HOW WILL IT ALL END?

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 8, 4 October 1917, Page 9

HOW WILL IT ALL END?

THE GERMAN CRIME AND THE . PUNISHMENT

G; B; SHAW & HILAIRE BELLOC AIR THEIR VIEWS

.Two.interesting views of the peace issues, one a speech by Mr. Bernard Shaw, and the other a letter by Mr. Jlilaire Belloc, to the editor, appeared recently in the columns of the London "Daily News." .Gaoh'is characteristic; of tho man.' Thus Mr. Shaw on tho. Stockholm Conference:— "Tho ordinary patriotic Englishman is afraid lest some ; .insignificant individual should.slop Iho; war, and he is in a frenzy of terror in Ciiso Air. Itarnray Ma.cDqnn.ld should do it," said. Mr. Bernard ShuW in Iho tou.rso.of an .address at the .Summer School of. the Fabian Society lit! Oodiilming yesterday. "I only wish,":proceeded the.speaker, "Mr. MacDonald had tho power to stop the war; I am certain he would dp it, as would any reasonable "being. I am very doubt' ful about going, to Stockholm.. I don't quite- see what we aro going there for," Mr. Shaw continued. "Howe Socialists are imagining that they have something to do with the war, and that they will have an important part in making' the terms of peace. They will find that they will havo nothing whatever to do with the terms of peace. When tho Kaiser drow the sword he staked every acrft of territory and every penny he has got, and when we went in on the other side we did the same. Whoever loses will havo to pay. "You may take it from me that if the Germans beat us in this war they will skin us alive. They can't help doing it; and their Prime Minister, the Kaiser himself, or the Junkers, or the Socialists may protest against- it, and sajr that they are sowing the seeds of a • future, war. But they'will be just as powerless as Bismarqk and the Socialists were after 1871. If we beat the Guwnane we shall skin them alive, and we cannot help doing it. No amount of agitation by Socialists, pacifists, or'. anyone else will prevent us taking tho fullest measure of victory. If we are not going to do so, what nro wo fa'ghting'.for? When people like Mr. Lloyd George say there must be 'no' next time/ it is nonsense. So long as war exists there jnust be a next time.' Are you going to run away and say because you have had such a tremendous drubbing by the Germans you won't fight? If. the English nation ire going to take that hue, I can tell vou that the Irish nation wilUnot-do so. (Laughter.) All you can honestly sav if you go to Stookholm is that U Germany wins nhe will get the last ounce out of us, and that if we. win we will do the same. Is it worth while yomg to Stockhobn just to say that? / "I want to find out whether ,w can Rpttln anything. It we don't make our utmosteffort to win, and if the Germans do Dot make their utmost eftort, this "var will not settle whether war is a practical thins at all. If it turns out that neither side can win except at a price which is suicidal, then we may come to the point at which the war may end by both sides saying: 'We axe very SE-y; it is a" up with war.' You don t succeed in making an end ot war by disliking it."

■ The Blessed VvVd "Democracy." "The diatino-tion drawn benvoau victory over a ilinuocraue enemy and an autocratic one is one tliat cloee not corrwnouil lo tbe real ixxution m Jiuxope, observes Air. Hilaire 'Jielloc. "Democracy. L take it, is that form. , of govurninen: in'which, power is exercised directly by tiie people. l r ou see it ut work in most of U>o owiss cantons, and the best examplo I have ever seen is the excellent little State of Andorra. An attempt to realise it in great and highly centralised States stab as our own is always imperfect, though by a combination or high looal autonomy and strong centralised institutions a-great measure ol demueraoy can be obtained. It will, 1 think, be universally admitted that democracy is impossible'in States where it is not ' desired, and I think it will also be admitted that very many happy and exalted States in history have.existed under other forms of government, with the lull consent of the governed and as cpmn|etu a sonee of citizenship as the citizens ot any democracy ever enjoyed, it is. alter all only one form of human government, though it b« Uio best. 1 may add that very few of those intimate j; acquainted with this oouutry and her history would 'allude to our own form of government as democratic. On the contrary what strikes foreigners most about Eng and when they come to know her well s rather the aristocratic iorm of hei institutions and the aristocratic instinct ° "But^veii e 'if thj6 were not the case, even if the Alii* were in general democracies, while the Central Empires and their allies wore as anil-democratic as the Spartans or tho Venetians, that Mireiy could not weigh against tho enormousreality of the modern.-German crime! 'The massacre of innocent men and women, and little children wholesale; flip wholeeale pillage, theft, and arson without. u shred of military excuse; the vile humiliations heaped upon defenceless pris,on S5 and civilians; the P™™ murder thai, has been going on at sea for 21 jeare-theae' things are not (ho. acts of soma unpopular autocrat, they are the acts of Uie'German people; thej are enthusiastically applauded by the_ whole of the German people, and ., l . ne . G r er t ?. l people are as much responeiblβ for them as an indh-idual is responsible for his °T nation S 'which has. deliberately done Ihtse-things and gloried in themjdll either succeed in escaping , pumpbnJent oi will sun'er the punishment morally, due to such abominations. IT it escapes punishment, whether as a democracy,.a theocracy an aristocracy, an autocracy, or any.otfl'er kind of "cracy/ .it will mean that Europe cannot restrain. somctMng in its midst which is capable of destroying' Europe. As for those who do i not know what Europe is or feel the common European tradition, it may be sufficient to point out that-the escape ..of the German nation from puiushment and from strict control in the near future wtlMnevitably mean the decline, imporerislimenV, and humiiTation of England. And EnglalWl is sometWag yw the ma*d people who love it dp not connect with anv i' orm o£ government, but. with fin Wea much mor« intimate airtl real, tn'at of a nation, and the race.