n a comprehensive system of organization is
self-evident. But that organization must utilize all the resources of
the Allies and include permanent arrangements, economic and other, for
a future which shall not be a continuation of the past. Many of the
advantages which the old ordering of things assured us are gone beyond
recall. Conscription is become inevitable. Free trade is an
institution of the past. The control of armies in the field by
delegates of a democratic parliament such as is now demanded by the
French Chamber is a dangerous craving for the fleshpots of Egypt.
Whether Germany wins or loses, her rebellion against European
civilization will effect substantial and durable changes in the
methods of that civilization from which even the United States will
not be exempted.

Thus between the old order of things and the new yawns an abyss which
has to be crossed before we can worst our enemies even in the military
campaign which is but one phase of the world-struggle. Our resources
for the purpose of bridging it are ample, but our first difficulty is
the circumstance that we are chained to the old system and are still
unwilling to burst the bonds that hold us. And until efficacious means
of effecting this are adopted the end must remain unattainable.
Victory will not descend on our camp like a manna from on high. The
Allied Armies do not resemble the mulberry tree which, having long
lagged behind its rivals, suddenly bursts into fruit as well as
flower.

During the past twenty months the Allies in general, and the British
in particular, have achieved feats of which they have reason to be
proud--feats which two years ago seemed beyond the compass of human
effort. But, much as we have done, we have not reached, nor indeed
attempted to reach, the limits of our capacities, and the story of
these memorable twenty months of struggle is dimmed by the shadow of
the vaster exploits from which we have unaccountably shrunk.

The old-world social conceptions still prevalent in Great Britain
afford no standard by which to gauge the significance of the crisis
through which Europe is passing, nor do they provide efficacious means
of satisfying the pressing needs which it has created. Yet the
nation's guides perceive nothing to change in those conceptions; on
the contrary, they uphold them zealously. No event has occurred in
modern times of greater concern to Europe than the unleashing of
disruptive forces which threaten when