NATIONAL IDEALS.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLIV, Issue 122, 31 May 1910, Page 6

NATIONAL IDEALS.

(By Leveson Scarth.)

"Where there is no vision the people perish." In a letter on "The Decay _of Ideals," written some considerable time ago, Lord Meath presses the truth that whenever m history a people have failed to be inspired by noble ideas, however wealthy they have been, or however powerful in outward ' seeming, they have diminished slowly, but continuously, like Holland, or have been destroyed rapidly like Carthage. _ He asks whether we, the British people, are conscious of the call ot spiritual voices; because whether we are or not actuated by noble visions is a matter of the most critical import to-day. . ... . ~ The primary impulse of lite is tne urgency of food. This is the underlying cause even nowadays ot all \ efforts, rivalries, antagonisms, or wars, concealed as this may be by the complexities of civilisation; in more primitive times the obviously simple motive of the great sweeping movements of whole peoples seems to have been just hunger. The Goths and Huns and Tartars poured west and south in search of pasturage. Allowing this to be elementally true, nevertheless man does not live by bread alone. The highest part of even the practical business of the world concerns itself with ideas; but this kind of work, being too immaterial for measurement, is usually under-estimated. Yet history seems to show that every active, vigorous nation of the past, consciously or unconsciously, has been stirred by an - informing spirit—an unseen force „ from within, which has inspired their ■"" outward life and shaped their aims; spmethng else, and better, than themselves by which they measured their advance, by and through which they worked out their material development. In a word, both individually and in communities, man lives and moves in response to ideals. The lives of past nations illustrate this genaralisation. The ideal of Egypt may, perhaps, be summarised as Mystery, that of ■Greece as Beauty, that of Rome as Power. Planted in a fertile plain,l where food was abundant, the Egyptians show the development of a mysterious spiritual life, whose relics still stand in the vast desolation of the sandy desert. ' Greece, through the ages, speaks of Beauty as vividly and as brilliantly to-day, as she spoke two thousand .years ago to the Emperor Hadrian— Beauty born in her through national ■effort and creative power as the whole-souled expression of that wonderful people, craftsmen of infinite patience. "A statue or a poem is the embodiment of deepest vision, of deepest agony, now at rest there—a loveliness for ever."

The magic influences of Poseidon's Temple at Poestum, or the delicate words of Theocritus with their choicerness and lucidity, penetrate and suddenly arrest the mind even in the very midst of the commonplaces of our modern daily life. In philosophy, in literature, Greek wit is as elastic, her reason as incisive, her style as perfect as ever.

Rome, her successor and despoiler, shows an ideal of power in the subjugation of the whole known world, and the enforcement of the Pax Roniana.

That she gave Law and Justice to all her subjects is held in the judgment of History to be a complete justification for the sternness of her rule.

Carthage, on the other hand, displays no fine ideal making for nationhood," beyond her merchandise, her trading, and her accumulation of wealth. A broken arch and some fragments of stone are all that remains now doubtfully hers. She lives merely as an incident of the early history of Rome.

The Saxons and the Danes manifested a spirit of enterprise in crossing the North Sea which has its fruits in the emigration ideas of their descendants in the present day. "The Scandinavians in our race still hear in every age the murmur of their Mother, the Sea." If the Danes voyaged to harry, th© Saxons came to settle; and the Saxon element in our intricate ancestry clings always closely to Home wherever that home may be.

In the spacious days of Queen Elizabeth, this continuing spirit of discovery and pioneering furnished ideals for the daring in person or in money. Men adventured upon deep and unknown seas, and steered by the stars. Drake and Raleigh, gentlemen unafraid, were the salt that savoured their age.

The ideal of the Spaniard against whom they fought was pride of race. France has had an ideal of military glory under Napoleon; founding, however, no lasting results even upon his commanding personality, because a genius for Empire-building is in"tforn, and <as rare as the genius for art; ideals, indeed, however brilliant, must be used to light this work-a-day world; in other words, - the union of the practical with the mystical is necessary to produce permanent effects, but the practical tinged by the mystical cannot fail to be productive, and its results cannot be evanescent. A happy combination of the two qualities within a sufficient number of individuals gives force and life and progress to the whole community.

All pre-eminent nations have gone forward as it were by faith; for the strongest impulse of mankind is to realise its ideals these taking shape in..movements, perhaps in wars, and finally.in laws, customs, and injunctions.

Thus the Norman ideal, imposed by conquest and settlement, was Feudalism ; that of the English was always Freedom. From serfdom, by means of Charter and Law, to absolute liberty is the record of our story. Liberty still remains undaunted ■amongst us; sympathy with the oppressed and the unfree is one of our noblest characteristics. The acts of Great Britain hitherto have been those of free, forcible men, whose £#penness of mind and character has Jbeen gradually moulded and built "through ceaseless effort, in history. ! The. story of out endeavour, epitomised in Westminster Abbey, is our inspiration .and our pride. "A people which takes no heed to the noble achievements of remote ancestors will never achieve anything worthy to be remembered by their remote descendants" (Macauiay).

History, founded on idealisms in practical action, furnishes a continuous series of examples tand illustrations ; therefore, Pageants are welcome as pictures for remembrance.

But Pageantry quickly fades. "The tumult and the shouting dies, the

captains and the kings depart. There remains our ' Heritage—our position and possessions in the world —all that is meant by and included in the British Empire1. This represents, indeed, ideals already realised, such as comfort, security, home enjoyments, maps painted red. Yet imagination must have altogether decayed from disuse unless it means duty in the future much more than mere content in the present. "Bear-bought and clear, a thousand year Our father's title runs, Make we likewise their sacrifice, Defrauding not our sons." The keynote of all national life, its mainspring and impulse, is the looking forward for those coming after, the handing on undiminished what we have ourselves received and enjoyed. This is patriotism. Imperialism is patriotism transfigured and ennobled, enlarged so as to embrace five nations and millions of colored races. The word Imperial in history has long had a flavour of conquest; therefore it has clinging associations of vainglory and boasting; but the British Empire is too laden with heavy responsibilities to be anything but a thought for humbleness and prayer. : . Imperialism expresses m a single woi'd that natural desire for effective combination which five scattered nations feel who are separated from one another by the vast spaces of the sea, but who are united in loyalty to the same Flag and the same King, and who are thinking much the same thoughts. Britannia, the grey mother, is the chief and centre of the five. Ancient, but not old, rather she might be gently described <as "having been young a very long time." The daughter nations are most evidently youthful, and therefore full of hope and energy; they are the impersonation of vitality. Hopefulness is the note of modern Imperialism. We of the Motherland have not yet fully realised the forcefulness of the family, nor its usefulness if kept together, nor its danger of dispersion. The ideals which stir us here are still local and parochial. They are not, even in regard to Great Britain, truly national. That of Progress has in our time been an ideal of infinite value in our social development. Any tendency of impatient persons to push forward too rapidly has been controlled by tradition, . and by an orderly deside that changes should be well considered—the equally admirable ideal of standing in the ancient ways. A sharpened sense of the discomforts and distresses which affect humanity has developed an ideal of Socialism with its enticing short-cuts to happiness. Contrariwise the ideal of Capital is to maintain and fructify as the steady basis of trade and prosperity; the ideal of Labor is that the hand-worker shall toil less and enjoy more.

All these are respectable, nay fine

ideals striving for the betterment of the whole community through that section of it most* regarded by separate groups of idealists; but all are partial, and pitched in a key of minor importance. In them we are as golfers "putting" on the welltrimmed green, but neglecting to play boldly the long game. Imperialism, however, comprehends all lesser and existing British ideals, and can claim their allegiance. ' There is surely nothing inconsistent between Imperialism and even Socialism. Socialistic ideas must, have an economic basis, and without the Empire they would lack, at any rate in Britain, this essential foundation. The dream of Cosmopolitanism or the "Brotherhood of Man" is as yet in the clouds. Any mystic who cherishes this ideal should be practical enough to recognise that a Brotherhood of English-speaking nations is a long and an obtainable step towards this goal; moreover, that it can best be achieved by way of the present and future British Empire. The ideal of Progress again can find under the British Flag ampler scope for the free actions of a free people with every variety of circumstances. On the other hand, the constraint of an alien language and alien ideals, if imposed upon us, would arrest the clock, and each Briton would find himself pushed back into semi-Medicevalism, and into a kind of Feudal status from which he has only just nationally emerged"!'rafter incredible pains and effort, 'j'1;"! ' ;'■ We in Great Bifitain'sa%;''extraordinarily free from the freest nation in the w*6rM biit wen» longer have the wider cahised by the need of terrifoi'ial'^paiilsion, nor do we feel the stress''feifia'1 Strain of having to establish'ftitfsely#s iffrmly and securely. All this has'bWeii done for us by our fathers. 'Therjefb'te :we are too content merely to '*"exist beautifully." ' : Whereas, outside our "haunt of ancient peace, our sacred afel unraviaged land," a less settled world is in restless activity, which we seem to heed as little as the quiet readers in a club library heed the roaring of the London streets.

The yellow races are moving uneasily. Japan has developed a national spirit, the ideal of which is individual self 'sacrifice for the sake of the Emperor as the divine head of the people. Japan is our ally—at present. But Australia recognises a not distant danger, and realises at last her foolishness in keeping British cmi' grants away so that, wages may be high. In a sparse population the value of the individual man is enhanced ; but her best ideal is a white Australia untinged with yellow, and therefore she now sets an example to Britain in that she arms and drills her whole manhood.

The United States, again, have ideas extending beyond even their enormous territory, and they look out across the western sea. Their ideal, like Japan's, is that of a great Pacific influence, in pursuit of which they have pust fixed their naval base at Hawaii.

Canada, too, looks and develops westward, thinking forward about the finished Panama Canal through which her trade will travel back to the Atlantic. Her ideal is "Wheat enough to feed the world, and homes for countless millions of the British race."

All "these countries have lifted up their eyes; they have, like Napoleon, "so much of the future in their mind"—consequently their thoughts are broadened, braced, and stimulated. Every nation is the better for

having large schemes and a wide outlook. Her citizens hold their heads higher, and step onward more assuredly. (To be Concluded.)