--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 33 number: 1 published: 1929-11 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: "Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations, “Europe in the Melting Pot,” *Improvement Era* 33, no. 1 (November 1929): 9–12." source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera3301unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera3301unse start_page: 9 end_page: 12 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1929-11) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera3301unse publication_year: 1929 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1929, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Europe in the Melting Pot THE IMPROVEMENT ERA 3SE Vol 33-41 NOVEMBER, 1929 No. 1 Europe in the Melting, Pot CAN this be Europe? How it has changed from the Eu- rope of my childhood or of my student days, thirty-one years ago! Of course, the narrow, cob- blestone streets, the crowded, queer houses, the cramped mode of liv- ing, the grimy poverty, the social strata, and the weight of castled and cathedraled centuries — the face of Europe — are still here, much as in the past. The difference is one of outlook and attitude, of hope and fear, of the spirit, but as real as wood or stone. The change is remarkable. The spirit of tolerance, new and pervasive, is startling. A genera- tion ago "Mormon" elders in Ger- many divided their time between being in jail and keeping out of jail for the crime of being "Mor- mons;" today, they have the use of magnificent schoolhouses in Ber- lin for Sunday meetings. Then, according to the British press, mag- netic "Mormon" elders exported English girls to an "immoral" place in the American West; today, the same papers publish respectful interviews with said elders, and comment upon the splendid achievements of the State of Utah; and one paper is now publishing, serially, a life of Brigham Young, written by one of his daughters. There are those who would gladly flay or burn a "Mormon," but their voice is thin, and they are of the class who indiscriminately would like to flay or burn some- body. HTHE spirit of tolerance is not confined to "Mormonism." It has entered every concern. The old barriers of prejudice have crumbled. It is conceded, though ever so re- luctantly, that good may "come out of Nazareth." A European can now, at the comfortable close of By DR. JOHN A. WIDTSOE President of the L. D. S. European Missions and a Member of the Council of the Twelve. i i i i y day, look over his country's bor- der into his neighbor's land with- out wheezing and bristling. There are yet selfish nationalism and na- tional selfishness enough to be dan- gerous, but the feelings of the masses of the people are mellowing before the sun of tolerant under- standing. The cocksureness of the Euro- pean is passing. "After all," he seems to say, "my country may not be the only one under the sun." The Briton is pondering deeply, "Perhaps the British lion is not the only animal with sharp teeth." One is not now crowded off Ger- man sidewalks by self-sufficient, 10 The Improvement Era For November, 1929 long-coated militarists. Even the Frenchman, in heated argument, swears at you behind his hand. There is a new realization that the world is made for all men. There is an equally noticeable change in language. I mean in spoken thought, not in kind of speech. Europe is still afflicted with a dozen or more tongues that re- tard mutual comprehension and goodwill. That is one of the seri- ous problems of the European fu- ture. But in every European tongue very much the same thoughts are now being discussed — relatively new thoughts — and spoken thoughts are the real lan- guage of nations. Some hundreds of years ago, Europe spoke in terms of Catholic power; then of the Bible and the Reformation; then of democracy or political liberty — each period marked by tremendous, world-shaping events; today the loud and insistent speech is of economics, of bread and butter. The need for physical comforts is co-equal with man, and has always been a human issue, but the manner of expressing the need is peculiar to this age. The common man, the average man, with common speech is mak- ing Europe tolerant. His thoughts are on the lips of parliaments. He is coining today's language. He is man is more interested in sunlight and full physical maintenance — things denied him in the past — than with boundary lines and dip- lomatic history. His economic speech is multiplied in volume, be- cause there are more common men in Europe than ever before, while the valleys and hills that hold the elements of sustenance, have re- mained unchanged in size. Polit- ical freedom has come or is com- ing, that is taken for granted; equality in the enjoyment of the good things provided by nature through human industry is de- manded. Whatever the subject, modern European speech is effective and un- derstandable only in terms of hu- man needs. A government is good because it is economically success- ful; a man is worth while because he has contributed to the economic welfare of his fellow-men; a phil- osophy is enlightening only if it explains the events of today; a re- ligion must be practically capable of use in daily life. Do not mis- understand; Europe is built upon spiritual foundations. It is not a materialistic language; rather one requiring that all human effort shall converge upon human wel- fare. "I do not fear the hereafter," says the modern European, "but I detest and dread sin and poverty starved British workman helplessly accepts the existence of vast estates of pasture and hunting lands, c.f >.- CHATEAU-THIERRY (Aisne). - Monument de Li 3' Division de i'Armee-sit* litats-Un el Se M6tho The Improvement Era For November, 1929 11 HTHE focusing of national feeling, placing countless limitations riers be broken down, and the countries unite in economic en- upon trade and friendship, causes deavor? The tide of feeling favors Avenue in Geneva, Switzerland, Named After our War President international blindness. I asked an intelligent Berlin workman, I suspect now that he was a commu- nist, for his remedy for Europe's woes. He gave prompt answer: "A United States of Europe!" That sounded interesting — so I se- cured the views of people in vari- ous countries, concerning such a European union. The immediate statement was unanimous. "We want nothing of it. We want to be governed by our own people, who speak our language. It is im- possible." There was not a dis- senting voice. Clearly, it was an expression, not of matured analysis and reflection, but of century-di- rected feelings. Such traditional points of view are curiously, and disturbingly, intermingled with Europe's new tolerance and call for economic equality. A United States of Europe did not seem so impossible, however, when the matter was further dis- cussed. The objection seemed to be to a political, rather than to an economic union. Men eat bread, not politics. The example of America was always used. Among the half-hundred States of the American Union, approximately the area of Europe, but with only one-fifth the population, all activi- ties are carried on fully, without boundary interference, and an economic success, not before known in the world, has been attained. Can the same be achieved in Eu- rope, if the present customs bar- the experiment. M. Briand only voiced Europe's thought in his recent proposal of a European eco- nomic federation. It will come; and perhaps out of it may grow the larger governmental union, indis- pensable to future world peace. That which has not been accom- plished by abstract truth, however majestic, may be realized through economic pressure. Fear of the United States, pros- perous, well-fed country, with her wares on every European counter, is crystallizing the feeling for an European economic union. "If we do not get together," says the can- did European, "we shall become bond slaves to America, our im- mature child." No love for America is lost on European high- ways. Affection is not begotten for the successful competitor or the inexorable interest and capital col- lector. Other favors are forgotten in economic warfare. A generation ago, America was hated, as I well remember, because, having won the war with Spain, she was interfer- ing with divine monarchial rights. Today she is praised on European shores for upsetting thrones, but condemned for her economic suc- cess. The United States is ever- present in European thinking. HT HE Great War? O yes, it is remembered ! The Frenchman who keeps a meagre hotel at Chateau Thierry stroked his arti- ficial jaw and touched his glass eye. "That's all I got out of it." The middle-class German, aged and grey with grief, whose only son was killed, and whose wife as a result is in a mental hospital, said, "It was a useless war. None wanted it, except the military men." The bookseller in my old university town straightened up and almost shouted, "There is only one end to the whole affair — Paris!" In central and Eastern Europe, particularly, a noticeably large proportion of the people who were children during the war years, are dwarfed, hump-backed, crook- ed-limbed— results of insufficient or improper nutrition. Horrible gashes over the face of Europe, material and spiritual, are constant reminders of the war. One won- ders if the brutes who were respon- sible for causing it can ever be racked enough. The war taught terrible lessons, which are not fully learned; for, amidst the happy transformations, lurks the expec- tancy of war and the necessity of preparing for it. Centuries of war- fare have left the nations unable to conceive of other means of set- tling misunderstandings and dis- putes or of solving wounded honor. It is so easy to rush to the arsenal! On every hand is the cry that American reparations demands are the cause of European troubles. That is patently not so, but it is true that war debts are Europe's insurance against her own imme- diate folly. Without reparation 12 The Improvement Era For November, 1929 payments, Europe would think less of peace and more of spending her surplus, and more in preparations for war. Again, economic neces- sity outweighs spiritual ideals. It is to be hoped that no impractical, slushy sentimentality will cancel present obligations. The memory of war horrors needs to be strengthened. And, it may be added, that the nations that most valiantly are attempting to make repayments are those which, with America, will preserve the world in peace. All this and more may be said about Europe in 1929. Mean while, our civilization was born in Europe. America, which has so successfully built upon European foundations, is tempted to view Mother Europe as a very old, slow lady; but she, knowing her vig- orous, skilful children, chuckles, often with good reason, at our im- maturity, and she can go fast enough. The fastest steamers, railroad trains and aeroplanes are in Europe. The sound apprecia- tion of spiritual foundations — education, science, art and music and literature — yet dominates the desire, if not altogether the practice, of Europe. On her lands, religion still continues to be more than a buttonhole bouquet. The very principles of action that have made America an incomparable world power, may yet transform Europe by the use of her wealth of accu- mulated experience to foster and establish every human good. HP HIS is what I set out to say: 1 Europe, just now, is in a melting pot. The stuff of which she is made is genuine enough, and the old rusty corners of the anti- quated systems are rapidly soften- ing. A melting and recasting of the old material would be for ev- erybody's good. The outcome of present conditions will depend on the intensity and the length of ap- plication of the heat. Let us hope it may continue until the impend- ing changes have assumed perma- nency. "Hearken, O ye people who pro- fess my name, saith the Lord your God; for behold, mine anger is kindled against the rebellious, and they shall know mine arm and mine indignation, in the day of visitation and of wrath upon the nations." Doc. and Cov. 56:1. As a Man Soweth A Contrast By A. A. HINCKLEY Former Commissioner of Agri- culture of Utah A FARMER in an outlying county returned home one evening and said to his boys: "I met Mr. B. today and he wants to buy a cow. He's comin' over in the mornin' to look at ours. I'd like to git rid of that good-for- nothing old rip we all hate so much to milk and who breaks down every fence on the place. I've been thinkin' that it would be a good plan to let her go tonight and tomorrow mornin' without milk- in' and of course she'll have a big udder and will draw his attention. When he asks about her you boys chip in and say, 'Dad, you surely ain't goin' to sell old Fill-pail, are you?' Then I'll say, 'Course not. We couldn't spare her. She's the best cow we got.' "That will make him want the old hussy more'n ever. Now you'll have to be cute about it and not say too much, but say enough. Just foller me, and you'll see how to do the thing right." AND the farmer rubbed his "^ hands gleefully in anticipation of a high price for an inferior ani- mal. His boys were no less joy- ous, for this particular cow was the bane of their existence. Mr, B. came as was expected, and the pre-arranged plan worked out as if on ball-bearings. Sundry sly winks were exchanged between the farmer and his sons; and be- hind the backs of their father and the visitor, as the money was changing hands, the boys could hardly restrain their mirth. It was not often that a sucker of such proportions came to the farm. When the purchaser leading "Fill- pail" was out of earshot, the father and the boys shouted with glee. What became of the stranger and the cow? That isn't important, and I don't know. But I do know what became of the boys. They have both served terms in the Utah penitentiary for cattle stealing. Who was to blame? By LEROI C. SNOW Member of the Y. M. M. I. A. General Board JACOB HAM B LIN, noted J scout, was set apart "an apostle to the Lamanites" by President Brigham Young, and was promised that as long as he was faithful to his calling he would never be harmed by the Indians. Confident in this promise he mingled fear- lessly with them during the serious troubles in the early 80's, in south- ern Utah and Arizona, and became known as the great "peacemaker." The following experience related by Jacob Hamblin, Jr., indicates his character: "On one occasion my father told me he had a horse to exchange for Navajo blankets, and asked me to get on my pony, lead the horse to be traded, and go to the Indian vil- lage and see what kind of a bargain I could make. "The old chief, recognizing me, came out of his hut. I explained my errand and asked if he knew anyone who wanted to make such a trade. The chief, after looking the horse over, brought out some fine blankets, spread them upon the ground, and said: Til give you those for the horse.' RATHER had said, 'Be sure not -*- to trade the horse unless you get its full value.' So I shook my head and demanded more. The surprised chief got more, among them two fine buffalo robes. Fi- nally I closed the bargain. "With difficulty I carried the big bundle home on my pony, happy over the trade, and showed the blankets to my father. Imagine_ my surprise when he divided them into two piles, then rolled up one lot and asked me to get on my pony and take them back and tell the chief he had sent too many. It was a hard thing to do, but I was al- ways obedient and did as my father asked. When I explained to the chief what father had told me to do, the old Indian put his hand on my head and said: 'I knew you'd come back. Jacob would not keep so many. You know, he is our father as well as your father.'