" FUNDAMENTAL BRAINWORK."
[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."] SIR,—It would be foolish indeed to think there could be any. royal road to national prosperity, ornny " panacea " for .the economic and industrial troubles of the time. But small in, cidents are sometimes illuminating, and two such, I .venture to think, respectively point the way. along the one. and throw into relief some of the causes of the other. (]),Marshal Foch has been acclaimed by experts as one of the great soldiers of all time, and his .genius is said to have been nourished in pre- cisely the same way .as that of Napoleon. In a recent sketch of his character the expression " fundamental brainwork" occurs more than once, and the writer states that the Marshal, like Napoleon, had accustomed himself to concentrate for hdurs. on sheer abstract thinking, and exacted the same discipline from the officers he trained. (2) We may .grant that neither' wicked Dukes on the one hand, nor the depravity of the work-: ing classes on the other, are wholly responsible for the troubles, that beset us.at this moment. But even with goodwill is it to be-supposed that there is any may out. of them (or out of the' Irish dilemma).save the way of "lundamental brainwork "?. Yet this is the precise moment when we are told that our rulers have " insufficient time for thought "-s-even, presumably,. the inexact kind beloved of Anglo-Saxondom. 'Have we any right to expect that our Anglo-Saxon "qualities" shall .for ever save us from the consequences of their -". defecte"'?-1
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