LAND AND WATER. 
August 7, 1915. 
than on the British: indeed, it is not until wc approacli 
and enter upon tiie lustorv of the growth of the I.uropean 
nations, as we know tlieni to-day, that this idea of pro- 
gress, wliich alread\ seems so essential to life, is dearly 
discernible at all. This we should discover; but we 
should discover something else also. Looking for pro- 
cress and for the circumstances under which it arises 
we should quickly be aware that it never enters history 
alone. It comes always accompanied by another pre- 
sence which like a shadow moves by its side and refuses 
to be separated from it. It appears that, among the com- 
nninilies in which progress is a law of life, liberty also 
is a law of life. The two are inseparable. 
There have been purely despotic empires in which 
neither libertv nor progress ever showed their face. 
There luue been oligarcliies in which progress has been 
confined to a governing class, while immobility has 
settled on (he masses from whom liberty was excluded. 
Again there have been nations, and here we embark on 
the current of Western civilisation, which have made of 
libert\ a still cherished, though often thwarted, ideal of 
life; and among these last it is that progress has become 
indigenous and has made her home, impregnating the 
consciousness of the community to such an extent that 
it tends to be accepted as almost the law of life itself. 
Progress and Liberty. 
This spirit, this inward hope in progress and in 
libertv, to-day animates the greater part of Europe. Its 
triumphant revival has been the chief motive in 
European history during the past century. It has been 
France's aspiration for a hundred years; it is identical 
in spirit with the national movement in Italy; it is 
cherished in the soul of Russia; it has renewed the life 
of Greece; it sanctifies the martyrdom of Belgium; and 
it secretly sways those Balkan States whose sufferings 
from tvranny have been so acute and recent. We our- 
selves, in virtue of our unique achievement as the 
creators of a free Empire, are, more than any, the visible 
embodiment of this European hope. 
Against us stand the forces of reaction, Prussia, 
Austria, Turkey, whose present alliance has been 
formed by insensible degrees, and slowly cemented 
bv the instinctive opposition of each to the growth of 
libertv, Prussia, Austria, Turkey, or, in terms of men, 
Bismarck, Metternich, Abdul Haniid — these have been 
for man\' a year marked down as the destined enemy 
against which the progressive movement would one day 
have to. figlu. Slowly during the past half-century, 
slowly and unconsciously the combatants have been 
moving to their places in the ranks. Each checlc or each 
advantage on either side — the continuous collapse of 
'I'urkey, the steady progressive development in the 
South and East of Europe, tiie threatened disintegration 
of Austria-Hungary — has brought the quarrel nearer to 
a head. Every advance, every expansion of the forces 
of freedom, has been felt as a threat by Germany and, 
with the decline of the power of her Allies, has thrown 
upon her an ever-increasing share in their common 
endeavour, and the-corresponding necessity of an ever- 
increasing preparation for the inevitable struggle. 
We talk of the rivalry of nations, but it was the 
rivalry of no nation which drove Germany on to arm, 
and arm, and arm; which made the subject of war an 
obsession with her, and the goal alike of all her action 
and all her thought. No, it was her consciousness of a 
more impalpable danger, a danger v\'hich was springing 
up on all sides, which was impregnating the very air 
of Europe; it was the profound hostility which existed 
between her and the arising spirit of libertv which neces- 
sitated her warlike preparations. Between that spirit 
which was spreading and catching throughout Europe, 
as light flushes the hill-tops, between this and the 
Prussian spirit of domination and rule by force the 
quarrel was mortal. Tiie thought of Prussia if it is to 
prevail must kill luiropean tlioiight ; Europe's thought 
if it is to live must kill Prussia's. I sav Prussia's, for 
this thought itself is Prussia's, not Germany's. No 
episode in history is more sad and tragic 'than the 
passing of the German spirit under the iron control 
of Prussia. The reader remembers the story; he re- 
members Ik.w all the German States thrilled in the 
middle of last century to the idea of a united Cier- 
manv founded on liber'ty ; how the apparently successful 
Revolution of 1848 seemed to confirm their hopes; how 
the forces of reaction set in and tlie flame of popular 
enthusiasm died down ; and how the Prussian might and 
the iron will of Bismarck proceeded to yoke the new 
German lunpire to the reactionary principles repre- 
sented by Prussia. 
The Real Motive. 
It is against the forces of reaction tlius strengthened 
and solidified that the forces of progress are pitted to- 
day. The consolidation of those forces has drawn Eng- 
land inevitably into the struggle. To emphasise the fact 
of our insular position, and to base on that 
position an insular diplomacy used to be the per- 
haps not unnatural inclination of some of our 
politicians. Sucii a policy might last while the 
questions at issue on the Continent were superficial. 
It could no longer justify itself when the question was 
the existence or non-existence of tlie principle on which 
our own Empire was based. Impatient of ideas as we 
often are in this country, wc are apt to ignore the deeper 
motives of our conduct and substitute for them some 
practical plea or outward circumstance lying upon the 
surface. Thus do we allege Germany's breach of faith 
and violation of Belgium's neutrality. But the real 
motive lay deeper far. What has been the record of Eng- 
land over Europe during the past century? Have not 
her sympathies — not her aid necessarily, for to that 
International impediments might exist— been ever on 
the side of nations struggling to be free? So that she 
has come to be thought by such nations as a moral ally 
and is recognised by persecuted patriots as a refuge and 
second home. And why so? Because like tends to 
like. Because in strengthening and upholding the cause 
of freedom we were strengthening our own cause and 
our own position. Just in the same way have not the 
sympathies and influence of Germany and Austria been 
steadily emplo\ed to strengthen and foster every ob- 
solete form of tyranny from which liberty was shaking 
itself clear? The two orders of ideas have for long been 
in secret antagonism, and the struggle now raging is 
but the most overt and tremendous of their acts or 
thoughts of enmity. 
Our Own Ideals. 
It is not Belgium, it is not France even that we are 
fighting for; it is for our own ideal, for that which we 
as Englishmen stand for in the world. Our whole 
history, all that we have ever been, our ancient struggles 
for independence, and all the events of a thousand years 
which have purified in us the love of liberty, are at stake. 
If this fight goes against us we might as well never have 
lived, for in that case nothing we have done will have 
borne fruit, nor will the idea for which England stands 
take effect upon the world and live after us. We shall 
have missed our destiny. The eggs we were given to 
hatch we shall have addled. In the moment of its 
dawning triumph our thought of liberty as an Imperial 
bond will be stamped out of existence. It is because we 
are fighting to-day for everything of value contained in 
the word British that our recruits flock in from the whole 
Empire. One may feel to the utmost with Belgium and 
France, yet feel, too, that a cause like ours, so solemn, 
so rooted in history, so almost religious, is associated 
with thoughts more permanent than any alliances. 
The more clearly we grasp the magnitude of the 
slake the sterner, as it seems to me, and more implacable 
will our resolution and temper become. We are up- 
holding, let us remember it, that inward animating hope 
in the destiny of mankind which is based on liberty and 
results in progress; while opposed to us, united by their 
common hate and distrust of all we trust in, are banded 
those dark forces which have withstood the advance of 
mankind in all ages. 
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