NOTES AND COMMENTS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22774, 7 July 1937, Page 12

NOTES AND COMMENTS

"BOW OR BE BROKEN" "We shall simply walk over any groups who go against us. They' must either bow to us or be broken. There can bo only one authority," said Herr Hitler in his May Day speech. "That applies to the Churches, too. So long as they attend to their own affairs the State will not intervene. But if they go against us with sermons and encyclicals and encroach on the business of the State, "vre shall call them to order and we shall force them back into their proper place of caring for the religious needs of the people. They have no right to attack the morals of the State. They should concern themselves with their own morals." RIGHT AND LEFT IN ART All human activity is divided into two halves, one of which stands for tradition and the other for innovation, writes Mr. Eric Newton, the art critic of the Manchester Guardian. The one gives life a sort of solid basis and the other gives it vitality. Artists have the double function within themselves, but some are more traditional and some more experimental than others. "What is to be deplored is. that there is a sort of traditional warfare between the two sides. One side seems always to think .it is its duty to be scoffing at and scorning the other. Both sides of life, the academic and. the creative, are necessary; both sides are complementary to each other. There is no quarrel; no cleavage. Eaeli has to exist. There has to be an academy to enshrine and contain the traditions as they grow up; there must be a creative body to give birth to those traditions. Continually, new traditions are being born, and continually the Academicians win the battle by the calm process of taking over and recognising the traditions that posterity has approved of."

PERSONAL CONTACTS ESSENTIAL "This tendency to become self-centred is a thing that we have to guard against," said the Australian Treasurer, Mr. R. G. Casey, in a broadcast talk from Daventry on "Responsibilities of Empire." "We mustn't lose interest in each other. We tend more and more to rely on the newspapers and wireless and the air-mail for our contact with each other —but, in spite of these up-to-date methods, I believe that nothing takes the place of personal contact. Argument and discussion across a table are the only way to avoid misunderstandings and to impress our personalities on each other. I believe there is not anything like sufficient personal contact between the various parts of the Empire. The men at the head of affairs in Governments and business do not meet each other often enough. They will say that in the stress and strain of modern life they haven't got the time to travel, but I think that is an excuso rather than a reason. First things should come first —and I consider Imperial face-to-face contacts supremely important."

SOVEREIGNTY OF LOVE ! j "Few things are of greater consequence than the grounds on which we take pride in this Empire or teach the children who are its future citizens to take pride in it," said the Archbishop of York, Dr. Temple, the preacher at St. Paul's, London, for the Empire service, which was attended by the King and Queen. "If the ground of our pride is that it represents an imposition of our culture and policy upon other peoples whether they will or no, ! then we shall make it an instrument of our self-assertiveness calling forth the resistance of others till it perishes in the conflict it has provoked. But the ground of our pride in the Empire can be far different from this; it can be, and surely is, the freedom of fellowship which units the self-governing Dominions in freely offered loyalty to the Throne, the tradition and ideal of equality before the law for the many races composing it, the maintenance of even justice throughout its borders, and the ready co-operation with others in the common tasks of civilisation; if these be the ground of our pride, we shall be vigilant to notice and to check whatever mars the perfection of our adherence to those principles, and shall devote our energy to keeping our great inheritance ever more true to its own distinctive character. For the Kingdom of God is the Sovereignty of Love—since God is Love. That great proclamation brings comfort and courage to all whose hearts are attuned to it; for if God is Love, then Love is the ultimate power of the universe, and every purpose or policy prompted by Love —by the desire to serve rather than to gain—will reach its fulfilment, whatever the sacrifices that may first be required of it, because it is allied with the supreme power."

EMPIRE DEFENCE CO-OPERATION

Speaking on the question of Imperial defence, in addressing the Empire Press Union, the British Minister for the Coordination of Defence, Sir Thomas Inskip, said the fact that impressed him was that defence was no longer, if it ever, was, the interest of the United Kingdom alone. Empires first disintegrated at the circumference,* though decay might begin at the centre, and tho vulnerability of the several parts of tho Empire, because of the importance and the vital character of trade communications, was obvious to any observer. Perhaps in Britain they had been inclined to think too much of any war that might happen in the future in terms of the vulnerability of Britain to air attack. No service was done to clear thinking if too much concentration was placed upon that. It tended to produce a spirit of defeatism, which was neither likely to improve the moral of the nation, nor indeed was it in accordance with the facts. "No doubt it is vital to protect tho heart of tho Empire," Sir Thomas Inskip proceeded, "but an Empire like ours is as vulnerable in its parts as it is in the centre. It is a mistake to suppose tho main danger is from the air. The maintenance of our great trade routes is vital to the existence of tho Empire. If the arteries are severed, then life will surely How out. The trade routes, I am happy to say, will be protected by tho co-operation of the naval and air forces. This word co-operation is the now spirit of tho organisation of our services. I am not exaggerating when I say that little now remains to bo done so far as naval, military and air force are concerned, in perfecting arrangements for co-ordination between these services in the Dominions and the United Kingdom, and in perfecting uniformity of training and equipment.