to win the sympathy and confidence of the people for their proposals, especially if a large number of those who were brought out were children and were being delivered from almost certain death... The whole matter is so big and other claims are so urgent that we want further to make the proposition that there shall be appointed someone of high standing for whom this should be a primary responsibility... My chief protest is against procrastination of any kind. It was three months ago that the solemn declaration of the United Nations was made and now we are confronted with a proposal for an exploratory Conference at Ottawa. That sounds as if it involves much more delay. It took five weeks from December 17 for our Government to approach the United States, and then six weeks for the Government of the United States to reply, and when they did reply they suggested a meeting of representatives of the Government for preliminary exploration. The Jews are being slaughtered at the rate of tens of thousands a day on many days, but there is a proposal for a preliminary exploration to be made with a view of referring the whole matter after that to the Inter-Governmental Committee on Refugees. My Lords, let us at least urge that when that Conference meets it should not meet for exploration only but for decision. We know that what we can do is small compared with the magnitude of the problem, but we cannot rest so long as there is any sense among us that we are not doing all that might be done. We have discussed the matter on the footing that we are not responsible for this great evil, that the burden lies on others, but it is always true that the obligations of decent men are decided for them by contingencies which they did not themselves create and very largely by action of wicked men. The priest and the Levite in the parable [536] were not in the least responsible for the traveller's wounds as he lay there by the roadside and no doubt they had many other pressing things to attend to, but they stand as the picture of those who are condemned for neglecting the opportunity of showing responsibility. We at this moment have upon us a tremendous responsibility. We stand at the bar of history, of humanity and of God. I beg to move." [537] <248> After the Archbishop of Canterbury had spoken, Lord Rochester spoke "as a Methodist layman":