RURAL PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT 265 



genius hitherto unknown in Canada. It has fostered harmony in 

 some measure between employer and employee. It has brought our 

 gentle women into touch with the struggles of the toilers and enabled 

 them to understand and share their burdens. It has dignified labour 

 while ennobling the character of those who have made sacrifices to 

 fill the places of our boys who have "crossed the bar." 



One morning recently a mother, while working in one of the 

 munition factories, received news that her boy had been killed at 

 the front. For a moment she was stunned, and had the deepest 

 sympathy of her fellow-workers. Instead of collapsing into grief 

 under the shock, and giving up her work, she set her face resolutely 

 and worked with almost supernatural strength. Her employer informed 

 me that she produced more shells that day than on any previous 

 day. 



This war, with all its horrors, savagery and sacrifices, has had its 

 ennobling effects, producing absolute and timeless qualities beyond 

 the power of oxidation. Science has discovered no solvent powerful 

 enough for them. They are outside the engineers' specifications and 

 tests. They are engraved on the heart, and beyond the decay of moth 

 and rust. This moral fibre in Canadian industry has provided better 

 conditions in the works, and has brought into prominence welfare 

 work of inestimable value. Signs are not wanting that it will increase 

 facilities for the education of the workers and establish a community 

 of interests between masters and men which exalt humanity above 

 self-interest. If my vision of the future is not distorted, this same 

 moral fibre in both the employer and employed is going to quicken 

 "man's devouring need of liberty." If awakened Canada, with its 

 vast territory, thirty-onetimes greater than the United Kingdom and 

 with its natural resources of almost immeasurable value, is to "utilize its 

 possessions, it must shake off the fetters that bind it to systems 

 which are opposed to a full and free industrial, technical and general 

 education of the people. 



