The Story of Mankind [186]
century. They associated the idea of violence with the long-
ago age of unlimited monarchies and intriguing dynasties.
Every day they read in their papers of still further inventions,
of groups of English and American and German scientists who
were working together in perfect friendship for the purpose
of an advance in medicine or in astronomy. They lived in a
busy world of trade and of commerce and factories. But only
a few noticed that the development of the state, (of the gigantic
community of people who recognise certain common ideals,)
was lagging several hundred years behind. They tried to warn
the others. But the others were occupied with their own
affairs.
I have used so many similes that I must apologise for bringing
in one more. The Ship of State (that old and trusted
expression which is ever new and always picturesque,) of the
Egyptians and the Greeks and the Romans and the Venetians
and the merchant adventurers of the seventeenth century had
been a sturdy craft, constructed of well-seasoned wood, and
commanded by officers who knew both their crew and their
vessel and who understood the limitations of the art of navigating
which had been handed down to them by their ancestors.
Then came the new age of iron and steel and machinery.
First one part, then another of the old ship of state was
changed. Her dimensions were increased. The sails were discarded
for steam. Better living quarters were established, but
more people were forced to go down into the stoke-hole, and
while the work was safe and fairly remunerative, they did not
like it as well as their old and more dangerous job in the
rigging. Finally, and almost imperceptibly, the old wooden
square-rigger had been transformed into a modern ocean liner.
But the captain and the mates remained the same. They were
appointed or elected in the same way as a hundred years before.
They were taught the same system of navigation which
had served the mariners of the fifteenth century. In their
cabins hung the same charts and signal flags which had done
service in the days of Louis XIV and Frederick the Great.
In short, they were (through no fault of their own) completely
incompetent.
The sea of international politics is not very broad. When
those Imperial and Colonial liners began to try and outrun
each other, accidents were bound to happen. They did happen.
You can still see the wreckage if you venture to pass
through that part of the ocean.
And the moral of the story is a simple one. The world is
in dreadful need of men who will assume the new leadership--
who will have the courage of their own visions and who will
recognise clearly that we are only at the beginning of the
voyage, and have to learn an entirely new system of seamanship.
They will have to serve for years as mere apprentices.
They will have to fight their way to the top against every possible
form of opposition. When they reach the bridge, mutiny
of an envious crew may cause their death. But some day, a
man will arise who will bring the vessel safely to port, and he
shall be the hero of the ages.
AS IT EVER SHALL BE
``The more I think of the problems of our lives, the more I am
``persuaded that we ought to choose Irony and Pity for our
``assessors and judges as the ancient Egyptians called upon
``the Goddess Isis and the Goddess Nephtys on behalf of their
``dead.
``Irony and Pity are both of good counsel; the first with her
``smiles makes life agreeable; the other sanctifies it with her
``tears.
``The Irony which I invoke is no cruel Deity. She mocks
``neither love nor beauty. She is gentle and kindly disposed.
``Her mirth disarms and it is she who teaches us to laugh at
``rogues and fools, whom but for her we might be so weak as
``to despise and hate.''
And with these wise words of a very great Frenchman I
bid you farewell.
8 Barrow Street, New York.
Saturday,