THE HIGHER PRINCIPLE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 11537, 5 November 1915, Page 4

THE HIGHER PRINCIPLE.

- ■ —s■ . SIR EDWARD GREY'S IMMORTAL SERVICE. Mr Benjamin Kidd, the author of ''Social Evolution" and " Principles of Western Civilisation," in an interview in the "Daily News," points out what are the winning principles iu this great light. " Go back to Darwin and natural selection." be said. "It is tho nation with tho highest principle that is destined to survive, and in this ease that nation is not Germany. We have grasped the higher principle—Sir Edward Grey has held fast to it—and outbusiness is to organise and develop it as Germany has developed the lower. We have not yet realised that the strength of Germany lies in her reliance on organised idealism, with William 11. as its central figure. The German Emperor is, in my estimation, immeasurably the greatest man in civilisation, and we ought to recognise it. But ho has turned the edge of all those gifts against himself by allowing German policy to be ruled by people who throw over the principles of civilisation.

" Sir Erhvard Grey's immortal service to Britain in this war is that ho has formulated the case against Germany's military caste clearly in terms of the principles of civilisation. The spectre which haunts the minds of Germany's ruling classes now above all other preoccupations is the fear that the nature of this case should ultimately penetrate to the mind of the German people. " For Sir Edward Grey's service to civilisation has this remarkable effect. It has made any proposal for the. making of peace with the present rulers of Germany almost like a proposal for compounding a felony. Civilisation may yet have to act on this fact. We have no quarrel with the German people. Only with their rulers. The mpst direct way of resolving this situation so as to bring m the full power of civi'sation behind it may yet be for the great Allies at no distant date to declare the United States of Enropo. "1 do not believe that this war will end war, but it will give the world the greatest opportunity it has known in modern yeai-s of freeing itself from the incubus of force. This is the greatest example wo have ever had before us of what war really mcaiio, and we must seize the impression it creates and use it as an instrument of escape from i]\c era of organised force. \\ e must set the higher principle bolero us and convert the psychology of nations. ft t >_ member that our own country stands in a unique position. We have retained our freedom and rejected the domination of force. To recede now would be to betray the future hopes qf humanity. If we cannot stop conscription Prussianism remains enthroned, and wo may ns well put the world's shutters up. " J.ord Kitchener has still in reserve the greatest, recruiting appeal of all. He has. simply to tell the- British people that, as under no possible conditions can he h;iA' conscription, he ad« for our last man. He will get him. That is tho British. W4^'."