The Healing of Nations and the Hidden Sources of Their Strife by Edward Carpenter
page 88 of 164 (53%)
page 88 of 164 (53%)
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of the Son of Man--conscious of it, indeed, as a great light of
brotherhood shining within them, even amid the clouds of race-enmity and ignorance, and will deny once for all the gospel of world-empire and conquest which has so long been foisted on them for insidiously selfish ends. An empire based on brotherhood--a holy _human_ empire of the World, including all races and colours in a common unity and equality--yes! But these shoddy empires based on militarism and commercialism, and built up in order to secure the unclean ascendancy of two outworn and effete classes over the rest of mankind--a thousand times no! That dispensation, thank Heaven! is past. "These fatuous empires with their parade of power and their absolute lack of any real policy--this British Lion, this Russian Bear, these German, French, and American Eagles--these birds and beasts of prey--with their barbaric notions of Greed and War, their impossible armaments, and their swift financial ruin impending--will fall and be rent asunder. The hollow masks of them will perish. And the sooner the better. But underneath surely there will be rejoicing, for it will be found that so after all the real peoples of the earth have come one degree nearer together--yes, one degree nearer together." FOOTNOTES: [22] In Servia, for instance, which many folk doubtless regard as a benighted country, more than four-fifths of the people are peasant farmers and cultivate lands belonging to their own families. "These holdings cannot be sold or mortgaged entire; the law forbids the alienation for debt of a peasant's cottage, his garden or courtyard, his plough, the last few acres of his land, and the cattle necessary for |
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