WHAT A. C. BENSON THINKS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXIV, Issue 69, 14 November 1912, Page 3

WHAT A. C. BENSON THINKS.

.REAL LIFE. Mr A. C.-Benson, writing in “Public Opinion” on “Real Life,” asks what is it we are aiming at? He goes on to say that if one reads the daily papers, studies the political speeches of party leaders, scans the foreign telegrams, skims the programmes of social reformers, one is apt, every now and then, to find oneself confronted with an awkward question: “What is it all about?” Politics are, after all, he points out, nothing but the making arrangements for men to live at peace with each other. People got in-the way of talking of the State as if it were something above and separate from the nation. But the State is after all the nation, and Parliament is but the nation making its own rules and its arrangements. Mr Benson tells us that: “Men are apt to get so immersed in politics that, they begin to think administration,,an,,en|l in itself. They base their political need not on a programme or a principle, but on an outspoken, hatred of their adversaries. Yet it remains true that the best governed country is the least governed i country. The payment of Ministers and members is so much money spent to give certain people the right to talk in public. The creation of bureaucratic offices to attach supporters is the grossest sort of corruption, if the offices thus created are unnecessary; it only means so many more mouths for workers to feed. ‘What then we may ask ourselves, is the real life that we are aiming at, which our political institutions exist to secure?’ The object of any community is, and must be, to prevent waste, to see'that no one is unnecessarily rich, and that no one is unduly poor; to reward merit by comfort; to induce men to be disinterested, public-spirit-ed, inventive; to give equal chances to all; to diminish crime and vice, and, most of all, to increase happiness.

That is what wo are aiming at, or cught to 1)0. What, then, is the ideal life for the citizen of a community? He ought to be made healthy, neighbourly, good-humoured, upright, selfnestrained, orderly. Ho ought to have a definite piece of work to do, in order to support himself, and to support also those members of the community, the children, the invalided, tire frail, the aged, who cannot do any work. These will always have to be supported, so that all toilers n ill be obliged to do more work than is actually needed for their own support. But toil ought never to fall into mere and hopeless drudgery. Everyone ought to have leisure and to be able to use it. Work ought to he enjoyable and enjoyed ; and, besides that, there ought to be an enjoyment of. beautiful and leisurely things. That is a simple programme, and yet bow far ■vve are from realising it!” Proceeding, the writer says disease, mental deficiency and taints of every kind, aie the chief obstacles in the way of such life, crime and vice often being merely symptoms of mental unsoundtiess. Ho also thinks there are signs of progress in the dawning of these ideas, evidenced by the diminution of cruelty and the desire that peace and goodwill shall prevail. In conclusion, he says: “The plain duty then of the man who desires to help on the life of his time is to have an ideal that is both simple and disinterested; ho must not claim too large a share of comfort, and he must above all things desire to impart as well as to participate. That, I take it, is the true Socialism, the constructive Socialism not based on confiscation hut on participation. The tendency to isolate oneself, to feel superior, to be very conscious of one’s j rights, to wish to avoid one’s duties—j that is the individualism with which no terms must bo made. It is on these lines that I believe our new Democracy is shaping itselfand I rejoice with all my heart to think that it. is not a mere vague ideal, but a belief which is amply justified by the signs of the times.”