Our successes have brought us the material benefits we see in the well-fed prosperity of our peoples. The non-material benefits it is difficult to estimate. So naturally do we accept both, that the thoughtless among us assume such comfort to be the normal lot of good people such as we are. We are content with our present portion—the best the world provides—and would counsel others to be content with theirs. We think we are a peaceful people, and deprecate as bad form the huge expenditures made by European nations for military and naval preparations. Some Americans contemplate their small army as though their nation were by that proved virtuous, much as though the learned Babu, contemplating the fur-clad {136} Eskimo, should pride himself on his own tropical attire. Like the sons of wealthy shopkeepers who disdain to demean themselves by trading, we Pan-Angles forget sometimes on what harsh foundations was laid our present exemption from harshness.
Apart from its short-visioned inconsistency, this attitude may betray us into dangers. The English-speaking peoples have fallen into a sense of security, assuming the continuance of our present peace as the normal condition of affairs. We pride ourselves that we mind our own business with success. And from minding it for so long, and with so slight a chance of having it disarranged by outsiders, we have grown accustomed to pursue without doubts our way to greater individual freedom. We are oblivious sometimes of the fact that all our efforts for greater individual freedom are of no avail if some other nation may deprive us of the wherewithal to individualize:—Our land, our trade, and our political system. "To live well a people must first live; and an ideal that ignores the primary conditions of national existence is a castle in the air."[136-1]
Since the throes of the eighteenth century, North America has been developed and Australia and New Zealand have prepared themselves for large populations—all undisturbed by fear of invasions. In these newer countries have been nurtured many of the ideals of the race. There, have been tested not only the federal idea, but also many political and social reforms, such as those whose names are associated with Australasia, but which find a congenial {137} habitat in other branches of the race. In peace we have thus been aiding each other, as we have so often in war. And it is well for us that this reign of peace has continued so long, not merely because peace is to be desired, but because of the strength it allows to accumulate for struggles to come. That this long peace is unusual, that struggles will come, history teaches.
Tacitus tells us of a Teuton tribe, "just and upright." "Unmolested by their neighbors, they enjoyed the sweets of peace, forgetting that amidst powerful and ambitious neighbors the repose, which you enjoy, serves only to lull you into a calm, always pleasing, but deceitful in the end. When the sword is drawn, and the power of the strongest is to decide, you talk in vain of equity and moderation: those virtues always belong to the conqueror. Thus it happened to the Cheruscans: they were formerly just and upright; at present they are called fools and cowards." [137-1]
We, unmolested by our neighbours, are now enjoying "the sweets of peace." Is there anything we are forgetting? Are we backing the Pax Britannica and the Pax Americana with sufficient power to ensure their maintenance? Shall we continue to be called "just and upright"?
We still have land to which to extend our population. Our prosperity is still undimmed. No one is our proved superior in civilization. Recent wars have not contributed to our military reputation, but our faith in our naval superiority has not been shaken and our pride of race intensifies.
{138}
Yet slowly a consciousness is creeping over us by way now of London, now of Brisbane, now of Durban, or again of Vancouver or San Francisco, that all is not as safe for us as it once was. Once we could afford to squabble a bit in the family; now we feel we must stop such silly behaviour. To all of us has come this feeling. It is not merely the appearance of Germany in the North Sea or the South Pacific, nor the desire of Asiatic Indian coolies for entrance to the Transvaal, nor the willingness of these and other Asiatics to share with us the wealth of North America. These are but signs. They forebode coming dangers whose extent we cannot foresee.
Out of the future loom menacing forms, hardly more tangible and comprehensible to us than were the Teutonic hordes to the Romans. What latent energies lie hidden in the north and east we can only fearfully surmise. There, perhaps, are peoples multitudinous in numbers and unmeasured in resources. Their faiths and ideals are not ours. To be subject to them would be no illusion.
Across the north of Europe and Asia stretches Russia—a land of eight and one-half million square miles,[138-1] larger than all the Pan-Angle area were either Australia, Canada or the United States omitted from the total.[138-2] Its population of 168,000,000[138-3] outnumbers the Pan-Angle whites {139} by 22,000,000.[139-1] Russia is self-supporting in that within its borders are food and fuel for years to come. In Siberia are ample coal and iron fields. Petroleum, of such growing importance in these days of aerial navigation, Russia has in plenty. The growth of the Russian power has been practically simultaneous with that of the Pan-Angles, for in 1913 was celebrated the third centenary of Romanoff rule. What was once the small state of Muscovy has extended its borders and pushed back its frontier, until now it presents by far the largest stretch of contiguous territory under one rule in the world. It has, moreover, room for internal development. Only the fighting edges of Siberia are filled with settlers, most of them ex-soldiers and their families. The interior is scantily populated against the time when the advance of the frontier shall be checked.