Agriculture -- Canada; Agriculture -- Canada -- Societies, etc.
Is it to be co-operation in all sincerity or class warfare? If the other
great interests in our national life will meet the Farmer in a fair
spirit, approaching our national problems in an honest attempt to
co-operate in their solution for the common good, they will find the
Farmer meeting them eagerly. They will find that these farmer leaders
are reasonable men, broad-minded, square-principled and just--no less so
because the class they represent is organized to stand up for its rights.
The situation is not hopeless. Most of these pages we have been turning
are Back Pages. Old conditions and much of the bitterness which they
generated have passed. The story of those old conditions has been told
from the viewpoint of the Farmer in order that his attitude may be
understood. But it must be remembered that the grain trade to-day is a
very different proposition to what it was and that many of the men who
have devoted their lives to it in the cities have played a big and honest
part in its development. The Winnipeg Grain Exchange as an Exchange has
done a great deal for Western Canada, a point that undoubtedly has been
overlooked by many farmers. Gradually, however, the Farmer has learned
that all is not evil in "Babylon"; for out of revolution has come
evolution.[1]
The key to that better future which is desired so earnestly and wisely is
Education. The problems of the day are commanding the mental focus of
the nation. The Banks, the Railways, the Manufacturers are considering
them. The Joint Committee of Commerce and Agriculture has great
opportunities for removing much old-time hostility on both sides. And
now that true co-operation of all classes has become a national duty,
surely out of the testing must come better understanding and a greater
future.
Just now, of course, there is only the War. It has brought the Canadian
people to their feet. For the angry glare of the gun flashes has thrown
in silhouette many fallacies, many foibles and rubbish heaps, and these
must be swept out in preparation for the new nationhood which Canada is
called upon to assume. With a third of the entire British Empire
entrusted to her management and the hopeful gaze of homemakers the world
over turning upon her Canada's responsibilities are great. But she will
rise to her opportunities.
Just now there is only the War. The history of mankind has no previous
record of such chaos, such a solemn time. Thrones toppling, maps
changing, whole peoples dying of starvation and misery while the fate of
Democracy is balanced on the issue. Men are slaying each other on land,
in the air, on the water and below it while the forces of Destruction are
gnawing holes in the World's resources with the rapacity of swarming
rats. It is costing Great Britain alone over thirty-five million dollars
every day--a million and a half every hour!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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