Repository: UIHistories Project: Commencement - 1927 [PAGE 11]

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should be able to order our international relations with

loss bias.

The ethical principles that control individual conduct

,;pply in the relations oi nations to one another. In my opinion there is some confusion o( thoughl about what i

| called morality, both in relation to the individual and to

roups. We hear a great deal about the "new ethics," the I "new morality," the "new education," and new this and

that. We are told that morality nun- vary with the latitude I or the topographical character of a country. The statement

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I is true of what may be called "applied" el hies or morality. 1 do not believe it IS a correct statement with reference to

| underlying principles. I believe on the contrary that there

are certain eternal, immutable principles of right, as con-

I trasted with wrong, for the guidance o( the conduct o( man.

These principles, whatever they are, have become better known and better understood by men as the generations and centuries have passed. Being better known and better understood their application to conduct has produced in successive generations and centuries what may fairly be

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i new "practical" morality. This does not mean new

principles. The sun and moon and stars move according to immutable laws, although men, from time to time, with

imperfc t knowledge, have given different explanations of

these laws; have accounted for the universe under the

Ptolemaic hypothesis, the Copernican, Newtonian, or

what not. 'The revelation of ethical principles, as of the ph\ il universe, is eternally progressive. 1 lence the practical pplh it ion of growing knowledge in both spheres leads in time to changes in the practices aiTi ted by these law . So in the pre ess oi the centuries a clearer and wider k: >uledge of the eternal principles of righteousness have led to their wider applii T o n in human affairs, and therefore to the abolition of "tic evil after another. Thus it happen that the good of today 18 the evil oi tomorrow, to be al ndoned for newer and I tter ways. Tli ie thoughts are appli tble to OUr international relati us. i >nce the It ran er, the I rei ner, was our natural

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