PUBLIC OPINION.

Hokitika Guardian, 22 June 1928, Page 1

PUBLIC OPINION.

COWARDICE IN AVAR

“ My experience of life, and such experience as I had in the war, have shown me that the greatest men are afraid of something, and that the greatest’cowards are brave under some conditions. Cowardice is a matter of the greatest difficulty. Some people fortunately, were not afraid of shells, hut they might have been afraid of something else; and a man might be shot just because the special sort of danger of which he was afraid was one which lie could not resist. Perhaps tho greatest argument which I have against it is this: It is all very well to have a death penalty when you have" a professional Army, and men enlist on terms which they know, hut if we were,

unfortunately, at war again,'our Army would not be a professional Army, but an Army of all the manhood of tbe nation. AA’liat right have we to take a man from the shop or the office and, if' his nerves failed under the strain of war, to shoot him ? Ido not think that we have that right, and I do not think that it would do any good, or make the Army braver.”—Major Hills, M.P., speaking in the House of Commons ou tho Army Bill.

THE OTHER SIDE OF A PROBLEM. “ I am not much impressed with what one hears of the number of days lost through trade disputes and their supposed effect upon industry. They do not constitute the particular plague spot which has caused industry to stop in its path/. The figures show that in 1927 tlie number of days lost through disputes was 1,180,000. Back in 1924 the number was 8,420,000. The number has enormously decreased, for it is not fair to take an abnormal year like 1920 into account. I investigated the matter from the other end and tried to find out how many days were lost bv other causes. I obtained the num-

ber of persons who were insured for national health purposes. In 1920 in sickness benefits alone £11,28-4,300 was paid out. It is fair to assume that the average benefit was 2s Od a day, so that this figure represented a loss of working days of 90,274,400 in a year.” Mr C. T. Cramp, Industrial Secretary to the British National Union of Railwaymen.

THE PEOPLE AND THEIR PARLIAMENT.

“The House of Commons remains, as it has been for several centuries, of supreme importance to the whole British race; and it is quite a mistake to imagine that people have lost interest in its doings. I assert, on the con trary, that actually "more people hear about them, think about them, have ' some comprehension bf their significance, and are interested in them, than at any previous period. What proportion of the population of.the England of the eighteenth century read who' Burke said, or understood Pitt’s pol icy? How large was the middle-clas-electorate that was thrilled by the combats of Gladstone and Disraeli? How many readers (or rather how few !) had the newspapers of my boyhood, which every day reported the Parliamentary speeches at what we now consider an intolerable length? To-day wc are more conscious than our fathers were of the masses wliose daily toil and scanty livelihood, whose financial anxieties arid imperfect education, combine to dull their appreciation of matters that to them are as remote as the stars. But that ‘ dim, inarticulate multitude ’ has always existed, even when legislators ignored it; and my conclusion is that the House of Commons now enters into the thoughts, I not only of a greater number of Britons than ever before, but also actually

touches the minds of a larger proportion of tho contemporary population of Great Britain than at any previous date.”—Mr Sidney AA’ebh. AVHAT IS DEMOCRACY. “At the present moment Democracy is assailed by doubts in many quarters. AA r e are no longer os sure as we once were that the basic’ assumptions of Democratic theory are truo. As a practical test, some of them are listed below. Try them on your own credulity. If you can swallow them hook, line, and sinker, you arc an orthodox Democrat. The theory of Democracy assumes: “That king and slave were born free; V “That philosopher and fool were born equal ; “That a natural reservoir of wisdom and virtue resides in the common man ; “That this wisdom and virtue will express itself through-tlio ballot; “That every man in his right mind wants to vote; “That there exists an intangible but very real something called ‘the will of the people’ ; “That ‘the will of the people’ can be ascertained by counting noses.”— “Tlio Forum.”

THE VANISHING CLERGY

“The shortage of clergy is not peculiar to the Church of England,” says the “Modern Churchman.” “In the Presbyterian Churches in Scotland the decrease in ordinands is even more impressive. In the University of St. Andrew's there are only thirteen theological students, in Aberdeen, University only seventeen, in Glasgow only thirty. The United Free Church possesses only forty-five candidates for eighty vacant posts. It is reported that in the Highlands and Isles nearly half the parishes will very soon lack ministers. If this movement away from the Christian ministry continues. and it is not by any means clear that the lowest point has been reached, tbe_ churches, unless they are to lose their membership, will have to develop their lay ministries, both men and women.”

MATERIALISM IN ACTIQN. “Materialism as a theory is dead; no one really holds it now; hut materialism in practice is very much alive. In fact, I should say that there never was a time in the history of our civilisation when men were so absorbed in the contemplation of the things of sense, or so satisfied therewith, to the -virtual exclusion of all interest in the things of the spirit. They do not .want to look on the other idc of the curtain, or to know anything about what is there.”—-The Rev Dr R. J. Campbell.