OLIVE SAREINER.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXI, Issue 64, 16 March 1900, Page 2

OLIVE SAREINER.

C'fo the Editor.;

Sir,—-My reply to -Mr W. Whittaker its tliat neither in my letter (vide yout issue ol tlie 9tii> or. in my thoughts hud I come to the conclusion tJiat Olive Schreiner "had not acted couj scientkmsly," but that she had conid i under tii-e law 01 sellish love, tiie? tyranny of an exclusive passion, that lar the time prevented her froui:judging and doing justly to either? L'itlantler or Kailir. To their appeal ringing- through the supreme court oi humanity her inward ear is apparently closed. She is conscientious as,may 1 suppose, -Mr Whittaker when he assumes the seat of judgment and foresees the in tolerable doom of lcutlyard Kipling; as conscientious as those thousand clergymen of the Southern Confederacy when they declared Negro slavery a Divine institutkm, and appealed to Europe anu to heaven on behalf of the shm>fc power; as conscientious as Saul of j Tarsus when he verily thought within : ; i himself he ought to do many tilings, contrary to Jesus of Nazareth, which;; ihe also dkl in Jerusalem. But the? "revelation" came, the dungeon wherein he had imprisoned men ami ■women flamed with light. He could" never afterwards forgive himself. His best apology was: "1 did it ignorautly throug-h unbelief." It therefore by no means follows that the judgments of Olive Schreiner are just and righteous, or that she, j being a British subject, has the right, .'or can with impunity encourage or' in any way promote privy conspiracy and rebellion against the British Government, under whose sway she has shared the blessings of equitable laws, the protection of life an<f prop perty, of civil and religious 'liberty/ Had her judgment been on the side• of; mercy and humanity how could sin bo wrong"? Does Mr W. Whittaker esteem Kruger's Pharoah like policy, his exacting and contemptuous treat-: ment of the Uitlanders, and , tie ■ atrocious cruelty and slavery of thel blacks, "the side of mercy and; humanity?"' Has history adornecT,; 'the Boer treatment of others in South/ Africa with these crowningl virtues? . Ask Living-stone, the MoSats - aiuT?; their successors. Have the Boers, i during this terrible campaign, beenconspicuous for these heavenly t s graces? Ask our soldiers and oinv generals; ask our "most beloved ami} considerate Eoberts. And yet it is to; these self-centred and self-blown Boers that Olive Kchreiner and, I sirp-. pose. slr W. Whittaker, would leave' the destinies of South Africa! —I am, etc.. not "Dr. Cox," but his father. "' EDWIN COX. "\rnrHi 15. ■ - • ■■":0i