SWITZERLAND

Wairarapa Times-Age, 23 January 1941, Page 7

SWITZERLAND

* COUNTRY WITH MANY FRIENDS | HOPES OF SAVING FREEDOM. DEEP RELIGIOUS SENSE. i Switzerland has many friends in the ■ world and they are anxiously followI ing the development of this war with i Une hope that Switzerland can preserve j i her freedom states Henry W. Steiger tai j Swiss graduate student in America) ini ■ the “Christian Science Monitor.” . I It is of importance to understand ?'why Switzerland is a free country and j ■ to know whether she deserves to be; I fret. This question is the more inter-1 ■ ! csting because about 70 per cent of the. : ,j } pulaticn land the original part» | ’| speaks a German dialect and was a| . i par, of the Holy Roman Empire uniill | 1499 and theoretically until 1648. | A most astonishing event was the | 1 foundation o’ me Swiss Federation in I ‘ 1291 in the year Rudolf von Hapsburg ' passed on. On a small sheet of parchj ment. which still exists, we tind the | ; substance of a constitution in thirteen .pirns. U V>\- may ask how it was possible that -i in the Middle Ages. when nobody I thought about constitutions, those poor. ; uneducated peasants laid the founda- ’ i tion of a State based on a principle! Ah j explanation can be found in the situai tion of those valleys at the extremity I of German culture in the direction of (Italy, where the influence of Greek j thought had been more or less pre-1 ; served. This influence, together with I I the sound mentality of the free moun-( taineers. must be considered as the! ; background of the foundation of Swit-1 j zerland. .After successful defence of 1 | the new Confederation and further ( success in other wars, the Swiss State | ! grew strong in other wars, the Swiss I I grew strong enough that it no j j longer required the protection of the I I German emoeror. and a war decided I (Swiss independence in 1499. I Not long after the separation from a I i temporal monarchical pi.wer the em-! . peror there followed the separation of I the Swiss from the spiritual monarch- ■ I leal power, the Pope. The reformation | of Switzerland by Ulrich Zwingli is I more or less independent of Luther. Tn j be sure, Zwingli’s first thought had its | roots in the writings of Luther but he| translated the German thought into Swiss thinking which is not first of all I abstract but practical. Zwingli was* not only a man of the church. He was also a politician. He knew that a solid'! new church must have a background ( in a solid political State. It is interesting to note that the lead-; ing thoughts of Calvin were already ;

put forward by Zwingli. Calvin was not Swiss, but he lived in Switzerland and in the Swiss asmosphere gave to the ideas of the Reformation the shape which was accepted by the Puritans in ! Great Britain and later in America. ■ It is quite obvious that Switzerland has had a great influence on the development <>f western thought. It is therefore important to discover tin. nucleus of Swiss thinking. The Swiss wants to act according to his conscience. For him. he. as well a* everyone else has his own conscience and he claims the right to follow its direction. The freedom the Swiss claims is not a rev.'ll against discipline: on the contrary it is the freedom to act according to principle Such thinking h not satisfied by abstractions, but calls for action Here is a fundamental difference from German thinking which is primarily theoretical The good relations between Switzerland and the Anglo-Saxon world can be explained in part by the common spiritual inclinations of the two peoples. It is therefore not surprising that National Socialist c.-ncepts have not found fertile soil in Switzerland Class distinctions ire not great it: Switzerland There i neither great poverty nor great wealth among the people One of tlie most import.ml factors in the Swiss spirit is tlie constant intercourse of Germanic and L.itm culture within the borders of. the country. Switzerland is a confederation of twen-ty-five originally free States, somewhat similar to the United States of Amer ica. That such a State can exist it !•■ necessary to find a middle way bearchy. extreme vent!-ali.-m (to I'.iti-.m In 1848 Switzerland got the constitution ■.■.inch is the basis >f her present form ■ J government. much, livi.’ii.' ..nd •■ ■ ,cii in?.;