15

NATIONAL LIFE AFTER THE WAR.

By THE Rev. CANON J. G. SIMPSON.
My subject, as I understand the request which has been
addressed to me, is to offer some thoughts upon the reconstruc.
tion of the national life after the war, and that with an eye to
the part which women especially will be required to play in that
momentous task. In one sense this is impossible. No one can
say under what conditions the nation will emerge from the war,
the issues of which, so far as we can see, are not vet even
approaching a decision. But the end may be very much nearer
than is apparent, and it is folly not to recognize that the real
task only begins with the conclusion of peace. What we shall
then have to do is to set about bravely building up the civilization
 which the ruthless hand of war has destroyed.
But God forbid that we should build the new city upon the
insecure foundations of the old. The war will have taught us
very little if it has not burned into our conscience abhorrence of
the old principles of rivalry and competition, of which the horror
of thick darkness which now besets us is the logical outcome and
appropriate Nemesis. There is a widespread conviction that the
conflict in which we are engaged is a war against war. Thousands
upon thousands of our brave boys have thrown their whole heart
into the struggle because they believed that liberty and all that
makes life worth living for the great mass of civilized mankind,
that, in a word, the progress of mankind and the opportunities
of future generations were endangered by the irresponsible outbreak
 of a people that delighted in war. The newspapers are
never weary of reminding us that we are out to crush militarism.
This conviction has no doubt inspired most of what is best in
the devotion and sacrifice which keeps us from despairing of the
world when we contemplate the destruction that has been wrought
on the earth. But I hope we shall remember that it is one thing
to use these appeals to justice and righteousness when we are
confronted with the immediate necessity of restraining the madness
 of an infuriated foe, and quite another to keep in remembrance
these divine ideals when, exhausted by the drain of warfare, we
are face to face with the still more gigantic task of restoring the
old wastes. It is one thing to cut the claws of militarism ; itis
another to make it impossible for the claws to grow again.
We must keep our head cool and our temper calm. Moral
indignation, righteous wrath, holy anger are very dangerous
weapons to play with. They are natural sentiments and, in so
far as they testify to a deeply rooted hatred of evil, thev witness