[9] This would be as true under a syndicalist régime as it is at present.
[10] These changes, which are to be desired on their own account, not only in order to prevent war, will be discussed in later lectures.
[11] What is said on this subject in the present lecture is only preliminary, since the subsequent lectures all deal with some aspect of the same problem.
[12] Except by that small minority who are capable of artistic enjoyment.
[13] Booth’s “Life and Labour of the People,” vol. iii.
[14] As regards the education of young children, Madame Montessori’s methods seem to me full of wisdom.
[15] THE TEACHING OF PATRIOTISM. HIS MAJESTY’S APPROVAL.
The King has been graciously pleased to accept a copy of the little book containing suggestions to local education authorities and teachers in Wales as to the teaching of patriotism which has just been issued by the Welsh Department of the Board of Education in connection with the observance of the National Anniversary of St. David’s Day. His Private Secretary (Lord Stamfordham), in writing to Mr. Alfred T. Davies, the Permanent Secretary of the Welsh Department, says that his Majesty is much pleased with the contents of the book, and trusts that the principles inculcated in it will bear good fruit in the lives and characters of the coming generation.—_Morning Post_, January 29, 1916.
[16] What Madame Montessori has achieved in the way of minimizing obedience and discipline with advantage to education is almost miraculous.
[17] There was a provision for suits _in forma pauperis_, but for various reasons this provision was nearly useless; a new and somewhat better provision has recently been made, but is still very far from satisfactory.
[18] The following letter (_New Statesman_, December 4, 1915) illustrates the nature of his activities:—
SIR,—The following episodes may be of interest to your readers. Under the new facilities for divorce offered to the London poor, a poor woman recently obtained a decree _nisi_ for divorce against her husband, who had often covered her body with bruises, infected her with a dangerous disease, and committed bigamy. By this bigamous marriage the husband had ten illegitimate children. In order to prevent this decree being made absolute, the Treasury spent at least £200 of the taxes in briefing a leading counsel and an eminent junior counsel and in bringing about ten witnesses from a city a hundred miles away to prove that this woman had committed casual acts of adultery in 1895 and 1898. The net result is that this woman will probably be forced by destitution into further adultery, and that the husband will be able to treat his mistress exactly as he treated his wife, with impunity, so far as disease is concerned. In nearly every other civilized country the marriage would have been dissolved, the children could have been legitimated by subsequent marriage, and the lawyers employed by the Treasury would not have earned the large fees they did from the community for an achievement which seems to most other lawyers thoroughly anti-social in its effects. If any lawyers really feel that society is benefited by this sort of litigation, why cannot they give their services for nothing, like the lawyers who assisted the wife? If we are to practise economy in war-time, why cannot the King’s Proctor be satisfied with a junior counsel only? The fact remains that many persons situated like the husband and wife in question prefer to avoid having illegitimate children, and the birth-rate accordingly suffers.