Part 22 (2/2)

Here's what there is for us tae do. It's tae see that the change is in the richt direction. We canna stand still the noo. We'll move. We'll move one way or the other--forward or back.

And I say we dare not move back. We dare not, because of the graves that have been filled in France and Gallipoli and dear knows where beside in these last five years. We maun move forward. They've left sons behind them, many of the laddies that died to save us. Aye, there's weans in Britain and America, and in many another land, that will ne'er know a faither.

We owe something to those weans whose faithers deed for this world's salvation. We owe it to them and to their faithers tae see that they have a better world to grow up in than we and their faithers knew. It can be a better world. It can be a bonnier world than any of us have ever dreamed of. Dare I say that, ye'll be asking me, wi' the tears of the widow and the orphan still flowing fresh, wi' the groans of those that ha' suffered still i' our ears?

Aye, I dare say it. And I'll be proving it, tae, if ye'll ha' patience wi' me. For it's in your heart and mine that we'll find the makings of the bonnier world I can see, for a' the pain.

Let's stop together and think a bit. We were happy, many of us, in yon days before the war. Our loved yins were wi' us. There was peace i' a'

the world. We had no thought that any wind could come blowing frae ootside ourselves that would cast down the hoose of our happiness.

Wasna that sae? Weel, what was the result?

I think we were selfish folk, many, too many, of us. We had no thought, or too little, for others. We were so used to a' we had and were in the habit of enjoying that we forgot that we owed much of what we had to others. We were becoming a very fierce sort of individualists. Our life was to ourselves. We were self-sufficient.

One of the prime articles of our creed was Cain's auld question:

”Am I my brother's keeper?”

We answered that question wi' a ringing ”No!” The day was enow for the day. We'd but to gae aboot our business, and eat and drink, and maybe be merry. Oh, aye--I ken fine it was sae wi' me. Did I have charity, Weel, it may be that the wife and I did our wee bit tae be helping some that was less fortunate than ourselves. But here I'll be admitting why I did that. It was for my ain selfish satisfaction and pleasure. It was for the sake of the glow of gude feeling, the warmth o' heart, that came wi' the deed.

And in a' the affairs of life, it seems to me, we human folk were the same. We took too little thought of G.o.d. Religion was a failing force in the world. Hame ties were loosening; we'd no the appreciation of what hame meant that our faithers had had. Not all of us, maybe, but too many. And a' the time, G.o.d help us, we were like those folk that dwell in their wee hooses on the slopes of Vesuvius--puir folk and wee hooses that may be swept awa' any day by an eruption of the volcano.

All wasna sae richt and weel wi' the world as we thought it in you days. We'd closed our een to much of bitterness and hatred and malice that was loose and seeking victims in the hearts of men. Aye, it was the Hun loosed the war upon us. It was he who was responsible for the calamity that overtook the world--and that will mak' him suffer maist of all in the end, as is but just and richt. But we'd ha' had trouble, e'en gi'en there'd been no war.

It wouldna ha' been sae great, perhaps. There'd not be sae much grief and sae much unhappiness i' the world today, save for him. But there was something wrang wi' the world, and there had tae be a visitation of some sort before the world could be made better.

There's few things that come to a man or a nation in the way of grief and sorrow and trouble that are no punishments for some wickedness and sin o' his ain. We dinna always ken what it is we ha' done. And whiles the innocent maun suffer wi' the guilty--aye, that's a part of the punishment of the guilty, when they come to realize hoo it is they've carried others, maybe others they love, doon wi' them into the valley of despair.

I love Britain. I think you'll all be knowing that I love my native land better than anything i' the world. I'd ha' deed for her gladly-- aye, gladly. It was a sair grief tae me that they wadna tak' me. I tried, ye ken? I tried even before the Huns killed my boy, John. And I tried again after he'd been ta'en. Sae I had tae live for my country, and tae do what I could to help her.

But that doesna mean that I think my country's always richt. Far frae it. I ken only tae well that she's done wrang things. I'm minded of one of them the noo.

I've talked before of history. There was 1870, when Prussia crushed France. We micht ha' seen the Hun then, rearing himself up in Europe, showing what was in his heart. But we raised no hand. We let France fall and suffer. We saw her humbled. We saw her cast down. We'd fought against France--aye. But we'd fought a nation that was generous and fair; a nation that made an honorable foe, and that played its part honorably and well afterward when we sent our soldiers to fight beside hers in the Crimea.

France had clear een even then. She saw, when the Hun was in Paris, wi' his hand at her throat and his heel pressed doon upon her, that he meant to dominate all Europe, and, if he could, all the world. She begged for help--not for her sake alone, but for humanity. Humanity refused. And humanity paid for its refusal.

And there were other things that were wrang wi' Britain. Our cause was holy, once we began to ficht. Oh, aye--never did a nation take up the sword wi' a holier reason. We fought for humanity, for democracy, for the triumph of the plain man, frae the first. There are those will tell ye that Britain made war for selfish reasons. But it's no worth my while tae answer them. The facts speak for themselves.

But here's what I'm meaning. We saw Belgium attacked. We saw France threatened wi' a new disaster that would finish the murder her ain courage and splendor had foiled in 1871. We sprang to the rescue this time--oh, aye! The nation's leaders knew the path of honor--knew, too, that it was Britain's only path of safety, as it chanced. They declared war sae soon as it was plain how Germany meant to treat the world.

Sae Britain was at war, and she called oot her young men. Auld Britain--wi' sons and daughters roond a' the Seven Seas. I saw them answering the call, mind you. I saw them in Australia and New Zealand.

I kissed my ain laddie gude bye doon there in Australia when he went back--to dee.

Never was there a grander outpouring of heroic youth. We'd no conscription in those first days. That didna come until much later.

Sae, at the very start, a' our best went forth to ficht and dee.

Thousands--hundreds of thousands--millions of them. And sae I come to those wha were left.

It's sair I am to say it. But it was in the hearts of sae many of those who stayed behind that we began tae be able tae see what had been wrang wi' Britain--and what was, and remains, wrang wi' a' the world to-day.

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