OBITER DICTA.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 18900, 15 January 1927, Page 14

OBITER DICTA.

(By K.) ] Whenever I am tempted to think! that this is a very defective world or a very unpleasant age, the philosophers always come along to show that it might be worse. Actually of course, it could not be worse, and could not be better. For the world changes not; every age is like every other age. Our age differs from those that went before, and those that are to come, only in this: that it speculates concerning the future. And the philosophers differ. Dean Inge thinks that our descendants will have no teeth or eyes or ears or anything. Mr Ted Howard thinks that they will all wear red ties and sing happily at work in a world in which there will be no money and no inequalities. Mr W. J. 'Williams believes that the trend is towards cocoa-parties. But Mr H. G. Wells, if one may believe a cable message printed during the week, has calculated that man will not work until he is an adult, will marry late, have a small successful family, and go on for twenty years before he begins to decay. There will be only active, hopeful children, and though many people will be full of years none will be aged. The philosophers, as I say, differ. But the realists know that nothing will alter much. Man will remain a beast of prey. So, while the philosophers are differing, the War Offices are quietly going ahead. They are preparing a new world in which huge aeroplanes and giant bombers will crowd the skies carrying searchlights of 100,000,000,000,000,000 candle power, throwing beams 400,000,000 miles. In order to avoid these glares the bombers will be forced to ascend to such heights that the pilots will wear electrically-heated suits and will be enclosed in air-tight compartments containing 100,000,000 tons of oxygen. Night bombers will be able to swoop on their prey at a speed of 300,000,000 miles an hour. But the prey, fortunately, will be equipped with instruments so finely tuned and adjusted that aircraft can be detected flying at a height of over 300,000,000 leagues. As the Dunedin " Times " once said of the discovery of the North Pole, this "makes one proud of the human race." It is most unfortunate that these delightful decorations of the skyey air are only a pleasure to come, instead o£ being an actual present possession of mankind, for one feels sure that two or three hundred millions of these giant bombers would be of great service in China. In the meantime life goes on. ODTAA, no doubt, but that is life. Mr Q. K.. Chesterton, in one of his papers in "Heretics," long ago pointed out a fact which is very consoling in this age of news:— ! . Under all this vast illusion of the cosmopolitan planet, with its Empires, and its Router's Agency, the real life of man goes on, concerned with this tree or that temple, with this harvest or that drinkina song, totally uncomprehended, totally untouched. . . And it watches, from its splendid parochialism, possibly with a smile of amußement, motor-car civilisation go its triumphant way, outstripping Time and consuming Space, seeing all and seeing nothing, roaring on at last •to the capture of the Solar System, only to find the Sun cockney and the Stars suburban.. This is entirely true. The world is tbinJang far more of such things

as King George's shingle than of the joy* rfj&H our bombed and toothy d£*fs| He who loves a Bhinglej Eton crop admires dismayed by his Majestrt mISS For although the ers greatly prefer their Kaffil l Mussolini, even their esty cannot persuade votes of no-confidenee in yJjfly growing beards. rrfji • ■nSJA i" u *s ] " f St Mussolini's theory are a sign of decadent, WwfSj he is right Who has ever bWm?*' on the beetle-browed and außUgsjNji son who points an arresij(j»fc|p£ you from the fl dverging American magazines as hesSwil make you a forceful increase your wiU-poweyty|«|i§ day may come when grey and full of beard over the Btt&kffflm, tainly will come unless, manship of Italy surprising thing is thrtsSsEig manages his dictato«jg||Sl diet of milk, assisted hyljraSjyf excluding females from tfiKsffifflFi tion offices. Women, fere with efficiency and. eMMf] This is perfectly true, hntwpl believe that after all there jfnjml| for hurry. And women too. Once it needed, Wttfial o'othe a woman, and now, mum from Bradford laments, obb uhl is enough, and not an tmrj]|9 silk-worm at that. I shaityj|j£9 lini's opinion concerning them! alfalfa, and face-mats of the owra but as to women the anti-FaieMg9 proclaimed long ago in this Comm The modern girl i« full a{|^9 AH paint without, all fWmH I like her. >'% mM She shocks the sober A silken, scented foe 4&3wl§| A bare-armed blot o||jfiH| Mr Footer's anxiety in the list of " those prtt£olj||ffl Mayor's party was not gnatefiffl anxiety with which, 'whenevefMHß lish mail comes in, I lwk ttjjs|Bli papers to find New Any mention is times one wishes that onP.'Mjrai were not dwelt upon. f hiffi&ffl of papers there ffelg ferences to tbe only one of the papers tteTMMU perhaps there were bushes in some parts The occasion for all was the news that seeking for some revel in the work of land. It may tarn out pest may be worse than.M|||j|| rabbit, the sparrow, and ftjjjlffi should be warnings to us. Mb are preserved in England,jl||ml prizes at the Grorse-breeding ' They are the foundation ]|9H| poetry, too. England is * ori import anything it certainty that it will inhabitants of TuddenhMfts|lH Tawton. H New Zealand MMM the potato, it would tavjjliMH land with jungle. inhospitable island, M ,B%|p3 advantages. •' '-^|«H