The War was a terrible evil, and we have suffered very greatly, but I
refuse absolutely to be apologetic in regard to our method of carrying
it through. On the contrary, I think there is nothing in human history
more magnificent than the way in which people in the British Empire
steadily kept to their purpose and were willing to make any and every
sacrifice to maintain the right. Here I appeal to a contemporary
judgment which happens to be as impartial as the judgment of any future
historian is likely to be. I mean the judgment passed on us by the firm
if friendly hand of the American Ambassador, Mr. Page. Wonderful and
deeply moving are his descriptions of the way in which the English
people of all classes and of all political creeds and temperaments
withstood the shock of the declaration of war and of its first dreadful
impact. Speaking generally his descriptions of the years '14, '15, and
'16--"Years which reeled beneath us, terrible years"--are as great and
as memorable as anything ever recorded in human history. As a picture of
a people undergoing the supreme test and seen in the fullest intimacy
and absolutely at first-hand, it is equal to anything even in
Thucydides. A noble passion inspires and consecrates the narration--
vibrant with the sense not only of sorrow but also of exaltation and
complete understanding. It was the happiest of accidents that one of our
own race, and blood, and language should have been able to view the
nation's sacrifice as he viewed it, and yet be able to speak as could
only a man who was not actually participating in the sacrifice, and was
not actually part of the nation. An American citizen of pure English
language and lineage, like Mr. Page, could say things, and say them
outright, which no Englishman could have said. The Englishman would have
been checked and tongue-tied by the sense that he was plucking laurels
for his own brow. _Page's immortal letters--I am using the words with
sober deliberation and not in any inflated rhetoric--stand as the best
and greatest national monument for Britain's dead and Britain's
living_.