NOTES AND COMMENTS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22948, 28 January 1938, Page 8

NOTES AND COMMENTS

POWER OF WORLD OPINION The world's condemnation of Japan has been clear and all but unanimous, notes tho Economist. To this worldwide feeling the Japanese are patently sensitive, and the plaudits of the tiny minority of mankind that believes in the ideology of aggression can do little to fortify the Japanese against tho consciousness of being condemned by an overwhelming majority of their fellow men. This judgment of the world is like the spaciousness of China; it will tell against the Japanese with a cumulative ell'ect ilie further they go and the longer they keep at it. China is faced with a tragedy. But beneath all the mafficking in Tokio the wiser heads of Japan cannot contemplate without disquiet tho endless vista of the difficulties toward which their country is being thrust with such headlong precipitancy. HOPING AGAINST HOPE "The Home Secretary spoke of the terrible fact that we are to-day passing a Bill of this kind at this stage of human civilisation," said Mr. F. Montague, a former Under-Secretary of "State for Air, speaking in the House of Commons on the Air Raid Precautions Bill. "One can only agree with him about the insanity of the human race, and one wonders whether it might not be the case of the planetary cycle over again, barbarism to primitive civilisation, primitive' civilisation to kingship, kingship to democracy, democracy to dictatorship and then back again from dictatorship to barbarism. But I have hopes that there is some principle in the universe greater than that. I believe that there is something which will prove, in effective measure, an urge to progress in humanity. I have faith in the goodness of humanity at heart. With all the bad signs of human character that are displayed, I believe that when it comes to the final issue, the good will triumph over the bad, and that we shall be able to reach out to finer and more beautiful horizons of human civilisation than we have ever known." ARCHITECTS OF DREAMS "Art from the Outside" was discussed at the annual dinner of the Royal Society of British Artists' Art Club. Mr. Clifford Bax said it was his opinion that painting and poetry belonged to a stage of human history which for the time heing was past. Poetry and the arts belonged, he believed, to the youth-time of the world. He was sure that those of them who loved tho arts more than making money, more than politics, were belated people who really belonged to an age which had gone by. Mr. Humbert Wolfe said he did not think there was cause for lovers of the arts to be timorous about their future. After every great tumult in history a period of terror and darkness had encompassed mankind. Sometimes the twi-« light age had lasted for centuries, hut whatever tho period of difficulty and struggle, mankind had always emerged into the light again. But if the poets, tho painters, and the sculptors—the architects of dreams —were' to lose faith, whence would the light come? Now the darkness was very real. It was a period of danger, and all over Europe the bullies were in charge. Ho believed, however, that eventually truth would prevail. CHARACTER IN CONTROL

What is controlling men and nations —will-power, selfish motives, intellectual dishonesty, unscrupulous methods? Or integrity—observance of divine control? asks Mr. Irvine S. Bailey, writing in the Christian Science Monitor. Present clay activities witness the exemplification of human qualities and human planning as controlling factors. Widespread effort of influences of unproved worth to gain control has many mediums, organs and channels through which it is operating. Campaigns for control are being carried through gradually but systematically in such a way that the goal shall not in general be too quickly perceived. The aim is to include control of governments and municipalities. Mass control of votes is one method used. And the scheme and campaign ranges from operation within innocent groups to instructed politicians seeking place and power in local and national politics. One of the most effective ways to end secret and hidden control is to place in public service men and women of ideals and vision, those who have wisdom, practical experience, integrity, unquestionable character. .Men and women who are above manipulation, firm in their stand for the right. PSYCHOLOGICAL ILLNESS

" The extent of psychological illness is enormous," said Dr. I. 31. Sclare, of Glasgow, in an address at the Glasgow conference of the Scottish Association of Mental Welfare. As an example of this illness he mentioned the case of a man whose legs were stiff and his joints sore simply because " something in the outside world had frightened him." The disturbance of function had not arisen from actual bodily disease. Dr. Sclare said that, private general practitioners had told him they were convinced that three out of every four cases they were asked to see were chiefly functional. He himself did not think it would be exaggerating to put the proportion at one-third. Little provision had been made for coping \vith the illness; in the training of medical students no official notice had ever been taken of it in this country. Inferring to the depressing effects of this neglect, Dr. Sclare spoke of a girl who had been costing the public about 10s a week in tablets for the control of her epileptic convulsions. "On investigation 1 found the seizures were not epileptic at all. The girl suffered from" a psychoneurosis —an anxiety state — and the so-called seizures, which were really little fainting turns, represented her desire symbolically to retreat from the difficulties of her environment. During the time she was swallowing her so-called controlling tablets she was taking 50 turns a week, but after only 15 minutes' talk about the mechanism causing her illness her mother reported that the number of fits dropped to only one or two a week—and without her taking any tablets. " Slot-macliine-tablet-therapv replaced by psychotherapy! " Dr. Sclare exclaimed. "Psychotherapy is the cheapest and most scientific way to attack one-third of all illness."