The Stratford Evening Post WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 21, 1911. CIVILIZATION.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXI, Issue 86, 24 November 1911, Page 4

The Stratford Evening Post WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 21, 1911. CIVILIZATION.

Has civilization failed us? is the question asked by the London “Ooserver.” The Italian theft of Tripoli, the amazing negotiations between France and Germany over Morocco, which belongs to neither, the outbreak of revolution in China against Manchu corruption, is leading the cynics to declare that force is the only remedy, that peace is a dream, and that the optimist is blind. The “Observer” in particular rubs in this interpretation of the events of the day. “There is nothing new in pacificist philosophy,” it remarks. “There are few things so old as their arguments and their failure. Nature was ‘red with beak and claw’ before the appearance of the most remarkable of her bipeds. From the dim beginnings of human strife upon earth—strife springing from instincts earlier than the human species—men and women between struggles have longed again and again for everlasting peace without being able to obtain it. Century upon century has passed since sagos first declared war to 1)0 not only wicked and cruel, but senseless and wasteful. Their reasonings have been shattered by two main facts. ‘Upon the one hand, war has continually raised human activity, and even human intellect, to a higher power, and has so brought nut the best as well as the worst in men that the final impression loft upon the imagination of the world as a whole has never been one of pure horror. On the other hand, some nations are no more content with the existing distribution of territory than are the democratic masses with the present distribution of wealth. What nation of ‘Haves’ will readily give up the territory it possesses, at least for any consideration short of equivalent gain, to satisfy, to placate the unsatisfied States, like Germany, who refuse to accept the present consequences of their late entry into the international drama, and protest that they do not enjoy their fair share of the globe? As if these considerations were not serious enough, there is a third factor. Bloodshed and tumults do not solely arise from quarrels between nations. They spring as often from civil troubles, which

disturb States within themselves, and sometimes, as in the case cf tlio French Revolution, make their further olfoet felt in a way that convulses the whole sphere of foreign policy. That is what the prophets of the millennium have never yet reckoned with. The paeilieists who think they can dispose of war by figures of speech, such as that which describes it as an ‘optical illusion,’ are themselves the dreamers of dreams, who do not understand the conflicts of passion and desire which still agitato the world. Sin months; ago there was another outburst of optimism as naive as though the world were still living in the sentimental era of Glass Exhibitions. Since then there lias opened another era of political earthquakes and conflagrations, and the area of disturbance continues to extend. Before the 'Tripoli problem has been safely liquidated or the peace of the Balkans is assured, wo have the outburst in China of an insurrection which may change the face of the Ear East and give an incalculable increase of force to all the impulses set moving by the triumph of Japan. All we can be certain of in the region of world-politics is that nothing is certain. Bo wc need further lessons to convince us that the peace • of civilization is founded upon the crust of a volcano?” asks the “Observer.” Is this pessimistic view justified, or did Matthew Arnold speak well when ho said that there was in tire world a Power —not ourselves—Which Makes For Righteousness ? Events in China prove that he was right. Europe will learn the lesson one day.