The Washington Conference was not a surprise to me. I knew that England was not a militarist nation any more than America was, and I knew, too, that once they talked things over they would see the utter futility of building battleships against one another. America and England should have the largest fleets because they will certainly use them more as policemen than as fighting forces. After all, when England had the greatest navy in the world she never used it except to keep the freedom of the seas. I often wonder whether Imperialist Germany might not have treated the Monroe Doctrine like a scrap of paper had her fleet been the strongest in the world. However, I don’t want to go back to an ancient grudge. It’s hopeless trying to go forward when you are looking backward. It is a great mistake to keep such things alive; it only means trouble, and surely there is enough trouble in the world now without looking backward. America, I am told, draws back with horror when she looks at Europe. I don’t blame her. Certainly, it is a sad enough sight to make one draw back. I cannot believe, though, that standing back is the right way to help, and I don’t believe that any part of the world can go forward in the truest sense while another part is suffering desperately. The war has shown us that the world is really round and is part interdependent. I am struck more and more by the way in which our stock of moral good-will on both sides is still thwarted by the extent of our misunderstanding. This not only hinders the recovery of hundreds of millions of people from all the mischiefs of war, but works new mischief of its own. I am thinking now, not so much of America and Britain, who have had their heart-to-heart explanations at the Washington Conference, with an effect which ought to make their relations foolproof, in spite of the small people who are so blinded by their fear or envy and hate, that they would do all in their power to pull them apart. But I am not afraid of them. I am only sorry for them. There is nothing more pitiful than people who are moved by envy or hate, and there is nothing weaker than people who fear. Envy and hate are the most blinding things on earth; it is only people with vision who never perish. When I talk of misunderstanding I am thinking of Europe. I know that both America and England feel that Europe is not getting on with the peace, that she still has large armies, still fights, and at the same time cries out for help. Russia and France still have great armies, and this naturally makes smaller states arm too. Of course it is all desperately disappointing to some of us. We had hoped that this was a war to end wars--I think it has ended the biggest wars, yet there seem to be a few small private wars going on, and still a great deal of fear and hatred left. I am sure that you will never end war with wars.