A SPIRITUAL ARMING FOR PEACE.

White Ribbon, Volume 21, Issue 247, 18 January 1916, Page 14

A SPIRITUAL ARMING FOR PEACE.

(Elizabeth Rotten.) Day by day the human sorrow and suffering upon this earth are growing greater; with every hour the spiritual burden which we women bear grows heavier. Not one of us but grieves for some loved one lorn from us in the bloom of health, oi trembles for those who have yet to be sacrificed, however willing the sacrifice. A common sorrow weaves a bond between all of us who share in it. Women of .ill lands are going down into the valley of tribula.ion, and there in the awakening of our deepest consciousness, of slumbering (‘motions only stirred in rare moments of our existence, we come together in common trouble and gather strength for the common task whi. h the turmoil of the world lays on our shoulders. We love our country wiih passionate love; we realise to the full its special individuality, which has a right to be perfectly respected. And yet, at a moment when the ideal of humanity stands in most imminent danger, we women must, as far as in us lies, strive to keep it safe and unsullied. Amidst the death and horror, amidst our anxict) for our loved ones, and our deepened love and gratitude towards our native land, we feel there something at the bottom of our souls stronger than all our differences, which binds us more closely together than before. We ask: What can we women at such a time throw into the scale to raise the dignity of mankind to a higher level, even now when the old order is being thrown down into the dust? And though we have not the right to order weapons to be laid down, there i sone thing given us—a thing nu»>t bitterly needed if the spiritual and moral ravages of this war are not to be still more disastrous even than the loss of human life'. We can and must put a stop to the' warfare of thoughtless words and poisoned utterances ; we must leave no waste ground for international rancour to bear its unhallowed fruits. Let us women put forth all our powers of heart and mind in this endeavour. Let us draw strength from the thought that in every land we have sisters who with equal courage are doing the same.

Peace is the one >• <>al of every army; this we know, and learn from even land. Hue we are threatened with the disappearance from the international consciousness of the knowledge that peace is an inward state, not an outward circumstance. The weapons of war can only create the outward possibility of peace; but peace itself, if it is to be anything more than a breathing space between wars, on a deeper basis. Bit by bit this basis is being undermined, and when the hour comes to lay down arms, it will find a generation of human beings quite unprepared for peace. We women must remember it is with spiritual weapons that we must during war itself fight the good fight for peace. We must form an army, courageous and far-sighted, led by spiritual pioneers, whose work it is to build a boldly planned and firmly constructed bridge of communication, across which those who are now divided by a world of misunderstanding may send hostages to each other bearing pledges of a new will to better understanding. This is the spiritual arming for peace. Vet nobody has thought of recruiting a free company for this service. Women, sisters of all lands, let us create this army; let us take up these weapons, labour in abundance, and not a day but summons us afresh to the battlefield. No time was ever so full of horror as the present, but none ever offered so much scope for the service of heart and minds towards a better future. Let each of u> work undauntedly in her own circle to broaden it so that at last the day must come when all these broadening circles encounter one another.

And let us live in this faith, that those of our brothers, husbands, sons, now bearing untold suffering in the trenches for the sake of securing peace for their native land, who shall come back to us at the end of the war, may labour afresh at the creation of new values with which, for their country’s weal, to enrich the common treasury of humanity—those loved ones will surely be grateful to us for keeping alight the sacred flame, the spiritual preparedness for th« peace for which they have s'.aked their lives.