three communications upon this question made at different times by the present writer to the press.  The circumstances of their publication are significant.  The first is in substance identical with a letter which was sent to the Times late in May, 1917, and rejected as being altogether too revolutionary.  For nowadays the correspondence in the Times has ceased to be an impartial expression of public opinion.  The correspondence of the Times is now apparently selected and edited in accordance with the views upon public policy held by the acting editor for the day.  More and more has that paper become the organ of a sort of Oxford Imperialism, three or four years behind the times and very ripe and “expert.”  The letter is here given as it was finally printed in the issue of the Daily Chronicle for June 4th, 1917, under the heading, “Wanted a Statement of Imperial Policy.”

Sir,—­The time seems to have come for much clearer statements of outlook and intention from this country than it has hitherto been possible to make.  The entry of America into the war and the banishment of autocracy and aggressive diplomacy from Russia have enormously cleared the air, and the recent great speech of General Smuts at the Savoy Hotel is probably only the first of a series of experiments in statement.  It is desirable alike to clear our own heads, to unify our efforts, and to give the nations of the world some assurance and standard for our national conduct in the future, that we should now define the Idea of our Empire and its relation to the world outlook much more clearly than has ever hitherto been done.  Never before in the history of mankind has opinion counted for so much and persons and organizations for so little as in this war.  Never before has the need for clear ideas, widely understood and consistently sustained, been so commandingly vital.

What do we mean by our Empire, and what is its relation to that universal desire of mankind, the permanent rule of peace and justice in the world?  The whole world will be the better for a very plain answer to that question.

Is it not time for us British not merely to admit to ourselves, but to assure the world that our Empire as it exists to-day is a provisional thing, that in scarcely any part of the world do we regard it as more than an emergency arrangement, as a necessary association that must give place ultimately to the higher synthesis of a world league, that here we hold as trustees and there on account of strategic considerations that may presently disappear, and that though we will not contemplate the replacement of our flag anywhere by the flag of any other competing nation, though we do hope to hold together with our kin and with those who increasingly share our tradition and our language, nevertheless we are prepared to welcome great renunciations of our present ascendency and privileges in the interests of mankind as a whole.  We need to make the world understand that we do not put our nation nor our Empire before the commonwealth of man.  Unless presently we are to follow Germany along the tragic path her national vanity and her world ambitions have made for her, that is what we have to make clear now.  It is not only our duty to mankind, it is also the sane course for our own preservation.