I have been reading a Life of George Washington, which has filled me with admiration of your stand against our Junkers of those days. And I am familiar with the way we outraged the sentiment of both the North and the South, in the days of your Civil War. No wonder your history books were not precisely Anglophile, and that Americans grew up in a traditional dislike of Great Britain! I am realist enough to know that the past will not vanish like a ghost—just because we have fought side by side in this war; and realist enough to recognise the other elements which make for patches of hearty dislike between our peoples. But, surveying the whole field, I believe there are links and influences too strong for the disruptive forces; and I am sure that the first duty of English and American citizens to-day is to be fair and open to understanding about each other. If anyone will take down the map of the world and study it, he will see at once how that world is ballasted by the English-speaking countries; how, so long as they remain friends, holding as they do the trade routes and the main material resources of the world under their control, the world must needs sail on an even keel. And if he will turn to the less visible chart of the world’s mental qualities, he will find a certain reassuring identity of ideals between the various English-speaking races, which form a sort of guarantee of stable unity. Thirdly, in community of language we have a factor promoting unity of ethics, potent as blood itself; for community of language is ever unconsciously producing unity of traditions and ideas. Americans and Britons, we are both, of course, very competitive peoples, and I suppose consider our respective nations the chosen people of the earth. That is a weakness which, though natural, is extremely silly, and merely proves that we have not yet outgrown provincialism. But competition is possible without reckless rivalry. There was once a bootmaker who put over his shop: ‘Mens conscia recti’ (‘A mind conscious of right’). He did quite well, till a rival bootmaker came along, established himself opposite, and put over his shop the words: ‘Men’s, Women’s, and Children’s conscia recti,’ and did even better. The way nations try to cut each other’s commercial throats is what makes the stars twinkle—that smile on the face of the heavens. It has the even more ruinous effect of making bad blood in the veins of the nations. Let us try playing the game of commerce like sportsmen, and respect each other’s qualities and efforts. Sportsmanship has been rather ridiculed of late, yet I dare make the assertion that she will yet hold the field, both in your country and in mine; and if in our countries—then in the world.
It is ignorance of each other, not knowledge, which has always made us push each other off—the habit, you know, is almost endemic in strangers, so that they do it even in their sleep. There were once two travellers, a very large man and a very little man, strangers to each other, whom fate condemned to share a bed at an inn. In his sleep the big man stirred, and pushed the little man out on to the floor. The little man got up in silence, climbed carefully over the big man who was still asleep, got his back against the wall and his feet firmly planted against the small of the big man’s back, gave a tremendous revengeful push and—pushed the bed away from the wall and fell down in between. Such is the unevenness of fate, and the result of taking things too seriously. America and England must not push each other out, even in their sleep, nor resent the unconscious shoves they give each other, too violently. Since we have been comrades in this war we have taken to speaking well of each other, even in public print. To cease doing that now will show that we spoke nicely of each other only because we were afraid of the consequences if we did not. Well, we both have a sense of humour.
But not only self-preservation and the fear of ridicule guard our friendship. We have, I hope, also the feeling that we stand, by geographical and political accident, trustees for the health and happiness of all mankind. The magnitude of this trust cannot be exaggerated, and I would wish that every American and British boy and girl could be brought up to reverence it—not to believe that they are there to whip creation. We are here to serve creation, that creation may be ever better all over the earth, and life more humane, more just, more free. The habit of being charitable to each other will grow if we give it a little chance. If we English-speaking peoples bear with each other’s foibles, help each other over the stiles we come on, and keep the peace of the world, there is still hope that some day that world may come to be God’s own.
Let us be just and tolerant; let us stand fast and stand together—for light and liberty, for humanity and Peace!
Transcriber’s Notes:
Punctuation and spelling inaccuracies were silently corrected.
Archaic and variable spelling has been preserved.
Variations in hyphenation and compound words have been preserved.