hat of a Cabinet Minister,
Stephen More by name, who opposes from his seat in the House of Commons
a war threatened by England against a weaker nation, and continues his
opposition after the war has been declared and an English army has been
slaughtered. Resigning his office, he stumps the country in a campaign
for peace, alienates his wife, who is outraged by his attitude, faces
persistently the attacks of angry mobs, and at last is murdered and thus
made a martyr to his cause. The spiritual, if not the dramatic, climax
of the play comes in the second scene of the last act, where Stephen
More, in answer to his wife and his father-in-law, who are appealing to
him for the last time to abandon his mad purpose, contrasts his deeds
with those of the soldiers at the front. "Our men," answers More, "are
dying out there for the faith that's in them. I believe my faith the
higher, the better for mankind. Am I now to shrink away? (Mine's) a
forlorn hope--not to help let die a fire--a fire that's sacred--not only
now in this country, but in all countries for all time." And in this
spirit, with the execrations of his family and of an entire people on
his head, he goes alone to a cruel death.

What we see in this drama of Mr. Galsworthy is only what we see again
and again after all in the infinitely greater drama of humanity. The
noblest testimony to the quality of men's souls that we have anywhere,
is that which has been given to us by the "noble company of the
apostles, the goodly fellowship of the prophets, the noble army of
martyrs," who, refusing to take the easy road of popularity, have
deliberately chosen the thorny path of insult, ignominy, destruction,
for the faith that glowed within their souls. Isaiah, Jeremiah,
Socrates, St. Paul, Wycliff, Huss, Savanarola, Martin Luther, John Knox,
George Fox, John Wesley, Joseph Priestly, Theodore Parker--how the names
multiply, all as sweet as honey to our lips, of those who refused to
barter their souls even for the good will of men. And first among them
all, of course, is Jesus, the Nazarene. The noblest thing that was ever
said of the Carpenter-Prophet was this--that "he made himself of no
reputation." The noblest and also the most pathetic thing that He ever
said of Himself was this--that "the birds have nests and the foxes
holes, but the son of man hath nowhere to lay his head." The noblest
thing He ever did was this--to walk from the house of Pilate to the
crest of Calvary, wi