bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Justice or Expediency?
Authors: G.C.H.  
Published: July 2007

One of the gravest dangers of the present political system in this country is the acceptance of expediency as the guiding principle of legislation. Moral principles have no longer any practical influence in government. The disadvantages of employing ecclesiastics in high offices in the Government, always greatly exaggerated, had the important counter-balancing advantage of the recognition of moral principles in legislation.Political ecclesiastics might be corrupt, though there is no historical evidence to show that they were more corrupt than the modern lawyer-politician, business-politician, or demagogue-politician. It would be difficult to show that Holy Orders, per se, are more demoralising than the verbal subtleties of the Statute Book, stock and share broking (or pushing), or even a righteous indignation at the sweating of the working classes.A statesman or politician in Holy Orders (to-day this suggests the Devil in Holy Water) must, at the worst, make some show of informing with moral principles his public acts and those for which he is officially responsible. He has some acquaintance with moral principles drawn from the Christian code, which is the code permeating our culture and civilisation and therefore not foreign to the minds and consciences of the people. The lawyer, business man or demagogue may be quite ignorant of Christian moral principles, except in so far as he has to adapt himself to the effect of them on his fellows. He may deliberately discard such principles and only permit them to influence his actions as necessary but regrettable expedients.
St. Thomas and Humanism
Authors: Vann Gerald 
Published: July 2007

If St. Thomas had not been born a Catholic, his philosophy would have brought him to Catholicism. If he had not been—or if he were not—by temperament a humanist, Thomism and the Faith were sufficient to make him one. These three, which meet and fuse in the human soul, are so intimately linked together that it ris impossible perfectly to possess any one of them without possessing the others. All three find common expression in the enfranchisement of the personality. Humanism in the full and real.sense is more than the incomplete humanism of the ancients; more than the atrophied humanism of the Renaissance. For in humanism there are two elements. There is the worship, the love, of beauty, wherever beauty is to be found. There is the realization of the personality in whatever sphere that realization is possible. And both Greece and the Renaissance failed in fullness in these things. If there be any realm of reality, any part of the university of being, whose beauty finds no echo in the heart of a man; if there be anything of life and its fullness to which his personality will not respond, that man is, in that degree, no humanist. In the same degree he will be, logically, no follower of the philosophy of St. Thomas or of the religion of Christ.It need hardly be said that such a conception is in no conflict with the Christian idea of what is called detachment or of mortification.
St. Thomas and Humanism
Authors: Vann Gerald 
Published: July 2007

St. Thomas’s originality lies in the fact that he made his philosophy a welded, organic whole including and co-ordinating in the sweep of its horizon the entire panorama of being. To understand the humanism which is one facet of his philosophy. We must understand his W eltanschauung : his vision of the world, of reality, as a whole. It is the aim of this essay simply to set forth St. Thomas’s teaching, hoping thereby to shew that his philosophy is humanist in what has been submitted in the preceding pages to be the true meaning of humanism.Man is not to be studied as an isolated phenomenon : he is part of a design infinitely vaster than himself. It is of importance to realise that St. Thomas’s metaphysic, like Aristotle’s, is teleological. In exitu creaturarum a primo principio, he says in the Sentences, attenditur quaedam circulatio vel regiratio, eo quod omnia, revertuntur sicut in finem in id a quo sicut a principio prodierunt. He sees the birth of worlds, the march of centuries, as an emanation from the infinite, which in a vast sweep runs its course back to the abyss of energy from which it sprang. The Aristotelean idea of potentiality applies to the universe as a whole : each entity aspiring towards its proper actualization, the cosmos itself is viewed as ‘yearning,’ in the Aristotelean phrase, for its fulfilment. The desire of the soul for assimilation with the godhead is the supreme human example of this general trend.
Broadcasting Catholicism
Authors: Swinstead A.E.H. 
Published: July 2007

There has been a good deal of discussion lately about religious broadcasting. Some people will not have wireless at any price, think it is undermining our lives like the rest of the mechanical inventions, and would not have Catholics touch the accursed thing. Unless wireless is in itself wrong—and the example of Vatican City seems to settle that—there is a good deal to be said against the withdrawal of Catholic broadcasts, but it is not the purpose of this article to try to say it. Other people object to the way it has to be, or at any rate is, done. They criticise the matter of broadcast sermons, and resent what they regard as interference with Catholic worship. Father Martindale has several times explained, and again recently in The Southwark Record, that Catholics are free to present the whole faith, but the impression seems to remain that they do, in fact, water it down for wireless audiences.Like most discussions, this is best—if not most warmly—argued by people with knowledge, and the knowledge required is not perhaps possessed by the ordinary layman. He knows what his own acquaintances think of Catholic broadcasts and what he himself feels about them, but no more. Priests like Père Lhande, of Radio-Paris, and Father Martindale really have some chance of judging of the effects of their talks, and the clergy are the best judges of the material considered suitable for wireless audiences. But there is a line of approach to the whole subject that is within the competence of anyone who has done a good deal of listening-in and is prepared to think a little, and I am not sure that the most has been made of it.
Metaphysics Revived
Authors: Gilby Thomas 
Published: July 2007

Pure philosophy is no longer unfashionable. In the last few years, scientists of repute have impressed the general reader with its capital importance. The brilliant expositions of contemporary science by Sir A. S. Eddington and Sir James Jeans mount to a philosophical enquiry. They make it quite clear that physical science as such cannot arrive at the nature of things.The Cambridge University Press has now given us an account, in a small volume the size of The Mysterious Universe, of a voyage into metaphysics launched in the true spirit of Plato, St. Thomas, Spinoza and the pure philosophers of the past. It does not set out to discover and provide a popular map of reality. But when philosophy has been too often confused with so much that is inferior, it is agreeable to read of ‘a resolute direction of thought to the problem of Being’; of an effort to attain truth through Ideas and not images; of a search for causes that are at the same time reasons.
Disarmament
Authors: Jarrett Bede 
Published: July 2007

We take our stand on the phrase of Pope Benedict XV in his letter to the belligerent powers on August 1st, 1917, that what is needed is ‘a simultaneous and reciprocal diminution of armaments’ and it is needed precisely in order to help the nations to an era of peace. No one doubts but that these enormous armaments are themselves a cause of unrest in Europe, of themselves they suggest menace and a doom.But again it is undoubted that armaments are themselves not so much a cause of evil as a result of evil; they testify to an evil beneath the surface of which they are the outward and visible sign. That deeper evil is the one which is in most need of cure. It would be as unwise to attempt to cure our troubles by mere disarmament as it would be to cure a fever by putting ointment on the resulting rash, for everyone knows that armaments are a symptom and are not the disease.That disease is selfishness, unrestrained desire to possess. It runs through national as well as international politics, it is to be found not merely in nations but in persons; not just at Geneva or Shanghai but in each of us. A gathering of Christians to protest against excessive armaments is in the nature of a confession. There would be no need to-day to have this meeting if we ministers of Christ had properly done our work. We meet here therefore not first to protest against others but to confess our own failure.
Owen Glendower
Authors: Charles-Edwards. T. 
Published: July 2007

Owen Glyn DWR has been neglected to a remarkable extent by English historians. The reason is perhaps not far to seek. He belonged to the great army of unsuccessful men; and history has never been kind to failures. He survived in the memory of Englishmen as a character in a Shakesperian play. In so far as he entered at all into serious history, they were content to put him down as an irascible but unpractical Celt, a picturesque bandit, the main object of whose existence was to kill Saxons.His fate at the hands of his countrymen was little better. Paradoxically enough the battle of Bosworth, which enabled a Welsh king to ride into London at the head of a largely Welsh army, did Wales little but harm. The gentry came to court and became Anglicised : the Reformation which destroyed the monasteries—the cultural centres of the country—completed the process. The patriots were usually papists, and either fled abroad or perished on the gallows. The Act of 1535 avowedly aimed at the extirpation of the Welsh language : and the unpleasant figure of the anglicised Welshman began to appear. In 1567 Dr. Griffith Roberts, the Chaplain of St. Charles Borromeo, and a prominent exile, satirized the type in the preface to his Grammar : ‘their Welsh is Englishfied, and their English, God knows, is too Welshy.’ Morus Kyffin, a fervent defender of the Reformation, wrote in 1595 of a ‘clerical person’ who ‘said that it was not right to allow any Welsh books to be printed.
Military Service or Military Slavery
Authors: de la Bedoyere Michael 
Published: July 2007

As much as any other single factor, conscription or enforced military service lies near the root of the military mentality and the atmosphere of war which weigh down on a world the vast majority of whose inhabitants hate the very idea of war. Yet the abolition of conscription has hardly figured at all in the various disarmament proposals, and no serious effort has been made to relegate it to the category of social abuses to which it belongs, serfdom, feudal service, and certain kinds of industrial wage-slaveries.Before discussing the question of whether and when conscription is ethically justifiable, it will be worth our while to examine the reason for the mischievous part it must play in the modern world. One of the oddest characteristics of the post-war world which still claims to be democratic in spirit if not always in political organisation is the divorce between what political philosophers have called the general will of the people of a State and the actual will of the State as manifested in the policies and activities of its rulers. We may imagine, for example, the average Englishman or the average Frenchman or the average Italian opening his morning paper. He will read of this financial crisis or that, of this political squabble or the other, of the reports of the various countries’ unsympathetic reception of some disarmament proposal. What link, what nexus is there between his mind and these items of news? Practically none, unless we call fear a nexus. He may be afraid for his money, his property, still more afraid of being personally dragged into some disastrous consequence of the mismanagement of the powers that be.
The Fallacy of Primitive Communism
Authors: Piddington Ralph 
Published: July 2007

It has been suggested by writers of note that the next few decades will see an advance in the social sciences comparable to the advance which has already been made in our knowledge of the material sciences. In spite of the more pessimistic view, that prejudice and class interests must necessarily render a sane solution of our social problems impossible, there is a general tendency towards a co-ordination of the work of social scientists, and from the chaos of extravagant theories certain general principles are slowly but surely gaining acceptance by the majority of students in the fields of psychology, sociology, and economics.Nowhere is this tendency more apparent than in social anthropology, the science which studies the social structure of primitive societies with a view to understanding the motives which actuate human beings reared in an environment totally different from our own. These studies are proving of great value in the solution of social problems, and the savage, instead of being dragged in as an afterthought to justify preconceived theories, is being studied for his own sake, and the results applied to more advanced societies.
Hitler—Entwicklungsmoeglichkeiteni
Authors: Pottmann Karl 
Published: July 2007

The late German revolution gives opportunity to enlarge on the present situation of Central Europe. The fall of the Republic, the rise of Hitlerism and their influence on national as well as international politics, leave much room for speculation. The reports about Jew-baiting, the contradictory pronouncements of Nazi leaders, the compulsory silence of critical public opinion, all these present some aspects of recent happenings, but they certainly fail to convey understanding. It is said that Germany has lost many friends in England; expressions like barbarism, dangerous nationalism, etc., occur in every discussion on the subject. Indeed, the most unfavourable image of Imperial Germany shows its face through the ‘National Revolution at least to the average Englishman.It is a difficult task to give an impartial view about a national upheaval when confronted with suspicious public opinion and still more when the writer, for different reasons, has much in common with that opinion. Hitlerism, until now, has little to show that would claim sympathy from the foreign observer. Yet, however much the Nazi movement may be disliked, it would seem that it is incomprehensible in its essential force. This difficulty of understanding, which sometimes expresses itself in astonishment, more often in disappointment over Germany, gives the basis and encouragement to this article.
The Witness of the Parochial and Plain Sermons
Authors: Dix Fabian 
Published: July 2007

Centenaries ecclesiastical and secular have of late years crowded so fast upon one another’s heels that they have become almost dangerously popular. Cathedrals, abbey ruins, tombs of poets and birthplaces of novelists have beckoned to the devout or the sightseer and in every case the char-a-bancs have made reply, and the newspapers have risen to the occasion. A hundred years ago the staid respectability of the Established Church of England received a shock, and though at the time very few of its members knew with certainty what it was all about, the vast majority were quite sure that it was something very shocking. Rumour had it that while courtly prelates maintained a dignified isolation in their palaces and country squires dozed peacefully in their pews an insidious band of cultured divines with Oxford as their plotting ground, were seeking to change the features of the National Church so completely that even its most intimate friends would experience no little difficulty in recognising it.Among that select group around which the battle raged, three names stand out prominently, but while Pusey lent his name to denote the adherents of this brave endeavour and Keble blunted the enemy’s sword by gentle verse making, John Henry Newman is the man whose name leaps to the tongue and captures thought whenever mention is made of the Oxford Movement.
The Ideal of the Church
Authors: Goodier Alban 
Published: July 2007

Let me begin with an assumption. I assume that I am speaking to an audience, every member of which has much in common with me. Above all we have before us a common end. We have a common desire that all believers in Jesus Christ our Lord, the true Son of the true God, should be one, even as He and the Father are one. We have all an ambition, and it is more than a mere Utopian dream, to restore in Christendom what we recognise as having been severed, ‘the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. One body and one Spirit: as we are called in one hope of our calling.’Nevertheless, before I begin to say anything positive at all, I am conscious that there is a fundamental difference of outlook between many who kindly listen to me here and my colleagues and myself. Though in words we may seem to reach the same goal, we start from different standpoints. It is a difference, not so much of theological definitions as of philosophical first principles. We may profess to believe the same truths, we may express them in the same terms, and even in the same actions, yet, because of the different foundations on which we build them, they have not for us the same substance, or value, or solidity. Many, whether consciously or not, will not easily accept the external evidences, the objective truths, which to us, as to all Catholics, appear conclusive and convincing. To them truth is more subjective, more a matter of personal judgment, and personal interpretation, than it is to us; to them it is something that comes rather from within a man himself than from without.
The Language Question in Malta
Authors: Bonnici C. Mifsud 
Published: July 2007

The Islands of Malta and Gozo are situated midway between Europe and Africa. Scientists contend that they are but the remains of a natural bridge which, in the oldest pre-historical times, united the two continents. To-day, these Islands are about fifty miles from Sicily and one hundred and eighty miles from the nearest point of Africa. They occupy almost the centre of the Mediterranean Sea, the theatre, up to 1492 when America was discovered, of all that written history records of past civilizations which grew and flourished round its shores. This has exercised a predominant influence on the Maltese Islands, which changed destiny and fortune with the rise of each new power holding sway in the Mediterranean Sea: Malta, since the remotest times, has always belonged to the strongest naval Power.Archaeological remains on the Island speak of a civilization much older than that of the Phoenicians. These people knew Malta as a place of shelter, and confined themselves to its shores. But it is difficult to trace the race to which the aborigines belonged. All the theories on the subject are mere guess-work. A clue, however, of importance is to be found in the teeth of the so-called Neanderthal Man discovered during excavations at Ghar Dalam, and constituting a scientific basis to the much credited theory that Malta once formed a pillar of a bridge between Europe and Africa.
The Plight of Freedom
Authors: McNabb Vincent 
Published: July 2007

I was speaking to a crowd on Parliament Hill Fields. In answer to a persistent questioner whom I admired for his youth I said somewhat testily: ‘Freewill is not omnipotent; it is not the power of doing what we like, but of willing what we like.’ He replied at once, and as I thought, not without a certain nimbleness of wit ‘In other words, freewill is only the power of willing what we will.’ He laughed and I think the crowd laughed as if I had happened upon an absurdity.For a moment I was numbed by the nimbleness of the reply and the spontaneity of the laughter. Then suddenly I saw how the youth’s paradoxical form of words had thrown light, where I had long wished light to be thrown, upon the essential action of freedom. I therefore looked my questioner in the face as I said: ‘Yes, free-will is essentially the power to will what we will. Other animals can will this or that, can will to run or to lie down—-can will to chase their quarry or to flee danger. But no animal wills to will. You can control a man’s body, and sometimes by controlling his body you can control his intelligence, but you cannot control his will. You may throw him to death over a cliff; but you cannot control him to will or not to will to be thrown.’
An Aspect of Russian Communim
Authors: Jensen G. 
Published: July 2007

AN ASPECT OF RUSSIAN COMMUNISMSir,A correct understanding of Communism, both in theory and in practice, is perhaps at this moment the most important of all questions facing the civilised world. Therefore at the risk of tiring your readers I revert to it again. In a letter published two months ago your contributor, Fr. J. F. T. Prince, expressed the opinion that only personal knowledge of the situation could discredit the views expressed by him in a series of articles. As personal knowledge may always be questioned, whatever the qualifications of the writer, I prefer to give the translation of an official document, reference to which has already appeared in the daily Press. It is the report of Comrade Steinhart, head of the Politsector mtc (political section?), North Caucasus, to the Central Committee of the (Communist) Party, published in the official daily Pravda, Moscow, August 8th. A copy of this paper has been secured at the Soviet Bookshop, Bush House, and can be produced, if necessary. I believe it is now unobtainable. The translator has aimed at preserving the style and language of the original, though a few paragraphs have been curtailed.‘REPORTof Comrade Steinhart to the C.C. of the R.C.P. upon the safeguarding of the collective crops.‘According to the initiative of the Political Section of North Caucasus a number of measures have been taken for the enlisting of the children of the collective farms (Kolkhosy) for the safeguarding of the harvest. On July 2nd the Kraikom (Regional Committee) of the Russian Communist Party agreed with the suggestion of the Political Section upon this question. Units of “light cavalry” formed from children of the collective farms and “pioneers” (soviet scouts) have already been organized.
Peace and Disarmament
Authors: Kirwan J. R. 
Published: July 2007

In the Preamble to the Covenant of the League of Nations it is stated that the League is brought into existence ‘to promote international co-operation and to achieve international peace and security.’ The first article of the Covenant which is concerned with policy (Art. 8) deals with the reduction of armaments. The League Secretariat accepts disarmament as the touchstone of the work of organizing peace. Peace is the end and the extent to which the nations of the world approach that end is to be judged by the extent to which they approach disarmament.Just as peace is the end of the League, so is the demand for peace its foundation. But, founded also on the Treaties of Peace, it is, like them, grounded in war, partaking of the conditions of war, its ambitions, its hatreds and fears. It has then to obey two masters who do not always agree. Itself a result of the last war, it is called upon to prevent the next.The position is further complicated by the fact that the demand for peace is itself largely a result of the War. Nothing so widespread and at the same time so deep has been known before as a force in international affairs. Though there was a demand for peace, nothing comparable existed before 1914. In England at least it did not exist until the Somme brought disillusionment, a disillusionment made more bitter by Paschendaele, March, 1918, and the submarine campaign. Born, too, of war, the demand for peace is based rather upon disgust and horror for the one than upon love for the other.