What seems to have been entirely forgotten in the debate
was to consider how Mr. Massingham, if he had been willing, as surely he should have been willing in war time, to sink his amour propre, should have taken the annoyance of having the export of a few hundred copies per week stopped. Surely what he should have said was : 'I am writing to influence my countrymen, and to make them see what I sincerely hold to be the right view—to direct them and to admonish them. I am obliged to do this in plain terms. Incidentally, I am aware that an unscrupulous enemy might quite well twist what is said in all sincerity into dangerous admissions, or by clever manipulation of my text make me appear pro-German and anti-Ally. Therefore I am grateful to the Government for preventing my paper going abroad to be misused. The embargo will give me a freer hand to express my own views, for I have been embarrassed by the risk of misinterpretation.'
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