It is agreeable and indeed useful to step back for
a moment from the doubts and dangers of our present turmoil and to consider the effect of the Japanese outrage upon the Grand Alliance. I should wish for this purpose to recommend a little book by Eric Linklater which is published this week by Messrs. Macmillan. It is called Corner Stones, and the scene is laid among the beeches and the rivulets of the Elysian fields. The main characters are Confucius, Lincoln, Lenin and a young R.A.F. officer of the name of Arden. The chief properties are a television set, through which they observe the battles of the earth, and a jug of nectar, in which they are able to toast the Nobler Purpose. They are an intelligent and therefore optimistic
quartet, and the conclusion to which they come is that Great Britain, Russia, the United States and China, being equally threatened by the Axis, having an equal faith in the perfect- ability of man, are the four corner-stones upon which the new world will be constructed. It is an attractive gospel and Mr. Linklater has handled it with ingenuity and moderation. He has two minor characters, one present and one absent. The former is an unknown warrior who shows the wounds which he received at Thermopylae and Agincourt and whose name is " Courage." The latter is Monsieur Voltaire who, being a spirit of negation, has the tact to absent himself from the symposium on the ground of indisposition. The four main characters dis- cuss the world among themselves with sense and acumen. They also discuss the strange events which have brought their four countries together. What, they ask, is the common factor which unites such disparate elements? The answer is placed in the mouth of Lenin. " Some of you," he says, " believe in sanctities which I do not credit, and I shall not quarrel with your belief. But I believe that man is sacred, and with all who do not subscribe to my belief I cannot fail to quarrel. There is my faith. It is a faith in which you and your peoples and your Governments might be united." * * *
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