BY THE WAY

Evening Star, Issue 17038, 8 May 1919, Page 3

BY THE WAY

[By Cabm. Cboss.]

By no means the least distinction of Montaigne (1533-92) is the fact that his was the first influential voice, or pen, to condemn the principle of persecution for religious opinions. Somewhere in his essays he has a remark to the effect that it is setting an uncommonly mighty store by our fine theories when we can torture and murder good men for them. And the condemnation is as valid when the persecuting, theories are economic as when they are religious. Religious orthodoxies are no longer able to slaughter men of independent mind, but the hellish work of Leninism in Russia has shown that economic orthodoxies on tho warpath can easily rival the Spanish Inquisition in cruelty. The outstanding feature in religious persecution was that men were consigned to horrible tortures whose lives were not only blameless, but conspicuously virtuous. They were good citizens and good subjects, "bub it was sufficient that, in the absence of all other charges, they were charged with holding unauthorised opinions; and, being of such' high quality that they scorned to deny their convictions, they were done to death. In like manner Lenin and his accomplices are ready to turn the world into a red desert, and all for an economic orthodoxy that gives no more guarantee of a permanent solution of the great social and economic problem than the religious creeds gave of finalitv in their line. And yet, fanatically hot with their Soviet orthodoxy and their gospel of immediate violence, Leninism ■tortures and kills good and honorable men for what it is pleased to .regard as economic heterodoxy. It paints them " bourgeoisie" because they are employers or professional men, or men of culture unsympathetic to the new economic despotism. As "bourgeoisie" they are beyond the pale of humanity, and anything may happen to them any day. Their culture and intellectual balance and independence are an unpardonable offence to the economic "Inquisition"; their personal quality and status cry loudly for vengeance. Away with them ! ******* In these parts we do not talk about the " bourgeoisie," because we would sooner go out of business. than attempt to get our ' tongues around French terms ; but we take up much the same attitude towards what with greater facility we call the "capitalist." Applying tho term "capitalist" only to the successful business or professional man who has money to invest, it is evident that, like the '"' worker," he may be anything personally. The fact 'that he has money invested gives no clue whatever to his character, any more than we can guess a man's personal quality from the fact that he is a wage-earner. Where all are striving, the capitalist, as such, is distinguished only by the degree of his success; and every day capitalists or their sons are falling back, and wage-earners or their families are forging ahead into the ranks of the capitalists. -And yet, as under the Lenin regime in Russia, so here—though we have not vet got so far—'the more or less successful business or professional man is pilloried and execrated purely for the fact, and threatened from some quarters with forcible expropriation. It is assumed that, with the State as sole capitalist, everything would go gloriously, and everybody would bo content. It is forgotten that even under State industrialism the iron law of values would still have to be accommodated, and every industrial concern would have to ipay. The great improvement in Labor conditions won by the workers during the last generation or two have all been achieved' under what is called the capitalistic regime. That ameliorative movement is still in full career, and is bright with promise of future good, unless it is wrecked by the idiots, scoundrels, and plausible humbugs for whom Lenin and his Soviets represent the last word in political sagacity and social salvation. The admitted evils of the private capitalistic regime are becoming more and more amenable to the enlightened will of the people, and in any case there is not the ghost of a guarantee that life would be'freer and happier under a übiquitous State despotism or enforced communism than it is now. *#***»* Mr J. L. Garvin, of the London ' Observer,' writing in a, prophetic strain on the general outlook, reveals some uneasiness at the prospect of Germany in the saddle in Russia, whose natural wealth is so enormous that Germany could replenish her own depleted coffers while earning Russia's gratitude for restoring order and developing her resources. "The future of the German race is incalculable," says Mr Garvin, "but in all probability it will be relatively stronger than ever, with the German-Austrians coming in to make it a solid central block of nearly 80,000,000 of people. Russia is in chaos. In its vast territories, covering a sixth of the globe, and among its 100,000,000 inhabitants, the writ of the Peace Congress does not run. The Powers at Paris have no policy. But Russia will come together again, will consolidate. Yet the danger increases every day—this is well known to all those who are even tolerably informed that the best elements in Russia, those surest to succeed in the long run, those who have been faithful to the Allies, are being driven needlessly, by neglect, vacillation, blunders, by what they regard as virtual betrayal, towards, a course which would throw" them into the arms of Germany. If Russia and Germany came together, the whole array of new States lying between them would have to submit to the same system or go down like a row of bricks." *******

Whatever may be the fate of the League of Nations, the war has gone a long way to produce in the world euch a sense oi the society of nations as will impose a powerful check upon either Germany or | any other nation that may have the mind for a policy of colossal brigandage upon their neighbors. The immeasurable wrong inflicted "bv Germany upon the world has 1 stung the moral sense of humanity to a mare vivid appreciation of its collective responsibility for preventing or punishing such wicked outrages in the future. Injury maliciously inflicted upon the individual instantly becomes the concern oi the community", and the war has been a powerful incentive to the realisation of the community of nations and the moral obligation of "all to each and of each to s.11; and that now and deeper sense ot obligation is none the less real for the fact that its formal expression m an effective league abounds with difficulties. In a great° measure the Hague Convention failed but the fact that it was held was a .registration of human progress. In the same way the League of Nations may come to grief, but the spirit m which )♦ was conceived will remain an inspiration to well-doing, and a Sinai to witness against the transgressor. I have often contrasted the eloquence of the politician, the preacher, and the reformer with the clear-ouit diamond-like oxnosition of the trained scientist. With the former the illuminative quality is so apt to suffer from the dust of polemic, the exaggerations of emotion, the I,ltru " eion of a subtle vanity, and the farced reasoning of the special pleader. A lecture on radium by Professor Rutherford lives in my memory as a charming and perfect bit of exposition on a difficult subject. An article by Sir Oliver Lodge on 'Ether, Matter, and the Soul m the ' Hibbert Journal' impresses me in the same way. Take this on electricity : " Electricity seemed something immaterial and elusive, only becoming apparent when associated with .ordinary matter. . . - Whether there was anything substantial about an electric .charge, whether there was anything really running along a wire , •vmveyin.g a current, that was greatly doubted and thought improbable. But a 1 change has come over the spirit of eleci tricail science, and. largely owing • to the genius of men still living, electricity has nut on body, and form, and size, and mass. It is a substance—a. fluid, if we like to call it veo—it consists of particles, not material/indeed, but corpuscular. It has become concrete and substantial, though it remains inaccessible to our senses. Electricity is no form of ordinary matter. but suggests itself as the raw material

out of which ordinary matter is composed. It is still refined and subtle, but it is no longer elusive. Tho corpuscles can by indirect and most ingenious means be counted, and weighed, and measuredThey crowd on the surface of a charged body, and constitute its charge. They rush through a wire convoying a\'current, and constitute the current. They whirl in almost infinitesimal orbits, and constitute what wo know as magnetism. They swirl and -change in speed or in direction or movement, and thus excite in the ether the specific disturbance which appeals to our eyes as light. That is how light is generated, by the changing movements at electric corpuscles. And when light v absorbed or mopped up again it is to th astonishing evolutions of those same cor puecles that its energy is entrusted, lb' period of indefiniteness and recondite nuzzledom has come to an end, and tlnperiod of definite ooraeeptions in tuis department of physics has begun." The centenary of the birth of John Ruskin—he was born in London on February 8, 1819—has brought sheaves oi appireciation and extracts from his works expressing his characteristic oi life. One of these quotations on Ruskin s favorite theme of education is Ml of wis© admonition and implied reproof, bays » writer in the ' Daily News' : "It was alwavs the spiritualising of life that he sought. Tho main purpose of education was ' to see the sky '—to see at not with astronomer's telescope, but with human eyes trained to love and reverence. ' lou do not educate a man by telling him what he knew not, but by making him what he was not.' True education was not directed to 'success' in _ life; it was in itself advancement in life, ' for he only is advancing in life whose heart is getting softer, whose blood warmer, whose brain auickea-, whose spirit is entering into living peace.' The task of education, in a word, was not the manufacture of acute intellectual instruments, but_ of noble lives, just as the task of .political economy was not the manufacture of riches, but of tho wealth of human life." ******* I do not believe that under any circumstances we can limit the German army to 100,000 men. At the present moment *he must have two or three million highlytrained men. and she can easily pile up the necessary equipment under a score of oretexts. I do not believe wo can compel Germany to adopt and adhere to the principle of voluntary enlistment, especially if some other European nations remain under Conscription. Npr is it credible that she will pay much attention to the dictation of the Allies as to the size and gun-power of her navy. One of the darkest clouds on the horizon is the mere than possibility of the reorganisation of Russia by Germany, and in such a case Germany could easily build a navy for herself 'that was ostensibly for Russia. Indeed, so long as Germany meets the financial obligations imposed upon her for her infamies, it is questionable if we have the right to interfere in her internal economy.