THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

Manawatu Herald, Volume L, Issue 40016, 29 October 1929, Page 4

THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

“The* English character has changed very little, if'at all,” says M]r. John Galsworthy in a preface to a collected edition of his latest novels. “We are still a people that cannot be rushed, distrustful of ext reined,'saved fey the grace of our defensive humour, 'well-tempered, resentful of interference, improvident and wasteful, -but endowed with a certain genius for recovery. If we believe in nothing much else, we still believe in ourselves. That salient characteristic of the English will bear thinking about. Why, lor instance, do we continually run ourselves down? Simply because we have, not got the inferiority complex and are indifferent to what other people think of us. No people in the world seems openly leas sure of itself; no people is secretly more sure Only those

strong enough to keep silent about seif are strong enough to fee sure of self. The epoch we are passing through is one which favours misjudgment of the English character, and of the position of England. 'There never was a country where , real deterioration of human fibre •had less chance than in this island, because there is no other country whose climate is so changeable, so •tempering to character, so formative of grit arid so basically healthy.”

“The generation which came in when Queen Victoria went out, through new ideas about the treatment of children, because of new modes of locomotion, and owing to the Great War, has decided that •everything requires revaluation,” Mr. Galsworthy continues. “And, since there is, seemingly, very little future befolre property, and less before life, it is determined to live now or never, without bothering •about the fate of such off-spring as it may chance to have. Not that the present generation is less fond of its children than were past generations —human nature does not change on points SO' elementary — but when . everything is keyed to such pitch of uncertainty,, to secure the future at the expense of the present no longer seems worth while. This is really the fundamental difference between the present and the past generation. People will not provide against that which they cannot see ahead. . .

The fact remains that for the moment, at least, youth is balancing, twirling on the tiptoes of uncertainty. What-is to come? Will contentment yet be caught? How will it all settle down —who knows ? •Are there to come fresh wars, and fresh inventions hot-foot on those not yet mastered and digested? Or will 'Fate decree another pause, like that of Victorian times, during which teevaluated life will crystallise, and give property and its brood of definite beliefs, a further innings.”