• The Hague To turn from such thoughts to the
Conference Chamber at The Hague must be dispiriting. We seem to keep high and noble thoughts for the past, and to descend to sordid bargaining over debts and the materialism of the present. Yet this should not be so. There is no thought of war now at the Conference ; the League of Nations is inexpugnably established; friends and former foes have now the habit of sitting at conference tables. These things are to the good, and the business of settling for the future has got to be done. Business need not be sordid if it is looked upon as a duty done to advance security and peace. So let us regard the Conference just as serious business. The experts in Paris did so, and *struggled against every difficulty to reach agreement. If the Young Plan is wrecked, the blame will fall on the politicians. Their task is a hard one, in which they have 'our sympathy, but in the need to avoid failure their responsibility is supreme.
