PROPHETS OF GLOOM.

Evening Star, Issue 19062, 3 October 1925, Page 6

PROPHETS OF GLOOM.

Sir Ari'iior Conan Doyle as a story teller holds a high place in the public regard. Kia imagination and powers of narration enable him to reconstruct the past in a vivid way, but when ho adventures into the realm of the occult, and, trusting to his “spirit guides,” attempts to foretell future events, he should be taken with moro reserve. No one who heard Sir Arthur lecture in Dunedin will doubt bis sincerity, but there was a feeling that he was allowing his enthusiasm for the cause he was advocating to overshadow his common sense. “ Spirit warnings ” that he has received lately are of the gloomiest kind. Disasters, he says, are coming that will be of such a nature as'to shock the soul of man. There will be no single momentary calamity to put us out of our misery, but one disaster is to follow another over a period of several years. Then he goes on to say that the world needs something like this, for its people are sinking deeper and deeper into the mire. No doubt we are surrounded by many and great dangers. History shows that it has always been the case, but in spite of this the world goes on from age to age, and on tho whole humanity is marching steadily to better things. There certainly are disturbing factors in our civilisation to-day, but allowing for these the condition of tho people is improving. A survey of Europe a hundred years ago would compare very unfavorably with the position to-day. Dire predictions have always been a phenomenon in our social life. In the nineteenth century religious zealots were continually predicting tho end of the world. This was notably so in England and America. Tho day and the hour were announced, and thousands of simple people waited in terrified apprehension for the dread event. In Dr Johnson’s time the philosophers seriously considered these questions. This caused a certain Mr Edwards to naively remark, after hearing ono of these discussions i “I, too, would like to be a philosopher, but I always find cheerfulness breaking in.” Sir Conan Doyle’s statement that we are sinking deeper and deeper into the mire can bo challenged. It is true that" there are phases of our social and industrial life that are to be deplored. Wo have not yet returned to normal life after the shook of war, but there is no justification , for the exaggerated forebodings so commonly expressed.

In another category is the economic prophet, the man who predicts that the world will soon bo over-populated, and that there will not be enough food and other necessaries to go round. There have been anticipations of a coal famine, which we know in the light of events to-day to bo groundless. More than thirty years ago a prominent British physicist declared that there was an imminent danger of a decrease in the world’s wheat supply that would cause tire price of that cereal to soar to heights beyond the great mass of consumers to buy. Just afterwards the potentialities of Canada as a wheatproducing country wore realised, and the alann soon passed. Since then there have been many suggestions of a similar nature relating to other commodities and services, but all equally groundless. This scarcity-of-food alarm was raised recently by Mr H. C. Wallace, an American authority on agricultural subjects, who asserted that by 1960 the food shortage will have reached such a pass that “ nations in their scramble for food and markets will find another universal blood-letting the only solution of the problem.” The food resources of the world have never been carefully surveyed, let alone developed. They are immense, and under modern scientific methods it is reasonable to assume that food could be supplied to feed a vastly-augmented»popu-lation. What is most wanted is a spirit of goodwill and co-operation throughout the world. As for the prophets, they should not be taken too seriously.