OPINION AND THE WAR.

Press, Volume LV, Issue 16412, 4 January 1919, Page 10

OPINION AND THE WAR.

/ COMPENSATION IMPOSSIBLE.

(from ocb owk correspondent.) LONDON, October, 29. The Lord Chancellor, to the InterAllied Parliamentary Committee:— a "Wo are now in sight of the end. France has endured unto the end, and we are about to see it. What will that end be? I daresay many of us will remember an anecdote of the lady of whom France is justly proud, Sarah Bernhardt, who, I think in Denmark, wljen the French Minister proposed the toast of France not long after the war of 1871, responded by saying 'La France entiere.' That will soon be accomplished. Alsace and Lorraine will be restored to that country. Co-op-eration is the business of the hour," and the business of the hour is to achieve victory, to crush militarism. Let us achieve victory and all good things will follow. The question between us and Germany is simply this: Germany says that 'might is right,' and we say 'right is right,' whatever else may befall, and that we mean to make that good. Germany says that this is a war of defence. It has been the most wicked and wanton war of aggression that ever was. We have had two aims in this war. One is the punishment of those who have been proved to be guilty of outrages, and the othe? is reparation for the wrongs that have been done. Let it not be said that these things were demanded by us, as the Germans are trying to say. in the friendly arrogance of victor. We demanded these things from the beginning of the war, and.we demanded these things even when -the sky was darkest for us, and when our prospects were at the worst. We shall not cease to demand them now that we have good reason for . thinking that we .are,on the way to victory. As regards reparation, there are some wrongs which cannot be righted. The murdered cannot be restored to their families; outraged honour cannot be made good." FRIENDSHIP IN INTERNATIONAL POLITICS. Lord Robert Cecil, at the British International Association of Journalists: "While it is not so difficult to bear with adversity there are comparatively few people wiio come out of prosperity unscathed. Whatever happens —whatever may be the strain which peace is said to put upon Allies—;l am confident that it will not be-our fault if anything happens to diminish that friendship. Wo are resolved to maintain it at any oost as the central factor in our international policy. The task before us must not be under-rated. ' We have to bring forth order out of chaos, we have to create a new feeling between nations, and we have to do this at a time when it will be absolutely' essential that a number of new national organisations shall come into existence. I believe that these problems, difficult as they are, can be solved if only we bring to bear the right spirit, the League of Nations spirit, the'substitution of co-operation for competition. If we oome to those 'problems with the old ideals, if we come to. them in the spirit of national ambition, and not with the real genuine desire of achieving a settlement which will last and be for the advantage of the whole civilised world, we may be preparing for ourselves a fresh failure and a fresh disaster from whicß it is by no means cer-ti;-i European civilisation can survive." (Cheers.) REPRISAL FOR WRONG. j The Archbishop of Canterbury, at Lambeth Parish Church: "In the world's life there has never been such an example, on such a scale, as is before our eyes to-day of the rivalry between two ideas—the idea of j sheer force and strength on one side and the idea of righteousness and conscience on the other. We have given ourselves deliberately, as a people, to the second of these. We have not always kept our ideal pure and unsullied and simple, for we—like Israel of old —are wayward, and sometimes faithless to our own best ideals,- But 'the two things have been set quite clearly over against one another, and we have, at all events, tried to stand continuously for what we avowed from tho first to be our standard—that is, for what we believe to be honesty, and good faith, and freedom. We have striven persistently for the_ victory and the rule of that spirit. Now it does seem to be coming about that the 'Spirit' of righteousness, and not the principle of sheer unmitigated force is going to gain the mastery. Wrong, grave and terrible wrong, in many of its outcomes irreparable, has been done to our common brotherhood, our Christian civilisation. A real victory of righteousness means, I suppose, that that wrone must be, in such measure as is possible, set right, made good by the wrongdoers. To stop short might easily be to do despite to .the immeasurable and heroic sacrifice of th© best and bravest. There must, as it seems to me, be no tampering with that stern measure of righteousness in action, cost what it* may. The statesmen of the Allies must have behind them, if their work is to Le real and lasting, a people keen for themselves for righteousness, stem in selfdiscipline and self-restraint. Thoughts, theories, passions are in the air. Some of them helpful, some of them, perhaps, very unhelpful." TO LOOT THE WORLD. Mr Winston Churchill, to Sheffield munition workers:— "When the Germans and their aMiea, the four Powers banded together to loot the world, fall upon • evil days,

such as those through which wo, undeterred' and undaunted, have been passing, they begin to fall to pieces because a malevolent self-interest was the only bond that kept them together, whereas in our rough times we have always been able to feel that the triumph, of barbarism could never take place. (Cheers;) We are entering upon an extremely critical and potentially dangerous period in our struggle in tlils great, war. It is unthinkable that we should allow the assiduous treachery of/the Germans to .check us in our advance towards tho victory whicli we have waited so long to achieve. What is the use of supposing ; that the. Germans have repented ?. All that they are sorry for is that they "have not succeeded. (Cheers.) No nation should be denied a reasonable' assurance as to its future. But it is our duty to make , sure that our men's lives have not been sacrificed in vain and that we shall not be confronted with a renewal of the struggle. It is oulv in that sense, and with that object, that we must insist -upon effectual guarantees. (Cheers.) THE SEAMEN'S BOYCOTT. Mr.J. Havelock Wilson, at the Aldwydi Club:— "Our union resolved that it their duty to their members, 15,000 of whom are at the bottom of the sea, to institute the boycott, which , now stands, at seven years. (Loud cheers.) We tliink that if we can get it into the thick German heads that the more damage they do tho worse it will be for them it mav hav« some influence. We will be prepared to stop the boycott when the Germans have 'sectored a form of government that will give ■ confidence to the peoples of the world. Over 250,000 seamen have resolved not to have any intercourse with the Germans so-long as the boycott was on,'' and 300,000 dockers have declared that no German goods in British or German or neutral ships; will ''be discharged in this country while the boycott lasts. And lam convinced thai the coal miners will refuse coal to German shipß either in this countrv or at any coaling station. Germany for the past ten years has been hoarding gold, and for the past four years has been stealing it. I_ would take that gold, and if that is not enough, • I would' take German merchant ships and warships. (Cheers.) How can we negotiate with a burglar? We must go on ■until Germany has Admitted defeat* and when the Germans have done that they piust be given • orders as to what they have to do." (Hear, hear.) NO BREATH FOR THE HUN. Mr Asquith, at the National Liberal Club:—

"The war is not yet. over, but the back of the enemy resistance is..broken. We. may say with confidence now that the purposes for which we confronted and have endured the most ordeal in our history, unless we wilfully or blindly throw them, away, are being and will be attained. (Cheers.) We might have held aloof from the strife, watching, and in some ways, perhaps, profiting, by the agony of the world; escaping, at any rate, the long strain of effort and anxiety and the terrible sacrifice of life which has darkened most of our homes and extinguished the-hopes of not a few. (Hear, hear.) I But is there one among us, even of those from whom the war has exacted its uttermost farthing in bereavement and loss, who would wish that this country had taken a different position? (Cries of "No.") We have boen • taught that it profits a man ! nothing if he gains the whole world I and loses" his own soul. It is not too 1 much to say that Great Britain in saving her soul saved the world also. ■ (Cheers.) Conceive, if yon can, what the world would have been to-day if we had stood aside. Force,, naked and unrestrained, would have become undisputed master of the world. Moral law would have been wiped out of the | dealings between States. The faith of treaties would have passed into a byword. Liberty, which is the lifebreath of nations, the power of free development which comes through personality. and enables each to make its own contribution to the common stock, would have been shackled, and in time altogether stifled. And yet—remember this, there would have been no -rest, for the free spirit of mankind, which cannot be extinguished, would have continued to chafe and struggle.

Those arc the evils which threatened the world, and from which, we may say with confidcnce, wo liavo been delivered. Wo cannot imperil for a moment the position of ascendancy which we have gained or £ivo breathing time for the enemy. (Cheers.) That jp obvious common-sense, lb would bo/a condition precedent to any. , negotfktions even if wo were dealing wish an enemy whose hands were clean and whoso word could be trusted. (Hear, hear.) It is unhappily a fact that neither proposition can be affirmed or the Germans. (Hear, hear.) That, facl forms the real stumbling-block in, tho way either of armistice or negotiations. For four years we have witnessed the systematic violation on their, part of the rules both of honour and humanity." (Hear., hear.)