DR. JOWETT AND MILITARISM.

Dunstan Times, Issue 3127, 24 July 1922, Page 8

DR. JOWETT AND MILITARISM.

Dr .Jowett, the eminent Nonconformist divine, discourses on a wide range of subjects in his sermons, and they always repay perusal. Discussing the Washington Disarmament Conference, he said : “We have discovered that when we make armor for our own defences we at the same time paralyse our own limbs. Our weapons are our fetters. The coat of mail is a strait-jacket. . . . Swords and spears not only symbolise passion; they stimulate it. Military pomp stimulates military pride.” Hut Dr Jowett recognises the inherent evil m man, and the vain hope of an ideal world where all men will live as brothers in amity. He said further: “Washington, in proposing to us to lay down our armor, is helping to cool our spirits. . . . Hut you still have the human heart to deal with, that awful cauldron in which all men’s evil passions are heated. 1 think Washington is going to bury a lot of dreadnoughts, but not the old Adam. I do not think the grave is going ce be deep enough for the carnal mind oi die race.” PATHS OF INTEREST. The card tourney recently played between the Fire Hrigade and Hinklers’ Club was won by the former by a .margin of two games. In the next round. Builders meet Watersidcrs. Date will be advertised. In speaking to a remit at the Farmers’ Conference at Auckland a delegate stated: “It is almost impossible to compel the Covernment by law -to do anything.” A request that the salary minimum allowed civil servants prior to the first “cut” be restored, was made to the Prime Minister by Mr T). G. Sullivan (Labor member for Avon) in the House of Representatives last week. His question was that in the event of the Government being determined to proceed! with the second “cut,” in spite of the fact that the all groups index finger did not justify the second reduction, would the Prime Minister at least agree to restore the minimum of £234 Ids per annum in the case of married civil servants to the figure at which it stood prior to the first “cut”? Mr Sullivan said he had received a letter from a married man in this class who stated that he was paying fids per week rent. £ll per year superannuation, and C(5 2s per year insurance, etc., after which he had only 8s or 9s per head per week on which to keep his family. Mr Massey replied that this was an important question, and it required an oflicial reply, which he promised to supply at an early date. Coleridge, in bis “Table Talk.” says: “The three great ends which a statesman ought to propose to himself in the Government of a nation are: (1) Security to possessors; (2) Facility to acquirers; (3) hope to all.” The statesmen in the Reform Government conform to all three. They throw the net of security around the men of great possessions; they afford facilities, by means of pools and concessions of different kinds for the producers to acquire more wealth, and they give to the vast bulk of the people the hope that He form ineptitude will one day be supplanted by a capable Government more in accord with the democratic sentiment of the country. “He that hath a contented spirit hath great riches, and he that added!h field to field addet.h trouble to trouble . . . and wealth pouring in at the door driveth happiness out of the window.” —Sophocles.