AN OBJECT LESSON.

Northern Advocate, 1 May 1914, Page 11

AN OBJECT LESSON.

Europe, rich as it is in historic associations, has, from the -standpoint of civilised humanity, Wore to learn from the New World than the New has from the Old. Europe to-day is an armed caitnp. Every frontier bristles with fortresses, guns and armed men. Between the two foremost purely European Powers there runs a boundary Jine across which no man dare go without a passport, and along the whole length of which are to be seen in their highest perfection the fruit of man's scientific and mechanical genius when applied to the weapons and methods of war. How different are th e conditions when we pass, from Europe to North America. What these are has been declared in eloquent terms by Sir Wilfrid Laurier. Speaking in the Dominion House of Commons some three years ago, the then Prime Minister said:—"There is a spectacle that should astound the world by its novelty and grandeur— the spectacle of two peoples living in amity side by side for a distance of 4000 miles along a line which is hardly visible in many quarters, with no cannon, no guns frowning across it, with no fortresses on either side, with no armament one against another, but living in harmony and mutual confidence, and with no other rivalry than generous emulation in. the,arts of peace." Small wonder is it that this unarmed Cana-dian-American frontier has been referred to as, " A rebuke to the militarism of the Old World and a challenge to the courage and faith of every, nation." And what now is in the North American Continent might well be in Europe also.