outh
in the political equilibrium of the generations. Now--I dare not speak
too plainly. The young men of the western world are already, since
August 1914, noticeably fewer. Death may have made no difference to
them. It has made an immense difference to the future. It means that the
eager expectancy of youth, which is the source of so much enthusiasm for
a better world, is being lost. The crisis is here. As yet the common
ideals of civilized nations still survive; but the desire for a better
future is at ebb and flow with a tired acquiescence in the established
order. It is in our hands to decide which shall overcome. No generation
has faced a greater issue. We cannot tell what will be the outcome; but
to hope too much is at least a more generous fault than to despair too
soon.

BOOKS FOR REFERENCE

C.D. Burns, _Political Ideals_. Clarendon Press.

P. Geddes, _Cities in Evolution_. Williams & Norgate.

J.A. Hobson, _Towards International Government_. Allen & Unwin.

P.S. Reinsch, _Public International Unions_. Ginn & Co.

XII

POLITICAL BASES OF A WORLD-STATE

World-state is a term likely to be offensive in its arrogance, if it be
taken to mean the substitution of a single political community and
government for the numerous separate national states which have hitherto
existed. I therefore hasten to say that I intend no such meaning, but
use the term as a convenient expression to cover any body of political
arrangements, to which most of the principal nations of the world are
parties, sufficiently stable in character and wide in scope to merit the
title of international government.

Towards such a possibility the nineteenth century has made three great
contributions. During that century great advances have been made in the
settlement of political government upon a basis of nationality. This
process has been accomplished partly by throwing off the dominion of
some foreign power, as in the case of Belgium, Greece, Montenegro,
Bulgaria, Rumania, and Serbia, and the South American colonies of Spain;
partly by the closer federal union of independent states, as in the case
of Germany and Switzerland; partly by a blend of the two methods as in
the case of Italy; and partly by the peaceful dissolution of an
unnatural union, as with Norway and Sweden. Though much still remains to
be done before the identification of statehood with nationality even for
Europe is completed, and some backward steps have been tak