ness and self-stultification are not permanently to continue.

6. That means, in the next place, that we may believe that the war contains in itself the incidental opportunity for a great world advance toward a more Christian civilization. For the enormous tasks that the war has compelled, we may hope, will kindle the imagination and enlist energy for still greater constructive world tasks to follow. Lloyd George said to a labour deputation:

As

"Don't always be thinking of getting back where you were before the war. Get a really new world. I firmly believe that what is known as the after-thewar settlement will direct the destinies of all classes for generations to come. I believe the settlement after the war will succeed in proportion to its audacity. The readier we are to cut away from the past the better we are likely to succeed. Think out new ways, new methods, of dealing with old problems. I hope no class will be harking back to the pre-war conditions. If every class insists upon doing that then God help this country. Get a new world."

In this new world, we may hope that there will be a completer mastery over the ambiguous forces of civilization we noted-the solidarity of the world life, the enormously increased resources of power and wealth and knowledge; the extent of forced co-operation; and, also, a more consistent working through of the positively helpful characteristics of

the world-order-the democratic trend, the league to enforce peace, and the new internationalism.

All this should lead to great social gains, and to the permeation of all civilization with the spirit, the standards, and ideals of Christ-a true conquest of Christ over individuals, classes, institutions, nations, and races.

7. A special ground of hope is to be found in the positively helpful factors, noted in the changing world-order-the democratic trend, the virtual existence already of a league of nations to enforce peace, and the new actual internationalism.

(1) First of all, the general trend, the world over, toward democracy, is most notable. Every nation, even in Asia, except Afghanistan, is living under some form of constitution. China, with its immense territory and population, has become republican, even unstably so. The Russian revolution, in spite of the grave anxieties it now stirs, was a prodigious achievement in itself, and prophetic of similar changes elsewhere. Everywhere the war bids fair, with simple justice, to extend the suffrage and the recognition of the rights of the common people among all the belligerents. The sweeping changes in the suffrage which are planned in England, including its extension to women, and the bringing of India into the Imperial Conference, are illustrations. Situations inconsistent with an essentially democratic viewpoint, men more and more feel are not be defended. Even in Germany demo

cratic aspirations have found vigorous utterance. Maximilian Harden speaks undoubtedly for many Germans when he says:

"Because our existence depends on it-demands it-must we go toward democracy. There is democracy all around; who dares stop the wheel of history? The union of peoples is on the way; do we wish to freeze outside?"

Scheidemann, leader of the majority of the Socialist Party in the Reichstag, declares:

"The whole world sees among our enemies more or less developed forms of democracy, and in us it sees only Prussians."

Ledebour dared to say in the Reichstag: "We regard a republic as a coming inevitable development in Germany."

An equally prominent English publicist similarly remarks:

"The stars in their courses, the logic of circumstances, the everyday needs and everyday intelligence of man, all these things march irresistibly towards a permanent world peace based on democratic republicanism."

(2) Moreover, it is not too much to say-and it is a most significant and encouraging fact-that, now that the cause of the Allies is cleared of the gross inconsistency of the Russian autocracy, a League of Nations to enforce peace is already in existence. As one of our most thoughtful editors puts it:

"The league of peace exists sooner than any of us dared to hope. What was a paper plan and a theoretic vision two years ago, is today a reality. The liberal peoples of the world are united in a common cause."

(3) It is of even deeper significance, that, as the war has spread and the needs of the world have become greater, a new internationalism has arisen, and a supernational control of necessities has been practically forced upon the Allies. The New Republic's statement must impress the thinking man:

"What is being arranged in Washington these days is really a gigantic experiment in internationalism. For the first time in history the food supply, the shipping, the credit, and the manpower of the nations are to be put under something like joint administration. We are witnessing the creation of a supernational control of the world's necessities. The men who are charged with conducting this war are now compelled to think as international statesmen. The old notions of sovereignty no longer govern the facts. Three of the unifying forces of mankind are at work-hunger, danger and a great hope. They are sweeping into the scrap heap the separatist theories that nations should be self-sufficing economically and absolutely independent politically. A new and more powerful machinery of internationalism is being created. It is a true internationalism because it deals not with dynastic and diplomatic alliances but with the co

operative control of those vital supplies on which This is the birth of the

human life depends. League of Nations."

Such internationalism-built upon a true nationalism, for they are not inconsistent-opens up a vision of a new world. For the problems here forced by the war are in truth always the only less critical problems of peace also. The earth and the race are perfectly capable of producing an adequate supply of all that men need, the world over. Famines anywhere are truly unnecessary. The great problems of peace are these same problems of an humane and scientific control of production, distribution and consumption. Here is opportunity for men's highest powers in times of peace; here, a great challenge for that liberation of human energies in peaceful outlets for which Bertrand Russell pleads.

"The United States, we believe and hope (says another editor), is already permanently a member of an international federation that will finally, in some form or other, embrace all progressive countries, and decide at a joint council table, those questions which involve conflict of interests."

There is thus opened the hope of such companionship on high aims, as the world has never seen, that should send a thrill of expectation through every aspiring man. Are we to allow this opportunity to be lost?

8. The war has also brought new faith in the common men of all the nations. It is significant,