Who would attempt to place the citizens of the war state beside the citizen of the world and hold him up as the more enviable creature? Who that is honest can say that he would rather be a worshipper of Mars and have all his children heirs to that es tate than be one of the peace-makers and a child of the real God? We

after righteousness, inherit the earth and find out what it really is.

We should know all that joy and beauty that eye hath not seen nor ear heard, and the joys that are prepared for them that love the Lord.

Having thus briefly outlined the cooperative world as opposed to the war state I shall in the next chapter consider the answer of peace to war.

HEN Okuma became Prime

W Minister of Japan following on

the Yamamoto cabinet crisis of 1914, it was emphasized that a period of progressive internal policy had opened. Popularly, the militarist group was under the cloud of the disheartening naval scandals. The reaction seemed to point to liberalism needed social and industrial legislation.

True, to some Baron Kato holding the folio of the Foreign Office struck a discordant note. He was known as an aggressive diplomat favoring truculent foreign policy. It was understood he had strong views on the Chinese question. An influence of England, he possessed an hardly concealed animosity for the United States, and the conventional determination to press Japanese interests in the alien land incident. In that regard Kato In that regard Kato had the failure of the previous ministry before him vividly. But the venerable figure of Okuma speedily dispelled any apprehension. Even hostile critics admitted the ministerial program hit essentially a domestic note-administrative economy and social sanation being foremost. While While exterior questions were not neglected, it apeared that Okuma was determined to carry out a number of pressing reforms.

It was well known that during the decade he was out of office the Prime Minister made efforts to bring about an improvement in the condition of the people. He realized that the industrial development of Japan was undermining the nation; he felt that steps must be taken to counteract the evils resulting. Two aspects in the life of the country challenged him. It was

not that Japanese labor was unorganized, at the mercy of overweeningly ambitious capitalists. It was not that the worker was a political nonentity and impotent to break the shackling traditions of an age far removed from the industry of to-day. And it was not because he discerned the wage-earners of Japan crushed under a ruthless exploitation. What Okuma saw was that the vicissitudes of Japanese industry weighed dangerously on labor, and that the morality of the rising generation was disintegrating-effects, not

causes.

It was the plan of Okuma to mitigate the burden of these conditions through the intervention of the government. He did not want to disturb the underlying economic causes, for he believes implicitly in the necessity of establishing the industrial hegemony of Japan in the Far East. Accordingly, one of his first acts on heading the ministry was to appoint a commission for the investigation of the situation. In due time the government formulated its policy, and state insurance to relieve the working classes was announced amid considerable opposition.

The Prime Minister declared he wanted to help the people of small incomes irrespective of occupation. He proposed that the government subsidize the enterprise with a fund of $100,000. While the $100,000. While the extent of the grant was limited, the individual liability was placed very low-varying from $25 to $125, the largest risk. The restricted amounts of the policy were in keeping with the purpose of Okuma; it was to put insurance within the reach of the masses, aiding the family threatened by disaster in the routine

of life. The striking feature of the measure was the using of the Japanese posts for administration. Just as the United States based its savings bank system on the Post Office Department, so Okuma planned to have the post offices in Japan the agency of insurance. In this way the cost of operation of social insurance was reducible to a small item, comparatively speaking. The development of the proposal showed the possibility of extensive relief, low administrative costs, and security greater than afforded by Japanese insurance companies. The approaching session of the Diet was to see the consummation of the act.

But the outbreak of the European war changed the whole situation. The bitter condition of the workers of Japan was forgotten while its attitude in the world crisis was being formulated. Then after days of anxiety the country entered the reduction of Kiaochow as the first step toward the restoration of peace in the Far East. The misery of the Osaka cotton mills gave way to the martial adventure seizing on the nation. The extraordinary session of the Diet was too much occupied in passing war credits to consider the social legislation of Okuma.

Following on on the occupation of Tsing-tao came the beginning of the trouble with China. By the time the Diet reconvened in the last of December, 1914, Japanese politics were seething over the conduct of foreign affairs. Feeling was strong against what were popularly regarded as the impertinences of China; Kato spent some tense moments crushing the objections of the Seiyukai leaders. The opposition kept reverting to foreign relations in the hope of discrediting the ministry. The budget was defiantly rejected, due in the main to the army estimates providing for the Korean divisional increase; the introduction of domestic proposals was impossible in the welter of political recrimination.

When the appeal to the country came, the Okuma ministry was limping along on emergency financial estimates based on the credit program of the previous cabinet. Little further was heard of a purpose to conserve the coming generation: the clash for years inevitable with China shook Japan in the opening months of 1915.

The Japanese general election returned the supporters of Okuma in a decisive majority - not on governmental economy nor for the handling of social conditions, but on the Chinese question. The clamor for an unbending policy toward China was to be satisfied. Strengthened by the popular verdict, Okuma pushed the negotiations to an hard conclusion, shocking American and European sensibilities.

Whatever may be the ulterior objects of the ministry, now nobody in Japan gives a thought about the internal problems of the wage-earners. Which is not infrequently the purpose of aggressive foreign policy under a bureaucratic government. At the Diet just ended nothing more was heard of social legislation; Japanese labor only figured in determining its ability to meet stiffened taxes. Outwardly the Okuma ministry was helpless. It was caught between the derisive attacks of those who held Kato had given way pusillanimously pusillanimously to the squeals of China, and the denunciations charging Okuma with over-reaching in a colossal blunder. With his political acumen the Prime Minister concluded. that the opposition of the people believing that Japan had gotten too much was less to fear than the cries for greater expansion.

Imperialism holds Japan. Notwithstanding the turmoil of the last Diet, Okuma forced through the costly increase in the army fostered by Terauchi and the militarists. Of social legislation, not a word. It is unknown what devious pressure was brought to

bear on the ministry from the attitude of the Elder Statesmen and the House of Peers. But there is no secret that Kato's policy has been severely criticized as to its results, that the English Alliance was questioned.

One fact is clear: the conviction is growing in Japan that the settlement with China was abortive. It has raised more problems without and within Japan than have been closed by the negotiations. The continuance of political unrest in China intensifies the situation.

It is the irony of polites that Okuma, with his professions of governmental retrenchment and social reform, should enter on a policy of external expansion and the consequent enlargements in national defense. The army has its increase. The taint of the navy

scandals is hidden under the heroics of the skirmish with Germany on the Pacific. Already the premonitions of a reversion to the more ambitious naval program formulated in 1907 after the Russian war, have appeared. The possibility of an alliance with Germany, following the European struggle, is frankly discussed by statesmen and officials connected with the govern

ment.

The alignment of Okuma in all this is uncertain. Supporters say the Prime Minister is the victim of circumstances. Others declare he is lending his ministry to the making of Japan's destiny. Which is correct matters little: the important point is that expansion once more is dominant. The internal conditions of the country are looked on as secondary to this end.

T

HAT virility is best expressed in War, has been the impression of most men after making the acquaintance of Tennyson's Charge of the Light Brigade. Normal manhood does not evidence itself in time of War, for War is an abnormal condition and in the scheme of Creation, to meet this abnormal condition a concurrent stimulation springs in the minds and hearts of men. That this stimulation is rather demoniacal than manly could probably be scientifically established by a qualified alienist. That this hysteria or unleashed enthusiasm is insanity, not valor, has become the suspicion of thoughtful men, thoughtful in that they have outgrown their impressionable age that deified a Napoleon.

Manhood demands a self-control, a bridling of fury, a thought not a blow, love not hate, a communication not a severance, and above all poise not intemperance. War wants of man all that is ordinarily considered unmanly and criminal. Peace seeks in man dogged plodding and patient determination. Peace has a driving punchwar has a fiendish clawing. Peace calls for sustained endeavor-war for spasmodic excesses.

A nation at peace is fighting-is fighting a manly fight. A nation at war is raving-raving and snarling like a Tasmanian Wild Dog. Pluck is shown in Peace-substantially showing the subordinating through human perseverance of Nature's mighty obstacles to man's progress. Pluck reveals

itself in the unrelenting conquest by man of impalpable disease. Pluck reveals itself in man's series of successes against his insistent baser nature.

There is strife in Peace-a healthy, bettering strife. We cannot live unless we fight for life. The fight does not consist of an effort to destroy life, but in a proximate selfish effort to better one's own life, which results in an ultimate universal effect of ameliorated life. I must live on man. I must struggle to give unto man that for which he will give me a compensation, and man is constantly demanding more of me.

This is the punch in Peacethis force to give what man forces man to give.

War is a holiday of aberration. Peace is a protracted period of drudging normality. Red Europe leers, drivels and is maudlin. White Europe was smiling, intelligent and sure. Red Europe is drunk-on a rampage-off the reservation of civilization. Europe has lost its punch. America and Asia have lost respect for Europe. Europe has lost its vigor, its vitality, and its human value. Africa almost laps it in the race of human progress. Europe is a smashed hulk. Africa is a growing dynamic giant. Europe and Africa measure up like the spent Jeffries and the tense Johnson. Sanguine Europe edifiedsanguinary Europe disgusts.

The blood soaking through the ground of Europe to be licked by the flames of the Hell raging within this planet, for virility's sake might better be peacefully

warming the now inglorious cadavers once the bodies of sturdy workers in the shops and fields of man. War has enfeebled Europe before its time. Europe requires the services of a physician. Peace and its tonics will soon be called upon to help Europe to its feet. Peace is bracing-War is enervating. Europe at War has the same economic value to the world as a rabid mongrel at large to a city.

Peace is the manly state-Peace is the forceful state-Peace is the state for pride. Why should Europe have built up for centuries to tear down in months? Only for the same reason that a temperamental female tramples on her hat. Peace and progress appeal more than War and waste. One worker is worth a swarm of warriors.

Man at War has turned his forces against himself-has jeopardized his future and withered his powers. Peace can apply man's forces to reclaim this future and future and revitalize these powers through intelligently directed activities. War makes for exhaustion-peace for vim and plenty.

The human equation is reduced in War to the quantitative value of bodies. War sentences the innocent and the efficient to a continental amphitheatre of electric chairs.

The glory of War will give way to the glory of Peace as soon as it is realized by all that the European condition is a possible world-consuming cancer and not mere wound that will leave only an unsightly scarification.

New York State produces less than one-third of the raw material used in her wood industries. In spite of the popular impression that the introduction of concrete, brick, and steel is doing away with the use of wood, it has been found that the State is yearly

using more wood per capita than ever

before. More than twice as much wood is used per person to-day than fifty years ago. More than six times as much wood per person is used in New York State than in Germany, and more than ten times as much as in Great Britain.