THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS.

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 20039, 22 September 1930, Page 15

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS.

ADDRESSES IN CHURCHES. THE EXAMPLE OP NANSEN. The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church has expressed a wish that at each of its churches one sermon in September be devoted to the subject of the League of Nations, and its work. In accordance with this request, reference to the League was made by the Eev. J. A. Allan at the services at St. Ninian's, Riccarton, yesterday, v/hen the addresses were based on the life of Dr. F. Nansen, the famous Arctic explorer, and for some time before his death Norway's delegate to the League. Dr. Nansen was one of foremost members of the League of Nations in its first years of existence and was in charge of the repatriation of refugees after the Great War.

"Dr. Nansen was a lover of humanity and a great international idealist," said Mr Allan. "Hie life was emblematic of the spirit of brotherhood and love, which was brought into the world by Christianity. "He'showed in his exploration work the spirit of the Vikings and his policy always was not to look behind. He decided, before his great crossing of Greenland, that those who had failed previously had done so because civilisation offered them inducement to turn back when chances of success were fading. He decided to start from the barren East Coast, when to turn back would prove fatal, and succeeded in making the crossing for the first time. That was typical of Nansen, and in after life he often expressed the opinion that only by going off the beaten paths could the nations succeed in their quest for world peace. His spirit was one that took risks, cut off all lines of retreat, and worked without clauses of reserve." The Servant of Men. The speaker then referred to Nansen's great service to his fellow-men in connexion with the League of Nations. He made it his task to relievo to a great extent the great suffering caused throughout Europe by war devastation. There were thousands of men, refugees all over Europe, who had to be'repatriated. The task was a tromendous one, but by 1927, Nansen, had 427,000 of these destitute men and women returned to their homes at a cost of about £1 each. Another task which stirred Nansen to his greatest efforts was in connexion with a million Russian refugees, for whom homes and occupations had to be found. In a few years over 300,000 of these men had been provided for. Thousands of Greeks, driven out of Asia Minor, by the Turks, were established under Nansen's direction in Macedonia, and 35,000 Russians and Americans who had been scattered by the war all over Europe were found employment in thirty different countries. This was the work of a mighty organiser. Nansen inspired thesa efforts and carried them out.

"Nansen was both a peßsimißt and an optimist," concluded the speaker. "A pessimist in believing in the probability of another World War, and an optimist in the belief that by following the policy of the League of Nations a warless world was possible."