GLASS HATRED.

Hokitika Guardian, 29 August 1924, Page 4

GLASS HATRED.

. A DOCTRINE OF DESPAIR. ( I!v John Rlunt ill the “Daily Alail”) 1 am very glad to read that -Mr J. H. Thomas, Secretary of State for the Colonies, has been trouncing the doctrine id' class hatred, which, of ail tloetrinesevcr preached, is the most Imereti and the most "hopeless. The man who preaches class hatred is, like the man who preaches a hatred of capital, a mere destroyer. He forgets the simplest of all truths, which is that every class has its good and its evil people, and every institution its useful and its bad points. If you destroyed capital you would destroy work, and if you destroyed one class its place would be taken by another. IXFAXTi I.E IDEA.

The crude idea that there are only two (lasses in the world, and that the problems which distract the universe would be abolished if you got rid of one of them, is so infantile and so obviously false that one can only suppose that the people behind it are either insane egotists or complete scoundrels. What ha.' class hatred ever done to help let-ward anything;" It has certainly resulted in the collapse of Hus sin, but I cannoi see that Russia is a shining example of brotherly love tu material prosperity. And what is more, I do not believe that tiny revolutionary thinks ii i-. lint 1 suppj-o there is a type of mind which sees in t!ie very act of deal ruction the promise of a brighter tut me.

Hut there is a more common type of mind which sees in destruction a debt intis act of vengeance against society and. a wonderful opportunity for letting loose the wickedness and license which lurks iii its own heart. FITJI.K 11 ATI! hi I).

There is something profoundly contemptible about the revolutionary outlook. If is so easy u> smash things, it is so easy to talk heroics, it is easy to grab what other people have taken voars to earn.

Class hatred leads nowhere, because, in its verv essence, till hatred is futile and destructive. Moreover, hatred is lhi- most, blinding of all emotions; it does not open wider horizons, it Instens upon cute like a lixed idea that blots out everything else.

People who believe in class haired are people with blinkers on their eyes. They see only one narrow goal, forgetting that the world is not simple but excessively ( omplex. People talk glibly about a revolution, a* though it would be the end of till their troubles; but the truth is that i( would solve nothing at all, hut create, in-lead, a large number of new probems. The revolutionist is always going to gain at the expense of some laxly else, which, while no doubt a very alluring idea, is cpiite typical of hinieiitality. SLAVES OF WOI! DS. Nobody denies that this is not an ideal world and that there is much iii.jtisl.iee, hut you do not make it a l etter or a juster world b.v committing outrages in the name of liberty and fraternity. Such an idea is fraudulent nett sense. Hut unfurl 'ilia toly many people have become the slaves of words and an not which they would regard with abhorrent e when committed by an autocrat they regard with lenience or even approval when committed by a revolutionary. lit their passion for justice they develop a hue capacity lor believing or disbekvviiig whatever suits their book. With numbers ol people class hatred is based upon a rankling sense ol injustice, but to bate a whole class is, in itself. a very great injustice. Such

people would readily commit one evil in order to do away with what they consider another. Hy so doing they would hut increase the total sum of