The Moral Basis of World Peace

Abstract

I HAVE been asked recently if I would not, upon my return to China a couple of months from now, establish a branch of the Spinoza Foundation in Shanghai. I have agreed to the proposal, if for no other reason, because that great Jewish philosopher of the seventeenth century made a very pregnant remark. Peace, he said, not the absence of war, but a virtue born from the strength of soul. I feel that in the present critical period it is a very important observation. I feel that it lays the correct emphasis. was what made Immanuel Kant say, in the succeeding century, It is a mistake to think that peace is a political problem: it is a moral I believe that for centuries the people in the West have considered the problem of peace only as a matter of political and social adjustment. Such adjustment is no doubt important, but I believe that we need something more than a mere adjustment of practical interests to establish a lasting peace. I should like therefore to address myself to a consideration of the question: Why is it that there has been such lack of harmony among the nations? Why is it that peace has been so elusive and difficult of attainment? I don't know that my answer will be at all satisfactory. I do know that it will not satisfy those people who consider themselves to be practical or realistic. My views will be somewhat long-range views, and I hold them because I believe that only when we lay aside the merely practical interests, at least for the moment, can we find a remedy for our present uncertainty. The war which we have just gone through has stimulated all of us, as never before, to thoughts of peace, and we have had quite a crop of notable book and articles on the subject. These have advanced many plans and schemes and blueprints for the organization of peace, but it seems to me that, important as they are, they do not go deep enough. Their emphasis continues to be on the periphery rather than on the core of the problem. For if the malady, as I believe with Spinoza and Kant, is in the hearts of men, then, however perfect a plan or scheme may be, it has small chance of success if it is not preceded by a radical and drastic change in our attitude towards political and international relations.