NO ECHO.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 130, 5 June 1933, Page 3

NO ECHO.

STUDENTS AND WAR. OXFORD UNIVERSITY STAND. ARCHBISHOP'S CRITICISM. (By Telegraph.—-Own Correspondent.) CHRISTCHURCH, this day. The recent decision by students at Oxford University that tlicy would not bear arms was referred to by Archbishop Julius in an address at a veterans' service in the Cathedral yestcrdav.

"My dear old University of Oxford has decided, through its debating society, that it will never take up arms at any bidding. It was a brave thing to do," said ins Grace. "That example has been followed here, and by our own students in Canterbury College.

"It seems a little hard on those who served in the South African war or the Great War that tlicy should be told that they were serfs and went to those wars because they could not help it, and came back because they weren't shot; also, that if tlicy were not murderers, at all events they were next of kin to those who murdered their fellows, but this is the voice of young men. They don't mean all they say, and it doesn't matter twopence if they do. They find no echo in the fiearts of those you served."

His Grace remarked that because an Oxford undergraduate said he wouldn't handle a rifle, it didn't mean that there would be 1.0 more wars. Statesmen did not care, and it would be forgotten in the fever of another war. It was, however, an important indication of thoughts in the hearts of men to-day. His Grace said he had precious little sympathy for those who were called pacifists. In the last war some of them were governed by their conscience, and went to prison, taking their medicine quietly. Others were just shirkers, who squealed. "They callcd themselves martyrs, but I never knew a martyr who squealed," continued the speaker. "I wouldn't touch them with a pitchfork." His Grace said he hoped for the coming of peacc, and lie was glad to see young people setting themselves against war.