PROBLEMS OF THE EMPIRE.

Taranaki Daily News, 5 August 1919, Page 5

PROBLEMS OF THE EMPIRE.

LORD MILNER'S VIEWS. By Tel«raph.—Press Assn.- Copyr'ght. London, August 2. lord Milner, in the Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford, delivered his inaugural address on "Problems of the Empire" at the summer meeting. Eight hundred students, including Australian and New Zealand soldiers, were present. Lord Milner said that, though the war was a source of great encouragement to the Imperialists at Home, a set-baok to to Imperial politics must be expected for some time. Immense strides had recently been made in organising cooperation amongst the self-governing Btates of the Commonwealth, but these great institutions were now in abeyance. The Dominions' statesmen, whose participation in the war was invaluable, had gone back to become immersed in local affairs, and, like the British leaders, were not troubling about the instrument of future Imperial co-operation. Overburdened Ministers, distracted Legislatures, and the hectic press were not ready to apply the fundamental brain work to the solution of the Imperial problem. Some fear had been expressed that the League of Nations would tend towards the disruption of the Dominions and the Mother Country. Lord Milner said he did not share the fear, but it would be an irreparable disaster if, in stretching out. for pax mundi we let slip the pax Britannia which had long been an assured and well-tested possession. By doing this we should be sacrificing the substance for the shadow.

The peoples of the Dominions must ftarn more regarding their obligations as members of a world-encircling society of nations. The United Kingdom alone carried the burden of the vast dependent Empire. In tlie future development of the Commonwefitli there una bound to be closer connection than at pre?ent between the self-governing and dependent Empire.—Aus.-'N.Z. Cable As'<