excellent work has been done, and there is! no reason to believe that more cannot be! achieved. It is to be hoped that, by' a policy avoiding sterile, embittering controversy and] the striving towards appeasement, it will be possible to find peace through ce-operation. When that day comes it may be that the world will unite in finding better methods, in adapting, and modifying the League's procedure. For that reason it is necessary that the League shall continue. To abandon it would be the confession of probably the biggest failure in human history. To retain it may yet prove the foundation of the better] things which it is hoped are to come. But subscription to thefe ideas must not blind the world to the fact that the danger of] another world war is such that no reasonable] man should refuse to accept the urgent need for preparation against it. In the absence of} a spirit insisting upon the sanctity of treaties there is no protection for any nation save the armament, which is now proceeding. Weakness from now on will merely invite disaster: at the hands of those nations whose secession' from the League is adequate warning that, unless what they want is given to them peaceably, they will endeavour to take. Fortunately' the balance of power is still in the] hands of those remaining loyal to the League, and there may still be very much hesitation before any of the seceding nations will embark upon such action against them which their preparations seem to foreshadow. Member nations are still so powerful that in the event of a world war they would probably still win, of, if not, effect such a resistance that the world would ultimately be reduced to the chaos naturally to be expected as the result of the collapse of a civilization. The League may at the moment be a very frail reed, but it is a reed, nevertheless.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.