PUBLIC OPINION.

Hokitika Guardian, 9 April 1927, Page 4

PUBLIC OPINION.

NATIONAL PRESTIGE. " There is that intangible but very powerful oleiiinet ol national prestige and nationalist vanity, which, like personal snobbery, is associated with wealth and brute ioree. This national vulgarity also, like fear and like seliish - ii(‘ss, is connected with the old anarchy anil will die with it. The reign •>! law will destroy the glamour that was wont to surround the bully and the brave. Courtesy and co-operation will be the new patriotic virtues. the reiptiroit change-over in ideas is. ol course, prodigious. Hut it has begun with the establishment. of- the League ol Nations and its Civil Servi;e. and it should gain momentum with increasing rapidity. There are great and thrilling risks to he run in laying down arms and making the great adventure: hut they are risks worth running for an end worth attaining.”—ll. X. Swanwiek, In ■■ Foreign Affairs.” LIFE’S CONSOLATIONS. ■■The majority' reconcile themselves quite comfortably- to the inevitable. They find that life, passed in the eoiiinioii way, has its consolations. II it is not a charming fairy tale it may tie a ipiite interesting chronicle. Love, affection. friendship, duty, work well done, intellectual activity, amusement, sport, social intercourse, are quite good enough to (ill the days and occupy the thoughts. There is no occasion, and usually no time, to lament, the uiiiuliilled aspirations. It would he unfortunate never to have had them; but they are only tragic if they last too long nnd leave an inishiked and tormenting thirst for the unattainable, which does sometimes happen. More oI ten they

missed into that useful ‘adaptation to tlie environment’ which is the condition of tolerable existence for tile Individual as well as the species.”—Sidney Low in the ‘‘Weekly Dispatch.

LESS GOVERNMENT IN RESINESS.”

■■ 1 1 is most vital that work should he found for our people. It is foolish to expect prosperity with a country of Russia’s size out. of action ; and it is maddening to think that, if we do nor. get in others w ill. You can never coovert a Lolshevik with talk. For every word he will give you a hundred. W’liat. can i oil vert. Moscow Only a good dinner. Have we forgotten that tn England nearly a century ago poverty begat di-rnption ; and what cured disruption? All unprecedented season uf prosperity. Ilus-ia i- exhausted want- Mverytliing that we can niantifaei.tirc. MV are only tin* pale shadow it what we once wire. We want markets. and I say. for one. Hen the State small, whole r lv he Conservative, labour. Liberal, who can hud a way out of the Ru.--i.ui problem 1- this nciml ry’s he- l friend How ever we may talk, the p-diems of the pa-t have led es into a mora-s. and lie day hamile wlii'ii ih" vci.v justifiable cry ol ‘No politics in industry’ -hail be npolitd to the presell! ease.”- -Rev A. 11. Headley, in the “Sunderland Echo.’' A WORLD UF MAKE- RELIEVE. "No one lias taught or lived with little children without realising how strong is their power ol make-believe. Kail-;,- tides have no difficulties for I hem. for they are themselves fairies. To freak the iridescent bubble of their fancy by the intrusion of dull, disturbing fact is a sorry sport- for adults. Rut it education is for life a luller. richer and happier life, let us allow them to embrace the opportunities the drama gives for fuller realisation of life. Let them live in imagination, a whole cycle of lives. The transition into a laud of make-believe, the creation of a world peopled with noble presences. each of which exerts its unseen and unconscious influence on the life and character of the children inspires them to write the noble action. —C. W'. lkiiley, headmaster of the Holt School Liverpool.

ENSHRINING TRUTH IN HEARTY. “There are two kinds of poetry, the poetry of retreat and the poetry of interpretation. They correspond to the two conditions between which the

spirit of man moves—satisfaction and desire, rest and advance, re luge and adventure. A, poet, is otten satisfied to bo the minister of peace, and by his song to lure ifiolionrl. of man awa.v front the strife anfl confusion, of the world into some quiet resting-place where the discords were absorbed in the harmony which for the time his music inspires. This is a great and worthy ministry, for life within and without is full of broken promises and desires denied. Hut the pence of a conjured mood pusses soon, and there is no shelter in. which man may rest unless il shelters the mind and

prompts some answer to its questioning. And this the greatest poetry attempts, and, beyond all the other arts, achieves. The greatest poetry is of interpretation. It reads the riddle and utters the noblest truth in noblest speech. It enshrines truth in beauty.—Rev. G. E. Darlaston. iu the “Congregational Quarterly.’'

; “I‘rohahly the most siriking feature in the domestic history of this country within the past fifty years has been the vast amelioration in the lot of what it is popular to call the ‘working classes.’ Measured iu mere terms of pounds, shillings, and pence, no account being taken of improved conditions of living and of labour, the phenomenon is remarkable enough, hut when reckoning is made of less obvious factors the social change is little short of revolutionary. It will readily he seen, therefore, that the amelioration of the lot of llto present-day worker is not confined to hard cash and improved conditions of labour. He lias at his disposal a vast and expensive system of social services, to the upkeep of which he contributes only a fraction. If we take the population of Scotland ns roughly live millions, we find that the average benefit per head amounts to some eight pounds, or over thirty pounds per average family, which in actual practice doubtless amounts to a considerably greater sum. All this represents a supplement to wages which must he taken into account in any just recoknining ol “The Scotsman.”

REVISING THE PRAYER BOOK. “To help our people to worship better. to pray better, to approach God more worthily. This is the core and kernel of our endeavour, and hv this test the work must he judged. We must all cultivate a temper becoming to those in whose keeping for the time being is the honour of the Church, and who desire not only to hand down the precious tradition intact, but to uncover more of its treasures, and to adapt it. under the Spirit’s guidance, to those new circumstances with which in this twentieth century we are confronted. The elder generation is alwavs tempted €o try to forte the new

one into its old well-worn grooves, and inevitably, being human, we are all tempted to suppose that that aspect oi the truth which we see most plainly is the only aspect. Rut this is ail unwise proceeding, and the temptation can he resisted by those who believe in a gospel which is always new, and in a Spirit who is eternally alive, and in a Lord who in His divine majesty is, as the Psalmist says, viral and fresh as the dews of flic morn.”—T he Bishop of Winchester, speaking oil the object of .Prayer Rook revision. A WARNING FROM P.S.A. We ill this country can extract from American experience in State shipping, taken together with that of oilier countries, a warning against any similar incursion by our own Government into the business ol sea transport. which is essentially international. There has been no absence ol initiative and ability in the management of the State shipping oi the l nited States. Australia. Canada, and Franco. No effort has been made to extract Iron - , the undertakings interest on the capital invested, or to provide against the deprecation of Hie ships. But, nevertheless, in every ease heavy losses have been incurred, in spite ol the favours which as a matter of policy, the various Governments have showered on these ventures.’’--The “Daily Telegraph.” UN DOING WITT 10FT. T have read in some hooks,’ I re marked, ‘ that the great philosopher Diogenes used continually to decry the luxury which he saw around him, declaring that fur him three things sufficed as furniture and clothing: the cloak \therewith he covered his nakedness, tin' stall wherewith lie supported his steps, and the cup wherewith ii? quenched his thirst. Now one day, as he was drawing near to a stream to drink, he saw a child bending douTi 1 over it, and raising the water to its lips by means of its hands, which it had ! placed together to form a cup. When 1 Diogenes saw this he threw away flip cup which he carried, and cried out’,

“ Alas! alas! lor years I have been inveighing against, unnecessary luxury, and all the whole 1 carried with me an encumbrance of which this child has taught me the uselessness!” The moral of this is obvious, to wit, that what is really indispensable to us is hut little.’

—E. G. Brown, relating in “A Year Among the I’ersiaiis.” how he replied to their query as to why he had no horse of his own. THE NEW NATIONALISATION. “ The point which needs to he made clear is that the word ‘nationalisation,’ though it is desirable to use it because of its relative familiarity, is by no means adequate to cover all that we mean. The conception af a ' living income ’ for all workers must he brought before the public mind at: least as prominently as the conception of public control of industry; and public control of industry must lie stripped of the narrow and semewhai old-fashioned associations which have gathered round it. We now sco ili:--i Hie various forms of coni ml which have already been attempted in certain branches <>t iiidustrv trustification, centralised control

of certain operations, public corporation: of a monopolistic character—all these have their lessons to teach, and

are daily providing fresh experience which must he studied and utilised by i !u- political ar<-hit<>ct.” —G. Roden Rtr.'mi, in Ihe " Labour Magazine.” WHEN EAST .MEETS WEST’. “There is the question of questions—the natives. Seven to one they are. and they are a problem, and could he a menace. It is no good disguising that, on the whole, the opinion of the Dutch and the South African born is ill favour of ‘/keeping i he- native in his plaeo”. "His plan-'' means farm labourer.-: at 1-Ts. month (plus food and some aoennniHidation). or town lalnuireis at ISs. a week. But the native is touched by the class consciousness ol coloured races all over Ihe world todnv and wants more. He wants more education, heller housing, more elaborate focal better wagers; that is our problem jhi South Africa. AI y own opinion is that you can draw no ultimate. line in colour, at least in 1 lie commercial and indnistrial world. It the native is eapiable ol advance he will advance. Nothing nrtilieial will .stop him—only the face of white men doing bettor work than he can. "I’roat the native justly ; give him fair opportunity. but boat him by superior capacity and achievement”—- that is my humble advice to white South Africa”.- Dr Walter Carey. Bishop of Bloemlonteiu in the London “Evening News.”

tih: drains of England. “The brains of England are not confined to: what are called the upper classes. If England is to ivnmin a great (Oiiuti'v she will have to make the use of every particle ol brain that she can find." * Dean Ely. THE BASIS OB BUSINESS. “Mutual benefit must he (or be expected) in every transaction or on business would he done. But it should he consciously known and acknowledged and aeled upon and taught, li means that sheer greed and grab grind is not good business, and that one should have due consideration of other parlies’ interest as well as one’s own Then there will he good-will instead of ill-will. Business connot he done oil purely altruistic principles; neither do 1 think that the principle of ‘service’ appeals very generally; it is too ideal and one-sided; hut ‘mutual benefit’ is practical two-sided business, and will appeal to all if we only open our eyes to it. Our best business men are already adopting this principle, though perhaps, not with full consciousness, and finding that it works admirably all round.” H. N. Goodman in the “Birmingham Post.”