INTERNATIONAL AMITY.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1789, 30 June 1913, Page 8

INTERNATIONAL AMITY.

ADDRESS BY MR..7,'. H. F. ALEXANDER; At the meeting of the Wellington City Mon's Brotherhood in the New Theatre yesterday afternoon, an address upon "International Peaco and Brotherhood" was delivered by Mr. "W. H. F. Alexander, of London. Mr. J. Kershaw presided orcr an attendance of about fifty persons. During the afternoon Miss Lessick contributed a recitation, and Mr. M'Lcnnan a solo. In his address Mr. Alexander traced the development of national and international feeling and sentiment, from early times. In the old days, ha said, neighbouring towns customarily cherished contempt and hatred for one another, and even nt the present day the samo spirit cropped up in most unexpected places. In ancient Greece the Athenian hated and 'despised the mlin of Sparta, and' the Spartan, proud of hi 9 bodily perfection, looked down upon tlve cultured and easeloving Athenian. Tho annals of our own Mother Country were full of tales of Border reiving and similar internecine Itrife, in which many lives weTe uselessly sacrificed. In further illustration of Ihe spirit that used to prevail, Mr. Alexander: mentioned such practices as Fhose of the .Cornish wreckers in bygono days. 11l moderi) times, he continued, an enormous chango had come over the world. Neighbouring provinces 'and even countries had learned not only; to respect, but . to.servo Jind love one another. The call of this' uay. and-generation was to carry tho matter one stage further until the ■whoio world should bo filled with the spirit of. mutual love, brotherhood, and ■even sacrifice for one another, until, as tho ■ Scriptures put it: "The earth shall 1>» filled with thd knowledge of tho Lord as; the waters cover the sea." After enumerating virions factors making for peace, Mr. Alexander went on to state that somo people were guilty of promoting national hatred from motives of self-in-tevest. Ha knew of oases in which individuals had offered to bear the cost of telegraphing a.broad from Great Britain newsdtems calculated to work up hatred of Germany, and newspapers had been paid to insert articles of a similar kind, fhis.had happened within the British Empire. It wm a pity,' Mr. Alexander remarked, that the Christian Church was not taking tho lead in tho work of promoting international peaco. Instead of rusolvinc that th« first quarter of the twentieth cenhiry »houkl be marked by doing away with war m the beginning of lait century had be»n marked by the abolition of tlavery, th« Church in too many cue* wa» dumb, and hod »r»n «lli«d itself with th« w»r faction. N«w Zealand and Auitralia during the last five years, laid Mr. Alsmndsr, h*d thrown their weijlit on th» «do of thos> who preached hatred of Gmnanj and inoreow of armaments. Would it not b» grand«r 'and nobler; h» ««ked, to lead th» way in promoting peace? Concluding, Mr. Alexander urged nil young mm who had religious" objections to military training to use the loophole provided by Section 05 of tho Defence Act of Last year, and cleanse their hands of any complicity in this Act.. ■ Having answered a number of questions, Mr. Alexander was accordcd a vote of The speaker at the Brotherhood meeting next Sundav will be Dr. M'Arthur, S.M. Mr. H. H. Ostler will preside,