yearning for the time when we shall be able to work side by side with the youth of the whole world.”

During the crucial years since the European war, the youth of the world has been gathering its force as if for a supreme struggle with the militant, destructive past. Repudiating alike its inherit- ance of institutions, customs and ideals, the generation now assuming manhood and womanhood in East and West is gradually creating the substance of a different way of life, a new outlook, destined to form a nw civilization. Viewed from the ranks of those molded by the past, this manifestation of youth has appeared one of the most tragic, misguided, even sinister of social phenomena, since its triumph must involve the overthrow of so much that mankind has done and been. The statement of youth itself, so far as youth has yet defined its own energies, experiences and directions, will tell a different story. In this department World Unity Magazine will publish from time to time brief articles expressing the outlook of youth, by youth itself, on those vital issues which are recurrent from age to age.

THE WORLD YOUTH PEACE CONGRESS

by

ALFRED BENNIS JACOB IWuodbrooke Settlement, Birmingham, England

NE may not safely judge the significance of a great gathering without the perspective of time. Now that some months have passed since the closing of the first World Congress of Youth for Peace, we may fairly

consider what its true position will be in the movement toward international understanding and goodwill.

Its significance may well be considered under three heads: its meaning to individuals, its message to the world, and its in- fluence in the movement toward lasting peace.

Although a Congress composed of such diverse minds must bring widely differing conclusions to its various participants, it is probable that its greatest influence upon the American dele- gates, was in the following two ways.

LI17 �[Page 218]218 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

It showed, first, how little we can understand of the Old World. America is large, uniform in language, education and background, wealiny, isolated, secure from outside foes. How is it possible for Americans to understand the deep problems of the many smaller cultural groups who struggle to preserve their precious heritage from encroaching neighbors, economic monop- olies, unsympathetic foreign government, or actual extermina- tion? We cannot truly understand until we have worked with them side by side over their own problems and shared with them their own hopes. It was this great privilege which the Peace Congress gave. It has resulted in much greater understanding of the many groups who are working earnestly against great odds for the advancement of their culture or nation. It is no small gain to come to that sort of appreciation; fo. Americans by their very wealth and security are made least capable of under- standing those conditions which, as the most powerful nation, they should understand best. Greater appreciation of our foreign brothers grew out of the World Congress of Youth for Peace.

Secondly, the diversity and inharmoniousness which were evident at the beginning of the Congress have caused another great gain in understanding. What could have been known of the inevitable nature of other international gatherings if this one had been perfectly well ordered? Much better it is that through such a vivid experience of initial discord which grad- ually approaches accord, we learn the troubles of other inter- national bodies. Our respect for the League of Nations increases many fold when, through our own experience, we learn the difficulties which it has to overcome in placing internationalism before nationalism.

It is needless to say that there were many gains beyond these, many minds changed, many interests aroused; yet the two which I have mentioned seem particularly important for Amer- icans, who rarely can realize fully how vastly different we are from our friends across the sea.

The message of the Congress to the world expresses a senti- ment which, when carried into the lives of the future leaders of �[Page 219]THE WORLD YOUTH PEACE CONGRESS 219

the world, will work a great change. The Congress as a whole was irreconcilably opposed to social injustice, to imperialism, to race discrimination, and to armaments. The majorities of individual commissions resolved that compulsory military serv- ice is an unjustified violation of individual conscience; that all international religious and humanitarian organizations should use their influence to give the widest possible publicity to the wrongs and injustice suffered by the oppressed nations, races, and classes of the world; that the renewal of the inward life which really leads to peace can come only through the renewal of the spiritual life of the individual; that religious bodies throughout the world should call upon their meinbers tc refuse all military service and work earnestly to overcome evil with love; that the youth of imperialist states should feel in duty bound to stimulate feelings of responsibility in their own country- men, to combat all untrue racial propaganda, and to make personal bonds of friendship between the races; that there should exist a responsible international body representing all the nations of the earth, to which all international problems should be brought, and that the basis for such a body should be the League of Nations. Many other resolutions were passed dealing with various phases of the great world problems, and showed a strong unity in the condemnation of all misunderstanding with its resultant unfairness and oppression.

What is perhaps most pertinent for American youth was the emphasis placed on ‘‘practical remedial measures.’’ There was strong feeling that the youth of the great nations should spur themselves into exerting the great influence which they have, refusing to tolerate injustice at home or abroad. The necessity for an international conscience among youth which expresses itself in determined action on vital issues, cannot be over- emphasized.

The significance of the Congress in the movement toward peace is not yet determined. The truest value of the Congress could not be brought out in the brief ten days during which it met. Its real meaning lies in the future and within each one of us. �[Page 220]220 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

To those who will see, it has showed several facts. The world is still far from unity of spirit, nor will it be achieved without great labor. The cause needs earnest workers who valiantly will set their shoulders to the wheel of this largest vehicle—world progress. There must be more devoted lives, more liberal attitudes, more intercourse between nations, more language study, more personal responsibility, more world congresses of youth. If the recent congress and its successors show to more individuals their responsibility to the world; if it raises the future leaders of the countries with a world outlook; if it is the starting point of an- other phase of the great movement toward internationality, and is not a thing concluded and left in the past; if it is the father of a future world family of youth, in which each one feels individual responsibility for the progress of the worid;—then no word need be said by verbose critics about its ‘‘success’’ as a ten-day gather- ing. The truest significance of the World Youth Peace Congress lies in the future, and within each loyal co-worker for peace.

>, �[Page 221]

UNITY AND DISUNITY IN INTERNATIONAL POLITICS

Edited by

Dexter PERKINS Department of Histcry and Government, University of Rochester

The Reduction of Armaments

HE recent sessions of the Preparatory Disarmament Com-

mission at Geneva have called attention with particular

definiteness to the possibility of limiting or reducing arma-

ments, and I shall therefore devote my survey of inter- national politics this month to some analysis of what has been transpiring in Geneva.

With regard to land armaments, it is difficult to be other than profoundly pessimistic. Some agreement to limit arma- ments, I think, is within the boundaries of possibility, though not of probability; but anything like a substantial reduction is out of the question.

With regard to this whole matter, it 1s necessary to look the facts in the face. The treaty of Versailles created a new European order. A group of satisfied states was created, in France, Poland, Czecho-Slovakia, and Rumania. At the same time a drastic limitation was imposed upon the military force of the defeated powers. Germany was held to a force of 100,000 men, recruited by voluntary enlistment for a period of twelve years. Similar treatment was meted out to Austria, Hungary and Bul- garia. Thus an attempt was made to buttress and solidify the new status quo. It is this new status quo which forms the principal diplomatic interest of the states which have profited from the

Wart.

221 �[Page 222]2d WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

Now the difficulty about the reduction of land armaments is simply this. If honestly worked out, it would tend to diminish the relative military strength of the dominating group of Euro- pean states. While, therefore, they pay lip service to the idea, they are at bottom very reluctant to adopt it in practice.

In the Preparatory Disarmament Commission, this reluc- tance has exhibited itself most strikingly in the attitude assumed toward the whole question of conscription. One of the most important questions to be discussed when it came to fixing a basis for the reduction of land armaments was the manner in which reserves should be counted. The satisfied states all have retained the system of conscription. In most of them the term of service has been shortened. In France, for example, it is now one year where it was three years before the war. But very obviously, the conscription system means that a very great number of soldiers are easily available for active service, after having been passed through the colors. On the other hand, nations with a voluntary system of recruiting, like present-day Germany, have no such advantage.

It would be difficult to deny the logic of counting such reserves, if the matter is looked at from an abstract point of view. There is no reason in the world why they should not be taken into account. But France, and its Continental allies, have steadily refused to do so. Up to the last month, Great Britain, the United States and Germany, have taken the other side of the question. But in a recent session of the Commission, Mr. Gibson, the American representative, withdrew American opposition to the Continental view-point, and Great Britain has done the same. In other words, the question of reduction of land armaments 1s now being prepared for solution on a basis which is fundamen- tally unjust, and which is intended to confirm the physical superiority of the satisfied states oi the Continent.

The American reversal on this question was, no doubt, the only way of preventing a permanent deadlock. It may facilitate the work of the Commission when dealing with the problem of reduction of naval armaments. It is a challenge to the sincerity �[Page 223]THE RIODUCTION OF ARMAMENTS 223

of the military powers on the whole question of reduction. It is possible that it may make some limited form of agreement feasible. But it would be foolish to expect very sweeping changes, unless Continental public opinion expresses itself in behalf of arms cuts much more vigorously than has yet been the case.

The road to any very great change in the situation on the Continent, many persons believe, lies through the fuller develop- ment of machinery for the maintenance of peace. Fundamentally, the question is one of security. The successions states and, still more France, are nervous about the solidity of the existing order. Until some kind of international force is put behind that order, they will be very reluctant to give up a militarv superiority from which they derive, as they believe, very positive advantag~

On the other hand, it must be admitted, there are difficulties in the way of providing the international guarantees that might make reduction of land armaments possible. Many persons, rightly or wrongly, believe the present territorial settlements in Europe, to be fundamentally unjust. They would be unwilling to buttress, even violently opposed, to buttressing them by inter- national machinery for the maintenance of peace. There is an answer to their point of view, and, in my judgment, a sufficient answer. This answer is to the effect that war is not, and must not be conceded to be, the sound method of remedying inter- national grievances, and that the remedy for the injustices of the peace treaties must be found in the creation of machinery of adjustment, not in the invocation of force. No settlement that any future war could bring about would be any more likely to be just than is the present settlement. Indeed, there is not, and never will be, any consensus of opinion amongst Europe's national groups as to what justice actually is. The solution of many of Europe's problems must be found in adjustments and compromises, not in any simple formula. It must be found by orderly methods, not by war. But it is not easy to make some people see this. As long as they do not see it, they will oppose machinery for the preser- vation of peace. As long as such machinery, machinery of an international character, is not developed, any sweeping change �[Page 224]224 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

in the situation with regard to land armaments is unlikely, if not impossible.

With regard to naval armaments, the situation is a little less complicated, perhaps, than with regard to land armaments. But it must not be thought of as precisely simple, or as a mere ques- tion of agreement between the United States and Great Britain. For Britaig’s views on naval power are related to those of Japan, and France and Italy, as well as those of the United States. In the Preparatory Commission, up till recently, there had been a deadlock on this as well as on the military problem. France put forward the thesis of limitation of tonnage ‘‘globally,’’ that is, the fixation of a certain figure, with liberty for each nation to build whatever types of ships it wished to build up to the limit set. Great Britain, on the other hand, contended for limitation by categories, or, in other words, wished not only a total limita- tion, but restriction on the number of ships of each type that might be constructed. In the recent session at Geneva Mr. Gibson has favored a sort of compromise, which was, I believe, at one time suggested by the French also. He would provide for limita- tion by categories, but would permit the transfer of a certain number of vessels from one category to another. This obviously represents a compromise between the two extreme positions, and it may provide a way out of the difficulty.

Mr. Gibson has also announced that this country has worked out a measuring rod by which the value of different types of ships, and ships of different age, might be worked out when it comes to the practical business of limitation. In other words, he has a detailed formula for the existing situation.

The principal difficulty about reductions in naval armaments will lie, no doubt, in the attitude of the naval experts. If these gentlemen have their way, if they are allowed to direct events, they will, most of them, be looking for formulas that are of advantage to the naval interests of the power they represent. They will be seeking, not a genuine accord, but a good national bargain. And in so doing, they will be very likely to make any kind of understanding impossible. �[Page 225]THE REDUCTION OF ARMAMENTS 225

Behind any reduction of naval armaments there must be the force of public opinion. The situation is by no means hopeless. There is much sentiment for such reduction in the United Stz tes. There is a distinct drift toward understanding in Great Britain. France, placated by concessions on land armaments, may show a conciliatory spirit in dealing with sea forces. The attitude of Japan and Italy is more problematical, but the Japanese are not wholly unfriendly to limitation, and the Italians would be un- likely to stand out against all the other naval powers. The question of security is there, as in the case of land armaments, but it is easier to approach because there are no such serious post-war antagonisms involved as on the Continent of Europe.

World problems must be solved by world opinion. No one nation can solve them alone. But one nation can often block their solution. It is for Americans to see to it that it will not be the United States which stands in the way of a new naval ac- cord. The friends of international peace in this country must rally all the public opinion they can behind the move of the Hoover administration toward reduction of naval armaments.

i �[Page 226]QYRIZODR YAN DRY ODEO

ee en

CAN RACE RELATIONSHIPS BE TAUGHT IN THE CLASSROOM?

by

VERDINE Peck Hutu Central High School, Cleveland, Ohio

LEVELAND attempts in its social studies course to teach something about those social problems which cause friction among different classes of people. This work is undertaken with the hope of cultivating better feelings

about these conditions so that helpful cooperation may take the place of competition. Each semester grade has one unit given to the study of a social problem. These major units of the course are placed as follows:—7B grade, sectionalism; 7A grade, religious tolerance; 8B, race relations; 8A, capital and labor; 9B, the conflict between town and country; 9A, nationalism vs. internationalism or the problem of world peace. The teaching of each of these units requires from one-fourth to one-third of a semester's work.

Recognition of the social need motivated the setting up of these units. Class hatreds are the immediate experience of many children. The classroom, therefore, is a more socially significant situation than is often realized. Junior high school pupils not only have interests in social problems but they also have opinions about them. Adolescent boys and girls are peculiarly sensitive to stimuli which prodye feelings on religion and race. Their reactions to these stimuli may become either the bitter hatred or the sane tolerance of their manhood and womanhood. In this plastic and emotional period of life individuals are equally sus- ceptible to right and wrong influences. They are more free from group drives and interests than at any other time and are more likely to develop those habits of thought which will later lead them to independent thinking and acting.

226 �[Page 227]CAN RACE RELATIONSHIPS BE TAUGHT IN THE CLASSROOM? 227

To explore pupil interests in the subject matter to be taught is the first step in the teaching of any unit of the course. By this means the pupils naturally desire to know more about the subject. The teaching of the social problems is most effective when this approach uncovers rather than avoids hatreds and prejudices. The subject matter then becomes vital to the pupils. The subject matter for these units has been selected carefully. It aims to answer the questions the pupils raise, to furnish the facts for forming just opinions and tolerant attitudes, and to incite a desire to become more intelligent about these subjects before forming opinions or engaging in argument.

The unit on race relationships is the result of the work developed in four eighth grade classes by three teachers in two schools. From thirty to fifty per cent of the pupils in each class were Negro. The approach revealed the presence of racial prejudice in two Classes. In the other classes intolerance was not apparent in the group, but the pupils were conscious of race prejudice in their neighborhood. The approach used in each class led to a desire to study the various races of the world. The interests of the pupils centered about the problem, how may the different races learn to respect and tolerate one another.

The objective of this unit is to help pupils acquire an attitude of tolerance and apply intelligence rather than prejudice to the consideration of race problems. To realize this objective the subject matter presented to the classes served two purposes. Excerpts from the writings of sociologists and biologists supplied reliable information which helped the pupils form reasonable opinions. Music and poetry developed desirable emotions.

The excerpts were compiled under the following titles: the inherent traits and qualities of the different races; some explana- tions for the supremacy of the white race; the problem of stand- ards of living; the attitudes necessary for the consideration of race problems; the effect of living well together on the benefits of civilization to all; the worth to cach race of maintaining its racial ideals; the importance of team work in maintaining justice and the proper standards of living; the cooperation of the black �[Page 228]228 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

and the white races in the South for the better understanding of each other; the effect of transportation on race relations.

These quotations provoked an animated discussion which extended over several class periods. The pupils so constantly applied this information to the contentions which arose in class that prejudices gave way to broader views and opinions became more just.

Much time was given to the contributions which the differ- ent races have made to civilization. Both the Negro and the white pupils gave excellent reports on the leaders in Negro life in America. Some pupils recited the poems of Negro poets, while others gave quotations from Negro prose writers. All reports were given and received with a fine spirit of appreciation. Several pupils who prepared talks on the music of the races of the world brought records to illustrate their talks. Their records were played with others selected from a list prepared by the music department for the social studies course. The Negro spirituals gave the white children a new insight into the souls of the black people and the Negro children a greater appreciation of their own race.

Because the race problem in Cleveland concerns the Negro and the white races, the greater part of the study was given to relations between these races. However, a few reports acquainted the pupils with other races and race problems, particularly, the Oriental problem in the Pacific coast states.

As the work proceeded, tolerant attitudes were revealed by such expressions as these:

‘‘We know more about different races and all have some good and some bad.”

‘I have had prejudice against the white people in the South. This study has helped me. We have all nationalities in our classes. In social science we talk about races. When we grow up, we will know.”

‘It (this study) has helped me to see that I can go out in the world without prejudice and help some people overcome theirs."’ �[Page 229]

BOOKS RECEIVED

The Nature of the Physical World, by A. S. Eddington, Macmillan.

Anthropology and Modern Life, by Franz Boas, W. W. Norton and Company.

Recent Gains in American Civilization, ed. by Kirby Page, Harcourt, Brace and Co.

The Chinese System of Public Education, by P. W. Kuo, Teachers College, Columbia University.

War as an Instrument of National Policy, by James T. Shotwell, Harcourt, Brace and Co. ,

The Preservation of Peace, ed. by Parker Thomas Moon, Columbia University.

Historical Selections, by Hutton Webster, D. C. Heath and Co.

Britain and Germany, ed. by Rolf Gardiner and Heinz Rocholl, Williams and Norgate, Ltd.

Coming of Age in Samoa, by Margaret Mead, Wm. Morrow and Company.

What Philosophy Is, by Harold F. Larrabee, Macy Masius.

The New Explorations, by Benton Mackaye, Harcourt, Brace and Company.

Art and Civilization, ed. by F. S. Marvin and A. F. Clutton-Brock, Oxford University Press.

An Outline of Aesthetics, ed. by Philip N. Youtz, Norton. Scientific Method in Aesthetics, Munro. The World, the Arts and the Artist, Edman. With Eyes of the Past, Ladd. The Mirror of the Passing World, Allen. The Judgment of Literature, Wells.

Christianity, the Way, by Joseph B. Matthews, Doubleday Doran.

The Washington Conference and After, by Yamato Ichihashi, Stanford

University Press. 229 �[Page 230]230 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

The Motives of Proteus, by José E. Rodo, Brentano's.

Religion, by Edward Scribner Ames, Henry Holt and Company.

International Economics, by John Donaldson, Longmans, Green and Company.

The Creative Intelligence and Modern Life, University of Colorado Press.

Our Changing Civilization, by John Herman Randall, Jr., Stokes.

Our Minds and Our Motives, by Paul D. Hugon, G. P. Putnam's Sons.

Tongues of Fire, compiled by Grace H. Turnbull, Macmillan.

Moral Adventure, by Burnett Hillman Streeter, Macmillan.

Our Economic Morality, by Harry F. Ward, Macmillan.

Frankness in Religion, by Robert J. Hutcheon, Macmillan.

A History of Christian Missions in China, by K. S. Latourette, Mac- millan.

Dependent America, by Wm. C. Redfield, Houghton, Mifflin Com- pany.

Developing Personality in Boys, by W. Ryland Boorman, Macmillan.

American Foreign Relations, 1928, pub. for Council on Foreign Re- lations, New York, Yale University Press.

An Anthology of Recent Philosophy, by Daniel Sommer Robinson, Crowell.

Experience and Nature, by John Dewey, W. W. Norton and Com- pany.

The Doctrine of Necessity in International Law, by Burleigh Cushing Rodick, Columbia University Press.

Peace Crusaders, compiled by Anna Bassett Griscom, Lippincott.

Introduction to Agricultural Economics, by Fred R. Yoder, Crowell.

The Religion of Love, by H. I. H. Alexander, Century Co.

The Politics of Peace, by Charles E. Martin, Stanford University Press.

Society and its Problems, by Grove Samuel Dow, Crowell.

Altai-Himalaya, by Nicholas Roerich, Stokes.

The Motives of Men, by George A. Coe, Scribner's.

The Modern Temper, by Joseph Wood Krutch, Harcourt, Brace and Company. �[Page 231]BOOKS RECEIVED 231

Christian and Jew, ed. by Isaac Lauderman, Horace Liveright.

International Arbitration from Athens to Locarno, by Jackson H. Ralston, Stanford University Press.

America Challenged, by Lewis F. Carr, Macmillan.

Youth Looks at World Peace, by Joseph B. Matthews, American Committee, World Youth Peace Congress.

The Public International Conference, by Norman L. Hill, Stanford University Press.

The Mighty Medicine, by Franklin Henry Giddings, Macmillan.

A Preface to Morals, by Walter Lippmann, Macmillan.

The New World, by Isaiah Bowman, World Book Company.

The Bases of Modern Science, by J. W. N. Sullivan, Doubleday Doran.

Krisis der Kultur, by Jacob Christonus, Carl Reissner.

A Social Interpretation of Education, by Joseph K. Hart, Henry Holt and Co.

Miéd-Channel, by Ludwig Lewisohn, Harper's.

Religion and the Modern World, by J. H. Randall and J. H. Randall, Jr., Stokes.

The Development of China, by Kenneth Scott Latourette, Houghton, Mifflin Co.

Until Philosophers are Kings, by Roger Chance, Oxford University Press. �[Page 232](QYX KODE OANDNY OIRO

WORLD UNITY CONFERENCES

Under the Auspices of World Unity Foundation

The World Unity Conferences are a medium by which responsible leaders of opinion can convey their message to the public without restriction of race, class, nationality or creed. Upholding the ideals of brotherhood found in all religious and ethical teachings, the Conferences strive to quicken the spiritual resources of the community by bringing upon one platform gifted speakers representing the universal outlook and capable of interpreting the meanings of the new age. World Unity Con- ferences are held at frequent intervals in cities of che United States and Canada, and this educational activity will be extended as soon as possible to Europe. A distinctive feature of the Conferences consists in the local World Unity Councils, composed of leading liberals, established in the various cities to further the world unity ideal. This department will publish the programs and report the activities of the World Unity Conferences and Councils.

Meetings Held at Hartford, Connecticut, and at Providence, Rhode Island

On Tuesday, April 30, and Wednes- day, May 1, public World Unity Con- ferences were held at Central Church House, Hartford. Dr. Rockwell Har- mon Potter, Dean of Hartford Sem- inary Foundation, presided at the opening session. An address on ‘“The New Internationalism'’ was delivered by Mr. Alfred W. Martin, of the Soci- ety for Ethical Culture, New York, followed by ‘*‘The Birth of a World and Its Implications for the Twenti- eth Century,”’ an address by Dr. John Herman Randall, Director of World Unity Foundation. The chairman at the second meeting was Dr. W. Doug- las MacKenzie, President of Hartford Seminary Foundation. This program included an address, *‘Is It Daybreak Everywhere?”’ by Rabbi Abraham J. Feldman of Temple Beth Israel, and ‘*Strengthening the Forces for World Friendship,’’ by Dr. James Gordon Gilkie of Springfield, Mass.

232

The ideals and principles of World Unity were presented by Dr. Randall to the following meetings at Hart- ford, supplementing the two World Unity Conferences: Asylum Avenue Baptist Church, First Congregational Church of Wethersfield, Inter-racial Amity Meeting, East Hartford Con- gtegational Church, the staff of the Public Library, Colored Baptist Church, Trinity College, Rotary Club, Y. M. C. A., Temple Beth Is- rael, Advertising Club, New Thought Society, Windsor High School, Uni- versalist Church, Good Will Club, Loomis Institute, Wise Men's Club, and Civitan Club.

The World Unity Conferences in Providence, Rhode Island, were held at Manning Auditorium of Brown University on May 14 and 15. At the opening session, an address on ‘‘The �[Page 233]WORLD UNITY CONFERENCES 233

New Internationalism’’ was made by Mr. Alfred W. Martin, followed by ‘The Birth of a World and Its Impli- cations for the Twentieth Century,’ by Dr. Randall. Rev. Arthur W. Cleaves of the First Baptist Church, presided. The program of the second session included an address by Dr. W. H. P. Faunce, President of Brown University, on ‘‘Who Is My Neigh- bor?’’ and ‘Strengthening the Forces for World Friendship,’ by Dr. James Gordon Gilkie. Dr. John Herman Randall, Director of World Unity Foundation, served as chairman and presented the aims of the Conferences.

• * *

Hartford World Unity Council

The following Council will carry on the activities of the World Unity Foundation at Hartford, Connecticut.

Chairman, Rabbi Abraham J. Feld- man of Temple Beth Israel; Dr. W. Douglas MacKenzie, President of Hartford Seminary Foundation; Dr. A. B. Meredith, State Board of Edu- cation; Miss Mary Bulkley, President of Connecticut League of Women Voters; Dr. Rockwell Harmon Pot- ter, Dean of Hartford Seminary Foun- dation; Mr. C. C. Hemenway, Editor of The Times; Rev. Willis H. Butler, Asylum Hill Congregational Church; Miss Ella E. Muir, Assistant Treas-

urer of Connecticut Federation of Churches; Mr. Fred D. Wish, Super- intendent of Public Schools; Dr. Ed- ward L. Troxell, Trinity College; Mrs. Milton Simon, Chairman of Connecticut Council on International Relations; Dr. John C. Jackson of Union Baptiste Church; Rev. Richard H. McLaughlin of the Universalist Church; and Mrs. R. C. Nason of Connecticut Council on International Relations.

• * *

Through the active interest and in- fluence of friends of World Unity, the movement is soon to be extended to the Pacific Coast. On June 30, a World Unity dinner will be held at St. Francis Hotel, San Francisco, un- der the auspices of a committee in- cluding Rabbi Rudolph I. Coffee, of Temple Sinai, Oakland, chairman; Mrs. C. M. Cooper, San Francisco, vice-chairman; and Mr. Lero C. Ioas, 65 Market Street, San Francisco, sec- retary. Readers of World Unity Maga- gine resident in California who wish to participate in this interesting ex- pression of the movement may make reservations through Mr. Ioas.

This meeting falls during the week of meetings of the National Confer- ence of Social Work in San Francisco, June 26-July 3.

Details of the program will be pub- lished in a later issue.

N) �[Page 234]MAN ONION ON ODER

NOTES AND ANNOUNCEMENTS

This is the season when the daily mail brings announcements of Con- ferences on subjects of general public interest and importance, especially those intended for an international audience. The opportunity for educa- tion in the truest sense of the word was never so abundantly offered and enthusiastically shared as in these post-war days, when knowledge of people is more highly valued than knowledge of things.

Those who have a moderate amount of free time and money dur- ing the summer months are given a bewildering choice of vacations com- bining physical recreation with stim- ulating association with like-minded people from many lands. The web of world unity is being woven by these voluntary activities far more rapidly perhaps than by the official relations of statesmen and government bodies. One may choose today not only one’s vacation p/ace but one’s vacation state of mind. The modern world will yet, by experiment, recover the Greek harmony of mind, soul and body.

Among the Conferences likely to prove of interest to World Unity read- ers on the Pacific Coast, is that main- tained by the Sufi School of Cali- fornia, at Fairfax, Marin County, from June 9 to August 4. Its program consists of lectures on the history,

234

literature and mysticism of the major religions. es * &

The present issue of World Unity Magazine, bringing together Dr. Schmidt's ‘‘Science and Religion’ and Dr. Burtt’s ‘‘Tentativeness of Scientific Thinking,’’ in contrast with Mr. Norman Angell’s “‘How Shall the Plain Man Understand In- ternational Relations?’’ serves to em- phasize the rapid assimilation of modern science into the general val- ues of human life. Nothing could be more encouraging to the student of world issues than this transfer of in- terest from science, the portentous miracle, to science, the molder of a new type of intelligence, an outlook and a character more amenable to change and better adapted to social cooperation. We only have the thing we afe.

The essence of this restoration of science to life has been finely ex- pressed by Dr. Burtt in these words: ‘‘Perhaps the greatest achievement of character which the world needs is the combination of practical decisive- ness in moments requiring it, with

unreserved intellectual progressive-

ness. This is the new type of charac- ter revealed in and supported by the tentative procedure of modern science." �[Page 235]Current Books on World Unity

OUR CHANGING CIVILIZATION by John Herman Randall, Jr., Ph.D.

“It is the most penetrating exposition of the present situation of the Western World that I know of. Anyone who wants an understanding of how and why our present civilization is as it is, should read this book.”—John Dewey. $3.00

STOKES, Publishers

THE NEW WORLD

by IsAtaH BowMAN

A clear interpretation of the vital national and _inter- national problems of our time. An essential guide for under- standing current world affairs. $4.80 postpaid.

World Book Company, Yonkers, N.Y.

THE FOUNDING of WESTERN CIVILIZATION

by George C. Sellery and A. C. Krey “Imaginative appeal . . . revealing

illustrations ... an event in any reader’s life."—Minneapolis Journal. $5.00

HARPER @& BROTHERS

RELIGION IN AN AGE OF SCIENCE

By Epwin A. Burtt (‘Religion and the Modern Age”

Edited by John Herman Randall.) The modern age is the age of sci- ence. What does this mean for life in geneval and for religion in para 1.50

Series,

STOKES, Publishers

RELIGION AND THE MODERN WORLD By JoHN Herman RANDALL and JoHN HERMAN RANDALL, Jr.

(‘Religion and the Modern Age” Series, Edited by John Herman Randall.)

A book dealing constructively with present-day religious problems in the light of modern conditions. “Magnificent !"—Dr. Charles Francis Potter. $1.50

STOKES, Publishers

THE SCANDAL OF CHRISTIANITY

by Peter AINns_iz

This book is a clarion call for a united Christian brotherhood of man.

Willett, Clark & Colby $2.00

Order These Books from WORLD UNITY, 4 East rath St., New York or through your Loca, BooxsTore:

Please send me the books checked below:

(CO Our Changing Civilization

oO bb SE eeee ae of Western Civilisa- “en

0 Religion and the Modern World... 1.50

I enclose $

0 The New World

(C0 Religion In an Age of Science.... O America and Europe

> The Scandal of Christianity

WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE (0 Vol. 1—Oct., 1927-March, 1928... .$4.25 00 Vol. 2—April-September, 1928 .... 4.25 D Vol. $—Oct., 1928-March, 1929.... 4.25 CO World Unity Reading List

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