Current Monthly Reveals Alertness

With the country still buzzing over Germany's unsympathetic reply to the "antepenultimatum," the Monthly launches a little manifesto, "On the Guilt of Error," by A. K. McComb. The pacifists of today, we learn, are the successors of the opponents of religious persecution in the sixteenth century. These "rationalists," "Castellio, Montaigne, Socinus, believers in the power of human reason, proclaimed that the truth might only be discovered by the free discussion of varied ideas . . . and in the end these men triumphed, and with this triumph persecution ceased. The innocence of error was everywhere acknowledged." This is news to many--to the Jews of Eastern Europe, who hold to the view that religious persecution is even now a real and terrible force; to the writer of an editorial on the recent Haverhill riots in this very number of the Monthly; to our philosophers, who after centuries of free discussion are still seeking the truth; to the students of history who have attributed the growth of toleration to many causes besides the rationalism of Castellio, Montaigne, and Socinus.

The modern pacifists, our author believes, are the "third party" who can end the impasse now existing in Europe by reasoning with the belligerents. Mr. Ford had that idea--perhaps it would be wise for the next delegation to begin by testing its powers of persuasion on Pancho Villa.

Seriously, the fundamental error of such arguments is the confusion of defence with aggression. Most of the so-called "militarists" agree that it is not only wicked but stupid to punish either a man or a nation for disagreeing with what we consider orthodox political principles. But when our opponent's particular variety of heresy leads him to invade our territory, destroy our property, and kill our citizens, we believe that a machine-gun will come in handier than a copy of "Briefs for Debate."

More practical is Mr. Allinson's suggestion, in his carefully reasoned discussion of "Sea Law," that the only solution of the submarine controversy is an agreement that all merchant ships shall go unarmed and submit to visit and search, there by making it utterly inexcusable for a submarine to torpedo without warning.

The rest of the number is less controversial, more purely literary. Mr. Mitchell's "Study of Oscar Wilde" is judicious, sound, and pleasing, though he uses some odd English--"he was wretchedly raised"; "wearing his top coat every day and leaving it off on Sundays," "impulsive with protest against the contract of existence"; and "protagonists" in a wrong sense. The essay leaves us in doubt as to whether Wilde's work is really worth such thorough study and careful criticism.

There is only one piece of fiction in the number, "Esther's Children." Mr. Behrman has written truthfully, simply, and sympathetically of a phase of life which he evidently knows at first hand, and the result is a story that is far more impressive than anything that usually appears in a college paper. It is an unusual and a notable contribution.

The verse is less distinguished; some of it, in fact, is bad. The most finished poem of the seven is Mr. Mitchell's sonnet; the most effective. Mr. Dos Passos' "Incarnation," an experiment in a form which allows itself something of the flexibility of "vers libre" yet retains rhyme and metre. Mr. Allinson's "Renaissance," a sonnet replete with mythological allusions of surprisingly cosmopolitan range, must have been written of some other April than the month we have just survived.

The editorials are sane, illuminating, and well-written; the review of two collections of recent poetry is intelligent and competent. These concluding articles confirm the impression made by the number as a whole; the Monthly is frankly and unaffectedly literary, alive to recent tendencies and events, but still respectful toward standards other than its editors', and reassuringly free from extremes, poses, and "isms" of the baser sort.