The temptation not to write this article is almost overwhelming. I am seated on the verandah of a wooden bungalow overlooking a lovely valley of Queensland and within a few miles of what is surely one of the finest beaches in the world. The fruits of the earth are here available in an abundance that is staggering to one who spent the war years in Europe. It is a hot, lazy day. It is moreover the holiday season and a prosperous care-free people are taking their ease.

It seems a dismal if not an immoral act to sit down at a typewriter deliberately to suggest that the end of all this is almost certain to come upon us before our children are grown up. And yet it is becoming more and more apparent that nothing short of a miracle can save the world from another war, and one so frightful in its consequences that all the values we now profess to cherish in our civilization would disappear. No matter which side we may stand on in the contest the result will be the same, for war today means defeat and destruction for all. Moreover history has proved, and is proving again, that the politician can no more avert the disaster than a picket fence can avert a tidal wave, so that even so uninformed a person as the ‘common man’ can see that only some acts of great vision-some gesture that will completely transcend all politics and all international diplomacies—can offer any hope of salvation. But although ordinary people everywhere can see this they feel powerless to do anything about it. In almost every country in the world men now only middle-aged have twice already in their lifetime found themselves committed to a war that was none of their seeking. Once again they see the danger and dread it, but feeling completely frustrated and helpless they now seek only to live for the present.