PATRIOTISM AND THE WAR.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1752, 28 August 1917, Page 2

PATRIOTISM AND THE WAR.

AT the welcome homo to Private James Robertson, at Orona Domvs. on Saturday, the Rev. Father Corley delivered a stirring patriotic address on patriotism. He said: — “We realise more than ever the grim realities of war when we welcome our returned soldiers. They left us in the bloom of perfect health, and but too often they come back to us with shattered nerves, torn off limbs and undone health. In the light of these events we ought ever to be awake to this verity that now is the. hour of testing, that a crisis is at hand in our lives, for peace has gone and war is hero. Car souls ought to change with this change for hotter or for worse. Middling virtue, which -may exist in lime of peace, cannot survive in time of war. It must cither expand in heroism or sink into baseness. Follow citizens, will yon rise to the occasion? Will yon be worthy of the men and women that: helped (o weld lie. British Empire into a mighty nation? Of those noble souls who gave their sons, husbands, brothers, lovers, weeping, yel smiling through iheir tears,broken hearted yet grand hearted, grieving to lose’ a man,' yet proud of gaining a soldier? It has become a truism lhal the blood of marlyrs must moisten the roots of SAiith before fruit can glow upon the tree of Religion. Is not the same true of the blood of soldiers, of 1 lie 1 rools of a nation and the fruit of a genuine national greatness. The blood at the root gives the glow to the fruit. Suffering and greatness have seldom, if ever, been mutually dissevered either in (lie individual or (he State. In religion martyrdom is not a slaughter, Iml a triumph. In (lie Slate patriotism unto the shedding of blood is not a milamity but an apotheosis. In the days of Augustus, a great Roman

writer said: cl decorum csi pro patria mori." ti is sweet and honourable to die for one's country —will you withhold your sons from glory? The Empire has been in labour that you might sin 1 the light of liberty under a most democratic form of government. Do you owe the Empire nothin" in return? You have been living on (he fat of her land. Shall you have received without being 1 willing' to give? Besides, a dead backer of." his country is a greater comfort to his people than a live slacker. The one is a. glorious memory, the other an inglorious reality. Were this awar of compiest, well might we hesitate. But it is a war of honour and self-defence. The Empire went to war to avenge broken treaties, to save unto the world domoeracy, civilisation and honour. Our foe was ever guided by expediency, and long since has thrown off every pretense of decency. Ilohenzollcrn (Icrmany Ims sunk our peaceful liners, has sunk our hospital ships, ium bombed our defenceless (din's, has destroyed our eeuturies-old monuments of arts, has used our churches as targets, lias terrorised our invaded countries, has deported our populations to increase his failing man-power, has violated our wives and daughters, has mistreated her prisoners, has outdone the dark' deeds of Paganism by enslaving whole nations. Fellow citizens, our hoys cry lo us from the deep for reparation; our wives and daughters, with dishevelled hair and hollow faces, beg us to avenge their lost honour; our enclaved nations ex;eud piteously their hands to you ■Mid beg <>f you lo hasten the blessed day of liberation. You aie unto (hem the radiant star of hope which shines in the inky-black sky of (heir sufferings. You say, ‘War is terrible.’ Verily, but lost honour is worse, and because of this you repudiate a peace with Prussianised (lermauy, which you would' knoAv lo he it sham and a mere truce in tin* world war."