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THE TABLET A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER AND REVIEW PRO ECCXES1A DEI, PRO REGE ET PATRIA VOL. 183 No. 5429 PUBLISHED AS A NEWSPAPER LONDON, MAY 27th, 1944 SIXPENCE WHITSUNTIDE The Role o f the Church as the Salt and Preservative o f Social Life ON THE TEACHING OF LITERATURE The Responsibilities of the Teacher. By Philip Leon OSCOTT: 1794-1944 By Philip Hughes “ LONG LIVE FRANCE AND ALSACE ! ” The Bishop o f Strasbourg Speaks THE WORLD WEEK BY WEEK “The Heart of the Cause of Man” General Smuts began a notable address in Birmingham last week by speaking of the British Commonwealth, which he saw as the pattern of international society in the future : but if that kind of association was to provide the structural model, with, in General Smuts’ vision, the United States and the Soviet Union as its twin props, the heart of it, he insisted, must always be, not in London or in Washington or in Moscow, but in the continent of Europe. “ Europe,” he declared, “ is the heart of the cause of man, and her decadence would mean an immeasurable loss to all that is most precious in our human heritage. America could not take her place ; nor, certainly, could Asia do so. And Africa is no claimant for such honours. Europe has been the spiritual home of the West, the source of our concepts of progress, liberty and of all the other basic ideas of our higher life. I put the problem of Europe, of her salvaging and rehabilitation, first in our programme of world reconstruction after this war.” On any view of the evolution of the Soviet regime, Russia has a technical contribution to make ; so has the United States ; but Europe is the heart of the cause of man, and, far from being a laboratory in which experiments can be made in ways of life devised elsewhere, remains the only source of spiritual vitality wherefrom the technicians may be nourished. It is good that these things should be affirmed by a leading statesman of the British Commonwealth. General Smuts had earlier spoken of the great strain, both physical and moral, now being endured by enemy-occupied Europe ; and he declared that it is vital that the war shall be brought to its conclusion with the least possible delay, lest there should be crackings under the strain. In his last important speech in this country he had spoken pessimistically of the future of France, and we may surmise that he had France principally in mind when he spoke now about the dangers of delay. Certainly the French are finding the strain very severe, and it is particularly with regard to France that there must all the time be in the background the fear which General Smuts expressed : the fear lest victory should come too late. In the case of France it is pre-eminently important that victory shall not come too late, for “ the question of the survival of France is the question of the survival of European culture, as we have understood the words” : the phrase is Christopher Dawson’s, from the current La France Libre. The appeal of the Cardinals was for relief in what, short of land fighting, is the hardest part of the physical ordeal. No section of the population in any nation in the world has been subjected to bombing on the scale on which northern France and the Low Countries have known it these past months. Hamburg’s ordeal last year had a briefer term to it. The cities of the Ruhr have never undergone attack at once so concentrated and sustained. There is little or no sign yet that this is creating what the Cardinals fear it may eventually create : a lasting bitterness against Britain and America. On the contrary, the Action Française (for what its evidence is worth) declared the other day that whereas the great number of deaths, the daily pathetic funerals and thousands of domestic havocs, initially caused “ a set-back for Gaullisme, ’’ the ground lost has already been more than regained as nerves and muscles are braced for the battles for which the bombardments are the preliminary. This newspaper maintains, we may note, that the parish clergy bear a leading responsibility for the lack of bitterness. The prescribed bitterness is to be found only in the Press. There are descriptions of German soldiers helping to protect Rouen cathedral from the fires. At Louvain, which has suffered heavily, there is talk of replacing the well-known inscription with another, beginning “ Furore Britannico . . . ” But these are on the surface. Cardinal Suhard, the Archbishop of Paris, reinforcing the Cardinals’ appeal in a pastoral letter, makes it perfectly plain that there is no request that bombing shall cease:— ‘‘We wish before everything to be just, and to rise above all partisan opinions. Nevertheless, we deplore the ravages made among our populations by raids which strike too widely away from the target aimed at. Too many innocent victims are being sacrificed in this way. ’’ The Advance on Rome Italy, of course, has endured hardly less than France, and yet there is not the same sense of crisis about the news of the Italians. The sheer misery brought about for them by the war will become, as Mr. Churchill remarked in the House on Wednesday, still worse, but there is not the same tension as a result. There is more fatalist resignation and less apprehension. The Germans furiously call it apathy. The reasons, beyond differences in national temperament, are various, but are largely to be found in the last war. It is because France, and in particular northern France and Flanders, has the physical presence of war for the second time within easy memory and the third in a long lifetime, that the strain is now so great. Meanwhile, the Allies advance upon Rome by the Appian Way, in a full-scale offensive, with, on their right flank, a conspicuous part being played by the army of the Poles. It was particularly fitting that it should fall to the Poles to recover Monte Cassino, in their greatest victory since General Sosnkowski’s victory at Lwow in the first month of the war. Succisa virescit is the abbey’s motto ; it might well be Poland’s also. Amgot lost no time in issuing a communiqué to say in general terms that the monastery can be rebuilt ; but present information suggests that all the foundations will have to be laid anew. We do not know whether St. Benedict’s cell has survived again. Mr. Godfrey Talbot, of the B.B.C., following the Poles into ruins still smoking from the last of the bombings, could see intact on fragments of wall some of the Beuronese mosaics which the Lord Chancellor contemptuously dismissed as “ modern German,” but beyond that nothing to show that this had been a religious house, save an altar on which a sniper had made his bed. In all the accounts of the abbey’s ruins which have appeared we have seen no reference to gun emplacements discovered among them, or of fortifications or concrete works. No evidence has come to light to support, as against the Abbot’s

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THE TABLET A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER AND REVIEW

PRO ECCXES1A DEI, PRO REGE ET PATRIA

VOL. 183 No. 5429

PUBLISHED AS A NEWSPAPER

LONDON, MAY 27th, 1944

SIXPENCE

WHITSUNTIDE

The Role o f the Church as the Salt and Preservative o f Social Life

ON THE TEACHING OF LITERATURE The Responsibilities of the Teacher. By Philip Leon

OSCOTT: 1794-1944

By Philip Hughes

“ LONG LIVE FRANCE AND ALSACE ! ”

The Bishop o f Strasbourg Speaks

THE WORLD WEEK BY WEEK “The Heart of the Cause of Man”

General Smuts began a notable address in Birmingham last week by speaking of the British Commonwealth, which he saw as the pattern of international society in the future : but if that kind of association was to provide the structural model, with, in General Smuts’ vision, the United States and the Soviet Union as its twin props, the heart of it, he insisted, must always be, not in London or in Washington or in Moscow, but in the continent of Europe. “ Europe,” he declared,

“ is the heart of the cause of man, and her decadence would mean an immeasurable loss to all that is most precious in our human heritage. America could not take her place ; nor, certainly, could Asia do so. And Africa is no claimant for such honours. Europe has been the spiritual home of the West, the source of our concepts of progress, liberty and of all the other basic ideas of our higher life. I put the problem of Europe, of her salvaging and rehabilitation, first in our programme of world reconstruction after this war.” On any view of the evolution of the Soviet regime, Russia has a technical contribution to make ; so has the United States ; but Europe is the heart of the cause of man, and, far from being a laboratory in which experiments can be made in ways of life devised elsewhere, remains the only source of spiritual vitality wherefrom the technicians may be nourished. It is good that these things should be affirmed by a leading statesman of the British Commonwealth.

General Smuts had earlier spoken of the great strain, both physical and moral, now being endured by enemy-occupied Europe ; and he declared that it is vital that the war shall be brought to its conclusion with the least possible delay, lest there should be crackings under the strain. In his last important speech in this country he had spoken pessimistically of the future of France, and we may surmise that he had France principally in mind when he spoke now about the dangers of delay. Certainly the French are finding the strain very severe, and it is particularly with regard to France that there must all the time be in the background the fear which General Smuts expressed : the fear lest victory should come too late. In the case of France it is pre-eminently important that victory shall not come too late, for “ the question of the survival of France is the question of the survival of European culture, as we have understood the words” : the phrase is Christopher Dawson’s, from the current La France Libre.

The appeal of the Cardinals was for relief in what, short of land fighting, is the hardest part of the physical ordeal. No section of the population in any nation in the world has been subjected to bombing on the scale on which northern France and the Low Countries have known it these past months. Hamburg’s ordeal last year had a briefer term to it. The cities of the Ruhr have never undergone attack at once so concentrated and sustained. There is little or no sign yet that this is creating what the Cardinals fear it may eventually create : a lasting bitterness against Britain and America. On the contrary, the Action Française (for what its evidence is worth) declared the other day that whereas the great number of deaths, the daily pathetic funerals and thousands of domestic havocs, initially caused “ a set-back for Gaullisme, ’’ the ground lost has already been more than regained as nerves and muscles are braced for the battles for which the bombardments are the preliminary. This newspaper maintains, we may note, that the parish clergy bear a leading responsibility for the lack of bitterness. The prescribed bitterness is to be found only in the Press. There are descriptions of German soldiers helping to protect Rouen cathedral from the fires. At Louvain, which has suffered heavily, there is talk of replacing the well-known inscription with another, beginning “ Furore Britannico . . . ” But these are on the surface. Cardinal Suhard, the Archbishop of Paris, reinforcing the Cardinals’ appeal in a pastoral letter, makes it perfectly plain that there is no request that bombing shall cease:—

‘‘We wish before everything to be just, and to rise above all partisan opinions. Nevertheless, we deplore the ravages made among our populations by raids which strike too widely away from the target aimed at. Too many innocent victims are being sacrificed in this way. ’’ The Advance on Rome

Italy, of course, has endured hardly less than France, and yet there is not the same sense of crisis about the news of the Italians. The sheer misery brought about for them by the war will become, as Mr. Churchill remarked in the House on Wednesday, still worse, but there is not the same tension as a result. There is more fatalist resignation and less apprehension. The Germans furiously call it apathy. The reasons, beyond differences in national temperament, are various, but are largely to be found in the last war. It is because France, and in particular northern France and Flanders, has the physical presence of war for the second time within easy memory and the third in a long lifetime, that the strain is now so great.

Meanwhile, the Allies advance upon Rome by the Appian Way, in a full-scale offensive, with, on their right flank, a conspicuous part being played by the army of the Poles. It was particularly fitting that it should fall to the Poles to recover Monte Cassino, in their greatest victory since General Sosnkowski’s victory at Lwow in the first month of the war. Succisa virescit is the abbey’s motto ; it might well be Poland’s also. Amgot lost no time in issuing a communiqué to say in general terms that the monastery can be rebuilt ; but present information suggests that all the foundations will have to be laid anew. We do not know whether St. Benedict’s cell has survived again. Mr. Godfrey Talbot, of the B.B.C., following the Poles into ruins still smoking from the last of the bombings, could see intact on fragments of wall some of the Beuronese mosaics which the Lord Chancellor contemptuously dismissed as “ modern German,” but beyond that nothing to show that this had been a religious house, save an altar on which a sniper had made his bed.

In all the accounts of the abbey’s ruins which have appeared we have seen no reference to gun emplacements discovered among them, or of fortifications or concrete works. No evidence has come to light to support, as against the Abbot’s

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