The Spectator

From ‘President Wilson's Mistake’, The Spectator, 27 March 1915: President Wilson's attitude can only be described as a tragedy. We do not believe that there was a man more determined than he was when he entered office to conduct his administration on moral lines, and to show the world that morality and politics are not incompatible, and that cynicism need not really be the rule for statesmen. Alas for the President that he did not follow his own natural instinct for the right instead of his reason. It would never have betrayed him. Instead, it would have led him on the road which he really wants to travel.

From ‘News of the Week’, The Spectator, 27 March 1915: The controversy as to what should be our future military policy in the west still goes on, and calculations are made on the basis of the inquiry — If it cost us so many thousand men to advance two miles on a front of four, how many men will it cost the Allies to advance a hundred miles on a front of two hundred? No doubt the losses would be very heavy if we made such an advance, but we must point out that all these arithmetical calculations are quite valueless. If a general advance were ordered, the problem would change not merely in degree but in kind, and no calculations based upon the Neuve Chapelle figures would be of the alighted value for estimating the casualties.

From ‘The Industrial Situation’, The Spectator, 27 March 1915: The present industrial situation shows how completely what we may call the economic pacificists misjudged the probable effects of a great European war. Instead of our industries being brought to a standstill, they are in a condition of abnormal activity. The trouble is not to find work but to find workers. To a certain extent this fact is doubtless due to the favoured position occupied by Great Britain as an island defended by an overwhelmingly powerful Navy. But it must be admitted that, so far as evidence can be obtained, our enemies, in spite of the destruction of their maritime commerce, are still able to carry on many, if not most, of their industries.

From ‘The Racing Problem’, The Spectator, 20 March 1915: We are not temperance fanatics. We do not suggest the prohibition of the public sate of intoxicants in order to penalize any one or to punish people for having sold alcohol in the past. We do not regard either the sale or the consumption of alcohol as a crime. A moderate consumption of alcohol does no more harm either morally or physically than a moderate indulgence in other unnecessary luxuries like smoking. We know, too, that a permanent temperance, a temperance worth having, can only come by a change in national habits—through freedom, not through interference with liberty. What we are asking for is merely war prohibition in order to produce national efficiency at the moment.

From ‘How We Are Blockading Germany’, The Spectator, 20 March 1915: We are, indeed, fighting against a thoroughly unscrupulous enemy, and we have to consider how we can bring the war to an end in the shortest possible time. If we shorten the war, we shall save life—the lives of the non-combatants at sea who are threatened by Germany's diabolical engines—and shall redeliver to the world the seas free and open to traffic. We shall sustain Liberty against despotic dictation, and vindicate the sanctity of national pledges. Beside such objects temporary commercial inconveniences are really small matters. We cannot help feeling strongly that we shall make a great mistake if we try to argue solely on legal grounds.