i9io3 An Apostle of Peace 



Angell Lane, and as " Norman Angell " he was allowed Norman 

 by Harmsworth (Lord Northcliffe), owner of the "^"^^^^ 

 Mail, to contribute to other journals pacifist and 

 democratic articles not in accordance with North- 

 cliffe's views or rather policy, for the famous journal- 

 ist has apparently no views. Under his pseudonym, 

 therefore, Lane had already published a most remark- 

 able pamphlet, "Europe's Optical Illusion." In this 

 he asserted that Europe was heading directly toward 

 war, unthinkable from any rational point of view, 

 and bound to end in general ruin. The movement he 

 ascribed to an "optical illusion," the current belief 

 that nations gain in strength and wealth by war. 



This little book was later expanded by its author "The 

 into "The Great Illusion," which has been translated ^,7"^'. „ 

 mto nearly every language, and which soon made its 

 author the leader of active and constructive work for 

 pacifism in Great Britain, and to a large extent 

 throughout the world, with a growing reputation as 

 "the greatest of pamphleteers." 



In England in 1913 and 1914 I saw much of his 

 work. Slender and fragile of body, with a fine face, 

 he yet had an air of solid conviction which carried 

 weight. As a teacher of young men I have hardly a master- 

 known his equal. He has a clearness and fairness of ^^^ ^^^'^^'' 

 logic which cuts away irrelevant matter and sets one 

 to thinking about things as they really are. Return- 

 ing to England about 191 1, he soon gathered around 

 him a large group of students, particularly in London, 

 Cambridge, and Manchester, and the theory of the 

 economic futility of war as well as its political suicide 

 became known as "Norman Angellism." In 1914 

 his disciples established a monthly journal, War and 

 Peace, for free discussion of democracy in its relation 



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