The New York herald., 1921-07-24
SIR PHILIP gibbs
SEES CHANGE FOR
BETTER in WORLD
Hopes of Idealists Have
Overcome Little Politicians
With Maggots in Brains
BELATED CONVERSIONS
Offer of Dominion Home
Rule to Ireland Two Years
Ago Called Visionary.
ULSTER KEY TO PROBLEM
Policy, for Long Dictated by
North, to Break Spell and
Press Concessions.
ULSTER KEY TO PROBLEM
BY SIR PHILIP GIBBS.

BY SIR PHILIP GIBBS.
Special Cable to THE New York HERALD
CopWi0ht. 1921, by THE New York HERALD.
LONDON. July 90. - For the first
time since the armistice after the
great war, with it's false promises of
universal peace and human progress,
the heavy clouds of pessimism are
lifting from the spirit Of those who
were beginning to despair of their
own ideals. The idealists are becom-
ing justified among those who jeered
at them. In every country that I
know, including the United States,
there were groups Of intellectuals
and plain folk of good will who be-
1ieved that out of the awful lesson
of the last war some new wisdom
ought to come to safeguard human
ity from another massacre Of that
kind by means of some new code Of
international justice, by an associa-
tion of free peoples and by the grad
ual rehabilitation of armies and
hatreds.
They believed that the immense
ruin created by the war could only
be repaired by economic cooperation
among the nations dependent upon
one another, and they looked forward
to leadership which would give new
call to mankind for the fulfilment
OF these ideals. All that seemed
simple and easy and the only way Of
safety in the face of the tremendous
perils threatening civilization
Thwarted by Little Maggots.
But the programme of the ideal
lists, speaking, writing, preaching,
praying and working in every coun-
try with passionate faith and enthu-
siasm, was thwarted by little poll
ticians with little maggots in their
hearts and brains; by the old greeds,
hatreds and cruelties of evil tradi-
ton, poked up again by the poll
ticians as smoke screens for their
own ambitions.
Things reached their blackest
pitch a few weeks ago in the Euro
pean outlook. In Great Britain es-
pecially, with stagnation at home, a
vanished export trade, menace Of
war in the Near East and a Govern
ment which seemed stubborn in it's
obstinate allegiance to old traditions
and in its antagonism of new hopes,
the prospect seemed rather hopeless
except to those who had great pa
tience. Now all this has been
changed, it seems, as if some magic
wand had been waved.
There is industrial peace at home,
the leaders of the world have made
their call at last for the ideal of in
ternational peace and In Ireland
there is still hope of giving q per-
petual truce to people weary Of the
long strife for that liberty, now
within their reach, which is their
hearts desire. What has actually
happened to make this change? 1t
has not yet been accomplished, but
the outlook seems very hopeful
venture to think it is what have
often foretold. It Is the breaking Of
the hard crust Of old tradition by the
yelling up of all those new convic-
tions. ideals, hopes. yearnings and
spiritual beliefs which have come to
the masses of men and women after
the war. 1t is the first touch of the
worlds new springtime. 1t is the
beginning OF a new chapter in his
tory, when the common sense of
mankind turns back the black page
and starts on a clean sheet, which
soon, alas, may be blotted and dog
cared, but which is now ready for
new records.
Politicians Always Yield.
To put the matter in a more pro-
sale way, the politicians could no
longer resist the pressure OF public
opinion and saw that they must
either yield bit or lose their Jobs.
My experience with politicians has
been that they always prefer to yield,
though sometimes they delay too
long. Fortunately also for the world,
there are two men who are greater
tl:an politicians afraid of losing their
Jobs. In both cases. indeed. their
Jobs are assured One is President
Harding and the other is King
George, both of whom have given a
lead to the world and have fulfilled
the mass feeling of great peoples.
King George. according to the
story have heard. summed up the
situation in Ireland Mt the time when
his speech in Belfast was flagrantly
contradicted by the aggressive words
of the Lord Chancellor and the Prime
Minister threatening drastic meas
ures and military action.
1T is all very we'll for Lloyd
George and Birkenhead to promise
one thing and do another" the King
said, "for II they are found out and
lfail they can go. But II I promise