From ‘The Pacificist Vision’, The Spectator, 24 July 1915:
It must not be supposed that the majority of Americans are pacificists, but there are enough pacificists to force a strong tide of feeling through the country. In the West an advanced pacificisin—what seems to us, when we reflect on the probable results, a hopelessly unthinking pacificism—is very popular. As an illustration of this present wave of pacificism we must refer to an article by Mr. Sydney Brooks, a student of American affairs, which was published in the Daily Mail on Monday. Mr. Brooks says:—
“A friend of mine who has lately returned from a visit to America tells me that wherever he travelled he heard the Song of the Pacifist. It runs as follows:—
I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier,
I brought him up to be my pride and joy.
Who dares to put a musket on his shoulder,
To kill some other mother’s darling boy?
The nations ought to arbitrate their quarrels,
It’s time to put the sword and gun away.
There’d be no war to-day
If mothers all would say,
‘I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier!’Behind the sentiments expressed in this ditty there is rallied, in any judgment, a force of American opinion such as has never yet in any country been devoted to the cause of peace—peace at any price, peace regardless of justice and national dignity and rights.”
The lilting cacophonies of this prosaic verse haunt us. We cannot banish them. We are as much afflicted as Mark Twain was by the ticket collector’s lilting jargon which transformed itself into the famous doggerel with the refrain:— ” Punch, brothers, punch, punch with care, Punch, in the presence of the passenjare!” There is a terrible triumphant crash about that last line, “I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier!” With a good tune it must be invincible. But what are we to say of the political faith behind this verse of captivating ugliness? It is surely an appallingly unforeseeing faith, even a mad one.
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