The Dominion. WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 1910. NATIONAL SELF-CRITICISM.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 933, 28 September 1910, Page 4

The Dominion. WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 1910. NATIONAL SELF-CRITICISM.

To those who keep up their read ing of the British press a striking thing about the speeches of the leading public men in England is the , tone of their , references to Great Britain. The very last thing that can be charged against New Zealanders is that thej are humble in their words and thoughts about their country. Recessionals have no popularity here. In Britain, however, the very reverse is the case, and no very long time elapses without some British statesman or publicist referring, with' an odd commixture of pride and sadness and glee and disapproval, to the national habit of. self-deprecia-tion. The London Spectator of August. 13, which arrived here on Dominion Day, happens to contain a general discussion of .this very English trait. , A Canadian correspondent of the great English weekly, it appears, had written' in very strong orins to protest against the injury that was done to the Empire'.by:'the" Englishman's habit of under-rating himself in public. This was a new aspect of the • question to the Spectator— that ."our national habit of self-depreciation,"r-which is ."a kind of intellectual, luxury," is. regarded- in. the-oversea States . "not as a proof of watchfulness, but:as a proof of decadence, and with results .Jiat aro;not only bewildering but positively'poisonous." , It deems; that with the .assistance of the American newspapers and.press agencies, the "native-boras" in Canada are constantly being'assured that this or that important mm or newspaper" in Britain has said that Great Britainis going to, the dogs. They are constantly hearing "shrieks that' English trade has been.captured, by Germany; howls that a German war.balloon, is flying: o Ver .London by night; facts one day showing that; at least forty per cent of tho English nation is getting ready to-go to tho.work-. ' iiouse; - facts th'e ' next. day. showing that the other sixty, per- cent, should already be in air asylum for the-in-sane"; and the result is that the "native-born" is losing: faith in Britain , as "an old doddering nation shaken by hysteria.'.' How,'asks the Spectator's vigorous correspondent, a'boy remain deeply attached to I ,3 father, "if he' is taught from his ycuth to believe: that his father has gone to. tho dogs, was a waster, and a man who" lived in constant" fear I of his neighbours"? . ' , .If this;.'is true of Canada, it is: not true of New Zealand. - The, late .Me. Seiidon certainly used -to refer, with deep.concern, to tho bad case of a country from w.hich six hundred million golden: sovereigns fled away .each year.,' and: he never wearied of. declaring _ that New Zealand ' must consider ifcself the appointed guide of the future course, the drum-major,- as it were, of the Imperial band. . Mr. Seddon's devoted attachment to the Mother Country was perhaps the finest thing about hinijDut.he did assist to set flowing a. big stream of tendency amongst thoughtless New-,. Zealandei'B .to think of. the United Kingdom, as being "played out." That stream is still flowing, and we have on many - occasions' entered our protest against the stupidity and ignorance that feeds' it. Our leading public men, :to be sure, are -.'usually careful, in their praises of- Now Zealand, to abstain from heightening that'praise by suggesting that Great Britain is decaying. : But some New Zealand newspapers, as well as an extreme Radical section, have been very liable, since the introduction of'the 1909 Budget, to express : a blatant contempt for the British polity that' their hero, Mr..: Lloyd-George, is to transform into something rich and new by of a series of Limehouse speeches.: -The average -New Zealander is very deeply attached'to 'the Mother Country, but it would be idle to. deny that there is a ;good deal of ignorant readiness to mix the affection with baser ingredients. Yet nothing could be. further from the truth than any suggestion that the British habit: of self-depreciation damages Britain in the eyes of New Zealariders. The injury due to that habit is.in the heightening of -the self-complacency of : ,this country. Let any New 'Zealander compare his mental attitude towards America with his attitude towards Britain. He loves.Britain, but often.enough he... will .find he has a greater admiration of a kind for America. Inclined to boasting ourselveswe are rather proud to do homage to a big country whose normal tone is the tone of the loudest of our- own optimists. The Specto.tor. has an that bears upon this fact. Jones,: ! a prosperous British business man, was brought up at his public school and his university never to boast about his money oriiis abilities. And so he likes to represent himself-as poor; he fancies himself in the hunting field,- hut he would nover say he was a-good: man; across country—ho would.' only say that he just potters about; a wellread man, lie proclaims that he knows really nothing much. In fact, the pride that apes humility is his pet vice. Ultimately, he finds that his growing: children really begin to suspect that he is all ;be says lie is. So far as foreign countries are concerned, the British habit of selfdepreciation is of no moment. Foreign nations are better instructed thaii arc the young know well what value to put upon British self-criticism. The conclu-' sion of tho Spectator is that there may be something-in. its correspondent's suggestion that the habit should be abandoned. At the same time our contemporary shrinks from the alternative. In an unusually, spirited paragraph, it concludes its article by carrying the war into the camp of' the colonial critics. This paragraph reflects tho British attitude so well, ■ and contains-such wholesomo truths

for colonial consideration, that we cannot hotter spend our space than by reproducing it at length; Wo feel constrained to sny a word or two to our fellow citizens in r tho colonies.: Unquestionably the fault is not altogether, on our side. They ought, and wo say it frankly and plainly, to bo not a little ashamed oi' themselves for being so simple-minded as to take our selfdepreciation in the literal way they do. Surely expcrieiico of life must have taught them that it is not tho arrogant boaster or the self-complacent man who does the finest tilings in the world. Have they never met the fool who declared that nobody could beat hiin at this or that game, mid'.was then ignominiously defeated by tho quiet self-depreciatory, man who said that of course ho was not any good and had forgotten the .little he did know of the game, but still he did not mind having a try? No nation ought to be so "green" as not to realise that not only is self-commendation no praise, but that self-depreciation is very likely to bo unjustified. Besides, when all is said and done, thore is something in the old Greek view that Nemesis r/ursues those who boast with insolent arrogance of their successes. The man whose head is full of his own glories and of all the wonderful things he has done, is doing, and is going to do ..is very apt to come-a cropper. No doubt as a nation we ought to be ashamed of having so greatly overdone the' pride that apes humility, and thereby acquired the habit of selfdepreciation. But the daughter-nations ought also, as we have said, to .be ashamed of being so foolish as to fall into the" error of thinking. that men and nations aro not strong unless they go about strutting and swearing and giving themselves certificates of character.