'THE GREAT ILLUSION.'

Evening Star, Issue 14964, 26 August 1912, Page 7

'THE GREAT ILLUSION.'

The second and concluding leclur* on •'The Great Illusion' was given last evening in tho Trades Hall by the Rev. W. F. Kennedy. It dealt with the aspect of the cafie for war from the point of view of human nature. Upholders of militarism maintained that war and the preparations it entailed were beneficial, inasmuch as it helped to build up and strengthen tho cbarjcter of individuals and the nation, encouraged self-denial and heroism, inured men to hardship, and brought out the best that is in them. It was the test of a nation's political, physical, and intellectual worth, and the day "that humanity achieved a great pacific Empire, having no external enemies, that day it» morality and intelligence would be placed in the greatest peril. Civilisation had not changed human nature, and armed strife would not disappear from the earth until human nature changed. The race which had lost the capacity for strife would go down before the race which had retained this characteristic. Mr Norman Angeli asserted that, despite the apparent force of these arguments, they were based on a profound illusion and a gross misreading of all the facts of the case. The alleged unchnngeability was not a fact. To argue that it is was going against historical evidence. Did those who affirmed that human nature could not be changed mean that the thoughts and feelings of primitive man, who ate hie enemies, or even his relatives, were the came a*, say, the thoughts and feelings of a Herbert* Spencer? Were we to suppose that a modern city man might turn cannibal, or that lx>rd Kitchener would impale the- heads of his enemies, or drive, over them in his motor car? 1 tie custom of settling private quarrels by duel was Aill practised by Continental peoples, who maintained that it was not in human, nature to expect that men of good birth would tamely submit to insult or injury without thus* seeking satisfaction. But in the Anglo-Saxon world duelling had boon altogether abandoned in favor of more rational methods. It was not tiue that war ; -made for the survival of the tit and the elimination of the unfit, and conquest did not eliminate the conquered, (treat Britain conquered India, but the inferior race survived, and weie given an extra lease of life by reason of the conquest. It would be truer to say that war made for the elimination of the ii' and the sunival of the unfit. It was precise!v these who were stoniest, bravest, and most virile who perished in battle. The Roman L'mpire perished for want ox men. After the conclusion of the gieat wars of ancient Greece,' we were told, only cowards remained, ami from their broods came the new gencratione. A soldier's training w;>o useless : it conduced neither to efficiency nor morality. He was treated, as Hernatd Shaw says, like a child, punished like a child, dress*d prettily like a child, washed and combed like a child, forbidden to marry like a child, and tailed "Tommy'" like a child. He had wo real work to keep him from going mad except housemaid's work. Robeit'Blatchfoid, who supported the cause of militarism, asserted that barrack life was bad and always would bo bad. When he joined tho Army the language of the barrack room shocked and .appalled him. Physical force was a constantly diminishing factor iu human atf.'.irs. This involved profound changes in life. The increasing factor iu the world was co-operation, which tended to do away with national barriers and divisions. Struggle was still the law of survival, but it. was the struggle of man with the universe, not man with man. "Dog does not eat dog." The real dividing lines between men were opposing ideals. Thie made the real conflict in life —the conflict between democracy and plutocracy, between socialism and individualism, between the forces of reaction and the forces of progress. The German plutocrat had much more to fear from the German Socialist than from the British Navy, and the Euglish. Tory was much more likely to feel tho pinch of Mr Lloyd George's "Budget than to have his sleep disturbed by Germany's big guns. What stood in the way of the British Democrat securing for social needs the enormous sums that now go to armaments was merely the lack of co-operation between himself and the>. Democrats of a hostile nation, who were in a like ease. This step, if history had any meaning, was bound shortly to be taken" Co-operation, brotherhood," lore',-'justice, freedom, truth—these were the forces cf progress. " Slowly but eurely we are emerging from the ago of brute" force, and the 'Uy i< not far off when the blood-stained blot" of war upon our civilisation and our Christianity will be removed ; the spirit of the ape and the tiger will have parsed away, and man be liker man."