A Sheaf, by John Galsworthy.

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CONTENTS

MUCH CRY — LITTLE WOOL

ON THE TREATMENT OF ANIMALS

REVERIE OF A SPORTSMAN

THE SLAUGHTER OF ANIMALS FOR FOOD

ON PERFORMING ANIMALS

VIVISECTION OF DOGS

HORSES IN MINES

THE DOCKING OF HORSES’ TAILS

AIGRETTES

CONCERNING LAWS

ON PROCEDURE IN PARLIAMENT

THE NATURE OF LAWS

PASSING

THE MODERN STOIC: AN ILL-NATURED DUOLOGUE.

ON PRISONS AND PUNISHMENT

SOLITARY CONFINEMENT

THE SPIRIT OF PUNISHMENT

AN UNPUBLISHED PREFACE

ON THE POSITION OF WOMEN

GENTLES, LET US REST!

APPEAL TO THE PRESS

ON SOCIAL UNREST

ON PEACE

THE WILL TO PEACE

PEACE OF THE AIR

THE WAR

VALLEY OF THE SHADOW

CREDO

FRANCE

REVEILLE

FIRST THOUGHTS ON THIS WAR

THE HOPE OF LASTING PEACE

DIAGNOSIS OF THE ENGLISHMAN

OUR LITERATURE AND THE WAR

ART AND THE WAR

TRE CIME DI LAVAREDO

SECOND THOUGHTS ON THIS WAR

TOTALLY DISABLED

CARTOON

HARVEST

AND — AFTER?

PRELUDE

FREEDOM AND PRIVILEGE

THE NATION AND TRAINING

HEALTH, HUMANITY AND PROCEDURE

A LAST WORD

THE ISLANDS OF THE BLESSED

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MUCH CRY — LITTLE WOOL

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ON THE TREATMENT OF ANIMALS

Obvious! - and yet - just a century ago, it wasn't.

"Honour" killings still continue, for that matter!

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"“Gold-fish!”

"I looked at him very doubtfully; one had known him so long that one never looked at him in any other way.

"“Can you imagine,” he went on, “how any sane person can find pleasure in the sight of those swift things swimming for ever and ever in a bowl about twice the length of their own tails?”

"“No,” I said, “I cannot — though, of course, they’re very pretty.”"

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"“Does a man ever mean to be cruel? He merely makes or keeps his living; but to make or keep his living he will do anything that does not absolutely prick to his heart through the skin of his indolence or his obtuseness.” —

"“I think,” I said, “that you might have expressed that less cynically, even if it’s true.”

"“Nothing that’s true is cynical, and nothing that is cynical is true. Indifference to the suffering of beasts always comes from over-absorption in our own comfort.”
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"“Well,” I said, at last, “in England, anyway, we only keep such creatures in captivity for scientific purposes. I doubt if you could find a single instance nowadays of its being done just as a commercial attraction.”

"He stared at me.

"“Yes,” he said, “we do it publicly and scientifically, to enlarge the mind. But let me put to you this question. Which do you consider has the larger mind — the man who has satisfied his idle curiosity by staring at all the caged animals of the earth, or the man who has been brought up to feel that to keep such indomitable creatures as hawks and eagles, wolves and panthers, shut up, to gratify mere curiosity, is a dreadful thing?” To that singular question I knew not what to answer. At last I said:

"“I think you underrate the pleasure they give. We English are so awfully fond of animals!”"
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"“Pigeons are so complacent.”

"My friend smiled in his dubious way, and answered:

"“Do you know the ‘blue rock’?”"

"My friend, the joke is this: To the man who lets no little bird away to freedom comes much honour, and a nice round sum of money! Do you still think there is no connection?”"

"“The sportsman is necessary to the expansion of Empire. Besides, you must remember that one does not expect high standards at Monte Carlo.”"

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"“Do you mean to tell me,” he asked, “that any woman of gentle instincts, who knows that the ‘aigrette,’ as theycall it, is a nuptial plume sported by the white egret only during the nesting season — and that, in order to obtain it, the mother-birds are shot, and that, after their death, practically all their young die from hunger and exposure — do you mean to tell me that any gentlewoman, knowing that, wears them? Why! most women are mothers themselves! What would they think of gods who shot women with babies in arms for the sake of obtaining their white skins or their crop of hair to wear on their heads, eh?”

"“But, my dear fellow,” I said, “you see these plumes about all over the place!”

"“Only on people who don’t mind wearing imitation stuff.”"

"“That is very clever,” I said, “but how about the statistics of real egret plumes imported into this country?”

"He answered like a flash: “Oh, those, of course, are only brought here to be exported again at once to countries where they do not mind confessing to cruelty; yes, all exported, except — well, those that aren’t!”

"“Oh! “I said: “I see! You have been speaking ironically all this time.”

"“Have you grasped that? “ he answered. “Capital!”

"After that we walked in silence.

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"“But surely,” I said, “if we can’t do anything to help the poor things we had better keep our ears from hearing.”

"“And our eyes shut? Suppose we all did that, what sort of world should we be living in?”

"“Very much the same as now, I expect.”

"“Blasphemy! Rank, hopeless blasphemy!”

"“Please don’t exaggerate!”

"“I am not. There is only one possible defence of that attitude, and it’s this: The world is — and was deliberately meant to be — divided into two halves: the half that suffers and the half that benefits by that suffering.”"

"“You acquiesce in that definition of the world’s nature? Very well, if you belong to the first half you are a poor-spirited creature, consciously acquiescing in your own misery. If to the second, you are a brute, consciously acquiescing in your own happiness, at the expense of others. Well, which are you?”"

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"But we had reached my rooms.

"“Before I go in,” I said, “there is just one little thing I’ve got to say to you: Don’t you think that, for a man with your ‘ sense of proportion,’ you exaggerate the importance of beasts and their happiness?”

"He looked at me for a long time without speaking, and when he did speak it was in a queer, abstracted voice: “I have often thought over that,” he said, “and honestly I don’t believe I do. For I have observed that before men can be gentle and broad-minded with each other, they are always gentle and broad-minded about beasts. These dumb things, so beautiful — even the plain ones — in their different ways, and so touching in their dumbness, do draw us to magnanimity, and help the wings of our hearts to grow. No; I don’t think I exaggerate, my friend. Most surely I don’t want to; for there is no disservice one can do to all these helpless things so great as to ride past the hounds, to fly so far in front of public feeling as to cause nausea and reaction. But I feel that most of us, deep down, really love these furred and feathered creatures that cannot save themselves from us — that are like our own children, because they are helpless; that are in a way sacred, because in them we watch, and through them we understand, those greatest blessings of the earth — Beauty and Freedom. They give us so much, they ask nothing from us. What can we do in return but spare them all the suffering we can? No, my friend; I do not think — whether for their sakes or our own — that I exaggerate.”

"When he had said those words he turned away, and left me standing there."

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July 13, 2021 - July 14, 2021.

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REVERIE OF A SPORTSMAN

"Sport" being hunting, shooting, ... not for need, but entertainment.

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"I should think every beast and bird I ever shot, or even had a chance of killing, must have been there, and all whispering: “ Look at him! The ferocious brute! Oh, look at him!”

"Animal lover, as every true sportsman is, those words hurt me. If there is one thing on which we sportsmen pride ourselves, and legitimately, it is a humane feeling toward all furred and feathered creatures — and, as every one knows, we are foremost in all efforts to diminish their unnecessary sufferings."

"“He certainly ate me,” he said; “said I was good, too!”

"“I do not believe” — this was the first hare speaking—” that he shot me for that reason; he did shoot me, and I was jugged, but he wouldn’t touch me. And the same day he shot eleven brace of partridges, didn’t he?” Twenty-two partridges assented. “And he only ate two of you all told — that proves he didn’t want us for food.”

"The hare’s words had given me relief, for I somehow disliked intensely the gluttonous notion conveyed by the quail that I shot merely in order to devour the result. Any one with the faintest instincts of a sportsman will bear me out in this."

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July 14, 2021 - July 14, 2021.

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THE SLAUGHTER OF ANIMALS FOR FOOD

Descriptions of the horror are avoidable for vegetarians.

Wonder if nazi death camps were brought to mind of anyone else, reading this during years, decades, post WWII.

The recommendations here by the author, based on continental slaughterhouse practices, were NOT followed at Auschwitz et al, needless to say.

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" ... We should never stand the horses and dogs and cats we make such pets of being killed when their time comes in the manner in which we kill our sheep and pigs. And partly the law stands idle because in the case of horses and dogs and cats there is no large leagued interest, such as that of the meat trades, unconvinced of the need for improvement."
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"But the animal is not given the benefit of the doubt. Whatever the degree of consciousness of animals awaiting slaughter (sometimes for a whole hour) just divided by a door which, all regulations to the contrary, is far from always shut, whether they know or not that it is death which awaits them, any spectator accustomed to animals in their normal state has only to look at their eyes, as they stand waiting, to feel sure that they are in fear of something."

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" ... But to say that it does not matter whether we needlessly hurt the sheep or pig because they are going to die anyway is really to say that no suffering matters, however unnecessary, since we must all die and it will be all the same a hundred years hence. ... "

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" ... I blame no one, for I am not in a position to — the charge of callousness falls heavily on my own shoulders, who have eaten meat all these years without ever troubling as to what went before it. ... "

" ... And let those who would attack this plea train their guns on the Report of the Admiralty Committee, 1904. For I have but conveniently summarized the unanimous verdict of able and disinterested men, who, officially appointed to examine the whole matter, held many sittings, heard many witnesses, saw with their own eyes, and made their own experimental investigations. ... "

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July 14, 2021 - July 14, 2021.

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ON PERFORMING ANIMALS

Arguments of this piece apply just as well to lives of women, to the social norms applied and enforced, the must-dos and restrictions, whatever the culture or status.

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" ... I have only a certain knowledge of human and animal natures, and a common sense which tells me that wild animals are more happy in freedom than in captivity — domestic animals more happy as companions than as clowns. ... "

" ... I admit at once that animals have no more rights than have babies under the age when they may be said to have duties (on which rights, we are told, depend), that animals have no more rights than imbeciles, or those who are deaf, dumb, and blind. ... Once admit that we have the right to inflict unnecessary suffering, and you have destroyed the very basis of human society, as we know it in this age. ... "

"Nothing so endangers the fineness of the human heart as the possession of power over others; nothing so corrodes it as the callous or cruel exercise of that power; and the more helpless the creature over whom power is cruelly or callously exercised, the more the human heart is corroded. ... "

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July 14, 2021 - July 14, 2021.

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VIVISECTION OF DOGS

Amazing, when a hunting based civilisation capable of caring - naturally - so much for horses and dogs, necessary to human survival in Nordic civilisation dependent on hunting, nevertheless that civilisation heaps disrespect and worse on a far higher, far more ancient treasure of a civilisation for caring for the cattle vital to agrarian life in tropics.

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July 14, 2021 - July 14, 2021.

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HORSES IN MINES

This obviously applies to most family situations, including some where the male isn't breadwinner, since most wives and children, and often grownup daughters as well, lack power to fight back sheer physical brutality, physically or socially.

"Apart from the aberrations of human brutes, who flourish as well above ground as below, cruelty in these days is not deliberate, but requires for its existence three primary fostering conditions: the first, an overdriven or irritated state of nerves; the second, secrecy; the third, a helpless object."

"It is no more desirable for human beings than for animals to have to spend their lives underground; and what men can put up with animals certainly can. But men have at all events some choice in the matter, and they do spend half the week at least on the surface."

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July 14, 2021 - July 15, 2021.

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THE DOCKING OF HORSES’ TAILS

Just as justifiable as binding and consequent maiming of feet, and similar and far worse damages caused by corsets.

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July 15, 2021 - July 15, 2021.

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AIGRETTES

Horrible, until one considers Churchill starving to death millions in India by stealing the harvest and saying it was of no consequence if millions died in India; FDR even sent ships filled with grain to help India, which Churchill didn't allow forth past Australia.

" ... That English women — English ladies — after years of revelation concerning this dismal matter, should continue to support by their demands the killing of myriads of beautiful birds at breeding season is the most discouraging instance I know of the blindness of the human creature whose vanity is threatened."

"“The evidence has been such as to show conclusively, in the opinion of the Committee, that not only are birds of many species slaughtered recklessly, but also that the methods employed for slaughter are such as in many cases, and especially in that of egrets, to involve the destruction of the young birds and eggs.

"“Birds are, as a rule, in their finest plumage at the time of nesting, and have been shown to be especially the prey of hunters at that season.”"

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July 15, 2021 - July 15, 2021.

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CONCERNING LAWS

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ON PROCEDURE IN PARLIAMENT

John Galsworthy points out social ills of U.K., chiefly those resulting from industrialisation that affect the poor.

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July 15, 2021 - July 15, 2021.

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THE NATURE OF LAWS

Galsworthy has answers to the sputprious arguments about it being not business of law to make men moral.

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" ... In a democratic society, such as ours, only public opinion, or, I would rather say, the true secret consensus of general thought, makes laws possible — I am speaking of laws against inhumanity. And laws so made are but constant reminders to every one that public opinion is against such and such a thing. Laws were made against murder and rape because public feeling against such acts became so strong that, until the laws were made, normal individuals did not rest till they had torn to pieces persons who acted in such abnormal ways. ... "

"But pass a law to penalize the moderate smacking of small naughty children, it will simply be disregarded, because nine out of ten people do not see any harm in either their neighbours or themselves moderately smacking their imps."

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July 15, 2021 - July 15, 2021.

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PASSING

Passing of bills against cruelty to the helpless ...

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July 15, 2021 - July 15, 2021.

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THE MODERN STOIC: AN ILL-NATURED DUOLOGUE.

"First, what gives you the right to say these sufferings are necessary to society, and to interfere with our attempts to reduce them so far as we can? Secondly, what makes you an authority at all on the nature and degree of suffering?”"

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July 15, 2021 - July 15, 2021.

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ON PRISONS AND PUNISHMENT

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SOLITARY CONFINEMENT

Galsworthy argues against solitary confinement, but fails to see two or three separate things connected to it.

One, obviously, is about what precisely can a just and fair punishment be for heinous crimes against humanity, even if it's only rape, murder, or paedophile crimes, not amounting to massacres or genocides or terrorism.

Germans, after WWII, argued against death sentences even for heinous crimes, and also against imprisonment of war criminals, claiming that such offenders need "education", and neither death sentence nor life imprisonment serve any purpose, and are no different from murder.

Another is where the author speaks of "the warped"; since his time, studies in DNA and related studies in criminology have come to realise that a greater than normal proportion of offenders, amongst those having committed most heinous and violent crimes, consist of males with an extra y chromosome; but so far, the only effect of this realisation has been, contrary to expectations in interest of victims, that of concern that such males, unless already convicted of such crimes, ought not to be recipients of any prejudice against them!

Second, often life for a housewife amounts to solitary confinement with no possible escape. Men are likely to brush aside this, since they are not likely to be in that position, but it's no different from claiming that working for ones own family deserves no financial reward consideration and is no sacrifice, and so forth.

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"I think of it like this: Every now and then, seldom enough but still too frequently, we come across children, in all classes, who, from the age when they begin to act at all, show that there is something in them warped, distorted, inherently inimical to goodness. It is in them, of them, a taint in their blood, a lesion of their brain. They grow up. They are not insane, but they have a blind spot, a place in their souls or internal economy — or whatever you like to call it — that some mysterious, rather awful, hand has darkened. They are doomed from their birth by reason of that blind spot sooner or later to become criminals, that is, to commit some action which is not consonant with the actions of those who are born without this blind spot; some are not found out, some are. When found out they are known as ‘the criminal type.’ They form a portion, not perhaps a very large one, of our convicts. Can those, who have had the good fortune to be born like their fellows, punish these unfortunates for the sake of punishing them, for the sake of avenging society? I cannot bring myself to think so.

"“These are not, however, the bulk of our convicts. The greater part of them are those who are born more or less normal, but with what is called a weak character. I don’t know if you have ever been much amongst those classes which supply the vast proportion of our criminals; if you have, you will recognize, as I do, what a wonderful thing it is that so small a proportion of them become criminals. You will have seen the very dreadful struggle they have against luck from the time when they begin to know anything. You will feel, as I do, that keeping their heads above water is, and must be, touch and go with them from day to day; they’ve just a plank between them and going down, and a very little extra sea (it runs high all the time) tips that plank over. Many of them are bred in slums and garrets where the only real God is Drink. When they go under, they are suddenly up against the most inexorable thing in life, Law and Order, to whose mercilessness every citizen subscribes in self-defence, whether he will or no. When they have paid their debt to Law, they emerge into the same conditions against which they were too weak by nature to stand up before, with the one weapon they had, character, either gone or gravely damaged. It is not remarkable that they go down again, and then again, and so on, until they become ‘ enemies of society.’"
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"I — could not get an admission from any prisoner that the suffering they underwent in separate confinement deterred them from coming back to prison. The two reasons they assigned for coming back to prison were:

"(1) — That they had so little chance outside.

"(2) — Drink.

"It is obvious, however, that the separate period is almost universally regarded as much the worst part of the sentence."

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July 15, 2021 - July 16, 2021.

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THE SPIRIT OF PUNISHMENT

Here, the opening statement by the author,

"In the matter of our administration of justice there is a very simple question to be asked by every man of his own conscience: What do I believe is the object of punishment? Until this question has been asked and coherently answered by the community it is obviously as mad to apply punishment as for a man to set out to dine with a friend of whose address he has no knowledge."

reminds one of one by him in a previous piece, THE NATURE OF LAWS.

Presumably, adult and juvenile criminals receive more consideration by the author than "small naughty children", because of a subconscious awareness of the ever present possibility of being in the former, but never in the future in the latter, position!

This is even more obvious when hearing pious opposition from Germans about death sentence for even serial paedophile rapists and murderers, and - of course! - war criminals, who in their opinion - were only suffering because Germany lost the war!

It's the same reason that drunken - male, mostly - drivers killing toddlers got very rarely punished beyond a rap on knuckles by - mostly male - judges, until MADD - Mothers Against Drunken Drivers - was organised, and fought for justice. Or, for that matter, rape cases were very rarely given justice, always with a doubt cast against the victim, until Boston Globe fought back with "If she said 'no, it's rape".

Or is it worse, and actually about a subconscious foundation of ownership of the children- and wife - by the male?

"Now, whatever sentimental relation there be between punishment and our deep instincts of equity, the object of ‘punishment is the protection of society and the reformation of the offender."

Former is necessary and possible, and the whole point of law enforcement machinery; latter, cannot be guaranteed, especially at expense of the former.

"The protection of Society includes the adjustment of punishment so as not to leave on the mind of the injured person a crude sense of injury unhealed by retribution. It includes the removal from individuals of the desire to take the law into their own hands. It is necessary to preserve in punishment a due element of deterrence. The State and those who administer its functions have no business with anything but the scientific application of the best means to do all this, and reform the offender."

This is ignoring the necessity of protection of possible victims in future and ignoring also the impossibility of guaranteed reform.

"Crime is disease — if not in the medical, in the moral sense of the word. ... "

Hospitals need ICU and other isolated sections.

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July 16, 2021 - July 16, 2021.

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AN UNPUBLISHED PREFACE

"The characteristics of all prison life, at all events in England, are silence and solitude, physical or spiritual; and this cell scene was selected to convey as nearly as the limitations of the stage permitted, these commonest characteristics of detention.

"For the truth of this picture of Blind Justice as a whole I rely on the testimonial of that theatre attendant, employed out of charity, who, having been prosecuted, sentenced, imprisoned, and released, knew, let us hope, more of the matter spiritually, than those who criticize. After the play on the first night, to the question of his manager, “Well, is it true?” he looked up from his sweeping, and said: “Every word of it, sir.”"

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July 16, 2021 - July 16, 2021.

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ON THE POSITION OF WOMEN

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GENTLES, LET US REST!

Funny, how the author was far more specific and erudite when championing cause of animals, or even criminals, but here goes into abstruse discussion regarding equity and societal developments. Reminds one of his pronouncement regarding "smacking" of "small naughty children". He wouldn't legislate against it!

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"This is to state no crazy creed, that because equality is mathematically admirable, equality should at all times and in all places forthwith obtain. Equality, balance, is a dream, the greatest of all visions, the beloved star — ever to be worshipped, never quite reached. And the long road towards it travels the illimitable land of compromise. It would have been futile, as it was in fact impossible, to liberate slaves, when the consciousness of the injustice of slavery was present only in a few abnormal minds, and incommunicable by them to the mind of the surrounding society of the time. The process is slow and steady. ... "
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" ... Women, who can be divorced for one offence, must, before they obtain divorce, prove two kinds of offence against their husbands."

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" ... But it has yet to be proved that women are, in a wide sense of the word, more emotional than men; and, even conceding that they are, why forget that they will bring to the consideration of international matters the solid reinforcement of two qualities — the first, a practical domestic sense lacking to men, and likely to foster national reluctance to plunge into wild-cat wars, the second, a greater faculty for self-sacrifice, tending to fortify national determination to persist in a war once undertaken. It is well known that during the American Civil War the women of the Southern States displayed a spirit of resistance even more heroic than that of their men folk. ... "

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July 16, 2021 - July 16, 2021.

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APPEAL TO THE PRESS

"All political and social movements in this country depend for vitality on catching the eye and the thought of the community. And we may draw one of two alternative morals from that prolonged silence of the Press towards woman’s suffrage which originally brought about the campaign of violence: Either, that men having possession of the organs of public opinion, deliberately kept them closed to the discussion of the political rights of women — a supposition, I should prefer not to entertain. Or, that reports of violence and sensationalism are more sought after than tales of reason and sobriety! Whichever the moral drawn, it is very discreditable to public feeling in this country."

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July 16, 2021 - July 16, 2021.

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ON SOCIAL UNREST

Few admit existence of caste in West, or indeed anywhere except in India; so much so, few reflect to see that the very word is of European, not Indian, origins. Galsworthy is amongst the rare that acknowledge, not just see facts.

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" ... In my day at a public school — and I have no reason at all to hope that, whatever be the exceptions, the general rule has greatly changed — the Universe was divided into ourselves and “ outsiders,” “bounders.” “chaws,” “cads,” or whatever more or less offensive name best seemed to us to characterise those less fortunate than ourselves. It is true that we applied the name mainly to the lower ranks of Capital rather than to actual Labour, but this was only because we lived so far away from industrial workers that we never even thought of them. Such working folk as we actually came into personal contact with we never dreamed of associating with any such offensive thought in our minds or speech on our tongues; but, generally, the working man did not exist for us except as a person outside, remote, and almost inimical. From our homes, t ouched already by this class feeling, caught up from political talk by chance overheard, we went to private schools, where the teaching of manners, mainly under clerical supervision, effectually barred us from any contaminating influence; so that if by chance we encountered the “lower class” boy we burned to go for him and correct his “cheek.” Thence we were passed into the great “caste” factory, a public school, where the feeling became, by mere process of being left to itself, as set and hard as iron. It is true that a levelling process went on among the boys themselves, so that a duke’s son was no more accounted of than a stockbroker’s, but nevertheless all learned to consider themselves “the elect.” Of ten public schoolboys, seven have come from “caste-” infected homes and private schools, and have active prejudice already. The remaining three may still be open-minded or indifferent; of these, two will infallibly follow the sway of the herd instinct; one may perhaps develop a line of his own, or adhere to the influence of a home inimical to “caste,” and become a “ smug” or Radical. In result, failing definite sustained effort to break up a narrow “caste” feeling, the public school presents a practically solid phalanx of the fortunate, insulated against real knowledge of, or sympathy with, the less fortunate. This phalanx marches out into the professions, into business, into the universities, where, it is true, some awaken to a sense of wider values — but not too many. From the point of view of any one who tries to see things as they are, and see them as a whole, there is something terrific about this automatic “caste” moulding of the young. ..."
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"Since, in relation to the foregoing, four objections, at all events, are bound to be made, let me make them myself, and answer them too. First: It is not the public school and ‘varsity man who is lacking in sympathy and good-will towards Labour; it is the self-made capitalist, or the grammar school man. The truth is that, with exceptions, they all are lacking. But the defect is more dangerous and insidious within “the caste” than without; for not only is “the caste “ homogeneous, and far more influential in every way, but it veils its lack of sympathy in this very pretension of having sympathy. ... "

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July 16, 2021 - July 16, 2021.

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ON PEACE

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THE WILL TO PEACE

Galsworthy opens this, published in Daily Mail in 1909, with

"I WAS walking in the district known as Notting Dale looking for signs of the Millennium, when I saw on a poster these words: “Why England and Germany must go to war.”"

And proceeds to describe those looking at it along with him, evoking contempt and disgust, with a clear intention that this will rub off on the poster, the topic, and generally on everyone in his country in favour of such a war. Having tricked the reader, he then proceeds to argue more openly, with clear contempt for any argument he imagines for the war, not mentioned.

But he lived through that war, and well into rise of Nazism. He ought to have known Germany was responsible for escalating a local tragedy in Sarajevo into a global war with millions dying for better part of a decade. Did he ever change his mind about blaming England for it? Judging by his writings through that war, no he didn't.

Would he have known better after Nuremberg trials and the evidence of atrocities?

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In fact he quotes the argument for war that belongs, not to allies, but German regimes, both times:-

“War is an evil, but it is necessary; for the human race is divided into breeds, distinct from one another, and plunged into struggle from their births up. Only in each country’s jealous preservation of itself can we look for the welfare of the whole. There is no avail in dreams of peace; no use in preparation for it; men have always killed each other for their own advantage and always will; if they did not so kill their neighbours they could not themselves survive. Life is so conditioned; there is not enough for all. We know, therefore, that this war must come. We see it coming. We have fastened our eyes on it. We cannot get out of its way. We must offer ourselves up in holy sacrifice before this bloody, predestined monster.”

And if one knows about pursuit of Alexandra of Battenberg by her first cousin the Kaiser Wilhelm II, whom she refused, preferring another cousin - the then Tsarevich, Nicholas - and the subsequent sending of Lenin by Kaiser Wilhelm II into Russia by using a German diplomatic privilege of a German train going deep into Russia without examination by Russian authorities, which resulted ultimately into not only the bloodbath in Russia that helped Germany but also had Alexandra and Nicholas murdered with all their children and many other close relatives, ... well, the only blame England could accept was not showing alacrity enough - and men enough - to save them and Russia.

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July 16, 2021 - July 16, 2021.

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PEACE OF THE AIR

Galsworthy argues for scorching all possible development of warfare in air, which presumably amounts to scorching all possibilities of air travel and more, just so air and skies are left innocent.

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July 16, 2021 - July 16, 2021.

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THE WAR

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VALLEY OF THE SHADOW

Galsworthy prays against war.

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July 16, 2021 - July 16, 2021.

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CREDO

"And so I hold that without tarnishing true honour, endangering civilization present and to come, and ruining all hope of future tranquillity, my Country could not have refused to take up arms for the defence of her little neighbour Belgium’s outraged neutrality, which she had solemnly guaranteed.

"I claim from the trend of events, and of national character, during the last century that in democracy alone lies any coherent hope of progressive civilization or any chance of lasting peace in Europe, or the world.

"I believe that this democratic principle, however imperfectly developed, has so worked in France, in Britain, in the United States, that these countries are already nearly safe from inclination to aggress, or to subdue other nationalities that have reached approximately their stage of development.

"And I believe that while there remain autocratic Governments basing themselves on militarism, hostile at heart to the democratic principle, Europe will never be free of the surcharge of swollen armaments, the nightmare menace of wars like this — the paralysis that creeps on civilizations which adore the god of force."

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July 16, 2021 - July 16, 2021.

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FRANCE

"France! You, of all Countries, have the gift of Living Form, of a coherent grace, like that of your own flower of light, or such as haunts La Gioconda, listening to life."

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July 16, 2021 - July 16, 2021.

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REVEILLE

"While I stood thus watching, the sun rose, and, above the plain clad in the hues of spring, the heaven brightened to full morning. Amazed, I saw that the stars had not gone in, but shone there in the blue."

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July 17, 2021 - July 17, 2021.

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FIRST THOUGHTS ON THIS WAR

Galsworthy remarks on the prayers at the war for victory, vanquishing the enemy and so on, and contrasts it with the supposed creed.

" ... When this war is over and reason resumes its sway, our dogmas will be found to have been scored through for ever. Whatever else be the outcome of this business, let us at least realize the truth: It is the death of dogmatic Christianity! Let us will that it be the birth of a God within us, and an ethic Christianity that men really practise!"

Only - did he think this was the first war in Europe, or the first instance of brutality in name of the religion for that matter that he thinks is gentle, even without declared war? Was he unawsre of the inquisition, the burning of Jean D'Arc at stake, the papal orders to assasinate Queen Elizabeth I, and much much more?

Or - did he think colonial empires were acquired by missionaries by merely praying, and were run too by smiles and prayers, with no looting and massacres of subjects by conquistadores regimes?

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"If only autocracies — masquerading or naked — go down in the wreckage of this war!

"The superstition that unmilitarized nations suffer from fatty degeneration of the heart has perished in the forty-fourth year of its age, at the siege of Liège, blown away by the heroism of a little unmilitary nation!"
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It's ironic how much of the last part of following was so wrong.

"The Russian people is not Russia, unless it should become so in this war. There has hitherto been an almost absolute divorce between the essentially democratic nature of the Russian and the despotic methods by which Russia is governed. We English and French, fighting not only for our lives, but for democracy, for the decent preservation of treaty rights, and a humanity that we believe can only flourish under democratic rule, find it somewhat ironical that we have with us a despotism. And there is a profound reason why it has been and will be difficult for Russia to change its form of government. The emotional, uncalculating Russian has little sense of money, space, or time; he falls an easy prey to those sterner, more matter-of-fact than himself. Bureaucracy attracts the hard and practical elements of a population; there are, or were, many of Teutonic origin manning Russian officialdom. And Russia is so huge; democratic rule will find it difficult to be swift enough; in decentralization there is danger of disruption. Nevertheless, we” welcome the help of Russia, for, if France and we were beaten, it would not only be our own deaths, but the death of democracy and humanism in Europe — perhaps in the world. The tide of democracy sets from the West. It must permeate Germany before it reaches Russia. Out of this war many things may come. If Fate grant that military despotisms fall in any country, they may well fall in all, and our ally, Russia, gain at last a Constitution and some real measure of democratic freedom, some real coherence between the Russian people and Russian policy."

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Galsworthy repeatedly, consistently, overestimate West and Christianity, and its consequent other side of the coin too shows in his writings, identifying East and other religions, other cultures with dark, ignorant, despotic forces.

" ... The moon and stars would be shining over the battlefields, the wind rustling the trees there, the earth sleeping in dark beauty. So would it be all over the Western world. The peace of God doth indeed pass our understanding!"

Yet he fails to recall that, supposedly historic figure of Jesus was from East as seen from Europe, while his executioners were despotic Roman empire; just as he fails to see that subjugation of India doesn't testify to democracy of England.

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July 17, 2021 - July 17, 2021.

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THE HOPE OF LASTING PEACE

Notice the complete obliteration of nations, cultures, lands subjugated by european colonial empires:-

"And in considering how far the principle of nationality should be exalted, one must remember that it is in the main responsible for the present state of things. In truth, the principle of nationality of itself and by itself is a quite insufficient ideal. It is a mere glorification of self in a world full of other selves; and only of value in so far as it forms part of that larger ideal, an international ethic, which admits the claims and respects the aspirations of all nations. Without that ethic little nations are (as at the present moment) the prey — and, according to the naked principle of nationality, the legitimate prey — of bigger nations. Germany absorbed Schleswig, Alsace-Lorraine, and now Belgium, by virtue of nationalism, of an overweening belief in the perfection of its national self. Austria would subdue Serbia from much the same feeling. France does not wish to absorb or subdue any European people of another race, because France, as ever, a little in advance of her age, as already grounded in this international ethic of solid respect for the rights of all nations which belong, broadly speaking, to the same stage of development. The same may now be said of the other Western democratic Powers, Britain and America, “To live and let live,” “To dwell together in unity,” are the guiding maxims of the international ethic, by virtue of which alone have the smaller communities of men — the Belgiums, Bohemias, Polands, Serbias, Denmarks, Irelands, Switzerlands of Europe — any chance of security in the maintenance of their national existence. In short, the principle of nationality, unless it is prepared to serve this international ethic, is but a frank abettor of the devilish maxim: “Might is right.” All this is truism; but truisms are often the first things we forget. —"

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Galsworthy forgets, as Germans would love everyone else to, that German population outside ger9was direct result of German expansionism of over a millennium, when they turned conveniently to East instead of going to Jerusalem during crusades, massacred Prussian people wholesale and had Germans settle the land.

" ... What is a nation? Shall it be determined by speech, by blood, by geographical boundary, by historic tradition? The freedom and independence of a country can and ever should be assured when with one voice it demands the same. It is seldom so simple as that. Belgium, no doubt, is as one man, Poland is one man in so far as the Poles are concerned, but what of the Austrians, Russians, Germans settled among them? What of Ireland split into two camps? What of the Germans in Bohemia; in Alsace; in Schleswig? ... "

This was almost successfully repeated and was the very purpose of German expansion during WWII, begun precisely to colonise Europe and the rest of the world. Hence, too, the expulsion of all Germans from every nation East post WWII - none wished a repetition of the excuse of German population amongst them being cause of another war to annex their parts or whole.
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Again, ignoring world outside Europe, almost on par with a belief that they deserve colonial slavery without any consideration, almost on par with animals as in a zoo, or pets at best, with some used for work:-

"In my belief the best hope for lasting peace, the chief promise of security for the rights and freedom of little countries, the most reasonable guarantee of international justice and general humanity, lies in the gradual growth of democracy, of rule by consent of the governed. When Europe is all democratic, and its civilization on one plane — instead of as now on two — then and then only we shall begin to draw the breath of real assurance."

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"Representative Governments must answer for their actions to their fellow-men. Autocratic Governments need only answer to their gods. The eyes of representative Governments are turned habitually inwards towards the condition of the people whom they represent. The eyes of autocratic Governments may indeed be turned inwards, but what they usually see of the people whom they do not represent is liable to make them turn outwards. In other words, they find in successful foreign adventure and imperialism a potent safeguard against internal troubles."

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July 17, 2021 - July 17, 2021.

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DIAGNOSIS OF THE ENGLISHMAN

" ... Englishman. Ignorance in Central Europe of his character tipped the balance in favour of war, and speculation as to the future is useless without right comprehension of his nature."

Galsworthy sings paens of public school sustem and its effects, though restricted to English upper castes.

" ... THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. — This potent element in the formation of the modern Englishman, not only in the upper but of all classes, is something that one rather despairs of making understood — in countries which have no similar institution. But! Imagine one hundred thousand youths of the wealthiest, healthiest, and most influential classes, passed, during each generation, at the most impressionable age, into a sort of ethical mould, emerging therefrom stamped to the core with the impress of a uniform morality, uniform manners, uniform way of looking at life; remembering always that these youths fill seven-eighths of the important positions in the professional administration of their country and the conduct of its commercial enterprise; remembering too, that, through perpetual contact with every other class, their standard of morality and way of looking at life filters down into the very toes of the land. This great character-forming machine is remarkable for an unself-consciousness which gives it enormous strength and elasticity. Not inspired by the State, it inspires the Stated The characteristics of the philosophy it enjoins are mainly negative, and, for that, the stronger. “Never show your feelings — to do so is not manly, and bores your fellows. Don’t cry out when you’re hurt, making yourself a nuisance to other people. Tell no tales about your companions and no lies about yourself. Avoid all ‘swank,” side,’ ‘swagger,’ braggadocio of speech or manner, on pain of being laughed at.” (This maxim is carried to such a pitch that the Englishman, except in his Press, habitually understates everything.) “Think little of money, and speak less of it. Play games hard, and keep the rules of them, even when your blood is hot and you are tempted to disregard them. In three words: PLAY THE GAME” — a little phrase which may be taken as the characteristic understatement of the modern Englishman’s creed of honour, in all classes. ... "

Wonder if he thought Dyer was an aberration? The Queen's late husband publicly stated, on his last visit to India, that Dyer had told him that only a few people died (as he, Dyer, barricaded the gate of the enclosed garden in Amritsar with a tank and had soldiers open fire on unarmed civilians of all ages and genders, until they were dead - was that an example of "not exaggerating" fostered by Public schools?

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" ... You hail a porter; if you tell him you have plenty of time, he muddles your things amiably with an air of, “It’ll be all right,” till you have only just time. But if you tell him you have no time — he will set himself to catch that train for you, and catch it faster than a porter of any other country. Let no foreigner, however, experiment to prove the truth of this, for a porter — like any other Englishman — is incapable of taking a foreigner seriously (after a year of war he is not even yet taking the Germans seriously); and, quite friendly, but a little pitying, will lose him the train, assuring the unfortunate that he can’t possibly know what train he wants to catch."

"The Englishman makes constant small blunders; but few, almost no, deep mistakes. He is a slow starter, but there is no stronger finisher, because he has by temperament and training the faculty of getting through any job he gives his mind to with a minimum expenditure of vital energy; nothing is wasted in expression, style, spread-eagleism; everything is instinctively kept as near to the practical heart of the matter as possible. ... The Englishman’s proverbial “ hypocrisy” — that which I myself have dubbed his “island Pharisaism” — comes chiefly, I think, from his latent but fearfully strong instinct for competition which will not let him admit himself beaten, or in the wrong, even to himself; and from an ingrained sense of form that impels him always to “save his face”; but partly it comes from his powerlessness to explain his feelings. ... "

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July 17, 2021 - July 17, 2021.

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OUR LITERATURE AND THE WAR

Repeatedly, Galsworthy finds war distasteful, however justified the involvement of England (he agrees with that); and for him, an artist or writer can only be inspired by beauties of nature at peace.

" ... the war is likely to have little deep or lasting influence on literature. ... "

He ignores, or perhaps is unaware of, all great works of lliterature that do not fit into his idea.

Some celebrated works of lliterature were in the process of gestation even as his life came to an end - Hemingway, for example. Margaret Mitchell was writing her one stupendously celebrated book then, and without the U.S. civil war it wouldn't exist.

But Mahabharata is ancient literature from treasures of an ancient culture still alive and flourishing, and while it does not advise war - God Krishna does his utmost to avoid it every time possible, until forced at end by intractable villains into agreeing to battle - the epic does laud heroic figures, contrary to pronouncements by Galsworthy, and there is no greater work of literature.

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July 17, 2021 - July 17, 2021.

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ART AND THE WAR

For someone who championed cause of women's rights, human rights, and so on, Galsworthy was either not well informed or quite inconsistent in his opinion about artists whose lives and conduct wasn't in accord with his thinking.

"MONSIEUR RODIN — perhaps the greatest living artist — has lately defined art as the pursuit of beauty, and beauty as “ the expression of what there is best in man.”"

Rodin's treatment of women in his life, even of his son, was abominable; and as to being greatest, it's a matter of opinion - perhaps most people find it convenient to follow public opinion, or that of the latest fashion minority, but Rodin was certainly not the greatest if one considers Impressionists.

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" ... Art for art’s sake — if it meant what it said, which is doubtful — was always a vain and silly cry. ..."

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" ... Tolstoi, in limiting art to such of it as might be understanded of simple folk, served his purpose of attacking the extravagant dandyisms of æstheticism, but fell lugubriously short of the wide truth. .... "

" ... Not, of course, that the size of his public is proof of an artist’s merit. The public of all time is generally but a small public at any given moment. Tolstoi seems to have forgotten that, and to have neglected the significance attaching to the quality of a public. ... "

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Wrong, again.

"When the war is over, the world will find that the thing which has changed least is art. There will be less money to spend on it; some artists will have been killed; certain withered leaves, warts, and dead branches will have sloughed off from the tree; and that is all. The wind of war reeking with death will neither have warped nor poisoned it. The utility of art, which in these days of blood and agony is mocked at, will be rising again into the view even of the mockers, almost before the thunder of the last shell has died away."

A great turmoil did take place post, and even during, WWI, but far more was to come; and world culture has changed since WWII in myriad ways that only scientists could hsve foreseen.
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" ... The greatness of Blake is the greatness of his simpler work. Though, in this connection, it is as much affectation to pretend that men are more childish than they are, as to pretend that they all have the subtlety of a Robert Browning. ... "

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July 17, 2021 - July 17, 2021.

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TRE CIME DI LAVAREDO

Over and over, Galsworthy overgeneralises his perception and statements from him become incorrect because he fails to see they might not be true, or even coerect, outside Europe.

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"You three rock mountains above Misurina of the Italian Tyrol — how many times have we not climbed up, to lie on your high stony slopes, steeping our eyes in wild form and colour, wherefrom even a dull spirit must take wings and soar a little! Width of thought is surely born, in some sort, of majestic sights — cloud forms, and a burning sky, rock pinnacles, and wandering, deep-down valleys, the gray-violet shadows on the hills, the frozen serenity of far snows. All the outspread miracle there lies fan-shaped to the south, south-east, south-west, having that warmth which so makes the heart rejoice the moment one passes over and looks southward from any mountain. What traveller does not feel strange loveliness steal up into his soul from southern slopes? Domodossola below the Simplon; Val d’Aosta beyond the Matterhorn; Bormio beneath the Stelvio; and many another holy place. It is not merely charm and mellowness — the South can be savage as the North — it is some added poignancy of form and colour, and a look of being blessed.

"Tre Cime di Lavaredo! Music comes drifting up your slopes, from pasture far down enough to give magic to cow-bells."
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July 17, 2021 - July 17, 2021.

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SECOND THOUGHTS ON THIS WAR

Galsworthy sees Germany!

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"Germany calls the war “this English war;” we English as fervently believe it a Prussian war, having deep root in Prussian will, and history. One thing is certain: At the last moment the world, desperately balancing, was thrust over the edge of the abyss by a sudden swoop of the Prussian war party.

"“Pourtales (German Ambassador to Russia) called Sazonoff’s attention in the most serious manner to the fact that nowadays measures of mobilization would be a highly dangerous form of diplomatic pressure; for in that event the purely military consideration of the question by the General Staffs would find expression, and that if that button were once touched in Germany the situation would get out of control.” (Count Szapary, Austrian Ambassador to Russia. Austrian Book, No. 28.)"

" ... I cannot but think that, when peace comes and Prussian Junkerism is held harmless for a span, Junkerism in general will have a better chance of pushing up its hydra heads than it had before this war. ... "

" ... States still can seize here or seize there, if they be strong enough, but we emphatically deny that they should do so on principle, as the new German philosophy seems to teach, and set the robber’s ideal, the robber’s fashion of morality, for the individuals who compose those States. ... "
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"Our enemy now proclaims that his objective is the crushing of Britain’s world-power in the interests of mankind.

"Are we justified in retaining if we can what, in a by no means unstained past, we have acquired, or should we hand over our position, well and ill-gotten, to this new claimant, with his new culture, for the benefit of the world?"

" ... Germany, after being petrified with surprise at our intervention, now accuses us of having planned the war and deliberately attacked her. It is divinely easy to claim things both ways when you are at war. ... "

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"“A war of exhaustion.” How often we use those words! They are current in all the belligerent countries, and in all they are unreally used, as yet. But they are, I fear, literally true. It is a war which — save for some happy chance — can hardly end till one group or the other have no longer the men to hold their lines. The sway of the fighting is of no great moment; it does not seem to matter where precisely the killing, maiming, and capturing go on, so long as they do go on with a certain mathematical regularity. A year or so hence, when the total disablement is nearer twenty than ten millions, the meaning of the words will be a little clearer, and they will probably only then be used by the side whose united population is still more than twice that of the other side. ... "
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" ... The Teuton of all men requires the Christian, or shall we say the humanistic, ethic, to modify something science-ridden, overbearing, and heady in his soul. The Teuton, before the new philosophy of self-expansion at all costs laid hold on him, was welcome, from his many great qualities, in a world of other men. But his was the last nature that could afford to succumb wholesale to the faith that his race was the only race that mattered. If he could see himself he would realize that the very thoroughness and over-exaltation of his nature made it ruinous for him to tamper with this particular ideal, for he was bound sooner or later to run it to death, to the danger and alarm of all other races. ... "

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July 17, 2021 - July 17, 2021.

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TOTALLY DISABLED

"They who lie helpless are no longer quite bodies, for the essence of body is movement; already they are almost spirits. It is as if, in passing, one looked at minds, nearly all in the heyday of consciousness and will."

"To you, women of Great and Greater Britain, it has fallen to raise on Richmond Hill this refuge and home for our soldiers and sailors totally disabled. Where thirty-two are now lying there will soon be two hundred more. Nearly all my life I have known the spot on which this home will stand; and truly, no happier choice could have been made. If beauty consoles — and it can, a little — it is there in all the seasons; a benign English beauty of fields and trees and water spread below, under a wide sky."

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July 17, 2021 - July 17, 2021.

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CARTOON

This was published, verbatim, under the title "Gibbet", in Tatterdemalion.

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July 17, 2021 - July 17, 2021.

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HARVEST

" ... There is no solace in the thought that death is nothing! — save for those who still believe they go straight to Paradise. ... "

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July 17, 2021 - July 17, 2021.

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AND — AFTER?

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PRELUDE

Prophetic!

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"The strength of a League for Peace will depend before all on the conduct of each separate nation. We in this country cannot control the faith, conduct, or stability of the other members of the League; we can control our own.

"However it ends, this war must leave the bitterest feelings. League for Peace or none, there will remain for this country a menace from without.

"If Germany were what is called “crushed” — a queer notion in connection with sixty-five millions of people — she would smoulder with such a fire of vengeance that a victorious British nation, slumbering in dreams of security, waxing fat and swollen-headed, would in a few years time be in as great danger as ever. If Germany be merely shorn of her pretensions and forced back within her former boundaries, then, unless good fortune bring her a social revolution and the comparative blessings of Democracy, Germany may be much the same as she has been, a soldier-ridden State, quickly or slowly gathering force, to reforge the iron machinery of the Prussian soul, and lead the armoured dance again. Stung to the quick by memory of mistake, knowing that she misjudged our nature and our power, she will not make mistake a second time. However ardently the successful may desire to forget — it takes two to bury the hatchet. Let no one think that Germany will forget."

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July 17, 2021 - July 17, 2021.

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FREEDOM AND PRIVILEGE

It's unclear whether Galsworthy is deluded, trying to convince himself and others despite evidence to the contrary, or simply misinformed or worse.

"WHAT is this thing called the British Empire? A family of children, ruled by a Mother, or a gathering of kinsfolk under the roof of one ideal? Is it in reality an Empire or a Confederacy? It has been the first, if is fast becoming the second. Imperialism is governed for good or ill by the principle that underlies it.

"At the time of the American War of Independence British government stood for the principle of Domination; even so late as the Boer War there is much doubt whether, for the moment at least, it stood for anything very different. A great change has come. The British Empire stands now, as it never yet stood, for the principle “Live and let live”; for coherence through common ideals and affections, rather than for coherence through force. ... "

Even if that was written before the massacre at Amritsar of unarmed civilians of all ages and genders, by Dyer using a tank to barricade the only exit of an enclosed garden, still India was ruled by force and worse, as evident by the celebrity treatment given Dyer by his then fellow Brits in India (and promotions he got back in Britain) although he was reprimanded and sent home by the then British government of India; for that matter, decades later the visit to India (post demise of Princess of Wales), of the queen Elizabeth II with her husband, was marred by his casually minimising the heinous act of Dyer, stating he was told by Dyer that it wasn't a gig deal, that only a few hundred were killed under the rifle fire he'd ordered opened.

" ... In this war we have not ceased to assert that, besides the preservation of our own safety, we fight for the independence of little countries, and the rights of nations to settle their own affairs. ... "

Galsworthy champions causes of animals, and criminals without consideration of their offense, and the above assertion does not take into account the great nation of India and the treatment accorded India by British, while he talks of British championing case of small nations; at the very least, its racism on par with worst of slaveowner confederate South where a horse or mule was valued more than a slave. (A horse thief was liable to execution by law in almost all states, well into mid twentieth century, while a slave could be whipped or shot by anyone "white", with no risk of even a reprimand)!

" ... By this declared championship, unless we wish to bring down poetic justice on our heads, we have consecrated the principle of Freedom within the confederacy of the British Empire; we have abrogated the right of coercion. ... "

If there was more than slight partial truth therein, India should have had freedom - without partition - immediately after WWII. As it is, British had no intention of setting India free - and stopping the enormous looting and theft causing deaths of millions by starvation - until, due to army raised by Bose reaching India's borders, there were revolts in naval docks, which suddenly frightened Brits into an abrupt flight ignoring the deaths of another few millions caused by the partition they enforced, just so they could have use in perpetuity of free military bases for west for use against USSR; that India was forever thereby saddled with a terrorist factory at the border, helped by West for the said use of the military bases, was a convenient side benefit for Brits, as revenge against India for having stopped the loot by British.

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And here's another example of the fraud perpetrated by British hypocrisy.

" ... Only of its own free will can Ireland ever be made one. If the halves be not forced, they will become one the faster. ... "

If Ireland were not occupied and looted by British, there would be no Dublin verses Ulster, and using religion to pretend that Irish do not want to unite, thst a part of Ireland wants British occupation to continue, is plain fraud.

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Another instance of hypocrisy here.

" ... Will not the first act of justice be the giving of the vote to women on the same terms as to men — with, perhaps, some limitation of age to equalize numbers, since the preponderance of women is brought about mainly by the less dangerous nature of their lives?... "

Why, when women risked life and health in childbirth and endured physical, legal, financial, emotional and verbal duress from husbands, fathers, and society in general, did anyone ever come up with how and what to deprive males of, aged or otherwise, as a compensation?

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July 18, 2021 - July 18, 2021.

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THE NATION AND TRAINING

Galsworthy discusses conscription, and interim training of boys.

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"“‘ According to the main statistical sources of information the very serious fact emerges that between 70 and 80 per cent, of the boys leaving elementary schools enter unskilled occupations. Thus, even when the boy ultimately becomes apprenticed or enters a skilled trade, those intervening years from the national point of view are entirely wasted. Indeed the boy, naturally reacting from the discipline to which school accustomed him, usually with abundance of spare time not sufficiently utilized, and without educative work, is shaped during these years directly towards evil. ‘ (Majority Report of the Poor Law Commission, Part VI., Chap. VII.)”

"Now, if the richer classes of this country could be brought face to face with a sight of their own boys from fourteen to eighteen planted in this morass that boys of the poorer classes have as a matter of course to struggle through, they would marvel that the poorer classes have not long ago demanded that it be drained. Working-class parents have not demanded this chiefly because the boy from fourteen to eighteen has meant so many scanty shillings in the family pocket. When shillings are scarce one more or less seems vital. ... In the withdrawal too, of so large a number of boys from the labour market lies some chance of solving a problem that will begin to loom as soon as Peace comes: How to find places for the women whom the war has accustomed to work and wages? By this withdrawal, also, old and unemployed men would benefit; we shall want all the help we can get to minimize the unemployment that will sooner or later follow the war. ... "

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"But there is another aspect of this matter worth more than passing attention. If the war ends victoriously, Great Britain will bulk very large, dangerously large, in the eyes of the world. The German cry is: “Great Britain is the tyrant; the Fleet of England is the menace, threatening every country!” No effort will be left untried to din that whisper into every ear, to implant that suspicion in every mind. ... "

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July 18, 2021 - July 18, 2021.

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HEALTH, HUMANITY AND PROCEDURE

Galsworthy speaks of need to pay attention to slums in England, and feeding the children therein adequately.

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" ... The old-fashioned idea that children must go hungry or be fed so as to grow up rickety because their parents (being “rotters” already) must not be rotted further is a doctrine devoid both of common sense and compassion. ... "

Whoever heard of anyone being rotten enough to have so rotten a philos6???!!!!

" ... Working-class mothers who neglect to feed their children better than themselves are but exceptions, nor will a sounder system of State-help seriously alter the deepest instinct of human nature. The heroism of British soldiers in the trenches is no greater than the lifelong heroism of British mothers in the slums struggling against want. ... "

"The estimated number of school children in England and Wales being fed by the State in 1911 — 1912 was 230,000 out of a school population of 5,357,367. The estimated number of this school population showing signs of malnutrition is variously given at from 10 to 20 per cent. Taking it at 15 per cent., or 800,000 children, we have more than half a million school children wanting meals and not getting them. ... "

Hence the media being okay the whole horror, with clampdown on Churchill stealing India's harvest resulting in millions starving to death, and further, his not only declaring India dying by starvation was ok, but refusing to let the ships filled with grain - sent by FDR to help India when millions died - further than Australia, enhancing this crass statement about India dying of starvation was of no importance? No wonder he was a good match with the third partner amonst allies in WWII!

" ... But when the children under school age who need food and are not getting it, are added to this number, the proportions of this national folly and inhumanity stagger the brain. It does not yet seem to be grasped that these children, who are fighting not only against insufficiency of proper food, but against bad air and bad housing, grow up with so much per cent, knocked off their national value. A stitch in time is supposed to save nine. A pound spent on the age of growth brings back many pounds from the age of stability. To those few who ride the doctrine of Liberty to the death of national health it may simply be said: So long as you have no hope of repealing compulsory education, you have no right to let children receive it in an unfit condition. Education and decent nourishment are inseparable; and decent nourishment is as necessary in the years that come before as in the years of schooling. No! In reality the principle is now rooted, and, like other things, it’s all a question of money. But a country with a capital of £16,000,000,000 and an income of £2,100,000,000 cannot really afford to allow this state of affairs to continue — especially after the gold-letting of this war. ... "

Any thought there about how much of that 21,000,000,000 was looted from India, letting millions of India starve to death as a direct consequence?

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"What is it going to be — after — unless our measures in regard to food, to housing, and to drink, are heroic? For heroic measures we shall need a keener sense of justice, a larger humanity, than we have ever had. ... Man has only a certain capacity for feeling; one expects callousness now towards civil inhumanities. But must that callousness last after peace has come? If so, we are in a bad way."

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July 19, 2021 - July 19, 2021.

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A LAST WORD

"One must resolve — resolve that this new unity shall stand not only the strain of war, but the greater strain of the coming Peace. After — will come the test. Having guaranteed our country for the moment from destructive powers without, shall we at once redeliver it to the destructive powers within — go gack to strife over Ireland, the Suffrage, the Welsh Church, and the Second Chamber? Or, preserving our new-found unity, settle generously and in a large spirit those distressful matters, and pass on to the real work — to a wider and freer view of Empire, to the right training of the nation, the right feeding of the nation, to securing for each man, woman, and child a solid foundation of health and hope; to the restoration of the land and of our food supply; to clearance of mutual suspicions, and the stablishing of a new trustfulness between Labour and Capital; to the banishment of inhumanity; the freeing of the eyes of Justice; and interment of the privileges of class?"

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July 19, 2021 - July 19, 2021.

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THE ISLANDS OF THE BLESSED

Funny, the English never grasped the fact that their invading, occupying and looting other lands was never accepted, much less seen as benefic, by others so occupied - and while many brits were surprised thst, say, India did not see England as "mother country" (as John Galsworthy seems to take for granted that everyone did, as does the charter of commonwealth for thst matter), except those brought up as per Macaulay policy of turning a privileged few into brown replicas of the English and teaching them a view of the universe as per acceptable to England - they, the English including Galsworthy, are surprisingly oblivious to the real feelings of, not only Irish, but even Scots and Welsh, who never stopped feeling, not only occupied and looted, but abused continuously, as well.

And while Scots hsve barely refrained from declaring independence - English are not known to admit the loot, much less refund it or apologise for massacres - Welsh have, on the other hand, resurrected the language they were penalised for centuries for speakin .

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"I SUPPOSE there are Britons who have never seen the sea; thousands, perhaps — unfortunate. But is there a Briton who has not in some sort the feeling that he is a member of a great ship’s crew? Is there one who never rejoices that his Land sails in space, unboarded, untouched by other lands? It must be strange to be native of a country where, strolling forth, one may pass into the fields or woods of another race. ... "
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"This love of country is so deep and sacred that we cannot utter it; let us not forget that it is as deep and sacred to the natives of other lands!"

Including those occupied - and even the ones swallowed - by England, not merely those of Europe, friends or otherwise.

"Looking back into the dark of history, how quaint is our origin — offspring of invading robbers, wave after wave, for some two thousand years before the Norman Conquest! If these be not in truth the blessed islands that the ancients dreamed of, they seem to have been sufficiently attractive. ... "

Hence, of course, the English need too declare that Aryan were not original inhabitants of India but invaders, like other invaders of these last two millennia, just so majority of India would be robbed of righteous feeling of belonging!

" ... Who our Neolithic forerunners were, whence they came, or whether they were here before our isles cut loose from the mainland and set out on an endless voyage, we shall never, I suppose, know. A strain of their blood, more than we think perhaps, must still be alive within us; the rest of it is freebooting fluid — Celts and Romans, Anglo-Saxons, Danes, Normans, all robbers; blent at last — and in Ireland not yet quite blent — to the observance of honour among thieves."

India, on the other hand, does know who we are; invaders and migrants are a minority despite two millennia of strenuous efforts to the contrary by the invaders, which continue in shape of foreign funding of press and political opposition in india to denigrate India continuously.

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" ... I hold the theory — how far scientifically tenable I know not — that the continued vitality of a race depends on two main conditions: the presence of many strains of blood not too violently differing one from the other, and the absence of too much sun. I hold that nations may become too inbred; or may have the sap dried out of them by heat. In Britain we cannot yet have reached the point of perfect fusion — are not in danger for a long time of becoming too inbred. Nor can the sun be called a desperate peril. We are “game,” as they say, for centuries yet; unless — ! For our besetting danger is another."

If that bit about sun is honest, why were English going out desperately, not only occupying India in face of opposition by India, but going to Africa all over the continent looting it and "settling" other continents by massacring natives thereof? California isn't lacking sun in any way on most days, nor is Australia. Why not allow their natives the lands that sap them?

As for the breeding, why carp about other cultures having definite breeding policies, and why hold spawns of English on other lands as lesser breed?

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July 19, 2021 - July 19, 2021.

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Kindle Edition

Published December 3rd 2019

(first published May 1st 2001)

ASIN:- B082BHPT6B

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July 13, 2021 - July , 2021.

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Paperback, 408 pages

Published May 1st 2001

by International Law & Taxation

ISBN1589632419

(ISBN13: 9781589632417)

Edition LanguageEnglish

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Monday, July 19, 2021

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