The L - 6,gue of - Nations Making a Pool-Proof World WRITING after
General Smuts' speech at Oxford, it would be presumptuous in me to attempt to write anything new about the beginnings of the League. " Once a great idea has appeared in concrete form, it seems well-nigh indestructible." One epoch is the history of the world has closed, and another opened." No nation—and the British Empire least of all—can afford to disregard the currents of world-opinion at Geneva. I take these facts as established, even if not as self-evident or as generally accepted as they should be in all their implications. The time is past when the League needed any justification, but the need is all the more urgent for an exploration of the possibilities that lie ahead. What is this child of the human race, and of no particular set of men," likely to accomplish for humanity, its parent ?
THE WORLD'S Curus.
Besides General Smuts' speech, I have recently been reading the excellent articles on the League in the new Encyclopaedia Britannica, and a new publication by the League of Nations Union, Ten Years' Life of the League of Nations, 11319-1029 (price 5s.), and studying Philip's League of Nations Map of the World, on a scale of 200 miles to the inch (price 45s.) ; and the result of these studies, combined with, I suppose, rather more than the average interest in the work being done at Geneva, has convinced me that what General Smuts has called " one of the great miracles of history " is the mystery of birth and growth in the region of mind, rather than any definitely accomplished fact. The League began as a delicate child, orphaned in its critical infancy by the United States, and nurtured on idealisms which at first appeared unsubstan- tial ; now, however, it has grown beyond alt expectation, so that a power has been loosed on the world whose hands may fashion all the future of our posterity. We could not, if we would, suppress this mysterious force ; but by understand- ing and directing it, we have the greatest instrument ever forged for the world's happiness. In a sense this is a platitude. But truths which are obvious in the cosmopolitan—or rather international—atmosphere of Geneva are not so readily dis- cernible in the homes and clubs and village halls of England. Ideas take time to percolate into national consciousness, and yet until the organization of the world's peace is better understood in this country there will be room for books such as this record which I have hi galley-proof before me, sponsored by the League of Nations Union.
"TEN YEARS' LIFE OP' THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS."
In the book, to be published on the I5th, there will be, in addition to the text, about fifty pages of illustrations, and the whole format will be that of a book of double the price actually asked. The writing and editing has been done without fee, so that it has been possible to keep the cost to 5s., at which price it should reach the large numbers of people who shun argumentative pamphlets and cannot be bothered with reference books, yet desire a readable narrative of the forces that have brought the League of Nations into being. There is an introduction by Lord Cecil, and an epilogue by Professor Gilbert Murray. Five chapters cover the general history of the League. The making of the Covenant is described, and a historical retrospect given, showing the growth of those ideas during and since the Middle Ages, which concerned the forma- tion of an international community ; the increase of inter- national interdependence and communications through the centuries ; the arbitration movement in the last century ; and the War. We then pass to the essential points of the Covenant, a deseription of the Members and non-Members of the League, the functions and development of the Assembly, the lines upon which the Council came to handle its task, the Secretariat, with a sketch of its varied work, and an apprecia- tion of personality of Sir Erie Drummond, the Secretary- General.
SONS CRITICISMS.
Mr. Fanshawe, who has made a name for himself in his writings on the World Court, contributes a thoughtful paper on the creation, scope and work of that Tribunal, and there are two excellent chapters on the International Labour Office., in the coarse of which Mr. Eppstein traces the fight for
better conditions of labour through international action during the nineteenth century, and describes the creation and working of the vast establishment over which M. Albert Thomas presides. M. Thomas himself contributes a cheerful and eloquent " foreword " to this section, while Mr. Handel Mills covers the whole record of the achievements of the Office, the conventions that have been debated being grouped according to the classes of workers they affect. All this is excellent and inspiring. I am not so enthusiastic, however, about some of the personal expressions of opinion by officials of the Union with regard to Ministers. I know how difficult it is to keep out personal opinion and yet secure that vividness and vitality necessary to sustain interest. But I tremble before some of the slapdash indictments which I find in these pages of the policy of some nations, especially the Latin nations. For instance : " Paris, Rome, Prague, Belgrade, Bucharest, Angora are deaf to the truth that cries out from the blood-stained pages of history that uniformity never brought unity ; nor fusion, peace."
THE LEAGUE AT WORK.
The sixth chapter covers all the principal interventions of the Council to arrest fighting, or to compose political dis- putes that might have led to war. The Bulgarian-Greek incident of 1925 is described in some detail, and compared with Serajevo, and Lord Grey contributes a short introduction on the same point—namely, the value of having permanent and accepted international machinery to settle acute con- flicts as against the hopeless jumble of national jealousies in 1914. How far, we may ask ourselves, has the League become, in the popular mind, an alternative to war as a means of defending or vindicating material rights ? Mr. Henderson has some weighty words on the subject, and Mr. Eppstein dis- cusses the Arbitration—Security—Disarmament complex with much lucidity, and gives an account of the progress in the pacific settlement of disputes and the vicissitudes of the disarmament movement. Miss Freda White contributes the chapter on Mandates, prefaced by a note from Lord Lugard, and Dame Rachel Crowdy writes a foreword on the Social Services of the League.
THE ENCYCLOPAEDIA ON THE LEAGUE.
Here I find myself moving in a more judicial and urbaner atmosphere. Would that every teacher throughout England should study Lord Cecil of Chelwood's introductory article on the League. The basis of his article is the great truth (which cannot be too often dinned into the cars of those who would make the League bear strains and stresses for which it is not yet ready) that we have at Geneva " a practical method of achieving practical ends which arc of importance to every citizen in every country." The League provides the mach- inery of reason, not of force. That, of course, is where the Protocol was so dangerous, as General Smuts has just pointed out. I have not space to enter into the difficulties which will undoubtedly be encountered when we come to measure, as we shall have to, the logical mind of the Latins against the cloudier aspirations of the Germanic (or Slav) races, but probably both types of intelligence are alI necessary as the bases of a durable world-peace. We can at any rate be clear as to our own point of view. " The League is not yet universal in its composition. The ability to deal with a first-class dispute between first-class Powers has fortunately not yet been tested. There is, as yet, no complete assurance that such a dispute would find the League united or effective . . . The League may lead, but it can never advance far beyond the opinion of the world." That is the sum and conclusion of the matter, and it could not be better stated. Sir Arthur Salter is its author. Each of the Britartnica articles on the branches of the League's work—Disarmament, Sanctions, Guarantees, the Treaty of Versailles, the Supreme Council, Outlawry of War, Disarmament and Security, Minorities, Mandates, Health and Economics, is equally cogent and in- formative : the new Encyclopaedia has brought the English- speaking world a step nearer to the realization of world-peace by publishing these most sane and well-written contributions.
F. YEARS-BROWN.
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