POLITICS AND IDEALS

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 147, 23 June 1928, Page 21

POLITICS AND IDEALS

MR,'BALDWIN'S BELIEF "Our Inheritance." Speeches and addresses by tlio Right lion. Stanley Baldwin, M.E. London: Hodder and Stoughton. My. Baldwin's volume of speeches, just published, relate in the main to Canada. In reviewing this work for the London "Daily Telegraph" Mr. S. P. B. Mais shows that the Prime. Minister is at pains, to interpret Canada to England, as lie was, during his recent tour, anxious to interpret England to Canada. Ho makes his, general purpose clear in the closing paragraph or! his preface: ■ . One who enters Westminster Abbey and surveys tho hoarded history of Its thousand years cannot but feel richer from tho consciousness it brings that centuries have gone to nis making and that his roots are established in the ages. The Abbey is an epitome of England. One who visits Canada and sees her in the radiance and glory of her morning loams a new hope, a new security. It has befallen me within tile last year to try in such measure as I might to make our peoples conscious of their common heritage and destiny; and it is in the hope -that these speeches may ever so little further that aim that I have ventured to send them forth again under tho title of "Our Inheritance." • The general tone of the book, 'states Mr. Mais, may be gauged from a sentence in the speech on Democracy, given at Cambridge: "Politics without ideals" are no use at all,'-' and the motto which he selected for the, title-page: '(Providence being their guide, they builded better.than they knew." Emphatically it is a, book of good cheer- —not of false comforts, but of a genuine belief that, underlying many superficial signs of disorder and unrest, the heart of Great Britain and the Dominions is sound. I found in all classes In Canada (hat same respect for law. and order, that we have at home ... a' sense of what is meant by an incorruptible justiciary and au incorruptible police. . . She is maintaining the standards and the values of education —no small thing in a. democracy. ■ Mr. Baldwin in a stirring appeal bids Canadians not to be in t6o much of a hurry, to put quality before quantity, and'to maintain their values and standards. In Quebec lie singles out for special commendation the exaltation of family life and the native courtesy; in Montreal ho reminds his audience'of tho importance of increasing tho import and export trade between the various parts of the Empire; in Ottawa ho explains the necessity of fostering a spirit of consideration, co-operation, and coordination among the units of the Empire. . , ■ "British problems," ho said, "in our history have always been solved ambulando. Let us go on doing that. Let us not be in a hurry to define. Definitions and the desire for dolinitions split Christendom into fragments in its early days, and it lias never recovered yet." The Prime Minister finds, as he has always found) solace and comfort for the problems that attend segregation in cities in the countryside; he has excellent things to,say of cricket, of books, of scientists, historians, sculptors, and archaeologists; but the most memorable words, words ' that are unlikely to be forgotten, remarks Mr. Mais, were those spoken by him in the House of Commons as a tributeto tho memory of Lord Oxford. In this speech, which will take its place in all anthologies of modern English prose, wo got an epitome of the forthrightness, integrity, and simple clarity that are the outstanding features of .tho Prime. Min-. ister. ' ■ ' . • Though, perhaps, temptations come more subtly and less easily discerniblo to men who walk in the high places of,this earth, tho deterioration of character which lias so often been seen in' this world is more obvious to mankind when men have to face- hitler ami cruel disappointments. In tho last years of his life lie (Lord Oxford) had to faco such, and lie faced them 'Without bitterness, wltjiout blame, without self-pity, and with no. attempt,at selfjustification. He faced tliom with a dignity perfect and restrained, and towards tho closing years of his life,. us. throughout his life, but never more than in thoso closing years, ho conferred distinction on tho public life of this country and distinction on this House, which he had known for so long.