CHAPTER SIX
Therefore, whenever a true American and a true Briton get together, let them hold an international symposium of their own. If it were not for the unfortunate interposition of the Atlantic Ocean, this interview would be extended, with proportional profit, to the greatest symposium the world has ever seen. Meanwhile, we will make shift with a company of two.
The following counsel is respectfully offered to the participants in the debate.
Let the Briton remember:—
1. Remember you are talking to a friend.
2. Remember you are talking to a man who regards his nation as the greatest nation in the world. He will probably tell you this.
3. Remember you are talking to a man whose country has made an enormous contribution to your cause in men, material, and money, besides putting up with a good deal of inconvenience and irksome supervision at your hands. Remember, too, that your own country has made little or no acknowledgement of its indebtedness in this matter.
4. Remember you are talking to a man who believes in "publicity," and who believes further, that if you do not advertise the fact, you cannot possibly be in possession of "the goods." So for any sake open up a little, and tell him all you can about what the British Nation is doing to-day for Humanity and Civilization—in other words, for America.
5. Remember this man is not so impervious to criticism as you are. Don't over-criticize his apparent attitude to the War. Remember you are talking to a man whose patience under such outrages as the sinking of the Lusitania has been strained to the uttermost; so don't ask him whether he is too proud to fight, or he may offer you convincing proof to the contrary.
6. Remember you are talking to a man whose business has been considerably interfered with by the stringency of the Allied blockade. So don't invite him to wax enthusiastic over the vigilance of the British Navy or the promptness of the Censor in putting the mails through.
7. And do try to disabuse the man's mind of the preposterous, Germany-fostered notion that your country regards this war merely as a vehicle for commercial aggrandizement, or that the British Foreign Office proposes to maintain the Black List and other bugbears after the War. It seems absurd that you should have to give such an assurance, but doubts upon the subject certainly exist in certain quarters in America to-day.
Let the American remember:
1. Remember you are talking to a friend.
2. Remember you are talking to a man who regards his nation as the greatest in the world. He will not tell you this, because he takes it for granted that you know already.
3. Remember you are talking to a man who is a member of a traditionally reticent and unexpansive race; who says about one third of what he feels; who is obsessed by a mania for understating his country's case, exaggerating its weaknesses, and belittling its efforts; who is secretly shy, so covers up his shyness with a cloak of aggressiveness which is offensive to those who are not prepared for it. Remember that this attitude is not specially assumed for you: as often as not the man employs it toward his own wife, who rather enjoys it, because she regards it as a symptom of affection.
4. Remember you are talking to a man who is fighting for his life. To-day his face is turned toward Central Europe, and his back to the United States. Do not expect him to display an intimate or sympathetic understanding of America's true attitude to the War. He is conducting the War according to his lights, and is prepared to abide by the consequences of what he does. So he is apt to be resentful of criticism. Bear with him, for he is having a tough time of it.
5. Enemy propaganda to the contrary, remember that this man is not a hypocrite. He is occasionally stupid; he is at times obstinate; he is frequently high-handed; and often he would rather be misunderstood than explain. But he is neither tyrannical nor corrupt. He went into this War because he felt it his duty to do so, and not because he coveted any Teutonic vineyard.
6. Remember that your nation has done a great deal for this man's nation during the War. Tell him all about it: it will interest him, because he did not know.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Practically every one in this world improves on closer acquaintance. The people with whom we utterly fail to agree are those with whom we never get into close touch.
Individual Americans and Britons, when they get together in one country or the other, usually develope a genuine mutual liking. As nations, however, their attitude to one another is too often a distant attitude—a distance of some three thousand miles, or the exact width of the Atlantic Ocean—and ranges from a lofty tolerance in good times to unreserved bickering in bad. Why? Because they are geographically too far apart. But with the shrinkage of the earth's surface produced by the effects of electricity and steam, that geographical abyss yawns much less widely than it did. So let us get together, whether in couples or in millions. The thing has to be done. No rearrangement of the world's affairs after the War can be either just or equitable or permanent which does not find Great Britain and the United States of America upon the same side. What we want is common ground, and a sound basis of understanding. Our present basis—the "Hands-across-the-Sea, Blood-is-thicker-than-Water" basis—is sloppy and unstable. Besides, it profoundly irritates that not inconsiderable section of the American people which does not happen to be of British descent.
We can find a better basis than that. What shall it be? Well, we have certain common ideals which rest upon no sentimental foundations, but upon the bedrock of truth and justice. We both believe in God; in personal liberty; in a Law which shall be inflexibly just to rich and poor alike. We both hate tyranny and oppression and intrigue; and we both love things which are clean, and wholesome, and of good report. Let us take one common stand upon these.
We must take certain precautions. We must bear and forbear. We must forget a good deal that is past. We must make allowances for point of view and differences of temperament. And we must mutually and heroically refrain from utilizing the unrivalled opportunities for repartee and pettiness afforded by the possession of a common tongue.
Of course, we must not expect or attempt to work together in unison. National differences of character and standpoint forbid. And no bad thing either. Unison is a cramping and irksome business. Let us work in harmony instead, which is far better. And so—to paraphrase the deathless words of the greatest of Americans:—With charity toward all, with malice toward none, with mutual understanding and confidence, we shall go forward together, to bind up the wounds of the world, and prevent for all time a repetition of the outrage which inflicted them.