SOME HOME TRUTHS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 315, 15 June 1915, Page 3

SOME HOME TRUTHS.

ABOUT THE AVAR.

In the course of a potent and eloquent sermon at St. Mary's on Sunday evening, the vicar (Rev. A. IT. Oolvile) uttered some home truths which could profitably he told to i much larger congregation than any one church accommodates. He was referring to the part woman had played in the history of the world, the influence they had wield ed and their inspiring of all that "was noblest and finest in the live£ of men at times of crises. Never, he remarked, had there been a time in the history of the British nation when women had such an opportunity for inspiring their men folk with a realisation of their duty to their country and to civilisation and with tile necessity for self-sacrifice. The ca'blcs that were printed by the Press frequently deluded the public. They did not disclose the real gravity of the situation. They glossed over the defeats of the Allies and minimised the succcesses cf the foe. Really, some of the cables were an insult to the intelligence. He did not blame the excellent local papers for this; he knew that they but published the eables that ea-me to them, and in their leading columns they occasionally warned the public of accepting some of the cabled items as presentments of facts Only the previous day the cables were full of stories regarding the stampeding of buffaloes and other picturesque details of operations on the Italian frontier, etc., but the real important item, the one thing that vitally mattered, was given only two lines! He referred to the intimation of the expected evacuation of Lemberg by tho Russians. To anyone who followed the course of events intelligently, there eould be no doubt that the issue of the war was still in the balance, that if we and our Allies were to he victorious we must do more than we are doing. We must organise the nation, every part of it, to ensure victory. We in New ZeaJand talked of having done and of still doing our duty. The people of this Dominion, however, must do more than t,heir duty. He was no party man—ln believed with Philip Snowden that in essential things there was no difference between the parties—but an exhibition of parish-pump, party warfare at a ,time like this was very unedifying. What was desired, what was imperatively necessary at the present time j was not party warfare, but the co-oper- j ation of the best brains of our public j men, irrespective altogether of party, for the organisation of the resources of the Dominion in men and material for the purpose of helping the Motherland to achieve victory. The Government wanted inspiration, they all required inspiration to rise above the small, unimportant tilings, and concentrate their minds and attention upon the one thing that at the moment really mattered—the successful outcome of the war. If women played their part nobly in this crisis they would have established ahold on men's lives, on the life of the nation, that they never had before. One could prophecy that men's respect for women would be mightily increased and women's influence over men wonderfully strengthened as the result of the inspiration given and the sacrifice made.