And yet it is conceivable that in no Western country may the turmoil of the next few years take a more acute form than in Canada. The youthfulness of the Dominion, the recency and frailty of the ties that bind the scattered provinces, the deep divisions of race and language and religion which criss-cross Canada in every direction, the high percentage of the new Canadians that have come, and recently, from the countries with which Canada has been at war, the large numbers of men who have now returned from overseas and who for different reasons, some of them unpreventable, are naturally and inevitably finding it difficult to discover their places in the tasks of peace--these conditions bring it about that Canada is not only not safeguarded, but is peculiarly full of inflammable material. It is true that Canada in population is only one of the small nations, but it would seem as if none of the greater nations, since ramshackle Austria-Hungary fell to pieces, faces so severe an internal strain. But, after all, nations never find their soul except through hard tasks. God educates peoples as He educates individuals, by putting them in tight places. This little book is written in the faith that the task of finding the right solution of Canadian national problems is so high and hard that only the deepest and truest soul of the Canadian people can achieve it, but, also, in the faith that Canadians, by the blessing of God, will be found equal to the task; and the chief purpose of what follows will be to show what are the good and beneficial elements in the turmoil, and how, with the least of strife and confusion, all who have other than selfish aims may co-operate in the divine movement. There can be little fruitful constructive effort without hope, and, perhaps, we shall find, when we try to analyze the situation, that it has even more of hope in it than menace. The aim of the following discussion is, as the title suggests, twofold: First, to show that in the unrest and confusion of the civilized nations two principles, above all others, are at work; that these two principles are both of them right beyond question; and that the disturbance and alarm so widely felt are both due to the fact that these principles are finding their way into regions from which they have hitherto been largely excluded--to show, in short, that the whole commotion of the world, in the last analysis, is chiefly due to the overflow of the two great Christian principles of democracy and brotherhood. Second, to point out the only kind of Christianity which is adequate to meet the situation, or in other words, to describe the Christianity which, we may hope, is taking form. PART I. THE NEW SOCIAL ORDER CHAPTER I. THE OVERFLOW OF DEMOCRACY