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Show I! f "‘i' {flown ‘ in ' Belgian universities to which our hearts are going out to-day-the friend of Erasmus in the chair of St. Peter. It may seem almost idle in these days of bloodshed and destruction to look back for half a thousand years. But with the stillness as well as with the profound earnestness of the noblest part of Belgian spiritual life from the fourteenth to the sixteenth century may well be compared the sustained eiforts for peace between the nations which long seemed one of the most hopeful Signs in the public life of the latter half of the nineteenth century and in the early years of our own; and in these efforts Belgian statesmen and publicists have notably taken what may be called a leading part. For the sake of the long historical connection between the two peopleS; for the sake of the deep compassion and the high admiration to which the Belgians have become entitled by what they have suffered and what they have done in the dark days of the present, and for the sake of the peace which they and we have at heart-we have welcomed among us thesubjects of our King's kinsman and ally, and we pray for their restoration, in God's good time, to their own fair and gracious land. fleet/wt By THE RIGHT. REV. BISHOP OF LONDON, D.D., LL.D. 'l‘I'IE real difliculty of writing about Belgium is to find language adequate to express in the first plaCe the scandalous injustice of her treatment. \N'hatever any other State may have done, or not done, Belgium had done absolutely nothing to deserve this treatment; she had maintained her neutrality with perfect impartiality, and her treatment will be considered one of the crimes of history. But, if language is inadequate to describe the injustice of her treatment, who can describe the pathos of that fleeing multitude, homeless, ruined, and in terror of their lives? The heart of the world goes out to them in pity. But, with pity is mingled the deepest admiration. Led by their splendid King, they have given an example of sublime courage and unflinching valour which has ennobled the world. They have shown that the soul of a people can be uneonquerable while its whole territory is ravaged and its towns and villages are in flames. It must be the prayer of every lover of justice in the world that the Great God in Heaven may avenge the wrongs and reward the courage of the Belgian people. By PROFESSOR GILBERT MURRAY I SAW yesterday a regiment of British cavalry returning from manteuvres, every man of them wearing the colours of a foreign nation. That is not a common sight. Sometimes the soldiers of a conquered people have been forced to wear foreign colours, but they would not wear them with pride as these men did. Sometimes the soldiers of a weak and oppressed people have been proud to wear the colours of some great and conquering Power which was its ally. But these men were wearing the colours of a small and unfortunate nation, a nation in exile, whose lands are ravaged, its towns destroyed, and its territory in the occupation of the enemy. It is not for any material or worldly reason that British soldiers are proud to wear Belgian colours ; it is because Belgium in a time of terrific trial has done what we all should be most proud to have done, and has become an emblem to all the world of freedom and heroic courage. The sufferings of Belgium would be enough in themselves, and more than enough, to constitute a Claim on all the help that we can give. Every one admits the claim. In the town where I write it is not only well-to-do people who are offering every kind of help and hospitality. Shops from time to time refuse to take money when they hear that the goods they have supplied are for the Belgians. Artisans and tradesmen come and offer to work in their spare hours without payment. In the last few days the town workmen in one very poor neighbourhood have offered food and lodging rent free for a year; the agricultural labourers in small villages have clubbed their pennies together and rented and furnished cottages. The same spirit is to be found all over England. Now it is not mere sympathy, not mere pity for misfortune, that has stirred our whole nation like this. There is that in it, of course ; but still more there is admiration and gratitude. And we are grateful not only because Belgium stood, as a matter of fact, between us and the first fury of the German onslaught, but because Belgium has raised our ideal of human life and taught us to expect greater things of the world. We did not know that our comfortable liberal-minded western civilisation had in it this heart of heroism. We had read of the heroes and martyrs of history, and we felt with a misgiving that they were perhaps out of date. Life was no doubt easier now and less cruel ; but it seemed looser in quality and woven of cheaper material. We have been shaken out of that false resignation. We have discovered that the days of cruelty are by no means past ; and, just when the shock of that discovery came, Belgium rose and showed us that the (lays of heroism are not past either. She stands as an example to all nations who doubt whether national life is a thing worth suffering for, to all individuals who doubt their own value as free souls or their capacity for facing danger or martyrdom. Consciously or unconsciously there has come to each man's heart a secret message, raising his confidence in himself and bracing all his faculties: " The Belgians have done these things: why should not I ? " 8 3 |