ENGLAND
VIII[H]
“A fool without fear is sometimes wiser than an angel with fear.”
IT WAS very kind of the English Speaking Union and the League of Nations Union American Committee to have thought of giving me this welcome. It was particularly appropriate that they should have asked the First Lord of the Admiralty to preside, and gracious of him to come. You see, if I have done any good in any way in public life, it’s due to the men and women of England’s most famous port—Plymouth. I think we can safely call it the most historical port in the world for two reasons: first, it was off Plymouth that the Armada was defeated. That may seem just a big sea-fight of ancient days. It was not thought so by the enemy at the time. They knew what it meant. It meant that England would be free to worship God in her own way—not free enough for some, but far freer than any other place in the world at that time. Then, from Plymouth, those who found their more advanced ideas about religious freedom hampered, sailed away to America, where they carried on their English traditions of freedom. There, in course of time, all men from all countries found freedom to worship God in their own way. I think it would have shocked them had they realised that some whom they welcomed to their shores would preach hate in the name of God toward the country from which they came; yet that is what they have done, some of these people who went to America. They have not understood that true freedom can never come to a man or a nation that hates. I, personally, have never feared people who preach hate—never—and in 1918 I was proved right. The nation which hated most was most handsomely defeated. The people in America who preach hate will also some day be defeated, and I don’t believe their days is far off.
I am an unregenerate Anglo-Saxon, not because I am a Virginian-born British M. P., not because I care so desperately for the British Empire or the United States, but because I care for something even greater than these two great countries. I care for civilisation based on Christianity. I’ll admit that I have not seen much of it yet, but I’ve seen glimpses of it, and I’ve seen thousands of men lay down their lives because it seemed the nearest right. It seemed nearer right than the belief that might is right. They had a vision, and that vision goes on. It’s in many a heart, and it’s the hope of the world. Other countries have visions, but no other countries in the world have fought and won so many battles for freedom as the English-speaking peoples. The Reformation, it is true, began in Germany, but it was in England that its spirit flourished. Anglo-Saxonism stands to me for true freedom, spiritual progress, high moral ideals, and a great sense of service. It is based on the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. I know we fail miserably to carry out our high ideals, but we have no illusions about our virtue when we do fail. We don’t talk nonsense about the superman or our thwarted souls. We know every one of us well enough right from wrong. We have an ideal, and if we will only listen to our consciences we realise that the Kingdom of God is within us, and it’s our failure, not God’s, if this Kingdom seems so far away.