INTRODUCTION
The boys and girls of this generation have had the opportunity and responsibility of living through great times. In days to come they will look back with a feeling akin to awe on the hours when, in Sir Owen Seaman's words, they "saw the Powers of Darkness put to flight" and "saw the morning break." The future of our country will be determined by the youth of to-day. Problems of the greatest complexity and perplexity await solution, and can be solved only by honesty, intelligence, sympathy, breadth of outlook, sacrificial service, and the fear of God. The teachers and pupils now in our schools are in the midst of a great crisis, and will need greatness of soul that they may rightly face it. That they will respond nobly to the challenge of the age, I have not the shadow of a doubt.
Never was there a more timely occasion for the teaching of an ardent and enlightened patriotism. Those who understand the issues at stake in the Great War, the genius of the world-wide British Commonwealth, the national consciousness of our own fair Canada, the lessons taught us by the mighty struggle, will be well-instructed citizens of this Dominion, equipped by knowledge and by spirit to serve their country, their Empire, and the world.
The selections of Verse and Prose in this book set forth the varying and successive phases of the War, and seek to remind, to inform, and to inspire. The teachers will use them as vehicles of moral and patriotic instruction. The pupils will keep them forever in their hearts and minds. Surely if we wish to introduce any good element into the life of a nation, it can best be introduced through its schools and colleges.
It is well to recall the issues that have been decided; for in no struggle have greater hung in the balance. The crime perpetrated against the Belgians, aggravated by its accompanying treachery and brutality and immediately followed by unparalleled sanguinary atrocity, revealed as by a lurid flash the nature and the greatness of the menace to which Christian civilization was exposed. Prussian militarism, in this belated, almost incredible but all too terrible, outbreak of Pagan barbarism, threatened to overthrow all the best elements in international life.
(1) The very idea of a Commonwealth of Europe, the growing sense of solidarity, the recognition of general interests, the existence of international institutions such as the Hague Tribunal—were seen to be doomed, if Germany should come forth a victor.
(2) The law of international good faith,—the absolutely indispensable foundation for any international fabric,—would be abolished, if a single criminal state could defy it with impunity, and could profitably disregard treaties, oaths, Geneva Conventions, Hague Declarations, if these interfered with its own selfish advantage.