1923

In pursuit of peace

Time-honoured custom has laid it down that on the eve of Christmas all controversy should be laid aside, sordid cases and worries shall be given high holiday, and an atmosphere of universal benevolence shall prevail.

The quest of mankind is ever after true happiness and no people will continue for long in any path that does not seem at least to lead to the ideal. Yet true happiness can only be found in this world in the assured calm of Peace and Good-will.

Isolated voices have been crying for the past nine years that preventable war is a crime. It is, indeed, the greatest of crimes. These were as voices crying in the wilderness; and the men and the leaders, whose quest for happiness was blinded by worldly ambition, turned the world whose conquest they sought into something worse than a wilderness.

To-day, instead of peace, there is unrest everywhere. Misery, unemployment, the groundswell of a thousand grievances.

Our own beloved land is free from none of these plagues. It, too, has been crucified. Out of the tragedy a new set of ambitions has arisen and they permeate and disturb every grade of society and every shade of politics.

Pictured: Waiting for a buyer during the Christmas Market at Market Street in December 1987.